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Israel responds to rockets fired from Gaza after death of Palestinian prisoner on hunger strike
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Militant groups in Gaza are firing rockets at Israel — and the Israeli army is responding with rockets of its own — after a Palestinian on a hunger strike died in an Israeli prison.
Khader Adnan, who died Tuesday after three months of hunger-striking, is the first Palestinian to die by this form of protest. He and others have been refusing food to protest Israel’s policy of detaining accused terrorists for extended periods of time, sometimes years, without charges.
Adnan was also a leader of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the organization most recalcitrant and willing to target civilians that Israel faces in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The Gaza Strip-based group launched dozens of rockets into Israel after Adnan’s death, seriously injuring at least one civilian in Israel’s south, the Israeli army said.
Israel returned fire, sending rockets into Gaza Tuesday night. But right-wing government officials were pressing Israel to respond more aggressively, with some arguing that the end of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month, should free Israel from acting with restraint.
Adnan’s death and the subsequent rocket fire exacerbates tensions that have been flaring for a year between Israelis and Palestinians, threatening to ignite them at a time when Israeli is deeply divided internally.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu assembled his top security chiefs to discuss the events of the day. “Anyone who attempts to harm the citizens of Israel will be sorry,” Yoav Gallant, the defense minister, said in a statement.
Adnan’s death got attention in Washington, D.C., Tuesday as a Biden administration spokesman weighed in the case. Vedant Patel, the State Department spokesman, was responding to a question from Said Arikat, a Palestinian reporter who is the Washington correspondent for Jerusalem’s Al Quds newspaper.
“Our view is that we have a deep respect for human rights and believe that all individuals, including prisoners should be treated humanely,” Patel said. “What I will also note, Said, is that Palestinian Islamic Jihad is a designated foreign terrorist organization and as we have seen, with today’s rocket attacks, this group continues to advance violence.”
Arikat asked again: Do Palestinian prisoners deserve a trial? “That is for the Israeli government to determine,” Patel said.
Human rights group say Israel is holding more than a thousand prisoners in what Israeli military authorities call “administrative detention.” Israel defends the practice, which it inherited from the British Mandate, saying it keeps dangerous actors off the streets while protecting intelligence sources that would risk exposure at trial.
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The post Israel responds to rockets fired from Gaza after death of Palestinian prisoner on hunger strike appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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UK PM Starmer Says There Could Be New Powers to Ban Pro-Palestinian Marches
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer gives a media statement at Downing Street in London, Britain, April 30, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Jack Taylor/File photo
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the government could ban pro-Palestinian marches in some circumstances because of the “cumulative effect” the demonstrations had on the Jewish community after two Jewish men were stabbed in London on Wednesday.
Starmer told the BBC that he would always defend freedom of expression and peaceful protest, but chants like “Globalize the Intifada” during demonstrations were “completely off limits” and those voicing them should be prosecuted.
Pro-Palestinian marches have become a regular feature in London since the October 2023 attack by Hamas on Israel that triggered the Gaza war. Critics say the demonstrations have generated hostility and become a focus for antisemitism.
Protesters have argued they are exercising their democratic right to spotlight ongoing human rights and political issues related to the situation in Gaza.
Starmer said he was not denying there were “very strong legitimate views about the Middle East, about Gaza,” but many people in the Jewish community had told him they were concerned about the repeat nature of the marches.
Asked if the tougher response should focus on chants and banners, or whether the protests should be stopped altogether, Starmer said: “I think certainly the first, and I think there are instances for the latter.”
“I think it’s time to look across the board at protests and the cumulative effect,” he said, adding that the government needed to look at what further powers it could take.
Britain raised its terrorism threat level to “severe” on Thursday amid mounting security concerns that foreign states were helping fuel violence, including against the Jewish community.
“We are seeing an elevated threat to Jewish and Israeli individuals and institutions in the UK,” the head of counter-terrorism policing, Laurence Taylor, said in a statement, adding that police were also working “against an unpredictable global situation that has consequences closer to home, including physical threats by state-linked actors.”
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War Likely to Resume After Trump’s Rejection of Latest Proposal, Says IRGC General
Iranians carry a model of a missile during a celebration following an IRGC attack on Israel, in Tehran, Iran, April 15, 2024. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
i24 News – A senior Iranian military figure said that fighting with the US was “likely” to resume after President Donald Trump stated he was dissatisfied with Tehran’s latest proposal, regime media reported on Saturday.
The comments of General Mohammad Jafar Asadi, one of the top Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commanders, were relayed by the Fars news agency, considered as a mouthpiece of the the powerful paramilitary body.
“Evidence has shown that the Americans do not not adhere to any commitments,” Asadi was quoted as saying.
He further added that Washington’s decision-making was “primarily media-driven aimed first at preventing a drop in oil prices and second at extricating themselves from the mess they have created.”
Iranian armed forces are ready “for any new adventures or foolishness from the Americans,” he said, going to assert that the Iran war would prove for the US a tragedy comparable with what was for Israel the October 7 massacre.
“Just as our martyred Leader said that the Zionist regime will never be the same as before the Al‑Aqsa Storm operation [the name chosen by Hamas leadership for the October 7, 2023 massacre in southern Israel], the United States will also never return to what it was before its attack on Iran,” he said. “The world has understood the true nature of America, and no matter how much malice it shows now, it is no longer the America that many once feared.”
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Trump Says US Navy Acting ‘Like Pirates’ to Carry Out Naval Blockade of Iranian Ports
A view of Iranian-flagged cargo ship M/V Touska as the US Navy Arleigh Burke-class Aegis guided missile destroyer USS Spruance conducts its interception in a location given as the north Arabian Sea, in this screen capture from a video released April 19, 2026. Photo: CENTCOM/Handout via REUTERS
President Donald Trump said on Friday the US Navy was acting “like pirates” in carrying out Washington’s naval blockade of Iranian ports during the US and Israel’s war against Iran.
Trump made the comments while describing the seizure by US forces of a ship a few days ago.
“We took over the ship, we took over the cargo, we took over the oil. It’s a very profitable business,” Trump said in remarks on Friday evening. “We’re like pirates. We’re sort of like pirates but we are not playing games.”
Some of Tehran’s vessels have been seized by the US after leaving Iranian ports, along with sanctioned container ships and Iranian tankers in Asian waters.
Iran has blocked nearly all ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz apart from its own since the start of the war. Trump has imposed a separate blockade of Iranian ports.
The US and Israel attacked Iran on February 28. Iran responded with its own strikes on Israel and Gulf states that host US bases. US-Israeli strikes on Iran and Israeli attacks in Lebanon have killed thousands and displaced millions.
The war has raised oil prices and led to the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint for about 20 percent of global oil and liquefied natural gas shipments.
Trump, who has offered shifting timelines and goals for the war that remains unpopular in the US, has faced widespread condemnation over his comments on the conflict, including when he threatened to destroy Iran’s entire civilization last month.
Many US experts said last month that American strikes on Iran may amount to war crimes after Trump threatened to target civilian infrastructure.