Israel Update 2.1.25

The cumulative effect of continued unpredictable middle-of-the-night rude awakenings on the Israeli civilian population as Houthi terrorists launch ballistic missiles at Central Israel is hard to describe and goes largely unreported by international media – except when Israel strikes back. In the past 2 weeks, millions of Israelis have had to dash to shelters multiple times with only 90 seconds’ warning. The attack early last Friday had been the 5^th such disturbed night within the previous 8 days.

HOUTHI THREAT CONTINUED

A Pentagon weapons specialist, Bill LaPlante said: “I’m an engineer and a physicist, and I’ve been around missiles my whole career,” but the increasingly sophisticated Iranian-supplied Houthi weapons are “scary.” Report here

For the first time since its deployment in Israel, the U.S. THAAD air defence system intercepted a Houthi missile launched towards Israeli territory early last Friday.18 people were lightly hurt while rushing to a bomb shelter, and two people suffered acute anxiety attacks. Air defences intercepted a missile fired from Yemen that triggered sirens in the Jerusalem, southern West Bank and Dead Sea areas in the early hours of Saturday morning, in the sixth such overnight attack on the centre of the country in less than two weeks.

Israel’s Arrow system intercepted another missile launched from Yemen on Saturday night.Reports here here & here

Another Houthi ballistic missile was intercepted before it entered Israeli territory on Monday night. Alarms were triggered across central Israel out of concern for falling shrapnel. Fragments of the missile were found over a wide area including a large piece in Beit Shemesh. Takeoffs and landings were temporarily delayed at Ben-Gurion Airport, but they resumed within the hour. Reports here& here

Meanwhile:

In its largest airstrike in Yemen since the war began, Israel targeted the control tower at Sanaa International Airport and civilian aircraft used by the Houthi government last Thursday. Additional strikes targeted Hodeidah port, a power station and oil facilities. The U.S. provided intelligence for the strike. Report here

The Yemeni Houthi group reported a fresh U.S.-British airstrike on the capital Sanaa last Friday evening. Report here

On Dec. 30 and 31, U.S. Navy ships and aircraft targeted a Houthi command and control facility and advanced conventional weapon production and storage facilities that included missiles and UAVs and destroyed a Houthi coastal radar site and seven cruise missiles and one-way attack UAVs over the Red Sea.
The strikes are a part of CENTCOM’s effort to degrade Iran-backed Houthi efforts to threaten regional partners and military and merchant vessels in the region. Press Release here

TERRORIST ATTACK IN ISRAEL

Ludmila Lipovsky, 83, was stabbed to death by a Palestinian terrorist in Herzliya last Friday. The victim, a Holocaust survivor, had just left her assisted living complex and was waiting for a ride to a doctor’s appointment The assailant was neutralized by security guards on the scene. Report here

ABUSE OF HOSTAGES HELD IN GAZA

Hostages who returned from Hamas captivity in Gaza endured beatings, isolation, deprivation of food and water, branding, hair-pulling, and sexual assault, an Israel Health Ministry report to be submitted to the UN has revealed. The food and water they had access to were of poor quality, leading to multiple cases of malnutrition and illness.
Most released hostages returned home to discover their families had been murdered by Hamas and their homes had been destroyed. Numerous hostages have been suffering from survivor’s guilt.
Two children reported that they were bound together and beaten throughout their captivity, and two additional children were found with burn marks consistent with branding on their lower limbs. Many hostages of all ages and genders described undergoing sexual abuse at the hands of their captors.Report here

KAMAL ADWAN HOSPITAL

Some international media reporting failed to explain how and why the IDF entered the hospital and gave credence to Hamas’ false claims.

The IDF announced Saturday it had arrested more than 240 suspects at a Hamas command centre located inside Kamal Adwan Hospital in Jabalya, northern Gaza. The hospital was being used for military activities in violation of international law. Troops faced resistance during the operation, including anti-tank fire from terrorists.
The detainees included members of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, as well as 15 individuals implicated in the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel. Among those arrested were engineering and anti-tank missile operatives and the hospital’s director, suspected of being a Hamas operative. Some detainees attempted to evade capture by posing as patients or fleeing in ambulances.
Prior to the operation, 350 patients, medical staff and caregivers were evacuated from the hospital. The hospital had been supplied with tens of thousands of litres of fuel, food and medical supplies in recent weeks to ensure its functionality. Report here

