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[VIDEOS/PICTURES] Bloodshed in the land of Palestine - 2023 Edition

aboveandbeyond said:
Hand over the palastanian hostages in return for their own.

But the facts are, it's nothing to do with the hostages, its about Israel further occupying ilegal settlements.
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I’m speaking about those 1200 Israelis slaughtered by Hamas on the 7th of October last year. What was Israel supposed to do after that?​
 
Hitman said:
I’m speaking about those 1200 Israelis slaughtered by Hamas on the 7th of October last year. What was Israel supposed to do after that?​
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Year 2023 was the worst year since 2005 for the brutal killing of innocent palastanians. So what do you think about that?
 
aboveandbeyond said:
Year 2023 was the worst year since 2005 for the brutal killing of innocent palastanians. So what do you think about that?
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I'll anwer your question after you answer mine. I was the one who asked first.

P.S. Why was 2023 the worst? What happened in 2023?
 
Hitman said:
I'll anwer your question after you answer mine. I was the one who asked first.

P.S. Why was 2023 the worst? What happened in 2023?
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Israel has been massacering palastanians for 76 years. I'm really surprised by your lack of knowledge. Clearly History is not your strong point .

As for 2023 being a bloodbath for the palastanians, absolutely. They suffered most lost of life since 2005.
 
aboveandbeyond said:
Israel has been massacering palastanians for 76 years. I'm really surprised by your lack of knowledge. Clearly History is not your strong point .

As for 2023 being a bloodbath for the palastanians, absolutely. They suffered most lost of life since 2005.
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You've been ignoring my question deliberately because you don't have a rational answer. What was Israel expected to do after what Hamas did on 7th October last year?
 
Hitman said:
You've been ignoring my question deliberately because you don't have a rational answer. What was Israel expected to do after what Hamas did on 7th October last year?
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Israel should have called for a truce. What they've been doing for 76 years is not a patch on what happened on October the 7th.
 

Netanyahu walks tightrope as US urges Gaza ceasefire deal​


If diplomats have groundhog days, when they are condemned to reliving the same 24 hours, perhaps Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, felt a certain weariness as his jet approached the Middle East on his latest trip.

It is his eighth diplomatic tour of the region in the eight months since the Hamas attacks on Israel on 7 October last year.
The politics of trying to negotiate an end to the war in Gaza and an exchange of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners were already complicated.

They are more tangled than ever now that the Israeli opposition leader Benny Gantz has resigned from the war cabinet of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, along with his political ally Gadi Eisenkot. Both men are retired generals who led the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) as chiefs of staff.

Without Benny Gantz, the Americans have lost their favourite contact in the cabinet. Now he’s back in opposition, Mr Gantz wants new elections - he is the pollsters’ favourite to be the next prime minister - but Mr Netanyahu is safe as long as he can preserve the coalition that gives him 64 votes in the 120-member Israeli parliament.

That depends on keeping the support of the leaders of two ultranationalist factions. They are Itamar Ben-Gvir, the national security minister, and Bezalel Smotrich, the finance minister.

That is the point at which Secretary of State Blinken’s mission collides with Israeli politics. President Joe Biden believes that the time has come to end the war in Gaza.

Mr Blinken’s job is to try to make that happen. But Messrs Ben-Gvir and Smotrich have threatened to bring down the Netanyahu government if he agrees to any ceasefire until they are satisfied that Hamas has been eliminated.

They are extreme Jewish nationalists, who want the war to continue until no trace of Hamas remains.

They believe that Gaza, like all the territory between the Mediterranean Sea and the River Jordan, is Jewish land that should be settled by Jews. Palestinians, they argue, could be encouraged to leave Gaza “voluntarily”.

Antony Blinken is in the Middle East to try to stop the latest ceasefire plan from going the way of all the others. Three ceasefire resolutions in the UN Security Council were vetoed by the US, but now Joe Biden is ready for a deal.

On 31 May, the president made a speech urging Hamas to accept what he said was a new Israeli proposal to end the war in Gaza. It was a three-part deal, starting with a six-week ceasefire, a “surge” of humanitarian aid into Gaza, and the exchange of some Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners.

The deal would progress to the release of all the hostages, a permanent “cessation of hostilities” and ultimately the huge job of rebuilding Gaza. Israelis should no longer fear Hamas, he said, because it was no longer able to repeat 7 October.

President Biden and his advisers knew there was trouble ahead. Hamas insists it will only agree to a ceasefire that guarantees an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and an end to the war.

The destruction and civilian death inflicted by Israel in Nuseirat refugee camp in Gaza during the raid to free four hostages last week can only have strengthened that resolve. The Hamas-run health authorities in Gaza say that 274 Palestinians were killed during the raid. The IDF says the number was less than 100.

Mr Biden also recognised that some powerful forces in Israel would object.

“I’ve urged the leadership in Israel to stand behind this deal,” he said in the speech. “Regardless of whatever pressure comes.”

www.bbc.com

Bowen: Netanyahu walks political tightrope as US seeks Gaza deal

Secretary of State Blinken's Middle East mission collides with Israeli politics, Jeremy Bowen says.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
 

UN Security Council backs plan for Israel-Hamas ceasefire​

UNITED NATIONS, June 10 (Reuters) - The United Nations Security Council on Monday backed a proposal outlined by President Joe Biden for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip and urged the Palestinian militants to accept the deal aimed at ending the eight-month-long war.

Hamas welcomed the adoption of the U.S.-drafted resolution and said in a statement that it is ready to cooperate with mediators over implementing the principles of the plan.

Russia abstained from the U.N. vote, while the remaining 14 Security Council members voted in favor of the resolution supporting a three-phase ceasefire plan laid out by Biden on May 31 that he described as an Israeli initiative.

"Today we voted for peace," U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield told the council after the vote.

The resolution welcomes the new ceasefire proposal, states that Israel has accepted it, calls on Hamas to agree to it and "urges both parties to fully implement its terms without delay and without condition."

Algeria, the only Arab member of the council, supported the resolution because "we believe it can represent a step forward toward an immediate and lasting ceasefire," Algeria's U.N. Ambassador Amar Bendjama told the council.

"It offers a glimmer of hope to the Palestinians," he said. "It's time to halt the killing."

The resolution also goes into detail about the proposal, and spells out that "if the negotiations take longer than six weeks for phase one, the ceasefire will still continue as long as negotiations continue."

Thomas-Greenfield said the vote showed Hamas that the international community was united.

"United behind a deal that will save lives and help Palestinian civilians in Gaza start to rebuild and heal. United behind a deal that will reunite hostages with their families, after eight months in captivity," she said.

The council in March demanded for an immediate ceasefire and unconditional release of all hostages held by Hamas.

For months, negotiators from the U.S., Egypt and Qatar have been trying to mediate a ceasefire. Hamas says it wants a permanent end to the war in the Gaza Strip and Israeli withdrawal from the enclave of 2.3 million people.

Israel is retaliating against Hamas, which rules Gaza, over an Oct. 7 attack by its militants.

More than 1,200 people were killed and over 250 taken hostage by Hamas on Oct. 7, according to Israeli tallies. More than 100 hostages are believed to remain captive in Gaza.

Israel launched an air, ground and sea assault on the Palestinian territory, killing more than 37,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities.

Source: Reuters
 
UN Security Council backs Israel-Hamas ceasefire plan

The United Nations Security Council on Monday backed a proposal outlined by President Joe Biden for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip and urged the Palestinian militants to accept the deal aimed at ending the eight-month-long war.

Hamas welcomed the adoption of the U.S.-drafted resolution and said in a statement that it is ready to cooperate with mediators over implementing the principles of the plan "that are consistent with the demands of our people and resistance."

Russia abstained from the U.N. vote, while the remaining 14 Security Council members voted in favor of the resolution supporting a three-phase ceasefire plan laid out by Biden on May 31 that he described as an Israeli initiative.

"Today we voted for peace," U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield told the council after the vote.

The resolution welcomes the new ceasefire proposal, states that Israel has accepted it, calls on Hamas to agree to it and "urges both parties to fully implement its terms without delay and without condition."



Reuters
 

Israel’s war on Gaza: Official says Hamas accepts ceasefire resolution​

Hamas has agreed to a ceasefire resolution adopted by the UN Security Council, senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri tells the Reuters news agency.

Israel’s military says it has carried out targeted raids in Rafah, taking out fighter cells and calling in air strikes throughout southern and central Gaza.

Source: Al Jazeera
 
Hamas seeks commitment to permanent ceasefire in Gaza proposal response

Hamas says it has submitted its response to a proposed Gaza ceasefire to mediators, with a senior group official telling the BBC that it still requires an Israeli commitment to a permanent ceasefire.

In a statement, the group, and its Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) allies, expressed "readiness to positively" reach a deal.

The proposed ceasefire plan - which was endorsed by the UN security council on Monday night - calls for a six-week ceasefire that would eventually become permanent.

Qatar and Egypt - who, along with the US, have mediated negotiations between Israel and Hamas - confirmed that the Palestinian group had submitted its reply.

In a statement, the countries said they would now "examine the response and coordinate with the parties concerned regarding next steps".

The proposal set out by Mr Biden last month involves an initial six week ceasefire with Hamas releasing some hostages in exchange for Israel releasing an undefined number of Palestinian prisoners.

A second phase would see the remaining hostages released by Hamas and a total withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza as part of a “permanent” ceasefire, but the latter would still be subject to negotiations.

Earlier on Tuesday US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had "reaffirmed his commitment" to the Gaza ceasefire plan and the world was waiting for the Hamas response.

Mr Netanyahu has acknowledged his war cabinet has authorised the plan but has not voiced unequivocally support for it. Far right ultranationalist members of his cabinet have threatened to quit his coalition and trigger its collapse if the deal goes forward, seeing it as surrender to Hamas.



BBC
 
US assessing Hamas response to Gaza ceasefire plan

The US says it is evaluating the Hamas response to the latest proposal for a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal.

The Palestinian armed group said it was ready to “deal positively” with the process but stressed the need for Israel to agree to a permanent ceasefire.

Israel’s government has not commented, but an anonymous Israeli official said Hamas’s response amounted to a rejection.

Meanwhile, the US secretary of state is heading to Qatar - which along with the US and Egypt is acting as a mediator - to try to push the plan forward.

Antony Blinken said on Tuesday that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had "reaffirmed his commitment" to the deal, and that Hamas would be to blame if there was no progress.

However, Mr Netanyahu has not publicly endorsed the proposal, which US President Joe Biden said had been offered by Israel when he outlined it 12 days ago.

A brief statement confirmed Hamas had given an official response to the latest ceasefire plan, which has garnered broad international support and was endorsed by the UN Security Council on Monday.

This reiterated a demand for what Hamas called “a complete halt of the ongoing aggression against Gaza”, and full withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Palestinian territory.

A Hamas official, Izzat al-Rishq, said the response was “responsible, serious and positive” and that it opened up “a wide pathway” to reach an agreement.

The Israeli prime minister’s office did not release an on-record reply.

But a statement was issued by an anonymous Israeli official, who said that Hamas had “changed all of the main and most meaningful parameters” and “rejected the proposal for a hostage release that was presented by President Biden”.

The more critical reaction is now awaited from mediators - particularly, the US - once they have studied the proposal and judged the extent of the Hamas amendments.

“We're in receipt of this reply that Hamas delivered to Qatar and Egypt and we are evaluating it right now,” White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters on Tuesday, without elaborating.

Qatar and Egypt said in a joint statement that they would study Hamas’s response and “co-ordinate with the parties concerned regarding the next steps”. They also pledged to continue their mediation efforts with the US “until an agreement is reached”.

The Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza to destroy Hamas in response to an unprecedented cross-border attack on southern Israel on 7 October, during which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 37,160 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

A deal agreed in November saw Hamas release 105 of the hostages in return for a week-long ceasefire and some 240 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails. Israel says 116 hostages are still being held, 41 of whom are presumed dead.

Mr Biden said the new proposal involved three phases.

The first would see an initial six-week ceasefire, when Hamas would release some of the hostages - including women, the elderly and the sick or wounded - in exchange for Israel releasing an undefined number of Palestinian prisoners.

A second phase would see all remaining living hostages released and the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza as part of a permanent “cessation of hostilities", but the latter would still be subject to further negotiations.

In the third phase, the remains of any dead hostages would be returned and a major reconstruction plan for Gaza would commence.

Mr Netanyahu has acknowledged that his war cabinet has authorised the plan, but has not unequivocally voiced support for it. Far-right members of his cabinet have threatened to quit his coalition and trigger its collapse if the deal goes forward, seeing it as surrender to Hamas.

The actual Israeli proposal - reportedly lengthier than the summary presented by Mr Biden - has not been made public and it is unclear whether it varies from what Mr Biden conveyed. It was presented to Hamas days before Mr Biden's speech.

BBC
 
Israel, Hamas accused of war crimes in new UN report

Israel and Hamas have been accused of committing a litany of war crimes and human rights abuses since 7 October in a new independent report to the UN Human Rights Council.

The damning accusations, compiled by investigators from the UN's Commission of Inquiry, accused both sides of war crimes for mounting attacks against civilian populations and "murder or wilful killings".

The report, which covers the period up to the end of 2023, specifically accused Israel of crimes against humanity for torture, "extermination" and "gender persecution targeting Palestinian men and boys".

Israel rejected the report's findings and accused the commission of pursuing "a narrow-led political agenda" against it.

Investigators compiled the report, which will be submitted to the UN's human rights council next week, through hours of interviews with victims and witnesses, medical reports and open source information.

The panel, led by former UN human rights chief Navi Pillay, said Israel's use of heavy weapons in populated areas constituted a war crime as it was a direct attack on civilian populations which intended to cause "maximum damage, disregarding the principles of distinction, proportionality and adequate precautions".

