For the second time in two weeks, a terrorist has driven a car into a crowd of civilians in Jerusalem.
Security sources say that Ibrahim al-Acri, an Arab man with connections to Hamas, drove a car into four people at a light rail station in eastern Jerusalem. He then drove a quarter mile further to strike ten more people before crashing his vehicle.
He leapt from his car with an iron rod to attack people but fled when police arrived. He was shot as he attempted to avoid police.
Rescue workers on the scene say at least one of the victims at Shimon HaTsadik light rail station is dead.
Hamas claimed credit for the attack according to a statement obtained by USA Radio News.
“We call on the people of Jerusalem and the West Bank and all of the Palestinians to carry out more of these activities with full force in order to defend al-Aska,” said the Hamas statement.
The leader of Boko Haram, who the Nigerian government claimed to have killed, has appeared in a new video that was posted to the social media site YouTube.
“Here I am, alive. I will only die the day Allah takes my breath,” Abubakar Shekau says in the video. “Nothing will kill me until my days are over. … I’m still alive. Some people asked you if Shekau has two souls. No, I have one soul, by Allah.”
The video showed Shekau in the back of a pickup truck where he says they are running their Islamic caliphate. The video also showed them killing a man accused of adultery and lashing a woman for having sex outside of marriage.
Boko Haram also confirmed their alignment with ISIS, essentially spreading the terrorist group from the Middle East into Africa.
The executive director of the Christian Association of Nigerian-Americans says that President Obama needs to stop focusing only on ISIS and realize that Islamic terrorism is spreading throughout the world.
“Obama will need to include other terrorist groups like Boko Haram, Hamas and Hezbollah,” Pastor Laolu Akande said.
In their first meeting since the 50-day Israel-Hamas war, President Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu struck a cordial tone.
Netanyahu praised President Obama for his commitment to destroy the Islamic terrorist group ISIS and his willingness to stand with Israel against Islamic terror. Obama said that Israel was dealing with a “turbulent neighborhood.”
Obama said there needs to be new and different efforts to end violence in the region.
“We have to find ways to change the status quo so that both Israeli citizens are safe … but also that we don’t have the tragedy of Palestinian children being killed as well,” Obama said.
Netanyahu also took time to praise Obama and the U.S. Congress for their support of more funding for the Iron Dome rocket defense system. The PM said the system saved “so many lives” during the conflict with Hamas.
However, the PM took a more aggressive tone when he said that further steps need to be taken to keep Iran from becoming a nuclear power.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called out the hypocrisy of world leaders in condemning and attacking the Islamic terrorist group ISIS while not seeing the similarities between ISIS and Hamas.
Netanyahu spoke to the general assembly of the United Nations on Monday.
“Last week, many of the countries represented here rightly applauded President Obama for leading the effort to confront ISIS, and yet weeks before, some of these same countries, the same countries that now support confronting ISIS, opposed Israel for confronting Hamas. They evidently don’t understand that ISIS and Hamas are branches of the same poisonous tree,” Netanyahu said.
Netanyahu laid out the similarities between the groups including their expressed desire to destroy the nation of Israel.
“As Hamas’ charter makes clear, Hamas’ immediate goal is to destroy Israel, but Hamas has a broader objective. They also want a caliphate. Hamas shares the global ambitions of its fellow militant Islamists, and that’s why its supporters wildly cheered in the streets of Gaza as thousands of Americans were murdered in 9/11, and that’s why its leaders condemn the United States for killing Osama bin Laden whom they praised as a holy warrior,’ Netanyahu explained.
Netanyahu said that ISIS must be destroyed and that Israel will back the effort to eliminate the extremist group.
In what is likely an attempt to strengthen their hand before talks with Israel in October, Islamic groups in the Gaza strip have agreed to allow a unity government to take control of the region.
The ceasefire that had been struck in August between Israel and Hamas called for the Palestinian Authority to take over as civil administration for the region. The deal with Hamas and Fatah announced today in Cairo calls for the unity government to take over immediately.
The deal was brokered by Egyptian intelligence services.
“All civil servants will be paid by the unity government because they are all Palestinians and it is the government of all Palestinians,” said Azzam Ahmed of Fatah on Thursday.
The groups reportedly have agreed to eliminate “all the obstacles” to a national unity government. They will also negotiate with the UN and Israel over border crossing access.
However, in what might be a blow to potential talks, the leaders of the unity government said they want Israel tried for war crimes.
The Islamic terrorist group ISIS announced plans to attack Israel and eventually the U.S. in a magazine they produced called “Dabiq”.
