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A U.S. Navy submarine has arrived in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in a show of force as a fleet of Russian warships gather for planned military exercises in the Caribbean. U.S. Southern Command said the USS Helena, a nuclear-powered fast attack submarine, pulled into the waters near the U.S. base in Cuba on Thursday, just a day after a Russian frigate, a nuclear-powered submarine, an oil tanker and a rescue tug crossed into Havana Bay after drills in the Atlantic Ocean. The stop is part of a “routine port visit” as the submarine travels through Southern Command’s region, it said in a social media post. Other U.S. ships also have been tracking and monitoring the Russian drills, which Pentagon officials say do not represent a threat to the United States. “This is not a surprise. We’ve seen them do these type of port calls before,” Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said Wednesday when asked about the Russian drills. “We of course take it seriously, but these exercises don’t pose a threat to the United States.” The exercises, however, come less than two weeks after President Joe Biden authorized Ukraine to use U.S.-provided weapons to strike inside Russia to protect Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city. Russian President Vladimir Putin then suggested his military could respond with “asymmetrical steps” elsewhere in the world. Singh said it wouldn’t be a surprise to see more Russian activity around the United States in such global exercises. The drills are in international waters, and U.S. officials expect the Russian ships to remain in the region through the summer and possibly also stop in Venezuela. Russia is a longtime ally of Venezuela and Cuba, and its warships and aircraft have periodically made forays into the Caribbean. Russian ships have occasionally docked in Havana since 2008, when a group of Russian vessels entered Cuban waters in what state media described as the first such visit in almost two decades. In 2015, a reconnaissance and communications ship arrived unannounced in Havana a day before the start of discussions between U.S. and Cuban officials on the reopening of diplomatic relations. (AP)

President Joe Biden and Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed a 10-year security agreement Thursday that they hailed as a milestone in relations between their countries, but that alone was not enough to stop Zelenskyy from wondering how much longer he could count on America’s support. Zelenskyy also said his country “urgently” needed additional air defense systems to protect Ukrainians and the nation’s infrastructure from Russia’s continued bombardment. The leaders signed the agreement on the sidelines of the annual Group of Seven summit, held this year in Italy, and Biden said the goal “is to strengthen Ukraine’s defense and deterrence capabilities.” Zelenskyy said at a joint news conference that the signing made for a “truly historic day,” but he also wondered about the durability of support from the United States and other allies. Ukraine’s president said the right question to ask is “for how long the unity in the world will remain? The unity in the U.S., together with European leaders” and how it will be influenced by the outcome of elections this year in many of those countries. Topping that list is voting in the U.S. in November in a campaign that could see the return of Republican Donald Trump to the presidency. Trump has been skeptical of providing additional military aid to Ukraine, at one point criticizing the “endless flow of American treasure.” He more recently has expressed openness to lending money instead and has said Ukraine’s independence is important to the United States. Biden said the U.S. has commitments from five countries that he did not name to provide Patriot missile and other air defense systems to Ukraine. He said countries that have been expecting the same weapons from the U.S. have been told they will have to wait because “everything we have is going to go to Ukraine until their needs are met.” Zelenskyy said he “urgently” needed seven Patriot systems. Biden then told him, “You’ll have some relatively quickly.” Germany is one of the five countries that have promised an additional Patriot system for Ukraine. Zelenskyy went on to deliver a stark warning about Russian aggression, saying that “if Ukraine does not withstand, the democracy of many countries, I am sure, won’t withstand either.” The U.S. and European countries also agreed to keep sanctioned Russian assets locked up until Moscow pays reparations for its invasion of Ukraine, clearing the way for a $50 billion loan package for Ukraine. Combined with new sanctions against Russia announced earlier in the week, Biden said the series of actions to support Ukraine show Putin that “he cannot wait us out. He cannot divide us.” The highly anticipated agreement will leverage interest and income from more than $260 billion in frozen Russian assets, largely held in Europe, to secure a $50 billion loan from the U.S. and additional loans from other partners. Ukraine will receive the first payments sometime this year, a U.S. official said. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to preview the agreement, which will be included in the G7 leaders’ statement on Friday. Ukraine will be able to spend the money in several areas, including military, economic, humanitarian and reconstruction needs, the official said. The leaders’ statement on Friday will also preserve the option of confiscating the Russian assets entirely, for which the allies have yet […]

Senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan admits uncertainty regarding the status of the remaining 116 hostages taken on October 7, saying, “I don’t have any idea about that. No one has an idea about this,” in an interview with CNN.

He attributes the psychological state of the four recently rescued hostages to Israel’s actions, following a doctor’s report of their enduring continuous physical and emotional abuse during captivity. “I believe if they have mental problem, this is because of what Israel have done in Gaza,” Hamdan claims, controversially suggesting the hostages appeared healthier leaving Gaza than when they were taken.

Hamdan justifies Hamas’s refusal to accept truce terms, insisting that Israel must agree to a total ceasefire before hostage release discussions can proceed. Hamas requires “a clear position from Israel to accept the ceasefire, a complete withdrawal from Gaza, and let the Palestinians to determine their future by themselves, the reconstruction, the (lifting) of the siege … and we are ready to talk about a fair deal about the prisoners exchange,” he states.

