The Times of Israel is liveblogging Thursday’s events as they happen.
Montreal synagogue firebombed for 2nd time in just over a year; Trudeau: ‘Vile antisemitism’
Assailants firebombed a synagogue in a Montreal suburb for the second time in just over a year, the latest in a series of attacks on Canadian Jewish institutions since Hamas’s October 7, 2023, invasion of Israel.
As in the other recent attacks on Canadian Jewish sites, no one was injured in the incident.
Mordecai Zeitz, the emeritus rabbi at Congregation Beth Tikvah, a modern Orthodox synagogue in the suburb of Dollard-des-Ormeaux, says the congregants met for morning prayers on Wednesday morning outside the synagogue.
“We were able to recite the morning prayers in an abbreviated way,” he said.”We did not close even if we had to go outside to avoid the fires on the inside, but we had the fires of Jewish identity and Jewish pride very much front and center, in front of the charred doors of the synagogue,” Zeitz tells the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Flames were seen rising from the building at around 3 a.m. local time Wednesday. Police later said they found an “incendiary device” near the scene.
“The damage is minor, we are talking about smashed windows and damage caused by smoke from the fire,” Montreal police spokeswoman Veronique Dubuc tells AFP.
There were no injuries, she says.
Witnesses saw a “suspicious man” leave the area right after the fire broke out, she says, and a another building belonging to a Jewish community group was also damaged nearby.
A criminal investigation is underway, but Dubuc says it’s too early to attribute a motive, while Prime Minister Justin Trudeau denounces the “cowardly” and “vile antisemitic attack.”
Syrian rescuers find human remains at site used by Hezbollah and other Assad allies
DAMASCUS — The Syrian Civil Defense group, known as the White Helmets, uncovered at least 21 corpses as well as incomplete human remains on Wednesday in the Sayeda Zeinab suburb of the capital Damascus.
The discovery was made at a site previously used by Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Iran-backed Iraqi militias, both allies of deposed president Bashar Assad during the country’s civil war. The site included a field kitchen, a drugstore and a morgue, according to Ammar al-Salmo, an official with the White Helmets, a volunteer organization that operated in areas that were controlled by the opposition.
Rescue teams in white hazmat suits searched the site, located not far from the revered shrine of Sayeda Zeinab, the granddaughter of Prophet Mohammad. The remains were placed into black bags and loaded onto a truck as bystanders from the neighborhood looked on.
“Some (of the remains) are skeletons, others are incomplete, and there are bags of small bones. We cannot yet determine the number of victims,” al-Salmo says.
“Damascus has become a mass grave,” he says, pointing out the growing reports of war-related graves and burial sites in the capital and other places in Syria.
Iran and Hezbollah provided Assad’s government with military, financial and logistical support during the civil war.
Turkish FM urges removal of Syria’s Hayat Tahrir al-Sham from terror watchlists
ISTANBUL — Turkey’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan says world powers should remove the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group which seized power in Syria from their terror watchlist.
“I think it is time for the international community starting from UN… to remove their name from the terrorism list,” Fidan tells broadcaster Al Jazeera.
US official: Senior Hamas official’s brother was moved to another prison, not freed
WASHINGTON — Following reports that the half-brother of senior Hamas official Khaled Mashaal was released early from federal prison in Texas last week, a US official tells The Times of Israel that Mofid Mashaal was simply transferred to another detention facility where he is continuing to serve his sentence.
Footage posted on social media last week appeared to show Mofid Mashaal outside of prison, speaking to supporters over mobile video chat while being driven in a car.
The US Department of Justice has not immediately responded to a request for clarification.
WATCH⚡️
Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal’s half-brother, Mofid Meshaal, was unexpectedly released from a federal prison in Texas a few days ago. Convicted for financing Hamxs, Mofid Meshaal served 16 years of a 20-year sentence and claims he hasn’t changed. pic.twitter.com/NI7pmjO17p
— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) December 17, 2024
In 2009, Mofid Mashaal was sentenced to 20 years behind bars for financing Hamas. Following reports of his release, several Israeli media sites speculated that it could be tied to the ongoing hostage negotiations between Israel and Hamas.