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Former President Donald Trump issued a warning yesterday, declaring that he plans to imprison anyone found guilty of “unscrupulous behavior” during the 2024 election results.

Trump made this declaration on Truth Social, his own social media platform, while repeating his claims that the 2020 election was rigged, accusing Democrats of “rampant Cheating and Skullduggery.”

He wrote, “The 2024 Election, where Votes have just started being cast, will be under the closest professional scrutiny and, WHEN I WIN, those people that CHEATED will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the Law, which will include long term prison sentences so that this Depravity of Justice does not happen again.”

He further stated, “Please beware that this legal exposure extends to Lawyers, Political Operatives, Donors, Illegal Voters, & Corrupt Election Officials. Those involved in unscrupulous behavior will be sought out, caught, and prosecuted at levels, unfortunately, never seen before in our Country.”

{Matzav.com}

CIA Director William Burns, who also serves as the lead U.S. negotiator working on a ceasefire agreement and hostage release in Gaza, announced yesterday that a more comprehensive proposal for a ceasefire would be put forward in the coming days, Reuters reports.

Speaking at a Financial Times event in London, where he appeared with MI6 chief Richard Moore, Burns explained that he was heavily involved in developing “texts and creative formulas” alongside mediators from Qatar and Egypt. These efforts aim to draft a ceasefire proposal that both sides would find acceptable.

“We will make this more detailed proposal, I hope in the next several days, and then we’ll see,” Burns said, noting that the outcome depends on the political will of both parties. He emphasized his hope that leaders from both sides would understand that “the time has come finally to make some hard choices and some difficult compromises.”

Burns highlighted that while most of the agreement is already settled, “90% of the paragraphs had been agreed,” the remaining 10% is proving to be the most challenging to resolve.

“My hope is that, you know, they’ll recognize what’s at stake here and be willing to move ahead on that basis,” he remarked.

Burns’ remarks followed a report from The Washington Post, which detailed ongoing U.S. negotiations with Egypt and Qatar to present a final “take it or leave it” offer. However, the same report indicated that U.S. officials had recently “indefinitely postponed” the presentation of this final agreement.

According to the Post, the latest stumbling block emerged when Hamas unexpectedly demanded the release of prominent terrorists in exchange for humanitarian prisoners.

On Thursday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged both Israel and Hamas to resolve the remaining points of contention and finalize a Gaza ceasefire agreement. Speaking at a press briefing in Haiti, Blinken explained that while “nearly 90%” of the deal is in place, there are still major unresolved issues, including the Philadelphi corridor.

“I expect in the coming days, we will share with Israel, and they (Qatar and Egypt) will share with Hamas our thoughts, the three of us, on exactly how to resolve” these remaining points, Blinken said.

{Matzav.com}

Question: If a girl is good at gymnastics and would like to put out a video of her skills, can she publish a not-tznius video labeled ‘For Women Only’?

Former President Donald Trump has commented that the upcoming presidential debate will not allow candidates to alter their height by using platforms or other means behind the podium.

Trump made this claim in a post on his social media platform, Truth Social.

“No boxes or artificial lifts will be allowed to stand on [sic] during my upcoming debate with Comrade Kamala Harris,” he wrote. “We had this out previously with former NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg when he was in a debate, and he was not allowed a ‘lift.'”

The former president went on to say, “It would be a form of cheating, and the Democrats cheat enough. ‘You are who you are,’ it was determined!”

It is not entirely clear whether Trump’s statement was based on actual discussions with ABC, which is set to host the debate, or if it was simply his own speculation.

Trump’s post referenced a past conflict with former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, whom Trump often mocked as “Mini Mike” during Bloomberg’s attempt to secure the Democratic nomination in 2020.

At the time, Trump repeatedly alleged that Bloomberg requested to use a box to appear taller during a Democratic debate, although there is no evidence to support that Bloomberg ever made such a request.

Bloomberg’s campaign quickly responded to the accusation at the time, with a spokesperson stating, “The president is lying. He is a pathological liar who lies about everything: his fake hair, his obesity, and his spray-on tan.”

Vice President Kamala Harris, meanwhile, clarified her height earlier this year during an interview with Katie Couric on “Today.” After Couric mistakenly said Harris was 5’2″, the vice president corrected her.

“I am 5’4″ and a quarter — sometimes 5’4″ and a half,” Harris explained to Couric. “And with heels — which I always wear — I’m 5’7′ and a half, thank you very much.”

As for Trump, his height has been variously reported as either 6’2″ or 6’3″.

