The Times of Israel is liveblogging Sunday’s events as they unfold.
Harris, Trump address Israel’s airstrikes in Iran during US presidential campaigns
On the campaign trail this weekend, US Vice President Kamala Harris and former president Donald Trump briefly addressed Israel’s airstrikes on Iran military sites.
“Israel is attacking — we’ve got a war going on and she’s out partying,” Trump said at a rally in Michigan on Friday as Harris was holding an event with Beyoncé in Texas.
Meanwhile, Harris on Saturday called for “de-escalation and not an escalation of activities in that region.”
“I feel very strongly, we as the United States feel very strongly that Iran must stop what it is doing in terms of the threat that it presents to the region and we will always defend Israel against any attacks by Iran in that way,” she told reporters in Michigan.
Iran’s president mourns 4 killed in Israeli strikes, warns against future attacks
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, in a statement posted to X, gives his condolences to the families of the four people, all with the military air defense, killed in Israel’s first-ever open attack on Iran.
The president also warns against future attacks.
“Enemies of Iran should know these brave people are standing fearlessly in defense of their land and will respond to any stupidity with tact and intelligence,” Pezeshkian writes.
After IDF warning, Lebanese media reports Israeli raid on southern Beirut
Lebanon’s state news agency reports an Israeli raid on southern Beirut, after the IDF issued a fresh evacuation call.
The official National News Agency says shortly after midnight that Israel “targeted the southern suburbs of Beirut.”
The Israeli army earlier urged residents of two neighborhoods in the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital to evacuate their homes.
“You are located near Hezbollah facilities and interests, against which the IDF will operate in the near future,” military spokesman Col. Avichay Adraee said in a post on social media platform X.
The evacuation call included maps showing buildings that would be targeted in Burj al-Barajneh and Hadath.
Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.
US defense chief: Iran ‘should not make the mistake of responding to Israel’s strikes’
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin warns Tehran against responding to Israel’s strikes on military sites in Iran and says he has stressed in a call to his Israeli counterpart the opportunities to de-escalate tensions in the region.
“Iran should not make the mistake of responding to Israel’s strikes, which should mark the end of this exchange,” Austin says in a statement.
IDF says 2 drones crossed from Lebanon, were downed over open areas
Sirens warning of a suspected drone infiltration sounded earlier in the coastal city of Nahariya and in several towns near the Lebanon border.
The IDF says the incident is “over,” with the military having identified two drones that crossed from Lebanon into Israel, and intercepting both over open areas.
Reservist eulogized for desire to take revenge against Gazans, setting home on fire to boost morale
During the recent funeral of an IDF reservist who was killed fighting in Lebanon, his loved ones eulogized him as someone who was determined to take revenge against Gazans, even women and children, and who allegedly set a home in the Strip on fire without authorization from his superiors in order to cheer up his fellow soldiers.
“You entered Gaza (after Hamas’s October 7, 2023, onslaught) to take revenge — as much as possible. [Against] women, children — everyone you saw. As much as possible. That’s what you wanted,” said Uriah Ben-Natan, the brother of 22-year-old Sgt. First Class (res.) Shuvael Ben-Natan, from the northern West Bank settlement of Rehelim.
Clips from the controversial eulogies have been picked up by left-wing media watchdog The Seventh Eye, which criticizes Israeli media outlets for mostly not including them in their coverage of Ben-Natan’s funeral in what it claims is an extension of an effort to hide or downplay alleged IDF war crimes in Gaza.
Ben-Natan was killed along with three others during a clash with Hezbollah operatives in Lebanon on Wednesday. Earlier in the war, though, he fought in Gaza as well.
“You were the happiest and biggest goofball in the platoon. We realized this for the first time when you set a house on fire without approval in order to boost morale,” said one of his fellow soldiers in a subsequent eulogy at the funeral.
Ben-Natan’s father David referenced his son’s arrest last year for shooting dead a 40-year-old Palestinian man in front of his wife and children while they were harvesting olives in the West Bank.
Ben-Natan claimed he was acting in self-defense after Palestinians from the area attacked him. The local Palestinians from the northern West Bank village of As-Sawiya, in turn, claimed that settlers had been trying to prevent them from harvesting their olives and that Ben-Natan had shot Bilal Salah in cold blood.
Ben-Natan was indicted, but his father said at the funeral that the case against him was closed. However, The Seventh Eye reports that the IDF says the investigation hasn’t been completed or handed to the Military Advocate General, meaning it can’t have been closed.
Despite having been severely wronged, Ben-Natan put what happened behind him and decided that he was still going to enlist after October 7, his father claimed at the funeral.
“I want to be with the Jews in their war,” his father recalled him having said.
התקשורת הישראלית סיקרה את ההספדים בהלוויתו של חייל צה"ל שובאל בן-נתן, אולם השמיטה את דברי אחיו על הכוונה להשמדת עם והקריאה לרצח נשים וילדים:
"אתה נכנסת לעזה בשביל לנקום, כמה שיותר, נשים, ילדים, כל מי שראית, כמה שיותר, זה מה שרצית".
"בעזרת השם, שכל עם ישראל יזכה לנקום את הנקמה… pic.twitter.com/3a574A7hRV
— העין השביעית (@the7i) October 26, 2024
IDF says it hit Hamas command center placed in former school in Gaza City
Air Force jets conducted a targeted strike a short while ago on a Hamas command center placed at the site of a former school in Gaza City, the IDF says.
The military says the airstrike on the former Saleh a-Din School compound was “precise” and intelligence-based, targeting a site used by the Palestinian terror group to “plan and carry out terror actions against IDF forces and the State of Israel.”
It adds that it took many steps to mitigate harm to civilians, including using precise munitions, aerial observation and more.
The army once again accuses Hamas of violating international law by placing its assets in civilian areas and compounds.
IDF warns of imminent strikes on 2 Hezbollah-linked buildings in southern Beirut
The IDF urges Lebanese residents to evacuate the area of two Hezbollah-linked buildings in Beirut’s southern suburbs of Burj al-Barajneh and Hadath, indicating imminent airstrikes on them.
The military’s Arabic-language spokesperson, Col. Avichay Adraee, says civilians should stay at least 500 meters away from the sites.
#عاجل إلى جميع السكان المتواجدين في منطقة الضاحية الجنوبية وتحديدًا في المباني المحددة في الخرائط المرفقة والمباني المجاورة لها في المناطق التالية:
????برج البراجنة
????حدث⭕️أنتم تتواجدون بالقرب من منشآت ومصالح تابعة لحزب الله حيث سيعمل ضدها جيش الدفاع على المدى الزمني القريب… pic.twitter.com/rMTLeU7Kd2
— افيخاي ادرعي (@AvichayAdraee) October 26, 2024