The northernmost half of northern Gaza has been progressively emptied of most Palestinian terrorists and civilians since early October. Last week, the IDF targeted Hamas’s latest attempt to reconstitute itself in northern Gaza, embedded within the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Jabalya.
In the weeks before the operation, the IDF cleared improvised explosive devices in the vicinity of the hospital as well as for most of the pathways and potential escape routes to and from the hospital. The IDF also engaged in a few targeted attacks on smaller Hamas cells near the hospital, but was careful to avoid attacking the hospital itself. This was part of a strategy to lull the Hamas terrorists hiding in the hospital into a false sense of security.
When the IDF finally attacked on Friday, it needed only an hour to control all routes to and from the hospital to lock down and block any Hamas terrorist escape attempts. There was a short initial battle between Hamas terrorists and IDF soldiers, but all of the terrorists were quickly killed. Two groups of terrorists also tried to escape in two different directions, but they were also killed by IDF forces.
As hundreds of Palestinians emerged from the hospital, in the first ambulance of “patients,” the IDF found that 13 out of 21 passengers were uninjured and were terrorists pretending to be patients.
The arsenal of weapons found in the hospital was smaller than in other Hamas-run hospitals, as Hamas had moved much of its weaponry to apartments across the street from the hospital. These weapons were also confiscated. No IDF casualties were reported during the mission. Report here

The IDF on Saturday denied Hamas allegations that Israeli troops had set fire to the Kamal Adwan Hospital.
An IDF spokesperson said, “While IDF troops were not in the hospital, a small fire broke out in an empty building inside the hospital that is under control.” An investigation had found “no connection” between military activity and the fire. Report here

GAZA WAR AGAINST HAMAS

On Sunday Staff Sgt. Yuval Shoham died in a tank accident in northern Gaza.

Five more rockets were launched from northern Gaza, this time at Sderot, one of the largest rocket attacks from Gaza in recent months. Two were intercepted, while the other three struck open areas. Report here

On Monday Sgt. Uriel Peretz, 23 was killed and eight soldiers were wounded during fighting in northern Gaza. Israel’s toll in the ground offensive against Hamas in Gaza and in military operations along the border with the Strip rose to 395. Three rockets were launched from Gaza towards Israeli border communities. Report here

Also on Monday, the IDF released footage obtained from cameras belonging to Hamas operatives, showing them planting roadside bombs only 45 metres (around 148 feet ) from the Indonesian Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip. The IDF had operated last week at the Indonesian Hospital, with troops killing several terror operatives. Dozens of members of terror groups were also detained, and several explosive devices planted by them in the area were neutralized. Report here

Two rockets fired Saturday from northern Gaza toward the Jerusalem area were successfully intercepted. Long-range rocket fire from Gaza has become increasingly rare as the war has progressed, with Hamas’s launching capabilities severely hindered by the IDF’s ground offensive. Report hereand here

IDF troops spotted and killed “many dozens of terrorists” in Jabalya in northern Gaza in ambushes Sunday night, following intelligence on plans by operatives to flee the area. The IDF released footage showing armed terrorist squads running from the area after the IDF raided Kamal Adwan hospital. Report here

For 417 days after he was critically wounded during Hamas’s October 7, 2023, massacre in southern Israel, Sgt. First Class Yona Betzalel Brief, 23, tried to recover. But after losing both legs and enduring medically induced comas, he died in late November. “He became a symbol of ‘Don’t quit,’” said his mother. The combat medic has come to symbolize the sacrifice by hundreds of fallen soldiers in what many in Israel see as a war for the country’s survival. Article here

LEBANON

With a month to go until Israeli forces are due to fully pull out of southern Lebanon, IDF troops this week located and destroyed a large cache of Hezbollah weapons in an area just across the border from the Israeli city of Kiryat Shmona. They found rocket launchers, missiles, explosives and other weapons. During another raid on nearby buildings, the soldiers found numerous other weapons, including assault rifles, grenades, missiles, mines, explosive devices and other military gear. Report here

Israel is exploring the possibility of keeping IDF forces in key positions in southern Lebanon after the 60-day deadline stipulated in the ceasefire agreement for a full withdrawal. The primary reasons are sluggish deployment of the Lebanese Army in the south, and the continued discovery of Hizbullah weaponry and infrastructure, coupled with its ongoing efforts to rebuild its capabilities with Iranian assistance. In recent weeks, Israel has repeatedly complained to international bodies about the slow pace of the Lebanese Army’s actions, warning that if Lebanon does not fulfil its obligations under the agreement, Israel may need to stay in southern Lebanon to safeguard its northern communities.Report here

