RSS
Several Hurt as Hezbollah Fires 100 rockets deep into north Israel
Illustrative: A Magen David Adom ambulance. Photo: David King via Wikimedia Commons.
Several people were hurt when Hezbollah launched more than 100 rockets and drones at northern Israel in waves of attacks overnight Saturday and Sunday morning.
Rockets hit the Haifa bayside suburb of Kiryat Bialik and Moreshet, a community in the Lower Galilee, the military said. The IDF’s aerial defense array intercepted some of the projectiles.
The Israel Fire and Rescue Services was operating to put out numerous blazes ignited in the area.
Three people suffered shrapnel wounds when Hezbollah rockets hit several homes in Kiryat Bialik.
The Magen David Adom emergency service medics and paramedics treated and evacuated a 76-year-old man to Haifa’s Rambam Medical Center in moderate condition with a shrapnel wound to the eye, as well as a 70-year-old man and a 16-year-old girl in mild condition with shrapnel wounds.
Maj. Gen. Rafi Milo, head of the IDF Home Front Command, toured the site of the Hezbollah strike in Kiryat Bialik. In addition to the civil protection, medical and firefighting services, Israel Police and the local authority participated in searches of the area.
According to the IDF, 85 rockets were detected following air-raid sirens that sounded between 6:24 and 6:32 a.m. and between 6:52 and 7 a.m. Before that, sirens sounded in the Jezreel Valley at 4:48 and 5:10 a.m., with 20 rockets detected crossing from Lebanon into Israel.
Most of those rockets were intercepted, with the rest striking open areas. No injuries were reported, according to the IDF.
At 1:48 a.m., the IDF said that 10 projectiles were detected crossing from Lebanon into the Jezreel Valley, with most intercepted and a fallen projectile identified in the area.
Magen David Adom said that at 1:20 a.m., it received a report about a 60-year-old man with a minor head injury, likely from a small interception fragment, near a village in the Lower Galilee. He was transported to the Scottish Hospital in Nazareth.
Additionally, several people were lightly injured running to bomb shelters, including a month-old infant, two women in their 30s and men and women in their 70s and 80s. They were evacuated to Emek Medical Center in Afula and the Holy Family (Italian) and English Hospitals in Nazareth.
In total, the IDF said that Hezbollah launched 115 “aerial threats” towards civilians in northern Israel in recent hours.
Hezbollah took responsibility for the overnight and morning waves of attacks, stating that it had sent “dozens of Fadi 1 and Fadi 2 missiles” at the Ramat David Airbase southeast of Haifa and Rafael Advanced Defense Systems north of Haifa. It was reportedly the first time since Oct. 8 when the terror group began attacking Israel in support of Hamas that it has used this type of weapon.
The Iranian-backed terror army said that the missiles launched were “in response to the repeated Israeli attacks that targeted various Lebanese regions and led to the fall of many civilian martyrs,” about last week’s series of communication device explosions that killed and wounded thousands of Hezbollah terrorists.
Hezbollah has vowed revenge for the deadly pager and walkie-talkie blasts last week across Lebanon, attributing the attacks to Jerusalem.
A targeted strike by the IDF in Beirut on Friday killed senior Hezbollah terrorist Ibrahim Aqil.
Following Hezbollah’s attack on northern Israel, the IDF said on Sunday morning that it was currently striking terror targets in Lebanon.
“The IDF defensive arrays are deployed in the area, and on high preparedness to thwart threats,” the military said, adding that “IDF strikes will continue and will intensify against the Hezbollah terrorist organization.”
Since Saturday afternoon, Israel has struck 290 targets in Southern Lebanon, including thousands of launcher barrels and additional terrorist infrastructure.
In an additional series of strikes, the IDF said that it struck 110 Hezbollah terror targets, including launchers and terrorist infrastructure.
The IDF also announced changes to the Home Front Command defensive guidelines, which effect “the northern Golan Heights, the Confrontation Line, the southern Golan Heights, Upper Galilee, Central Galilee, Lower Galilee, the Haifa Bay and the Valleys (HaAmakim).”
The updated guidelines prohibit educational activities, limit work activities to those taking place near bomb shelters and limit gatherings and services to up to 10 people outdoors and up to 100 people indoors. Additionally, beaches are closed to the public.
