Casualties in Gaza are growing, and so is Israel’s concern about the war’s direction
In the dark and the cloying heat of a Gaza night, the troops of the 13th Battalion of Israel’s Golani Brigade were attempting to advance in northern Gaza amid the flashes of air and artillery strikes across the Gaza Strip.
The ambush, when it happened, caught them by surprise – 30 fighters from an elite Hamas unit emerging from hidden tunnel entrances.
Continue reading...António Guterres calls humanitarian situation in Gaza ‘horrific’ as thousands of people remain without food, water and medicine
Agence France-Presse has reported on the aftermath of what Hamas authorities said was Israeli tank shelling that killed 20 people at the Osama bin Zaid boys’ school north of Gaza City.
The report said:
Ambulance teams rushed into the debris-littered building to aid the injured and remove the dead.
Stunned onlookers wept and wandered the scene with hands clasped above the head in horror and disbelief.
Continue reading...US secretary of state meets officials from Jordan, Lebanon, Qatar and UN as further civilian casualties reported in Gaza
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, met senior Jordanian and other Arab officials in Amman on Saturday in the latest effort by Washington to avert a regional escalation of the war between Israel and Hamas, ease the acute humanitarian crisis in Gaza and build support for planning a post-conflict future for the territory.
The trip was Blinken’s second to the Middle East since the conflict began almost a month ago but came against the backdrop of further civilian casualties in Gaza and an apparent snub from the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.
Continue reading...Netanyahu says ‘full force’ offensive will continue, despite growing concerns over civilian casualties
Israel will continue its offensive in Gaza “with full force” and will refuse any temporary ceasefire that does not include the release of more than 240 hostages held by Hamas, Benjamin Netanyahu has said, rejecting US calls for a pause in the fighting.
Earlier on Friday, the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, flew into Israel to urge the Israeli prime minister to temporarily stop its military offensive to allow aid into the territory amid rising concerns over civilian casualties as the fighting intensifies.
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On Friday afternoon, the Hezbollah secretary general, Hassan Nasrallah, is to make a highly anticipated speech. The head of the influential Iran-backed Shia militant group will break weeks of silence with a broadcast from Beirut, which comes in the wake of a rise in violence on Israel’s northern border.
Hezbollah said on Thursday it had simultaneously attacked 19 positions in Israel on Thursday evening. The clashes have so far been mostly contained to the frontier, and Hezbollah has used only a fraction of the firepower that Nasrallah has been threatening with Israel for years.
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One minute after the House approved an Israel aid package that excluded providing similar assistance to Ukraine, the top Republican in the Senate, Mitch McConnell, tweeted this:
This what some would call a “subtweet”: McConnell does not mention the House proposal at all nor its architect, Republican speaker Mike Johnson, but he is clearly referring to the just-passed bill. While some Republicans are ready to cut off aid to Kyiv, McConnell remains a steadfast backer of the country’s defense against Russia.
Continue reading...IDF spokesperson says military ‘powerfully deployed’ north of Gaza and civilians still urged to move south
Israeli forces have surrounded Gaza City and are attacking Hamas infrastructure and destroying tunnels used by militants to launch attacks, the Israeli military said.
Airstrikes continued alongside the intensifying ground offensive in what Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, described as the second stage of the war.
Continue reading...US secretary of state in Tel Aviv to call for pauses in fighting to allow more aid to enter Gaza
Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, has arrived in Tel Aviv to meet Israel’s war cabinet and urge it to show greater restraint in its campaign to destroy Hamas, starting by allowing more aid to enter Gaza and implementing humanitarian pauses.
Israel says it has Hamas surrounded in Gaza City and has shown no willingness to back a break in the fighting advocated by the US president, Joe Biden, let alone agree a ceasefire.
Continue reading...Led by House speaker Mike Johnson, Republican plan passes Thursday 226-196 as Biden threatens veto
The US House of Representatives on Thursday passed a Republican plan to provide $14.3bn in aid to Israel as it fights Hamas, despite Democrats’ insistence it has no future in the Senate and the White House’s promise of a veto.
The measure passed 226-196, largely along party lines, with most Republicans supporting the bill and most Democrats objecting.
Continue reading...The evacuees were able to cross from the Gaza Strip into Egypt, the US president said on Thursday
The United States has been able to get 74 Americans with dual citizenship out of the Gaza Strip, Joe Biden said at the White House on Thursday, one day after evacuees began crossing into Egypt.
“Good news, we got out today 74 American folks, dual citizens,” the president told reporters in the Oval Office at the start of a meeting with the president of the Dominican Republic, Luis Abinader.
Continue reading...Hamas armed wing the al-Qassam brigades says it hit border town, while Hezbollah claims attack on 19 Israeli positions
Hamas’s armed wing, the al-Qassam brigades, said its fighters in southern Lebanon were behind the shelling of the northern Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona, where four rockets landed in an industrial area, injuring two people and damaging buildings.
In a second barrage, Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shia militant group, said it had simultaneously attacked 19 positions in Israel on Thursday evening in the latest escalation on Israel’s northern border.