{Matzav.com}

The IDF says it struck a Hezbollah rocket launcher in southern Lebanon’s Aynata this evening, used in an attack earlier today on Tzefas.

A study funded by the Jim Joseph Foundation reveals growing opposition to Israel among U.S. college students, with many seeking to socially isolate peers who express support for Israel. The 65-page report, titled “A Year of Campus Conflict and Growth: An Over-Time Study of the Impact of the Israel-Hamas War on U.S. College Students,” was released on Sept. 3 and examines the experiences of Jewish and non-Jewish students on campuses across the country. Conducted by College Pulse, the study includes surveys from the same cohort of students between 2022 and 2024, along with hour-long focus group sessions. The findings are striking: one in five non-Jewish respondents reported they would avoid friendships with individuals who support Israel, while over half of Jewish students acknowledged that openly supporting Israel often comes with social repercussions. “This study, conducted over three years, reveals extraordinary detail about the experience of American college students during a historic period of tensions on campus,” said co-author Eitan Hersh, a political science professor at Tufts University. (YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

The race for control of Congress is as close as ever, with barely two dozen House seats and a handful in the Senate likely to determine the majority this November and whether a single party sweeps to power with the White House. Lawmakers are returning to Washington for a three-week legislative sprint, away from the campaign trail where races have become “trench warfare” and a seat-by-seat slog. Many of the highest-profile races are being waged in Montana, New York, California and beyond, far from the presidential battleground states contested by Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris. “Buckle up,” said Jack Pandol, communications director for the National Republican Congressional Committee. Upended by the summer shake-up that replaced President Joe Biden with Harris atop the Democratic ticket, the down-ballot campaigns enter this fall stretch at a virtual toss-up, a high-wire uncertainty where every single seat won or lost could make the difference in party control. What’s changed is not so much the fundamentals of the individual races, but which side has the energy and enthusiasm to make sure their voters actually show up and cast their ballots, strategists said. Money, volunteers and voter enthusiasm are flowing to the Democratic campaigns since Harris replaced Biden. That’s challenging Republicans who entered the election cycle favored for gains and buoyed by Trump’s comeback bid, despite the criminal charges hanging over his potential return to the White House. Trump and Republicans are working feverishly to regain the momentum they enjoyed from the GOP convention in Milwaukee and from the Supreme Court decision giving former presidents broad immunity from prosecution, including for some acts related to his effort to overturn the 2020 election and for the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. Trump’s campaign staff held a private conference call Friday with House Republicans, assuring them that the movement is shifting to Trump as they game out strategies ahead, according to another Republican who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the closed conversation. “There’s a lot of handwringing going on and a lot of anxiousness about where this election is headed,” said Montana Sen. Steve Daines, a Trump ally who heads the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the campaign arm. Speaking at the Republican Jewish Coalition in Las Vegas, Daines played up GOP Senate candidates as warriors and predicted that enthusiasm from rural voters who will “crawl over broken glass” to vote for Trump will help Republicans such as Sam Brown, who is challenging Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev. Still, the fundraising gap Republicans now find themselves facing with Democrats is a problem, say GOP strategists on both ends of the Capitol, leaving them without money to keep pace with advertising and on-the-ground organizing. “We have a lot of work to do,” Daines said. Long gone are the days of supermajorities in the House and Senate, replaced by a new era of razor-thin margins that leave little margin for errors in political campaigns, or actual governing. Senate heads toward 50-50 split Democrats are almost certain to see their narrow majority slip to at least a 50-50 split with Republicans with the retirement of independent Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia. His departure is making way for Republican Gov. Jim Justice to handily win that seat. Trump is wildly popular in Montana, where Senate Republicans see their […]

Can you figure out the connection between: 1 – a Chiddushei Me’ri, 2 – a Gemara from Yehsivas Chachmei Lublin, 3 – a commemoration of the Chevron Massacre, 4 – and a Sefer Baal Shem Tov? This is what The Sefer Socher would like to call “the Yeshivas Slobodka-Chevron Collection” It’s a perfect example of how 4 seemingly separate and distinct items weave together to portray one great story of our history...ENJOY! TO SEE THE REST OF THE STORIES CLICK HERE Yeshivas Slobodka-Chevron was a small branch of the Slobodka Yeshiva in Europe before the war. However, after the war it became one of the epicenters of Limud Hatorah and the spreading of the Slobodka teachings and derech, for which it is known to this very day. Yeshivas Slobodka-Chevron led by the great gaon Rabbi Yechezkel Sarne became one of the great centers of the Torah world. With it’s famous trials and tribulations as well as it’s successes, it went on to becoming the great Yeshiva of which it is still known this very day! TO SEE THE REST OF THE STORY CLICK HERE The Sefer Socher is not an auction it’s a BUY NOW store.. What sets The Sofer Socher apart from the others is its vision. The goal of The Sefer Socher is to bring out the story behind the history of Judaica in a way where everyone can connect to it.

