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In Jerusalem neighborhoods bound together by terror, anger and trepidation about what comes next
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Time stops on Shabbat in Jerusalem, for the living and the dead.
Up the stairs in an apartment on the main road in the Neve Yaakov neighborhood in the city’s northeast, past hallway portraits of Sephardic rabbis, the Mizrahi family was not taking visitors on Saturday. “This is not the right time,” a woman who opened the apartment door said.
A Palestinian gunman gunned down Eli and Natali Mizrahi on Friday night. Now the couple was in a morgue awaiting burial. There are no Jewish funerals on Shabbat. They would be buried after nightfall.
The gunman killed seven people Friday night, in the worst terrorist attack in Jerusalem in over a decade.
A day earlier, Israeli troops killed nine people, including two civilians, in a raid in the northern West Bank city of Jenin that Israeli officials said was aimed at preempting a major terrorist attack; a 10th died later. A day later, a 13-year-old Palestinian shot and wounded an Israeli father and son outside Jerusalem’s Old City walls amid a scattering of further incidents.
Jerusalem, the country, the region are on edge. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced new measures aimed at curbing the violence, targeting families of terrorists. Police arrested 42 people in connection with the Neve Yaakov attack. Bill Burns, the CIA boss, is on his way to Israel to consult with Netanyahu about how to keep the region from blowing up.
On Friday night, around 8 p.m., in the middle of the Sabbath evening meal, Eli Mizrahi, 48, ran downstairs as soon as he heard the gunfire. His father, Shimon, asked him not to go, the Times of Israel reported. Eli’s wife of two years, Natali, 45, followed her husband.
Eli Mizrahi spoke to the gunman, who shot him and Natali dead.
On Saturday, Neve Yaakov residents stood in groups on the street in the long shadows cast by the winter sun, gossiping, trying to piece together details from second hand reports; Shabbat forbade them from turning on the radio or TV or checking their phones.
“We sat here in the living room and suddenly I heard shooting,” said Sara Gablayev, 76, who lives on the ground floor, below the Mizrahis. “I ran to the window and saw two people falling. Then I saw some running and I shouted, ‘What happened?’ He said two more people were killed down the street.”
Family and friends of Eli and Natali Mizrahi, who were killed in a shooting attack in Jerusalem, mourn during their funeral in Bet Shemesh, jan. 28, 2023. (Amir Levy/Getty Images)
It was Friday evening, as Shabbat services were ending. Kheiri Al-Qam, 21, drove his car down Neve Yaakov Boulevard, shooting civilians, seemingly aiming at whomever he could reach.
He murdered the Mizrahis. He murdered Rafael Ben Eliahu, 56, who worked for the post office, and who left a widow and three children. He murdered Asher Natan, who was 14. He murdered Shaul Hai, 68, a sexton at one synagogue who was entering another to attend a Torah lesson. He murdered Irina Korlova, a Ukrainian caregiving worker. He murdered Ilya Sosansky, 26.
“The terrorist killed three people at the entrance to the synagogue and left three others with various injuries,” said Chanoch Reem, a volunteer first responder with United Hatzalah who lives next to the synagogue Hai was entering and who rushed to the scene when he heard the commotion. “He then drove away while continuing to shoot passersby.”
In a release, United Hatzalah quoted another of its first responders, Yosef Deshet, who was in the synagogue when Al-Qam opened fire. “When I heard the gunshots begin I took cover on the floor under a table with my son,” he said. “Immediately after the shooting ended, I ran to my house nearby to bring my son back to safety and to grab my medical trauma kit and bulletproof vest.”
Al-Qam drove his car to a junction that connects roads to Neve Yaakov and Bet Hanina, a Palestinian neighborhood. There, he exchanged fire with Israeli troops, and was killed.
On Saturday, in Ras al-Amud, an eastern Jerusalem neighborhood seven miles south of Neve Yaakov, Israeli troops surrounded the six-story building where Al-Qam lived with his extended family. Before dawn, troops bound men and boys to one another by the wrists and led them out. Neighborhood Palestinian youths grouped together on a nearby stairway watched the soldiers.
One of the young Palestinian men watching the troops said they were in wait-and-see mode.
“Maybe they’ll demolish the house. Maybe it will be a surprise,” he said. “It’s a crazy government now. Any decision is possible.”
Netanyahu’s government, just weeks old, is the most right-wing in Israel’s history. His public security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, was weaned on the teachings of Meir Kahane, the racist rabbi assassinated in 1990, and has called for loosening rules of engagement with the Palestinians.
Ben-Gvir the lawyer represented Jewish Israelis who were accused of violence against Palestinians. In a detail that underscored the entwined fates of the two neighborhoods, one of those whose innocence he helped obtain was Haim Perlman, arrested in 2010 on suspicion of having murdered another Kheiri Al-Qam — the Neve Yaakov attacker’s grandfather. Perlman was never charged.
Ben-Gvir the provocateur with a criminal record made his name acts aimed at forcing the government rightward, accusing it of weakness. On Friday night Ben-Gvir the government minister traveled to Neve Yaakov, and now the anger, the pushback, the pleas to do something, anything were aimed at him.
