President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump will meet at the White House on Thursday with Edan Alexander, the last living American hostage in Gaza, who was released in May. “The President and First Lady have met with many released hostages from Gaza, and they greatly look forward to meeting Edan Alexander and his family in the Oval Office tomorrow,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement. Alexander, now 21, is an American-Israeli from New Jersey. The soldier was 19 when militants stormed his base in Israel and dragged him into the Gaza Strip. Alexander moved to Israel in 2022 after finishing high school and enlisted in the military. He was released on May 12 by the militant group Hamas after 584 days in captivity.

Israel’s Defense Ministry Directorate of Defense Research and Development (MAFAT) has cleared for publication new data on the country’s war with Iran, revealing unprecedented intelligence-gathering efforts and highly effective air defense results. According to MAFAT, Israeli intelligence captured tens of millions of square kilometers of imagery from space during both the lead-up to and the course of the war. This included more than 12,000 satellite images taken over Iranian territory, day and night, providing critical information to support Israeli strikes inside Iran. During the conflict, Israel’s air defense systems intercepted 86% of the Iranian ballistic missiles launched toward its territory, MAFAT reported.

Police are warning of a sophisticated ATM scam preying on elderly New Yorkers, after at least nine reported thefts on the Upper East Side left seniors more than $70,000 poorer in recent weeks. Authorities say a trio of suspects — two men and a woman — were caught on surveillance cameras during three of the incidents, which occurred between May 8 and June 26 at branches of Chase Bank, Bank of America, Capital One, and Citibank. Among the hardest hit was an 86-year-old woman who lost nearly $24,000 from her account around 11:30 a.m. on June 19 at the Chase branch on York Avenue near East 79th Street. That same location was hit at least three times, police said.

Before she became the acting president of Columbia University, Claire Shipman wrote a private text urging the dismissal of Shoshana Shendelman, a Jewish member of the university’s board of trustees who is the most active pro-Israel member on the board.

Hamas on Wednesday issued a ten-day ultimatum to a Gaza militia leader accused of working with Israeli security forces, warning he would be tried in absentia if he failed to surrender. Yasser Abu Shabab, 32, from the southern Gaza city of Rafah, is facing a series of allegations, including treason, espionage, and leading an armed rebellion. According to Hamas officials, Abu Shabab commands weapons reportedly supplied by Israel and heads a group they consider a direct threat to Gaza’s stability. “The announcement is a clear message to any party thinking about fomenting division within the resistance,” Hamas said. Abu Shabab leads the Popular Forces, a militia that portrays itself as a civilian defense group distributing aid and protecting local residents.

Ye, the U.S. rapper formerly known as Kanye West, was recently stripped of an Australian visa after he released his single “Heil Hitler,” a government minister said on Wednesday. Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke revealed Ye has been traveling for years to Australia, where his wife of three years, Bianca Censori, was born. Her family live in Melbourne. Burke said “Heil Hitler,” released in May, promoted Nazism. The song has been criticized as an antisemitic tribute to German dictator Adolf Hitler. “He’s been coming to Australia for a long time. He’s got family here. And he’s made a lot of offensive comments that my officials looked at again once he released the ’Heil Hitler’ song and he no longer has a valid visa in Australia,” Burke told Australian Broadcasting Corp.

Two serious traffic accidents occurred on Wednesday evening in Chareidi neighborhoods, one in the Romema neighborhood of Jerusalem, where a child was killed, and the second in the Ramat Beit Shemesh Daled neighborhood of Beit Shemesh, where a girl was critically injured. The accident in Jerusalem occurred at the intersection of Petah Tikva and Zichron Yaakov streets in the Romema neighborhood of the city. The boy was critically injured and was pronounced dead minutes later. MDA emergency medics Mordechai Musai, Baruch Eliyahu Hoffman, and Eli Raymond reported, “When we arrived at the scene of the accident, there was a lot of commotion. We saw the cyclist, a child about 5 years old, lying unconscious after being hit by a car.

Curtis Sliwa, the Republican nominee in New York City’s mayoral election, offered an apology for past comments widely criticized as antisemitic, describing his ability to acknowledge mistakes as a personal strength as he seeks support among Jewish voters ahead of the general election. Sliwa, founder of the Guardian Angels and a longtime talk radio personality, has faced renewed scrutiny over remarks in which he portrayed Jews as power-hungry and dependent on public benefits, and claimed antisemitic attitudes were “in his DNA” as a non-Jew. Speaking to The Forward on Tuesday, Sliwa called those statements wrong and said he had apologized before but wanted to restate his regret.

Iran’s president on Wednesday ordered the country to suspend its cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency after American and Israeli airstrikes hit its most-important nuclear facilities, likely further limiting inspectors’ ability to track Tehran’s program that had been enriching uranium to near weapons-grade levels. The order by President Masoud Pezeshkian included no timetables or details about what that suspension would entail. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi signaled in a CBS News interview that Tehran still would be willing to continue negotiations with the United States. “I don’t think negotiations will restart as quickly as that,” Araghchi said, referring to U.S. President Donald Trump’s comments that talks could start as early as this week.

The Israel Defense Forces on Tuesday identified the soldier killed in combat in northern Gaza as Sgt. Yaniv Michalovitch hy”d, a 19-year-old tank crew member from Rechovot. Michalovitch served in the 82nd Battalion of the 7th Armored Brigade, known as “Saar Migolan.” According to the IDF, two other members of the same battalion — a tank commander and another soldier — were seriously wounded in the same incident. In a separate battle elsewhere in northern Gaza, a soldier from the elite Egoz unit of the Commando Brigade was also seriously injured, military officials said. All wounded soldiers were evacuated to hospitals for medical treatment, and their families have been informed. (YWN World Headquarters – NYC)