Eretz Yisroel moved another step closer to elections Sunday night after Degel HaTorah chairman MK Moshe Gafni met with the Slabdoka Rosh Yeshiva Rav Dov Landau, who instructed the Degel HaTorah representatives to support dissolving the Knesset in Wednesday’s vote.

Following the meeting, a statement released from the home of Rav Landau said that Gafni arrived together with the new rov of Ramat Hasharon, Rav Yitzchok Edelstein, accompanied by Bnei Brak deputy mayor Menachem Shapiro, for brachah and consultation with the Rosh Yeshiva.

The statement added that “Maran repeated and emphasized the message delivered last night, that the members of Knesset of Degel HaTorah are to vote in favor of dissolving the Knesset on Wednesday.”

Earlier today, the home of Rav Landau informed the media that “the members of Knesset of Degel HaTorah were instructed last night by Maran Rav Dov Landau not to be dragged into political games and to support dissolving the Knesset this coming Wednesday.”

According to a senior Degel HaTorah source, Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu is attempting to stall the dissolution process in order to gain additional time and push elections off until October.

The source claimed Netanyahu is using the chok hagiyus issue as a political tactic while trying to coordinate elections for October, something strongly opposed by Yahadus HaTorah.

“What do you do when you want to gain time?” the senior source explained while outlining what he described as Netanyahu’s strategy. “You tell the chareidim there is suddenly a breakthrough in obtaining a majority — when there is no majority. They tell Boaz Bismuth to hold committee discussions, and according to the attorney general there still need to be another two or three discussions before the law can be brought for a reading.”

The source further claimed Netanyahu is currently freezing advancement of the Knesset dissolution bill.

“And this way he gained another week or two,” the source added. “Even if afterward they want to bring a dissolution bill, the Elections Committee will not allow it because it will not be able to organize itself according to the required timetable.”

A senior Agudas Yisroel official reportedly confirmed the claims and sharply criticized the Prime Minister, saying, “And once again there is no majority and once again they are lying to the chareidim.”

The comments reflected the deep frustration among the chareidi parties over the ongoing handling of the chok hagiyus negotiations.

Unless there is a dramatic last-minute development, the Knesset is expected this week to approve the preliminary reading of a bill to dissolve the Knesset, bringing Israel significantly closer to elections in 2026.

Still, the political picture remains uncertain. A renewed war or agreements with at least some of the chareidi factions could still delay elections. At this stage, the position of Shas remains unclear, though current indications suggest the party may ultimately align with Netanyahu and support postponing dissolution efforts.

A California judge has ruled that the longtime advertising campaign used by Kars4Kids violated the state’s False Advertising Law, ordering the charity to stop broadcasting the commercials in their current form beginning June 8.

The ruling was issued by an Orange County Superior Court judge and specifically targets the nonprofit’s well-known commercials featuring the familiar “1-877-Kars4Kids” jingle, which for years became a recognizable part of radio and television advertising and a recurring subject of pop-culture humor.

The case was brought by an Orange County resident who claimed he donated a vehicle under the impression that the charity’s proceeds were helping disadvantaged children throughout the United States.

According to the court’s decision, the advertisements gave donors the impression that the organization broadly supported needy children, while most of the funds raised were actually directed to another nonprofit that supported Orthodox Jewish youth programs in New York, New Jersey, and the Middle East.

Legal analyst Neama Rahmani said the central issue in the case involved how the organization presented its charitable mission to the public.

“When you’re running ads with young kids and the funds are going to older kids in another state and maybe even another country that’s a problem,” he said.

Anthony Graham, the attorney representing the plaintiff, said the legal burden required proving that the organization intentionally misled the public.

“We have to show that they knowingly and intentionally misled the public and it’s not an easy thing to do, but we did it,” he said.

Kars4Kids strongly disputed the ruling and announced plans to appeal. In a written statement, the organization described the court’s decision as “deeply flawed” and argued that its website openly identifies the group as a Jewish organization.

“We believe this case was nothing more than a lawyer-driven attempt to siphon off charitable funds for their own gain. We expect to win on appeal because the law and the facts are clearly on our side,” said Wendy Kirwan, the organization’s communications director.

The charity is also facing a separate federal class-action lawsuit that attorneys say could expose the organization to massive financial liability.

“You have to be looking at least ($400 million) to $500 million,” Graham said.

Legal observers say the ruling could bring additional attention from government authorities. According to experts following the case, if regulators or prosecutors decide to become involved, executives connected to Kars4Kids could potentially face criminal investigations as well.

{Matzav.com}

It is with sadness that we report the petirah of Rebbetzin Tova Kalman a”h, who was nifteres suddenly at her home in Bnei Brak at the age of 83. Her petirah came without warning — she had been feeling unwell and within moments was no longer responding. Hatzalah was summoned but were unable to revive her.

Rebbetzin Kalman was born and raised in Bnei Brak, into a home that was steeped in Torah and avodas Hashem from every direction. Her father, Harav Yehudah Dov (Berl) Tshishensky zt”l, was one of the last survivors of the famed town of Ger in Poland, where he had grown up as a child in the very court of the Imrei Emes zt”l.

Her husband, Harav Pinchas zt”l was a talmid of the Chazon Ish zt”l who had been among the founding generation of the Kollel Chazon Ish in Bnei Brak. And the home she built with her husband was situated in the very apartment where the Chazon Ish’s rebbetzin had lived out her final years — a home that breathed the kedushah of that generation.

Her father Rav Berl, who was known affectionately among the Gerrer chassidim as “Berl Gerer,” was regarded as one of the most reliable and vast repositories of Gur’s tradition. When the Gerrer leadership sought to verify a minhag, it was to Reb Berl that they turned. Based on his precise recollections, the ohel of the Chiddushei HaRim and the Sfas Emes in the town of Ger was restored, along with other graves in Poland. The Beis Yisrael zt”l himself remarked of the Tshishensky family: “All of Reb Berl’s children are yirei Shamayim, refined and good.” Reb Berl’s wife had founded the Bnos Agudas Yisrael organization in Bnei Brak and established mosdos for the chareidi community there, with the encouragement and support of the Chazon Ish.

Even before her marriage, the Rebbetzin had forged her own bond with the world of the Chazon Ish. As a young woman, she used to assist the Chazon Ish’s rebbetzin, caring for her with great devotion in her later years. When the Chazon Ish’s rebbetzin was nifteres, the apartment — which belonged to Kollel Chazon Ish — was entrusted to Rebbetzin Kalman and her husband, and she lived there until her final day.

Her husband was himself a figure of great stature. Born in Budapest to his father Rav Avraham Yaakov hy”d, he lost both parents in the Holocaust and came to Eretz Yisrael with his aunt, where he was raised in the Ponevezh orphanage in Bnei Brak. There he came under the influence of  Chazon Ish zt”l, who even purchased his tefillin for his bar mitzvah.

Rav Pinchas went on to learn his entire life in the Kollel Chazon Ish, davening each day in the nearby Lederman shul, known to all as a hidden tzaddik who walked with great humility.
He maintained a close bond with his neighbor the Sar HaTorah, Harav Chaim Kanievsky zt”l, having learned together with him as a chavrusa before his marriage. Harav Chaim presented Reb Pinchas with a Sefer Chochmas Adam as a wedding gift, inscribed “l’yom chasunaso, from (Rav) Chaim Kanievsky” — though Reb Pinchas, in his great humility, crossed out the title “HaRav HaGaon” that Rav Chaim had written before his name. When Rav Pinchas was niftar during COVID and the levayah was small, Harav Chaim stood watching from his window.

Those who knew Reb Pinchas recalled stories that spoke to a purity of middos unusual even among the outstanding. On one occasion, while spending Shabbos at a son’s home in Moshav Tifrach, he woke in the morning and told his son quietly that he would not be eating the cholent. When pressed for a reason, he shared that he had dreamed that he was carrying the cholent outside the eruv. Father and son soon discovered that the eruv had indeed fallen during Shabbos — and that the cholent had been moved before Shabbos to a neighbor’s home that was outside it.

The Chazon Ish had once been asked whether there are Lamed-Vav tzaddikim in this generation. A young bochur was present in the room that day. The Chazon Ish replied that yes, there are — and pointed to Reb Pinchas, saying: he is one of them.

It was a condition of their shidduch that Reb Pinchas, who came from a Hungarian background, would don a shtreimel, as befitting her Gerrer family. He did so willingly. Their home was a place of tznius, emunah and kedushah. As a teacher, Rebbetzin Kalman was beloved by her students, to whom she imparted a deep sense of emunah. The last act she performed before her petirah was the iber-maissering of food(“double maaser”- a chumra practiced by talmidim of the Chazon Ish, Briskers and other groups, who don’t wish to rely solely on the maaser that is under kashrus supervision) — a practice she had observed meticulously her entire life, as was the custom of the Chazon Ish.

Rebbetzin Kalman a”h is survived by her children and grandchildren, who continue the legacy of these great homes.

Notably, the rebbetzin was nifteres on Rosh Chodesh Sivan, but was brought to kevurah on 2 Sivan; her husband’s s yahrtzeit.

She was buried in the Segulah cemetery in Petach Tikvah.

Yehi zichra baruch.

A request to approve a class action lawsuit against El Al was filed last week in the Tel Aviv District Court, accusing the airline of improperly refunding passengers for canceled flights through installment payments instead of issuing the money back in one immediate payment.

The lawsuit focuses on situations in which passengers had already fully paid for their tickets before the flights were canceled. The filing was submitted by an attorney who is also a customer of the airline. Represented by attorneys Nitzan Gadot and Doron Radai of the Radai-Gadot law firm, the plaintiff estimates the damages suffered by the affected group of customers at more than 2.5 million shekels.

According to the filing, El Al follows a policy under which customers whose flights are canceled receive their refunds divided into the same number of installments used during the original purchase transaction. The lawsuit argues that this practice continues even when the airline had already collected the entire payment long before the cancellation took place. The plaintiff contends that this violates Israel’s Aviation Services Law, which requires airlines to return the full refund within 21 days and does not permit refunds to be spread out over installments.

The request states that “this conduct causes passengers real financial harm, including by tying up their credit limit and denying them the ability to make immediate use of their money.”

In the specific case described in the filing, the plaintiff says she bought a Sun d’Or ticket to Warsaw for her daughter and paid El Al in two installments. According to the lawsuit, the payments for the ticket were completed in January 2026, but after the April flight was canceled at the end of March due to updated directives that sharply reduced operations at Ben Gurion Airport, the airline refunded the money through two future installments. This occurred even though the full amount had already been paid months earlier.

The plaintiff said she was stunned by the airline’s handling of the refund because El Al had already held the full payment for an extended period before the cancellation. “Why, then, once the ticket was canceled by El Al, is the refund being delayed by the company?” she asked.

The lawsuit states that the plaintiff later contacted El Al seeking clarification as to why the refund was divided into installments despite the ticket having already been fully paid. According to the filing, the airline responded by placing responsibility on the credit card company and claiming that the installment refund process was determined by the credit card issuer. The plaintiff argues that “El Al’s puzzling response was that it had made the refund in one payment, and that when a ticket charged in an installment transaction is canceled, the method of the refund is the responsibility of the credit card company.”

However, according to the filing, when the plaintiff contacted the credit card company, she was told the exact opposite — that El Al itself had instructed that the refund be issued in two installments.

The request further alleges that “by continuing to hold passengers’ money after their flights were canceled for a period exceeding the refund period set by law, El Al is unjustly enriching itself at their expense and effectively turning passengers whose flights were canceled into a source of financing for itself.”

El Al responded to the report by saying: “The statement of claim in question has not yet been received by the company. Once it is received, the company will study it and respond through the legal proceeding as customary.”

{Matzav.com}

Sen. John Kennedy delivered another one of his trademark sharp-tongued attacks against Vice President Kamala Harris, mocking her as a “Woketopus” and accusing her of pandering to the far-left wing of the Democratic Party.

Speaking in remarks that quickly spread online and across conservative media circles, the Louisiana Republican took aim at Harris’s political style and policy positions with a string of colorful insults.

“She’s a Woketopus, pandering to the loon wing of her party. Nobody has ever accused her of being a policy maven. Sometimes she acts like she has a billy goat brain and a mockingbird mouth, that’s a dangerous combination,” Kennedy said.

Kennedy, who has become known nationally for his folksy one-liners and blunt criticism of Democrats, has frequently used unusual metaphors and Southern-style expressions during television appearances and interviews.

WATCH:

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — Taiwan’s president on Sunday stressed that arms purchases from the United States are “the most important deterrent” of regional conflict and instability, after President Donald Trump called into question continued U.S. support of Taiwan following his visit to China.

U.S. arms sales to Taiwan and security cooperation between the two sides are not only governed by law but also a catalyst for regional peace and stability, President Lai Ching-te said in a statement.

“We thank President Trump for his continued support for peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait since his first term, including the continuous increase in the scale and amount of arms sales to Taiwan,” he said.

His statement came days after Trump raised doubts over his willingness to continue to sell arms to Taiwan, the island democracy that China claims as its own breakaway province, to be retaken by force if necessary.

The U.S., like all countries that have formal ties with China, doesn’t recognize Taiwan as a country but has been the island’s strongest backer and arms supplier. Washington is bound by its own laws to provide Taiwan with the means to defend itself and sees all threats to the island as a matter of grave concern.

Trump rattles Taiwan with ‘bargaining chip’ comment
Trump already approved in December a record-breaking $11 billion arms package to Taiwan including missiles, drones, artillery systems and military software.

In an interview aired Friday on Fox News, just as Trump wrapped up a high-stakes visit to China, he said he has yet to greenlight a new $14 billion arms package to Taiwan and that it “depends on China.”

“It’s a very good negotiating chip for us frankly,” he said.

His comments raised concerns on the island, which the Taiwanese government has sought to disperse, noting that the U.S. official policy on Taiwan has not changed.

“Taiwan will not provoke or escalate conflict, but it will also not relinquish its national sovereignty and dignity, or its democratic and free way of life, under pressure,” Lai said in his statement, calling China “the root cause of undermining regional peace and stability and attempting to change the status quo.”

U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson praised Lai’s statement, saying “I thought that was a reasonable thing for the leader there to say.” Johnson said on Fox News Sunday, “China cannot just go take over land, and we’re going to stand strong and resolute by that. I know the Congress will.”

U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said on ABC’s “This Week with George Stephanopoulos” on Sunday that the president is “considering how to move forward on” the arms sales to Taiwan, noting previous U.S. presidents had paused sales in the past and Trump will need to weigh many factors. “When the president makes a decision on national security, it’s really based on American security needs first though,” Greer said.

China has framed Taiwan as “the most important issue in China-U.S. relations” during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s recent talks with Trump.

In one of his strongest statements to date, Xi on Thursday warned Trump of “clashes and even conflicts” if the issue of Taiwan was not handled properly.

China and Taiwan have been governed separately since 1949, when the Communist Party rose to power in Beijing following a civil war. Defeated Nationalist Party forces fled to Taiwan, which later transitioned from martial law to multiparty democracy.

JERUSALEM (VINnews) – An Israeli military correspondent said Monday he faced harassment and death threats after his reporting on an Iranian missile impact helped determine the outcome of a massive wager on the prediction market Polymarket, where more than $22 million was at stake.

Emanuel Fabian, military correspondent for The Times of Israel, reported March 10 that an Iranian missile warhead struck an open area near Beit Shemesh, causing no injuries or damage. He emphasized it was not an interception.

The report drew intense scrutiny from bettors on Polymarket, which had a market on whether Iran would carry out a drone, missile or air strike on Israeli soil that day. Bettors who wagered against a strike contacted Fabian, initially asking and later demanding he alter his article to claim the debris resulted from an interception rather than a direct impact.

Fabian detailed the escalation in a Times of Israel article, describing messages that included bribes, repeated harassment and explicit death threats targeting him and his family. One message warned he would “discover enemies who will be willing to pay anything to make your life miserable,” while another threatened to invest substantial sums to harm him after potential losses.

The volume of bets on the market grew significantly after Fabian’s initial coverage and subsequent public statements, climbing from around $14 million to more than $22 million by resolution time.

Polymarket condemned the threats, banned involved accounts and said it would share information with authorities. The platform’s rules rely on media consensus and official confirmations to settle such markets, inadvertently positioning journalists like Fabian as key arbiters.

Fabian reported the incidents to Israeli police and stood by his original reporting, stating he knew it was accurate and would not change it under pressure.

The episode has sparked broader discussion about the potential for prediction markets to incentivize interference in journalism and real-world events amid high financial stakes.

American Airlines said Sunday that it will continue halting its direct flights between New York and Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport until January 6, 2027.

“We will proactively reach out to impacted customers of this schedule adjustment, offering options in line with our customer-friendly schedule change policy,” the airline said in an e-mailed statement.

The carrier first stopped flying to Israel in the immediate aftermath of the Hamas massacre on October 7, 2023.

Although American Airlines had initially planned to restart service to Israel in March, the company has repeatedly postponed its return because of ongoing instability and security concerns in the region.

Before Sunday’s announcement, the airline had already extended the suspension of its Tel Aviv route through September 7.

Last week, the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) revealed that it was prolonging its Conflict Zone Advisory covering Israeli airspace as well as parts of the broader Middle East and Persian Gulf region, according to Globes.

The revised advisory is scheduled to remain active through at least May 27. However, the agency’s latest language reflected a somewhat different approach to the regional threat environment.

Earlier notices from the European regulator had strongly encouraged airlines to stay away from the area entirely. The newest guidance instead emphasizes heightened caution and ongoing monitoring of conditions.

Several major European airlines, including Wizz Air, KLM, Air France, and Air Europa, are now reportedly reconsidering the timing of their planned return to Israel because of the continuing EASA advisory.

{Matzav.com}

JERUSALEM (VINnews) – More than a dozen Israeli settler activists illegally crossed the border into Syria in several incidents Sunday, including a group of 10 who entered a short time ago, the Israel Defense Forces said.

Troops stationed in the area returned all the suspects to Israel, detained them and handed them over to police for further questioning, the military said.

“The IDF strongly condemns the incident and emphasizes that this is a severe event constituting a criminal offense that endangers civilians and IDF forces,” the IDF added in a statement.

The activists, who call themselves the Bashan Pioneers, have breached the border and entered Syria multiple times over the past year. The group advocates for establishing Israeli settlements in southern Syria and has drawn support from some lawmakers in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition.

President Donald Trump intensified his rhetoric toward Iran on Sunday with another pointed post on Truth Social, fueling increasing speculation that the United States could soon resume military operations against the Islamic Republic.

The post included a map covering the Middle East and Central Asia, draped in the design of the American flag. Iran appeared prominently in the center, marked by numerous red arrows directed toward the country.

The message followed an earlier warning Trump issued just hours beforehand in which he declared that “the clock is ticking.”

“For Iran, the Clock is Ticking, and they better get moving, FAST, or there won’t be anything left of them. TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE! President DJT,” he wrote in the earlier post.

On Saturday, Trump also shared a mysterious Iran-related post on Truth Social.

That post showed an AI-generated image of Trump standing alongside a U.S. Navy admiral against a backdrop of stormy seas and several naval vessels, including one bearing the Iranian flag, as reports circulated that fighting could resume in the near future.

The caption displayed over the image read, “It was calm before the storm.”

The series of posts comes as reports continue circulating that Trump is weighing whether to authorize renewed strikes against Iran.

Speaking Friday aboard Air Force One while returning from China, Trump suggested he could support a 20-year freeze on Iran’s nuclear activities, though he emphasized that any arrangement would require stronger assurances from Tehran.

During the exchange with reporters, Trump was asked whether he had dismissed Iran’s latest proposal.

“Well, I looked at it, and if I don’t like the first sentence, I just throw it away,” the President replied, explaining that the first sentence of the Iranian proposal was “an unacceptable sentence because they fully agree, no nuclear, and if they have any nuclear of any form, I don’t read the rest of their letter.

Trump was then asked if 20 years is not enough for him for a moratorium, to which he replied, “No, 20 years is enough, but the level of guarantee from them is not enough. In other words, it’s got to be a real 20 years, not a fake 20.”

In an interview Thursday with Sean Hannity on Fox News, Trump indicated his patience with Iran was running out.

“I’m not going to be much more patient. No, I’m not. They should make a deal. Any sane person would make a deal, but they might be crazy,” Trump clarified.

The interview aired shortly after Trump hinted in another Truth Social post that the conflict with Iran may not yet be finished and that further military action against the regime remained possible.

Those remarks were included in a broader statement Trump published following his visit to China.

{Matzav.com}

Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu’s decision to publicly confirm his previously undisclosed wartime trip to the United Arab Emirates was reportedly driven by political considerations tied to a possible visit by former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, according to a report aired Sunday night on Channel 12.

Last Wednesday, the Prime Minister’s Office took the unusual step of officially confirming a Channel 13 report stating that Netanyahu had traveled to the UAE during the war with Iran. The confirmation reportedly triggered significant tensions with Abu Dhabi, whose leadership had specifically requested that the meeting remain confidential.

According to the report, Emirati officials were displeased that the visit became public, particularly after explicitly asking that the meeting remain secret. Nevertheless, Netanyahu’s office chose to release details of the trip, leading to what the report described as a serious diplomatic dispute with the UAE at a time when Israel and the Emirates are cooperating closely on multiple fronts, including matters connected to the conflict with Iran.

Channel 12 reported Sunday that the motivation behind Netanyahu’s decision was entirely political.

According to the report, Netanyahu learned that Bennett — viewed as one of his primary political rivals — was scheduled to visit the UAE on Thursday, one day after Netanyahu’s own visit became public. Bennett was reportedly expected to meet with UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed and other senior Emirati officials.

Based on information from two sources familiar with the matter, Netanyahu did not want a situation in which Bennett’s visit would be publicly acknowledged while his own remained secret, potentially creating the impression that the Emiratis were willing to host Bennett openly but not Netanyahu.

Although Bennett’s trip has not been publicly confirmed, the report stated that Netanyahu’s concern that it eventually would become public led him to approve disclosure of his own visit — despite longstanding understandings regarding confidentiality with the Emiratis.

A spokesperson for Bennett declined to confirm the details and refused to comment on whether the visit had taken place. Netanyahu’s office denied the report entirely.

Palm Beach International Airport will officially be renamed President Donald J. Trump International Airport effective July 9, the Federal Aviation Administration announced, with the airport’s three-letter code changing from PBI to DJT, denoting the president’s initials.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy confirmed the code change, the latest in a growing list of buildings, institutions, government programs, warships and currency to bear Trump’s name during his second term.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed the renaming legislation on March 30, transferring authority over major commercial airport names to the state. The Florida Legislature approved the bill in February, fiercely opposed by state Democrats. Palm Beach County, which owns and operates the airport, retains all operational control. The renaming is expected to cost roughly $5.5 million in design, signage and rebranding expenses, funded through the state budget.

Just as the renaming bill was moving through the Florida Legislature, DTTM Operations LLC, a New York business tied to the Trump Organization, filed trademark applications on the airport’s new name. The filings – for “President Donald J. Trump International Airport” and “Donald J. Trump International Airport” on Feb. 13, followed by “DJT” on Feb. 14 – positioned the Trump family business to hold the trademarks on the very name a public airport would be required to use.

Earlier this month, the Palm Beach County Commission voted 4-3 to approve a licensing agreement with the Trump Organization that allows the county to use the airport name on signage and merchandising, but does not grant exclusive rights. Under the deal, the Trump Organization retains the ability to use the airport name commercially elsewhere, can license the trademark to third parties, and can continue producing and selling its own branded merchandise.

The agreement also gives the Trump family control over any biographical material presented at the airport or on airport materials, and requires the airport to choose vendors for branded merchandise from a list approved by the Trump family business.

County officials said the agreement comes at no cost to the county and does not include royalties, fees or revenue sharing with Trump or his company. But intellectual property experts have flagged the arrangement as unusual for a public facility.

“This is a unique situation where a public airport is tied to a private trademark,” Victoria Doyle, a Palm Beach County congressional candidate and trademark attorney, said in an interview. “It raises questions about control over branding and how the name is used.”

The arrangement marks a sharp departure from previous instances of airports named after presidents. When Washington National Airport was renamed for Ronald Reagan, there was no licensing deal with the late president’s family. The same was true when New York’s airport was named after John F. Kennedy.

Palm Beach County Mayor Sara Baxter cast the deciding vote on the licensing agreement, criticizing members of the public who opposed the deal. Vice Mayor Maria Woodward, who voted against it, said county staff had indicated that refusing the agreement could put state transportation funding at risk.

“It’s not whether or not this airport gets renamed — it’s whether or not we maintain our seat at the table,” Woodward said during the meeting.

The airport, which has been ranked among the best in the country in recent traveler surveys, generates more than $4.6 billion annually for the South Florida economy, according to a state aviation study. It sits just miles from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

Lakewood Police have arrested a man accused of fleeing from police following a reckless driving incident earlier this month in Lakewood, as dashcam obtained by TLS showed.

The Lakewood Police Department announced that Nicholas Ratajczak was charged following an investigation into the May 4 incident. The video appeared to show vehicles performing donuts before drivers fled from officers, driving erratically down New Hampshire Avenue.

