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Lieberman: The ‘Generals’ Lost Opportunity to Get Rid of Netanyahu

Israel’s former Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman. (Reuters)
Israel’s former Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman. (Reuters)
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Lieberman: The ‘Generals’ Lost Opportunity to Get Rid of Netanyahu

Israel’s former Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman. (Reuters)
Israel’s former Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman. (Reuters)

Israel’s former Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman slammed Blue and White leader Benny Gantz and MP Gabi Ashkenazi, saying that both men, who served as chiefs of staff, are “not smart” and their arrogance prevents them from taking advice from those more skilled in politics, such as himself.

Lieberman, in an interview with the Maariv daily, said that Blue and White has lost the chance to get rid of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s rule in Israel.

Lacking political wisdom, the party has become a personal tool used by Netanyahu to escape trial, he added.

When asked about the possibility Gantz will eventually replace Netanyahu at the helm in a year and a half as part of a rotation agreement, Lieberman said that Netanyahu will make Gantz’s life “a living hell” until he will “resign on his own accord.”

Lieberman, the leader of the Yisrael Beytenu party, was speaking at a time when negotiations to form a government had failed, because Netanyahu had at the last minute backed away from his agreement with Gantz.

After deal to form government was said to be close, Gantz’s party accused Netanyahu’s Likud of seeking to renegotiate understandings.

“After reaching understandings on all issues, the Likud party asked to re-open discussions regarding the committee to appoint judges. In light of this, negotiations have been halted. We will not allow any change in the functioning of the judiciary nor damage to democracy,” Blue and White said in a statement.

Netanyahu and Gantz, however, have agreed to resume negotiations again after Easter.

Lieberman pointed out that Netanyahu's goal now is to end Gantz's appointment to head the government, which ends after three days.

“I will not be surprised if I see Gantz's party broken in the upcoming elections,” Lieberman said.

When asked about the possibility that Netanyahu might annex the Jordan Valley, or perhaps parts of the West Bank under the so-called Deal of the Century offered by US President Donald Trump, Lieberman said that the only goal Netanyahu has is to reach the needed 63-64 voices he needs in the Knesset to pass any legislation he needs to avoid standing trial.

Netanyahu was meant to begin trial for alleged corruption and breach of trust in March, but after Justice Minister Amir Ohana shut down the regular functions of the courts due to COVID-19, the date had been postponed to May.

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World

Around 20 Injured After Spraying Incident in Tokyo Mall

Emergency personnel work outside the Ginza Six luxury shopping complex in Tokyo's Ginza district, Japan, 25 May 2026. (EPA)
Emergency personnel work outside the Ginza Six luxury shopping complex in Tokyo's Ginza district, Japan, 25 May 2026. (EPA)
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Around 20 Injured After Spraying Incident in Tokyo Mall

Emergency personnel work outside the Ginza Six luxury shopping complex in Tokyo's Ginza district, Japan, 25 May 2026. (EPA)
Emergency personnel work outside the Ginza Six luxury shopping complex in Tokyo's Ginza district, Japan, 25 May 2026. (EPA)

Around 20 people were injured at a luxury shopping complex in central Tokyo on Monday after a man sprayed a substance inside, police and fire department officials said.

Tokyo police spokesman Yusuke Koide told AFP that a man sprayed a substance at an ATM on the ground floor of the building, while a local fire department official said "around 20 people were injured" after a report of a "smell".

The road in front of the mall -- located in the touristy and upmarket shopping district of Ginza -- was blocked off following the incident, and fire trucks lined the street.

But shoppers continued to come and go from the building using side entrances.

An AFP reporter at the scene saw two people on stretchers being put into an ambulance, while firefighters and officials dressed in hazmat suits brought people from the mall into specialized trucks to examine them.

Public broadcaster NHK said the injuries appeared to be light.

One 70-year-old woman who was at the mall told the broadcaster that her throat started "stinging and hurting" as she approached the ATM.

"By the time I arrived, the commotion had already started, and I thought there might have been a small fire or something.

"Once I went into the ATM corner, my throat felt scratchy, almost numb."

Police are investigating the cause, a fire department officer at the scene said.

Violent crime is relatively rare in Japan, which has a low murder rate and some of the world's toughest gun laws.

However, there are occasional stabbing attacks and even shootings, including the assassination of former prime minister Shinzo Abe in 2022.

In December last year fourteen people were injured in a stabbing attack in a factory in central Japan during which an unspecified liquid was also sprayed.

Japan remains shaken by the memory of a major subway attack in 1995 when members of the Aum Shinrikyo cult released sarin gas on trains, killing 14 people and making more than 5,800 ill.

On March 20, 1995, five members of the Aum cult dropped bags of Nazi-developed sarin nerve agent inside morning commuter trains, piercing the pouches with sharpened umbrella tips before fleeing.

