Gaza strikes kill Hamas commander, two other operatives over weekend — IDF

IDF publishes Hamas document with plans to plant explosives near displaced-person camps in Gaza

This infographic published by the IDF on October 19, 2026, shows an April 2024 Hamas document. (Israel Defense Forces)

The Israeli military publishes what it says is an internal Hamas document detailing the terror group’s efforts to plant bombs near displaced persons camps in the Gaza Strip during the war.

The document, written in April 2024, “shows that Hamas’s engineering department proposed planting explosive devices around displaced persons camps and detonating them as IDF troops approached, placing the civilian population in the camps at risk, to create panic as a smokescreen for the escape of its operatives,” the military says.

The IDF says the document was part of Hamas’s “preparations to protect its leadership and operatives and evacuate them from areas where the IDF was expected to operate, while endangering and exploiting the civilian population in the area, fully aware that these actions were likely to cause direct harm to civilians.”

“In the document, the Hamas terror organization proposed an additional method of planting explosive devices along routes used by residents of the Gaza Strip, as part of an attempt to delay the advance of IDF troops in the area,” the military says.

Another proposal in the document included firing “stun grenades into the camps to create chaos and panic, to allow Hamas terrorists hiding in the area to flee.”

“This is further evidence that the Hamas terror organization is willing to endanger the lives of the civilian population in the Gaza Strip to advance its terrorist activities,” the IDF adds.

Australian lawmaker critically hurt in possible deliberate car-ramming, police say

Helen Haines, independent MP for the neighboring electorate of Indi, poses during the Farrer By-Election in Albury, New South Wales, on May 9, 2026. (HILARY WARDHAUGH/AFP)

MELBOURNE, Australia — A car hit an Australian federal independent lawmaker, critically injuring her in a potentially deliberate act, police say.

The driver was arrested.

Helen Haines, 65, was struck by a Toyota Land Cruiser SUV outside her electoral district office in the city of Wangaratta in Victoria state, a police statement says.

Police do not identify the victim, in accordance with privacy policy, but Haines’s family confirms her identity in a media statement.

The 43-year-old driver was arrested at the scene by a passerby. He will be interviewed in relation to the incident, police say.

“A knife was located by police and seized from inside the Toyota,” police say.

“At this stage, police are investigating as to whether this was an intentional act,” police add.

Haines, who was first elected to the Parliament in 2019, was taken to a hospital with critical injuries, police say.

Authorities are concerned that there were more than 1,000 threats of violence against public figures in Australia in the past year and that being in public office has become more dangerous.

Katz insists police must handle West Bank settler violence after spate of attacks

Defense Minister Israel Katz arrives at the Western Wall during the Jewish holiday of Sukkot, in Jerusalem’s Old City, September 28, 2026. (Chaim Goldberg/ Flash90)

Defense Minister Israel Katz says all aspects of settler violence in the West Bank must be handled by the Israel Police, following a spate of attacks over the weekend, while claiming that the army does not support renewing administrative detention orders against suspects.

“The handling of the serious violence perpetrated by a handful of Jewish rioters in Judea and Samaria (West Bank) must be placed entirely under the responsibility of the Israel Police’s Judea and Samaria District, including prevention, investigation and prosecution,” says Katz in a statement.

In August, Katz ordered the IDF to draw up plans to “transfer responsibility for civilian enforcement in the West Bank to the Israel Police,” a move widely seen as impractical in the lead-up to a national election.

“The IDF should not and cannot engage in civilian law enforcement, but rather fight Palestinian terrorism and defend the country’s borders and the Jewish communities,” Katz says.

He says that in accordance with his order in August, “the IDF has prepared a comprehensive plan to regulate civilian law enforcement activities” in the West Bank, which he says distinguishes between the IDF’s authority in the territory and the “transfer of responsibility for actual civilian law enforcement to the Israel Police’s Judea and Samaria District.”

Katz says he spoke with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about “implementing the plan as soon as possible, including holding discussions and coordinating between the IDF and the Israel Police, and allocating the necessary budget and personnel resources to the police’s Judea and Samaria District to carry out the task.”

“The plan does not include recommendations to reinstate administrative detention orders against settlers in Judea and Samaria,” Katz claims, calling it a “draconian measure that I canceled upon taking office as defense minister and which I have no intention of reinstating.”

