Condemnation pours in for Israel’s attack on aid convoy

Condemnation pours in for Israel’s attack on aid convoy

Post By World Famine, Food aid, Israel Hamas war, Jews, The Gaza Strip, united nations

All the latest developments from the Israel Hamas war.

Condemnation for Israel’s attack on aid convoy

Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan are among the countries which have so far condemned Israeli forces for firing on a crowd of Palestinians waiting for aid in Gaza City on Thursday.

In a statement issued late Thursday, the Turkish Foreign Ministry accused Israel of using “starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza” and alleged that the latest event, which left more than 100 people dead, was evidence “of Israel’s intention to destroy the entire Palestinian population.”

“The entire world must realise that the atrocity in Gaza is about to become a global catastrophe with repercussions far beyond the region,” the ministry said. “We therefore call on all those with influence over the Israeli government to stop the ongoing violence in Gaza.”

The Turkish ministry described the attack as “yet another crime against humanity.”

The incident received condemnation from European authorities too, with EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borell, describing it as “totally unacceptable carnage”.

The UN has called for a probe into the attack.

“I condemn Thursday’s incident in Gaza in which more than 100 people were reportedly killed or injured while seeking life-saving aid,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres wrote on social media.

“The desperate civilians in Gaza need urgent help, including those in the north where the UN has not been able to deliver aid in more than a week.”

France, Italy and Germany also called for an independent investigation into the attack on Friday.

More than 100 people were killed in the attack, bringing the death toll since the start of the Israel-Hamas war to more than 30,000, according to health officials. At least 700 others were wounded.

Hospital officials initially reported an Israeli strike on the crowd, but witnesses later said Israeli troops opened fire as people pulled flour and canned goods off of trucks.

Israeli officials acknowledged that troops opened fire, saying they did so after the crowd approached in a threatening way. The officials insisted on anonymity to give details about what happened, after the military said in a statement that “dozens were killed and injured from pushing, trampling and being run over by the trucks.”

After the strike, Gaza’s Health Ministry, which is run by Hamas, said the Palestinian death toll from the war in the territory had climbed to 30,035, with another 70,457 wounded. Most of those killed have been women and children. The ministry’s count does not distinguish between fighters and non-combatants.

Israel claims it has killed 10,000 militants, but has offered no evidence.

Impossible to aid Palestinians amid unrelenting conflict – UN

The United Nations has said it is almost impossible to assist Gaza’s 2.3 million people due to the ongoing violence.

It made the comments in response to recent Israeli claims that the international organisation itself is failing to deliver much-needed food, water and medicine to civilians in the embattled enclave.

On Wednesday, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told reporters a breakdown of law and order in Gaza and “insufficient coordination” with Israel on security was putting the lives of humanitarian workers at risk.

“That’s why we’ve repeatedly asked for a humanitarian ceasefire,” he said.

UN officials say Israeli airstrikes have targetted police officers guarding aid trucks, exposing them to looting by desperate civilians and criminal gangs.

Drivers have been shot at, attacked with axes and box cutters, and had their windows smashed, said UN humanitarian coordinator James McGoldrick in February.

Israeli forces have also reportedly fired on UN aid convoys carrying vital food supplies in central Gaza.

Israel’s deputy UN ambassador Brett Miller on Tuesday blamed the UN for refusing to deliver aid to northern Gaza and shifting the blame onto his country

At least one-quarter of Gaza’s population – 576,000 people – is one step away from famine and virtually the entire population needs food, according to the UN.

Ultra-Orthodox Jews eyed in new military draft law

Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant has urged his government to come up with a new draft law that would force ultra-Orthodox Jews to serve in the military, claiming the war in Gaza leaves the country with “no other choice.”

Military service is compulsory for Jewish males, but politically powerful ultra-Orthodox parties have won exemptions for their communities to allow men to pursue religious education. This has caused resentment and anger in some quarters.

“The Torah has protected Judaism for 2,500 years; however, without our physical existence, there’s no spiritual existence,” Gallant said Wednesday evening.

“Every sector of the country needs to work together to protect our home,” he continued.

Gallant said he would also extend the enlistment and reserve duty requirements for the military as well.

There are approximately 60,000 ultra-Orthodox males of military age currently not serving in the military, according to Hiddush, an organisation that promotes religious equality. Israel mobilised some 300,000 reservists after Hamas’ 7 October attack.

Ultra-Orthodox parties – a key coalition partner of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – want to maintain exemptions.

In the past, attempts to overhaul the draft law to include the ultra-Orthodox have drawn tens of thousands of ultra-Orthodox to the streets in large, violent protests that blocked major roadways.

Aid workers face deportation from Israel

Dozens of humanitarian staff have been forced to leave Israel and Palestinian territories, according to a group representing aid agencies

The Association of International Development Agencies (AIDA) said Israel has stopped granting visas for international workers in humanitarian organisations, hampering efforts to get food and other vital supplies into Gaza.

Others – including the key figures within aid organisations – are overstaying their visas and risk deportation to continue working.

Emergency response teams, experienced in working with Gaza, have been especially impacted, said Faris Arouri, AIDA director.

Israel’s visa block means aid groups have not been able to bring any experts into Jerusalem, where aid to Gaza is coordinated.

“We are being forced to advocate just to let staff come to Jerusalem,” Arouri said, adding that the visa freeze was unprecedented.

“There have always been ups and downs, especially since the second intifada [from 2000 to 2005]. There were phases where there were some restrictions or where access was harder. But never on this scale.”

More than 150 jobs were affected, Arouri said.

Nearly 100 visas of staff had already experienced or would do so within weeks, he detailed, adding that humanitarian organisations were unable to recruit the staff needed to scale up operations, as the situation in Gaza grows increasingly dire.

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US to block UN resolution for Gaza ceasefire as Israel bombs Rafah

Post By World Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel, Joe Biden, The Gaza Strip, USA

The World Health Organisation warned on Sunday that the Nasser Hospital in Gaza is “not functional anymore”.

Israeli strikes across Gaza killed at least 18 people overnight and into Sunday, according to medics and witnesses, as the United States said it would veto another draft UN ceasefire resolution.

An airstrike in Rafah overnight killed six people, including a woman and three children, and another strike killed five men in Khan Younis, the main target of the offensive over the past two months.

In Gaza City, which was isolated, largely evacuated and suffered widespread destruction in the initial weeks of the war, an airstrike flattened a family home, killing seven people, including three women, according to Sayed al-Afifi, a relative of the deceased.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu remained defiant to international pressure over a ground operation in Rafah – where 1.4 million Palestinians, more than half the enclave’s population, are sheltering – and to calls for a two-state solution to the conflict.

Such calls were reiterated by the French and Egyptian leaders on Sunday who, according to a readout of their call from the Elysée “expressed their firm opposition to an Israeli offensive at Rafah, which would lead to a humanitarian catastrophe on a new scale, as well as any forced displacement of populations into Egyptian territory, which would constitute a violation of international humanitarian law and pose a further risk of regional escalation”.

“They also stressed the need to work towards a way out of the crisis, and the decisive and irreversible relaunch of the political process, with a view to the effective implementation of the two-state solution,” the readout also says.

Negotiations ‘not progressing as expected’

But Netanyahu’s Cabinet adopted a declaration Sunday saying Israel “categorically rejects international edicts on a permanent arrangement with the Palestinians” and opposes any unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state, which it said would “grant a major prize to terror” after the Oct. 7 attack that triggered the war.

Netanyahu has vowed to continue the offensive until “total victory” over Hamas and to expand it to Gaza’s southernmost town of Rafah.