He also dismisses a Wall Street Journal report alleging that Hamas’s Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar deemed civilian casualties a “necessary sacrifice,” calling it misinformation. “It was fake messages done by someone who is not Palestinian and (it) was sent (to the) Wall Street Journal as part of the pressure against Hamas and provoking the people against the leader,” Hamdan tells CNN, though providing no evidence for his claim.

{Matzav.com Israel}

The Israel Defense Forces confirmed on Wednesday the targeted killing of Hezbollah commander Sami Taleb Abdullah, who headed the Nasr Unit, or “Victory Force,” one of the Iranian-back terror group’s three divisions in Southern Lebanon, responsible for the eastern sector.

Abdullah, 55, who assumed his position in 2016, was killed in an airstrike Tuesday night in the Jouaiyya area, where he oversaw attacks since Oct. 7 on the cities of Kiryat Shmona and Safed, Moshavs Margaliot and Avivim, and other places. He was known within Hezbollah as Hajj Abu Taleb.

He also spearheaded attacks causing recent widespread fires in the Golan Heights and Upper Galilee, as well as the launch of Hezbollah’s Burkan missiles, which have a maximum range of 10 km. (6.2 miles) and carry up to 500 kg. (1,100 pounds) of explosive material, at Israeli communities.

He is the senior-most of some 300 Hezbollah terrorists killed since the Iranian proxy began near-daily attacks on Israel in the immediate aftermath of Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre.

“Abdullah was one of Hezbollah’s most senior commanders in Southern Lebanon who planned, advanced and carried out a large number of terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians,” the IDF said.

Three additional terrorists were killed in Tuesday’s strike.

In response, Hezbollah fired more than 200 rockets at northern Israel. JNS

A corpse found on Thursday in the Sha’ar Hanegev region, adjacent to the northeastern Gaza Strip, is most likely that of a Hamas terrorist who took part in the Oct. 7 massacre, the Israel Police says.

A civilian discovered the remains, which were said to be in a state of “advanced decay,” at an intersection where terrorists murdered at least 26 people on Oct. 7.

Alongside the body, security forces located an empty combat vest and a shirt with Arabic letters on it. The writing on the shirt appeared to be the symbol of Hamas’s “military” wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades.

Police are still waiting for the full results of the identification process at the L. Greenberg National Institute of Forensic Medicine in Tel Aviv, also known as the Abu Kabir Forensic Institute.

“The suspicion is that this is a Hamas terrorist who was killed during the attack,” the Israel Police said in a statement on Thursday afternoon.

On Oct. 7, 2023, some 3,000 Hamas-led terrorists invaded Israel by land, sea and air, killing about 1,200 people, kidnapping 251 people back to Gaza and terrorizing hundreds of thousands more by using rape and torture as a weapon while temporarily conquering several Israeli communities.

Israeli security forces killed around a thousand of the terrorists who crossed the border fence that day and captured many others. JNS

President Joe Biden will host a White House event next week celebrating an Obama-era directive that offered deportation protections for young undocumented immigrants, as his own administration prepares potential new benefits for others without legal status but with long-standing ties in the United States. White House officials are closing in on a plan that would tap Biden’s executive powers to shield spouses of U.S. citizens without legal status from deportation, offer them work permits and ease their path toward permanent residency and eventually American citizenship, according to five people with knowledge of the deliberations. The people said those actions could be unveiled as early as next week, although a White House official stressed Thursday that no final decisions have been made on what Biden will announce, if anything. As of earlier this week, Biden had not been presented with the proposal for his final approval, adding to the uncertainty for the timing of any announcement. The president is currently in Italy participating in the Group of Seven summit of the world’s wealthiest democracies. But Biden telegraphed last week as he rolled out his directive to crack down on asylum claims at the border — a move that has infuriated immigrant-rights groups and many Democratic lawmakers — that he would be announcing other actions more to the advocates’ liking. “Today, I have spoken about what we need to do to secure the border,” Biden said at the June 4 event at the White House. “In the weeks ahead — and I mean the weeks ahead — I will speak to how we can make our immigration system more fair and more just.” To protect the spouses of Americans, the administration is expected to use a process called “parole-in-place.” It not only offers deportation protections and work permits to qualifying immigrants but also removes a legal obstacle that prevents them from getting on a path to a green card, and eventually, U.S. citizenship. That power has already been used for other groups of immigrants, such as members of the U.S. military or their family members who lack legal status. For Biden’s actions, White House officials were narrowing in on a plan that would offer parole in place for spouses of Americans who have been here for at least five or 10 years, according to the people briefed on the deliberations. The people were granted anonymity to discuss internal White House deliberations. The immigrant advocacy group FWD.us estimates that there are roughly 1.1 million immigrants without legal status married to Americans. However, depending on how the Biden administration writes the proposal, the actual universe of people who could qualify for the president’s plan is likely far smaller. Advocates were also lobbying the White House to include benefits for immigrants lacking legal status who provide caregiving roles for American family members, according to two of the people familiar with the discussions, although that provision was seen as far less likely to be enacted for now. Allowing such caregivers to apply for a so-called “cancellation of removal” would affect immigrants like family members of Americans who have specific needs or disabilities. Amid these deliberations, the White House has invited lawmakers to an event Tuesday afternoon to celebrate the 12th anniversary of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, according to a person familiar with the […]

