Israel-Hamas war: Gaza death toll rises as US ceasefire veto condemned

Israel-Hamas war: Gaza death toll rises as US ceasefire veto condemned

Post By World Benjamin Netanyahu, Gaza City, Hamas, Israel, Israel Hamas war, Palestine

The latest developments from the Israel-Hamas war.

Gaza death toll rises to 17,700 with a further 48,780 wounded

The health ministry in Gaza has announced that the death toll in the war-torn region has risen to at least 17,700.

They added that at least another 48,780 people have been wounded in ongoing Israeli attacks.

“The crimes and genocide against the people of Gaza are beyond any description… Ending Palestinian existence with American and European support is inhuman,” the ministry’s spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra said.

UN aid official warns that half of all Gazans are starving

A senior UN aid official has indicated that the food and aid issues are getting significantly worse in Gaza.

Carl Skau, the deputy director of the UN World Food Programme (WFP), warned during an interview with Reuters that some nine out of 10 people in the Palestinian territory are not able to eat every day – and added that half the population is starving.

In the interview, Skau explained that nothing had prepared him for the despair, chaos and fear he found when visiting Gaza.

He added that conditions on the ground are making deliveries near impossible and that just a tiny fraction of the food supplies needed are coming into the region.

Tens of thousands take to London’s street to protest war

For the eighth week in a row, tens of thousands of people have taken to the streets of the UK, protesting against Israel’s war on Gaza in London and other cities in the nation.

Most are chanting ‘ceasefire now’ and the majority of the grounds are angry with the government, moreso still since they abstain from voting at the UN Security Council on an immediate ceasefire.

Hamas hostage killed – Haaretz report

It has been reported that Hamas hostage Sahar Baruch has been killed.

The 25-year-old was among the hostages kidnapped by the Hamas militant group on 7 October.

In a joint statement issued to Haaretz, Kibbutz Be’eri and the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said: “It is with great sadness and a broken heart that we announce the murder of Sahar Baruch who was kidnapped from his home by Hamas terrorists to Gaza on Black Saturday and murdered there”

“His brother Idan was murdered by Hamas on 7 October. We share in the unbearable grief of his parents, Tami and Roni, his brother, Guy and Niv, his family and all his loved ones,” they added.

“We will demand the return of his body as part of any hostage return deal. We will not stop until everyone is at home.”

The death comes following Hamas’ Al-Qassam Brigades announcing on Friday via Telegram that a number of its fighters had discovered a special forces unit mounting a rescue attempt and attacked it.

In the process, they say they killed and wounded several soldiers, including one Israeli soldier – named as Sahar Baruch.

Man arrested at pro-Palestine march in London, accused of racially aggravated public order offence

A man has been arrested in London on suspicion of an apparently racially aggravated public order offence during a pro-Palestine march in the capital city.

London’s Metropolitan police force say the man was carrying a placard which made comparisons between Israel and Nazi Germany.

Thousands are expected to attend the march in the city. An exclusion zone has been put in place prohibiting any protesters from assembling around the Israeli embassy.

UN veto: Abbas holds US ‘responsible for bloodshed’ in Gaza

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has said that he holds the United States “responsible for the bloodshed” in Gaza, after their veto of a UN resolution for a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel in the Palestinian territory.

The Americans, allies of Israel, reiterated their hostility to a cease-fire on Friday.

Describing the American position as “immoral”, President Abbas said he held Washington “responsible for the bloodshed of Palestinian children, women and elderly people in the Gaza Strip at the hands of Israeli occupying forces.”

According to a statement from his office, the United States is “partners” with Israel in its “crimes of genocide, ethnic cleansing and war”, whether committed in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem.

“This policy is becoming a danger for the world and a threat to international security and peace,” added Mr. Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority based in the West Bank, a Palestinian territory occupied since 1967 by Israel.

Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh had already described the failure at the UN as a “shame” and “a new licence given to the occupying state to massacre, destroy and displace”.

Palestinian death toll rises to 17,487

Gaza’s Hamas-controlled health ministry has announced that the death toll from the start of the conflict on 7 October has risen to 17,487.

In a statement, spokesman Dr Ashraf Al-Qedra said that 70% of those killed were children and women.

Al-Qedra added that in the past 24 hours 71 fatalities had arrived at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital.

Arab-Islamic committee calls on US to step up ceasefire pressure on Israel

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has met with the Arab-Islamic Summit Ministerial Committee in Washington DC.

Qatar’s ministry of foreign affairs says the Qatari Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani were also in attendance.

“During the session… members of the ministerial committee stressed their call for the United States to play a broader role in pressuring the Israeli occupation for an immediate ceasefire,” the ministry said in a statement on X – formerly Twitter.

It also added that members of the committee also expressed “their disappointment at the failure of the UN Security Council, for the second time, to vote on a resolution for an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip for humanitarian reasons, after the United States used its veto power.”

‘Relentless’ bombardments hit Gaza Strip

Israeli warplanes struck parts of the Gaza Strip overnight into Saturday in relentless bombardments, including some of the dwindling slivers of land Palestinians had been told to evacuate to in the territory’s south.

The latest strikes came a day after the United States vetoed a United Nations resolution demanding an immediate humanitarian cease-fire in Gaza, despite it being backed by the vast majority of Security Council members and many other nations. The vote in the 15-member council was 13-1, with the United Kingdom abstaining.

“Attacks from air, land and sea are intense, continuous and widespread,” UN

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said before the vote. Gaza residents “are being told to move like human pinballs – ricocheting between ever-smaller slivers of the south, without any of the basics for survival.”

Guterres told the council that Gaza was at “a breaking point” with the humanitarian support system at risk of total collapse, and that he feared “the consequences could be devastating for the security of the entire region.”

In response to the US vetoing the resolution, Hamas branded the nation’s decision ‘inhumane’.

No escape for many Palestinians

Gaza’s borders with Israel and with Egypt are effectively sealed, leaving Palestinians with no option other than to try to seek refuge within the territory.

The overall death toll in Gaza since the start of the war has surpassed 17,400, the majority of them women and children, according to the Health Ministry in Hamas-controlled Gaza, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in its count.

Israel holds Hamas responsible for civilian casualties, accusing the militants of using civilians as human shields, and says it’s made considerable efforts with its evacuation orders to get civilians out of harm’s way.

On Saturday, Gaza residents reported airstrikes and shelling in the northern part of the strip as well as in the south, including the city of Rafah, which lies near the Egyptian border and where the Israeli army had ordered civilians to evacuate to.

The main hospital in the central city of Deir al-Balah received the bodies of 71 people killed in bombings in the area over the past 24 hours, the Health Ministry said Saturday morning. The hospital also received 160 wounded, the ministry said. In the southern city of Khan Younis, the bodies of 62 people and another 99 wounded were taken to Nasser Hospital over the past 24 hours, the ministry said.

Why has there been no ceasefire – or renewed truce agreement?

More than 2,200 Palestinians have been killed since the collapse of the truce on 1 December.

About two-thirds of that number were women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

Despite growing international pressure, the Biden administration remains opposed to an open-ended cease-fire, arguing it would enable Hamas to survive and pose a threat to Israel.

Officials have expressed misgivings in recent days about the rising civilian death toll and dire humanitarian crisis, but have not pushed publicly for Israel to wind down the war, now in its third month.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant has argued a cease-fire would be a victory for Hamas. “A cease-fire is handing a prize to Hamas, dismissing the hostages held in Gaza, and signalling terror groups everywhere,” he said.

As fighting resumed after a brief truce more than a week ago, the US urged Israel to do more to protect civilians and allow more aid to besieged Gaza. The appeals came as Israel expanded its blistering air and ground campaign into southern Gaza, especially the southern city of Khan Younis, sending tens of thousands more fleeing.

Airstrikes were reported overnight in the Nuseirat refugee camp, where resident Omar Abu Moghazi said a strike hit a family home, causing casualties.

There were also airstrikes and shelling in Gaza City and other northern parts of the strip.

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The far left (still) doesn’t understand the Middle East conflict

Post By World European Parliament, European Union, euroviews, Gaza City, Israel Hamas war, Middle East

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not represent in any way the editorial position of Euronews.

