Category Archives: Middle East and North Africa

Israel ‘using Hamas prisoners to track down terror chiefs’

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As pressure grows on Israel to avoid civilian deaths, IDF believes killing leaders will collapse organisation

The Israeli military’s coming push into southern Gaza is driven by the belief that intelligence gleaned from hundreds of militants captured during the fighting in the north will allow them to find and kill leaders of Hamas.

Israel’s politicians and generals believe that taking out top commanders – and leader Yahya Sinwar – is their best chance of forcing the collapse of an organisation that is deeply embedded in Gaza, after nearly two decades controlling the enclave.

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As the ceasefire ends, a question from history lingers: will Israel win the battle but lose the war against Hamas?

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One lesson from the 1982 Lebanon war is that Israel’s enemy only needs to survive against superior firepower to gain an advantage

The scene is one familiar from many conflicts. Soldiers line up to get food from an outdoor canteen, weapons slung haphazardly over their shoulders, boots muddy, shirts undone. An armoured personnel carrier clanks by, the roar of its engine temporarily drowning out the boom of artillery. Officers shout orders. Tired men jump down from dusty vehicles and swear.

Even during the recent ceasefire, the rear areas of the massive Israeli military offensive in Gaza were busy. So too was Hamas, which used the seven-day pause in hostilities to reorganise its battered forces and reconstitute some of its degraded capabilities.

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Israeli grid maps make life in Gaza ‘macabre game of Battleships’, say aid workers

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Online system designed to order precise evacuations inaccessible to those without power or network access

• Israel-Hamas war – live updates

Israel’s new grid system for targeted evacuation warnings in southern Gaza risks turning life in the territory into a “macabre game of Battleships”, aid workers have warned.

When Israel resumed its offensive in Gaza after a week-long ceasefire deal collapsed, it immediately signalled plans to intensify attacks on the south of the territory, in areas where Palestinian civilians had previously been urged to take shelter.

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Two Revolutionary Guards members killed by Israeli strike in Syria, says Iran

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Airstrikes near Damascus follow end to seven-day pause in fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza Strip

Two Iranian Revolutionary Guards members serving as military advisers in Syria have been killed in an Israeli attack, Iranian state media has said.

Strikes near the Syrian capital of Damascus came less than 24 hours after the end of a seven-day pause in fighting between Israel and the Hezbollah ally Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

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Cop28 live: UK and US among 22 countries to call for tripling of nuclear by 2050

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Hosts the UAE also signed the declaration, which drew a mixed reaction

For the first time at a Cop the UNFCCC, which organises the summits, has published the full list of participants in spreadsheet format, making them far easier to analyse.

Carbon Brief have looked at the provisional figures, and found that 84,101 people are registered to attend, 3,074 of whom are attending virtually.

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Israel-Hamas war live: Israeli attacks on Gaza continue as further truce talks ‘reach dead end’; Unicef condemns ‘ongoing war on children’

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A team from Israel’s Mossad intelligence services has been ordered home after talks in Qatar about another pause in fighting in Gaza reach a ‘dead end’

Here are the latest images coming across the wires:

Israeli airstrikes killed two Syrian pro-Hezbollah fighters when they hit sites belonging to the Iran-backed group near Damascus early on Saturday, a war monitor told AFP.

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Israel signals intent to launch ground invasion of southern Gaza

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Israel orders Palestinians to evacuate southern city of Khan Younis, where it says Hamas leadership is based

Israel has signalled that it is preparing to launch a ground assault in southern Gaza in a significant escalation of the war, as it attacked the Strip on Friday after the end of a seven-day truce, leaving at least 178 Palestinians dead.

The country’s military dropped leaflets in parts of Khan Younis, where Israel believes Hamas’s leadership is based, warning citizens to evacuate farther south to Rafah, prompting humanitarian groups to say that Palestinians risked being forced completely out of the territory.

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Activist on trial for damaging UK sites of Israeli arms maker says he was justified

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Palestine Action’s Richard Barnard and co-defendants say alleged actions against Elbit Systems were aimed at stopping bombings

A co-founder of Palestine Action on trial with others for damaging an Israeli arms manufacturer’s UK sites has said they were justified because they were trying to stop people being bombed.

Richard Barnard, 51, and seven other defendants are accused of charges relating to actions against Elbit Systems Limited, which he said Palestine Action aims to “shut down”.

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Renewed strikes on Gaza bring fear to families of Israeli hostages

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Safety of civilians held by Hamas in further doubt after expiration of truce that allowed hostage-prisoner swaps

The families of hostages being held in Gaza have said they are terrified about the safety of their loved ones after the end of a seven-day ceasefire.

Fighting resumed on Friday after the expiry of the truce, during which Hamas released 80 Israeli hostages in exchange for 240 Palestinian prisoners.

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Israel’s military strategy threatens to make a desperate situation utterly dire

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IDF claim to be avoiding blanket bombing the south, where about 2mn people live, but their new approach does not look much different

Israel’s Defense Forces waited just four minutes after the truce expired at 7am before restarting bombing, according to one resident of Khan Younis. An hour later, its military set out its plan for the “next stage of the war”: a division of Gaza into dozens of numbered “evacuation areas”, a core part of the military’s plan to gradually take control of the southern part of the strip.

The military’s plan, canvassed privately this week, is to avoid a repeat of the blanket bombing of the northern Gaza in the crowded south, with sequential, targeted bombing campaigns. Under the plan, people in certain numbered districts of Gaza will be told to evacuate before bombing begins, although how much time they will get is not clear; homes in Khan Younis were among the targets struck on Friday hours after the truce expired, and residents were given little if any time to flee.