by Chaim Weber Jewish mothers are professional multi-taskers. Which can lead to all sorts of interesting questions. Imagine a busy woman borrowing her neighbor’s fleishig pot to make supper. But in between carpools, suggesting a shidduch, organizing a simcha, and calling back teachers, she accidentally used a spoon with dairy on it. If the amount of dairy was significant enough to not be batel and the pot was a type of pot that cannot be kashered, what is the halacha? Does she have to pay for the pot? The Opinion of the Rosh Ordinarily, a borrower is responsible for any accidents causing damage to a borrowed item. However, the Gemara in Bava Metzia (96b) tells us that there’s an exception called meisah machamas melacha – if an animal died while performing work. If an animal died while performing work, the borrower is exempt. The question is how far does this exemption go. The Rosh says that meisah machamas melacha only applies when the animal dies while performing the work for which it was borrowed. Not if the damage was incidental to the work. For example, if one borrowed a donkey for travel purposes and it died due to the travel effort, then the exemption of meisah machamas melacha would apply. However, if bandits killed it on the way, the meisah machamas melacha exemption wouldn’t apply, as the death wasn’t a direct result of the animal’s work. It was only incidental. Why wouldn’t incidental damage be an exemption? The Machaneh Ephraim (She’elia Upikadon 4) explains that the Rosh holds like the Ramban. The Ramban explains that the reason for meisah machamas melacha is that the owner shouldn’t have lent out the animal knowing that ordinary work would damage it. By lending out the animal, the owner was negligent and the borrower is therefore exempt. This reasoning only applies when the damage was the result of the animal’s usual labor. Not if it got damaged through other means. The Rema (Choshen Mishpat 340) quotes the opinion of the Rosh but gives a slightly different explanation. He notes that if the damage was only incidental and not a direct result of the work, it’s possible that this damage would have happened regardless of whether the animal was working or not. Therefore, the exemption of meisah machamas melacha can only apply when it was a direct result of the animal’s work – where there is a direct and traceable cause and effect. This explanation fits better in the wording of the Rosh, as quoted by the Tur (the Rosh’s son). The Opinion of the Ramah The Ramah (quoted in Tur, Choshen Mishpat 340) disagrees. The Ramah says the meisah machamas melacha exemption applies as long as the work caused the damage in any way, even if the cause was incidental. Therefore, if bandits killed an animal that was borrowed for the sake of travel, that’s also considered meisah machamas melacha, as the animal wouldn’t have been killed if it wasn’t traveling. According to the Ramah, the efforts of the journey don’t have to cause the damage – rather, as long as the damage wouldn’t have happened if the animal wasn’t working, the exemption of meisah machamas melacha would apply.   The Rambam appears to hold like the Ramah, as the Rambam (She’eila 1:3) cites […]

A 29-year-old Queens man, Judd Sanson, was arrested early Wednesday morning after a traffic stop revealed a cache of weapons and extremist materials in his vehicle, sparking fears of a potential terrorist plot. According to police, Sanson’s vehicle, a Ford Explorer with an obscured license plate, was pulled over around 1 a.m. near 23rd Avenue and 86th Street. Upon searching the car, officers found a loaded 9mm gun, nine loaded magazines, an NYPD vest, handcuffs, two axes, a stun gun, multiple knives, a weighted whip, and an expandable baton. The baton had disturbing messages etched into it, including “You left me no choice, I am sorry, You gon learn today” and the Arabic word for “God forgive me.” Police also discovered an orange MTA vest and a Guy Fawkes “V for Vendetta” mask, which has been associated with anarchist and extremist groups. Sanson, who allegedly expressed extremist views online, was taken into custody and charged with multiple weapons offenses. NYPD Chief Jeffrey Maddrey praised the two alert officers who made the stop, saying, “Members of this department make gun arrests, weapons arrests, arrests for knives every day, but an arrest of this magnitude, the amount of ammunition, NYPD paraphernalia in the car was significant.” The investigation is ongoing, but sources believe Sanson may have been planning something “very bad.” One officer noted, “The sum of the parts had the potential for something awful.” Police officials credited the traffic stop with potentially averting a disaster, saying “ghost cars” like Sanson’s, with phony or obscured license plates, can be tied to criminal activity. (YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

The head of the United Nations has blacklisted both the Israeli military and Hamas, including them for the first time on his annual list of perpetrators that harm children during conflict.

“I am appalled by the dramatic increase and unprecedented scale and intensity of grave violations against children in the Gaza Strip, Israel” and Judea and Samaria, wrote António Guterres in his yearly report, which was sent to U.N. Security Council members on Tuesday and published on Thursday.

Guterres’s special representative for children and armed conflict, Virginia Gamba, carries a Security Council mandate to monitor, prevent and report on such violations.

The report, known as the “list of shame,” is intended to embarrass those so designated into performing corrective action with regards to their alleged violations against children, including killing, maiming, recruitment, abduction, sexual violence, denial of humanitarian assistance and attacks against schools and hospitals.

Guterres blacklisted the Israeli military and security forces, Hamas’s Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades and affiliated factions and Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s Al-Quds Brigades.

In the report viewed by JNS, covering the 2023 calendar year, the United Nations said it verified 8,009 grave violations against Israeli and Palestinian children, but the verification process has been hampered due to the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.

Of the verified violations, 113 were against Israeli children, with most child casualties in Gaza since Israel’s military response to Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre, caused by “the use of explosive weapons in populated areas by Israeli armed and security forces.”

Israeli officials have expressed indignation at being included on the list, which has typically featured designated terrorist groups such as ISIS and Al Qaeda or other Islamic fundamentalist groups like the Taliban.

