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

Having read this entire thread in entirety -- took a few hours -- it started off with raw emotions last year, and now has tapered into a dumping ground of news articles.

Just death counts with no follow up of anguish or prayers for the deceased, or even calls for ummah to unite no more.

Begs the question whether the original emotions were feigned by certain individuals at the start, and now cannot be sustained.
 
Farhan The Man said:
Having read this entire thread in entirety -- took a few hours -- it started off with raw emotions last year, and now has tapered into a dumping ground of news articles.

Just death counts with no follow up of anguish or prayers for the deceased, or even calls for ummah to unite no more.

Begs the question whether the original emotions were feigned by certain individuals at the start, and now cannot be sustained.
Click to expand...

You read the entire thread! 1521 posts!

Emotions tend to be raw in the begininng. That's human nature.

May Palestine become victorious against oppressors.
 
Hamas confirms death of commander in Israeli strike on West Bank

Hamas' armed wing al-Qassam Brigades confirmed death of one of its commanders Zahi Yaser Oufi in an Israeli strike on the West Bank city of Tulkarm along with seven other fighters, the group said in a statement on Friday.

The Israeli military said that it killed Oufi, head of the Hamas network in Tulkarm, in an attack on Thursday.


Reuters
 
Cricket Warrior said:
Hamas confirms death of commander in Israeli strike on West Bank

Hamas' armed wing al-Qassam Brigades confirmed death of one of its commanders Zahi Yaser Oufi in an Israeli strike on the West Bank city of Tulkarm along with seven other fighters, the group said in a statement on Friday.

The Israeli military said that it killed Oufi, head of the Hamas network in Tulkarm, in an attack on Thursday.


Reuters
Click to expand...
Nice way to start the day for me.
 
Farhan The Man said:
Wishing words, devoid of action, are meaningless.

It is abundantly clear Allah is helping those who helped themselves.

Jews are by far Allah's favorite in this race to glory. Fact.
Click to expand...

Do not confuse temporary setback with final outcome.

Evil will be defeated one day in sha Allah.
 
Netanyahu says Macron's call for arms embargo is 'a disgrace'

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has criticised French President Emmanuel Macron over his call to halt arms deliveries to Israel for use in Gaza.

Macron told France Inter radio that "the priority is that we return to a political solution, that we stop delivering weapons to fight in Gaza".

At a summit in Paris on Saturday, the French president reiterated his concern over the conflict in Gaza continuing despite ceasefire calls, and he also criticised Israel's decision to send ground troops into Lebanon.

Netanyahu responded: "Shame on them," referring to Macron and other Western leaders who have called for what he described as an arms embargo on Israel.

In a video released by his office, Netanyahu said "Israel will win with or without their support", adding that calling for an arms embargo was "a disgrace".

In an interview with the French broadcaster, which was recorded on Tuesday and aired on Saturday, Macron said "France is not delivering any" weapons to Israel.

He added: "I think we are not being heard."

"I think it is a mistake, including for the security of Israel," he said, adding that the conflict was leading to "hatred".

Macron also said that avoiding an escalation in Lebanon was a "priority" and that "Lebanon cannot become a new Gaza".

Netanyahu's office responded by saying that any country that did not stand with Israel was supporting Iran and its allies and proxies.

Netanyahu said: "As Israel fights the forces of barbarism led by Iran, all civilised countries should be standing firmly by Israel's side.

"Yet, President Macron and other Western leaders are now calling for arms embargoes against Israel. Shame on them."

Macron's office later said that France is a "steadfast friend of Israel", adding that Netanyahu's reaction was "excessive and detached from the friendship between France and Israel".

Speaking at the at the 19th Francophonie Summit at the Grand Palais in Paris on Saturday, Macron said that while both the US and France had called for a ceasefire in Lebanon, he added: "I regret that Prime Minister Netanyahu has made another choice, has taken this responsibility, in particular, for ground operations on Lebanese soil."

However, Macron reaffirmed Israel's right to self-defence and said that he would be meeting relatives of Franco-Israelis held hostage in Gaza on Monday.

Monday will mark the first anniversary of Hamas's attack on Israel on 7 October, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others taken hostage. More than 40,000 people have been killed in Gaza since then, the territory's Hamas-run health ministry says.

BBC
 
Israeli strikes on Gaza mosque and school kill 26, health ministry says

The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza says 26 people have been killed in Israeli air strikes on a mosque and school housing displaced Palestinians in the centre of the territory.

Dozens of people were also injured in strikes that hit Ibn Rushd school and Al-Aqsa Martyrs mosque in Deir al-Balah early on Sunday morning, according to the health ministry.

The Israeli military said it had targeted Hamas militants operating within "command and control" centres at the sites.

Videos verified by the BBC from the mosque show bodies and blood on the ground among the rubble, while footage at the school shows the structure on fire and a man being pulled out on a stretcher.

Earlier, the Hamas-run civil defence agency said 21 people were killed and a large number wounded in the strike on the mosque, according to the AFP news agency.

Sunday's strikes occurred almost exactly one year on from 7 October 2023, when Hamas gunmen attacked Israel, killing around 1,200 people and taking 251 hostage.

Since then, 41,870 Palestinians have been killed and more than 97,000 injured in Gaza, according to the health ministry. It does not differentiate between civilians and fighters.

According to the United Nations, which uses Gaza health ministry figures and considers them reliable, 187 people were killed in Gaza from 30 September to 4 October alone.

In a statement on the strike on the mosque, Hamas accused Israel of "bombing citizens' homes and demolishing them over their heads, resulting in the deaths and injuries of dozens".

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said that "before the attacks many steps were taken to reduce the chance of harming civilians, including the use of precision weaponry, aerial surveillance and additional intelligence information."

Hamas has denied using schools and other civilian sites for military purposes.

Elsewhere in Gaza, Israel's military began to surround Jabalia in the north overnight in response to what the IDF said were efforts by Hamas to rebuild in the area.

The military said it had struck "dozens of military targets" before and during the ground operation.

The IDF warned the public that north Gaza is "still considered a dangerous combat zone" and published a new map on Sunday showing zones for potential evacuation in the north.

It also said it had expanded the humanitarian zone in al-Mawasi in southern Gaza, although it is still smaller than it was at the start of July.

Both the mosque and the school hit on Sunday are located in the humanitarian zone.

The IDF said it had re-opened two evacuation routes from the north to access the zone.

Israel does not allow international journalists from media organisations, including the BBC, independent access to Gaza, making it hard to verify the facts on the ground.

BBC
 
Palestinian journalist, 19, killed in Israeli raid after receiving threats

Israeli forces have killed Palestinian journalist Hassan Hamad in an air strike on his home in northern Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp, days after the slain journalist said he was warned by an Israeli officer to stop filming in Gaza.

With the killing of the 19-year-old journalist, whose work appeared on Al Jazeera and other networks, the number of Palestinian journalists killed since the war began has risen to 175, according to Gaza’s Government Media Office. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) says at least 128 journalists and media workers are among the more than 41,000 people killed since Israel launched the devastating war on Gaza in October 2023.


www.aljazeera.com

Palestinian journalist, 19, killed in Israeli raid after receiving threats

Hassan Hamad was killed in an attack on his home in Jabalia camp, taking the total number of journalists killed to 175.
www.aljazeera.com www.aljazeera.com
 
A question for Pro-Palestinians: What explanation is there for demonstrating on the anniversary of the 7th of October attacks?

To the rest of the world, surely this only looks like you're celebrating the massacre that took place on the 7th of October.

When someone asks you why you're demonstrating on the anniversary of the 7th of October attacks, what is your response? What is the reason? Help me understand the mind set here when they are celebrating killings, rapes, kidnappings
 
I do not know what sort of Israeli response did Hamas expect after their actions a year ago? They must've know Israel would strike back in some manner, but it doesn't look like Hamas made plans to save up rations and think of public safety etc.... instead they seem to be singularly focussed focussed on the attack. I do not know what they were willing to pay for this operation, but in hindsight it looks like a hefty price.
 
Chickens coming home to roost.

Slowly, but surely, reality is setting in for armchair warriors -- aka cohort with UK/NA passports and ME residencies.

Their mouths were writing big checks that palistinies couldn't cash.

Now the latter are cannon fodder whilst the "warriors" go about their business of writing smaller checks.
 
Oct 7 was a turning point.

Before it, Israel's message to Palestinians was: "You are worthless, so you'll live here without safety, dignity, freedom, or rights."

After it, that message became: "We will mass slaughter your children until you accept to live like we proposed."
 
North Gaza hospitals ordered to evacuate; U.S. backs Israel’s ground offensive in Lebanon

The Israeli military has ordered three hospitals in northern Gaza to evacuate as it intensifies attacks on the area, according to Gazan health officials. A U.N. official described the situation in the north as “hell,” with “at least 400,000 people” trapped there.

The Biden administration has dropped its support for an immediate cease-fire in Lebanon and is openly supporting Israel’s ground offensive, a State Department spokesman said Tuesday, calling the Israeli actions “incursions to degrade Hezbollah’s infrastructure.” President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a phone call Wednesday.

SOURCE:https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/10/09/israel-lebanon-hezbollah-war-news-gaza/
 
At least 28 people have been killed and 54 injured in an Israeli air strike on a school sheltering displaced families in the central Gaza Strip, the Palestinian Red Crescent says

Videos from the scene at Rufaida al-Aslamia school in the town of Deir al-Balah show a cloud of smoke and dust rising up as people rush to help the injured.

Witnesses said there were two air strikes that hit two rooms in the school where food aid was being stored and distributed.

The Israeli military said the “precise strike” targeted Hamas fighters operating inside a "command-and-control centre” at the school.

It also said it had taken numerous steps to mitigate harm to the civilians living there.

“This is a further example of the Hamas terrorist organisation’s systematic abuse of civilian infrastructure in violation of international law,” it added. Hamas has denied the allegation.

Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry also put the death toll at 28 and denounced what it called a “new massacre” by the Israeli military.

A list published by al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital in Deir al-Balah suggested that at least two of those killed were children, five were women and three were men in their 60s.

Another person named on the list was Ahmed Adel Hamouda, 58, whose widow said he had worked in the school’s administration.

“They killed my only support in life. They killed the support of our three disabled daughters, Rahab, Alaa and Reem,” she said.

Eyewitness Khaled al-Sultan told BBC Arabic’s Gaza Today programme that he saw “horrible things that are beyond description”.

“We were not able to retrieve one complete body because all the victims' bodies turned into pieces. The number of martyrs is shocking,” he added.

Another man, Taha Majad, asked: “Why would a shelter school like this be bombed by F-16 jets? We are humans, aren’t we?”

Rufaida al-Aslamia school in the town of Deir al-Balah

Source: BBC
 
Thousands trapped in Jabalia camp as Israel escalates deadly attacks in northern Gaza

Thousands of people are trapped in Gaza's Jabalia camp as Israeli forces attack the area, Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) said on Friday, a week after Israel launched an offensive there which it says is aimed at stopping Hamas regrouping.

At least 20 Palestinians were killed and dozens more were wounded late on Friday by Israeli strikes in Jabalia, which also damaged four nearby homes, medics told Reuters. The death toll is likely to rise, they added.

Israeli military strikes killed at least 61 Palestinians across the Gaza Strip on Friday, the medics added. Nearly half of the fatalities, including the 20 killed at the home, occurred in Jabalia, the northern district which is the largest of Gaza's historic refugee camps.

The Israeli military says it has killed dozens of militants in Jabalia, though it remains unclear how many of the dead were civilians rather than fighters.


 
Nicaragua breaks diplomatic relations with Israel

Nicaragua is breaking off diplomatic relations with Israel, the Central American nation said on Friday, calling the Israeli government "fascist" and "genocidal."

