Tag: Israel latest news

Biden says Israel shouldn’t press into Rafah without ‘credible’ plan to protect civilians

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Israel shouldn’t go ahead with a military operation in the densely populated Gaza border town of Rafah without a “credible” plan to protect civilians, President Joe Biden told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday, the White House said.

They spoke after two Egyptian officials and a Western diplomat said Egypt threatened to suspend its peace treaty with Israel if Israeli troops are sent into Rafah, where Egypt fears fighting could force the closure of the besieged territory’s main aid supply route.

The threat to suspend the Camp David Accords, a cornerstone of regional stability for nearly a half-century, came after Mr. Netanyahu said sending troops into Rafah was necessary to win the four-month war against the Palestinian militant group Hamas. He asserted that Hamas still has four battalions there.


Also read: Netanyahu promises ‘safe passage’ to Palestinians ahead of Rafah operation

Over half of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million have fled to Rafah to escape fighting in other areas, and they are packed into sprawling tent camps and U.N.-run shelters near the border. Egypt fears a mass influx of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees who may never be allowed to return.

Mr. Netanyahu told “Fox News Sunday” that there’s “plenty of room north of Rafah for them to go to” after Israel’s offensive elsewhere in Gaza, and said Israel would direct evacuees with “flyers, with cellphones and with safe corridors and other things.”

The standoff between Israel and Egypt, two close U.S. allies, took shape as aid groups warned that an offensive in Rafah would worsen the catastrophic humanitarian situation in Gaza, where around 80% of residents have fled their homes and where the U.N. says a quarter of the population faces starvation.

A ground operation in Rafah could cut off one of the only avenues for delivering Gaza’s badly needed food and medical supplies.

Hamas’ Al-Aqsa television station quoted an unnamed Hamas official as saying that any invasion of Rafah would “blow up” talks mediated by the United States, Egypt and Qatar aimed at achieving a cease-fire and the release of Israeli hostages.

Mr. Biden last week called Israel’s military response in Gaza “over the top.”

All three officials confirmed Egypt’s threats, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief reporters on the sensitive negotiations. Qatar, Saudi Arabia and other countries have also warned of severe repercussions if Israel goes into Rafah.

“An Israeli offensive on Rafah would lead to an unspeakable humanitarian catastrophe and grave tensions with Egypt,” European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell wrote on X.

Human Rights Watch said in a statement that forced displacement is a war crime and that civilians who don’t evacuate are still protected by international humanitarian law. “There is nowhere safe to go in Gaza,” refugee and migrant rights researcher Nadia Hardman said.

The White House, which has rushed arms to Israel and shielded it from international calls for a cease-fire, has also warned against a Rafah ground operation under current circumstances, saying it would be a “disaster” for civilians.

Israel and Egypt fought five wars before signing the Camp David Accords, a landmark peace treaty brokered by then-U.S. President Jimmy Carter in the late 1970s. The treaty includes several provisions governing the deployment of forces on both sides of the border.

Egypt has heavily fortified its border with Gaza, carving out a 5-kilometer (3-mile) buffer zone and erecting concrete walls above and below ground. It has denied Israeli allegations that Hamas operates smuggling tunnels beneath the border, saying Egyptian forces have full control on their side.

Egyptian officials fear that if the border is breached, the military would be unable to stop a tide of people fleeing into the Sinai Peninsula.

The United Nations says Rafah, normally home to fewer than 300,000 people, now hosts 1.4 million more who fled fighting elsewhere, and it is “severely overcrowded.”

Inside Rafah, some displaced people packed up again. Rafat and Fedaa Abu Haloub, who fled Beit Lahia in the north earlier in the war, placed their belongings on the back of a truck. “We don’t know where we can safely take him,” Fedaa said of their baby. “Every month we have to move, and with all the fear and missiles.”

An Israeli ground invasion of Rafah may force Palestinians in Gaza to flee to Egypt, Om Mohammad Al-Ghemry said, and she hoped that Egyptians would “open the borders and let us flee to Sinai.”

Israel has ordered much of Gaza’s population to flee south, with evacuation orders covering two-thirds of the territory, even as it regularly carries out airstrikes in all areas, including Rafah. Airstrikes on the town in recent days have killed dozens of Palestinians, including women and children.

Israel’s offensive has caused widespread destruction, particularly in northern Gaza, and heavy fighting continues in central Gaza and the southern city of Khan Younis. In Gaza City on Sunday, remaining residents covered decomposing bodies in the streets or carried bodies to graves. Some streets were piled high with sand from bombings.

Gaza’s Health Ministry said Sunday that the bodies of 112 people killed across the territory had been brought to hospitals in the past 24 hours, as well as 173 wounded people. The fatalities brought the death toll in the strip to 28,176 since the start of the war. The ministry does not distinguish between civilians and fighters but says most of those killed were women and children.