COUNTER TERRORISM

In an annual report published Tuesday summarizing its activities over the past year, the Shin Bet said it interrogated more than 650 suspects from the Gaza Strip, thwarted 1,040 major terror attacks in the West Bank and Jerusalem, busted 20 terror cells among Arab Israeli citizens and foiled a record 13 Iranian espionage plots. Report here

ETHIOPIA

An Israeli medical delegation has concluded its latest mission to provide critical eye care services to communities in Ethiopia.
The 15-member team treated nearly 1,000 patients, working to restore the eyesight of over 500 blind people through its Cataract Campaign, and providing hundreds of pairs of glasses to patients.Report here

WORKFORCE

Tens of thousands of Palestinian construction workers have been barred from entering Israel since Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack.
Indian construction workers are part of Israel’s effort to fill the void. Some workers can make three times what they would back home.
16,000 workers have come from India over the past year – and Israel has plans to bring thousands more.Report here

ARCHAEOLOGY

In what they called an “archaeological Hanukkah miracle,” a University of Haifa team discovered on Friday a rare hoard of some 160 coins, dating from the Hasmonean period, during a dig in the Jordan Valley. They were dated to 80/79 BCE, during the reign of Judah Maccabee’s grand-nephew King Alexander Jannaeus. Report here

A rare, 4th-century CE ceramic oil lamp recently discovered during Israeli Antiquities Authorities excavations near the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem was displayed to the public for the first time during Hanukkah holiday. The unusual lamp is decorated with imagery related to the services in the Second Temple in Jerusalem, including a Temple menorah. Report here

TRAVEL

From Jan 1^st, foreign nationals wishing to visit Israel from visa-exempt countries including the UK, US and EU will have to apply for a travel permit and pay an NIS 25 (about £6) fee. Once the application form is filled out online with information about identity, length of stay, and reason for travel, a reply is sent via email within 24 to 72 hours. The electronic authorization is valid for travel on multiple trips to and from Israel within a period of two years or until the traveller’s passport expires, whichever is earlier. Report here Application online here

COMMENT & OPINION

Battle of Kamal Adwan hospital

Brendan O’Neill: In their coverage of the Battle of Kamal Adwan Hospital in Gaza, much of the media is burying, if not outright hiding, the most vital part of this tale – that a neo-fascist militia is using a hospital as a base from which to plot the murder of Israel’s soldiers and citizens.
When I watch news coverage of the clashes in and around Kamal Adwan, it is very clearly a fight between Hamas militants cynically holed up in a hospital and IDF troops who want to stop this army from attacking their nation. Yet it is presented to us as a mad, bloodlusting invasion of a medical facility by that most psychopathic of nations, Israel, which lays waste to hospitals for sport.
What’s really appalling is what Hamas has done. They have committed the war crime of hiding in civilian infrastructure to pursue their pitiless war on the Jewish nation. But you wouldn’t know it from the headlines. The real story here is that there exists a terror outfit so wicked it will happily hide itself in a hospital, and that the army of a democratic nation has decided to clear the hospital of these killers. Yet the terrorists who brought war to a hospital are made invisible, and so rendered blameless. Israel is fighting a war it did not start. Article here (paywall)

Hamas’ military use of hospitals

“From the first day of the Israel-Hamas War, Hamas left no hospital untouched for terrorist purposes,” Maj. (ret.) John Spencer, chair of urban warfare studies at the Modern War Institute at West Point, said. “Hospitals receive special protection under international law as places of refuge. However, the law explicitly prohibits the use of hospitals to shield military objectives from attack.”… “In almost every hospital the IDF entered, there was evidence of Hamas’s military use of the facility, which the army revealed and publicized. At Shifa Hospital, evidence was found of hostages being held, weapons and ammunition stored, and an extensive tunnel with command and control infrastructure. In other cases, Hamas operatives were documented firing from within Sheikh Hamad Hospital, while others fired rockets near Al-Quds Hospital before running inside.”
To address this challenge, “the IDF often surrounds the hospital and calls on the terrorists to come out while simultaneously using advanced facial recognition techniques to identify Hamas operatives attempting to ‘blend in’ with civilians….Hamas operatives often try to appear as the most vulnerable patients – using wheelchairs, crutches, or carrying a sick baby. Article here

