Israel’s political leadership has instructed the IDF to freeze all operations considered “sensitive” in southern Lebanon following a request from the United States, Kan News reported Friday.
The directive will remain in effect until further notice and until it becomes clear how the current escalation between the United States and Iran develops, as well as what happens with the negotiations between Israel and Lebanon.
U.S. officials, who have been focused in recent days on the confrontation with Iran, have expressed concern that Israel could also be drawn into the fighting. A security official said Israel is prepared to use any Iranian attack against it as an opportunity to carry out significant strikes in Iran. However, following the White House request, the IDF was instructed to wait so the current confrontation does not expand to include Israel.
The IDF is also expected to begin withdrawing from the pilot areas in southern Lebanon as early as next week, when another round of talks between Israel and Lebanon is scheduled to take place in Rome.
U.S. Ambassador to Israel Yechiel Leiter is expected to lead the Israeli delegation together with the team that participated in previous rounds of negotiations with Lebanon.
Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund, the third-largest shareholder in German automaker Volkswagen, is reportedly putting hundreds of additional jobs at the company’s German plants at risk.
According to a report in the German newspaper Bild, Qatari representatives have vetoed an agreement for an alternative use of Volkswagen’s struggling plant in Osnabrück. The potential partner in the deal was Israeli defense company Rafael.
Initially, it appeared that a solution had been found to save the factory. At the end of April, Volkswagen signed a letter of intent with Rafael, which planned to manufacture components for the Iron Dome missile defense system at the plant. However, Volkswagen’s Qatari shareholders have now reportedly objected to the agreement due to the strained relations between Qatar and Israel.
The Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), the state-owned sovereign wealth fund, holds 17% of Volkswagen’s voting rights and 10.4% of the company’s total share capital, giving it significant influence over decisions made at Volkswagen’s headquarters in Wolfsburg.
Mohammed Saif Al-Sowaidi, CEO of the Qatar Investment Authority, along with two former Qatari government ministers, serves on Volkswagen’s supervisory board.
Qatar, which for years has been regarded as a major financial supporter of Hamas in Gaza, reportedly opposes an agreement to manufacture weapons components intended solely for Israel’s defense against rocket attacks.
Security expert Peter R. Neumann of King’s College London warned in an interview with Bild that while investment from Gulf states is welcome, “the same principle applies here as elsewhere: we must not become dependent on any one country.”
Neumann added that Germany should adopt “a more pragmatic approach” toward the region. Since Germany’s economy began slowing, Gulf states have sought to expand their strategic influence in the country.
The Skverer community is abuzz today after New York State Police allegedly stopped the Skverer Rebbe’s motorcade on Route 17 as he was returning home from the airport following a trip to Malibu, California.
According to sources withing the community, troopers pulled over the Rebbe’s entourage while it was traveling along Route 17 and issued a total of 14 traffic tickets to members of the motorcade.
The incident delayed the procession before it was allowed to continue toward New Square.
Rabbi Moshe Wiener, executive director of the Jewish Community Council of Greater Coney Island, was planning a community gathering in response to a July 4 mass shooting in Coney Island, in which eight members of the same non-Jewish family were wounded, when he heard from City Hall.
Zohran Mamdani, mayor of New York City and a frequent critic of Israel whom many Jewish leaders have decried as an antisemite, wanted to attend.
“He’s still the mayor of the city of New York, and we have to show respect,” Wiener told JNS. “He wants to do the right thing for the city of New York, and whether we agree or disagree with his policies, the best that we can do as a social service agency is try to impress upon and educate him to the greatest extent possible of what works, what’s needed, what unmet needs there are.”
One of the Jewish Community Council of Greater Coney Island’s programs that aims to curb violence is Operation H.O.O.D. (Helping Our Own Develop).
“I hope that he’ll agree and support initiatives that will make a positive change in the lives of the residents of the city,” Wiener said of the mayor.
Rabbi Moshe Wiener speaks at Operation H.O.O.D. shooting response gathering. Coney Island, N.Y. July 7, 2026. Credit: Courtesy.
“It was really extraordinary that he stayed there for the full hour-and-a-half,” said the rabbi, who is part of the Chabad movement but doesn’t hold an official or leadership role. “He was very, very compassionate. It was very impressive the way that he interacted with them.”
Mamdani even “stayed the extra time” at the end of the event to “talk to them and comfort them and encourage them,” Wiener said, of the shooting victims’ family members.
Wiener used the community gathering to urge the mayor and lawmakers to invest in violence prevention, trauma recovery and vocational training.
“Law enforcement is indispensable,” he said in his public remarks at the gathering. “Violence interruption is indispensable. Families are indispensable. Schools are indispensable. Faith communities are indispensable. Each has a unique responsibility that no one else can fulfill.”
Wiener asked the city to revive plans for a long-delayed vocational training center in Coney Island. Stable employment is one of the strongest long-term prevention tools, he said.
“City-owned property at Surf Avenue and West 28th Street was designated” for the site more than 25 years ago, he said at the gathering. “Then circumstances changed.”
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani attends a stop gun violence event in Coney Island, as Rabbi Moshe Wiener, executive director of the Jewish Community Council of Greater Coney Island, looks on, July 7, 2026. Credit: Michael Appleton/Mayoral Photography Office.
The rabbi cited frozen land-use approvals and canceled funding and called for funding to be renewed. “That dream should not remain unfinished,” he said at the event.