According to Capt. LeRoy Marshall, detectives identified Ratajczak as the alleged driver involved in the incident and located both Ratajczak and the vehicle believed to have been used during the encounter.

Ratajczak was taken into custody and charged with eluding, along with multiple motor vehicle violations. He was later released pending a future court appearance.

Police also identified a second individual, Bronson Sandford, during the course of the investigation. Authorities said Sandford was issued several motor vehicle summonses connected to the incident.

“This investigation is another example of the dedication and persistence of our officers in holding reckless drivers accountable and keeping our roadways safe,” Lakewood Police Chief Gregory H. Meyer said in a statement.

The investigation was conducted by the department’s Traffic Unit with assistance from the Toms River Police Department.

DASHCAM VIDEO: Vehicles Doing Donuts Run from Lakewood Cops.

Two suspects doing donuts in a parking lot in Lakewood, and then took off when police attempted to stop them pic.twitter.com/rCRPLhZwz3

— The Lakewood Scoop (@LakewoodScoop) May 6, 2026

The sentence imposed on a Nachal Brigade soldier who received 30 days in military prison for wearing a “Moshiach” patch on his uniform is expected to be reduced following widespread backlash and political pressure, according to a report Sunday evening by I24NEWS journalist Amiel Yarchi.

A security official familiar with the matter said the soldier is expected to receive a lighter punishment once a formal request is submitted on his behalf shortly after he enters military prison. The soldier was scheduled to begin serving his sentence Sunday night, and his combat gear has already been taken from him.

Behind the scenes, Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee chairman Boaz Bismuth and other Likud lawmakers reportedly pressured IDF Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir, sending letters and expressing support for the soldier’s family.

Earlier Sunday, Bismuth spoke with the soldier’s parents and condemned the decision, saying, “The punishment is disproportionate. I usually do not intervene, and I respect institutions, but here you are right,” and added, “Every soldier is like my own child.”

At the same time, Bismuth published a message on X calling on the Chief of Staff to reverse the ruling. “A Nachal soldier will begin serving 30 days in prison today when his entire ‘crime’ was wearing a Moshiach patch. I call on the Chief of Staff to reverse this mistaken and extreme decision. It is not too late to correct it,” he wrote.

The controversy began last week after the commander of the Nachal Brigade sentenced the soldier to 30 days in military prison over the “Moshiach” patch. In addition, the platoon commander received a suspended 14-day sentence, while the company commander was given an official reprimand. Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir reportedly ordered the disciplinary proceedings during a visit to northern Shomron.

The IDF has argued that the punishments were not issued solely because of the patch, but also due to additional violations of accepted military conduct.

{Matzav.com}

Many families have a minhag to use flowers to decorate their homes on Shavuos.

This year, Kosher.com launched a creative challenge: to design a beautiful, floral tablescape on a $150 Amazon budget (plus allowance for fresh flowers).

Our of nearly 100 submissions, five women were selected to take the challenge. They surpassed expectations with five different looks, each with its own overall style and color scheme, unique personality touches, and a full vision for what makes a beautiful yontif table.

What makes the contest truly special is that these are realistic tables that people can actually recreate in their own homes without spending a fortune. Links are available so you can see exactly what they bought, and replicate anything you loved in your own home.

**Voting is open now through May 19.
**

The finalists include:

• Michal Mendlowitz

• Chana Ben Lapid

• Rochel Besser

• Chaya Miller

• Chani Judowitz

Whether you’re looking for centerpiece ideas, color palette inspiration, affordable table decor, or just love seeing talented people in the community showcase their creativity, this is worth browsing before Shavuos.

Vote and see all the finalists here:

The Shavuos Tablescape Challenge

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Sunday that he would enthusiastically support Vice President JD Vance if Vance decides to seek the presidency in 2028, while emphasizing that his current focus remains on serving in President Donald Trump’s administration.

During an interview with NBC News, Rubio was asked whether he personally hopes to become president one day. In response, he stressed his commitment to his current role and praised Vance as a potential future nominee.

“I’m going to be in this job for the next two and a half years. I’m going to do that job. I’m going to finish the job for this president. I’m enjoying it very much. I think we’re going to make a lot of good things happen. JD is a very good friend of mine. If JD runs for president. I think he’d be a phenomenal candidate. I’ve said publicly, and I’ll say it again, I’ll be the first person to sign up and support him. I think JD would do great.”

When asked whether he would consider serving as vice president, Rubio again downplayed any immediate political ambitions beyond his current position.

“I want to be the secretary of state, and I’ll worry about the future in the future. I’m not telling you that that’s what I’m aiming for. You know, I’ve been doing this for a long time, too. I was in the Senate starting in 2010 so I’d like to do some other things with my life at some point, although public service is an honor to be able to be involved in.”

Rubio’s comments come as Vance continues to perform strongly in early Republican polling for the 2028 presidential race. Rubio has also consistently appeared among the top names in hypothetical GOP primary matchups.

A Harvard/Harris poll conducted April 23–26, 2026, among 2,745 registered voters showed Vance leading the Republican field with 48% support. Donald Trump Jr. followed at 18%, Rubio received 16%, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis had 9%, and Tucker Carlson drew 4%.

The same survey showed Kamala Harris leading the Democratic field with 50% support, ahead of California Gov. Gavin Newsom at 22%, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro at 9%, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at 8%, and Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker at 6%. The poll carried a margin of error of plus or minus 1.87%, and found that 67% of respondents had given at least some thought to the next presidential election.

Another poll conducted May 1–5, 2026, among 3,612 American adults also showed Vance and Harris leading their respective primary fields. In that survey, Vance led Republicans with 40% support, followed by Donald Trump Jr. at 15% and Rubio at 14%, while the remaining Republican contenders remained in single digits.

Among Democrats in that same survey, Harris received 38% support, followed by Newsom at 16%, while Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg each received 9%.

A separate AtlasIntel survey conducted May 4–7 among 2,069 U.S. adults presented a different picture of the Democratic race. That poll showed Ocasio-Cortez leading the field with 26% support, followed by Buttigieg at 22.4% and Newsom at 21.2%.

In the AtlasIntel survey, Harris finished in fourth place with 12.9% support, while all other potential Democratic candidates registered single-digit support levels.

{Matzav.com}

A menahel never walks alone.

On his shoulders, on his mind, he carries the responsibility of an establishment, the needs of tens of faculty members, and the worlds of hundreds of students. Before him stand rows of talmidim, and behind each talmid stands a future.

The halls of The Armon Hotel in Stamford, CT hosted hundreds of menahalim this year, each one walking the floors with an entire mosad behind him. Founded four years ago by menahalim, for menahalim, the annual Conference has grown steadily in both reach and program, this year drawing guests from as far as California and Arizona, alongside international participants who flew in especially from Belgium and the UK. Every segment of the program is reviewed by a dedicated committee to ensure that each address is deeply relevant and that the networking is both high-energy and high-impact, befitting a truly chashuva audience.

What sets the Torah Umesorah Menahel Conference apart is not only what happens at the podium — it is what happens in the spaces between. Through intentionally built networking opportunities, Menahalim connect with peers who understand the unique weight they carry, sharing practical solutions to pressing issues in conversations that often become the highlight of the event.

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What Every Menahel Should Know

The conference opened with HaRav Moshe Brown shlita and HaRav Lipa Geldwerth shlita in a candid session of divrei chizuk and shailos u’teshuvos, tackling what every menahel quietly wonders but rarely gets to ask. 

The conversation explored what gives Rabbanim genuine confidence in school leadership — and where misunderstandings between Rabbanim and hanhala most commonly arise — offering participants rare, direct access to the daas Torah they rely on most. 

Leadership, Accountability, and the Courage to Say No

Dr. Noam Wasserman led two professional development sessions. His first, Leading Effectively, focused on how leaders can build a culture where accountability and caring coexist. A central theme was embracing critical feedback — actively inviting it from staff and modeling openness to it. His second tackled The Art of Saying “No,” outlining five principled categories for refusal and stressing that decisions should be anchored in policy, values, or mission rather than personal discomfort. Leaders were reminded that discomfort is not a sign of doing something wrong; it’s a sign of doing it honestly.

Lunch at the conference featured a special presentation honoring Rabbi Dovid Bernstein upon his retirement from the Yesud Ma’aloh Principal Fellowship, where he was presented with an album of heartfelt letters from program alumni.

At the Chinuch Panel, Rabbi Nosson Muller, Rabbi Krigsman, and Rabbi Naftali Eisgrau tackled some of the most charged dynamics in school leadership  — from backing your Rebbi and having hard conversations, to honestly reckoning with students who aren’t being reached, navigating difficult parents, and knowing when and how consequences belong. General Studies emerged as a persistent pressure point, with teacher quality and the natural authority gap at the root. 

Shailos U’Teshuvos session with HaRav Elya Brudny,shlita

The Rosh Yeshiva , opened the session by grounding the menahel’s role. This role is something more fundamental than job description. At its core, he explained, the position carries two distinct responsibilities: the menahel is the chief mechanech of the mosad, accountable for every child — and the appointed leader of a faculty, with all the obligations the Rambam outlines in הלכות שכירות. These are not simply practical roles; they are rooted in דיני ממונות, and the two should never be in contradiction. Everything else a menahel does flows from them. 

Leadership in Crisis

Dr. Gavriel Fagin’s late-night session drew on specific cases and practical guidance for navigating some of the most difficult situations a menahel can face — leaving participants better prepared and better informed.

Above all, the Conference offers hadrachah — the opportunity to hear directly from gedolei Yisrael and leading rabbanim. This year, HaRav Elya Brudny shlita, Rav Moshe Brown, and Rav Lipa Geldwerth each addressed the participants, enabling them to walk away with daas Torah, renewed clarity, and strengthened purpose for the work ahead.

An Evening of Vision and Appreciation

A Gala Appreciation Dinner closed the gathering, joined by members of the Torah Umesorah Board.A Gala Appreciation Dinner closed the gathering, joined by members of the Torah Umesorah Board. R’ Chaim Rajchenbach, who three months ago answered the call to serve as Board President alongside R’ Y.L. Fruchthandler, spoke with the quiet weight of someone who understood exactly what he had taken on.
He didn’t begin with a vision statement. He began with a listening tour — fifty-plus conversations with menahalim and heads of mosdos across the country.

“I didn’t just learn about needs,” he told the room. “I gained a window into a world I hadn’t fully seen — and a renewed appreciation for the giants inside it. People of absolute devotion and inspiring intention.”

The message was simple: We are behind you. We won’t stop listening. Our journey is just beginning.

And so every participant left carrying not only the weight of his own mosad — but the strength of an entire community standing beside him.

In Their Own Words

“The focused energy of the Menahalim from across the country and around the world, from all sorts of schools, was a beautiful sight to behold — ‘havei m’kol adom’ was present everywhere you turned.”

“Dr. Wasserman’s sessions were professional and appreciated by all. The networking until late at night was so tachlidik and toichdik. And, of course, the presence of the Gedolei Torah, the Rabbanim, and the Roshei Yeshiva added a certain chashivus that Torah Umesorah is known for. Thank you for making this possible and for all that you do!”

“I came from Toronto to attend this conference. The classes, shiurim, and networking — especially the way the Menahalim were grouped together — were really enjoyable. I learned a lot and made a real kesher with Menahalim from other schools, and I plan to keep in touch to continue learning and sharing, which is really one of the main focuses of this conference. Thank you!”

“Thank you to all the Torah Umesorah staff who work so hard to make this conference happen. It is so refreshing and rejuvenating — to gather with so many like-minded individuals, discuss real and actionable issues, and work together toward something higher.”

For years, askanim and community leaders stood beside politicians at the White House, in Albany, and at City Hall. They built relationships, advocated for resources, and fought for the needs of the community. Most people understood the purpose. Government controls funding, influence, and access, and maintaining those relationships often produced real benefits for Jewish communities.

Critics occasionally mocked the optics or accused communal leaders of becoming too close to power, but most reasonable people understood that representation matters. Strong advocacy has long been an essential part of protecting and advancing communal interests.

But this moment is different.

Antisemitism is no longer hiding in the shadows. Jews are increasingly targeted under the cover of terms like “Zionists,” “anti-Israel,” and “anti-IDF.” The language may be politically sanitized, but the hostility behind it is becoming harder to ignore.

After watching Jewish neighborhoods in Manhattan, Queens, and now Midwood overwhelmed by hostile protests, masked agitators, and aggressive mobs, nobody can honestly pretend anymore that this is simply normal political activism.

What unfolded in Midwood was not peaceful “activism.” It was intimidation, chaos, and fear. Parents frantically searched for their children. Families rushed indoors. Residents felt trapped in their own neighborhood while police appeared either overwhelmed or unwilling to remove mobs marching without permits and in open violation of city law.

And afterward, City Hall said virtually nothing.

That silence was deafening.

Recent legislative battles at City Hall and now in Albany over establishing “protective distances” around shuls and yeshivas raise an obvious question: what difference does 50 feet, 100 feet, or even 1,000 feet make if aggressive mobs are still allowed to illegally march, without permits, through Jewish residential neighborhoods?

Allowing mobs to illegally march without permits and terrorize Jewish residential neighborhoods is outrageous.

Either there is law and order or there is not.

And if anyone still believes this mayor is going to offer meaningful protest or genuine concern, they simply have not been paying attention.

In the aftermath of the Midwood riots, the only notable public message from Mayor Mamdani was an incendiary tweet posted before Shabbos commemorating the “Nakba.”

Which brings us to the upcoming Jewish Heritage event at Gracie Mansion.

Year after year, these events have attracted a who’s who of community leaders, organizational representatives, askanim, and politically connected machers.

But things are different now.

There is something profoundly unsettling about watching Jewish neighborhoods overwhelmed by masked mobs and then, days later, seeing yarmulke-wearing communal representatives participate in carefully staged, feel-good photo opportunities with the same administration many believe enabled, excused, or tolerated the hostility directed at Jewish communities.

Political engagement matters. No serious person disputes that. Meetings should continue. Advocacy should continue. Relationships with government should continue.

But there is a difference between advocacy and exploitation.

Communal representatives should advocate privately and professionally for the needs of the Jewish community. They should continue fighting for security, funding, education, and protection. What they should not do is allow themselves to become political props while Jewish neighborhoods increasingly feel under siege.

At some point, the optics themselves become damaging.

Many ordinary community members no longer view these public displays as productive diplomacy. They view them as tone-deaf, humiliating, and disconnected from the fear and anger many Jewish families are currently experiencing.

And that raises a fair question:

Who exactly are these public appearances serving?

Charles Weiss
Flatbush, Brooklyn

The views expressed in this letter are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of YWN. Have an opinion you would like to share? Send it to us for review.

President Donald Trump said Iran has informed the United States that only America and China possess the specialized equipment capable of removing what he described as “nuclear dust” from Iranian nuclear facilities damaged during Operation Midnight Hammer last summer.

Trump made the remarks to reporters aboard Air Force One while returning to the United States following his trip to China this week.

“[Iran] said that they can’t remove it because they don’t have the technology to remove it,” Trump told reporters. “They don’t have the type of tractors… They told me directly, they said the only one that can remove it is China or the U.S., we’re the only ones with the equipment.”

According to Trump, Iranian officials have acknowledged that the Fordow, Natanz and Esfahan nuclear facilities were destroyed by bunker-buster bombs used during Operation Midnight Hammer. However, he said the remaining material buried deep underground continues to be a central issue in negotiations over a possible agreement.

“They said, ‘You were right, it is a complete obliteration.’ With that being said, I want to get it, and they agreed to it, but then they took it back, but they’ll agree to it eventually,” he added.

Speaking more broadly about Iran during an interview Thursday with Fox News host Sean Hannity, Trump said Chinese President Xi Jinping had expressed willingness to assist.

“He said, ‘If I can be of any help at all, I would like to be of help’… Anybody that buys that much oil has obviously got some kind of a relationship with them… He’d like to see the Hormuz Strait open,” Trump said.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio later emphasized that Trump had not asked Xi for assistance regarding Iran and stated that the United States does not require Chinese involvement in the matter. Rubio’s remarks echoed comments Trump made Tuesday while departing the White House for China.

“He could. I mean, it might be. I don’t think we need any help with Iran, to be honest with you,” Trump said when asked whether Xi might contribute to a future agreement. “They’re defeated militarily, and they’ll either do the right thing, or we’ll finish the job.”

During Friday’s return flight to the United States, Trump was also asked about Iran’s newest proposal in negotiations aimed at ending the war.

“I looked at it, and if I don’t like the first sentence, I just throw it away,” he said.

When a reporter pressed him on what the opening sentence contained, Trump replied, “An unacceptable sentence, because they have fully agreed no nuclear, and if they have any nuclear of any form, I don’t read the rest of their letter,” he added.

{Matzav.com}

A spokesman for Iran’s parliament has issued a new ultimatum to the United States, declaring that Washington has two choices: accept Tehran’s conditions or “surrender to our missiles.”

Ebrahim Rezaei, spokesperson for the Iranian parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, made the comments amid the ongoing standoff between Tehran and Washington over a U.S. peace proposal and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. The U.S. has reportedly set five conditions in response to Iran’s counter-proposals, including no payment of war damages and the transfer of 400 kilograms of uranium, according to reports from the IRGC-affiliated Fars News.

Rezaei has emerged as one of the most aggressive voices in Tehran’s messaging campaign against Washington. Earlier this month, he announced that Iran’s “restraint is over,” warning that any aggression against Iranian vessels would be met with a heavy and decisive response targeting American vessels and bases. He has also stated that Iran could raise uranium enrichment to 90% if pressure continues, and has dismissed the U.S. proposal as a “wish list.”

The latest threats come as Iran launched a new maritime toll and insurance system for vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz, which Tehran shut down to enemy states following the U.S.-Israeli aggression against Iran on February 28. Stricter controls were imposed after President Donald Trump announced a blockade of Iranian vessels and ports in April.

Trump has repeatedly threatened to resume military action against Iran if Tehran does not accept a deal that includes reopening the Strait of Hormuz and rolling back its nuclear program. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham called for additional U.S. military action against Iran on Sunday, telling NBC’s Meet the Press that the status quo is strengthening Tehran.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has insisted that any negotiations do not amount to surrender, stating that Iran will defend its national interests with “resolute strength.”

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

Channel 12 journalist Amit Segal published a scathing attack against Deputy Attorney General Gil Limon and his superior, Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, in his weekly column in Yisrael Hayom.

“Many people are endangering democracy in Israel,” Segal began. “But it’s doubtful there is anyone who endangers it more than Deputy Attorney General Gil Limon. The Deputy Attorney General, the bureaucrat who has never given an interview and always stays in the background, is the driving force behind the Attorney General’s effort to turn Israel’s administrative and constitutional law into dust and ashes.”

“His goal is to delay and obstruct at any cost—turning every appointment, every piece of legislation, and every government procedure into an almost declarative event, empty of substance, that always ends up in the High Court. When this is done systematically and consistently, with twice‑daily warnings about the ‘end of democracy,’ the result is the neutering of majority rule.”

Segal then addressed the affair surrounding the appointment of Roman Gofman as Mossad chief, calling it “the peak—or the low point—of Limon and his circle’s conduct.”

“The number of substantive flaws committed by Baharav-Miara exceeded any flaws Goman was accused of: deliberately delaying her response, submitting her opinion only to former Supreme Court President Asher Grunis, and lying to the media that no such opinion existed.”

Segal added: “Limon and his circle are inflicting severe damage on democracy because they constantly change the rules, rewrite them, and allow oral interpretations to override written ones—interpretations that themselves change from day to day, all according to the interests at hand.”

Segal concluded sharply: “The Justice Ministry has collapsed. The next government will have to lift it off the floor.”

(YWN Israel Desk—Jerusalem)

When the sun began its descent over the nation’s capital last Friday afternoon, something unprecedented was unfolding inside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building. Roughly 120 Jewish guests gathered in the ornate Indian Treaty Room for a pre-Shabbos reception hosted by the White House — a direct expression of President Donald Trump’s historic proclamation calling on the country to observe what has become widely known as Shabbat 250.

As part of the White House’s Jewish American Heritage Month proclamation, President Trump designated the period from sundown Friday, May 15, through nightfall Saturday, May 16, as a national Shabbos, in honor of the 250th anniversary of American independence.
The call marked the first time an American president had formally urged the celebration of Shabbos.

Rabbi Levi Shemtov, executive vice president of American Friends of Lubavitch-Chabad and one of the most recognizable Jewish faces on the Washington political scene, was among those who spoke at the event. Rabbi Shemtov, in a Sunday interview with Belaaz, described the atmosphere inside the Indian Treaty Room as lively and warm. Guests enjoyed tapas-style hors d’oeuvres and refreshments, and the gathering wrapped up with enough time for everyone to make their way home before the z’man.

From there, the evening only deepened. A group made their way on foot to the Decatur House, adjacent to the White House, where davening was followed by a full Shabbos seudah — with Rabbi Shemtov making Kiddush for the roughly 100 guests in attendance.

Martin Marks, Special Assistant to the President and White House Liaison to the Jewish Community, also addressed the crowd. “The room broke out into singing and dancing,” Rabbi Shemtov said. “It was lebedik — very lebedik.”

A separate Shabbos dinner, organized by Arie Lipnick of the Combat Antisemitism Movement, drew a parallel gathering of Jewish administration members, Capitol Hill staff, media figures, and policy professionals in celebration of the president’s national Shabbos.
President Trump, who had been returning from a lengthy trip to China, touched down as the White House event was winding down and was not present at the seudos.

Rabbi Shemtov said he also witnessed a beautiful Kabbalas Shabbos in the courtyard of the complex.

Asked whether he had seen anything quite like it before, he reached back to a different memory — a massive musical davening led by Beri Weber outside the White House on the day of a major Washington rally, with what he estimated was close to a thousand people and a massive Kiddush Hashem. “But that,” he noted, “was not inside the White House. This was actually at the White House.”

For Rabbi Shemtov, the significance of the moment ran far deeper than the festivities themselves. He drew a pointed historical parallel. “Compare it to Antiochus,” he said. “Antiochus forbade the Jewish people from keeping Shabbos, from performing bris milah, from sanctifying Rosh Chodesh — because he wanted Jewish observance stripped of its quality of kabbolas ohl, of submission to the ratzon of the Ribono Shel Olam. Here comes the President of the United States, leader of the free world, and decides that he’s going to call on Jewish people to keep Shabbos.”

The proclamation itself came as part of a weekend in which the administration had organized a large prayer event on the National Mall — a multi-faith gathering that, as Rabbi Shemtov noted, was not something many Jewish people could comfortably or appropriately participate in.

The President’s singling out of Shabbos for the Jewish community, rather than folding them into the broader program, carried its own message. “He wants to make sure that when they say they’re celebrating their Judeo-Christian values or the foundations of the founding of America, that includes people who are of the Jewish faith,” Rabbi Shemtov said. “I think that’s very interesting and unprecedented. It means Jews are being told that they can observe their religion without compromise.”

What made this gesture stand apart from prior presidential outreach, he explained, was its reach. Making the White House kosher for a party — as George W. Bush did during his administration — was one thing. “Here he’s asking people to do something outside the White House, across the country,” Rabbi Shemtov said.

The proclamation invoked President George Washington’s seminal 1790 letter to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, Rhode Island, and paid tribute to Revolutionary War-era financier Haym Salomon, highlighting the role Jewish Americans have played in the life of the nation since its founding.

While the website Shabbat250.org logged over 7,500 pledges to observe Shabbos, Rabbi Shemtov said the true scope of the response was almost certainly far greater. “I don’t think you have to think wildly to say that hundreds of thousands of people across the country responded to this call,” he said, pointing to the wave of Chabad House programs organized specially for the occasion, shuls that marked the Shabbos in unique ways, Chabad on Campus initiatives, and alerts and calls to action issued by the OU, Agudath Israel and affiliated organizations.

For Rabbi Shemtov, the cumulative effect of that response captured something essential about what the proclamation was meant to accomplish. The Shabbat 250 call, he said, reached Jews across the spectrum — those keeping Shabbos for the first time, those being brought to the table by a friend or family member who keeps Shabbks, and even those who are fully shomer Shabbos but were given pause to reflect on just how fortunate they are.
“The Ribono Shel Olam has allowed us a unique freedom within the larger society for us to do what we need to do in terms of Yiddishkeit without any interference into our practices,” he said. “That is something very, very important.”

“When the president asked people across the country, everywhere, who are of the Jewish faith, to do something about Shabbos — that wasn’t only that he took it personally,” Rabbi Shemtov said. “He wanted them — meaning us — to take it personally.”

The second day of the Gunfighters Skies Airshow, a free public airshow that showcases the U.S. Air Force’s Thunderbirds, was canceled Sunday after two Navy fighter jets collided in midair during an aerial demonstration. The pilots ejected and were found safe a mile away from the smoke.

The airshow took place at Mountain Home Air Force Base in southwestern Idaho.

“All four of the air crew successfully ejected and they are being evaluated by medical personnel. First responders are on the scene,” the base said in a statement, adding that the incident is being investigated.

“We had four good parachutes,” the Idaho Statesman quoted an air show announcer as saying. “The crews were able to eject. They’re located one mile south of where the smoke is. The parachutes came down.”

