A cargo ship damaged by a Houthi missile and abandoned in the Red Sea is slowly taking on water, the U.S. military said early Saturday, warning that its sinking could be environmentally disastrous because of a large load of fertilizer it was carrying.

The operator of the vessel, called the Rubymar, said the partly submerged ship was still afloat and would soon be towed to Djibouti or Aden, a port city in Yemen. Its remaining cargo would be transferred to another ship and sent to Bulgaria, said Roy Khoury, the head of the ship’s operator, Blue Fleet Group. The ship’s engine room and one of its holding compartments are underwater, he said.

The U.S. Central Command said in a statement on social media early Saturday that the damage to the vessel had created an 18-mile oil slick. The command called it an “environmental disaster” that could get much worse if the tens of thousands of tons of fertilizer the ship was carrying were to spill into the Red Sea.

Though few of the Houthi missile and drone attacks on ships in the Red Sea since the start of Israel’s war in Gaza have inflicted major damage, the attack on the Rubymar appeared to be one of the Houthis’ more serious to date. At least one missile struck the ship on Monday night after being fired from a part of Yemen controlled by Houthi militants, the U.S. military said.

The Houthis, an Iran-backed group that has been targeting ships in what they call a campaign to pressure Israel to stop the war in Gaza, later claimed that they had sunk the ship. But satellite imagery and the ship’s operator confirmed that the Houthis had not. The U.S. Central Command said it was anchored but slowly taking on water.

After the Rubymar was hit, its crew issued a distress call and then abandoned ship, according to the Central Command. A coalition warship responded to the distress call, and the crew was taken to a port by a merchant vessel in the area, a Central Command statement said.

They were taken to Djibouti by a vessel operated by a French shipping company and have since flown home, according to Mr. Khoury. Djibouti port officials said 24 crew members were on board: 11 Syrians, six Egyptians, three Indians and four Filipinos.

The port officials also said that the fertilizer the Rubymar was carrying is classified as “high consequence dangerous goods” for its combustion risk by the International Maritime Organization, the U.N. body that regulates global shipping. The Central Command said the ship was carrying 41,000 tons of fertilizer when it was attacked. The Blue Fleet Group did not comment about the ship’s cargo.

The Rubymar, a bulk carrier sailing with a Belize flag, is owned by Golden Adventure Shipping, a company registered in the Marshall Islands, Mr. Khoury said. The Blue Fleet Group is based out of Athens.

Since the Houthis began attacking ships in the Red Sea, a coalition of countries, including the United States and Britain, have used naval forces to defend vessels and retaliate. The U.S.-led coalition has repeatedly struck missiles and launchers in Yemen and intercepted drones and missiles. But the attacks have persisted against ships flying a variety of flags.

On Thursday, the Central Command said that it had conducted “self-defense strikes” against four Iranian-backed Houthi drones and two missiles that were prepared to launch from Houthi-controlled parts of Yemen. On Friday, the military said it had shot down three Houthi drones near “several commercial ships operating in the Red Sea” and destroyed seven missiles being prepared to launch.

The U.S. and the United Kingdom conducted a series of strikes at 18 Houthi targets at eight different locations inside Yemen Saturday, part of a continuing effort to fight back against the Iran-backed group that has continued to attack commercial and military vessels in the Red Sea.

The strikes Saturday hit a number of Houthi targets, including underground weapons storage facilities, other missile storage facilities, one-way attack drones, air-defense systems, radars and a helicopter, according to a statement issued by the Pentagon. The U.S. and U.K. conducted the strikes with assistance from Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Denmark, the Netherlands and New Zealand.

“These precision strikes are intended to disrupt and degrade the capabilities that the Houthis use to threaten global trade, naval vessels, and the lives of innocent mariners in one of the world’s most critical waterways,” according to the statement, issued jointly by all the countries supporting the operation.

The operation Saturday was one in a series of planned, joint strikes on Houthi targets to counter the more than 45 attacks the Houthis have mounted against commercial and military vessels in the Red Sea since November. Those attacks on vessels began following Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza, which was sparked by the militant group’s attack on Israel Oct. 7 that killed about 1,200 people.

Saturday’s operation marked the fourth time since last month the U.S. has conducted the larger, strategic joint operations with the U.K and the other nations against multiple targets at one time. Those operations are different from the so-called self-defense strikes that the U.S. has been conducting routinely in recent weeks.

The Houthi problem has presented deep challenges to the U.S. and other countries as they try to deter the group—which is armed, funded and supported by Iran—from further attacks. The Houthis have a large number of missiles and cheap, one-way drones they use to attack vessels in the Red Sea, U.S. officials have said, and the group’s attacks have become more audacious.

That includes an attack against one U.K.-owned ship that injured a crew member, and another that nearly struck another ship, the U.S.-owned M/V Sea Champion, on its way to delivering humanitarian aid to Yemen.

Other attacks include a Feb. 18 attack on M/V Rubymar, a Belize-flagged, U.K.-owned cargo ship that was hit and is now at risk of sinking in the Gulf of Aden. That ship had to be abandoned by its crew. It is now anchored but taking on water and poses a serious environmental danger, officials said, as it is carrying 41,000 tons of fertilizer, which could end up contaminating the Red Sea. The attack on the ship has already caused an 18-mile oil slick, officials said. And a British-owned, Palau-flagged cargo ship off the southern coast of Yemen was set on fire following a strike on it on Thursday.

Also on Saturday, the USS Mason, a guided-missile destroyer, shot down an antiship ballistic missile that was launched into the Gulf of Aden by the Houthis and appeared to be targeting the MV Torm Thor, an American-flagged, owned and operated chemical and oil tanker, according to military officials. The tanker wasn’t damaged and there were no injuries, officials said. That operation was one of dozens of so-called self-defense strikes the Pentagon has conducted in recent weeks against the Houthis.

Since the Israel-Hamas war began Oct. 7, the U.S. has also had to defend American troops against a different set of Iran-backed groups who operate in Iraq and Syria. There have been more than 165 attacks against troops in those countries as well as Jordan, where an attack late last month left three American service members dead.