It’s time to wake up to the systemic oppression characterising so much of the Palestinian leadership, especially including Hamas-ruled Gaza, and to the hatred and hypocrisy rife in our own societies, fanning flames of falsehood and frenzy, MEP David Lega writes.

It has come to this: 50 years after the Yom Kippur trauma, hundreds of Israelis ended up butchered or kidnapped; antisemitism spiked; and thousands worldwide are calling for a Palestine “from the river to the sea”.

The recent hostage deal is a welcome step. Every life counts. And with Israeli forces going house by house now in the north of Gaza, it may be we are at last at the end of the beginning of this latest dark chapter of the Middle East conflict. But whatever else happens, we have at least now seen the far left for who they are.

For decades, far-left activists, armed with Marxist theories, have tried to delegitimise Israel’s very existence.

This was the spirit underlying University of California professor Judith Butler’s complaint in October that “unless people condemn Hamas, they are not considered acceptable.”

The same spirit led progressive US Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib to threaten President Joe Biden politically for standing with Israel — and then led Bernie Sanders, progressive leader in the US Senate, to hedge in condemning Tlaib’s endorsement of the “river to the sea” mantra.

Some on the left, foremost President Biden, have remained strongly steadfast on Israel’s right to self-defence. But too many others, when asked what that means, have admitted they have no idea.

All they have allowed is that Israel, on moral grounds, should only neutralise armed terrorists if the risk — to non-Israeli, not Israeli, civilians — is zero. Being ignorant of the security threats facing Israel, perhaps they should be more humble in imposing their military advice on the country.

We can’t continue to be blind to the facts

For many on the far left, anti-Israel bias leads to myopia — and to suggestions that Israel has never been unjustly attacked or faced extinction, or that Palestinian representatives have never forfeited the moral high ground (by, for instance, tormenting Palestinian Christians, sexual minorities or political dissidents).

To suggestions, ultimately, that were Israel simply to lay down arms, stop guarding the gates, and relinquish the land it has controlled since its 1967 war of survival — then terrorism against Israelis, and against Jews writ large, would magically melt away.

In Europe, the left as a whole has urged for — and I have agreed — significant EU funding to meet Palestinians’ humanitarian needs.

But many of these same voices continue to pretend that any and all such EU funding is a harmless, risk-free investment for peace.

I and many others have long understood this is just false. A European Commission report this week concludes that no EU money has gone for “unintended” consequences to the Palestinian authorities.

But we know EU money paid for school content fostering an ecosystem of hate; has contributed to pensions and pay-outs incentivising martyrdom; and has bought materials which Hamas and their cronies have not just hoarded but have weaponised against Israeli civilians.

Even after his recent trip to the region, the EU’s high representative and vice-president for foreign affairs and security policy, the socialist Josep Borrell, simply can’t or won’t understand these connections.

A case of pathological naïveté

Perhaps nowhere is pathological naïveté towards Israel more evident than among my Swedish compatriots.

In July, for instance, in her Foreign Affairs Committee report for the European Parliament on EU relations with the Palestinian Authority, the socialist MEP Evin Incir made no mention of Hamas.

Or terrorism. Or antisemitism. Or the persecution, by Palestinians, of Palestinian Christians. These stories play no part in her Middle East narrative.

In another example, a member of the Swedish parliament’s foreign affairs committee, another socialist Jamal El-Haj, spoke at a conference affiliated with Hamas — earning him a rebuke, but not expulsion, from his party.

When a failed rocket from Palestinian terrorists blew up a Gaza hospital on 17 October, Swedish socialist party leader Magdalena Andersson (who’s angling to be Sweden’s next prime minister), in a knee-jerk reaction, and based on Hamas-sourced reporting, blamed Israel.

And two weeks ago, in the European Parliament’s plenary session, a Swedish member of the Left Party, Malin Björk, passionately urged not just a humanitarian pause in Gaza — to ensure basic supplies to civilians or facilitate hostage talks — but a permanent ceasefire.

Doesn’t she know that Hamas will use whatever time they can to carry out their campaign to wipe Israel from the map all over again?

Hatred and hypocrisy fanning flames of falsehood and frenzy

The far left doesn’t understand the Middle East conflict. For whoever delegitimises Israel’s right to exist, whoever denies Israel’s right to self-defence, and whoever fails to see the links between the Holocaust and hate is actually carrying water for the terrorists bent on Israel’s annihilation.

It’s time to wake up. To the systemic oppression characterising so much of the Palestinian leadership, including especially Hamas-ruled Gaza.

To the naive, feckless policies which have demanded of these groups such little accountability.

And to the hatred and hypocrisy rife in our own societies, fanning flames of falsehood and frenzy. It is to our lasting shame — a shame that alarms — that we, in my home of Sweden, of Europe, of the West, find we have not after all left behind our dark past of identitarian ideologies, including even bald antisemitism.

Tragically, it is the far left, most of all, which has not left this legacy behind. If 7 October doesn’t prompt an awakening, I fear it may only come too late.

David Lega (Kristdemokraterna, EPP Group) is a Swedish Member of the European Parliament, where he serves on the Foreign Affairs and Human Rights committees.

At Euronews, we believe all views matter. Contact us at [email protected] to send pitches or submissions and be part of the conversation.

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A ceasefire in Gaza is a moral imperative, not a concession

Post By World euroviews, Gaza City, Israel Hamas war, Israel-Palestine Peace Process, Suella Braverman, United Kingdom

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not represent in any way the editorial position of Euronews.

A disagreement on some issues has become a divorce on each and every one. In moments of crisis, we must hear voices that challenge our assumptions and ask us to do better, Muddassar Ahmed writes.

A month and a half into the devastating Gaza conflict, the call for an immediate ceasefire has never been more urgent.

The grim toll is already staggering, with more than 13,000 lives lost, including a heart-wrenching 5,500 children.

Meanwhile, the survivors remain trapped in a suffocating open-air prison — unable to leave and subjected to the ruthless bombardment of a relentless, seemingly endless Israeli campaign.

We in Europe and the West are supposed champions of international law, human rights, rules-based order, and accountability. But by our standards, we have not just failed, we have become complicit.

Irresponsible language is harming our civil harmony

Instead of dialling down the violence in the Middle East–before that violence spirals out of control–too many of our leaders are instead spending time tearing our own societies apart.

The irresponsible — yet publicised — language of prominent public figures is instead deliberately misrepresenting peaceful solidarity and civic activism, endangering not only Palestinians and Jewish populations, but our own civil harmony.

When columnist for the Spectator, Douglas Murray, described all protesters as barbarians, what effects did he think would echo across our frayed society?

When the UK’s former Home Secretary, Suella Braverman — who was fired only last week for her remarks — called pro-Palestinian demonstrations “hate marches,” and accused the Met Police of bending to “Islamists”, did she think she was making life safer for British Jews, let alone Muslims?

When a columnist for the Financial Times, Camilla Cavendish, misconstrued Pro-Palestinian demonstrators and the wider Muslim population as an “angry” maligned part of Britain “stoked by Islamo-fascists” was she considering the claims of war crimes and breaches of international law?

And when British political adviser, Nick Timothy, called for an authoritarian surveillance state, did he think strangling democracy would see it blossom?

Zero-sum thinking has little to give

Such claims not only stoke unfounded fears but also feed into a damaging stereotype that paints Muslims as a homogeneous, extremist group incompatible with the democratic values we value in the West.

This goes beyond mere recklessness — it is a manifestation of a wider, more insidious trend that drowns out dialogue, suppresses calls for justice, and fuels hostility.

Across the Atlantic, a surge in anti-Muslim sentiment includes the former and possibly next US president reviving talk of his travel ban.

Tragically, earlier last month, a six-year-old American child of Palestinian ancestry and Muslim faith was stabbed to death by his landlord.

And while US President Joe Biden has announced a National Strategy to Counter Islamophobia, how can such a strategy succeed when Biden himself casts doubt on Palestinian casualty figures?

Not surprisingly, the space for peaceful engagement shrinks daily. We have gone so far in the wrong direction that we have seen a Palestinian literary festival cancelled in Germany and an exhibit of premodern Islamic art in Pittsburgh postponed for fear the apolitical content might offend unnamed sensitivities.