Road Closures due to the Levaya of the Skulener Rebbe HaRav Yeshaya Yaakov Portugal ZT”L scheduled for Sunday at 12PM.

Tensions surrounding Israel’s conflict with Hamas flared at Harvard University on Friday, as anti-Israel protesters marched through campus chanting “Long live the intifada” and “Globalize the intifada.” The demonstration took place just three days after the start of classes, indicating that the summer break had done little to reduce the campus divide over the war in Gaza. Despite the heavy police presence, the protest, organized by Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine (HOOP), proceeded without incident, according to the Harvard Crimson. Approximately 80 protesters participated in the march, which concluded with a rally outside a campus building where Harvard’s interim president, Alan Garber, met with HOOP representatives. The group has been demanding that Harvard disclose and divest from investments related to Israel. “No matter what the university says or does, our demands have always been crystal clear: Disclose and divest,” HOOP organizer Tamar Sella told the Crimson. “These meetings were never the end goal of our campaign.” The protest also included speakers criticizing the university’s decision to discipline students who had participated in a pro-Palestinian encampment earlier in the year. The Crimson reported that five students involved in the 20-day encampment were suspended, while more than 20 others were placed on probation. Harvard and other elite U.S. campuses have become focal points for anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian activism, especially following Hamas’s October 7 attack on southern Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,200 Israelis and the abduction of 251 hostages. Following the attack, roughly 30 Harvard student organizations blamed Israel for the violence. In June, a task force on antisemitism at Harvard concluded that Israeli students on campus were facing severe exclusion. The university’s handling of Jewish student concerns has been under scrutiny since the attack. Harvard President Claudine Gay resigned in January after failing to adequately address whether “calls for the genocide of Jews” violated university policy during a congressional hearing. Gay’s resignation came after conservative activists published evidence of multiple instances of plagiarism in her academic work, though the university’s board had previously decided against firing her. (YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

A Philadelphia public school teacher with a history of anti-Israel statements made online threats against parents of Jewish students, according to a complaint that the Deborah Project filed, on behalf of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, with the School District of Philadelphia.

Keziah Ridgeway, who teaches at Northeast High School, is accused of naming previously-anonymous School District of Philadelphia Jewish Family Association leaders on social media and “fulminating that they had disobeyed her demand that they cease protesting against her antisemitism,” per the Deborah Project.

Omar Crowder, principal of Northeast High, sent an email to families on Friday stating that an unnamed staff member “will be reassigned offsite” while an investigation is conducted into a complaint about a “Northeast High School staff member,” who “made statements on social media that may violate school district policy,” per a copy of the email that a source shared with JNS.

JNS sought comment from the School District of Philadelphia, which has an enrollment of nearly 200,000 across 330 schools, and from Northeast High, which is part of the district.

“The school district is committed to creating a safe, welcoming and inclusive environment for all students, staff and families,” Crowder added in the email. “We have a plan in place to ensure that the academic needs of affected classes are met.”

“The plan for additional support, for both students and staff, is forthcoming,” he wrote. “Given the ongoing investigation and personal considerations, we cannot provide additional details at this time.”

Ridgeway is accused of “goading the Jewish parents with, ‘Ain’t no fun when the rabbit got the,’” and then inserting “an emoji for a human face with finger on lips—making clear that she was talking about a ‘gun,’” according to the Deborah Project, a public interest law firm.

The teacher reportedly also asked in a post if there were black-owned gun shops “in or near Philly? Asking for a friend.”

“It’s disgraceful that the Philadelphia School District has known about this aggressively antisemitic school teacher and has failed to rein in her profanity-laced, hateful public comments targeting Jewish families and students in the District,” stated Lori Lowenthal Marcus, legal director of the Deborah Project.

“Now Ridgeway has resorted to threats of gun use against Jewish parents. What will it take for the Philadelphia School District to respond?” she added.

The Deborah Project shared screenshots with JNS of posts that it said were from Ridgeway, in which she called Zionism racism and said the Jewish state commits genocide.

Michael Balaban, president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, told JNS that “every student has the right to learn in a safe environment and receive a fair and balanced education without being subject to ethnic intimidation.”

