Plot to attack Taylor Swift shows was intended to kill thousands ... CIA

 

The suspects in the foiled plot to attack Taylor Swift concerts in Vienna earlier this month sought to kill “tens of thousands” of fans before the CIA discovered intelligence that disrupted the planning, the agency’s deputy director said, according to The Associated Press.

The CIA alerted Austrian authorities about the plot, which was reportedly connected to the Islamic State (ISIS) terrorist organization. This intelligence and the subsequent arrests led to the cancellation of three sold-out shows.

CIA Deputy Director David Cohen discussed the thwarted plot during the annual Intelligence and National Security Summit in Maryland this week.

“They were plotting to kill a huge number — tens of thousands of people at this concert, including I am sure many Americans — and were quite advanced in this,” Cohen said, according to AP. “The Austrians were able to make those arrests because the agency and our partners in the intelligence community provided them information about what this ISIS-connected group was planning to do.”

Austrian officials have identified the main suspect as a 19-year-old Austrian man, who was reportedly inspired by ISIS. He allegedly planned to target fans outside the stadium, where approximately 30,000 were expected to gather, using knives or homemade explosives. Inside the venue, an additional 65,000 fans were anticipated.

Three teenagers have been detained in connection with the investigation and are suspected of plotting a suicide attack.

Investigators found a stockpile of chemicals, explosive devices, detonators and €21,000 in counterfeit cash at the home of the main suspect, a 19-year-old ISIS sympathizer who had been radicalized online, authorities said.

Austria’s interior minister, Gerhard Karner, noted that assistance from other intelligence agencies was essential because Austrian investigators, unlike some foreign services, lack the legal authority to monitor text messages.

Swift addressed the cancellations last week after her London shows concluded.

“The reason for the cancellations filled me with a new sense of fear, and a tremendous amount of guilt because so many people had planned on coming to those shows. But I was also so grateful to the authorities because thanks to them, we were grieving concerts and not lives,” Swift wrote.

“I was heartened by the love and unity I saw in the fans who banded together. I decided that all of my energy had to go toward helping to protect the nearly half a million people I had coming to see the shows in London,” she continued. “My team and I worked hand in hand with stadium staff and British authorities every day in pursuit of that goal, and I want to thank them for everything they did for us.”

Rare Stone Seal Unearthed in Jerusalem From the First Bais Hamikdash Times!

  A rare and unique First Temple-era stone seal inscribed with a name in paleo-Hebrew script has been uncovered near Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, the Israel Antiquities Authority announced on Thursday.

The ancient black stone seal, which was unearthed in an excavation by the Temple Mount’s southern wall, is believed to date back 2,700 years, and was used by a senior official in the Kingdom of Judah’s administration, the state-run archaeological body said.

“The seal, made of black stone, is one of the most beautiful ever discovered in excavations in ancient Jerusalem, and is executed at the highest artistic level,” said Yuval Baruch and Navot Rom, who directed the excavations with funding by the City of David Foundation.

The object—which is engraved with reverse script, served its owner both as an amulet and as a signature for legal documents and certificates, according to the IAA.

It has a hole drilled through its length so that it could be strung onto a chain and be worn around the neck.

The artifact is engraved with the words “LeYehoʼezer ben Hoshʼayahu”—“For Yeho’ezer son of Hosh’ayahu”—in paleo-Hebrew script.

Experts said that the seal is an extremely rare and unusual discovery.

“This is the first time that a winged ‘genie’—a protective magical figure—has been found in Israeli and regional archaeology,” said Filip Vukosavović, IAA archaeologist and assyriologist. “Figures of winged demons are known in the Neo-Assyrian art of the 9th-7th centuries BCE, and they were considered a kind of protective demon.”

The seal was apparently made by a local craftsman, “a Judahite, who produced the amulet at the owner’s request. It was prepared at a very high artistic level,” Vukosavović said.

The name Yehoʼezer appears in the Bible (Chron. I 12:7) in its abbreviated form, Yoʼezer, one of King David’s fighters. In the Book of Jeremiah (43:2), which depicts events thought to have occurred during the same period the seal was in use, the name “Azariah ben Hosh’aya” appears. “Hosh’aya” is the abbreviated form of Hoshʼayahu.

“This is further evidence of the reading and writing abilities that existed in this period,” said Baruch. “Contrary to what may be commonly thought, it seems that literacy in this period was not the realm only of society’s elite. People knew how to read and write—at least at the basic level, for the needs of commerce.”

When Hosh’ayahu died, his son Yeho’ezer inherited the seal, and he “added his name and his father’s name on either side of the demon,” in an effort to “directly appropriate to himself the beneficial qualities he believed the talisman embodied as a magical item,” the archaeologists believe.

The paleo-Hebrew inscription “was done in a sloppy manner,” unlike the “careful engraving of the demon,” indicating that it could have been “Yehoʼezer himself who engraved the names on the object,” said professor Ronny Reich of the University of Haifa, who took part in the research.