World

Two Killed in Russia During Ukrainian Strikes

A man standing in smoke looks at heavily damaged buildings following Russian strikes in Kyiv on May 24, 2026, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (AFP)
A man standing in smoke looks at heavily damaged buildings following Russian strikes in Kyiv on May 24, 2026, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (AFP)
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Two Killed in Russia During Ukrainian Strikes

A man standing in smoke looks at heavily damaged buildings following Russian strikes in Kyiv on May 24, 2026, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (AFP)
A man standing in smoke looks at heavily damaged buildings following Russian strikes in Kyiv on May 24, 2026, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (AFP)

Two people were killed Monday in Ukrainian strikes on the Russian border regions of Belgorod and Bryansk, local authorities said.

"A drone attacked a vehicle in the town of Graivoron," the authorities of the Belgorod region said in a statement, reporting that "a civilian was killed."

In Bryansk, a man was killed in a Ukrainian strike in the settlement of Belaya Beryozka, the acting regional governor Yegor Kovalchuk wrote on Telegram.

Ukraine regularly targets Russia in retaliation for the daily bombardments it has been subjected to since the start of the large-scale Russian offensive in February 2022.

At least four people were killed and more than one hundred injured in Ukraine overnight Saturday to Sunday in intense Russian bombardments that particularly targeted the capital, according to Ukrainian authorities.

Kyiv and Moscow reported that Russia used its Orechnik nuclear-capable ballistic missile during these strikes, which followed a Ukrainian drone attack on educational buildings in the Russian-occupied eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk that left 21 dead and more than 40 injured.

US-mediated negotiations to end this conflict, the worst in Europe since the Second World War, have been at a standstill since the outbreak of war in the Middle East.

World

Philippine Construction Collapse Toll Hits Four, over Dozen Missing

The death toll in a Philippine construction site collapse has risen to three. Ted ALJIBE / AFP
The death toll in a Philippine construction site collapse has risen to three. Ted ALJIBE / AFP
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Philippine Construction Collapse Toll Hits Four, over Dozen Missing

The death toll in a Philippine construction site collapse has risen to three. Ted ALJIBE / AFP
The death toll in a Philippine construction site collapse has risen to three. Ted ALJIBE / AFP

The death toll rose to four Monday in the collapse of a building under construction near the Philippine capital, with more than a dozen people still believed missing, authorities said.

Two workers pinned beneath the wreckage were found alive after the nine-storey structure gave way Sunday, hitting a nearby hotel and killing a Malaysian guest.

But the two workers trapped at the site in Angeles, which is north of the capital Manila, died despite rescue efforts.

"The first of the two was pulled out alive, but unfortunately, his body gave out and he did not survive. Doctors could not resuscitate him," regional fire bureau spokeswoman Maria Leah Sajili told AFP.

"The other one suffered a cardiac arrest around 3:00 am (1900 GMT Sunday). Doctors could not attend to him as he was still pinned down," she added.

Crews pulled another corpse from the rubble on Monday, but it was not immediately clear if the unidentified body belonged to a person listed among the missing, rescuers said in an updated toll.

Due to the uncertainty, authorities said approximately 17 other people were still considered missing, mostly construction workers who were sleeping at the building site when disaster struck.

Lea Casilao, girlfriend of a missing construction worker, told AFP she had taken a bus from her northern Manila home to Angeles with rice and canned goods for her mate on Sunday, unaware of the pre-dawn accident on the same day.

"It's very difficult, it is breaking my heart to wait for something uncertain," 47-year-old Casilao said, crying as she recounted how she slept alone at a local government building overnight Sunday.

- Lacking safety gear -

Stephanie Batar and her mother Noby told AFP they only learnt about the accident on social media from their home in nearby Bulacan province early Monday and have been unable to contact her 64-year-old father who had been hired only weeks earlier at the job site on a six-month contract.

"I couldn't breathe. I couldn't stand. It's very painful and we did not know what to do," the daughter said.

The cause of the collapse is not known.

Regional labor department director Geraldine Panlilio said she had briefly shut the project down in September 2024 over violations of occupational safety standards.

"Our labor inspectors had monitored poor working conditions, a violation that would put our workers at risk," she said in an interview over Manila radio station DZMM.

The construction workers "lacked safety gear" like hardhats, boots, safety belts and lifelines, and worked under poor lighting and with no visible safety signages, she added.

Construction resumed a month later after the building contractor complied with requirements, Panlilio said.

Officials said up to 70 people were employed at the construction site, though most had gone home for the weekend.

Alfredo Albis, 55, told AFP he was asleep at a barracks for workers about five meters (16 feet) from the structure when it gave way.

"I have two cousins who are still trapped there. They were working here to earn for their families and (they) are missing," he said, adding "there's a possibility that my relatives are dead".

Sajili, the fire bureau spokeswoman, said that "rescue in (a) building collapse is very challenging since any sudden shift triggered by the movements of our rescuers can cause areas to move and people under can get crushed".

If no more survivors are found after a search with thermal scanners, mechanical diggers and other heavy equipment will be brought in to clear debris and recover bodies, she said, but gave no timeline.