Israel to buy two new combat squadrons of F-35 and F-15IA advanced fighter aircraft from Lockheed Martin and Boeing in a deal worth tens of billions of dollars.
Published On 3 May 20263 May 2026
Israel has given final approval for a multibillion-dollar deal to buy two new combat squadrons of advanced F-35 and F-15IA fighter jets from United States manufacturers Lockheed Martin and Boeing, the Ministry of Defence says.
Israel’s Ministerial Committee on Procurement signed off on the deal as the initial phase of a 350-billion-shekel ($119bn) programme to boost the country’s armed forces and “strengthen readiness ahead of a demanding decade for Israeli security”, it said on Sunday.
Recommended Stories
list of 3 itemsend of list
“Alongside immediate wartime procurement needs, we have a responsibility to act now to secure the [military’s] edge 10 years from now and beyond,” Defence Ministry Director General Amir Baram said.
The continuing US-Israel war on Iran “reinforced just how critical the US-Israel strategic relationship is and how essential advanced air power remains”, he added.
Under the deal, Israel would buy a fourth F-35 squadron from Lockheed Martin and a second squadron of F-15IA fighter jets from Boeing.
In December, Boeing was given an $8.6bn contract for Israel, including 25 new F-15IAs and an option for 25 more.
Baram said the next step would be to move forward with finalising the agreements with the US government and military.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the purchase “reinforces Israel’s overwhelming air superiority – a superiority that was demonstrated in Am KeLavi [12-day war on Iran] and now in Shaagat HaAri [ongoing war in Iran]”.
“Our pilots are prepared to reach anywhere in Iranian airspace if required,” he added.
‘Keep pressing forward’
The US and Israel launched a war on Iran on February 28, but a fragile ceasefire has been in place since April 8. The US Navy maintains a blockade of Iranian ports.
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said the US-Israel war on Iran demonstrated the air force’s power and its decisive role in protecting Israel.
“The lessons of that campaign require us to keep pressing forward on force build-up to ensure air superiority for decades to come,” he said.
Katz said the new aircraft would lead to a significant technological leap in integrating autonomous flight capabilities and next-generation defence systems and in establishing Israeli military dominance in space.
Two U.S. service members are missing in southwestern Morocco following an annual multinational military exercise, sparking an ongoing search-and-rescue effort by U.S. and allied forces, officials said Sunday.
The incident happened on May 2 at the Cap Draa Training Area near Tan Tan, a Moroccan city about 15 miles from the Atlantic Ocean, the United States Africa Command (AFRICOM) said.
“The incident remains under investigation and the search is on-going,” it said in a statement, adding that the rescue operation includes ground, air and maritime assets.
Fox News Digital reached out to AFRICOM for more details but did not immediately hear back.
U.S. and Moroccan military forces participate in the 20th edition of the African Lion military exercise in Tantan, south of Agadir, Morocco, on May 31, 2024.(Mosa’ab Elshamy/AP)
The war games exercise, known as African Lion, started in April and runs across four countries, including Tunisia, Ghana and Senegal. It is scheduled to end in early May.
African Lion is the U.S. military’s largest annual exercise in Africa, bringing together senior commanders from the United States and key regional allies. It was originally launched in 2004.
Punjab Crime News: A very horrifying case has come to light in Shadihari village of Sangrur district of Punjab, where a father and son, who had come to resolve a domestic dispute, were shot dead by their own son-in-law. After committing this crime, the accused son-in-law fled from the spot. After this incident, an atmosphere of fear has spread in the area.
As soon as information about the incident was received, the police reached the spot and started investigation. This double murder is said to have taken place late on Wednesday night. The deceased have been identified as father-in-law Lakhbir Singh and brother-in-law Jagseer Singh, while the accused is Gurvinder Singh.
According to the information, Gurvinder Singh was married to Veerpal Kaur, daughter of Lakhbir Singh of Basi Rasuli, Patiala. There was a domestic dispute going on between the husband and wife for a long time. To resolve this dispute, Lakhbir Singh along with his son Jagseer Singh had reached daughter Veerpal Kaur’s house in Shadihari village on Wednesday night.