Nicaragua's government, in a statement, said the break in relations was due to Israel's attacks on Palestinian territories.

The nation's congress had, earlier in the day, passed a resolution requesting Nicaragua take action to coincide with the one-year anniversary of the Gaza war.

The conflict, the Nicaraguan government said, now also "extends against Lebanon and gravely threatens Syria, Yemen and Iran."

The Middle East is on high alert for further regional escalation after Iran launched a barrage of missiles at Israel on Oct. 1. Iran backs Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah, which Israel has targeted in a series of recent deadly attacks.

Iran is also an ally of Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega's administration. Nicaragua has become increasingly isolated in recent years after Ortega cracked down on anti-government protests in 2018, which rights groups say left around 300 dead.

REUTERS
 
Food aid has not entered northern Gaza since 1 October, says organisation

No food aid has entered northern Gaza since 1 October, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) has said.

In a post on X, the organisation said "escalating violence" in the region was having a "disastrous impact" on food security.

It warned that it was "unclear" how long its supplies in the area would last.

Concerns of a hunger crisis have risen in Gaza after the UN's independent investigator on the right to food accused Israel of carrying out a "starvation campaign" against Palestinians last month.

Israel has denied such allegations and insisted that it has allowed food and other aid into Gaza in significant quantities.

The WFP said its food distribution points, as well as kitchens and bakeries in northern Gaza, have been forced to shut down due to airstrikes, military ground operations and evacuation orders.

Sky News
 
Israeli tanks deepen their push into the northern Gaza Strip

Israeli forces widened their raid into northern Gaza, and tanks reached the north edge of Gaza City, pounding some districts of the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, residents said, forcing many families to leave their homes.

Residents said Israeli forces have effectively isolated Beit Hanoun, Jabalia, and Beit Lahiya in the far north of the enclave from Gaza City, blocking access between the two areas except upon their permission for families willing to leave the three towns, heeding evacuation orders.

Gaza's health ministry said the eight-day-old Israeli incursions in the north have so far killed dozens of Palestinians, with dozens of others feared dead on roads and under rubble of their houses, beyond the reach of medical teams.

Many Jabalia residents posted on social media platforms: "We will not leave, we die, and we don't leave."

The northern part of Gaza, home to well over half the territory's 2.3 million people, was bombed to rubble in the first phase of Israel's assault on the territory a year ago, after the Oct. 7 attacks on Israeli towns by militants who killed 1,200 people and captured 250 hostages.

After a year of Israeli assaults that killed 42,000 Palestinians, hundreds of thousands of residents have come back to ruined northern areas. A week ago Israel sent troops back to root out fighters it said were regrouping for more attacks. Hamas denies fighters operate among civilians.

The escalation in northern Gaza has taken place alongside a huge Israeli air assault and ground campaign on a separate front in southern Lebanon against Hezbollah, which like Hamas is an ally of Iran.

"As the world is focused on Lebanon and possible Israeli strike against Iran, Israel is wiping out Jabalia," said Nasser, a resident of Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip.

"The occupation is blowing up roads and destroying residential districts. People also don't find anything to eat, they are trapped inside their homes, fearing bombs could fall onto their heads," he told Reuters via a chat app.

The Israeli military said in a statement on Sunday that forces operating throughout the Gaza Strip in the past 24 hours had attacked about 40 targets and killed dozens of militants.

"The forces of Division 162 continue to operate in the Jabalia region, in the last day the forces killed dozens of terrorists and found explosives, weapons, grenades and other means of warfare in the region," it said.

The armed wings of Hamas, the Islamic Jihad, and smaller other factions said their fighters attacked Israeli forces in Jabalia and nearby areas with anti-tank rockets and mortar fire.

Palestinian and United Nations officials say there are no safe areas in Gaza. They have also voiced concerns over severe shortages of food, fuel, and medical supplies in northern Gaza, and said there is a risk of famine there.

Some tank shells landed in some streets of the Gaza City suburb of Sheikh Radwan, where tanks arrived at the edges of the territory, residents said, spreading panic among the population further south.

SOURCE: https://www.reuters.com/world/middl...eir-push-into-northern-gaza-strip-2024-10-13/
 
UN condemns 'large number of civilian casualties' in north Gaza

The UN has condemned the "large number of civilian casualties" caused by Israeli strikes on northern Gaza in recent days.

The comments - made by a spokesperson for Secretary General Antonio Guterres - come as at least 10 people have reportedly been killed by Israeli artillery fire at a food distribution centre at Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, where Israeli tanks and troops are continuing a ground offensive.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) said shells hit inside and outside the centre on Monday morning as some hungry people were trying to get food handouts.

The Israeli military said it was reviewing the incident, adding that it operates "only against terror targets".

Hundreds of people are reported to have been killed since the military said it was launching the offensive in the area and two neighbouring northern towns nine days ago to root out Hamas fighters who had regrouped there.

The UN said on Sunday that more than 50,000 people had fled the Jabalia area, but that others remained stranded in their homes amid increased bombardment and fighting on the ground. UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said civilians must "be protected at all times".

"The secretary general condemns the large number of civilian casualties in the intensifying Israeli campaign in northern Gaza, including its schools, displacing sheltered Palestinian civilians," he told reporters at a news conference in New York.

The offensive had also forced the closure of water wells, bakeries, medical points and shelters, as well as the suspension of other humanitarian services, including malnutrition treatment, it warned.

The UN said it had not been allowed to deliver essential supplies, including food, since 1 October, with two nearby border crossings closed and no deliveries allowed from the south.

The Israeli military said a convoy of 30 aid lorries entered through a crossing south of Gaza City on Sunday, when US President Joe Biden told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of what the White House called the “imperative to restore access to the north”.

The military has ordered residents of Jabalia and neighbouring areas to evacuate to the Israeli-designated “humanitarian area” in southern Gaza, saying it is “operating with great force against the terrorist organisations and will continue to do so for a long time”.

But many of the estimated 400,000 Palestinians living in the north say they are reluctant to flee to the south, fearing that if they do they will not be allowed to return home.

They believe the Israeli military is planning to implement a plan, proposed by retired Israeli generals, to completely empty the north of civilians and besiege Hamas fighters remaining there until they release Israeli hostages held since Hamas's 7 October 2023 attack on Israel.

The Israeli military has denied it is implementing the plan. "We are making sure we're getting civilians out of harm's way while we operate against those terror cells in Jabalia," spokesman Lt Col Nadav Shoshani told reporters.

Overnight, four people were killed when an Israeli aircraft struck a tented camp for displaced people next to al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital in the central town of Deir al-Balah.

The Israeli military said it had conducted a “a precise strike on terrorists who were operating inside a command-and-control centre in the area of a parking lot”, and that it took measures to mitigate harm to civilians.

“Shortly after the strike, a fire ignited in the hospital's parking lot, most likely due to secondary explosions. The incident is under review,” Lt Col Shoshani wrote on X. “The hospital and its functionality were not affected from the strike.”

A video posted online appeared to show secondary explosions, but it was not clear whether they were caused by weapons or fuel tanks.

A spokesman for al-Aqsa hospital, Dr Khalil al-Daqran, said more than 50 tents were burned and that it was struggling to treat about 50 people who were injured, including children, women and the elderly, as well as casualties from other recent Israeli strikes.

A resident of the camp, Umm Mahmoud Wadi, said her family lost everything.

"Where should I take my daughters? Winter is coming. There's no bedding, no clothes, nothing. I'm devastated. The gas bottle exploded - and we [our world] exploded.”

On Sunday night, more than 20 people were reportedly killed by tank fire at a UN-run school being used as a shelter for displaced families in Nuseirat refugee camp, which just north of Deir al-Balah.

A spokeswoman for Unrwa told the BBC that it had been “another night of absolute horror for people in the Gaza Strip”.

Louise Wateridge said the severe damage to al-Mufti school in Nuseirat meant it could not be used for the second round of the major polio vaccination campaign in Gaza, which began in the centre of the territory on Monday.

Local medics and Unrwa workers are leading the effort to give drops of the vaccine to 590,000 children aged under 10 over the next two weeks.

The campaign was organised by the World Health Organization (WHO) and Unicef after the first case of polio in two decades was discovered in an unvaccinated baby in central Gaza, where 80% of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is now sheltering.

UN officials are pressing for humanitarian pauses to be respected during the vaccination drive.

“This is critical because we cannot issue vaccinations for children who are fleeing for their lives, who are forcibly displaced. We cannot issue vaccination while there are bombs coming from the sky,” Ms Wateridge said.

She added: “These pauses are in the daytime, there are very specific timeframes for us to reach these thousands of children. The strikes and the military operations do continue around that and it's incredibly dangerous and terrifying experience to run any kind of humanitarian response in these conditions."

Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to the group's unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 42,280 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

BBC
 
US tells Israel to improve Gaza humanitarian situation or risk military aid

The United States has told Israel it must take steps in the next month to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza or face potential restrictions on U.S. military aid, U.S. officials said, in the strongest such warning since Israel's war with Hamas began a year ago.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin wrote to Israeli officials on Sunday demanding concrete measures to address the worsening situation in the Palestinian enclave amid a renewed Israeli offensive in northern Gaza, U.S. officials said on Tuesday.

Failure to do so could impact U.S. policy, said the letter, which was first reported by Israeli News 12.

"We are particularly concerned that recent actions by the Israeli government ... are contributing to an accelerated deterioration in the conditions in Gaza," said a copy of the letter posted by an Axios reporter on X.

The letter cited restrictions Israel was imposing, including those on commercial imports, the denial of most humanitarian movements between northern and southern Gaza, and "burdensome and excessive" restrictions on what goods can enter Gaza.


 

Nicaraguan president compares Netanyahu with Hitler​

Daniel Ortega lashes Israeli Prime Minister for war in Gaza and calls him 'son of the devil'​


President of Nicaragua Daniel Ortega compared Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday with Adolf Hitler, and called him "son of the devil," three days after Managua announced the rupture of diplomatic relations with Israel.

"At the head of the Government of Israel there is a prime minister who is the son of the devil," said Ortega in his speech in an act marking the 45th anniversary of the Nicaraguan police.

Ortega said he compares Netanyahu to Hitler because Israel's prime minister" has a policy of terror in practice" in the Middle East.

"And it's Hitler, yes, the prime minister of Israel is Hitler, installed there, calling to destroy the peoples," he added.

On Friday, the Nicaraguan government broke off diplomatic relations with Israel "one year after the brutal genocide that the fascist and criminal war government of Israel continues to commit against the Palestinian people."

"The government of the Republic of Nicaragua breaks all diplomatic relations with the fascist government of Israel," the statement said.

The decision, which had been announced by Vice President Rosario Murillo, wife of President Ortega, was taken based on a resolution of the Nicaraguan Parliament. The government also ordered the withdrawal of its ambassador to Israel on Monday.

Israel and Nicaragua had reestablished diplomatic relations in 2017 after Ortega broke ties in 2010.

The Nicaraguan president also accused the United States and the countries of the European Union of supporting and arming Israel.

"They lead the planet to a total war or simply they have no choice but to wait for defeat," said Ortega, who has been in power since 2007.
Click to expand...

Source: https://www.aa.com.tr/en/americas/nicaraguan-president-compares-netanyahu-with-hitler/3363355.
 
US gives Israel 30 days to boost Gaza aid or risk cut to military support

The US has written to Israel, giving it 30 days to boost humanitarian aid access in Gaza or risk having some US military assistance cut off.

The letter, sent on Sunday, amounts to the strongest known written warning from the US to its ally and comes amid a new Israeli offensive in northern Gaza that has reportedly caused a large number of civilian casualties.

It says the US has deep concerns about the deteriorating humanitarian situation, adding that Israel denied or impeded nearly 90% of humanitarian movements between the north and south last month.

