ISRAEL AT WAR - DAY 367
The Times of Israel liveblogged Sunday’s events as they unfolded.
A 50-year-old man is in serious condition after almost drowning off the coast of Tel Aviv’s Gordon Beach.
He was treated by medics at the scene before being rushed to a nearby hospital.
Five Jewish Israelis entered Joseph’s Tomb in the West Bank city of Nablus illegally and had to be extracted by Palestinian Authority police after they were attacked by an angry mob.
One of the Israelis was lightly injured after being hit by stones hurled by Palestinians.
Israelis regularly enter Joseph’s Tomb — located in PA-controlled Area A of the West Bank, which is off limits to Israeli civilians — in controversial overnight visits that are coordinated with the army, but today’s entrance was uncoordinated.
Tel Aviv’s municipality stands by its refusal to allow Rosh Yehudi to hold events on public ground during the Sukkot holiday, the municipality tells the Tel Aviv District Court.
The municipality’s reply today is to a petition filed by Rosh Yehudi last week. In it, the nonprofit, whose activity is focused on encouraging secular Jews to observe an Orthodox Jewish lifestyle, argues that the city unjustly withdrew its permits for holiday activities, including building a sukkah, a ceremonial hut, on public grounds in Tel Aviv.
“The decision was appropriate,” the municipality writes. “As a rule, the municipality does not allow third parties to host events not meant for the entire public, that exclude parts of the broader public, or if the sought use [of public grounds] will cause a disturbance to public life, disturbances, confrontations, and friction.”
The reply follows a request by the District Court of Tel Aviv that the two parties, Rosh Yehudi and the municipality, review their positions and reach a compromise. The request, however, came in a ruling that said the court lacks jurisdiction to intervene in a matter that is squarely within the municipality’s purview. The court therefore effectively rejected Rosh Yehudi’s appeal for an injunction against the city.
The city banned the Sukkot events, citing violations in how Rosh Yehudi ran prayer services for Yom Kippur on Dizengoff Square last week. The city issued the permit for the prayer under the stipulation that Rosh Yehudi refrain from placing a physical barrier between men and women, which Rosh Yehudi had sought to do as per the requirements of Orthodox Jewish law.
The city said this was discriminatory. Rosh Yehudi has been hosting prayers on Dizengoff Square since 2020 with a sex segregation barrier.
Initial reports indicated that at least one person has been killed and several more wounded in a suspected car bombing and shooting incident near Kiryat Malachi in the south.
According to first responders, a car exploded between Routes 3 and 7, wounding two people, one of them critically — who was later pronounced dead — and one of them moderately.
At the same time, two people were reported wounded from gunshots just nearby, one seriously and one moderately, according to the Magen David Adom ambulance service. Initial reports indicate that the gunfire came from police responding to the car bombing.
The incident is suspected to be part of an ongoing feud between local crime families, and not terror-related.
Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef says that secular Jews are “pitiable” and “stupid,” in comments made yesterday at his weekly sermon which were publicized earlier today on social media.
Secular Jews “don’t have any satisfaction in their life,” Yosef says. “A person who eats non-kosher food, his brain gets stupid, he can’t understand things, doesn’t get it. As soon as he starts keeping kosher, you can start to influence him.”
Yosef says that secular Jews are “jealous of [Haredi Jews], it’s all jealousy… it all comes from jealousy and becomes hatred.”
Yosef also says that he believes the majority of Israeli Jews love Judaism, and that it was a “tiny minority” who took part in the protest against gender-segregated prayers in Tel Aviv over Yom Kippur.
Supreme Court President Esther Hayut has reportedly canceled the ceremony at the President’s Residence marking her retirement from the bench, as a sign of protest against Justice Minister’s Yariv Levin’s behavior.
According to the Kan public broadcaster, Hayut has canceled the expected event due to Levin’s refusal to appoint a replacement court president.
Kan also reports that Hayut has requested that Levin not speak at an upcoming ceremony marking the retirement of Supreme Court Justice Anat Baron. A statement from the judicial authority published by Kan notes that it does not believe such a speech would be appropriate, due to a number of open cases involving Levin himself.
The public broadcaster also suggests that Hayut believes Levin would use the speech to criticize the justices, rather than to speak nicely about Baron, as is generally expected.
President Joe Biden vows that the United States will not abandon Ukraine, despite aid being dropped from a deal to avoid a government shutdown, urging Republicans to “stop the games” on funding.
“I want to assure our American allies, the American people, and the people in Ukraine that you can count on our support. We will not walk away,” Biden says in an address from the White House.
The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), listed as a terror group by Turkey and its Western allies, claims responsibility for a suicide bombing in the Turkish capital of Ankara earlier today that injured two people.
“A sacrificial action was carried out against the Turkish Interior Ministry by a team from our Immortal Brigade,” the PKK tells the ANF news agency, which is close to the Kurdish movement.