The tool allows authorities to hold suspects indefinitely without due process.

“Administrative orders are not the solution, but rather strong and effective police enforcement,” he says.

However, Katz has authorised and boasted of using administrative detention orders against Palestinian terror suspects and Arab Israeli citizens who have alleged ties to terror groups.

Eisenkot, Lapid slam Netanyahu’s updated security doctrine as ‘hollow’ election push, pledge alternative plans

Opposition Leader Yair Lapid (L) meets with former MK Gadi Eisenkot, September 7, 2025. (Courtesy)

Leading opposition figures Gadi Eisenkot and Yair Lapid sharply criticize Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s updated national security doctrine, which he unveiled in a rare briefing with Israeli reporters yesterday, accusing him of presenting election slogans rather than a coherent strategy for addressing Israel’s security challenges three years after the Hamas-led October 7 massacre.

While Netanyahu stressed a transition from containment to offensive action in his doctrine, both opposition leaders frame the doctrine’s release, nine days before the October 27 election, as an attempt to deflect attention from Netanyahu’s record rather than meaningfully confront the lessons of October 7.

Eisenkot, Netanyahu’s chief election rival, calls the two-page document released by the premier’s office “hollow” and “filled with slogans that have absolutely nothing to do with a security doctrine.”

In a Hebrew-language post on X, he accuses the premier of failing to achieve four key war objectives: destroying Hamas’s military and governing capabilities, deterring Hezbollah and other northern threats, maintaining stability in the West Bank, and preserving national unity.

Eisenkot pledges that a government under his leadership would formulate and formally adopt a national security strategy within 150 days of taking office, in accordance with legislation he says he advanced alongside former Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee chairman Yuli Edelstein.

In a separate Hebrew-language post, Lapid similarly dismisses Netanyahu’s presentation as “a collection of inflated slogans devoid of substance.”

He points to the exemption of ultra-Orthodox men from military service despite the doctrine’s emphasis on military superiority, Netanyahu’s refusal to establish a state commission of inquiry into October 7 despite stressing intelligence preparedness, and Israel’s deteriorating international standing despite promises to strengthen strategic alliances.

Netanyahu addressed criticisms on those issues during his briefing yesterday by advocating for his coalition’s draft law, establishing a politically appointed commission of inquiry, and arguing that Israel’s military and industry would continue to boost ties despite its current isolation on the world stage.

For his part, Lapid pledges to end Netanyahu’s “policy of containment” by excluding Turkey and Qatar from Gaza’s postwar arrangements, halting the flow of Qatari funds into the territory, eliminating Hamas’s military capabilities and Hezbollah’s remaining presence in southern Lebanon, and intensifying operations against Iran, including strikes on its oil industry.

He stresses his proposal for recruiting 20,000 ultra-Orthodox men within two years, arguing that ending financial support for draft evasion could save the economy some NIS 30 billion annually, which could then be directed toward defense without raising taxes.

Settlers reportedly attack Palestinians during olive harvest, set fire to vehicle near Ramallah

Palestinian media outlets report that settlers attacked Palestinians harvesting olives near the village of Turmus Ayya, near Ramallah.

Footage published by Palestinian media shows a man with a head injury, apparently caused by blows or stones, and a vehicle that was set on fire.

There are no reports of injuries resulting from the vehicle fire.

???? جانب من اعتداء مليشيات المستوطنين على المواطنين في بلدة ترمسعيا شمال رام الله. pic.twitter.com/BfGZpX33g2

— شبكة يافا الإخبارية (@yaffa_ps) October 19, 2026

عاجل | إصابة مواطن جراء اعتداء المستوطنين على منزله وإحراق مركبته في بلدة ترمسعيا شرق رام الله. pic.twitter.com/BZ3b0O0e85

— المركز الفلسطيني للإعلام (@PalinfoAr) October 19, 2026

Police examining complaint against Rabbi Dov Lior over ruling permitting Jews to harvest olives on Palestinian land

Rabbi Dov Lior attends a ceremony honoring late Jewish extremist leader Rabbi Meir Kahane in Jerusalem on November 19, 2024. (Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

Police say they are examining a complaint filed in response to comments by ultranationalist religious leader Rabbi Dov Lior that Jews may harvest olives belonging to Palestinians.

