Important Takeaways:
- Harris’ comments provided the clearest explanation yet of her views on the conflict as she works to balance the issue that has not only divided the country but caused friction within the Democratic Party.
- Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said that committing to the deal in its current form would mean “surrendering” to Hamas’ leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar. A deal would “allow Hamas to rehabilitate… abandoning most of the hostages in Hamas captivity.” Smotrich wrote on X. “Do not fall into this trap!”
- The Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir wrote on X Friday, “The war won’t be ceased, Madame candidate.”
- Following Harris’ remarks, Israeli media have been quoting a “senior Israeli official” as saying that pressure from the US vice president to reach a ceasefire and hostages deal in Gaza is counter-productive and may put at risk efforts to reach an agreement
- The October 7 attacks killed 1,200 people in Israel and saw more than 250 others taken hostage.
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Important Takeaways:
- The bodies of kindergarten teacher Maya Goren as well as the soldiers Major Ravid Aryeh Katz, Master Sergeant Oren Goldin, Staff Sergeant Tomer Ahimas and Sergeant Kiril Brodski were found during an operation in the Khan Younis area.
- The military said it had determined that Ms. Goren was murdered in captivity, while the soldiers were killed in combat on 7 October and their bodies then abducted.
- The announcement means 111 of the 251 people taken hostage are still being held in Gaza, including 39 who the military says are presumed dead.
- The Hostages and Missing Families Forum praised what it called the “crucial and decisive military action that provides their families with important closure and eternal rest for the murdered”.
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Important Takeaways:
- Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin will preside over Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s joint address to Congress on Wednesday as he faces calls to boycott the speech.
- The Maryland office of Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, urged the Maryland senator to boycott what the largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization referred to as Netanyahu’s “war criminal” address to Congress.
- “It is deeply troubling that Sen. Cardin would choose to lend legitimacy and support to a war criminal who is responsible for egregious violations of human rights and international law,” said CAIR’s Maryland Director Zainab Chaudhry.
- Netanyahu arrived Monday in Washington, D.C., where he will hold meetings with the Biden administration and will address the joint session of the House and Senate on Wednesday, as he seeks bipartisan support for Israel just days after President Joe Biden announced he would end his re-election bid.
- As Netanyahu addresses the joint Congress on Wednesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson has warned lawmakers that there will be a “zero-tolerance” policy for anyone who disrupts the speech and that law enforcement “will remove … offending visitors from the gallery and subject them to arrest.”
- On Tuesday, hundreds of members of the group Jewish Voice for Peace were arrested during a demonstration inside the Cannon House Office Building in Washington, D.C., according to the group.
- “Arrests are beginning as over 400 American Jews refuse to leave Congress, but we won’t leave until our government stops arming Israel and ends the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza!” the group wrote Tuesday in a post on X.
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Important Takeaways:
- The chaos in Washington, could sway Hamas to harden its stance in the hostage talks and give Iran that impression that now is the moment to increase military activity against Israel.
- Now, he is suddenly a lame duck president with only six months left in office, and there are calls for him to step down immediately in favor of Vice President Kamala Harris.
- This means that the issue of retrieving the hostages and forming a military coalition against Iran could almost immediately fall into her hands.
- The leadership chaos will be most acute in the next month, given that the question of Harris replacing Biden on the ticket can only be officially decided by the Democratic National Convention on August 19-22.
- This sudden potential shift in leadership comes as Biden and his administration are in the final phase of potentially closing a hostage deal.
- The problem is not just that Harris is untested on these issues, but more that Biden is now at his weakest point during a month when Israel most needs Washington to be in a strong leadership position.
- That will create difficulties with closing the hostage deal and make Israel seem more vulnerable to Iran.
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Important Takeaways:
- Senior Hezbollah Radwan force commander Ali Jaafar Maatuk was killed in a strike in southern Lebanon on Thursday, the military said.
- During the attack, other Radwan forces commanders were also killed who were responsible for launching attacks into Israel.
- The Radwan forces have been active during the exchanges of fire in the north between Israel and Hezbollah.
- Several high-ranking Radwan commanders have been targeted during the war, with the mastermind of the March 2023 Megiddo bombing being killed in February, he was also responsible for coordinating Hezbollah’s attacks in the immediate aftermath of October 7.
