Gadi Haggai, 73, a dual U.S.-Israeli citizen who was confirmed dead on Dec. 22, 2023, having been killed by Hamas terrorists. Source:  YouTube/CBS News.
  • Words count:
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Headline
Gadi Haggai, 73, is first US citizen confirmed killed by Hamas as a hostage
Intro
The terror organization continues to hold Haggai’s body, and his wife reportedly also remains a Hamas hostage.
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An Israeli-American is the first U.S. citizen taken hostage who has died in Hamas captivity in Gaza, a group representing the families of Hamas prisoners announced on Friday.

Gadi Haggai, 73, a U.S.-Israeli dual national, was on a walk with his wife Judi Weinstein, 70, near Kibbutz Nir Oz when Hamas began its attack on the morning of Oct. 7. Weinstein was able to call a member of the kibbutz to tell them that she and her husband had been shot, and the two were presumed to be held hostage in Gaza.

The Hostages and Missing Persons Families Forum has now announced, however, that Haggai was killed on Oct. 7 and his body taken into Gaza. His wife, who is also a Canadian citizen, is thought to still be alive and a hostage of the terrorist group.

Haggai is the first American hostage to have been killed during the conflict.

“It remains unclear how officials were able to determine he had died in captivity, as Hamas officials do not comment on the death reports,” per the New York Post.

“Haggai, a retired chef and jazz musician, was a father of four and grandfather of seven,” wrote the UJA Federation of Greater Toronto. “His wife, Canadian citizen Judith Weinstein, remains in captivity.”

“Both Gadi and Judith considered themselves pacifists and were committed peace activists. Hamas of course couldn’t care less. Those animals are still holding the body of Gadi and Judith as hostage,” wrote Arsen Ostrovsky, CEO of the International Legal Forum.

“Instead of doing everything to demand Judith’s release, Canada is too busy lecturing Israel, while receiving thanks by Hamas for voting for U.N. ceasefire resolutions that don’t even mention the terror group,” Ostrovsky added.

Will Ripley, senior international correspondent at CNN, got emotional reporting the news: “73-years-old. That’s the same age as my parents,” he said. “Can’t imagine what the families have been going through.”

The White House and U.S. State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Neither put out a statement initially, nor did four accounts on X associated with U.S. President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, nor those of First Lady Jill Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, the U.S. State Department and Matthew Miller, the department spokesman.

Some nine or 10 hours after the news was first reported, the White House released a statement from Biden.

"Jill and I are heartbroken by the news that American Gad Haggai is now believed to have been killed by Hamas on Oct. 7. We continue to pray for the well-being and safe return of his wife, Judy," the president said.

"Their daughter joined by phone my meeting with the families of hostages last week. Those families bravely shared with me the harrowing ordeal that they have endured over the past months as they await news of their loved ones. It’s intolerable," Biden added. "Today, we are praying for their four children, seven grandchildren and other loved ones and are grieving this tragic news with them." 

"I reaffirm the pledge we have made to all the families of those still held hostage: We will not stop working to bring them home," he added.

"It’s been 76 days since Iran-backed Hamas terrorists took hundreds hostage, including Americans. And today, we learned of the heartbreaking death of 73-year-old Israeli-American hostage Gadi Haggai," wrote Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.). "We can’t let this continue. We must bring them all home."

"Another American killed by the Hamas’s Oct. 7 terrorist attack," added Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.).

"Gadi Haggai, 73, was murdered by Hamas while being held hostage. Haggai was a retired chef and jazz musician, the father of four and the grandfather of seven. He and his wife were kidnapped by Hamas on Oct. 7 while on their morning walk," wrote Ted Deutch, CEO of the American Jewish Committee.

"Murdering and kidnapping innocent elderly civilians. Hamas is an enemy of humanity," he said. "May Gadi Haggai's memory be a blessing."