In a statement from the Prime Minister’s Office, PM Benjamin Netanyahu denies any rift between him and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, and says any such reports are ill-intentioned.
Netanyahu says that the security meeting held earlier today with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and other security officials “was focused on Iran and did not deal with any internal security issues.”
“Any attempt to create a conflict between the prime minister and the national security minister and to attribute it purportedly to sources close to the prime minister are completely false — and done on purpose,” the statement reads.
“The prime minister and Minister Ben Gvir will continue to work fully together for the good of every citizen of Israel.”
Reports have repeatedly swirled that Ben Gvir has been uninvited from several high-level meetings over fears that he will leak classified information to the media or somehow otherwise compromise such top-secret information.
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant has received an invitation from his American counterpart, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, to Washington, his office says.
A statement from the Defense Ministry says Gallant is scheduled to hold the official visit to the United States later this month.
“During the visit, Minister Gallant will meet with additional senior US officials and will discuss developing security challenges and opportunities in the Middle East region,” his office adds.
A list of coalition MKs have sent a letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel Police chief Kobi Shabtai demanding an examination of the treatment of Jewish visitors to the Temple Mount by police officers.
The letter, spearheaded by Religious Zionism MK Simcha Rothman — and signed by several Likud MKs — claims that Jewish visitors to the Temple Mount last week were physically hit by police officers and had their phones and cameras confiscated.
The letter says that “such a reality, after 2,000 years of exile, cannot happen in the Jewish state,” and calls for convening the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee to discuss the issue “if necessary.”
Jewish visits to the flashpoint site have long been a contentious and highly charged issue, at times sparking a significant escalation with the Palestinians. Under the status quo, Jews are allowed to visit but not pray at the site, the holiest location in Judaism, although some groups seek to circumvent those rules.
A number of Lebanese suspects hurled stones at the Israeli border fence near the town of Metula earlier today, the military says.
The Israel Defense Forces says troops responded with riot dispersal means against the suspects, and they fled the area.
Tensions along the border have increased in recent months amid provocations by the Hezbollah terror group, including the erection of two tents on the Israeli side of the UN-recognized Blue Line in the Mount Dov area.
Rep. Matt Gaetz says he will try to remove US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, a fellow Republican, from his leadership position this week after McCarthy relied on Democratic support to pass legislation that avoided a government shutdown.
Gaetz, a longtime McCarthy nemesis, says McCarthy is in “brazen, material breach” of agreements he made with House Republicans in January when he ran for speaker. As a result, Gaetz says he will be filing a “motion to vacate the chair,” as House rules permit.
No speaker has ever been removed from office through such a move. Procedural votes could be offered to halt the motion or it could trigger a House floor vote on whether McCarthy, R-California, should remain speaker.
“I think we need to rip off the Band-Aid,” Gaetz, R-Florida, tells CNN’s “State of the Union.”
“I think we need to move on with new leadership that can be trustworthy.”
McCarthy has the support of a large majority of House Republicans, but because the GOP holds such a slim majority, he may need votes from some Democrats to keep his job.
A man has been shot and seriously wounded in Ashkelon amid an ongoing crime wave that is continuing to spread nationwide.
According to police, a 25-year-old man has been shot and wounded in the coastal city, and police suspect that the incident is criminal in nature and not terror-related.
Magen David Adom paramedics say that the man is unconscious and being treated for his wounds.
Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi denounces any attempts by regional countries to normalize relations with its arch-enemy Israel as “reactionary and regressive.”
The remarks come amid ongoing US-brokered negotiations between Israel and Saudi Arabia to establish formal ties, with the United States saying on Friday that the two countries are moving towards the outline of a deal.
“Normalizing relations with the Zionist regime is a reactionary and regressive move by any government in the Islamic world,” Raisi says during an international Islamic conference held in Tehran.
Raisi further labels any normalization attempt as the “foreigners’ desire,” while stating that “surrender and compromise” regarding Israel are not on the table.
“The only option for all the fighters in the occupied land and the Islamic world is to resist and stand against the enemies,” he says, reiterating Iran’s position that Jerusalem must be “liberated.”
The Attorney General’s Office approves Justice Minister Yariv Levin request to obtain independent legal counsel in petitions to the High Court of Justice against the government’s decision to establish a commission of inquiry into the alleged illicit use of spyware by law enforcement bodies against Israeli citizens.
Petitions were filed against the establishment of the commission on the grounds that it could interfere with, and unduly influence, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ongoing criminal trial.
In a letter to Levin, Deputy Attorney General Gil Limon insists however that the justice minister’s claim on Friday that the Attorney General’s Office has a conflict of interest in the case “lacks any basis,” and argues that as the government’s legal advisory body it is obligated to express its opinion when it believes the government is seeking to “take action which exceeds the boundaries of its authority.”