Israel is reviewing the letter, an Israeli official was reported as saying, adding the country "takes this matter seriously" and intends to "address the concerns raised" with US counterparts.

Israel has previously said it is targeting Hamas operatives in the north and not stopping the entry of humanitarian aid.

On Monday, the Israeli military body responsible for managing crossings into Gaza, Cogat, said 30 lorries carrying aid from the World Food Programme had entered northern Gaza through the Erez crossing.

That ended a two-week period during which the UN said no food aid was delivered to the north, and supplies essential for survival were running out for the 400,000 Palestinians there.

A UN official has said that Gaza is in a state of "constant peak emergency".

Antoine Renard, head of the World Food Programme (WFP) in the occupied Palestinian territories, told the AFP news agency people in the north of the territory were "relying solely on assistance" with practically no access to fresh food other than that provided by UN agencies.

The US is by far the biggest supplier of arms to Israel, and the Israeli military has relied heavily on US-supplied aircraft, guided bombs, missiles and shells to fight the war against Hamas in Gaza over the past year.

The US letter to the Israeli government - the contents of which have now been confirmed by the state department - was first reported by the Axios website. It is signed by Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin.

"We are now writing to underscore the US government’s deep concern over the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza, and seek urgent and sustained actions by your government this month to reverse this trajectory," it says.

It states that Israeli evacuation orders have forced 1.7 million people into the narrow, coastal al-Mawasi area where they are at “high risk of lethal contagion” due to extreme overcrowding, and that humanitarian organisations report that their survival needs cannot be met.

"We are particularly concerned that recent actions by the Israeli government - including halting commercial imports, denying or impeding nearly 90% of humanitarian movements between northern and southern Gaza in September, continuing burdensome and excessive dual-use restrictions, and instituting new vetting and onerous liability and customs requirements for humanitarian staff and shipments - together with increased lawlessness and looting - are contributing to an accelerated deterioration in the conditions in Gaza," it adds.

The letter says Israel "must, starting now and within 30 days" act on a series of concrete measures to boost aid supplies, adding that failure may “have implications for US policy”.

It cites US laws which can prohibit military assistance to countries that impede delivery of US humanitarian aid.

It says Israel must "surge all forms of humanitarian assistance throughout Gaza" before winter, including by enabling a minimum of 350 lorries a day to enter through all four major crossings and a new fifth crossing, as well as allowing people in al-Mawasi to move inland.

It also calls on Israel to end the "isolation of northern Gaza" by reaffirming that there will be "no Israeli government policy of forced evacuation of civilians" from north to south.

At a news conference in Washington on Tuesday, US state department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters that the letter was "a private diplomatic communication that we did not intend to make public".

"Secretary [Blinken] along with Secretary Austin thought it was appropriate to make clear to the government of Israel that there are changes they need to make again to see the level of assistance making it into Gaza comes back up," he said.

Mr Miller declined to speculate on what consequences there might be for Israel if it did not boost humanitarian aid access.

But he noted: "Recipients of US military assistance do not arbitrarily deny or impede provisioning of US humanitarian assistance. That’s just the law and we of course will follow the law. But our hope is that Israel will make the changes that we have outlined."

He also said the 30-day time limit was not linked to the upcoming US presidential election on 5 November, saying it was "appropriate to give them time to work through the different issues".

Israel has previously insisted there are no limits to the amount of aid or humanitarian assistance 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.

Before Israel’s ground offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah in May, President Joe Biden suspended a single consignment of 2,000 and 500lb bombs for the first time as he tried to dissuade it from an all-out assault.

But the president immediately faced a backlash from Republicans in Washington and from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who appeared to compare it to an "arms embargo". The suspension was partially lifted in July and has not been repeated.

Earlier on Tuesday, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) warned that families in northern Gaza were "facing unimaginable fear, loss of loved ones, confusion, and exhaustion" because of the Israeli offensive that began 10 days ago.

The Israeli military says it has sent tanks and troops back into the town of Jabalia and its urban refugee camp for a third time to root out Hamas fighters who have regrouped there.

It has ordered residents of Jabalia, as well as neighbouring Beit Lahia and Beit Hanoun, to evacuate to the al-Mawasi "humanitarian area".

The UN says about 50,000 people have fled to Gaza City and other parts of the north. But for many it is unsafe to leave their homes or they are unable to leave because they are sick or disabled.

Khalid, a resident of Jabalia whose accounts of the past year are featured in a new BBC documentary, said in a voice note that he and his family had been living in fear for a week.

"We were told to go to the south, but we couldn’t because the Israeli army has surrounded the area, either with dirt barricades or using quadcopter drones. We can’t move, it’s too difficult."

"At the same time, because of the intense bombing we’re living in constant terror. My daughter has become sick and she has a fever. Her entire body is shaking in fear because of the sound of the bombings and I don’t know what to do with her. I can’t even take her to the hospital," he added.

Gaza’s Hamas-run Civil Defence agency said its first responders had recovered the bodies of 42 people killed by Israeli air and artillery strikes in Jabalia and neighbouring areas on Tuesday.

They reportedly included 11 members of the same family, nearly all of them women and children, whose home was destroyed in an air strike overnight.

The Israeli military said on Tuesday that its troops had killed “dozens of terrorists” in the Jabalia area over the previous day.

On Monday, Israeli human rights groups warned of what they called “alarming signs that the Israeli military is beginning to quietly implement the Generals’ Plan”, echoing widespread Palestinian concerns.

The controversial plan calls for the forcible transfer of all civilians in the north followed by a siege of the Hamas fighters remaining there to force their surrender and the release of Israeli hostages.

The Israeli military denies it is being implemented, saying it is only “getting civilians out of harm's way”.

Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to the group's unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 42,340 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

BBC
 

Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar 'highly likely' killed in Gaza, Israeli army claims​


Sinwar, who is believed to have been the mastermind of the 7 October attack on Izrael, became the leader of Hamas in Gaza after replacing Ismail Haniyeh following his assassination in Tehran in August.

Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar has been "highly likely" killed after Israeli forces engaged with and killed three militants during ground operations in Gaza on Thursday, the IDF said in a joint statement with Shin Bet.

It said the identities of the three had not been confirmed so far, but it was “checking the possibility” that one of them was Sinwar.

Money, documents and weapons were found on the bodies of the militants, according to a statement released to domestic media.

The Israeli army retrieved the bodies for a DNA test. Israel has Sinwar's DNA and biometric data on file since his time spent in an Israeli jail.

The units that engaged the three militants were not participating in an assassination operation and did not have knowledge of Sinwar's presence there.

"In the building where the terrorists were eliminated, there were no signs of the presence of hostages in the area," the IDF added.

The operation took place in the Gaza city of Rafah, Israeli military radio said.

Sinwar, a secretive figure who led Hamas' hardliners and is close to Iran, was one of the chief architects of Hamas’ attack on Israel on 7 October.

He has been at the top of Israel’s kill list after the attack, which left 1,200 people dead and about 250 taken hostage.

Sinwar was born in 1962 in a refugee camp in Khan Yunis in Gaza. As an early member of Hamas — formed in 1987 — he was in charge of the militant group's security branch, known for its cruelty against those it suspected of spying for Israel, earning him the "Butcher of Khan Yunis" moniker.

Having spent half of his adult life in Israeli jails, Sinwar steadily rose to power in the organisation since his release in 2011.

He was chosen as the group’s top leader following the assassination of Ismael Haniyeh in July in an apparent Israeli strike in the Iranian capital Tehran.

Unlike Haniyeh, who had lived in exile in Qatar for years, Sinwar remained in Gaza. As Hamas' leader in the territory since 2017, he rarely appeared in public but kept an iron grip on Hamas' rule.

Last month, people close to him told Reuters he remained unrepentant about the 7 October attacks and the resulting Israeli offensive in Gaza.

www.euronews.com

Hamas leader Sinwar 'highly likely' killed in Gaza, Israeli army says

Sinwar, who is believed to have been the mastermind of the 7 October attack on Izrael, became the leader of Hamas in Gaza after replacing Ismail Haniyeh following his assassination in Tehran in August.
www.euronews.com www.euronews.com
 
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on Thursday that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar is dead.

"Mass murderer Yahya Sinwar, who was responsible for the massacre and atrocities of October 7, was killed today by IDF (Israeli military) soldiers," Katz said in a statement.

Reuters
 
FearlessRoar said:
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on Thursday that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar is dead.

"Mass murderer Yahya Sinwar, who was responsible for the massacre and atrocities of October 7, was killed today by IDF (Israeli military) soldiers," Katz said in a statement.

Reuters
Click to expand...
It was bound to happen. He had a target on his back for a while now.
 
Well atleast they held out for a year and probably realised they got stuffed by the iranians.

The less said about hezbollah the better the way that organisation got folded by isreael within a few days is a massive victory for israel.
 
Champ_Pal said:
It was bound to happen. He had a target on his back for a while now.
Click to expand...
Israelis calling Yahya Sinwar a mass murderer 😂, irony just died millions of times, just like the innocent Palestinian Men, Women, Children and Babies they killed and continue to kill indiscriminately, time and time again. Day in Day out.

Well Israel gets ‘free’ extra land out of this now anyway. Since those they evicted have nothing to return to now.
 
guard said:
Israelis calling Yahya Sinwar a mass murderer 😂, irony just died millions of times, just like the innocent Palestinian Men, Women, Children and Babies they killed and continue to kill indiscriminately, time and time again. Day in Day out.

Well Israel gets ‘free’ extra land out of this now anyway. Since those they evicted have nothing to return to now.
Click to expand...
Rich Arab nations should absorb their brothers from Gaza into their countries. They need manual labor anyways. Instead getting people from India, BD and Srilanka, they can as well take these people. The only issue is that Arab countries do not want the radicalized ones.
 
Champ_Pal said:
Rich Arab nations should absorb their brothers from Gaza into their countries. They need manual labor anyways. Instead getting people from India, BD and Srilanka, they can as well take these people. The only issue is that Arab countries do not want the radicalized ones.
Click to expand...
Rich caucasian nations should absorb their brothers. Save money in the process
 
Champ_Pal said:
Rich Arab nations should absorb their brothers from Gaza into their countries. They need manual labor anyways. Instead getting people from India, BD and Srilanka, they can as well take these people. The only issue is that Arab countries do not want the radicalized ones.
Click to expand...

Your last sentence is misleading.

The vacuum of Radical immigrants is already filled by the Hindutwa mob.
 
aboveandbeyond said:
Your last sentence is misleading.

The vacuum of Radical immigrants is already filled by the Hindutwa mob.
Click to expand...
Kick out the Hindutva mob. Arabs are smart in not giving citizenships to these Indian workers like the West does. Indian workers have no political rights. They can be kicked out anytime.
 
FearlessRoar said:
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on Thursday that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar is dead.

"Mass murderer Yahya Sinwar, who was responsible for the massacre and atrocities of October 7, was killed today by IDF (Israeli military) soldiers," Katz said in a statement.

Reuters
Click to expand...
Looks like IDF reversed the brain surgery Sinwar had in Israel by taking a headshot. He is confirmed dead. They checked dental records and confirmed although he still can be identified by sight.
 
FearlessRoar said:
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on Thursday that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar is dead.

"Mass murderer Yahya Sinwar, who was responsible for the massacre and atrocities of October 7, was killed today by IDF (Israeli military) soldiers," Katz said in a statement.

Reuters
Click to expand...
Poor guy!
 
what happened to the original thread when all this started on Oct 7 2023?

Looks like it has gone missing.
 
rpant_gabba said:
damn thought there would be more reaction to this here
Click to expand...
Two set of emotions, initially in 2023.

