Israel at war: What happened on days 42-43?

Rocket sirens sounded across northern Israeli border towns on Saturday morning after a barrage of at least 25 rockets was fired from Lebanon, the IDF confirmed.

The Israeli military said it was striking the source of the fire, as well as several Hezbollah terror positions across the border. 

Sirens also sounded in the northern city of Kiryat Shmona later on Saturday. The IDF said it responded to the rocket fire.

The IDF strikes Hezbollah terror targets in southern Lebanon on November 18, 2023 (credit: REUTERS/ALAA AL-MARJANI)

Hezbollah says it shot down Israeli drone

The Iran-backed Hezbollah said it shot down an Israeli drone near the border in the early hours of Saturday.

Lebanese officials said an Israeli airstrike hit a building in an industrial area near the town of Nabatieh, one of the deepest Israeli strikes inside Lebanese territory since fighting resumed last month. The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the incident.

Jordan's foreign minister warned on Saturday the Arab kingdom would do "whatever it takes to stop" the displacement of Palestinians, amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.

"We will never allow that to happen, in addition to it being a war crime, it would be a direct threat to our national security. We'll do whatever it takes to stop it" Ayman Safadi said at the IISS Manama Dialogue security summit in Bahrain.

The Israel-Hamas war has reawakened long-standing fears in Jordan, home to a large population of Palestinian refugees and their descendants. They fear that Israel could expel Palestinians en masse from the West Bank, where Israeli settler attacks on Palestinian inhabitants have surged since Hamas' October 7 attack.

The IDF forces operated on Friday night in Hebron as part of an extensive wave of arrests which led to the arrest of Qutaiba Omar al-Qwasma, whose brother carried out the attack on the tunnel road in Jerusalem earlier this week.

Documentation of the attack near Jerusalem was released on Friday.

In addition, a Palestinian was killed during the activity of the IDF soldiers in Tubas, according to Palestinian media.

The IDF forces operated on Friday night in Hebron as part of an extensive wave of arrests which led to the arrest of Qutaiba Omar al-Qwasma, whose brother carried out the attack on the tunnel road in Jerusalem earlier this week.

In addition, the Palestinians report that a Palestinian was killed during the activity of the IDF soldiers in Tubas.

Hours later, five terrorists were killed in Nablus in the West Bank after an air strike on the Balata refugee camp, including the camp commander.

IDF bulldozers have since entered the Batala Camp and demolishing monuments of terrorists.

This is a developing story.
 

In the span of two days, one Jewish lawmaker became the first to call on Israel to join a ceasefire, another called the Palestinian death toll “unacceptable” and a third said Israel’s conduct was a “moral failure.’

The 35 Jews in the U.S. House of Representatives and in the Senate — all but two of them Democrats — have been among the most stalwart in defending Israel since Hamas’ October 7 massacres launched the war. Last month, three Jewish lawmakers, including two progressives, spearheaded a letter from more than half of House Democrats supporting President Joe Biden’s robust backing for Israel. All 24 Jewish Democrats in the House signed it.

Now — as the war enters its sixth week, the Palestinian death toll rises and the humanitarian crisis intensifies — anguished expressions of dissent from Reps. Becca Balint of Vermont and Dean Phillips of Minnesota, and Sen. Jon Ossoff of Georgia, suggest that wall of support might be crumbling.

Phillips, Ossoff and Balint each said that the massacres Hamas carried out, killing 1,200 people and taking more than 200 captive, recalled the horrors of the Holocaust. “These events call to mind the Einsatzgruppen SS, the Nazi death squads who hunted and massacred our relatives across Eastern Europe 80 years ago,” Ossoff said on the Senate floor.

But they said they have been haunted by the subsequent carnage, in which the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry has said that more than 11,000 Palestinians have died, including thousands of children. It’s not known how many among that number are combatants, and how many among the dead were victims of misfired rockets aimed at Israel.

Rockets are fired from Gaza towards Israel, on October 16 2023 (credit: ABED RAHIM KHATIB/FLASH90)

On Thursday, Balint became the first Jewish member of Congress to endorse a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war.

