Weekly roundup of world briefs

Jewish leaders in Virginia oppose Kaine’s call to stop weapon transfers to Israel

(JNS) — Concern expressed by Tim Kaine (D-Va.) that certain U.S.-supplied arms sent to Israel could kill Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, and Judea and Samaria, prompted pushback from the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington.

Kaine released a statement last week about his intent to stop five out of 100 weapon transfers to Israel.

“Since February, I have called on the Biden administration to support Israel through the provision of defensive weapons, such as those used to defeat the Iranian drone and missile attacks in April,” Kaine explained. “But I have also urged a pause in the transfer of any offensive weapons because of the serious harm they will likely cause to Palestinian civilians in Gaza and in the West Bank.”

Kaine said he believed that “the U.S. transferring more offensive weapons into the region right now will be an accelerant to ongoing hostilities, jeopardizing the prospects for a ceasefire and hostage release deal in Gaza.” He said he would “vote to oppose transfers of weapons that are primarily offensive in nature.”

On Monday, Ron Halber, CEO of the JCRC, and Vicki Fishman, the group’s director of Virginia government and community relations, released a statement responding to Kaine’s plan. As governor and senator, he has been “an ally of Israel and the Jewish community in Virginia,” the JCRC officials wrote. “We are therefore disappointed that he would imperil Israel’s security by limiting its military capabilities when it faces unprovoked attacks on multiple fronts.”

Halber and Fishman called for Kaine to “rescind his support for misguided resolutions that would weaken Israel and strengthen its terrorist enemies, who also are America’s enemies.” They warned that should the senator’s plan move forward “Israel’s enemies would be further emboldened to strike Israel with impunity.”

IDF kills Palestinian who lynched soldiers near Ramallah in 2000

(JNS) — An Israel Defense Forces strike in the Gaza Strip on Thursday killed Aziz Salha, who gained global notoriety for video of him lynching two Israeli soldiers in Ramallah’s twin city of el-Bireh on Oct. 12, 2000.

The images of Salha standing at a window in the Palestinian Authority’s el-Bireh police station, waving his blood-soaked hands in front of a Palestinian mob during the early days of the Second Intifada, became etched into the collective Israeli psyche, and for many remains a direct consequence of the Oslo Accords.

IDF Cpl. (res.) Vadim Norzhic, 33, a truckdriver from Or Akiva who had made aliyah from Irkutsk 10 years earlier, and Sgt. First Class (res.) Yosef Avrahami, 38, a toy salesman from Petach Tikvah, were pulled from their vehicle and beaten and stabbed to death, and then mutilated, after accidentally entering the Palestinian Authority-controlled city of Ramallah, located in the Judaean Mountains some 10 km. north of Jerusalem.

Salha, 43, was arrested a year later but was among the 1,027 Palestinian terrorists released from Israeli jails as part of the 2011 deal to free IDF soldier Gilad Shalit from Hamas captivity in Gaza.

Salha was targeted in an airstrike in central Gaza’s Deir al-Balah, the military said.

“In recent years he was involved in directing terrorist activity in Judea and Samaria and continued to engage in terrorist activity even in these past days,” the IDF said.

IDF kills Hamas commander in Samaria’s Tulkarem

(JNS) — An Israeli Air Force fighter jet conducted a rare strike in Tulkarem in northwestern Samaria 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.

Anti-Israel protester sets himself on fire outside White House

By Mike Wagenheim

(JNS) — A man attempted to self-immolate, lighting his left arm on fire outside the White House on Saturday during an anti-Israel protest.

The man, who identified himself as a journalist, was seen in video taken at the scene holding his arm in the air, engulfed in flames. Several members of the crowd tossed water on his arm and tried to put the flames out with towels, as the man screamed.

The sleeve of his shirt appeared to be burned off, with burn marks visible on his left arm in the video.

Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police Department officers restrained the man, and rescue services transported him to a local hospital with nonlife-threatening injuries, according to police.

The man reportedly screamed at one point that “we spread the misinformation,” and later that “I’m a journalist, and I said it was OK.”

The man’s identity has not yet been confirmed publicly. An Arizona man with a similar photo has social media pages loaded with content on the Israel-Hamas war and posted that he would be at the White House protest on Saturday to give a speech. That individual also identifies as a journalist.

The incident took place at about 5:45 p.m. along the 800 block of 16th Street, close to the White House, where activists—some supporting Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre—gathered in protest ahead of the one-year anniversary of the attack.