Israel was also accused of several other war crimes, including starvation, arbitrary detention, and the killing and maiming of “tens of thousands of children”. The report also said Israel had weaponised a "total siege" which limited power, food and water to civilians, which it said amounted to "collective punishment".

Oher crimes against humanity committed by Israel, the authors said, included the "extermination, murder, gender persecution targeting Palestinian men and boys, forcible transfer of the population, torture, and inhuman and cruel treatment".

Hamas was also accused of a host of abuses during its 7 October attacks, which saw 1,200 people killed and 251 more kidnapped. The report said there was evidence of widespread sexual violence committed against Israeli women and a pattern of mass killings in public shelters.

“Many abductions were carried out with significant physical, mental and sexual violence and degrading and humiliating treatment, including in some cases parading the abductees,” the report said. “Women and women’s bodies were used as victory trophies by male perpetrators.”

Israeli forces were also accused of sexual violence for public stripping of Palestinians, which the investigators said was intended "to humiliate the community at large and accentuate the subordination of an occupied people".

Israel - which refused to co-operate with the investigation - was quick to reject the report, accusing it of “systematic anti-Israeli discrimination".

Meirav Eilon Shahar, its ambassador to the UN in Geneva, accused the commission of seeking to draw a false equivalence between Hamas and the Israeli military in relation to sexual violence.

Hamas has yet to comment on the allegations.

The report itself does not carry any penalties, but it could be used in a potential future prosecution of Israeli and Hamas leaders.

Hamas leaders Yahya Sinwar, Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri and Ismail Haniyeh are already subject to an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Israeli Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Yoav Gallant are also subject to similar warrants.

Wednesday's report specifically attacked the rhetoric used by some unnamed Israeli officials, which it said could amount to "incitement" and may constitute "other serious international crimes".

Speaking after the publication of the report, Ms Pilay said it was "imperative" that anyone accused of committing crimes in the conflict "be held accountable".

“The only way to stop the recurring cycles of violence, including aggression and retribution by both sides, is to ensure strict adherence to international law," she added.

More than 37,120 people have been killed in Gaza since the conflict began, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.

BBC
 
Gaza ceasefire plan hangs in balance as US says Hamas seeking changes

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday that Hamas had proposed numerous changes, some unworkable, to a U.S.-backed proposal for a ceasefire with Israel in Gaza, but that mediators were determined to close the gaps.

Senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan denied that the Palestinian Islamist group had put forward new ideas.

Speaking to pan-Arab Al-Araby TV, he reiterated Hamas' stance that it was Israel that was rejecting proposals and accused the U.S. administration of going along with its close ally to "evade any commitment" to a blueprint for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.

White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on Wednesday many of Hamas' proposed changes were minor "and not unanticipated" while others differed more substantially from what was outlined in a U.N.

Security Council resolution on Monday backing the plan put forward by U.S. President Joe Biden.

"Our aim is to bring this process to a conclusion. Our view is that the time for haggling is over," Sullivan told reporters.

Hamas also wants written guarantees from the U.S. on the ceasefire plan, two Egyptian security sources told Reuters.

Earlier on Wednesday, Izzat al-Rishq, from Hamas' political bureau based outside Gaza, said its formal response to the U.S. proposal was "responsible, serious and positive" and "opens up a wide pathway" for an accord.

Biden's proposal envisages a truce and a phased release of Israeli hostages in Gaza in exchange for Palestinians jailed in Israel, ultimately leading to a permanent end to the war.


 
Hamas rebuffs Blinken blame for elusive ceasefire

Hamas has pushed back after being criticised by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken for not yet accepting a ceasefire proposal, saying it had shown "positivity" towards the negotiations.

The group said it had "dealt positively... with the latest proposal and all proposals to reach a ceasefire agreement".

It said, in contrast, "while Blinken continues to talk about 'Israel’s' approval of the latest proposal, we have not heard any Israeli official voicing approval".

Mr Blinken has repeatedly said that Israel has accepted a ceasefire proposal outlined by President Biden on 31 May. Israel's government has not officially said so, though an Israeli plan formed the basis for Mr Biden's declaration.

Speaking in Qatar on Wednesday, Mr Blinken expressed frustration with Hamas's response to the Israeli ceasefire proposal, which the group delivered on Tuesday.

The details of the response have not been made public, though Mr Blinken said Hamas had proposed changes, some of which were unworkable.

"At some point in a negotiation – and this has gone back and forth for a long time – you get to a point where if one side continues to change its demands, including making demands and insisting on changes for things that it already accepted, you have to question whether they’re proceeding in good faith or not."

But in a series of statements on Wednesday night, Hamas questioned whether Israel had actually accepted either the plan or a UN Security Council resolution endorsing it.

"The world did not hear any welcome or approval from [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu" and his government to the resolution," it said. "Rather they continued to emphasise the rejection of any permanent ceasefire, in clear contradiction with the Security Council resolution and President Biden’s initiative."

Hamas said that on the other hand, it had "clearly expressed its positive position on what was included in US President Joe Biden’s speech" and on "what was included" in the resolution. It also said it had confirmed its "readiness to co-operate" with the mediators involved in the ceasefire negotiations.

After a meeting with Mr Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Monday, Mr Blinken said the prime minister had "reaffirmed his commitment" to the ceasefire proposal.

Mr Netanyahu has not publicly endorsed the plan, although the war cabinet which he leads authorised the proposal which was delivered to Hamas on 27 May. That proposal - reportedly lengthier than the summary presented by Mr Biden - has not been made public and it is unclear whether it varies from what the president conveyed in his televised statement at the end of last month.

One of the main sticking points between the two sides appears to be their visions for ending the war. Reports say Hamas is insisting first on written guarantees that Israel will end the war before it will sign up to the plan. Mr Netanyahu has said the war will not end until Hamas's "governing and military capabilities" have been destroyed and the hostages returned.

The war began after Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October, killing about 1,200 people and taking 251 others back to Gaza as hostages. The Hamas-run health ministry says more than 37,000 people have been killed in Israel's offensive since then.

BBC
 

Erdogan calls on US, UN Security Council to pressure Israel on Gaza truce​


Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday called on members of the United Nations Security Council, particularly the United States, to pressure Israel into a ceasefire in Gaza after the Council backed a US proposal earlier this week.

Speaking in Madrid alongside Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, Erdogan said Ankara welcomed any ceasefire proposals that would end the Gaza war, adding Washington’s stance on Israel’s operations there were “truly upsetting” Turkiye.

 
Thirty Palestinians were martyred and 105 others injured in unabated Israeli strikes across Gaza during last 24 hours

According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, martyrdom toll of Palestinians in Israeli aggression has risen to 37,232 since October 7 last year.

Meanwhile, Gaza officials have said that at least 15,694 children have been martyred and 17,000 are without parents after 250 days of Israel's war on Gaza.

On the other hand, Gaza’s Ministry of Health has warned that hospitals, health centres and the only oxygen station in the Gaza City are at risk of going out of service due to lack of fuel.

Source: Radio Pakistan
 
A commission at the United Nations published a report on Wednesday detailing acts of violence in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, accusing both sides of war crimes and arguing that the immense loss of life in the Gaza Strip amounted to a crime against humanity

The report consisted of two parallel investigations, one focused on the Oct. 7 attack on Israel led by the armed Palestinian group Hamas, and the other on Israel’s military response. It is one of the most detailed examinations thus far of the conflict and provides legal analysis that is likely to be used in future criminal proceedings related to the war in Gaza.

According to the report, 800 civilians were among the more than 1,200 killed by Hamas and other armed Palestinian groups involved in the Oct. 7 attack on Israel. More than 250 additional people — including 36 children — were taken hostage, the commission said.

The commission accused Israeli forces of responding to the Hamas-led attacks in such a way that amounted to collective punishment against Palestinians, with a lethal toll on civilians that constituted a crime against humanity. The Ministry of Health in Gaza said more than 37,000 people are now dead, though it does not distinguish between civilians and combatants.

The commission said both sides were responsible for killing civilians despite their identifying themselves as noncombatants.

The report also highlighted the conflict’s heavy toll on children, not only in terms of those killed by both sides, but also in the large number who were orphaned.

It accused Israel of failing to ensure the ability to collect forensic evidence, particularly in regards to the accusations of sexual violence perpetrated by Hamas, “undermining the possibility of future judicial proceedings, accountability and justice.”

The Independent International Commission of Inquiry was led by Navi Pillay, a former U.N. human rights chief; Chris Sidoti, an Australian expert on human rights law; and Miloon Kothari, an Indian expert on human rights and social policy.

The three-person panel conducted interviews with victims and witnesses and also examined satellite imagery, forensic medical records and open-source data like photographs and videos.

The panel noted that Israel did not participate in the inquiry and had accused the commission of bias. The commission also said Israel obstructed its efforts to communicate with key witnesses in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank. Because it was unable to enter Gaza, the commission conducted many of its interviews remotely. It also met with victims and witnesses who escaped to Egypt and Turkey to flee the conflict.

What actions were identified as war crimes?
The commission said the widespread use of heavy weapons, air and artillery strikes in densely populated areas of the Gaza Strip made vast civilian casualties inevitable and constituted “an intentional and direct attack on the civilian population, particularly affecting women and children.”

Israel acted “with intent to cause maximum damage,” and did not take precautions or consider the proportionality of its actions, the report said.

After analyzing 80 of Israel’s evacuation orders between October and December 2023, the commission said Israel had not provided the protections civilians in Gaza had a right to expect by following its instructions. Evacuees “were targeted along the evacuation routes and in designated safe zones,” the commission said. It added that some of the evacuation orders indicated “an intent to forcibly transfer the population,” which could be a crime against humanity.

Pointing to the siege on Gaza, the commission said Israel had “used starvation as a method of war.” It added, “Israel has weaponized the withholding of life-sustaining necessities, cutting off supplies of water, food, electricity, fuel and other essential supplies, including humanitarian assistance. This constitutes collective punishment and reprisal against the civilian population.”

In the case of Hamas and other Palestinian militants involved in the Oct. 7 attack — including civilians who joined in crossing into Israel — the commission has accused the groups of intentionally abducting and killing civilians. It also said that “many abductions were carried out with significant physical, mental and sexual violence.” The commission documented extensive accusations of sexual violence by the Oct. 7 attackers, which is a violation of international humanitarian law and can be considered a war crime.

The report also said that Israeli soldiers who were sick, wounded, captured or otherwise incapacitated from fighting were killed, which could also constitute a war crime.

The report said militants from Hamas and other armed Palestinian groups had used sexual violence, particularly against women. It reviewed images of bodies partly or completely undressed that showed signs of such abuse. It also said it had obtained reliable witness accounts that described exposed genitals and women whose hands had been tied.

The commission said it was unable to independently verify the accusations of rape, sexualized torture or genital mutilation that had been reported in the news media. It noted that Israel blocked its access to witnesses, crime scenes and unedited versions of recorded testimonies.

The cases of sexual violence were “not isolated incidents but perpetrated in similar ways in several locations,” the report said. However, the commission said it had found no credible evidence that militants were ordered to commit sexual violence on Oct. 7.

The commission accused Israel of sexual- and gender-based violence during its offensive in Gaza, including torture, abuse and sexual humiliation.

Detained Palestinians were forced to “walk completely or partially undressed” in front of the public and to walk completely or partly undressed “while subjected to sexual harassment,” it said.

Most of these acts were perpetrated against men and boys, the commission said, while Palestinian women also experienced psychological violence and sexual harassment.

What have Israel and Hamas said about the report?
The commission said that Hamas had rejected all accusations that its forces used sexual violence against Israeli women during the Oct. 7 attack.

Israel’s mission to the United Nations in Geneva said the report was “reflective of the systematic anti-Israel discrimination of this commission of inquiry.”

Israel said the commission had ignored Hamas’s use of civilians as “human shields,” an accusation the report briefly addressed by noting that there was not enough evidence to substantiate claims that militants had embedded in the civilian population on a widespread scale.

The Israeli mission also said the commission had “outrageously and repugnantly” drawn a false equivalence between Hamas and the Israeli military in relation to sexual violence.

Source: The New York Times
 
Hamas fighters killed eight Israeli soldiers traveling in military vehicles in Rafah after firing rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) and then ambushing a support force deployed to the scene

The attacks on Saturday marked one of the deadliest days for Israeli soldiers in Gaza in months as its ground invasion of the southern region continues to ramp up.

Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s armed wing, said in a statement its soldiers “carried out a complex ambush against enemy vehicles” in the Saudi neighbourhood of Tal as-Sultan district, western Rafah city.

The armed group said it fired Yassin-105 RPGs at a D9 military bulldozer, killing and wounding an unidentified number of Israeli soldiers. A “rescue force” vehicle that later arrived was also attacked, “resulting in its destruction and the death of all its occupants”.

Israel’s army said in a statement the eight soldiers “fell during operational activity in southern Gaza”, without elaborating. Daniel Hagari, Israeli’s military spokesperson, said an investigation will be launched into how exactly the attack occurred.

“We’re working to disarm all the fighters in order to prevent Hamas from targeting civilians again like on October 7. Today, we received another reminder of the high price we are paying because of this war, and we have soldiers ready to sacrifice their lives in order to defend Israel,” Hagari said in a televised statement.

At least 307 Israeli troops have been killed and thousands wounded since October 27 when the ground invasion of Gaza was launched. At least 37,296 Palestinians – mostly women, children, and elderly – have died since the war began on October 7, Gaza’s health ministry says.

Saturday’s casualties will likely fuel calls for a ceasefire and heighten Israeli public anger. In January, 21 Israeli troops were killed in a single attack by Palestinian fighters in central Gaza.

