Today’s Image
This is a Waze map image captured from an Israeli mobile phone. Waze, an Israeli Company bought by Google, is widely used in Israel. I only use Apple Maps because I am an “Apple Bigot” and only use Apple products. My phone showed a similar image today, but in Cairo. The IDF is jamming GPS signals all over the country. Until a couple days ago it was mostly restricted to the north. But now, with threats coming from all over the Middle East, signal are being jammed all over the country. Lebanese are seeing similar problems. I guess that their phones are showing that they are in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
Gaza Rockets
No rockets fired from Gaza landed in Israel the past four days.
Casualties
No IDF casualties have been reported in the past six days.
Gaza Operations
Today, the IDF announced that it has confirmed its attack on July 13 of a villa owned by Hamas Khan Yunis Brigade Commander Rafah Salame also killed Hamas military leader Mohammed Deif, who survived more than four previous assassination attempts.
Hamas combatants were reassembling inside an UNRWA school in the Shejaya neighborhood of Gaza City when IDF drone launched missiles struck them using small, precise missiles. The facility was watched for hours before the strike to ensure no civilians were in the school at the time.
And in Khan Younis several rocket launchers, armed and ready to fire, were destroyed by Israeli Air Force aircraft.
Operations continue in Rafah’s Tel al-Sultan neighborhood where booby trapped buildings are being either dis-armed or blown apart, sometimes with Hamas combatants inside. Recently, in an interview on Israeli TV the commander of the Southern Forces was asked how many civilians were killed in the Rafah operations. You remember, this is the operation over which Biden and his administration threatened Israel and forced the IDF to postpone its entry into the area by more than 3 months. He said that to his knowledge 0, that is none, civilians were killed during operations in Rafah, but more than 1,300 Hamas combatants have been killed. Too bad Israel didn’t ignore the US’s advice earlier…
Yesterday, Al-Jazeera claimed that one of its runners in Gaza was killed in an Israeli air strike. Today the IDF confirmed that Ismail Al-Ghoul was killed in the strike and that he was a member of Hamas’s Nukhba force, participating in the October 7 massacre. They have videos to prove this. Al-Ghoul, among other things, was instructing the other terrorists, during the October attack, on how to film and distribute the videos of their vicious actions. You can read more here.
Hamas has called for a “day of rage” to coincide with the burial of Ismail Haniyeh in Doha, Qatar. They and the Palestinian Authority like to do that. They call for a “day of rage” frequently. It generally consists of a general strike by merchants and demonstrations (that means rock throwing) in the streets.
Lebanon Operations
Yesterday I reported that of the 12 children still hospitalized from the Majdal Shams tragedy last Saturday, 3 remained in serious condition. Today it was announced that only 2 are in serious condition with all the rest on the road to recovery.
Syria/Iraq/Egypt/Jordan/Turkiye/Iran
Today, in both The Jerusalem Post and The New York Time, reports have surfaced that the explosion that killed Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was not an aerial missile but a bomb that had been planted in his Tehran residence in June, 2024 and then remotely detonated. The explosive and means for detonation are very similar to the manner in which Iran’s nuclear chief Mohsen Fakhrizadeh was assassinated in November 2020. Also, according to reports in the Israeli Press, it is believed that, despite all the nonsense being published in much of the Western News Media, the removal of Haniyeh will improve the possibility of a hostage/ceasefire deal as he was recently becoming an obstacle in the negotiations. But, just to remind everyone we still do not know who was actually behind this assassination. Here are more details. It is almost surreal, like an episode out of Apple TV+’s TV Series - “Tehran”, which is produced in Israel.
According to reports in many Western outlets, Iran’s Supreme Leader Sayyed Ali Khamenei has ordered a direct attack on Israel. According to many of these reports, Iran is coordinating with its partners in the “Axis of Resistance” to plan retribution. It is interesting how one day Iran is planning attacks with its fanatic partners and the next it is telling the USA and Saudi Arabia that it has very limited influence on the Houthis. Here in Israel:
people are being advised not to travel abroad for fear of an attack on foreign soil,
people are genuinely worried and taking precautions regarding trips inside the country,
many foreign airlines have announced suspension of flights to/from Israel stranding many Israelis in Europe,
outdoor concerts and fairs are being cancelled/postponed and
most of us are expecting some form of attack in the next 3-4 days.