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  • Words count:
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    June 23, 2025

Echoing United Nations claims, the European Union accused Israel of committing "indiscriminate attacks ... starvation ... torture ... [and] apartheid" against Palestinians in Gaza, a review leaked on Monday shows.

The eight-page document dated June 20, which Israel has dismissed as factually incorrect and morally flawed, holds that "there are indications that Israel would be in breach of its human rights obligations" in the 25-year-old EU-Israel Association Agreement.

Dissolution of the Association Agreement, which regulates trade and cooperation between the bloc and the Jewish state, could cost Israel more than $1 billion a year that it now receives in trade concessions, according to the EU Observer site, which first published the review document.

Spain's Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares told reporters on Monday that he would ask the European Union Council to approve an immediate suspension of the Association Agreement.

Spain, under its Socialist government, is one of the most hostile E.U. member states to Israel. It has accused Israel of genocide and imposed a blanket arms embargo, and its prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, last month called Israel a “genocidal country.”

The leaked E.U. paper is not binding. Israel has allies in Hungary, the Czech Republic, Germany and Austria, among others, in the E.U., which would need a consensus to alter the Association Agreement.

The leaked review is described as a "note" meant to "contribute to the ongoing review" of E.U.-Israel relations.

The text acknowledged the existence of violence by the Hamas terrorist group, but said this lay outside the scope of the document.

The report follows Brussels' decision to look into Israel's trade pact obligation last month, a review initiated by the Netherlands and led by E.U. foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, after a majority of member states called for a formal investigation.

Israel's food blockade meant "half a million people (one in five)" in Gaza were "facing starvation," the Kallas report said. "The blockade and siege of Gaza by Israel amounts to collective punishment ... and may also amount to the use of starvation as a method of war," it added.

An estimated 6,000 Hamas-led terrorists invaded Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, murdering some 1,200 people and abducting another 251. Israel launched a military campaign to dismantle Hamas and recover the hostages, which triggered an escalation and military confrontation between Israel and other Iranian proxies and later Iran.

The U.S. on June 22 attacked Iranian nuclear sites in coordination with Israel, as Iran continued to fire hundreds of rockets on Israeli population centers, killing 26 people in the first 10 days of the Iran-Israel war, according to Tel Aviv University's Institute for National Security Studies.

Israel was "in violation of an ICJ [International Court of Justice] provisional ruling" meant to "prevent the commission of acts within the scope of the genocide convention," the E.U. review document read, in the only time it mentioned the word "genocide."

It spoke of "indiscriminate [Israeli] attacks" using "heavy weapons, including air-dropped bombs, on places where civilians are sheltering."

An Israeli Foreign Ministry response dated June 18 and shared with Euractiv said of the document: “In the midst of this grim reality [of war with Iran], the European Union is considering a ‘review’ of its relationship with Israel. This is not a policy adjustment—it is a moral distortion.”

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  • Words count:
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The Islamic Republic on Monday morning issued threats to Israel and the United States amid Israel's ongoing military operation against Iran's nuclear program.

“The Zionist enemy has made a grave mistake, has committed a great crime; it must be punished, and it is being punished. Even now, it is being punished,” Iranian dictator Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s X account stated, alongside an apparently AI-generated photo of a Star of David engraved on a large skull, on top of a battered city with trails of fire raining down from the sky.

Khamenei’s senior adviser Ali Akbar Velayati warned that “there will no longer be any place for the presence of the United States and its bases” in the region in the wake of the American military’s airstrikes against three Iranian nuclear facilities on June 21, Iran’s IRNA news agency reported, according to the BBC.

Velayati further stated that other countries “will become legitimate targets” for Tehran if they assist U.S. actions.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) said that Tehran has “identified the location from which the aggression took place,” according to the IRGC-affiliated Tasnim news agency.

U.S. military bases in the region are not “strength” but “vulnerability,” the statement added.

According to the BBC, the United States has bases in Iraq, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Jordan and Syria.

In 2020, Iran fired ballistic missiles at U.S. air bases in Iraq in response to Washington’s killing of IRGC commander Qassem Soleimani during U.S. President Donald Trump’s first term.