But this zero-sum thinking has little to gift us except tension, polarisation, and paralysis.

It’s all about equal treatment

To be clear, I do not know any serious Muslim leader who wishes to see the end of Israel or has anything but revulsion from the Hamas attacks.

But the global response to the resulting Israeli invasion has amplified an uncomfortable truth: within our Western discourse, Palestinian lives often warrant mere footnotes rather than chapters.

A staggering 70% of the fatalities in Gaza are women and children. The area is effectively a “graveyard for children” and more children have died in Gaza in the past month than all global conflicts — combined — since 2019.

The mediating institutions that act as our moral touchstones, the United Nations, the International Committee of the Red Cross, and the Human Rights Watch — claim Israel has clearly breached international law. Yet their calls for a ceasefire have been condemned, mocked, or simply ignored.

For far too long, Palestinians have not been treated equally in Western eyes. Their pain and their occupation are most often treated as an inconvenient fact, a natural disaster we can do nothing about, instead of the product of politics and policies we have every ability and right to challenge.

The sweeping demonisation of pro-Palestinian voices doesn’t just deny basic civic rights and responsibilities. It alienates huge numbers, undermines the thoughtfulness of our foreign policy, and likewise makes it harder to build the kind of inclusive societies we need.

We in the West, with its professed commitment to human rights, must reconcile with its evident double standards.

We must see the fundamental injustice towards Palestinian lives. We must understand the vital need for all parties to respect international law.

Voices challenging our assumptions must be heard

I know what happens when leadership shirks its responsibility. Too often in Western society, we can’t agree on anything, even when it is manifestly in our interests to agree.

A disagreement on some issues has become a divorce on each and every one. In moments of crisis, we must hear voices that challenge our assumptions and ask us to do better.

If our museums are afraid of history, if our universities are afraid of scholarship, and if our governments police speech — I would not go so far as Murray and say we would all be barbarians, but I would suggest we are moving away from civilisation.

Ultimately, this unchecked conflict has the potential to ignite far more than just the Middle East, it could in fact completely destabilise and destroy the diverse tapestry of our democracies and Western societies.

We shouldn’t call for a ceasefire in Gaza because Muslims are “angry”, but because it’s the right thing to do.

Muddassar Ahmed is a former Independent Advisor to the UK Government and a Board Member of FODIP — Forum for Discussion of Israel & Palestine.

At Euronews, we believe all views matter. Contact us at [email protected] to send pitches or submissions and be part of the conversation.

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Shifa Hospital patients, staff and displaced leave the compound as Israel strikes targets in south

Post By World Gaza City, Gaza Egypt shipments, Gaza food supplies, Gaza’s shortage of food and water, Israel fuel, Israel’s military, Palestinians, Shifa Hospital

Patients, staff and displaced people left Gaza’s largest hospital Saturday, health officials said, leaving behind only a skeleton crew to care for those too sick to move and Israeli forces who had taken over the facility earlier in the week.

The exodus from Shifa Hospital in Gaza City came the same day internet and phone service was restored to the Gaza Strip, ending a telecommunications blackout that forced the United Nations to shut down critical humanitarian aid deliveries because it was unable to coordinate its convoys.

In the south, an Israeli airstrike hit a residential building on the outskirts of the town of Khan Younis, killing at least 26 Palestinians, according to a doctor at the hospital where the bodies were taken.

Israel’s military has been searching Shifa Hospital for traces of a Hamas command center that it alleges was located under the building — a claim Hamas and the hospital staff deny – and urging the several thousand people still there to leave.

On Saturday, the military said it had been asked by the hospital’s director to help those who would like to leave do so by a secure route.

The military said it did not order any evacuation, and that medical personnel were being allowed to remain in the hospital to support patients who cannot be moved.

But Medhat Abbas, a spokesman for the Health Ministry in Hamas-controlled Gaza, said the military had ordered the facility cleared, giving the hospital an hour to get people out.

After it appeared the evacuation was mostly complete, Dr. Ahmed Mokhallalati, a Shifa physician, said on social media that there were some 120 patients remaining who were unable to leave, including some in intensive care and premature babies, and that he and five other doctors were staying behind to care for them.

It was not immediately clear where those who left the hospital had gone, with 25 of Gaza’s hospitals non-functional due to lack of fuel, damage and other problems and the other 11 only partially operational, according to the World Health Operation.

Israel has said hospitals in northern Gaza were a key target of its ground offensive aimed at crushing Hamas, claiming they were used as militant command centers and weapons depots, which both Hamas and medical staff deny.

Israeli troops have encircled or entered several hospitals, while others stopped functioning because of dwindling supplies and loss of electricity.

Since occupying Shifa, Israel has been facing pressure to prove its claim Hamas set up its main command center in and under the hospital. So far, Israel has shown photos and video of weapons caches that it says were found inside, as well as what it said was a tunnel entrance. The Associated Press could not independently verify the Israeli claims.

The war, now in its seventh week, was triggered by Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack in southern Israel, in which militants killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted some 240 men, women and children.

More than 11,400 Palestinians have been killed in the war, two-thirds of them women and minors, according to Palestinian health authorities. Another 2,700 have been reported missing, believed buried under rubble. The count does not differentiate between civilians and combatants, and Israel says it has killed thousands of militants.

The U.N. has warned that Gaza’s 2.3 million people are running critically short of food and water, but it was not immediately clear when the agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, would be able to resume the delivery of aid that was put on hold Friday.

The Palestinian telecommunications provider said it was able to restart its generators after UNRWA donated fuel. The end of the communications blackout meant a return to news and messages from journalists and activists in the besieged enclave on social media platforms as service began to return late Friday night.

Gaza’s main power plant shut down early in the war and Israel has cut off the electricity supply. That makes fuel necessary to power the generators needed to run not only the telecommunications network, but water treatment plants, sanitation facilities hospitals and other critical infrastructure.

Israel has barred entry of fuel since the start of the war, saying it would be diverted by Hamas for military means. It has also blocked food, water and other supplies except for a trickle of aid from Egypt that aid workers say falls far short of what’s needed.

Going forward, Israel said it would allow in 10,000 liters (2,641 gallons) of fuel daily for communications service to continue, according to the U.S. State Department.

Additionally, COGAT, the Israeli military body responsible for Palestinian affairs, said it would amount to 60,000 liters (15,850 gallons) a day for the U.N.

Still, that is only 37% of the fuel needed by UNRWA to support its humanitarian operations, including food distribution and the operation of generators at hospitals and water and sanitation facilities, the U.N. said.

Gaza has received only 10% of its required food supplies each day in shipments from Egypt, according to the U.N., and the water system shutdown has left most of the population drinking contaminated water, causing an outbreak of disease.

Dehydration and malnutrition are growing, with nearly all residents in need of food, according to the U.N.’s World Food Program.

Thousands of marchers — including families of more than 50 hostages — snaked along a main Israeli highway Saturday on their last leg of a five-day walk from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Calling on the government to do more to rescue some 240 hostages held by Hamas, they planned to rally outside Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s house later in the day.

A spokesperson for the families, Liat Bell Sommer, said two members of Israel’s wartime Cabinet, Benny Gantz and Gadi Eisenkot, had agreed to meet with them. She added it was not yet clear whether Netanyahu would as well.

Many are furious with the government for refusing to tell them more about what is being done to rescue the hostages. They have urged the Cabinet to consider a cease-fire or prisoner swap in return for the hostages, both proposals which the government has thus far opposed.

Hamas offered to exchange all hostages for some 6,000 Palestinians in Israeli jails, which the Cabinet rejected.

Israel has signaled plans to expand its offensive south while continuing operations in the north.

In Khan Younis, the attack early Saturday hit Hamad City, a middle-class housing development built in recent years with funding from Qatar. In addition to the 26 people killed, another 20 were wounded, said Dr. Nehad Taeima at Nasser Hospital.

Israel rarely comments on individual strikes, saying only that it is targeting Hamas and trying to avoid harm to civilians. In many of the Israeli strikes, women and children have been among the dead.

Most of Gaza’s population is now sheltering in the south, including hundreds of thousands of people who heeded Israel’s calls to evacuate Gaza City and the north to get out of the way of its ground offensive.