The war began with Hamas’ attack into southern Israel on Oct. 7, when Palestinian militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted around 250. Over 100 hostages were released in November during a weeklong cease-fire in exchange for 240 Palestinian prisoners. Some of the remaining hostages have died.

Hamas has said it won’t release any more unless Israel ends its offensive and withdraws from Gaza. It has also demanded the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, including senior militants serving life sentences.

Mr. Netanyahu has ruled out both demands, saying Israel will fight on until “total victory” and the return of all the hostages.



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Israel strikes 2 homes, killing more than 90 Palestinians while hundreds have been detained

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More than 90 Palestinians, including dozens from an extended family, were killed in Israeli airstrikes on two homes, rescuers and hospital officials said Saturday, a day after the UN chief warned again that nowhere is safe in Gaza and that Israel’s offensive is creating “massive obstacles” to distribution of humanitarian aid.

Also Saturday, the Israeli military said troops arrested hundreds of alleged militants in Gaza over the past week and transferred more than 200 of them to Israel for further interrogation, providing rare details on a controversial policy of mass roundups of Palestinian men.

The army said more than 700 people with alleged ties to the militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad have so far been sent to Israeli lockups.

Israel declared war after Hamas gunmen stormed across the border on Oct. 7, killing some 1,200 people and taking some 240 hostages.

More than 20,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s war to destroy Hamas and more than 53,000 have been wounded, according to health officials in Gaza, a besieged territory ruled by the Islamic militant group for the past 16 years.

Despite mounting international calls for a cease-fire, Israel has vowed to keep up the fight until Hamas is destroyed and removed from power in Gaza and all the hostages are freed.

The Biden administration has shielded Israel in the diplomatic arena. On Friday, the UN Security Council adopted a watered-down resolution that calls for immediately speeding up aid deliveries to desperate civilians in Gaza, but not for a cease-fire.

The Health Ministry in Gaza on Saturday evening said 201 people had been killed over the past 24 hours.

On Friday, airstrikes flattened two homes, one in Gaza City and the other in the urban refugee camp of Nuseirat in the center of the territory.

The Gaza City strike killed 76 people from the al-Mughrabi family, making it one of the deadliest of the war, said Mahmoud Bassal, a spokesman for Gaza’s Civil Defense department. He provided the names of 16 heads of households within the family, and said the dead included women and children.

Among those killed were Issam al-Mughrabi, a veteran employee of the UN Development Program, his wife, and their five children.

“The loss of Issam and his family has deeply affected us all. The UN and civilians in Gaza are not a target,” said Achim Steiner, the head of the agency. “This war must end.” Later Friday, a strike pulverized the Nuseirat home of Mohammed Khalifa, a local TV journalist, killing him and at least 14 others, according to officials at the nearby Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Hospital where the bodies were taken. Mourners held funeral prayers Saturday in the hospital’s courtyard while rescue teams continued to search for survivors. The legs of at least two bodies were seen under what appeared to be a collapsed roof.


Also Read | Gaza in flames: On Israel’s expanding offensive

Israel blames Hamas for the high civilian death toll, citing the militants’ use of crowded residential areas and tunnels. Israel has launched thousands of airstrikes since Oct. 7, and has largely refrained from commenting on specific attacks.

Israel’s offensive has been one of the most devastating military campaigns in recent history, displacing nearly 85 per cent of Gaza’s 2.3 million people and leveling wide swaths of the tiny coastal enclave. More than half a million people in Gaza — a quarter of the population — are starving, according to a report this week from the United Nations and other agencies.

The military spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, said late Friday that forces are widening the ground offensive “to additional areas of the strip, with a focus on the south.” He said operations were also continuing in the northern half of Gaza, the initial focus of Israel’s ground offensive. The army said that it carried out airstrikes against Hamas fighters in several locations of Gaza City.

The army statement on detentions followed earlier Palestinian reports of large-scale roundups of teenage boys and men from homes, shelters and hospitals in northern Gaza where ground troops have established firmer control. Some of the released detainees have said they were stripped to their underwear, beaten and held for days with minimal water.

Hamas called on the International Committee of the Red Cross and other global organizations to put pressure on Israeli authorities to reveal the whereabouts and conditions of hundreds of people in Gaza who were detained.

Israel’s military has denied abuse allegations and said those without links to militants were quickly released.


Also Read | Israel orders more Gaza evacuations as envoys seek truce

Israel says it has killed thousands of Hamas militants, including about 2,000 in the past three weeks, but has not presented evidence. It says 139 of its soldiers have been killed in the ground offensive.

Following the UN resolution, it was not immediately clear how and when aid deliveries would accelerate. Currently, trucks enter through two crossings — Rafah on the border with Egypt and Kerem Shalom on the border with Israel. On Friday, fewer than 100 trucks entered the crossings, the UN said — far below the daily average of 500 before the war.

