All posts tagged: Israels

Trump confirms using foul language with Israel’s Netanyahu

Trump confirms using foul language with Israel’s Netanyahu

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump has confirmed a tense exchange with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in which he reportedly berated his close ally with expletives. In an interview published Wednesday (Jun 3) in the New York Post, Trump was asked about the conversation he had with Netanyahu over the phone on Monday. “You said, ‘Are you f-ing crazy? What are you f-ing doing? I helped you stay out of jail.’ Is that true? Did you speak to him in those terms?” the interviewer asked. “I did,” Trump responded. “I was a little bit perturbed at his constantly fighting with Lebanon.” “I said, ‘Bibi, we gotta stop this.’” Trump went on to say he had a “very good relationship” with Netanyahu. “We’ve done well together … I like Bibi a lot.” Trump unleashed the profane tirade over Israel’s threats to bomb the Lebanese capital Beirut, fearing it would undermine talks with Tehran to end the war in the Middle East, the Axios news outlet and ABC News reported. Source link

Netanyahu vows to expand Israel’s grip on Lebanon after deepest incursion in 26 years

Netanyahu vows to expand Israel’s grip on Lebanon after deepest incursion in 26 years

UNESCO, the U.N. cultural agency, said Friday ahead of the site’s capture that it was “deeply alarmed” by Israeli strikes near Beaufort Castle, which has a provisional protected status. Such sites should receive the “highest level of legal protection against attack and use for military purposes,” the body said. The crossing of the Litani River and capture of Beaufort Ridge are a major escalation in the current conflict. The river has become a de facto boundary in Lebanon since Israel’s invasion, with large areas to the south under Israeli military control and residents ordered to leave. Israeli forces had already begun striking and destroying bridges over the Litani that connect the south to the rest of the country. Israel’s military says they were being used by Hezbollah to smuggle weapons and move fighters. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot on Sunday requested an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council, a French foreign ministry spokesperson confirmed to NBC News. He told France’s BFMTV channel that “nothing can justify” the “ever-deeper occupation” of Lebanese territory. Fears …

Israel’s President, Isaac Herzog, Denounces Israeli Violence

Israel’s President, Isaac Herzog, Denounces Israeli Violence

Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog, on Sunday delivered an unusually harsh indictment of what he described as “a terrible process of brutalization” creeping into Israeli society. He cited examples of thuggery like a surge of “mob” violence by Jews against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and the abuse of detainees in Israeli custody. Mr. Herzog, whose role is largely ceremonial, was speaking at an event to award the annual Jerusalem Unity Prize at his official residence. The award was established by the families of three Israelis who were abducted and killed by Palestinians in the West Bank in 2014. “I wish I could speak today only about unity,” Mr. Herzog said before launching into a discussion of the actions taken by some Israelis that have prompted international censure and, he said, are “threatening us all.” “There are segments among us that are barely shocked by violence anymore,” Mr. Herzog said. “Certain other segments treat it lightly.” He warned that extremist and inhuman behavior is being normalized, and even celebrated, by some people on the margins …

France bans Israel’s Ben-Gvir from entry – POLITICO

France bans Israel’s Ben-Gvir from entry – POLITICO

The activists have since said they have been mistreated at the hands of Israeli soldiers, describing beatings, tasers and attack dogs. Israel has denied mistreatment, calling the allegations “false and entirely without factual basis.” With his statement, Barrot joined a growing chorus of European leaders who are calling for EU sanctions against Ben-Gvir. “Like my Italian colleague, I call on the European Union to also impose sanctions on Itamar Ben-Gvir,” Barrot said in the social media post. But Czech Foreign Minister Petr Macinka on Wednesday vowed to block sanctions on Israeli government ministers, which require unanimity among the EU’s 27 member states. Last year Ben-Gvir was sanctioned by the U.K., Canada, Australia, Norway and New Zealand over what those governments described as his repeated incitement of violence against Palestinians. Source link

Israel’s October 7 tribunal: Show trial of Palestinians or justice? | Israel-Palestine conflict News

Israel’s October 7 tribunal: Show trial of Palestinians or justice? | Israel-Palestine conflict News