The guidelines are in effect from Sunday at 6 a.m. until Monday at 6 p.m., with the possibility of an extension.
The post Several Hurt as Hezbollah Fires 100 rockets deep into north Israel first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd
Magdeburg Christmas market, December 21, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Christian Mang
i24 News – A suspected terrorist plowed a vehicle into a crowd at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg, west of the capital Berlin, killing at least five and injuring dozens more.
Local police confirmed that the suspect was a Saudi national born in 1974 and acting alone.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz expressed his concern about the incident, saying that “reports from Magdeburg suggest something bad. My thoughts are with the victims and their families.”
Police declined to give casualty numbers, confirming only a large-scale operation at the market, where people had gathered to celebrate in the days leading up to the Christmas holidays.
The post Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister
A person waves a flag adopted by the new Syrian rulers, as people gather during a celebration called by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) near the Umayyad Mosque, after the ousting of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, Photo: December 20, 2024. REUTERS/Ammar Awad/File Photo
Syria’s new rulers have appointed Murhaf Abu Qasra, a leading figure in the insurgency which toppled Bashar al-Assad, as defense minister in the interim government, an official source said on Saturday.
Abu Qasra, who is also known by the nom de guerre Abu Hassan 600, is a senior figure in the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group which led the campaign that ousted Assad this month. He led numerous military operations during Syria’s revolution, the source said.
Syria’s de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa discussed “the form of the military institution in the new Syria” during a meeting with armed factions on Saturday, state news agency SANA reported.
Abu Qasra during the meeting sat next to Sharaa, also known by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Golani, photos published by SANA showed.
Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir said this week that the defense ministry would be restructured using former rebel factions and officers who defected from Assad’s army.
Bashir, who formerly led an HTS-affiliated administration in the northwestern province of Idlib, has said he will lead a three-month transitional government. The new administration has not declared plans for what will happen after that.
Earlier on Saturday, the ruling General Command named Asaad Hassan al-Shibani as foreign minister, SANA said. A source in the new administration told Reuters that this step “comes in response to the aspirations of the Syrian people to establish international relations that bring peace and stability.”
Shibani, a 37-year-old graduate of Damascus University, previously led the political department of the rebels’ Idlib government, the General Command said.
Sharaa’s group was part of al Qaeda until he broke ties in 2016. It had been confined to Idlib for years until going on the offensive in late November, sweeping through the cities of western Syria and into Damascus as the army melted away.
Sharaa has met with a number of international envoys this week. He has said his primary focus is on reconstruction and achieving economic development and that he is not interested in engaging in any new conflicts.
Syrian rebels seized control of Damascus on Dec. 8, forcing Assad to flee after more than 13 years of civil war and ending his family’s decades-long rule.
Washington designated Sharaa a terrorist in 2013, saying al Qaeda in Iraq had tasked him with overthrowing Assad’s rule and establishing Islamic sharia law in Syria. US officials said on Friday that Washington would remove a $10 million bounty on his head.
The war has killed hundreds of thousands of people, caused one of the biggest refugee crises of modern times and left cities bombed to rubble and the economy hollowed out by global sanctions.
The post Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels
View of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib / Flash90.
i24 News – Sweden will no longer fund the U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) and will instead provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza via other channels, the Scandinavian country said on Friday.
The decision comes on the heels of multiple revelations regarding the agency’s employees’ involvement in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.
Sweden’s decision was in response to the Israeli ban, as it will make channeling aid via the agency more difficult, the country’s aid minister, Benjamin Dousa, said.
“Large parts of UNRWA’s operations in Gaza are either going to be severely weakened or completely impossible,” Dousa said. “For the government, the most important thing is that support gets through.”
The Palestinian embassy in Stockholm said in a statement: “We reject the idea of finding alternatives to UNRWA, which has a special mandate to provide services to Palestinian refugees.”
Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel thanked Dousa for a meeting they had this week and for Sweden’s decision to drop its support for UNRWA.
“There are worthy and viable alternatives for humanitarian aid, and I appreciate the willingness to listen and adopt a different approach,” she said.
The post Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels first appeared on Algemeiner.com.