Earlier this month, the U.S. struck 85 targets in Iraq and Syria in an effort to deter further attacks on American forces such as one inside Jordan in which three American troops were killed. The U.S. also used a special precision Hellfire missile with six long blades known colloquially as “the Ginsu” to kill the Syrian leader of an Iran-backed group, Kataib Hezbollah, in Baghdad earlier this month. That strike has, for now, all but stopped attacks on American troops in Iraq, Syria and Jordan, who are there to conduct a train-and-advise mission against Islamic State.

Police used water cannons against anti-government protesters while clashing with them in Tel Aviv on Saturday night, as demonstrators at a nearby rally calling for the return of hostages held in Gaza expressed rare optimism following reported progress in talks on a hostage deal with Hamas.

The clashes, the most violent of their kind since the outbreak of war on October 7, resulted in 21 arrests and several injuries Saturday night on Kaplan Street, opposite the Kirya army base, which is the headquarters of Israel’s defense establishment.

Protesters at adjacent Democracy Square — the intersection of Kaplan Street and Begin Road — confronted officers who were tasked with preventing the demonstrators from blocking the Ayalon Highway, a police spokesperson said. Clashes and water cannon blasts also reached demonstrators gathered at the site of the anti-government rally approved by police.

At least two of arrested demonstrators were leaders of the protest movement against the government, according to spokespeople for a loose affiliation of groups on their WhatsApp channel titled “Israeli Pro-Democracy Protest Movement.” Several people required medical treatment after the clashes, in which mounted police knocked over some 10 individuals to push back the crowd.

Video showed one mounted officer using the reins of his horse to strike a protester across the head.

Two soldiers killed in Gaza; IDF says gunmen found hiding among fleeing civilians

Troops nabbed several members of terror groups who attempted to hide among a group of civilians evacuating from combat zones in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis, the Israel Defense Forces said Sunday, illustrating the challenges of fighting in the crowded territory as Israel comes under increasing criticism over mounting threats to Palestinian civilians.

The issue was further driven home by Israel’s announcement that it had wrapped up a weeklong raid on a Khan Younis hospital, maintaining it had attempted to take patients’ needs into account while claiming that both weapons and fighters had been found there, necessitating the incursion into a compound normally off-limits to fighting.

The deaths of two soldiers brought Israel’s death toll in the lengthy ground offensive to 240, as troops continued to battle in various hotspots around the Strip, with a looming offensive into the far southern Gaza city of Rafah put off for the time being after talks on a truce and deal to free hostages appeared to make rare progress over the weekend.

Fighting has shunted Gaza’s civilians out of many areas, largely driving them south toward Rafah and other areas along the Egyptian border where safe zones have been established. Each day, thousands flee fighting in an attempt to reach safety, but fear the safety may not last should Israel expand its ground offensive into Rafah, the last Hamas stronghold remaining in the Strip.

Intense fighting is still ongoing in Khan Younis, some five kilometers (3.5 miles) north of Rafah. According to the IDF, terror operatives were captured by troops of the 7th Armored Brigade as they tried to flee with the civilian population, underlining Israeli claims that Hamas and other terror groups are embedding themselves within the civilian population, endangering noncombatants.

The military did not say how soldiers were able to spot the terror operatives among the civilians but noted that troops killed several more gunmen and located weapons in the area.

The two Israeli fatalities were named as Staff Sgt. Ido Eli Zrihen, 20, of Jerusalem, and Staff Sgt. Nerya Belete, 21, from Shavei Shomron. Both had been fighting with the Givati reconnaissance unit in southern Gaza. In addition, an officer and two soldiers in the Givati Brigade were seriously injured in fighting in the southern Gaza Strip, the military said.

Soldiers were engaged in close combat against Hamas forces, killing fighters in gun battles, and ambushing gunmen with snipers, as well as calling in airstrikes.

Troops raided a number of sites, finding weapons, explosives, grenades, rifles, and other military equipment. A rocket launcher and a long-range projectile were found hidden in a refrigerator in a medical lab in the area, the army said.

The IDF also confirmed it had wrapped up a “precise and limited operation” at Nasser Hospital, where some 200 terror suspects were nabbed, some of whom are alleged to have links to the October 7 onslaught on southern Israel and the taking of hostages. Some 1,200 people were killed in the Hamas-led assault on communities near Gaza that sparked the war, and another 253 taken hostage, mostly civilians.

The IDF confirmed it had found sealed boxes of medication with the names of Israeli hostages on them in the hospital, part of shipments apparently send by relatives without the Israeli government’s involvement.

Israeli hostages had been previously held at Nasser Hospital, according to testimonies from released captives and interrogated terror suspects.

The army said weapons belonging to Hamas operatives were also found during several days of operations in the hospital.

The World Health Organization had said the hospital, Gaza’s second largest and crucial to the territory’s crippled health services, was unable to function during the weeklong raid, calling it “a massive blow to Gaza’s health system.”

However, the army said it had taken pains to “ensure minimal disruption to the hospital’s ongoing activities and without harming patients and medical staff,” delivering a replacement generator after the hospital’s stopped functioning during the operation and enabling fuel to be delivered to the premises to keep the generator running. It denied that power to the medical center had been interrupted and said it said it “coordinated the entry of professional officials to examine the electricity problem in the hospital.”

Food, water, medical supplies, and infant formula were also delivered to Nasser Hospital with IDF coordination, it said.

Fighting also raged in the Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City, an area previously conquered by troops but where forces have recently been redeployed. Airstrikes rocked sites across the Strip, including attacks on cells operating drones in southern Gaza and the coastal Shati area of Gaza City.

The Gaza health ministry, which is controlled by Hamas, said early Sunday that 98 people had been killed overnight, with the Hamas media office reporting strikes along the length of the territory, from Beit Lahia in the north to Rafah in the south. The figures cannot be verified and do not differentiate between fighters and civilians.

According to the Hamas, 29,606 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the war, two-thirds of them women and children. Israel says its troops have killed more than 12,000 terror operatives.

Amid concerns of a worsening humanitarian crisis in the Strip, with shortages of food, water and medicine reported, the health ministry said on Saturday that a two-month-old baby identified as Mahmud Fatuh had died of “malnutrition” in Gaza City.

Save the Children said the risk of famine would continue to “increase as long as the government of Israel continues to impede the entry of aid into Gaza.”

