PM’s office says five senior Hamas officials killed in Gaza strikes over ceasefire violations

 https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog-november-22-2025

Israel eliminated five senior Hamas officials in airstrikes on Gaza today in response to the terror group’s violations of the ceasefire, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office says in a post on X.

“Today, Hamas violated the ceasefire again, sending a terrorist into Israel held territory to attack IDF soldiers. In response, Israel eliminated five senior Hamas terrorists,” the post reads.

“Israel has fully honored the ceasefire, Hamas has not,” the post continues, accusing “dozens” of Hamas terrorists of crossing into the IDF-controlled side of the withdrawal line in Gaza since the ceasefire came into effect.

Trump remains silent as Mamdani accuses Israel of genocide

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/418169

The New York City mayor-elect accused Israel before reporters and President Trump of carrying out "genocide" in Gaza, and said that "the U.S. government is funding it." President Trump did not contradict him.

"“I shared with the president in our meeting about the concern that many New Yorkers have about wanting their tax dollars to go toward the benefit of New Yorkers and their ability to afford basic dignity. There’s a desperate need not only for the following of human rights but also the following through on the promises we’ve made New Yorkers. We've spoken about the Israeli government committing genocide and I’ve spoken about our government funding it."

4 takeaways from the bizarrely chummy Trump-Mamdani meeting

 https://edition.cnn.com/2025/11/21/politics/takeaways-zohran-mamdani-trump-oval-office-new-york

Among Trump’s comments:

“I think he’s going to surprise some conservative people, actually.”

“Some of his ideas really are the same ideas that I have.”

“We agree on a lot more than I would’ve thought.”

“I think this mayor can do some things that are going to be really great.”

When a reporter noted Trump had threatened to cut funding to New York City if Mamdani were elected, the president suggested that he’ll play that card if he needs to. But he also downplayed the possibility.

“I expect to be helping him, not hurting him,” Trump said.

The Trump presidency is collapsing like the Berlin Wall collapsed

Robert F Kennedy Jr instructed CDC to change stance on vaccines and autism

 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/21/rfk-jr-cdc-vaccine-autism

Robert F Kennedy Jr, the US health secretary, said in an interview with the New York Times that he personally instructed the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to change its longstanding position that vaccines do not cause autism.

Countering decades of science showing vaccines to be safe, the US public health agency’s website was changed to say: “The claim ‘vaccines do not cause autism’ is not an evidence-based claim because studies have not ruled out the possibility that infant vaccines cause autism.”

In the interview, Kennedy said that while the large-scale epidemiological studies of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine had found no link to autism, and that studies of the mercury-based preservative thimerosal had also shown no link, there are gaps in the vaccine safety science.

Trump meets Mamdani in the Oval Office: Winners, losers and takeaways

 https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/5618271-trump-mamdani-meet-affordability

The oddest of political couples had a startlingly positive meeting Friday afternoon when President Trump came face-to-face with New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani (D) in the Oval Office.

Biggest winner: Zohran Mamdani

The encounter was, by any reasonable measure, a big success for the 34-year-old incoming mayor.

Mamdani achieved his key objective in finding common ground with Trump without ceding any real issue of principle.

Just Say No to Palestine

 https://mishpacha.com/just-say-no-to-palestine

    Is Trump intent on delivering a Palestinian state?

It should be clear that the Trump administration, which views foreign policy through a transactional lens, sees greater economic potential and investment opportunities in the Arab world than in Israel. Trade with the Arab world doesn’t have to come at Israel’s expense. In 2024, US trade with Israel in goods and services totaled $55 billion, nearly 40% of the $141 billion the US traded in the Middle East and North Africa, but Trump is setting new priorities, along with his top two Middle East envoys, Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, who are more than knee-deep in personal business transactions with the Arab world.

Israel must steel itself to reject pressure to sign deals that benefit other parties far more than they benefit them, and to prevent pushing the Middle East further away from real peace and stability.

Modern Jewish Era

 What was the critical factor?

Shabtzai Tzvi

Mendelson

Napolean

Spinoza

Emancipation

Zionnism

Chasidim

Kabbala

Shulchan Aruch

White House defends Trump calling female reporter ‘Piggy’

 https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/11/20/trump-reporters-piggy/

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Thursday defended President Donald Trump’s decision to call a female reporter “Piggy” on Air Force One, claiming the insult reflected the “frankness” that helped him win a second term.