The midair collision took place at about 12:10 p.m. local time. At about 1:18 p.m. local time, Mountain Home Police Department officially canceled the event and said that no one should travel to or attempt to enter the base “as a spectator, as the event will no longer be taking place.”

In a later update, police said that the area had been secured and spectators could now exit, as first responders had initially requested that attendees remain in place until the area was secured.

Video showed the jets colliding in midair, then spinning and tumbling to the ground, with flames and smoke billowing out at the point of impact. Four parachutes could also be seen opening in the sky an instant after the crash occurred.

The Gunfighter Skies Air Show in Idaho, which was scheduled for May 16 and 17, was supposed to include aerial performances, static displays, and history and science exhibits. The 366th Fighter Wing, which performs in the show, is stationed at the Mountain Home Air Force Base.

“The Gunfighters are proud to open our gates and share our mission with the community we call home,” Col. D. Ray Gunter, commander of the 366th Fighter Wing, had previously said. “This event attaches a face to the mission, showcasing the skilled professionals and dedicated Airmen who make airpower possible.”

This was the first Gunfighters Skies Airshow held in eight years.

A local child was rescued today after a vehicle window had to be broken when the youngster was reportedly left inside during dangerously hot temperatures, Askonim told TLS.

Fortunately, the child was removed in time and was not seriously injured.

Authorities and Chaveirim are reminding parents that even when outside temperatures are in the low 80s, the temperature inside a parked vehicle can rapidly climb well above 130 degrees within minutes – creating potentially fatal conditions Ch’v for children.

Children should never be left inside a vehicle, even briefly while running errands, as distractions can happen unexpectedly.

Parents are also urged to always keep vehicle doors locked. In some cases, children can climb into unattended vehicles on their own and become trapped without knowing how to get back out.

With temperatures in the Lakewood area expected to hover in the 90s over the coming days, residents are being urged to remain especially vigilant.

[Video below.] Sen. Lindsey Graham on Sunday called on President Donald Trump to restart American military strikes against Iran, arguing that the current ceasefire deadlock and continued closure of the Strait of Hormuz are benefiting Tehran while damaging the U.S. economy.

“I think the status quo is hurting us all,” Graham said during an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” insisting that sustained military pressure — rather than prolonged diplomacy — is the quickest way to end the conflict.

Graham’s remarks came as negotiations between the United States and Iran remain frozen.

Talks between Washington and Tehran, which have been mediated by Pakistan, have been suspended after both sides rejected each other’s most recent proposals. No permanent agreement has been reached since the two countries announced a ceasefire last month.

According to Graham, the ongoing stalemate plays directly into Iran’s hands.

“The longer the [Strait of Hormuz] is closed, the more we try to pursue a deal that never happens, the stronger Iran gets,” he said.

The South Carolina senator, who has strongly supported Trump’s military operations against Iran, urged the administration to intensify pressure on the regime.

“He credited the administration’s strikes as “amazing, militarily.” But, he said, “there’s more targets to be had.”

Graham also argued that Iran’s leadership has shown no indication that it has abandoned what he described as the regime’s objective “to terrorize the world, destroy Israel, come after us.”

The ongoing closure of the Strait of Hormuz — a critical waterway that handled more than 20% of the world’s energy supply before the war began — has sent global oil prices sharply higher since fighting erupted on Feb. 28.

By Friday, the average price of regular gasoline in the United States had climbed above $4.50 per gallon, representing a 51% increase since the war started.

Graham argued that decisive military action against Iran would ultimately reduce energy prices. Speaking to NBC moderator Kristen Welker, he said, “Gas prices will come down when you put Iran in a box.”

Meanwhile, Iranian officials have shown little willingness to soften their position.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Friday that Tehran has “no trust” in the United States and would only return to negotiations if Washington demonstrates serious intent, accusing American officials of sending “contradictory messages.”

The diplomatic stalemate coincided with Trump’s recent multi-day visit to China, where he held meetings with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

During an interview with Fox News anchor Bret Baier, Trump said he did not ask China for assistance regarding Iran. “If he wants to help, that’s great, but we don’t need help,” Trump said, adding that accepting outside assistance often creates future obligations.

The Iran conflict has also created growing political concerns inside the United States.

Trump faced criticism last week after saying that Americans’ personal finances were not his primary consideration during negotiations with Iran, comments that reportedly unsettled some Republicans ahead of the upcoming midterm elections.

Graham dismissed those political concerns entirely.

“It’s worth losing my job,” he told Welker. “If I had to give my job up to make sure Iran would never have a nuclear weapon, I would do it.”

His comments echoed Trump’s own position. Speaking with Baier, the President said he would not allow electoral politics to shape policy toward Tehran because Iran “cannot have a nuclear weapon.”

Trump acknowledged that his approach could temporarily “screw up” Republican polling numbers as some GOP candidates continue weighing how closely to align themselves with him during the campaign season.

WATCH:

{Matzav.com}

Following the assassination of Hamas military chief Izz al-Din al-Haddad on Friday, Israel is preparing for the possibility of a return to intensive combat against terror organizations in Gaza, Ynet reported on Sunday.

Under instructions from the political leadership, the IDF has begun updating operational plans for a broader campaign against Hamas and other terror groups in the Strip. Israeli officials described Haddad’s killing as “the first sign” of a possible return to war.

Still, officials stress that an escalation is not imminent. President Donald Trump is said to oppose opening a major front in Gaza before the Iranian issue is resolved.

“Trump is not giving us a free hand in Gaza,” one Israeli official familiar with the discussions said. “He supports surgical operations against ticking bombs — like the Radwan Force commander in Beirut or Hamas’s military chief in Gaza — but is far less supportive of a full-scale war.”

Israeli officials believe that if Tehran suffers a significant setback or agrees to a deal under American pressure, Hamas could come under increased pressure to compromise or even consider disarmament. If not, Washington may eventually back a broader Israeli campaign aimed at dismantling Hamas militarily.

Israeli assessments also point toward a resumption of battle with Iran itself, a development that could reshape the entire regional picture.

(YWN Israel Desk—Jerusalem)

NEW YORK — AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile are teaming up in an effort to reduce cellphone “dead zones” across the United States by expanding satellite-based wireless coverage.

The carriers said the initiative will use direct-to-device satellite technology, allowing standard smartphones to connect in areas where traditional cell towers are unavailable, including rural highways, national parks and remote communities.

The companies said the technology could also help maintain communications during natural disasters and other emergencies that damage ground-based wireless infrastructure.

T-Mobile already partners with SpaceX on satellite-powered mobile services, while AT&T and Verizon work with AST SpaceMobile to expand satellite connectivity.

The partnership reflects a growing push within the wireless industry to integrate satellite service into future 5G and 6G networks, moving beyond emergency-only satellite communications.

A police officer suffered a head injury overnight in Modiin Illit after officers responding to a violent altercation were allegedly attacked by a local resident during an arrest attempt. The suspect, a man in his 20s, was taken into custody and transferred for questioning.

The incident began after Israel Police received an emergency report about a violent fight unfolding in a public area of the city. Due to concerns that the situation could escalate further, patrol officers from the Modiin Illit station, part of the Shomron district, were dispatched to the scene.

When officers arrived, they identified a local man in his 20s whom they believed was involved in the original assault that prompted the emergency call.

Police attempted to calm the situation and carry out an arrest, but according to authorities, the suspect resisted and became physically aggressive toward the officers attempting to detain him.

During the struggle, the suspect allegedly attacked one of the officers in what police described as a severe assault, striking the officer in the head.

Medical teams were called to the scene after the officer sustained a head injury requiring evaluation and monitoring. After receiving initial treatment at the scene, the officer was transported to a hospital for further medical care and additional examinations.

Despite the violent confrontation and difficult conditions at the scene, additional officers managed to subdue the suspect, place him in handcuffs, and complete the arrest.

The suspect was then transported under police guard to the Modiin Illit police station, where investigators immediately launched a probe into the entire incident, including both the original altercation reported by residents and the alleged assault on the officer during the arrest.

Police said the investigation remains ongoing and that authorities will determine, based on the findings, whether to request an extension of the suspect’s detention before a judge.

{Matzav.com}

A two-year-old in Beverly, Mass., did what two-year-olds do … and first responders had to be called in to rescue him.

Little Theo thrust his head between the banisters on the stairs in his home, and his wee head got stuck. His frantic mother called for emergency responders, and local police and firefighters succeeded in getting him out by using oil and pulling the posts apart.

As responders clambered up the stairs, gathered around the child and pulled apart the posts, Theo cried, saying it hurt. Mercifully, it took only seconds to rescue him.

A friend of the family, Stanly Foreman, captured the incident on video.

“He got adventurous and put his head between the spindles going upstairs,” his mother, Liz, told Forman. “And we couldn’t get his head out. It was very scary, right Theo? We don’t know how you got it in there.”

She said the little boy had been playing while waiting for his grandmother to take him to the park.

After the ordeal was over, Theo got to check out the fire engines.

New York (VINNEWS/Rabbi Yair Hoffman)  There is a well-known minhag, brought down in the Rema (Orach Chaim 494:3), to eat milchig foods on Shavuos. Many reasons have been offered. Among the most famous is the one cited in the Mishnah Berurah (494, sk 12) in the name of earlier sources: when Klal Yisrael stood at Har Sinai and received the Torah, they received with it the laws of basar b’chalav. Until then, their utensils were not kashered for meat, and they could not slaughter, salt, nor prepare meat in time for the seudah. They therefore ate milchig on that first Shavuos. What more fitting moment, then, to sit down once again and review — or perhaps to learn anew — the halachos of meat and milk that were given to us on this very day?  Perhaps this might be good material for Shavuos night learning.  Much of this was prepared with the aid of a remarkable sefer called Aizer LaShulchan.  So, even though it is Shavuos, in the spirit of Pesach, let’s ask four fundamental questions. [Feel free to print out and study].

• First: did the meat and milk in fact mix, and through what mechanism?
• Second: did taste actually transfer from the one to the other at the point of contact?
• Third: was that taste a nosein ta’am l’shvach — a flavor that improves — or nosein ta’am lifgam — one that spoils?
• And fourth: was the taste that traveled a full, first-degree flavor, or was it only nat bar nat — a secondhand taste of a taste?

Each of these four questions contains its own sugya, its own debates of the Rishonim, and its own practical applications. The Beis Yosef, the Rema, the Shach, the Taz, the Magen Avraham, and the Pri Megadim build the entire structure of Yoreh Deah simanim 87 through 97 upon them.

Question #1: The Mechanism — How Did They Mix?

Cold Touching Cold

When a piece of meat and a piece of cheese come into contact while both are cold, nothing is absorbed from one into the other. A simple rinse suffices (see Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Deah 91:1). Should cold milk fall upon cold meat that has cracks or grooves, the milk may need to be scraped out of those grooves, as the Mechaber elaborates in YD Siman 91:7. Even where scraping is required, the concern is only d’rabbanan; min haTorah, only meat and milk actually cooked together are forbidden.

Meat and cheese resting beside one another — even touching — when both are cold are wholly permitted. There is not even a rabbinic concern, since the fire is not involved. But when one is hot and the other cold, the matter is disputed. The Rema (105:3) and the Shach (sk 9) hold that one peels off the k’dei klipah — the outer layer — of the cold piece. The Taz (sk 5) is more stringent and forbids the entire piece where there is no significant hefsed merubeh.

Bishul — Cooking Together

Meat and milk cooked together are forbidden min haTorah. “Bishul” in this context means cooking together in a kli rishon — the primary vessel on the fire — or even in a kli rishon that has been removed from the flame, so long as it remains yad soledes bo, the temperature from which the hand instinctively recoils.

Where one of the two foods is hot from a kli rishon and the other cold, the principle is tata’ah gavar — the lower item dominates (Chullin 91b; Shulchan Aruch 91:4). Cold milk that falls into hot meat renders the meat forbidden. Hot meat that falls onto cold milk leaves the meat muttar with the removal of klipah, since only a slight surface flavor seeps in.

Iruy — Pouring from a Pot

The Rishonim disagreed whether iruy mi-kli rishon — pouring from a hot vessel that was on the fire — cooks the food onto which it lands as the kli rishon itself does. The accepted halachah is that an unbroken stream of pouring does cook the lower food and forbids it min haTorah.

Where the stream has been broken, the Shach holds the flavor still penetrates fully though it does not technically cook, leaving only an issur d’rabbanan. The Magen Avraham holds that once the stream is broken, klipah suffices, and even that is only a chumra d’rabbanan.

Kli Sheni

The Gemara establishes that a kli sheni — a secondary vessel into which food has been transferred — does not cook (Shabbos 40b; Chullin 108a). Some Rishonim hold that since it does not cook, it also does not transfer flavor at all.

The Rashba and others hold that while it does not cook, it does transfer flavor. The Shulchan Aruch ruled stringently l’chatchilah and leniently b’di’eved in pure cold contact. The Maharshal maintained that a kli sheni transfers no flavor whatsoever, while the Taz ruled not to be lenient absent hefsed merubeh.

The Shach brings the many Rishonim who hold that a kli sheni transfers no taste, and rules accordingly: absent significant loss, one is machmir to peel klipah in earthenware vessels and in the food itself. The Rema is lenient — a kli sheni transfers no flavor at all — while the Maharshal is stringent, and the Magen Avraham treats this stringency as if it were a Torah-level concern for one who actively cooks. Some authorities further hold that even a solid piece of food sitting within a kli sheni absorbs and transfers as it would in a kli rishon — davar gush being a sugya of its own.

Tzli — Roasting

When meat is roasted with cheese, the absorbed taste spreads only k’dei klipah — the depth of a thin peel. But where the meat is fatty (shamen), the entire piece of cheese soaks up flavor, and the meat soaks up flavor in return, so that the issur disperses throughout the entire piece. The Taz disagrees on this point. Where the issur has dispersed, one requires shishim — sixty times the volume of permitted food — to be mevatel the forbidden taste. The same applies in reverse where it is the cheese that is fatty.

The Rema rules that ein anu beki’in — we are no longer expert in determining when meat is considered fatty — and we are therefore always stringent to require shishim for any flavor that comes through tzli, even absent hefsed merubeh. Leniency is permitted only in cases of real loss. The Shach (105:17–18) clarifies that even with this chumra, we do not extend it to claim a lack of expertise regarding sidkei basar — the cracks in fatty meat themselves.

All of the above applies where both pieces were hot, or where the lower piece alone was hot, since the roasting then enabled the meat to take in flavor through hadachah or absorption. Where only the upper piece was hot, klipah suffices, just as in bishul.

A forbidden item can sometimes be returned to a permitted state through tzli after the fact. This avenue is open only when the item itself is not the forbidden substance but merely carries an absorbed forbidden flavor that roasting can draw out. Where the item itself is the issur — for example, where permitted meat was cooked together with non-kosher meat and never rinsed — tzli cannot help. However, where the absorbed forbidden taste is a fatty substance, the flavor can be drawn out through tzli just as it would from any forbidden item, and the same applies even by bishul.

Regarding basar b’chalav specifically — a piece of meat that absorbed milk flavor through a permitted means — the Shach is stringent and forbids it even through tzli in fatty cases, though the milk’s taste has not actually dispersed through the meat. The Taz holds there is no distinction here from other forbidden foods, since meat which was cooked without milk is not itself basar b’chalav mamash. Even with the Shach’s chumra in fatty matter, the Shach (105:17–18) himself does not extend the principle of ein anu beki’in to the cracks in the meat.

The poskim further disagreed whether tzli even rises to the level of bishul for basar b’chalav. Some hold the issur is min haTorah, while others rule it is only d’rabbanan, since the pasuk specifies cooking and not roasting.

Tigun — Frying

The poskim likewise disagreed whether tigun — frying — qualifies as bishul for basar b’chalav. The Pri Megadim’s position is to be machmir absent hefsed merubeh. Frying in a substantial quantity of oil, where the food sits within the oil itself, disperses absorbed flavor throughout all of the oil exactly as cooking does. Where the oil is minimal, the rule turns on whether the piece was actually fried in oil. According to Rashi, the juice that emerges from the meat follows the rules of broth in bishul. According to Rabbeinu Tam, the distinction depends on whether broth actually runs out of the meat, and the case is treated either as bishul or as tzli — even with only a small amount of oil involved, as the Beis Yosef explains in the relevant passage of siman 105.

Melichah — Salting

Salting follows the rules of tzli and produces both absorption and emission of flavor. With regard to basar b’chalav, however, melichah is forbidden only mid’rabbanan, since it is not the ordinary mode of cooking (see Chullin 97b; Shulchan Aruch 91:5). The reach of the forbidden flavor is k’dei klipah. In fatty cases, the issur spreads through the entire item and shishim is required. The Shulchan Aruch holds that even in fatty cases the spread is only klipah, but the Shach (105:28) holds that in melichah we do not invoke the leniency that removes the basic prohibition.

In our day, salting a minimal amount — a k’mo nemalah, an ant-like quantity — is not considered like tzli. But where one salts in this way in order to cook the meat immediately, the Rema (91:5) writes to be stringent. Anything salted k’melichah l’kadeirah — the salting done to draw out blood for cooking, even a light salting — falls under this rule. The Beis Yosef discusses the matter in siman 105, in the passage beginning V’inyan tzli.

The forbidden taste seeps into every crack, and shishim is required to be mevatel it. The Shulchan Aruch holds that even in hefsed merubeh one is machmir in melichah, and where the permitted food has absorbed flavor, the entire permitted food is forbidden, since it has mingled with the gufo of the issur. The Shach (105:28) holds that in melichah we do not say the permitted food removes the underlying prohibition.

Kevishah — Pickling

Pickled food has the halachic status of cooked food: kavush k’mevushal (Chullin 97b; Shulchan Aruch 105:1). Meat that was pickled in milk renders both wholly forbidden. Kevishah is defined as twenty-four hours of soaking together. Some hold that pickling in a davar charif — a sharp substance — produces the same effect after only twenty-four minutes. With brine, all agree that the entire item is forbidden in the time it takes for fire to bring the brine to a boil — the same span required to peel off the outer layer immediately. Regarding vinegar, some hold that brine acts faster; the Shach holds that the kulah applies only to drawing flavor out, not to joining two flowing substances together. Pickling in items forbidden min haTorah produces a Torah-level prohibition; for basar b’chalav, kevishah is only d’rabbanan, since it is not the normal mode of cooking.

Davar Charif — A Sharp Item

A davar charif — onion, garlic, radish, and the like — draws absorbed flavor outward through forceful pressure, such as the pressure of a knife (duchka d’sakina). When one cuts an onion with a fleishig knife, the absorbed flavor disperses through the entire onion. The spread of forbidden taste through a cold item is normally limited to klipah, leaving the remainder muttar; but the Rema is stringent and forbids the entire item ab initio (see Yoreh Deah 96).

Question #2: Did Taste Actually Transfer?

Where meat and milk became mixed but were not cooked, they are not rendered forbidden unless taste can actually be discerned in the mixture. Where meat was cooked in milk and the matter is tested through tasting, and a kafeilah — an expert chef or taster — reports no taste of milk, the meat is permitted. The Shulchan Aruch (98:1) defines who qualifies for this purpose. The Rema holds that in our times we no longer rely on tasting altogether. Instead, if there is shishim of the meat against the milk, the meat is muttar. Chazal established this ratio on the assumption that taste will not register where the permitted food outweighs the forbidden by sixty to one.

The reason tasting is admissible even where both flavors are of the same min is explained by Rabbi Akiva Eiger in his Teshuvos (Mahadura Kama, siman 6). All the Rishonim agree that without permitted substance to be mevatel the issur, the food is forbidden, since one does not rely on the absence of taste. The Rema’s position in our day is that the heter operates through bittul, since Chazal’s measure of shishim means that flavor is not felt once the permitted food outweighs the issur sixty to one.

Chaticha Na’asis Neveilah

Where a k’zayis of meat was cooked in milk and itself became a chaticha na’asis neveilah — a piece that has become wholly forbidden — and that piece was then cooked with other meat, shishim is required against the entire piece, not merely against the half-zayis of cheese that originally caused the prohibition. With other issurim — for example, where a k’zayis of meat and a half-zayis of forbidden meat are cooked together with other meat — the Rishonim divide. Some say shishim is measured against the whole k’zayis of meat that absorbed the issur, while others hold that the rule of chanan does not apply, and shishim against the half-zayis itself suffices (see Chullin 100a).

Im Yesh L’Mochaso

Where that piece was then cooked a second time with shishim against the original forbidden item, the Gemara records divergent views. According to those who reject chanan, where the absorbed flavor yesh l’mochaso — can be squeezed back out — the first piece reverts to its original permitted status. According to those who hold asur l’mochaso — that the absorbed flavor may not be squeezed out because the permitted food has taken on forbidden taste — the piece is still permitted, but on different grounds. The halachah is the subject of dispute, and the poskim’s practical psak is to be stringent. The view that does apply chanan also holds asur l’mochaso, as the Gemara works out in Chullin 108a. The Gemara there asks how one could possibly say yesh l’mochaso: what is unique about a chaticha na’asis neveilah? After all, the very name “chaticha na’asis neveilah” arose through bishul itself, and so the same should permit yesh l’mochaso. See further in the Pri Megadim (siman 92:10).

The Acharonim disagreed as to why asur l’mochaso. The Maharam of Lublin and others held that because the forbidden flavor was originally absorbed in that piece, it is forever “that piece.” Until squeezing has removed the issur, it retains its forbidden status — and so even if it later absorbed something else and the original flavor was wholly destroyed, the forbidden taste may yet remain. The Pri Megadim (siman 92:11) rules clearly that as long as no one has actually tasted any flavor, we treat it as if no flavor is there; once a kapelan has tasted and there is no flavor of the issur, the halachah follows the Maharam of Lublin.

Question #3: L’Shvach or Lifgam?

A forbidden taste that has gone bad inside the permitted food does not render the food forbidden: nosein ta’am lifgam mutar (Avodah Zarah 67b; Shulchan Aruch 103:5). When something assur was cooked in a pot and twenty-four hours have since passed without use, the absorbed flavor is considered spoiled. Permitted food cooked in that pot afterward is not forbidden. The same applies to basar b’chalav: meat cooked in a milchig pot twenty-four hours after milk was last cooked in it is not forbidden — provided the other relevant conditions are met.

Where one has a pot whose history is unknown — where it is uncertain whether the pot has been used within the past twenty-four hours — the assumption is that it has not been used bnos yomo and is therefore eino ben yomo.

Davar Charif Once More

The poskim disagreed whether a davar charif retains its eino ben yomo leniency after twenty-four hours. The accepted view is to be stringent, since a sharp substance replaces the spoiled flavor with a fresh and improved one — achaliyei l’shvach. One who cooks a sharp food in a pot eino ben yomo therefore renders the food forbidden k’dei klipah. Likewise, one who cuts a davar charif with a forbidden knife eino ben yomo renders the sharp food forbidden k’dei klipah. Some hold the entire item is forbidden.

Question #4: A Full Ta’am or Only Nat Bar Nat?

Meat cooked together with milk — or cooked in a pot in which milk had just been cooked within the time that taste still transfers — receives a full, first-degree taste of the milk and is forbidden, absent shishim. Meat cooked together with a davar parve that was earlier cooked in a milchig pot, however, is not forbidden. This is nat bar nat: the milk gave taste to the pot, the pot gave taste to the pareve food, and the pareve food alone is what came into contact with the meat. The transfer is one step too removed to forbid (see Shulchan Aruch 95:1).

Absorbed Flavor Without Liquid

Where forbidden flavor has been absorbed into something — food or vessel — and that item then comes into contact with a permitted item without any liquid between them, even with both hot, the permitted item is not necessarily rendered forbidden. Absorbed taste does not always emerge without a liquid medium. The matter turns on three variables: whether the absorbed flavor is regular taste or actual fatty substance (shumno); whether the flavor is absorbed within food or within a vessel; and whether the item now being touched is food or a vessel.

A Quick Reference

What follows is a practical summary of the rules for how absorbed taste spreads without liquid:

Flavor absorbed in food → touching food: If the flavor is lean, the touched food is permitted (Shulchan Aruch 105:7). If the flavor is fatty, the touched food is forbidden (Shulchan Aruch 105:7).

Flavor absorbed in food → touching a vessel: If the flavor is lean, the vessel is permitted (Taz 105:16). If the flavor is fatty, the matter is disputed. The Beis Hillel (92:15; 105:15) is lenient; the Bach (Yoreh Deah, Beis Shmuel siman 105) disagrees, and many Acharonim are stringent — see Darkei Teshuvah 105:143.

Flavor absorbed in a vessel → touching food: If the flavor is lean, one removes klipah (Shach 105:23). If the flavor is fatty, the matter is doubtful (Shach there). The stricter view applies specifically to fatty substance in oily food where there is no certain absorbed flavor; where there is moisture and even a small amount of fat throughout, and one wishes to peel off only k’dei klipah l’chatchilah, the Shach’s reasoning extends further, as the Maharshal questioned the Maharsha and as the Shach writes end of siman 94.

Flavor absorbed in a vessel → touching another vessel: If the flavor is lean, the second vessel is muttar (Rema 92:8). It is even permitted l’chatchilah, though some Acharonim forbid l’chatchilah. If the flavor is fatty, it is likewise permitted, as is clear from the Taz (92:3) where he speaks of mafladin — that there is fat present — and yet permitted vessel-touching-vessel. The Pri Megadim writes similarly (105:22).

