IDF forces on Saturday night were successful in preventing the smuggling of drugs into Israel from Egypt.

An IDF spokesperson stated that troops operating in the area “identified an approach to the fence from the Egyptian side of the border.”

“Directed by IDF observation forces, the troops reached the spot and thwarted the smuggling,” the IDF added.

14 bags of drugs were seized in the area and transferred for further treatment of the Israel Police.

Israeli forces periodically clash with smugglers on the border with Egypt, a major smuggling route for drugs, weapons and women into Israel.

Israel in recent years has built a fence along the Egyptian border to block the flow of work migrants coming to the country from Africa through Egypt.

The tall fence has also been helpful in slowing down the prolific smuggling trade from Egypt into Israel, mostly the work of local Bedouin tribes.

Israeli forces on Monday arrested two terrorists who carried out a firebomb attack on an IDF post a week ago, the military cleared for publication on Wednesday.

In the attack that occurred on October 6, three terrorists hurled Molotov cocktails at a military post adjacent to Jenin, near the community of Einav in Samaria.

The soldiers responded with gunfire and hit one of the terrorists.

The other two terrorists fled the scene. The IDF launched a manhunt for them and subsequently arrested them Monday night.

No Israelis were harmed in the attack.

The killed terrorist was identified as Samir Hamidi. He had served three and a half years in an Israeli prison for terrorism-related offenses and was a member of the Fatah.

Two IDF fighters were lightly and moderately wounded on Tuesday during an operation to arrest a wanted terrorist in the Balata refugee camp in the city of Shechem (Nablus), in the area of the Samaria Regional Brigade.

The soldiers were probably wounded by shrapnel from an explosive charge thrown at them.

The soldiers, of the Nahal Brigade, were evacuated for medical treatment at a hospital.

No further information was available.

Yad Vashem, Israel’s national Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem, welcomed Facebook’s announcement that it updated its hate speech policy to prohibit all forms of Holocaust denial and distortion on its platform.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a post on Monday that “with rising anti-Semitism, we’re expanding our policy to prohibit any content that denies or distorts the Holocaust as well. If people search for the Holocaust on Facebook, we’ll start directing you to authoritative sources to get accurate information.”

“Drawing the right lines between what is and isn’t acceptable speech isn’t straightforward, but with the current state of the world, I believe this is the right balance,” he said.

“Yad Vashem has long stated that Holocaust denial and distortion are forms of anti-Semitism and should be classified as hate speech,” the organization state.

In a recent letter to Zuckerberg, Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev indicated that anti-Semitism is not simply identifiable by keywords, phrases or algorithms but requires human understanding and sensitivities in recognizing and banning such posts.

Shalev further wrote how “education is a vital way of fighting Holocaust distortion and anti-Semitism.”

Accordingly, Yad Vashem supports Facebook’s initiative of directing its users to credible and fact-based content sources, such as Yad Vashem’s comprehensive website in eight languages, as a significant step in the right direction.

“We encourage Facebook to do its utmost and implement these new policies, which we hope, in time, will help fight against all forms of anti-Semitism, hatred and bigotry, which plague us both on and off line,” stated Director of Yad Vashem Communications Division Iris Rosenberg.

A senior source in the Palestinian Authority (PA) informed TPS that Ron Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress, visited Ramallah on behalf of US President Donald Trump, after it became clear to the Trump Administration that there are initial contacts between Abu Mazen and Joe Biden’s staff.

Furthermore, there preparations ongoing for the establishment of direct channels of communications with Biden’s team, through businessmen.

The PA has contacts with Evangelical Christians and with representatives of the Republican Party, but they have been ineffective at making any impact within the PA.

The source also told TPS that the meeting between Lauder and Abu Mazen dealt with the need to resolve the tax crisis in light of the poor situation in the PA and implied the US administration’s intent to help resolve the serious crisis in the PA and renewing coordination channels between Israel and the US.

The PA is still waiting for the election results and at the moment there is no shift in the direction, said the source.