Free Republic

ADL complains to US Postmaster General after mail to Israel turned away in several states. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has written to complain to the US Postmaster General, after receiving widespread reports that US post offices around America have been refusing to accept mail to Israel. In the last several days ADL reports that it has received complaints from Massachusetts, Michigan and New Jersey, revealing postal customers were incorrectly told that the US Postal Service is not accepting mail for Israel due to Operation Protective Edge in Gaza. "The postal employees have told these individuals that current USPS policy says...

Two hours before the Gaza truce was due to end Wednesday midnight, Palestinian rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip at large parts of southern Israel, including Ashkelon, Kiryat Gath, Yoav District, Shear Hanegev. Two were intercepted. No casualties were reported. Hamas envoys said that the Cairo talks had broken down and the truce would not be renewed unless their conditions were met. They called off a scheduled news conference without explanation. Hamas went back to launching rockets after Israel nodded its acceptance of a further truce, while at the same time concentrating armored forces on the Gaza border in...

Two months ago, after much lobbying by the biggest satellite company in North America, DigitalGlobe, the US government relaxed restrictions to allow for commercially available satellite imagery up to 25 cm resolution—twice as detailed as the previous limit of 50 cm. Now, the first commercial satellite set to capture these high-res images, DigitalGlobe's Worldview-3, will launch this Wednesday. The extra sharp images from Worldview-3 will greatly increase the maps' level of detail to the point where it can make out 10-inch objects, which means Google will soon be able to see “manholes and mailboxes” from its hired eyes in the...

Criticism of the government’s handling of the Gaza war is reaching fever pitch. No one seems to understand what direction Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is pulling them in vis-a-vis Hamas. And everyone is getting the feeling that the terrorists increasingly determine the flow of life in Israel. Hundreds of families from the villages in the vicinity of Gaza protested what they said is the government’s failure to provide security in Israel’s southern regions. The sentiment, which is shared by Israelis across the country, is that the army pulled out of Gaza too early. A number of cabinet ministers agree. Foreign...

LONDON, United Kingdom – Today's anti-Israel protests in London reportedly attracted around 150,000 according to organisers, making the rally the largest since Israel's war against the terrorist group Hamas began over a month ago. The Independent newspaper quotes London's Metropolitan Police in saying that the march from the BBC's studios on Regent Street to Hyde Park "was entirely peaceful and no arrests were made". But photos obtained exclusively by Breitbart London show a dark side of the protests that mainstream media organisations refuse to report. The march, which was attended by Members of Parliament, media commentators and more, also played...

Jewish Home head says Protective Edge has not succeeded as long as residents of the south are not safe. Jewish Home Chairman, Economics Minister Naftali Bennett, said Sunday that Israel prefers the security of its citizens to international approval of its actions. He made clear that he did not see Operation Protective Edge as having achieved its aims. “The government of Israel embarked on the Protective Edge campaign and defined the goal as bringing back security to the residents of the south. We need to look at the picture with honesty and say that the goal has not yet been...

A rocket fired from Gaza scored a direct hit on a house in the embattled Israeli city of Sderot - but miraculously no injuries were caused as the residents were out at the time. However significant damage was caused to the property itself, and police were called to deal with shrapnel from the rocket. Terrorists usually pack Gaza-made "Kassam" rockets with nails, ball bearings and other pieces of shrapnel to maximise the lethality of the missiles. Several other rockets fired at the same time landed in open areas, including one in the city of Ashkelon and another in the the...

In the space of a few hours, two Palestinian terrorist attacks occurred in Jerusalem, both in areas close to Arab districts. In the second, Monday afternoon, Aug. 4, a motorcyclist shot an Israeli soldier outside the tunnel leading to Mt. Scopus and Wadi Joz, injuring him seriously. As the assalant raced off, a passerby shot at him and missed. The soldier was evacuated with stomach wounds to the nearby Hadassah Hospital which shares Mt. Scopus with the Hebrew University campus. A large-scale hunt has been launched for the assailant. Three hours earlier, a 19-year old Palestinian rammed a heavy excavator...

A reporter for France 24, Gallagher Fenwick, was reporting from Gaza Friday and explaining how its residents' “food security” has been affected by the fighting there, when something unexpected happened. "This was a rocket,”, a rattled Fenwick told his audience, “this was a rocket, rockets were just shot right next to where we are standing, so I'm not going to stand here very long because usually there's a strike just moments after this occurs.” The occurrence proves Israel's contention that Hamas fires rockets from among civilians, using them as human shields and manipulating any civilian casualties that are thus incurred,...