1) Feigners: Muslims in passing. Had to say something to soothe their bruised egos. Now could care less over muslim deaths.
2) Armchair warriors: Want to fight. Can't fight. Went through 5 stages of grief. Now accepted israeli/western dominance.

Interestingly both cohorts have NA/UK/EU citizenships or ME residencies. Contributing diligently to israeli armaments.

Either cohort are now hiding in corners, hope no one notices.
 
Farhan The Man said:
Two set of emotions, initially in 2023.

1) Feigners: Muslims in passing. Had to say something to soothe their bruised egos. Now could care less over muslim deaths.
2) Armchair warriors: Want to fight. Can't fight. Went through 5 stages of grief. Now accepted israeli/western dominance.

Interestingly both cohorts have NA/UK/EU citizenships or ME residencies. Contributing diligently to israeli armaments.

Either cohort are now hiding in corners, hope no one notices.
Click to expand...
<mic drop>
 
Farhan The Man said:
Two set of emotions, initially in 2023.

1) Feigners: Muslims in passing. Had to say something to soothe their bruised egos. Now could care less over muslim deaths.
2) Armchair warriors: Want to fight. Can't fight. Went through 5 stages of grief. Now accepted israeli/western dominance.

Interestingly both cohorts have NA/UK/EU citizenships or ME residencies. Contributing diligently to israeli armaments.

Either cohort are now hiding in corners, hope no one notices.
Click to expand...
With expected Trump win in November, there is going to be a decisive end to Ukraine-Russia and this crisis in Middle East.
 
Farhan The Man said:
Two set of emotions, initially in 2023.

1) Feigners: Muslims in passing. Had to say something to soothe their bruised egos. Now could care less over muslim deaths.
2) Armchair warriors: Want to fight. Can't fight. Went through 5 stages of grief. Now accepted israeli/western dominance.

Interestingly both cohorts have NA/UK/EU citizenships or ME residencies. Contributing diligently to israeli armaments.

Either cohort are now hiding in corners, hope no one notices.
Click to expand...
Hiding because there is absolutely nothing any of them can do. No one thought Israel will go this hard. They basically taken out almost all leaders who were listed in wikis of Hamas, Hezabulla. They have put the fear of god by exploding pagers and walkie talkies. Everyone knows once this is all over, which will be over soon if Trump comes, then Israel will normalize ties with Saudi and others. Even Lebanon may be able to move forward.
 
FearlessRoar said:
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on Thursday that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar is dead.

"Mass murderer Yahya Sinwar, who was responsible for the massacre and atrocities of October 7, was killed today by IDF (Israeli military) soldiers," Katz said in a statement.

Reuters
Click to expand...

Hamas says leader Yahya Sinwar killed​

Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, architect of the group’s cross-border raids in 2023 that became the deadliest day in Israel’s history, was killed in combat, Khalil Al-Hayya, deputy Gaza Hamas chief and the group’s chief negotiator, said on Friday.

Sinwar’s death, which follows Israeli assassinations of other Hamas leaders and commanders, will deal a huge blow to the group which has faced relentless airstrikes since it attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people, according to Israeli tallies.

It also dragged about 250 people back to Gaza, creating a hostage crisis for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right government which has vowed to eliminate Hamas.

Sinwar will be remembered as a ruthless enforcer among Palestinians who collaborated with Israel and an implacable enemy of the country which jailed him for many years.

Sinwar was named the group’s paramount leader on August 6, as a successor to former political chief Ismail Haniyeh, who was assassinated in Tehran on July 31.

Widely known as the architect of the Oct. 7, 2023 attack, the most devastating event for Israel in decades, Sinwar has been in Gaza, defying Israeli attempts to kill him since the start of the war.

Born in a refugee camp in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, Sinwar, 62, was elected as Hamas’ leader in Gaza in 2017.

The controversial leader, who spent half his adult life in Israeli prisons, was the most powerful Hamas leader left alive following the assassination of Haniyeh.

https://english.alarabiya.net/News/middle-east/2024/10/18/hamas-mourns-group-s-leader-yahya-sinwar
 
Looks like he was found with forged passports, around 10k USD and UNRWA ids. He was reasonably close to the border. It was a very lucky find for Israel otherwise he would have slipped out to Egypt in few more days.
 
Hamas likely to name new leader from outside Gaza after Sinwar's death

The Palestinian militant group Hamas will likely replace Yahya Sinwar with a new political leader based outside Gaza while his brother - Mohammad Sinwar - is expected to assume a bigger role directing the war against Israel in the territory, experts say.

In its leadership deliberations, Hamas must consider not only the preferences of its main backer - Iran - but also the interests of the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, where all the main candidates to take over as politburo chief currently reside.

 
Israel has launched new airstrikes and sent more troops into Gaza, dashing brief hopes among many residents of the territory that the killing of the Hamas leader, Yahya Sinwar, could bring an end to the devastating conflict

Sinwar, 62, was killed on Thursday by tank fire directed at a building in Rafah in the far south of Gaza after exchanging fire with an Israeli patrol.

Several airstrikes were reported overnight and on Friday morning. At least 62 deaths have been recorded since Thursday, according to Palestinian health authorities in Gaza.

The most intense recent clashes have come in Jabalia, the largest of Gaza’s eight historical refugee camps and the site of fierce fighting in recent weeks between Israeli forces and Hamas militants who have regrouped there. Tens of thousands of civilians are thought to be trapped in Jabalia, where conditions are deteriorating.

Israeli military officials said Israel was sending reinforcements to bolster its operation in Jabalia, raising fears of an escalation of violence there.

“We always thought that when [Sinwar was killed] the war would end and our lives would return to normal,” said Jemaa Abou Mendi, a 21-year-old Gaza resident. “But unfortunately, the reality on the ground is quite the opposite. The war has not stopped, and the killings continue unabated.”

Mustafa al-Zaeem, 47, a resident from the Rimal neighbourhood in western Gaza City, said Israel had achieved one of its principal war aims and should stop the fighting. “If Sinwar’s assassination was one of the objectives of this war, well, today they have killed Yahya Sinwar,” Zaeem said. “Enough death, enough hunger, enough siege. Enough thirst and starvation, enough bodies and blood.”

Some in Gaza said they had been inspired by the images released by Israeli military of Sinwar’s last moments, which showed the veteran leader covered in dust, wounded and with his head wrapped in a Palestinian keffiyeh. In the footage, Sinwar appears to throw a stick at a drone that has tracked him into a half-destroyed apartment.

Source: The Guardian
 
Israeli attack said to have killed dozens in Gaza

An Israeli air strike has killed at least 33 people including 21 women at a refugee camp in northern Gaza, the strip's Hamas-run authorities say.

There was no immediate comment on the reported attack at Jabalia from Israel, whose forces have been besieging the densely-populated camp for weeks.

The killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar this week raised hopes in some quarters of an end to the war but the group's deputy leader said Hamas would only be strengthened.

US President Joe Biden has said there is a chance of "working towards a ceasefire” in Lebanon, where Israel is fighting Hezbollah militants, but it will be "harder in Gaza”.

He was speaking as he left the German capital Berlin, where he had met German, French and British leaders.

According to a statement from Gaza's Hamas-run government media office, Friday's air strike also injured more than 85 people, some seriously, as homes belonging to three families in the camp were hit.

The final death toll could reach 50, it added, as people were buried under the rubble of buildings.

The report could not be verified independently. Local sources indicate that northern Gaza is effectively isolated, with telecommunications and internet services severed in the region.

A video circulating on social media - which the BBC has not verifed - appears to show bodies wrapped in white shrouds laid out in the courtyard of al-Awda Hospital.

The director of the hospital spoke to reporters about an overwhelming influx of casualties.

“Ambulance crews are still attempting to retrieve the martyrs and the wounded from Jabalia," the director said.

"Our hospital wards are completely full and many injured individuals are receiving treatment on the floor.”

According to Reuters news agency, the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said at least 39 Palestinians, many in Jabalia, had been killed by Israeli strikes on Friday before the latest attack.

About 400,000 people have been trapped inside the camp with little food or water for more than two weeks.

The head of the UN's Office for Humanitarian Assistance, Georgios Petropoulos, told the BBC's Newshour programme that families in Jabalia were enduring "atrocious conditions".

"We can't hit the alarm bell hard enough about how dire and dangerous the situation for civilians there is," he said, speaking from Rafah in southern Gaza.

Israel said it had sent about 30 lorries of supplies into northern Gaza on Friday including food, water, medical supplies and shelter equipment but local health officials told Reuters aid had not been reaching the worst-affected areas such as Jabalia.

Israel has repeatedly denied it is preventing humanitarian aid from entering Gaza but the US has told it to boost access or risk having some US military assistance cut off.

An Israeli minister, Amichai Chikli, told the BBC that Israel had "blockaded" parts of northern Gaza, which include Jabalia.

"We allowed the civilian population to escape into the safe zone, and we prevented supplies to enter the blockade region," he told the Newshour programme.

He insisted this was "legal according to the international law".

BBC Verify analyses footage of the Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar's killing

Since the Hamas-led attack on Israel just over a year ago, at least 42,500 people have been killed and tens of thousands injured in Gaza, the Hamas-run authorities say.

About 1,200 people were killed by Hamas and its allies in the 7 October 2023 attack and 251 others were taken to Gaza as hostages.

On Friday Hamas deputy leader Khalil al-Hayya said Israeli hostages would not be returned until Israel ended the war and withdrew from Gaza.

Sinwar was held responsible for the 7 October attack. According to the Israeli military, he was killed in a firefight after the building where he was hiding in the southern Gaza city of Rafah was struck with "tank fire".

The pathologist in Israel who conducted his autopsy told US media he had been shot in the head.

Dr Chen Kugel also found injuries to his right forearm from "missile fire", a damaged left leg from "fallen masonry" and shrapnel injuries.

On Friday, fighting also continued in Lebanon, where Israel has been conducting a ground invasion against Hezbollah.

The Israeli military said it had killed about 60 Hezbollah fighters and destroyed the Iran-backed group's regional command centre with an air strike.

Hezbollah said it had fired rockets at the Israeli city of Haifa and areas to its north.

BBC
 
The Bald Eagle said:
Martyr and freedom fighter of the highest order.
Click to expand...
Of the highest order? You just made up tiers of martyrdom.

Comes across hyperbole to soothe self-inflicted pain. Yet with your other hand, uncle sam keeps receiving unfettered war taxes.

In reality a miserable death. Alone, running and hiding. The same man who coaxed youth in the prime of their lives to strap on vests. And leave their families behind unsheltered, uneducated, and despaired.
 

Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar cause of death revealed by autopsy after Israeli soldiers killed terror boss in Gaza firefight​


Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar was killed by a single gunshot to his head, his autopsy has found.

The architect of the October 7 massacre and Israel's most wanted man, he was killed on Wednesday after being hunted by intelligence services and the Israeli Defence Forces for over a year.

The 61-year-old - dubbed the Butcher of Khan Younis - was finally taken out apparently by chance after an hour-long firefight of trainee soldiers on a routine operation in the Rafah area of the Gaza Strip.

The strike has seen a shock wave spread across the region - with Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei declaring: 'Hamas is alive and will remain alive.'

During the fierce battle, two militants fled to one building while Sinwar - whose identity was not known by the Israelis until much later - escaped to another.

In a graphic display of the intensity of the encounter, the Hamas leader was found with electric cable tied in a makeshift tourniquet around his arm, which was wounded by shrapnel from a small missile or tank shell.

But Dr. Chen Kugel, who oversaw his autopsy, told The New York Times: 'It wouldn't have worked in any case. It wasn't strong enough and his forearm was smashed.'

He was later shot in the head, the director of Israel's national forensic institute revealed.