Source: Al Jazeera
 
Israeli military announces daily ‘tactical pause’ in southern Gaza to allow in aid

The Israeli army has announced a daily “tactical pause in military activity” in part of the southern Gaza Strip to allow delivery of increased quantities of humanitarian aid, amid growing international criticism of its offensive there.

The army said the pause would begin in the Rafah area at 8 am (0500 GMT) and remain in effect until 7 pm (1600 GMT). It said the pause would take place every day until further notice.

The pause is aimed at allowing aid trucks to reach the nearby Israel-controlled Kerem Shalom crossing, the main entry point for incoming aid, and travel safely to the Salah a-Din highway, a main north-south road, to deliver supplies to other parts of Gaza, the military said.

It said the pause was being coordinated with the UN and international aid agencies.

The crossing has suffered from a bottleneck since Israeli ground troops moved into Rafah in early May.

The announcement came shortly after the military said that another two Israeli soldiers had been killed in northern Gaza on Saturday, in addition to eight killed in a blast that engulfed their armoured vehicle in Rafah on the same day.

The losses, among the heaviest for the military since it began its ground offensive in Gaza on October 27, will probably fuel mounting calls for a ceasefire and heighten Israeli public anger over ultra-Orthodox exemptions from the military.

At least 19 Palestinians were killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza on Saturday. At least 37,296 have been killed since the Israeli offensive on the territory began, with thousands more believed to be buried under the rubble and tens of thousands wounded.

Israel’s eight-month military offensive against the Hamas militant group has plunged Gaza into a humanitarian crisis, with the UN reporting widespread hunger and hundreds of thousands of people on the brink of famine as Israel blocked the delivery of aid and cut off water supplies. The international community has urged Israel to allow more aid in.

From 6 May until 6 June, the UN received an average of 68 trucks of aid a day, according to figures from the UN humanitarian office, known as OCHA. That was down from 168 a day in April and far below the 500 trucks a day that aid groups say are needed.

The flow of aid in southern Gaza declined just as the humanitarian need grew. More than 1 million Palestinians, many of whom had already been displaced, fled Rafah after the invasion, crowding into other parts of southern and central Gaza. Most now languish in ramshackle tent camps, using trenches as latrines, with open sewage in the streets.

Cogat, the Israeli military body that oversees aid distribution in Gaza, claims there are no restrictions on the entry of trucks. It says more than 8,600 trucks of all kinds, both aid and commercial, entered Gaza from all crossings from 2 May to 13 June, an average of 201 a day. But much of that aid has piled up at the crossings and not reached its final destination.

A spokesperson for Cogat, Shimon Freedman, said it was the UN’s fault that its cargos stacked up on the Gaza side of Kerem Shalom. He said the agencies have “fundamental logistical problems that they have not fixed,” especially a lack of trucks.

The UN denies such allegations. It says the fighting between Israel and Hamas often makes it too dangerous for UN trucks inside Gaza to travel to Kerem Shalom, which is right next to Israel’s border.

It also says the pace of deliveries has been slowed because the Israeli military must authorise drivers to travel to the site, a system Israel says was designed for the drivers’ safety. Due to a lack of security, aid trucks in some cases have also been looted by crowds as they moved along Gaza’s roads.

The new arrangement aims to reduce the need for coordinating deliveries by providing an 11-hour uninterrupted window each day for trucks to move in and out of the crossing.

It was not immediately clear whether the army would provide security to protect the aid trucks as they move along the highway.

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN
 

Israeli fire kills 8 Palestinians amongst merchants and civil guards waiting for commercial trucks, health officials say​


CAIRO, June 17 (Reuters) - Eight Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire as merchants and civil guards waited for commercial trucks along the eastern road of the Gaza Strip, which is designated for commercial trucks to roll on, health officials told Reuters on Monday.

 
Latest Updates on Israel's atrocities in Gaza
  • Multiple deadly Israeli strikes have been reported overnight in the Nuseirat refugee camp, central Gaza.
  • Israeli police try to break up overnight demonstrations as protests continue against the Netanyahu government’s handling of the war.
  • At least nine Palestinians waiting for aid trucks in Rafah killed and several critically injured by Israeli fire.
  • At least 37,372 people killed and 85,452 injured in Israel’s war on Gaza since October 7. The revised death toll in Israel from the Hamas-led attacks stands at 1,139 with dozens of people still held captive in Gaza.
Source: Al Jazeera
 
Lack of aid, including food, nutritional supplements and vaccines, has put 3,500 children at risk of dying from malnourishment, Gaza’s Government Media Office warns.

AL JAZEERA
 
White House questions Netanyahu’s criticism over weapons delay

The White House has pushed back against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's claims that the US is "withholding" weapons and ammunition from Israel, hours after he lashed out at the Biden administration.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre confirmed an ongoing pause remained on one particular shipment of bombs, echoing comments from Secretary of State Antony Blinken hours beforehand, but she insisted no other weapons were being withheld.

"We genuinely do not know what he's talking about," Ms Jean-Pierre said on Tuesday.

Mr Netanyahu’s comments were an attempt to remove the block on a single weapons consignment announced by the White House last month over the way the arms were being used in Gaza

His office published a video in which he rebuked the US, saying he had told Mr Blinken it was “inconceivable” that weapons and ammunition had been withheld "in the past few months".

Speaking in English, Mr Netanyahu's comments were clearly aimed at Mr Blinken. The video was released an hour before the US secretary of state planned to hold a news conference in Washington and appeared to be an attempt by Mr Netanyahu to grab the agenda.

"America’s closest ally, fighting for its life," he said of Israel.

Mr Netanyahu said Mr Blinken, who visited Israel last week, assured him he was "working day and night to remove the bottlenecks".

At the news conference, held in Washington, Mr Blinken confirmed the administration was continuing to hold back a consignment of bombs from Israel over concerns about their use in urban areas of Gaza, but that the issue remained under review.

He faced repeated questions from reporters over exactly what he had told Mr Netanyahu, but he wouldn't be drawn on what he called a diplomatic conversation.

Mr Netanyahu has frequently tried to appeal to his domestic nationalist base by claiming a unique ability among Israeli politicians to extract concessions from US leaders.

Controversy over the US supplying arms to Israel has grown in America and Europe along with the scale of destruction in Gaza, while the issue has become a lightning rod for protest and dissent. Mr Netanyahu has adamantly opposed any moves to reduce arms supply.

Last month, a senior administration official confirmed to the BBC that the delivery of thousands of 2000lb and other bombs had been paused - the first delay of US munitions to Israel.

The US is by far Israel's biggest source of weapons and ammunition. By law, it provides Israel with $3.8bn (£3bn) of military aid each year. The US Congress last month passed a bill providing a further $14bn of military support.

And the Biden administration will move forward with another major arms sale to Israel that includes 50 F-15 fighter jets worth more than $18bn, US media report, after two key Democratic holdouts signed off.

The deal, first reported by the Washington Post, had been stalled by the objections of Senator Benjamin Cardin of Maryland and congressman Gregory Meeks of New York.

"Any issues or concerns Chair Cardin had were addressed through our ongoing consultations with the Administration," said a spokesman for Senator Cardin in a statement to the BBC.

"That’s why he felt it appropriate to allow this case to move forward."

Senator Cardin, a vocal supporter of Israel and the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, did not express those concerns publicly.

Mr Meeks, whose office has been contacted for comment, had been outspoken about his opposition to the sale, citing concerns over Israel's conduct in its war against Hamas. Mr Meeks is the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

"I don't want the kinds of weapons that Israel has to be utilised, to have more death," he said in an interview with CNN in April.

But after months of delay, and mounting pressure from the Biden administration, both Mr Cardin and Mr Meeks ultimately signed off on the transaction several weeks ago, the Post reported.

In his statement, Senator Cardin's spokesman Eric Harris said the sale to Israel had gone through the "regular review process".

Once the consultation process with Congress is complete, the state department can take the next step of officially notifying Congress of the sale.

If approved, it would be one of the largest arms transactions with Israel since the war began in October.

President Joe Biden has faced growing concerns within his own party over Israel's handling of the war, and the United States' continued military support.

Republicans meanwhile have continued to criticise the delay of the shipment of weapons to Israel. Congressman Russell Fry of South Carolina last month called the weapons holdup "reprehensible", writing on X that "the United States must stand with Israel. Period".

The Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza to destroy Hamas in response to an unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October, during which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 37,340 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

BBC
 
Hitman said:
Israel should have called for a truce after Hamas slaughtered 1200 of their people, raped their women, and took more than 200 of their people as hostages? 😆
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No one was raped. Thats been debunked along with the 40 beheaded babies lie. Israel should have returned stolen land, and ended apartheid and occupation and Hamas would have no reason to exist.
 
SM1989 said:
No one was raped. Thats been debunked along with the 40 beheaded babies lie. Israel should have returned stolen land, and ended apartheid and occupation and Hamas would have no reason to exist.
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More like Israel should have left and handed over the entire piece of land, right?
 
Hitman said:
More like Israel should have left and handed over the entire piece of land, right?
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They stole most of it. Britain had no right to give it to them. In an ideal world they should all leave head back to Europe or settle in the midwest states in the US. There is plenty of land there and the american govt loves them anyway and so should have no problem hosting them.
 
SM1989 said:
They stole most of it. Britain had no right to give it to them. In an ideal world they should all leave head back to Europe or settle in the midwest states in the US. There is plenty of land there and the american govt loves them anyway and so should have no problem hosting them.
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So that's what they should do? That's the only way there will be peace, and that's what Hamas, Palestine, and the Muslim word demands?
 
Hitman said:
So that's what they should do? That's the only way there will be peace, and that's what Hamas, Palestine, and the Muslim word demands?
Click to expand...
Ofcourse peace will only be attained when the genocidal zionist project is dismantled. Listen to the rhetoric of zionists from their own mouths, they want all of the land with the Palestinians driven out so they can build their temple in Jerusalem over the Al Aqsa mosque. Whilst zionism is present in the region, there will never be peace.
 
SM1989 said:
Ofcourse peace will only be attained when the genocidal zionist project is dismantled. Listen to the rhetoric of zionists from their own mouths, they want all of the land with the Palestinians driven out so they can build their temple in Jerusalem over the Al Aqsa mosque. Whilst zionism is present in the region, there will never be peace.
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Why play with words? Come to the concrete point. This is what you posted -

Israel should have returned stolen land, and ended apartheid and occupation and Hamas would have no reason to exist.
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So Israel should cease to exist? The Jews should move away to some other place, and hand over everything to Palestine? That's what you want?
 
I really hope hezbollah really opens one up on this Israeli state.

I said it from start that once Palestinians are out of the way they will go after the neighbours .

I think a massive war in middleast with them dragging iran into it is inevitable.
 
Hitman said:
Why play with words? Come to the concrete point. This is what you posted -



So Israel should cease to exist? The Jews should move away to some other place, and hand over everything to Palestine? That's what you want?
Click to expand...
Israel as a colonial project built on stolen land should ofcourse be dismantled. The land should be returned to the Palestinians. Jews whose ancestors were present in the region pre-1917 should be allowed to stay. The rest of them are zionist settlers (many with dual nationalities) they should largely be repatriated to where they came from or to any other country that would take them in, unless the Palestinians willingly allow them to stay.
 
IMMY69 said:
This ^
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Agreed, I crossed the line there. But can you please post the quote to which I was replying. I want to see what the context of the discussion.

Anyways, I can't even mention some of the things said about us Indians in the past which belongs to the racism category, post that were reported and removed by the mods.​
 
SM1989 said:
Israel as a colonial project built on stolen land should ofcourse be dismantled. The land should be returned to the Palestinians. Jews whose ancestors were present in the region pre-1917 should be allowed to stay. The rest of them are zionist settlers (many with dual nationalities) they should largely be repatriated to where they came from or to any other country that would take them in, unless the Palestinians willingly allow them to stay.
Click to expand...
Great! And then people say peace should prevail. This is the definition of peace.
 
Hitman said:
Great! And then people say peace should prevail. This is the definition of peace.
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You cannot have peace when injustice is present. The zionist settlers have stolen the land from the Palestinians, which is a wrong that needs to be corrected for peace to prevail.
 
SM1989 said:
You cannot have peace when injustice is present. The zionist settlers have stolen the land from the Palestinians, which is a wrong that needs to be corrected for peace to prevail.
Click to expand...
Good luck at achieving 'peace' that way!

By the way, do you know of any way your solution can be achieved?
 
SM1989 said:
The rest of them are zionist settlers (many with dual nationalities) they should largely be repatriated to where they came from or to any other country that would take them in
Click to expand...
Never going to happen and very stupid, with all due respect. You can't expect millions of people to leave their homes, jobs, friends and settle in a foreign land where they don't know anyone and anything.

Thankfully this will remain a wishful fantasy
 
Hitman said:
Good luck at achieving 'peace' that way!

By the way, do you know of any way your solution can be achieved?
Click to expand...
It probably wont happen in the near future. Although some seeds have been planted. It will happen when the following events take place:

- The global world order becomes multipolar and the US dollar ceases to be the world’s currency
- The US tears itself apart internally due to polarisation, culture wars etc leading to a more isolated foreign policy and withdrawal of support for Israel. Israel only exists because the US is its lifeline
- The Free Palestine movement grows further globally and Israel continues to become a pariah on the world stage leading to divestment from it as happened to Apartheid South Africa.
- The Arab countries ruling regimes who are currently subservient to the US are replaced by regimes who are sincere to the Palestinian cause.
 
Statpadder Inc said:
Never going to happen and very stupid, with all due respect. You can't expect millions of people to leave their homes, jobs, friends and settle in a foreign land where they don't know anyone and anything.