As he faces political blowback for his handling of the files related to deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, Trump has escalated his disparagement of female reporters.

Days later at a White House event with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Trump called Mary Bruce, the chief White House correspondent for ABC News, a “terrible person and a terrible reporter” and called her network “fake news.” He also urged his Federal Communications Commission chairman, Brendan Carr, to revoke ABC’s broadcast licenses in response to Bruce’s questions, which concerned the killing of Post contributing columnist Jamal Khashoggi and the Epstein files.

JD Vance expressed hope his Hindu wife will become a Christian. That’s ruffled feathers in India

 https://edition.cnn.com/2025/11/21/world/jd-vance-wife-india-religion-debate-hnk-dst

Speaking at an event last month with Turning Point USA at the University of Mississippi, Vance was asked by an audience member about Christianity and American patriotism.

“Why are we making Christianity one of the major things that you have to have in common to be one of you guys? To show that I love America just as much as you do?” the audience member asked.

“This is completely in contrast to Vance’s previous comments that his wife’s Hindu upbringing and values inspired his own return to faith,” Priyanka Deo, US correspondent of Indian network NDTV, said on Instagram, adding that his latest remarks suggest acceptance in the United States is conditional and predicated upon becoming a Christian.

rump’s Texas Gerrymander Backfire

 https://www.wsj.com/opinion/texas-redistricting-map-gop-house-donald-trump-doj-gerrymandering-supreme-court-460691a7?mod=hp_opin_pos_1

President Trump’s insistence that Texas Republicans redraw their House map before the 2026 midterms is looking like it could backfire in a big way. A federal court on Tuesday struck down the new map as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. The dispute is a legal hash, but it suggests the GOP didn’t look before leaping into a mid-decade gerrymander free-for-all.

Mr. Trump saw redistricting Texas as an easy way to pick up five GOP House seats next year. At first state officials resisted. They jumped on board after the Justice Department sent the state a letter in July, claiming “serious concerns regarding the legality” of House seats that Texas drew in 2021, after the last Census. The DOJ said those seats were “coalition districts,” in which two or more minority groups add up to a majority. The letter called this a violation of the law and constitution.

Brooklyn DA Backs Reduced Sentence for Notorious Child Molester

 https://www.thecity.nyc/2025/11/13/brooklyn-eric-gonzalez-nechemya-weberman

Gonzalez’s position isn’t a totally new take. 

On Andrew Cuomo’s last day in office as governor in 2021, Gonzalez asked him to commute Weberman’s sentence, arguing in part that the severe punishment “might deter other victims from coming forward and witnesses from participating in a process that could result in such an excessively harsh outcome.” 

Antisemitic mob descends on historic NYC synagogue — urging the ‘resistance’ to ‘take another settler out

 https://nypost.com/2025/11/20/us-news/antisemitic-mob-descends-on-historic-nyc-synagogue-urging-the-resistance-to-take-another-settler-out

A hateful mob of anti-Israel protesters descended on a prominent New York City synagogue Wednesday night, chanting “Globalize the intifada” and sinisterly urging the “resistance” to “take another settler out.”

Some 200 demonstrators gathered outside the Park East Synagogue in Manhattan and heckled Jews attending an event by Nefesh B’nefesh, a Zionist organization that helps Jews immigrate to Israel, according to the Times of Israel.

“It is our duty to make them think twice before holding these events,” one protest leader told the crowd.

Trump calls Democrats' message to troops seditious behaviour, punishable by death

 https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx2p2dz9zk2o

President Donald Trump accused six Democratic lawmakers of "seditious behaviour, punishable by death", after they released a video urging US service members to refuse unlawful commands.

The six lawmakers, all of whom have served in the military or intelligence community, called Trump's remarks dangerous and said they amounted to threats against elected officials.

Sen Kelly, who served in the Navy and is a former astronaut, says: "Our laws are clear. You can refuse illegal orders."

"No one has to carry out orders that violate the law or our constitution," the lawmakers say in the video.

"This administration is pitting our uniformed military and intelligence community professionals against American citizens," it says. "Like us, you all swore an oath to protect and defend this Constitution. Right now, the threats coming to our Constitution aren't just coming from abroad but from right here at home."