“It is time for the Philadelphia School District to uphold these standards to support students of all backgrounds,” Balaban said. “This is only one example of a teacher who has been allowed to express their bias against Israel publically on social media and in school settings, creating an increasingly unsafe environment for Jewish students.”

Christina Clark, communications officer for the School District of Philadelphia, told JNS that the district is aware of the complaint.

“The district strives to create safe, welcoming and inclusive learning environments for all of our students, staff and families,” Clark said. “Threats of violence towards our school communities are not tolerated and we work closely with the appropriate authorities when handling these situations.”

Ridgeway is associated with Jewish Voice for Peace and American Muslims for Palestine, according to Canary Mission, a Jew-hatred watchdog.

(JNS)

Three security guards at the Allenby Bridge crossing in the Jordan Valley were killed in a terrorist shooting this morning. The gunman, who according to the IDF was a Jordanian citizen, was killed, and Israeli forces were conducting scans of the area to ensure there were no more terrorists in the area.

Magen David Adom emergency service spokesperson Zaki Heller said that “after resuscitation operations, MDA medics and paramedics in cooperation with the IDF medical force pronounced the deaths of three men about 50 years old with gunshot wounds to their bodies.”

One of the victims was named as Yochanan Shchori, 61, a father of six from Ma’ale Efraim.

Yuri Birnbaum, 65, from Moshav Na’ama north of Yericho, was also killed in the attack.

The third victim was Adrian Marcelo Podsmeser, from Ariel.

The terrorist who carried out the attack was named as Maher D’yab Hussein Jazi, a 39-year-old truck driver from the city of Irbid.

The IDF said that the terrorist drove in a truck to the crossing from the Jordanian side. The terrorist then exited the vehicle and began firing at forces guarding the crossing. Security forces were working to rule out suspicions that the truck was laced with explosives.

Jordan’s Interior Ministry announced the “beginning of the investigation into the shooting incident” at the border. A Jordanian security official told Arab media that the Allenby crossing was closed on the Jordanian side following the attack.

The crossing was also closed on the Israeli side and security forces cordoned off nearby Yericho to rule out the presence of additional terrorists who may have crossed the border.

The Allenby Bridge, known in Jordan as the King Hussein Bridge, located around three miles east of Yericho, connects Israel’s Yehuda and Shomron region with the Hashemite kingdom. The terminal is used mostly by Palestinians and foreign tourists and is forbidden for Israeli citizens, except for Muslims making a pilgrimage to Mecca.

David Elhayani, head of the Jordan Valley Regional Council, told Channel 13, “We have known for several months from conversations with the military that they are aware of what is happening in Jordan, and are aware that the Palestinian population in Jordan supports Hamas and encourages it.”

He continued, “The army knows this and prepared for it, but they did not think that it can come from a bridge of apparent peace. The result is very difficult.” JNS

{Matzav.com Israel}

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. scored a pair of legal victories Friday in the battleground states of North Carolina and Michigan, and a setback in Wisconsin, in his quest to get his name off of the ballots in some states after he suspended his campaign and endorsed former President Donald Trump. North Carolina’s intermediate-level Court of Appeals issued an order granting Kennedy’s request to halt the mailing of ballots that included his name, upending plans in the state just as officials were about to begin sending out the nation’s first absentee ballots for the Nov. 5 presidential election. The court — a three-judge panel ruling unanimously — also told a trial judge to order the State Board of Elections to distribute ballots without Kennedy’s name on them. No legal explanation was given. In Michigan, its intermediate-level Court of Appeals ruled that Kennedy should be removed from the ballot, reversing a decision made earlier this week by a lower court judge. And in Wisconsin, a Dane County circuit court judge denied Kennedy’s request for a temporary restraining order to put on hold the state elections commission’s decision to keep him on the ballot. “A matter of such consequence deserves a full development of the record with appropriate briefing by all sides,” Judge Stephen Ehlke wrote. He set a scheduling conference for Wednesday, a week before the deadline for the printing of ballots. In separate statements, a Kennedy attorney praised the North Carolina and Michigan rulings, saying they uphold state elections laws and support ballot integrity by ensuring no one must vote for a candidate no longer running in their state. A favorable outcome for Kennedy could assist Trump’s efforts to win North Carolina, Michigan and Wisconsin. North Carolina law required the first absentee ballots to be mailed or transmitted to those already asking for them no later than 60 days before the general election, making Friday the deadline. The process of reprinting and assembling ballot packages likely would take more than two weeks, state attorneys have said. The State Board of Elections formally asked the state Supreme Court late Friday to reverse the Court of Appeals decision. State lawyers asked the justices to act quickly before adjustments to the ballots ordered earlier Friday is complete — likely in a few days. Five of the seven Supreme Court justices are registered Republicans. Kennedy, the nominee of the We The People party in North Carolina, had sued last week to get off the state’s ballots after he suspended his campaign and endorsed Trump. But the Democratic majority on the State Board of Elections rejected the request, saying it was too late in the process of printing ballots and coding tabulation machines. Kennedy then sued. Wake County Superior Court Judge Rebecca Holt on Thursday denied Kennedy’s effort to keep his name off ballots, prompting his appeal. In the meantime, Holt had told election officials to hold back sending absentee ballots until noon Friday. More than 136,300 people — military and overseas workers and in-state civilian residents — have requested North Carolina absentee ballots so far, the State Board of Elections said late Friday. In an email, state board Executive Director Karen Brinson Bell told election directors in all 100 counties to preserve current ballots and coding in case rulings revert to keeping Kennedy on the […]