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Ehud Barak, the former Israeli prime minister and army chief, has spoken to Foreign Policy magazine, saying Israel will “probably lose the support of public opinion” over its response to the 7 October Hamas attack.
In a transcript of the interview published on the publication’s website, the former prime minister said, “our objective is to limit the military and government capabilities of Hamas in the Gaza Strip. This could not be accomplished by airstrikes alone. We have to deploy probably many thousands of boots on the ground.”
Even if it develops into a full-scale regional conflict with Hezbollah, which has 10 times more rockets and missiles, or if the West Bank or Golan Heights are involved, Israel is still stronger. It’s not an existential threat, but it will take more time, more losses, and more friction with our supporters in the world.”
Continue reading...President Sisi has been criticised for allowing few refugees through, but housing large numbers would be a big political risk
Egypt has been caught in a dilemma for weeks about opening the Rafah crossing into Gaza: wanting to help the most seriously injured Palestinians leave, but adamantly refusing to contemplate a surge of Palestinian refugees into the Sinai peninsula. “We are prepared to sacrifice millions of lives to ensure that no one encroaches upon our territory,” Egypt’s prime minister, Mostafa Madbouly, said earlier this week.
The negotiations over the release of wounded Palestinians and some foreign nationals, largely overseen by Qatar, have been inextricably linked to the flow of aid from Egypt into Gaza over the same crossing. The US president, Joe Biden, negotiated a passage for aid through Rafah, but levels are low compared to what is needed. On Wednesday the UN humanitarian coordinator, Martin Griffiths, again called for Israel to reopen Kerem Shalom, the crossing it controls at the southern tip of Gaza.
Continue reading...Americans were provided flights from Israel after the 7 October Hamas attacks, but those in besieged Gaza Strip cannot leave
American citizens trapped in the Gaza Strip and their families in the US are lawyering up after weeks of desperate and futile attempts to exit the war zone, which has been under heavy bombardment by Israel since Hamas’s attacks on 7 October.
Nearly a dozen lawsuits have been filed or are set to be filed against the US state department, according to the Arab American Civil Rights League.
Continue reading...Relatives of the 200 British or dual nationals trying to leave describe scenes of chaos and desperation
The families of British citizens trapped in Gaza have said it is devastating that their loved ones have been turned away from the Rafah border crossing with Egypt, as the Foreign Office said the first UK nationals had made it through.
Hundreds of foreign passport holders and injured Palestinians requiring hospital treatment crossed into Egypt on Wednesday after more than three weeks of conflict in which thousands of people have been killed.
Continue reading...Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu vows to press on with ground offensive despite rising death toll
Fifteen Israeli soldiers were killed amid fierce fighting in Gaza in a series of incidents that have underlined the mounting challenges facing the Israel Defence Forces in their attempts to push further into built-up areas of Gaza.
The heaviest loss of life occurred when a “Namer” armoured personnel carrier was hit at about noon on Tuesday by an anti-tank guided missile, killing 11 soldiers and wounding several more.
Continue reading...However, Republican senator Lindsey Graham says, Israel should be ‘smart’ and try to limit casualties ‘the best they can’
The US should place “no limit” to civilian casualties Israel might inflict in Gaza in response to the Hamas terror attacks of 7 October, a senior Republican senator said.
Speaking to CNN, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina was asked: “Is there a threshold for you, and do you think there should be one for the United States government, in which the US would say, ‘Let’s hold off for a second in terms of civilian casualties?’”
Continue reading...Hamas says hundreds injured after refugee camp strikes; the US president responded to an anti-war protestor saying he supports a humanitarian ‘pause’
Iranian leaders have warned the world is closer to a regional war in the Middle East and that Israel has crossed red lines, which, in the words of President Ebrahim Raisi, “may force everyone to take action”.
But Iran is walking a tightrope, keen to avoid a direct confrontation and therefore blurring its red lines to avoid walking into a trap. Instead, it leans on proxy militias around the region from its “axis of resistance” to launch limited strikes aimed at Israel and US military bases in Iraq and Syria.
Continue reading...Crossing open for first time in weeks to allow evacuation of foreign passport holders and injured Palestinians
The Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt has opened for the first time in more than three weeks of brutal conflict to allow the evacuation of dozens of injured Palestinians requiring hospital treatment and hundreds of foreign passport holders.
Witnesses at the border on the Gaza side saw scores of people and cars hurrying to get through the gates towards the Egyptian side through the damaged terminal area, some carrying their belongings. Ambulances whisked away the wounded to Egyptian field hospitals, including one young boy with heavy bandaging around his stomach.
Continue reading...Israeli military says it bombed Jabalia camp to target a key Hamas commander, Ibrahim Biari
Israeli airstrikes have destroyed apartment blocks and killed dozens of people at a refugee camp in northern Gaza on the 25th day of a conflict that the United Nations said has become a “graveyard” for children.
At least six airstrikes hit residential areas in the Jabalia refugee camp on Gaza City’s outskirts on Tuesday, killing more than 50 people and injuring about 150 people, Hamas officials said.
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