Israel was informed last Friday that it would be included on this year’s list, with Gilad Erdan, the Jewish state’s U.N. ambassador, telling Guterres’s chief of staff during the so-called courtesy call that he was “utterly shocked and disgusted by this shameful decision of the secretary-general,” adding that Israel’s placement on the list rewards Hamas, which uses children and other civilians as human shields and recruits soldiers of minor age.

Erdan later published a recording of his remarks during the call, drawing criticism from Guterres’s office.

Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu said last Friday that “the U.N. added itself to the blacklist of history when it joined those who support the Hamas murderers,” adding, “The IDF is the most moral army in the world. No delusional U.N. decision will change that.” JNS

A tropical disturbance that brought a rare flash flood emergency to much of southern Florida delayed flights at two of the state’s largest airports and left vehicles waterlogged and stalled in some of the region’s lowest-lying streets. “Looked like the beginning of a zombie movie,” said Ted Rico, a tow truck driver who spent much of Wednesday night and Thursday morning helping to clear the streets of stalled vehicles. “There’s cars littered everywhere, on top of sidewalks, in the median, in the middle of the street, no lights on. Just craziness, you know. Abandoned cars everywhere.” Rico, of One Master Trucking Corp., was born and raised in Miami and said he was ready for the emergency. “You know when its coming,” he said. “Every year it’s just getting worse, and for some reason people just keep going through the puddles.” Travelers across the area were trying to adjust their plans on Thursday morning. More than 20 inches (50 centimeters) of rain has fallen in some areas of South Florida since Tuesday, with more predicted over the next few days. Ticket and security lines snaked around a domestic concourse at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport just before noon Thursday. The travel boards showed about half of that terminal’s flights had been canceled or postponed. Bill Carlisle, a Navy petty officer first class, had spent his morning trying to catch a flight back to Norfolk, Virginia. He had arrived at Miami International Airport at about 6:30 a.m., but 90 minutes later he was still in line and realized he couldn’t get his bags checked and through security in time to catch his flight. “It was a zoo,” said Carlisle, a public affairs specialist. He was speaking for himself, not the Navy. “Nothing against the (airport) employees — there is only so much they can do.” So he used his phone to book an afternoon flight out of Fort Lauderdale. He took a shuttle the 20 miles north, only to find that flight had been canceled. He was now heading back to Miami for a 9 p.m. flight, hoping it wouldn’t get canceled by the heavy rains expected later in the day. He was resigned, not angry. “Just a long day sitting in airports,” Carlisle said. “This is kind of par for the course for government travel.” Wednesday’s downpours and subsequent flooding blocked roads, floated vehicles and even delayed the Florida Panthers on their way to Stanley Cup games in Canada against the Edmonton Oilers. The disorganized storm system was pushing across Florida from the Gulf of Mexico at roughly the same time as the early June start of hurricane season, which this year is forecast to be among the most active in recent memory amid concerns that climate change is increasing storm intensity. The disturbance has not reached cyclone status and was given only a slight chance to form into a tropical system once it moves into the Atlantic Ocean after crossing Florida, according to the National Hurricane Center. In Hallandale Beach, Alex Demchemko, was walking his Russian spaniel Lex along the still-flooded sidewalks near the Airbnb where he’s lived after arriving from Russia last month to seek asylum in the U.S. “We didn’t come out from our apartment, but we had to walk with our dog,” Demchemko said. “A lot of flashes, […]

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) said that antisemitism was antithetical to American and progressive values, and that “bad faith actors” falsely accuse black women in particular of being antisemitic.

“Antisemitism is an assault on our values as Americans and especially as progressives,” she said during an online webinar.

“It is also important to say here in this moment and during that conversation that criticism of the Israeli government is not inherently antisemitic and criticism of Zionism is not automatically antisemitic,” she added.

The congresswoman, who is known as AOC, said that “when the Jewish community is threatened, the progressive movement is undermined,” adding, “it is also true that accusations and false accusations of antisemitism are wielded against people of color and women of color by bad-faith political actors.”

This “weaponizing [of] antisemitism is used to divide us and create a false choice between the fight for Jewish safety and the calls for Palestinian self-determination,” she said.

Sam Markstein, national political director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, called the congresswoman part of “the Hamas caucus,” expressing shock that “the Democratic Party has this much difficulty calling out antisemitism.” He added that “instead of despicable race-baiting, AOC should focus on fighting bigotry in her own ranks.” JNS

President Biden emphatically defended his son at a summit of world leaders in Italy, commenting directly for the first time since Hunter Biden was convicted this week on federal gun charges, while also reiterating that he would not use his presidential powers to soften whatever penalty his son faces.

“I’m extremely proud of my son, Hunter,” Biden said during a brief news conference at the Group of Seven meeting, as two of Hunter’s daughters, Maisy and Finnegan, watched from several feet away in the audience. “He has overcome an addiction. He’s one of the brightest, most decent men I know.”

The president reiterated that he would not pardon his son, saying he trusted the deliberations of a jury that found Hunter Biden guilty of lying on a gun-purchase form in 2018 when he checked a box saying he was not using illegal drugs.

As Biden was walking away from the stage, he was also asked whether he would commute his son’s sentence – that is, reduce its severity. “No,” Biden responded.