Israel has defended its track record of allowing aid into Gaza, saying that 13,000 trucks carrying relief supplies had entered the territory since the start of the war.

An AFP reporter said there were a number of airstrikes on Saturday evening in Rafah, a city along the territory’s southern border with Egypt where hundreds of thousands of Gazans have fled to escape fighting elsewhere.

The presence of so many civilians packed into the area has sparked concerns over Israeli plans for troops to finally push into the city, the last major urban center the military has yet to enter.

But hopes that the offensive may be staved off rose over the weekend as talks in Paris were held between Israel, American, Egyptian, and Qatari representatives produced the outline of a deal to free hostages and pause the fighting. It remained to be seen how Hamas would respond to the latest proposal, but reports said the terror group has softened its position on some points.

Multiple reports indicated the outline includes the release in the first phase of some 40 hostages held in Gaza, consisting of women, children, female soldiers, and elderly and ill abductees, along with a pause in fighting of some six weeks.

It also includes the release by Israel of hundreds of Palestinian terror convicts, and a “redeployment” of Israeli troops within Gaza — but not a complete withdrawal as Hamas had previously demanded. The outline would also reportedly see Israel enable the return of Palestinian women and children to northern Gaza, from where hundreds of thousands evacuated during the fighting, and which Israel has kept cut off from the rest of the enclave.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signaled Saturday night that the expected push into Rafah had not been abandoned, adding that “at the beginning of the week, I will convene the cabinet to approve the operational plans for action in Rafah, including the evacuation of the civilian population from there.”

“Only a combination of military pressure and firm negotiations will lead to the release of our hostages, the elimination of Hamas, and the achievement of all the war’s goals,” he added.

Israel’s global allies have voiced deep concerns over the harm an offensive could cause, with the city full to bursting with civilian refugees from throughout the Strip.

Rafah has swelled in size in recent weeks. Hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians have splayed out across the town in tents or at the homes of friends or relatives. The estimated 1.5 million people sheltering there — more than half of Gaza’s population — have nowhere to flee in the face of an offensive that has leveled large swaths of the urban landscape in the rest of the territory.

UN officials warn that an attack on Rafah will be catastrophic, with more than 600,000 children in the path of an assault. A move in the town and surrounding area also could cause the collapse of the humanitarian aid system struggling to keep Gaza’s population alive.

Israel says it must take Rafah to ensure Hamas’s destruction and to free the remaining hostages held by terrorists.

Hamas 'could not have anticipated' Israel's response to October 7, official says

Updated: FEBRUARY 25, 2024 17:57

Hamas official Mousa Abu Marzouk claimed that Hamas did not anticipate Israel’s response to its October 7 massacre, according to a translation of an interview given to Egypt’s Alghad TV on Thursday by the Middle East Media Research Institute.

“When the [al-Qassam] brigades did what they did on October 7," the interviewer asked, "did they have any expectations regarding the consequences of the attack?” Marzouk responded that nobody had anticipated Israel’s response.

“Nobody in the whole world expected them to be so barbaric,” Marzouk said. “And in such violation of all international laws, treaties, and norms. Nobody expected the [Israeli response] to be so barbaric because, ultimately, the resistance fights soldiers. It is not fighting civilians with planes and tanks.”

The same Hamas official claimed in October that terror tunnels had been constructed to protect Hamas terrorists and that it was Israel's and the United Nation's responsibility to protect Palestinian civilian lives.

The IDF has been forced to fight on Gazan terrain as Hamas has a large amount of military infrastructure built within civilian areas of Gaza. Notably, terror tunnels used by Hamas have been located under hospitals and the UNRWA headquarters.

Despite evacuations in Gaza, the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry has claimed that over 30,000 Palestinians have been killed since Israel began operations.

The interviewer prompted again, asking “What would you have done if you had expected these consequences?”

Ignoring the question, which seemed to ask Marzouk if Hamas would have attacked on October 7 if it had known that Israel would respond the way it has, Marzouk said, “Nobody expected that the Western powers, the US and Britain, would wage a war against civilians. Nobody had expected that.

Taking the initiative, Marzouk asked the interviewer: “Do you think that anyone in the world could have expected there to be a world war? In the sense that America, Germany, Britain, France, Italy, and Spain – all of them would gather armies, and the US would send two of the largest aircraft carriers to the Mediterranean Sea, all in order to fight a movement?

“By what logic could anyone have expected that the US and the entire West would unite without exception to wage war against a movement? Who could have expected this?"

Only a day after Hamas launched its massive terror attack, where they murdered over 1200 people and kidnapped over 240 more, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced that the US would move a carrier strike group closer to Israel. This strike group included US would move a carrier strike group closer to Israel. This strike group included the USS Gerald Ford carrier.

The Gerald Ford, spanning 333 meters in length and 78 meters in width, is the first completely new US aircraft carrier in four decades, Walla! reported. It'sIt is designed with enhancements to reduce radar signature and to boost efficiency.

The mass Western response to October 7, which Marzouk claimed could not have been anticipated, may also be connected to the large number of foreign nationals killed and kidnapped during the attack.

One now-released hostage, 3-year-old American citizen Abigail Idan, had drawn significant attention from US President Joe Biden, who discussed her captivity with Qatar's Emir. Abigail’s parents Roy and Smadar were murdered on October 7, and she made one of 40 children abducted to Gaza.

In December, the White House confirmed that America estimates that eight US citizens are still being held in Gaza, according to Reuters.

As Lebanon teeters on the edge, a war with Israel would be catastrophic

BEIRUT — Wages for Lebanon’s soldiers have fallen so low that many now have second jobs driving for Uber or working as parking valets. A GoFundMe campaign has been launched to support the country’s emergency response services. Angry depositors in Beirut have attacked the headquarters of a major bank with fireworks because it wouldn’t release their savings.

Even before the Israel-Gaza war, Lebanon was in economic crisis: Since 2019, the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) has fallen by 50 percent, and poverty now plagues 80 percent of the population.

A wider war, long feared amid ongoing skirmishes between Israeli forces and Iranian-backed Hezbollah along Lebanon’s southern border, would be catastrophic.

