Late Motzei Shabbos, the IDF announced the discovery of more bodies underground in Gaza, which are likely those of Israeli hostages previously held by Hamas. Amid social media speculation regarding the identities of the potential hostages, the IDF stated that confirmation would only be possible once the bodies have been returned to Israel and examined by professional experts, likely on Sunday. IDF sources clarified that if the bodies are indeed those of hostages, they were not killed in any recent skirmish with Hamas in the area, as no military force was used nearby. In Rehoboth, Delaware, US President Joe Biden, after leaving a church service, commented on the IDF’s statement about finding bodies in Gaza that could be hostages. He remarked on the uncertainty surrounding the exact number and identities, stating there is “a lot of speculation who they are,” and emphasized the need to wait until the bodies are identified and “their families are notified.” “It’s time this war ended. We should end this war. I think we’re on the verge of having an agreement,” Biden added. (YWN World Headquarters – NYC)
Russian shelling in the town of Chasiv Yar on Saturday killed five people, as Moscow’s troops pushed ahead in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region. The attack struck a high-rise building and a private home, said regional Gov. Vadym Filaskhin, who said the victims were men aged 24 to 38. He urged the last remaining residents to leave the front-line town, which had a pre-war population of 12,000. “Normal life has been impossible in Chasiv Yar for more than two years,” Filaskhin wrote on social media. “Do not become a Russian target — evacuate.” A further two people were killed by Russian shelling in the Kharkiv region. One victim was pulled from the rubble of a house in the village of Cherkaska Lozova, said Gov. Oleh Syniehubov, while a second woman died of her wounds while being transported to a hospital. Meanwhile, Russia’s Ministry of Defense said it captured the town of Pivnichne, also in Ukraine’s Donetsk region. The Associated Press could not independently verify the claim. Russian forces have been driving deeper into the partly occupied eastern region, the total capture of which is one of the Kremlin’s primary ambitions. Russia’s army is closing in on Pokrovsk, a critical logistics hub for the Ukrainian defense in the area. At the same time, Ukraine has sent its forces into Russia’s Kursk region in recent weeks in the largest incursion onto Russian soil since World War II. The move is partly an effort to force Russia to draw troops away from the Donetsk front. Elsewhere, the number of wounded following a Russian attack on the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv on Friday continued to rise. Six people were killed, including a 14-year-old girl, when glide bombs struck five locations across the city, said regional Gov. Oleh Syniehubov. Writing on social media Saturday, he said that the number of injured had risen from 47 to 96. Syniehubov also confirmed that the 12-story apartment block that was hit by one bomb strike, setting the building ablaze and trapping at least one person on an upper floor, would be partly demolished. Ukrainian officials have previously pointed to the Kharkiv strikes as further evidence that Western partners should scrap restrictions on what the Ukrainian military can target with donated weapons. In an interview with CNN on Friday, Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov said that Kyiv had presented Washington with a list of potential long-range targets within Russia for its approval. “I hope we were heard,” he said. He also denied speculation that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy ’s decision to dismiss the commander of the country’s air force Friday was directly linked to the destruction of an F-16 warplane that Ukraine received from its Western partners four days earlier. The order to dismiss Lt. Gen. Mykola Oleshchuk was published on the presidential website minutes before an address which saw Zelenskyy stress the need to “take care of all our soldiers.” “This is two separate issues,” said Umerov. “At this stage, I would not connect them.” The number of injured also continued to rise in the Russian border region of Belgorod, where five people were killed Friday by Ukrainian shelling, said Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov. He said Sunday that 46 people had been injured, of whom 37 were in the hospital, including seven children. Writing on social media, Gladkov also said […]
Lawyers for Donald Trump intend to urge a judge to dismiss the federal election subversion case against the former president after a Supreme Court opinion that narrowed the scope of the landmark prosecution, according to a court filing. The defense team, in a joint filing late Friday with prosecutors that lays out dueling proposals for the next steps, foreshadowed a series of anticipated challenges that would draw out until deep into next year the criminal case charging Trump with plotting to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Those include arguments that a new and more limited indictment issued by prosecutors this past week still contains allegations for which Trump, as a former president, is entitled to immunity, such as his conversations with his then-vice president, Mike Pence. Defense lawyers also intend “as a threshold matter” to seek the dismissal of the case on the same grounds that a federal judge in Florida cited last month in tossing out a separate prosecution charging Trump with illegally hoarding classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate. The judge in that case, Aileen Cannon, held that special counsel Jack Smith, whose team brought the case, was unlawfully appointed and that his office was improperly funded. The federal court filing in Washington offers competing visions for how the case should proceed and comes before a status conference set for the coming week — the first court appearance in the case in months. The Supreme Court opinion made it all but certain that no trial can be held before the election, and it now falls to U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan to determine which of the acts