Loading...
| View Mobile Version / Add Daily Alert App to Your Home Screen | |||
| www.dailyalert.org SubscribeLarger Print/Mobile Search Back Issues | Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign AffairsDAILY ALERT | Sunday, July 13, 2025 | |
| In-Depth Issues: Iranian Religious Establishment Declares Jihad Against President Trump: $42 Million Has Been Raised for His Assassination (MEMRI) In Iran in recent days there has been an increase in explicit calls for assassinating President Trump from the Iranian regime's religious establishment due allegedly to a threat by Trump to assassinate Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei - even though Trump said he had actually prevented such a move. These calls are backed by fatwas issued in late June by Iranian grand ayatollahs. The fatwas stated that th e punishment for Trump is the same as for a muhareb - an enemy of Allah and Islam - and that is death, and the permitting of spilling his blood. Assembly of Experts members who are close to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, senior clerics and lecturers at the Howza-e Ilmiyya seminaries, and the regime's Friday preachers are explicitly calling for Trump's assassination. The regime's religious elite has also called on young Muslims and on "cells of resistance" across the world to carry out this fatwa, presenting the fight against Trump as a religious obligation that will be greatly rewarded, including with entry into Paradise. A new movement in Iran, called "Blood Covenant," claims to have raised $40 million for assassinating Trump. These calls to assassinate Trump are coming from above and being echoed in the street and through all strata of society, including in the Iranian media. The struggle is depicted not as a political clash but as an all-out religious war between Islam and the "leader of apostasy" and the "enemy of Islam," and between the messengers of Allah and the enemies of Allah. In Northern Gaza, Israeli Officers See Tactical Success - Amos Harel (Ha'aretz) After a nighttime visit to the northern Gaza town of Beit Hanoun on Thursday, I asked reserve paratrooper officers - most of whom have already spent over 300 days on duty - if the dismantling of Hamas's infrastructure can realistically be achieved. Their response was unequivo cal. The IDF, they asserted, is winning the campaign, the objectives are within reach, and by the time the fighting ends, Israeli communities along Gaza's northern border will be significantly safer. Beit Hanoun will be leveled entirely. The remaining terror tunnels will be destroyed and Hamas members pushed beyond firing range of Israeli towns. Israeli military officials estimate that 70 to 80 Hamas operatives remain in Beit Hanoun, and are believed to be mostly hiding in tunnels. The fighting is largely one-sided. Hamas members surface only briefly when they spot an opportunity. Israeli Life on the Gaza Border - Henry Bodkin (Telegraph-UK) Last Sunday evening, a mortar shell struck near the edge of Kibbutz Nirim just two seconds after the red alert blared out, giving the group of children playing soccer no time to react. It exploded 30 meters away. Miraculously, no one was hurt. "It brings back all the anxiety and fear. You can't let your kids go out to play soccer," said Maya Liberman, the community manager. When I visited, the sound of the conflict just over the fence in Khan Yunis was inescapable: from the thud and crack of airstrikes and artillery shells, to heavy machine guns and the constant whine of drones. This is now the reality for increasing numbers of Oct. 7 massacre survivors, who are returning to their homes in the Gaza envelope after the army lifted most restrictions at the end of last month. Although significantly degraded, Hamas is still capable of threatening Israeli communities with its rockets and mortars. Nirim was one of the first Israeli communities attacked by Hamas on Oct. 7. Seven people were murdered in Nirim, with four taken hostage. Two women were subsequently released, while the two men were murdered in captivity. SpaceX Launches Israeli Communications Satellite - Roi Bet Levi (Israel Hayom) Israel's new national communications satellite, "Dror-1," was successfully launched into space on Sunday morning from Cape Canaveral, Florida, aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) announced. The satellite is expected to reach its final geostationary orbit, 36,000 km. above the equator, within about two weeks following a series of in-space maneuvers. IAI stated, "As Israel's national space house, Israel Aerospace Industries has led the nation's space program since the 1980s." IDF Drone Commander Recounts Striking Iranian Missiles - Amir Bohbot (Jerusalem Post) Lt.