Soleimani was the chief of the IRGC’s extraterritorial division, the Quds Force, and considered to be one of the most powerful military leaders in Iran.

Trump on Sunday praised the “spectacular military success” of the U.S. strikes, “taking the ‘bomb’ right out of [Iranian] hands (and they would use it if they could!)… Thank you to our incredible military for the AMAZING job they did last night. It was really SPECIAL!!!” he wrote on Truth Social.

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Sunday that the U.S. strikes had “obliterated” Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. The U.S. military had completed its mission to “destroy or severely degrade Iran’s nuclear program,” continued Hegseth.

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  • Words count:
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The Dutch Labor Party, a former political home for the country’s Jews, on Thursday called on the government to stop selling Israel parts for the Iron Dome rocket interceptor, triggering widespread condemnations and a walkout by Jewish members.

The draft motion, which the lower house of the Dutch parliament voted down by a large majority, said that “the interceptor is no longer used defensively by [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu, but as a part of the assault strategy” of Israel.

The draft motion’s language shocked many Dutch Jews and centrists, who said it reflected growing anti-Israeli radicalism within a left wing that’s eager to court a growing Muslim electorate.  

During a party gathering on Saturday, Kati Piri received a minute-long standing ovation from thousands of members present. She appeared overcome with emotion.

Dutch defense exports to Israel are extremely limited, totaling $4.5 million over the past 1.5 years, the RTL broadcaster reported. Of that total, about $350,000 was for radar systems that may be linked to the Iron Dome, though their importance and relevance to the system are unknown, RTL reported.

The practical implications of the ban that Dutch Labor promoted unsuccessfully are secondary to the move's declarative significance, Ronny Naftaniel, a former leader of Dutch Jews, told JNS on Sunday.

“As Israel is targeted by hundreds of Iranian missiles, Dutch Labor says Israel has no right to defend itself, essentially telling 10 million Israelis they could die as far as the party’s concerned. That’s what’s so terrible about this draft motion,” said Naftaniel. He called on other parties to avoid forming a coalition agreement with Labor-Green Left due to its "radicalization," as he called it.

Several lawmakers challenged Piri on the draft motion in parliament, before it was defeated. “So as far as Labor-Green Left are concerned, parts to the Iron Dome should not be supplied even if that means towns and cities in Israel are exposed? Because that’s what you’re saying,” Eric van der Burg, a lawmaker for the centrist People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) party, asked Piri.

“That’s your reasoning. Ours is that everything must be done to stop the violence,” said Piri, whose draft motion also accused Israel of “ethnic cleansing and genocide” in Gaza.

The draft motion followed a recent fusion between Labor and the more extremist Green Left party. Together, the two parties have 25 seats out of 150 in the current Tweede Kamer, the lower house of the Dutch parliament, and are projected to win more in the coming elections, set to take place in October.

Hardliners within Labor made sure that the draft motion would be voted on jointly with Green Left internally before it was brought to a vote in parliament, in order to prevent moderates from blocking the draft motion, according to Naftaniel, the former head of the Central Jewish Board of the Netherlands and a seminal figure of the Center for Information and Documentation on the Netherlands, or CIDI, a think tank and antisemitism watchdog group established in 1975.

Naftaniel had been a Labor member for 45 years until last year, when he quit the party in protest against its leaders’ public opposition to the arrival of Israeli President Isaac Herzog to attend the inauguration of a Holocaust museum.

Frans Timmermans, the head of Dutch Labor, has often vowed to oppose antisemitism and famously said that “Europe wouldn’t be Europe without its Jews,” but he has “allowed the party to fall to extremism, which the draft motion clearly illustrates,” said Naftaniel.

The draft motion spurred a fresh wave of resignations from the party by prominent Jews, including Michel Waterman, a columnist for the NIW Dutch-Jewish weekly. The draft motion is “unforgivable” and “actually says: go ahead and bomb Israel to bits,” Waterman wrote in his letter announcing his departure from Labor after 46 years of membership.