Hunter Biden is not likely to be sentenced for several weeks, as the prosecution and defense prepare reports for the judge on what they consider to be an appropriate penalty. While his conviction carries a potential prison sentence, some legal analysts have said that may be less likely given that Hunter is a first-time offender who owned the gun for only 11 days and never used it.

Still, the issue of a chief executive’s pardon authority has taken on an unusually prominent role in the 2024 presidential campaign, largely because presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump has been convicted of falsifying business records to hide an alleged affair. Trump also faces three more criminal trials, which may not begin until after the Nov. 5 election, while Hunter Biden faces a tax-evasion trial in September.

Biden answered the questions about his son as he addressed reporters alongside Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky after the two leaders announced a new security pact between their countries.

The moment underlined Biden’s efforts to balance political and personal demands at this week’s summit, as he juggles pressures that have far-reaching global consequences with those that pertain to his tightknit family.

In the hours before he left for the trip – and on the day Hunter Biden was convicted – the president made a quick trip to Wilmington, Del., where he was greeted on the tarmac by his son, along with Hunter’s wife, Melissa, and their son, Beau.

Biden’s priority at the summit was to get a deal done on Ukraine funding while trying to assure allies of American leadership. But the president was also trying to keep his family together, and he brought along three of his granddaughters, children of Hunter Biden.

That included Naomi Biden, the president’s 30-year-old granddaughter who just days ago was tearful after her testimony in a witness box in a Wilmington courtroom and this week joined the president at a majestic setting near the Adriatic Sea.

During the news conference, the president’s granddaughters, along with Naomi’s husband, Peter Neal, looked on.

(c) Washington Post

Anti-Israel protesters continued to run wild across New York as masked agitators on a city subway car Monday demanded to know if there were any Zionists on board, while elsewhere in the city vandals attacked the home of the Jewish director of the Brooklyn Museum.

The back-to-back events coming on the heels of a raucous pro-Hamas rally outside an exhibition on the victims of the Oct. 7 massacre raised concern that rabid antisemitism of a radical minority of agitators was spiraling out of control in New York City.

The group of masked passengers on the subway demanded to know if there were any “Zionists” on the train—then warned them, “This is your chance to get out,” according to a video circulating on social media.

The video shows the slogan being yelled inside the packed subway car by a man, with the crowd of activists echoing his words.

Less than 48 hours later, the New York homes of the Jewish director of the Brooklyn Museum and other non-Jewish museum officials were vandalized Wednesday in a coordinated attack.

The assailants smeared red paint and graffiti on the Brooklyn Heights home of Anne Pasternak, director of the museum, and hung a banner at the entrance to the museum director’s apartment building that accused her of being a “white supremacist Zionist.”

“Blood on your hands” was also splashed in red paint on the walkway leading to her building.

The homes of two trustees and the museum’s president and CEO Kimberly Panicek Trueblood, whose husband is Jewish, were also targeted in the overnight attack that was carried out under cover of darkness.

“This is not peaceful protest or free speech,” New York Mayor Eric Adams wrote in a post on X where he shared the images. “This is a crime, and it’s overt, unacceptable antisemitism. These actions will never be tolerated in New York City for any reason.”

“The latest lesson in anti-Zionism as antisemitism,” Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.) posted on X. “The anti-Zionist left is not only seeking to purge Zionists (i.e. most Jews) from public places like public transit. It is vandalizing the private homes of individual Jews.”

The Brooklyn Museum was itself stormed by protesters last month who damaged artwork and unfurled a “Free Palestine” banner from the roof.  Dozens of people were arrested in that incident.

Earlier this week, a mob of protesters chanting “intifada revolution” rallied outside a New York City exhibit memorializing the hundreds of victims of the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attack on the Supernova music festival in southern Israel.

The crowd lit flares and waved PLO flags, along with one associated with the Iran-backed Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah, in front of the exhibition on Wall Street during what was billed by organizers as a “citywide day of rage for Gaza.”

The protest was widely condemned across political lines, including a denunciation from the White House, and the exhibition will now run until June 22 due to overwhelming demand.

Some American Jewish leaders are now calling for a ban on masks in New York City due to the explosion of antisemitism by mobs with hidden faces. JNS

American journalist Evan Gershkovich of the Wall Street Journal will soon stand trial in the Russian city of Yekaterinburg on charges of spying for the CIA, Russian authorities said Thursday, even as they continued to disclose no evidence to support the accusations.

Gershkovich, 32, was arrested in March 2023 while on a reporting assignment for the Journal in Yekaterinburg and accused of espionage by the Federal Security Service, or FSB. If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in prison. Gershkovich, the Journal and U.S. officials repeatedly have rejected the charges as baseless.

Russian prosecutors, announcing that they had finalized an indictment, said in a statement that they had “established and documented” that Gershkovich “collected secret information” about the Uralvagonzavod military factory in the Sverdlovsk region while “on assignment from the CIA.”

It was the first time Russian authorities revealed any details about the case they intend to build against him, and they still did not reveal any evidence to justify the allegations. All pretrial hearings against Gershkovich have been held behind closed doors.

The State Department has declared him and former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, who was arrested in 2018 on similar charges, to be wrongfully detained, a designation that commits the federal government to work for their release.

In a Thursday statement, the Journal and its publisher, Dow Jones, once again rejected the charges and demanded Gershkovich’s immediate release, saying they “expect the U.S. government to redouble efforts.”