Lebanon is no stranger to disaster, having survived a 15-year civil war and a conflict between Israel and Hezbollah in 2006. But this time, according to Simon Neaime, an economics professor at the American University of Beirut, the Lebanese are exhausted.

“The situation is totally different today. In 2006, during the last war with Israel, we had a fully functioning economy, we had a functional banking system supplying credit to the private sector and contributing to growth, we had a government in place, we had a president,” Neaime said.

The signs of disintegration are everywhere. The country has been without a president for more than a year, and a functioning government for almost two, and the currency has lost more than 90 percent of its value since 2019.

Lebanon’s insolvent banks won’t allow depositors to withdraw their money in full, which the rating agency S&P Global has called a selective default. The Association of Banks in Lebanon has said the institutions do not have enough liquidity to pay back depositors.

On Jan. 7, travelers through Beirut’s airport saw the arrival and departure screens suddenly flash a message addressed to the powerful leader of Hezbollah: “Hasan Nasrallah, you will not have any supporters if Lebanon is drawn into a war for which you will bear responsibility.”

The message underlined the deep fear that Hezbollah’s current confrontation with Israel could explode into a new war — and showed how easy it was to hack vital transportation systems.

Neaime said that in 2006, Lebanon received support from Arab countries, particularly oil-rich Persian Gulf nations, for reconstruction after the end of that war. This is not the case today, with ties to the gulf monarchies strained by Hezbollah’s increased regional presence, and the tension compounded by a general lack of interest in Lebanon among younger gulf leaders.

In fact, one of the only remaining elements of Lebanon’s traditional formula for survival is the Lebanese themselves — or rather those living abroad. A 2023 U.N. study estimated that remittances from the diaspora, averaging $6.5 billion a year, account for more than a third of GDP.

“This is what has kept the economy running; this is the major source of foreign exchange today besides meager tourism revenue. We don’t export much — we import a lot,” Neaime said.

But if a full-blown war breaks out, he said, “it will become very difficult for the Lebanese diaspora to continue sending remittances from abroad.”

According to the Policy Initiative, a local research center, foreign investment indicators have been trending downward since the war started in October, reflecting a lack of investor confidence in the country. The fighting has also harmed the nation’s tourism sector and agriculture, much of which is based in the south and accounts for a significant portion of exports.

Public services and the people who staff them have borne the brunt of the financial crisis, with salaries becoming nearly worthless after the currency lost most of its value. Many of these services, such as hospitals and emergency response, would be crucial in a war.

“We do not have equipment to rescue anyone from under the rubble. We do it manually using our hands and with primitive instruments,” said Hussein Fakeh, head of civil defense in the south. A GoFundMe page was set up in January to support the organization, which includes firefighters and EMTs — though it has denied any link to it. “A wider potential war with Israel would certainly impact our work with the limited capacities,” he added.

Lebanon’s overburdened health-care system will also be unable to cope if the war spreads. Shut out by the skyrocketing costs of private health care, most people are forced to seek treatment at underfunded public hospitals in a country whose health care was once the pride of the region.

According to Doctors Without Borders, rates of individuals relying on treatment from aid agencies are on the rise. In areas near the country’s border with Syria, the organization has observed a 67 percent increase in clinic visits since the financial crisis started.

Talent is also in limited supply. According to Caline Rehayem, medical coordinator for Doctors Without Borders Lebanon, “with the overlapping crises, a number of health-care professionals — doctors and nurses — have left the country.”

“War could be devastating on the medical services in the country because of the low staff and the lack of medical supplies and equipment,” said Lorda Helow, a nurse at a Beirut hospital, whose salary of $500 a month barely lasts her a week.

And then there is the military, where increasing numbers of soldiers are moonlighting to pay the bills. The United States is pushing for Hezbollah to move its troops well north of the Israeli border to de-escalate tensions, and this hinges on a strong Lebanese army having an increased presence in the area.

The army is already relying on substantial foreign funding to pay, feed and medically treat soldiers. Although it has received military aid from the United States totaling more than $3 billion since 2006, the needs are still immense.

The United States sent $72 million in 2023 alone for temporary financial support of salaries. That same year, Qatar donated $30 million in fuel and, in 2022, sent $60 million for salaries, as well 70 tons of food. France has provided medical equipment.

“I couldn’t feed my family. I used to earn $1,500 [a month] from the army, and then all of a sudden, it was just $60, and I have a daughter who was only 2 — she was still on diapers and baby formula. So I had to work at night,” said one former soldier, who drove for Uber while still reporting for duty during the day.

“We joined the army so that we could raise our children, but it got to a point where we could not afford to do that,” he added, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic. He eventually took early retirement and left the military, saying soldiers were being humiliated.

Even if war doesn’t eventually break out, Neaime said, economic and financial collapse are still possible.

“No reforms have been introduced since the financial crisis erupted in 2019. Nothing has been done to deal with the crisis. So let alone what’s happening in the south, the economy is still on a collision path with a full collapse.”

Israel-Gaza war: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a postwar plan for Gaza that pushes for indefinite military control over the Palestinian enclave. The U.S. opposition to an immediate cease-fire in Gaza came under repeated criticism during a two-day meeting of the chief diplomats of the world’s 20 largest economies.

Middle East conflict: Tensions in the region continue to rise. As Israeli troops aim to take control of the Gaza-Egypt border crossing, officials in Cairo warn that the move would undermine the 1979 peace treaty. Meanwhile, there’s a diplomatic scramble to avert full-scale war between Israel and Lebanon.

Hours before Hamas attack, IDF noticed dozens of terrorists activating Israeli SIMs

At around midnight before Hamas’s October 7 onslaught, Israeli intelligence officials identified that dozens of terror operatives in the Gaza Strip had activated Israeli SIM cards in their phones, the Israel Defense Forces acknowledged on Monday,

The massacre in southern Israel was launched hours later, at 6:30 a.m., during which some 3,000 Hamas-led terrorists burst across the border into Israel from Gaza by land, air and sea, killing some 1,200 people and seizing 253 hostages of all ages — mostly civilians — under the cover of a deluge of thousands of rockets fired at Israeli towns and cities.

The IDF censor allowed some details of the SIM cards case to be published after it was reported during a live Channel 14 news broadcast on Sunday, although it did not verify the report, which claimed some 1,000 SIMs were activated simultaneously at midnight.