Elsewhere, the Israeli military said its aircraft struck what it described as a hideout for militants in the urban refugee camp of Balata in the occupied West Bank. The Palestinian Red Crescent ambulance service said five Palestinians were killed in the strike.

The military alleged that those targeted had planned to carry out imminent attacks on Israeli civilians and military targets.

The deaths raised to 210 the number of Palestinians killed in West Bank violence since the Gaza war erupted on Oct. 7, making it the deadliest period in the territory since the second Palestinian uprising in the early 2000s.

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‘No childhood for them’: The desperate situation for children in Gaza

Post By World Gaza attack, Gaza City, Israel Hamas war, refugee children, save the children, united nations

More than a hundred children have been killed on a daily basis since the conflict in Gaza began on 7 October and, for many, a happy childhood is little more than a distant dream.

When Gaza’s southern border crossing opened up, briefly, a few thousand of the enclave’s 2.3 million people were recently able to escape to safety.

“My daughter asked me about the people leaving through the Rafah crossing,” says Raida, a mother of three who lives in Gaza.

“I explained to her that they have citizenship from other countries. She ran to get her piggy bank, which had 50 shekels [about €11] in it, and begged me to buy her a citizenship.”

“I am exhausted,” she says.

The heartbreaking story underscores just how desperate people are in Gaza, and how the deadly conflict has impacted children particularly hard.

“A humanitarian catastrophe is unfolding in Gaza, with unimaginable and unnecessary suffering,” Jason Lee, Save the Children’s Country Director in occupied Palestinian territory tells Euronews.

It’s a desperate picture in the region, more than a month on from the start of the conflict.

Upwards of 4,000 children have been killed so far – a hundred each ady – and countless more injured, often seriously.

“This number is still rising,” Lee adds, “For those children who survive the bombs and ground operations, many will die from disease, starvation, and dehydration if humanitarian aid continues to be weaponised”.

On Thursday, the United States announced that Israel had agreed to a four-hour humanitarian pause every day to get much-needed aid into the besieged Gaza strip.

Toby Fricker of UNICEF, the United Nation’s wing responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to children, says that those pauses will be crucial as the conflict rages on.

“Medical facilities and hospitals are in dire need of aid deliveries to bolster their resources,” he told Euronews, “They’re under such strain, especially when it comes to helping women who are giving birth, babies who are in incubators, children who are living with cancer, children who need dialysis, to name just a few examples.”

Aid workers on the ground in Gaza say that, due to the circumstances of the war, hundreds of thousands of people are forced to live in extremely close confines together.

Existing in such a way runs the risk of outbreak of disease, not least because the sanitation conditions are very challenging, especially when it comes to toilet facilities and massively overstretched water resources.

Before the conflict began on 7 October, UNICEF were already working with thousands of children, struggling with the pressures of living somewhere as unstable as the Gaza strip.

“Around half the child population, some 500,000, needed some form of mental health or psychosocial support,” Fricker explains, “They were living through fairly regular escalations of hostilities. They were living in a heightened sense of anxiety day in, day out, with fear of what could happen.”

Clearly, then, many of the children of Gaza had already experienced significant blows to their mental and physical well-being.

Fricker adds that the unprecedented escalation means children are now purely “struggling to survive”.

On top of the thousands of young people killed in the fighting, an estimated 300,000 children are currently suffering from various forms of malnutrition.

As the days go by, authorities are warning that this figure could rapidly grow, as well as the likelihood of an increase in waterborne diseases, children getting dehydrated after drinking contaminated or salty water – often the only liquid available – and those who aren’t able to get the vaccines they so desperately need to keep healthy.

Even before these afflicted children are even born, life is already a struggle for them.

In Gaza, there are an estimated 50,000 pregnant women requiring maternal health services and around 5,500 births each month.

20-year-old Bayan is seven months pregnant. When approached by UNICEF, she explained that, instead of the joyful anticipation that should accompany pregnancy, she is filled with an overwhelming terror.

“In my darkest moments, I wonder how I will ever get to the hospital when the roads are damaged, and transportation is non-existent. And even if I somehow make it to the hospital, will they be able to deliver my precious baby safely? The hospitals are overflowing with the injured and the dead,” Bayan says.

Even after these children are born, Fricker told Euronews “there’s no childhood for them”.

While UNICEF and other charities and aid workers on the ground are attempting to provide psychosocial support for these children and provide them with a safe space to simply be young, it’s a near-impossible task.

Many of them are sheltering in schools they should be attending. In relatively peaceful moments, Fricker says workers “try to give children an hour of childhood so that they can temporarily forget about the horrors around them”.

“Of course, it’s not enough,” he adds.

There have been countless reports of children resorting to self-harm – ripping hair out of their heads and scratching their skin until they bleed.

Many have panic attacks and early signs of PTSD, terrified over what will happen to them and their families.

According to international law, governments are responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to children – something that is proving concerningly hard in the Gaza conflict.

When asked about the future for these children living in what amounts to a hellscape, Fricker told Euronews: “right now no child, no family, no parent inside the Gaza Strip can even think of the future. UNICEF staff members on the ground speak about living not just day by day, but second by second.”

“The immediate needs for young people in Gaza are so acute that it’s very, very difficult to even think past the next hour, past the next day and certainly not, say, a year ahead. We don’t know when the conflict will end so, for now, part of the international community’s priority is to try to resume some sort of childhood for these youngsters wherever possible,” he added.

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Israel-Hamas war: Gaza hospitals at breaking point as Iran says Israel is ‘terrorist organisation’

Post By World Benjamin Netanyahu, Gaza attack, Gaza City, Hamas, Israel Hamas war, Israeli-Palestinian conflict

The latest developments from the Israel-Hamas war.

Iran asks Muslim countries to label Israeli army a ‘terrorist organisation’

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has called on Muslim countries to qualify the Israeli army as a “terrorist organisation” because of its armed operations in the Gaza Strip.

In a speech to Arab and Muslim leaders gathered in the Saudi capital, Raisi also asked Muslim countries to “arm the Palestinians” if “the attacks continue” in Gaza.

Pro-Palestinian march under heavy surveillance in London

Hundreds of people began to gather in London for a pro-Palestinian march organised under heavy police surveillance on this weekend of commemorations of the First World War armistice.

The police said they expected the presence of more than 100,000 demonstrators in the capital, who came to demand a ceasefire, five weeks after the deadly attack by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas against Israel.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has warned London police chief Mark Rowley that he will hold him “responsible”, particularly if protesters disrupt Armistice Day commemorations, planned at the same time in the capital.

“It is thanks to those who fought for this country and for the freedom we cherish that those who wish to demonstrate can do so, but they must do so in a respectful and peaceful manner,” Downing Street said in a statement.

The route of the march carefully avoids the Whitehall area, where the main Armistice ceremony is due to take place.

Nearly 2,000 police officers were mobilised to ensure the security of both the commemorations and the demonstration. The Metropolitan police stressed that this weekend would be “particularly tense and difficult”.

Fighting intensifies around Gaza hospitals – reports

Israel is facing increasing calls to protect civilians in Gaza, as fighting with Hamas intensified around hospitals in the small Palestinian territory where residents are seeking refuge to escape intense bombardment.

On the 36th day of the conflict triggered by an unprecedented attack by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas on Israeli soil, half of the 36 hospitals in Gaza which have been constantly bombed since 7 October are no longer functioning “at all” according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).

On Saturday morning, clouds of smoke rose into the sky over Gaza City and numerous gunshots could be heard.

The al-Chifa hospital, located in Gaza City, was the target of fire according to its director. “Al-Chifa was targeted all night by intense artillery fire, like other hospitals in Gaza City,” Mohammed Abou Salmiya said.

The director specified that the ambulances had not been able to pick up “dozens of dead” and “hundreds of injured” because of “the strikes and projectiles”.

According to Hamas, which has controlled the Gaza Strip since 2007, “one person was killed and many others were injured in strikes on the intensive care building of al-Shifa hospital” on Saturday morning, the day after a bombing which left 13 dead in this same hospital complex, according to Hamas.

The Israeli military has not yet commented on these claims. On Friday, they said they would “kill” Hamas fighters “who shoot from hospitals” in Gaza and said in the evening that they had eliminated “around 150 terrorists.”