“A complaint has been received by the Israel Police and passed on for examination and to be addressed by the relevant authorities,” the police say.

Lior, the most authoritative rabbi in the hardline religious-Zionist community, wrote in a religious ruling on Friday that Palestinian land had essentially been stolen from Jews since the Jewish people never willingly relinquished their property in the Land of Israel.

Lior, 92, wrote that it was permitted for Jews to harvest olive trees on Palestinian property the owners could not access due to prohibitions by security services, and indeed on any land, “in order to show to the public our ownership of the land, and in so doing one fulfills the [religious] commandment of conquering the land.”

On Sunday, the Rabbis for Human Rights organization filed a complaint for incitement to racism and soliciting the theft of property.

“I regret having to file a police complaint against a rabbi in Israel, but reality compels us to stand on the side of the Torah,” said acting director of Rabbis for Human Rights Anton Goodman.

“Entering others’ land and taking their crops in violation of the law — that is not what God wants from us in this land.”

The Israeli penal code defines racism as “persecution, humiliation, degradation, displaying enmity, hostility, or violence, or the incitement of discord against a public or segments of the population — all on the grounds of color, membership in a race, or national-ethnic origin,” and is punishable by up to five years in prison.

Prosecutors have been reluctant to indict rabbis over religious rulings, however. In 2012, then attorney general Yehuda Weinstein closed an investigation into the authors of the infamous “Torat Hamelech” book, which said it is permissible in some situations to kill non-Jews according to Jewish law. Weinstein said the case was closed because there was not enough evidence that the book was published with the intention to incite racism.

An arrest warrant was issued against Lior in that case in 2011 because he wrote an endorsement of Torat Hamelech, but he refused the police summons. He was subsequently arrested, questioned, and later released.

Rubio: Palestinian issue would be easier to deal with if Iran’s Islamic regime didn’t exist

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio participates in the C5+1 ministerial meeting in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, October 19, 2026. (Kylie Cooper/Pool Photo via AP)

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio says the conflict with the Palestinians would be easier to deal with without the Islamic Republic of Iran’s interference.

“So, look, I think traditionally, the American political class thought that peace in the Middle East, the core central issue, is the Palestinian question,” Rubio says in an interview with Breitbart.

“I’m not saying it’s irrelevant, but I think what President Trump has exposed is that the number one driver of instability and war and conflict and the number one obstacle to peace in the Middle East is the Islamic regime in Tehran, and I think the evidence bears it out in Lebanon,” he says.

“If there was no Islamic clerics, these radical Shia clerics in Iran—if they didn’t exist, if that wasn’t there—none of these problems would exist. You may still have a Palestinian issue. I would argue that issue would be easier to deal with if Iran didn’t exist. So they’re at the core of all of these problems, and I think correctly identifying who it is that’s driving instability and war in the Middle East is important in order to solve it,” he adds.

Turkish-Israeli woman is mobbed by anti-Israel protesters at Istanbul mall, called a ‘terrorist’ and ‘murderer of children’

Claudia Medina Halfon, a Turkish-born Israeli businesswoman, is accosted by a mob of anti-Israel activists at a mall in Istanbul after her location was shared on social media.

“Everyone, look here, there is a terrorist in Istanbul right now,” one of the activists yells at her at the mall.

Others continue to call her a “terrorist” and a “murderer of children,” and say, “We don’t want Zionists in our country.”

Mall security guards intervened and escorted her from the premises.

According to Channel 12 news, Halfon works in the tourism industry.

A video by an activist calling on people to meet at the mall to protest her presence accused her of bringing IDF soldiers to Turkey for vacation.

This is what murderous hatred looks like.

They would have beaten her to death if mall security hadn't intervened.

A Turkish-born Israeli tour guide was attacked by violent terror supporters in Turkey. pic.twitter.com/V4BCdkWViU

— נועה מגיד | Noa magid (@NoaMagid) October 18, 2026

Austrian Airlines says no danger found after Tel Aviv-Vienna flight threat

BERLIN, Germany — Austrian Airlines says that searches of flight OS82’s aircraft, passengers and crew in Sofia found no danger after a threat forced the Tel Aviv–Vienna service to divert yesterday.

The airline says the flight, carrying 51 passengers and six crew, continued from Sofia to Vienna the same night with all passengers on board.