RSS
Netanyahu welcomes Black Democratic Congress members as he angles for White House invite
(JTA) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with 10 members of the Congressional Black Caucus as he tries to improve his standing with the Biden administration and among Democrats.
The meeting Sunday in Jerusalem was part of a visit sponsored in part by the American Israel Education Foundation, an affiliate of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. It came as some U.S. Democrats are keeping their distance from Netanyahu because of his government’s efforts to sap the power of Israel’s judiciary.
The delegation was led by Rep. Lucy McBath, a Georgia Democrat whose suburban Atlanta district includes a substantial Jewish population, and Rep. Nikema Williams, a Georgia Democrat who co-chairs the Congressional Caucus on Black-Jewish Relations.
From the outset of the meeting, Netanyahu emphasized his commitment to bipartisan U.S. support for Israel. “It’s an opportunity to cement our relationship which is always based on a bipartisan relationship between Israel and both sides of the House and both sides of the Senate,” he said, according to text released by his office. “It’s very important for us, and I view this meeting as an important building block in this relationship.”
The Israeli prime minister has so far failed to secure a White House meeting with President Joe Biden, who has made clear his unhappiness with Netanyahu’s far-right government and plans to overhaul Israel’s court system. The White House has said the two leaders will encounter each other later this month when both men attend the U.N. General Assembly but has studiously avoided confirming claims by Netanyahu officials that there will be a White House meeting.
Netanyahu has been dogged for years by suspicions among Democrats that he favors Republicans. Black Democrats especially were furious with him in 2015 when he accepted an invitation by Republicans to speak in Congress to lambast the Iran policies of President Barack Obama.
AIPAC has in recent months been aggressively been pushing back against claims by rival J Street that it is losing support among Democrats and progressives because its political action committee affiliates backed pro-Trump Republican election-deniers in the last election. AIPAC’s PACs, and PACs close to AIPAC have backed McBath, Williams and others on the delegation, including Rep. Ritchie Torres of New York.
The delegation will continue to Rwanda. Williams told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution last week that a theme of the visit was recovery from genocide, sayin the delegation would study “the two countries’ effort to build common ground while developing and growing socially, culturally, and economically out of tragedy.”
—
The post Netanyahu welcomes Black Democratic Congress members as he angles for White House invite appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
RSS
250 Hezbollah Terrorists Including 21 Commanders Eliminated in Ground Op
i24 News – The Israeli military eliminated 250 Hezbollah terrorists including 21 commanders in four days of ground combat, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said in a statement on Friday.
IDF soldiers operating in southern Lebanon have uncovered vast caches of weapons and munitions in civilian residences, showing how central embedding within civilian population is to Hezbollah’s mode of warfare.
Meanwhile, heavy strikes targeting the Hezbollah stronghold of Dahieh in southern Beirut were ongoing, Lebanese media reported.
The post 250 Hezbollah Terrorists Including 21 Commanders Eliminated in Ground Op first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Airstrikes Launched on Several Parts of Yemen, Houthi Al Masirah TV says
Airstrikes were launched on Friday at several parts of Yemen including its capital Sanaa and Hodeidah airport, Al Masirah TV, the main television news outlet run by the Houthi movement controlling much of Yemen, and residents said.
Strikes also targeted the south of Dhamar city and the southeast of al-Bayda province, the channel added.
Residents said that the attack on al-Bayda province targeted several Houthi military outposts.
Al Masirah TV reported that the strikes had been carried out by the United States and British forces, but a British government source said Britain was not involved.
Iran-aligned Houthi militants have launched attacks on international shipping near Yemen since last November in solidarity with Palestinians in Israel‘s war with Hamas.
The attacks have drawn US and British retaliatory strikes and disrupted global trade as ship owners reroute vessels away from the Red Sea and Suez Canal to sail the longer route around the southern tip of Africa.
Following the airstrikes, a Houthi spokesman called the attack “a desperate attempt,” adding that “Yemen will not be deterred by these attacks and will continue its steadfastness in confronting the enemies.”
The post Airstrikes Launched on Several Parts of Yemen, Houthi Al Masirah TV says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
IDF Kills Hamas Commander in Tulkarem
JNS.org – An Israeli Air Force fighter jet conducted a rare strike in Tulkarem in the West Bank on Thursday night, targeting top Hamas terrorist Zahi Yaser Abd al-Razeq Oufi.
The Palestinian Authority reported at least 18 fatalities in the strike, with a local security source telling Agence France-Presse it was the deadliest in Judea and Samaria since the Second Intifada.
Ayyth Radwan, the head of Islamic Jihad’s Tulkarem branch, was also reportedly killed.
Oufi was planning a terrorist attack “in the immediate time frame,” according to the Israel Defense Forces, and directed the thwarted car bombing last month near Ateret in the Binyamin region of Samaria.
There were no casualties in the incident, which Israel Ganz, the head of the Binyamin Regional Council, called a “great miracle.”
The IDF said Oufi was involved in smuggling weapons to terrorists who perpetrated several recent attacks against Israelis, including some that resulted in injuries to civilians.
He also “worked to establish terrorist networks on behalf of Hamas and assisted terror operatives in the area to carry out significant shooting and explosive attacks,” added the military.
The post IDF Kills Hamas Commander in Tulkarem first appeared on Algemeiner.com.