The Palestinian Red Crescent said Israeli snipers fired on al-Quds hospital on Friday.

Arab and Muslim leaders will demand end to violence in Gaza

Arab leaders and Iran’s president will meet in Saudi Arabia on Saturday for a joint summit that is expected to highlight the urgency of ending Israel’s attacks on Gaza before conflict engulfs the region.

Emergency meetings of the Arab League and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) are being held in Riyadh, five weeks after the start of the war.

Since then, Israel has relentlessly bombed the Palestinian territory controlled by Hamas, killing more than 11,000 people, including at least 4,500 children, according to the Hamas government’s Health Ministry.

The Arab League and the OIC were initially scheduled to hold their meetings separately, but the Saudi Foreign Ministry announced early on Saturday that the two summits would be held jointly.

The Arab League will discuss “the way forward on the international stage to end the aggression, support Palestine and its people, condemn the Israeli occupation and hold it accountable for its crimes,” the deputy secretary general of the Arab League said.

Islamic Jihad, Hamas’ ally in Gaza, said, however, that it expected “nothing” from this meeting. “We do not place our hopes in such meetings” which have never produced results, Mohammad al-Hindi, deputy secretary general of the group, said on Friday at a press conference in Beirut.

“The fact that this conference is being held after 35 days (of war) is a clear indication,” he added.

Israel and its main ally, the United States, have so far rejected demands for a ceasefire, a stance that is expected to draw sharp criticism at Saturday’s meetings.

According to Saudi analyst Aziz Alghashian, fingers should not only be pointed at Israel, but also those who “make it easier… that is to say essentially the United States and the West” .

The differences in position were clearly displayed during the latest visit of US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to the region, and that of British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly on Thursday in Riyadh, where he met some of his counterparts.

“What we have said is that it is understandable to ask for a ceasefire, but we also recognize Israel’s right to take measures to ensure its own stability and security,” Cleverly said.

Red Cross: ‘Point of no return’ for hospitals in North Gaza

Hospitals, healthcare workers and patients in northern Gaza must be protected as intense fighting rages, the International Committee of Red Cross (ICRC) has said.

“Overstretched, running on thin supplies and increasingly unsafe, the healthcare system in Gaza has reached a point of no return risking the lives of thousands of wounded, sick and displaced people,” the organisation said.

The statement, which did not specifically name either the Israeli military or Palestinian militants, came after several reported strikes on or near at least four hospitals in northern Gaza. Tens of thousands of people had crowded into hospital grounds, believing they would be safe.

The ICRC noted that children’s hospitals had sustained major damage from the fighting. The Nasr Hospital was heavily damaged by fighting and Rantisi Hospital had to completely shut down, the statement said. It also added that Al-Quds Hospital is fast running out of supplies.

Macron ‘urges Israel to stop’ bombings killing civilians in Gaza

French President Emmanuel Macron “urges Israel to stop” the bombings killing civilians in Gaza, in an interview with the BBC.

“We share (Israel’s) pain. And we share their desire to get rid of terrorism.” But “de facto, today, civilians are being bombed. These babies, these women, these elderly people are being bombed and killed.” There is “no justification” and “no legitimacy for this. We therefore urge Israel to stop,” he stressed.

The Hamas Ministry of Health announced that 11,078 people, including 4,506 children, have been killed in Israeli bombardments on the Gaza Strip since the start of the war triggered by the bloody attack of the Palestinian Islamist movement against Israel on 7 October.

This “reaction in the fight against terrorism, because it is led by a democracy, must be consistent with the international rules of war and international humanitarian law,” said the French president.

Asked about a possible violation of international law by Israel, Emmanuel Macron stressed that he was “not a judge”, but “a head of state”.

He also expressed concern that the “massive bombing” of Gaza would create “resentment” in the region.

“There is no other solution than a humanitarian pause first” to move towards a “ceasefire, which will protect all civilians who have nothing to do with the terrorists,” he insisted.

“It is impossible to explain that we want to fight against terrorism by killing innocent people,” the French president further underlined.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reacted to Macron’s remarks by emphasising that “responsibility for any harm done to civilians lies with Hamas”, which started the war with the massacres of 7 October and which uses civilians as “human shields”.

More than 250 attacks on Gaza health care system – WHO

The World Health Organisation has verified more than 250 attacks on hospitals, clinics, patients and ambulances in Gaza since Hamas’ incursion into Israel on 7 October – as well as 25 attacks on health care in Israel.

In Gaza, the “health system is on its knees” and the situation on the ground “is impossible to describe,” WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council.

“As we speak, there are reports of firing outside the al-Shifa and Rantisi hospitals,” he said, adding that Palestinian health workers were still saving lives despite being “directly in the firing line.”

Last week saw attacks on five hospitals in one day in Gaza, Ghebreyesus said, and in the past 48 hours four hospitals with some 430 beds were put out of action.

He said half of the Gaza Strip’s 36 hospitals and two-thirds of its primary health care centres are not functioning, and facilities that are functioning “are operating way beyond their capacities.”

Israel lowers 7 October death toll to 1,200 people

Israel’s Foreign Ministry says the official death toll in Hamas’ 7 October cross-border attack into Israel has been lowered to 1,200 people.

Israeli officials have previously estimated the death toll at 1,400.

The ministry gave no reason for the revision. But an Israeli official said the number had been changed after a painstaking weeks long process to identify bodies, many of which were mutilated or burned.

The official said the final death toll could still change. He said a number of bodies have not been identified and it is unclear whether all of the nearly 240 hostages believed to be held by Hamas are still alive.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity pending an official government announcement.

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Israel Hamas war: Gaza comms remain down as UN warns ground offensive could cause even ‘more pain’

Post By World Benjamin Netanyahu, Gaza attack, Gaza City, Hamas, Israel, Israel Hamas war

All the latest developments from the Israel Hamas war.

UN chief ‘surprised’ by Israel’s ‘unprecedented’ bombardment of Gaza

UN Secretary-General António Guterres says he was surprised by Israel’s massive overnight airstrikes on Gaza amid a communication blackout across the besieged strip.

Writing Saturday on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, Guterres said he previously had felt encouraged by an apparent growing consensus on the need for a humanitarian cease-fire.

“Regrettably, instead I was surprised by an unprecedented escalation of bombardments, undermining humanitarian objectives. This situation must be reversed,” he said.

Guterres called President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi of Egypt on Saturday, and the two discussed ongoing diplomatic efforts to deescalate the war between Israel and Hamas, the Egyptian presidency said in a statement.

EU diplomacy chief calls for ‘pause in hostilities’

The High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, has called for a “pause in hostilities” to allow the delivery of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, hit by intense Israeli bombardments.

“Gaza is completely without power and completely isolated as intense bombardment continues,” Borrell said on social media. “Far too many civilians, including children, have been killed. This is contrary to international humanitarian law,” he wrote, adding: “A pause in hostilities is urgently required to allow humanitarian access.”

Erdogan: the West is the “main culprit” of the massacres in Gaza

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has accused the West of being “the main culprit of the massacres in Gaza”.

“The main culprits of the massacres in Gaza are the Westerners. With the exception of a few consciences who raised their voices, (these) massacres are totally the work of the West,” the head of state said.

He made the remarks during of a “meeting in support of Palestine” which brought together several hundred thousand people at the former Atatürk airport in Istanbul.

In a virulent speech against them, the Turkish head of state challenged Western powers of “creating an atmosphere of crusade” against Muslims.

“Everyone knows that Israel cannot take a step without them,” he said, criticising Western powers for failing to call for a ceasefire.

“You mourned the children killed in Ukraine, why this silence in the face of the children killed in Gaza?” he said.

Saying that a “million and a half people” attended the meeting, he accused Israel of “war crimes”.

“Israel, we declare you before the whole world a war criminal,” he said: “Israel, you are the occupiers, the invaders.”

“Of course every country has the right to defend itself, but where is the justice? What is happening in Gaza is not self-defence but a massacre,” continued the Turkish president.

President Erdogan did also add that it was important for Israelis not to “minimise the Turks’ feelings of pity”: “Listen to our calls for dialogue, take a step in the right direction for you and your children. We believe that there will be no losers in a just peace,” he added.