Issur itself (not absorbed flavor) → touching a vessel: If lean, some hold one removes klipah — see the Chazon Ish on the Shach (94:8). If fatty, the vessel is forbidden, since those who were lenient permitted only what sat in oil; with an actual fatty substance, the matter is wholly forbidden.

Issur itself → touching food: If lean, hadachah suffices (Shulchan Aruch 105:4). If fatty, the food is forbidden (Shulchan Aruch 105:5).

A Closing Thought

This is the skeleton of a sugya that fills many pages of Mechaber, Ramah, Shach, Taz, Pri Megadim, and acharonim. Every word above opens onto further machlokes, further chumros, further kulos in cases of hefsed merubeh. The Rema (Yoreh Deah 87:3) reminds us that the prohibition of basar b’chalav is so foundational that the very utensils used for the one must be kept entirely separate from those used for the other — a separation that, more than perhaps any other halachic detail, marks the daily rhythm of our homes.

When we sit down  on Shavuos, the milchig spread on the table is not only a remembrance of how we ate on the morning the Torah was given. It is testimony that the Torah we received included these very halachos.

The author can be reached at [email protected]

The World Health Organization on Sunday declared the worsening Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo and neighboring Uganda a global health emergency as the number of suspected infections and deaths continues to rise.

Health officials say more than 300 suspected cases have been identified so far, with at least 88 reported deaths linked to the outbreak.

According to the W.H.O., the outbreak centered in eastern Congo’s Ituri province does not currently meet the threshold for classification as a pandemic emergency, though the agency said that possibility has not been ruled out, according to the BBC.

The outbreak involves the Bundibugyo strain of the Ebola virus, for which there are presently no approved vaccines or treatments, the agency said.

Initial symptoms of the disease include fever, muscle aches, fatigue, headaches and sore throat, followed later by vomiting, diarrhea, skin rashes and internal or external bleeding, according to the BBC report.

The W.H.O. said eight cases have been laboratory confirmed thus far, while additional suspected infections and deaths have been reported across three health zones, including Bunia, the capital of Ituri province, as well as the gold-mining communities of Mongwalu and Rwampara.

One confirmed case has also been detected in Kinshasa, Congo’s capital city, involving a patient believed to have recently traveled from Ituri province.

Over the past five decades, Ebola outbreaks across Africa have claimed approximately 15,000 lives.

The deadliest outbreak in Congo occurred between 2018 and 2020, when nearly 2,300 people died from the virus.

Another outbreak last year in a remote region of Congo resulted in 45 deaths.

Ebola spreads through direct contact with bodily fluids including blood, vomit and semen. While infections are relatively rare, the illness is highly contagious, severe and frequently fatal, according to the Associated Press.

The W.H.O. said its emergency declaration is intended to mobilize international aid organizations and governments into taking action. Under the agency’s guidelines, such a declaration signifies that the situation is serious, poses a risk of spreading internationally, and requires a coordinated global response, the AP reported.

{Matzav.com}

A growing dispute over automated license plate reader technology in Troy, New York, has sparked legal action and renewed debate over privacy, data collection, and concerns about possible federal surveillance involvement.

At the center of the controversy are Flock cameras, an AI-powered license plate recognition system that records not only license plates but also vehicle details such as make, model, and color. Critics have voiced concerns that the system could potentially be used by Immigration and Customs Enforcement to monitor immigrants.

The dispute escalated Monday when Troy’s Democrat-led City Council filed a lawsuit against Republican Mayor Carmella Mantello after she issued an emergency order allowing the cameras to remain operational. The legal challenge came after the council directed the city auditor to “pause payments to Flock until the city resolves all outstanding questions and public concerns.”

Mantello defended the program, arguing that the cameras are an important public safety tool that assists law enforcement in solving crimes.

“I believed there was a path to share that work collaboratively with the City Council — to protect civil liberties while ensuring law enforcement has effective tools to keep our neighborhoods safe,” Mantello said in a statement, according to The Record of Troy. “Unfortunately, the Council has chosen frivolous litigation instead of collaboration. That does not change our mission.

“My administration will continue doing everything necessary to keep Troy safe, address crime proactively, and ensure those who break the law are held accountable.

“The people of Troy expect leadership focused on results — not political theater — and that is exactly what we will deliver.”

During last week’s City Council meeting, Mantello publicly opposed proposed legislation aimed at restricting how much information can be retained from the camera system, The Record reported.

Under the proposal, any collected data would need to be erased after 48 hours unless state evidence laws require preservation. At present, the information may be stored for up to 30 days.

The legislation would also require any city agency using the technology to publish annual public reports on the city website. The proposal was formally introduced last week, with a public hearing scheduled for June 4.

Flock’s surveillance network relies on artificial intelligence-enabled cameras that photograph every vehicle traveling through monitored areas.

The technology generates what the company describes as a digital “fingerprint” of each vehicle, including distinctive identifying features such as bumper stickers or gun racks. Law enforcement agencies support the technology because the company’s nationwide database can be used to trace vehicle movements connected to drug investigations, recover stolen cars, and assist in major criminal probes.

A spokesperson for the company told The Washington Post that the technology helps “communities across the country in addressing crime and locating missing people.”

“At Flock, we believe safety and privacy should go hand in hand, which is why our technology is built around transparency, accountability, and local control,” Chris Castaldo, Flock Safety’s chief information security officer, said. “Our platform includes safeguards like audit trails to help ensure accountability at every step.”

Still, Flock’s rapid growth nationwide has fueled concerns over mass surveillance, especially following reports that federal immigration authorities have used the system to help locate illegal immigrants, according to The Washington Post.

A nationwide mapping effort known as DeFlock estimates that more than 90,000 license plate readers are currently operating across the United States. The Post also reported that more than 60 municipalities have either canceled or rejected agreements with Flock and similar companies.

In a statement cited by The Record, the Troy City Council sharply criticized Mantello’s actions, saying, “The mayor has gone far beyond her lawful authority. If left unchallenged, it sets a dangerous precedent where the mayor can claim a public safety emergency anytime she disagrees with the legislative branch, creating an unchecked power that echoes what is happening in Washington.”

{Matzav.com}

Israeli officials are preparing for the arrival of the “Global Sumud” flotilla, which departed Thursday from the Turkish coastal city of Marmaris and is heading toward the Gaza Strip. According to current estimates, the flotilla — organized by the IHH organization, which was behind the 2010 Mavi Marmara flotilla — is expected to reach the area within the next two to three days.

An Israeli source said authorities believe activists aboard the ships may behave more violently than in previous incidents. According to the official, Israel is expected to seize control of the vessels and detain those onboard, with concerns that some activists could physically resist arrest or even use melee weapons.

Israel reportedly attempted through diplomatic channels to prevent the flotilla from departing Turkey, but those efforts were unsuccessful. According to the report, the United States also approached Turkey and requested that the flotilla be stopped before departure, but those attempts likewise failed.

A diplomatic source said Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu has already held a preliminary security consultation regarding the flotilla, which Israeli officials say includes Hamas supporters and is intended to breach the naval blockade on Gaza. According to the source, Netanyahu is expected to convene an additional operational meeting with senior security officials.

Israeli authorities are reportedly preparing for the arrival of approximately 50 vessels. Among the activists believed to be onboard are Saif Abu Kashk, a Palestinian resident of Spain, and Thiago Avila, a Brazilian citizen. Both men were arrested late last month after the Israeli Navy intercepted the “Spring 2026” flotilla, which had departed from Spain en route to Gaza.

After being questioned in Israel and deported, Abu Kashk and Avila reportedly traveled to Turkey and boarded ships participating in the new flotilla. An Israeli official said this time Israel does not intend to release them quickly.

Following their previous detention in Israel, the two activists launched a hunger strike protesting their arrest and denied the allegations against them. The Adalah legal organization, which represented them, claimed the pair endured psychological abuse and were denied proper treatment. Israeli officials rejected those accusations and alleged the activists were involved in offenses including membership in a terrorist organization, aiding the enemy during wartime, and maintaining contact with terror operatives.

Following their deportation, Israel’s Foreign Ministry described the activists as “professional provocateurs” and reiterated that Israel would not permit violations of the naval blockade surrounding the Gaza Strip.

Hamas is preparing to exploit the upcoming Hajj pilgrimage as cover for a large-scale fundraising and smuggling operation aimed at moving cash and gold into the Gaza Strip, Israeli public broadcaster KAN News reported, citing Palestinian sources familiar with the plan.

The Hajj, the annual Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca that draws millions of Muslims to Saudi Arabia, begins on the evening of May 24 and runs through Friday, May 29. The sheer scale of movement during the pilgrimage — and the difficulty Saudi and regional authorities face in monitoring it — makes the season uniquely suited for the discreet transfer of funds and assets, the sources told KAN.

According to the report, Hamas operatives intend to solicit donations from pilgrims under a humanitarian or religious guise, collecting both cash and jewelry. The assets would then be smuggled out of Saudi Arabia into Egypt, and from Egypt into Gaza, using a network of intermediaries.

Once the funds reach Egypt, the sources said, they would be laundered or “redirected” through a mix of methods designed to obscure their origin and final destination. Those methods include electronic transfers, digital wallets, exchange companies, informal money-transfer systems such as the hawala network, and the use of front men to break large sums into smaller amounts that draw less scrutiny.

The plan, as described, fits a pattern Israeli and Western counterterrorism officials have documented for years. Treasury Department designations issued in October 2024 accused Hamas of operating “sham and front charities that falsely claim to help civilians in Gaza,” and estimated that the group was bringing in as much as $10 million a month through such donations as of early last year. Israeli intelligence officials, speaking anonymously to Bloomberg in early 2024, put the figure even higher, at $8 million to $12 million a month, mostly through online channels.

In June 2025, the Treasury Department sanctioned Filistin Vakfi, a Turkey-based charity, for raising funds for Hamas’s military wing, calling Turkey “a hub for Hamas’s clandestine financial operations.” A separate Italian-based outfit, ABSPP, was designated for funneling at least $4 million to Hamas over a decade under the guise of humanitarian work.

The Hajj scheme described in the KAN report would mark an effort to tap a different and harder-to-track stream: in-person donations during a religious gathering, converted into portable assets like gold, and moved through the same informal financial corridors that have long shielded Hamas funding from Western oversight.

Saudi authorities, who manage the pilgrimage and screen attendees through a centralized visa system, have not publicly commented on the report.

The fundraising report comes as Hamas struggles to fill its own top political post. The terror group announced Saturday night that its internal leadership election had ended without a result, and that another round of voting would be held in the coming period.

The race is widely expected to come down to two figures: Khaled Mashal, the veteran Hamas leader based abroad who previously chaired the group’s political bureau, and Khalil al-Hayya, a senior Hamas politician who has been a central figure in cease-fire negotiations.

Hamas has been without a permanent head of its political wing since October 2024, when Yahya Sinwar was killed by Israeli forces in Gaza. The vacancy is one of many created by an unprecedented Israeli decapitation campaign over the past two years that has eliminated much of the group’s senior military and political leadership.

Taher al-Nunu, a media advisor to Hamas, told Al Jazeera that the wave of Israeli assassinations had forced the organization into a sweeping restructuring. Vacant positions, he said, would be filled through the movement’s “consultative mechanism and silent elections.”

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

Thousands of devout Christians flocked to the National Mall Sunday in Washington, D.C., which stretches between the Capitol grounds to the east and the Washington Monument to the left, for a daylong prayer rally. Huge stained glass windows with sweeping arches soared upward to meet imposing columns as religious music spilled out from a stage, imbuing the space with the feeling of attending a church service.

The purpose of the event was laid out in a statement by the official White House X account: “Thousands of Americans are gathering on the National Mall TODAY for a powerful day of prayer, praise, and patriotism as we chart the course for America’s next 250 years and rededicate ourselves to ONE NATION UNDER GOD.”

Following the theme of rededication, President Donald Trump addressed the crowd via a video address in which he quoted at length from 2 Chronicles 7, a passage that deals with the dedication of the Temple. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), among other top Republicans, also took part in the celebrations marking 250 years of American independence.

Speakers at the event celebrated Christianity as the foundation of the United States of America in a doctrine that critics have dubbed Christian nationalism. One of the speakers owned the term.

“If being a Christian nationalist means loving Jesus Christ and loving America, count me in,” said the Rev. Robert Jeffress, a well-known Southern Baptist pastor.

The speakers argued that the United States was founded as a Christian nation, a controversial position that has its detractors.

Arguing against the position, Rabbi Jonah Dov Pesner, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, pointed to the religious diversity of early Americans, who counted among them Jews and Muslims. “I want to shine a light on America’s history as a nation that welcomes, celebrates, and protects people of all faiths and those of no faith,” Pesner said.

“We are deeply concerned that what is really being rededicated is a nation to a very narrow and ideological part of the Christian faith that betrays our nation’s fundamental commitment to religious freedom,” said the Rev. Adam Russell Taylor, a Baptist minister and leader of the Sojourners, a progressive Christian organization.

A criminal complaint unsealed Friday in Manhattan federal court against a senior commander of Kataib Hezbollah includes a striking allegation buried in its pages: that operatives working for the Iranian-backed Iraqi militia may have been behind a pair of March shooting attacks in Toronto, including one targeting a shul.

The complaint against Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood Al-Saadi — the high-ranking Kataib Hezbollah figure charged Friday in connection with a plot to bomb a Manhattan shul and a broader campaign of attacks across Europe and North America — quotes Al-Saadi telling an undercover law enforcement officer that his “people” had carried out two attacks in Canada, one against a consulate and one against a shul.

The undercover officer, according to court papers, took the consulate reference to mean the March 10 shooting at the U.S. consulate in Toronto, in which an unknown gunman fired at the building in the early morning hours. The Toronto Police Service said at the time that the shooting caused damage to the building but no injuries. The case had not previously been publicly linked to a foreign state actor.

The shul claim is harder to map. The greater Toronto area saw three separate shul shootings within a five-day span in March, in what the Anti-Defamation League called a tipping point for Canadian Jewry.

The first came on the evening of March 2, just after Purim, when a gunman fired multiple rounds into the front windows of Temple Emanu-El, a Reform congregation in North York. People were still inside the building when the shots were fired. No one was injured.

Four nights later, just before midnight on Friday, March 6, gunfire struck the front doors of Beth Avraham Yoseph of Toronto — the BAYT — one of the largest Orthodox congregations in North America, located in the heavily Jewish Thornhill section of Vaughan. Two facilities workers were inside cleaning up from an event that had just ended. Eight bullets shattered the glass; no one was hurt. Less than half an hour later, just after midnight on March 7, shots were fired into the front entrance of Shaarei Shomayim, a large Orthodox shul on Bathurst Street in North York.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney condemned the shootings as “criminal antisemitic attacks.” Ontario Premier Doug Ford called them “cowardly.” Rabbi Daniel Korobkin of the BAYT described the gunfire at his shul as “an appalling and cowardly act of evil.”

On May 6, the Toronto Police Service and York Regional Police announced the arrest of an 18-year-old man — who was not named because he was 17 at the time — in connection with the BAYT and Shaarei Shomayim shootings. He was charged with seven gun-related counts, including two counts of discharging a firearm into a place. Investigators did not file terrorism or hate-crime charges at the time of arrest, but Toronto Police Chief Myron Demkiw said the investigation remained open.

That leaves the March 2 shooting at Temple Emanu-El still without a publicly named suspect, and now potentially fitting within the framework Al-Saadi described to the undercover officer.

The Toronto allegations are a small piece of a sweeping U.S. case that, as laid out in the complaint, paints Al-Saadi as a one-man hub for a global wave of pro-Iran terrorism. Prosecutors say Al-Saadi planned, directed, or claimed responsibility for at least 18 attacks in Europe and two in Canada, many of them carried out under the banner of Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiya (HAYI), described in the complaint as a component of Kataib Hezbollah.

The European attacks attributed to him include the firebombing of a Bank of New York Mellon building in Amsterdam, an attempted IED detonation at a Bank of America building in Paris, and the stabbing of two people in London, one of them a Jewish-American citizen.

In the United States, prosecutors allege, Al-Saadi pledged thousands of dollars in cryptocurrency to a person he believed was a hired attacker — but who was in fact an FBI undercover agent — to bomb a prominent Manhattan shul. He also allegedly provided the agent with photographs and maps of Jewish institutions in Los Angeles and Scottsdale, Arizona, as additional targets. Al-Saadi sent a $3,000 down payment and demanded the Manhattan attack be carried out by April 6, prosecutors said. He was arrested in Turkey and transferred to American custody before that deadline.

The campaign, according to the complaint, was framed by Al-Saadi as retaliation for the joint U.S.-Israeli military operation against Iran that began in late February, and as an attempt to pressure Washington and Jerusalem into halting it.

Kataib Hezbollah is widely regarded by U.S. officials as one of the most operationally capable proxies of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and its overseas arm, the Quds Force. Court papers include photographs of Al-Saadi with Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, the longtime Quds Force commander killed in a U.S. drone strike in Baghdad in January 2020. Prosecutors say Al-Saadi worked closely with both Suleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the Kataib Hezbollah founder killed in the same strike.

While the Iraqi militia has a long and well-documented record of attacks on American forces in Iraq and Syria, it has not historically operated at the kind of global reach implied by the latest U.S. complaint. If the Toronto allegations hold up, they would mark one of the clearest known instances of Iranian-directed terrorism reaching Jewish institutions on North American soil since the start of the current Middle East war, and would suggest that the wave of antisemitic violence Canadian Jewry has been absorbing for the past 2.5 years is, at least in part, being directed from Tehran.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

President Donald Trump said renovation work on the Reflecting Pool at the National Mall is progressing ahead of schedule and may be completed before Independence Day.

In a Truth Social post, Trump shared images from what he called a “sample test” of the famous Reflecting Pool, featuring views of both the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument.

“Looking really good!” Trump wrote.

“Should be completed before the Fourth of July, our target date.”

The Reflecting Pool, one of Washington’s best-known landmarks, runs between the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument and serves as a major attraction for tourists, national gatherings, and historic events.

In his post, Trump referred to the site as “the World’s longest” reflecting pool.

Trump said the project has grown substantially beyond its initial scope in order to improve the site’s appearance and extend its longevity.

“I’ve made this a much larger job than originally contemplated for purposes of Beauty, and a much longer life,” Trump wrote.

According to the President, the upgrades include the use of stronger construction materials, enhanced finishing treatments, sandblasted granite, and newly installed exterior stonework and walkways.

He added that crews are also applying “a higher quality sealer with more reflectivity.”

The renovation effort comes as the administration continues emphasizing restoration and beautification projects involving monuments and federal public spaces throughout Washington.

Trump has repeatedly spoken about preserving national landmarks and improving the visual appearance of the capital city.

Officials did not immediately release additional information Saturday regarding the total cost of the project or the anticipated construction schedule. It also remains unclear which federal agencies or private contractors are supervising the work.

The Reflecting Pool has undergone several restoration projects over the years, including a major rehabilitation completed in 2012 that addressed infrastructure deterioration, water-quality problems, and structural repairs. The National Park Service oversees the landmark.

Trump encouraged the public to visit the site even before construction is officially completed.

“Check it out before the Opening — It’s a very exciting project!” he wrote.

The National Mall remains among the most heavily visited tourist destinations in the United States, attracting millions of visitors each year to sites including the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument, and the U.S. Capitol.

If the project is completed by July 4, the renovated Reflecting Pool would reopen in time for Independence Day festivities and the height of Washington’s summer tourism season.

London’s Shomrim partnered with Scotland Yard’s Counter Terrorism Policing unit to deliver a specialized security training session for members of the frum Jewish community in Stamford Hill, as the UK’s national terrorism threat level remains at “severe.”

The Action Counters Terrorism (ACT) Operational training, which was also supported by the Metropolitan Police’s Hackney Safer Neighbourhood Teams, covered a range of critical security topics, including how to identify hostile reconnaissance and suspicious activity, recognize potential terrorist threats, and respond effectively in an emergency situation.

Terrorism Policing London Protective Security Operations division led the session, which brought together Prevent officers and community liaison personnel alongside Shomrim volunteers who helped coordinate and facilitate the training.

The session came as British security services maintain a SEVERE threat level — the second-highest designation on the national scale — indicating that a terrorist attack is considered highly likely within the next six months. Officials said the elevated threat environment makes community-level preparedness training more essential than ever.

Participants were reminded to trust their instincts and immediately report any suspicious behavior to police.

Shomrim thanked the counter-terrorism officers, Prevent teams, and Met Police personnel for their continued cooperation with the community and their support for proactive safety initiatives.

As previously mentioned in this series, much attention has been given to the challenges confronting our talmidim. Technology, internet exposure, social media, and, more recently, AI, are often identified as the primary concerns. In response, gatherings are convened, safeguards are implemented, and efforts are made to protect our Mosdos and homes.

Yet, a painful question continues to linger: why do talmidim still drift from the warmth of Torah life? Why do they seek validation and belonging elsewhere?

Before focusing solely on external influences, perhaps we must reflect inward and ask: are there areas within our own approach in teaching Torah that require strengthening?

It is certainly true that the outside world presents נסיונות unlike any previous generation. However, חז״ל teach that when foundations are strong, outside influences have far less impact. As Chazal state: קידושין ל ע״ב

בָּרָאתִי יֵצֶר הָרָע, בָּרָאתִי לוֹ תּוֹרָה תַּבְלִין
“I created the evil inclination; I created for it the Torah as spices.”

The Torah is the תבלין, (spices), the force that refines and strengthens a person, enabling him to withstand and properly channel external influences.

When a child can read, translate, and understand the text, it becomes alive for him, empowering him, building his confidence, and giving him the tools to overcome the yetzer hara.

But when these foundational skills are lacking, the same Torah can feel inaccessible and frustrating. In such a case, it becomes far more difficult for the child to draw upon the strength of Torah to overcome challenges.

The responsibility therefore rests upon us, and the educators, to ensure that every student is equipped with the skills and confidence to access the Torah’s תבלין. Only then can Torah truly strengthen, refine, and protect him from outside influences.

No Child Should Be Left Behind

A yesod guiding every Torah community is that every Jewish child deserves a makom Torah**.**

Yet painful realities remain: some children do not find their place, and families are forced to seek less-than-ideal alternatives.

As previously written, my revered Rebbe, Rabbi Mattisyahu Salomon זצ״ל, stated publicly in Lakewood: “no girls’ school should open until every girl has been placed ”. This was a clear expression of responsibility and a reminder of what klal yisroel stands for. (Obviously, this applies equally to boys’ yeshivos.)

Consider the magnitude of that declaration. After the devastation of the Holocaust when nearly two million Jewish children were murdered by Adolf Hitler,יִמַּח שְׁמוֹ, entire communities were destroyed.

Today we live in a generation that has witnessed extraordinary rebuilding where mosdos have flourished beyond imagination. Boruch Hashem,communities that once lay in ruins have been rebuilt with remarkable dedication and sacrifice.

Yet despite this incredible growth and success, I and others are still getting phone calls asking for help for their child who is struggling to find a place in school.

This reality should shake us.

How can we speak about preserving Yiddishkeit while closing the doors of mosdos to children who seek to enter? How can educators and leaders stand each morning and recite Birkas HaTorah with sincerity while children remain outside the gates?

Every day we daven in the morning :

…. וְהַעֲרֶב נָ ה

And please, Hashem our God, make the words of Your Torah sweet in our mouths and in the mouths of Your people, the House of Israel. May we, our children, and the children of Your people, the House of Israel, all come to know Your Name and study Your Torah for its own sake. Blessed are You, Hashem, Who teaches Torah to His people Israel.

“וְהַעֲרֶב נָא” literally means “ And please make [the Torah] sweet.” Every morning we dave that Torah should be experienced as sweetness and joy not only by ourselves, but by our children and the doros that will follow.

We must ask ourselves honestly: can we daven these words daily whilst at the same time rejecting or expelling talmidim from mosdos**?**

A Timeless Lesson: כל ישראל ערבים זה בזה

חז״ל illustrate this responsibility with a moshol in Midrash Vayikra Rabbah 4:6:

מָשָׁל לִבְנֵי אָדָם שֶׁהָיוּ יוֹשְׁבִין בַּסְּפִינָה. נָטַל אֶחָד מֵהֶם מַקְדֵּחַ וְהִתְחִיל קוֹדֵחַ תַּחְתָּיו.

אָמְרוּ לוֹ חֲבֵרָיו: מָה אַתָּה עוֹשֶׂה?
אָמַר לָהֶם: מָה אִכְפַּת לָכֶם? תַּחְתַּי אֲנִי קוֹדֵחַ!
אָמְרוּ לוֹ: שֶׁהַמַּיִם עוֹלִין וּמַצִּיפִין עָלֵינוּ אֶת הַסְּפִינָה.

Bnei Odom were sitting in a boat.
One of them took a drill and began drilling under his seat. His companions said to him: What are you doing? He replied: Why does it concern you? I am drilling under my own place!

They answered: But the water will come in and flood the entire boat!

Lesson: this is the meaning of “כל ישראל ערבים זה לזה – Every Jew is responsible for the other. One person’s actions can affect the entire community.