The US, Israel’s top ally, which hopes to broker a ceasefire agreement and hostage release between Israel and Hamas, and envisions a wider resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, meanwhile said it would veto a draft UN ceasefire resolution circulated by Algeria.

The Arab representative on the UN Security Council’s resolution calls for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, unhindered humanitarian access, as well as rejecting the forced displacement of Palestinian civilians.

US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said in a statement late Saturday that the draft resolution runs counter to Washington’s own efforts to end the fighting and “will not be adopted.”

“It is critical that other parties give this process the best odds of succeeding, rather than push measures that put it — and the opportunity for an enduring resolution of hostilities — in jeopardy,” she said.

The US, Qatar and Egypt have spent weeks trying to broker a ceasefire and hostage release, but there’s a wide gap between Israel and Hamas’ demands and Qatar said Saturday that the talks “have not been progressing as expected.”

Hamas has said it will not release all of the remaining hostages without Israel ending the war and withdrawing from Gaza. It is also demanding the release of hundreds of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel, including top militants.

Netanyahu has publicly rejected both demands and any scenario in which Hamas would be able to rebuild its military and governing capabilities. He said he sent a delegation to ceasefire talks in Cairo last week at Biden’s request but doesn’t see the point in sending them again.

WHO team prevented from entering Nasser Hospital

Meanwhile, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said that Nasser Hospital, the main medical centre serving southern Gaza, “is not functional anymore” after Israeli forces raided the facility in the southern city of Khan Younis last week.

Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the head of the UN health agency, said a WHO team was not allowed to enter Nasser Hospital on Friday or Saturday “to assess the conditions of the patients and critical medical needs, despite reaching the hospital compound to deliver fuel alongside partners.”

In a post on X, formerly Twitter, he said there are still about 200 patients in the hospital, including 20 who need urgent referrals to other hospitals.

Israel says it has arrested over 100 suspected militants, including 20 who it says participated in Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel, without providing evidence. The military says it is looking for the remains of hostages inside the facility and does not target doctors or patients.

The Gaza Health Ministry said 70 medical personnel were among those arrested, as well as patients in hospital beds who were taken away in trucks. Ashraf al-Qidra, a spokesperson for the ministry, said soldiers beat detainees and stripped them of their clothes. There was no immediate comment from the military on those allegations.

The war erupted after Hamas burst through Israel’s defences and attacked communities across southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking around 250 hostage. Militants still hold around 130 hostages, a fourth of whom are believed to be dead, after most of the others were released during a weeklong ceasefire in November.

At least 28,985 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been killed since the beginning of the war, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its records. The toll includes 127 bodies brought to hospitals in the past 24 hours, it said Sunday. Around 80% of Gaza’s population have been driven from their homes and a quarter face starvation.

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The UNRWA case reveals a much larger problem with humanitarian aid

Post By World euroviews, extremism, Humanitarian aid, Israel Hamas war, The Gaza Strip, UNRWA

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

The global consensus that humanitarian work is essential too easily surrenders the moral high ground, often with devastating consequences. It is time to recover that ground, Ambassador Mark Wallace and Dr Hans-Jakob Schindler write.

Evidence implicating UNRWA employees in the 7 October terrorist attacks should come as no surprise to anyone who has followed the activities of the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees closely.

Allegations that some UNRWA workers were in fact Hamas operatives are merely the latest iteration of a much larger problem plaguing the international aid sector.

A stunning lack of oversight and regulation of humanitarian funds over the past several decades has allowed untold billions in taxpayer money to make their way into terrorists’ coffers.

While aid agencies may baulk at what they perceive as burdensome “red tape”, strict oversight and transparency are in fact fundamental to humanitarian work: they ensure that aid is delivered to those who need it, not diverted to extremist and terrorist groups.

Claims of no knowledge increasingly strain credulity

For years, UNRWA has played host to bad actors uninterested in a peaceful resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

According to a dossier presented by Israeli intelligence, one in ten staff are terrorist “operatives”.

Some 23% of male UNRWA workers in Gaza have ties to Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), compared to 15% of male Gazans as a whole. And 49% are alleged to have “close relatives” also tied to either Hamas or PIJ.

Claims by UNRWA that it had no knowledge of the vast network of Hamas tunnels under schools and hospitals, funded by billions of dollars of diverted aid, increasingly strain credulity.

Several UNRWA personnel over the years have been discovered to be terrorists or officials of terrorist organisations, including PIJ rocket-maker Awad al-Qiq, former Hamas interior minister Said Siam, and Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, a suicide bomber who killed seven CIA employees in Afghanistan in 2009.

On 7 October, 12 UNRWA personnel helped Hamas execute the massacre, or aided the group in the wake of the attack.

According to the dossier, one of the agency staffers took a woman hostage, another dispensed ammunition, and a third took part in mass murder at an Israeli kibbutz.

This case is no exception

How did humanitarian workers come to play a role in the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust?

The reality is that UNRWA is by no means the exception when it comes to humanitarian terror financing. In the world of international aid, it’s an occupational hazard.

Throughout the 1990s, the Taliban regularly harassed and robbed aid agencies. The current Taliban regime likewise uses a network of sham local organisations to divert aid money.

In the early 2000s, reports emerged that in Somalia, the al-Qaida affiliate al-Shabaab had siphoned off so much international aid that it established a “Humanitarian Coordination Office”, charging aid groups to “register”.

Several years later, al-Shabaab continued to extort aid deliveries via roadblocks and so-called “taxes”.

In 2018, a partial audit of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) found that some $700 million (€649m) of US taxpayer-funded programming in Iraq and Syria had been improperly vetted.

That same year, several dozen individuals and organisations who had received USAID funding in the region were blacklisted, and over $200m (€185.5m) in funds were frozen.

The Houthi rebel group in Yemen stifles almost all movement of international aid through the areas they control; they have set up a “humanitarian” agency, the Supreme Council for the Management and Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and International Cooperation (SCMCHA), for the express purpose of re-directing aid toward their own militant ends. The results have been catastrophic for the Yemeni people.

Decisions that didn’t age well

Regulating aid is not simply about alleviating security concerns. On the ground, any dime relinquished to a militant group is unlikely to achieve its stated aims and, as in the case of UNRWA, in fact, exacerbates the conflict it is trying to alleviate.

Just two years ago, the Biden administration began funding UNRWA again on the basis that the organisation had made commitments to “transparency, accountability, and neutrality”.

Several European governments, including Germany, even increased UNRWA funding in the wake of the October attacks.

Those decisions have obviously not aged well. But they are the result of a steady flow of arguments from humanitarian workers and aid groups who claim that regulations and sanctions, even with humanitarian exemptions, do little more than hamper their work.

This attitude is dangerously dismissive, as former UNRWA General Counsel James Lindsay wrote in a 2009 report: “UNRWA has taken very few steps to detect and eliminate terrorists from [its] ranks…and no steps at all to prevent members of terrorist organisations, such as Hamas, from joining.”

We can’t keep surrendering the moral high ground

Brutal terror groups and extremist regimes will always see humanitarian funds as quasi-piggy banks for enhancing their own power.

Effective oversight, budget transparency, complete reporting requirements, as well as internal and external controls are indispensable elements to ensure that any developing problems are caught early, aid diversion is mitigated, and guardrails are in place to prevent international aid workers from being involved in terror groups or attacks.

Despite criticism from the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs, several European countries, in addition to the US, have now suspended payments to UNRWA. This is a step in the right direction.

The global consensus that humanitarian work is essential too easily surrenders the moral high ground, often with devastating consequences.

