A truce between Israel and the Lebanese militant group has come into effect after 14 months of fighting
A ceasefire to end 14 months of fighting between Israel and the militant group Hezbollah has come into effect, with Lebanese civilians already returning to the devastated south of the country.
Continue reading...IDF would withdraw entirely from southern Lebanon and Hezbollah pull back its heavy weapons under agreement
Israel’s security cabinet is due to meet on Tuesday to decide on a ceasefire agreement with Lebanon after more than a year of fighting between Israeli forces and the Shia militia Hezbollah.
Under the deal being considered, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) would reportedly withdraw entirely from southern Lebanon, Hezbollah would pull its heavy weapons north of the Litani River, about 16 miles (25km) north of the Israeli border, and the Lebanese army would move in to provide security in the border zone alongside an existing UN peacekeeping force, during an initial 60-day transition phase.
Continue reading...Some who live close to the border with Lebanon believe a deal would allow them to raise their children in safety, but others say communities are split
There is a crack, a boom and a siren, all more or less simultaneously. Sergio Helman has not quite reached the concrete shelter a dozen metres away from his hummus restaurant, off highway 99, which marks the northernmost limit of the northern Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona.
The 60-year-old shrugs and explains that Hezbollah fires the rockets from so close that Israeli air defence systems can give only 15 seconds warning at best.
Continue reading...Killing of journalists in Israeli strike could be war crime, legal experts say after Guardian investigation
A Guardian investigation has found that Israel used a US munition to target and kill three journalists and wound three more in a 25 October attack in south Lebanon which legal experts have called a potential war crime.
On 25 October at 3.19am, an Israeli jet shot two bombs at a chalet hosting three journalists – cameraman Ghassan Najjar and technician Mohammad Reda from pro-Hezbollah outlet al-Mayadeen, as well as cameraman Wissam Qassem from the Hezbollah-affiliated outlet al-Manar.
Continue reading...Ministers also ban government advertising from critical newspaper that is widely respected internationally
Israel’s government is set to punish the country’s leading left-leaning newspaper, Haaretz, by ordering a boycott of the publication by government officials or anyone working for a government-funded body and halting all government advertising in its pages or website.
In a statement on Sunday, the office of Shlomo Karhi, the communications minister, said that his proposal against Haaretz had been unanimously approved by other ministers.
Continue reading...Senior Israeli minister says the war is far from over and Israel will stay ‘for years’ in the territory
The Israeli military has ordered the evacuation of new areas of northern Gaza, setting off a fresh wave of civilian displacements on Sunday as intense airstrikes continued across much of the territory.
In Jerusalem, a senior minister said the war in Gaza was far from over and that Israel would stay “for years” in the territory.
Continue reading...Group’s armed wing says unnamed woman’s death established after long break in contact with her captors
Hamas’s armed wing said on Saturday that an Israeli woman taken hostage during the October 2023 attack had been killed in a combat zone in northern Gaza, as the Israeli military said it was investigating.
The spokesperson for Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, Abu Obeida, said contact had been restored with the woman’s captors after a break of several weeks and it was established that the hostage had been killed in an area of north Gaza where the Israeli army has been operating.
Continue reading...Charges against Israeli prime minister and his former defence minister Yoav Gallant mark first time western-affiliated leaders have been targeted for war crimes
The international criminal court’s decision to issue arrest warrants for Israeli leaders over the war in Gaza has been welcomed by Palestinians as a landmark moment in their decade-long fight to challenge the Israeli occupation through international institutions.
Thursday’s announcement from the international criminal court’s pretrial chamber of arrest warrants for Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his former defence minister, Yoav Gallant, has sent shockwaves through the international legal system. As the first time that officials from a democratic, western-allied state have been charged with war crimes, it is widely seen as the most significant action taken by the court since it was set up at the turn of the century.
Continue reading...Advocates and officials argue that consequences of Israeli siege are inextricably linked to tackling the climate crisis
As countries negotiate over climate finance, Palestinian officials and advocates have come to Cop29 in Baku to highlight global heating’s intersection with another crisis: Israel’s siege on Gaza.
“The Cop [meetings] are very keen to protect the environment, but for whom?” said Ahmed Abu Thaher, director of projects and international relations at Palestine’s Environment Quality Authority, who had travelled to Cop29 from Ramallah. “If you are killing the people there, for whom are you keen to protect the environment and to minimise the effects of climate change?”
Continue reading...Missing families feared dead after block of flats and nearby homes destroyed by airstrikes on Lebanese capital
At least 20 people have been killed and 66 wounded in a series of Israeli airstrikes on an apartment block in the densely populated Basta neighbourhood of central Beirut.
At least four bombs hit an eight-storey apartment building at about 4am on Saturday, without warning, producing blasts heard around the Lebanese capital. The strike levelled the building and destroyed seven smaller residential buildings in the surroundings, leaving meters-deep craters of rubble where the structures once stood.
Continue reading...Israeli PM thanks his Hungarian counterpart after he extends invite in defiance of moves by International Criminal Court
The US have said they “fundamentally reject” the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrants for senior Israel officials and said the court does not have jurisdiction over the matter.