Both crossings were closed Saturday by mutual agreement among Israel, Egypt and the UN, Israeli officials said.

Ahead of the Security Council vote, the US negotiated the removal of language that would have given the UN authority to inspect aid going into Gaza, something Israel says it must continue to do itself to ensure material does not reach Hamas.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Friday that it’s a mistake to measure the effectiveness of the humanitarian operation by the number of trucks.

“The real problem is that the way Israel is conducting this offensive is creating massive obstacles to the distribution of humanitarian aid inside Gaza,” he said. He said the prerequisites for an effective aid operation don’t exist: security, staff who can work in safety, logistical capacity and the resumption of commercial activity.

Mr. Guterres said “much more is needed immediately” to end the “nightmare” for people in Gaza.

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Israel’s mass arrest campaign isolates fighting age men as part of Gaza campaign

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The Israeli military has rounded up hundreds of Palestinians across the northern Gaza Strip, separating families and forcing men to strip to their underwear before trucking some to a detention camp on the beach, where they spent hours, in some cases days, subjected to hunger and cold, according to human rights activists, distraught relatives and released detainees themselves.

Palestinians detained in the shattered town of Beit Lahiya, the urban refugee camp of Jabaliya and neighborhoods of Gaza City said they were bound, blindfolded and bundled into the backs of trucks. Some said they were taken to the camp at an undisclosed location, nearly naked and with little water.

“We were treated like cattle, they even wrote numbers on our hands,” said Ibrahim Lubbad, a 30-year-old computer engineer arrested in Beit Lahiya on December 7 with a dozen other family members and held overnight. “We could feel their hatred.”

The roundups have laid bare an emerging tactic in Israel’s ground offensive in Gaza, experts say, as the military seeks to solidify control in evacuated areas in the north and collect intelligence about Hamas operations nearly 10 weeks after the group’s deadly October 7 attack on southern Israel. Militants killed about 1,200 people and abducted over 240 that day.

“This is already helping us, and it will be crucial for the next stage of the war,” said Yaakov Amidror, a former national security adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “That’s the stage where we clean areas from all the remnants of Hamas.”

In response to questions about alleged mistreatment, the Israeli military said that detainees were “treated according to protocol” and were given enough food and water. The army spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, said this week that arrests took place in two Hamas strongholds in northern Gaza and that detainees were told to strip to make sure they didn’t conceal explosives.

Hagari said the men are questioned and then told to dress, and that in cases where this didn’t happen, the military would ensure it doesn’t occur again. Those believed to have ties to Hamas are taken away for further interrogation, and dozens of Hamas members have been arrested so far, he said.

The others are released and told to head south, where Israel has told people to seek refuge, Hagari said.

Photos and video showing Palestinian men kneeling in the streets, heads bowed and hands bound behind their backs, sparked outrage after spreading on social media. U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller on Monday said the United States “found those images deeply disturbing” and was seeking more information.

To Palestinians, it is a stinging indignity. Among those rounded up were boys as young as 12 and men as old as 70, and they included civilians who lived ordinary lives before the war, according to interviews with 15 families of detainees.

“My only crime is not having enough money to flee to the south,” said Abu Adnan al-Kahlout, an unemployed 45-year-old with diabetes and high blood pressure in Beit Lahiya. He was detained December 8 and released after several hours when soldiers saw he was too faint and nauseated to be interrogated.

“Do you think Hamas are the ones waiting in their homes for the Israelis to come find them now?” he asked. “We stayed because we have nothing to do with Hamas.”

Israeli forces have detained at least 900 Palestinians in northern Gaza, estimated Rami Abdo, founder of the Geneva-based advocacy group Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, which has worked to document the arrests. Based on testimony it collected, the group presumes Israel is holding most detainees from Gaza at the Zikim military base just north of the enclave.

Tens of thousands of Palestinians are believed to have stayed in the north despite the danger — unable to afford a ride, unable to abandon disabled relatives or convinced things are no safer in the overcrowded south, which also has come under daily bombardment.

Palestinians cowered with their families for days as Israel poured heavy machine-gun fire into Beit Lahiya and Jabaliya, the tank shelling and firefights with Hamas militants stranding families in their homes without electricity, running water, fuel or communications and internet service. Hundreds of buildings have been crushed by Israeli bulldozers, clearing paths for tanks and armored troop carriers.

“There are corpses all over the place, left out for three, four weeks because no one can reach them to bury them before the dogs eat them,” said Raji Sourani, a lawyer with the Palestinian Center for Human Rights in Gaza. He said he saw dozens of dead bodies as he made his way from Gaza City to the southern border with Egypt last week. Israeli forces are holding one of his colleagues, human rights researcher Ayman al-Kahlout, in custody.

