Israel at war: What happened on day 25?

IDF forces under the command of the Givati ​​Brigade took control over a Hamas military stronghold in western Jabaliya in the northern Gaza Strip on Tuesday, a military spokesperson said.

Approximately 50 terrorists were killed by Israeli forces. Furthermore, Israeli fighter jets, under Shin Bet intelligence, eliminated Ebrahim Biari, the commander of Hamas's Jabalia battalion, and was one of the leaders of the October 7 massacre. 

(New York Jewish Week) — Police have taken a suspect into custody over threats to kill Jewish students at Cornell University over the weekend, Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office said Tuesday as her office announced a series of measures to combat antisemitism on campuses and elsewhere in New York.

New York State police detained the Cornell suspect for questioning on Tuesday after identifying the individual earlier in the day, Hochul said, a day after she visited Jewish students at the university in a show of support.

Anonymous antisemitic threats posted to a Greek life website over the weekend threatened to “shoot up” Cornell’s kosher dining hall and included comments such as “jewish people need to be killed” and “eliminate jewish living from cornell campus.”

“If i see a pig male jew i will stab you and slit your throat,” read a post by a user called “hamas.”

Police were called to the dining hall, and the campus Hillel warned students to avoid the building after the threats.

Cornell Jewish students threatened on university forum. (credit: screenshot)

NY governor announces measures to combat hate crimes

“When I met with Cornell students yesterday, I promised them we would do everything possible to find the perpetrator,” Hochul said as she announced the suspect was in custody. “Public safety is my top priority and I’m committed to combating hate and bias wherever it rears its ugly head.”

Hochul also announced a series of measures to combat hate crimes and antisemitism in New York.

The governor ordered a third-party review of antisemitism and discrimination policies at New York City’s massive public university system, the City University of New York. The school system has been an antisemitism battleground in recent years, with some Jewish students and faculty alleging discrimination and harassment and demanding action from the administration. Much of strife across the system’s 25 colleges centers on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, with Jewish students saying anti-Israel criticism often veers into antisemitism, and pro-Palestinian activists decrying alleged attacks on free speech.

Judge Jonathan Lippman, a former chief judge on the New York Court of Appeals, will lead the review of CUNY antisemitism. The probe will look into the campus environment; policies, procedures and handling of antisemitism complaints; and balancing free speech rights with antisemitism.

Last May, a student speaker at the CUNY School of Law graduation praised the school as a place where students could “speak out against Israeli settler colonialism,” said Israel was “indiscriminately raining bullets and bombs on worshipers,” and blamed “donors” and “investors” for stifling anti-Israel criticism. Two weeks later, CUNY Chancellor Felix Matos Rodríguez and the board of trustees denounced Fatima Mousa Mohammed’s remarks as “hate speech.”  The previous year, radical pro-Palestinian activist Nerdeen Kiswani delivered a similar speech at the law school graduation.

“We will take on the antisemitism we have seen on college campuses,” Hochul said during a press conference Tuesday. “The problem didn’t begin with the weeks following the Oct. 7 attacks. It’s been growing on a number of campuses and seen most acutely in the City University of New York.”

CUNY said in response to the announcement, “We will cooperate with Judge Lippman’s review as we work to build on the progress we’ve made combating antisemitism across our campuses.”

“As an institution of higher learning and one of the country’s most diverse universities, CUNY has taken many steps to combat hate, discrimination and intolerance in all forms, important work which we continue every day,” a CUNY spokesperson told the New York Jewish Week.

The US Department of Education is investigating CUNY’s Brooklyn College over alleged antisemitism in a probe announced last year.

In addition to the CUNY review, the state’s division of criminal justice services will distribute $50 million for law enforcement agencies statewide to acquire new technology and equipment to better solve and prevent hate crimes, and $25 million in grants for securing communities against hate crimes, a program to boost protection as nonprofit organizations and other sites.

The state will also expand its social media analysis unit to better monitor violent threats against schools and campuses.

Antisemitic incidents have spiked in New York City and the United States since the start of the war in Israel, according to data collated by the New York Police Department and Jewish security groups. Jews are targeted in hate crimes in the city more than any other group.

US President Joe Biden and Jordan's King Abdullah on Tuesday discussed their shared commitment to increasing aid to civilians in Gaza during the Israel-Hamas conflict, the White House said.

The two men also reiterated the importance of protecting civilian lives and that it was critical to ensure that Palestinians were not forcibly displaced from Gaza, the White House said.

Chilean President Gabriel Boric said on Tuesday the country was recalling its ambassador to Israel for consultations after "Israel's violations of international humanitarian law in the Gaza Strip."

"Chile strongly condemns and observes with great concern... these military operations," Boric wrote in a post on social media platform X.

The IDF intercepted a surface-to-air missile fired from Lebanon at an Israeli drone on Tuesday night, according to the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit.

The IDF struck the site where the missile was fired from and the cell that fired the missile in response.