It is time to recover that ground, which has for too long provided cover for the worst acts of terrorism.

Ambassador Mark Wallace serves as CEO and Dr Hans-Jakob Schindler is Senior Director at the Counter Extremism Project.

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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Netanyahu warns no one can halt Israel’s war to crush Hamas

Post By World Benjamin Netanyahu, civilian deaths, Hamas, Israel Hamas war, Israele Hamas war, The Gaza Strip

Netanyahu was speaking after the International Court of Justice at The Hague held two days of hearings on South Africa’s allegations that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians – a claim that Israel has fully rejected.

Israel will pursue its war against Hamas until victory and will not be stopped by anyone, including the world court, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said in a defiant speech, as the fighting in Gaza reaches the 100-day mark.

Netanyahu spoke after the International Court of Justice at The Hague held two days of hearings on South Africa’s allegations that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians, a charge Israel has rejected as libelous and hypocritical. South Africa asked the court to order Israel to halt its blistering air and ground offensive in an interim step.

“No one will stop us, not The Hague, not the axis of evil and not anyone else,” Netanyahu said in televised remarks on Saturday evening, referring to Iran and its allied militias.

The case before the world court is expected to go on for years, but a ruling on interim steps could come within weeks. Court rulings are binding but difficult to enforce. Netanyahu made clear that Israel would ignore orders to halt the fighting, potentially deepening its isolation.

Israel has been under growing international pressure to end the war, which has killed more than 23,000 Palestinians in Gaza and led to widespread suffering in the besieged enclave, but has so far been shielded by US diplomatic and military support.

Thousands took to the streets of Washington, London, Paris, Rome, Milan and Dublin on Saturday to demand an end to the war. Protesters converging on the White House held aloft signs questioning President Joe Biden’s viability as a presidential candidate because of his staunch support for Israel during the war.

Israel argues that ending the war means victory for Hamas, the Islamic militant group that has ruled Gaza since 2007 and is bent on Israel’s destruction.

The war was triggered by a deadly 7 October attack in which Hamas and other militants killed some 1,200 people in Israel, mostly civilians. About 250 more were taken hostage, and while some have been released or confirmed dead, more than half are believed to still be in captivity. Sunday marks 100 days of fighting.

Could there be a regional escalation?

Fears of a wider conflagration have been palpable since the start of the war. New fronts quickly opened, with Iran-backed groups – Houthi rebels in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Iran-backed militias in Iraq and Syria – carrying out a range of attacks. From the start, the US increased its military presence in the region to deter an escalation.

Following a Houthi campaign of drone and missile attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea, the US and Britain launched multiple airstrikes against the rebels on Friday, and the US hit another site on Saturday.

In more fallout from the war, the world court this week heard arguments on South Africa’s complaint against Israel. South Africa cited the soaring death toll and hardships among Gaza civilians, along with inflammatory comments from Israeli leaders presented, as proof of what it called genocidal intent.

In counter arguments on Friday, Israel asked for the case to be dismissed as meritless. Israel’s defence argued that the country has the right to fight back against a ruthless enemy, that South Africa had barely mentioned Hamas, and that it ignored what Israel considers attempts to mitigate civilian harm.

What next for the affected Palestinians?

Netanyahu and his army chief, Herzl Halevi, said they have no immediate plans to allow the return of displaced Palestinians to northern Gaza, the initial focus of Israel’s offensive. Fighting in the northern half has been scaled back, with forces now focusing on the southern city of Khan Younis, though combat continues in parts of the north.

Netanyahu said the issue had been raised by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken during his visit earlier this week. The Israeli leader said he told Blinken that “we will not return residents (to their homes) when there is fighting.”

At the same time, Netanyahu said Israel would eventually need to close what he said were breaches along Gaza’s border with Egypt. Over the years of an Israeli-Egyptian blockade, smuggling tunnels under the Egypt-Gaza border had constituted a major supply line for Gaza.

However, the border area, particularly the city of Rafah in southern Gaza, is packed with hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who had fled northern Gaza – and their presence would complicate any plans to widen Israel’s ground offensive.

“We will not end the war until we close this breach,” Netanyahu said on Saturday, adding that the government has not yet decided how to do that.

In Gaza, where Hamas has put up stiff resistance to Israel’s blistering air and ground campaign, the war continues unabated.

Gaza death toll reaches nearly 24,000

The Gaza Health Ministry said on Saturday that 135 Palestinians had been killed in the last 24 hours, bringing the overall toll of the war to 23,843. The count does not differentiate between combatants and civilians, but the ministry has said about two-thirds of the dead are women and children. The ministry said the total number of war-wounded surpassed 60,000.

Following an Israeli airstrike before dawn on Saturday, video provided by Gaza’s Civil Defence department showed rescue workers searching through the rubble of a building in Gaza City by flashlight.

Footage showed them carrying a young girl wrapped in blankets with injuries to her face, and at least two other children who appeared dead. A boy, covered in dust, winced as he was loaded into an ambulance.

The attack on the home in the Daraj neighbourhood killed at least 20 people, according to Civil Defense spokesperson Mahmoud Bassal.

The Palestinian telecommunications company Jawwal said two of its employees were killed on Saturday as they tried to repair the network in Khan Younis. The company said the two were hit by shelling. Jawwal said it has lost 13 employees since the start of the war.

Israel has argued that Hamas is responsible for the high civilian casualties, saying its fighters make use of civilian buildings and launch attacks from densely populated urban areas.

Since the start of Israel’s ground operation in late October, 187 Israeli soldiers have been killed and another 1,099 injured in Gaza, according to the military.

More than 85% of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million has been displaced as a result of Israel’s air and ground offensive, and vast swaths of the territory have been levelled.

Fewer than half of the territory’s 36 hospitals are still partially functional, according to OCHA, the United Nations’ humanitarian affairs agency.

Amid already severe shortages of food, clean water and fuel in Gaza, OCHA said in its daily report that Israel’s severe constraints on humanitarian missions and outright denials had increased since the start of the year.

The agency said only 21% of planned deliveries of food, medicine, water and other supplies have been successfully reaching northern Gaza.

American and other international efforts pushing Israel to do more to alleviate the suffering of Palestinian civilians have met with little success.

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Fighting in Gaza rages near hospital as Blinken seeks postwar plan

Post By World ceasefire, genocide, Israel, The Gaza Strip

The latest news from the Israel Hamas war.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke on Wednesday to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas about reforming his government, as Blinken sought to rally the region behind postwar plans for Gaza that include concrete steps toward a Palestinian state.

In their meeting in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Blinken told Abbas that the US supports “tangible steps” toward a Palestinian state, according to State Department spokesman Matthew Miller.

He said the two discussed administrative reform.

The vision outlined by Blinken faces serious obstacles. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has so far rejected Palestinian Authority control in Gaza and adamantly opposes the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

While the US Secretary of State and the Palestinian leader discussed the future, outside a peaceful demonstration against Blinken’s visit ended in clashes with the police.

Israeli military operations in Gaza are focused on the southern city of Khan Younis and urban refugee camps in the territory’s center. Hundreds of people have been killed in recent days in strikes across the territory, including in areas of the far south where Israel told people to seek refuge.

A heavy strike on Wednesday brought down a two-story building in the central town of Deir al-Balah, close to its main Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, killing at least 20 people, according to hospital officials. A strike killed six people in an ambulance near Deir al-Balah, including four crew, a medical aid group said.

Israeli army filmed shooting Palestinians seemingly without provocation

Security camera video from a West Bank village shows a young man standing in a central square when he is suddenly shot and drops to the ground. Two others rushing to his aid are also hit, leaving a 17-year-old dead, moments before Israeli military jeeps roll in.