Multi-front war

Gil Troy: Too many Americans keep asking “Why is Israel still fighting?” It’s as if Israel’s right to self-defence after October 7 had a two-month expiration date. This naive, impatient, approach to urban warfare ignores our enemies’ stubborn cruelty. They’re continuing the war they started. The real question is “How can Israel stop now, with so many homicidal maniacs still trying to destroy the Jewish State?” …. In politics, overdosing on outrages deadens your conscience. We get used to Hamas hiding in once-sacrosanct civilian sites such as the Kamal Adwan Hospital. We sigh as The Jerusalem Post headlines “Army arrests 240 suspects, some posing as patients, at Jabalya Hospital used as command center,” but BBC screeches “Israel forcibly evacuates Gaza hospital and detains medical staff”… We count the missiles launched from Yemen and Tehran, overlooking how many thousands they could kill if their payloads of 200, 300, or 400 kilograms detonated in a neighbourhood. Article here

Houthis

Prof. Eyal Zisser: The Houthis are not a nuisance-they are a strategic threat.
Following Oct. 7, the Houthis attacked Israeli ships in the Red Sea and launched drones and missiles toward Israel. At first, the Yemeni threat was dismissed as a nuisance, especially given the immediate threats Israel faced from Gaza and Hizbullah in Lebanon. However, it has become clear that Yemen is a significant battleground where Israel must establish dominance to restore deterrence. The Houthis have become a tangible and escalating danger. Disrupting shipping in the Red Sea has shut down Israel’s Eilat Port.
Although the Palestinian cause holds little genuine interest for the Houthis, they exploit it to bolster their regional influence and rally support across the Arab world, including among Sunni populations. Nevertheless, their stated goals include an uncompromising fight against their enemies in the Arab world, the West, Israel, and even Jews globally.
Merely targeting the Houthis is not enough; their rule must be toppled entirely. Effectively countering the Houthis requires escalating military pressure while forming a local coalition, akin to the approach used against ISIS, built around the 70% of Yemenis who oppose the Houthis. Article here

Civilian casualties

Con Coughlin: If Western politicians and aid agencies want to apportion blame for the high death tolls in the conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon, then they need look no further than the Iranian-backed terror groups cynically risking the lives of innocent civilians to achieve their diabolical agenda.
Whether it is using schools and hospitals that are supposed to be afforded immunity in conflict under international law, or simply using Palestinian civilians as human shields, Hamas terrorists have consistently jeopardized the well-being of those they purport to defend.
It is a similar picture in Lebanon, where Hizbullah fighters have deliberately located their missile stockpiles and command centers within densely-populated civilian areas.
While the Israel Defence Forces implemented a range of measures in both Gaza and Lebanon to avoid civilian casualties – which includes encouraging civilians to leave their homes in advance of military action – Western politicians and aid agencies invariably blame Israel for any civilian casualties, when they should really be blaming the Hamas and Hizbullah terrorists who deliberately put their own people in harm’s way in the first place. Article here

Israel’s Arab community

Khaled Abu Toameh: A poll conducted after Oct. 7 showed that 68% of the Arab citizens of Israel believe that the attack did not reflect Arab society’s values, the Palestinian people, and the Islamic nation. The poll also found that 86% support helping out with civilian volunteering efforts during the war between Israel and Hamas, while 70% reported that they feel part of Israel and its problems.
A survey conducted by the Moshe Dayan Center at Tel Aviv University found that 57% of Israeli Arabs believe that Hamas intentionally targeted civilians, including women and children, during the Oct. 7 onslaught. At least 54% approve of Arab Israelis taking part in the efforts to explain Israel’s position in the war to the world.
However, some Israeli Arab leaders continue to act against the interests of their own people, taking advantage of the country’s democratic system to engage in anti-Israel rhetoric. These Israeli Arab leaders are causing huge damage to their own constituents. These leaders make the Israeli Arabs look as if they are a “Fifth Column” – an enemy within – stoking fear and mistrust between Jews and Arabs inside Israel, while ignoring that most Israeli Arabs say they feel comfortable living in the Jewish state.
At least 23 Arab Israeli citizens were murdered by Hamas terrorists during the attack on Oct. 7 or by Hamas rocket attacks in the ensuing days. Most of the victims were Bedouin residents. Moreover, several Bedouin men and women were abducted by Hamas.
If Israeli Arabs want to secure a prosperous future for themselves and their children, they need to get rid of extremist Arab leaders who speak and act against the interests of the Arab community inside Israel. If these Arab leaders are unhappy living in Israel, they are welcome to move to the West Bank, Gaza or any Arab country – where they will quickly miss Israel’s democracy and freedom of speech. Article here