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Israeli airstrikes hit near Damascus, says Syria – as it happened

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This blog is now closed. Our live coverage continues here

Palestinian media is reporting Israeli military strikes in northern Gaza, Reuters has snapped.

The Israeli military has resumed combat against Hamas in Gaza, the military announced, saying Hamas had violated the truce and fired towards Israeli territory, Reuters has snapped.

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Israel launches strikes on Gaza as fighting resumes after truce expires

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More than 170 Palestinians killed as Red Cross head warns ‘nightmarish situation’ for civilians has returned

Israel attacked targets across Gaza after the end of a seven-day ceasefire on Friday, leaving more than 170 Palestinians dead after negotiations over further hostage releases fell apart overnight.

Israel’s military said it had attacked 200 targets from land, sea and air across the north and south of the strip by lunchtime, including in Khan Younis, a southern city from which it had ordered civilians to evacuate.

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Hospital damage in Gaza during Israeli offensive – a visual investigation

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Study covering period in late October and early November shows damage to 10 hospitals and health facilities
• Warning: this article contains images and videos some may find distressing.

An investigation has revealed the damage caused to hospitals, health facilities and ambulances in the northern Gaza Strip over 21 days in the course of the Israeli offensive against Hamas in Gaza.

The Guardian collected and analysed more than 200 pieces of evidence including videos, photos, news footage and satellite imagery from between approximately 21 October and 11 November, and spoke to international humanitarian organisations, to investigate the damage caused to 10 of Gaza’s hospitals and health facilities. Of the 10, only two are functioning.

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Spanish police investigate deaths of four migrants forced off speedboat

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Vessel was near Andalucían shore when passengers, believed to be from north Africa, were apparently pushed overboard

Spanish police have opened an inquiry after four people were killed as a result of being forced out of a moving speedboat into the sea just metres from the southern shores of Andalucía.

In a tactic the EU border agency has said is becoming increasingly common, the people who died on Wednesday were among 27 passengers apparently forced off the fast-moving vessel by its drivers near Camposoto beach in the province of Cádiz, officials said. Another eight were left near Sancti Petri beach.

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French-Israeli woman seen in Hamas hostage video is freed

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Mia Schem was abducted from music festival on 7 October; lawyer Amit Soussana has also been released

Mia Schem, a French-Israeli woman who was abducted from the Supernova music festival in Israel and shown in the first Hamas video of a hostage speaking from captivity, has been released.

She was one of eight hostages released in two tranches on Thursday.

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Israeli assault on southern Gaza could lead to 1m refugees, UNRWA chief warns

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Philippe Lazzarini urges Israel to think of consequences of offensive if truce is not further extended

An Israeli military assault into the south of Gaza may lead to 1 million refugees, the head of the UN’s Palestine relief agency UNRWA has warned.

After a second overnight visit to Gaza where he met overwhelmed Palestinians, Philippe Lazzarini urged Israel to think through the consequences of an offensive in the south if the temporary truce in the fighting is not extended.

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Hamas claims responsibility for deadly Jerusalem bus stop shooting

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Two men, reportedly brothers from East Jerusalem, shot dead at scene after attack that killed three people

Hamas has claimed responsibility for a deadly gun attack at a busy bus stop in west Jerusalem in which three Israelis were killed, prompting the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to pledge to eliminate the Palestinian group whenever the hostage release halts.

The shooting overshadowed negotiations aimed at extending the existing truce in Gaza, but despite the attack, Egypt and Qatar remained hopeful of securing a two-day extension in return for the release of another 20 hostages and a further 60 Palestinians held in Israeli jails.

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‘Don’t be naive like I was’: UK academic advises Cop28 attenders to stay safe

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Matthew Hedges, tortured in UAE in 2018, tells reporters and activists to take clean phones and watch who they deal with

Journalists and campaigners attending the Cop28 climate conference in Dubai should “not be naive” and take steps to protect their physical and digital security, a British academic who was tortured in the summit’s host country has warned.

Matthew Hedges, who was detained in the United Arab Emirates for seven months in 2018, advised reporters and activists to take new, clean phones, think carefully about who they deal with and how and where they protest.

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West ‘encourages’ killing of civilians in Gaza, says father of activist shot dead by IDF

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Anthony Hurndall, whose son was shot by the IDF in 2003, has called on governments to challenge Israeli claims about deaths of women and children

Western governments are “actively encourag[ing] the killing of women and children” in Gaza, because they are not willing to challenge Israeli accounts of the war there, the father of a British peace activist killed by an Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) sniper has warned.

Anthony Hurndall’s son, Tom Hurndall, was shot in the head in April 2003 in Rafah, while he was helping Palestinian children.

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Israel-Hamas war: ceasefire extended for a day amid last-minute mediation efforts

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IDF and Hamas agree at last minute to extend truce into seventh day as Antony Blinken arrives in Israel as part of diplomatic efforts to avoid a return to fighting in devastated Gaza Strip

Israel’s military confirmed on Thursday that a truce with Hamas will continue, allowing further hostage and prisoner releases and the possibility of more a durable pause in hostilities.

There were frantic diplomatic efforts through the night to prolong the six-day halt to fighting in Gaza which was set to end at 7am local time (5am GMT) on Thursday. The current extension appears to be only for 24 hours, though this has yet to be explicitly confirmed by all parties.

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