An Associated Press review of the video and interviews with the two wounded survivors showed Israeli soldiers opened fire on the three when they did not appear to pose a threat.

One of the wounded Palestinians was shot a second time after he got up and tried to hop away.

The fatal shooting in the village of Beit Rima last week is the latest in a series of incidents in which soldiers appeared to fire without provocation, a trend Palestinians say has worsened since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza three months ago.

The Israeli military said troops entered Beit Rima overnight Thursday into Friday as part of a “counter-terrorism operation.” It said troops fired at suspects who threw explosives and firebombs at them.

The video, obtained by the AP from a local shop, does not show anyone throwing explosives.

Violence in the West Bank has surged to levels unseen in nearly two decades since fighting broke out on 7 October.

Israel battles against genocide claim at world court

Israel is sending top legal minds, including a Holocaust survivor, to The Hague this week to counter allegations it is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

The robust engagement with the International Court of Justice is unusual for Israel, which normally considers international tribunals unfair and biased.

Participating rather than boycotting reflects Israeli concerns judges could order Israel to halt its war against Hamas and tarnish its image internationally.

“Israel cannot run away from an accusation that is so serious,” said Alon Liel, a former director general of Israel’s Foreign Ministry.

Israel has tapped a former Israeli Supreme Court chief justice to join the court’s 15 regular members who will rule on the accusation. It has also enlisted a British barrister and lauded international law expert as part of its defence team.

Israel hopes their expertise will trounce the South African claim that Israel’s military campaign in Gaza amounts to genocide. Israel claimed halting the war with Hamas still intact and captive hostages would amount to a Hamas victory.

The genocide charge strikes at the heart of Israel’s national identity. The country sees itself as a bulwark of security for Jews after 6 million were killed in the Holocaust. International support for Israel’s creation in 1948 was deeply rooted in outrage over Nazi atrocities.

Israel’s unprecedented air, ground and sea offensive has killed more than 23,200 Palestinians, two-thirds of them women and children, according to health officials in Gaza.

Israel’s military campaign has displaced roughly 85% of Gaza’s 2.3 million population, many with no homes to return to.

More than a quarter of the population is starving.

US defends its veto of call for Gaza ceasefire

The United States defended its veto of a call for the immediate suspension of hostilities in Gaza at a UN meeting on Tuesday.

Washington has again faced demands by the Palestinians and many other countries to help secure a ceasefire now in the Israel Hamas war.

US Deputy Ambassador Robert Wood called the Russian-proposed amendment to a 22 December Security Council resolution which it vetoed “disconnected from the situation on the ground.”

The council then adopted a watered-down resolution, with Washington abstaining, calling for urgent steps to immediately allow expanded humanitarian aid into Gaza, “and to create conditions for a sustainable cessation of hostilities.”

Wood called it “striking” that those urging an end to the conflict have made very few demands of Hamas, following its surprise 7 October assault into southern Israel that killed around 1,200 people.

No-one was urging the Palestinian militants “to stop hiding behind civilians, lay down its arms, and surrender,” he claimed.

Wood reiterated ongoing US efforts to secure a “pause” in the fighting to get 136 Israeli hostages out of Gaza.

Some observers challenge the human shields argument often raised by Israel and its allies, claiming it is used to deflect attention from Israeli violence and does not omit obligations to protect civilian life under international law.

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BBC urged to drop Olly Alexander from Eurovision after Israel comments

Post By World Eurovision song contest, Israel, Israel Hamas war, LGBTQ, The Gaza Strip, United Kingdom

The UK entrant for next year’s Eurovision endorsed a statement by an LGBTQ+ “direct action” pressure group accusing Israel of genocide. Now, several groups are demanding the BBC drop Olly Alexander.

The BBC has been urged to drop Britain’s entrant at next year’s Eurovision Song Contest after it emerged he had signed a letter calling Israel an “apartheid regime”.

Olly Alexander, the singer of pop band Years and Years and star of Russell T Davies’ TV series It’s A Sin, was announced as the UK entrant by the national broadcaster last week. He endorsed a statement by an LGBTQ+ “direct action” pressure group Voices4London, which called for a ceasefire in Gaza and accused Israel of genocide.

The letter was published on 20 October amid the ongoing Israeli military response to the 7 October attacks carried out by Hamas.

It read: “We are watching a genocide take place in real time. Death overflows from our phone screens and into our hearts. And, as a queer community, we cannot sit idly by while the Israeli government continues to wipe out entire lineages of Palestinian families. We cannot untangle these recent tragedies from a violent history of occupation. Current events simply are an escalation of the state of Israel’s apartheid regime, which acts to ethnically cleanse the land. Since the violent creation of the state 75 years ago, the Israeli military and Israeli settlers have continued to terrorise Palestinian people.”

The letter continued: “Queer and trans Palestinians have long highlighted that pinkwashing plays a significant role in Zionist propaganda… We stand against any and all harassment and discrimination against Jewish communities. For the many queer and anti-Zionist Jewish individuals invested in liberation, this unthinking philosemitism, which hesitates to criticise an ongoing genocide out of fear of being seen to criticise Jewish people, is simply the other face of anti-Semitism”.

Anti-Zionism is the denial of the state of Israel. Philosemitism, a controversial term, refers to an interest in and admiration of Jews, their history and their influence – but was used as a pejorative term in Nazi Germany.

Following the reports of the Voices4London letter signed by Alexander, who is gay and vowed to fly the flag for the UK “in the gayest way possible” after his selection was confirmed last week, a Jewish charity – Campaign Against Antisemitism – has called for the 33-year-old singer to be replaced. They have also demanded that the BBC cut ties with him altogether.

Elsewhere, a source inside the Conservative Party has accused the BBC of “either a massive oversight or sheer brass neck” by selecting Alexander. “After they refused to call Hamas a terrorist organisation, you would think BBC bosses would try to steer clear of causing any more diplomatic blunders. Maybe it’s time to stop letting the BBC decide who represents the UK at Eurovision.”

However, according to reports by British broadsheet newspaper The Telegraph, the BBC apparently does not plan to take any action because Alexander signed the letter before he was unveiled as the UK’s act.

Sharing a link to the Telegraph’s report on X, the Embassy of Israel in London said:

“Clearly, Olly Alexander graduated from the Middle Eastern School of TikTok. We would be happy to arrange a trip for you to visit the Oct 7 massacre sites in Israel, where the rights of LGBTQ+ [people] are celebrated, protected and cherished. Unfortunately, our neighbours can’t guarantee the same.”

Indeed, same-sex activity between men is illegal in Palestine and carries a prison sentence of up to 10 years. Conversely, Israel is seen as the most gay-friendly country in the Middle East, hosting annual pride parades in big cities.

Boycott Eurovision?

This recent criticism comes amid calls for Israel to be dropped from Eurovision 2024 altogether, due to the ongoing Israel Hamas war. Some have even called for a general boycott of next year’s Eurovision.

Following online criticism, the European Broadcasting Union released a statement regarding Israel’s participation in Eurovision, saying that it currently has no plans to ban Israel from the Eurovision Song Contest.

“The Eurovision Song Contest is a competition for public broadcasters from all over Europe and the Middle East. It is a contest for broadcasters – not for governments – and the Israeli public broadcaster has been participating in the contest for 50 years. The EBU is a member-led organisation. The EBU’s governing bodies – led by the Board of Directors – represent the members. These bodies assessed the list of participants and decided that the Israeli public broadcaster complies with all competition rules. Together with 36 other broadcasters, it will be able to participate in the competition next year.”