An aerial threat was intercepted over the Red Sea near Eilat on Tuesday night, according to the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit. No alert was activated in the city.

תושבים באילת דיווחו על פיצוץ ושובל יירוט בשמי העיר@Itsik_zuarets @hadasgrinberg pic.twitter.com/Kdmta6KaOU

— כאן חדשות (@kann_news) October 31, 2023

No threat was posed to civilians and the threat did not enter Israeli territory, according to the IDF.

Shortly after the interception was reported, Hezam Alasad, a member of the political bureau of the Iran-backed Houthi militia, posted the word “Eilat” in Arabic and Hebrew on X (formerly Twitter).

Yachts are seen docking at the Eilat Port (credit: WALLPAPER FLARE)

Houthis threaten further missile fire

The incident comes less than 24 hours after drones and missiles fired by the Iran-backed Houthi militia towards Eilat were intercepted by the IDF.

On Tuesday afternoon, the spokesman for the Houthi’s military branch, Yahya Saree, confirmed that the Houthis had fired “a large batch of ballistic and winged missiles and a large number of drones at various targets of the Israeli enemy” on Tuesday morning.

Saree added that the drone and missile fire on Tuesday morning was the third such attack conducted by the Houthis and warned that the Iran-backed militia would “continue to carry out more qualitative strikes with missiles and drones until the Israeli aggression stops.”

When asked if the IDF intended to respond to the attacks by the Houthis earlier on Tuesday, IDF Spokesperson Daniel Hagari stated “the wise thing isn’t speaking to media, the wise thing is speaking with actions and protecting the security interests of Israel and to do so in the necessary time and place.”

“There are many elements in the region working on behalf of Iran, such as the Houthis, who are trying to challenge us and divert us from the war in Gaza. We stay focused. We are focused on the war in Gaza,” said Hagari.

The Abraham Accords are not at risk amid the war between Israel and Hamas, said Dr. Ali Rashid Al Nuaimi, chairman of the Defense, Interior, and Foreign Affairs Committee of the United Arab Emirates Federal National Council on Tuesday, according to the European Jewish Press.

“This the third war in Gaza. Whenever there is something happening in Gaza, people come to us and ask: ‘What do you think of the Abraham Accords. Are you going to change?’” said Nuaimi in comments to a special online briefing organized by the European Jewish Association (EJA) and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

“The Accords are our future. It is not an agreement between two governments, but a platform that we believe should transform the region where everyone will enjoy security, stability and prosperity.”

“This is a people to people engagement. This is what we need. We want everyone to acknowledge and accept that Israel is there to exist and that the roots of Jews, Christian are not in New York or Paris but here in our region. They are part of our history and they should be part of our future,” added Nuaimi.

The Emirati official explained that the UAE wants to change the educational system and religious narrative.

Ali Rashid Al Nuaimi, Chairman of Defense Affairs, Interior & Foreign Affairs Committee of the UAE Federal National Council sits with Ram Ben Barak, chairman of the Knesset, Israel's parliament, Foreign Affairs and Defense committee, in Jerusalem. February 7, 2022 (credit: RONEN ZVULUN/REUTERS)

Emirati officials warns of 'enemies' opposed to Abraham Accords

“It is very important to understand that there are enemies for what we are doing. Those terrorist organizations don’t respect human life. Don’t let them achieve their goals. No person with a human feeling and common sense will agree with the barbarian terrorist attack that Hamas committed on October 7. No one.”

Nuaimi stressed that “enemies” took advantage of the war and that there is a difference between Hamas and the Palestinian people.

“We need those who believe in peace in Europe, the US and everywhere to counter the hate narrative that we see in demonstrations in Paris and London.”

Amid the war between Israel and Hamas, the UAE has issued statements condemning both Hamas’s assault on Israel and Israel’s ground operation in the Gaza Strip.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will arrive in Israel for the second time since the beginning of Operation Swords of Iron this Friday.

Interior Minister Moshe Arbel met with Jerusalem's Latin patriarch Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa on Tuesday to discuss Israel's hostages in Gaza who were abducted by Hamas.

The meeting was held at the initiative of the Religious Denominations Department in the Interior Ministry and saw Arbel explain to Pizzaballa Israel's standing in the war against Hamas.

The Israel Foreign Affairs Ministry presented the atrocities done by Hamas on October 7 that were caught on film to approximately 70 ambassadors on Tuesday.

"The whole world must know about what happened on that cursed Saturday on October 7. We invited dozens of foreign ambassadors to the office today so that they could see for themselves what happened to our citizens more than three weeks ago by the terrorist organization Hamas, the worst of ISIS," Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said. "The pictures are difficult and shocking, but we at the Foreign Ministry will continue to present what happened, on any stage and in front of any audience, in Israel and abroad, especially when the voices of the deniers of the massacre and the distributors of the 'fake news' grow louder."