Uncategorized
2 Israeli sisters, ages 16 and 20, killed in West Bank shooting
(JTA) — Gunmen shot and killed two Israeli sisters and critically injured their mother in an attack on a car in the West Bank on Friday.
First responders responded to what at first was believed to be a car accident at Hamra junction in the northern Jordan Valley, Israeli media reported. They found a car riddled with over 20 bullet holes. Troops were searching the area for the attackers.
Two sisters, aged 16 and 20, were dead, and their mother was evacuated to a hospital. The father of the family was driving in a car ahead and doubled back to find the scene. The family are residents of the West Bank town of Efrat, near Bethlehem. Haaretz reported that they are immigrants from Britain.
The shooting was an echo of an attack in the West Bank town of Huwara in February, when a gunman shot dead two brothers traveling on Route 60, a north-south artery.
That was followed by an Israeli settler revenge attack on Huwara that left at least one Palestinian dead and stirred international outrage.
The shooting attack comes after a day of rocket fire on Israel from the Gaza Strip and from Lebanon, which spurred Israel to launch retaliatory air raids before dawn on Friday.
Violence between Israelis and Palestinians has intensified since a series of Palestinian stabbing attacks on Israelis were followed by Israeli army raids on Palestinian centers in recent months. The tensions flared in December after Benjamin Netanyahu formed the most right-wing government in Israel’s history and appointed ministers who favor further restrictions on West Bank Palestinians. At least 16 Israelis and close to 100 Palestinians have been killed since the beginning of this year.
The latest round of violence started Tuesday night when Israeli troops subdued Palestinian worshippers who were occupying Al-Aqsa mosque in the Temple Mount, a site in Jerusalem holy to Muslims and Jews. The worshipers threw fireworks and stones at the troops, who beat the worshipers in scenes caught on phone video.
The worshipers were violating a rule against spending the night in the mosque because of reports that Jewish extremists planned on sacrificing an animal on the Temple Mount to mark Passover. Jewish worship on the Mount is limited by a decades old arrangement to silent prayer, and attempts top breach that norm have in the past led to tensions and violence.
Temple Mount violence has tended to increase in years when Ramadan, the month-long Muslim holy period of fasting and worship, coincides with major Jewish holidays.
—
The post 2 Israeli sisters, ages 16 and 20, killed in West Bank shooting appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Uncategorized
Israel’s Netanyahu Hopes to ‘Taper’ Israel Off US Military Aid in Next Decade
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks to the press on Capitol Hill, Washington, DC, July 8, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in an interview published on Friday that he hopes to “taper off” Israeli dependence on US military aid in the next decade.
Netanyahu has said Israel should not be reliant on foreign military aid but has stopped short of declaring a firm timeline for when Israel would be fully independent from Washington.
“I want to taper off the military within the next 10 years,” Netanyahu told The Economist. Asked if that meant a tapering “down to zero,” he said: “Yes.”
Netanyahu said he told President Donald Trump during a recent visit that Israel “very deeply” appreciates “the military aid that America has given us over the years, but here too we’ve come of age and we’ve developed incredible capacities.”
In December, Netanyahu said Israel would spend 350 billion shekels ($110 billion) on developing an independent arms industry to reduce dependency on other countries.
In 2016, the US and Israeli governments signed a memorandum of understanding for the 10 years through September 2028 that provides $38 billion in military aid, $33 billion in grants to buy military equipment and $5 billion for missile defense systems.
Israeli defense exports rose 13 percent last year, with major contracts signed for Israeli defense technology including its advanced multi-layered aerial defense systems.
US Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, a staunch Israel supporter and close ally of Trump, said on X that “we need not wait ten years” to begin scaling back military aid to Israel.
“The billions in taxpayer dollars that would be saved by expediting the termination of military aid to Israel will and should be plowed back into the US military,” Graham said. “I will be presenting a proposal to Israel and the Trump administration to dramatically expedite the timetable.”
Uncategorized
In Rare Messages from Iran, Protesters ask West for Help, Speak of ‘Very High’ Death Toll
Protests in Tehran. Photo: Iran Photo from social media used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law, via i24 News
i24 News – Speaking to Western media from beyond the nationwide internet blackout imposed by the Islamic regime, Iranian protesters said they needed support amid a brutal crackdown.
“We’re standing up for a revolution, but we need help. Snipers have been stationed behind the Tajrish Arg area [a neighborhood in Tehran],” said a protester in Tehran speaking to the Guardian on the condition of anonymity. He added that “We saw hundreds of bodies.”
Another activist in Tehran spoke of witnessing security forces firing live ammunition at protesters resulting in a “very high” number killed.
On Friday, TIME magazine cited a Tehran doctor speaking on condition of anonymity that just six hospitals in the capital recorded at least 217 killed protesters, “most by live ammunition.”
Speaking to Reuters on Saturday, Setare Ghorbani, a French-Iranian national living in the suburbs of Paris, said that she became ill from worry for her friends inside Iran. She read out one of her friends’ last messages before losing contact: “I saw two government agents and they grabbed people, they fought so much, and I don’t know if they died or not.”
Uncategorized
Report: US Increasingly Regards Iran Protests as Having Potential to Overthrow Regime
United States President Donald J Trump in White House in Washington, DC, USA, on Thursday, December 18, 2025. Photo: Aaron Schwartz via Reuters Connect.
i24 News – The assessment in Washington of the strength and scope of the Iran protests has shifted after Thursday’s turnout, with US officials now inclined to grant the possibility that this could be a game changer, Axios reported on Friday.
“The protests are serious, and we will continue to monitor them,” an unnamed senior US official was quoted as saying in the report.
Iran was largely cut off from the outside world on Friday after the Islamic regime blacked out the internet to curb growing unrest, as videos circulating on social media showed buildings ablaze in anti-government protests raging across the country.
US President Donald Trump warned the Ayatollahs of a strong response if security forces escalate violence against protesters.
“We’re watching it very closely. If they start killing people like they have in the past, I think they’re going to get hit very hard by the United States,” Trump told reporters when asked about the unrest in Iran.
The latest reported death toll is at 51 protesters, including nine children.