During the conversation, instead of calming down, the matter worsened. The matter got so bad that in anger the accused Gurvinder Singh opened fire on his father-in-law Lakhbir Singh and brother-in-law Jagseer Singh. As soon as the bullets hit, both of them fell on the ground and died on the spot. After this incident, there was an outcry on the spot and people nearby gathered.
After committing this incident, the accused son-in-law immediately fled from the spot. However, after receiving the information, the police have registered a case. At present the police has started searching for the accused son-in-law. Police say that they will soon arrest the accused Gurvinder Singh and send him to jail.
Bhandara Crime News: A horrifying and heart-wrenching moment has come to light from Bhandara district of Maharashtra, where a brother-in-law brutally murdered his own widow (widow) sister-in-law over a love dispute. After committing this incident, the accused fled on a motorcycle, but Lakhandur police arrested him from Bramhapuri in Chandrapur.
The deceased has been identified as Madhuri Ambade, who is 30 years old. The accused brother-in-law has been identified as Gaurav Ambade, who is 25 years old. It is being told that both were residents of Brahmapuri. This incident took place in Bhagadi village of Lakhandur taluka on Sunday morning, causing sensation in the entire area.
What is the whole matter?
According to the information received, the husband of the deceased woman had died 5 years ago and she was living with her 8 year old daughter. During this time, she developed a love affair with her brother-in-law Gaurav Ambade.
Accused Gaurav pressurized Madhuri to marry her, but Madhuri clearly refused to marry him. After this, Gaurav decided to marry another girl, but Madhuri broke that relationship too. Due to the breakdown of the relationship, Gaurav became very angry and decided to take this dreadful step.
How did the murder happen?
According to the police, the accused brother-in-law first attacked Madhuri on her neck with a sharp knife and seriously injured her. Not only this, but he pressed her face with a pillow, Madhuri died due to lack of breathing. The surprising thing is that the accused carried out this incident in front of the 8 year old daughter of the deceased.
The incident occurred while returning from a wedding ceremony.
It is being told that the deceased woman, her daughter and accused Gaurav had gone to Palandoor to attend a wedding ceremony. Due to getting late while returning from the wedding, they decided to stay at the house of a relative, Nakrika Ganveer, in Bhagadi village. After this he stopped there.
On Sunday morning, the accused murdered the woman in the same house and fled from the spot. As soon as the information was received, the police immediately took action and arrested the accused from Bramhapuri. At present, the police have started investigating this matter and are also investigating from the angle of love affair and personal dispute.
Philippines Mayon volcano: A very dangerous natural phenomenon has occurred in Albay, Philippines. Here on Sunday, May 3, 2026, the Mayon volcano erupted, that is, it has become active again. During this period, thousands of people have been evacuated from the area. Officials have issued a warning of lava and landslides. Thousands of people have been evacuated after Mayon volcanic activity increased again in Albay province, southeast of Manila. During this, clouds of ash rose into the sky and completely engulfed the surrounding area.
People are prohibited from going within 6 kilometers of the volcano
Here, after the volcanic eruption, the parameter of level five has been increased to level 3. Besides issuing an alert to the residents of the danger of lava, landslides and further eruptions, residents have been prohibited from going within a radius of 6 kilometers from the area. Strombolian eruptions are taking place in the famous volcano, which is approximately 2,462 meters high and known for its small size. However, this explosion is medium. It intermittently expels lava, gas and volcanic debris.
Due to the spread of ash here, transport in the surrounding areas has been affected. Business has also decreased. Due to this, 5 thousand people have been kept in relief centres.
According to officials, Strombolian activity is being seen in the volcano. In this, lava, gas, and volcanic debris are exploding intermittently. This is the most active volcano in the Philippines. This is also a tourist place. However, the situation still remains unstable.
There was a sensation when a suspicious body of a B.Sc student was found in a mountain mine in Mahoba. The deceased student was a resident of the neighboring state of Madhya Pradesh, who had last talked to his mother on phone before his death. As soon as information about the incident was received, police from both UP and MP states reached the spot. At present the police is considering it a suicide, while the family members are suspecting a murder conspiracy and demanding a fair investigation.
Recently the young man had completed his B.Sc degree.