“The spectacular and unique find opens another window for us into the days of the Kingdom of Judah during the First Temple period, and attests to that administration’s international connections,” said Israeli Heritage Minister Rabbi Amichai Eliyahu. “In doing so, it demonstrates the importance and centrality of Jerusalem already 2,700 years ago. It is impossible not to be moved by such an unmediated and direct encounter with a chapter of our past, a time in which the First Temple stood in all its glory.”

Additional information about the seal is to be presented to the public next week at the annual “City of David Research Conference,” which takes place on Wednesday, Sept. 4 in Jerusalem.

Biden imposes sanctions against Israeli volunteer organization

 

On Wednesday, the White House announced sanctions against volunteer security organization Hashomer Yosh and a Jewish settler on allegations of violence against Arabs.

The individual sanctioned is Yitzhar security coordinator Yitzhak Levi Filant.

State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said, “Extremist settler violence in the West Bank causes intense human suffering, harms Israel’s security, and undermines the prospect for peace and stability in the region.”

Hashomer Yosh is an NGO funded by the Israeli government and is affiliated with parties led by government ministers Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich.

The Yesha council is concerned about the growing number of settlers an organizations serving Jews in Judea and Samaria that are getting sanctioned by the US government.

Hashomer Yosh is focused on protection of settler outposts against terrorist violence and is established to safeguard farms in Judea and Samaria.

The NGO receives support from the Ministry of Agriculture and the Ministry of the Environment.

Miller listed the allegations that led to the sanctions, “After all 250 Palestinian residents of Khirbet Zanuta were forced to leave in late January, Hashomer Yosh volunteers fenced off the village to prevent the residents from returning.”

The statement continued, “The volunteers also provided support by grazing the herds and purporting to “guard” the outposts of U.S.-designated individuals,” he said.

“The United States will continue to take action to promote accountability for those who commit and support extremist violence, “ Miller concluded.

The Israeli Prime Minister’s Office in statement said “Israel is seriously concerned about the imposition of sanctions on Israeli citizens. The issue is under intense discussion with the United States.”

This is the newest in a series of sanctions the US has impose against individuals and organizations in Judea and Samaria.

In March, the US sanctioned three Israeli residents of Judea and Samaria, accusing them of “undermining peace, security, and stability in the West Bank.”

The State Department alleges their farms and properties are serving as bases from which the accused are perpetrating “violence against Palestinians.”

What the Frum Silent Majority Thinks of Going Up to the Har habayis

 

I have taken a sample of comments from different blogs!

Intellectual conversation or bust

 1 day ago

#2176634

Dear amoratzim: stop screaming, wipe the foam from your mouth, go learn some mishnayos before getting involved in adults’ conversation. No, it’s completely irrelevant from the halachik point of view what someone allegedly said, unless he put out a well articulated tshuva where his reasoning can be examined. The undisputed halacha is that there are different areas on Har Habais, some of which are MUTAR to enter. If you want to dispute the above, bring up the halachik sources and well articulated tshuvos, not the cult-of-personality apikorsus.

Pravda

 1 day ago

#2176472

Yated is the AP of chareidis. What are they afraid of ? Why not publish opposing halachik views ?

Learn mishnayos before screaming!

 1 day ago

#2176745

 Reply to  shmendrick

Rav Elyashiv did NOT issue a Har Habais psak halacha that can be applied to entire Am Yisroel. If your rabbi tells YOU not to enter, his reasoning could be because he knows that YOU are an am hooretz and YOU can’t be trusted not to step out of the permitted area; as such, your rabbi’s statement is NOT a psak halacha for everyone else, but exclusively for you.
The HALACHA is undisputed: there are different areas of Har Habais, some of which are mutar to enter; obviously one has to know the relevant halachos to enter! Not a single posek argues on this.

Wipe foam off your mouth!

 1 day ago

#2176796

 Reply to  shmendrick

Learn the inyan: there exist areas of Har Habais that are mutar bli sofeik. Not a single posek argues on this. If a rav prohibits YOU something that’s normally mutar, that’s a chesoron on you, not a psak halacha for the entire Am Yisroel.

5

 Reply

No politics in halacha

 12 hours ago

#2177220

 Reply to  shmendrick

No buddy, it’s you who doesn’t understand the concept. You and people like you have been screaming “absolutely issur koreis” blanket statements. Now finally you concede that the basic halacha states that there are different areas. Good. Welcome aboard. As far as lemaisa, what the exact gedorim are, that is to be treated just like any other halacha: no politics, researching the inyan and doing our best to figure out the emes. So, maybe you learn the inyan one way and the other posek learns it differently; you have no right to call the other guy a sheigetz!

aakov S

 1 day ago

#2176482

 Reply to  He is not well

Oh, HE’S the provocateur, not the murderous Muslim drek. They could have it all but not us Jews. Sure, let them stomp all over us and our once holiest site, by building an edifice seen for miles and in practically every photo of the kosel. How nauseating. It should make every Jew sick.

Rabbis are NOT idols!

 1 day ago

#2176802

 Reply to  shmendrick

Bring real halachik sources to prove that the entire Har Habais is osur or sofeik osur. The acceptable sources are: gemoras, rishonim, acharonim, well articulated tshuvos from contemporary poskim. Screaming names is NOT a proof! You are the one deviating from the acceptable halacha, hence the burden of proof is on you.