“What is needed right now is an immediate break in violence to allow for a true negotiated ceasefire,” she said in an op-ed for VTigger, a Vermont news site. “One in which both sides stop the bloodshed, allow critical access to humanitarian aid and move towards negotiating a sustainable and lasting peace.”

Israel opponents seize the opportunity

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat who is a leader of the “Squad,” the most left-wing faction in the House, immediately seized upon Balint’s support, noting her Jewish identity.

“Rep. Becca Balint is now the first Jewish member of Congress to come out in favor of a ceasefire in Gaza,” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted. “She is incredibly brave, taking a stance rooted in her commitment to human rights and protection of the innocent.”

Balint’s appeal differs in some ways from the ceasefire promotion that Ocasio-Cortez champions, in two substantive ways: Ocasio-Cortez this week spearheaded a letter to Biden urging him to press Israel into a ceasefire. Balint’s appeal was to Israel, and not to Biden to exert pressure on Israel.

Balint also said in her op-ed that a condition of a ceasefire must be the removal of Hamas from power — which is Israel’s objective in the war.

“A lasting bilateral cease-fire can only work if Hamas does not continue to rule in Gaza,” she wrote. “Hamas is a terrorist organization, and its stated goal is to annihilate the state of Israel. It can’t remain in power in Gaza.”

Ocasio-Cortez’s letter, which got 24 signatures, makes no such condition.

Later in the day, Ossoff took to the Senate floor to excoriate Israel’s conduct. He did not call for a ceasefire — he said Israel must pursue Hamas. But he was unstinting in his criticism of Israel’s conduct of the war and its resistance to Biden Administration pleas to allow in humanitarian assistance.

“The extent of civilian death and suffering in Gaza is unnecessary,” he said. “It is a moral failure and it should be unacceptable to the United States.”

Ossoff was especially galled that Israel seemed to be rebuffing Biden administration appeals to allow in relief and to curb violence by a group of Israeli West Bank settlers who have seized the moment to attack Palestinian communities.

“Requests by the United States that the Israeli leadership conduct a more targeted campaign, that they permit and provide a safe passage for aid essential to the sustenance of innocent life, that they clearly define objectives, that they prevent extrajudicial killings by extremists in the West Bank, that they present a credible plan for Gaza’s future governance have mostly been ignored,” Ossoff said.

He raised the specter of conditioning U.S. defense assistance to Israel on its compliance. “I do not accept that the total deprivation of millions of innocent civilians is necessary for Israel to secure its objectives or in the national interest of the United States, and where the United States is committing arms funds and support to those efforts, we must guard our principles and our interests,” he said.

On Friday, Phillips, who is mounting a long-shot primary challenge to Biden and is known for his moderate positions, released a statement outlining his vision for a way out of the war that did not spare Israel or its leadership. He too called on Israel to dismantle Hamas’ fighting capacity.

“Israel has every right and expectation to target Hamas terrorists and dismantle their capability of destroying the state of Israel,” he said. “But that response has taken an unacceptable toll on Palestinians, many of whom are subject to Hamas terror — not supporters of it.”

He took aim in particular at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who he said had “exacerbated” policies of “repression and illegal settlement on Palestinian lands.” He said Israelis should hold elections soon. Netanyahu also has low approval ratings within Israel.

Phillips presented a five-point plan to create a “future of peace.” The document was notable considering Phillips has been a leader in Congress in terms of calling out fellow Democrats for Israel criticism that he believed was antisemitic.

Until now the only Jewish Democrat forcefully criticizing Israel’s response has been Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, the unofficial leader of congressional progressives. But he has refused to call for a ceasefire and has distanced himself from fellow progressive who do.

The shifts by Jewish lawmakers comes amid accelerating volleys of sentiment by people in and close to the U.S. government. Hundreds of Biden administration staffers have signed statements criticizing the administration’s handling of the Israel-Hamas war and calling for Biden to do more to support the Palestinians, the New York Times reported this week.

Also this week, more than 100 former staffers for Barack Obama issued a letter praising Biden’s “moral clarity” for backing Israel and endorsing his request for a $14 billion emergency assistance package to Israel.