“The claim that the Attorney General’s Office is at a conflict of interest when it points out legal flaws and a concern over interference with investigative and trial procedures, while harming the law and justice systems, is baseless,” Limon adds.
Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara told Levin last month that the commission does not have the authority to probe open legal cases, and in particular, expressed concern that the committee may interfere with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ongoing corruption trial.
The commission, established in August, will examine the conduct of police and the State Attorney’s Office in matters touching upon procurement of, surveillance with, and data collection through cyber tools, such as the Pegasus software.
In 2022, the Calcalist newspaper reported that the police used spyware tools to spy on dozens of high-profile Israeli figures, including family members and associates of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, without any judicial oversight, although investigations by the police and an interim report by Deputy Attorney General Amit Marari found Calcalist’s reporting to have been largely incorrect.
Dozens of amusement park attendees were trapped on a roller coaster at the SuperLand park in Rishon Lezion, according to social media postings.
אימה בפארק: עשרות נתקעו על רכבת הרים בסופרלנד | תיעוד@hadasgrinberg pic.twitter.com/UjQK2EVm9z
— כאן חדשות (@kann_news) October 1, 2023
The intermediate days of Sukkot are among the busiest days of the year for the park.
According to the Ynet news site, the halt continued for several minutes after someone on the ride hit the emergency brake, before continuing as usual.
An Italian-Palestinian student detained without charges by Israel since August was due to be released, his lawyer in Rome announces.
Khaled El Qaisi, 27, was arrested on August 31 while crossing from the West Bank to Jordan after a family vacation in his home city of Bethlehem.
Family members in Rome appealed last month for intervention from Italy to help the university student, who was born in the Palestinian territories but is also an Italian citizen.
His Italian lawyer, Flavio Rossi Albertini, confirms to AFP that El Qaisi is due to be released but “we don’t have any official information,” he said.
El Qaisi’s wife, Francesca Antinucci, tells the Il Manifesto daily that Italy’s consul in Israel had confirmed to her the pending release. El Qaisi will be subject to bail and prohibited from leaving Israel for 7 days, she says.
The Gaza terror group “Revolutionary Youth,” which has been organizing riots on the Israel border since mid-September, calls off a rally along the security fence a few hours after announcing it.
The group says on its Telegram channel that the call for unrest was made by some group members who had not previously consulted with the leadership, adding that whoever will go to the border today will have to take responsibility for it.
The group adds that it is still “closely monitoring” the actions of the “Zionist enemy” and whether Israel will respect the commitments that were achieved through the mediators last week.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says that the “terrorists” will never achieve their aims, a few hours after an attack near the country’s parliament in Ankara.
“The villains who threaten the peace and security of citizens have not achieved their objectives and will never achieve them,” he says, after two police officers were injured in the attack.
Hearings scheduled for next week in the ongoing criminal trial of Benjamin Netanyahu have been delayed after the death of the father of one of the presiding judges.
Jerusalem District Court Justice Rivka Friedman-Feldman’s father died on the Sukkot holiday, and therefore the traditional shiva period will not begin until after the holiday ends this weekend. Therefore, the hearings, which were scheduled for next Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, have been canceled, according to a statement from the court.
An anti-government rally in Warsaw has gathered “hundreds of thousands” people, Polish opposition leader Donald Tusk says, as he addresses the crowds in the capital’s center.
“When I see these hundreds of thousands of smiling faces, I have a good feeling that the breakthrough moment in the history of our homeland is coming,” Tusk tells supporters, ahead of general elections on October 15.
A Gaza group called “Revolutionary Youth,” affiliated with Hamas, announces that it will resume disturbances at the security barrier with Israel today, after a three-day break it had announced Thursday.
The group has been carrying out rallies on the border since mid-September, which have often escalated into clashes with Israeli soldiers. Rioters have launched grenades and incendiary balloons across the security fence and placed explosive devices along the barrier.
In a statement, the group says it intends to “expand the scope of the confrontation and add fuel to the fire, and ignite our eastern borders with flames and the blast of our bombs,” in response to Israel’s alleged “intensified desecration” of the al-Aqsa compound.
The group says it made its decision after a visit by dozens of Jews to the Temple Mount on Sunday, where the al-Aqsa mosque is located, during Sukkot. Palestinian media sources from various factions, including the official Wafa agency, have condemned the visit, claiming that Jews have entered the compound to “perform Talmudic rituals” under the pretext of celebrating Sukkot.
Jews are allegedly “carrying vegetable offerings made of palm fronds, which they intended to sacrifice inside Al-Aqsa,” Wafa writes, appearing to refer to the traditional lulav and etrog.
Rallies on the Gaza border are supposed to resume around 4 p.m., following the afternoon prayer. The “Revolutionary Youth” group also calls on people in the West Bank to join the unrest.