Thankfully this will remain a wishful fantasy
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They left Europe to come settle in Palestine en masse despite having no cultural familiarity with the locals. They can do the same again. As mentioned many are already dual citizens.
 
SM1989 said:
They left Europe to come settle in Palestine en masse despite having no cultural familiarity with the locals. They can do the same again. As mentioned many are already dual citizens.
Click to expand...
I wonder why they left Europe, almost like they were being wiped out in a genocide.

This is 2024, you can't force millions of people to leave everything they have and settle in a foreign land with nothing.

This is beyond delusional if you think that Millions of Israelis will be forced to leave their country and ended up as refugees on some other part of the planet.
SM1989 said:
It probably wont happen in the near future. Although some seeds have been planted. It will happen when the following events take place:

- The global world order becomes multipolar and the US dollar ceases to be the world’s currency
- The US tears itself apart internally due to polarisation, culture wars etc leading to a more isolated foreign policy and withdrawal of support for Israel. Israel only exists because the US is its lifeline
- The Free Palestine movement grows further globally and Israel continues to become a pariah on the world stage leading to divestment from it as happened to Apartheid South Africa.
- The Arab countries ruling regimes who are currently subservient to the US are replaced by regimes who are sincere to the Palestinian cause.
Click to expand...
The difference is that Israel isn't a 2 but nation like South Africa, their political,economical and military influence is more significant
 
Israeli attacks across Gaza ongoing

Reporting from Al Aqsa Hospital, Deir al-Balah, central Gaza

Generally, the security situation across the Strip is escalating at a very high speed now.

Within the past hour, the Israeli military has targeted a group of Palestinians in the eastern portion of Rafah city.

We are surrounded by two Israeli military drones that are flying and hovering at a very low altitude in the vicinity of the Al-Aqsa Hospital.

People here are fearful that they [Israeli forces] … might attack in the coming hours.

Source: Al Jazeera
 
Statpadder Inc said:
I wonder why they left Europe, almost like they were being wiped out in a genocide.

This is 2024, you can't force millions of people to leave everything they have and settle in a foreign land with nothing.

This is beyond delusional if you think that Millions of Israelis will be forced to leave their country and ended up as refugees on some other part of the planet.

The difference is that Israel isn't a 2 but nation like South Africa, their political,economical and military influence is more significant
Click to expand...
They left Europe due to widespread antisemitism and the Nazis at that time yes, but now European countries like UK, Germany etc and US are bending over backwards to support them, so there should no problem relocating them to Europe and US. European countries are already experiencing ageing populations, so taking in zionists will help them with that.

Yes agreed Israel has more clout than apartheid South Africa, but this will not last forever (nothing does).
 
Fighting in Rafah as tensions soar on Israel-Lebanon border

Israeli air strikes and clashes between troops and Palestinian militants rocked Gaza on Wednesday, as Israel’s army warned it had readied an “offensive” against the Lebanese Hezbollah movement on the country’s northern front.

Witnesses and the civil defence agency in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip reported Israeli bombardment in western Rafah, where medics said drone strikes and shelling killed at least seven people.

The Israeli military has announced a daily humanitarian “pause” in fighting on a key road in eastern Rafah, but a UN spokesman said days later that “this has yet to translate into more aid reaching people in need”.

More than eight months of war, sparked by Hamas’s unprecedented October 7 attack on Israel, have led to dire humanitarian conditions in the Palestinian territory and repeated UN warnings of famine.

The Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt has been shut since Israeli troops seized its Palestinian side in early May, while nearby Kerem Shalom on the Israeli border “is operating with limited functionality, including because of fighting in the area”, said UN deputy spokesman Farhan Haq.

He told reporters that in recent weeks, there had been “an improvement” in aid reaching northern Gaza “but a drastic deterioration in the south”.

“Basic commodities are available in markets in southern and central Gaza. But... it’s unaffordable for many people.”

The war has sent tensions soaring across the region, with violence involving Iran-backed Hamas allies.

The Israeli military, which has traded near-daily cross-border fire with Lebanon’s Hezbollah since October, said late Tuesday that “operational plans for an offensive in Lebanon were approved and validated”.

On Wednesday the military said its warplanes had struck Hezbollah sites in southern Lebanon overnight, while reporting a drone had infiltrated near the border town of Metula in an attack claimed by Hezbollah and targeting troops.

The Iran-backed group also announced the death of two of its fighters.

Lebanon’s official National News agency reported Israeli strikes on several areas in south Lebanon on Wednesday morning, including on the border village of Khiam, where an AFP photographer saw a large cloud of smoke.

The army’s announcement that its plans for an offensive in Lebanon had been approved, along with a warning from Foreign Minister Israel Katz of Hezbollah’s destruction in a “total war”, came as US envoy Amos Hochstein visited the region to push for de-escalation.

Syrian state media said an Israeli strike on military sites in the country’s south killed an army officer on Wednesday. Israel has not commented on the report.

In Gaza, Islamic Jihad, a Palestinian armed group that has fought alongside Hamas, said its militants were battling troops amid Israeli shelling of western Rafah.

Witnesses reported seeing Israeli military vehicles enter the city’s Saudi neighbourhood, followed by nighttime gun battles.

Parts of central Gaza also saw fighting overnight, with witnesses reporting artillery shelling and heavy gunfire in Gaza City’s Zeitun neighbourhood.

The October 7 attack that triggered the war resulted in the deaths of 1,194 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.

The militants also seized 251 hostages. Of these, 116 remain in Gaza, although the army says 41 are dead.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 37,396 people in Gaza, also mostly civilians, according to the territory’s health ministry.

At least 24 people died over the past day, the ministry said.

In a message on the occasion of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha, US President Joe Biden called for the implementation of a ceasefire plan he outlined last month.

Hochstein said the plan would ultimately lead to “the end of the conflict in Gaza”, which would in turn quell fighting between Israel and Hezbollah.

AFP
 
Gaza's broken water system crippling children with sickness

Eight months of war have reduced nine-year-old Yunis Jumaa to skin and bone.

Stretched out, semi-unconscious on a hospital bed in Khan Younis in southern Gaza, his twisted frame is hard to look at.

His arms and legs like matchsticks, his knee joints bulging, his chest heaves with the skin stretched tight over his rib cage.

“My son was in excellent health before, he was normal,” says his mother Ghanima Jumaa.

“But when he developed this malnutrition and dehydration, he became as you see him now.”

“There is no bottled water. The children walk a long distance - when they get water it reaches us contaminated,” Ghanima says.

Along the corridor at Nasser hospital lies five-year-old Tala Ibrahim Muhammad al-Jalat.

She is just about awake but not moving, her milky eyes rolled to the back of her head.

Tala too is severely dehydrated and malnourished.

By her bedside her father Ibrahim Muhmmad al-Jalat holds her hand, careful not to disturb the intravenous drip feeding into her wrist.

He knows that the scorching weather, with temperatures close to 40 degrees, and a lack of clean water have brought his daughter close to death.

“The situation is getting worse,” he says.

“The temperature in our tent is unimaginable, and the water we drink is definitely contaminated, because both young and old are getting sick.”

And with their houses destroyed, hundreds of thousands of Gazans are now displaced, living under canvas in makeshift camps, with little protection from the scorching sun.

Getting water, whether it is clean or not, is a daily struggle. Long queues form at distribution centres.

With the sewage system badly damaged and with few toilets, what water there is is easily contaminated.

“It is no secret that the biggest cause of intestinal infections currently occurring in the Gaza Strip is the contamination of the water supplied to these children,” says Dr Ahmed al-Fari, head of the children’s departments at Nasser Hospital.

“The first problem is intestinal infections with vomiting and diarrhoea which causes dehydration,” he says.

“The second problem is hepatitis C or A, which are no less dangerous than intestinal infections, if not more so.”

The United Nations Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs says 67% of Gaza’s water and sanitation system, poor at the best of times, has now been destroyed.

“We need a tremendous international effort to re-establish water and sewage networks,” says Salaam Sharab, who’s a water engineer in the Khan Younis municipality.

“We in Khan Younis have lost between 170 and 200km of pipes, which have been completely destroyed, along with wells and water tanks.”

The Israeli military says it is allowing around 200 trucks carrying humanitarian aid to enter the strip through the Kerem Shalom crossing every day.

It says the problem is that aid agencies on the other side are not distributing it.

The aid agencies argue continued fighting, especially in the area around Rafah in southern Gaza, means it is too dangerous for them to operate.

They also say what’s being allowed in is a drop in the ocean of what’s actually needed.

Gazans’ growing desperation to get food and water means there is also a threat of looting with reports of aid trucks being ransacked by gunmen as well as by ordinary civilians.

But the International Criminal Court prosecutor has accused Israel of using starvation as a weapon of war and has requested arrest warrants for the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as well as the Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.

The Israeli government has reacted with outrage at the move.

It insists that claims by aid agencies that there is already widespread famine in Gaza are exaggerated and says it is Hamas which started the war, bringing suffering and misery to Palestinians.

The United Nations has warned that more than a million Gazans face the highest level of starvation by the middle of July.

Israeli ministers deny there is a humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

But for Ghanima Jumaa, carrying her emaciated son in her arms along the corridors of Nasser hospital, it doesn’t feel that way.

BBC
 
Armenia has formally recognised a Palestinian state, the latest country to do so during the war in Gaza, prompting Israel to summon the Armenian ambassador.

In announcing the move on Friday, Armenia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs also condemned Israel’s military conduct in the Gaza Strip and Palestinian group Hamas’s taking of captives.


Al Jazeera
 
Red Cross says 22 killed in strike near its Gaza office

The International Committee of the Red Cross says its offices in Gaza have been damaged by shelling, which killed 22 people who had sought shelter around its compound.

"Heavy-calibre projectiles landed within metres of the office and residences of the International Committee of the Red Cross on Friday afternoon," an ICRC statement said.

It added that all parties had an obligation to take precautions to avoid harm to civilians and humanitarian facilities.

An Israel Defense Forces spokesman told the BBC that initial inquiries suggested there was "no indication" that it had carried out a strike in the area, but added that the incident was "under review".

"The strike damaged the structure of the ICRC office, which is surrounded by hundreds of displaced civilians living in tents, including many of our Palestinian colleagues," the ICRC said.

"This incident caused a mass casualty influx at the nearby Red Cross Field Hospital, with the hospital receiving 22 killed and 45 injured, with reports of additional casualties."

The ICRC said the "grave security incident" was one of several in recent days.

"We decry these incidents that put the lives of humanitarians and civilians at risk," the statement added.

The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza gave different figures, saying 25 people had been killed and 50 injured in the shelling, which it blamed on Israel.

The Israeli military launched a campaign to destroy the Palestinian armed group in response to an unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October, during which about 1,200 people - mostly civilians - were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 37,390 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry. Its figures do not differentiate between civilians and combatants, but it had reportedly identified 14,680 children, women and elderly people among the dead by the end of April.

In another development, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has warned that spiralling hostilities between Israel and the Lebanese Islamist movement Hezbollah risk triggering a catastrophe for the region and beyond.

Mr Guterres accused both sides of increasingly warlike rhetoric and called for an immediate de-escalation, saying the world could not afford for Lebanon to become "another Gaza".

The past months have seen a series of retaliatory cross-border strikes between Israel and Hezbollah. The Iran-backed group says it is fighting Israel to support its ally, Hamas, in Gaza.

BBC
 

Israeli strikes on Gaza City kill dozens, Hamas says​

Two Israeli air strikes on buildings in Gaza City have killed at least 38 people and injured many more, Hamas says.

The Israeli military said warplanes had struck Hamas military infrastructure sites and it would provide more details later.

A spokesman for Gaza's civil defence said a residential block in the al-Shati area, one of Gaza's historic refugee camps, was hit several times. The other strike targeted houses in the al-Tuffah district, the Hamas-run government media office said.

Footage showed people carrying away the wounded and searching for survivors in the wreckage as dust filled the streets.

Earlier reports put the estimated death toll at 42.

Israeli media reported that the air strikes may have been targeting a senior Hamas official.

Hussein Muhaisen, a civil defence spokesman in Gaza City, told AFP that the impact from the strikes was "like an earthquake".

"The whole area was targeted, as you see homes were destroyed. There are still families under the rubble," he said.

"Some of the injured were transferred to the Baptist Hospital, and now we are rescuing others from under the rubble, and the situation is very, very difficult due to the lack of tools and fuel for ambulances."

Meanwhile the EU's foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the EU condemned Friday's shelling of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) offices in Gaza, which the ICRC said had killed 22 people who had sought shelter around its compound.

Mr Borrell called for an independent investigation and for those responsible to be held accountable.

On Saturday the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said an initial inquiry into the shooting in the al-Mawasi area of southern Gaza found there was "no direct attack carried out by the IDF against a Red Cross facility".

It said the incident would be "quickly examined" and the findings presented.

Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to an unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October, during which about 1,200 people - mostly civilians - were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 37,551 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

Its figures do not differentiate between civilians and combatants, but it had reportedly identified 14,680 children, women and elderly people among the dead by the end of April.

Source: BBC
 

Gaza protestors in Belfast supported by GAA​


A parade and rally, calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, took place in Belfast city centre on Saturday afternoon.

Protestors left Writers Square and marched through the city centre to Belfast City Hall.

It was organised by Gaels Against Genocide, which is supported by some of the best known names in the Gaelic Athletics Association (GAA).

Flags from counties and GAA clubs across Ireland were flying, and speeches were made in front of the City Hall.

There has been a surge in violence in the West Bank since the start of the war in the Gaza Strip, triggered by Hamas's deadly attack on southern Israel on 7 October.