-Col. G., 39, who led the drone operations targeting Iran, said, "Every [Iranian rocket] launcher we hit means one less missile that could land in Beersheba, Bat Yam, Holon, or Tel Aviv." "I was positively surprised by how effectively we disrupted Iranian launches. Sometimes, just hearing the drone's buzz was enough to deter a launch." He recalls the successful strike on the Khorramshahr-4 - one of Iran's most dangerous missiles. "It's their biggest missile. Range of over 1,500 km. A 1,500-kg warhead - three times more than those fired at us - and it can carry a nuclear payload." "We smashed it. Then we saw all the Iranians fleeing - and there was no site left." That same day, his five-year-old daughter said: "Today there was no Red Alert." After the War: Israel's Economic Future Looks Strong, Stable - Dr. Amit Serusi (Ynet News) After more than a year and a half of security threats, clear signals are emerging that Israel's economy is stabilizing, strengthening, and preparing for a significant leap forward. Since the outbreak of conflict with Iran, the Tel Aviv stock exchange-35 index has climbed, the shekel has appreciated against the dollar, and this is happening in contrast to negative trends in other global markets. The reduction of strategic threats creates a fundamentally different environment - one of growing stability and renewed confidence. That's the kind of setting in which economies thrive. Support Daily Alert RSS Feed Key Links Archives Portal Fair Use/Privacy | News Resources - North America, Europe, and Asia:Trump Signals Support for New Israeli Attack If Iran Moves toward Bomb - Alexander Ward At the White House last week, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu told President Trump that if Iran resumed moving toward a nuclear weapon, Israel would carry out further military strikes. Trump responded that he favored a diplomatic settlement with Tehran, but didn't otherwise object to the Israeli plan. Israel wouldn't necessarily seek explicit American approval to resume strikes on Iran, a senior Israeli official said. Trump is counting on the threat of further at tacks to pressure Tehran into an agreement that would foreclose it from building a nuclear weapon. Israel is skeptical a diplomatic settlement would prevent Iran from secretly rushing toward a nuclear weapon. Top Israeli officials said they thought the U.S. and Israeli military strikes had set back Tehran's ability to build a nuclear weapon by up to two years, matching a recent Pentagon assessment. Any effort by Iran to retrieve the uranium from Isfahan or revive the decimated nuclear program would be quickly detected by Israel, the senior Israeli official said. (Wall Street Journal)Putin Urges Iran to Take "Zero Enrichment" Nuclear Deal with U.S. - Barak Ravid Russian President Vladimir Putin has told both President Trump and Iranian officia ls that he supports the idea of a nuclear deal in which Iran is unable to enrich uranium, sources familiar with those discussions tell Axios. Moscow has encouraged the Iranians to agree to "zero enrichment," according to three European officials and one Israeli official with knowledge of the issue. Two sources said the Russians also briefed the Israeli government about Putin's position regarding Iran's uranium enrichment. "We know that this is what Putin told the Iranians," a senior Israeli official said. However, "the Iranians said they won't consider it," said one European official. (Axios)Iran Hosting and Protecting Al-Qaeda Leadership, Says UK - Damien McElroy Intelligence officials in the UK believe that Iran is hosting the headquarters of al-Qaeda, giving the terrorist leadership a lifeline. Parliament's security and intelligence committee reported, "Being based in Iran has allowed [al-Qaeda] to retain some oversight of franchises internationally, creating a complex intelligence landscape, as Iran is a less accessible environment for the West than other parts of the Middle East - which, in turn, may have increased the [al-Qaeda] threat." The committee said that Richard Moore, head of the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), "told us, the Iranian regime has been 'extremely pragmatic for many years in terms of the partners it will enlist, if they are prepared to work against its common enemies in the shape of the United States, the West, Israel in particular.'" Committee chairman Lord Beamish said, "Iran poses a wide-ranging, persistent and unpredictable threat to the UK, UK nationals and UK interests. As the committee was told, Iran i s there across the full spectrum of all the kinds of threats we have to be concerned with." He said Iranian interference in the UK ranged from infiltration, espionage and cyber attacks to direct threat to lives within Britain. The committee found that between the beginning of 