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Important Takeaways:
- The top U.N. court said Friday that Israel’s presence in the Palestinian occupied territories is “unlawful” and called on it to end and for settlement construction to stop immediately, issuing an unprecedented, sweeping condemnation of Israel’s rule over the lands it captured 57 years ago.
- In a non-binding opinion, the International Court of Justice pointed to a wide list of policies, including the building and expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, use of the area’s natural resources, the annexation and imposition of permanent control over lands and discriminatory policies against Palestinians, all of which it said violated international law.
- It said Israel must end settlement construction immediately and that existing settlements must be removed, according to the 83-page opinion read out by court President Nawaf Salam.
- “The Jewish people are not conquerors in their own land — not in our eternal capital Jerusalem and not in the land of our ancestors in Judea and Samaria,” Netanyahu said in a statement issued by his office, using the biblical terms for the West Bank. “No false decision in The Hague will distort this historical truth and likewise the legality of Israeli settlement in all the territories of our homeland cannot be contested.”
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Important Takeaways:
- Hezbollah has warned it will find new targets for its rocket attacks should Israeli attacks continue to “target” civilians in Lebanon.
- Noting that eight non-combatants were killed in Israeli attacks on Lebanon in recent days, Nasrallah said that more civilian bloodshed would see Hezbollah fire at new Israeli towns.
- “Continuing to target civilians will push the Resistance to launch missiles at settlements that were not previously targeted,” he said in an address to mark the largely Shia holy day Ashura.
- Israel has said it is striking Hezbollah fighters and infrastructure in Lebanon and does not target civilians.
- As the temperature rises between Israel and Hezbollah, fears are growing of an all-out war that could spark regional turmoil.
- Nasrallah on Wednesday reiterated a vow that Hezbollah would keep up the fight, insisting that Israel is on its heels after 10 months of grinding war in Gaza.
- “If your tanks come to Lebanon … you will have no tanks left,” Nasrallah said.
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Important Takeaways:
- Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, on Thursday voted overwhelmingly to reject the establishment of a Palestinian state, reflecting the deepening decline in support for a two-state solution among wider Israeli society.
- The vote could signal that Israeli lawmakers have confidence that “the next president is going to be Donald Trump,” one analyst said.
- The vote came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepares to travel to the United States to address a joint session of Congress and meet with President Joe Biden
- Israel has faced growing pressure to present a clear plan for what happens when the war comes to an end, with Israeli opposition to a two-state solution complicating paths to a viable diplomatic resolution.
- Addressing the Knesset on Wednesday, Netanyahu defended his handling of the war in Gaza, saying Israeli forces had been effective in putting Hamas “under pressure” amid negotiations for a cease-fire deal that would bring an end to fighting in Gaza and see hostages who remain held by Hamas in the enclave released.
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Important Takeaways:
- Israel is “prepared for a very intense operation,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on a visit to the Lebanese border last month
- In Lebanon, Israel would face a larger, better-armed and more-professional foe, experts warn, and the threat of an even deeper military quagmire.
- Hezbollah insists it will not lay down its arms, or consider retreating from the Israeli border, until a cease-fire is in place in the Strip.
- Israeli military leaders have been drawing up plans for a Lebanon offensive for months
- Since the start of the operation in Gaza, 326 Israeli soldiers have been killed, more than four times the toll from the 2014 war against Hamas.
- To avert a Lebanon war, Israeli officials are demanding — through U.S. and European diplomats — that Hezbollah retreat about 10 miles north of the border, past the Litani River, a military demarcation agreed upon at the end of the 2006 war.
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Important Takeaways:
- The Israeli military expanded its evacuation order to the whole of Gaza City on Wednesday after sending tens of thousands of Palestinians fleeing from several of the city’s neighborhoods earlier this week.
- It also issued a notice saying it will be suspending inspections along two roads in Gaza City, in the north of the Gaza Strip, to allow civilians to reach humanitarian zones more easily and quickly as the city “will remain a dangerous combat zone.”
- The IDF has been issuing evacuation orders affecting large parts of Gaza City since Sunday, urging 250,000 residents to head to “safe zones” further south, in Deir al-Balah and al-Zawaida.
- The IDF has said that evacuation orders are necessary so that civilians don’t get caught up in its renewed operations in areas where Hamas is seeking to re-establish a presence. The IDF insists it goes to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties.
- Hamas has said the evacuations threaten to return negotiations for a ceasefire and hostage deal to “point zero.”
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