“Evan Gershkovich is facing a false and baseless charge,” they said in the statement. “Russia’s latest move toward a sham trial is, while expected, deeply disappointing and still no less outrageous. Evan has spent 441 days wrongfully detained in a Russian prison for simply doing his job. Evan is a journalist. The Russian regime’s smearing of Evan is repugnant, disgusting and based on calculated and transparent lies. Journalism is not a crime.”

State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Thursday the charges against Gershkovich “are false and the Russian government knows that they are false.”

“We have been clear from the start that Evan has done nothing wrong. He should never have been arrested in the first place,” Miller said.

Gershkovich’s arrest marked the first time an American journalist had been accused of espionage in Russia since the Cold War. The Kremlin has signaled that it is open to the possibility of trading Gershkovich for Russian nationals jailed abroad once a verdict is delivered.

In February, President Vladimir Putin told American right-wing host Tucker Carlson in his first interview with a Western media figure since the 2022 invasion of Ukraine that “an agreement can be reached” with the United States to release Gershkovich.

Putin made a thinly veiled reference to Vadim Krasikov, an FSB agent currently serving a life sentence in Germany after being convicted of murdering a Georgian military officer, Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, in the Berlin park Kleiner Tiergarten in 2019.

“Listen, I’ll tell you: sitting in one country, a country that is an ally of the United States, is a man who, for patriotic reasons, eliminated a bandit in one of the European capitals,” Putin said.

Other officials have confirmed initial discussions had taken place about an exchange that would have involved Gershkovich, Krasikov and Alexei Navalny, the Russian political opposition figure who died suddenly in an Arctic prison in February. Navalny’s family and associates said he was killed to prevent such an exchange from taking place.

Navalny had recovered at a Berlin hospital after he was nearly assassinated with a chemical weapon in Russia in 2020, and freeing him was seen as a way to persuade Germany to release Krasikov.

U.S. officials and analysts have accused Russia of using Americans as bargaining chips to win the release of Russians convicted in the West of serious crimes.

The arrests in recent months of dual U.S.-Russian citizens – Alsu Kurmasheva, a reporter with U.S.-government-financed Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, and Ksenia Karelina, a spa worker who had been living in California – brought the number of Americans in Russian custody to at least six.

Those detentions have fueled speculation that Russia is seeking to gain more leverage. Moscow denies that the arrests are politically motivated and insists each detainee has violated Russian law.

In February 2022, just before the invasion of Ukraine, the American WNBA star Brittney Griner was arrested in Russia for possessing less than a gram of hash oil and charged with drug smuggling. She spent nearly 10 months in prison in Russia before being exchanged for the notorious Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, who was being held in a U.S. federal prison.

Former U.S. Marine Trevor Reed, meanwhile, was swapped for convicted drug trafficker Konstantin Yaroshenko in April 2022.

– – –

Michael Birnbaum and Natalia Abbakumova contributed to this report.

(c) Washington Post

President Joe Biden said Thursday that he will not use his presidential powers to lessen the eventual sentence that his son Hunter will receive for his federal felony conviction on gun crimes. Biden, following the conclusion of a news conference held at the Group of Seven summit of the world’s wealthiest democracies, responded he would not when asked whether he plans to commute the sentence for his son. Hunter Biden’s sentencing date has not been set, and the three counts carry up to 25 years in prison, though that’s unlikely as a first-time offender. Ultimately, it will be up to U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika, who was nominated to the bench by former Republican President Donald Trump, to decide how much time, if any, Hunter Biden serves behind bars. Biden’s remarks came one day after the White House declined to rule out a potential commutation for Hunter Biden. Both the president and the White House have said for months that Biden would not pardon his son. “I’m extremely proud of my son Hunter. He has overcome an addiction. He is one of the brightest most decent men I know,” Biden said earlier during the news conference Thursday. “I abide by the jury decision. I will do that and I will not pardon him.” (AP)

While Israeli security officials have requested that the four hostages rescued by the Israel Defense Forces on Shabbos keep their experiences secret, some details have nevertheless emerged.

The four—Noa Argamani, 26, Almog Meir Jan, 21, Andrey Kozlov, 27, and Shlomi Ziv, 40—appeared to be in good health when first seen on camera on June 8, the day of the raid.

But two days later, Dr. Itay Pessach of the Sheba Medical Center revealed they were in a “state of severe malnutrition.”

“They all suffered from all types of abuse—physical abuse and mental abuse, and for a long time,” he said. “We’ve heard stories that are beyond anything you can imagine.”

Details will take time to come out. More than a month passed before the full picture emerged of what hostages had endured following an earlier prisoner swap. It turned out they suffered torture, abuse, lack of food and medical care.

In a Wednesday interview with Channel 12, Kozlov’s partner, Jennifer Master, revealed that Kozlov couldn’t join the interview due to his weakened condition.

 

“He blames himself for being kidnapped…He just came back a fragile and different person,” she said.

“They were subjected to very, very severe psychological abuse, more than the physical,” she added.

As an example, terrorists would tell him that his government wanted him dead, she said.

In terms of physical punishment, terrorists would pile blankets on him during the hottest part of the day and lock him in the bathroom if he forgot to knock before requesting to be let out.

Although they had only been together for three months prior to his kidnapping by Hamas, Master became a spokesperson for his release at demonstrations and in media interviews.

That Kozlov was originally from Russia didn’t help him at all. In fact, it worked against him. The terrorists said that the other hostages were born Israelis but he had chosen to come to Israel, which made him more guilty in their eyes.

