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Netanyahu Tells UN to Get Forces Out of Harm’s Way in Lebanon

UNIFIL peacekeepers drive in a vehicle in Naqoura, in southern Lebanon, near the border with Israel, Oct. 13, 2020. Photo: Reuters / Aziz Taher.

JNS.orgIsraeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday called for United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres to remove UNIFIL peacekeepers from areas of IDF activity in Southern Lebanon.

“I want to directly address the U.N. Secretary-General from here: It is time for you to remove UNIFIL from Hezbollah’s strongholds and from the combat areas,” the premier said in a statement.

“The IDF has repeatedly requested this, only to be met with refusal, a refusal aimed solely at providing Hezbollah terrorists with a human shield. Your refusal to evacuate UNIFIL soldiers turns them into hostages of Hezbollah. This endangers both them and the lives of our soldiers,” he continued.

“We regret the harm caused to UNIFIL soldiers, and we are doing everything we can to prevent it. But the simplest and most obvious way to ensure their safety is to simply remove them from the danger zone.
Mr. Secretary-General, get the UNIFIL forces out of harm’s way. It should be done right now, immediately,” Netanyahu said.

“Unfortunately, some European leaders are applying pressure in the wrong place. Instead of criticizing Israel, they should direct their criticism at Hezbollah, which uses UNIFIL as a human shield, just as Hamas in Gaza uses UNRWA as a human shield. Unfortunately, in Gaza, UNRWA even collaborates with Hamas.”

Netanyahu issued the comments following reports that Israeli forces fired on U.N. peacekeeping positions in Lebanon.

The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon said on Saturday that unidentified gunfire hit a peacekeeper on Friday, the fifth U.N. soldier wounded in Southern Lebanon in two days.

UNIFIL also said that buildings in Ramyah “sustained significant damage due to explosions from nearby shelling.”

Two U.N. peacekeepers were injured on Friday by an Israeli strike close to their watchtower in Southern Lebanon, the IDF said, expressing “deep concern” and saying that troops fired at an “immediate threat” coming from near a UNIFIL position.

The IDF said that the peacekeepers were warned hours earlier to take shelter. UNIFIL said the two injured peacekeepers were from Sri Lanka.

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati told the AFP news agency on Sunday that Netanyahu’s demand to Guterres “represents a new chapter in the enemy’s approach of not complying with international” norms.

Beirut “condemns Netanyahu’s position and the Israeli aggression against UNIFIL” peacekeepers, the Lebanese leader added.

Meanwhile on Sunday, sirens sounded in the Upper Galilee, central Galilee, Haifa, Acre and surrounding areas of northern Israel amid Hezbollah’s daily rocket, missile and drone fire across the border.

As of 3 p.m., approximately 115 projectiles that were fired by the Hezbollah terrorist organization have crossed from Lebanon into Israel today [Sunday],” the military said. “The IDF will continue to defend the State of Israel and its people against the threat posed by the Hezbollah terrorist organization.”

Hezbollah terrorist captured

Israeli ground troops operating in Southern Lebanon apprehended a Hezbollah terrorist embedded in an underground compound, the IDF said on Sunday.

During a targeted raid, soldiers discovered an underground tunnel shaft in a building leading to a hideout area for terrorists with an adjacent exit shaft.

Troops encircled the building, scanned the tunnel shaft, and discovered the compound seven meters deep and a 50-meter hideout area, where the terrorist was located alongside weapons and equipment for a long-term stay.

The terrorist surrendered and was interrogated on-site before being transferred to a detention facility in Israel for further questioning, the IDF said.

Drone footage shows Israeli ground activities in Lebanon

The IDF on Sunday published drone footage of ground activities in Southern Lebanon, showcasing the work of the 8th Reserve Armored Brigade alongside the counter-terrorism unit of the Marom Paratroopers Brigade, under the command of the 91st Division, aka the Galilee Formation.

Video documentation from Southern Lebanon includes a tunnel shaft in the heart of a village, dozens of underground infrastructures and the elimination of terrorists.

“The forces are engaging in hand-to-hand combat, eliminating terrorists and destroying terror infrastructures that Hezbollah has deployed along the border,” the IDF said.

“The forces are locating, confiscating and destroying numerous weapons, including dozens of rockets, Kalashnikovs, Kornet [man-portable anti-tank guided] missiles, grenades and ammunition intended for use by Radwan Force,” the army continued.

In addition, the forces located several weapons storage facilities equipped with dozens of missiles inside civilian homes.

200 Hezbollah targets hit

The Israeli Air Force in cooperation with the IDF Northern Command struck some 200 Hezbollah terror targets in Southern Lebanon and deeper into Lebanese territory over the past 24 hours. The targets included terrorist squads, launchers, military structures, anti-tank positions and “military” headquarters.

Moreover, over the past 24 hours, ground troops in Southern Lebanon have “eliminated dozens of terrorists, uncovered shafts and located numerous weapons, including firearms, launchers, anti-tank missiles, ammunition and more.”

Two soldiers severely wounded

Two soldiers from the 9920th Battalion, 6th “Etzioni” Reserve Infantry Brigade, were severely wounded in separate incidents during combat operations in Southern Lebanon, the IDF said on Sunday.

Other soldiers were lightly and moderately wounded during the incidents.

The soldiers were evacuated to the hospital and their families were notified.

Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya reported on Sunday receiving 17 casualties from Southern Lebanon, most with minor injuries. Four were in moderate condition due to shrapnel wounds.