The EBU based its decision on the current attitude of other international organisations towards Israel: “At the moment, there is an inclusive attitude towards Israeli participants in major competitions. The Eurovision Song Contest remains a non-political event, uniting audiences worldwide through music.”

Facing comparisons between Israel being allowed in the contest and Russia being banned (Russia were excluded from Eurovision in 2022 due to the country’s invasion of Ukraine), the EBU explained: “In 2022, following the invasion of Ukraine, the EBU’s governing bodies decided to exclude Russia from the Eurovision Song Contest, where they were to compete alongside Ukraine. As said before, the Eurovision Song Contest is a competition for broadcasters. After repeated violations of membership obligations and violation of the values of the public media, Russia was suspended.”

Sweden will host the 68th Eurovision Song Contest next May. The world’s biggest live music event is being staged in Malmö, marking the third time that city has hosted the contest.

Israel has won the contest for times – in 1978, 1979, 1998, and most recently in 2018, when Netta Barzilai won with ‘Toy’ in Lisbon.

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Nine Israeli soldiers killed in Gaza City ambush

Post By World Benjamin Netanyahu, Hamas, israel defense forces IDF, Israel Hamas war, soldier, The Gaza Strip

Israeli troops are still locked in heavy combat with Hamas fighters in and around Gaza City, more than six weeks after invading the territory’s north.

Palestinian militants carried out one of the deadliest single attacks on Israeli soldiers since the Gaza invasion began, killing at least nine in an urban ambush, the military said Wednesday, a sign of the stiff resistance Hamas still poses despite more than two months of devastating bombardment.

The ambush in a dense neighbourhood came after repeated recent claims by the Israeli military that it had broken Hamas’ command structure in northern Gaza, encircled remaining pockets of fighters, killed thousands of militants and detained hundreds more.

The tenacious fighting underscores how far Israel appears to be from its aim of destroying Hamas — even after the military unleashed one of the 21st century’s most destructive onslaughts. Israel’s air and ground assault has killed more than 18,600 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s health officials. Gaza City and surrounding towns have been pounded to ruins. Nearly 1.9 million people have been driven from their homes.

The resulting humanitarian crisis has sparked international outrage. The United States has repeatedly called on Israel to take greater measures to spare civilians, even as it has blocked international calls for a ceasefire and rushed military aid to its close ally.

Clashes raged overnight and into Wednesday in multiple areas, with especially heavy fighting in Shijaiyah, a dense neighbourhood that was the scene of a major battle during the 2014 war between Israel and Hamas.

“It’s terrifying. We couldn’t sleep,” Mustafa Abu Taha, a Palestinian agricultural worker who lives in the neighbourhood, said. “The situation is getting worse, and we don’t have a safe place to go.”

The ambush took place Tuesday in Shijaiyah, where troops searching a cluster of buildings lost communication with four soldiers who had come under fire, the military said. When the other soldiers launched a rescue operation, they were ambushed with heavy gunfire and explosives.

Among the nine dead were Col. Itzhak Ben Basat, 44, the most senior officer to have been killed in the ground operation, and Lt. Col. Tomer Grinberg, a battalion commander.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it was a “very difficult day,” but he rejected international calls for a ceasefire.

“We are continuing until the end, there is no question. I say this even given the great pain and the international pressure. Nothing will stop us, we will continue until the end, until victory, nothing less,” he said in a talk with military commanders.

Suffering in the South

Heavy rainfall overnight swamped tent camps in Gaza’s south, where Israel has told people to seek refuge, even as that region has also come under daily bombardment.

In the central city of Deir al-Balah, the storm brought cold winds and flooded a sheltered area behind a hospital, sending torrents of water coursing between the tents. “The situation is catastrophic,” said Ibrahim Arafat, a father of 13 who fled Shijaiyah.

Because of the fighting and Israel’s blockade of Gaza, the health care system and humanitarian aid operations have collapsed in large parts of the territory, and aid workers have warned of starvation and the spread of disease among displaced people.

Israel invaded southern Gaza nearly two weeks ago, and heavy fighting has continued in its first target — the city of Khan Younis. Israeli strikes overnight hit two residential buildings in and around the city.

A strike on a home near the main highway between Khan Younis and the southern border town of Rafah killed two boys, ages 2 and 8, a woman in her 80s and a woman in her 30s, according to Mohammed al-Beiyouk, a relative of the deceased. Another strike killed a baby and his grandfather, according to hospital records at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis.

The military rarely comments on individual strikes. Israel says it tries to avoid harming civilians and blames the high toll on Hamas because it conceals fighters, tunnels and weapons in residential areas.

Videos show Israeli soldiers acting ‘maliciously’

Several viral videos and photos of Israeli soldiers behaving in a derogatory manner in Gaza have emerged in recent days, creating a headache for the Israeli military as it faces an international outcry over its tactics and the rising civilian death toll in its punishing war against Hamas.

In response, the Israeli army has pledged to take disciplinary action in what it says are a handful of isolated cases.

Among the scenes that have caused dismay and anger are clips of Israeli soldiers apparently rummaging through private homes in Gaza, destroying plastic figurines in a toy store, or trying to burn food and water supplies in the back of an abandoned truck. Troops have been depicted with their arms slung around each other, chanting racist slogans as they dance in a circle.

The videos seem to have been uploaded by soldiers themselves during their time in Gaza.

Such videos are not a new or unique phenomenon in Israel or around the world. Over the years, a significant number of soldiers have been caught on camera acting inappropriately or maliciously in myriad conflict zones.

Critics, though, say these new videos – which have been largely shrugged off in Israel – reflect a national mood that is highly supportive of the war in Gaza, with little empathy for the plight of Gaza’s civilians.

“The dehumanisation from the top is very much sinking down to the soldiers,” Dror Sadot, a spokeswoman for the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem, which has long documented Israeli abuses against Palestinians, told the Associated Press.

Israel has been embroiled in fierce combat in Gaza since 7th October, when Hamas militants raided southern Israel and killed about 1,200 people – mostly civilians – and took about 240 hostages.

‘There are no people who are uninvolved’ – IDF

In one video of IDF forces on the ground, troops are seen riding bicycles through rubble. In another, a soldier appears to have moved Muslim prayer rugs into a bathroom, while another video shows boxes of lingerie found in a Gaza home. Yet another clip shows a soldier trying to set fire to shipments of food and water, both extremely scarce in Gaza.

In one photograph, a soldier poses next to words spray-painted in red on a pink building that read: “Instead of erasing graffiti, let’s erase Gaza.”

A video posted by conservative Israeli media personality Yinon Magal on X, formerly Twitter, shows dozens of soldiers dancing in a circle, apparently in Gaza, and singing a song that includes the words, “Gaza we have come to conquer… We know our slogan – there are no people who are uninvolved.”

The video, which Magal took from Facebook, has been viewed almost 200,000 times on his account and widely shared on other accounts.

Magal said he did not know the soldiers involved – but the Associated Press has verified backgrounds, uniforms and language heard in the videos and found them to be consistent with independent reporting.

Magal said the video struck a chord among Israelis because of the popular tune and because Israelis need to see pictures of a strong military. It is based on the fight song of the Beitar Jerusalem soccer team, whose hard-core fans have a history of racist chants against Arabs and rowdy behaviour.

“These are my fighters, they’re fighting against brutal murderers, and after what they did to us, I don’t have to defend myself to anyone,” Magal told The Associated Press.

He condemned some of the other videos that have surfaced, including the ransacking of the toy store, apparently in the northern area of Jebaliya, in which a soldier smashes toys and decapitates a plastic figurine, as destruction that is unnecessary for Israel’s security objectives.