It is not known who fired the bullet or what kind of weapon was used to deliver the fatal blow.

After the dust had cleared, Israeli soldiers realised the body found in the rubble of the now-blown apart building bore a striking resemlance to Sinwar.

They cut off one of his fingers to confirm his identity.

According to the Israeli military, Sinwar had been forced out of the underground lair where he was cowering ás they covertly closed off streets and blew up tunnels in the area.

Dr Kugel said he was pale, explained by the amount of time he spent in Hamas' subterranean network, and weighed over 150 pounds - showing no signs of malnutrition.

Continuing, the Israeli medic said: 'It was only when I stepped outside that I internalized that this was the man responsible for more murder than anyone in the history of the country.'

The body is now held by the country's military - alongside hundreds of corpses of dead Palestinians, to be used for a future trade with Hamas.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar cause of death revealed

The architect of the October 7 massacre and Israel's most wanted man, he was killed on Wednesday after being hunted by intelligence services for over a year.
www.dailymail.co.uk www.dailymail.co.uk
 
Netanyahu can now declare "Mission Accomplished" with the killing of Sinwar. Unfortunately the last year has proven he'll find any excuse or last-minute demand to prolong the war, even in defiance of his own security officials, and thus his stay in office.

Sinwar isn't a man to be mourned. He was extreme even by Hamas's standards. He launched this war without even consulting Iran or Hezbollah (read here). He inflicted the biggest military defeat on Israel on a single day but also the worst disaster on Palestinians since 1948.

However it's delusion to think Palestinian militancy or Hamas starts and ends with one man. Before Sinwar there was Ismail Haniyeh. Before him there was Sheikh Yassin and Abdel Rantisi. On and on it'll go until there's a political settlement and an end to occupation.
 

With this Khomeni earned himself a target on his back.​

​

www.yahoo.com

A drone targets the Israeli prime minister's house during new barrages with Hezbollah

Israel's government said a drone targeted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s house Saturday, with no casualties, as fighting with Lebanon-based Hezbollah and Gaza -based Hamas showed no pause after the killing of the Hamas mastermind of last year’s Oct. 7 attack. Israel's military said dozens...
www.yahoo.com www.yahoo.com

​

A drone targets the Israeli prime minister's house while strikes in Gaza kill more than 50.​


JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel's government said a drone targeted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s house Saturday, with no casualties, as fighting with Lebanon-based Hezbollah and Gaza -based Hamas showed no pause after the killing of the Hamas mastermind of last year’s Oct. 7 attack.

Israel's military said dozens of projectiles were launched from Lebanon a day after Hezbollah announced a new phase in fighting. Netanyahu’soffice said the drone targeted his house in the Mediterranean coastal town of Caesarea. Neither he nor his wife were there. It wasn't clear if the house was hit.

“The proxies of Iran who today tried to assassinate me and my wife made a bitter mistake,” Netanyahu said.

Hezbollah didn't claim responsibility for the drone attack, but said it carried out several rocket attacks on northern and central Israel. The barrage came as Israel is expected to respond to an attack earlier this month by Iran, which backs both Hezbollah and Hamas.

Israel in turn carried out at least 10 airstrikes on Beirut's southern suburbs known as Dahiyeh, a heavily populated area home to Hezbollah's offices, Lebanese authorities said. Israel’s military said it struck Hezbollah targets.

In Gaza, Israeli forces fired at hospitals in the Palestinian enclave's battered north, and strikes killed more than 50 people, including children, in less than 24 hours, according to hospital officials and an Associated Press reporter there.

“The possibility of war in the region remains a serious concern,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said while visiting Turkey. Group of Seven defense ministers warned against escalation and “all-out war.”

Barrages from Lebanon target northern Israel

The Israel-Hezbollah war has intensified. Hezbollah said Friday it planned to send more guided missiles and exploding drones into Israel. The militant group’s longtime leader, Hassan Nasrallah, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in September, and Israel sent ground troops into Lebanon early this month.

Israel’s military on Saturday said about 180 projectiles were fired from Lebanon. A 50-year-old man was hit by shrapnel and killed in northern Israel, and four other people were wounded, Israel’s medical services said.

In the northern city of Kiryat Ata, one rocket landed. Itzik Billet, commander for the Haifa area, said nine people were slightly injured.


Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said an Israeli airstrike on an apartment in eastern Baaloul village killed five people, including the mayor of a nearby village, Sohmor. An Israeli military official confirmed that the IDF struck targets in the Bekaa Valley.

Lebanon’s health ministry said an Israeli airstrike hit a vehicle on a highway north of Beirut, killing two people.

Israel has issued near-daily warnings for people to leave buildings and villages in parts of Lebanon. The fighting has displaced more than 1 million people, including around 400,000 children.

Israel also said it killed Hezbollah’s deputy commander in the southern town of Bint Jbeil. The army said Nasser Rashid supervised attacks against Israel.


Israel drops leaflets showing Sinwar's body….
 

Another tragic incident, but it will be the precursor of their enemy's doom​

====

At least 73 people have been killed in an Israeli attack on north Gaza’s Beit Lahia. The death toll is expected to rise, the Strip’s Government Media Office says​


This particular attack is a reminder of the initial weeks of this genocidal war – the intensity, the scale, the number of repeated attacks, just a culmination of these 15 days of ongoing horror in the entire northern part [of Gaza].

Let’s not forget that people have endured 15 days of not having any proper access to food, water, supplies or any life-saving resources or items, and have been forced to flee from one area to another, until the ended up in the Project area.

People have not only endured that but now they are paying a heavy price for this ground incursion and aggressive invasion of the northern cities of the Gaza Strip.

Source: Al Jazeera
 
Hospitals under fire as Israeli forces deepen operations in northern Gaza

Israeli military forces besieged hospitals and shelters for displaced people in the northern Gaza Strip on Monday as they stepped up their operations, preventing critical aid from reaching civilians, residents and medics said.

Troops rounded up men and ordered women to leave the Jabalia historic refugee camp, they said. An Israeli airstrike on a house in Jabalia killed five people and wounded several others, medics said.

The U.N. Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA said Israeli authorities were preventing humanitarian missions from reaching areas in the north of the Palestinian enclave with critical supplies, including medicine and food.

"People attempting to flee are getting killed, their bodies left on the street," UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini said on X.

Medics at the Indonesian Hospital told Reuters that Israeli troops stormed a school and detained the men before setting it ablaze. The fire reached hospital generators and caused a power outage, they added.


 
Farhan The Man said:
Of the highest order? You just made up tiers of martyrdom.

Comes across hyperbole to soothe self-inflicted pain. Yet with your other hand, uncle sam keeps receiving unfettered war taxes.

In reality a miserable death. Alone, running and hiding. The same man who coaxed youth in the prime of their lives to strap on vests. And leave their families behind unsheltered, uneducated, and despaired.
Click to expand...
Not sure what's so brave about killing young girls at a concert
I understand the prisoners bit as one palestinian life is worth 100,000 Israeli life's
Haniyeh and yahya have both died themselves after causing 1000s of people to die fighting their holy war for them
 
deltexas said:
A militant of the highest order.
Click to expand...

Hindutwa join in in the Zionest bandwagon.

They've been constantly saying Hamas has been using palastanians as human shields. When the truth is the Zionest cowards are using Palastanians as human shields, rather than man up and fight.

www.theguardian.com

Palestinians describe being used as ‘human shields’ by Israeli troops in Gaza

Detainees say they were sent into unexplored houses and tunnels before soldiers, in violation of Geneva conventions
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
 
aboveandbeyond said:
Hindutwa join in in the Zionest bandwagon.

They've been constantly saying Hamas has been using palastanians as human shields. When the truth is the Zionest cowards are using Palastanians as human shields, rather than man up and fight.

www.theguardian.com

Palestinians describe being used as ‘human shields’ by Israeli troops in Gaza

Detainees say they were sent into unexplored houses and tunnels before soldiers, in violation of Geneva conventions
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
Click to expand...
Big words: all talk no action.

Bet you are OK as long as it is someone else, or someone else's child.

Are you that comfortable with your western passport and surroundings that you can't man up and fight yourself? Still paying the zionist war taxes huh?
 
Farhan The Man said:
Big words: all talk no action.

Bet you are OK as long as it is someone else, or someone else's child.

Are you that comfortable with your western passport and surroundings that you can't man up and fight yourself? Still paying the zionist war taxes huh
Click to expand...

Protests, boycotting, it's all working .

There will come a day when the zionests will pay a heavy heavy price.

And by the way . ONCE A TROLL, ALWAYS A TROLL.
 
Israel still preventing humanitarian missions to north Gaza, Unrwa says

The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) says Israel is continuing to prevent humanitarian missions from reaching northern Gaza with critical supplies, including food and medicine.

“Hospitals have been hit and are left without power while injured people are left without care,” Philippe Lazzarini wrote on X.

He also said Unrwa’s remaining shelters were so overcrowded that displaced people were “forced to live in the toilets”, and cited reports that people trying to flee were being killed.

The Israeli military has been intensifying a weeks-long offensive in parts of northern Gaza against what it said were Hamas fighters who had regrouped there. On Monday residents and medics said Israeli forces were besieging hospitals and shelters for displaced people.

The Israeli military said it was facilitating evacuations of civilians and ensuring hospitals remained operational while it continued “operating against terrorists and terrorist infrastructure”.

Medics at the Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza told Reuters that Israeli troops stormed a school and detained the men before setting the building ablaze.

Palestinian media also reported on Monday that at least 10 people had been killed by Israeli artillery fire that hit a camp for displaced people at a school in Jabalia refugee camp, a densely-populated urban area to the north of Gaza City.

Israel does not allow the BBC and other international media into Gaza to report independently, making it difficult to verify facts on the ground, so we rely on information from video footage and testimonies.

Graphic videos of the aftermath of the Israeli strike posted online by Gaza’s Hamas-run Civil Defence agency and local journalists appeared to show at least four bodies, including a child and a woman, lying on the ground inside a tented camp.

One of the videos was filmed by a paramedic called Nabila as she ran between the dead and wounded.

“Calm down,” she is heard screaming at a badly hurt woman sitting in a pool of blood, “I swear I don’t have anything to stop the bleeding”.

In a passage pockmarked by shrapnel, she comes across a woman sitting with a baby, who says: “My children are gone, look at them.”

The Israeli military said it was checking the reports.

The Israeli military body responsible for managing crossings into Gaza, Cogat, also announced that 41 aid lorries and six fuel tankers had been transferred to the north over the past day, and that a Unicef mission had been able to deliver polio vaccines to the north.

Cogat said there were also 600 lorry loads of aid waiting to be picked up and distributed at various crossings, most of it by UN agencies.

The UN said no aid was allowed into northern Gaza during the first two weeks of October, when the Israeli military began its offensive in and around Jabalia.

The UN’s acting humanitarian chief said a “trickle” of aid was allowed through last week, after the US warned Israel in a letter to urgently boost access within 30 days or risk having some military assistance cut off.

On Monday, the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said it had been asking Israeli authorities for four days to access to the Falouja area of Jabalia but had been denied.

The OCHA also shared a video showing an appeal for help from a Jabalia resident who said he was one of 32 people buried underneath a building destroyed in an air strike on Friday.

“Eighteen of us got out. Fourteen people remain under rubble, including little kids. They are two, three and four-year-olds, as well as women. They’re under rubble. Alive. They begged for me to rescue them but I couldn’t,” Shamekh al-Dibes said.

Meanwhile, a representative of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) who recently visited Gaza City said the suffering for the estimated 400,000 people in the north was “unimaginable”.

“Heavy fighting and evacuation orders are tearing communities apart. While some are desperate to leave, many, especially the elderly, sick, and people with disabilities, are unable to leave. Other stay, believing nowhere is safe,” Stephanie Eller said in a video.

