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Hezbollah’s Deadly Rocket Attacks Raise Questions About New Tactics
A general view shows the town of Majdal Shams near the ceasefire line between Israel and Syria in the Golan Heights March 25, 2019. Photo: REUTERS/Ammar Awad
JNS.org – In the past seven days, two rocket attacks by Hezbollah targeting moving Israeli vehicles—one military and one civilian—in the Golan Heights have prompted a review within the Israel Defense Forces.
The attacks, which resulted in the deaths of a civilian couple on Wednesday and an IDF major on July 4, have raised serious questions about the operational capabilities of Hezbollah and local Israeli air defenses.
The first incident occurred on July 3, when a rocket struck a vehicle at a military camp, killing Maj. (res.) Itai Galea, 38, a deputy company commander in a reserve armored brigade.
The attack was launched by Hezbollah in response to an Israeli targeted killing of senior Hezbollah commander Muhammad Nimah Nasser, head of the territorial Hezbollah Aziz Unit. Nasser was killed in an airstrike on his vehicle in the Tyre region of Southern Lebanon. Hezbollah fired more than 200 rockets and 20 drones at locations in the Galilee and the Golan Heights, with one rocket striking Galea’s vehicle.
On Tuesday, reports emerged that an airstrike in Syria on the Damascus-Beirut highway killed Hezbollah operative and former Hassan Nasrallah bodyguard Yasser Qarnabsh, with I24 News reporting that a second casualty of that attack was an officer of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The Saudi state-owned Al Arabiya news channel reported on Wednesday that Qarnabash was responsible for transporting personnel and weapons to Syria.
Following that attack, Hezbollah unleashed a barrage of rockets targeting the Golan Heights on Tuesday, killing Israeli couple Noa and Nir Barnes, from Kibbutz Ortal in the northern Golan Heights. The attack left three children orphans.
Military investigations are underway to determine whether Hezbollah used any line-of-sight or drone-assisted targeting for these strikes.
The IDF’s initial findings suggest that these were not precision-guided munitions but rather parts of larger salvoes aimed at Israeli targets in the area.
But that doesn’t rule out the possibility that Hezbollah used lookouts or drones to help guide its barrages against moving vehicles.
The twin incidents have led to outrage and frustration among residents and local officials in the Golan Heights.
Living under threat
Katzrin Mayor Yehuda Doa expressed anger at the government’s lack of a clear strategy to deal with the persistent threat from Hezbollah. He emphasized the daily reality of living under the threat of rocket fire, which has become a grim routine for the north’s inhabitants.
The IDF’s air defense system has also come under scrutiny. The road where the Barnes couple was killed, near the Nafah Junction, was classified as an open area by the Israeli Air Force’s air defense network.
This designation could mean the rockets fired into the area were not intercepted because they were expected to strike uninhabited terrain. However, the road in question, Route 91, is a major road in the Golan Heights, frequently used by residents, raising concerns about the criteria used to classify areas for rocket interception.
Air defense policy generally avoids intercepting rockets aimed at open areas to conserve interceptor missiles.
The IDF has confirmed it is performing a thorough review of recent attacks to ensure improved protection.
Another layer of complexity is added by the GPS disruptions common in the Golan Heights, Army Radio noted. These disruptions can prevent the IDF Home Front Command’s alert app from functioning correctly, making it difficult for residents to receive timely warnings of rocket attacks. This technical issue may have played a role in the failure to alert residents in the targeted area about the danger they faced.
While the Home Front Command has recommended marking areas of interest on its official application for better alert coverage, this advice would not be relevant if the area in question is designated as “open.”
Ultimately, as Israel continues with its targeted killings of senior Hezbollah terrorists, the Lebanese organization has proved its ability to exact painful prices, leading to wider strategic questions about Hezbollah’s ability to absorb the deaths without losing most of its core terrorist–military capabilities.
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Iranian Media Claims Obtaining ‘Sensitive’ Israeli Intelligence Materials
FILE PHOTO: The atomic symbol and the Iranian flag are seen in this illustration, July 21, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
i24 News – Iranian and Iran-affiliated media claimed on Saturday that the Islamic Republic had obtained a trove of “strategic and sensitive” Israeli intelligence materials related to Israel’s nuclear facilities and defense plans.
“Iran’s intelligence apparatus has obtained a vast quantity of strategic and sensitive information and documents belonging to the Zionist regime,” Iran’s state broadcaster said, referring to Israel in the manner accepted in those Muslim or Arab states that don’t recognize its legitimacy. The statement was also relayed by the Lebanese site Al-Mayadeen, affiliated with the Iran-backed jihadists of Hezbollah.
The reports did not include any details on the documents or how Iran had obtained them.
The intelligence reportedly included “thousands of documents related to that regime’s nuclear plans and facilities,” it added.
According to the reports, “the data haul was extracted during a covert operation and included a vast volume of materials including documents, images, and videos.”
The report comes amid high tensions over Iran’s nuclear program, over which it is in talks with the US administration of President Donald Trump.