When a child is lost, it is not only his loss, it is a loss for his mishpacha, yeshiva, and klal yisroel. If a child cannot find his makom and later seeks belonging elsewhere, it should not be surprising.

This is not criticism of dedicated educators whose mesiras nefesh is extraordinary. It is a call for reflection: how can we expand, adapt, and ensure that these children feel included, valued, and successful?

The Irony We Must Confront

It was brought to my attention of instances where children of administrators, educators, or influential community members required placement, and solutions often appeared quickly and accommodations were made, and space was found. Meanwhile, other families spent months searching, only to hear, repeatedly, that there was no availability.

If a room can be found for one child, it demonstrates that room can be created. If policies can be adjusted for insiders, surely they can be adjusted for any child in genuine need.

When fairness appears dependent on connections rather than compassion, trust erodes. Children notice these realities, and the impact of perceived injustice can deeply affect their sense of belonging.

A child denied admission or prevented from transferring may carry the emotional impact for years. Even when unintentional, this sense of rejection can be profound. When belonging is denied within the world of Torah, some inevitably seek acceptance elsewhere. ( from a personal conversation with a talmid).

Access to Torah should never depend on status, influence, or personal relationships; it is a shared inheritance of all klal yisroel.

The Power of Care and Encouragement

Many children who struggle academically are not lacking intelligence or have developmental disabilities. Often, they simply missed essential foundational skills early in learning. As my Rebbe explained in the foreword to my book I Can Learn: children who fall through the cracks often have lost fundamental skills. With additional care, patience, and guidance, their confidence and sense of value can be rebuilt.

If we are serious about protecting our youth from outside influences, the solution cannot be restriction alone. It must be the creation of environments where Torah learning is meaningful, alive, and deeply welcoming.

The responsibility to create that reality rests upon all of us.

To be continued…

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Austin police are searching for a suspected active shooter believed to be tied to a series of apparently random shootings across the city this weekend.

According to local reports, at least three shootings are being investigated together, including gunfire directed toward two Austin fire stations. One man was shot Sunday morning and remains in serious but stable condition. Police say the suspect may be a white or Hispanic male in his late teens, possibly driving a white Kia Optima.  

The City of Austin issued a shelter-in-place warning for a large section of South Austin, bordered by South Slaughter Lane, East McKinney Falls Parkway, North Ben White Boulevard and West Escarpment Boulevard, as law enforcement searches the area.  

Police are urging residents to stay indoors, remain alert, avoid approaching anyone suspicious, and call 911 immediately with any information. The motive remains unclear, and the investigation is still developing.

MK Meir Porush of United Torah Judaism sharply attacked the IDF after the military released new figures showing a shortage of roughly 12,000 soldiers, accusing army leadership of turning the military into what he described as a political weapon against bnei Torah.

Porush claimed senior officers were allowing legal advisers to dictate policy and said “the army has become a political tool in the hands of those persecuting Torah learners.” He argued that the military establishment was ignoring recommendations from a professional advisory panel that supported exempting yeshiva students who commit to three daily sedorim of Torah study.

The criticism followed a recent IDF briefing revealing that the military is currently short approximately 12,000 troops, including between 6,000 and 7,500 combat soldiers. Defense officials warned that the manpower shortage could deepen dramatically if mandatory service is reduced to 30 months.

Military officials stressed that without broader enlistment legislation — particularly involving the charedi sector — the IDF could face a serious personnel crisis within a relatively short period of time.

According to the army, the ongoing fighting across seven active fronts has forced standing troops into nearly constant operational service, while reservists are being called up for significantly more duty days than initially anticipated.

During the past two years, the IDF expanded its force structure by adding nine armored companies, an engineering battalion, a Home Front Command battalion and an additional charedi battalion, while simultaneously enlarging reserve force capabilities.

Data presented by the military also showed that out of approximately 80,000 people categorized as being involved in “draft-evasion processes,” roughly half are from the charedi community, while another quarter are believed to belong to the same sector. In July 2025, the Chief of Staff ordered draft notices sent to all eligible charedi recruits and appointed Brigadier General Avinoam Amona as adviser on charedi matters.

At the same time, enlistment numbers among charedim have steadily risen. Approximately 2,200 charedim entered military service in 2023, followed by 2,800 in 2024. During the first six months of 2025, about 1,850 enlisted, and officials estimate the yearly figure could surpass 3,000 by the end of the year.

Responding to the military’s presentation, Porush said the IDF’s public statements indicate that “certain elements have decided to turn the military into a political instrument against Torah scholars.”

He also referred to an advisory committee established by then-Defense Minister Yoav Gallant with backing from former Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi. The committee, headed by a retired major general and composed of senior officers, reportedly recommended protecting full-time yeshiva students who maintain intensive daily Torah study schedules.

Escalating his criticism further, Porush accused military leaders and legal officials of waging “a campaign against Torah learners” and using public briefings as part of an effort to block any compromise arrangement based on the committee’s recommendations.

Speaking during a recent session of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee attended by the Chief of Staff, Porush challenged the military’s approach toward drafting yeshiva students and questioned why the army was ignoring the professional conclusions reached by the advisory panel.

{Matzav.com}

London police arrested tens of protesters at an anti-Muslim “Unite the Kingdom” rally led by pro-Israel activist Tommy Robinson and a counterprotest that included demonstrators from the Stand Up Against Racism group protesting Robinson’s rally itself and anti-Israel protesters marking Nakba day, the police announced Sunday.

The police had prepared its biggest operation yet ahead of the rally, fearing violent clashes that had broken out at previous rallies. The arrests numbered 20 people from Robinson’s rally, which drew 60,000 people, and 12 from the counterprotest, which drew 15,000-20,000 people, according to numbers cited by the Metropolitan Police. Organizers of both rallies claimed higher attendance than that cited by police.

The arrests broke down as follows: nine from the Unite the Kingdom rally for hate crimes and two from Stand Up to Racism; police said they were arrested for “offenses motivated by race, religion, sexuality and disability.” An additional seven suspected hate crimes from the Nakba rally are under investigation.

Other arrests at the Robinson rally included public order, drunk and disorderly offenses, previous grievous bodily harm, telecommunications offenses, assaults on emergency workers and telecommunications offenses.

The Nakba rally included arrests for failing to remove face masks, assaulting an emergency worker and supporting a proscribed organization.

One Nakba protester shouted “Hitler knew how to deal with these people,” and others called for Tommy Robinson to be hanged and shot in the neck like Charlie Kirk.

Robinson had warned his supporters ahead of the protest to stay away from alcohol and to be “peaceful and courteous.” At his rally speech, he urged them to get politically active and prepare themselves for the “cultural revolution” he was leading, which would culminate in the “battle of Britain” in 2029, i.e., Britain’s next election.

The browser used to be a window into work. Now it is becoming the workplace itself, and in the AI era, it may also be the most exposed point in the enterprise. That is the bet behind Akamai Technologies’ decision to acquire Israeli cybersecurity startup LayerX Security for roughly $205 million in cash, a deal aimed at giving one of the world’s largest cloud and cybersecurity companies a stronger position in browser-based AI usage control. Akamai said the transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of 2026, subject to customary conditions.

Conductor – Akamai Boston – photo by Photoflight Aerial Media. Subject to copyright ©Photoflight Aerial Media

LayerX is not being bought because it is already huge. It is being bought because the problem it targets is quickly becoming impossible for major companies to ignore. Employees are no longer just browsing websites. They are pasting corporate data into generative AI tools, uploading files to SaaS platforms, testing copilots, using AI coding assistants, and beginning to hand tasks over to autonomous agents. Akamai says LayerX extends its protection directly into that browser layer, where much of modern enterprise work now takes place.

That is the key to the deal. LayerX does not force workers into a completely new enterprise browser. Its technology is designed to sit on top of the browsers employees already use, including the new generation of AI-driven browsers such as Atlas and Comet. Akamai says this gives security teams visibility and control over prompts, file uploads, web content and SaaS activity without changing infrastructure or disrupting the way employees work.

Founded in 2022 by Or Eshed and David Vaisbrud, LayerX raised $45 million from investors including Glilot Capital Partners, Dell Technologies Capital and Jump Capital. Calcalist had reported earlier that Akamai was in advanced talks to buy the company at a valuation of around $250 million, before the final announced cash price landed at about $205 million after purchase price adjustments.

The financials show what Akamai is really buying. Akamai expects LayerX to reach only about $10 million in annual recurring revenue by year-end and said the acquisition should reduce non-GAAP earnings per share by roughly $0.12 in fiscal 2026. In other words, this is not a pure revenue grab. It is a strategic purchase of a category, a team and a control point Akamai clearly believes will matter as enterprise AI moves from experimentation into daily operations.

LayerX’s pitch is simple, the old security stack was built around networks, endpoints and access gates, but the action has moved into the interaction itself. A worker pastes sensitive data into an AI tool. A browser extension sees something it should not. A contractor logs into a SaaS app from an unmanaged device. An AI agent starts moving between files, repositories and accounts. LayerX tries to give security teams policy control at that exact moment, before the data leaves and before the damage is done. Its own platform messaging focuses on AI discovery, GenAI data loss prevention, access control, prompt-injection protection, browser-extension security and protection for AI browsers.

Gartner estimates that fewer than 10% of organizations currently use secure enterprise browser technology, but predicts that 25% will deploy it by 2028 to fill gaps in remote access and endpoint security. Gartner also says browsers have become a primary access method for modern corporate applications and a useful control point for enterprise security. That is exactly the market Akamai is moving into with LayerX.

Akamai already has the scale. The company reported $1.074 billion in first-quarter revenue, including $590 million from security, up 11% year over year. It also reported a 40% jump in cloud infrastructure services revenue and disclosed a $1.8 billion, seven-year commitment from a U.S.-based frontier AI model provider. That gives the LayerX acquisition a wider frame: Akamai is trying to position itself not just as an internet infrastructure company, but as a security and cloud platform for the AI economy.

For Israel, the deal lands as another reminder that local cybersecurity is not just surviving a brutal period of war, pressure and uncertainty. It is still producing technology global buyers want. LayerX joins a growing Akamai-Israel acquisition chain that includes Guardicore, acquired for about $600 million, and Noname Security, acquired for about $450 million. Akamai said LayerX is its fourth Tel Aviv-based cybersecurity acquisition in five years and that the founders and employees will join its Zero Trust organization.

There is also a deeper Israeli thread inside Akamai itself. The company still honors co-founder Danny Lewin, who was raised in Jerusalem, served as an IDF officer, studied at the Technion and MIT, and helped build the algorithms at the core of Akamai’s early services. Akamai says Lewin was killed aboard American Airlines Flight 11 on September 11, 2001.

NEW YORK (VINnews) – It will be an evening of gratitude on June 15th, as hundreds are expected to gather in Lower Manhattan to show their support for United Hatazlah, which continues to remain at the forefront of emergency care in Israel even as the conflict with Iran rages on.

This year has been United Hatzalah’s busiest, with the nonprofit’s 8,600 active volunteers responding to 750,000 emergencies at all hours of the day and night, with an average response time of less than three minutes.

“We’ve had so many missile attacks from Iran and Hezbollah and there has been a constant need for support, both medical and emotional,” United Hatzalah president and founder Eli Beer told VIN News.

Beer noted that United Hatzalah is prepared for the next escalation in attacks, making the need for donations more critical than ever.

“We need people to remember that Israel, which is subjected to constant threats, is part of all of us,” said Beer. “In addition to the duty each one of us has to support our own communities, we also have a duty to support Israel.”

The annual New York gala will be an evening of gratitude for those who have shown exceptional commitment to Israel. Former Israeli Ambassador Ron Dermer will be recognized with the Hero of Israel award in recognition of his tireless efforts which included the return of all of the October 7th hostages.

“He deserves a big yasher koach for bringing them home,” observed Beer.

Also being honored is comedian Modi Rosenfeld, who will be presented with the Beacon of Joy award, for infusing people’s lives with hope and positivity during incredibly difficult times. The Israeli-born Modi recently made headlines for pulling out of a planned appearance at the hip Downtown Seder after learning that Mayor Zohran Mamdani would be in attendance.

“He is someone who gave chizuk to am Yisrael,” explained Beer. “He made us understand that we need to laugh to recover and he is always talking about Moshiach, achdus in am Yisrael and love for every Jew.”

The program for the New York gala includes a conversation between Dermer and Blackstone’s David Blitzer, as well as an appearance by former hostage Bar Kupershtein. The evening’s young leadership co-chairs Brandon and Casey Lutnick are sons of the current United States Secretary of Commerce. The senior Lutnick and his wife Allison chaired United Hatzalah’s 2024 New York gala, which raised $20 million for United Hatzalah as the shadow of October 7th still loomed large.

PEA RIDGE, Ark. (AP) — Walmart and Amazon are racing to speed up online order deliveries in rural areas of the U.S., a rich source of untapped sales that major retailers long wrote off as too sparsely inhabited, too remote or too impoverished to serve profitably.

Walmart has a running start in the contest to build a loyal customer base in rural America. Roughly 90% of U.S. residents live within 10 miles of a Walmart store, and 45% of the company’s full-service Supercenters are in places with populations under 20,000, according to a report by investment bank Morgan Stanley.

Competition for the underserved market, which the bank’s analysts estimated could be worth up to $1 trillion in annual sales, has intensified as remote workers swell the populations of small towns and communities on the far fringes of metropolitan areas.

The same technology that makes it possible for more people to do office work from wherever they want is making it easier for the nation’s two biggest retail companies to get merchandise to them more efficiently.

Amazon last year invested $4 billion to bring same-day or next-day deliveries to 4,000 smaller cities, towns and rural communities. They included places like the coastal town of Lewes, Delaware, Milton, Florida, a city hat is considered the state’s canoe capital, Padre Island, Texas, which is about 37 miles from Corpus Christi, and Abbeville, Louisiana, known for its Cajun food scene.

In a letter to shareholders last month, CEO Andy Jassy said the average monthly number of Amazon customers receiving same-day deliveries doubled in 2025 compared to the year before. Amazon is using artificial intelligence-based tools to better forecast demand, while opening small micro hubs in rural areas.

“While other companies have been backing away from these customers, we’ve been running to them,” Jassy wrote.

The turf battle between the Goliath of e-commerce and Walmart is taking place as FedEx, UPS and the U.S. Postal Service are scaling back or slowing deliveries to some rural areas to cut costs or to concentrate on more profitable businesses.

Here’s a look at why and the many ways Walmart and Amazon are cultivating customers in rural America:

Changing demographics
The final step of a package’s journey from a distribution hub to a shopper’s home has always presented challenges in rural areas. Delivery drivers have to travel longer distances between stops and sometimes navigate narrow or unpaved roads in thinly populated areas, adding time that increases per-package labor and fuel costs, experts say.

Rural areas also used to be thought of as less financially well-off and therefore less desirable for retailers. But over the past decade, rural counties have shown steady growth in productivity and income, according to consulting firm McKinsey.

The median household income in rural counties rose 43% between 2010 and 2022, reaching an all-time high of nearly $60,000 a year, McKinsey said. Since the pandemic, more exurban communities located as far as 60 miles from a major city’s downtown have been among the fastest-growing places in the U.S., the U.S. Census Bureau reported.

The $1 trillion rural shoppers spend annually on electronics, clothing, home furnishings and other merchandise accounts for 20% of all retail purchases in the U.S. except for cars and gasoline, according to Morgan Stanley.

The shifting retail landscape
Amazon and Walmart are not the only companies that see potential demand from former city dwellers who grew accustomed to having groceries, clothes and other products brought to their doors quickly.

In an apparent move to stave them off in the countrysides and small towns where it staked a claim, Dollar General in January extended its same-day delivery service to more than 17,000 of the discount chain’s 20,000 stores. More than 80% of Dollar General’s same-day orders arrived in an hour or less, CEO Todd Vasos told investment analysts in March.

Rural lifestyle retailer Tractor Supply is increasing its direct delivery services to shoppers, particularly for bulky items like fence panels and riding lawnmowers. It announced plans in January to add more than 150 delivery hubs this year for a total of 375, covering more than half of its stores and reaching over 15 million customers.

Different approaches
Both Amazon and Walmart are expanding their use of delivery drones to speed up shipments from stores or order fulfillment centers. They also using methods that reflect their own roots and taking pages from each other’s playbooks.

Befitting its origins in traditional retail, Walmart is equipping its physical stores with robotic technology that picks and packs online orders from a storage area stocked with the most popular delivery items for each location.

The automated retrieval system helped a Walmart Supercenter in Bentonville, Arkansas, home to Walmart’s headquarters, deliver groceries within a 30-mile radius, up from 10 miles just a few years ago, Doug Sanders, Walmart’s senior director of e-commerce store fulfillment, said late last year.

The company further credits the adoption of a hexagonal mapping system with making same-day deliveries available to 12 million more households. The system replaced traditional service boundaries like ZIP codes, which can leave out small areas at the edges, executives said.

The switch also gives Walmart an expanded view of which nearby stores might have the items needed to fulfill customers’ orders. Instead of shoppers having to place separate orders from multiple locations to get everything they want, drivers now can retrieve packages from more than one store in their service area.

Amazon, which started as an online bookseller and this year closed its Amazon Fresh supermarkets and Amazon Go convenience stores, is putting local infrastructure in place to shorten the distance between its warehouses and rural areas.

The company is setting up small delivery stations to serve a group of nearby communities based on travel drive time, customer demand, and delivery efficiency, the company said. Packages that were assembled at Amazon’s massive fulfillment centers are sent to the hubs for sorting before local gig workers and contractors pick the up for delivery.

The goal is to halve the time it takes from when a customer places an order to when it arrives, from as many as five days to less than two days, according to Holly Sullivan, Amazon’s vice president of worldwide economic development.

For example, a newly opened station in Roanoke, Virginia, delivers tens of thousands of packages every day that previously weren’t getting to the customer nearly as quickly, station manager Patrick Hamilton said. Delivery routes from the facility can reach customers roughly 90 minutes away by road, spanning both the city and surrounding rural communities.

Dalton Klinger is the operations manager of the Chamber of Commerce for St. George, Utah, a city with a population of 100,000 located in the northeastern part of the Mojave Desert. The city’s mountainous surroundings are difficult for deliveries, but an Amazon station has helped speed them up.

Klinger, who has lived in St. George since 2021, said his Amazon orders of essentials like canned tuna and jars of tomato sauce that used to take four days now get to him in two.

“People are wanting faster deliveries,” he said. “It’s all about instant gratification.”

Following instructions from Defense Minister Yisroel Katz, IDF Central Command chief Major General Avi Bluth signed an amendment to the Judea and Samaria Security Directives Order formally applying the recently approved death penalty law for terrorists to the region as well.

Under the legislation, military courts are authorized to sentence terrorists to death for carrying out terror attacks in which Jews are murdered.

The decision marks a major change in Israeli policy in the wake of the October 7 massacre and fulfills one of the flagship campaign promises of the Otzma Yehudit party.

According to the new law and the military order amendment, the death penalty will now serve as the standard punishment in military courts in Judea and Samaria for terrorists who deliberately kill in acts of terror.

The amendment also significantly alters the existing legal framework. Moving forward, prosecutors in military court will no longer need to specifically request the death penalty in order for it to be imposed. In addition, a unanimous ruling by the judicial panel will no longer be required, with a regular majority now sufficient. Restrictions regarding the rank of judges overseeing such cases have also been removed.

The new policy further states that the commander of IDF forces in the region will not have the authority to pardon convicted terrorists or reduce their sentences. In addition, the law explicitly bars the Israeli government from including terrorists sentenced to death, or convicted of offenses punishable by death, in future prisoner exchange agreements.

Minister Yisroel Katz praised the implementation of the measure, saying, “The era of restraint is over. Terrorists who murder Jews will not sit in prison under comfortable conditions and will not wait for deals; they will pay the heaviest price by hanging. Immediately after the law was approved, I instructed the Israel Defense Forces to implement it fully in Judea and Samaria, and today we have turned the new policy into reality.”

Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir also welcomed the move, stating, “We promised, and we delivered. Against murderous terrorism, the State of Israel is changing the equation. We do not retreat, and we create a price that no terrorist will want to pay.”

TAKE NOTE: The Nesivos Marathon will be taking place today between 5-7PM in Lakewood.

It will begin on North Lake and end in the Swarthmore area. Use caution around runners and expect some delays.

Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu delivered remarks Sunday at a special government session marking Yom Yerushalayim, held at the Knesset Museum in Froumine House, where he addressed Israel’s security challenges on multiple fronts, praised the IDF’s ongoing operations, and spoke about the country’s efforts against emerging drone threats.

At the beginning of his remarks, Netanyahu reflected on the historic significance of the original Knesset building and its restoration. “This is the second time I am visiting here since the restoration, the original home of the Knesset in Froumine House. I believe that anyone who comes here feels the uniqueness of this place, which essentially served as the home for the revival of our people’s sovereignty in our land after thousands of years. It always makes the heart stir. I also remember as a Jerusalem boy, being right across the street and looking at this building; back then, it was closed to boys like me, but today it is open to all of the people of Israel. I invite all of you, the citizens of Israel, to come here and enjoy this heritage. A truly wonderful, highly original, highly authentic, and very faithful restoration job has been done here, and the atmosphere provides a great deal of inspiration.”

Netanyahu also paused to express condolences to the family of Captain Maoz Israel Recanati, the Golani officer killed during fighting in Lebanon. “At the beginning of my remarks, I wish to send condolences to the family of the late Captain Maoz Israel Recanati. Maoz left everything behind, including his fiancée whom he was set to marry in about a month, led his soldiers in battle in Lebanon, and fell. May G-d avenge him. May his memory be a blessing.”

Turning to the fighting in Lebanon and the growing drone threat facing Israel, Netanyahu said the military continues to operate aggressively while adapting to evolving dangers. “I want to say a few things about the campaign in Lebanon. We are doing a lot there; holding territory, clearing territory, protecting Israel’s communities, but also fighting an enemy that is trying to outsmart us.”

The prime minister recalled warning years ago about the strategic danger posed by drones and said Israel has spent years developing responses to the threat. “Six years ago, during a Cabinet meeting, I warned against the threat of drones. At the time, I saw it primarily as a serious threat, as a tool for targeted eliminations of public figures, but since then, it has obviously evolved. From the start of the war, and of course having observed the war in Ukraine, I thought this could also serve as a tool on our battlefield. At my request, the IDF installed canopies on the tanks. That was one measure. The IDF and the Ministry of Defense have done a great deal over the years, this needs to be understood, and they have thwarted many hundreds, if not thousands, including UAVs, thousands of attempted drone and UAV strikes against our forces. And they are succeeding. Every time there is a new threat, they succeed in neutralizing it,” he said.

Netanyahu went on to describe the creation of a specialized task force focused on combating FPV drones and said the initiative would operate without budget restrictions. “Today, we are facing the challenge of neutralizing FPV (Fiber-Optic/First-Person View) drones. This is a specific type of threat. I convened a special team together with the Minister of Defense, personnel from the Ministry of Defense, and individuals from outside the ministry, not just from the defense industries, but also from the civilian sector, the best minds in Israel, and in my opinion, the best minds in the world. I held three meetings in two weeks, but in the meeting we held a few days ago, I told them something that surprised them a bit: ‘You have no budgetary constraint.’ Whatever it costs, it costs. You also have no limits, as far as I know, to your creativity and imagination, because you are the best in the world. Therefore, my directive to the team is to find a solution for this, and for the next threat that will come.”

He expressed confidence that Israel would ultimately lead the world in solving the drone challenge. “I have no doubt that Israel will be the first country, just as we have done in other fields, to deliver a complete solution to this problem as well. This requires patience and sometimes gritting our teeth, but both of these, patience, determination, and the ability to stand up to the challenge, we have in abundance. We will achieve this too.”

Addressing the fighting in Gaza, Netanyahu announced the elimination of senior Hamas leader Iz al-Din al-Haddad and reiterated Israel’s objectives in the war. “Over the weekend, we eliminated the master murderer Iz al-Din al-Haddad. He was essentially number one in Hamas’s military wing. He has been eliminated. This despicable terrorist was responsible for the murder, injury, and kidnapping of thousands of Israeli citizens and IDF soldiers. He used hostages as human shields, and he is no longer with us. It is important to say that I promised two things, and the Government, along with me: I promised that we would return all of our hostages, down to the very last one. Down to the hero of Israel, the late Ran Gvili. And we returned them. There were doubts, but we had no doubts. We returned them.”

Netanyahu added that Israel is nearing completion of another key war objective. “I promised a second thing, that every single architect of the massacre and the hostage-taking would be eliminated down to the last one, and we are very close to completing this mission as well. In Gaza now, we are no longer holding 50%, but already 60%. We have Hamas in our grip. We know exactly what our mission is, and our mission is one: To ensure that Gaza will never again pose a threat to Israel, and we are carrying out this mission too with the help of our heroic soldiers. They truly are heroes. In Lebanon, in Gaza, and also in the skies of Tehran. Our fighters, our pilots, our female combatants, and our female pilots, heroes and heroines.”

Concluding his remarks, Netanyahu addressed the Iranian front and revealed plans for another conversation with President Trump. “Our eyes are also wide open regarding Iran. I will speak today, as I do every few days, with our friend President Trump. I will certainly hear his impressions from his trip to China, and perhaps other matters. There are certainly many possibilities; we are prepared for any scenario.”