Another prominent Jewish member and former Labor European Parliament candidate, Robert Baruch, wrote on X on Saturday that with the draft motion, Labor ”has decided that I can no longer be a member.”

Labor-Green Left is the Netherlands’ largest opposition party, and polls predict it will grow further in this year’s election.  

Several top Labor members criticized the draft motion, including former party leaders Lodewijk Asscher and Job Cohen, both of whom are Jewish, and Ad Melkert.

Earlier this month, Geert Wilders, the leader of the Party for Freedom— an anti-Muslim, pro-Israel movement that leads the current coalition— announced his party is pulling out of the coalition due to its inability to impose immigration restrictions. This led to the scheduling of early elections.

The Party for Freedom has also had friction with some of its coalition partners over Israel, including the VVD Foreign Minister Casper Veldkamp.

In an interview in the Het Parool newspaper published on Saturday, he acknowledged that Wilders’ support of Israel was “one of the things” that made the partnership difficult."

“I read a letter in which a group of lawyers wrote that the Dutch policy in the Middle East was strongly influenced by the leader of the largest party in the coalition. I say: for me, the government program is what matters. So we strive for an independent, viable Palestinian state alongside a safe Israel,” said Veldkamp.

He has supported a review within the European Union of its trade agreement with Israel following Israel’s war on Hamas in Gaza.

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  • Publication Date:
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Air-raid sirens sounded across Israel for more than 30 minutes on Monday morning as Iran launched several ballistic missile barrages, totaling around 15 missiles.

The Israel Defense Forces identified four volleys, each consisting of several missiles.

Five impact sites were reported, with no initial reports of casualties according to Magen David Adom spokesperson Zaki Heller.

An impact was reported in an open area near Safed in the Upper Galilee, where fire crews were working to extinguish the resulting blaze. An impact was also reported in Ashdod, in an open area off a highway.

The Israel Electric Corporation reported that a "strategic facility" in the south was hit, causing disruptions in the local power supply. Energy and Infrastructure Minister Eli Cohen said that some 8,000 people were without electricity and that power would be restored within about three hours.

Sirens pealed from the border with Lebanon to the border with Gaza and across central Israel during the attack.

Following a brief lull, Iran fired another salvo at northern Israel. MDA reported no calls regards impacts or casualties.

The Israeli Air Force began heavy strikes on regime targets in Tehran shortly after the morning barrages.

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A single Iranian missile launched at central Israel was intercepted overnight Sunday.

Millions were awakened just after 3 a.m. as air-raid sirens sounded across the Tel Aviv area and the center of the country.

The Magen David Adom emergency service reported that there were no impacts or casualties, "except for cases of anxiety and people who were injured on their way to a protected area."

Approximately two and a half hours later, the Israel Defense Forces said that a drone had been intercepted before crossing the border in the Eilat area, and therefore it did not trigger alerts, in accordance with protocol.

According to Israel Defense Forces data posted on Saturday, since the start of "Operation Rising Lion" on June 13, the Iranian regime has launched more than 950 missiles and drones at Israeli civilians, resulting in 24 deaths, 1,217 injuries and 8,190 people being evacuated from their homes. There have been 25,040 incidents related to buildings and 5,629 incidents related to cars and other property.

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Israeli landmarks honored the United States on Sunday with gestures of gratitude following the American military’s aerial operation against Iran’s nuclear facilities early that morning.

The front of the Knesset building was illuminated in red, white and blue, while the ceremonial plaza was adorned with American flags. An honor guard was stationed at the site, with the participation of Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana.

“On behalf of the Knesset, which represents all the citizens of Israel, I wish to thank President Trump for a historic, courageous and profoundly moral act; one that will be remembered in the annals of history as the day the U.S. saved the world from the tremendous danger of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of the ayatollah regime,” Ohana said.

