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Sirens Sound for the Dead — and for Rockets — on Israeli Memorial Day
People stand still as a siren sounds marking Israel’s Memorial Day, while the country commemorates fallen soldiers of Israel’s wars and Israeli victims of hostile attacks, amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, in Tel Aviv, Israel, May 13, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton
Memorial sirens for generations of Israeli war dead sounded on Monday while air raid sirens warned of incoming shells from the conflict triggered by the Oct. 7 Hamas attack.
Traffic slowed to a standstill for the traditional two-minute silence for Israel’s annual Memorial Day, observed the day before Independence Day.
There was one new vigil at the site of a music festival where more than 350 revelers were killed.
Grief-stricken relatives stood face-to-face with pictures of the dead erected across a desert field.
“I want to remember her here, and light a candle for her and pray for her,” said 31-year-old Naama Kazes whose friend died.
President Isaac Herzog opened commemorations at Jerusalem’s Western Wall on Sunday evening with his shirt collar torn in a Jewish mark of mourning.
Speaking after him, armed forces chief Lieutenant-General Herzi Halevi took personal responsibility for the failure to stop the cross-border rampage by Palestinian terrorists, the deadliest day in Israel’s history.
Much public anger has focused on the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a veteran conservative who long promoted himself as guarantor of national security.
Netanyahu has sidestepped questions of his political liability. He casts the war — which has set off a second front with Lebanon and drawn attacks by Iranian-backed militias in Syria, Yemen, and Iraq — as a showdown with Tehran that he had long predicted.
“Our beloved, who fell in this war, and in all of Israel’s wars … represent eternal values: love of humanity and people, love of country, readiness to sacrifice, belief in a just cause,” Netanyahu said in a speech.
“It’s either us — Israel — or them — the Hamas monsters. Either continued existence, liberty, security, and prosperity — or destruction, slaughter, rape, and enslavement. And we are determined to be victorious in this struggle.”
Some 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 kidnapped on Oct. 7 during Hamas’ onslaught. Since then, Israel has waged a military campaign aimed at freeing the hostages and destroying Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group that rules neighboring Gaza.
Swathes of Israel have been evacuated in the south near Gaza and in the north on the border with Lebanon, both of which saw air raid alerts on Monday. The memorial sirens sounded with a fixed tone, while air raid sirens had rising and falling notes, so residents could tell the difference.
Commentator Chen Artzi-Sror wrote in the best-selling newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth that this year it was not a day of remembrance because the “ongoing present of sorrow and loss” was not yet in the past.
“There is no daily routine at a moment when our brothers and sisters are held hostage, when entire swathes of our country are empty of residents, when the list of fallen and wounded grows by the day.”
While surveys have found broad Israeli support for the war, views on the government are mixed. Almost half of the public — 48 percent — wanted ministers to sit out memorial events at military cemeteries, the Israel Democracy Institute think-tank said.
The post Sirens Sound for the Dead — and for Rockets — on Israeli Memorial Day first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Hamas Warns Against Cooperation with US Relief Efforts In Bid to Restore Grip on Gaza

Hamas terrorists carry grenade launchers at the funeral of Marwan Issa, a senior Hamas deputy military commander who was killed in an Israeli airstrike during the conflict between Israel and Hamas, in the central Gaza Strip, Feb. 7, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ramadan Abed
The Hamas-run Interior Ministry in Gaza has warned residents not to cooperate with the US- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, as the terror group seeks to reassert its grip on the enclave amid mounting international pressure to accept a US-brokered ceasefire.
“It is strictly forbidden to deal with, work for, or provide any form of assistance or cover to the American organization (GHF) or its local or foreign agents,” the Interior Ministry said in a statement Thursday.
“Legal action will be taken against anyone proven to be involved in cooperation with this organization, including the imposition of the maximum penalties stipulated in the applicable national laws,” the statement warns.
The GHF released a statement in response to Hamas’ warnings, saying the organization has delivered millions of meals “safely and without interference.”
“This statement from the Hamas-controlled Interior Ministry confirms what we’ve known all along: Hamas is losing control,” the GHF said.
The GHF began distributing food packages in Gaza in late May, implementing a new aid delivery model aimed at preventing the diversion of supplies by Hamas, as Israel continues its defensive military campaign against the Palestinian terrorist group.
The initiative has drawn criticism from the UN and international organizations, some of which have claimed that Jerusalem is causing starvation in the war-torn enclave.
Israel has vehemently denied such accusations, noting that, until its recently imposed blockade, it had provided significant humanitarian aid in the enclave throughout the war.
Israeli officials have also said much of the aid that flows into Gaza is stolen by Hamas, which uses it for terrorist operations and sells the rest at high prices to Gazan civilians.
According to their reports, the organization has delivered over 56 million meals to Palestinians in just one month.