On Thursday, arrest warrants were issued by the court for the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s former defence minister Yoav Gallant and the late Hamas military leader Mohammed Deif over alleged war crimes committed in Gaza.
Continue reading...Viktor Orbán says he will not enforce ICC decision that requires court members to detain Israeli PM if he enters their country
Hungary’s illiberal prime minister, Viktor Orbán, has said he will invite his Israeli counterpart, Benjamin Netanyahu, to visit in defiance of an international criminal court arrest warrant, as world leaders split over the ICC’s momentous decision.
The world’s highest criminal court issued warrants on Thursday for Netanyahu, his former defence minister Yoav Gallant and the Hamas commander Ibrahim al-Masri, commonly known as Mohammed Deif, who is believed to be dead, for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Continue reading...Leaders from across spectrum are outspoken in rejection of court’s ‘antisemitic’ and ‘outrageous’ decision
Israeli leaders from across the political spectrum united to condemn the decision by a three-judge panel of the international criminal court to issue arrest warrants for the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and the former defence minister Yoav Gallant.
Netanyahu’s office described the warrants as “an antisemitic decision … equivalent to the modern Dreyfus trial”, referring to the 1894 trial of a French artillery captain of Jewish descent that has become one of the most prominent examples of antisemitism.
Continue reading...The ICC warrants are a legal earthquake and could weigh heavier on the Israeli PM and his former minister over time
• Middle East crisis – live updates
The arrest warrants issued by the international criminal court (ICC) represent an earthquake on the world’s legal landscape: the first time a western ally from a modern democracy has been charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity by a global judicial body.
Inside Israel, the warrants against Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defence minister Yoav Gallant will not have an immediate impact. In the short term they are likely to rally support around the prime minister from a defiant Israeli public.
Continue reading...This live blog is now closed. You can read our latest reporting on the ICC arrest warrant here:
Israel’s position has always held that the rulings of the international criminal court do not apply to it, as it is not a member.
Foreign minister Gideon Saar on Thursday said that it had “issued absurd orders with no authority” against Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant because “Israel is not a member of the court.”
The Chamber found reasonable grounds to believe that during the relevant time, international humanitarian law related to international armed conflict between Israel and Palestine applied. This is because they are two High Contracting Parties to the 1949 Geneva Conventions and because Israel occupies at least parts of Palestine.
The Chamber also found that the law related to non-international armed conflict applied to the fighting between Israel and Hamas.
Continue reading...Joe Biden describes as ‘outrageous’ the warrants for Israeli PM and former defence minister, which put them at risk of detention if they go to some other countries
The international criminal court has issued arrest warrants for the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, the country’s former defence minister Yoav Gallant and the Hamas military leader Mohammed Deif for alleged war crimes relating to the Gaza war.
It is the first time that leaders of a democracy and western-aligned state have been charged by the court, in the most momentous decision of its 22-year history.
Continue reading...Israeli move follows Guardian report that 12-year-old girl’s evacuation for treatment had been repeatedly blocked
The Israeli authorities have permitted Mazyouna Damoo, a 12-year-old Palestinian girl whose face was “ripped off” when an Israeli missile struck her home in June, to leave Gaza for medical treatment, five days after the Guardian reported that repeated requests for her urgent medical evacuation had been denied.
Last Friday, the Guardian highlighted the Damoo family’s desperate battle to get Mazyouna evacuated from Gaza to the United States to receive emergency surgery on devastating injuries to her face sustained in a missile attack by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), which tore off half of her cheek and exposed her jawbone.
Continue reading...Israeli attacks have destroyed huge areas of land used for crops, with 90% of cattle killed, analysis shows
More than 90% of cattle have died and about 70% of land for crops in Gaza has been destroyed or damaged since the beginning of the war in the territory, an analysis of satellite imagery by the UN has found.
More than half of sheep and goat herds have been wiped out, while more than three-quarters of the territory’s famous orchards have been destroyed or damaged, the survey in September found.
Continue reading...WHO says hijacking by armed men has aggravated already severe scarcity of food, medicine and other aid
Food prices have soared in Gaza after the looting of nearly 100 aid trucks amid an already severe food crisis caused by more than a year of war between Israel and Hamas.
This weekend’s hijacking of 98 lorries of a 109-strong convoy by armed men – the biggest such attack to date – has aggravated food, medicine and other aid shortages, according to a World Health Organization spokesperson, Margaret Harris. “It’s getting harder and harder to get the aid in,” she said on Tuesday.
Continue reading...Draft resolution for UN general assembly seeks to protect the aid agency and allow it to keep functioning in Gaza
Norway is to seek an international court of justice (ICJ) advisory opinion condemning the Israeli government for ending cooperation with the UN Palestinian relief agency Unrwa.
The Israeli Knesset passed two bills last month banning Unrwa from Israeli territory and prohibiting Israeli state contact with the agency, moves that would prevent it from delivering aid to Gaza, after allegations by Israel that members of Unrwa staff in Gaza were involved in the 7 October attacks by Hamas. The UN launched an investigation into the Israeli claims and fired nine Unrwa staff as a result.
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