Palestinians recount similar terrifying scenes as the Israeli military combs through northern towns. Soldiers go door to door with dogs, using loudspeakers to call on families to come outside, residents said. Or they blast doors of homes open with a grenade, yelling at men to remove their clothes and confiscating money, IDs and cellphones.

In most cases, women and children are told to walk away to find shelter.

Some released detainees reported soldiers shouting sexually explicit insults at women and children and beating men with their fists and rifle butts after bursting into their homes. Others reported enduring humiliating stretches of near-nudity as Israeli troops took the photos that later went viral. Some guessed they were driven several kilometers (miles) before being dumped in cold sand.

The Israeli military declined comment on where the detainees were taken.

Abu Adnan al-Kahlout’s family believes its members were singled out for mistreatment because they share a last name with the spokesman for Hamas’ military wing better known by his nom de guerre, Abu Obeida. But family members — among them electricians, a tailor, a bureau chief for London-based news site Al-Araby Al-Jadeed and employees of Hamas’ political rival, the Palestinian Authority — insist they have nothing to do with Gaza’s Islamic militant rulers.

Three family members remain in Israeli custody. No one has heard from them in days. Other relatives, like 15-year-old Hamza al-Kahlout and 65-year-old Khalil al-Kahlout, returned home Dec. 8 to find their five-story building a charred skeleton. They fled to a nearby U.N. shelter at a school. But the Israeli military stormed the school and arrested them again as it pressed on with its crackdown.

Released detainees said their wrists were blistered from tightly drawn handcuffs. Exposed to the chill of night, they endured repeated questions about Hamas activities that most couldn’t answer. Soldiers kicked sand in their faces and beat those who spoke out of turn.

Several Palestinians held for 24 hours or less said they had no food and were forced to share three 1.5-liter bottles with some 300 fellow detainees. Construction worker Nadir Zindah said he was fed meager scraps of bread over four days in custody.

Darwish al-Ghabrawi, a 58-year-old principal at a U.N. school, fainted from dehydration. Mahmoud al-Madhoun, a 33-year-old shopkeeper, said the only moment that gave him hope was when soldiers released his son, realizing he was just 12.

Returning home brought its own horrors. Israeli soldiers dropped detainees off after midnight without their clothes, phones or IDs near what appeared to be Gaza’s northern border with Israel, those released said, ordering them to walk through a landscape of destruction, tanks stationed along the road and snipers perched on roofs.

“It was a death sentence,” said Hassan Abu Shadkh, whose brothers, 43-year-old Ramadan and 18-year-old Bashar, and his 38-year-old cousin, Naseem Abu Shadkh, walked shoeless over jagged mounds of debris until their feet bled. They begged the first person they saw for rags to cover their bodies.

Naseem, a farmer in Beit Lahiya, was shot and killed by an Israeli sniper as they made their way to a U.N. school in Beit Lahiya, Abu Shadkh said. His brothers were forced to leave their cousin’s body in the middle of the road.

Israeli officials say they have reason to be suspicious of Palestinians remaining in northern Gaza, given that places like Jabaliya and Shijaiyah, in eastern Gaza City, are well-known Hamas bastions.

“We will continue to dismantle each and every one of these Hamas strongholds until we finish in Jabaliya and Shijaiyah and then continue,” government spokesperson Eylon Levy said, signaling the military would widen its campaign as ground forces press deeper into the south, where over a million Palestinians have taken refuge.

He said the southern town of Khan Younis, now at the center of fighting, would be next.

“We will of course work out who needs to be arrested and detained and put to justice as a Hamas terrorist and who does not,” Levy said.

Human rights groups say mass arrests should be investigated.

“It isn’t clear on what basis Israel is holding them and it raises real serious questions,” said Omar Shakir, Human Rights Watch’s regional director. “Civilians must only be arrested for absolutely necessary and imperative reasons for security. It’s a very high threshold.”

Meanwhile, families plead for information about loved ones who disappeared. The International Committee of the Red Cross said its hotline had received 3,000 calls from people trying to connect with missing relatives from the beginning of the war until Nov. 29.

“I can’t take not knowing, I feel sick,” said 40-year-old Zindah, the construction worker, who arrived Monday by foot at the hospital in Deir al-Balah after four days in Israeli detention with his 14-year-old son, Mahmoud. “I don’t know where my wife and seven kids are. Are they alive? Are they dead? Are they in prison?”

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Israel-Hamas war, Day 23 LIVE updates | Gaza civilians should move south where humanitarian efforts ‘will be expanding’: Israeli military

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The Health Ministry in the Hamas-run Gaza said Israeli strikes had killed 7,703 people, mainly civilians, including more than 3,500 children

October 29, 2023 07:46 am | Updated 10:55 am IST

The Israeli military fires shells toward the Gaza Strip on October 28, 2023.
| Photo Credit:
AFP

Israel’s army relentlessly hammered the territory on October 28 after fierce overnight bombardment that rescuers said destroyed hundreds of buildings three weeks into a war sparked by the deadliest attack in the country’s history.