Israeli Defence Minister: the war with Hamas ‘has entered a new phase’

Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant has announced that the war against the Palestinian movement Hamas had “entered a new phase” after a night of intense bombings and an incursion by the Israeli army into the Gaza Strip.

“We have entered a new phase in the war. Yesterday, the earth in Gaza shook,” Mr. Gallant said in a video published by the ministry.

Israel’s latest military action takes pain in Gaza to ‘new level’ – UN human rights chief

The UN human rights chief has said Israel’s overnight intense air and ground bombardment has taken the crisis in Gaza to “a new level of violence and pain.”

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk’s comments came as Gaza remains cut off from the outside world following a communication blackout.

He said the blackout has added to the misery and suffering of civilians in the Palestinian territory, with ambulances and civil defence teams no longer able to locate the wounded.

“The humanitarian and human rights consequences will be devastating and long-lasting,” Turk said.

“Given the manner in which military operations have been conducted until now, in the context of the 56-year-old occupation, I am raising alarm about the possibly catastrophic consequences of large-scale ground operations in Gaza and the potential for thousands more civilians to die,” he added.

Elon Musk guarantees Starlink connection of ‘recognized’ organisations

Billionaire Elon Musk has assured that his Starlink satellite internet access service would support the connectivity of “internationally recognized aid organisations” in Gaza, cut off from the world since Friday due to the shutdown of telecommunications and Internet.

“Starlink will support the connectivity of internationally recognized aid organisations in Gaza,” wrote Elon Musk on the social network X (formerly Twitter), which he also owns.

He responded to a message from a Democratic representative in the American House of Representatives, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who on Saturday deemed the shutdown of telecommunications in the Palestinian territory “unacceptable”.

Palestinian killed by Israeli settler in West Bank – Palestinian ministry

A Palestinian was killed Saturday by an Israeli settler in the Nablus area of the northern occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Authority Health Ministry said.

Bilal Abou Salah, 40, is reported to have been “killed by a gunshot to the chest by a settler” in the village of Sawiya near Nablus, the ministry said in a statement.

The mayor of Sawiya, Mahmoud Hassan, told AFP that Bilal Abou Salah was killed while picking olives with other members of his family on their land located not far from the village’s security fence.

“They were attacked by four settlers and one of them, armed with an M16 rifle, opened fire on them without warning. Abu Salah was hit in the chest and he was martyred in front of his family and his children,” the ministry added.

The Israeli army has not yet made any comment.

Hamas Ministry of Health announces death toll of 7,703 in Gaza

The Hamas Health Ministry announced on Saturday that 7,703 people had been killed in the Gaza Strip since the start of the war with Israel.

According to the ministry, more than 3,500 children are among the deaths recorded since the start of the war on October 7. The latest report communicated on Friday showed 7,326 deaths.

Israel set to expand its ground operation in Gaza even further

Israel has announced it is expanding its ground operation in Gaza with infantry and armored vehicles backed by “massive” strikes from the air and sea, including the bombing of Hamas tunnels – a key target in its campaign to crush the territory’s ruling group after its bloody incursion in southern Israel three weeks ago.

The Israeli military released grainy images of tank columns moving slowly in open areas of Gaza and said warplanes bombed dozens of Hamas tunnels and underground bunkers.

“The forces are still on the ground and are continuing the war,” the army spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, said on Saturday, indicating that the next stage has begun in what is expected to evolve into an all-out ground offensive in northern Gaza.

Days ago, Israel had already amassed hundreds of thousands of troops along the border. Until now, troops have conducted brief nightly ground incursions before returning to Israel.

Hagari said the ground forces were backed by what he described as massive strikes from the air and sea. He said two more key Hamas military commanders were killed overnight, arguing that Israel was facing a “weakened” enemy. There was no immediate confirmation of that claim from Hamas.

Hundreds of buildings ‘completely destroyed’ in Gaza in latest Israeli raids

Hundreds of buildings were “completely destroyed” in the Gaza Strip in Israeli bombardments overnight, the Gaza Civil Defence service has announced.

“Hundreds of buildings and houses have been completely destroyed and thousands of other homes have been damaged,” Gaza Civil Defense spokesman Mahmoud Bassal told AFP, adding that the intense bombardments of the night had “changed the landscape” of the northern Gaza Strip.

Communications still cut off in the Gaza Strip

Phone and internet service in the Gaza Strip was cut off by Israeli bombardment late on Friday evening and the issue is continuing into Saturday, with hundreds of thousands of people uncontactable. Services were cut Friday evening, following a heavy round of Israeli airstrikes that lit up the night sky over the darkened territory.

Rights groups and journalists say they have lost contact with colleagues in the enclave and

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the head of the World Health Organisation, says the agency is still unable to reach its staff and health facilities in the region.

“I’m worried about their safety,” he wrote on X – formerly Twitter.

“Evacuation of patients is not possible under such circumstances, nor to find safe shelter. The blackout is also making it impossible for ambulances to reach the injured,” he added.

Bombings in Gaza: families of hostages demand explanations

The families of mostly Israeli hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip have expressed their “concern” and demanded explanations from the government after intense military operations in the Palestinian territory.

“Families are worried about the fate of their loved ones and are waiting for explanations. Every minute seems like an eternity. We demand that Defence Minister Yoav Gallant and members of the war cabinet meet with us this morning,” at the end of “a night of immense anguish”, according to a press release from the association bringing together the families of more than 220 hostages kidnapped by Hamas on 7 October.

The Forum expresses its “enormous anger that none of the members of the war cabinet took the trouble to meet the families of the hostages to explain one thing to them: does the ground operation endanger the 229 hostages” identified by the authorities.

Authorities have identified 229 hostages, according to the latest figures released on Friday by the Israeli army.

An American woman and her daughter as well as two Israeli octogenarians were released by Hamas after Egyptian-Qatari mediation.

Erdogan asks Israel to ‘stop this madness’ and ‘end the attacks’

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday asked Israel to “immediately stop this madness” and “put an end to its attacks” in a message posted on X (formerly Twitter).

“Israeli bombings that intensified last night on Gaza once again targeted women, children and innocent civilians and deepened the ongoing humanitarian crisis. Israel must immediately stop this madness and end its attacks,” he added.

Israeli army targets Hamas underground network

The Israeli army announced on Saturday that it had targeted the Hamas tunnel network by striking “150 underground targets” in the north of the Gaza Strip, during a night of intense bombardment.

Israel is convinced that the Palestinian Islamist movement directs and organises its operations from this gigantic network of underground tunnels and stores its arsenal there.

“Overnight, IDF warplanes struck 150 underground targets in the northern Gaza Strip, including tunnels used by terrorists, underground combat sites and other underground infrastructure. Several Hamas terrorists were killed,” the statement claimed.

The Israeli army also claims to have killed a Hamas official who was in charge of “paramotors, drones, detection equipment and air defence”.

“Asem Abu Rakaba took part in organising the massacre in the communities bordering the Gaza Strip on October 7… he led the terrorists who infiltrated Israel with paramotors and was responsible for the attacks of drones on IDF surveillance posts,” the statement said.

“We are bombing the Gaza Strip with unprecedented intensity. From the air, on the ground and underground – the IDF will eliminate any terrorists, whether major or secondary, and (destroy) the entire Hamas terrorist infrastructure,” it added.

Global protests calling for an end to the war ramp up

Thousands of protesters across the globe have been demanding an end to the ongoing conflict.

In New York City, hundreds of protesters in black T-shirts filled the city’s iconic Grand Central Terminal during the evening rush hour on Friday to demand a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war.

Many of the protesters were detained by police and taken out of the station, their hands zip tied behind their backs. The NYPD could not immediately say how many were taken into custody.

Inside the main concourse, protesters wore shirts that read “cease-fire now” and “not in our name” chanted, with some holding banners in front of the list of departure times.

In Indonesia, more than 3,000 protesters marched to the heavily guarded US Embassy in Jakarta on Saturday to demand an end to the war and bombardment of the Gaza Strip.

Waving Indonesian and Palestinian flags, the protesters, many wearing white Islamic robes, filled a major thoroughfare in downtown Jakarta running outside the embassy. About 1,000 police were deployed around the compound, which is blocked off by concrete road barriers.