He continued, “President Trump proved today that he is not only the leader of the free world, but also the most important president the U.S. has had in modern history, the best friend the Jewish people have ever had in the White House, and the closest partner Prime Minister Netanyahu has ever had, without whom this day would not have happened.”

https://twitter.com/amirohana/status/1936849190434304492

In addition, Israeli and American flags were projected onto the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City, while in Tel Aviv, City Hall was illuminated with the same flags as a token of appreciation.

https://twitter.com/Osint613/status/1936850237794263332

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Sunday that American military’s strikes had “obliterated” Tehran’s nuclear ambitions, as he revealed details about “Operation Midnight Hammer.”

The U.S. military had completed its mission to “destroy or severely degrade Iran’s nuclear program,” said Hegseth, adding that the operation against Tehran “was not and has not been about regime change.”

https://twitter.com/StandWithUs/status/1936868588154913180

Netanyahu on Sunday prayed at the Western Wall in Jerusalem’s Old City, giving thanks for the United States joining the war against Iran.

The prime minister recited a special prayer for Trump, known in Hebrew as Hanoten teshuah (“He who grants deliverance”), asking that God bless him for standing with the Jewish nation and against evil, Israel’s Channel 12 News reported.

The premier and his wife also offered a prayer for the safety of Israeli security forces, as well as the remaining 50 hostages held captive by Hamas terrorists in the Gaza Strip for 626 days.

https://twitter.com/seanhannity/status/1936914403833839655
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  • Words count:
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    June 23, 2025
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The Israeli Air Force on Monday targeted six airports across western, eastern and central Iran. The strikes focused on runways, underground hangars, a refueling aircraft and several Iranian regime warplanes, including F-14 and F-5 fighter jets and AH-1 attack helicopters.

According to the IDF, the destroyed aircraft were intended for use against Israeli Air Force jets to hinder future strikes within Iranian territory. The attacks significantly disrupted takeoff capabilities at the targeted airports and degraded the Iranian military’s ability to operate its air force from those locations.

https://twitter.com/idfonline/status/1937028792817451041

Also on Monday, 15 IAF fighter jets carried out strikes in the Kermanshah region of western Iran, neutralizing several surface-to-surface missile launchers and storage sites aimed at Israel.

“The IDF continues its efforts to degrade the Iranian regime’s military capabilities and achieve aerial superiority over Iranian airspace in order to protect the State of Israel,” the military said in a statement.

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  • Words count:
    665 words
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  • Publication Date:
    June 23, 2025

Iran’s Lebanese terrorist proxy, Hezbollah, is expected to remain on the sidelines of Tehran’s war with Israel in the immediate term, following U.S. airstrikes on Iranian nuclear sites early Sunday.

The United States attacked three Iranian nuclear facilities—Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan—in the first instance of direct American military involvement in the aerial war.

“Iran is a strong country capable of defending itself; logic dictates that it can confront America and Israel,” a Hezbollah spokesperson told Newsweek. “Hezbollah remains committed to all matters agreed upon since the ceasefire.”

However, the spokesperson noted that “the issue remains subject to developments,” leaving open the possibility of Hezbollah’s involvement at a later stage, while again stressing that “Iran certainly has its own military capabilities.”

On Nov. 26, 2024, Israel and Lebanon signed a ceasefire agreement aimed at ending more than a year of cross-border clashes between Israel and Hezbollah. The terrorist group began attacking Israel in support of Hamas following the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre.

Since the truce, Israel has carried out frequent operations aimed at preventing Hezbollah from, in violation of the ceasefire agreement, reestablishing its "military" capabilities in Lebanon.

Overnight Friday, an Israeli Navy vessel attacked infrastructure belonging to Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force, targeting a site near Naqoura in southwestern Lebanon. The site was being used to facilitate terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians and was a clear violation of understandings between Israel and Lebanon, the army said.

Earlier on Friday, the IDF killed the commander of Hezbollah’s firepower array in the Litani sector, in the Chabriha area north of Tyre in southwestern Lebanon.

