Welcome to The Times of Israel’s Daily Briefing, your 15-minute audio update on what’s happening in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world.
Today is day 45 of the war. Military reporter Emanuel Fabian and reporter Canaan Lidor join host Amanda Borschel-Dan on today’s podcast.
Sixty-six soldiers have been killed so far in the ground offensive in Gaza. The IDF has presented evidence that several hostages taken from Israel into Gaza on October 7 were indeed in the Shifa Hospital compound and that one at least was killed there. Fabian fills us in.
Yesterday, we reported that Yemen’s Houthi rebels claimed that they had hijacked an Israeli cargo ship traveling through the Red Sea. Israel, for its part, blamed Iran for the incident and denied that the vessel was Israeli. Fabian untangles the knot.
Even as the first mixed-gender unit entered Gaza yesterday, there are reports that senior commanders refused to heed the warnings of young female surveillance soldiers who were tasked with watching the Gaza border in the weeks before the brutal Hamas massacre on October 7. The soldiers believe sexism was a factor in their being ignored, according to a Haaretz report.
The October 30 burial of Alina Plahti, who was killed by Hamas at the Supernova rave, roiled the nation because she was buried outside the main cemetery in Beit She’an. Her father is Jewish, she served in the IDF, but she dropped out of her conversion program three years ago. Lidor explains.
Lidor dives into the increase of inflammatory language out of South Africa, including the use of “genocide.”
And finally, Lidor tells of a group of Jewish and Arab Israelis who are working together to clean up bomb shelters in Haifa.
For the latest updates, please look at The Times of Israel’s ongoing live blog.
IDF: Hostage was killed in Shifa; clip shows Hamas take 2 other hostages there on Oct 7
Surveillance soldiers charge sexism a factor in their Oct. 7 warnings being ignored
Yemen’s Houthis claim to hijack Israeli ship in Red Sea; Jerusalem: It isn’t Israeli
After Oct. 7 victim buried outside cemetery, fence separating non-Jews lowered
In Haifa, bomb shelter cleanup action fosters Arab-Jewish partnership
THOSE WE HAVE LOST: Stories of civilians and soldiers killed in Hamas’s onslaught on Israel
THOSE WE ARE MISSING: The hostages and victims whose fate is still unknown
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