The protesters, organised by the Indonesian Ulema Council, known as MUI, chanted “God is Great” and “Freedom for Palestine” during the noisy but peaceful protest. Banners and placards proclaimed, “We stand with Gaza,” and slammed the Israeli government while denouncing the staunch US support of Israel.

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#Israel #Hamas #war #Gaza #comms #remain #warns #ground #offensive #pain

Confusion over aid convoy reports as Israel vows to step up strikes

Post By World Benjamin Netanyahu, Gaza attack, Gaza City, Hamas, Israel Hamas war, Israeli-Palestinian conflict

The latest updates from the Israel Hamas war.

UN says no second convoy entered Gaza, despite reports

Egypt’s state-run media reported that 17 aid trucks were crossing into Gaza on Sunday – but the United Nations said no trucks had crossed.

“Until now, there is no convoy,” said Juliette Touma, spokeswoman for UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

On Saturday, 20 trucks entered in the first shipment into the territory since Israel imposed a complete siege two weeks ago.

Associated Press journalists saw seven fuel trucks head into Gaza, but Touma and the Israeli military said those trucks were taking fuel that had been stored on the Gaza side of the crossing deeper into the territory and that no fuel had entered from Egypt.

Israeli army claims it mistakenly struck an Egyptian position

The Israeli army has announced that one of its tanks had “mistakenly” hit an Egyptian position on the border between the two countries.

“A short time ago, an Israeli army tank mistakenly hit an Egyptian position near the border in the Kerem Shalom sector,” the army announced in a statement, saying it “deplored” this incident and announced the opening of an “investigation”.

Biden: ‘We can’t ignore the humanity of innocent Palestinians’

Joe Biden has reiterated that Israel has a right to defend itself but called on the country to “operate by the laws of war” in a post on X, formerly Twitter.

The US President wrote: “We can’t ignore the humanity of innocent Palestinians who only want to live in peace.”

Biden has yet to call for a humanitarian ceasefire in the besieged Gaza Strip – a move which has drawn significant criticism from the international community.

France rallies behind Israel

The President of France’s National Assembly,Yaël Braun-Pivet, visiting Israel on Sunday, indicated that Paris “fully supports Israel “, believing that nothing should “prevent it from defending itself” in the war between it and the Hamas militant group.

“France fully supports Israel, the only democracy in the Middle East, a democracy which has been attacked in a terrible way. So we must make no mistake, neither in combat nor in words,” declared Pivet.

She visited the Beeri and Re’im villages on Sunday with her Israeli counterpart in a show of solidarity. “France is linked to the pain of #Israël through mourning and the wait for the return of the hostages” she tweeted on the the social media platform X.

Second humanitarian aid shipment enters Gaza at Rafah Crossing

A convoy of 17 trucks bringing aid to besieged Palestinians crossed into Gaza on Sunday, Egypt’s state-run media reported.

The delivery will be the second shipment into the territory in the past two days – but the UN says it’s not enough.

Netanyahu: Hezbollah would make “the mistake of its life” by going to war against Israel

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Lebanese Hezbollah on Sunday that it would “make the mistake of its life” if it decided to go to war against Israel.

“It will make them regret the Second Lebanon War [in 2006]… we will strike with a power that they cannot imagine and which will be devastating for the State of Lebanon,” Mr Netanyahu declared during a visit to troops in the north of the country.

4,651 dead since the start of the war with Israel – Hamas Health Ministry

At least 4,651 Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas on 7 October, the Palestinian Islamist movement’s health ministry said on Sunday.

At least 1,873 children are among the dead, according to the ministry, which also recorded 14,245 injured – with 70% of them being children and women.

Gaza Strip: at least 55 dead in overnight Israeli bombings – Hamas

At least 55 people were killed in the Gaza Strip overnight from Saturday to Sunday after the announcement of the intensification of Israeli bombardments, Hamas has announced.

At least 55 people were killed “in the night until 6 a.m. and more than 30 homes (were) destroyed,” a Hamas statement said.

In its latest report on Saturday, Hamas reported nearly 4,400 deaths, mostly civilians, in Israeli strikes triggered by the bloody attack it launched on 7 October against Israel which left 1,400 dead.

Israel will intensify strikes on Gaza – army

The Israeli army announced that it will “increase” its bombings on the Gaza Strip, in preparation for the next phase of its offensive against the Palestinian territory controlled by Hamas.

“From today we will increase strikes [on the Gaza Strip]”, warned General Daniel Hagari, spokesperson for the Israeli army.

General Hagari also confirmed the presence of at least 210 hostages in the Gaza Strip, most of them Israelis.

Several Israeli army officials visited the troops on Saturday, emphasising the preparation of the armed forces for a likely ground intervention in the Gaza Strip.

“We are going to enter Gaza, we are going to do it for an operational purpose, to destroy the infrastructure and the Hamas terrorists and we are going to do it in a professional manner”, Major Herzi Halevi, the IDf’s Chief of the General Staff said.

“Gaza is complex, Gaza is densely populated, the enemy is preparing a lot of things there, but we are also preparing,” warned Halevi, adding, “We will keep in mind the photographs and images, as well as the deaths of two weeks ago.”

Israeli airstrikes hit airports in Damascus and Aleppo

Syrian state media reported that Israeli airstrikes early on Sunday targeted the international airports of the Syrian capital Damascus and the northern city of Aleppo, killing one person.

The runways were damaged and put out of service.

The attack is the second this month on the Damascus International Airport and the third on Aleppo’s airport as tensions increase in the Middle East over the Israel-Hamas war.

Syrian state media quoted an unnamed military official as saying the airports were struck by the Israeli military from the Mediterranean to the west and from Syria’s Israeli-occupied Golan Heights in the south.

It said one employee was killed and another wounded in Damascus in addition to material damage.

The Israeli military had no immediate comment.

Hezbollah is ‘dragging Lebanon into war’ – Israeli army

The Israeli army has accused Hezbollah of seeking military escalation at the risk of dragging Lebanon into a war, after new clashes at the border, where tension has been high since the attack launched on 7 October.

“Hezbollah is attacking and dragging Lebanon into a war from which it will not benefit, but in which it risks losing a lot,” warned a spokesperson for the Israeli army, Jonathan Conricus, on the social network X – formerly Twitter.

The international community fears a spillover from the war and especially a greater involvement in particular of the pro-Iranian Hezbollah, an ally of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas.

The Israeli army has been on alert on its northern border with Lebanon since 7 October.

Cross-border clashes left six Hezbollah fighters and a Palestinian Islamic Jihad member dead in Lebanon this weekend, while three Israeli soldiers were injured, one seriously, as well as two Thai agricultural workers.

Since 7 October, people have died on the Lebanese side, the majority combatants, but also civilians, including a journalist from the Reuters news agency.

Europeans in support of the besieged Gaza Strip

Thousands of people took part in a pro-Palestinian protest in London for the second consecutive weekend on Saturday. The Met Police estimated up to 100,000 people joined the march which ended near Downing Street.

In Germany, despite a ban on demonstrations issued by Berlin police, several hundred pro-Palestine demonstrators marched unhindered through the streets of the capital. Police officers on duty surrounded the demonstrators and finally allowed the procession to move on.

German police have recorded more than 1,100 offences in relation to the Israel-Gaza conflict in the last two weeks.

“Over 100 police officers have been injured by thrown bottles and fireworks,” said Interior Minister Nancy Faeser on Friday.

“This violence… is in no way acceptable,” she added.

Moving south to Rome, a few hundred people demonstrated on Saturday calling for a stop to Israeli airstrikes on Gaza.

Waving Palestinian flags, the demonstrators chanted “Free Palestine!” and held a red banner reading “No peace until we get freedom”.

“Israel carries out war crimes there, crimes against humanity there, and the international community has never acted,” said Maya Issa, president of the Movement of Palestinian Students in Italy, which organised the demonstration.

Israel strikes underground compound at West Bank mosque, military says

The Israeli Defence Forces said a military aircraft launched a strike early Sunday on the Al-Ansar mosque at the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank.

The IDF said via X, formerly known as Twitter, that Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants had been using an “underground terror route” beneath the mosque. One Palestinian was killed in the shelling, the Palestinian Red Crescent said.