The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk warned that there was a potential for thousands more civilians to die if Israel presses a major ground offensive in Gaza. The U.N. rights chief also condemned the Internet and telecommunications blackout that has hit the Palestinian enclave since Friday.

The Health Ministry in the Hamas-run Gaza said Israeli strikes had killed 7,703 people, mainly civilians, including more than 3,500 children.

Also Read | Israel-Hamas war Day 22 updates

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Saturday that fighting inside the Gaza Strip would be “long and difficult”, as Israeli ground forces operate in the Palestinian territory for more than 24 hours. The Israeli military spokesman said the country is expanding its ground operation in Gaza with infantry and armoured vehicles backed by “massive” strikes from the air and sea.

Israel unleashed its bombing campaign after Hamas gunmen stormed across the Gaza border on October 7, killing 1,400 people, mostly civilians, and seizing more than 220 hostages, according to Israeli officials.

Meanwhile, the United Nations on Friday overwhelmingly called for an immediate humanitarian truce and demanded aid access to the besieged Gaza Strip and protection of civilians. India was among the 45 countries who abstained from voting.

(With inputs from agencies)

Follow the live updates here:

  • October 29, 2023 10:55

    Explained | How much financial aid does U.S. provide to Israel?

    The Biden administration on October 20 sought emergency assistance from the U.S. Congress amounting to $14.3 billion in aid to Israel amid the ongoing war with Hamas in Gaza Strip.

    In an address to the nation, U.S. President Joe Biden declared his support for Israel [and Ukraine as well, against Russia] and said that the urgent funding for Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan, as well as humanitarian aid and border management is a “smart investment that’s going to pay dividends for American security for generations.”

    Read more here

  • October 29, 2023 10:37

    PM Modi discusses humanitarian assistance with Egypt’s El-Sisi as Israel attacks Gaza

    PM Narendra during the weekend spoke with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi to discuss the latest in the Israel-Palestine conflict which reached a critical stage with Israeli forces rolling into the north Gaza during late Saturday. The discussion indicated fast moving international exchanges among the key stakeholders as Prime Minister Benyanmin Netanyahu asserted that Israel will fight a “long and difficult” war against Hamas in Gaza.

    The discussion also indicates the importance that India attaches to the role of Egypt in ensuring humanitarian assistance to Gaza Strip where most of the Israeli military action is focusing right now. On October 22 India sent humanitarian relief meant for Gaza to Egypt’s El Arish airbase. However, Palestinian ambassador to India Adnan Abu Al-Haija had told The Hindu that much of the relief material that various countries have been sending for Gaza remained stuck inside Egypt because of intense military activity by Israel as well as because of shortage of fuel for the trucks inside Gaza.

    Read more here

  • October 29, 2023 10:10

    Gaza civilians should move south where humanitarian efforts ‘will be expanding’: Israeli military

    The Israeli military on Sunday told civilians in Gaza to move to the south of the besieged Strip, where it said humanitarian efforts “will be expanding”.

    “Tomorrow, the humanitarian efforts to Gaza, led by Egypt and the United States, will be expanding,” IDF spokesperson Daniel Hagari said in a statement recorded on Saturday.

    – AFP

  • October 29, 2023 09:59

    Israel pounds Gaza as Red Cross warns of ‘intolerable’ suffering

    Israel further intensified its attacks on Gaza Sunday, warning its war on Hamas would be “long and difficult”, as calls mounted to end the violence and the Red Cross warned of “intolerable” suffering.

    The United Nations said thousands more civilians could die in Gaza as Israel announced the war had entered a “second stage”, with ground forces still operating inside the Hamas-run territory more than 24 hours after entering it on Friday.

    Relentless Israeli strikes on Gaza have killed more than 8,000 people, half of them children, the Hamas-controlled health ministry in the territory said Saturday.

    – AFP

  • October 29, 2023 09:45

    Hamas ready to release Israeli hostages in return for Palestinian prisoners

    Hamas’s top leader in Gaza Yehia Sinwar said the Palestinian militant groups are ready to release Israeli hostages in return for Palestinian prisoners in Israel’s jails.

    “We are ready immediately to have an exchange deal that includes releasing all prisoners in the prisons of the Zionist occupation enemy in return for the release of all prisoners held by the resistance,” he said in a comment posted Saturday evening on Hamas media groups.

    The Israeli military spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, dismissed the offer as “psychological terror” andsaid Israel is working on multiple channels to free the hostages.

    – AP

  • October 29, 2023 09:34

    No international aid entered the Gaza Strip on Saturday

    No international aid entered the Gaza Strip on Saturday, as the communications blackout created by Israel continued.