This incident took place in the mountain mine located in Kumhrauda village of city Kotwali area in Mahoba district, when a suspicious body of a youth was found lying there. The deceased has been identified as Sunil, resident of Hardwar village under Lavkush Nagar police station of Madhya Pradesh. Sunil was a B.Sc student and had recently completed his degree. Seeing the seriousness of the incident, both the teams of Mahoba city Kotwali police and Madhya Pradesh’s Lavkush Nagar police reached the spot.
The police inspected the incident site closely and collected evidence. To the police, prima facie it appears to be a case of suicide, but the actual cause of death will be revealed only after the post mortem report comes. At the same time, this incident has left many unresolved questions. The relatives of the deceased say that Sunil had left the house in the morning, but after some time he called his mother. Hearing what Sunil said on the phone, the ground slipped from under the feet of the family.
‘After today you won’t be able to see my face’
Sunil had told his mother that after today you will not be able to see my face, find me within two hours. Just two and a half hours later, his body was found in the mines of Mahoba. The family members claim that there was no dispute or quarrel of any kind in the house. They suspect that Sunil has either been brought here or there is some deep conspiracy behind it.
Brother Vishal and uncle Vipin Kushwaha have demanded a fair investigation from the police administration, so that it can be clear whether Sunil jumped himself or someone pushed him. At present, the police have taken the body into their custody and sent it for post-mortem and the matter is being investigated from every aspect.
Misinformation from top health officials in the Trump administration has created a “crisis of public trust” – and Congress should conduct oversight hearings and possibly impeach officials such as Robert F Kennedy Jr, the secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), according to a recently released report.
Experts say that officials in the past year have focused intently on both vaccines and autism, including efforts to connect autism to the use of acetaminophen (frequently sold as Tylenol) during pregnancy, despite growing evidence of no link, and replacing all members of the federal autism committee with advisers who have anti-vaccine and pseudoscientific histories.
The first meeting of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) was abruptly postponed in March and rescheduled for Tuesday, the same day the report was published by the Autistic Self Advocacy Network (ASAN) and the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD).
The report includes a timeline of all HHS actions taken in the first year of the second Trump administration. Such changes have been “harmful to its mission” and “detrimental to the autistic community”, such as widespread layoffs, reductions in force and terminations, cutting autism research by about $31m, and removing warnings about dangerous and unproven autism treatments from the website of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), said Zoe Gross, director of advocacy at ASAN.
“When you look at it, one thing after another, you can really realize how overwhelming it has been for those of us who are in the autism trenches trying to combat this misinformation and stigmatizing language and these bad decisions, as well as how dedicated this government is to spreading misinformation and to pursuing policies that damage public health,” Gross said.
Such an accounting is “crucial”, said Shannon Rosa, a senior editor and cofounder of Thinking Person’s Guide to Autism, a neurodiversity resource hub. The constant flood of actions is “like drowning in misinformation”, because the administration has led “a constant assault of misinformation, and having it all laid out, especially with the timeline, is really helpful for people who just feel like they can’t catch their breath and catch up,” she said. “Whereas the flood of disinformation is disempowering, this kind of accounting is empowering because it gives us a tool that we didn’t have before.”
It is particularly important to track all of these moves soon after they happen, instead of retrospective analyses years later, Rosa said. “These are the talking points that we can take to our community members. These are the talking points that we can take to our county, state, city administrators and push back and say, ‘We don’t want this to happen.’”
Another Kennedy pronouncement is now rocking the disability community, Rosa said.
Kennedy said in recent budget hearings that home health aides might be defrauding the government, because some caregivers were “getting paid to do things that they used to do as family members for free”, Kennedy said. The assertion prompted “constant outrage” among disabled people and their loved ones, because paid family caregivers frequently can’t work other jobs or support their family members without this assistance, Rosa said.
Last April, according to the report’s timeline, the administration made several high-profile moves, including issuing reduction-in-force notices and closing the office managing freedom of information requests, which diminished the capacity and transparency of health agencies. Kennedy said in a cabinet meeting that they would “know the causes of autism” by September, and he held a press conference saying autism is “destroying families”. Jay Bhattacharya, acting director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), announced the creation of a national autism registry.
This April, which is Autism Acceptance Month (also known as Autism Awareness Month), officials appear to be downplaying unpopular moves ahead of the midterm elections.