“Hospitals are overwhelmed, struggling with too many patients and lack of fuel, electricity, and water supplies,” she added. “People need food, water, medical care and, above all, a respite from the ongoing hostilities.”

Hadeel Obeid, the chief nurse at the Indonesian hospital, also near Jabalia, said its water supply had been cut off and that was no food for the fourth consecutive day. She also said that the hospital needed permission from the Israeli military to operate its generator.

Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to the group's unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 42,000 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

BBC
 
US top diplomat issues warning to Israel over Gaza aid

Antony Blinken has told Israeli leaders that “much more needs to be done” to get humanitarian aid to civilians in besieged northern Gaza, raising possible consequences in US law if action isn’t taken, a senior Biden administration official says.

On Tuesday, the US secretary of state met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer and senior military officials in a series of meetings in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

The meetings are part of a regional tour that Washington sees as a chance to revive diplomacy after Israel’s killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in Gaza last week.

The account of Blinken’s face-to-face message to the Israelis comes despite mounting criticism that the US has failed to stem the rate at which civilians have been killed in Gaza because it has been unwilling to use its supplying of weapons to Israel as leverage.

Washington has consistently rejected the criticism.

The official said Blinken also pressed the Israeli leadership over reports that its military has been implementing a so-called “generals’ plan” in northern Gaza - a tactic described as using mass forced displacement of civilians and a surrender-or-starve tactic against all who remain.

The official said the Israelis told them the tactic was “absolutely not” their policy, to which the Americans responded that their Israeli counterparts then needed to make this clearer publicly.

Israel has said its offensive in northern Gaza is to rout a Hamas resurgence.

Blinken’s apparent warning on humanitarian aid followed his letter last week, co-signed by US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin, which gave the Israeli government 30 days to surge aid into the northern Gaza Strip or risk having some military assistance cut off.

“There was extended conversation about this,” the senior State Department official said.

They added: “The steps that have [been] taken thus far have not been sufficient and we made that clear today, that we do need to see more.”

“We have seen some initial progress. We heard more from Minister Gallant in detail about… steps that he is overseeing to be responsive to it, but… both with the prime minister, Minister Dermer and with Minister Gallant, this was a central part of the discussion,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Aid groups have warned that civilians in northern Gaza risk starvation amid Israel’s military siege.

Israel says its offensive there is focused on Hamas fighters, while the US has warned it not to try to forcibly displace residents to the south of Gaza, where 1.7 million civilians are crammed into a dangerously overcrowded area at “lethal risk” of disease.

Pressed on whether Blinken warned the Israelis verbally about repercussions if Israel didn’t heed its demands, the official said Blinken “made clear it has implications under our law and policy, [and] what those actions need to be”.

A statement issued by Netanyahu’s office after the meeting made no mention of humanitarian assistance. It stressed the “Iranian threat” against Israel and the need for the US and Israel to “unite” against it.

The statement also said Blinken had expressed America’s “deep shock” over what Israel says was an Iranian assassination attempt against Netanyahu via a Hezbollah drone strike on his private residence at the weekend.

It said Blinken had characterised the event as “an exceptionally extreme incident”.

Asked whether this account was accurate, the US official said Blinken “expressed concern that it was a very serious incident… ‘Exceptional and extreme’ is not language that he would typically use.”

The official added the US had no assessment either way over the claim of Iranian involvement.

The discrepancy in the characterisation of their conversation comes with Israel poised to carry out a retaliatory strike against Iran for its 1 October ballistic missile attack on Israel. That had followed Israel’s recent assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut and Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran.

The US is attempting to get Israel to dial down the scale of its response for fear of further regional escalation.

The US official also said Blinken discussed the war between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon as part of a “diplomatic push” the Americans are making to de-escalate the fighting, but didn’t provide any update on whether this had made progress.

BBC
 
IDF soldiers should refuse orders that may be war crimes, Israeli ex-security adviser tells BBC

As someone who served four Israeli prime ministers and was deputy head of the country’s National Security Council, Eran Etzion’s judgement was trusted at the highest levels of the state.

A longstanding critic of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he is also someone whose years of public service earned him widespread respect.

But now Mr Etzion, a former soldier himself, is warning that Israel’s military - the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) - might be committing war crimes in northern Gaza. And he is suggesting that officers and troops should reject illegal orders.

“They should refuse. If a soldier or an officer is expected to commit something that might be suspected as a war crime, they must refuse. That's what I would do if I were a soldier. That's what I think any Israeli soldier should do,” he tells me.

We are sitting on the balcony of his home in Shoresh in central Israel.

Here there is the quiet sunshine of an autumn morning. A peaceful neighbourhood where some builders are working on house improvements.

Less than 40 miles down the road is the Gaza neighbourhood of Jabalia.

As Mr Etzion and I are speaking, doctors and medical staff at the Indonesian Hospital in Jabalia are sending desperate voice notes to the international community begging for aid.

One senior nurse - in a message heard by the BBC - speaks in an exhausted voice of relentless privations allegedly imposed by the Israelis besieging Jabalia.

“My friend, I’m so so tired,” he says. “I can’t explain how tired I am. The water is empty. We don't have water. We contacted the Israeli force to allow us to charge water to the tank, but they don't accept that.... And we don't know what will happen tomorrow. The situation is very very bad.”

Another nurse says: “I am sorry for my language, I can't talk well. I am very fatigued and dizzy. I haven't eaten since yesterday. We try to give the food that we found to the patients and families and we don't eat ourselves.”

Tens of thousands of people are now fleeing Jabalia as the Israeli army continues its offensive against what it says is an attempt by Hamas to regroup.

Mr Etzion is worried for the civilians of Jabalia and his country. “There is a very dangerous erosion of norms. There is a very widespread sense of revenge, of rage,” he says.

This is because, Mr Etzion says, Israel is in the grip of trauma after the 7 October 2023 Hamas attacks in which around 1,200 Israelis were killed and more than 200 taken hostage into Gaza.

“The will to revenge could be understood. It's human, but we're not a gang, we're not a terror organisation, and we're not a militia. We're a sovereign country. We have our history, we have our morals, we have our values, and we must operate under international law and under international standards if we want to continue to be a member of the international community, which we do.”

He is speaking out as a former soldier, as someone whose children served in the IDF, and whose family and friends still serve. “I'm just a concerned citizen trying to raise my voice. So that's what I'm doing. I want to make sure that no soldier is involved in anything that could be constituted as a war crime.”

Israel has faced mounting international criticism over its conduct during the war. The United States has threatened to cut arms shipments if Israel does not surge aid into Gaza.

The UN has accused the Israelis of repeatedly blocking or impeding the transfer of aid, most recently into northern Gaza.

The IDF has consistently rejected allegations that it is implementing a deliberate policy of starvation to force residents to flee from Jabalia. Israel has long accused Hamas of using the civilian population as human shields, launching attacks from schools and medical facilities.

“Hamas does not hesitate to abuse Gazans, exploit them, steal aid from them, and forcefully prevent them from evacuating when it is necessary for them to do so,” the IDF said in May.

A wounded girl is treated at the Kamal Adwan hospital in northern Gaza

One of Britain’s most prominent war crimes lawyers, Prof Philippe Sands KC, told me that that while Israel had a right to self defence after the 7 October attacks, it was now violating international law.

“It has to be proportionate. It has to meet the requirements of international humanitarian law. It must distinguish between civilians and military targets.

"It doesn't allow you to use famine as a weapon of war. It doesn't allow you to forcibly deport or evacuate large numbers of people.

"So it's impossible to see what is going on now in Gaza, as it's impossible to see what happened on 7 October, and not say crimes are screaming out.”

Prof Sands has led the genocide case against Myanmar, and the case for Palestinian statehood at the International Court of Justice in the Hague.

His book East West Street: On the Origins of Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity won the Baillie Gifford Prize for non-fiction. The book also details his own Jewish family’s experience of the Holocaust.

I ask if the crisis in Gaza makes him worry about the survival of international law.

He points to the fact that the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) is seeking arrest warrants for Israel’s prime minister and defence minister.

The prosecutor also sought warrants for three Hamas leaders. All three, including Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, are now dead.

"It [international law] is not working on the ground in relation to Russia and Ukraine. It's not working on the ground in relation to Sudan. It's not working on the ground in relation to Palestine and Israel.

"There's just no ifs and buts. We just have to, we have to recognize that. But that is not a reason to tear up the entire system.

"If you ask yourself what the alternative is, which is basically no pieces of paper with the words Treaties written on it, you're back to the 1930s, and at least what we have now is a system of rules which allows people to stand up and say: ‘This is a violation of a treaty'.”

We asked the IDF for an interview but they said no spokesperson was available today, and referred us to an earlier statement which says: “The IDF will continue to act, as it always has done, according to international law.”

And today the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), the army’s humanitarian relief wing, said it was their policy to facilitate the entrance of aid into Gaza “without limits”.

This is Israel’s narrative. But as scenes of civilian suffering continue to emerge from Jabalia it is being widely challenged.

BBC
 

Israel strike on Gaza school-turned-shelter kills 17, hospital says​


An Israeli airstrike on a school building in central Gaza has killed at least 17 people, according to a local hospital.

Al-Awda hospital told AFP and Reuters that the strike on Thursday hit the Al-Shuhada school in the Nuseirat refugee camp.

The Hamas-run government media office reported the same death toll and said the school was being used as a shelter for displaced people.

Videos from the scene, verified by the BBC, show wounded children being carried out in the arms of men.

Israel said it had targeted a Hamas command centre at the site "used by the terrorists to plan and execute terrorist attacks" against Israel and its troops.

The government media office said "thousands of displaced people” were using the school as a shelter when the strike hit, “most of them children and women".

Nine children were among the 17 killed, with more than 52 injured, the media office added.

Mahmud Bassal, spokesman for Gaza's civil defence agency, also told AFP that 17 people were killed and dozens wounded.

In recent weeks, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has hit several buildings being used as shelters across Gaza, saying it was targeting Hamas personnel and infrastructure.

Israel does not allow international media organisations - including the BBC - independent access to Gaza, making it difficult to verify facts on the ground, so we rely on information from video footage and testimonies, as well as Israeli and Hamas official statements.

In northern Gaza, the IDF has been intensifying a weeks-long offensive against what it said were Hamas fighters who had regrouped there.

At least 650 people have been killed since the new offensive in the north began, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.

The Israeli military said it was facilitating evacuations of civilians while it continued “operating against terrorists and terrorist infrastructure”.

But residents unwilling or unable to comply with Israeli evacuation orders are said to be living in increasingly desperate conditions, with food and other essential supplies running out.

The final stage of an emergency polio vaccination campaign in the area has been postponed by UN agencies because of intense Israeli bombardments, mass displacement and lack of access.

The last phase of the two-stage rollout - prompted by Gaza’s first case of polio in 25 years, which left a baby boy paralyzed - was due to begin on Wednesday.

Almost 120,000 children in northern Gaza had been expected to receive a second dose of the oral polio vaccine.

www.bbc.com

Israeli airstrike on school building kills 17 in Gaza

Israel says it targeted a Hamas command centre in the Nuseirat refugee camp when it hit Al-Shuhada school.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
 
Gaza ceasefire talks to resume in coming days

Negotiations over a potential Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal are set to resume in Doha in the coming days, officials from the US, Israel and Qatar have said.

A spokesperson for Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said an Israeli delegation will travel to Qatar on Sunday.

It is not yet clear whether Hamas has agreed to participate in the talks.

The US believes the death of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar last week - seen as one of the group's most extreme figures - may open the door to an agreement, though Hamas has accused Israel of being the primary block to any deal.