2022 and August 2023, there had been at least 15 attempts at murder or kidnap of British nationals or UK residents by Iran. (The National-UAE)Charter Signed by Hundreds of Muslim Scholars Supports Hamas's October 7 Attack on Israel: It Was Jihad Against the Infidels - Y. Yehoshua On June 27, 2025, hundreds of religious scholars and clerics from across the Muslim world held a conference in Istanbul, Turkey, and issued the "Charter of the Islamic Nation's Religious Scholars" to give religious sanction to Hamas's Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel and to reject calls to disarm Hamas. The charter states, similarly to the ideology of the Hamas movement itself, that the conflict with Israel is a religious one between Muslims and infidels, and that Hamas's "resistance" against Israel constitutes "jihad for the sake of Allah." According to the charter, Palestine "from the river to the sea" - namely all of Israel's territory - is Islamic land, and anyone who gives up any part of it is a traitor. It says the demand to disarm Hamas is "treason against Allah" and it highlights the necessity of educating the younger generation to wage jihad for the sake of Allah. Many of the signatories are senior members of the International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) based in Doha, Qatar, and backed by the Qa tari and Turkish regimes. (MEMRI)News Resources - Israel and the Mideast:Two Palestinian Authority Policemen Murder Israeli Security Guard outside Gush Etzion Shopping Center - Idan Bloemhof Shalev Zvuluny, 22, was shot and killed when two Palestinian gunmen opened fire in the parking lot of a shopping center in Gush Etzion, south of Jerusalem. The two assailants, members of the Palestinian Authority police, were killed by armed Israeli civilians following a firefight. (Ynet News)Net anyahu: Iran Willing to Use Nuclear Bomb Against Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Fox News in an interview aired on Saturday that Iran "rushed to weaponize enriched uranium after the fall of Hizbullah and the collapse of the axis. We saw it. We said, within a year they will have a nuclear bomb, and they will use it. Unlike other nuclear powers, they will actually use it, and they will wipe us out." (Jerusalem Post) See also Iranian Advisor Posts Video Depicting Nuclear Strike on Israel (Jerusalem Post)Israel: Hamas Rejected the Qatari-Proposed Hostage Deal Israel accepted the Qatari-proposed hostage deal, based on the Witkoff outline, while Hamas rejected it, a senior official in the Prime Minister's office said Saturday. "Hamas rejected the Qatari proposal, is creating obstacles, refuses to compromise, and accompanies the talks with psychological warfare aimed at sabotaging the negotiations," the official said. Israel "has shown willingness for flexibility in the negotiations, while Hamas remains steadfast in its refusal, holding positions that do not allow the mediators to advance an agreement." (Jerusalem Post)Global Commentary and Think-Tank Analysis: The Gaza War Depleted Hamas Focuses on Capturing Israeli Soldiers in Gaza - Jason Burke Last week, IDF Sgt. Abraham Azulay, 25, was killed in Khan Yunis during an attempted abduction. Hamas militants also tried to take away his body but were stopped by Israeli forces. "This attempt failed. No doubt Hamas will increase its attempts to take new hostages, including bodies of dead soldiers and civilians," said Michael Milstein, head of the Palestinian studies forum at Tel Aviv University. "Hamas may release captives to have a ceasefire, at least for now, but is also attempting to capture more...so is signaling that any agreement is not going to be a permanent end to the overall conflict," said Abdeljawad Hamayel, a Ramallah-based political analyst. Milstein said Hamas was eager for a ceasefire but not at any cost. "Here in Israel, we have had an experiment with the idea that more and more pressure on Hamas means they will give up. Well, how much more pressure can you imagine? We have killed their leaders. We have destroyed Gaza. But we have not changed the basic attitudes and demands of Hamas." (Guardian-UK)IDF: Document Shows How Hamas Used Gaza Hospital for Attacks, Abandoned Its Own Fighters - Einav Halabi The IDF on Thursday released a handwritten document from a Hamas operative proving that the group used the European Hospital in Khan Yunis as a base for combat operations and fired on Israeli troops from within the facility. The document, discovered in February by Israeli soldiers beneath the hospital, outlines an incident in which Hamas company commander Mohamme d al-Bakri ordered an underground tunnel sealed shut while Hamas terrorists were engaged in a firefight with Israeli troops outside. "Let them die outside," al-Bakri told those