US Defence Secretary orders more defence systems in Middle East

US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin announced late Saturday he was sending additional air defence systems to the Middle East as well as putting more troops on prepare-to-deploy orders.

Austin said the US would be delivering a Terminal High Altitude Area Defence, or THAAD, battery along with additional Patriot missile defence system batteries “to locations throughout the region to increase force protection for US troops.” Bases in Iraq and Syria have been repeatedly targeted by drones in the days since hundreds were killed in a hospital blast in Gaza, and the destroyer USS Carney intercepted land attack cruise missiles in the Red Sea shot from Yemen on Thursday.

Austin said he had also placed additional forces on prepare-to-deploy orders, “part of prudent contingency planning” as the US and others brace for the potential of a wider regional conflict and as Israel prepares to launch a ground assault into Gaza. He said he gave the orders after detailed discussions with President Joe Biden on the recent escalations by Iran and its proxy forces across the region.

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Israel’s Security Cabinet has declared the country is at war

Post By World Gaza City, Hamas, Israel, Palestine

Israel has declared it’s a nation at war as the death toll of the conflict has risen to at least 600 people, according to local media reports.

All the latest developments as fighting continues between Israel and Hamas.

Israel’s Security Cabinet declared the country is at war

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office says his Security Cabinet has declared the country at war following a deadly Hamas assault in southern Israel.

The decision, announced on Sunday, formally authorizes “the taking of significant military steps,” it said in a statement.

“The war that was forced on the State of Israel in a murderous terrorist assault from the Gaza Strip began at 06:00 yesterday,” it said.

It gave no further details. But Netanyahu had previously declared the country at war, and the military has promised a harsh response in Gaza.

Palestinians seek refuge in UN schools

The UN agency for Palestinian Refugees, UNRWA, said over 20,000 people were sheltering in 44 of its schools around Gaza by Saturday evening.

“The number (of displaced) is rapidly increasing, “ said Inas Hamdan, acting public information officer in Gaza.

The agency said three of its schools suffered “collateral” damage from Israeli airstrikes. The agency also said its operations of nine water wells around the Gaza Strip were stopped early on Saturday. Operations in three wells resumed on Sunday, said Hamdan.

The agency’s food distribution centres, which provide for over 540,000 Gaza residents, have been closed since Saturday.

Hundreds killed since Saturday

The death toll in Israel following a surprise attack by the militant group Hamas stands at 600, according to several Israeli media outlets.

The Kan public broadcaster and Channel 12, as well as the Haaretz and Times of Israel newspapers, reported the toll on Sunday.

There has been no official confirmation of the number of deaths on the Israeli side since the fighting erupted early on Saturday.

Palestinian officials say more than 300 people have been killed in Gaza, without differentiating between fighters and civilians.

Netanyahu says there will be a ‘long and difficult’ war

Israeli forces on Sunday tracked down hundreds of Palestinian fighters who infiltrated into their territory and bombarded the Gaza Strip after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke of a “long and difficult” war against Hamas.

The surprise offensive, launched at dawn on Saturday by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas in power in Gaza, left hundreds dead on both sides.

“The first phase is being completed… with the elimination of the vast majority of enemy forces that have infiltrated our territory,” Netanyahu said, warning the Israelis that they were “embarking on a long and difficult war.”

The army announced that it would evacuate all residents living near the Palestinian territory in the next 24 hours.

On Sunday, Israeli forces regained control of the Sderot police station, bordering Gaza, after “neutralising 10 terrorists who were there”, according to police.

The Israeli authorities have not provided any figures on the civilians and soldiers kidnapped by Palestinian fighters, but the Israeli online news site Ynet puts forward “an estimate of around a hundred people”.

Hamas and Islamic Jihad, another armed Palestinian group, claimed to have captured “numerous soldiers” from Israel.

Schools will remain closed on Sunday, the start of the week in Israel.

UN Peacekeepers call for restraint

Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group fired dozens of rockets and shells on Sunday at three Israeli positions in a disputed area along the country’s border with Syria’s Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

Hezbollah said in a statement that the attack using “large numbers of rockets and shells” was in solidarity with the “Palestinian resistance.” It said the Israeli positions were directly hit.

A UN peacekeeping force deployed along Lebanon’s southern border called for “everyone to exercise restraint” and make use of the force’s “liaison and coordination mechanisms to de-escalate” and prevent a fast deterioration of the security situation.

It said it had detected several rockets fired from southeast Lebanon toward “Israeli-occupied territory,” followed by artillery fire from Israel toward Lebanon.

Israel’s military fired back at the Lebanese areas, but there was no immediate word on casualties.

Rockets fired overnight

Before daybreak on Sunday, rockets were fired from Gaza towards Israel, hitting a hospital in the coastal town of Ashkelon. The hospital sustained damage, said senior hospital official Tal Bergman.

There was no report of casualties.

Israeli airstrikes in Gaza had intensified after nightfall, flattening residential buildings in giant explosions, including a 14-story tower that held dozens of apartments as well as Hamas offices in central Gaza City.

Around 3 am, a loudspeaker atop a mosque in Gaza City blared a stark warning to residents of nearby apartment buildings: Evacuate immediately. Just minutes later, an Israeli airstrike reduced one nearby five-story building to ashes.

After one Israeli strike, a Hamas rocket barrage hit four cities, including Tel Aviv and a nearby suburb. Throughout the day, Hamas fired more than 3,500 rockets, the Israeli military said.

Netanyahu says Israel will cut off supplies to Gaza

Israel will stop supplying electricity, fuel and goods to Gaza, according to a statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office Saturday night. Much of Gaza was already thrown into darkness by nightfall after electrical supplies from Israel, which supplies almost all of the territories’ power, were cut off earlier in the day.

Israel’s allies express their unconditional support

On Saturday, Western allies expressed their unconditional support for Israel. The United States warned “any party hostile to Israel” from exploiting the situation.

US President Joe Biden added that his country’s support for Israel was “rock solid and unwavering”

“In this moment of tragedy, I want to say to them and to the world and the terrorists everywhere: the United States stands with Israel,” he said. ” We will not ever fail to have their back.”

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen condemned what she called a “senseless attack carried out by Hamas against Israel” amid a day of unprecedented violence in the region.

Speaking to attendees of the two-day gathering of the Renaissance political party in Bordeaux, von der Leyen branded the attack as “terrorism” and said that Israel had the right to defend itself.

She also said the European Union “stands with Israel”, and that the “ordeal” would be the latest in a long list of challenges that would be “overcome together”.

Support for Hamas

Thousands in Turkey’s capital Istanbul participated in a march called “March for Fatah” to support the Palestinians.

It was a response echoed in Sanaa in Yemen, where thousands of pro-Palestine Yemeni supporters took to the streets with Palestinian flags on Saturday to celebrate Hamas’ surprise attack on Israel.

In Beirut, Lebanon, hundreds of Hezbollah supporters took to the streets, waving the Palestinian flags together with the Hezbollah flag and chanting supportive slogans while others distributed celebratory sweets to passers-by.

Supporters hailed Hamas’ operation and considered it a victory for the resistance against Israel. Others expressed their joy and happiness and announced the 7th of October as a day of victory.

While in Iran, lawmakers chanted “death to Israel” in their parliament chamber on Saturday after Hamas’ unprecedented, wide-ranging incursion into Israel.

Airlines suspend flights to Israel

Airlines cancelled more than 80 flights to and from Tel Aviv by Saturday evening — roughly 14% of all flights scheduled — because of the unprecedented attack in Israel by the militant group Hamas, according to FlightAware.

Delta Air Lines and American Airlines cancelled flights Saturday night and Sunday night from New York’s JFK Airport to Tel Aviv, although a Delta return flight was able to depart Tel Aviv Saturday night. United Airlines also cancelled a Saturday flight from San Francisco. An earlier United flight turned around over Greenland and returned to San Francisco.

German carrier Lufthansa cancelled several flights between Frankfurt and Tel Aviv.

British man among the dead

A young British Jewish man fighting with the Israeli army was killed in the Hamas attack, his family said on Sunday, while another remains “missing” after he was lost near the Gaza border.

London resident Gaby Shalev confirmed the death of her brother Nathanel Young on Facebook.

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