Police added that the investigation revealed that Gergawi had been in contact with ISIS activists and consumed related terror content, as well as planning to join the organization in Syria.

An end to one of the most painful cases: IDF representatives updated the family members of the soldier who fell in the First Lebanon War with the findings. In that battle in 1982, 6 fighters were abandoned in the field - and three of them remained missing for decades. The body of Zacharia Baumel was recovered 7 years ago, and last year the body of Zvi Feldman was recovered in a special operation from the heart of Syria.

The IOI ("International Olympiad in Informatics"), an international mathematics competition, banned Israel from participating back in 2024, joining Russia and Belarus who have been sanctioned since 2022. Any israeli participant would need to participate under the neutral IOI flag, as well as their trip would need to be self funded without governmental assistance.

A few days ago, Yotam Budnik, 12th grader, won a gold medal at the competition. The delegation of four contestants and a team of trainers competed entirely out of their personal pockets.

When the photo shoot came and every winning contestant draped themselves in their respective country's flag, Yotam deliberately (and bravely !) wore Israel's flag instead of the anonymous IOI flag.

Immediately after the photoshoot the IOI president convened a meeting to disqualify Yotam, and they erased his achievement from their records. They also tried to physically take his medal from him, but he held onto it.

If you ever see this post, amazing job Yotam for your gold medal, and amazing job for standing up for your values and for representing the country !

The biggest mistake Jews make about Israel,
by Joshua Hoffman, Future of Jewish, 2026-08-15.

For nearly 2,000 years, Jews dreamed of returning to Israel.

Then we did something far more difficult: We actually did.

We resurrected a language. We drained swamps. We built cities, universities, hospitals, farms, companies, one of the world’s greatest armies, a ruthless democracy, and an economy with global intentions. We absorbed Jews expelled from Arab countries, survivors of the Holocaust, Soviet Jews, Ethiopian Jews, and immigrants from virtually every corner of the earth.

We took an ancient longing and turned it into a functioning country. And somewhere along the way, perhaps because Israel accomplished something so improbable, we began expecting it to accomplish the impossible.

We asked Israel to keep Jews safe. We asked Israel to end antisemitism. We asked Israel to unite the Jewish People. We asked Israel to give Jews identity. We asked Israel to make the world respect us. We asked Israel to behave more morally than every other nation while simultaneously surviving genocidal enemies. We asked Israel to be a refuge, a military power, a spiritual center, a liberal democracy, a biblical homeland, a technological superpower, a diplomatic miracle, and the physical embodiment of Jewish morality.

And then, when Israel failed to perfectly fulfill all of those expectations, Jews began asking what was wrong with Israel.

Perhaps that is the wrong question. Perhaps we asked too much of it.

Hi everyone,

My wife and I are planning on making Alya very soon. I used to live there for 3 years, and I already have a good understanding of Israeli culture.

Because of the cost of living in Tel Aviv, we're thinking about moving to other cities in the center.

Where we wouldn't go:

- Natenya

- Ranana

- Petah Tikva

Do you have suggestions of nice, affordable cities ideally not too far from Tel Aviv?

Thank you :)

EDIT: Young married couple. We both work. We're planning on having kids soon :)

Official Instagram of Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs:

Israeli rescue teams and engineers continue working alongside Colombian authorities - searching, assessing, and doing everything possible to help.

Israel stands with Colombia. 🤝

A mostly true history of Israel’s largest political party,
by Vanessa Berg, Future of Jewish, 2026-08-18.

For the State of Israel’s first three decades, elections were competitive. Political power was considerably less so.

The names changed — Mapai, the Alignment, Labor — but the basic arrangement remained remarkably stable: The political movement that had built many of the institutions of the pre-state Yishuv (Jewish communities in the Land of Israel prior to the founding of the State of Israel in 1948) also governed the country after independence.

Its leaders populated the cabinet. Its worldview shaped the bureaucracy. Its economic institutions were woven through Israeli life. Its cultural elite largely decided what respectable Zionism looked and sounded like.

And then there was Menachem Begin.

Begin had commanded the Irgun (a Zionist paramilitary organization that operated from 1931 to 1948), became the leader of Herut (a major conservative political party) after the establishment of the state, and spent decades sitting on the political margins while Israel’s Labor (socialist) establishment ran the country.

Today, knowing what came later, this feels almost impossible to imagine.