A number of pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli demonstrations have been held in Belfast since the violence started.

The UN says at least 480 Palestinians - members of armed groups, attackers and civilians - have been killed in conflict-related incidents in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

Ten Israelis, including six security forces personnel, have also been killed in the West Bank.

www.bbc.com

Gaza protest supported by GAA held in Belfast

It was organised by Gaels Against Genocide, it is supported by members of the GAA.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
 
Israeli airstrike kills eight at Gaza aid centre, witnesses say

Eight Palestinians were killed on Sunday in an Israeli airstrike on a training college near Gaza City being used to distribute aid, Palestinian witnesses said, as Israeli tanks pushed further into the southern city of Rafah.

The strike hit part of a vocational college run by the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA that is now providing aid to displaced families, the witnesses said.

The Israeli military said the site, which it said had served in the past as a UNRWA headquarters, has been used by Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants. It added that precautionary measures were taken before the strike to reduce the risk of harming civilians.


 
Israeli airstrikes kill at least 24 in Gaza City, say Gaza officials

Israeli forces killed at least 24 Palestinians in three separate airstrikes early on Tuesday on Gaza City and the dead included a sister of Ismail Haniyeh, the chief of the militant Islamist Hamas group, Gaza health officials and medics said.

Israeli tanks also pressed deeper into western areas of Rafah in the south of the enclave overnight, blowing up homes, residents said.

Two of the Israeli airstrikes hit two schools in Gaza City, killing at least 14 people, medics said. Another strike on a house in the Shati (Beach) camp, one of the Gaza Strip's eight historic refugee camps, killed 10 others.

The house in Shati belonged to the extended family of Hamas political chief Haniyeh, who is based in Qatar, killing one of his sisters along with other relatives too, family members and medics said.

Haniyeh, who leads Hamas' diplomacy and is the public face of the group that has been running Gaza, has lost many relatives in Israeli air strikes since Oct. 7, including three sons.

Israel's military said its forces had targeted militants overnight in Gaza City who had been involved in the planning of attacks on Israel. The militants included some involved in holding hostages captive and some who had taken part in Hamas' cross-border attack on Oct. 7.

The Israeli Air Force struck two structures "used by Hamas terrorists in Shati and Daraj Tuffah in the northern Gaza Strip. The terrorists operated inside school compounds that were used by Hamas as a shield for its terrorist activities", the military statement said.

Hamas denies using civilian facilities such as schools and hospitals for military purposes.

The group described the attacks on the two schools and the house in Shati camp as "massacres".

"We hold the administration of U.S. President Joe Boden responsible for the continued war of genocide against our Palestinian people in Gaza Strip through continuing to offer the Zionist government and its criminal army political and military cover," Hamas said in a statement.

Separately, the armed wings of Hamas and the allied Islamic Jihad groups said in a joint statement their fighters had fired mortar bombs overnight against Israeli forces in the Yibna neighbourhood of eastern Rafah.

In nearby Khan Younis, medics said Israeli tank shelling had wounded several people at a tent camp in the west of the city.

HEZBOLLAH CONFLICT

More than eight months into the fighting, international mediation backed by the United States has so far failed to bring a ceasefire agreement. Hamas says any agreement must bring an end to the war, while Israel says it will agree only temporary pauses in fighting until Hamas is eradicated.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday the phase of intense fighting against Hamas would end "very soon", freeing up more forces for deployment on Israel's northern border with Lebanon, where fighting with Iran-backed Hezbollah has escalated.

Israel's national security adviser Tzachi Hanegbi said on Tuesday Israel would spend the coming weeks trying to resolve the conflict with Hezbollah and would prefer a diplomatic solution there. Shelling has led to the evacuation of tens of thousands of people on both sides of the Israel-Lebanon border.

Israel's ground and air campaign in Gaza was triggered when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, killing around 1,200 people and seizing more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.

The Israeli offensive in retaliation has killed almost 37,600 people, according to Palestinian health authorities, and has left the tiny, densely populated Gaza Strip in ruins.

Since early May, fighting has focused on Rafah, on Gaza's southern edge abutting the border with Egypt, where around half of the enclave's 2.3 million people have been sheltering after fleeing other areas.

Gaza's health ministry said on Tuesday that hospitals and medical centres in the enclave were experiencing a severe shortage of medicines and medical supplies due to the continued Israeli offensive, Israel's control and closure of all crossings and its targeting of the health sector in Gaza.

In particularly short supply are medications needed for emergency, anaesthesia, intensive care and operations, the ministry said in a statement.

REUTERS
 

'High risk' of famine in Gaza persists, new UN-backed report says​

A UN-backed assessment says almost half a million Palestinians across Gaza are still facing “catastrophic levels” of hunger and that a “high risk” of famine persists as long as the Israel-Hamas war continues and humanitarian access is restricted.

However, the report by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) says the available evidence does not indicate a famine is currently occurring in the north of the Palestinian territory.

The previous assessment in March had projected that one was imminent in the area.

The amount of food and other aid allowed into the north has increased since then, and nutrition, water, sanitation and health services have been stepped up, the report says.

But it warns that food availability in the south and central Gaza has been significantly reduced due to the closure of the Rafah border crossing and the displacement of more than one million people from the city of Rafah since early May, when Israel launched a ground operation there.

The UN World Food Programme (WFP) said the report “paints a stark picture of ongoing hunger” and showed the critical importance of sustained humanitarian access.

UN officials have blamed the situation on Israeli military restrictions on aid deliveries, the ongoing hostilities and the breakdown of law and order.

Israel insists there are no limits to the amount of aid that can be delivered into and across Gaza and blames UN agencies for failing to distribute supplies. It also accuses Hamas of stealing aid, which the group denies.

The Israeli military launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to an unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October, during which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 37,650 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

The IPC - a global initiative by UN agencies, aid groups and governments - is the primary mechanism the international community uses to conclude whether a famine is happening.

Households are classified as IPC Phase 5 (Catastrophe) if they experience an extreme lack of food, starvation and exhaustion of coping strategies.

For a famine to be officially declared in a specific area, there must be evidence that at least 20% of households are in Phase 5, 30% of children are suffering from acute malnutrition, and there are two deaths for every 10,000 inhabitants, or four child deaths out of 10,000 children per day, “due to outright starvation or to the interaction of malnutrition and disease”.

www.bbc.com

Israel-Gaza war: 'High risk' of famine persists, UN-backed assessment says

But experts say evidence does not indicate a famine is occurring in the north after an aid increase.
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Israel to roll out plan to replace Hamas in northern Gaza, says official

Jerusalem will "soon" roll out a plan to replace Hamas governance in northern Gaza, Israeli National Security Advisor Tzachi Hanegbi said on Tuesday.

Speaking at Reichman University's annual Herzliya Conference, Hanegbi said that the collapse of Hamas's military ability to rule will open opportunities "for countries that want to see a governing alternative to Hamas in Gaza, with local leadership in Gaza, to join this process."

He explained that Gaza's new leadership will include Israel's Abraham Accords partners, the United States, the European Union and the United Nations, while the Israeli military continues "cleansing the area" of Hamas's presence.

"We've been talking about this notion of 'the day after' for many months and the main thing that we've tried to emphasise throughout is that it's mainly the day after Hamas in the sense that we don't need to wait for it to disappear, because that process could take a long time."

"The idea is, and this is what the Americans agree on, including in the conversations this week and also in the conversation that the minister of defense [Yoav Gallant] is conducting right now [in Washington], is that there will be a so-called top-down leadership, and not only bottom-up," he continued.

Said Hanegbi, "You cannot completely get Hamas to disappear because it's an idea, a concept."

The US has pressed Israeli officials to clarify a vision for Gaza's governance after the war. The Biden administration opposes Israel occupying Gaza or allowing the Strip to descend into chaos. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has stressed that Israel's three war aims are the destruction of Hamas's military and governing capabilities, the return of all hostages, and ensuring that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel.

In an interview with the US-based Punchbowl News on Friday, Netanyahu said a demilitarized post-war Gaza will be overseen by a civilian-run administration with the assistance of Arab countries. He also referred to a "deradicalization process."

At least 1,200 people were killed, and 252 Israelis and foreigners were taken hostage in Hamas's attacks on Israeli communities near the Gaza border on October 7. Of the 116 remaining hostages, more than 30 are believed dead.

SOURCE: https://www.business-standard.com/w...rthern-gaza-says-official-124062600089_1.html
 

In Beirut, Vatican urges parties to accept peace proposals​

Vatican Secretary of State Pietro Parolin has urged warring parties in the Middle East to accept “peace proposals”, saying the region including Lebanon “doesn’t need war”.

“The Middle East is going through a critical moment,” Parolin told a press conference in Beirut during a days-long visit to Lebanon.

The Roman Catholic Church’s Holy See “asks for peace proposals to be welcomed, so that fighting stops on each side, so hostages in Gaza are released, so that the necessary aid arrives unhindered to the Palestinian population”, he said.

“Lebanon, the Middle East, the whole world certainly doesn’t need war,” the cardinal added.

Israel and Hezbollah have traded near-daily cross-border fire since October 7.

Al Jazeera
 

Erdogan warns Netanyahu’s war plans will ‘lead to a great disaster’​

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has accused Israel’s Netanyahu, egged on by Western powers, of planning to attack Lebanon and ignite a regional war.

“Israel is now setting its sights on Lebanon and we see that Western powers behind the scenes are patting Israel on the back and even supporting them,” Erdogan told lawmakers of his ruling Justice and Development party (AKP).

The plans, he said, “will lead to a great disaster”.

Al Jazeera
 
Israeli forces pounded several areas across Gaza on Wednesday, and residents reported fierce fighting overnight in Rafah in the south of the Palestinian enclave.

Residents said fighting intensified in the Tel Al-Sultan neighbourhood in western Rafah, where tanks were also trying to force their way north amid heavy clashes. The armed wings of Hamas and the Islamic Jihad said fighters attacked Israeli forces with anti-tank rockets and mortar bombs.

Source: Reuters
 
Only 1,000 tons of Gaza aid from Cyprus distributed: US aid officials

Only 1,000 tons of the 7,000 tons of humanitarian aid shipped to war-ravaged Gaza from Cyprus have been distributed because of insecurity, US aid officials said on Wednesday.

The remaining 6,000 tons was on shore in secure conditions but has yet to be distributed because of an upsurge in violence and looting, the officials said.

The sea corridor linking Cyprus with the Gaza Strip opened in March, delivering a fraction of the basic supplies needed to sustain the Palestinian territory’s 2.4 million people.

The maritime aid route has faced obstacles, including security concerns at a US military-built pier and the distribution of aid upon arrival.

“I have never seen a more challenging or complex environment for the humanitarian community to work,” said USAID’s Doug Stropes.

“There is currently a security review on the lawlessness and gang activity,” he said, referring to information received from partners on the ground.

Cyprus Foreign Minister Constantinos Kombos said that despite the challenges, the aid effort to Gaza would continue.

“There is a constant flow of vessels and sending to the other side,” he said.

“There are of course certain challenges, challenges that relate to everything going on in Gaza, but we continue the effort.

“It is not going to be an easy task.

“We are, after all, operating in what is a war zone and we are doing everything we can in cooperation with our partners to ensure that this has an impact on the daily lives of people on the ground.”

The US ambassador to Cyprus, Julie Fisher, said Washington was committed to exhausting “every possible avenue to alleviate the suffering of the Palestinian people who are facing catastrophic levels of food insecurity.”


 
US keeps pause on one bomb shipment to Israel while it is under review

U.S. President Joe Biden's top aides told the visiting Israeli defense chief this week that Washington is maintaining a pause on a shipment of heavy bombs for Israel while the issue is under review, a senior U.S. official said on Wednesday.

The official, briefing reporters about national security adviser Jake Sullivan's meeting with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, said the allies remain in discussions about the single shipment of powerful munitions, which was paused by Biden in May over concerns they could cause more Palestinian civilian deaths in Gaza.

Without providing specifics, the official said other U.S. weapons will continue to flow to Israel as it battles Hamas militants in Gaza and faces Lebanese Hezbollah fighters on its northern border, where increased hostilities have spurred fears of a wider regional conflict.

Gallant warned during his visit that Israel was capable of taking Lebanon "back to the Stone Age" in any war with Iran-backed Hezbollah but stressed that his government prefers a diplomatic solution being pursued by the United States.

Wrapping up his trip, Gallant said on Wednesday that there had been significant progress on the issue of U.S. munitions supply to Israel, adding that "obstacles were removed and bottlenecks were addressed."

Gallant and U.S. officials sought to cool tensions following Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent claims that Washington was withholding weapons, prompting Biden's aides to express disappointment and confusion over the Israeli leader’s remarks

The United States in May paused a shipment of 2,000-pound and 500-pound bombs due to concern over the impact they could have in densely populated areas in Gaza in the war that began with Hamas' deadly Oct. 7 cross-border raid. But Israel is still due to get billions of dollars worth of other U.S. weaponry.

"We are in discussions ultimately to find a resolution," the senior U.S. official said on condition of anonymity. "But I think the president has expressed his concerns about that one shipment, and those are very valid concerns."

The official acknowledged there have been “bottlenecks” in some weapons deliveries to Israel but attributed that to a “complicated bureaucratic system” for approving military assistance and not any deliberate slowdown.

ISRAEL-LEBANON BORDER

Gallant said he also discussed with U.S. officials the need to resolve the "security situation in the north," insisting that Israel cannot accept Hezbollah "military formations" on the border with Lebanon.

An exchange of shelling and missile strikes has led to the evacuation of tens of thousands of people on both sides, and escalation has sparked fears of an all-out war.

"We do not want war, but we are preparing for every scenario," Gallant told reporters.