“With Sinwar gone,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told journalists, “there is a real opportunity to bring home [the hostages] and to accomplish the objective.”

Mr Blinken said that objective was to reach a deal "so that Israel can withdraw, so that Hamas cannot reconstitute, and so that the Palestinian people can rebuild their lives and rebuild their futures".

A senior Palestinian official told the BBC that a Hamas delegation was meeting with Egyptian intelligence officials on Thursday evening as part of discussions on the current situation in Gaza and ways to overcome obstacles to stop the escalation.

Qatar’s foreign minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said Qatari mediators had "re-engaged" with Hamas since Sinwar's death, but there was “no clarity” over the groups current plans with regards to ceasefire talks.

"There has been an engagement with the representatives from the political office in Doha. We had some meetings with them in the last couple of days," he said, adding that Egypt was also in "ongoing" discussions with Hamas.


www.bbc.com

Gaza ceasefire and hostage release talks to resume in coming days

The US believes the death of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar may open the door to an agreement.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
 
Hamas official says ready to stop fighting if Israel accepts Gaza truce

A senior Hamas official told AFP on Thursday that the group had told Egyptian officials it was ready to stop fighting in Gaza if Israel committed to a ceasefire deal.

The official said a Hamas delegation discussed “ideas and proposals” related to a Gaza truce with Egyptian officials in Cairo on Thursday, adding that “Hamas has expressed readiness to stop the fighting, but Israel must commit to a ceasefire, withdraw from the Gaza Strip, allow the return of displaced people, agree to a serious prisoner exchange deal and allow the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza.”

The Israeli army said on Thursday that four of its soldiers were killed fighting in southern Lebanon, where the military has been battling Hezbollah forces for weeks.

The Israeli army provided the names of the four soldiers in a statement, saying the troops “fell during combat in southern Lebanon” on Wednesday.

The death toll among Israeli troops fighting in southern Lebanon has risen to 26 since the military launched a ground operation in late September, according to an AFP tally based on official military figures.

The war in Lebanon erupted last month, nearly a year after the start of cross-border clashes between Hezbollah and Israeli forces.

Hezbollah began launching rockets at Israel from October 8, 2023, in support of Hamas after the Palestinian militant group launched its unprecedented attack on Israel.


AAJ News
 

Entire population of North Gaza 'at risk of dying,' UN says​

The entire population of North Gaza is "at risk of dying" because of actions by Israeli forces, acting United Nations Humanitarian Chief Joyce Msuya warned Saturday.

"What Israeli forces are doing in besieged North Gaza cannot be allowed to continue. Hospitals have been hit and health workers have been detained. Shelters have been emptied and burned down. First responders have been prevented from rescuing people from under the rubble. Families have been separated and men and boys are being taken away by the truckload," Msuya said.

"Hundreds of Palestinians have reportedly been killed. Tens of thousands have been forced to flee yet again," Msuya said. "Such blatant disregard for basic humanity and for the laws of war must stop."

Source: ABC News
 
Israeli protesters interrupt Netanyahu’s speech as Gaza truce talks resume

Israeli protesters have interrupted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech during a memorial to remember the victims of the October 7 attack as the Gaza ceasefire talks restarted in Doha, Qatar.

Netanyahu stood motionless at a podium during the ceremony on Sunday as audience members in the crowd shouted, interrupting him for more than a minute, according to a live broadcast of the speech. Some people shouted “Shame on you” and made a commotion, forcing Netanyahu to stop his speech shortly after it began.


www.aljazeera.com

‘Shame on you’: Protesters interrupt Netanyahu as Gaza truce talks resume

Pressure is mounting on Netanyahu’s administration to secure a deal for the release of the remaining captives in Gaza.
www.aljazeera.com www.aljazeera.com
 
Wretched government hell bent on their criminal ventures
====
More than 1,000 people have been killed since Israel intensified northern Gaza operations, civil defense says

More than 1,000 people have been killed since Israel began a large-scale military incursion into northern Gaza earlier this month, Mahmoud Basal, the spokesperson for the Gaza civil defense, has said.

Basal said intense Israeli bombardment has been continuous for 22 days in Jabalya, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun, among other areas, adding that Israeli forces have also prevented the civil defense and medical staff from accessing that part of the Gaza Strip.

“Those being bombed in the northern part of the strip will find no medical assistance or anyone to provide medical services,” he said. “We are thus facing a difficult and tragic situation.”

In addition to the more than 1,000 confirmed killed, many others are lying either beneath the rubble or on the streets, Basal added.

“Given the tragic and dire reality in northern Gaza, we continue to appeal to international organizations and institutions to fulfill their humanitarian and service roles to assist the citizens here in northern Gaza, who are being subjected to mass extermination and direct bombardment,” he said.

“We also call on organizations such as the Red Cross to intervene and allow civil defense and medical teams, as well as hospitals, to carry out their humanitarian duties in northern Gaza.”

“Otherwise, we are facing a serious threat to the lives of over 100,000 citizens who remain in their homes in the northern part of the strip,” Basal concluded.

Source: CNN
 
UNRWA banned from operating in Israel - as agency head warns move will 'deepen the suffering of Palestinians'

Israel has banned the UN Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA from operating in the country - a move which could hamper its work in Gaza.

UNRWA's chief Philippe Lazzarini has warned the ban "will only deepen the suffering of Palestinians, especially in Gaza".

Juliette Touma, UNRWA communications director, said it is "the largest humanitarian organisation in Gaza. Who can do its job?"

The new laws passed in the Knesset on Monday banned the agency from having any ties to Israeli officials and stripped its staff of their legal immunities.

The Israeli parliament also declared the group was a terror organisation.

The legislation will take effect 60 to 90 days after Israel's foreign ministry notifies the UN, according to the spokesman for politician Dan Illouz, one of the co-sponsors of one of the Bills.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the UK is "gravely concerned" at the ban, which, he said, jeopardises "the entire international humanitarian response in Gaza and delivery of essential health and education services in the West Bank.


news.sky.com

UNRWA banned from operating in Israel - as agency head warns move will 'deepen the suffering of Palestinians'

Israel has banned the UN Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA from operating in the country - a move which could hamper its work in Gaza.
news.sky.com news.sky.com
 
One medic left at Gaza hospital as Israel says it arrested 100 ‘terrorists’

Only one doctor remains at Gaza's Kamal Adwan Hospital following a days-long Israeli raid, a spokesman for the Hamas-run health ministry has said.

In a video statement, Dr Khalil Daqran urged international organisations to send medical staff to the hospital in the north of the strip, saying patients there were bleeding to death for lack of proper care.

On Monday, Israel said its forces had detained about 100 "terrorists" at the hospital before withdrawing.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the hospital, inside Jabalia refugee camp, had been used by Hamas - claims denied by local health officials.

Mr Daqran said: "Two days ago, the army stormed Kamal Adwan Hospital, causing widespread destruction: setting large parts on fire, destroying the hospital’s entrances, and demolishing surrounding walls.

"Patients and medical staff were assaulted, with many patients and companions arrested, along with most of the medical staff.

"The fate of 30 medical personnel remains unknown.

"The army has removed the hospital from service entirely, destroying all its contents. There are now no medicines, medical supplies or food within the hospital."

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed it had completed a "precise operation against a Hamas terrorist stronghold" in the hospital.

The IDF said it had taken steps to minimise civilian casualties and facilitated the evacuation of the hospital. It added that troops found weapons, cash and documents belonging to Hamas during the raid.

Some Hamas militants, including some linked to last year's 7 October attacks, disguised themselves as medical staff, the IDF said.

The Israeli raid injured medics and killed patients at the hospital, health officials said.

The Israeli army published a video purporting to show the interrogation of an ambulance driver who had worked at Kamal Adwan Hospital.

In the video, the authenticity of which could not be verified by the BBC, the alleged driver's face is blurred. The man says Hamas militants operated in the hospital.

He says Hamas used ambulances to transport militants to their missions and adds: "We have had enough. [Hamas] are stationed in the hospitals, stationed in the schools."

The northern Gaza Strip is facing a deepening humanitarian crisis, with hundreds of thousands of civilians living in increasingly desperate conditions.

Mr Daqran said: "Conditions in northern Gaza are catastrophic: there is no water, food or baby formula. Infrastructure has been decimated, sewage and waste are piling up among the residents, leading to the spread of disease and epidemics."

UN human rights chief Volker Türk said on Friday that "the Israeli military is subjecting an entire population to bombing, siege and risk of starvation".

"The Israeli government’s policies and practices in northern Gaza risk emptying the area of all Palestinians. We are facing what could amount to atrocity crimes, including potentially extending to crimes against humanity," Mr Türk added.

He also said it was unacceptable that Palestinian armed groups were reportedly operating among civilians, including inside shelters for the displaced, and putting them in harm’s way.

Many Palestinians believe the Israeli military is implementing out the so-called “Generals’ Plan” in the north, which would see the forced displacement of all of the estimated 400,000 civilians there to the south followed by a siege of any remaining Hamas fighters.

The Israeli military has denied having such a plan and says it is making sure that civilians get out of harm’s way.

Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to the group's unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 42,000 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's health ministry.

BBC
 
At least 93 killed and missing in Israeli strike on Gaza, health ministry says

At least 93 people are dead or missing after an Israeli air strike on the town of Beit Lahia in northern Gaza, the Hamas-run health ministry says.

Rescuers said a five-storey residential building was hit, and videos on social media showed bodies covered in blankets on the floor.

There has been no immediate comment on the strike from Israel's military, which began a new offensive in the area earlier this month after saying Hamas was regrouping there.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have been operating in northern Gaza during the past two weeks, particularly in the areas of Jabalia, Beit Lahia and Beit Hanoun.


www.bbc.com

At least 93 killed and missing in Israeli strike on Gaza, health ministry says

Israel has not commented on the strike, which rescuers say hit a five-storey building in northern Gaza.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
 
US calls deadly Israeli air strike 'horrifying'

The Israeli military said it was "aware of reports that civilians were harmed today [Tuesday] in the Beit Lahia area". It added that the details of the incident were being looked into.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have been operating in northern Gaza during the past two weeks, particularly in the areas of Jabalia, Beit Lahia and Beit Hanoun.

The director of the nearby Kamal Adwan hospital in Jabalia, Hussam Abu Safia, told the AFP news agency that children were being treated at the hospital, which is struggling to treat patients due to a lack of staff and medicines.

"There is nothing left in the Kamal Adwan Hospital except first aid materials after the army arrested our medical team and workers," Abu Safia said.

The IDF raided the hospital last week, saying it was being used by Hamas fighters.

State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said the US was "deeply concerned by the loss of civilian life in this incident. This was a horrifying incident with a horrifying result".

He pointed to "reports of two dozen children killed" in the attack.

The "tragic cost to civilians" in the latest strike "is another reminder of why we need to see an end to this war", Miller said.

Israel says its operations in northern Gaza are designed to prevent Hamas from regrouping and accuses them of embedding among the civilian population, which Hamas denies.

In a statement on Tuesday, it said it killed 40 “terrorists” in Jabalia, and in central Gaza it said it “eliminated many terrorists" over the past 24 hours including some who "attempted to plant explosives near the troops".

The northern Gaza Strip faces a deepening humanitarian crisis, with hundreds of thousands of people living in desperate conditions.

UN human rights chief Volker Türk said on Friday that "the Israeli military is subjecting an entire population to bombing, siege and risk of starvation".

He also said it was unacceptable that Palestinian armed groups were reportedly operating among civilians, including inside shelters for the displaced, and putting them in harm’s way.

On Monday, Israel's parliament voted through legislation to ban the UN's Palestinian refugee agency, Unrwa, from operating in the country, sparking warnings the delivery of aid to Gaza could be severely impacted..

Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to the group's unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 42,924 people have been killed in Gaza, according to the health ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and fighters in its figures.

Israel is not allowing international journalists from media organisations, including the BBC, independent access to Gaza, making it hard to verify facts on the ground.

BBC
 
UNRWA ‘backbone of humanitarian response in Gaza’: UN Security Council

The UN Security Council has underscored that the UN agency for Palestinian refugees “remains the backbone of all humanitarian response” in the besieged coastal enclave.

In a statement adopted by consensus, the 15-member council also:

Said that no organisation can replace or substitute UNRWA’s capacity and mandate to serve Palestinians in need.
Warned against any attempts to dismantle or diminish UNRWA’s operations and mandate.

Expressed concern over the Israeli ban on UNRWA and urged the Israeli government to abide by its international obligations.
Demanded that all parties enable UNRWA to carry out its mandate.

Called on all parties to “take necessary steps” to allow and facilitate aid to civilians in Gaza.

Source: Al Jazeera
 
Deadly Israeli strike targeted 'spotter' on Beit Lahia building's roof, official says

An Israeli military official has told the BBC that it carried out a deadly strike on a five-storey residential building in Beit Lahia in northern Gaza on Tuesday in response to seeing a “spotter” on the roof with binoculars observing Israeli forces.

Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry said more than 90 Palestinians, including 25 children, were killed or missing beneath the rubble of the building, which collapsed as a result of the strike.

The military official said it was not a planned strike and troops did not know the building was being used as a shelter for displaced people.

They also said there were discrepancies between the number of casualties reported and what the military had observed.

The strike provoked a strong response from Israel's closest ally, the US, which described it as a “horrifying incident with a horrifying result” and demanded an explanation.

On Wednesday, after the military official had spoken to reporters, US state department spokesman Matthew Miller said Israel was “not doing enough to get us the answers that we have requested”.

"They have said to us what they had said publicly, which is they're investigating the matter," he added.

Israel does not allow the BBC and other international media into Gaza to report independently, making it difficult to verify facts on the ground, so we rely on information from video footage and witness testimonies.

Videos posted on social media a few hours after the strike showed multiple bodies wrapped in blankets and people collecting body parts at the scene of the strike.

Umm Malik Abu Nasr later told BBC Arabic’s Gaza Today programme on Tuesday that the strike destroyed her family’s home and that she was among the survivors pulled from the rubble.

“At around 00:30 or 01:00, the Awda family house next to us was bombed,” she said. “We rushed to help and host them but their daughter [died] in our home.”

“At 04:00 the multi-storey house of the Abu Nasr family collapsed on top of us. They [Israel forces] bombed the house, which was housing about 300 displaced people who had fled their homes. These people sought to take refuge in our houses. We hosted them because they were just civilians and had nothing to do with resistance [Palestinian armed groups].”

“My husband and other young men are still under the rubble and have not been pulled out yet,” she added. “My husband’s cousin and her five children are still under the rubble.”

The director of the nearby Kamal Adwan hospital - which only has two doctors and limited nursing staff following an Israeli raid last week - said in a voice message recorded on Tuesday that it had received the bodies of more than 25 people killed in the strike and that another 77 were trapped under the rubble.

About 45 injured, including children and women, had also been brought to the hospital either by horse-drawn carts or by people carrying them, Dr Hussam Abu Safiya added.

The UN’s Middle East peace envoy, Tor Wennesland, said it was the latest in “a deadly series of recent mass casualty incidents, alongside a massive displacement campaign, in the north of Gaza that raises serious concerns about violations of humanitarian law”.

Hundreds of people have reportedly been killed since the Israeli military launched a ground offensive in Beit Lahia as well as neighbouring Jabalia and Beit Hanoun on 6 October, saying it was acting against regrouping Hamas fighters.

More than 70,000 residents have fled to Gaza City, but the UN estimates that about 100,000 remain in dire conditions, with severe shortages of food, water and medical supplies.

The offensive has also forced the closure of essential services, including medical facilities, firefighting, search and rescue, water wells and bakeries.

Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to the group's unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 43,160 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

BBC
 
Israeli troops attacked after entering Tulkarem refugee camp

Palestinian fighters are battling Israeli troops in Tulkarem in the occupied West Bank.

“Our brave fighters are engaged in fierce clashes with the Zionist enemy forces that have penetrated Tulkarem camp using machineguns and explosive devices,” the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades said in a statement on Telegram.

Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades is the armed wing of Fatah, the movement that controls the Palestinian Authority, which has limited self-rule in the occupied West Bank.

Israeli forces have conducted near-daily operations in the West Bank in recent m
onths.

Source: Al Jazeera
 
More than 100 BBC staff accuse broadcaster of Israel bias in Gaza coverage

More than 100 BBC employees are accusing the corporation of providing favourable coverage toward Israel and are calling on the broadcaster to “recommit to fairness, accuracy, and impartiality” over its reporting on Gaza.

In a letter sent to Tim Davie, signed by more than 230 members of the media industry, including 101 anonymous BBC staff, the corporation is criticised for failing its own editorial standards by lacking “consistently fair and accurate evidence-based journalism in its coverage of Gaza”.

Seen exclusively by The Independent, the letter, which has also been signed by Sayeeda Warsi and the actor Juliet Stevenson, calls on the BBC to report “without fear or favour” and to “recommit to the highest editorial standards – with emphasis on fairness, accuracy, and due impartiality”.

The letter also calls on the broadcaster to implement a series of editorial commitments including “reiterating that Israel does not give external journalists access to Gaza; making it clear when there is insufficient evidence to back up Israeli claims; making clear where Israel is the perpetrator in article headlines; including regular historical context predating October 2023; and robustly challenging Israeli government and military representatives in all interviews”.

The BBC has denied these claims, insisting it “strives to live up to our responsibility to deliver the most trusted and impartial news”.

A spokesperson said: “When we make mistakes or have made changes to the way we report, we are transparent. We are also very clear with our audiences on the limitations put on our reporting – including the lack of access into Gaza and restricted access to parts of Lebanon, and our continued efforts to get reporters into those areas.”

Other signatories on the list include the historian William Dalrymple, Dr Catherine Happer, a senior lecturer in sociology and director of media at the University of Glasgow, Rizwana Hamid, the director at the Centre for Media Monitoring, and the broadcaster John Nicolson.

It is not the first time the BBC has been criticised for bias during the Gaza war. In September, the BBC refuted claims that it had breached its own guidelines more than 1,500 times following a controversial report alleging that some BBC correspondents had excused or downplayed Hamas’s activities. A spokesperson for the BBC said at the time that it would “carefully consider” the research but denied claims of bias.

Nonetheless, the signatories of the letter insist the bias favours Israel. A current staff member who has signed the letter told The Independent that some of their colleagues have left the corporation over its coverage.

“I have never, in my entire career, witnessed such low levels of staff confidence,” they said. “I have colleagues who have left the BBC in recent months because they just don’t believe our reporting on Israel and Palestine is honest. So many of us feel paralysed by the levels of fear.”

Another said they were “losing faith in the organisation [they] work for”, having seen a “huge disparity” in the BBC’s approach towards Israel. They added: “I genuinely care about the future of the BBC, and every day I see that we are losing the trust of audiences across the world.

“People are going elsewhere to find the reality of what is happening because we are simply not giving it to them.”

Examples given by staff include “dehumanising and misleading headlines”, including the one given to an article about a six-year-old girl who was shot to death by the Israeli military in Gaza in January 2024.

Speaking about the headline, “Hind Rajab, 6, found dead in Gaza days after phone calls for help”, a signatory of the letter said: “This was not an act of God. The perpetrator, Israel, should have been in the headline, and it should have been clear that she was killed.”

Another colleague said: “Palestinians are always treated as an unreliable source and we constantly give Israel’s version of events primacy despite the IDF’s well-documented track record of lying.

“We often seem to prefer to leave Israel out of the headline if at all possible or cast doubt on who could be to blame for airstrikes. The verification level expected for anything related to Gaza hugely outweighs what is the norm for other countries.”

Other concerns raised by staff include omissions of coverage, such as the failure to live broadcast South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice on 11 January but choosing to live broadcast Israel’s defence the following day.

Of the 237 signatories, 72 have signed publicly, including former UK foreign minister and broadcaster Baroness Warsi and Emma actor Juliet Stevenson, as well as dozens of academics.

The letter, while focusing on the BBC, also highlights shortcomings in other media outlets including ITV and Sky.

The BBC said in response: “This conflict is one of the most polarising stories to report on, and we know people feel very strongly about how this is being reported, not only on the BBC but across all media. The BBC holds itself to very high standards, and we strive to live up to our responsibility to deliver the most trusted and impartial news – weighing and measuring the words we use, verifying facts, and seeking a wide range of interviews and expert opinion.”

While acknowledging that the “BBC does not and cannot reflect any single world view”, a spokesperson insisted that it receives an almost equal measure of complaints asserting bias towards Israel as bias against it.

They added: “This does not mean we assume we are doing something right, and we continue to listen to all criticism – from inside and outside the BBC – and reflect on what we can do better.”

SOURCE: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...r-tim-davie-bias-palestine-b2636737.html?s=08
 
Polio vaccinations restart in north Gaza

The final phase of a two-stage polio vaccination campaign has started in north Gaza on Saturday, the World Health Organization (WHO) said.

The second phase was postponed in October by UN agencies due to intense Israeli bombardments, mass displacement and lack of access in the region.

Gaza recorded its first case of polio in 25 years in August, which left a baby boy paralysed and prompted the rollout of the programme.

The immunisations are resuming as 15 UN and humanitarian organisations have described the situation in north Gaza as "apocalyptic" nearly a month after an Israeli ground offensive began.

A humanitarian pause in the fighting has been agreed upon to allow vaccinations to restart in Gaza City, the WHO said. The campaign will run for three days.

About 15,000 children under 10 years old in towns across north Gaza, such as Jabalia, Beit Lahia and Beit Hanoun, "still remain inaccessible" and will be missed by the vaccination campaign, compromising its effectiveness, the agency said.

The WHO had aimed to give 119,000 children in the area a second dose of the oral polio vaccine.

The agency added that achieving this target "is now unlikely due to access constraints".

The first round of the vaccine campaign successfully reached 559,000 children under 10 years old over three phases in south, central and north Gaza between 1 and 12 September, during which there were local “humanitarian pauses” agreed by Israel and Palestinian groups.

However, the area agreed in the latest humanitarian pause "has been substantially reduced" compared to the first round of vaccinations and is now limited to just Gaza City, according to the WHO.

From the start of the polio vaccination campaign in Gaza, medical experts stressed that delays in administering the second dose could jeopardise overall efforts to halt transmission of the contagious, potentially deadly disease.

To interrupt transmission, at least 90% of all children need to be given a minimum of two doses.

The UN human rights chief said last week that the Gaza war's “darkest moment” is unfolding in the north of the territory.

Hundreds of people have reportedly been killed since the Israeli military launched a ground offensive in Beit Lahia as well as neighbouring Jabalia and Beit Hanoun on 6 October, saying it was acting against regrouping Hamas fighters.

At least 100,000 people have been forced to evacuate from north Gaza towards Gaza City for safety, the WHO said.

The joint statement from UN agencies, including the WHO, released on Friday, said the situation was "apocalyptic", with the entire Palestinian population in the area "at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine and violence".

The UN estimates that about 100,000 residents remain in dire conditions, with severe shortages of food, water and medical supplies.

The US warned Israel this week to immediately increase humanitarian aid into Gaza as a deadline approaches to boost aid or face cuts to American military assistance. The US envoy to the UN said on Tuesday that Israel's words "must be matched by action", which was "not happening".

Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to the group's attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 43,160 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

BBC
 
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