A Maryland resident with a lengthy criminal history was arrested outside of the Israeli embassy in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday after causing a bomb scare.

The U.S. Secret Service told JNS that the suspect allegedly threw a backpack over the fence of the diplomatic compound in the northwest part of the District of Columbia, prompting a response from the U.S. Secret Service and Metropolitan Police Department’s Explosive Ordnance Disposal Team.

The MPD confirmed to JNS using a variant spelling that the suspect is Rasheed Adedokun, 35. Recent Maryland court records say that he is a resident of Bladensburg, Md.

The bomb disposal unit eventually declared the scene safe. Adedokun was arrested for unlawful entry and processed at the nearby Metropolitan Police District. It’s not clear if he remains in custody.

Adedokun has a long history of arrests though no apparent previous connection to Israel, the Middle East or the American Jewish community.

In 2016, he was sentenced to 54 months in prison for identity theft and credit-card fraud in excess of $100,000. In 2022, he was arraigned in Virginia for violating his parole. Later that year, he was arrested in Canada after forcing the emergency landing of a flight from Iceland for his “unruly actions,” according to the Royal Canadian Mounted police, who charged him with endangering the safety or security of an aircraft and its passengers.

Last month, prosecutors filed a case against him in Maryland court after the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority arrested him for trespassing and disorderly conduct.

At press time, WMATA had not responded to JNS’s request for comment about that arrest.

(JNS)

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu spoke about the murderous terror attack that occurred on Sunday morning and the ongoing war with Israel’s enemies at the start of the weekly Cabinet meeting in Jerusalem later on Sunday. “It’s a difficult day,” Netanyahu began. “A despicable terrorist murdered three of our citizens in cold blood at the Allenby Bridge Crossing. I extend, on behalf of the government and myself, condolences to the families of the victims.” “We are surrounded by a murderous ideology led by Iran’s axis of evil. In recent days, despicable terrorists murdered six of our hostages and three Israeli police officers in cold blood. The murderers  don’t distinguish between us; they want to murder us all until the last one—right and left, secular and religious, Jews and non-Jews.” “When we stand together, our enemies can’t defeat us, and that’s why their main goal is to divide us and sow discord within us.” “Last weekend, the German Bild newspaper published an official Hamas document revealing their plan of action: to create division among us, to wage psychological warfare on the families of the hostages, to exert internal and external political pressure on the Israeli government, to tear us apart from within, and to continue the war until further notice, until Israel is defeated. “The vast majority of Israeli citizens are not falling for this Hamas trap. They know that we are wholeheartedly committed to achieving the goals of this war – to eliminate Hamas, to bring back all our hostages, to ensure that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel, and to safely return our residents from the north and south to their homes. We will stand together, hold on tightly to the sword of Dovid, and b’ezrat Hashem, we will win.” Netanyahu concluded: “And one more statement, there are those who ask: ‘Will will always live by the sword?’ In the Middle East, there’s no eternity without the sword.” (YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)