Gallant said he also laid out to U.S. officials a three-level "day after" proposal for governance of post-war Gaza that would include local Palestinians, regional partners and the U.S., but not Israel or Hamas. He offered reporters few specifics, however, and said "it is a long and complex process that depends on many things."

The Biden administration has repeatedly urged Israel to craft a realistic post-war plan for Gaza, warning the lack of such an arrangement could trigger chaos.

Gallant said he also discussed Israel's transition to the next phase in Gaza. The Israeli military says it is preparing to shift to lower-intensity operations against Hamas' remaining fighters.

Another focus of Gallant’s meetings was Iran, Israel’s regional arch-foe.

While Israel has expressed increasing alarm over Iran's nuclear program, the U.S. official cited intelligence assessments that Tehran is not "currently pursuing the procedures and processes they would need to develop an explosive nuclear device." But the official added that Iran had taken some "provocative steps" recently.

The U.S. and Israel, the official said, are working to reschedule a strategic dialogue on Iran. A meeting set for last week was scrapped following Netanyahu's criticism.

Iran says its nuclear program is solely for peaceful purposes.

REUTERS
 
Canada imposes sanctions on 7 Israeli settlers

Canada’s Foreign Ministry has imposed sanctions on seven Israeli settlers and five entities in the occupied West Bank.

“We remain deeply concerned by extremist settler violence in the West Bank and condemn such acts, not only for the significant impact they have on Palestinian lives but also for the corrosive impact they have on prospects for lasting peace,” Foreign Minister Melanie Joly said in a statement.

This is the second time Ottawa has taken such a step in just over a month.

Those targeted include Ben-Zion Gopstein, founder and leader of the right-wing group Lehava, which opposes Jewish assimilation with non-Jews.

Source: Al Jazeera
 

Turkey says Israeli attacks on Gaza threaten ‘regional stability’​


The Turkish Ministry of National Defence has said that anything that can lead to a “larger conflict” must be avoided, Al Jazeera reports.

“Our priority is for the massacre in Gaza to end and for lasting peace to be established in the region,” spokesperson Zeki Akturk said, referring to “despicable attacks” by Israeli forces “on refugee camps and schools where displaced Palestinians seek refuge”.

“It is concerning that these attacks have threatened regional stability. Every step that could lead to a larger conflict must be avoided,” Akturk added.

Source: Al Jazeera
 
Palestinians flee as Israeli forces return to Gaza’s north

Palestinians fled eastern Gaza City on Thursday under heavy bombardment as the Israeli military issued an evacuation order for the area it had previously declared clear of Hamas militants.

The flare-up in the northern Gaza Strip’s Shujaiya district, which witnesses and medics said caused numerous casualties, comes as fears grow of a wider regional conflagration involving Israel and Lebanese Hezbollah, a Hamas ally.

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, on a visit to Washington to discuss the Gaza crisis and ways to avoid broader conflict in the Middle East, said Israel did not want war but warned fighting on a massive scale would send Lebanon “back to the Stone Age.”

In Gaza, fighting has ground on despite comments Sunday by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the “intense phase” of the war — now nearing its 10th month — was winding down.

Officials and medics in the Hamas-run territory said Israeli strikes overnight and early Thursday killed at least six people in northern Gaza, and the Israeli military said it had “attacked terrorists” in Khan Yunis,” in the south.

In Gaza City, a witness in Shujaiya who declined to be named told AFP the situation was “frightening” as Israeli military vehicles approached amid air strikes and shelling.

“Residents are running through the streets in terror... wounded and martyrs lie in the streets.”

The military’s Arabic-language spokesman, Avichay Adraee, told residents and displaced Gazans in the Shujaiya area to leave “for your safety,” in a message posted on social media.

They were asked to head south, to a declared “humanitarian zone” about 25 kilometers (15 miles) away.

An AFP photographer saw many leaving on foot, carrying their belongings as they walked through rubble-strewn streets.

Hamas in a statement said Israeli forces were “starting a ground incursion,” reporting “several” dead as “thousands flee under relentless bombing.”

Muhammad Ghurab, a doctor at Gaza City’s Al-Ahli hospital, said the facility had received seven “martyrs including four children” and dozens who were wounded “as the Israeli forces advanced to the east of Shujaiya neighborhood.”

Shujaiya resident Omar Sukar said he saw strikes as Gazans were collecting drinking water, which has been in limited supply due to an Israeli siege.

“The water truck had just arrived when the shelling began,” he told AFP.

A displaced Gazan woman, who asked not to be named, told AFP she was “devastated” by the violence and destruction.

“We lost our children and homes, and we keep fleeing from place to another.”

Beyond the evacuation order announced by Adraee, the military declined to comment on the fighting.

The war started with Hamas’s October 7 attack on southern Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.

The militants also seized 251 hostages, 116 of whom remain in Gaza although the army says 42 are dead.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 37,765 people, also mostly civilians, according to data from Gaza’s health ministry.

Israel in early January announced it had dismantled “Hamas’s military framework” in Gaza’s north, which saw the most intense fighting in the early stages of the war, but militants have since regrouped.

The war and siege have triggered a dire humanitarian crisis, with Gaza hospitals struggling to function, and basic supplies hard to come by as the vast majority of the territory’s 2.4 million people have been displaced.

UNICEF announced Thursday an agreement with Israel to restart a power line that could return a key water desalination plant in Khan Yunis to full operating capacity.

“This is an important milestone, and we are very much looking forward to seeing it implemented,” said Jonathan Crickx, spokesman for the United Nations children’s fund.

In a rare medical evacuation from Gaza, 21 cancer patients left through the Kerem Shalom crossing on the Israeli border, a medical source in Egypt said.

It was the first evacuation since the closure of the Rafah border crossing — a key conduit for aid into Gaza — when Israeli forces took over its Palestinian side in early May.

Months of talks toward a truce and hostage release deal have so far failed as Israel has rejected Hamas demands for a permanent end to fighting and full troop withdrawal.

Israeli protesters have piled pressure on Netanyahu’s government,with thousands gathering in front of Netanyahu’s residence in Jerusalem on Thursday to call for a hostage release deal, according to an AFP reporter.

US officials have voiced hope a Gaza ceasefire could also lead to a reduction in hostilities between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah, which have traded near daily cross-border fire since early October.

Tensions have surged as Israel said this month that its war plans were ready, sparking threats from Hezbollah that, in the event of all-out war, none of Israel would be safe.

Germany and Canada have advised citizens in Lebanon to leave.

In the latest clashes on Thursday, Hezbollah said it fired rockets at an Israeli military base and sent drones in retaliation for Israeli strikes on Lebanon, one of which killed a fighter.

Israel said its air defenses “intercepted most of the launches,” reporting no casualties.

Israel meanwhile dismissed a UN-backed report that said nearly half a million Gazans faced “catastrophic” hunger.

Government spokesman David Mencer said “claims regarding starvation” were designed to “exert pressure on Israel.”

SOURCE:https://www.arabnews.pk/node/2539081/middle-east
 

Singapore charges activists over pro-Palestinian letters​


Three activists in Singapore have been charged over rallying people to deliver letters to the prime minister urging him to end ties with Israel.

Singapore strictly regulates protests, and public demonstrations advocating causes of other countries are not allowed.

The war in Gaza has been a particularly sensitive issue for the tiny country that has a significant Muslim population and also maintains a close relationship with Israel.

Authorities have urged Singaporeans not to stage protests on the issue and instead participate in dialogues and donation drives.

But there has been deep concern about the war and some Singaporeans, particularly younger ones, have been vocal in expressing their views online and desiring to make themselves heard.

In February, the activists led about 70 people on a metres-long walk from a popular mall on Singapore's main shopping street Orchard Road to the presidential compound next door.

Photos of the procession posted on social media show participants carrying umbrellas looking like watermelons. The fruit, which has the same colours as the Palestinian flag, has become a symbol of solidarity.

The group stopped at the gates of the compound - which also houses the prime minister's office - and handed a sheaf of 140 letters to staff.

Authorities say the activists - Annamalai Kokila Parvathi, Siti Amirah Mohamed Asrori and Mossammad Sobikun Nahar - had organised the event without a permit. The women have not indicated yet whether they would plead guilty.

All public demonstrations in Singapore require permits from the police, who have said they would not grant any for public assemblies advocating causes of other countries or foreign entities.

The three women could be fined up to S$10,000 (£5,800, $7,300 ) or jailed for up to six months.

On Thursday when the women were released on bail, they appeared to strike a defiant note through their attire. Ms Amirah wore a shawl resembling the keffiyeh, the traditional Arab headdress that has become a symbol of Palestinian activism, while Ms Annamalai wore a T-shirt with the words "Justice Now!".

Local advocacy group the Transformative Justice Collective, which Ms Annamalai co-founded, described the charges as "a continuation of the intimidation of peaceful support for Palestinian lives in Singapore".

The police also released a statement urging Singaporeans "not to engage in activities that will damage the peace, public order and social harmony" and not to "break the law to express their views, nor emulate the protesters in other countries".

Singapore and Israel have a long-standing defence partnership, which includes arms trade. Israel also helped to build up the South East Asian country's military in its early years of independence, and the two countries also cooperate in industrial research, education and business.

But Singapore has also expressed support for Palestinians and the two-state solution. It has voted in favour of recent UN resolutions calling for Israel and Hamas to cease hostilities, as well as past resolutions opposing Israel's illegal settlements.

Since the war in Gaza erupted, the government has taken a neutral stance while also making it clear it would not tolerate anything it deems as stoking social tensions.

In March, the Singapore government ordered the Israeli embassy to take down a Facebook post comparing mentions of Israel and the Palestinian territories in the Quran.

Law and Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam called the post "insensitive and inappropriate", adding that it could "inflame tensions" and put the Jewish community in Singapore at risk.

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Singapore charges women who delivered pro-Palestinian letters

The letters addressed to the prime minister appealed to the government to end ties with Israel.
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When will the madness of apartheid regime end
====
UNRWA denounces ‘unbearable’ conditions in Gaza

Palestinians in Gaza are forced to live in bombed-out buildings or camp next to giant piles of waste, a United Nations spokeswoman said Friday, denouncing the “unbearable” conditions in the territory besieged by Israeli forces and raising fears of disease.

At least five Palestinians, including a girl, were killed in overnight Israeli attacks on two houses in Deir el-Balah.

Source: Al Jazeera
 
Seven Palestinians killed in Israeli shelling on Rafah and Gaza City

Seven Palestinian civilians were killed and several others injured this morning in Israeli airstrikes targeting a house west of Rafah and another in the Daraj neighborhood in Gaza City, marking the 268th day of ongoing Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip.

Local sources reported that Israeli warplanes bombed a house belonging to the Za’arab family west of Rafah in southern Gaza, resulting in the killing of six civilians, including children, and injuring others.

Additionally, Israeli artillery shelled southern areas of Rafah, causing casualties among civilians, alongside targeting another area in central Rafah. Explosions and intense gunfire were reported in the neighborhoods of Tel al-Sultan and Saudi west of Rafah.

Israeli warplanes also targeted the towns of Abasan and Khuza'a east of Khan Yunis in southern Gaza.

In another attack, one civilian was killed and several others injured when Israeli warplanes bombed a residential apartment in the Daraj neighborhood of Gaza City, amidst ongoing intense airstrikes in the area.

Israeli artillery further targeted homes in the vicinity of the Barcelona Park in Tel al-Hawa neighborhood southwest of Gaza City, with smoke rising from the area.

Furthermore, Israeli warplanes and artillery carried out heavy strikes on the neighborhoods of Tuffah and Shujaiya east of Gaza City, and the Sabra neighborhood in the center of the city. The attacks resulted in additional casualties and injuries among civilians, with medics facing difficulty reaching them due to continuous gunfire from Israeli drones targeting anything in motion.

Simultaneously, WAFA correspondent reported that Israeli military tanks are currently surrounding several families inside their homes near the Al-Shuhada Mosque in Shujaiya neighborhood, amidst heavy firing from drones.

The ongoing Israeli aggression on Gaza since October 7, 2023 has claimed the lives of 37,834 Palestinians, predominantly children and women, and left 86,858 others injured.

Thousands more remain trapped either under rubble or on the streets, as Israeli forces obstruct the access of rescue teams and civil defense crews to reach them.

SOURCE: https://english.wafa.ps/Pages/Details/145426
 

Two men detained after attack outside Israeli embassy in Belgrade​


Two men were remanded in custody after a Serbian police officer killed a man who shot him with a crossbow outside the Israeli embassy in Belgrade in a “targeted terrorist act,” a minister said Sunday.

The assailant, whom the police identified as being a “convert” to Islam, shot the officer while he was on duty in front of the Israeli embassy early Saturday.

The policeman opened fire in self-defense and the attacker later died.

The assailant, from Mladenovac, near Belgrade, lived in Novi Pazar, a historical and political center of Serbia’s Bosniak Muslim minority, police said.

They added a number of people known to the security services were suspected of being linked to the attack.

“Searches were conducted at several locations in Serbia, dozens of people were questioned,” Interior Minister Ivica Dacic told the state-run RTS broadcaster on Sunday.

The prosecutors will establish whether they were linked with the “targeted terrorist attack,” he added.

Two men were remanded in custody, the minister said.

Security was stepped up to the highest level throughout the country and the police operation was continuing, Dacic said.

“It is an operation against extremists and terrorists, people directly involved in the attack, but .... also against those for whom there are indications they might belong to terrorist groups.”

Israel’s Foreign Minister Israel Katz on Saturday thanked Serbian authorities for their “strong support and cooperation following the attempted terror act on the Embassy of Israel in Belgrade today.”

“Terrorism cannot be tolerated!” he said on X.