The Israeli military’s spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, has actually condemned some of the actions seen in the recent videos.

“In any event that does not align with IDF values, command and disciplinary steps will be taken,” he said.

The videos emerged just days after leaked photos and video of detained Palestinians in Gaza, stripped to their underwear, in some cases blindfolded and handcuffed, also drew international attention. The army says it did not release those images, but Hagari said this week that soldiers have undressed Palestinian detainees to ensure they are not wearing explosive vests.

Osama Hamdan, a top Hamas official, aired the video of the soldier in the toy shop at a news conference in Beirut. He called the footage “disgusting.”

Hamas, too, has come under heavy criticism for releasing a series of videos of Israeli hostages, clearly under duress. Hamas militants also wore bodycams during their rampage on 7th October, capturing violent images of deadly attacks on families in their homes and revellers at a dance party.

Eran Halperin, a professor with Hebrew University’s psychology department who studies communal emotional responses to conflict, said that in previous wars between Israel and Hamas, there may have been more condemnation of these types of photos and videos from within Israeli society.

But he said the October attack, which exposed deep weaknesses and failures by the army, caused trauma and humiliation for Israelis in a way that hasn’t happened before.

“When people feel they were humiliated, hurting the source of this humiliation doesn’t feel as morally problematic,” Halperin told AP.

“When people feel like their individual and collective existence is under threat, they don’t have the mental capacity to empathise or apply the moral rulings when thinking about the enemy.”

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Israel losing support of international community, Biden warns

Post By World Hamas, Israel, The Gaza Strip

President Biden renewed his warnings that Israel should not make the same mistakes of overreaction that the US did following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

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US President Joe Biden on Tuesday warned that Israel was losing international support because of its “indiscriminate bombing” of Gaza, speaking out in unusually strong language as the United Nations neared a vote on demanding a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war.

“Israel’s security can rest on the United States, but right now it has more than the United States. It has the European Union, it has Europe, it has most of the world supporting them,” Biden said to donors during a fundraiser Tuesday.

“They’re starting to lose that support by indiscriminate bombing that takes place,” Biden said.

The president said he thought Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu understood, but he wasn’t so sure about the Israeli war cabinet. Israeli forces were carrying out punishing strikes across Gaza, crushing Palestinians in homes as the military presses ahead with an offensive that officials say could go on for weeks or months.

The president offered a harder-than-usual assessment of Israel’s decisions since the October 7 attack by Hamas and the moves by his conservative government. Biden’s top national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, heads to Israel this week to consult directly.

Biden specifically called out Itamar Ben-Gvir, the leader of a far-right Israeli party and the minister of national security in Netanyahu’s governing coalition, who opposes a two-state solution and has called for Israel to reassert control over all of the West Bank and Gaza. Ben-Gvir sits on Israel’s security cabinet but is not a member of the country’s three-person war cabinet.

The president also renewed his warnings that Israel should not make the same mistakes of overreaction that the US did following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

He recounted a familiar anecdote about inscribing on a photo with Netanyahu decades ago, “Bibi, I don’t agree with a damn thing you have to say.” This time, the president added to his retelling of the story: “That remains to be the case.”

Israel to keep fighting despite global outcry against the war

Israel pressed ahead Tuesday with an offensive against Gaza’s Hamas rulers that it says could go on for weeks or months – despite global calls for a ceasefire amid the fast-rising death toll of Palestinian civilians.

A non-binding vote at the United Nations later on Tuesday is likely to show how widespread support for a ceasefire actually is and highlight the increasingly isolated position of Israel and the United States on the world stage.

More than 17,700 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, around two-thirds of them women and children, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-controlled territory.

About 90% of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been displaced within the besieged territory, where United Nations agencies say there is no safe place to flee. With only a trickle of humanitarian aid reaching a small portion of Gaza, residents face severe shortages of food, water and other basic goods.

Israel says 97 of its soldiers have died in its ground offensive after Hamas raided southern Israel on Oct. 7, killing about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking about 240 hostages.

Qatar, which has played a key mediating role, says efforts to stop the war and have all hostages released will continue, but a willingness to discuss a cease-fire is fading.

Hamas at ‘breaking point’, says Israel

The Israeli military claimed on Tuesday that Hamas is at “its breaking point” as violent clashes push civilians into increasingly dire humanitarian conditions.

The Palestinian militant group reported fighting in central Gaza overnight, while the Wafa news agency detailed 12 dead and “dozens” injured in an Israeli air raid on Rafah.

Numerous Israeli strikes targeted Khan Yunis, the new epicentre of fighting, and Rafah on the Egyptian border, where tens of thousands of people fleeing the violence are now massing.

“Hamas is at its breaking point, the Israeli army is retaking its last bastions,” Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said on Monday evening.

“The fact that people are surrendering… accelerates our success. That is what we want: to move forward quickly,” Army Chief of staff Herzi Halevi said.

He added that Israeli forces were “intensifying” their operations in the south while consolidating positions in the north.

‘Apocalyptic situation for civilians’

The situation facing civilians in Gaza is “apocalyptic”, warned the EU’s top diplomat Josep Borrell on Monday.

He likened the scale of destruction in the Palestinian enclave as “more or less, even greater” than that suffered by Germany during the Second World War.

More than half of Gaza’s homes have been destroyed or damaged by the war, according to the UN. Some 1.9 million people have also been displaced, equivalent to 85% of the population.

“More and more people have not eaten for a day, two days, three days… People lack everything,” said UNRWA director Philippe Lazzarini.

According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the displaced in Rafah “are facing dire conditions, in overcrowded places, both inside and outside the shelters.”

“We went from Gaza to Khan Yunis and then we were moved to Rafah. That night they bombed the house and destroyed it. They said Rafah would be a safe place. There is no safe place,” Oum Mohammed al-Jabri, 56, told AFP.

He lost seven of his 11 children in the war.

Calls for more humanitarian aid

The UN and humanitarian organisations have urged Israel to let more aid into the Gaza Strip, amid the desperate situation facing civilians.

Israeli authorities have said they want to control humanitarian trucks entering and leaving the territory.

The war between Israel and Hamas, which entered its 67th day on Tuesday, was triggered by Hamas’ bloody 7 October attack on southern Israel.

Some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, were killed in the shock assault, during which around 240 people were kidnapped and taken to Gaza.

A now-expired truce allowed the release of 100 hostages, with 137 remaining in captivity.

More than 18,200 people have been killed in Israeli bombings in Gaza, the vast majority of them women and children, according to Palestinian authorities. The Israeli army reported around a hundred deaths in its ranks.

2023 saw unprecedented violence against Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, even before the latest outbreak of fighting.

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Israel-Hamas war: UNRWA calls Gaza ‘hell on earth’ as fighting goes on

Post By World Benjamin Netanyahu, Hamas, Israel Hamas war, Palestine, refugee children, The Gaza Strip

The latest developments from the Israel-Hamas war.

Hamas: No hostage will leave Gaza ‘alive’ without ‘negotiations’

Abu Obeida, the spokesperson for Hamas’s Qassam Brigades has announced that Israeli captives, taken during the attack on 7 October, will not be released by military force.

“We tell the Israelis that Netanyahu, Gallant, and others in the war cabinet cannot bring back their captives without negotiations. The latest killing of a captive they tried to take back by force proves that,” he said in a pre-recorded video message.

Gaza health ministry: 18,000 Palestinians killed since start of war

The Hamas-led Gaza health ministry has announced that some 18,000 Palestinians have been killed since the war broke out on 7 October.

