According to the postings, the operators are offering a range of payments: $1,000 for placing notices outside a target’s home, $5,000 for supplying information about a person, $20,000 for arson attacks, and $50,000 for murder.

By Vered Weiss, World Israel News

Israeli security officials are investigating an anonymous website that has posted threats against hundreds of Israeli academics and offered cash incentives for attacks, prompting warnings of an unusual and dangerous escalation.

The site, operating under the name The Punishment for Justice Movement, has circulated the names, photographs and private information of researchers from major universities in Israel and abroad, and encourages supporters to register for encrypted channels to discuss what it describes as “the contract.”

The platform lists individuals from institutions including Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, the Technion, Hebrew University, Tel Aviv University, the Weizmann Institute, and several foreign universities such as Harvard and Oxford.

Among the details displayed are phone numbers, addresses, email accounts and, in some cases, images resembling passports or visas. Some of those named live outside Israel, including in the United States and the United Kingdom.

According to the postings, the operators are offering a range of payments: $1,000 for placing notices outside a target’s home, $5,000 for supplying information about a person, $20,000 for arson attacks, and $50,000 for murder.

The sum doubles for what the group calls “special targets,” a category that includes Ben-Gurion University president Daniel Chamovitz, physicist Shikma Bressler and former Weizmann Institute president Daniel Zajfman.

The organization claims these academics are “legitimate targets” and accuses them of aiding the Israeli military.

It says warnings were sent demanding they “abandon criminal activity,” asserting that those who continued “through financial and personal interests” had effectively marked themselves for retaliation.

A separate section lists dozens more senior figures in the sciences and defense-related fields, including researchers connected to Israel’s nuclear and particle-physics programs.

The catalog also names hundreds of additional students and faculty, each tied to a $50,000 reward for their killing.

Israeli officials say the site appears to operate from a Western country and may be linked to hostile foreign actors, including Iran, according to Ynet. The Shin Bet, Mossad and National Cyber Directorate have been alerted, and universities have advised faculty to heighten personal security and avoid publishing travel plans.

“This is a severe escalation in threats against Israeli civilians,” said a source aware of the investigation. “Even if this is a virtual organization, the explicit call for violence and the offer of financial rewards pose a real and immediate danger.”

The post Anonymous website issues cash bounties for killing Israeli academics, publishes personal details appeared first on World Israel News.

Air traffic controllers were told a plane will be sent into the Capitol building on Wednesday to avenge the death of Iranian general Soleimani.

By World Israel News Staff

The FBI is investigating after an anonymous broadcast on aviation frequencies that was heard by air traffic controllers threatening to fly a plane into the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, CBS News reported Tuesday.

A digitized voice told air traffic controllers in New York: “We are flying a plane into the Capitol on Wednesday. Soleimani will be avenged.”

The recording obtained by CBS came on the first anniversary of the American airstrike ordered by President Donald Trump that killed Iranian general Qassem Soleimani, Iran’s top military strategist who was involved in boosting Iranian-backed militias and regimes across the Middle East.

Iranian leaders vowed that they would avenge the killing, including threats to take out President Trump.

The government does not believe the attack warning to be credible, but is investigating the message as a breach of the use of aviation frequencies, CBS reported.

Sources told CBS News that the Pentagon and other agencies were briefed Tuesday about the recorded threat and said it suggests the Capitol would be attacked on the day that Congress is set officially confirm the Electoral College of the U.S. presidential election.

Aviation experts said the intrusion into the airline frequencies is of serious concern because broadcasts could also be used to give false instructions to pilots.

A message sent to all air traffic controllers on Tuesday reminded them to immediately report any threat or indications of any plane deviating from its flight path.

In the terror attacks on September 11, 2001, members of the Al Qaeda Islamic terror group hijacked four passenger planes and killed or disabled the crews. It was the worst terrorist attack in American history, killing 2,977 people.

Two of the planes were flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York and a third hit the Pentagon. Passengers in the fourth plane that might have been targeting the White House managed to break into the cockpit to confront the hijackers, who crashed the airliner into an empty field in Pennsylvania killing all aboard.

The FBI told CBS it is not commenting but added that it takes “all threats of violence to public safety seriously.”

The post ‘Soleimani will be avenged’: US air traffic controllers receive 9/11-style threat on Capitol appeared first on World Israel News.