He also called for permanent funding for H.O.O.D’s trauma recovery center, which relies on annual New York City Council appropriations.
“May the tragic shootings that have brought us together today become more than moments of grief,” he told attendees.
Wiener told JNS that he entered social services work 45 years ago, after seeking a rabbinic position in education.
What began with one contract in an office that “was a large closet in the local Jewish Y” has grown into a citywide organization with nearly 400 employees providing services across New York City’s five boroughs, he said.
Israel’s Knesset gave preliminary approval Wednesday to legislation establishing a national center to preserve and promote the legacy of Rabbi Nachman of Breslov, the influential 18th-century Hasidic leader.
The bill, sponsored by Likud lawmaker Eliyahu Revivo, passed its first reading by a vote of 19-0 and was referred to the Knesset Education, Culture and Sports Committee for further consideration.
Under the proposal, the center would be established as a statutory public corporation responsible for preserving Rabbi Nachman’s teachings and historical legacy. It would include a research institute, archive, scientific and educational committee, and a museum dedicated to his life and work.
The legislation also outlines the creation of a public governing council and provides for state funding of the center. Oversight would fall under Israel’s minister of culture and sports.
Supporters of the bill said Rabbi Nachman’s contributions to Jewish thought and spirituality warrant national recognition similar to memorial institutions established for Israeli prominent rabbis, including Rabbi Ovadia Yosef and Rabbi Haim Druckman.
Rabbi Nachman of Breslov (1772–1810), the founder of the Breslov Hasidic movement and great-grandson of the Baal Shem Tov, is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in Hasidic Judaism. His teachings continue to attract followers around the world, and tens of thousands of pilgrims travel annually to his burial site in Uman, Ukraine.
This is Jamey Carney, a 43-year-old woman from New York who became involved in the pro-Palestinian movement and decided to move to Ireland.
There she met her partner, Ahmad Al-Saqar, a Palestinian refugee from Jordan, and converted to Islam. She frequently posted on social media about their trips together.
It didn’t last long. She was brutally beaten to death by him. Her disfigured body was found by her 13-year-old daughter. The suspect has been on the run since Tuesday.
Western leftist pro-Palestinian women and those willing to convert to Islam need to wake up. Or they could end up like this.
We chewed this over countless times, but I'm reposting because of Pearl, the "The Dangerous Bubbie"
But the truth is that at this point, no matter what position you take, it is completely irrelevant, because the majority of the World's Jewish population now live in Israel and the Navie Amos (9:13) prophesized that we will no longer be uprooted again from EY!
I will plant them upon their land and they will never again be uprooted from their land that I have given them said Hashem, your God"
And as I said countless times, the 3 oaths are not mentioned in the entire Mishna Torah of the Rambam and not the entire Shulchan Aruch! In addition, there is no evidence that these oaths actually took place, where it took place and who witnessed it!
by Rabbi Shlomo Aviner
Many people in the Diaspora claim the while an individual who makes Aliyah is doing a praiseworthy deed, there is no mitzvah at this time for the Diaspora community as a whole to make Aliyah. They maintain that Jews in the Diaspora are supposed to remain where they are until Mashiach arrives. They cite what are called the “Three Oaths" in the Gemara to substantiate their claim.
However, this claim has long ago been rejected by all of the early and later Torah Authorities as cited in the Pitchei T’shuva commentary on the Shulchan Aruch (Even HaEzer, 75:6). which states that the mitzvah of Aliyah is a Torah commandment that applies in all generations, as explained by the Ramban (Supplement to the Sefer HaMitzvot of the Rambam, Positive Commandment #4).
The "Three Oaths" state (Ketubot 110b-111a) that:
1. The Jewish People are not to return to the Land of Israel forcefully en masse ("as a wall").
2. They are not to rebel against the nations of the world.
3. That the nations of the world are not to subjugate the Jewish people excessively.
The following is a rundown of the opinions (from the treatise “The Essay on the Three Oaths") rejecting the mistaken insistence that the Three Oaths is the accepted Halakhah:
It is stated in the Gemara, Ketubot (111a), that Rabbi Yosei son of Rabbi Chanina said: Why are there these three oaths? For it is written three times in Song of Songs: "I adjure you...do not arouse the love..." In truth, there is also a fourth time where it says: "I adjure you... if you find my beloved." However, regarding this fourth oath the Gemara does not discuss what some explain as delaying the Redemption, because there it is not speaking about not arousing the love.
Rabbi Zeira adds additional oaths, and holds like Rabbi Levi: Why are there these six oaths?... So that they should not reveal the end (Rashi: the prophets among them.). And that they should not distance the end (Rashi: through their sins.)
Based on this Gemara, the Geonim, as well as the Rishonim and Acharonim, discussed the commandment of inheriting the Land by the People of Israel, dispossessing the nations dwelling there, and even the establishment of a state for the Jewish People in the Land of Israel. As is well known, one of the Hasidic Rebbes, the Satmar Rebbe of blessed memory, wrote two books against the idea of the State of Israel: Vayoel Moshe and Al HaGeulah Ve'al HaTemurah. Among other things, he based his opinion on the Three Oaths.
However, the overwhelming majority of the great Torah Authorities did not identify with all of the points comprising his view. We will present some of arguments explaining why the above-mentioned oaths do not contradict the establishment of the State of Israel (and the subsequent mass Aliyah of Jews to the Jewish Homeland.)