with him, instructing them to tie the tunnel door closed. The operatives outside the tunnel who were attempting to reach it were subsequently killed. (Ynet News) Hizbullah Why Hizbullah Sat Out Iran's War with Israel - David Daoud Iran spent decades building Hizbullah as its first line of defense to deter Israel or the U.S. from attacking the Islamic Republic and its nuclear capa bilities, and for retaliation in case that deterrence failed. Yet, the first direct Iran-Israel war came and went, but Hizbullah was nowhere to be found. Hizbullah, with Iran's blessing, is prioritizing survival and desperately wants to avoid renewed conflict with Israel. Domestic factors influenced Hizbullah to remain inactive. The overwhelming majority of Lebanese, except for the Shiites, are fed up with the group arrogating to itself exclusive control over Lebanon's foreign policies, including when and with whom their country goes to war. They are calling for Hizbullah's disarmament. The Trump administration upheld the American letter of assurance to Israel attached to the ceasefire deal with Hizbullah of Nov. 27, 2024, which grants the Israelis freedom to act against Hizbullah if Lebanon did not. This allowed Israel to continue relentlessly targeting Hizbullah's assets and personnel throughout Lebanon and stymie its efforts at regeneration. This left Hizbullah too vulnerable to intervene on Iran's behalf. The writer is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. (Ha'aretz) Syria A Syrian Death Factory Gives Up Its Secrets - Jared Malsin Inside Bashar al-Assad's most-notorious death factory, the hangings had become routine. Once a month, around midnight, the guards at Saydnaya prison would call the names of the condemned, usually dozens at a time. They wrapped nooses around their necks, then dragged tables from beneath their feet. In March 2023, the pace picked up drama tically, according to six witnesses. "They gathered 600 people and killed them in three days, about 200 each night," said Abdel Moneim Al-Qaid, 37, a former rebel soldier who was arrested after handing himself in for what he thought was an amnesty deal with the government. On Dec. 8, 2024, rebels stormed the prison in northern Damascus, pulling back the veil on one of the worst examples of systematic state killing since World War II. The world knew about Saydnaya, but failed to stop the atrocities that took place inside. Saydnaya was the largest of dozens of execution centers that Assad's regime set up in an attempt to break the 2011 armed rebellion against his rule. In addition to the many thousands killed in organized executions, former detainees and war crimes experts say perhaps an equal number of people died from torture and extreme conditions, including beatings, starvation, thirst and disease. Some 160,123 Syrians were forcibly disappeared by the Assad regime throughout the war, according to the Syrian Network for Human Rights. (Wall Street Journal) Israeli Security Israeli Teens Facing Military Draft Say They Are Determined to Fight - Rachel Chason Yonatan Baba started his junior year of high school taking classes on Zoom as a security precaution after Hamas's attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. Over the course of the war, he said, friends of his have been killed or injured while fighting in Gaza. Last month, on the eve of what was supposed to be his graduation ceremony, Baba huddled in a bomb shelter in Tel Aviv, comforting a neighbor amid a barrage of Iranian missiles. A cross Israel, where military service is compulsory for most Jewish citizens above 18, a cohort of high school students who graduated last month will be among the next wave of conscripts entering the Israel Defense Forces - their views on Israel's place in the world shaped by fire. And now many say they are determined to fight. "We need to be ready to sacrifice ourselves and to protect our country," said Baba. While he has seen friends come home from Gaza physically wounded and withdrawn, he has only grown more resolved, he said, because "I don't want my kids to grow up in a place with rockets and kidnappings." Many young Israelis across the political spectrum saw their sense of security shattered in the wake of Oct. 7 and as a result have grown more hawkish, said Tamar Hermann, director of the Center for Public Opinion at the Israel Democracy Institute, which conducts regular surveys. "Young people, and especially young men, see themselves as part o f the national war effort," she said. "They see the war as meant to guarantee Israel's security in the future." The IDF is getting more requests to join elite combat units. Elite units are highly competitive, with top students vying for front-line positions. Physical and mental tests start years before draft day. Shahaf Davidovich, 18, whose family evacuated their home in northern Israel after Oct. 7, when Hizbullah began firing rockets into Israel, will join the paratroopers in August. "Everyone knows that we are surrounded by people who don't want us here," he said. "We know that we want to contribute as much as we can to defend the only Jewish country that we have." (Washington Post) U.S.