In a statement Monday, the IDF and Shin Bet security agency said reports that around 1,000 Israeli SIM cards were activated simultaneously in the Gaza Strip hours before the October 7 onslaught were “false and far from reality.”

They said that in practice, “several indicative signs accumulated, which included, among other things, the activation of only dozens of SIMs, which were activated in previous events in the past.”

“As previously published, on the night of October 7th, indicative signs were received for which situation assessments were conducted and operative decisions were made accordingly,” the IDF and Shin Bet said.

“The indicative signs are based on a variety of tools and capabilities, including technological tools whose method of operation cannot be detailed,” the statement added.

As the devices with Israeli SIMs had been activated in the past, without anything happening, this led Israeli intelligence officials to believe Hamas could again be carrying out an exercise, and this was not seen as a definitive sign of a planned attack. They decided to continue consultations on the matter throughout the night.

Further details surrounding the case of the SIM cards were not permitted to be published at this stage. It is believed that Israeli SIM cards enabled the terrorists better communication in southern Israel during the onslaught.

The IDF has said it will investigate all the incidents in the lead-up to the October 7 attack.

It was previously reported that on the night between October 6 and 7, hours before the early morning assault, an email was sent from an IDF base on the Gaza border describing “certain signs coming from Gaza” about an imminent attack. At the same time, the Shin Bet security agency also saw signs that something was up.

At around 1:30 a.m. on October 7, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi’s office manager was updated about this by the Shin Bet, and then by the IDF general in charge of the Southern Command. At around 3:30 a.m., Halevi was awakened. He asked to arrange a telephone consultation in order to hold a situational assessment. That session took place some 90 minutes later.

The IDF’s operations chief arranged his own consultation ahead of Halevi’s, found the same signs of an imminent attack and sought explanations as to whether this was a drill or a strategic operation against Israel set for the coming hours. That consultation concluded that no definitive explanation could be reached, and sought additional intelligence from the IDF’s 8200 signal intelligence unit.

When they held their consultation, Halevi, the head of IDF operations and the Southern Command chief were updated on the signs of an imminent attack. Halevi asked for more information and ordered that the Israel Air Force be updated. He also ordered that the intelligence information be checked — including from a perspective skeptical of the then-prevailing assumption that Hamas was not interested in war.

Maj. Gen. Aharon Haliva, the head of the Intelligence Directorate, was not involved in these October 6-7 consultations, as he was on vacation in Eilat. He was updated around 3 a.m. about the worrying signs from Gaza, but took no part in the consultations and wasn’t available by phone for them.

Haliva was quoted as later telling those around him that, even if he had participated in the consultations, he would have concluded that it was apparently a drill and dealing with the matter could wait until the morning. “It wouldn’t have changed the final result in any way,” he reportedly said.

Israel had multiple sources of information on Hamas’s drills and other preparations for an assault in the weeks ahead of October 7, reportedly including a 2022 Hamas attack plan.

The IDF had long touted its security fence, with cameras, watchtowers and high-tech sensors, as providing security to residents of Gaza border towns. But on October 7, Hamas terrorists knocked chunks of it aside with explosives and bulldozers at multiple locations, then drove right through the gaping holes in jeeps and on motorcycles, while others sailed over in hang gliders, as drones dropped explosives on observation towers and took out cameras. Amid a simultaneous rocket barrage across southern and central Israel, an estimated 3,000 terrorists stormed into southern Israel and slaughtered soldiers and civilians alike, with some local resistance but the military establishment slow to react.

Last week, The Times of Israel learned that the IDF would begin probing operational failures in the lead-up to the October 7 massacre, after Halevi decided not to wait until after the fighting ends to look into what went wrong.

The probes, set to begin by the end of the month, are aimed at drawing operational conclusions for the military, and will not look into the policies of the political leadership — thus avoiding a fight with government leaders who have insisted that investigations wait until after the end of Israel’s war against Hamas.

No longer afraid of sparking war, Israel takes gloves off against IRGC in Syria

Israel’s years-long air campaign against Iran-linked groups and weapons in Syria appears to have shifted into high gear in recent months, with strikes on high-value targets at a pace that is “changing the rules of the game,” according to experts.

Although Israeli attacks on Iran-sponsored weapons transfers and Tehran-backed militias, including Hezbollah, go back to at least 2013, the air force is now unleashing more frequent operations that include assassinations of Iranian officials. Those on the ground have taken notice.

In just the last few days, Israeli jets hit two members of the Hezbollah terror group traveling in a truck near the Syrian-Lebanon border Sunday morning, and bombed a residential building in an upscale neighborhood of the Syrian capital Damascus frequented by leaders of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, killing two people, according to local news sources. Tehran’s media sources claimed that no citizens of the Islamic Republic were killed.

“[Israeli airstrikes in Syria] are no longer just about attacking weapons transfer or attacking Damascus international airport,” said Carmit Valensi, a senior researcher on Syria and head of the northern arena program at the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security Studies (INSS).

The uptick in attacks seemingly started sometime shortly after October 7, as Israel found itself fighting in Gaza and fending off attacks from Iran-backed groups from Lebanon, Syria and beyond.

Since December, more than half a dozen IRGC officers have been killed in suspected Israeli strikes on Syria, including Iranian Brig. Gen. Seyed Razi Mousavi, a longtime Guards adviser in Syria slain in an Israeli airstrike on a suburb of Damascus.

“It seems that Israel is taking advantage of the war momentum to increase its activity against Iran in Syria,” said Valensi.

Israel has not claimed responsibility for the assassinations, but it has admitted to conducting strikes against arms shipments believed to be bound for Iran-backed groups in Syria, chief among them Hezbollah.

Valensi noted that before fighting began in Gaza, killing members of the Quds Force — the IRGC’s expeditionary unit — or Hezbollah operatives, would have been considered a red line, liable to spark a war.

That all changed on October 7, when Hamas-led terrorists stormed into southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people and kidnapping 253 others.

In the days and weeks after the massive terror attack, other war fronts were opened by Iran-backed paramilitary groups against Israel, including from Lebanon and to a much smaller extent Syria to the north, and from Yemen to the south.

With the region already plunged into conflict, Israel no longer needs to pull punches to the same degree.

