The IDF and Shin Bet announced on Sunday that a senior Hamas commander responsible for the deadliest assault on Israeli forces during the current war in Gaza was killed in a targeted drone strike over the weekend. The commander, Khalil Abed al-Nasser Mohammad Hatib, led a Hamas cell in the terror group’s Maghazi Battalion. He was behind a devastating RPG attack on January 22, 2024, that claimed the lives of 21 Israeli soldiers—the highest single-day death toll for Israeli forces in the ongoing conflict. According to the IDF, Hatib’s cell fired rocket-propelled grenades at two buildings near the Israeli border that had been fortified and prepared for demolition, as well as at a tank providing cover for the troops. The ambush resulted in catastrophic losses for the Israeli unit.

Two bridges in Russian regions bordering Ukraine collapsed on Sunday following explosions that Russian officials attribute to Ukrainian sabotage. The attacks, which killed at least seven people and injured 69 others, occurred in the Bryansk region, a strategic area near the Ukrainian border. Concurrently, Ukrainian drone strikes targeted Russian airfields, including one housing strategic bombers. According to Reuters, a road bridge in the Bryansk region collapsed onto railway tracks due to an explosion. Russian authorities reported that the incident killed seven people and injured dozens.

Hamas claimed on Sunday that Israeli forces killed at least 31 Palestinians and wounded 175 others near a U.S.-backed aid distribution site in Rafah, Gaza Strip, alleging the shootings occurred as civilians sought humanitarian aid. However, security footage released by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which operates the site, directly contradicts these claims, showing no gunfire or injuries at the time and location specified by Hamas. The incident reportedly took place approximately one kilometer from the GHF distribution hub in Rafah’s Tel al-Sultan neighborhood, an area controlled by Israeli forces. Hamas-run Gaza health authorities and the enclave’s Government Media Office claimed that Israeli troops opened fire on crowds moving toward the aid site.

U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee slammed France’s recent efforts to promote unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state, calling the move “revolting” and ill-timed amid Israel’s ongoing war with Hamas. In an interview with Fox News, Huckabee said the push for Palestinian statehood is out of touch with the current Israeli sentiment following the October 7, 2023, Hamas massacre that triggered the war in Gaza. “It’s incredibly inappropriate in the midst of a war that Israel is dealing with to go out and present something that I think increasingly Israelis are steadfast against,” Huckabee said.

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Vandals defaced France’s national Holocaust memorial, two shuls, and a kosher restaurant in central Paris with green paint overnight Friday. Among the sites targeted was a shul in the historic Marais district. Israeli President Yitzchok Herzog, whose great-grandfather Rav Yoel Herzog zt”l built the shul, said he was “appalled” by the incident and spoke with French Jewish leaders to offer chizuk and solidarity. “These heinous acts of hatred cannot go unanswered,” President Herzog said.

Syria’s new president, Ahmad al-Sharaa, formerly known as Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, has expressed a willingness to engage in dialogue with Israel, while urging an immediate halt to Israeli airstrikes in Syrian territory. In a rare interview published Wednesday by the Jewish Journal, al-Sharaa struck a markedly different tone from his predecessors, suggesting the two nations share common enemies and hinting at the potential for future cooperation. “The era of endless tit-for-tat bombings must end,” al-Sharaa said. “No nation prospers when its skies are filled with fear.” While stopping short of endorsing normalization with Israel, al-Sharaa acknowledged the possibility of regional alignment.

A harrowing incident in South Williamsburg earlier this week has ignited a firestorm of concern within New York City’s Orthodox Jewish communities – and has become a major talking point in a New York City Council race. On Sunday evening, a 3-year-old Chasidic girl was struck by an e-bike while crossing the protected bike lane on Bedford Avenue, sustaining minor injuries. The event, captured on video and widely circulated on social media, has intensified condemnation of the city’s bike lane policies. The child had just exited a double-parked car near Park Avenue when she darted into the bike lane and was hit by a 22-year-old cyclist, who remained at the scene. She was treated at Bellevue Hospital for minor abdominal injuries.

In a damning new report, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) revealed that Iran conducted secret nuclear activities using undeclared material at three long-suspected sites — confirming fears that Tehran was operating a clandestine nuclear weapons program. The confidential report, obtained by Reuters, was requested by the IAEA’s 35-nation Board of Governors and outlines decades of nuclear violations. It concludes that Iran operated a covert and structured nuclear weapons initiative until the early 2000s, and stored nuclear material and contaminated equipment at a fourth site, Turquzabad, between 2009 and 2018 — the same facility publicly exposed by Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu at the United Nations in 2018.

United Airlines announced on Saturday that it will resume its flight route between Newark Airport and Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport starting June 5. The airline becomes the second U.S. carrier to reinstate service after a Houthi ballistic missile struck near the airport earlier this month. The May 4 missile attack, launched from Yemen, hit a wooded area adjacent to an access road near Terminal 3, several hundred meters from the airport’s control tower. In response, United and most foreign carriers suspended service to Israel. Since the strike, numerous international airlines have continued to postpone their return to Israel, leaving many Israelis abroad scrambling for alternate routes or facing cancelled plans.