Israel Update 15.5.25

HOSTAGE RELEASE

 

IDF soldier Edan Alexander, who spent 584 days in Hamas captivity in Gaza, was released on Monday. Reportedly he was subjected to severe torture during lengthy interrogations and was held, confined to a tunnel with no daylight. For a prolonged period, he was locked in a cage, with his hands and feet shackled. He suffered from extreme food deprivation, and only in recent months did his captors begin providing more food. He was the last known living hostage with American citizenship. Report here

 

 

Edan spent part of his time in captivity bound and with a bag over his head. He described the first days after his abduction as “hell.”. He returned covered in flea bites and with visible injuries and said that he feels weak and will need time to recover. Report here

 

 

 

Footnote: Sheba Medical Centre has treated 46 former captives at the hospital’s Returning to Life Centre, a special unit dedicated to hostages and their families, where the staff is still learning how to navigate the mostly uncharted waters of caring for returning hostages. Article here

 

 

WEST BANK (JUDEA & SAMARIA)

 

 

Tzila Gez, a pregnant Israeli woman, was murdered in a shooting attack Wednesday night while on her way to hospital to give birth. Her husband was wounded. A Palestinian terrorist opened fire on them near Bruchin in Samaria. Three vehicles were targeted by gunfire on Highway 446 from a passing vehicle. The baby, delivered by C-section, is in serious but stable condition.Report here

 

 

IDF Lt.-Col. Netanel Shamkeh says 3 1/2 months after the launch of operations initially focused on Jenin and later expanded to Tulkarm and Nur Shams, the landscape in the northern West Bank has been transformed. “Of roughly 100 terrorists who once controlled the [Nur Shams] camp, only 20 to 30 remain, either in hiding or on the run. The entrances, once booby-trapped and patrolled by armed men under Hamas and Islamic Jihad flags, are now quiet. Today I can walk through the area unarmed.” Life continues in the nearby city of Tulkarm, where markets are open and schools have resumed. Report here

 

 

IDF soldiers located and destroyed an explosives lab in Tulkarm containing 200 explosive devices and 150 kg. of raw materials.Report here

 

 

POST-SCRIPT TO FIRST LEBANON WAR 1982

 

The IDF and Mossad have recovered the body of missing IDF soldier Sgt.-Maj. Tzvi Feldman in Syria, after 43 years. The IDF said the body had been recovered during a complex and secret operation deep in Syria, using precise intelligence information. Report here

 

UPDATE: FORMER BRITISH-ISRAELI  HOSTAGE EMILY DAMARI

 

Emily’s recent post on “X”

 

Dear Members of the Pulitzer Prizeboard,
My name is Emily Damari. I was held hostage in Gaza for over 500 days. On the morning of October 7, I was at home…in Kibbutz Kfar Aza when Hamas terrorists burst in, shot me and dragged me across the border into Gaza. I was one of 251 men, women, children, and elderly people kidnapped that day from their beds, their homes, and a music festival. For almost 500 days I lived in terror. I was starved, abused, and treated like I was less than human. I watched friends suffer. I watched hope dim. And even now, after returning home, I carry that darkness with me — because my best friends, Gali and Ziv Berman are still being held in the Hamas terror tunnels.
So imagine my shock and pain when I saw that you awarded a Pulitzer Prize to Mosab Abu Toha. This is a man who, in January, questioned the very fact of my captivity. He posted about me on Facebook and asked, “How on earth is this girl called a hostage?” He has denied the murder of the Bibas family. He has questioned whether Agam Berger was truly a hostage. These are not word games — they are outright denials of documented atrocities. You claim to honour journalism that upholds truth, democracy, and human dignity. And yet you have chosen to elevate a voice that denies truth, erases victims, and desecrates the memory of the murdered.
Do you not see what this means? Mosab Abu Toha is not a courageous writer. He is the modern-day equivalent of a Holocaust denier. And by honouring him, you have joined him in the shadows of denial. This is not a question of politics. This is a question of humanity. And today, you have failed it.  Post here

 Evidence of Abu Toha’s posts here:

 

 

Hundreds of Spurs supporters gathered outside their stadium on Sunday to welcome back newly released British-Israeli hostage Emily Damari in her first public appearance in London since she was freed from Hamas captivity earlier this year.