Israeli ambassador to Serbia Yahel Vilan on Sunday visited the wounded officer in a Belgrade hospital.

Serbia has continued arms sales to Israel since Hamas’s October 7 attack on southern Israel, which claimed 1,195 lives, mostly of civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.

The health ministry in Gaza said Saturday that at least 37,834 people have been killed in the Israeli response.

 
Israeli tanks advance into areas in north and south Gaza

Israeli forces advanced further on Sunday into the Shejaia neighbourhood of northern Gaza and also pushed deeper into western and central Rafah in the south, killing at least six Palestinians and destroying several homes, residents said.

Israeli tanks, which moved back into Shejaia four days ago, fired shells towards several houses, leaving families trapped inside and unable to leave, the residents said.

Speaking at a weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeated his stance that there is no substitute for victory in the war against the Islamist militant group Hamas.

"We are committed to fighting until we achieve all of our objectives: Eliminating Hamas, returning all of our hostages, ensuring that Gaza never again constitutes a threat to Israel and returning our residents securely to their homes in the south and the north," he said.


 

More wounded Palestinians tell BBC the Israeli army forced them on to jeep​


Two more Palestinian men, injured during a military operation in the occupied West Bank last week, have told the BBC that Israeli soldiers forced them on to the bonnet of an army jeep and drove them – sometimes at speed – along village roads.

Their accounts came days after footage of 23-year-old Mujahid Abadi Balas clinging to the bonnet of what appears to be the same Israeli army jeep sparked international outrage.

The BBC has now spoken to two men who allege similar treatment during the operation in Jabariyat, on the outskirts of Jenin, last Saturday.

25-year-old Samir Dabaya, now in hospital in Jenin, says he was shot in the back by Israeli forces during the Jabariyat operation, and lay face-down and bleeding for hours, until soldiers came to assess him.

When they turned him over and found that he was alive, he was beaten with a gun, he says, before being picked up, carried to the jeep and thrown onto it.

“They took off my [trousers]. I wanted to hold onto the car, but [one soldier] hit my face and told me not to. Then he started driving,” he said. “I was waiting for death.”

Samir showed us video footage from a security camera which appears to show him semi-naked, lying on a fast-moving jeep with a number 1 clearly marked on its side.

The location seems to match where the operation took place, but there is no date or time visible on the recording.

Another Palestinian man, Hesham Isleit, also told the BBC he was shot twice during the operation in Jabariyat and forced onto the same military jeep, marked with the number 1.

He described “shooting from all sides” and said he tried to run away but was shot in the leg, after which an army unit arrived to collect him and another man.

“They ordered us to stand up, and undressed us,” he said, “then they asked us to get onto the front of the jeep.”

The car was so hot, it felt “like fire”, he says.

“I was barefoot and undressed. I tried to put my hand on the jeep and I couldn’t, it was burning hot. I was telling them it was very hot, and they were forcing me to get on – telling me that if I didn’t want to die, I should do it.”

We put these allegations to Israel’s army; it said the cases were under review.

In response to the original video of Mujahid Abadi Balas last week, the Israeli army said that he was tied to the jeep in “a violation of orders and procedures” and that his case would be investigated.

“The conduct of the forces in the video of the incident does not conform to the values of the IDF,” it said in a written response.

From his hospital bed, Mujahid told the BBC he hadn’t expected to survive the experience, and was saying his final prayers as he lay on the moving vehicle.

He showed the BBC a second video, recorded at some distance, that appears to support his account of being thrown onto the vehicle by Israeli soldiers.

“Once they confirmed that I had nothing on me [no weapon], they came down from the jeep and started beating me on the face, the head, and the sites of my injuries,” he said. “The soldiers picked me up by my wrists and ankles, and [swung me] right and left, before throwing me in the air.”

He says he fell to the ground, was picked up and swung again, before being thrown onto the jeep, and driven to a nearby house.

The army said it was in Jabariyat last weekend to arrest wanted suspects, and that during the operation “terrorists opened fire at troops, who responded with live fire”.

Hesham said the house that he and Mujahid were in that day belonged to Majd al-Azmi, a neighbour and friend, who was arrested during the operation and remains in Israeli custody.

All three men say they were unarmed, and all were quickly released by the army after identity checks.

The Israeli human rights group, Btselem, has been tracking the cases.

Its spokesman, Shai Parnes, said that since the 7 October Hamas attacks, violence against Palestinians in the West Bank by Israeli soldiers and settlers has reached record levels.

“It’s more radicalised, it’s more brutalised, it’s more extreme,” he said. “Since 7 October, more than 500 Palestinians have been killed – more than 100 of them minors – and every day there are invasions of Palestinian cities.”

Jenin has been a particular target for Israeli raids since the 7 October Hamas attacks, with more than 120 Palestinians – civilians and fighters – killed by Israeli soldiers there.

But armed men still patrol Jenin camp where fighters backed by Hamas and Islamic Jihad are based, and residents in the town say there’s no sign of the war subsiding.

“What the army doesn’t know is that resistance is an idea planted in the heart,” one resident said. “It won’t stop. If one is killed, five more will replace him.”

During an Israeli operation this week, bombs buried deep in the roads around the camp hit two units as they came in – killing one soldier and wounding 16 others.

This battle began long before the Gaza War, but tactics and attitudes here are shifting in its wake, and the behaviour of Israeli troops is under scrutiny in the West Bank too.

This is different territory to Gaza, but it’s the same enemies, locked in the same wider war.

www.bbc.com

West Bank: More wounded Palestinians tell BBC the Israeli army forced them on to jeep

Two more Palestinian men tell the BBC they were shot and forced on to the bonnet of an Israeli jeep.
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Ultra-Orthodox protest against mandatory military service turns violent in Jerusalem​


Thousands of Jewish ultra-Orthodox men clashed with Israeli police in central Jerusalem on Sunday during a protest against a Supreme Court order for them to begin enlisting for military service.

The landmark decision last week ordering the government to begin drafting ultra-Orthodox men could lead to the collapse of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s governing coalition as Israel wages war in Gaza.

Tens of thousands of men rallied in an ultra-Orthodox neighborhood to protest the order. But after nightfall, the crowd made its way toward central Jerusalem and turned violent.

Israeli police said protesters threw rocks and attacked the car of an ultra-Orthodox Cabinet minister, pelting it with stones.

Water cannons filled with skunk-scented water and police mounted on horses were used to disperse the crowd. But the demonstration was still not under control late Sunday.

Military service is compulsory for most Jewish men and women in Israel. But politically powerful ultra-Orthodox parties have won exemptions for their followers to skip military service and instead study in religious seminaries.

The long-standing arrangement has bred resentment among the broader public, a sentiment that has grown stronger during the eight-month war on Gaza. Over 600 soldiers have been killed in fighting, and tens of thousands of reservists have been activated, upending careers, businesses and lives.

Ultra-Orthodox parties and their followers say forcing their men to serve in the army will destroy their generations-old way of life. Earlier Sunday, thousands of men crowded a square and joined in mass prayers. Many held signs criticizing the government, with one saying “not even one male” should be drafted. The ultra-Orthodox parties are key members of

Netanyahu’s governing coalition and could potentially force new elections if they decide to leave the government in protest.

Party leaders have not said whether they will leave the government. Doing so could be risky, with Netanyahu’s coalition’s popularity lagging since October 7.

 

Rocket barrage launched at Israel as battle rages in Gaza City​

Israel’s military says Palestinian armed groups in Gaza have launched about 20 rockets towards Israeli border communities - the heaviest such attack in months.

A number of the projectiles were intercepted and others landed inside southern Israel, but no injuries were reported. The military said it responded with artillery fire.

Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) said it launched the barrage in response to Israeli “crimes”.

It comes as Israel issued a fresh evacuation order for parts of the Khan Younis area in southern Gaza.

People in the area first received audio messages telling them to leave, before the Israeli military posted a message in Arabic repeating the warning to social media. Witnesses say many people are already fleeing.

Elsewhere, fierce fighting continued for a fifth day in Shejaiya in the north of Gaza and an Israeli soldier was killed in the southern Rafah area.

On Sunday, Israel’s prime minister said its troops were engaged in a “difficult fight” across the entire Palestinian territory.

The Israeli military launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to an unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October, during which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 37,900 people have been killed in Gaza since then, including 23 over the past 24 hours, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

www.bbc.com

Gaza war: Rockets fired at Israel as battle rages in Shejaiya

The barrage targeting southern communities was reportedly the biggest from Gaza in six months.
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Israel orders Palestinians to leave southern Gaza area after rocket fire

The Israeli military has ordered Palestinians to leave a wide sweep of land to the east of the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis after rockets were fired towards Israel.

People in the area first received audio messages telling them to leave, before the Israeli military posted a message in Arabic repeating the warning to social media.

Witnesses say many people are already fleeing.

It comes after about 20 rockets were launched in the heaviest such attack in months, with a number intercepted and others landing in open areas with no injuries reported.

Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) said it launched the barrage in response to Israeli “crimes”.

The latest evacuation order covers the area around the European hospital to the south-east of Khan Younis.

Staff have begun moving some key equipment to Nasser hospital in Khan Younis and some staff and patients have also left, local reports say.

Elsewhere, fierce fighting continued for a fifth day in Shejaiya in the north of Gaza and an Israeli soldier was killed in the southern Rafah area.

On Sunday, Israel’s prime minister said its troops were engaged in a “difficult fight” across the entire Palestinian territory.

The Israeli military launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to an unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October, during which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 37,900 people have been killed in Gaza since then, including 23 over the past 24 hours, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

On Monday morning, sirens sounded in Israeli communities near the Gaza border fence, many of which have been evacuated since the 7 October attack.

The Eshkol Regional Council later reported that 18 rockets were launched towards areas it governs, according to the Jerusalem Post. Most landed in open areas, but one fell “in the area of Kibbutz Holit’s fence”, it said. Another rocket was intercepted by the Iron Dome missile defence system, it added.

The Times of Israel reported that Monday’s barrage was the largest from Gaza since January, when at least 25 rockets were launched towards the city of Netivot.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the latest rocket-fire had come from the southern Khan Younis area and that its artillery had struck the sources.

Palestinian news agency Wafa reported that artillery strikes on Monday killed one civilian and wounded several others in the town of Khuzaa, which is south-east of the city of Khan Younis.

Israeli warplanes had also targeted a street in Shejaiya, in the east of Gaza City, and an area north of Nuseirat refugee camp, in central Gaza, it said.

Hamas’s military wing meanwhile said its fighters had targeted two Israeli tanks with explosive devices in Shejaiya.

The IDF said in a statement that its troops had “eliminated numerous terrorists in close-quarters encounters and located large quantities of weapons” during raids in Shejaiya. Air strikes had killed about 20 others and destroyed weapons manufacturing and storage facilities in the area, it added.

A battle has raged there since Thursday, when Israeli troops went back into the area following what the IDF said was “intelligence indicating the presence of terrorists and terrorist infrastructure”.

Over the weekend, residents said the assault had left bodies lying in the street, while the IDF said two Israeli soldiers had been killed in combat in northern Gaza.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) said up to 80,000 people in Shejaiya and surrounding areas had been told by the IDF to evacuate and head south, but that they were being pushed westwards because they could not pass through Israeli checkpoints in the Wadi Gaza area.

“The Israeli army has completely destroyed the neighbourhood,” a woman from the neighbouring Tuffah district told BBC Arabic’s Gaza Lifeline programme.

“Along with others, I fled as shells rained down around us. We moved from one area to another until we managed to escape the neighbourhood. But many residents were trapped and unable to leave," she added.

"We are experiencing hunger, fear, killing, displacement, and total destruction.”

Palestinian fighters have regrouped in several northern areas which were the focus of the Israeli ground offensive in the first three months of the war.

Rafah has been the main focus since early May, and the IDF believes it has now degraded the capabilities of three of the four Hamas battalions in the city.

Some of the estimated 10,000 people still in the city told Reuters news agency that Israeli tanks had pushed further into western and central areas on Monday, a day after they reportedly moved to within 1km (0.6 miles) of the Mediterranean coast.

The IDF meanwhile announced that one of its soldiers had been killed in combat in southern Gaza on Monday.

It provided no further details about the incident, but Hamas said earlier that its fighters had blown up a booby-trapped house in Rafah after luring Israeli troops into it.

In another development on Monday, the head of al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City was released after seven months in Israeli custody. Dr Mohammad Abu Salmiya alleged that he was tortured in custody. Israel denies mistreating detainees.

On Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a cabinet meeting that Israeli forces were operating “everywhere in the Gaza Strip” and killing “dozens of terrorists” every day.

“This is a difficult fight that is being waged above ground, sometimes in hand-to-hand combat, and below ground as well,” he warned.

“We are committed to fighting until we achieve all of our objectives: eliminating Hamas, returning all of our hostages, ensuring that Gaza never again constitutes a threat to Israel and returning our residents securely to their homes,” he added.

Unrwa’s director of planning, Sam Rose, told the BBC from Nuseirat camp that the humanitarian situation was becoming increasingly desperate for Gaza’s 2.2 million population, three quarters of which is displaced.

“People need water, people need healthcare. It’s getting hot here, it’s 35 degrees [Celsius], the stench of sewage, the lack of solid waste management facilities, the area is essentially becoming a dumping site [for rubbish],” he said.

“Fuel isn’t coming in in adequate quantities through the crossing points. Without that, incubators cannot work, the water wells cannot work... Doing the most simple of things is a real struggle for everyone.”

BBC
 
Palestinians flee Khan Younis as Israeli forces strike south Gaza

Palestinians have been fleeing districts to the east of Gaza’s second city of Khan Younis after Israel issued evacuation orders.