{Matzav.com}

WASHINGTON (AP) — Deciding when to get routine mammograms is confusing. Some health groups recommend women begin at age 40 or 45 while another recently opted for age 50. They also differ on whether yearly or every other year is best.

The conflicting advice is at least partly because guidelines for breast cancer screening are designed for women at average risk and with no possible cancer symptoms. But breast cancer is so common that it is hard to know who is really “average” and how to balance the pros and cons of screening.

“Breast cancer is not one disease,” said Dr. Laura Esserman of the University of California, San Francisco. “So how in the world does it make sense to screen everybody the same when everyone doesn’t have the same risk?”

Esserman is leading research to better understand the nuances of who is at low or high risk or somewhere in between and eventually offer more tailored screening advice.

More than 320,000 women in the U.S. will be diagnosed with breast cancer this year, according to the American Cancer Society. Death rates have been dropping for decades, thanks largely to better treatments. But it is still the second-most common cause of cancer death in U.S. women — and diagnoses are inching up.

For now, here are some things to know.

When to get a mammogram
The newest guidance comes from the American College of Physicians, which recommends that average-risk women ages 50 to 74 get an every-other-year mammogram. For those 40 to 49, the guideline says to discuss pros and cons with a doctor and if they choose screening, to go every other year.

That advice, issued last month, was a surprise. Most other U.S. health groups have urged women to start earlier, in their 40s. The influential U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recently switched its guidance to start every-other-year mammograms at age 40 instead of 50.

The American Cancer Society has long recommended yearly mammograms for 45- to 54-year-olds -– but says they can choose to start at 40. For those age 55 and older, the cancer society says women can switch to every other year or choose to keep going for yearly checks.

The new American College of Physicians guidelines also say doctors can ask if women 75 or older wish to stop routine screening. In contrast, the cancer society says there is no reason to stop if they are still healthy.

Why don’t experts agree?
The higher a woman’s risk of eventually developing breast cancer, the more benefit she will derive from more frequent screenings. But beyond some well-known factors like the cancer-causing BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes, it is hard for women to know their true risk. Age has long been a proxy because the risk of breast cancer rises as women get older.

Mammograms aren’t perfect. Sometimes they miss cancer or an aggressive tumor pops up after a routine mammogram. But guidelines seek to balance the benefits of catching cancer early with possible harms, such as stress and pain from investigating suspicious spots that don’t turn out to be cancerous.

“We’re not saying there’s no benefit” from mammograms in the 40s, cautioned Dr. Carolyn Crandall of the University of California, Los Angeles, who chaired the American College of Physicians report. But “there’s a narrower balance between the benefits you could get and the harms in 40- to 49-year-olds.”

The American Cancer Society recommends starting yearly mammograms at 45 because it found breast cancer incidence in 45- to 49-year-olds was higher than in the early 40s – more like what 50- to 54-year-olds experience, said public health researcher Robert Smith, the society’s expert on early cancer detection.

What is missing is a way to tell if someone is more likely to develop an aggressive breast cancer or a slow-growing one, Smith noted.

How dense breasts affect mammogram advice
Nearly half of women over 40 have dense breast tissue, which can make it harder to spot a tumor on a mammogram and can slightly increase the risk of developing cancer.

After a mammogram, women are notified about their breast density. Many experts say it is not yet clear if women with dense breasts would benefit from adding ultrasounds or MRIs to their screening. But the new American College of Physicians guidance advises considering 3D mammography – what doctors call digital breast tomosynthesis or DBT.

What’s next for breast cancer screening
In the future, adding a gene test — one that looks at more than just those well-known BRCA genes — along with broader risk factors may help refine women’s optimal mammogram schedule.

A recent study of nearly 46,000 women, called the WISDOM trial, used age, genetic testing, lifestyle, health history and breast density to classify women as low, average, elevated or high risk. That risk level determined if they waited to start mammograms at 50, went every other year or every year – and the highest-risk group was told to screen twice a year, once with a mammogram and again with an MRI scan. Risk-based scans were compared to standard yearly mammograms.

Risk-based screening worked as well as yearly screening, Esserman’s team reported in the medical journal JAMA. One surprise: About 30% of women whose gene testing indicated increased risk didn’t report relatives with breast cancer. While more research is underway, Esserman hopes the early findings will start influencing guidelines soon.

Also in the pipeline are AI tools being crafted to assess a woman’s risk of developing breast cancer in the next few years based on clues in her mammogram, another possible way to identify who might qualify for more or less frequent screening.

For now, women can talk with their doctors about close relatives who have had cancer, their own overall health and other risk factors such as whether they have had children and at what age.

Whatever mammogram age and interval they choose, the best advice is to stick with it, the cancer society’s Smith said: “Breast screening works best when it’s done regularly.”

Hamas’s military chief in Gaza, Izz ad-Din al-Haddad, made a series of operational mistakes in the months after the U.S.-brokered ceasefire that allowed Israeli intelligence to track and ultimately kill him in a strike on a Gaza City apartment, security sources told the Israeli news site Walla.

Haddad — known to Hamas operatives as “the Ghost” and described by Israeli officials as the last surviving senior architect of the October 7, 2023, massacre — was killed Friday in a precision strike on a residential building in Gaza City’s Rimal neighborhood. The IDF said three fighter jets dropped 13 munitions on the building and a vehicle that left the area moments later, killing Haddad along with his wife and a daughter, according to Hamas sources. Both of his sons had been killed in earlier Israeli strikes, in January and April of last year. Emergency services in Gaza put the total death toll at seven, with more than 50 wounded.

The killing came as U.S. peace envoy Nickolay Mladenov was working to advance the next phase of President Donald Trump’s post-war plan for Gaza, including efforts to demilitarize the Strip, transfer civil control from Hamas to a third party, and pull back IDF forces from Palestinian-controlled areas. Israeli officials said Haddad had been actively working to derail that process.

According to the defense sources cited by Walla, Haddad had for years moved almost exclusively through Hamas’s underground tunnel network, confiding his movements only to a tiny circle of aides. He survived multiple assassination attempts, dyed his hair and shaved much of his beard to alter his appearance, and reportedly surrounded himself at times with Israeli hostages to deter strikes.

The sources said Haddad was the Hamas figure who pushed at the last minute to accept the U.S.-mediated ceasefire that took effect in October, after realizing that IDF ground forces — operating under the aggressive posture set by Defense Minister Yisrael Katz — had encircled the heart of Gaza City, where he was hiding. He understood, the sources said, that if Hamas’s leadership rejected the deal, his own days were numbered and the military infrastructure the group had built since seizing Gaza from Fatah in 2007 risked collapse.

“He effectively pleaded for the ceasefire,” one defense official told Walla.

Even before the truce took hold, Haddad had begun violating the security rules he had set for himself, occasionally emerging from the tunnels into buildings to look outside. After the ceasefire, the discipline eroded further. With Israeli attention focused on the war with Iran and on the Lebanese front, Haddad was tempted above ground and began moving through the streets of Gaza in carefully chosen, limited appearances meant to project authority and signal that he feared neither Israeli intelligence nor the Israel Air Force.

Some Israeli officials, however, assessed that street theater was not his real motivation. After months underground, the sources said, Haddad was driven by a longing to see his wife and children — the same family members who were with him when he was killed. He had also continued to play a role in managing the Israeli civilian and military hostages still held in Gaza.

“He cracked under pressure,” a source familiar with the intelligence assessment told Walla, describing a pattern that has played out repeatedly in the Israeli campaign against Hamas’s senior ranks. Operatives who maintain strict communications and movement discipline tend to survive; those who break it, even briefly, are found.

Israeli Military Intelligence identified the windows of time in which Haddad was breaking his own rules, mapped his new movement patterns, and presented senior defense officials with strike opportunities carrying a high probability of success. The political-level approval to take the shot was given roughly ten days before the strike, according to Israeli media.

In the hours before the attack, the Air Force, under Maj. Gen. Omer Tischler, carried out a deception operation in the western Negev and Gazan airspace designed to keep Hamas’s military wing and Haddad’s inner circle on low alert.

At the same time he was making himself vulnerable, defense officials said, Haddad was building what one source described as “a well-oiled financial mechanism” inside Gaza, accumulating money, weapons, and influence as part of a broader project to rebuild Hamas’s military wing, tighten the link between Gaza and the West Bank, extend the range of Hamas attacks, restore the group’s standing on the Palestinian street, and block any diplomatic arrangement that could weaken it. Haddad received much of his policy direction from Khalil al-Hayya, the senior Hamas politician now considered a front-runner to take over the group’s overall political leadership.

He continued, throughout, to live as one of Israel’s most wanted men, distancing anyone within his orbit suspected of loyalty problems.

In the end, the strike found Haddad above ground, in a hideout apartment in Rimal, surrounded by family members. When people inside the building attempted to flee in vehicles, the IDF struck a second time, hitting the car to prevent the escape of his associates and any possibility that Haddad himself might survive.

Haddad had taken command of two regional commands and 14 battalions after the killing of Yahya Sinwar in October 2024, sharing effective control of Hamas with Mohammed Sinwar until the latter was killed by Israel in May 2025. From that point on, he was the sole commander of the Qassam Brigades, and, in the IDF’s assessment, the last senior figure still in place who had sat at the table when the October 7 attack was planned.

“In every conversation I held with the hostages who returned, the name of the arch-terrorist Izz ad-Din al-Haddad, one of the chief perpetrators of the October 7 massacre and the head of Hamas’s military wing, came up again and again,” IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir said in a statement confirming the kill. “Today, we succeeded in eliminating him.”

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

U.S. and Nigerian forces killed the Islamic State’s global second-in-command in a joint operation overnight Friday, striking a compound in the Lake Chad Basin in northeastern Nigeria, President Donald Trump and Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu announced on Saturday.

The target, identified as Abu-Bilal al-Minuki, was described by U.S. officials as the Senior ISIS General Directorate of Provinces Emir — the number two figure in the terror group’s worldwide command — responsible for overseeing attack planning, directing hostage operations, and managing the group’s financial network.

“Tonight, at my direction, brave American forces and the Armed Forces of Nigeria flawlessly executed a meticulously planned and very complex mission to eliminate the most active terrorist in the world from the battlefield,” Trump wrote on Truth Social late Friday night. “Abu-Bilal al-Minuki, second in command of ISIS globally, thought he could hide in Africa, but little did he know we had sources who kept us informed on what he was doing.”

Al-Minuki, Trump said, “will no longer terrorize the people of Africa, or help plan operations to target Americans.” He added that “with his removal, ISIS’s global operation is greatly diminished.”

According to the Nigerian Army, the strike was carried out in Metele, in Borno State, where ground troops conducted a precision air-and-land operation in close coordination with U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM). The operation began at roughly 12:01 a.m. local time and concluded at about 4 a.m. No U.S. service members were harmed.

Tinubu, in a statement issued Saturday morning, called the mission “a significant example of effective collaboration in the fight against terrorism.” Early assessments, he said, confirmed the elimination of al-Minuki — also known as Abu-Mainok — along with “several of his lieutenants, during a strike on his compound in the Lake Chad Basin.” The Nigerian president thanked Trump for his “leadership and unwavering support.”

Al-Minuki was a Nigerian national, born in 1982 in Borno State — the same region in which he was killed — according to documents from the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control. He was designated a Specially Designated Global Terrorist by the State Department in 2023, during the Biden administration, a status that imposed sanctions on his assets and barred American persons from doing business with him.

He had risen through the ranks of the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), the regional ISIS franchise that splintered from Boko Haram in 2016 and has waged a brutal insurgency across the Lake Chad Basin for the better part of a decade. The broader Boko Haram and ISWAP insurgency has killed thousands and displaced more than two million people across Borno and neighboring states over 17 years.

In 2024, he was listed among suspected ISWAP and Boko Haram commanders reported killed in the Birnin Gwari forest area of northern Kaduna State, a claim Nigerian officials later walked back. Bayo Onanuga, a spokesman for President Tinubu, acknowledged the earlier reported killing but said it had been “a case of mistaken identity or misattribution,” noting that the Birnin Gwari area was never within al-Minuki’s actual operational hub. “This time, however, security and military authorities maintain a far higher level of confidence,” Onanuga said.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said in a Saturday morning post on X that U.S. forces had been tracking al-Minuki “for months.”

“Back in November 2025, President Trump declared to the world that we will help protect Christians in Nigeria and instructed the Department of War to prepare for action,” Hegseth wrote. “So, for months, we hunted this top ISIS leader in Nigeria who was killing Christians, and we killed him — and his entire posse.”

Hegseth described al-Minuki’s role as overseeing “the planning of attacks, directing hostage-taking and managing financial operations” for ISIS worldwide. “This should serve as a reminder,” he added, “that we will hunt down those who wish to harm Americans or innocent Christians, wherever they are.”

AFRICOM commander U.S. Air Force Gen. Dagvin Anderson said in a separate statement that the strike “underscores the exceptional value of the U.S.-Nigeria partnership,” and was “made possible through the cooperation and coordination of our forces in recent months.”

The operation is the second high-profile U.S. strike on ISIS targets in Nigeria in less than five months. In December 2025, AFRICOM carried out an earlier round of strikes against ISIS-linked militants at camps in the country’s northeast, killing what the command described as “multiple ISIS terrorists.”

The strikes followed a sharp escalation in Trump’s rhetoric on Nigeria last fall, when he accused the Nigerian government of failing to confront Islamists slaughtering Christians, and instructed the Department of War to prepare for direct action. Since then, Washington has deployed drones and approximately 200 U.S. troops to Nigeria in what Nigerian military officials have described as a “strictly non-combat” role focused on training, intelligence support, and targeting assistance for Nigerian operations against ISIS and Al Qaeda-linked groups spreading across West Africa.

The Trump administration’s framing of the campaign — protecting Christians from jihadist violence — has been a defining feature of its Nigeria policy, though the framing has also drawn pushback. Nigerian officials have insisted the country’s security forces target armed groups that attack both Christians and Muslims, and have rejected Trump’s characterization as discriminatory against any single religion. Boko Haram and ISWAP have, in fact, killed large numbers of Muslims as well as Christians over the course of the insurgency, particularly in attacks on villages, mosques, and security forces in the Muslim-majority north.

The killing, if confirmed at the senior leadership level Trump and Hegseth claim, would be the most significant decapitation strike against ISIS since the killing of caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in 2019. Abu Hafs al-Qurayshi has led the group since August 2023, according to U.S. Congressional Research Service reporting.

Though ISIS lost its territorial caliphate in Iraq and Syria years ago, its decentralized provincial structure — the network al-Minuki helped manage — has continued to project violence across Africa, Afghanistan, and parts of Europe. ISIS-K, the Khorasan affiliate based in Afghanistan, was responsible for the March 2024 Crocus City Hall attack in Moscow that killed more than 140 people. The West African province al-Minuki helped lead has conducted some of the deadliest attacks in the Sahel region in recent years.

Last year’s annual U.S. intelligence community threat assessment continued to identify ISIS as a persistent global threat despite the loss of its Iraqi and Syrian strongholds, citing in particular the strength of its African affiliates.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

Hundreds of mourners gathered Sunday at the military cemetery on Har Herzl in Yerushalayim for the funeral of Captain Maoz Yisroel Recanati, a 24-year-old Golani Brigade officer who was killed during combat activity in southern Lebanon.

Representing the IDF, Golani Brigade Deputy Commander Naor Amichai spoke about Recanati’s impact on those who served alongside him, describing him as a person whose strength and character uplifted everyone around him.

“Your very name carried meaning,” Amichai said. “You were a source of support for everyone around you. The values that guided you throughout your military service and your life were always clear.”

Amichai described Recanati as someone who relentlessly pursued meaningful military service from the outset, working hard to earn a place in elite combat units. He eventually joined the Egoz commando unit, where, according to his commanders, he immediately stood out for his leadership qualities, devotion and work ethic. “He was always first,” Amichai said. “In runs, in marches, in carrying equipment and in every mission.”

Friends and fellow soldiers said Recanati became known as “King David,” a nickname they said reflected his humility, honesty and the quiet manner in which he led others. Following completion of officers’ training, he was appointed platoon commander in Golani’s 12th Battalion. Commanders said he built an exceptionally cohesive platoon through personal example, sensitivity and trust.

His fiancée, Roni, delivered an emotional eulogy at the funeral. The couple had planned to marry next month. “The first thing I noticed about you was your eyes,” she said. “Everyone always said your eyes looked kind.”

Roni spoke about Recanati’s gentle nature, courage and compassion, and about the future they had hoped to build together. “I waited so long for us to get married,” she said. “I wanted to see you as the father of our children. You were so good with children. You had the biggest heart of anyone I ever knew.”

Rabbi Daniel Lonczer, who had met with the couple only a week earlier to arrange their marriage registration, also addressed the mourners. During the hesped, he read aloud from the kesubah that Recanati and Roni had signed together.

Recanati’s grandfather, Rabbi Avraham Recanati, reflected on his grandson’s devotion to his mission as a soldier, while also speaking about the warmth and affection he displayed within the family.

Shomron Regional Council head Yossi Dagan described Recanati as someone deeply devoted to Torah, Am Yisroel and Eretz Yisroel. “You built yourself through hard work, humility, strength and humor,” Dagan said. “Thousands of young people will continue in your path.”

His sister, Tehila, remembered him as a quiet and caring individual who earned admiration everywhere he went. She said the source of his success in the military was not merely his abilities, but the values and humanity that guided him.

His brother, Shachar, described Recanati as a dedicated warrior involved in what he called “the battle of light against darkness.” He recalled that during his final Shabbos at home, Recanati repeatedly emphasized the need for professionalism and dedication, even in difficult circumstances.

Recanati served as a platoon commander in Golani’s 12th Battalion. He was killed Friday in an explosive drone strike targeting IDF troops operating in southern Lebanon.

He was the 20th Israeli soldier killed since fighting resumed along the Lebanon front. Recanati is survived by his parents, six siblings and his fiancée, Roni. A member of one of the founding families of Itamar in the Shomron, he was the son of Rabbi Eliyahu and Ayelet Recanati and the grandson of Rabbi Avraham and Rabbanit Devora Recanati.

WASHINGTON D.C (VINnews) – Representative Jared Moskowitz, a Jewish Democrat from Florida, has received a surge of antisemitic death threats and hateful voicemails at his congressional office, including calls to “kill all the Jews,” according to recordings shared with media outlets.

Moskowitz, who represents Florida’s 23rd Congressional District, publicized several of the messages this week amid what he and Jewish advocacy groups describe as a persistent rise in antisemitism. The voicemails, reviewed by outlets including CNN, TMZ and JNS, feature repeated slurs, Holocaust references, conspiracy theories about Jews and Israel, and personal threats against the congressman.

A spokesman for Moskowitz told JNS that the recordings represent a small sample from the past six months. “These voicemails were from the last six months and represent a small sample size of the hateful voicemails the office receives,” the spokesman said.

In one voicemail highlighted by TMZ, a caller referred to Moskowitz as a “Zionist Jew f**#ing pig” and directed vulgar insults tied to U.S. support for Israel. Other messages invoked violence against Jews broadly and targeted Moskowitz personally.

Moskowitz told TMZ the threats have affected his family. “I get people who leave me voicemails that say they wanna kill me, kill Jews… It’s scary. Obviously, my kids sometimes read the news and see some of this, or they hear it from their friends, and so look, it’s dangerous,” he said. He added that police now guard his home around the clock.

The congressman, whose great-grandparents were killed in the Holocaust, has been a vocal supporter of Israel on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. He said he will not be deterred.

The threats come weeks after an April 25 assassination attempt at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in Washington. Suspect Cole Tomas Allen, 31, of Torrance, California, faces charges including attempted assassination of President Donald Trump after allegedly firing shots while trying to breach security at the Washington Hilton. No one in the ballroom was injured.

Following that incident, public calls emerged to tone down political rhetoric. Moskowitz’s office has continued to field antisemitic messages despite those appeals.

FBI and ADL data have shown Jews as the targets of a disproportionate share of hate crimes in the U.S. in recent years, with incidents spiking after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel. Jewish lawmakers from both parties have reported similar harassment.

Moskowitz, 45, a former Florida state legislator and emergency management director, has represented the district since 2023. He has not commented further on potential investigations into the specific voicemails. Law enforcement typically treats such threats as criminal matters

Cuba has acquired more than 300 military drones and Cuban military officials have begun internally discussing scenarios for using them to strike the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, American military vessels, and potentially Key West, Florida — 90 miles north of Havana — according to classified U.S. intelligence reported Sunday by Axios.

The disclosure, citing what the outlet described as classified material and a senior U.S. official, marks the most pointed public signal yet that the Trump administration is treating the Cuban regime as a hard-security threat rather than the diplomatic and economic problem it has typically been for previous administrations. The intelligence, Axios noted, “could become a pretext for U.S. military action.”

CIA Director John Ratcliffe traveled to Cuba on Thursday and, according to U.S. officials, bluntly warned Cuban government counterparts against engaging in hostilities. A CIA official quoted in the report said Ratcliffe’s message was that Cuba “cannot be a platform for adversaries in the hemisphere.”

Additional U.S. sanctions are expected to be rolled out this week, and the Department of Justice is preparing to unseal an indictment against former Cuban President Raul Castro for ordering the 1996 shootdown of two Brothers to the Rescue civilian aircraft over the Florida Straits.

“When we think about those types of technologies being that close, and a range of bad actors from terror groups to drug cartels to Iranians to the Russians, it’s concerning,” the senior U.S. official told Axios.

What has changed the calculus in Washington, according to U.S. officials, is not Cuba’s traditional military, which is widely considered a hollowed-out shell of the force it was in the 1980s. “No one’s worried about fighter jets from Cuba. It’s not even clear they have one that can fly,” the senior U.S. official told Axios. “But it’s worth noting how close they are — 90 miles.”

The new concern is drones — and the people advising the Cubans on how to use them.

U.S. intelligence assesses that Iranian military advisers are currently in Havana, and that Cuban intelligence officials have been actively trying to learn from Tehran’s experience absorbing, and partially countering, the joint U.S.-Israeli air campaign that began in late February. According to intercepts cited in the report, Cuban intelligence officers have been “trying to learn about how Iran has resisted us.”

Within the past month, Cuban officials have also sought additional drones and military equipment from Russia, the senior U.S. official said. Russia and China both operate high-tech signals-intelligence (SIGINT) facilities on the island, long-standing positions that Washington has tolerated uneasily but that are now being viewed in a much harsher light.

“We’ve long been concerned that a foreign adversary using that kind of location that close to our shores is highly problematic,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, a Miami Republican, during a congressional hearing last Tuesday. In the same exchange, Hegseth also confirmed that Raul Castro had personally ordered the 1996 Brothers to the Rescue shootdown, foreshadowing the indictment now being prepared.

A second, less visible line of concern runs through Ukraine. U.S. officials estimate that as many as 5,000 Cuban soldiers have fought for Russia in its invasion of Ukraine, with the Cuban government collecting roughly $25,000 from Moscow for each soldier deployed. Many of those troops, U.S. officials say, have absorbed firsthand the realities of modern drone warfare — both Ukrainian first-person-view drone tactics and the Iranian Shahed-style standoff weapons Russia has used extensively against Ukrainian cities. Returning Cuban personnel have, according to intelligence intercepts, been briefing Cuban military leadership on what they observed.

“They’re part of the Putin meat grinder. They’re learning about Iranian tactics. It’s something we have to plan for,” the senior official said.

For all of the administration’s rhetoric, U.S. officials cautioned that they do not currently assess Cuba as posing an imminent threat or actively preparing an attack on American interests. The intelligence, as described, reflects internal Cuban military deliberations about how the island might use its drone capability if hostilities erupted, not operational planning for a strike now.

Cuba does not have the ability to close the Straits of Florida in the way Iran has been able to interdict shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, officials said, and the regime is not seen as a conventional military threat on the scale it represented during the 1962 Missile Crisis. The Cuban air force is, by most assessments, barely functional.

What is different is geography combined with technology. A drone with even modest range, launched from Cuban soil, can comfortably reach Key West. From the eastern end of the island, Guantanamo Bay — still home to a U.S. naval base on territory leased from Cuba in perpetuity over Havana’s strenuous objection — is within easy reach of even short-range systems.

The intelligence disclosure comes at a moment when the Castro regime is, by U.S. officials’ own assessment, weaker than at any point since the 1959 revolution. Years of U.S. sanctions, decades of economic mismanagement, the collapse of subsidized oil deliveries from Venezuela, and a hollowing-out of the productive economy have left the island in chronic blackout and its population in flight. Cuba is classified by the State Department as a state sponsor of terrorism and is described inside the administration as the “head of the snake” of revolutionary Marxism in Latin America.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

Democrats Party chairman Yair Golan responded Sunday to a viral AI-generated image portraying him dressed in traditional chareidi attire, using the opportunity to issue a sharp political pledge regarding the role of chareidi parties in Israel’s next government.

The image, which circulated widely on social media, showed Golan wearing a streimel and long peyos. In response, Golan posted a message drawing a firm political line ahead of the coming election campaign and any future coalition negotiations.