“Why did you come to Israel? Don’t you know it’s an occupation,” they would tell him, she said.

Kozlov was held together with Jan and Ziv the entire eight months. They became close friends and that helped them through the captivity.

“Sometimes the terrorists abused us but we remained strong and supported each other very much. We are very united,” Jan told Channel 12 in an earlier interview.

Jan’s uncle said the three “hadn’t seen the sun for eight months.”

Argamani was held separately. Little is yet known of what she went through.

All four had been at the Nova music festival near Kibbutz Re’im, where 364 of the 1,200 people killed by Hamas terrorists on Oct. 7 met their end. Kozlov was working security at the event.

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu meets with rescued hostage Noa Argamani at Sheba Medical Center in Ramat Gan, Israel on June 8, 2024. Credit: Maayan Toaf/GPO.

Sadly, Jan’s father, Yossi Meir, 59, died only hours before his son was rescued. Reports said he had “died of grief” due to his son’s capture and had lost 44 pounds.

Argamani’s mother, Liora, who suffers from terminal cancer, had her final wished fulfilled when she was reunited with her daughter.

“Unfortunately, her mother is in very poor condition,” Noa’s father, Yaakov, told Ynet. “She barely looked at Noa. They met after eight months, but it was very difficult.”

He said he believed that his wife understood, however. “There was a kind of response. Liora understood but simply couldn’t express her emotions or say what she had longed to tell Noa when she finally met her.” JNS

Anti-Israel protesters continued to run wild across New York as masked agitators on a city subway car Monday demanded to know if there were any Zionists on board, while elsewhere in the city vandals attacked the home of the Jewish director of the Brooklyn Museum.

The back-to-back events coming on the heels of a raucous pro-Hamas rally outside an exhibition on the victims of the Oct. 7 massacre raised concern that rabid antisemitism of a radical minority of agitators was spiraling out of control in New York City.

The group of masked passengers on the subway demanded to know if there were any “Zionists” on the train—then warned them, “This is your chance to get out,” according to a video circulating on social media.

The video shows the slogan being yelled inside the packed subway car by a man, with the crowd of activists echoing his words.

Less than 48 hours later, the New York homes of the Jewish director of the Brooklyn Museum and other non-Jewish museum officials were vandalized Wednesday in a coordinated attack.

The assailants smeared red paint and graffiti on the Brooklyn Heights home of Anne Pasternak, director of the museum, and hung a banner at the entrance to the museum director’s apartment building that accused her of being a “white supremacist Zionist.”

“Blood on your hands” was also splashed in red paint on the walkway leading to her building.

The homes of two trustees and the museum’s president and CEO Kimberly Panicek Trueblood, whose husband is Jewish, were also targeted in the overnight attack that was carried out under cover of darkness.

“This is not peaceful protest or free speech,” New York Mayor Eric Adams wrote in a post on X where he shared the images. “This is a crime, and it’s overt, unacceptable antisemitism. These actions will never be tolerated in New York City for any reason.”

“The latest lesson in anti-Zionism as antisemitism,” Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.) posted on X. “The anti-Zionist left is not only seeking to purge Zionists (i.e. most Jews) from public places like public transit. It is vandalizing the private homes of individual Jews.”

The Brooklyn Museum was itself stormed by protesters last month who damaged artwork and unfurled a “Free Palestine” banner from the roof. Dozens of people were arrested in that incident.

Earlier this week, a mob of protesters chanting “intifada revolution” rallied outside a New York City exhibit memorializing the hundreds of victims of the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attack on the Supernova music festival in southern Israel.

The crowd lit flares and waved PLO flags, along with one associated with the Iran-backed Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah, in front of the exhibition on Wall Street during what was billed by organizers as a “citywide day of rage for Gaza.”

The protest was widely condemned across political lines, including a denunciation from the White House, and the exhibition will now run until June 22 due to overwhelming demand.

Some American Jewish leaders are now calling for a ban on masks in New York City due to the explosion of antisemitism by mobs with hidden faces.

{Matzav.com}

Israel will overcome its enemies on the Jewish state’s southern and northern borders and return residents to their homes in evacuated communities, Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu said on Thursday.

During a joint visit with National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir to the Israel Border Police’s Yamam National Counter-Terrorism Unit, Netanyahu hailed the operation that freed four hostages from captivity on June 8.

“You caused an entire nation to stand tall, and you showed that we are willing to do everything to rescue our hostages,” he said. “The same bravery, the same determination, the same devotion to the mission will allow us to overcome our enemies in the south and the north.

“I come here to say on behalf of the entire people, and also on behalf of all of Israel’s friends worldwide, I come to tell you: Well done,” he said. “Congratulations on your bravery; congratulations on what you did.”

In addition to Ben-Gvir, Netanyahu’s military secretary, Maj.-Gen. Roman Gofman, Israel Police Commissioner Kobi Shabtai and Israel Border Police commander Asst.-Ch. Barik Yitzhak also participated in the visit.

Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir meet the Israel Border Police’s elite Yamam counterterrorism unit, June 13, 2024. Photo by Maayan Toaf/GPO.

Ben-Gvir told the Yamam officers, “You raised the honor of the State of Israel, you raised our pride, and above all, you told our enemies that we can come and free our hostages—anywhere, at any time.