It was also announced today that the bodyguard “protecting” Haniyeh, Wasim Abu Sha'ban, in Iran was a Hamas Nukhba terrorist commander responsible for an attack on IDF forces back in 2014. He and his team emerged from a cross border tunnel and launched an anti-tank missile killing 5 Israelis. So one could say that the killing of Haniyeh was a “two fer”, i.e. two for the price of one. Here is a photo of the Haniyeh’s residential building in Tehran, before the assassination:
On Channel 12 this evening it was reported that Israel is working through its connections in the Gulf States to coordinate anti missile systems in the event that Iran fires hundreds of missiles and drones against Israel in the coming days.
Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said today that Israel has turned “rogue”.
In other news, Reuters reports that Turkiye under the leadership of President for Life Tayyip Erdogan has vetoed every single NATO initiative intended to collaborate with Israel since Hamas’s October 7 attack. Here is the article.
IDF General
The Ministry of Defense announced today the signing of a major armaments deal with the Israeli Defense company, Elbit Systems. The deal amounts to $340M USD for the purchase of precision, advanced ammunitions. They will need to build a new factory in order to meet the order. Who knows maybe they will be able to replace all those arms being held up by the Biden Administration in the USA.
Aid
A total of 173 aid trucks entered Gaza today. Most were picked up for distribution, a refreshing change. I guess that the IDF’s new policy to killing anyone armed and interfering with the aid distribution is having the intended affect.
Politics/Protests
Protestors, about a two hundred, representing the families of the hostages blocked the major traffic artery in Israel, right outside my apartment building, this evening. It blocked traffic in both directions at rush hour on the busiest intersection in the country. I wonder if they really think that such actions help them in garnering support for their cause??
And there was a small protest by the ultra-orthodox this afternoon on a different traffic artery. They blocked traffic as they were mad that they might be forced to enlist in the IDF.
International
Due to recent operations in which terrorist leaders are being assassinated in the Middle East and as a precautionary measure, the US Navy has deployed 12 of its ships to the area.
And In Your Copious Spare Time…
This recent report describes how one of the IDF special forces units came close to capturing Hamas Leader Yahya Sinwar during operations in Khan Younis. During this operation they estimate that they destroyed 100 km of Hamas tunnels.
If you happen to be able to access The New York Times, behind their paywall, you should read this Op-Ed by Bret Stephens. Here are a few choice quotes:
Title - Israel’s Five Wars
“The threat of a major escalation on Israel’s northern border has turned entire cities into ghost towns and displaced more than 60,000 Israelis from their homes. That’s the proportional equivalent of roughly two million Americans forced out of their homes by the threat of terrorism.”
Israel’s most strident critics insist that the current conflict is about Palestinian existence, about Israel’s alleged refusal to grant a Palestinian homeland. But that’s a historically ignorant claim — and a dishonest one. Israel agreed to a Palestinian Authority in 1993, offered a Palestinian state in 2000 and vacated the Gaza Strip in 2005. When campus protesters at Princeton chanted, “We don’t want no two states, we want ’48,” they weren’t asking for Israel to accept a Palestinian state. They’re demanding Israel’s abolition.
It’s Israel’s war for the legitimacy of its actions, a war against the “yes but” thinking that now describes the middle ground of Western opinion on the conflict. That’s not a demand that people turn off their brains when it comes to judging Israel’s behavior. On the contrary, it’s a request that they turn their brains on.
How exactly do the people who say Israel has “the right to defend itself” propose that it do so against an enemy that entrenches itself beneath civilians in hundreds of miles of tunnels? What’s their strategy for lawful urban warfare against an enemy that fights unlawfully from hospitals and mosques and homes? Despite their notional acceptance of Israel’s right of self-defense, are they really calling for anything more than a unilateral cease-fire?
Antisemitism is the cause of Oct. 7, not the consequence of it. Mountains of documentation attest to this and predate the creation of the state of Israel: Haj Amin al-Husseini, the mufti of Jerusalem, met Adolf Hitler in 1941 to avow their shared struggle against “the English, the Jews and the Communists.” Today, it’s no surprise to see those who cheer Hamas’s aims are assaulting synagogues in Berlin or Los Angeles. Hatred of Jews will always find a convenient explanation or excuse; Israel is the latest, but hardly the first.
And here is a great OP-ED from the editorial staff at The Wall Street Journal.
“The press is fretting that the strikes will further delay negotiations over a Gaza cease-fire, and perhaps they will. But the evidence has shown that Hamas gives ground when it is most under military pressure. Israel recently killed Hamas military chief Mohammed Deif. The Hamas politicians remaining in Qatar now know their lives are also on the line if they continue to resist Israel’s reasonable terms. Al Qaeda and ISIS aren’t allowed “political wings” with terrorist diplomats in expensive suits. Why should Hamas be treated differently?”