Hamas’s latest threat comes amid growing international pressure to accept a US-backed ceasefire plan proposed by President Donald Trump, which sets a 60-day timeline to finalize the details leading to a full resolution of the conflict.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump announced that Israel has agreed to the “necessary conditions” to finalize a 60-day ceasefire in Gaza, though Israel has not confirmed this claim.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to meet with Trump next week in Washington, DC — his third visit in less than six months — as they work to finalize the terms of the ceasefire agreement.
Even though Trump hasn’t provided details on the proposed truce, he said Washington would “work with all parties to end the war” during the 60-day period.
“I hope, for the good of the Middle East, that Hamas takes this Deal, because it will not get better — IT WILL ONLY GET WORSE,” he wrote in a social media post.
Since the start of the war, ceasefire talks between Jerusalem and Hamas have repeatedly failed to yield enduring results.
Israeli officials have previously said they will only agree to end the war if Hamas surrenders, disarms, and goes into exile — a demand the terror group has firmly rejected.
“I am telling you — there will be no Hamas,” Netanyahu said during a speech Wednesday.
For its part, Hamas has said it is willing to release the remaining 50 hostages — fewer than half of whom are believed to be alive — in exchange for a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and an end to the war.
While the terrorist group said it is “ready and serious” to reach a deal that would end the war, it has yet to accept this latest proposal.
In a statement, the group said it aims to reach an agreement that “guarantees an end to the aggression, the withdrawal [of Israeli forces], and urgent relief for our people in the Gaza Strip.”
According to media reports, the proposed 60-day ceasefire would include a partial Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, a surge in humanitarian aid, and the release of the remaining hostages held by Hamas, with US and mediator assurances on advancing talks to end the war — though it remains unclear how many hostages would be freed.
For Israel, the key to any deal is the release of most, if not all, hostages still held in Gaza, as well as the disarmament of Hamas, while the terror group is seeking assurances to end the war as it tries to reassert control over the war-torn enclave.
The post Hamas Warns Against Cooperation with US Relief Efforts In Bid to Restore Grip on Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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UK Lawmakers Move to Designate Palestine Action as Terrorist Group Following RAF Vandalism Protest

Police block a street as pro-Palestinian demonstrators gather to protest British Home Secretary Yvette Cooper’s plans to proscribe the “Palestine Action” group in the coming weeks, in London, Britain, June 23, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Jaimi Joy
British lawmakers voted Wednesday to designate Palestine Action as a terrorist organization, following the group’s recent vandalizing of two military aircraft at a Royal Air Force base in protest of the government’s support for Israel.
Last month, members of the UK-based anti-Israel group Palestine Action broke into RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, a county west of London, and vandalized two Voyager aircraft used for military transport and refueling — the latest in a series of destructive acts carried out by the organization.
Palestine Action has regularly targeted British sites connected to Israeli defense firm Elbit Systems as well as other companies in Britain linked to Israel since the start of the conflict in Gaza in 2023.
Under British law, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper has the authority to ban an organization if it is believed to commit, promote, or otherwise be involved in acts of terrorism.
Passed overwhelmingly by a vote of 385 to 26 in the lower chamber — the House of Commons — the measure is now set to be reviewed by the upper chamber, the House of Lords, on Thursday.
If approved, the ban would take effect within days, making it a crime to belong to or support Palestine Action and placing the group on the same legal footing as Al Qaeda, Hamas, and the Islamic State under UK law.
Palestine Action, which claims that Britain is an “active participant” in the Gaza conflict due to its military support for Israel, condemned the ban as “an unhinged reaction” and announced plans to challenge it in court — similar to the legal challenges currently being mounted by Hamas.
Under the Terrorism Act 2000, belonging to a proscribed group is a criminal offense punishable by up to 14 years in prison or a fine, while wearing clothing or displaying items supporting such a group can lead to up to six months in prison and/or a fine of up to £5,000.
Palestine Action claimed responsibility for the recent attack, in which two of its activists sprayed red paint into the turbine engines of two Airbus Voyager aircraft and used crowbars to inflict additional damage.
According to the group, the red paint — also sprayed across the runway — was meant to symbolize “Palestinian bloodshed.” A Palestine Liberation Organization flag was also left at the scene.
On Thursday, local authorities arrested four members of the group, aged between 22 and 35, who were charged with conspiracy to enter a prohibited place knowingly for a purpose prejudicial to the safety or interests of the UK, as well as conspiracy to commit criminal damage.
Palestine Action said this latest attack was carried out as a protest against the planes’ role in supporting what the group called Israel’s “genocide” in Gaza.
At the time of the attack, Cooper condemned the group’s actions, stating that their behavior had grown increasingly aggressive and resulted in millions of pounds in damages.
“The disgraceful attack on Brize Norton … is the latest in a long history of unacceptable criminal damage committed by Palestine Action,” Cooper said in a written statement.
“The UK’s defense enterprise is vital to the nation’s national security and this government will not tolerate those that put that security at risk,” she continued.
The post UK Lawmakers Move to Designate Palestine Action as Terrorist Group Following RAF Vandalism Protest first appeared on Algemeiner.com.