That number is up from the figure of 17,700 reported yesterday.

The health ministry recorded a further 297 deaths and more than 550 injuries over the past 24 hours.

The ministry also added a total of 49,500 people have been injured since the start of the conflict.

The figures have not been independently verified. Israeli officials repeatedly say they believe the number to be significantly lower, accusing Hamas of inflating estimates.

Thousands of Moroccans take to the streets to denounce Gaza ‘genocide’

Several thousand of Moroccans have taken to the streets of Rabat, demonstrating to denounce a “genocide” in Gaza and demand a break in relations with Israel.

A large crowd marched in the centre of the capital, behind a large banner declaring “against the Holocaust in Gaza” and for “repealing normalisation”.

Since the end of 2020, the kingdom has established all-out relations with Israel in return for the recognition by the United States of Morocco’s sovereignty over the disputed territory of Western Sahara.

Waving Palestinian flags and wearing keffiyehs, demonstrators marched against “war crimes and genocide” in Gaza at the call of the “national action group for Palestine”, bringing together left-wing groups and the Islamist Party of justice and development.

UN: Food ‘used as weapon of war’ in Gaza

UNRWA’s commissioner general Philippe Lazzarini has claimed that, in Gaza, “humanitarian aid has been made conditional. Humanitarian assistance is withheld or delivered according to political and military agendas to which the United Nations is not privy”.

The head of the UN agency providing relief to Palestinian refugees was writing an opinion piece in the Los Angeles Times.

He added that “food, water and fuel are being systematically used as weapons of war in Gaza, as is disinformation”.

“Attacking and trying to discredit humanitarian organisations such as [UNRWA] is yet another means of waging war and compromising the humanitarian response, further weakening the protection of civilians and civilian infrastructure,” Lazzarini added.

In the article, he also wrote that “humanitarian aid is a strategic dimension of foreign policy and diplomatic competition – an instrument of power and war.  In Gaza, humanitarian assistance is being manipulated to serve political and military objectives, another breach among many in this war”.

Netanyahu expresses ‘dissatisfaction’ to Putin over Russian vote at UN

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed his “dissatisfaction” to Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday after Russia voted in favour of a ceasefire between Palestinian Hamas and Israel in Gaza at the UN Security Council.

“The Prime Minister expressed his dissatisfaction with the anti-Israel positions adopted by Russian delegates at the UN and other forums,” a statement from Netanyahu’s office said, following a telephone conversation between the two leaders.

The statement also added that Netanyahu “strongly criticised the dangerous cooperation between Russia and Iran”.

The comments come as Sergey Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, says “Hamas attacks do not justify punishment of Palestinian people”.

Saying it is not acceptable for Israel to use Hamas’s attack on 7 October as justification for the collective punishment of the Palestinian people, he added that the offensive “did not happen in a vacuum”.

He also renewed calls for international monitoring on the ground in Gaza.

Russian president Vladimir Putin has blamed the war between Israel and Hamas on the apparent failure of years of US diplomacy in the Middle East on a frequent basis.

Experts say he’s keen to position Russia as an important player within the region.

Guterres deplores UN ‘paralysis’ over Gaza

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has deplored the “paralysis” of the United Nations in the face of the war between Israel and Palestinian Hamas in the Gaza Strip, saying he regretted that the Security Council had not voted in favour of a ceasefire.

Speaking at the Doha Forum in Qatar, Guterres said the Security Council was “paralysed by geostrategic divisions”, thus compromising its ability to find solutions to the war.

“The authority and credibility of the Security Council have been seriously compromised” by its late response to the conflict, a damage to its reputation aggravated by the veto opposed Friday by the United States to a resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, he said.

The draft resolution was prepared after the UN Secretary General’s unprecedented invocation of Article 99 of the United Nations Charter, allowing him to draw the attention of the Security Council to a matter which “could endanger the maintenance of international peace and security.

“I reiterated my call to declare a humanitarian ceasefire… unfortunately, the Security Council failed to do so,” Guterres said, adding, “I can promise that I will not give up.”

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

“We are at serious risk of the collapse of the humanitarian system,” Guterres also warned at the Doha forum.

“The situation is rapidly evolving into a catastrophe with potentially irreversible implications for the Palestinians as a whole and for peace and security in the region.”

War in Gaza is having ‘catastrophic’ impact on health – WHO boss

The war in Gaza between Israel and Hamas is having a “catastrophic” impact on health, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, head of the World Health Organisation (WHO), has said.

“The impact of the conflict on health is catastrophic” and health workers are “doing their best in unimaginable conditions”, he said, at the opening of a special WHO meeting on sanitary conditions in the Palestinian territories.

Fighting ramps up further still as US lends support

Heavy fighting raged into Sunday in the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis, as Israel pressed ahead with its offensive after the US blocked the latest international efforts to halt the fighting and rushed more munitions to its close ally.

Israel has faced rising international outrage and calls for a cease-fire after the killing of thousands of Palestinian civilians and the displacement of nearly 85% of Gaza’s 2.3 million people within the besieged territory, where UN agencies say there is no safe place to flee.

The United States has lent vital support to the offensive once again in recent days, by vetoing United Nations Security Council efforts to end the fighting that enjoyed wide international support. They have also pushed through an emergency sale of over $100 million (€93m) worth of tank ammunition to Israel.

The US has pledged unwavering support for Israel’s goal of crushing Hamas’ military and governing abilities in order to prevent any repeat of the 7 October attack that triggered the war.

Israeli forces continue to face heavy resistance, even in northern Gaza, where entire neighbourhoods have been flattened by air strikes and where troops have been operating for over six weeks.

In Khan Younis, where ground forces moved in earlier this month, residents said they heard constant gunfire and explosions through the night as warplanes bombarded areas in and around the southern city, Gaza’s second largest.

Situation in Gaza ‘hell on earth’ – UNRWA chief

Speaking at the Doha Forum currently taking place in Qatar, the head of the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) has called for an urgent humanitarian ceasefire while decrying the devastating humanitarian toll in Gaza. He also warned that the region is akin to “hell on earth”.

“By any description, it is definitely the worst situation I have ever seen,” Philippe Lazzarini said.

“People are coming to the UN to seek protection, but even the blue flag is not protected anymore. By any account, the situation has reached a catastrophic nature,” he added.

Lazzarini said the world has failed the Palestinian people, also warning that the UNRWA is on the verge of collapse in Gaza..

Nowhere safe for Gazans to go?

Israel ordered the evacuation of the northern third of the territory, including Gaza City, early in the war, but tens of thousands of people are believed to have remained there, fearing that the south would be no safer or that they would never be allowed to return to their homes.

With the war in its third month, the Palestinian death toll in Gaza has surpassed 17,700, the majority women and children, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-controlled territory. The ministry does not differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths.

Israel holds Hamas responsible for civilian casualties, saying it uses civilians as human shields in dense residential areas. The military says 97 Israeli soldiers have died in the ground offensive. Palestinian militants have also continued firing rockets into Israel.

Israel says it has provided detailed instructions for civilians to evacuate to safer areas, even as it continues to strike what it says are militant targets in all parts of the territory. Thousands have fled to the southern town of Rafah and other areas along the border with Egypt in recent days – one of the last areas where aid agencies are able to deliver food and water.

Israel has designated a narrow patch of barren southern coastline, Muwasi, as a safe zone. But Palestinians described desperately overcrowded conditions with scant shelter and no toilets. They faced an overnight temperature of around 11 degrees Celsius (52 degrees Fahrenheit).