“In wartime, we have a different set of rules, by which Israel has more freedom of operation. Iran and Hezbollah have very limited ability to respond when it comes to the Syria theater,” Valensi said.

According to experts, Iranian military personnel on the ground in Syria number only in the dozens. The bulk of the forces controlled by the Islamic Republic in Syria, aside from Lebanese Hezbollah, are made up of foreign Shiite militias, imported mainly from Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

“Iran doesn’t like when Iranian Persian-speaking people are killed,” said former intelligence officer Col. (Res). Miri Eisin.

In recent years, according to Eisin, these foreign fighters had been deployed to the Syrian Golan, replacing the residents of towns emptied out by years of civil war. Many moved with their families.

“The whole demographics of the Syrian Golan has been changed,” said Eisin.

While the Iranian military presence in Syria was initially justified to support the Assad regime against rebels groups, the Shiite fighters in the Golan were imported with the explicit goal to “free Jerusalem,” that is, attack Israel, Eisin explained. Their training was carried out by Hezbollah, considered the closest of Iran’s proxies.

The reinvigorated Israeli campaign, however, has put many of them on the defensive, with many of the forces being redeployed away from the Syrian Golan to other areas of the country. They can still theoretically launch missiles at Israel, but a ground attack on the border is no longer feasible.

“The intense attacks that Israel has been conducting lately are a positive development for Israel because they do influence the Iran modus operandi in Syria,” Valensi said.

She said the Iranian pullback had begun in 2020, to minimize exposure to airstrikes. “That has gained momentum in the past four months,” she added.

“After the war broke against Hamas out, there were claims that Iran was increasing its presence in the south, preparing itself for opening another front with Israel,” Valensi said. “But after Israel launched a very intense aerial campaign in Syria, they were deterred.”

The real Israeli innovation, though, is the decision to systematically target IRGC officials, the experts say. Israel has liquidated a number of Iranian officials in Syria in the past, including at least one general in 2015, killed together with senior Hezbollah figure Jihad Mughniye, but strikes against IRGC figures had not been carried out in such a methodical and brazen way as they are now, the experts said.

“It’s like taking a list [of top IRGC leaders] and crossing off the names one by one, Eisin said. “And on top of that, in the heart of Damascus, a few miles away from where Bashar Assad is.”

Two Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)-affiliated sources told the New York Times that Iranian-backed Iraqi militias “fiercely resisted” IRGC Quds Force commander Esmail Ghaani’s orders in late January to halt attacks targeting US forces in the region.  

The two IRGC-affiliated sources claimed that Kataib Hezbollah and Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba commanders refused to stop attacking US forces during a meeting with Ghaani in Baghdad, which Reuters reported occurred on January 29.  Iranian and Iraqi sources added that senior Iraqi Shia clerics in Najaf and influential Iraqi politicians, including the Iraqi prime minister, convinced Kataib Hezbollah and Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba to halt the attacks.

The timeline of events indicates that Ghaani was instrumental in convincing Kataib Hezbollah to pause attacks, not Iraqi leaders. Kataib Hezbollah responded to Iranian directives from Ghaani by announcing that it would “suspend attacks” on January 30—roughly 24 hours after the meeting with Ghaani on January 29.

Reuters reported that Ghaani directed Iranian-backed Iraqi groups to “pause” attacks on US forces during the January 29 meeting. A senior Iranian-backed Iraqi militia commander told Reuters that Ghaani’s influence was essential in convincing Kataib Hezbollah to pause attacks. Reuters added that one group, presumably Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba, did not “initially agree” to Ghaani’s directive.  Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba said on February 2 that it would continue attacks targeting US forces.  The Islamic Resistance in Iraq claimed three attacks targeting US forces after Ghaani’s visit.

Iraqi Shia clerics in Najaf may also lack the influence to convince Kataib Hezbollah to cease attacks. Kataib Hezbollah and Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba are loyal to the Iranian supreme leader, not Iraqi Shia clerics in Najaf.  It is not clear why Kataib Hezbollah and Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba would follow orders from Iraqi Shia clerics over Ghaani, who speaks for the Iranian supreme leader.

Ghaani’s visit to Baghdad illustrates both the extent of and limits to Iran’s control of its proxy network in the Middle East. Most of Iran’s proxies and partners in Iraq immediately ceased attacks following Ghaani’s directive, though it is possible additional pressure from the Iraqi government further reinforced Ghaani’s orders. Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba initially did not agree to stop attacks, but Iranian-backed Iraqi groups have not resumed attacks targeting US forces since February 4.

The Iraqi prime minister has ample reason to attempt to stop Iranian-backed attacks against US forces to avoid additional US airstrikes targeting Iranian-backed groups in Iraq. The attacks—and the ensuing US airstrikes—undermine the prime minister’s ability to retain even a small international coalition presence to support Iraqi forces against ISIS.  Ghaani and Iran can pressure their partners and proxies to pause or resume these attacks as needed, however. Ghaani represents the Iranian supreme leader, to whom groups like Kataib Hezbollah and Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba proclaim loyalty, meaning that many Iranian-backed groups will respond as Ghaani directs.

Hamas Is Losing Every Battle in Gaza. It Still Thinks It Could Win the War.

Senior members of Hamas’s leadership in exile met in Doha, Qatar, earlier this month amid concerns that its fighters were getting mauled by an Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip. Enemy troops were killing dozens of militants each day as they methodically overran Hamas strongholds.

Then a courier arrived with a message from Yahya Sinwar, the head of Hamas in Gaza, saying, in effect: Don’t worry, we have the Israelis right where we want them.

Hamas’s fighters, the Al-Qassam Brigades, were doing fine, the upbeat message said. The militants were ready for Israel’s expected assault on Rafah, a city on Gaza’s southern edge. High civilian casualties would add to the worldwide pressure on Israel to stop the war, Sinwar’s message said, according to people informed about the meeting.

Hamas’s military wing in Gaza is waging an unequal fight with the strongest military in the Middle East—a war brought on by the U.S.-designated terrorist group’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel. But Sinwar, the mastermind of that attack and one of Israel’s prime targets, is playing a different game. His goal is for Hamas to emerge from the rubble of Gaza after the war, declare a historic victory by outlasting Israel’s firepower, and claim the leadership of the Palestinian national cause.