Overnight and into the morning, witnesses reported multiple Israeli strikes in and around Khan Younis. A medical source and the Palestinian Red Crescent said eight people had been killed and more than 30 wounded.

Patients and medical staff have also been leaving the European Gaza hospital in the area, as the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza told them to evacuate.

The Israeli military has not itself issued an evacuation order for the hospital.

The Red Cross is reported to have helped patients in the process of transferring to another hospital.

Louise Wateridge, an official with the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) in Gaza, asked where people could go as they were forced to leave their homes once again.

“In this area, people were already forced to survive in severely damaged, destroyed, structurally unsafe buildings after the Rafah military operation,” she said.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) issued a statement on its latest operation in Gaza, saying it was responding to some 20 projectiles that were launched from the area of Khan Yunis towards Israel on Monday.

“Overnight, the IDF struck terror targets in the area from which the projectiles were fired, including a weapons storage facility, operational centres and additional terrorist infrastructure sites,” it continued.

The IDF said Hamas was continuing to “systematically violate international law while using civilian infrastructure and the civilian population as human shields”.

The armed wing of Palestinian Islamic Jihad said it had carried out the attack on Monday, the biggest barrage launched into Israel from Gaza for months.

Much of Khan Younis was destroyed in a sustained Israeli offensive against Hamas earlier this year.

The city to which some of its residents subsequently returned is almost unrecognizable. Nevertheless, many moved back to take refuge from Israel's offensive in Rafah.

Now, once again, many are on the move, fearing a major new assault.

BBC
 
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Israel’s Netanyahu slams release of Gaza’s al-Shifa Hospital chief​

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is awaiting the results of an inquiry into the release of a prominent Palestinian doctor.

The outcome of the investigation by the domestic intelligence agency, Shin Bet, ordered by Netanyahu, into the “serious mistake” of releasing al-Shifa Hospital Director Muhammad Abu Salmiya, who has attracted global attention with claims that detainees from Gaza are being routinely abused, was expected on Tuesday.

The chief of what was Gaza’s largest hospital before it was largely reduced to rubble by Israeli bombardment was freed on Monday alongside 54 other prisoners. He was arrested seven months ago as the Israeli military laid siege to al-Shifa, claiming Hamas, the group governing the Palestinian enclave, was using it as a base.

Following their release, which was carried out to free up space in overflowing Israeli jails, according to unconfirmed reports, Abu Salmiya and others alleged that they had faced daily abuse and torture while imprisoned.

Israeli raids and vicious fighting have devastated al-Shifa. All of Gaza’s other medical institutions have also suffered damage, provoking concern over access to medical care for the wounded and Gaza’s starving displaced population.

www.aljazeera.com

Israel’s Netanyahu slams release of Gaza’s al-Shifa Hospital chief

PM awaits report from Israeli intelligence as released prisoners claim they were tortured and abused in Israeli jails.
www.aljazeera.com www.aljazeera.com
 
Hamas faces growing public dissent as Gaza war erodes support

The man in the video is beside himself, a mask of anguish radiating through his bloodied face.

“I am an academic doctor,” he says, “I had a good life, but we have a filthy [Hamas] leadership. They got used to our bloodshed, may God curse them! They are scum!”

The video - unthinkable before the Gaza war - was filmed outside a hospital, inundated with hundreds of Palestinian casualties after an Israeli operation to free hostages from central Gaza last month.

“I’m one of you,” he says, “but you are a cowardly people. We could have avoided this attack!”

The video went viral. And it’s not the only one.

Open criticism of Hamas has been growing in Gaza, both on the streets and online.

Some have publicly criticised Hamas for hiding the hostages in apartments near a busy marketplace, or for firing rockets from civilian areas.

Residents have told the BBC that swearing and cursing against the Hamas leadership is now common in the markets, and that some drivers of donkey carts have even nicknamed their animals after the Hamas leader in Gaza - Yahya Sinwar - urging the donkeys forward with shouts of "Yallah, Sinwar!"

“People say things like, ‘Hamas has destroyed us’ or even call on God to take their lives,” one man said.

“They ask what the 7 October attacks were for - some say they were a gift to Israel.”

Some are even urging their leaders to agree a ceasefire with Israel.

There are still those in Gaza fiercely loyal to Hamas and after years of repressive control, it’s difficult to know how far the group is losing support, or how far existing opponents feel more able to speak their mind.

But even some on the group’s own payroll are wavering.

One senior Hamas government employee told the BBC that the Hamas attacks were “a crazy, uncalculated leap”.

He asked that we concealed his identity.

“I know from my work with the Hamas government that it prepared well for the attack militarily, but it neglected the home front,” he said.

“They did not build any safe shelters for people, they did not reserve enough food, fuel and medical supplies. If my family and I survive this war, I will leave Gaza, the first chance I get.”

There was opposition to Hamas long before the war, though much of it remained hidden for fear of reprisals.

The last time Palestinian elections were held, in 2006, in the party list vote Gazans voted for Hamas in 15 out of 24 seats in the territory - in the other nine districts, voters chose a different party.

A year later, Hamas violently ejected Palestinian Authority forces from Gaza causing a bitter rift with the rival Fatah movement, and took over the running of the whole Gaza Strip.

Ameen Abed, a political activist, said he had been arrested many times for speaking out against Hamas before the war, but said - nine months on - dissent was becoming more common there.

“In Gaza, most people criticise what Hamas has done,” he said.

“They see children living in tents, and insulting their leaders has become routine. But it has a lot of support among those outside Gaza’s border, who are sitting under air conditioners in their comfortable homes, who have not lost a child, a home, a future, a leg.”

Desperation and war are eroding social structures in Gaza, and Hamas control is not what it was.

Four-fifths of Gaza’s population is displaced, often moving between temporary shelters.

And law and order has broken down in places, partly as a result of Israel’s policy of targeting Gaza’s security forces - not just the official Hamas internal security service, but also the community police responsible for street crime.

As control has waned, criminal gangs have thrived, looting neighbourhoods and aid convoys; and private security companies - some run by powerful local families - have emerged.

One staff member from an aid organisation operating in Gaza described "absolute chaos at street level" and "a state of anarchy", saying that civilian order had completely broken down as a result of the Israeli policy.

Israel’s prime minister has repeatedly vowed to continue the war until Hamas’s military and governing capabilities are destroyed.

But some aid agencies - in both northern and south areas of Gaza - have also reported regular checks on their activities by local Hamas officials, and videos are frequently circulated of unofficial Hamas security forces shooting and beating those caught looting.

One well-placed source told the BBC that dozens of people had been killed by Hamas in bloody score-settling with other local groups, after Israeli troops withdrew from one area.

Fear of criticising Gaza’s leaders might have lessened, but it hasn’t gone, so it is still hard to accurately gauge, beyond individual testimony, how far support for the group is shifting.

Some, like 26-year-old Jihad Talab, still strongly support Hamas.

Displaced from the Zeitoun area of Gaza City with his wife, daughter and mother, and now sheltering in Deir al Balah, he said the group was not responsible for their suffering.

“We must support [Hamas] because it’s the one working on the ground, the one who understands the battle - not you or I,” he said. “Empty accusations only serve the Occupation [Israel]. We’ll support it until our last breath.”

A regular poll carried out by a West Bank-based think tank, the Palestinian Centre for Policy and Survey Research, suggests that most people in Gaza still blame Israel and its allies for the war, rather than Hamas.

The latest survey in June found that almost two-thirds of Gazan respondents were satisfied with Hamas - a rise of 12 points from December - and that just around half would still prefer Hamas to run Gaza after the war ends, over any other option.

These results differ from several accounts given to the BBC, including from a senior Hamas official who privately acknowledged that they were losing support as a result of the war.

These glimpses through chinks in the media blockade around Gaza can never give a full assessment of the situation. International journalists are barred by Israel and Egypt from reporting on the situation there first-hand.

What is clear is that Hamas remains very sensitive to public opinion.

Strikingly similar messages regularly appear on certain social media platforms to justify its actions, often apparently in response to criticism at home.

A source familiar with Hamas told the BBC there was an organised international network to co-ordinate social media messaging for the group.

After Israeli families released a video showing the moment female soldiers were kidnapped by Hamas units on 7 October, some in Gaza questioned whether targeting women during war was in line with Islamic teaching.

In response, several pro-Hamas social media accounts put out similar messages insisting that soldiers - male or female - were justified military targets, and saying the unit had been involved in shooting Gazan protestors during demonstrations six years ago.

Criticism of Hamas is growing sharper, and long-buried divisions over Hamas rule in Gaza are becoming clear.

Out of the destruction left by Israel’s battle with Hamas, a new war is emerging: a battle for control of public opinion within Gaza itself.

BBC
 

Israel examining Hamas response to ceasefire plan​


Israel says it is studying a response by Hamas to a Gaza ceasefire plan outlined by President Biden at the end of May.

It comes after Hamas's political leadership said it had contacted mediators Egypt and Qatar "about the ideas" it has been discussing with the aim of reaching an agreement.

Up to now Hamas has demanded an end to the war and a full withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza. Israel says it will accept only temporary pauses in the fighting until it eliminates Hamas.

A Palestinian official familiar with the negotiations told the BBC Hamas is no longer insisting on a full ceasefire at the outset of the three-phase plan.

President Biden said the plan which he outlined was based on a more detailed Israeli proposal. The first phase would include a "full and complete ceasefire", the withdrawal of IDF forces from populated areas and the exchange of hostages for Palestinian prisoners.

The second phase would involve a "permanent end to hostilities" and the third phase a major reconstruction plan for Gaza and completion of return of dead hostages' remains.

A joint statement from the Israeli prime minister's office and the Mossad intelligence agency on Wednesday night said the mediators had "conveyed to the [Israeli] negotiating team Hamas's remarks on the outline of the hostages deal".

"Israel is evaluating the remarks and will convey its reply to the mediators," it added.

A senior Palestinian official told the BBC on Thursday that Hamas has given up the condition of a complete ceasefire in exchange for new conditions related to the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza's southern border area known as the Philadelphi corridor and from the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt.

The source, who was informed of Hamas’s response submitted to the mediators, added that the atmosphere is positive. "We are going to a new round of negotiations soon,” the source said.

The US has accused Hamas of blocking progress towards a ceasefire.

On Monday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the group was the “one exception” to international support for the ceasefire proposal. Hamas, he said, had created "gaps... in not saying yes to a proposal that everyone, including the Israelis, had said yes to”.

The war was triggered by Hamas's unprecedented attack on Israel on 7 October in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people and took 251 others back to Gaza as hostages.

At least 37,953 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza as a result of Israel's offensive, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

www.bbc.com

Gaza war: Israel examining Hamas response to ceasefire plan

Hamas is reported to have dropped its insistence on ending the war at the outset of a planned truce.
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Israel has approved ‘largest West Bank land grab in 30 years’, watchdog says​


Israel has approved the largest seizure of land in the occupied West Bank in more than three decades, according to a report released by an Israeli anti-settlement watchdog, a move that will exacerbate the escalating tensions surrounding the conflict in Gaza.

Peace Now said authorities recently approved the appropriation of 12.7 sq kilometres (nearly 5 square miles) of land in the Jordan valley, indicating it was “the largest single appropriation approved since the 1993 Oslo accords”, referring to the start of the peace process.

Settlement monitors say the recent land acquisition links Israeli settlements along a crucial corridor adjacent to Jordan, a development they say threatens the formation of a future Palestinian state.

Israel occupied the West Bank, capturing it from Jordan, in the six-day war of 1967. Since then, successive governments have made efforts to permanently cement Israeli control over the land, in part by declaring large swathes as “state lands”, which prevents private Palestinian ownership.

The recent land seizure, which was approved late last month but only publicised on Wednesday, comes after the seizure of 8 sq kilometres (roughly 3 sq miles) of land in the West Bank in March and 2.6 square kilometres (1 sq mile) in February.

Peace Now says Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu and far-right finance minister Bezalel Smotrich “are determined to fight against the entire world and against the interests of the people of Israel for the benefit of a handful of settlers”.

“Today, it is clear to everyone that this conflict cannot be resolved without a political settlement that establishes a Palestinian state alongside Israel,” the group added. “Still, the Israeli government chooses to actually make it difficult.”

UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric called it “a step in the wrong direction,” adding that “the direction we want to be heading is to find a negotiated two-state solution”.

In a leaked recording captured by Peace Now, Smotrich, during a conference for his National Religious Party-Religious Zionism party, disclosed that the land confiscations in 2024 surpassed previous years’ averages by approximately tenfold.

“This thing is mega-strategic and we are investing a lot in it,” Smotrich said. “This is something that will change the map dramatically.”

In May 2023, Smotrich, who said his “life’s mission is to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state”, had instructed Israeli government ministries to prepare for 500,000 more Israeli settlers to move into the occupied West Bank.

On 20 June, the Guardian revealed how the Israeli military has quietly handed over significant legal powers in the West Bank to pro-settler civil servants working for Smotrich.

An order posted by the Israel Defense Forces on its website on 29 May transfers responsibility for dozens of bylaws at the Civil Administration – the Israeli body governing in the West Bank – from the military to officials led by Smotrich at the defence ministry.

Since 7 October, settlers have stepped up beatings and attacks, forcing Palestinians to flee to nearby towns, and there has been an increase in army home demolitions.

Late in June, Israeli soldiers have destroyed 11 homes and other structures in Umm al-Kheir, a village in the occupied West Bank, leaving 50 people homeless, while early in July they fired live ammunition and teargas at six Palestinian villagers, including four women and a 5-year-old girl.

www.theguardian.com

Israel has approved ‘largest West Bank land grab in 30 years’, watchdog says

Peace Now says approval of more than 12 sq km is biggest since peace process began in 1993
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