FBI documents made public by the office of Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) show that Iran attempted to hire assassins to target several high-profile U.S. politicians, including President Joe Biden, former President Donald Trump, and former Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley. “Bad actors are determined to wreak havoc on our country, and American political leaders across both parties are sitting squarely in the crosshairs,” Grassley said in a statement. “In this extraordinarily heightened threat environment, federal agencies ought to be laser-focused on building up public trust and reassuring the American people of their efforts to carry out their protective missions.” The FBI report, which was originally unclassified and circulated on social media, has since been removed from Grassley’s website. However, Grassley’s office clarified that portions of the document were redacted, and that its disclosure falls under congressional oversight authority. According to the senator’s office, the U.S. Department of Justice acknowledged this oversight directly. The FBI report allegedly describes how an Iranian agent had drawn a diagram on a whiteboard to instruct a would-be assassin on how to carry out the planned attack. Despite the serious nature of the plot, the FBI marked the document as unclassified and did not label it “for official use only” or “law enforcement sensitive.” An FBI spokesperson responded to the disclosure, saying, “The FBI does not comment specifically on documents allegedly disclosed without authorization. Public disclosure about sensitive, ongoing national security investigations and potential cooperation from subjects is irresponsible and undermines the FBI’s ability to conduct thorough investigations and enforcement actions that keep Americans safe.” The spokesperson further warned that such disclosures “put lives at risk, especially when you are dealing with an adversary like Iran.” (YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

House Republicans are expanding their investigation of the Biden administration’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, according to people familiar with that matter, pursuing additional witness testimony as former president Donald Trump attempts to make the war’s deadly endgame a central issue with the election now weeks away.

The House Foreign Affairs Committee’s GOP majority has been in contact with at least three senior military officers who were in Kabul in August 2021 and directly involved in the hastily organized evacuation of tens of thousands of people whose safety was in jeopardy when the Afghan government collapsed. The operation left U.S. forces partially reliant for their security on Taliban militants, whose regime U.S. and coalition forces had warred with for 20 years, as they made a stunning return to power.

The senior officers targeted by the committee are Army Lt. Gen. Christopher Donahue, Navy Rear Adm. Peter Vasely, who recently retired from active duty, and Marine Corps Brig. Gen. Farrell Sullivan, according to several people familiar with the matter. Each officer supervised U.S. forces during the evacuation, and Vasely and Sullivan previously voiced frustration with the Biden administration’s management of the crisis.

The Foreign Affairs Committee, which had been forecast to complete its investigation by now, also has intensified efforts to speak with at least two key administration figures: Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who was subpoenaed by the committee this week, and White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan.

A Pentagon spokesman, James Adams, acknowledged that Donahue, Vasely and Sullivan had provided lawmakers with their “personal views and perspectives” and said “we are not aware of any official congressional requests for additional testimony” from them or other military personnel. A committee aide, who like others interviewed for this report spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing and politically charged inquiry, said investigators are reviewing the officers’ responses and that it is possible they will be asked for further participation in the inquiry.

A spokesman for Blinken, Matthew Miller, has accused the committee’s GOP leadership of “acting in bad faith.” A White House spokeswoman, Sharon Yang, said in a statement: “For multiple years already, Chairman McCaul’s investigation has only produced recycled, partisan attacks instead of any new substance. No matter how long House Republicans choose to continue playing politics, the fact remains that ending our longest war was the right thing to do and our nation is stronger today as a result.”

House Republicans’ plan to expand and prolong their investigation emerges as Trump prepares to debate Vice President Kamala Harris, his Democratic opponent, on Tuesday night. Coinciding with that, Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Tex.), the committee chair, is expected to release a report by Monday condemning the Biden-Harris team’s handling of the withdrawal. Committee Democrats are expected to respond with a report of their own defending the current administration. The additional testimony from three commanders is not expected to be included in either report but could be publicized at another time, people familiar with matter said.

It was not immediately clear whether either document will shed much new light on the episode, which is among the lowest moments of Joe Biden’s presidency and already has been thoroughly scrutinized by Congress and other institutions. The Afghanistan War Commission, a congressionally mandated bipartisan examination of the entire 20-year conflict commenced in July, is expected to make its findings public by August 2026.

In recent weeks, Trump’s campaign along with his allies in Congress have seized on the Afghanistan withdrawal to levy attacks on Harris, pointing to a suicide bombing during the operation’s waning days that killed 13 U.S. service members along with an estimated 170 Afghans. A number of the victims’ families have embraced the former president, fiercely defending him amid accusations from Democrats and other critics who say he is exploiting their tragedy for political gain. In the past, Trump has drawn the ire of military survivors and former aides disgusted by his alleged denunciation of fallen troops, whom he is said to have called “suckers” and “losers.”

Democrats on the Foreign Affairs Committee have consistently dismissed the investigation as partisan, noting that it fails to explore how Trump’s negotiations and withdrawal deal with the Taliban, signed in February 2020 during his presidency, helped set the conditions for Afghanistan’s collapse under Biden.

One Democrat on the committee, asked about the Republicans seeking testimony from the generals, suggested the GOP wants to “continue the theatrics” after compiling a “partisan report.”