in the indictment can be included in the case and which must be stripped out. The timetable proposed by the Trump team envisions the case remaining snarled in pretrial arguments up until potentially fall 2025, or well after this November’s presidential election. Smith’s team did not propose specific dates but said it would be prepared to file an opening legal brief on the central issue of Trump’s immunity “promptly at any time the Court deems appropriate.” The filing is an acknowledgment of the radically altered legal landscape since Smith filed the indictment in June 2023 and the challenges prosecutors have encountered in trying to hold Trump accountable this year. Though prosecutors initially accused Trump of wide-ranging schemes to cling to power and to block the peaceful transfer of power, they must now contend with the aftermath of a Supreme Court opinion that said former presidents enjoy absolute immunity for exercising core constitutional powers and are presumptively immune for other official acts they take as president. Smith’s team responded to the ruling with a new indictment this past week that removed allegations related to Trump’s dealings with the Justice Department, an area of conduct for which the court said Trump was immune from prosecution, and made other changes. But Trump’s lawyers, according to Friday’s filing, don’t think prosecutors went far enough and say they “strongly maintain that many classes of conduct alleged in the Superseding Indictment are immune — including, but not limited to, Tweets and public statements about the federal 2020 Presidential election, communications with state officials about the federal election, and allegations relating to alternate slates of electors.” They said they particularly objected to the continued inclusion […]
Rescuers are searching for a helicopter that went missing in Russia’s far east on Saturday with 22 people on board. The Mi-8 helicopter took off close to the Vachkazhets volcano in the Kamchatka region, but did not arrive at its destination as scheduled, Russia’s Federal Air Transport Agency said in a statement. It said it believed that 19 passengers and three crew members were on board. The Mi-8 is a two-engine helicopter designed in the 1960s. It is widely used in Russia, where crashes have been frequent, as well as in neighboring countries and many other nations. (AP)
The IDF on Motzei Shabbos announced that an IDF soldier was killed in a shootout with two Hamas terrorists in Jenin on Shabbos morning in a counterterrorism raid carried out as part of the ongoing Operation Summer Camps in Yehudah and Shomron and the Jordan Valley. The soldier was identified as Staff Sgt. Elkana Navon, H”yd, 20, from Petach Tikvah. He served as a squad commander in the 906th Battalion of the Bislamach Brigade. He was the fourth talmid of the Hesder Yeshivah in Kiryat Shmona to fall in battle since October 7. At about 6 a.m., IDF forces approached a building in Jenin that housed terrorists. Two senior Hamas terrorists who were both responsible for numerous terror attacks, managed to surprise them, opening fire from close range. A gun battle ensued during which both both terrorists were killed. Navon, z’l, was hit by gunfire and killed and three others were injured, including an IDF officer who was seriously injured. They were evacuated to Emek Medical Center in Afula and Rambam Health Care Campus in Haifa, as can be seen in the video below: (YWN’s Jerusalem desk is keeping you updated after tzeis ha’Shabbos in Israel)
A potentially deadly coordinated double terror attack in two areas of Gush Etzion on Friday night miraculously ended with only three people injured. The first incident occurred close to midnight when a car exploded at a gas station at the Gush Etzion Junction. A car had pulled up to the station against the flow of traffic and as it pulled up, the hood caught on fire. The terrorist then emerged from the car, completely burned. A gas station employee told Ynet that at first, an employee tried to douse the terrorist with a water hose, thinking it was an accidental car fire. But then the terrorist began running and trying to attack the security forces who had arrived at the scene. IDF soldiers opened fire, killing him. Two IDF officers were injured by friendly fire, one moderately and one lightly, and were evacuated to Shaare Tzedek Medical Center in Jerusalem. Only moments later, another terror attack occurred at the entrance to the yishuv of Karmei Tzur. A terrorist rammed his car through the barrier at the entrance of the yishuv and tried to run over the security guard, lightly injuring him. Nearby IDF soldiers opened fire at the driver but he continued driving into the yishuv. A member of the yishuv’s security patrol rushed to the area in his own car and deliberately collided with the terrorist’s car and then got out of the car and opened fire, killing the terrorist. Shortly later, the car exploded. The patrol member was lightly injured in the collision and was evacuated to Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital where he received treatment and was released shortly later. Security forces called to the scene launched a search of the yishuv to rule out the presence of additional terrorists on the yishuv. Meanwhile, residents of the yishuv were ordered to stay inside their homes and were only given an all-clear seven hours later. As of Motzei Shabbos, an investigation of the incidents is still ongoing but it is believed that the two terrorists, both residents of Chevron, drove together from Chevron in two booby-trapped cars on Route 60 to carry out a coordinated terror attack, one at the gas station and one in Karmei Tzur. Security officials believe that the car bombs, both of which were packed with nails and screws, were manufactured in the same explosive lab in Chevron. Following the attack, IDF forces entered Chevron and arrested six suspects. They also imposed a military closure on the city. Israeli security forces suspect that a third suicide bomber, who has not yet been located, may have driven along Route 60 with the other two terrorists. (YWN’s Jerusalem desk is keeping you updated after tzeis ha’Shabbos in Israel)
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