Israel approved the establishment of a special military tribunal to try Palestinians accused of participating in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel earlier this month, and will give the body the power to impose the death penalty. But analysts, campaigners, and international organisations – including the United Nations – have all questioned whether there will be any real justice delivered by the tribunal, and instead consider it a way of seeking revenge on imprisoned Palestinians. Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list The impact of the October 7 attack, in which 1,139 were killed and 250 abducted, was amplified in Israel through endless repetition of videos of the attack. Al Jazeera’s own investigation unit has found that stories of atrocities committed on October 7 – some of the false – were used to justify the genocide launched on Gaza after the attack, which has so far killed more than 72,600 Palestinians. Some Israeli parliamentarians have made their positions clear on what they hope will be the result of the televised trials of an …

Israel’s Human Wrecking Ball – The Atlantic

Israel’s Human Wrecking Ball – The Atlantic

On Wednesday, after Israeli forces intercepted a protest flotilla headed to Gaza and brought the participants to an Israeli port, Itamar Ben-Gvir, the Israeli minister of national security, posted a video on social media. The short clip shows the far-right politician taunting the detainees with nationalist slogans as the handcuffed prisoners are forced to kneel. One activist shouts “Free Palestine!” and is pushed to the ground by security personnel. “This is how we receive supporters of terror,” Ben-Gvir posted. The latest provocation by Ben-Gvir proved something that many Israelis have suspected for years: Ben-Gvir is not merely a nightmare for Israeli liberals, but the fulfillment of the fantasies of Israel’s enemies. He provides them with precisely the ammunition they need to argue, time and again, that Israel, in its fight against Hamas and Hezbollah, is the aggressor, and a cruel one at that. Ben-Gvir is a gift to the terrorist groups and the countries that seek Israel’s destruction. The flotilla activists did not actually plan to “break the siege” of Gaza, as they claimed. They …

Friday briefing: ​As Israel’s coalition collapses, can its prime minister hang on to power?

Friday briefing: ​As Israel’s coalition collapses, can its prime minister hang on to power?

Good morning. On Wednesday, Israeli legislators took the first steps towards dissolving parliament and calling fresh nationwide elections. Leading leftwing Knesset member Yair Golan hailed it “the beginning of the end of the worst government in Israel’s history.” Benjamin Netanyahu has spent 20 of the last 30 years as Israel’s prime minister, the last four of which have seen him helm a far-right coalition. Under the incumbent government, settlement building in the illegally occupied West Bank has accelerated, while many international humanitarian NGOs have been banned from the Palestinian territories. Following Hamas’s killing of 1,200 Israelis on 7 October 2023, Netanyahu has orchestrated a campaign of violence in Gaza, killing or injuring more than 10% of the population, and flattening the strip in what a UN commission has declared a genocide. Netanyahu remains on trial for three counts of corruption. Much has changed since Israeli voters last went to the polls. Public support for Israel in both western Europe and the US is at its lowest ever level. Israeli public opinion, meanwhile, has shifted further …

The battle of perception: From Israel’s Fauda to Hezbollah’s FPV footage | Hezbollah

The battle of perception: From Israel’s Fauda to Hezbollah’s FPV footage | Hezbollah

The footage lasts just three minutes. An Israeli flag flies over a position in the village of al-Bayada, in occupied southern Lebanon. One drone approaches the flagpole while another observes from above. The flag falls after the impact. The final frame displays a digitally rendered, torn Israeli flag with the words: “Al-Bayada does not welcome you.” The video’s caption reads: “Flag lowering ceremony”. This is the latest video released by Hezbollah, which reflects a broader context beyond a single hillside in southern Lebanon. Journalists and observers who covered southern Lebanon in the late 1990s may recall Hezbollah’s media strategy before the Israeli withdrawal. Al-Manar TV functioned as more than a television channel; it operated as a psychological campaign in plain view. Repeated footage of Israeli soldiers screaming after being attacked with a roadside bomb, retreating, positions abandoned, and flags lowered, created the perception in the Arab world that Israel was already departing before any official decision to do so had been taken. Back then, the image pushed forward a new reality, one that played a …