Israeli security and emergency forces at the scene of a shooting attack in Neve Yaakov, Jerusalem, Jan. 27, 2023. (Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90)
“It’s on your watch!” said one man, caught on video shouting at Ben-Gvir. “Let’s see what you do now!”
The next day, Saturday, the residents chattered with one another on Neve Yaakov Boulevard trying to make sense of the night before. Neve Yaakov, a neighborhood built after Israel captured eastern Jerusalem in the 1967 Six-Day War, is surrounded by Palestinian neighborhoods and the separation wall between Jerusalem looms near.
“We live down the street so we don’t know what happened,” said Miriam Reuven, who was standing on a traffic island with her three granddaughters. “We came to get more information. I don’t feel safe here anymore.”
Some residents shooed away reporters: It was Shabbat, after all. Shimon Yisrael sought them out. He was showing a French camera crew the bullet in his ground-floor window.
“He came with a pistol to my face,” he said of Al-Qam. “I was outside, he wanted to shoot me and I went into the house and he shot at the window. He wanted to kill me.”
He knows what to do with Al-Qam’s family, which is likely to receive benefits that the Palestinian Authority gives to the families of Palestinians killed or imprisoned over their role in attacking Israelis. “Destroy their house,” Yisrael said. “Deport the whole family to Syria, to ISIS, they’ll slaughter them over there.”
In Ras Al Amud, the youths outside Al-Qam’s building said his father, Musa, is at prayers at a mosque a few doors down.
At the mosque, men were gathered in a courtyard, drinking the bitter coffee typically served at funerals. Except there is no funeral. Israeli authorities are holding Khairi Al-Qam’s body.
Musa Al-Qam whose son, Khairi, murdered seven Israelis and was killed, mourns in a mosque in Jerusalem, Jan. 28, 2023. (Orly Halpern)
Musa Al-Qam came out of the mosque to meet a reporter in the courtyard. His voice was toneless.
“Today is a wedding. It’s a celebration,” he said of his son’s death. “We don’t need to cry. Everything that happens is from God.”
Men hugged him. He stiffened.
His hands are calloused. He explained that he has worked for years in construction. He has eight children, four boys and four girls. The youngest are twins, he said, and for the first time, he smiled.
“The soldiers told me my son is a fighter,” he said. “My son is not from any movement. I don’t know what happened to his mind. The occupation kills boys before they are men.”
A few hours later, Netanyahu’s office issued a release: The security cabinet had ordered his apartment building sealed ahead of its destruction.
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Fate of Iran Peace Talks Uncertain as Deadline Approaches for End of Ceasefire
A view of Iranian-flagged cargo ship M/V Touska as the US Navy Arleigh Burke-class Aegis guided missile destroyer USS Spruance conducts its interception in a location given as the north Arabian Sea, in this screen capture from a video released April 19, 2026. Photo: CENTCOM/Handout via REUTERS
Iran is considering attending peace talks with the United States in Pakistan, a senior Iranian official told Reuters on Monday, following moves by Islamabad to end a US blockade of Iran‘s ports, a major hurdle for Tehran to rejoin peace efforts.
However, the official stressed that no decision had been made.
Adding to the uncertainty, a source told Reuters that Vice President JD Vance was still in the US, denying reports that he was already on his way to Pakistan’s capital Islamabad for talks.
With a two-week ceasefire set to expire this week, the senior Iranian official said Tehran was “positively reviewing” its participation but no final decision had been made. The comments conveyed a clear change of tone from earlier statements ruling out attendance and pledging to retaliate for US aggression.
The Iranian official said mediator Pakistan was making positive efforts to end the US blockade and ensure Iran‘s participation.
BLOCKADE POSES A PROBLEM
The ceasefire had appeared in jeopardy after the US said it had seized an Iranian cargo ship that tried to run its blockade and Tehran vowed to retaliate.
A Pakistani security source said Pakistan’s key mediator, Field Marshal Asim Munir, had told US President Donald Trump the blockade was an obstacle to talks, and that Trump had promised to consider ending it.
The US was hoping to start negotiations in Pakistan shortly before the ceasefire expires, with sweeping security preparations under way in Islamabad.
However, Iran‘s President Masoud Pezeshkian said that “unconstructive & contradictory signals from American officials carry a bitter message; they seek Iran‘s surrender.”
“Iranians do not submit to force,” he added on X.
US-IRAN CEASEFIRE SET TO EXPIRE
Trump announced the two-week ceasefire with Iran on April 7, and has not specified when precisely it ends.
A Pakistani source involved in the talks said it would expire at 8 pm ET on Wednesday, which would be midnight GMT or 3:30 am Thursday in Iran.
The US has maintained its blockade of Iranian ports, while Iran lifted and then reimposed its own blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which typically handles roughly one-fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied gas supply.
Oil prices rose around 5% as traders remained fearful that the ceasefire would collapse. Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz was at a virtual standstill with just three crossings in the space of 12 hours, according to shipping data.
US MARINES BOARD IRANIAN VESSEL
The US military said it had fired on an Iranian-flagged cargo ship headed towards Iran‘s Bandar Abbas port on Sunday after a six-hour standoff, disabling its engines. US Central Command released video showing Marines descending ropes from helicopters onto the vessel.
