Reb Yishai Engelman, a Rosh Mesivta in the hesder yeshivah in Ma’ale Adumim was seriously injured on Monday in Gaza. He is sedated and ventilated in the ICU at Soroka Hospital in Be’er Sheva. His father, Rav Aharon Engelman, a Rav in the Ma’alot Yeshivah, asked for tefillos for his son, whom he said was injured by an explosive device. Please daven for a refuah sheleimah for Yishai ben Miriam b’toch sha’ar cholei Yisrael. (YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)

The U.S. government will pay the vaccine maker Moderna $176 million to develop a pandemic vaccine that could be used to treat bird flu in people as cases in dairy cows continue to mount across the country, federal officials announced Tuesday. The funds are targeted for release through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and will pay for continued development of a vaccine that uses the same mRNA technology that allowed rapid development and rollout of vaccines to protect against COVID-19. The award was made through the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, or BARDA, a program that focuses on medical treatments for potential pandemics.

President Biden’s family is laying the blame for his poor debate performance squarely on his staff, according to reports. The family, including First Lady Jill Biden, children, and grandchildren, gathered at Camp David on Sunday to urge the President to stay in the race and keep fighting, despite his performance. Sources familiar with the discussions told The Associated Press that some family members criticized how Biden’s staff prepared him for the debate, saying they didn’t adequately prepare him to go on the attack and focus on his vision for the next four years. The family also complained that the staff allowed the President to become overworked without enough rest beforehand.

Hurricane Beryl roared through open waters on Tuesday as a monstrous Category 5 storm on a path that would take it near Jamaica and the Cayman Islands after earlier making landfall in the southeast Caribbean, killing at least four people. A hurricane warning was in effect for Jamaica and a hurricane watch for Grand Cayman, Little Cayman and Cayman Brac. Beryl was forecast to start losing intensity on Tuesday but still to be near major hurricane strength when it passes near Jamaica on Wednesday, the Cayman Islands on Thursday and Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula on Friday, according to the National Hurricane Center.

A stampede among thousands of people at a religious gathering in northern India killed at least 60 and left scores injured, officials said Tuesday, adding the toll could rise. Attendees had rushed to leave the makeshift tent following an event with Hindu figure Bhole Baba, local media reported. Video of the aftermath showed the structure appeared to have collapsed. Women wailed over the dead. Deadly stampedes are relatively common around Indian religious festivals, where large crowds gather in small areas with shoddy infrastructure and few safety measures. Police officer Rajesh Singh said overcrowding may have been a factor in the stampede in a village in Hathras district of Uttar Pradesh state, about 350 kilometers (220 miles) southwest of the state capital, Lucknow.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Tuesday that the U.S. will soon announce an additional $2.3 billion in security assistance for Ukraine, to include anti-tank weapons, interceptors and munitions for Patriot and other air defense systems. The announcement came as Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov met with Austin at the Pentagon. And it marks a strong response to pleas from Kyiv for help in battling Russian forces in the Donetsk region. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Sunday that Russia had dropped more than 800 powerful glide bombs in Ukraine in the last week alone. And he urged national leaders to relax restrictions on the use of Western weapons to strike military targets inside Russia.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu strongly condemned the release of Shifa Hospital director Mohammad Abu Salmiya from custody, calling it a “severe mistake and ethical failure.” Abu Salmiya was arrested in November for allegedly allowing Hamas to use the hospital as a center of operations. “This man, under whose responsibility our hostages were held and murdered, belongs in prison,” Netanyahu said. He has ordered an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the release, which he claims was made without the knowledge or approval of the political echelon or security agency heads. The investigation, to be led by Shin Bet director Ronen Bar, will present its findings to the Prime Minister on Tuesday.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, long known for her hysterical outbursts, has threatened to bring articles of impeachment against the Supreme Court justices following Monday’s ruling granting former President Trump immunity from prosecution. The ruling stated that a president has absolute immunity for actions within their constitutional authority and presumptive immunity for official acts, sparking outrage among congressional Democrats. The Supreme Court’s ruling did not specify whether Trump’s alleged actions pertaining to charges he faces of attempting to subvert the 2020 election fell under his constitutional powers, leaving that determination to a lower court. “The Supreme Court has become consumed by a corruption crisis beyond its control,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote on X.

The IDF announced that its troops located and demolished the largest Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket manufacturing site found to date in southern Gaza’s Rafah. The site, located in the Tel Sultan neighborhood, was raided by troops from the Commando Brigade, 401st Armored Brigade, and the elite Yahalom combat engineering unit. According to the IDF, the underground facility was used by Islamic Jihad to manufacture rocket parts and long-range rockets, producing hundreds of projectiles in recent years. The site was identified as the terrorist organization’s largest rocket manufacturing hub in the Gaza Strip. During the raid, IDF commandos and elite combat engineers engaged in intense battles with gunmen both above and below ground.

by Rabbi Yair Hoffman to subscribe email the author at yairhoffman2@gmail.com