Ceasefire with Lebanon?

 The emerging ceasefire agreement between Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah terrorist organization includes the following principles, the Israeli newspaper Israel Hayom has learned:

Hezbollah will withdraw its forces north of the Litani River and will not renew its military presence in the area between the Litani and the Israel-Lebanon border.

 The Israel Defense Forces will pull back from Hezbollah’s current first line of positions in Lebanon, returning to the international border. The Lebanese army will dismantle Hezbollah’s remaining infrastructure in the area between the border and the Litani within 60 days of signing the agreement.

 The agreement will include international guarantees from the United States and Russia to prevent Hezbollah from rearming. As part of this framework, Syria will be responsible for stopping any weapons transfers from its territory to Lebanon, in contrast to the situation that prevailed in the years before the war.

In any instance of a violation of the agreement—whether by Hezbollah’s rearming or military actions against Israel or Israelis—the IDF will have the right to act in response, with international backing.

Israel Hayom has also learned that Israel’s Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer will depart for Russia, as previously reported by Army Radio, and then to the United States to finalize the remaining details of the agreement. Among other meetings, he is expected to meet with President-elect Donald Trump.

Last night, a senior government official confirmed to Israel Hayom that substantial progress had been made in diplomatic negotiations on the northern front.

Noa Tishby - Progrom in Amsterdam

 

Arab-Israeli soccer fan spoke Arabic to violent mob, saved Jewish fans

By Vered Weiss, World Israel News

A Druze Israeli said he spoke Arabic to Muslim attackers and warned Jewish Israelis during a violent anti-Israel riot that broke out after a soccer game in Amsterdam on Thursday.

Melhem Asad, from Kisra-Sumei, a Druze town in Israel, described how Dutch security guarded Israelis on their way to the Ajax-Maccabi game in Amsterdam. Still, the security situation fell apart at the conclusion of the game.

Asad told Channel 12, “We felt very safe, but at the end of the game the situation changed completely.”

“The fans were simply abandoned, we all got on the trains and headed for the hotels, and the local police just messed up, big time. They didn’t secure us, they didn’t watch over us, we felt very exposed,” he said.

Asad heard a group of people speaking in Arabic about their plans to attack Israelis, and that is when he realized he could use the fact that he spoke Arabic to confuse their plans.

He said, “I heard people from across the street talking in Arabic and planning on how and where to attack the Maccabi Tel Aviv fans. I took advantage of the fact that I spoke Arabic and shouted at them. They thought I was one of them.

Asad continued, “I told them that the Jews were no longer here, that they had fled. I did everything to confuse them; I knew exactly where our fans were, and it worked. I convinced them to go in the other direction.”

After Asad had confused some of the mob’s plans, he ran to warn the Israelis. He recounts, “I ran towards groups of Israelis and warned them that people were trying to harm us.”

Asad told them to take them off their Maccabi shirts after he heard members of the mob saying they would attack anyone wearing a Maccabi shirt. He ran into bars and restaurants to warn Israelis.

“My goal was to save everyone possible; I saw the amount of hatred and the number of people. I started running between bars, restaurants, alleys, wherever I knew the fans were passing on the way back from the game,” Asad said.

He said that the incident in Amsterdam made him think of October 7th and the hatred of Hamas terrorists who attacked Israelis.

“My heart burned at that moment. Unfortunately, I could not save everyone, but I tried to warn as many Israelis as possible. I feel that God sent me at the right moment and in the right place to save those who can.”

One Kibbutz on Gaza Border Starts to Rebuild Lives

 

This kibbutz on the Gaza border shows hope, energy and resilience
at its best as the residents of Nirim start rebuilding their lives

Life on the Border - Haifa where it is not at all normal

 (From my friend in Haifa,  Forest Rain Marcia - Life on the Border)

Here’s a tiny snippet of Israeli reality that is not at all normal –

Today I am at home, working on my computer. As I work, the alerts of sirens elsewhere beep on my phone. Every beep a siren screaming at other Israelis to run for their lives.

I saw the pattern of the alerts and it was obvious that they were getting closer to my location. I thought to myself, “maybe I should get up and go pee before the sirens go off and I have to run for the shelter.”

