Jewish extremists talked of firing a missile at a key Islamic holy site in Jerusalem and hundreds of others blocked main highways with burning tires -- examples of how opponents hope to scuttle Israel's planned summer pullout from Gaza and part of the West Bank.
Israeli police and officials said Monday they interrogated three Jews who planned to buy a missile from criminals and fire it at the Dome of the Rock, the ancient gold-topped shrine on the same plaza as the al-Aqsa Mosque. Such an attack would likely ignite violence throughout the Middle East.
Officials admitted that hard evidence in the missile case was weak, but the highway protesters showed that even relatively small numbers can tie down police -- a main goal of the opponents. More than 300 people were detained, police said.
The Cabinet and parliament have repeatedly approved the pullout plan, driving opponents to desperate measures to stop it. Many are driven by messianic religious beliefs, rejecting the right of a temporal government to make policies.
In Jerusalem, police pulled flaming tires off a key road with crowbars, and in other places, they hauled the protesters themselves off the roads.
At the northern entrance to Jerusalem, two tires burned in the middle of the road, forcing motorists to slow to a crawl and drive on the sidewalks to pass the tires and the billowing black smoke.
Protester Shlomo Sternberg, waving a flag, believed the pullout would be canceled.
"I am sure that we will not see that dark, evil day the prime minister and government are planning," he told Channel Two TV.
Irate motorists shouted at the demonstrators, and a TV station showed one man punching a protester blocking the highway.
Australians were downloading virtual private networks (VPNs) in droves, while one of the world’s largest porn distributors said it was blocking users from its platforms as the country yesterday rolled out sweeping online age restriction. Australia in December became the first country to impose a nationwide ban on teenagers using social media. A separate law now requires artificial intelligence (AI)-powered chatbot services to keep certain content — including pornography, extreme violence and self-harm and eating disorder material — from minors or face fines of up to A$49.5 million (US$34.6 million). The country also joined Britain, France and dozens of US states requiring
Hungarian authorities temporarily detained seven Ukrainian citizens and seized two armored cars carrying tens of millions of euros in cash across Hungary on suspicion of money laundering, officials said on Friday. The Ukrainians were released on Friday, following their detention on Thursday, but Hungarian officials held onto the cash, prompting Ukraine to accuse Hungary’s Russia-friendly government of illegally seizing the money. “We will not tolerate this state banditism,” Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrii Sybiha said. The seven detained Ukrainians were employees of the Ukrainian state-owned Oschadbank, who were traveling in the two armored cars that were carrying the money between Austria and
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