“I saw that a picture of me with a streimel is being circulated,” Golan wrote, before adding a direct promise to his supporters: “The Democrats will be your insurance policy that the chareidi parties will sit in the opposition in the coming years.”

Golan’s statement appeared aimed at energizing the secular base of his party, which unites representatives from the Labor and Meretz camps. However, political analysts quickly pointed to what they described as serious political and mathematical obstacles facing such a strategy.

According to current polling data, excluding the chareidi parties from any coalition would make it nearly impossible for the existing opposition bloc to reach a majority of 61 Knesset seats without relying on Arab parties.

Numerically, surveys indicate that once the chareidi parties are ruled out, the center-left bloc is effectively left with only one theoretical path toward forming a coalition: direct dependence on Arab factions such as Ra’am and Hadash-Ta’al.

That possibility, however, faces strong resistance from other opposition figures.

Leaders of center-right opposition parties — including Yisrael Beiteinu chairman Avigdor Lieberman and Beyachad party leader Naftali Bennett — have repeatedly stated during both previous and current election campaigns that they would refuse to join any government dependent on Arab party support.

The result, according to political observers, is a clear arithmetic deadlock.

Without the chareidi parties on one side, and with Bennett and Lieberman maintaining an absolute veto against Arab parties on the other, the center-left bloc currently has no realistic mathematical path to forming a governing coalition after elections.

Analysts noted that Golan’s declaration effectively leaves the balance of power in the hands of the right-wing bloc while placing left-wing parties at a significant numerical disadvantage that may be impossible to overcome.

The following is an ‘Ask The Mayor’ question submitted to TLS, and the Mayor’s response. Email your questions for the Mayor to [email protected].

Question:

Hi Ray,

Thanks for all you do for our town!

Now that the weather is nice my kids and a lot of the other neighborhood kids have been playing baseball in the Hearthstone park baseball field.

They told me that the field is very hard to play on due to dips and holes all over the field. Is there any way for the township to come and spruce up and smooth the field?

There has also been a huge amount of kids and adults who have started to play pickleball. Is there any way for the township to put some pickleball courts in an empty area of the park?

Thanks

Response from Mayor Coles:

Good afternoon

I’m glad you are getting so much enjoyment out of the park. I have asked public works to go in and clean up and level off as much as possible.

We get lots of requests for pickleball courts. I will ask them to see if there is any space to install one

Takle care

Ray

Question:

HI!
I can’t begin without thanking you for the many traffic fixes and more all around Lakewood where we see there is a mayor who really cares. Thank you!!

While driving to brooklyn I saw they have what appears to be an interchangeable hov lane that goes north and south at different peak times. I thought that might be a wonderful idea for route nine where the traffic is usually time based. Maybe the shoulder can be taken out and the streets restripped with the middle lane changing North or South based on a traffic study when it will be more useful? I’m not sure how they do it on the verezano bridge but it appears to be possible.

Thank you for your time and allowing regular folks to converse with you!

Response from Mayor Coles:

Good afternoon

I know the system you are referring to. I’ve seen them in several different places, including the bridge. I don’t think it would work in town, for a number of reasons, mainly because there is no room on Rt9 to accommodate it.

I appreciate the suggestion. Many times our residents come up with solutions that were overlooked. So please always reach out if you feel an idea could benefit the town. In the meantime, we will continue to press the state to make much needed, and long overdue improvements to their roads throughout town

Stay well

Ray

—————–

Have a question for the Mayor? Send it to [email protected]

Have a question for the Chief? Send it to [email protected]

Israel’s National Cyber Directorate issued a public warning Sunday after fake videos circulated online appearing to show Rishon LeTzion and Chief Rabbi of Israel Rav Dovid Yosef endorsing a medical product.

According to the cyber authorities, the videos are fraudulent and were created using deepfake technology. Officials stressed that Rav Yosef has absolutely no connection to either the video or the product being promoted through it.

The fabricated clips have reportedly been spreading widely across social media platforms in recent hours and direct viewers to a fraudulent website designed to steal personal information and payment details from unsuspecting users.

The National Cyber Directorate warned the public to exercise caution when encountering videos featuring well-known public figures and urged users to verify the authenticity of such content before responding to it.

Officials also cautioned the public not to click on links appearing in the videos themselves, in comment sections, or in accompanying messages connected to the posts.

In addition, the directorate advised consumers to confirm that any medical product they are considering purchasing appears on an official and recognized website before providing any information.

Authorities further warned people not to submit personal information or credit card details on unfamiliar websites.

The cyber agency urged the public that in cases of uncertainty, individuals should stop and verify the information through official sources before taking any action.

{Matzav.com}

(AP) – In the past week, many Americans remained focused on the economy, inflation and how those forces could impact their lives. Trips to the grocery store or gas station are more painful than they were last year, and that is impacting the decisions of both households and businesses.

Here’s a snapshot of prominent economic data and news that occurred over the past week and what it potentially means for you.

Gas prices fuel inflation surge of 3.8% in US
U.S. consumer prices climbed sharply again last month as the 10-week war with Iran pushed energy prices higher.

The Labor Department’s consumer price index rose 3.8% from April 2025, according to data released Tuesday. On a month-to-month basis, April prices rose 0.6% from March as gasoline prices rose 5.4% during the month; the month-over-month gain was down from a 0.9% increase from February to March.

Labor Department figures showed that gasoline prices are up more than 28% compared to a year ago. AAA says the average gallon of gasoline costs motorists more than $4.50 a gallon, about 44% more than it cost last year at this time.

Wholesale inflation came in hot during April
U.S. wholesale inflation came in hot last month. Producer prices rose 6% from a year earlier, the most since December 2022, as the 10-week Iran war pushed up energy prices and put pressure on companies to pass along higher costs to consumers.

The Labor Department reported Wednesday that its producer price index — which tracks inflation before it hits consumers — shot up 1.4% in April, the biggest monthly gain since March 2022.

Energy prices climbed 7.8% from March to April and 22.7% from a year earlier. Gasoline soared 15.6% from March and diesel, the dominant fuel used in shopping, jumped 12.6%.

Excluding volatile food and energy costs, so-called core producer prices were up 1% from March and 5.2% from April 2025.

All the numbers were much higher than economists had forecast.

Applications for unemployment benefits rise as Iran war drags on
The number of Americans filing for jobless aid rose last week but remains historically low despite the economic uncertainty caused by the war in Iran.

U.S. applications for unemployment benefits for the the week ending May 9 rose by 12,000 to 211,000, the Labor Department reported Thursday. That’s slightly more than the 207,000 new applications analysts surveyed by the data firm FactSet had forecast.

Weekly filings for unemployment benefits are considered a proxy for U.S. layoffs and are close to a real-time indicator of the health of the job market.

Despite relatively few layoffs, the labor market appears to be stuck in what economists call a “low-hire, low-fire” state. That has kept the unemployment rate low at 4.3%, but left many of those out of work struggling to find new employment.

Retail sales growth slows in April
Shoppers pulled back on spending in April as higher gas prices fueled by the Iran war meant less money left over for some nonessentials like clothing and furniture.

Retail sales rose a respectable 0.5% in April, but that was slower than the 1.6% growth seen in March, according to Commerce Department data released Thursday. March marked the largest one-month increase in retail spending in more than three years, largely because gas prices rose so rapidly.

Excluding gasoline, retail sales in April were up 0.3%. That’s less than half the 0.7% pace from the previous month, excluding gas station sales.

US home sales flat last month
Sales of previously occupied U.S. homes were essentially flat in April, another lackluster showing for the housing market during what’s traditionally its busiest time of the year.

Existing home sales edged up 0.2% last month from March to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.02 million units, the National Association of Realtors said Monday. Sales were unchanged compared to April last year.

The latest sales figure fell short of the roughly 4.12 million pace economists were expecting, according to FactSet.

Sales have been hovering close to a 4 million annual pace now going back to 2023, far short of the historic norm that is closer to 5.2 million.

Average US long-term mortgage rate moves lower
The average long-term U.S. mortgage rate edged lower this week, its first drop after rising the previous two weeks.

The benchmark 30-year fixed rate mortgage rate fell to 6.36% from 6.37% last week, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday. One year ago, the rate averaged 6.81%.

Borrowing costs on 15-year fixed-rate mortgages, popular with homeowners refinancing their home loans, also eased this week. That average rate fell to 5.71% from 5.72% last week. A year ago, it was at 5.92%, Freddie Mac said.

Stocks slide worldwide on inflation worries
The U.S. stock market was falling from its records Friday and joining a worldwide stock market drop as higher oil prices sent a shiver through the bond market. Stocks that had been caught up in the euphoria around artificial-intelligence technology that rose sharply for most of the week, led the decline Friday.

Iran is threatening to impose fees on undersea internet cables beneath the Strait of Hormuz, opening a new pressure front that could disrupt internet traffic, banking systems, cloud services and military communications across continents.

Iranian military spokesperson Ebrahim Zolfaghari said today that Tehran would “impose fees on internet cables.” Iranian regime-linked media later said major technology companies, including Google, Microsoft and Amazon, would be required to comply with Iranian law and pay usage fees, while cable-laying companies would also need permission to pass through the strait.

The threat targets one of the world’s most sensitive digital corridors. Undersea cables in and around Hormuz carry large volumes of data between Europe, Asia and the Gulf, including financial transactions, cloud traffic, energy-sector communications and services used by artificial intelligence companies. Damage to the cables could slow internet service, disrupt banking systems and affect oil and gas infrastructure across the region.

Mostafa Ahmed, a senior researcher at the UAE-based Habtoor Research Center, warned that small submarines or underwater drones operated by the Revolutionary Guard could damage the cables and trigger a “digital catastrophe.” Telecom experts have said most regional cables were laid closer to Oman to reduce risk, though at least some systems reportedly pass through Iranian territorial waters.

The warning came as Abu Dhabi authorities said a drone strike caused a fire at an electrical generator outside the inner perimeter of the Barakah Nuclear Power Plant in the UAE’s Al Dhafra region. Officials said there were no injuries and no impact on radiological safety levels. The IAEA expressed “grave concern” over military activity near nuclear infrastructure, as Gulf states face growing fears that Iran could expand the conflict beyond oil routes into digital and nuclear-linked targets.

The Israel Land Authority Council has approved new rules barring individuals classified as draft evaders from participating in the government’s discounted housing programs unless they regularize their military status with the IDF.

The decision, approved during a meeting convened by Housing Minister Chaim Katz, also significantly expands housing preferences for reserve soldiers. Under the new framework, 50 percent of apartments in the upcoming “Dira B’Hanachah” lottery will be reserved exclusively for reservists, with priority given to combat soldiers.

The remaining apartments will remain available to the general public, but eligibility will now depend on applicants having resolved their military status with the army, according to a report by Channel 13 News.

The move follows legal instructions issued by the attorney general’s office directing immediate implementation of the policy. As a result, individuals defined as draft-eligible who have not arranged their status with IDF authorities will no longer be able to participate in subsidized housing programs.

The decision comes after the most recent housing lottery was postponed twice. Initially, the delay was ordered by ministers Betzalel Smotrich and Chaim Katz, and later by the courts following petitions filed against the program.

Deputy Attorney General Gil Limon had previously instructed the Israel Land Authority Council to take immediate operational steps to enforce the policy. Under those instructions, the authority was required to establish a mechanism allowing for the immediate disqualification of draft evaders from participation in discounted housing initiatives.

According to the approved plan, all applicants entering future lotteries will be required to sign declarations stating whether they have arranged their military status with the IDF. Any applicant found to have submitted false information could lose their eligibility or forfeit an apartment if their true military status later becomes known.

Approximately 8,000 apartments are expected to be included in the upcoming lottery, though the distribution model will change dramatically under the new rules.

More than half of the apartments will now be allocated to reservists, who will also receive all units designated specifically for rental programs.

{Matzav.com}

Former minister and Shas MK Moshe Arbel officially submitted his resignation from the Knesset on Sunday, bringing to a close more than a decade of public service.

Arbel delivered his resignation letter to Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana under Section 40 of the Basic Law: The Knesset. His departure ends a 12-year tenure in parliament and government positions. According to the Shas party list, Erez Malul is expected to take his place in the Knesset.

In his resignation letter, Arbel reflected on his years in public service, beginning with his work as a parliamentary adviser and chief of staff before later serving as a Knesset member, Deputy Knesset Speaker, Interior Minister, and Health Minister.

“Twelve years – more than a quarter of my life – of meaningful work on behalf of all citizens of the State of Israel… Out of love for the People of Israel and seeing good in each and every one of them,” Arbel wrote.

He explained that his decision comes as the current Knesset term approaches its conclusion, adding that he intends to dedicate more time to his family, Torah study, and completing his doctoral studies in law at Reichman University.

Arbel also thanked the Moetzet Chachmei Hatorah and Shas chairman R’ Aryeh Deri for the confidence they placed in him throughout his years of service.

He concluded with a call for greater unity within Israeli society and among elected officials.

“May the Knesset merit removing the causes of division, eliminating the barriers that separate us, and banishing baseless hatred from among us, so that we may respect one another and act with moderation toward each other,” he wrote.

JERUSALEM (AP) — The tight relationship between Israel and the United Arab Emirates is typically managed discreetly. But this week, it was thrust into the open, illuminating tensions underlying the alliance as the Iran war embroils the entire region.

The U.S. Ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, first brought attention to the strengthening ties between Israel and the UAE by revealing that Israel had sent Iron Dome air-defense weapons and personnel to operate them to help protect the UAE from Iranian attacks.

Then, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had quietly visited the UAE during the war, prompting a hasty public denial from the Gulf nation.

As Netanyahu and the Trump administration ballyhoo their alliances as part of an effort to bolster the region’s anti-Iran factions, the Gulf states prefer to downplay these partnerships — a sign of how public ties to Israel remain deeply controversial in the region.

Here’s what you need to know about the Israel-UAE relationship:

Why would the UAE deny Netanyahu’s visit?
Netanyahu’s decision to reveal his wartime trip to Abu Dhabi rocked the boat, particularly coming after Huckabee confirmed military cooperation between the two countries. Reports swirled that Israel’s security chiefs had also visited.

The UAE’s official WAM news agency posted an article denying “reports circulating” about the visit. The agency wrote that the country’s relations with Israel “are public and conducted within the framework of the well-known and officially declared Abraham Accords, and are not based on non-transparent or unofficial arrangements.”

The report also denied any Israeli military delegation was received in the UAE.

“It complicates Abu Dhabi’s wartime-frame posture by forcing it into the open — which is why the denial was issued so quickly and worded so carefully,” said Hesham Alghannam, a Saudi Arabia-based scholar at the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center.

Though the UAE normalized relations with Israel in 2020, its rulers like to keep the alliance somewhat quiet.

Antipathy toward the Jewish state runs high in Arab and Muslim countries across the Middle East. The negative feelings were magnified by the war in Gaza, which began after Hamas, a militant group backed by Iran, attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages.

Israel’s ensuing offensive in Gaza flattened much of the territory and has killed over 72,700 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilian and militant deaths. That conflict spilled across the region, with Israel waging deadly and damaging campaigns against Iran-backed militants in Lebanon and Yemen, and striking militant targets in Qatar and Syria.

“We are the ugly duckling of the Middle East,” said Dan Diker, the president of the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs, a conservative Israeli think tank.

Diker, who has had extensive talks and relationships with Abraham Accord countries in the region, said the regional officials with whom he often negotiated always asked to keep things under the radar.

What is the Israel-UAE alliance based on?
Israel and the UAE collaborated militarily during the war with Iran. Israel benefited from having a defense foothold in a country geographically closer to its archenemy. The UAE, meanwhile, gained access to Israeli military technology, like the Iron Dome air-defense system.

The alliance has also been a boon for both countries’ economies, with trade between them rising steadily since 2020.

Israel, long isolated in the Middle East, gains legitimacy by partnering with an Arab country. And the UAE gains power in Washington.

The UAE was the third Arab country, after Egypt and Jordan, to establish full diplomatic ties with Israel.

Why did Netanyahu publicize his visit?
Netanyahu faces fierce domestic opposition headed into an election season in Israel. He believes his image is bolstered if he can show his base that he is a Middle East power broker.

The Iran war did not much help the leader’s domestic popularity. One thing that could help it — while strengthening his strained relationship with President Donald Trump — would be more regional powers following the UAE’s lead. Israel is currently in talks with Azerbaijan to join the Abraham Accords.

But if Netanyahu was hopeful that broadcasting close Israel-UAE ties could serve as a model for other countries, he may need to temper expectations.

Saudi Arabia, a leader in the region that has resisted joining the Abraham Accords, has taken a different approach throughout the war. It has maintained open lines of communication with Tehran, and has supported Pakistan’s mediation between the sides, said Alghannam, the Saudi Arabia-based scholar.

“The aim is not to take a posture on Israel, per se. It is to refuse entanglement in a war whose dynamics Riyadh did not set and cannot control,” he said.

“Riyadh discussing the full range of options openly, with partners, without locking into one track, is itself a strategic signal,” he said. “The regional security architecture will be designed regionally, not inherited from whatever Washington and Tehran negotiate bilaterally.”

President Donald Trump on Saturday hailed a decision by a major international climate panel to move away from one of its most extreme warming projections, using the shift to criticize Democratic climate policies and what he described as years of fear-driven messaging.

The United Nations-backed Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recently adjusted its framework that projected global temperatures could rise by 4–5°C by the year 2100. The model, known as RCP8.5, had been widely used in studies forecasting catastrophic outcomes tied to greenhouse gas emissions, including rising sea levels, widespread crop failures, and accelerated glacier melt.

“GOOD RIDDANCE! After 15 years of Dumocrats promising that ‘Climate Change’ is going to destroy the Planet, the United Nations TOP Climate Committee just admitted that its own projections (RCP8.5) were WRONG! WRONG! WRONG!” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

Trump, who has consistently promoted expanded domestic oil and gas production under his “drill baby, drill” agenda, has long rejected many mainstream climate change claims. During a United Nations address last year, he referred to climate change as a “con job.”

“For far too long Climate Activism has been used by Dumocrats to scare Americans, push horrible Energy Polices, and fund BILLIONS into their bogus research programs,” Trump added.

“Unlike the Dumocrats, who use Climate Alarmism nonsense to push their GREEN NEW SCAM, my Administration will always be based on TRUTH, SCIENCE, and FACT!”

Scientists involved in the updated assessment abandoned the high-end warming scenario in favor of seven other projections they argued provide a broader and more realistic range of possible climate outcomes.

“For the 21st century, this range will be smaller than assessed before,” the scientists wrote in the journal Geoscientific Model Development, adding that the worst-case projections “have become implausible.”

The Trump administration has reversed numerous climate-related regulations enacted during the Obama and Biden administrations. Earlier this year, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced the rollback of an Obama-era greenhouse gas policy.

Some critics of climate alarmism have pointed to earlier predictions that failed to materialize, including warnings that glaciers in Montana’s Glacier National Park would disappear by 2020. Park officials later removed signs containing those projections after the glaciers remained.

Tech billionaire Bill Gates has also moderated some of his previous rhetoric, recently acknowledging that global warming is unlikely to lead to humanity’s “demise.”

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton criticized Trump’s remarks, calling them “total disinformation.”

Senior figures in the Trump administration are urging the United Arab Emirates to take a more direct combat role in the war against Iran, including by seizing Lavan Island, a strategically vital Iranian oil terminal in the Persian Gulf.

“Go take ’em!” a former senior Trump security official told the paper, framing the proposal as a way to expand the ground campaign against Tehran without putting American forces in the line of fire. “It would be UAE boots on the ground instead of the U.S.”

The push, first reported by The Telegraph over the weekend, comes 11 weeks into a war that has redrawn the security map of the Middle East and turned the UAE — long a quiet hub for Western finance and Gulf diplomacy — into a frontline state. Since the United States and Israel launched their joint strike campaign against Iran in late February, the Emirates have absorbed more than 2,800 Iranian missiles and drones, the heaviest bombardment of any Gulf state, according to figures cited by analysts and Emirati officials. Targets have included Emirati airports, oil facilities, and the area around Dubai’s Burj Khalifa.

The volume and persistence of those attacks have forced Abu Dhabi to abandon its traditional posture of hedging between Washington, Jerusalem, and Tehran. Former U.S. Ambassador to the UAE Barbara Leaf, speaking to The New York Times, said Emirati leaders are now “looking at things in pretty stark, black and white terms, of friend or foe.”

The Telegraph and The Wall Street Journal have reported that the UAE has not, in fact, limited itself to defense. In early April, around the time of President Trump’s announcement of a partial ceasefire, Emirati forces using Western-made fighter jets and drones reportedly struck several Iranian targets, including the refinery on Lavan Island. The attack ignited a large fire and disabled much of the facility’s production capacity, according to those reports. Saudi Arabia is also said to have conducted a series of covert strikes on Iranian drone and missile launch sites in late March, though it has rebuffed Emirati attempts to organize a coordinated Gulf military campaign against Tehran.

Abu Dhabi has not publicly confirmed its role in the Lavan strike. Iran, for its part, has accused the UAE of being “an active partner in this aggression,” with Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi raising the issue at the BRICS foreign ministers’ meeting. The UAE rejected what it called attempts to justify “Iranian terrorist attacks,” but pointedly reserved “all its sovereign, legal, diplomatic and military rights to confront any threat, claim or hostile act.”

UAE Minister of State Khalifa Shaheen Al Marar, addressing the BRICS gathering, cited nearly 3,000 intercepted projectiles fired at the Emirates since late February and invoked the country’s right of self-defense under Article 51 of the UN Charter.

Lavan Island, located off Iran’s southern coast, is one of Tehran’s largest crude export hubs and sits atop substantial natural gas reserves. Seizing it would represent a dramatic escalation — the first foreign occupation of Iranian sovereign territory in decades — and would give Washington and its allies a far stronger grip on Persian Gulf shipping lanes.

The Telegraph report lays bare what officials in three capitals have privately acknowledged for weeks: the war has accelerated the consolidation of a Washington-Jerusalem-Abu Dhabi axis even as it has fractured the broader Gulf bloc.

Israeli ties with the UAE, normalized under the 2020 Abraham Accords, have visibly deepened during the conflict. U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee confirmed at a Tel Aviv University conference earlier this month that Israel had transferred Iron Dome batteries to the UAE — reportedly accompanied by Israeli personnel — to help intercept Iranian projectiles. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has separately disclosed that he made a secret visit to the UAE in March, at the opening of Operation Roaring Lion, and that the talks produced a “significant breakthrough.” Abu Dhabi has denied any such visit took place.

Relations with the UAE’s Gulf neighbors have moved in the opposite direction. According to The Telegraph, Emirati officials say the UAE asked both Saudi Arabia and Qatar to join in counterstrikes against Iran early in the war, but those approaches went nowhere. Emirati officials have publicly complained of a “weak response” from the Arab League and the Gulf Cooperation Council, and have privately faulted Pakistan — long a recipient of UAE bailout money — for taking too conciliatory a line with Tehran. Earlier this month, the UAE announced it was withdrawing from OPEC, the Saudi-dominated oil producers’ cartel, in what was widely read as a rebuke of Riyadh’s posture during the war.

Anwar Gargash, diplomatic adviser to UAE President Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan and a longtime hawk on Iran, said in April that Tehran’s attacks would “concretise” the U.S. role in the Gulf rather than reduce it, and that Israeli influence would “become more prominent in the Gulf, not less.”

Dr. Burcu Ozcelik, a researcher at the Royal United Services Institute in London, told The Telegraph that the war had “accelerated a U.S.-Israel-UAE alignment.” She cautioned, however, that the deeper this military cooperation runs, the more other Arab states will view the Emirates as complicit in Israel’s ongoing campaign in Gaza — a perception that could carry costs across the wider Muslim world.

Even as President Trump met Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing late last week to discuss the war, maritime incidents continued in and around the Strait of Hormuz. British authorities reported a commercial vessel seized near Fujairah and diverted into Iranian waters; an Indian cargo ship was sunk off the coast of Oman. Iran has repeatedly warned that any country hosting American or Israeli forces, or allowing its territory to be used for attacks on the Islamic Republic, would be treated as a legitimate military target.

Whether the UAE will act on the encouragement coming from inside the Trump administration’s circle is, for now, unanswered. Seizing Lavan would push the Emirates from covert combatant to declared occupier of Iranian soil — a line no Gulf state has crossed in the modern era. But for officials in Abu Dhabi who have spent eleven weeks watching Iranian drones come over the horizon, the calculus, as one Emirati official put it to The Telegraph, no longer looks the way it did before the war.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that Israel now controls approximately 60% of the Gaza Strip, signaling an expansion of territory held by the IDF during the ongoing ceasefire.

Speaking at the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, Benjamin Netanyahu stated, “In Gaza now, we already control not 50%, but 60%.”

At the start of the U.S.-brokered ceasefire that took effect last October, the IDF controlled roughly 53% of Gaza, while Hamas retained control over the remaining territory, where most of the enclave’s population resides. The military established what became known as the “Yellow Line,” marking the areas under Israeli military control.

According to reports, maps quietly distributed by Israel in March showed an additional restricted zone extending beyond the original Yellow Line. The expanded area reportedly covers another 11% of Gaza’s territory, bringing the total restricted area to nearly two-thirds of the Strip.