    Nebal Farsakh, a spokesperson for the Palestinian Red Crescent, told The Associated Press that no aid trucks entered Gaza on Saturday because communication was impossible and teams inside Gaza couldn’t connect with Egyptian Red Crescent or United Nations personnel.

    Before Saturday, a total of 84 aid trucks were let into Gaza, a tiny amount for a population of 2.3 million people in need of power, food, medical supplies and clean drinking water.

    – AP

  • October 29, 2023 08:55

    Gaza connectivity ‘being restored’: Internet monitor Netblocks

    Internet connectivity in the Gaza Strip is being restored, the global network monitor Netblocks said Sunday.

    “Real-time network data show that internet connectivity is being restored in the #Gaza Strip,” the company wrote on X, formerly Twitter, while an AFP employee in Gaza City said shortly after 4 a.m. (0200 GMT) that he could use the internet and phone network and had contacted people by phone.

    – AFP

  • October 29, 2023 08:37

    India abstains from UNGA vote on Israel, says terrorism is a ‘malignancy’ without naming Hamas

    Terrorism is a “malignancy” and knows no borders, nationality or race and the world should not buy into any justification of terror acts, India has told the U.N. General Assembly as it abstained on a resolution on the Israel-Hamas conflict.

    India on Friday abstained in the UN General Assembly on a Jordanian-drafted resolution titled ‘Protection of civilians and upholding legal and humanitarian obligations’ that called for an immediate humanitarian truce in the Israel-Hamas conflict and unhindered humanitarian access in the Gaza strip.

    Read more here

  • October 29, 2023 08:22

    Israel says its war can both destroy Hamas and rescue hostages

    The Israeli military has sought to assure the public it can achieve the two goals of its war on Hamas simultaneously — toppling the strip’s militant rulers and rescuing some 230 hostages abducted from Israel.

    But as the army ramps up airstrikes and ground incursions on the blockaded enclave, laying waste to entire neighborhoods in preparation for a broader invasion, the anguished families of hostages are growing increasingly worried those aims will collide — with devastating consequences.

    – AP

  • October 29, 2023 08:02

    Telephone, internet gradually returning in Gaza

    Telephone and internet communications are returning gradually to the Gaza Strip, several Palestinian media outlets said early on Sunday.

    – Reuters

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Israel-Hamas war, Day 13 updates: Israel says border village Manara shelled from Lebanon, no casualties

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Scores of foreigners were killed, wounded or taken hostage after Hamas attacked Israel on October 7.

The worst attack in Israel’s 75-year history killed more than 1,400 people, mostly civilians, inside the country, according to Israeli officials.

According to an AFP count, around 200 foreigners have been confirmed dead by their national authorities, with many also holding Israeli nationality. Some 203 people have been confirmed to have been abducted, Israel said on October 19.

United States: 31 dead, 13 missing, others abducted

At least 31 US citizens have been killed since the Hamas attack last week, the White House said late Tuesday. Another 13 American nationals are unaccounted for.

President Joe Biden said Tuesday that Americans were also among those detained by Hamas.

Thailand: 30 dead, 17 hostages

Thirty Thais have been killed, Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin said Wednesday.

Another 17 are thought to have been abducted.

About 30,000 Thais work in Israel, most in the agricultural sector, according to government figures.

France: 21 dead, 11 missing

Twenty-one French nationals have been killed, while 11 others remain missing, many of whom are “very probably Hamas hostages”, according to the foreign ministry.

The hostages include Mia Shem, a Franco-Israeli woman who was in a video released Monday by Hamas. It was the first time the Palestinian Islamist movement has released a video showing a hostage since its attack on Israel.

Russia: 19 dead, two hostages, seven missing

Nineteen Russian-Israeli citizens have been confirmed dead, according to the Russian embassy in Israel cited by the state Ria Novosti news agency.

Two Russian-Israeli citizens are hostages and seven Russian nationals are missing.

Ukraine: 18 dead

Eighteen Ukrainian citizens have been confirmed dead, according to Ukraine’s ambassador in Israel, Yevgen Korniychuk.

Nepal: 10 dead, one missing

Ten Nepali citizens were killed in Kibbutz Alumim, the Himalayan republic’s embassy in Tel Aviv said. Four others were hospitalised and contact had been lost with a fifth.

The kibbutz was hosting 17 Nepali students at the time of the attack.

Argentina: Seven dead, 15 missing

Argentina’s foreign ministry confirmed that seven citizens had been killed and 15 others were missing.

U.K.: At least seven dead, nine missing

At least seven Britons have been confirmed dead and nine remain missing, according to a death toll released by Downing Street on Wednesday.

Among the dead was Yahel Sharabi, a 13-year-old girl who was killed with her mother Lianne. Her older sister Noiya, 16, and her father Eli are still missing.

Canada: Six dead, two missing

Six Canadians have died and two were missing, according to a government update on Tuesday.