The terrorists say the conflict with Hamas has made Israel a target for their campaign of violence.
“As for the massacres taking place in Gaza against the Muslim men, women and children, the Islamic State will do everything within its means to continue striking down every apostate who stands as an obstacle on its path toward Palestine,” one article states. “Our actions speak louder than its words and it is only a matter of time and patience before it reaches Palestine to fight the barbaric Jews and kill those of them hiding behind the gharqad trees — the trees of the Jews.”
The magazine was named for a town where the terrorists believe Muslims and Westerners will fight before the apocalypse.
The magazine ends with the group telling their followers that they wlll eventually conquer the entire Arabian Peninsula, Rome and then will defeat the anti-Christ.
“ISIS’s tactics span all media, with devoted Twitter accounts and YouTube channels, including ones that showed the horrifying — and slickly shot — execution of photojournalist James Foley,” Josh Kovensky of the New Republic writes. “… much of Dabiq’s content focuses on a coming apocalypse, while pulling out the same glossy stops that one would expect from an American magazine.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel will step up and be a part of the international coalition to destroy the Islamic terrorist group Islamic State.
Netanyahu addressed the statements of President Obama in an address where he also warned Iran against acquiring nuclear weapons. Netanyahu said that Islamic State is no different than terror groups like Hamas, al-Qaeda, Boko Haram and al-Shabab.
“These groups must be fought. They must be rolled back and they must ultimately be defeated. That’s why Israel fully supports President Obama’s call for united actions against ISIS,” Netanyahu said.
“All civilized countries should stand together in the fight against the radical terrorism currently sweeping the Middle East, Netanyahu added. “And we are playing our part in this continued effort. Some of the things are known; some of the things are less known.”
Netanyahu said to the Muslims around the world they need to realize that Israel is an ally against Islamic extremism and that perhaps some Arab nations need to re-evaluate their relationships with Israel.
“They understand Israel is not their enemy but their ally in the fight against this common enemy. I believe that presents an opportunity for cooperation and perhaps an opportunity for peace.”
The Israeli Military Advocate General Corps announced investigations into five incidents connected to the 50-day battle between Israel and the terrorist group Hamas.
The most high profile of the cases involves the airstrike on a beach that resulted in the deaths of four Palestinian children. However, the IDF said none of the situations is being investigated under the guise of a “war crime.”
The MAG Corps speed at launching investigations is seen as a response to actions after the 2008-2009 Operation Cast Lead in Gaza that had some incidents left without investigation years later.
The beach investigation will look into accusations from reporters that no Hamas military targets were in the area of the beach at the time of the air strikes. The strike took place near a hotel where foreign journalists had been staying and they observed the air strike.
An investigation that has already taken place regarding an Israeli rocket that struck a UN school has shown that while one Israeli rocket hit the school, no injuries were caused to anyone by the strike. Hamas had claimed children were injured as a result of the strike.
Senior officials with the Israeli Defense Force has admitted to the Times of Israel that they underestimated the tenacity of Hamas and that they did not expect the conflict to last long.
“If you’d asked me two months ago, I wouldn’t assess that it’s going to take us 50 days,” the unnamed official said. “We thought it’s going to take them a shorter time to understand what happened, and we are mistaken here. It’s a tactical assessment mistake, but it’s a mistake.”
The official who demanded anonymity said that Hamas also had surprised the IDF with the power of their forces.
“They were in pretty good shape and pretty well trained,” he said, referring to amphibious commando-style raids.
“You can see for sure they were trained outside of the Gaza Strip,” he said. He also said that nothing surprised them militarily and that right now they’re believed to be in very bad shape.
The truce on August 26th continues to hold.
Israel’s Channel 2 is reporting that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu drew a line before the start of Operation Protective Edge regarding the release of prisoners in peace deals with the terrorist group Hamas or anyone negotiating on their behalf.
Netanyahu said anyone convicted of terrorist acts would not be eligible for release from prison in any negotiation.
Netanyahu’s reasoning said despite the public statements by Palestinian leaders condemning the killing of three kidnapped Israeli teens, the celebratory welcome given to terrorists released as part of a previous peace deal conflict with the words.
The edict of the Prime Minister is expected to make peace negotiations more difficult over the next few months. Prisoner releases along with a freeze on construction of Israeli settlements in the West Bank were demands of Palestinians for peace talks.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas reportedly is going to seek approval from the Arab League to offer a nine-month negotiation process to create a Palestinian state.
