Venezuela announced on Monday that it arrested at least one Israeli “mercenary,” amid reports of dozens of arrests of foreigners in the South American country in recent weeks.

Venezuelan Interior and Justice Minister Diosdado Cabello said that Venezuela arrested “125 mercenaries,” listing 16 nationalities of those detained, including Israel.

Yuval, a survivor of the Oct. 7 Nova Festival massacre and an IDF veteran of the war in Gaza, was relaxing in Morro de São Paulo, an idyllic island town in Brazil with a group of friends, when he got a call that disrupted what was meant to be a time of rest and recuperation.

There was a warrant for his arrest in Brazil for alleged war crimes, the Israeli Consulate in São Paulo told Yuval.

In an interview with podcaster Lex Fridman published on Sunday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke of his family who perished in the Holocaust and his grandfather, Semyon Ivanovich Zelensky, the sole survivor in his family, who fought in the Red Army against the Nazis in World War II.

“My grandfather, he graduated from the military academy, and from the very beginning of the war, he went to fight. He was in the infantry and he fought through the entire war. He had many wounds, as they used to say back then, ‘His chest is covered in medals,’ and it’s true,” Zelensky told Fridman during their discussion, which also covered the Russia-Ukraine war, President-elect Donald Trump’s upcoming inauguration and prospects for peace between Russia and Ukraine.

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle say they’ll try to pass the Antisemitism Awareness Act in the new Congress after failing to get the bipartisan bill across the finish line before the end of 2024.

The legislation never received floor time in the Senate after passing the House by a 320-91 vote in May. 

The Anti-Defamation League has hired the lobbying firm Ballard Partners — which has close relationships with the incoming Trump administration — to assist with its work on antisemitism policy.

The move is a sign of the ADL’s preparations for the incoming GOP administration. The deal was first reported by Punchbowl News.

President-elect Donald Trump expressed uncertainty about appointing former State Department spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus as deputy special envoy for Middle East peace – while announcing his decision to give her the role. 

Trump said in an unusually tepid statement posted to his Truth Social platform on Friday that he was “pleased to announce” that Ortagus would be serving as deputy to Steve Witkoff, his longtime friend and golfing partner who he appointed as special envoy to the Middle East in November. 

Sen. Jim Risch (R-ID), the incoming chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, expressed doubt in a recent interview with The Free Press that Iran would try to obtain a nuclear weapon or that the United States would need to act to take out Iran’s nuclear program. 

“I don’t think we need to finish [Iran] off. They’re finishing themselves off,” Risch said. “They talk about it, but where’s the nuclear weapon? They could have had one a long time ago.”

Two Israeli men in their mid-20s remain hospitalized — one in critical condition — after a driver intentionally rammed a pickup truck into a crowd during New Year’s celebrations on New Orleans’ Bourbon Street, killing 14 and injuring at least 30 in Wednesday’s terror attack.  

Both men were tourists from Israel, traveling through several American cities and expecting to end their jaunt in Florida, according to Elad Shoshan, consul of Israel to the Southwest United States. “They wanted to do New Year’s Eve in New Orleans,” Shoshan, who is currently visiting the men in a local hospital — and awaiting the Friday morning arrival of their family members — told Jewish Insider. “Obviously, it became a tragic situation,” he said.