Iranian-Israeli tensions reached an all-time high since the October 7 massacre and the subsequent Gaza war, including Iranian rocket fire on Israel and Israeli aerial raids in Iran that devastated much of the regime’s air defenses.
Israel, which regards the prospect of the antisemitic mullah regime obtaining a nuclear weapon as an existential threat, has indicated it could resort to a military strike against Iran’s installations should talks fail to curb uranium enrichment.
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Israel Retrieves Body of Thai Hostage from Gaza
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz looks on, amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, in Jerusalem, Nov. 7, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
The Israeli military has retrieved the body of a Thai hostage who had been held in Gaza since Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack, Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Saturday.
Nattapong Pinta’s body was held by a Palestinian terrorist group called the Mujahedeen Brigades, and was recovered from the area of Rafah in southern Gaza, Katz said. His family in Thailand has been notified.
Pinta, an agricultural worker, was abducted from Kibbutz Nir Oz, a small Israeli community near the Gaza border where a quarter of the population was killed or taken hostage during the Hamas attack that triggered the devastating war in Gaza.
Israel’s military said Pinta had been abducted alive and killed by his captors, who had also killed and taken to Gaza the bodies of two more Israeli-American hostages that were retrieved earlier this week.
There was no immediate comment from the Mujahedeen Brigades, who have previously denied killing their captives, or from Hamas. The Israeli military said the Brigades were still holding the body of another foreign national. Only 20 of the 55 remaining hostages are believed to still be alive.
The Mujahedeen Brigades also held and killed Israeli hostage Shiri Bibas and her two young sons, according to Israeli authorities. Their bodies were returned during a two-month ceasefire, which collapsed in March after the two sides could not agree on terms for extending it to a second phase.
Israel has since expanded its offensive across the Gaza Strip as US, Qatari and Egyptian-led efforts to secure another ceasefire have faltered.
US-BACKED AID GROUP HALTS DISTRIBUTIONS
The United Nations has warned that most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is at risk of famine after an 11-week Israeli blockade of the enclave, with the rate of young children suffering from acute malnutrition nearly tripling.
Aid distribution was halted on Friday after the US-and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation said overcrowding had made it unsafe to continue operations. It was unclear whether aid had resumed on Saturday.
The GHF began distributing food packages in Gaza at the end of May, overseeing a new model of aid distribution which the United Nations says is neither impartial nor neutral. It says it has provided around 9 million meals so far.
The Israeli military said on Saturday that 350 trucks of humanitarian aid belonging to U.N. and other international relief groups were transferred this week via the Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza.
The war erupted after Hamas-led terrorists took 251 hostages and killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, in the October 7, 2023 attack, Israel’s single deadliest day.
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US Mulls Giving Millions to Controversial Gaza Aid Foundation, Sources Say
Palestinians carry aid supplies which they received from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in the central Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ramadan Abed/File Photo
The State Department is weighing giving $500 million to the new foundation providing aid to war-shattered Gaza, according to two knowledgeable sources and two former US officials, a move that would involve the US more deeply in a controversial aid effort that has been beset by violence and chaos.
The sources and former US officials, all of whom requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, said that money for Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) would come from the US Agency for International Development (USAID), which is being folded into the US State Department.
The plan has met resistance from some US officials concerned with the deadly shootings of Palestinians near aid distribution sites and the competence of the GHF, the two sources said.
The GHF, which has been fiercely criticized by humanitarian organizations, including the United Nations, for an alleged lack of neutrality, began distributing aid last week amid warnings that most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is at risk of famine after an 11-week Israeli aid blockade, which was lifted on May 19 when limited deliveries were allowed to resume.
The foundation has seen senior personnel quit and had to pause handouts twice this week after crowds overwhelmed its distribution hubs.
The State Department and GHF did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Reuters has been unable to establish who is currently funding the GHF operations, which began in Gaza last week. The GHF uses private US security and logistics companies to transport aid into Gaza for distribution at so-called secure distribution sites.
On Thursday, Reuters reported that a Chicago-based private equity firm, McNally Capital, has an “economic interest” in the for-profit US contractor overseeing the logistics and security of GHF’s aid distribution hubs in the enclave.
While US President Donald Trump’s administration and Israel say they don’t finance the GHF operation, both have been pressing the United Nations and international aid groups to work with it.
The US and Israel argue that aid distributed by a long-established U.N. aid network was diverted to Hamas. Hamas has denied that.
USAID has been all but dismantled. Some 80 percent of its programs have been canceled and its staff face termination as part of President Donald Trump’s drive to align US foreign policy with his “America First” agenda.
One source with knowledge of the matter and one former senior official said the proposal to give the $500 million to GHF has been championed by acting deputy USAID Administrator Ken Jackson, who has helped oversee the agency’s dismemberment.
The source said that Israel requested the funds to underwrite GHF’s operations for 180 days.
The Israeli government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The two sources said that some US officials have concerns with the plan because of the overcrowding that has affected the aid distribution hubs run by GHF’s contractor, and violence nearby.
Those officials also want well-established non-governmental organizations experienced in running aid operations in Gaza and elsewhere to be involved in the operation if the State Department approves the funds for GHF, a position that Israel likely will oppose, the sources said.
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