“On this day, we feel the pain of the Zamora family; we will not forget our dear Arnon, but we will always remember that these fighters are at the forefront of the State of Israel,” he said. “Our role is to back them up, and with the help of God, may the Holy One bless them so they can continue doing many such actions and bring the hostages home to us.”

Ch. Insp. Arnon Zamora, 36, a Yamam squad commander, was mortally wounded during the Saturday operation to rescue hostages Noa Argamani, Almog Meir Jan, Andrey Kozlov and Shlomi Ziv from Hamas captivity in the Nuseirat Camp in the central Gaza Strip.

“I’m here at the Yamam base. I just met our wonderful fighters who rescued the hostages from the jaws of the enemy,” Netanyahu said in a video statement following the visit. “Unfortunately, this heroic operation claimed the life of a fighter, commander and wonderful person, the late Arnon Zamora. We named the operation after him, Operation Arnon.

“I saw the troops; I saw the determination, the bravery and dedication to the mission in their eyes. That bravery, the same determination, the same dedication will allow us to overcome our enemy both in the south and in the north and return residents safely to their homes,” the prime minister said.

Earlier on Thursday, Hezbollah launched 150 rockets and 30 drones towards northern Israel from Lebanon, in what the Iran-backed terrorist group described as “the largest and most comprehensive attack” since it joined the war in support of Gaza-based Hamas on Oct. 8.

“Lebanon and Hezbollah, under the guidance of Iran, bear full responsibility for the deterioration of the security situation in the north,” Israeli government spokesperson David Mencer said in response.

“Whether through diplomatic efforts or otherwise—Israel will restore security on our northern border,” added the spokesperson. JNS

A corpse found on Thursday in the Sha’ar Hanegev region, adjacent to the northeastern Gaza Strip, is most likely that of a Hamas terrorist who took part in the Oct. 7 massacre, the Israel Police says.

A civilian discovered the remains, which were said to be in a state of “advanced decay,” at an intersection where terrorists murdered at least 26 people on Oct. 7.

Alongside the body, security forces located an empty combat vest and a shirt with Arabic letters on it. The writing on the shirt appeared to be the symbol of Hamas’s “military” wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades.

Police are still waiting for the full results of the identification process at the L. Greenberg National Institute of Forensic Medicine in Tel Aviv, also known as the Abu Kabir Forensic Institute.

“The suspicion is that this is a Hamas terrorist who was killed during the attack,” the Israel Police said in a statement on Thursday afternoon.

On Oct. 7, 2023, some 3,000 Hamas-led terrorists invaded Israel by land, sea and air, killing about 1,200 people, kidnapping 251 people back to Gaza and terrorizing hundreds of thousands more by using rape and torture as a weapon while temporarily conquering several Israeli communities.

Israeli security forces killed around a thousand of the terrorists who crossed the border fence that day and captured many others.

{Matzav.com}

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin says his committee has uncovered at least three additional trips given to Justice Clarence Thomas by GOP megadonor Harlan Crow as part of the panel’s ethics investigation into the Supreme Court. Durbin, D-Ill., said Thursday the committee obtained information from Crow that Thomas took three trips, and at least six flights, on Crow’s private jet in 2017, 2019 and 2021. The panel also found evidence of private jet travel during trips to Indonesia and California that Thomas recently disclosed in an amendment to a 2019 financial disclosure report. The Democratic-led Judiciary panel launched the investigation last year after several reports that Thomas had for years received undisclosed expensive gifts, including international travel, from Crow. The committee has since pushed the Supreme Court to adopt a stronger ethics code as trips by Thomas and Justice Samuel Alito came to light, along with six-figure book deals received by other justices. The new information “makes it crystal clear that the highest court needs an enforceable code of conduct, because its members continue to choose not to meet the moment,” Durbin said in a statement. There was no immediate comment from the court on the Senate report. In the past, Thomas has maintained that he is not required to disclose the many trips he and his wife took that were paid for the Texas megadonor because Crow and his wife Kathy are “among our dearest friends,” Thomas said in an April 2023 statement that he was advised by colleagues on the nation’s highest court and others in the federal judiciary that “this sort of personal hospitality from close personal friends, who did not have business before the Court, was not reportable.” Thomas, 75, and his wife, Virginia, have traveled on Crow’s yacht and private jet in Indonesia as well as stayed at his private resort in New York’s Adirondack Mountains, ProPublica reported last year. ProPublica wrote that it could have cost more than $500,000 had Thomas chartered a plane and yacht himself. Last week, Thomas said in his annual financial disclosure that Crow paid for a hotel room in Bali, Indonesia, for a single night in 2019, and food and lodging at a private club in Sonoma County, California, the same year. But he did not report the plane flights or the stay on Crow’s yacht. In a statement released minutes after the Judiciary panel released its report, Crow’s office said he reached an agreement with the committee to provide information responsive to its requests going back seven years, “despite his serious and continued concerns about the legality and necessity of the inquiry.” The panel voted in November to authorize a subpoena for Crow as part of the probe, despite protests from all committee Republicans. Crow, a longtime GOP donor based in Dallas, has maintained that he has never spoken with his friend about pending matters before the court. The Judiciary panel said it will release a full report later this year. But among the details Durbin released Thursday were a 2017 trip Thomas took on Crow’s jet from St. Louis to Montana, along with a return flight from Montana to Dallas; round trip private jet travel in 2019 from Washington to Savannah, Ga., and a round trip flight on a private jet from Washington to San Jose, […]