Inside the stadium, Emily was greeted by several current and former high-profile Tottenham and England football players including midfielder James Maddison, Ledley King, Gary Mabbutt and Ossie Ardiles Report here

 

 

HEARTBREAKING FAMILY TRAGEDY

 

Two weeks after her great-grandson IDF reservist Master Sgt. (res.) Asaf Cafri  was killed by sniper fire fighting in northern Gaza, 96-year-old Holocaust survivor Magda Baratz died last Friday. At the time of his death she had been attending a Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremony at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, where she was honoured as a survivor of the death march from Auschwitz to Bergen-Belsen.Report here

 

 

GAZA WAR AGAINST HAMAS

 

Two IDF soldiers Cpt. Noam Ravid, 23 and Staff Sgt. Yaly Seror, 20 were killed and two were wounded in an explosion in a booby-trapped tunnel shaft in south Gaza on 3/5.

Two IDF soldiers as Sgt. Yishai Elyakim Urbach, 20 and Staff Sgt. Yam Frid, 21were killed on 8/5 and at least six others were wounded in separate incidents in south Gaza. Reports hereand here

 

The IDFattempted on Tuesday to target Mohammed Sinwar, Hamas’s leader in Gaza and the brother of slain former leader Yahya Sinwar. It is not yet clear if he was killed. Sinwar and other Hamas operatives were located in an underground “command and control centre” beneath the European Hospital in Khan Yunis,  southern Gaza.Report here (paywall)

 

A new study by two Australian professors reinforces existing evidence that Hamas’s Gaza fatality figures are “clear disinformation.” Female and child fatalities are underrepresented relative to their proportion of the general population, demonstrating IDF efforts to avoid civilian casualties.Report here

 

 

HOUTHI ATTACKS

 

Friday 2/5 & Saturday 3/5

 

On 2/5 the Houthis fired two ballistic missiles (at 5.31 am & 1.38 pm) at northern Israel, both of which were intercepted. Debris from the missile interception penetrated the roof of a kindergarten at Kibbutz Mishmar Ha’emek, causing some damage. On Friday evening a drone Yemen was shot down.

Early Saturday morning a ballistic missile triggered sirens in Jerusalem and some parts of southern Israel, in the fourth Houthi attack in some 25 hours. Reports hereand here

 

A missile launched from Yemen struck near Israel’s main international airport on Sunday 4/5 after interception attempts failed.Report here

 

Israel subsequently attacked targets in Yemen in two days of airstrikes, including targeting the airport in the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa, destroying terminal buildings and causing half a billion dollars in damage, according to its director.

On 6/5 the US announced   it would end its bombing campaign against the Houthis who, it said, had agreed to stop attacking ships in vital Middle East maritime routes. The agreement did not cover the Houthis’ attacks on Israel, and on7/8 a drone launched from Yemen was intercepted by the IAF. Report here

 

On 9/5 a ballistic missile triggered sirens across central Israel ( the third attack on the country since 4/5) and was intercepted by Israel’s Arrow air defence system. The American THAAD system deployed to Israel also engaged the missile but missed, for the second time that week. Report here

 

 

The IDF intercepted a missile fired at Israel by the Houthis on Wednesday morning (yesterday). Sirens sounded in central Israel and the Jerusalem area. This was the third missile attack in the previous 24 hours after two missiles were fired on Tuesday, one intercepted by IDF aerial defences while the other fell short.Report hereVideo here

 

Footnote: for information on the latest rocket & missile alerts in Israel which largely go unreported abroad see this link

 

 

ISRAEL & THE SYRIAN DRUZE

 

 

For the first time, an IAF transport helicopter delivered an “exceptional” amount of humanitarian aid to members of the Druze community about 70 km inside Syria’s border in an overnight operation between Friday night and Saturday morning.2/3 May.Report here

 

The IDF has set up a medical facility next to the Druze village of Hader in southern Syria to treat those wounded during recent sectarian violence by Islamist supporters of the country’s new regime. More than 30 wounded Syrian Druze have been evacuated to hospitals in Israel in recent weeks. Report here

 