The militants, commanded day-to-day by Sinwar’s brother Mohammed, have changed their tactics since a short cease-fire in November. Hamas fighters are now trying to avoid large firefights and instead use small-scale ambushes—using tools ranging from rocket-propelled grenades to recorded voices of hostages to lure Israeli troops into traps.

The ambushes have little chance of holding territory against Israel’s armored maneuvers. But they’re tailored to Hamas’s limited capabilities, and to Sinwar’s war aim.

“It’s a very sound tactical logic,” said Eyal Berelovich, a civilian analyst for Israel’s armed forces and a military historian at Jerusalem’s Hebrew University. “Their strategic goal is to survive.”

Many in Israel’s military, from senior commanders to ordinary soldiers who spoke to The Wall Street Journal, worry that their accumulation of tactical wins on the battlefield might not add up to a lasting strategic victory. After nearly five months of intense fighting, Israel is still far from its declared war aim of eliminating Hamas as a significant military and political entity.

“Fighting the enemy is like a game of whack-a-mole,” said an Israeli reservist in Khan Younis with the 98th Division. He said many soldiers sense the lack of a plan and wonder what their efforts are for. “It will be very hard to destroy Hamas.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has promised a “total victory” that annihilates the radical Islamist group. Israel’s military defines its mission more cautiously: to reduce Hamas’s capabilities to a level where the group can never again launch an attack like Oct. 7.

But many in Israel’s military believe the government’s reluctance to flesh out a plan for who should govern Gaza after Hamas is leaving a political vacuum that could help Hamas to grow back.

Gaza’s civilians continue to bear the brunt of the war, with thousands killed by airstrikes and ground fire and many more desperate for food, medicine and safety. Around 30,000 residents of the enclave have been killed in Israel’s invasion, most of them women and children, according to Palestinian health authorities, whose numbers don’t otherwise distinguish between militants and civilians. Israeli officials privately say the total death count is roughly accurate but dispute the composition, saying over one-third of those killed were Hamas fighters.

Hamas leaders in Gaza have told Egyptian officials and the group’s political wing in exile that the Al-Qassam Brigades have lost at least 6,000 men killed, out of an estimated 30,000 fighters before the war. Israel says it has killed about 12,000 Hamas militants in Gaza so far, plus about another 1,000 during the fighting in Israel on Oct. 7.

U.S. and Egyptian intelligence officials believe the true losses are roughly in the middle between the Israeli and Hamas claims. Military analysts say Hamas can recruit new fighters to replace its rank-and-file soldiers, but that replacing experienced commanders is more difficult.

Israel has so far lost 242 soldiers killed in Gaza, in addition to over 300 killed on Oct. 7.

Degrading Hamas’s capabilities is a realistic goal for Israel’s military, said Hussein Ibish, a scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute, a think tank in Washington. But sustaining it would require fully occupying Gaza, which would give Hamas a target for a never-ending insurgency, he said. “Recent history shows that you can be an effective insurgency on a shoestring,” said Ibish. “Anyone can make an IED,” or homemade bomb, he said. “It’s easy to get a pistol. If you’re willing to die, you can kill soldiers.”

Which side achieves its broader goal depends in part on the war of narratives. Israelis see the war in Gaza as necessary self-defense after Hamas’s gruesome killing of about 1,200 people in southern Israel on Oct. 7, the bloodiest day in the country’s history.

But the deepening humanitarian crisis and the scale of destruction in Gaza have strained Israel’s relations with countries around the world, including with its closest ally, the U.S. President Biden recently called Israel’s use of firepower “over the top.”

The U.S. is pushing for a cease-fire and Biden on Monday expressed optimism about a deal to pause the fighting and release hostages, but Israel and Hamas warned that their negotiating positions remain far apart.

Israel is betting that its military can do enough physical damage to Hamas to win security for itself, outweighing the diplomatic cost of worldwide opprobrium.

Hamas is betting that it can evade the Israelis’ best efforts to crush it, allowing it to regenerate and claim a political victory.

“We brought the Palestinian cause to the forefront. We have changed the status quo,” Sinwar said in a message delivered to Egyptian officials soon after Oct. 7.

Sinwar and other Hamas leaders initially hoped to trigger a wider war against Israel in the Middle East. But Hamas’s main allies Hezbollah and Iran didn’t want an all-out conflict, leaving Hamas to face Israel’s invasion of Gaza mostly alone.

Early on, Hamas often sought to attack Israeli troops with platoon-sized groups of up to 30 men, according to Israeli officers and military analysts.

In densely built neighborhoods of Gaza City, teams of Hamas fighters carried out coordinated attacks. One group would try to block an advancing Israeli unit. Another group would attack it from the flank. The militants would try to inflict casualties, then disappear into ruined buildings or the maze of tunnels beneath the enclave. But such actions led to heavy losses of Hamas fighters and commanders.

Hamas drew lessons during the November pause, said Israeli commanders and analysts. It shifted to hit-and-run attacks by tiny groups of two or three men, sometimes just one individual.

The new guerrilla tactics were observed throughout the Gaza Strip, said Berelovich, indicating that at that time, Hamas still had a functioning command-and-communications structure in the enclave.

The shift has reduced Hamas’s losses, but also the number of Israelis they are able to kill and wound. “The change in their tactics indicates that their need to survive has outgrown their need to coerce Israel,” said Berelovich.

Ambushes usually involve a rocket-propelled grenade, especially the Al-Yassin 105 round fired from a shoulder-held launcher, which Hamas developed from a Russian design. One fighter fires the RPG, a second man bears an AK-47 automatic rifle, and a third man wields a video camera for social media.

Hamas’s propaganda videos often end just as the RPG explodes, leaving it unclear how much damage was done to the target. The grenades usually do only limited damage to Israel’s heavily armored Merkava tanks, but can be effective against less-protected vehicles as well as soldiers on foot, said Guy Aviad, a researcher on Hamas and former Israeli officer.

Other Hamas ambushes use so-called sticky bombs, improvised explosives that attach themselves to Israeli armored vehicles with magnets or duct tape.