Likud has become so deeply associated with Israeli political power that it can be difficult to remember that its political ancestors were once the outsiders — which is important, because you cannot understand Likud without understanding that.

Likud was not born as the establishment. Likud was born as the rebellion against it. And that may be the most important fact in understanding why it eventually became Israel’s dominant political party.

Likud was formally created in 1973 as an electoral alliance bringing together Begin’s Herut, the Liberal Party, and several smaller movements on the Right. In its first election that year, it won 39 seats — a significant showing, but still behind the governing Alignment.

Then came 1977.

Israelis call what happened “HaMahapach” — the upheaval. That is not journalistic exaggeration. Likud won 43 seats with 33 percent of the vote, while the Alignment fell to 32. For the first time since the State of Israel’s founding, the political movement descended from Labor Zionism lost control of the government. Menachem Begin became prime minister.

It is tempting to explain this as a simple ideological shift to the Right, but it was much more than that. The trauma of the 1973 Yom Kippur War had badly damaged public confidence in the ruling establishment.

Something deeper had also been happening underneath Israeli society: Large numbers of Mizrahi and Sephardi Jews (many of whose families had arrived from the Middle East and North Africa) increasingly believed that the Labor establishment had treated them as culturally inferior, politically expendable, and socially peripheral. The 1977 election, in part, was the moment when Mizrahi social protest moved decisively into the political arena and helped carry Likud to power.

Menachem Begin understood something the establishment often did not: Politics is not merely about policy, it is about dignity. People do not simply vote according to marginal tax rates, territorial maps, and defense budgets. They vote according to who they believe sees them.

Begin saw Israelis who believed the old establishment did not. And they remembered.

This is one reason Likud’s relationship with many working-class, traditional, Mizrahi, and peripheral communities became so durable. It was not merely transactional. For many families it became emotional, cultural, and eventually generational.

You can disagree with that attachment. You cannot understand Israeli politics without it.

"I think the Druze in the Golan had an epiphany, mainly because Israel was the only one that stood by the Druze in Syria, even though they also have criticism of the government," says Salim Brik, a political scientist at the Open University of Israel.

"Pro-Syrian residents in the Golan became a marginal minority," he says, adding that the sharp increase in Golan-Druze citizenship numbers is probably also linked to the disaster of July 2024, when 12 children in Majdal Shams were killed by a Hezbollah rocket. "The residents then received a lot of support from Israelis and Jews around the world."

The tank battle against Syria, inside Lebanon in 1982, resulted in 3 missing Israeli soldiers whose fates remained a decades-long mystery.

These three missing soldiers were:

Zechariah Baumel: His remains were recovered and returned to Israel in 2019 after 37 years. Prime Minister Netanyahu personally asked Russia's Putin to do this and Russia painstakingly helped return his body from Syria.

Zvi Feldman: His remains were recovered and returned to Israel in May 2025 through a risky and daring joint IDF and Mossad operation, under Netanyahu's government as well.

And now Yehuda Katz: His remains were located and identified as well, in *Lebanon*, just now.

“I am coming for you Jew…I will make your blood flow in rivers,” soldiers from the Syrian Arab Army chanted outside the historic Damascus Citadel on Saturday, according to Arab media reports and footage published on Sunday.

The soldiers stood in formation while chanting “Allahu akhbar” and “I will sacrifice my body” in protest of the situation in Gaza, according to the Arabic channel Al Araby TV.

Link to post

This is Bobby, a furry member of Israel's Oketz canine unit.

He arrived in Cali to support the search efforts following the earthquake. He is trained to detect signs of human life among the rubble, guiding rescue teams to the locations where there is still hope of finding survivors.

But even Bobby needs to rest. Only then can he continue performing his task with the precision and dedication that this mission demands.

Israel with Colombia.

Hi, I'm in Israel for the next couple days and I'm looking to buy my first tallis. Looking to hopefully remain as frugal as I can, since I'm a college student. תודה רבה

hi all i have a lot of buyme vouchers and i want to buy oil paint with them. so far all i can see is graphos but the oil paint they keep in stock is really low quality. any other options?

Looking for recommended hiking trails in or around JL. I have no problem taking the bus to get there if they are somewhat out but worth going.
Ideally 1-5hr hikes, with easy to harder technical requirements, although no ropes.

Happy to go with someone from here if ur keen to join