Austria: Four dead, one missing

Four Israeli-Austrians were killed in the attacks, authorities said. One person remains missing.

China: Four dead, two missing

China’s foreign ministry said Monday that four Chinese nationals were killed and two were missing.

Romania: Four dead, one missing

Romania announced on Saturday the death of four nationals, including an Israeli-Romanian soldier. One other Romanian is still missing.

Belarus: Three dead, one missing

The Belarusian embassy in Tel Aviv said three of its citizens had died and another was missing.

Brazil: Three dead

The foreign ministry said Friday a Brazilian woman had been killed, bringing the total number of deaths to three.

Philippines: Three dead, three missing

The Philippines foreign ministry has said a 49-year-old woman was killed at a music festival that was being held just kilometres from the Gaza border.

Previously authorities said a 33-year-old woman and a 42-year-old man had been killed at a kibbutz.

Three citizens remained missing.

Peru: Two dead, five missing

Two Peruvians were killed and five missing, the authorities said.

South Africa: Two dead

The South African government announced that two of its nationals had been killed.

Australia: One dead

Foreign Minister Penny Wong said an Australian woman had been killed in the attacks.

Azerbaijan: One dead

The foreign ministry has said that one Azerbaijani national had been killed.

Cambodia: One dead

Cambodia’s Prime Minister Hun Manet said one Cambodian student had been killed.

Chile: One dead, one missing

A Chilean woman has been killed, say the authorities.

A kibbutz resident has been reported missing, according to the foreign ministry.

Colombia: One dead, one missing

Bogota announced the death of one Colombian and said another was missing.

Honduras: One dead

Honduran authorities confirmed on Friday the death of one of their nationals.

Ireland: One dead

A 22-year-old Irish-Israeli woman was killed in the attacks, the Irish government said.

Italy: One dead, two missing

A 65-year-old Italian-Israeli man was confirmed dead after DNA tests, the foreign ministry said on Tuesday.

Two other dual nationals remained missing.

Portugal: One dead, four missing

One Portuguese national was killed and four were missing, Foreign Minister Gomes Cravinho said.

Spain: One dead, one missing

The foreign ministry said one Spanish citizen had been killed.

A Spaniard from the Basque country, married to a Chilean woman, is one of the hostages being held in Gaza, according to Madrid.

Switzerland: One dead

An Israeli-Swiss national was killed in the October 7 attack.

Turkey: One dead, one missing

Ankara confirmed Friday that a Turkish-Israeli citizen, who had moved to Israel with his family in 1972, had been killed. Another was missing.

Germany: Several dead

The German foreign ministry said Wednesday that a number of Germans were among those killed, without giving a precise death toll.

“Unfortunately, we have to assume that a single-digit number of German casualties have fallen victim to Hamas terror,” a foreign ministry spokesman said, indicating that the number was fewer than 10.

The ministry spoke of “eight known cases” of hostages being held by Hamas, one of which may involve several people.

“A small double-digit number” of hostages with German nationality are involved, the spokesman said.

Mexico: Two hostages

Foreign Minister Alicia Barcena wrote on social media that two Mexicans, a man and a woman, had been taken hostage.

Netherlands: One hostage

An 18-year-old was taken hostage in the Beeri kibbutz, where he was visiting his girlfriend, according to the Israeli embassy in the Netherlands.

Paraguay: Two missing

Two Paraguayan nationals who had been living in Israel are missing, the government said.

Sri Lanka: Two missing

Sri Lanka’s ambassador to Israel said Tuesday that two nationals, a 48-year-old man and a 49-year-old woman, were missing.

Tanzania: Two missing

Tanzania’s ambassador to Israel told AFP two Tanzanian nationals were missing.

– AFP

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Israeli President urges PM Netanyahu to halt legal overhaul; mass protests, strike ramp up pressure

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Workers from a range of sectors in Israel launched a nationwide strike on March 27, threatening to paralyse the economy as they joined a surging protest movement against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to overhaul the judiciary.Tens of thousands of Israelis demonstrated outside parliament and workers launched a nationwide strike on Monday, as a surging mass protest movement threatened to paralyze the economy in its efforts to halt Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to overhaul the judiciary.

Departing flights from the country’s main international airport were grounded, large mall chains and universities shut their doors, and Israel’s largest trade union called for its 800,000 members — in health, transit, banking and other fields — to stop work. Diplomats walked off the job at foreign missions, local governments were expected to close the preschools they run and cut other services, and the main doctors union announced its members would also strike.

The growing resistance to Netanyahu’s plan came hours after tens of thousands of people burst into the streets around the country in a spontaneous show of anger at the prime minister’s decision to fire his defense minister after he called for a pause to the overhaul. Chanting “the country is on fire,” they lit bonfires on Tel Aviv’s main highway, closing the thoroughfare and many others throughout the country for hours.