Clashes with pro-government fighters have killed dozens of Druze in Syria’s Sweida province over the past few weeks, provoking such fear that some Druze say they are now looking for help from Israel. Recently, Israel has opened the border for the first time in decades for Drue religious pilgrimages and has also publicised a plan to grant permits to them to work temporarily in northern Israel.Report here (paywall)

 

 

The spiritual leader of the Druze community in Israel, Sheikh Mowafaq Tarif recently said that he was grateful for Israel’s actions in support of the Druze community in Syria. Report here

 

 

THE UN

 

UN special rapporteur on the Palestinian territories Francesca Albanese received $20,000 from pro-Hamas groups to fund trips to Australia and New Zealand in late 2023 – shortly after Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre, according to a UN Watch report. Albanese has compared PM Netanyahu to Adolf Hitler, claimed the U.S. is controlled by Jews, and called for the destruction of Israel.Report here

 

UN Watch Report: Why Democracies Should Sanction UN Rapporteur Francesca Albanese for Propagating Antisemitism and Supporting Terrorism. Text here

 

 

OLYMPIAD WINNER

 

Israeli Revital Vallah , 19, has won the World Physics Olympiad. The Technion student beat 370 competitors from 74 countries.Profile here

 

ECUADOR

 

Ecuadoran President Daniel Noboa said recently that Israel and the UAE had agreed to provide intelligence “to help” fight cocaine traffickers that are terrorizing his country.Report here

 

 

Ecuador has inaugurated its representative office in Jerusalem on the campus of the Hebrew University. The office, which will have diplomatic status, will be known as the Innovation, Research, and Development Centre.Report here

 

 

KING CHARLES III

 

 

Britain’s King Charles III wrote to President Herzog to congratulate him on the occasion of Israel’s 77th Independence Day, and said he is praying for the return of the remaining Gaza hostages.

“My wife and I wanted to send Your Excellency and the people of The State of Israel our congratulations on the auspicious occasion of your seventy-seventh Independence Day,” began the letter, which was sent for Yom Ha’Atzmaut. “We are all too aware of the immense pain and suffering still being endured by those who remain hostage in Gaza,”. Report here

 

 

EUROVISION

 

Yuval Raphael, 24, shows little sign that just a year and a half ago she was hiding beneath dead bodies, pretending to be dead herself, as Hamas gunmen attacked a music festival near Gaza, killing hundreds. Now she is represent Israeling at the Eurovision Song Contest in Basel, Switzerland.
When Hamas attacked, Raphael took cover in a roadside shelter for eight hours, watching as Hamas gunmen killed the young people around her. She hid under the bodies, covering her face with the hair of a young woman killed next to her.Reports hereand here

To vote for Yuval in tonight’s semifinal  (only outside Israel) go to the official voting site here

 

COMMENT & OPINION

 

 

Khaled Abu Toameh:

Palestinians… say that if anyone is stealing the humanitarian aid and food, it is Hamas.

Videos posted on social media have shown Hamas thugs brutally beating Palestinians suspected of stealing food for their families.

“Since October 7, I’ve said it without hesitation: Hamas is ISIS – only with better PR. And that PR machine runs on Qatari money, through media outlets that spin terrorism into heroism and wash blood with propaganda.” — Hamza Howidy, Gaza-born peace and human rights advocate, X, May 4, 2025.

Hamas relied on criminal elements to create pandemonium that generated mass looting events which provided some cover for the terror group to commit the organized theft of what remains of food supplies in Gaza.” — Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, a Gaza native and senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, X, May 2, 2025.

This criminality is precisely why the international community needs to back Israel’s effort to prevent Hamas from monopolizing and embezzling humanitarian supplies sent into the Gaza Strip.

