News Wrap: Israel on high alert, closes airspace as Iran launches drone attack

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• John Yang:

  Good evening, I'm John Yang. Tonight, Iran's much anticipated attack on Israel is unfolding slowly. Israeli army spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari says dozens of drones have been launched from Iran and were most recently seen over northeastern Iraq. Officials say the drones won't arrive in Israel for several hours.

  Israel has been on high alert for days military defenses have been beefed up. Israeli airspace is now closed and officials closed schools for tomorrow the beginning of the Israeli school week.

  In Washington President Biden cut short a weekend at his Delaware beach home. He returned to the White House to meet with national security officials. U.S. and Israeli intelligence I've been warning for days that Iran was preparing an attack. They say it was in retaliation for a suspected Israeli strike on an Iranian diplomatic building in Syria, which killed senior Iranian generals.

  Against this backdrop, Iranian special forces seized a cargo ship indirectly owned by an Israeli born billionaire. Iran said it was taking the ship to their territorial waters. Amid his defense officials shared cell phone video appearing to show commandos rappelling from a helicopter. The ship's operator says it as a crew of 25.

  It happened in the Strait of Hormuz, which connects the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman. On Friday the ship had been seen off the coast of Dubai, Israel says it's an act of piracy and it's called for sanctions.

  And tensions were high on the West Bank. The Israeli army found the body of a missing 14-year-old Israeli boy who the military said was the victim of a terrorist attack. It was his disappearance that said Israeli settlers rampaging through Palestinian villages yesterday, setting homes on fire, killing a Palestinian man and wounding more than two dozen others. The unrest continued today and Israel has sent more troops to the area.

  In Australia, a lone attacker stabbed six people to death at a popular Sydney shopping center. Eight others were injured some critically. They included a nine-month old baby who required surgery. Police shot the attacker dead. It triggered chaos among the shoppers hundreds fled and sought shelter outside. Eyewitnesses say the attacker appeared to target people indiscriminately.

• Jason Dickson, Eyewitness:

  He was put it down and then she shot him. But we are not invincible. She didn't shoot him. Well, he wouldn't get going. He was on the rampage. He was on the rampage.

• John Yang:

  Authorities say it was an isolated incident not related to terrorism.

  In southeastern Ukraine, more than a dozen people have died as Russian troops escalate their assaults across the east. Russia says Ukrainian shelling has killed at least 10 people some of them children in Russian occupied territory near Zaporizhzhia. Ukraine says Russian attacks killed at least three civilians elsewhere in the country.

  And in the mountains of Southern Turkey all 174 people stranded in dangling cable cars for nearly a day have been rescued. The ordeal began On Friday when a cable car struck a pole and burst open sending the passengers to the rocks below killing one of them and injuring seven, it happened just outside the resort city of Antalya during a busy Eid holiday week.

  Still to come on PBS News Weekend, the story of Charlie Sifford, the first golfer to break the PGA's color barrier, and a Brief But Spectacular take on the miracle of flight.

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