Demonstrators gathered again Monday outside the Knesset, or parliament, turning the streets surrounding the building and the Supreme Court into a roiling sea of blue-and-white Israeli flags dotted with rainbow Pride banners. Large demonstrations in Tel Aviv, Haifa and other Israeli cities drew thousands more.

“This is the last chance to stop this move into a dictatorship,” said Matityahu Sperber, 68, who joined a stream of people headed to the protest outside the Knesset. “I’m here for the fight to the end.”

Also Read | Israel passes law protecting Netanyahu as protests continue

It was unclear how Netanyahu would respond to the growing pressure. Some members of Netanyahu’s Likud party said they would support the prime minister if he did heed calls to halt the overhaul, while Israeli media, citing unnamed sources, reported that he could indeed pause it.

The plan — driven by Netanyahu, who is on trial for corruption, and his allies in Israel’s most right-wing government ever — has plunged Israel into one of its worst domestic crises. It has sparked sustained protests that have galvanized nearly all sectors of society, including its military, where reservists have increasingly come out publicly to say they will not serve a country veering toward autocracy.

Israel’s Palestinian citizens, however, have largely sat out the protests. Many say Israel’s democracy is tarnished by its military rule over their brethren in the West Bank and the discrimination they themselves face.

The turmoil has magnified longstanding and intractable differences over Israel’s character that have riven it since its establishment. The protesters say they are fighting for the very soul of the nation, saying the overhaul will remove Israel’s system of checks and balances and directly challenge its democratic ideals.

The government has labelled them anarchists out to topple a democratically elected leadership and says the plan will restore a balance between the judicial and executive branches and rein in what they see as an interventionist court with liberal sympathies.

At the center of the crisis is Netanyahu himself, Israel’s longest serving leader, and questions about the lengths he may be willing to go to maintain his grip on power, even as he battles charges of fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes in three separate affairs. He denies wrongdoing.

On Monday afternoon, Netanyahu issued his first statement since he fired Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, urging against violence ahead of a planned counterprotest in Jerusalem organized by ultranationalist supporters of the judicial overhaul.

The counterprotest was also slated to take place outside parliament. “They won’t steal the election from us,” read a flyer for event, organized by Religious Zionist party.

“I call on all protesters in Jerusalem, right and left, to behave responsibly and not act violently,” Netanyahu wrote on Twitter.

The firing of Netanyahu’s defense minister at a time of heightened security threats in the West Bank and elsewhere, appeared to be a last straw for many, including apparently the Histadrut, the country’s largest trade union umbrella group, which had sat out the monthslong protests before the defense minister’s firing.

“Where are we leading our beloved Israel? To the abyss,” Arnon Bar-David, the group’s head, said in a rousing speech to applause. “Today we are stopping everyone’s descent toward the abyss.”

On Monday, as the embers of the highway bonfires were cleared, Israel’s ceremonial president, Isaac Herzog, called again for an immediate halt to the overhaul.

“The entire nation is rapt with deep worry. Our security, economy, society — all are under threat,” he said. “Wake up now!”

Also Read | Israeli group asks court to punish PM Netanyahu over legal plan

Opposition leader Yair Lapid said the crisis was driving Israel to the brink.

“We’ve never been closer to falling apart. Our national security is at risk, our economy is crumbling, our foreign relations are at their lowest point ever, we don’t know what to say to our children about their future in this country,” Lapid said.

The developments were being watched by the Biden administration, which is closely allied with Israel yet has been uneasy with Netanyahu and the far-right elements of his government. National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said the United States was “deeply concerned” by the developments.

Netanyahu had reportedly spent the night in consultations and was set to speak to the nation, but later delayed his speech.

The architect of the plan, Justice Minister Yariv Levin, a popular party member, had long promised he would resign if the overhaul was suspended. But on Monday, he said he would respect the prime minister’s decision should he halt the legislation.

Still, Netanyahu’s hard-line allies pressed him to continue on. “We must not halt the reform in the judicial system, and we must not give in to anarchy,” National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said.

Netanyahu’s dismissal of Gallant appeared to signal that the prime minister and his allies would barrel ahead. Gallant had been the first senior member of the ruling Likud party to speak out against it, saying the deep divisions were threatening to weaken the military.

And Netanyahu’s government forged ahead with a centerpiece of the overhaul — a law that would give the governing coalition the final say over all judicial appointments. A parliamentary committee approved the legislation on Monday for a final vote, which could come this week.

The government also seeks to pass laws that would would grant the Knesset the authority to overturn Supreme Court decisions and limit judicial review of laws.

A separate law that would circumvent a Supreme Court ruling to allow a key coalition ally to serve as minister was delayed following a request from that party’s leader.

Netanyahu returned to power late last year after a protracted political crisis that sent Israelis to the polls five times in less than four years. The elections were all a referendum on Netanyahu’s fitness to serve while on trial for corruption.

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