Osher, a tank driver with the Israeli 4th Brigade, recalled being wounded by a sticky bomb in Khan Younis in December. While his unit was searching for a tunnel shaft, a single Hamas fighter ran across the street and attached the bomb to the tank near the driver’s position.

“There’s someone outside,” Osher heard a comrade say just before the device exploded. The force of the blast hit him through the armor. “Driver is OK,” Osher recalled saying, even though he wasn’t. “I couldn’t see or hear, I was concussed,” he said. He followed his training and drove the tank backward to a preplanned evacuation point. His crew told him his face was bleeding.

Hamas also tries to kill Israeli troops by putting booby traps in buildings throughout Gaza, many Israeli soldiers say. Booby traps have been widely found in the homes of Hamas operatives, but also in many civilians’ homes, Israeli soldiers said.

Early on the explosives were placed around the buildings’ entrances. The Israelis soon stopped using the front door, instead blasting or bulldozing their way through the walls of a house. Hamas has adapted, placing explosive traps in items inside buildings, from gas storage balloons to children’s’ toys, Israeli soldiers said.

In some places, Hamas has tried to lure Israeli soldiers into traps by planting explosives in items belonging to Israeli hostages taken on Oct. 7.

The commander of an Israeli unit tasked with reaching and evacuating wounded soldiers recalled an incident when soldiers found a bag bearing Hebrew writing that belonged to a resident of Kibbutz Be’eri in southern Israel. Peering carefully inside the bag, the soldiers saw two grenades primed to go off if the bag was picked up, the commander said.

In other cases, Hamas used voice recordings of hostages begging for help in Hebrew to try to draw soldiers into an ambush. Near the Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, a recording of Israeli voices played for several days over loudspeakers, recalled an Israeli infantryman who fought there late last year. “Please help me, please help me,” the voice said in Hebrew, followed by different voices speaking English with an Israeli accent, and the voice of a child, the infantryman said. “It sounded real. It was so very eerie,” he said.

When Israeli forces first heard such voices, they sent men to check whether hostages were really present, resulting in ambushes and some injuries, the infantryman said. The troops soon switched to using robots to investigate the source of the sound.

The Israelis reduced Hamas’s opportunities for ambushes by pulling out of Gaza City in the enclave’s north in January. But Hamas soon began filtering back into areas that Israeli troops had left. Israel’s military has conducted a series of raids to clear neighborhoods of Gaza City for the second time.

In the battle for Khan Younis, the biggest city in southern Gaza, Israel’s massive forces have dominated the ground and the air so much that Hamas fighters are at risk whenever they show themselves.

“Once they go overground, they’re no big challenge. The challenge is to flush them out from underground,” said Brig. Gen. Dan Goldfus, commander of the Israeli 98th Division, which is fighting in Khan Younis.

But the Israelis have made only partial progress in finding and destroying Hamas’s vast tunnel network.

Israeli officials now estimate that Hamas built around 350 miles of tunnels under Gaza, which is less than 30 miles long and up to 8 miles wide. There are thought to be several hundred tunnels under Khan Younis alone, which occupies an area roughly the size of the Bronx in New York.

Sinwar himself was believed for some time to be hiding in the tunnels under his hometown of Khan Younis, surrounding himself with hostages, but Israeli officials are no longer sure. Israel has made it a priority to kill or capture the 61-year-old militant, who spent 22 years in Israeli prison before becoming Hamas’s leader in Gaza in 2017.

Israeli analysts say Sinwar is ready to die for his cause, confident that Hamas will carry on. Some Egyptian intelligence officials, who like Hamas’s political leadership in exile have received bullish messages from Sinwar about the war, think he has lost touch with reality while hiding underground for months.

The scale of Hamas’s tunnel network distinguishes the fighting in Gaza from any other battles between regular forces and Islamist militant groups in recent history, say military analysts.

Hamas uses the tunnels as military headquarters, to maneuver across the enclaves’ cities, protect its leaders, hide Israeli and other hostages, manufacture weapons and conduct hit-and-run attacks. “Until you take all of this away from Hamas you won’t be able to beat it,” said Aviad.

The tunnels also contain a fixed-line phone system that Hamas used to communicate earlier in the war, along with walkie-talkies, burner SIMs and satellite phones. But with Israel hacking into those systems, the militants have increasingly shifted to using runners to convey verbal or written messages.

The Israeli army has found no systematic solution for finding and destroying Hamas’s tunnels, many soldiers said. Tunnel entrances have been found in homes, schools, mosques, courtyards, streets and farm fields. Some are covered by steel doors, others by mattresses in a home. Israeli forces have mostly relied on drones and robots to search tunnels, only sending soldiers in later to avoid firefights in the narrow passages.

The war is becoming a series of sporadic encounters with individual militants who try to shoot at Israeli soldiers or set off explosives, said the medical-evacuation commander. His unit is rescuing wounded men every two to three days now. At the start of the invasion, it was dealing with between five and 10 wounded soldiers every day. “The pace of events and the intensity is declining. We see there is less and less of the enemy,” he said.

“I didn’t see a single soul,” Israeli staff sergeant Corey Feldman said of his combat experience in Gaza. “We were shot at every day,” he said, but usually the enemy quickly disappeared. “They didn’t stick around long enough to engage in firefights.”

In late January an Israeli unit was preparing to detonate two buildings northeast of Khan Younis, part of the army’s effort to clear a kilometer-wide buffer zone inside Gaza’s border with Israel. Hamas militants emerged from a tunnel and fired RPGs, which set off the detonation charges, collapsing the buildings on top of the Israelis and killing 21 soldiers.

More often, though, the Israelis can bring to bear their firepower and surveillance capabilities. A sergeant from Israel’s 5th Brigade recalled how his unit uncovered and destroyed a Hamas team lying in wait to ambush them. A Hamas spotter posing as a civilian was ready to send a signal to trigger roadside bombs as Israeli vehicles passed by, he said. Fighters armed with RPGs were poised to emerge from tunnels after the explosion.

The Israeli unit called in airstrikes. D9 armored bulldozers plowed over the road, detonating the hidden bombs harmlessly. Engineers blew up the tunnel shafts.

“We’re having a lot of success inside Gaza. The question is what is the plan for the day after,” said the sergeant. “I don’t think there is any clear idea.”