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Hamas strikes

Plus, other Notre Dame fires and it’s a boy for the royals


Residents of the southern Israeli port city of Ashdod on Monday survey the damage from a rocket fired from Gaza. Associated Press/Photo by Ariel Schalit

Hamas strikes

ISRAEL: Israel’s military is investigating why Route 34 north of Gaza and near an Israeli kibbutz was left open after 68-year-old Moshe Feder was killed driving along the road, one of four Israeli civilians killed in a barrage of missiles launched from Gaza over the weekend. Hamas launched 690 rockets into Israel, including the sophisticated and expensive Russian-made Kornet anti-tank missile that killed Feder. Israeli Defense Forces responded with about 300 airstrikes of their own, killing 22 Gazans. The Israeli Iron Dome anti-missile system intercepted only about a third of the Hamas barrage. Tel Aviv University’s Amos Yadlin has a helpful list of pluses and minuses on Israeli policy with the weekend confrontation. Philos Project’s Robert Nicholson has a clip of the weird war Israelis live under.

SYRIA: Fighting has escalated inside Idlib, with Russian airstrikes hitting two hospitals and forcing the evacuation of thousands of civilians. A months-long Russia-Turkey truce over Idlib had created a buffer zone designed to avoid civilian casualties in a stand-off with al-Qaeda-linked groups.

FRANCE: Little notice has been given to a string of attacks at other Notre Dames, including a fire on Easter Sunday at a Notre Dame confessional near Marseilles. Despite extensive documentation of multiple incidents, attackers rarely are identified or arrested by authorities.

ALGERIA: The influential brother of former Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika and two generals have been jailed, as protests continue despite the downfall of Bouteflika last month.

AFGHANISTAN: The government’s call for a Ramadan truce has been rejected by the Taliban, which is negotiating directly with the United States over ending the 18-year war. Despite the ongoing talks, the Taliban launched last month a spring offensive, with 13 killed in an attack on a police post in northern Afghanistan Monday.

CHINA: President Donald Trump is threatening a new tariff hike on Chinese goods and China is threatening to walk away from trade talks.

RUSSIA: Give Vladimir Putin credit for punching above his weight. The Russian president has exploited U.S. indecisiveness and retreat, troublemaking despite his own country’s weak economy and diminished standing.

BRITAIN: Prince Harry announced that his wife Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, gave birth to a son this morning, and both are healthy and well.

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Mindy Belz

Mindy is a former senior editor for WORLD Magazine and wrote the publication’s first cover story in 1986. She has covered wars in Syria, Afghanistan, Africa, and the Balkans, and she recounts some of her experiences in They Say We Are Infidels: On the Run From ISIS With Persecuted Christians in the Middle East. Mindy resides with her husband, Nat, in Asheville, N.C.

@MindyBelz

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