The man on Saturday became the third known to have lit himself on fire, purportedly in protest of Israel’s military operations in Gaza.

Aaron Bushnell, a 25-year-old U.S. Air Force serviceman, died of his wounds following his actions outside the Israeli embassy in Washington in late February.

Last month, a man identified in news reports as 45-year-old Matt Nelson died four days after lighting himself on fire across the street from the Israeli consulate in Boston.

Germany experiencing ‘tsunami of antisemitism’

(JNS) — Germany has experienced a “tsunami of anti-Semitism” since Hamas’s Oct. 7 onslaught, while the anniversary of the atrocities in southern Israel could be a “trigger event” for civil unrest, two German officials said on Friday in separate statements.

Felix Klein, the first holder of the office of Federal Government Commissioner for Jewish Life in Germany and the Fight against Antisemitism, voiced stark warnings over the increase in anti-Semitism worldwide.

Speaking to AFP, he said that both in Germany and elsewhere the Hamas attack had led to “further breaches in the existing defenses in our society.”

He cited crime statistics in 2023, pointing to about 5,000 anti-Semitic incidents in Germany of which “half were committed after Oct. 7.”

Klein noted that the rise in anti-Semitism consisted of “classic German” right-wing elements, along with left-wing and Islamist elements who form alliances around this issue.

Meanwhile, head of Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution Thomas Haldenwang warned that the anniversary of the Oct. 7 attack could serve as “great potential for emotionalization, polarization and radicalization,” AFP reported.

“The potential danger of possible terrorist attacks against Jewish and Israeli individuals and institutions, as well as against ‘the West’ as a whole, has increased significantly in the past six months,” he went on to say.

“Islamists have understood how to use the current Middle East crisis to revitalize their propaganda and mobilize their followers,” he noted, pointing to the lethal stabbing in the city of Solingen last month.

The Islamic State group is “using its propaganda to use the situation in Gaza to create emotions and encourage young Muslims in the West in particular to carry out terrorist attacks,” Haldenwang added.

A number of large pro-Palestinian demonstrations are scheduled to take place on Monday across Germany, the report added.

Berlin’s police spokesperson warned that “we are looking at the coming days with great concern” after witnessing “hatred, anti-Semitism and violent excesses” by some pro-Palestinian activists.

On average, about 33 anti-Semitic incidents occurred per day in Germany from Oct. 7 until the end of the year, compared to a little more than seven daily from Jan. 1 to Oct. 7, 2023, according to the new data, released on Tuesday by the Bundesverband RIAS, which is funded by the German state.

Two-thirds of the instances that involved “extreme violence, assaults and threats” also took place after Oct. 7, per the study.

“The unprecedented rise in antisemitic incidents must be understood as a wake-up call,” stated Benjamin Steinitz, managing director of the Bundesverband RIAS. “The state has the responsibility to ensure that Jews can safely participate in civic life.”

Trump: Israel should attack Iranian nuclear facilities

(Israel Hayom via JNS) — Israel should attack Iran’s nuclear facilities, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said during a campaign rally in North Carolina on Friday.

“That’s the first thing you want to hit. The answer should be: Hit the nuclear first, worry about the rest later,” said the former president in response to President Joe Biden’s statement on Wednesday that he does not support striking Iran’s nuclear facilities.

These remarks came after a senior U.S. State Department official told CNN that Israel had not provided any guarantees that a strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, in response to the Iranian missile attacks on Israel, was off the table.

“We hope and expect to see some wisdom as well as strength,” said the official regarding the possibility of an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear sites, adding, “but as you know, no guarantees.”

On Wednesday, Biden stated that he plans to impose sanctions on Tehran and noted that he does not support striking the nuclear facilities. In addition, Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell told Reuters that not only is Israel considering responding to Iran’s attack, but so is the U.S.

On Friday, Biden said that Israel should consider alternative targets rather than attacking Iranian oil fields.

Israeli hostage Idan Shtivi declared dead

(JNS) — Israeli hostage Idan Shtivi was murdered during the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, 2023, and his body was taken to Gaza, Channel 12 reported on Monday, the first anniversary of the massacre.

Shtivi, 28, was murdered by terrorist infiltrators along with his friends while they were attempting to escape from the Nova music festival near Kibbutz Re’im in southern Israel.

He was considered missing until early January when his family officially learned he was abducted. On Monday morning, they were informed of his death.

A total of 1,200 people were killed in the attack, thousands more wounded and 251 kidnapped to Gaza, with 101 still held captive, including 97 from Oct. 7.