I didn’t get up – and the sirens went off. I grabbed my phone, keys and ran down to the shelter.

The other neighbors who were at home came down too. The young parents worried about their baby in his daycare (elsewhere in Haifa). The young woman with her two little dogs. Other neighbors.

Then a stranger came running in, panting. She left her care in the middle of the road and wasn’t sure where to go for shelter. We calmed her down and told her to just focus on catching her breath. It’s better to worry about her car being in other people’s way than to go out to early and risk shrapnel.

We waited our 10 minutes, according to safety guidelines and everyone went back to what they were doing before.

And that was better than yesterday –

I was on the highway, in the center of Israel when the sirens went off. We were in the left lane and had to get to the right side of the road where there was a bit of a shoulder. The concept is to get as far away from the cars as possible and, if there is no shelter, to lie flat, as low as possible and pray that any shrapnel flies over your head and doesn’t pierce your body.

Just getting to the side of the road wasn’t easy. Some people, in panic, kept on driving and could have easily hit anyone crossing the highway. We managed it, climbed over the rail and discovered there was a ditch to lie in – better than nothing and certainly better than being on the same level as the cars. When there is a blast car windows can shatter and become piercing shrapnel

We found ourselves in the ditch with a mixture of other people. Those who haven’t seen the results of missile impact are less careful about following safety guidelines than those of us who have. It's important to lie down, not just kneel and to get as far away as possible from anything that can turn into shrapnel.

 

There was a young woman, perhaps 17 who was on the phone with her dad so he could tell her what to do. She was worried about leaving the car and didn’t know how to protect herself. We showed her how to lie down and explained why and then took pictures so she could show her dad that she implemented what he was trying to explain on the phone. A young mother was holding a little girl, perhaps 10, trying to pretend that everything was normal. People were going back to their cars too quickly so I reinforced what the mother was doing, telling the little girl that her mom was right, that it’s important to wait the full 10 minutes and that she was very brave. She told us her name and smiled. The mother who had a harder time smiling, told us that it was the second time in the same day they were having that experience.

The booms from the interceptions were very loud. Very close. They make little puff clouds in the sky that are not at all cute when you know that they are death interrupted.

At night we heard the news that a young man was killed by shrapnel when he got out of his car to lie down in a field, according to instructions. He was alone and the missile was too close, the shrapnel hit the wrong way and there was no one there to provide emergency care.

This is our reality and it’s not at all normal.

One Gazan Citizen, Two Jobs!

(With thanks to Ben Herskowitz)

 
               

Why The IDF Destroyed This Girl’s House In Lebanon

written by David Mark November 4, 2024 

The video below has been making the rounds on social media in the attempt of defaming the IDF and tricking viewers into believing that Israel blew up an “innocent Lebanese” home. 

While it’s true the IDF destroyed this girl’s home in Khiam, her video does not tell the truth. Khiam is a known Hezbollah stronghold. It has been used to target Metula with non-stop rocket and anti-tank fire since October 8th. It is also Hezbollah’s main position blocking the IDF from reaching the Christian city of Marjaayoun which rests on the southern side of the Litani River.

A Lebanese woman who lives outside of Lebanon identified the piano in her home (more like a palace...) in the city of Khiam in southern Lebanon in a video posted by IDF soldiers on social media. She published the "after" and then the "before". The piano survived.

 

This same house, with its piano is nothing other than a major command center for Hezbollah. 

 That’s right, Julia Ali’s house was not some sort of innocent upper middle class home with a beautiful piano. It was a major Hezbollah position used to fire cornet missiles at Israeli civilians in northern Israel. That means Julia and her family are more than likely Hezbollah operatives and due to their purposeful targeting of civilians they are guilty of war crimes.

So why is this important?

Villages like Khiam and others close to the border with Israel are not some peaceful towns that have nothing to do with the conflict. They serve as the forward bases for Hezbollah soldiers themselves. Often times, the families in these buildings are members of Hezbollah. In other instances, Hezbollah chased out the families and took over their houses.

All of this should be a reminder that Jihadists condone the use of “civilians” as part of their armed conflict against their enemies. For Jihadists there are no civilians, just soldiers with different roles.