The post Netanyahu Tells UN to Get Forces Out of Harm’s Way in Lebanon first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Treasure Trove salutes the Jewish-Canadian woman who made the first Remembrance Day poppies

The poppies that we wear at this time of year are our visual pledge to remember the brave Canadian soldiers who served and sacrificed to preserve and defend our democracy.  […]

The post Treasure Trove salutes the Jewish-Canadian woman who made the first Remembrance Day poppies appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.

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Hasidic Man Attacked in Third Antisemitic Assault in Brooklyn in Eight Days

Illustrative: New York City Police Department (NYPD) vehicles are seen in Brooklyn, New York, United States, on Oct. 13, 2024. Photo: Kyle Mazza via Reuters Connect

An antisemitic hate crime spree in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, New York struck its latest victim on Wednesday, wreaking an “excruciating” beating on a middle-aged Hasidic man.

According to Yaacov Behrman, a liaison for Chabad Headquarters — the main New York base of the Hasidic movement — the victim was accosted by two assailants, one masked, who “chased and beat him” after he refused to surrender his cell phone in compliance with what appears to have been an attempted robbery.

“The victim is in excruciating pain and is currently in the emergency room,” Behrman tweeted. “The police are investigating the incident.”

The perpetrators were two Black teenagers, according to COLlive.com, an Orthodox Jewish news outlet.

Tuesday’s attack was the third time in eight days that an Orthodox resident of Crown Heights was targeted for violence and humiliation. In each case, the assailant was allegedly a Black male, a pattern of conduct which continues to strain Black-Jewish relations across the Five Boroughs.

On Monday morning, an African American male smacked a 13-year-old Jewish boy who was commuting to school on his bike in the heavily Jewish Crown Heights neighborhood

Less than a week earlier, an assailant slashed a visibly Jewish man in the face as he was walking in Brooklyn.

Numerous antisemitic hate crimes have occurred in Crown Heights in recent years. In July 2023, for example, a 22-year-old Israeli Yeshiva student, who was identifiably Orthodox and visiting New York City for the summer holiday, was stabbed with a screwdriver by one of two men who attacked him after asking whether he was Jewish and had any money. The other punched him in the face. Earlier that year, 10- and 12-year-olds were attacked on Albany Avenue by four African American teens.

According to a report issued in August by New York state comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, antisemitic incidents accounted for a striking 65 percent of all felony hate crimes in New York City last year. The report added that throughout the state, nearly 44 percent of all recorded hate crime incidents and 88 percent of religious-based hate crimes targeted Jewish victims.

Meanwhile, according to a recent Algemeiner review of New York City Police Department (NYPD) hate crimes data, 385 antisemitic hate crimes have struck the New York City Jewish community since last October, when the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas perpetrated its Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel, unleashing a wave of anti-Jewish hatred unlike any seen in the post-World War II era.

Beyond New York, anti-Jewish hate crimes in the US spiked to a record high last year, and American Jews were the most targeted of any religious group in the country, according to a report published by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in September.

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.

The post Hasidic Man Attacked in Third Antisemitic Assault in Brooklyn in Eight Days first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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‘Huge Victory’: Netanyahu Calls Trump to Congratulate Him on Election Win

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meets with US President Donald Trump during a meeting in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, DC, Sept. 15, 2020. Photo: REUTERS/Tom Brenner

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called US President-elect Donald Trump to congratulate him on his victory in the US presidential election earlier this week.

“Netanyahu spoke to President-elect Donald Trump and was among the first to call to congratulate him for his victory,” the Prime Minister’s office said on Wednesday. “The conversation was warm and cordial, and the two agreed to work together for Israel’s security and discussed the Iranian threat.”

During Trump’s first term, his administration had a “maximum pressure” policy with regard to Iran, aimed at making it more difficult for the country to make a nuclear weapon and fund its terror proxies — such as Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis — across the Middle East.

However, some observers are concerned the incoming US administration will not be as strong on the Iranian threat as it was in its first term. Late last month, US Vice President-elect JD Vance said on a podcast that the US and Israel can at times have conflicting interests and warned that Washington should seek to avoid a war with Iran, the Jewish state’s chief adversary in the Middle East.

“Israel has the right to defend itself, but America’s interest is sometimes going to be distinct — like sometimes we’re going to have overlapping interests and sometimes we’re going to have distinct interests. And our interest, I think, very much is in not going to war with Iran,” Vance said.

He then argued that a war with Iran “would be [a] huge distraction of resources; it would be massively expensive to our country.”

In addition to the phone call, Netanyahu’s office will also reportedly announce “the appointment of a new ambassador to Washington who will work with the new Trump administration” within the next 24 hours, according to Axios reporter Barack Ravid.

Netanyahu was the first world leader to congratulate Trump on his victory.

“Congratulations on history’s greatest comeback!” he wrote on X/Twitter. “Your historic return to the White House offers a new beginning for America and a powerful recommitment to the great alliance between Israel and America.”

He added, “This is a huge victory!”

During Trump’s first term, he and Netanyahu were close allies, working together to sign the Abraham Accords and move the US Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. However, their relationship reportedly strained when Netanyahu congratulated then-US President-elect Joe Biden on his victory against Trump while Trump was still actively disputing the results of the election.

“The first person that congratulated [Biden] was Bibi Netanyahu, the man that I did more for than any other person I dealt with,” Trump reportedly said at the time. “Bibi could have stayed quiet. He has made a terrible mistake.”

“I liked Bibi. I still like Bibi. But I also like loyalty,” he added. “The first person to congratulate Biden was Bibi. And not only did he congratulate him, he did it on tape.”

Heading into Trump’s second term, there have not been indications that this tension still lingers.

The post ‘Huge Victory’: Netanyahu Calls Trump to Congratulate Him on Election Win first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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