“If it looks, walks and quacks like desperate politics …” the Democrat said, leaving the sentence unfinished.

Another Democratic staff member said that while those members are partisan players, too, they have emphasized the importance of representing witness testimony in context.

“That’s because we want witnesses to keep coming and talking voluntarily to the committee,” the staff member said. “It is important to us that our committee’s oversight function be taken seriously and not become some laughingstock.”

Leslie Shedd, a spokeswoman for the committee’s Republican majority, rejected those assertions. McCaul, the chairman, began investigating the Afghanistan evacuation immediately after it happened, at a time the GOP was in the House minority, and repeatedly urged Democrats to join him, she said. “They chose to ignore his pleas and ignore this deadly catastrophe,” Shedd said.

An independent assessment by the congressionally appointed Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction found in 2022 that “the most important factor” in the collapse of the Afghan military was Trump’s withdrawal deal, “followed by President Biden’s withdrawal announcement,” which he made a few months after taking office in 2021.

McCaul claimed in a statement that his investigation will expose how the Biden administration “misled, and in some instances outright lied,” to the American people, prioritizing “optics over the safety and security of U.S. personnel.” And while an earlier report by McCaul’s committee barely mentioned Harris, he stressed now that she “was there every step of the way.”

“It is up to the American people to determine if they believe these things should disqualify Vice President Harris from continuing the Biden-Harris administration another four years,” McCaul said.

Democrats have countered that while the 13 Americans’ deaths were tragic, they must be put into the proper context of ending a 20-year war responsible for deaths of more than 2,400 other U.S. troops and tens of thousands of Afghan civilians. In signing the withdrawal deal with the Taliban that called for all U.S. personnel to leave Afghanistan by spring 2021, Trump left Biden with few good options, they argue.

Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.), an Afghanistan War veteran and member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, said that McCaul and his team have not taken an “appropriate approach” to the review.

“Ultimately,” he said in an interview, Republicans “decided to take a partisan approach to this, and weaponize the investigation, and make it just about a one-month period of an over-20-year war.”

The topic has grown increasingly politicized as Trump and other Republicans zero in on Harris’s comment in April 2021 that she was the “last person in the room” with Biden before he made up his mind about whether to withdraw. Afghan security forces disintegrated over the next few months as the Taliban swept across the country and into the capital.

While U.S. officials familiar with Biden’s deliberations have said there’s no indication Harris had sway with him on an issue in which he was deeply entrenched, Trump has claimed that Biden and Harris together were to blame for the deaths of the 13 service members “just like they pulled the trigger.”

One former senior U.S. official who has been involved in the investigation assessed that McCaul is now “in a tough spot,” attempting to navigate his desire to hold the Biden administration accountable without losing control of the situation.

“He has got to look around and weigh the odds of Trump winning this election – and of course the Republicans think this is something that will help Trump win,” the official said.

The committee’s latest moves follow the resignation in August of Jerry Dunleavy, a conservative journalist retained by the GOP to work on the investigation who had grown frustrated by what he called a failure by the majority to aggressively scrutinize the U.S. government’s final year in Afghanistan. The families of many of the service members killed in the bombing at the Kabul airport’s Abbey Gate also have pressed for greater accountability – reserving particular fury for Jake Sullivan, Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, whom they view as the architects of a disorganized departure that assumed far too much risk.

Jim McCollum, the father of one of the Marines killed in the attack, said in an interview that he is appreciative of the committee’s work and hopes to see it pursue additional witnesses.

“It looks to me like NSC has a central role in what happened,” he said, referring to the White House’s National Security Council.

Dunleavy, in a pointed letter posted online, wrote that he quit in protest of how McCaul and his staff had handled the investigation. Senior staff members, he alleged, had stymied some of his efforts.

Dunleavy, who has never been to Afghanistan but grew interested in the war when his brother deployed, co-authored a book about the evacuation and came to the GOP’s investigation with strong convictions about Biden’s failings. After his resignation, which he described as coming after McCaul disregarded a series of his suggestions and analyses, Dunleavy also cast the committee’s work as a failure.

Asked in an interview whether the committee also has a responsibility to scrutinize Trump’s Afghanistan decisions, Dunleavy acknowledged that the former president’s deal with the Taliban was a “very flawed agreement.” But the “proximate cause” of the Taliban seizing control of the country, he argued, was Biden ordering the full withdrawal of U.S. troops.

The committee declined to answer questions about Dunleavy’s accusations.

