A convoy of Russian military vehicles rolled down the highway towards the Syrian city of Tartus on Monday as soldiers stood guard. Planes periodically descended and rose from Russia’s Hmeimim air base in the Syrian coastal province of Latakia while smoke rose from the base. It was unclear what was burning. In the streets of Hmeimim, a town dotted with orange groves, many of the shops bear signs in Russian, a nod to the significance of the Russian military presence. But whether and how long that presence will last after the fall of former Syrian leader Bashar Assad is now an open question. Russia’s scorched-earth intervention on behalf of its ally, Assad, once turned the tide of the Syrian civil war.

An Israeli helicopter landed near a military site in the Damascus area overnight Monday, sources told the Russian Sputnik news agency on Tuesday. According to the report, which has not been confirmed by Israel, the IDF soldiers disembarked from the helicopter, entered the military site, and reboarded the helicopter after about 20 minutes, heading toward southern Syria Shortly later, Syrian media outlets reported Israeli strikes in the Sitt Zaynab area on the outskirts of Damascus. (YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)

A senior Russian general was killed Tuesday by a bomb hidden in a scooter outside his apartment building in Moscow, a day after Ukraine’s security service leveled criminal charges against him. A Ukrainian official said the service carried out the attack. Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, the chief of the military’s nuclear, biological and chemical protection forces, was killed as he left for his office. Kirillov’s assistant also died in the attack. Kirillov, 54, was under sanctions from several countries, including the U.K. and Canada, for his actions in Moscow’s war in Ukraine. On Monday, Ukraine’s Security Service, or SBU, opened a criminal investigation against him, accusing him of directing the use of banned chemical weapons. An official with the SBU said the agency was behind the attack.

Starting in September of 2027, all new passenger vehicles in the U.S. will have to sound a warning if rear-seat passengers don’t buckle up. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said Monday that it finalized the rule, which also requires enhanced warnings when front seat belts aren’t fastened. The agency estimates that the new rule will save 50 lives per year and prevent 500 injuries when fully in effect, according to a statement. The new rule will apply to passenger cars, trucks, buses except for school buses, and multipurpose vehicles weighing up to 10,000 pounds. Before the rule, seat belt warnings were required only for the driver’s seat. Under the new rule, outboard front-seat passengers also must get a warning if they don’t fasten their belts.

The Shin Bet and Israel Police revealed on Tuesday that last month they arrested a 23-year-old resident of Jerusalem for alleged security offenses under the direction of Iranian intelligence agents.

The IDF announced on Tuesday that two soldiers were killed in a building collapse in southern Gaza on Monday. One soldier was identified as Maj. (res.) Moshiko (Maxim) Rozenwald, H’Yd, 35, from Modiin. He served as a company commander in the Combat Engineering Corps’ 7107th Battalion. The name of the second soldier has not yet been released. A preliminary IDF investigation showed that the soldiers, who were killed while clearing buildings and tunnels of terrorists in Rafah, were clearing one of the last buildings in the area, a dilapidated structure, and it collapsed on them, instantly killing the two soldiers and moderately injuring another two soldiers. The building was heavily damaged and the investigation did not uncover any evidence that the collapse was caused by explosives.

President-elect Donald Trump seemed to entertain the discredited theory that vaccines cause autism as he answered questions from journalists at a press conference Monday at his Mar-a-Lago club. Trump said Robert F. Kennedy Jr., his choice to lead the Department of Health and Human Services who has been an anti-vaccine advocate, would look into the reasons for rising autism rates. Trump, seeming to respond to Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell’s defense of the polio vaccine, called himself “a big believer in it.” “You’re not going to lose the polio vaccine,” Trump said. A look at autism rates and why they are rising: What is autism? Autism is a developmental disability caused by differences in the brain. There are many possible symptoms, many of which overlap with other diagnoses.

Defense Minister Yisrael Katz issued a statement on Tuesday morning clarifying Israel’s stance on the control of Gaza “the day after” – after the war ends. “In response to various reports – my position regarding Gaza is clear,” Katz stated. “After we defeat Hamas’s military and governing power in Gaza, Israel will control Gaza security with full freedom of action, just like in Yehuda and Shomron. We will not allow any terror activity from Gaza against Israeli citizens and yishuvim. We will not allow a return to the reality before October 7.” His statement came in response to a report by Channel 12 that the defense minister recently told a US official that Israel is not interested in controlling Gaza.

TikTok on Monday asked the Supreme Court to step in on an emergency basis to block the federal law that would ban the popular platform in the United States unless its China-based parent company agreed to sell it. Lawyers for the company and China-based ByteDance urged the justices to step in before the law’s Jan. 19 deadline. A similar plea was filed by content creators who rely on the platform for income and some of TikTok’s more than 170 million users in the U.S. “A modest delay in enforcing the Act will create breathing room for this Court to conduct an orderly review and the new Administration to evaluate this matter — before this vital channel for Americans to communicate with their fellow citizens and the world is closed,” lawyers for the companies told the Supreme Court.

The U.S. Census Bureau is changing how it counts immigrants in annual estimates by including more people who were admitted for humanitarian, and often temporary, reasons. The change is being made in an effort to better reflect population shifts this decade, officials said Monday. Population estimates, including immigration, are due to be released Thursday showing how the populations of the United States and the 50 states changed this year. However, the new approach to counting immigrants will only be reflected nationally. The percentage of U.S. residents who were foreign born rose to its highest level in more than a century in 2023. It could be even higher under the new methodology.