The Israeli Air Force on Friday conducted additional strikes on Hezbollah sites in Southern Lebanon, targeting rocket and missile launchers as well as weapons storage facilities.

“Despite the attacks carried out by the Israeli enemy,” the Hezbollah spokesperson told Newsweek, “the party has remained committed to the agreement.”

A Hezbollah official told Reuters on June 13 that the group would remain on the sidelines following the launch of Israel’s “Operation Rising Lion,” which targets the Iranian regime’s nuclear and missile capabilities.

Defense Minister Israel Katz on Friday morning warned Hezbollah against joining in the war.

“The Hezbollah Secretary-General [Naim Qassem] has not learned the lessons of his predecessors and is threatening to act against Israel at the direction of the Iranian dictator,” Katz tweeted, referring to past chiefs of the terrorist organization who were slain by the Israeli Air Force in September and October 2024.

“I advise the Lebanese proxy to be cautious and understand that Israel has lost patience with terrorists who threaten it. If there is terrorism—there will be no Hezbollah,” the minister wrote.

Qassem declared on Thursday his group’s support for Tehran in the wake of the severe blows dealt by Israel’s military.

The Lebanese Islamist group is “not neutral, and therefore we express our position alongside Iran, its leadership, and its people, and we will act as we see fit in confronting this brutal Israeli-American aggression,” Qassem said in a statement on Telegram.

“Tyrannical America and criminal Israel will not be able to subjugate the Iranian people and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps,” he continued, according to AFP.

Hezbollah has a duty “to stand by Iran and provide it with all forms of support that contribute to putting an end to this tyranny and oppression,” Qassem added.

Meanwhile, U.S. Special Envoy for Syria Tom Barrack, who was visiting Beirut on Thursday, met with Hezbollah ally and parliament Speaker Nabih Berri and warned him not to get involved in the Israeli-Iranian war.

“I can say on behalf of President Trump … that would be a very, very, very bad decision,” Barrack said.

The U.S. Department of State on Sunday ordered the evacuation of nonemergency government personnel and family members from Lebanon due to the regional security situation, the American embassy in Beirut said.

The notice urged American citizens to “continue to exercise caution and encourage them to monitor the news for breaking developments.”

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  • Words count:
    656 words
  • Type of content:
    COLUMN
  • Byline:
  • Publication Date:
    June 23, 2025
  • Media:
    1 file

A year after the horrors of Oct. 7, 2023—when 1,200 Israelis were brutally murdered and 252 taken hostage by Hamas—Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared a new phase in the war.

He said the operation known as "Swords of Iron" now bears a far older, deeper name: “The War of Tkuma.” In Hebrew, tkuma means resurrection—a word rooted in Jewish memory, struggle and renewal.

This wasn’t just a rebranding. It was a signal.

With the symbolic conclusion of shiva—the seven-day Jewish mourning period—Netanyahu emerged from the shadow of grief, ready to reclaim leadership not only of a nation under fire, but of a people called once again to rise from ashes.

And rise they did.

In a moment pregnant with meaning, Netanyahu on Sunday placed a note into a crevice of the Western Wall—the second such message in 10 days—shortly after a U.S. strike targeted Iran’s nuclear infrastructure. The note read: "A people has risen up as a lion—Am Yisrael Chai!"

Netanyahu also said a special prayer for U.S. President Donald Trump: “May the President of the United States be exalted for assuming the responsibility of expelling evil and darkness from the world." It was not just a prayer. It was history in motion.

The attack was surgical. The United States deployed its stealth B-2 bombers, dropping 162 tons of ordnance on Iran’s Fordow enrichment facility. Simultaneously, Israeli forces struck and dismantled key elements of the regime’s nuclear furnace. In that moment, a photograph captured Netanyahu on the phone with Trump, watching history shift on a seismic scale.