The military reportedly provided the updated maps to humanitarian organizations operating in Gaza, explaining that the newly designated zone was intended to facilitate aid operations and that movements there would require coordination with the IDF. Officials said civilians were not directly affected by the change.

The enlarged restricted area has reportedly raised concerns among displaced Gazans living nearby, amid fears they could be viewed as security threats if they approach the zone.

“We are tightening our grip on Hamas,” Netanyahu said Sunday.

“We know exactly what our mission is, and our mission is one thing only — to ensure that Gaza will no longer pose a threat to Israel,” he added.

Addressing Friday’s reported elimination of senior Hamas terrorist Izz al-Din al-Haddad, Netanyahu said Israel was nearing completion of its campaign against those responsible for the October 7 massacre.

“I promised that all the architects of the massacre and all the architects of the kidnappings would be eliminated, every last one of them, and we are getting very close to completing that mission as well,” he said.

Al-Haddad was identified as one of the planners of the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack in which terrorists murdered 1,200 people and abducted 251 hostages to Gaza. He reportedly assumed leadership of Hamas in Gaza following the May 2025 killing of Mohammed Sinwar, brother of Yahya Sinwar.

Meanwhile, Palestinian health officials reported that at least four people were killed in Israeli strikes across Gaza on Sunday.

According to medics in Gaza, one strike near a Hamas police post in Khan Younis killed one person. The IDF said it had targeted an operative posing an immediate threat to Israeli forces operating in southern Gaza.

In a separate incident, medics said another Israeli airstrike struck a community kitchen near Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir Al-Balah, reportedly killing at least three people.

Israeli Prime Minister Binyomin Netanyahu is reportedly shifting strategy in the growing coalition crisis over the draft law and is no longer actively trying to block the preliminary vote on dissolving the Knesset this week.

Instead, Netanyahu is now focusing on advancing key coalition legislation — including the draft law — before the Knesset reaches the later and more decisive stages of the dissolution process.

According to the new plan, Netanyahu intends to move forward simultaneously with the draft law, legislation to split the attorney general’s position, and additional coalition-backed bills while the Knesset dissolution measure advances toward its second and third readings.

Politically, the move signals that Netanyahu is prepared to allow the dissolution proposal to pass its preliminary stage while preserving a limited window for the coalition to continue legislating before the Knesset is formally dissolved.

During that period, Likud lawmakers are expected to push ahead with several sensitive legislative initiatives, chief among them the draft law, which has become the central source of tension between the coalition and the chareidi parties.

According to reports, Likud officials claim the maneuver received approval from the Knesset’s legal adviser.

Party sources said, “Until the second and third readings, any legislation can still be passed.”

The new strategy appears aimed at lowering the intensity of the immediate political confrontation surrounding the dissolution vote, while at the same time signaling to coalition partners that there is still a realistic path to advancing the legislation most important to them before new elections are triggered.

{Matzav.com}

Dear YWN,

I am the same letter writer who blasted Mayor Mamdani last week for turning Flatbush into scenes of Germany in 1930. I feel compelled to write another letter.

A viral video circulating in the Flatbush Jewish community — and amplified by Councilwoman Inna Vernikov — is causing understandable concern among already anxious Jewish residents. But facts matter.

The video shows Muslim men praying on the sidewalk on East 16th Street near Avenue R, alongside the Prospect Park girls school building. (Side note, I had 5 daughters attend this school, and remain close to the administration.)

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But several important facts are being conveniently ignored:

#1 — The video falsely implies the school is “on East 17th Street.” That is misleading. Actually, she is a blatant LIAR. The school building stretches from East 16th all the way through East 17th Street.

#2 — The mosque is literally next door to the school building on East 16th Street.

#3 — The mosque has been there for years without incident.

#4 — The mosque operates out of a tiny apartment space and, sometimes at their Friday prayer gathering, there simply is not enough room to accommodate everyone indoors.

#5 — There was no protest, no chanting anything anti-Semitic, no intimidation, no confrontation. They prayed and left.

#6 — Jewish communities across Brooklyn also have countless shtieblach operating out of apartments, basements, and converted homes because space is limited.

#7 — When Prospect Park’s own shul holds Kiddush Levana outside, or when there is a Hachnosas Sefer Torah spilling into the street — as happened recently — would anyone seriously call that “intimidation”?

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Councilwoman Vernikov wrote:

“This is an ALL GIRLS Jewish school in my district. I’m all for prayer and free speech, but why do a bunch of GROWN MEN need to do this right outside of a school full of little Jewish girls??? Is not this what MOSQUES are for? Is this INTENTIONAL?”

After her original post, Vernikov added:

“Looks like there is a mosque right near the school, and these may be congregants. But the alarm from my constituents is understandable amidst the almost daily protests and emboldened public displays of antisemitism across our city which have blurred the line between provocation and genuine acts of religious faith. We shouldn’t have to live like this! PS: it’s not lawful to obstruct sidewalks!!!”

A councilwoman should actually know the houses of worship in her district before shooting from the hip (no pun intended).

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And Vernikov writes: “it’s not lawful to obstruct sidewalks!!!”

What about Jews having Hachnosas Sifrei Torah to the tune of dozens each year, blocking sidewalks and streets every Sunday? Why would she ever go down this road? What a reckless thing to do. Wait until non-Jews turn the tables on us. Totally irresponsible.

But this kind of rhetoric, without context, only inflames tensions and frightens constituents who are already on edge because of very real antisemitic threats elsewhere in the city.

Not every Muslim gathering is a threat. Not every prayer service is intimidation.

There has been a massive mosque on Coney Island Avenue for decades with virtually no issues, and local Jewish leaders have worked cooperatively with mosque leadership on numerous neighborhood matters over the years.

The Jewish community absolutely has legitimate concerns about rising antisemitism and violent anti-Israel extremism in NYC. Those threats are real and should never be minimized.

But manufacturing panic over a prayer gathering next to a mosque that has existed peacefully for years does not help anyone. It only deepens division, fuels suspicion, and makes coexistence harder.

Signed by a real, Midwood, Brooklyn resident, anonymously, out of fear, my home will be set ablaze.

The views expressed in this letter are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of YWN. Have an opinion you would like to share? Send it to us for review.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — One of Ukraine’s largest drone strikes on Russia killed at least four people, including three near Moscow, and wounded a dozen others, local authorities said Sunday. Debris fell on Russia’s largest airport without causing damage.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed the drone strikes, saying that they were “entirely justified.” Russia has repeatedly launched similar attacks on Ukraine’s capital and other cities during the war, and an expert said that the strikes appeared to be retaliation for recent Russian attacks on Kyiv.

Russian drone strikes on Ukraine overnight wounded eight people, Ukrainian authorities said.

In Ukraine’s strikes on Russia, a woman was killed after a drone hit her home in Khimki, a Russian city just northwest of Moscow, and two men died in the village of Pogorelki, which is 10 kilometers (6 miles) north of the capital, according to local Gov. Andrei Vorobyev.

Ukrainian drones had also damaged unspecified “infrastructure” and several high-rise buildings, Vorobyev said on social media.

One man was also killed after a drone struck a truck in the Belgorod region, which borders Ukraine, according to local authorities.

In Moscow itself, at least 12 people were wounded in the nighttime strike, mostly near the entrance to the city’s oil refinery, mayor Sergei Sobyanin reported. Sobyanin reported that the “technology” of the refinery hadn’t been damaged.

Hours later, the Indian Embassy in Moscow reported that an Indian worker died in a drone strike “in (the) Moscow region,” while three other Indian nationals were hospitalized with injuries. It wasn’t immediately clear whether the worker was one of the three people reported dead by Moscow region officials, or a further fatality.

Russia’s largest airport — Moscow’s Sheremetyevo — said that drone debris had fallen on its grounds without causing damage or affecting flights.

Russian defenses shot down 81 drones headed for Moscow overnight, state agency Tass reported, citing Sobyanin, marking one of the largest attacks on the city since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022.

Russian air defenses overnight destroyed 556 drones over Russia, the occupied Crimean Peninsula and the Azov and Black Seas, the Russian Defense Ministry said Sunday morning. Shortly after midday local time, it reported that more than 1,000 drones had been shot down or jammed in the previous 24 hours.

Zelenskyy said that the drones had flown more than 500 kilometers (310 miles) from Ukrainian territory, and that Ukraine was “overcoming” Russian air defense systems concentrated in and around the capital.

“Our responses to Russia’s prolongation of the war and attacks on our cities and communities are entirely justified. This time, Ukrainian long-distance sanctions have reached the Moscow region, and we are clearly telling the Russians: their state must end its war,” Zelenskyy said.

Revenge for Russian attacks, expert says
Nigel Gould Davies, senior fellow for Russia and Eurasia at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a London-based think tank, said that Ukraine’s large-scale attack appeared to be “the retaliation or revenge that President Zelenskyy promised after the fierce attacks that Russia carried out on Kyiv.”

Those strikes came immediately after the end of a brief ceasefire that allowed Russia to hold its annual Victory Day parade on May 9 commemorating the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany during World War II.

Russia and Ukraine accused each other of repeatedly violating the pause in hostilities.

“It brings home the fact Ukraine has the capacity to strike at very significant scale at or around the Russian capital,” taking the war home to Russians in a way that would be “most unwelcome” to the Kremlin, Gould Davies told The Associated Press.

“There is no ongoing peace process to disrupt. What (the attack) is more likely to do is add to the darkening cloud of anxiety over Russia which has developed palpably over the last three or four months,” he said.

He cited a combination of factors, including Russia’s recent battlefield setbacks, a deteriorating economic situation at home, and the Kremlin’s intensifying crackdown on the internet, including in Moscow and Russia’s second-largest city, St. Petersburg.

“The fact that Ukraine is reminding the Moscow population that it is vulnerable to these attacks is likely to intensify the mix of concerns now,” Gould Davies said. “I see no prospect though, in the shorter term, that even these factors together will induce Russia to consider the compromises that will be necessary for peace negotiations.”

Ukrainian drones are also flying deep into Russia to strike oil facilities, sending up plumes of smoke that can be seen from space and bringing toxic rain to tourist destinations on the Black Sea. The attacks are aimed at slashing Moscow’s oil exports, a key source of funding for Russia’s grinding invasion of Ukraine.

While their the economic impact is so far unclear — as the rise in oil prices from the Iran war, and a related easing of U.S. sanctions, have helped replenish the Kremlin’s coffers — the range of the strikes and their environmental impact is bringing the war home to ordinary Russians far from the front lines.

8 wounded in Russian drone strikes on Ukraine
Russia attacked Ukraine with 287 drones overnight into Sunday, 279 of which were shot down or jammed, the Ukrainian air force reported.

The strikes wounded 8 people in Ukraine’s central Dnipropetrovsk region: three in the regional capital of Dnipro, four in President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s hometown of Kryvyi Rih, and one in the district of Synelkove, Ukraine’s state emergency service said.

Residential buildings were damaged in all three locations, the service said.

Large crowds gathered at the Kosel this morning for Rosh Chodesh tefillos as tensions flared once again over the activities of the Women of the Wall group, whose members reportedly smuggled a Sefer Torah into the plaza in violation of existing regulations.

According to witnesses, members of the Reform-affiliated activist group raised the Sefer Torah in celebration after successfully bringing it into the women’s section of the Kosel plaza.

At the same time, hundreds of seminary students arrived at the site following longstanding guidance issued years ago by Rav Aharon Leib Shteinman zt”l encouraging participation in counter-demonstrations opposing the activities of the group commonly referred to as “Women of the Wall.”

Large police, Border Police, and riot-control forces were deployed throughout the Kosel area in anticipation of confrontations between the sides.

Police officers reportedly clashed with demonstrators during the morning, and one chareidi girl was arrested and taken to a police station located at the site.

Meanwhile, hundreds of people participated Friday in a large Shacharis minyan held specifically in the southern section of the Kosel plaza, the area at the center of ongoing legal and political disputes regarding efforts to establish a permanent Reform prayer space there.

Participants brought a mechitzah and conducted a traditional tefillah as part of what organizers described as an effort to strengthen the Jewish and traditional character of the site.

Those who attended said the decision to hold the tefillah specifically in the southern plaza symbolized the broader struggle over the future character and sanctity of the Kosel.

Participants also explained that the choice of location was intended “to declare in a clear voice — the Kosel belongs to all the Jewish people, but its holiness is not ownerless.”

OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — Three people were killed and several others were injured after a driver crashed into multiple cars and pedestrians late Saturday night in Oakland, California, authorities said.

The crash happened shortly after 11 p.m., according to officials.

Three people were pronounced dead at the scene and five others were injured, the Oakland Fire Department said. Two of those injured were in critical condition. The driver involved in the crash was also injured, though officials described those injuries as minor.

Authorities did not immediately release additional details about what led to the crash, and the driver’s identity was not made public.

The crash remains under investigation, officials said.

EDISON, N.J. — A gasoline tanker carrying 8,000 gallons of fuel erupted into flames after colliding with another vehicle on Interstate 287 in Edison early Sunday, leaving one person dead and several others injured, authorities and local officials said.

The crash happened around 6 a.m. on the northbound side of Route 287 near Exit 2 for Route 27. According to law enforcement sources cited by local media, a Jeep rear-ended the tanker before the vehicle became engulfed in flames.

Officials said one person was trapped inside the Jeep and died at the scene, while another person managed to escape. Edison Mayor Sam Joshi said four people were injured in the incident.

The intense blaze sent thick smoke into the air and spread into nearby wooded areas alongside the highway, prompting a massive emergency response involving more than 150 firefighters. Emergency dispatches indicated mutual aid tanker units and county hazmat teams were called to assist as crews battled heavy fire conditions and exposure concerns.

New Jersey State Police closed Route 287 in both directions between Exit 1 for Route 1 and Exit 2 for Route 27. Authorities also shut down Route 27 between Bridge Street and Route 287, with traffic diverted to Route 1.

The cause of the crash remains under investigation.

NOW: Car crash with oil tanker explodes causing massive 2 Alarm Fire in New Jersey

A major vehicle fire on the northbound lanes of I-287 near Exit 2A in Edison escalated into a 2nd Alarm response early Sunday morning, with mutual aid tankers and a full county hazmat recall… pic.twitter.com/HlTDXWhgTS

— Oliya Scootercaster 🛴 (@ScooterCasterNY) May 17, 2026

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — A drone strike targeted the United Arab Emirates’ sole nuclear power plant on Sunday, sparking a fire on its perimeter. There were no reports of injuries or radiological release, but it highlighted the risk of renewed war as the Iran ceasefire remains tenuous.

No one immediately claimed responsibility, and the UAE did not blame anyone. It has however accused Iran of launching drone and missile attacks in recent days as tensions rise over the Strait of Hormuz, a vital energy waterway still gripped by Iran, which is under a U.S. naval blockade.

The UAE has hosted air defenses and personnel from Israel, which joined the U.S. in the Feb. 28 attack that sparked the war.

U.S. President Donald Trump has suggested hostilities could resume and was expected to speak with Israel’s prime minister on Sunday. Iranian state television has aired segments with news anchors holding rifles in an effort to prepare the public for war. Diplomatic efforts aimed at a more durable peace have faltered.

Fighting has also heated up between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon despite a nominal ceasefire there, further straining the wider truce.

Barakah plant can provide a quarter of the UAE’s energy
The UAE Defense Ministry said three drones had come over its western border with Saudi Arabia, with the other two intercepted. It was investigating who launched them. Iran and Iranian-backed Shiite militias in Iraq have launched repeated drone attacks targeting Gulf Arab states in the war.

The $20 billion Barakah nuclear power plant was built by the UAE with the help of South Korea and went online in 2020. It is the only nuclear power plant in the Arab world and can provide a quarter of the energy needs in the UAE, a federation of seven sheikhdoms that is home to Dubai.

The UAE’s nuclear regulator said on X the fire didn’t affect plant safety and “all units are operating as normal.” Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, later said he spoke by phone with his South Korean counterpart.

The Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog, said the strike caused a fire in an electrical generator and one reactor was being powered by emergency diesel generators.

IAEA director-general Rafael Mariano Grossi expressed “grave concern” and said military activity that threatens nuclear safety is unacceptable, the agency said in a statement.

It’s the first time the four-reactor Barakah plant has been targeted in the war. It is near the border with Saudi Arabia, some 225 kilometers (140 miles) west of the UAE’s capital city, Abu Dhabi.

Yemen’s Irani-backed Houthi rebels, whom the UAE has battled as part of a Saudi-led coalition, claimed to have targeted the plant while it was under construction in 2017, which Abu Dhabi denied.

The UAE’s nuclear program is different from Iran’s and Israel’s
The UAE signed a strict deal with the U.S. over the nuclear power plant, known as a “123 agreement,” in which it agreed to forego domestic uranium enrichment and reprocessing of spent fuel to ease any proliferation concerns. Its uranium comes from abroad.

That’s very different from the nuclear program in Iran, which is at the heart of long-running tensions with the United States and Israel.

Iran insists its program is for peaceful purposes, but it has enriched its uranium close to weapons-grade levels and is widely suspected of having had a military component to its program until at least 2003. It has often restricted the work of U.N. inspectors, including since the 12-day war with Israel last year.

Israel is widely believed to be the only nuclear-armed country in the region, but has neither confirmed nor denied having atomic weapons. Iran struck near Israel’s Dimona nuclear facility during the war.

Nuclear plants have increasingly been targeted in wars in recent years, including during Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine that began in 2022. During the Iran war, Tehran repeatedly claimed its Bushehr nuclear power plant came under attack, though there was no direct damage to its Russian-run reactor or any radiological release.

Ceasefire appears increasingly shaky
Two people familiar with the situation, including an Israeli military officer, said Israel is coordinating with the U.S. about a possible resumption of attacks. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were discussing confidential military preparations.

Speaking to his Cabinet on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said “our eyes are also open” when it comes to Iran. He said he planned a chat with Trump later in the day to discuss the president’s trip to China and “perhaps” other things.

“We are prepared for any scenario,” Netanyahu said.

On Iranian state TV, presenters on at least two channels appeared armed during live programs.

One of them, Hossein Hosseini, received basic firearms training from a masked member of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard. Hosseini mimed firing a shot at the flag of the UAE.

On another channel, Mobina Nasiri said a weapon had been sent to her from a gathering in Tehran’s Vanak Square. “From this platform, I declare that I am ready to sacrifice my life for this country,” she said.

As a mother who has watched her children pack up for summer camp year after year, I am writing to ask camp directors to take a hard look at a ubiquitous tradition through the lens of genuine chinuch: the “Best in Bunk” or “Camper of the Month” award.

Choosing just one “winner” per bunk conflicts with a foundational truth of our generation: we must do our utmost to show every child that they are uniquely special, rather than telling one kid he is better than the rest.

To understand how damaging this is, look at our own homes. Imagine the immediate outcry if I stood up at my Shabbat table and handed a trophy to my favorite child, crowning them “Best in the Family.” We would instantly recognize that as a parenting disaster that breeds toxic rivalry and crushes the other children. Yet, as parents, we pay thousands of dollars to allow 17- and 18-year-old counselors to do the exact same thing to a bunk of sixteen children.

Without the training of a seasoned educator, a teenage counselor naturally treats “Best in Bunk” as a popularity contest, picking the most charismatic or athletic kid. This sends a crushing message to the rest of the bunk—including the kids who are fighting their own nature just to behave—that their personal avodah (struggle) and unique character are invisible. In today’s world, our children face unprecedented emotional pressures; they do not need to come home feeling like they didn’t measure up to the counselor’s favorite.

I know change is possible because I once had a counselor who did it right. Instead of picking one favorite, this counselor gave each kid a specific, personalized award highlighting their own unique achievement and growth during the month. The impact was incredible. Every boy felt seen, valued, and inspired to keep growing.

Instead of teaching staff how to crown a single winner, camps must train counselors to show each kid exactly how they are special. A great counselor unlocks the spark in every seat—whether it’s the child battling anxiety who finally participates, or the quiet kid performing acts of chesed when nobody is watching.

Our camps do an incredible job of creating a vibrant atmosphere of Torah and ruach. To elevate it further, we must shift from comparative, subjective awards to individualized recognition. I implore camp directors to end this award.

Thank you for your time and dedication to our community.

Warm regards,

A Frustrated Mother

TLS welcomes your letters by submitting them to us via  Whatsapp  or via email  [email protected]

LOS ANGELES  (VINnews) – Comedian and HBO host Bill Maher delivered a sharp rebuke of what he described as rampant antisemitism masked as criticism of Israel, highlighting global double standards and inconsistencies in public outrage during a “New Rule” segment on his show “Real Time.”

In the monologue, which aired Friday night near the 78th anniversary of Israel’s founding on May 14, Maher declared that everyone should wish the Jewish state a happy birthday or admit they are antisemitic. He argued that much of the intense focus on Israel stems not from legitimate policy critique but from deeper prejudice.

“Enough with hiding behind Israel or Zionism or Netanyahu,” Maher said. “If you think as so many do that Israel is a colonizer, an apartheid state committing genocide — and by the way, if your ‘brats’ had to spend a week anywhere in the Middle East other than Israel, you would understand what liberalism is not.”

Maher pointed to what he called a “frothing anxiousness for the literal extermination of this one group” and questioned the silence from Democrats and the left. He contrasted the obsessive scrutiny of Israel with far worse human rights situations elsewhere.

“No Jews, no news,” Maher stated, drawing an uncomfortable laugh from the audience. “But China, Russia, the Sudan, Iran, Myanmar, Haiti, the Congo, North Korea — all way worse. And that’s how you know it’s antisemitism. It’s the inconsistency.”

The host criticized campus protests, slogans like those from “Queers for Palestine,” and what he sees as selective outrage that ignores Jewish history and the necessity of a Jewish state in the face of persistent hatred. He noted that antisemitism has surged globally since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel.

Maher, long a critic of political correctness on both sides, directed much of his ire at Democrats, warning that indulging “woke idiots” and TikTok-influenced views on Israel risks further eroding principles of liberalism. He challenged the party: “Democrats, where are you?” on condemning rhetoric that would be unacceptable toward any other minority.

Louisiana Republican voters denied Sen. Bill Cassidy a third term Saturday, delivering a major political defeat to one of the few GOP senators who voted to convict President Donald Trump after the January 6 Capitol riot.

With most ballots counted, Trump-endorsed Rep. Julia Letlow finished in first place in the Republican primary, while Louisiana State Treasurer John Fleming secured second place, pushing Cassidy into third and ending his re-election bid.

According to vote totals with 92 percent reporting, Letlow received 44.8 percent of the vote, Fleming captured 28.4 percent, and Cassidy trailed with 24.7 percent. The Associated Press projected Letlow and Fleming as the two candidates advancing to the June 27 runoff election.

Letlow is considered the early favorite heading into the runoff, largely due to Trump’s endorsement, which the president reaffirmed Friday on Truth Social while returning from his summit in China with President Xi Jinping.

After Cassidy’s defeat became clear, Trump celebrated the outcome online and renewed his attacks on the Louisiana senator over the impeachment vote.

“Bill Cassidy . . . voted to impeach me on preposterous charges that were fake then, and now, are criminally insane!” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “His disloyalty to the man who got him elected is now a part of legend, and it’s nice to see that his political career is OVER!”

Cassidy, 68, was among seven Republican senators who voted to convict Trump on charges of incitement following the January 6, 2021 Capitol unrest. Political observers note that number could shrink even further in the next Congress if Sen. Susan Collins faces defeat in her own re-election race, potentially leaving Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski as the lone remaining Republican impeachment supporter still in office.

In addition to his impeachment vote, Cassidy had publicly urged Trump to withdraw from the 2024 presidential race following the classified documents indictment tied to Mar-a-Lago and had criticized the administration as insufficiently pro-life.

Trump moved early to weaken Cassidy politically by endorsing Letlow back in January — even before she officially entered the race — forcing the incumbent senator into a difficult renomination battle.

The president continued attacking Cassidy throughout Election Day itself.

“Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana is a disloyal disaster. His entire past campaign for the Senate was about ‘TRUMP,’ how he’s with me all the way, and then, after winning, he turned around and voted to IMPEACH me for something that has now proven to be total “bulls—!” Trump posted on Truth Social Saturday while the vote was going on.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, who also hails from Louisiana, acknowledged earlier in the week that the race had placed him in a politically uncomfortable position because of his relationships with all three candidates.

Johnson described Letlow as “like a sister to me” while also noting that Fleming had previously represented Louisiana’s 4th Congressional District before him.

Over recent months, Cassidy had attempted to repair relations with Trump and the MAGA base, including reluctantly voting to confirm Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as Health and Human Services secretary despite disagreements over vaccine policy.

Meanwhile, both Cassidy and Fleming criticized Letlow over her past role as a senior administrator at the University of Louisiana-Monroe, where she once described herself as a “strong and progressive leader” and supported diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives.

Cassidy’s loss marks another victory for Trump-backed candidates following a series of successful primary challenges against Republicans who had opposed the president on issues including redistricting in Indiana.

Attention now shifts to Kentucky, where another Trump-backed challenger will face off Tuesday against Rep. Thomas Massie. Former Navy SEAL and farmer Ed Gallrein is challenging the libertarian-leaning congressman with Trump’s endorsement behind him.

{Matzav.com}