The Dutch immigration service announced on Saturday that it will speed up the procedures for emigrating Palestinians with relatives in the Netherlands on the basis of family reunification, in order to help them leave the Strip as easily as possible.

In total, 10 emergency procedures were introduced involving several dozen people - mainly spouses and young children of Palestinians already living in the Netherlands.

The Dutch immigration authority clarified its decision and said that receiving a residency permit would not necessarily mean that people would be able to leave Gaza anyway due to the war.

Brunei, Indonesia and Malaysia on Saturday called for an immediate, durable and sustained humanitarian truce leading to cessation of hostilities in the Gaza Strip.

The countries said they were issuing their statement to give a better and fair reflection of the discussions on the Gaza situation during a meeting of leaders from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC).

About 26 Palestinians, mostly children, were killed in an Israeli bombardment of Khan Yunis city in south Gaza early on Saturday, the Palestinian news agency WAFA said.

A UN press release from November 16 has called for the international community to exert maximum pressure on Israel to end the fighting in Gaza and stated that the situation in the Strip points “to a genocide in the making.”

Quoting from a team of experts assembled to produce the report they state “Many of us already raised the alarm about the risk of genocide in Gaza. We are deeply disturbed by the failure of governments to heed our call and to achieve an immediate ceasefire. 

We are also profoundly concerned about the support of certain governments for Israel's strategy of warfare against the besieged population of Gaza, and the failure of the international system to mobilize to prevent genocide.”

According to the report, half of all civilian infrastructure in Gaza has been destroyed as a result of Israel’s bombing campaign aimed to oust the Hamas terrorist group from power and ultimately destroy them.

People gather in front of the United Nations Headquarters in Jerusalem demanding for action to be taken to return the hostages kidnapped by Hamas during the October 7 attacks, in Jerusalem November 13, 2023. (credit: REUTERS/AMMAR AWAD)

Israel has been occupying Gaza, UN says

The report also stated their estimation that Israel has functioned as an occupying power, even within the Gaza Strip, “Israel remains the occupying power in the occupied Palestinian territory, which also includes the Gaza Strip, and therefore cannot wage a war against the population under its belligerent occupation,” they said.

The press release concluded with a series of demands made by the experts, chiefly an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip but including the release of Palestinian prisoners and the invitation of UN forces into the West Bank and Gaza.

In a recent thread on X, Elon Musk discussed how phrases such as "From the river to the sea" and calls for "decolonization" of Israel are euphemisms for genocide and would lead to suspensions.

Musk, the owner of X, has been in hot water recently due to a series of comments called antisemitic by various organizations, including the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the White House.

As I said earlier this week, “decolonization”, “from the river to the sea” and similar euphemisms necessarily imply genocide.

Clear calls for extreme violence are against our terms of service and will result in suspension. https://t.co/1fCFo5Lezb

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 17, 2023

The comment stated "You have said the actual truth" in response to someone on X saying "Jewish communties [SIC] have been pushing the exact kind of dialectical hatred against whites that they claim to want people to stop using against them."

Many organizations and companies responded by suspending their advertising with X, either due to these comments or due to their adverts appearing alongside antisemitic content, including the likes of IBM, Lions Gate Entertainment, and Apple.

ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt (left) and X CEO Elon Musk (right). (credit: GAGE SKIDMORE, GONZALO FUENTES / REUTERS)

Musk has been in an ongoing feud with both Jonathan Greenblatt and the ADL for several months.

He has accused them of being "ironically the biggest generators of anti-Semitism on this platform!"

He would later announce that X Corp would be suing the ADL for defamation over its comments about antisemitism on X.

A free speech absolutist?

Musk has long touted his "free speech absolutist" credentials, when he bought Twitter and renamed it X, he claimed that free speech would be a core principle of his while running X.

In his post announcing that certain phrases will lead to suspensions, some commenters asked how banning these phrases matches up with his commitment to "free speech" on the platform.

Musk responded by saying "I am sticking to my principles!"

Followed by "As for any fake advocacy groups who seek to suppress free speech, they should remember that karma is real."