“RFK Jr has been much less outrageous this April than he was last April,” Gross said. “We have seen, in recent months, HHS be a little quieter about some of the things it’s doing,” such as cancelling the first meeting of the IACC indefinitely and then rescheduling it for Tuesday with little fanfare, she said.
But, Gross added, “I think RFK Jr and his appointees are no less dedicated to anti-vaccine policies.”
Officials touted leucovorin, a B vitamin, as an autism treatment, and said that Tylenol use during pregnancy led to autism in a September announcement. Yet the FDA recently approved leucovorin only for a rare folate deficiency, not autism, and a growing body of research points to no link between autism and acetaminophen.
“They could have chosen to double down on things like leucovorin and acetaminophen, but there was huge backlash to both of those pushes,” Gross noted. “It may be that they’re conscious of the backlash that they received when making those announcements, and knowing now that there’s more evidence against both of those positions, they’re choosing to hold back in light of the midterms coming up.”
But they haven’t corrected their September statements, Gross said: “They let the misinformation that they have already disseminated stand and continue to do harm.”
Orders of Tylenol for pregnant people in emergency rooms dropped after the September announcement, and uncertainty abounded.
“While we’re in a moment where it’s being kind of kept quiet, these are still the beliefs of our highest officials in HHS and in government, and none of that has been walked back, and we have no indication that anyone has changed their mind,” Gross said.
The FDA still plans to update the safety label for acetaminophen to warn about “prenatal exposures and child development”, an HHS spokesperson said.
“We’d really like to see Congress hold RFK Jr and HHS broadly to account for everything they’ve done over this past year that has been so harmful to the autistic community and to public health generally, with oversight hearings,” Gross said. “If, for example, RFK Jr is found in those hearings to have been derelict in his duty as secretary, then Congress should impeach him.”
When you’re in a slump, the smallest things seem to never go right.
The New York Mets are in that position currently. New York is 11-22, 12.5 games behind the National League East-leading Atlanta Braves and losers of six out of their last eight following a loss to the Los Angeles Angels on Saturday.
New York Mets catcher Francisco Alvarez runs after hitting an RBI single against the Los Angeles Angels during the sixth inning at Angel Stadium in Anaheim, Calif., on May 1, 2026.(Gary A. Vasquez/Imagn Images)
Mets broadcaster Todd Zeile acutely noticed just how bad things were on Friday night after catcher Francisco Alvarez struck out swinging in the top of the fourth inning.
Alvarez whiffed on a sinker from Angels pitcher Walbert Ureña. Alvarez tried to break his bat over his knee, but couldn’t even get that done.
“You see him trying to break that over his knee,” Zeile said on the broadcast. “That’s not going to feel too good. Can’t even break the bat correctly right now. Jeez.”
New York Mets catcher Francisco Alvarez runs home to score during the sixth inning at Angel Stadium in Anaheim, Calif., on May 1, 2026.(Gary A. Vasquez/Imagn Images)
New York was able to storm back from a 3-0 deficit on Friday to win the game. However, the team lost by the same score in extra innings on Saturday night.
The Mets have one of the best lineups on paper, but cold bats in April and at the start of May have sunk the team lower and lower in the National League. New York doesn’t seem to have any answers for their offensive woes, but made clear the team was standing by manager Carlos Mendoza despite the loud calls to fire him.
“We know our record is not what we want, and we know we are capable of more,” Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns told MLB.com. “We don’t view this as a manager problem, and we don’t intend to make a change.”
New York Mets manager Carlos Mendoza returns to the dugout after making a pitching change during the sixth inning against the Chicago Cubs in Chicago, Illinois, on April 18, 2026.(Erin Hooley/AP Photo)
Two US service members are missing in south-western Morocco after taking part in annual multinational military exercises in the North African country, the United States Africa Command (Africom) said Sunday.
The US, Morocco and other countries participating in the African Lion exercise have launched a search and rescue operation, Africom said.
“The incident remains under investigation and the search is on-going,” it said in a statement.
The incident happened on 2 May near the Cap Draa training area near Tan Tan, close to the Atlantic Ocean. The war games exercise started in April and runs across four countries, including Tunisia, Ghana and Senegal. It is scheduled to end in early May.
African Lion, which has been running since 2004, is the largest US annual joint military exercise on the continent and usually features high-ranking military officials from the US and its top African allies.