-Israel Relations Confessions of a Reformed Anti-Zionist - Zahava Feldstein I grew up with 16 years of American Jewish day school. At seventeen, I stood on the train tracks of Auschwitz wrapped in an Israeli flag, convinced that Jewish survival deserved any cost. When I arrived at college, my professors taught me that Zionism is a colonial project, depicted Jews as European interlopers, and described Israel's existence as dependent on the continual subjugation of Palestinians. So I walked away. First from Zionism, then from Judaism itself. At that point, I thought I had liberated my conscience. In truth, I had only hollowed it out. In my mind at the time, rejecting Zionism and recognizing my "privilege" equaled solidarity with the oppressed. Really, though, I was living in a borrowed story - a story written by others, for whom Jewish pain is always suspect, Jewish safety always provisional. After Oct. 7, while enrolled as a PhD student at Stanford, I experienced firsthand how quickly "political anti-Zionism" slips into irrefutable Jew-hatred. I lived it. I am trained in critical race theory, ethnic studies, and Jewish and Middle Eastern history. Most Stanford classmates measured my solidarity by my willingness to endorse the murder of Jews, the rape of Jewish women, and the immediate dissolution of the Jewish state as necessary for the project of "decolonizing Palestine." To my classmates (and quite a few professors), to mourn the loss of Jewish lives was invalid - the selfish conspiracy of an oppressor. The same progressive thinkers who demanded I acknowledge complexity in every other struggle refused to grant even a fraction of that nuance to Jewish experience. They interpreted my attempts to humanize Jews as proof of my complicity in empire and racism. My classmates assured me that unless I was in agreement that Jews deserve to be murdered i n the fight for "Palestinian liberation," I would never belong in their intellectual community. Being a Jew has always meant refusing to abandon our inheritance simply because it makes others uncomfortable. I am no longer willing to apologize for being a Jew. I have come back to my community, not because it is flawless, but because it is mine. And I will never again let anyone tell me that loving my people is something I must outgrow. The writer is Director of Academic Partnerships and Network Engagement at the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP). (Times of Israel)Observations: Red Flags Everywhere: How U.S. Public Opinion Is Tilting toward Palestinians - Irwin J. Mansdorf (Israel Hayom)The view of unbreakable American support for Israel may be a political mantra that may be true now, but a closer look at trends among the American population will show that a conceptual change may be taking place in full view.A few "red flags" are out there. The most glaring is the precipitous increase in antisemitism. Jewish leaders have called "for the government to take strong and aggressive action to stop the antisemitic murders, attacks, violence, and harassment."Hillel reports a 700% increase in antisemitic incidents against Jewish students. The recent overt acts of violence resulting in Jewish deaths in Washington and Boulder lend credence to these sentiments.If people are moving toward having less of a favorable attitude towards Israel, it is only a matter of time before the politicians that represent them do the same.In repeated polls over the last year and a half, sympathy for Israel over Hamas is indeed significant, but when "Palestinians" is substituted for "Hamas," this support wanes meaningfully. There is also a large swath of the population that is ambivalent on the matter, citing equal support for "both sides." The data we see all point to behaviors that don't support sympathetic attitudes toward Israel.If the political balance in the U.S. swings over from what we see today, the policy ramifications may be grave. Taking today's America for granted may be understandable, but taking tomorrow's America for granted may be simply foolish. The writer is a clinical psychologist an d a fellow at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs specializing in political psychology.Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign AffairsDaily Alert is published on Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday. Unsubscribe from Daily Alert. | ||
Loading...
Loading...