WASHINGTON — Following the quick collapse of the cease-fire in Gaza, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the White House not to force a truce with Palestinian militants on Israel. Sources familiar with conversations between Netanyahu and senior U.S. officials, including Secretary of State John Kerry, say the Israeli leader advised the Obama administration “not to ever second guess me again” on the matter. The officials also said Netanyahu said he should be “trusted” on the issue and about the unwillingness of Hamas to enter into and follow through on cease-fire talks. An Israeli official said the Netanyahu government viewed...

Let’s just recap what happened with the abduction of an Israeli soldier this morning. The Israeli government believed the word of the Secretary of State of the United States that, via his Turkish and Qatari friends, he had obtained acceptable terms for a ceasefire with Hamas. Mr. Kerry’s flunkies even bragged about the success of his Turko-Qatari connections, chiding those who looked askance at his bromance with friends and sponsors of Hamas. What happened next – a surprise attack on Israeli troops in the southern Gaza Strip an hour and a half into the “ceasefire”, an abduction of a soldier...

The IDF believes there is a high likelihood that a soldier was kidnapped this morning in Rafah (Rafiach) at 9:30am. Hamas terrorists attacked IDF troops this morning during the cease fire, a battle ensued, at it is believed they managed to kidnap a soldier. They have made numerous attempts, since the war began, to abduct soldiers, and this may have been their goal all along. The soldier’s family has been notified.

If you want to judge a nation, look at how it treats its most vulnerable civilians. Hospitals are a good place to start. Al-Shifa, the largest hospital in Gaza, is housed in a converted British army barracks. Some 126 miles north is Israel’s Ziv Medical Center in Zefat. Hamas, which controls Gaza, is using the civilian population as human shields. The terrorist group has placed its missiles in schools and mosques and, even more deplorably, burrowed its command center underneath the al-Shifa hospital. Hamas‘ activities are taking place in plain sight. Just two weeks ago, The Washington Post described al-Shifa...

The House on Wednesday passed a resolution to condemn the extremist group Hamas for its recent rocket attacks against Israel. The measure, passed by voice vote, specifically denounces Hamas's use of civilians as "human shields" during combat. "Hamas is engaging in a crime of enormous proportions, perpetrated by those who are deliberately hiding among civilians to protect themselves," said House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-Calif.). "The world can't let terrorists embed their forces among the civilian population, using them as human shields, without speaking out." It also expresses support for Israel to defend itself against Hamas, as well...

Three Israeli soldiers were killed and 27 injured in the Gaza Strip Wednesday, July 30, on the 23rd day of Israel’s counter-terror operation Defensive Edge against Hamas. A bomb planted in the wall of a building in Khan Younes blew up as the soldiers went in to examine a tunnel shaft. Maj. Gen. Sami Torjeman, OC Southern Command, told reporters that the soldiers had fought “stubbornly” and “seriously impaired” Hamas’ strength. Hundreds of enemy fighters have been killed, he reported, including scores of Hamas’ elite troops and some of the commanders hunkered down in their hideouts. Dozens too had been...

There needs to be an investigation of the UNRWA over this. Could it really keep happening without any UN officials knowing what was going on? The problem is, who can investigate the United Nations? Not Obama’s investigative or intelligence apparatus. In any case, if we had a President who had America and its allies’ best interests at heart, that President could announce that no U.S. funds would go to the United Nations if any more jihad rockets were found in its schools — and the schools would thenceforth be clear of the rockets. “THIRD Rocket Arsenal Found At UN School...

The conversation between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Barack Obama was tense and tough, according to a report on Channel 1 Tuesday evening. Based on a transcript of the conversation, obtained by Israel’s channel 1, Obama “behaved in a rude, condescending and hostile manner,” the network’s foreign correspondent concluded. During the 35-minute conversation on Sunday, the president reportedly demanded that Israel should immediately and unconditionally end the operation. When Netanyahu asked what Israel would get in return for unilaterally ending the strikes, Obama replied: “I believe Hamas will stop firing rockets – quiet in return for quiet.” To which...

That nine of the 10 Israeli servicemen who died in the counter-terror operation against Hamas Monday, July 28, were killed on Israeli soil was a wake-up call for Israel’s war leaders. It meant that Hamas had used the 22 days of combat to carry the contest from its own home ground into Israel by grabbing the tactical advantage of surprise. The Nahal Oz encounter was a tragic microcosm of the current face of Operation Defensive Edge. The tunnel, from which a band of Hamas infiltrators jumped out – and about whose existence the IDF admits to have known – ran...

IDF chiefs have asked the government for a clear decision on whether to expand their counter-terror operation in the Gaza Strip which entered its 22nd day Tuesday - or terminate it. This was reported by a senior IDF officer Tuesday. He put it this way: “Decide now whether we go in or out.” DEBKAfile: This comment reflects the mounting criticism in the IDF high command of the government’s slowness in reaching a decision about the next stage of the operation against Hamas. This irresolution, they say, exposes the troops to danger and point to the 10 fatalities the IDF suffered...