Alleged antisemitic attack in New York sees Shtreimel stolen from Jewish man

A neighbourhood watch group – Boro Park Shomrim – in New York city has released footage appearing to show a motorcyclist snatching and stealing a shtreimel hat from a Hasidic man in Brooklyn, a district of New York City.

The group alleged the attack was an antisemitic incident and urge anyone with information to get in touch with the local police force.

Detentions of Palestinians by Israeli soldiers increase

In recent days, videos and photos have emerged showing the detention of dozens of men who were stripped to their underwear, bound and blindfolded. The Israeli military says it is detaining people as it searches for remaining pockets of Hamas fighters.

Israel’s Channel 13 TV broadcast footage showing dozens of detainees stripped to their underwear with their hands in the air. Several held assault rifles above their heads, and one man could be seen slowly walking forward and placing a gun on the ground before returning to the group. Israeli media pointed to such scenes as evidence that Hamas was collapsing in the north.

Men from a separate group of detainees who were released on Saturday told The Associated Press they had been beaten and denied food and water.

Osama Oula said Israeli troops had ordered him and others out of a building in Gaza City before bounding their hands with zip ties, beating them for several days and giving them little water to drink. Ahmad Nimr Salman showed his hands, marked and swollen from the zip ties.

He said the troops asked if they were with Hamas. “We say ‘no,’ then they would slap us or kick us.” He said his 17-year-old son Amjad is still held by the troops.

The group was released after five days and told to walk south. Ten freed detainees arrived at a hospital in Deir al-Balah on Saturday after flagging down an ambulance. The Israeli military had no comment when asked about the alleged abuse.

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Palestinians running out of places to go as Israel widens offensive

Post By World Hamas, Israel, The Gaza Strip

Some two million people – most of the territory’s population – are stuck inside southern and central Gaza, where Israel’s ground offensive is now moving.

Israeli warplanes heavily bombarded an area around Khan Younis in southern Gaza on Monday as the military ordered mass evacuations from the city in the face of a widening ground offensive.

Palestinians are being pushed into a progressively shrinking portion of the besieged territory, raising sharp questions about what will happen to them.

The expanded assault posed a deadly choice for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians — either stay in the path of Israeli forces or flee within the confines of southern Gaza with no guarantee of safety.

Aid workers warned that the mass movement would worsen the already dire humanitarian catastrophe in the territory.

“Another wave of displacement is underway, and the humanitarian situation worsens by the hour,” Thomas White, the Gaza chief of the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Adding to the chaos, phone and internet networks across Gaza collapsed again Monday evening, the Palestinian telecom provider PalTel reported.

The network has broken down multiple times during the war, making it largely impossible for residents to communicate with each other or the outside world for hours or sometimes several days until it is repaired.

Human Rights Watch has previously warned that such communication blackouts risk providing a cover for atrocities in Gaza.

Israel has vowed to eliminate Hamas, whose 7 October attack on Israel from Gaza killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and triggered the deadliest violence in decades.

The war has already killed thousands of Palestinians and displaced over three-fourths of the territory’s population of 2.3 million people. Palestinian health officials say bombardment has killed several hundred civilians since a weeklong truce ended Friday.

Already under mounting pressure from its top ally, the United States, Israel appears to be racing to strike a death blow against Hamas — if that’s possible, given the group’s deep roots in Palestinian society — before any new ceasefire. But the mounting toll will increase international pressure to return to the negotiating table.

Airstrikes and the ground offensive in northern Gaza have reduced large swaths of Gaza City and nearby areas to a rubble-filled wasteland. Hundreds of thousands of residents fled south during the assault.

Since the truce’s collapse, the military has ordered the population out of an area of about 62 square kilometres in and near Khan Younis, according to the evacuation maps issued by the Israeli military. That further reduces the space available for Palestinians by more than a quarter.

Fighting in Central Gaza

Constant bombardment on the edges of Khan Younis, Gaza’s second-largest city, lit up the sky over the town Monday evening, and a stream of ambulances carrying wounded, including several women and children, flowed to the main hospital.

Over the past few days, Israeli strikes have been “on a ferocious scale,” said Mohammed Aghaalkurdi, an aid worker with the group Medical Aid for Palestinians in Khan Younis. “Barely has any kind of aid been delivered to the people, nor is there any food left in shops.”

He said neighbourhoods and shelters were emptying as people fled. Leaflets dropped by the Israeli military warn people to go south toward the border with Egypt. Still, they are unable to leave Gaza, as both Israel and neighbouring Egypt have refused to accept any refugees.

The area that Israel ordered evacuated covers about a fifth of Khan Younis. Before the war, that area was home to some 117,000 people, and now it also houses more than 50,000 people displaced from the north, living in 21 shelters, the U.N. said.

It was not known how many were fleeing. Some Palestinians have ignored past evacuation orders, saying they do not feel any safer since areas where they are told to flee have also been bombed. Many also fear they will never be allowed back to their homes.

It was not clear where Israeli troops had moved into southern Gaza, but the military told people to stay off the main road between Khan Younis and Deir al-Balah, suggesting forces were moving between the two towns.

Satellite photos from Sunday revealed some 150 Israeli tanks and armoured personnel carriers just under 6 kilometres north of the heart of Khan Younis.

Israeli media also reported intense fighting between Israeli troops and Hamas militants in northern Gaza — in the Jabaliya refugee camp and the Gaza City district of Shijaiya, both scenes of intense bombardment and battles in recent weeks.

Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, the Israeli military spokesman, said the army is pursuing Hamas with “maximum force” in the north and south while trying to minimise harm to civilians.

He pointed to a map that divides southern Gaza into dozens of blocks to give “precise instructions” to residents on where to evacuate. Most are urged to flee south, but, confusingly, a map posted on X by the military Monday urged people to flee into Fakhari, a district east of Khan Younis that the military ordered evacuated a day before.

“The level of human suffering is intolerable,” Mirjana Spoljaric, the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, said during a rare visit to Gaza. “It is unacceptable that civilians have no safe place to go in Gaza, and with a military siege in place, there is also no adequate humanitarian response currently possible.”

The World Health Organization said it was told by Israel to empty its medical supplies warehouse in southern Gaza within 24 hours ahead of an advancing ground operation. COGAT, a body in Israel’s defence ministry that deals with Palestinian civilian affairs, denied it had issued such an order.

Spoljaric, the Red Cross president, called for the immediate release of scores of hostages still held by Palestinian militants since the Oct. 7 attack.

In a letter to the Red Cross chief, a group of released Israeli hostages asked to meet her while she was visiting the region and called for more help from the organization to free the remaining 137 captives.

“Every day that passes could be their last, and the suffering they endure is inhuman,” wrote the eight freed captives and 102 relatives of hostages still in captivity.

Rising Toll

The Health Ministry in Gaza said the death toll in the territory since 7 October has surpassed 15,890 people – 70% of them women and children — with more than 42,000 wounded. The ministry does not differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths.

Health Ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qidra said hundreds have been killed or wounded since the ceasefire’s end, with many still trapped under rubble.

The Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah received 32 bodies overnight after Israeli strikes across central Gaza, said Omar al-Darawi, an administrative employee.

The Israeli military said aircraft struck some 200 Hamas targets overnight, with ground troops operating “in parallel,” without elaborating. It said troops in northern Gaza uncovered two militant tunnel shafts that held explosives and weapons in a school after coming under attack.

It is not possible to independently confirm battlefield reports from either side.

Israel says it targets Hamas operatives and blames civilian casualties on the militants, accusing them of operating in residential neighbourhoods. Still, it does not provide accounting for its targets in individual strikes.

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