A Jerusalem court cut short a massive strike and ordered tens of thousands of Israelis back to work Monday, ending the short-lived but powerful work stoppage that cast a spotlight on the political divisions and growing anger in the country after the weekend deaths of six Israeli hostages held by the terrorist group Hamas.

Hundreds of thousands of Israelis took to the streets Sunday and Monday to protest Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s handling of the hostage crisis, which has dragged on for nearly 11 months. Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel killed more than 1,200 Israelis and resulted in the taking of more than 250 hostages.

The massive protests put fresh pressure on Mr. Netanyahu at a pivotal moment in the Israel-Hamas war and his political future. About 100 Israeli hostages are still thought to be held by Hamas, though several dozen are likely dead, Israeli officials have said. The deaths of the six hostages, including Israeli American Hersh Goldberg-Polin, 23, sparked demonstrations in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and other cities across the country.

China’s military is employing international law as a pretext for aggressive and dangerous behavior in the Asia-Pacific region, leading the U.S. military to step up its own “counter-lawfare” defenses, the Navy captain and lawyer in charge of the program tells Threat Status.

Capt. Dustin Wallace, staff judge advocate for the Indo-Pacific Command, says Beijing is conducting a deliberate campaign of “lawfare” — the misuse and abuse of international law and legal principles — to advance strategic and military objectives in Asia and worldwide.

The Indo-Pacific Command two years ago set into motion a unique counter-lawfare program against China’s claims to large swaths of the South China Sea, Taiwan and areas around Japan’s disputed Senkaku Islands. Capt. Wallace tells National Security Correspondent Bill Gertz that the American counter-lawfare program is working along with the Australian and Japanese militaries and other U.S. combatant commands.

Both Washington and Manila are agonizing over their ability to deter China as confrontations between an under-resourced Philippine military and an expansionist Beijing increase in the South China Sea.

Tensions over disputed maritime territories in the strategic waterway are escalating, with barely a week going by without an incident. Most recently, Chinese and Philippine vessels rammed into each other in waters off Sabina Shoal, just 87 miles west of the Philippines and 746 miles south of China. Days prior to the incident, U.S. Indo-Pacific Commander Adm. Samuel Paparo told a conference in the Philippines that U.S. forces stand ready to act, if so ordered.

“We certainly have prepared a range of options and USINDOPACOM stands ready, if so called,” Adm. Paparo said. He declined to provide specific details, stating that doing so would enable a potential adversary to design countermeasures. However, the admiral did say he’s open to consultations on U.S. vessels escorting Philippine vessels in the disputed waters.

The Justice Department says its seizure of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s official airplane was warranted because the $13 million aircraft was purchased illegally through a shell company and smuggled out of the United States in 2023.

U.S. authorities captured the plane — a Dassault Falcon 900EX — from an airport in the Dominican Republic on Monday, weeks after the Biden administration accused Mr. Maduro of fraudulently refusing to leave office despite losing a July presidential election in Venezuela.

The Justice Department said in a statement that the aircraft has been flown to Florida at the request of the Biden administration “based on violations of U.S. export control and sanctions laws.” Seizing the official airplane of a foreign head of state is rare. Attorney General Merrick Garland said the seizure is an example of America’s commitment to enforce its economic sanctions.

America’s relationship with its European allies is under mounting stress over increasingly divergent views of online censorship, technological innovation and regulation of artificial intelligence.

Britain is locking people up over social media posts and threatening internet users beyond British borders who post what officials consider disinformation. France has arrested one of the world’s best-known tech entrepreneurs whose messaging platform has allegedly been used for child pornography and other criminal activity. And the EU is pushing for mandatory restrictions on AI development, while the U.S. pursues voluntary commitments from major tech companies.

Threat Status asked Ambassador Nathaniel C. Fick, the first head of the State Department’s cyberspace bureau, whether Europeans share the broad American support for free speech online. During a wide-ranging interview, Mr. Fick told National Security Tech Correspondent Ryan Lovelace that not every European nation supports the U.S. view but that the continent is not a monolith.

“I think that there are EU countries that, generally, broadly, have the same free speech views that the United States has, and there are some that don’t,” said Mr. Fick. “There’s always this tension between individual liberty and the collective good.”

Three years after the fall of Kabul, the Afghan program is still an experiment for the evacuees and for the communities striving to welcome them.

More Afghans continue to arrive in the United States, though the number is a small fraction of that seen in the rushed days of late 2021, when tens of thousands were whisked out of Kabul and sent to resettlement camps at U.S. military bases before being released into communities to find their way.

The Washington Times’ Stephen Dinan offers a deep-dive feature on the situation, reporting that while the federal government eventually provided some assistance, at first only private aid organizations connected the new arrivals with rental homes, helped them find jobs and gave them a crash course in American culture.

Afghans who never had to worry about their credit suddenly had to build a financial portfolio to rent a home. Lutheran Social Services — an outfit that delivered assistance to 4,500 Afghans in the first year — and other aid organizations have helped arriving Afghans sign up for Social Security, obtain driver’s licenses, enroll children in school and get them immunized.

The ongoing deterioration in their home country, including the Taliban’s banishment of women from much of public life, weighs heavily on the new arrivals, many of whom send money back to relatives.

• Sept. 3-6 — Billington CyberSecurity Summit

• Sept. 4 — The American Dream Lecture Series: Walter Russell Mead on American Foreign Policy in the Next Presidency, American Enterprise Institute

• Sept. 9 — The Role of China in Africa’s Just Energy Transition, Wilson Center

• Sept. 9 — Voices for Peace and Human Rights in Israel/Palestine, Stimson Center

• Sept. 10 — Strategic Planning in Chaos: The Future of the U.S.-Israel Security Partnership, Foundation for Defense of Democracies

• Sept. 10 — How to Counter China’s Global South Strategy in the Indo-Pacific, Hudson Institute