This wasn’t only a military triumph. As Israeli commentator Hagai Segal put it, it was perhaps the most significant diplomatic victory since David Ben-Gurion secured the U.N. vote for Israeli statehood in 1947.

The path to this moment was long and winding. For years, Netanyahu had warned that Iran’s nuclear ambitions were not just an Israeli concern—they were a threat to the free world. But American leadership often hesitated. Four successive presidents offered varying shades of appeasement, “red lines,” and “don’ts.”

Until Trump.

Together, Trump and Netanyahu forged a doctrine: Iran must never possess a nuclear weapon. When the Biden administration returned to hedging and hesitation, Oct. 7 shattered the illusion. The massacre by Hamas was no isolated flare-up—it was a link in Iran’s genocidal chain, a campaign to destroy Israel fueled by fanatical ideology, not unlike the Nazi vision of Jewish extermination.

Netanyahu, ever the student of history and son of the great historian Professor Benzion Netanyahu, understood what was required: to break free of the illusions that even he had once entertained during the Oslo era and his Bar-Ilan speech. The new reality demanded a return to primary principles: fight to survive, destroy the danger and rise in spirit.

And ruach—that sacred Hebrew word for “spirit” and “wind”—is now on Israel’s side.

Trump, too, understood. After years of intelligence, pressure campaigns, and broken negotiations, the moment had come. Despite domestic opposition, he acted. And in doing so, he may well have sealed his own vision: not only to make America great again, but to return it to its moral compass as the guardian of liberty and the ally of those who refuse to die quietly.

Iran can now either retreat—or self-destruct.

Its proxies—Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis—are being dismantled one by one. The regime’s aura of invincibility is shattered. Its genocidal ambitions are exposed. And for the first time in decades, a realignment in the Middle East may be possible—one not built on illusions, but on a shared understanding that the era of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s terror must end.

Some had claimed Trump abandoned Netanyahu. They were wrong. Their 60-day timeline for Iran to respond was real. Netanyahu held the line. Trump delivered.

This war, born of massacre, may yet lead to resurrection: Tkuma.

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  • Words count:
    334 words
  • Type of content:
    Update Desk
  • Byline:
  • Publication Date:
    June 23, 2025

Israeli Defense Minister Gideon Sa’ar on Sunday condemned the suicide bombing in a church in the Dweila neighborhood of Syria’s capital that killed at least 20 people and injured dozens more earlier in the day.

“Horrified by the cowardly terrorist attack in the Mar Elias Church in Damascus today, in which at least 20 innocent worshippers were murdered,” he tweeted. “My condolences to the families of the victims and to the Christian community in Syria,” Sa’ar added.

https://twitter.com/gidonsaar/status/1936850967678308371

A Syrian security source told Reuters that two men were involved in the attack, one of whom had blown himself up.

Earlier, the country’s interior ministry said that a suicide bomber entered the church, opened fire then detonated his explosive vest, according to Reuters.

He was linked to Islamic State, the ministry added.

Apparently this was not the first attack attempted by ISIS since Bashar Assad’s regime fell in December, but it was the first one to claim victims, another security source told Reuters.

Greece’s foreign ministry issued a statement “unequivocally" condemning "the abhorrent terrorist suicide bombing at the Mar Elias Greek Orthodox Church in Damascus, Syria.”

The ministry added, “Religious sites must never be targets for terror. Everyone has the right to practice their faith in complete peace and safety.”

It went on to demand that the Syrian transitional government “take immediate action” in holding those responsible accountable and ensuring the security of Christian communities and all religious groups.

https://twitter.com/GreeceMFA/status/1936844886411534438

A mass was being held at the church at the time of the attack, according to Syria’s state news agency SANA.

Footage from inside the church that surfaced on Syrian social media showed gory scenes of the deceased and significant destruction of the building, according to CNN.

U.S. Special Envoy to Syria Thomas Barrack said the attack was an act of “cowardice” and has “no place in the new tapestry of integrated tolerance and inclusion that Syrians are weaving,” per CNN.

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