(c) Washington Post

The heads of the British and American foreign intelligence agencies said Saturday that Ukraine’s surprise incursion into Russia is a significant achievement that could change the narrative of the grinding 2 1/2-year war, as they urged Kyiv’s allies not to be held back by Russian threats of escalation. Richard Moore, the head of MI6, said Kyiv’s surprise August offensive to seize territory in Russia’s Kursk region was “typically audacious and bold on the part of the Ukrainians, to try and change the game.” He said the offensive — which Ukraine said has captured about 1,300 square kilometers (500 square miles) of Russian territory — had “brought the war home to ordinary Russians.” Speaking alongside Moore at an unprecedented joint public event in London, CIA Director William Burns said the offensive was a “significant tactical achievement” that had exposed vulnerabilities in the Russian military. It has yet to be seen whether Ukraine can turn the gains into a long-term advantage. So far the offensive has not drawn Russian President Vladimir Putin’s focus away from eastern Ukraine, where his forces are closing in on the strategically situated city of Pokrovsk. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has repeatedly pressed allies to let Kyiv use Western-supplied missiles to strike deep inside Russia and hit sites from which Moscow launches aerial attacks. While some countries, including Britain, are thought to tacitly support the idea, others including Germany and the U.S. are reluctant. U.S. President Joe Biden has allowed Ukraine to fire U.S.-provided missiles into Russia in self-defense, but the distance has been largely limited to cross-border targets deemed a direct threat, out of concerns about further escalating the conflict. Burns said the West should be “mindful” of the escalation risk but not be “unnecessarily intimidated” by Russian saber-rattling, revealing that there was a moment in late 2022 when there was a “genuine risk of the use of tactical nuclear weapons” by Moscow. He also warned of the growing and “troubling” defense relationship between Russia, China, Iran and North Korea that he said threatens both Ukraine and Western allies in the Middle East. North Korea has sent ammunition and missiles to Russia to use against Ukraine, while Iran supplies Moscow with attack drones. Burns said the CIA had yet to see evidence of China sending weapons to Russia, “but we see lot of things short of that.” And he warned Iran against supplying ballistic missiles to Moscow, saying “it would be a dramatic escalation” of the relationship. He did not say whether such missiles had already been sent. But two people familiar with the matter said the United States has told allies that it believes Tehran has transferred short-range ballistic missiles to Russia. They spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a matter that has not been publicly disclosed. Ahead of their joint appearance at the FT Weekend Festival at London’s Kenwood House, the two spymasters wrote an opinion piece for the Financial Times, calling for a cease-fire in Israel’s war against Hamas and saying their agencies had “exploited our intelligence channels to push hard for restraint and de-escalation.” Burns has been heavily involved in efforts to broker an end to the fighting, traveling to Egypt in August for high-level talks aimed at bringing about a hostage deal and at least a temporary halt to the conflict. […]

Watch Former D.C. homicide detective Ted Williams reaction after a Pakistani man was charged for plotting to kill NYC Jewish residents around Oct. 7.

Late last night, sirens blared in Kiryat Shmona and several northern Israeli towns, as the IDF reported that more than 50 rockets were launched from Lebanon towards these regions.

In a statement, the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit detailed, “Following the sirens that sounded at 00:57 and between 2:34 to 2:39 in the area of Kiryat Shmona, approximately 20 projectiles were identified crossing from Lebanon. The IDF Aerial Defense Array successfully intercepted most of the projectiles. Fallen projectiles were identified in the area. No injuries were reported.”

The statement continued, “Following the sirens that sounded at 5:35 in the upper Galilee, approximately 30 projectiles were identified crossing from Lebanon. The IDF Aerial Defense Array successfully intercepted several projectiles and the rest fell in open areas. No injuries were reported.”

During the night, the IDF conducted airstrikes on Hezbollah military sites located in Aitaroun, Maroun El Ras, and Yaroun in southern Lebanon, according to the IDF.

Additionally, the IDF announced that on Shabbos they targeted and neutralized terrorists from the Amal terrorist group operating within a Hezbollah facility in Froun, southern Lebanon.

Hezbollah took credit for the rocket attacks on northern Israel, stating that the barrage directed at the Kiryat Shmona area was in retaliation for an attack on a vehicle in southern Lebanon on Saturday, which reportedly resulted in the deaths of several rescue workers.

Following the rocket assaults, which also affected unevacuated communities, the Home Front Command conducted a situation review and decided that Sunday classes in the Golan would proceed as planned.

Residents were advised to avoid areas in the northern Hula Valley, including Gonen, Shamir, Lehavot HaBashan, Amir, Kfar Szold, Kfar Blum, Sde Nechemia, and Neot Mordechai.

{Matzav.com Israel}