US military officials have said the annual multinational engagement serves as a venue for strengthening regional security cooperation and refining the readiness of participating forces for global crises.
Here is what you are supposed to believe about America in 2026: we are a post-Christian country. The faith of our grandparents is fading. The rising generation has moved on. The artifacts in the museums and the manuscripts under glass belong to a world that no longer speaks to ours. Then explain what just happened.
A book arguing the opposite — that the historical evidence for Jesus of Nazareth is stronger today than at any point in 2,000 years — just climbed to the top of the New York Times bestseller list. Not a celebrity memoir. Not a political tell-all. A book about ten discoveries — ossuaries, papyri, inscriptions, a linen cloth, coins pulled from Judean dirt — arguing that the man at the center of Western civilization is exactly who the Gospels said he was.
I wrote that book. I am not surprised it found readers. I am surprised by how many — and by what that number is telling us.
The story America keeps getting told is that faith retreats as evidence advances. The data say otherwise. Every shovel in the ground for the last century has cut against the skeptics, not for them.
The critics said Pontius Pilate was a fiction of pious imagination — a Roman governor invented by Christians to lend their story gravity. Then in 1961 at Caesarea Maritima, archaeologists turned over a limestone block with his name carved into it. Prefect of Judea. Inscription intact. The man the Gospels place at the trial of Jesus is now attested in stone by the very empire that executed him.
Jeremiah Johnston is the author of the new book, ‘The Jesus Discoveries’ (Bethany House Publishers, March 10, 2026).(Bethany House Publishers)
The critics said Nazareth did not exist in the first century. Then the excavations came, and the houses came, and the ritual baths came, and a first-century dwelling now stands beneath the Sisters of Nazareth convent. The critics said Caiaphas — the high priest who presided over the condemnation — was a Gospel invention.
Then in 1990, construction workers south of Jerusalem broke through into a burial chamber, and inside they found an ornate limestone ossuary inscribed with his family name. The man who sent Jesus to Pilate has left his bones to testify.
I have held a Roman crucifixion nail in my hand. I held one at the World Economic Forum in Davos this January — in the one room full of the people most confident that history has moved on. It had not moved on.
I could go on. The James Ossuary, with its inscription naming Jesus by name — the earliest archaeological reference to Jesus outside the Gospels themselves. The Magdalen Papyrus fragments at Oxford, carrying portions of Matthew from within living memory of the apostles. The Great Isaiah Scroll from Qumran, a thousand years older than any Hebrew Bible manuscript we had before 1947, matching the text we already held almost letter for letter. And the Shroud of Turin — which I went to Italy to see for myself, and which bears the image of a crucified man whose wounds match the Gospel accounts down to the Roman flagrum, the crown of thorns, the nail through the wrist.
Every one of those discoveries answers a question the academy was certain would never be answered. Every one of them sides with the Gospel writers.
The story America keeps getting told is that faith retreats as evidence advances. The data say otherwise.(iStock)
So why now? Why is a book full of inscriptions and ossuaries and manuscript scraps rocketing up a bestseller list in a country that is supposed to have moved past all of this?
Because the people have noticed what the experts missed. A generation that was told to outgrow faith is asking whether faith was ever the thing they needed to outgrow. A nation exhausted by ideology is reaching for history. A culture drowning in noise is reaching for stone — for the hard, quiet, stubborn evidence that refuses to bend to the spirit of the age.
I have held a Roman crucifixion nail in my hand. I held one at the World Economic Forum in Davos this January — in the one room full of the people most confident that history has moved on. It had not moved on. The nail was still iron. The point was still sharp. The weight of it in my palm said what every artifact in this book says: something happened here. A man died on a cross outside Jerusalem on Friday, April 3, AD 33. And three days later, the tomb was empty, and the movement he started has never stopped reaching the next generation, no matter how many funerals the cultured despisers schedule for it.
The bestseller list is not the story. The story is what the bestseller list is pointing at. Americans are not done with Jesus. They were done with being told that serious people had to be.
Dr. Jeremiah J. Johnston is an associate pastor for apologetics and cultural engagement at Prestonwood Baptist Church and president of the Christian Thinkers Society. His book “The Jesus Discoveries” (Bethany House) is a New York Times bestseller.