The international community should support any initiative aimed at ending Hamas’s rule over the Gaza Strip and destroying its military capabilities. Both Israel and the Palestinian people, who are paying a heavy price as a result of Hamas’s decision to commit the biggest massacre against Jews since the Holocaust, will only gain from this.Article here

 

 

Jonathan S. Tobin:
Many in the mainstream press have been acting as Hamas’s stenographers since Oct. 7 – accepting flagrantly false statistics about civilian casualties as truthful, downplaying or denying the Islamist group’s genocidal goals, and falsely alleging that the IDF have been committing war crimes when, in fact, they take greater care to avoid civilian losses than any other modern army.
Currently, the main anti-Israel media talking point is an effort to revive the myth that there is a famine going on in Gaza. With Hamas refusing to release the remaining Israeli hostages it still holds, and also showing itself unwilling to lay down its arms and give up control of the Strip, Israel has stopped the flow of aid into areas the terror group controls. It also plans on taking control of the distribution of food and fuel to prevent Hamas from continuing to steal most of it.
Palestinians in Gaza are suffering from Hamas’s continuation of the war it began on Oct. 7, but there remains no evidence of famine or anything close to it. The responsibility for this situation belongs to the terrorists, not the nation they attacked. Claims of a humanitarian catastrophe are largely part of an effort to allow the Islamist group to retain control, something that will ensure that the Jewish state will suffer more barbaric atrocities.Article here

 

 

Dr. Irwin J. Mansdorf : Hamas has turned hostage diplomacy into a psychological trap. The emotional appeal of bringing hostages home – a deeply human desire – has become the bait. The cost? A stronger, bolder, more dangerous Hamas, just as ideologically committed to Israel’s destruction as ever.

Public discourse is dominated by the plight of the hostages. Families appear on TV daily. Emotional appeals grip the nation and Hamas knows this. That’s why, every few weeks, another hostage video surfaces, precisely timed to stoke hope, pain, and division.

All the while, Hamas plays the victim: children under rubble, hospitals without power, shelters destroyed. The images are tragic – but they also serve a purpose, suggesting that the responsibility lies not with Hamas but with Israel. Headlines rarely acknowledge Hamas’s role in initiating the conflict or continuing to hold innocent Israelis captive. The moral burden shifts to Israel, while the terrorists evade accountability.

The moral imperative to rescue living hostages is real – but so is the government’s duty to protect its citizens from future atrocities. Article here

 

Colonel Michael Scott:
In September 2024, I returned to Israel as part of a senior international delegation. I entered Gaza alongside the IDF. What I witnessed, reaffirmed everything I knew. The IDF is the most educated, ethical, and lawful military force in world history — operating under scrutiny in a diabolically complex environment. They face not only terrorists with rifles, but terrorists with press and “health ministry” passes — armed with cameras instead of guns, but every bit as committed to the cause of destruction.Article here

 

Renowned historian Andrew Roberts chaired the panel responsible for the “7 October Parliamentary Commission Report” He says “There’s a movement afoot on behalf of Hamas and its sympathizers to pretend that October 7 never happened,” The report’s aim was to compile “a large amount of unimpeachable evidence to prove that it did.”Roberts, who is not Jewish, does not underestimate the scale of the challenge. “It took decades for Holocaust denial to really get going,” he says, “but October 7 denial started while the actual massacres were still ongoing.Article here

 

 

JC Editorial: Before Oct. 7, few serious voices in Europe called for recognizing a Palestinian state. There was a quiet consensus that doing so would be reckless, given the division, corruption and radicalization of the current Palestinian leadership. Then, Hamas carried out the most gruesome mass murder of Jews since the Holocaust – and the response in some European capitals has been to reward it with exactly what they wanted, recognition.
Spain, Ireland and Norway recognized Palestine a mere seven months after the massacres. French President Emmanuel Macron floated the idea last month. Some MPs urged the UK to follow suit.
Recognizing a Palestinian state after Oct. 7 would be a moral and strategic blunder. It would strengthen Hamas, undermine moderate Palestinian voices, and send the grotesque message that the more brutal the violence, the more urgent the international support. It would betray every peace-minded Palestinian as well as every liberal value Europe claims to uphold.
The call for recognition rests on a fiction that Palestinians are innocent victims without agency, perpetually denied a state by Israeli intransigence. History says otherwise. Palestinian leaders have rejected every serious offer of statehood since 1937. Each time, the answer was no, usually followed by violence.
Is there another national movement that has been offered statehood – repeatedly – only to reject it every time? Palestinian leaders have consistently prioritized fighting the Jewish state over building their own. Yet after every rejection, it is Israel that is blamed. Oct. 7 obliterated any Israeli hope that a Palestinian state would bring peace.Editorial here (paywall)

 

 

Avi Benlolo : Israel Still Shines as the Most Resilient Place on Earth.Article here