IDF releases previously unseen footage of Oct. 7 fighting

(JNS) — The Israel Defense Forces released previously unseen video footage of the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks, ahead of the one-year anniversary of Hamas’s cross-border terrorist massacre in the northwestern Negev.

One video clip shows members of the IDF’s elite Multi-Dimensional Unit operating in Kibbutz Re’im on the morning of Oct. 7. The kibbutz was one of the first communities attacked by Hamas terrorists that day, and IDF and police forces battled the gunmen for some 13 hours in the area.

During the confrontation with dozens of terrorists who infiltrated Re’im, the commander of the Multi-Dimensional Unit, Col. Roy Joseph Levy, 44, was killed, along with another officer, Cpt. Yotam Ben Bassat, 24.

A second video released by the IDF on Sunday shows the battle at the police station in the southern city of Sderot after Hamas took control of the area, killing dozens of people including police officers and civilians.

Sderot was one of the hardest-hit cities during the Oct. 7 massacre and was only liberated after many hours of fighting. Bulldozers were used to bring the police station down on top of the terrorists remaining inside.

The footage was filmed from the tank of the then-commander of the 401st Armored Brigade, Col. Benny Aharon, who fought a “persistent battle” against the approximately 10 Hamas terrorists holed up inside.

The death toll among IDF troops stands at 728 on all fronts since Oct. 7, 2023, and at 347 since the start of the Gaza ground incursion on Oct. 27.

Eighty percent of Gaza fatalities are Hamas or family members

By JNS Staff

(JNS) — Hamas is privately admitting that 80 percent of the Palestinians killed during the year-long war in Gaza are Hamas members or their families, Israel’s Channel 12 reported on Sunday.

The report comes as most of the international media continue to use unverified Hamas casualty figures, which do not differentiate between combatants and civilians and which statisticians have previously called into question.

According to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry, more than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed in the war, which was sparked by the terrorist group’s Oct. 7 massacre one year ago today.

Israel has previously estimated that 17,000 combatants have been killed in Gaza.  

A report issued by the United Nations last month using the unverified Gaza Health Ministry data concluded that 51.3 percent of the total fatalities in Gaza were women and children.

Earlier this year, a statistics expert said the Hamas claim that 70 percent of the casualties were women and children was “statistically impossible” and “not reliable at all.”

Macron, Netanyahu agree to disagree in conciliatory talk

(JNS) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and French President Emmanuel Macron spoke on the phone Monday, after exchanging direct and indirect criticisms in connection with the war between Israel and terrorists in Gaza and Lebanon.

Neither the French president, who last week called for a partial arms embargo on Israel, nor the Israeli prime minister, who called Macron’s statement shameful, backed down from their positions or apologized, according to statements by the offices of both leaders.

Macron and Netanyahu “acknowledged their different viewpoints,” as well as their “desire to be well understood by each other,” a statement by the French president’s office read. Macron called for a ceasefire on all fronts.

The French president’s office on Saturday called Netanyahu’s criticism “excessive.” 

Netanyahu’s office said of the call that he “repeated Israel’s positions, that as Iran supports all components of the Iranian terror axis, so are Israel’s friends expected to stand by it and not impose limitations that would only strengthen the Iranian evil axis.”

Macron and Netanyahu have agreed to speak about a future visit by Macron.

Separately, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot is in Israel to attend commemorations of the one-year anniversary of the Oct. 7 massacres. His visit began at the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum in Jerusalem.

Soldier killed on Lebanon border, bringing IDF toll since last Oct. 7 to 728

(JNS) — An Israel Defense Forces soldier was killed while battling Hezbollah terrorists along the border with Lebanon, the military announced on Monday morning.

The slain soldier was named as Master Sgt. (res.) Etay Azulay, 25, of the IDF’s elite Unit 5515, from Oranit.

Two other soldiers were seriously injured in the incident.

On Sunday, the military announced the death of a soldier wounded some four months ago during counter-terror operations in northern Gaza.

Sgt. First Class (res.) Nir Haddad, 28, from Petach Tikvah, served in the 8th Armored Brigade when he was wounded on June 15.

Also on Sunday, three IDF troops, including an officer of the Givati Brigade’s Shaked Battalion, were seriously wounded during fighting in the northern Strip, the military said.

The death toll among Israeli troops since the start of the Gaza ground incursion on Oct. 27 now stands at 347, and at 728 on all fronts since the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, terror massacre, according to official military data.