New Yorker arrested after telling police he would “shoot all these people” at yeshiva summer camp.

By Paul Shindman, World Israel News

Police arrested a Long Island man after he allegedly called them to complain about social distancing at a Yeshiva summer camp and would “go out there with a freakin’ machine gun and shoot all these people” if nothing was done, a local New York CBS affiliate reported Tuesday.

Nassau County police said they received a call from 58-year-old Nicola Pelle of Inwood who lives next door to Yeshiva Ketana of Long Island, complaining that kids at the Yeshiva’s summer day camp were not following health guidelines.

Nassau County Police Commissioner Patrick Ryder said Pelle complained “that approximately 500 students were wearing no masks and in violation of social distancing.”

“If I gotta go out there with a freakin’ machine gun and shoot all these people, I will,” Ryder quoted Pelle as saying.

Police searched Pelle’s home and found 14 firearms including legally owned rifles, shotguns, and hand guns, but also two assault weapons that are illegal, CBS affiliate WLNY reported.

Pelle, a landscaper, was charged with the felony of making a terroristic threat as well as gun crimes, which could result in a 7-to-11 year jail sentence if he is convicted.

Ryder said that while police take complaints of social distancing seriously, “we are more concerned about those threats that come every year against our children while they are in school.”

There were 570 threats against Nassau County schools just last year, WLNY reported.

Neighbor Anthony Rivellis called the threat out of character for Pelle,  who he described as a a “good guy” who recently had lung cancer surgery, a factor that might have prompted the threat over his claim of social distancing violations at the camp.

“He just was frustrated and I guess with the Oxycontins in him from the cancer surgery he just made a blur. I never expected that blur to come out of his mouth, not at all,” Rivelli said.

Yeshiva Ketana executive director Rabbi Ari Ginian told reporters his camp does follow all social distance guidelines, although it may not look that way for somebody looking in to the grounds from outside.

“We feel that he may have been frustrated by some of the situation that we are under. There is duress right now on everyone’s part. We feel for him that he brought himself to that point and we hope that he takes back what he said,” Ginian said.

The camp said it is grateful to police for their quick response to the threat.

The post New Yorker threatens to shoot up Jewish summer camp, 14 guns found in home appeared first on World Israel News.

With Iran unwilling to walk back threats to the Jewish state and other regional rivals, Israel took precautions to protect its borders and its citizens worldwide.

By World Israel News Staff and TPS

On Tuesday, reports surfaced in Israel that the nation’s military altered air defenses to adjust to current threats posed by Iran.

In addition, a number of Israeli embassies across the globe ratcheted up alert levels to account for Iran’s recent actions, reported the Jerusalem Post. Iran controls  terror proxies in various nations and is widely believed to have supported a number of attacks and assassination attempts throughout the world.

The move arrives following comments on Monday evening by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the Jewish Agency’s Board of Governors that the strategic power balance in the Middle East is shifting, as Iran places precision-guided missiles across the region in an effort to threaten Israel.

Earlier Monday evening, Netanyahu held a press conference with US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, in which he warned that Iran has already begun placing precision-guided missiles in Yemen, and intends to strike Israel from these positions.

At that event, Mnuchin pledged more sanctions on Iran to intensify the U.S.’ “maximum pressure campaign.”

Addressing hundreds of Jewish community leaders from around the world at the Jewish Agency event in Jerusalem, Netanyahu said, “We must be strong. And to be strong, we have to be united as a people; united in spirit, united in our quest to secure the future of the Jewish state and the Jewish people.”

Netanyahu also addressed the budgetary requirements of developing the required military strength, saying that funds would have to be taken from civilian purposes in favor of military ones.

“To be strong, we must advance our military might. And to be strong militarily, we now have to shift funds from the civilian areas to the military ones,” he said.

“That is very hard to do. You can do it in a time of crisis, when things happen that everybody can see, or you can do it in anticipation of avoiding a crisis. And that requires a very broad-shouldered government. That’s what we need today,” he added.

The post Israel places embassies on alert over Iran threat, ramps up air defenses appeared first on World Israel News.

New legislation working its way through the Knesset aims to expand firearm permits to current and former members of combat units in the IDF. The new law is expected to increase the number of civilian gun owners by 50,000, many of whom could act as first responders in threatening situations, such as a terror attack.

The post WATCH: Israel set to expand handgun permits to former combat soldiers appeared first on World Israel News.