The vessel is likely to have been carrying what Washington deems dual-use items that could be used by the military, maritime security sources said on Monday.
Iran‘s military said the ship had been traveling from China and accused the US of “armed piracy,” according to state media. They said they were ready to confront US forces over the “blatant aggression,” but were constrained by the presence of crew members’ families on board.
China, the main buyer of Iranian crude, expressed concern over the “forced interception,” and Chinese President Xi Jinping called for ships to resume passage through the strait as normal and for the conflict to be resolved through political and diplomatic channels, state news agency Xinhua reported.
Trump warned on Sunday that the US would destroy every bridge and power plant in Iran if it rejected his terms, continuing a recent pattern of such threats.
Iran has said that if the United States were to attack its civilian infrastructure, it would strike power stations and desalination plants in its Gulf Arab neighbors.
PREPARING FOR TALKS THAT MIGHT NOT HAPPEN
Pakistan geared up to host the talks despite uncertainty over whether they would go ahead. Nearly 20,000 security personnel have been deployed across the capital Islamabad, a government official and a security official said.
The US and Israel launched strikes against Iran on Feb. 28, in part to prevent the regime from developing nuclear weapons.
Trump said on Monday he believed a nuclear deal the US is currently negotiating with Iran will be better than a 2015 international agreement to curb Tehran’s nuclear program.
“The DEAL that we are making with Iran will be FAR BETTER than the JCPOA, commonly referred to as ‘The Iran Nuclear Deal‘,” Trump wrote in a social media post.
During his first White House term, Trump in 2018 withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action agreed to by Iran, the United States and world powers, calling it “the worst deal ever.”
“I am under no pressure whatsoever, although, it will all happen, relatively quickly!” Trump added in his Truth Social post.
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The Strokes End Coachella Set With Video Montage to Denounce US, Israel Bombings in Iran, Gaza
Part of the video montage shown by The Strokes during their Coachella set on April 18, 2026. Photo: YouTube screenshot
The American rock band The Strokes ended their performance on Saturday night, during the second weekend of the Coachella music festival, by showing the audience a video montage denouncing recent bombings in the Gaza Strip by Israel and joint US-Israel military airstrikes in Iran.
Massive screens behind Coachella’s main stage displayed footage of a controlled demolition of a large building in Gaza and an accompanying caption said the structure was the “last university standing” in the enclave. The footage followed scenes of destruction in the Islamic Republic with the caption “Over 30 universities destroyed in Iran.” The video montage was not included in the band’s set during the first weekend of Coachella.
Before turning to footage from the Middle East, the montage showed images and messages that accused the CIA of being involved in overthrowing governments and assassinating leaders in foreign countries. The video mentioned the separate plane crashes in 1981 that killed Panamanian President Omar Torrijos and Ecuador’s President Jaime Rondos, as well as the overthrowing of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh in 1953, Guatemala’s President Jacob Arbenz in 1954, Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba in 1961, Chilean President Salvador Alende in 1973, and Bolivian President Juan Torres in 1976.
The video montage also promoted the conspiracy theory that the US was involved in the assassination of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. The Strokes showed his image and a caption that read: “US govt found guilty of his murder in civil trial.” The mentioned trial, King v. Jowers, took place in 1999, but in 2000, a review by the US Justice Department found no credible evidence to validate the jury’s verdict. The video also showed images of slavery in the US and Black Lives Matter protests.
The video montage was displayed as The Strokes performed their song “Oblivius” for the first time in 10 years and the second time ever in concert. As the clip played for the audience, the band’s lead singer, Julian Casablancas, kept repeating the same lyrics in the song’s chorus: “What side you standing on?”
For those not attending the set in-person, their performance was available to watch live on Coachella’s official YouTube channel. The video montage and the band’s performance of “Oblivius” was not included in the band’s Coachella weekend one performance on April 11.
The Strokes is made up of Casablancas, Nick Valensi, Albert Hammond Jr., Nikolai Fraiture, and Fabrizio Moretti. In 2021, Casablancas signed a “Musicians for Palestine” open letter that asked artists to boycot Israel and publicly express solidarity with Palestinians.
The band will begin a world tour in June, and in August, they will headline the 2026 Just Like Heaven festival in Pasadena, California. The festival is produced by Goldenvoice, which also produces Coachella.
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Trump: Israel Never Talked Me Into War With Iran
US President Donald Trump speaks about research into mental health treatments in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, April 18, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Nathan Howard
President Donald Trump said on Monday that Israel did not persuade him to attack Iran, after news reports that Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu influenced the US president’s decision and criticism from right-wing commentators.
“Israel never talked me into the war with Iran, the results of Oct. 7th, added to my lifelong opinion that IRAN CAN NEVER HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON, did,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post.
Trump also said “the results in Iran will be amazing” in the post, which came as the United States prepared to resume negotiations in Pakistan although Iran was undecided.
“And if Iran’s new leaders (Regime Change!) are smart, Iran can have a great and prosperous future!” Trump wrote.