Category Archives: Israel-Gaza war

South Africa urges ICJ to consider Rafah intervention

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Country says Israel’s decision to extend operations could mean a further breach of rights of Palestinians

The UN humanitarian office has not received any communication from Israel of a plan to evacuate Gaza's Rafah area either alone or jointly and would not participate in any forced evacuation even if it did, a spokesperson told Reuters on Tuesday.

"We have not received any official communication from Israeli officials," Jens Laerke, spokesperson for OCHA said in response to Reuters questions about Rafah plans. "Regardless, the UN does not participate in forced, non-voluntary evacuations. There is no plan at this time to facilitate the evacuation of civilians," he said.

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Who are the Rochdale byelection candidates – and what do they stand for?

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With Labour withdrawing support for its candidate, the vote has been blown wide open

With Labour withdrawing support for its candidate, Azhar Ali, at the 11th hour, the Rochdale byelection on 29 February has been blown wide open. The candidates on the all-male ballot paper include George Galloway, who has been canvassing support among the Muslim population, and the seat’s former MP Simon Danczuk, who has appeared as a last-minute candidate for Reform UK.

Here’s a run-down of the candidates and what they stand for:

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Officials say progress being made on Gaza ceasefire talks

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US national security spokesperson says talks in Cairo ‘constructive and moving in right direction’

Israel and Hamas are making progress towards a deal that would bring about a ceasefire and free hostages held in the Gaza Strip, officials with knowledge of the talks have said.

The US national security council spokesperson, John Kirby, speaking as negotiations were held in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, said: “They’ve been constructive and moving in the right direction.”

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Starmer says he took ‘tough’ action to pull support from Rochdale candidate

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Labour leader says he acted decisively after further information on Azhar Ali’s comments about Israel

Keir Starmer has defended his handling of the controversy surrounding Labour’s candidate in Rochdale, who was suspended by the party on Monday night after days of revelations about remarks he made about Israel soon after the Hamas attacks.

The Labour leader said on Tuesday he had taken tough and decisive action against Azhar Ali, who will now campaign for the Rochdale seat with no official support for the party.

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Ireland and Spain among EU nations striking a different note on Gaza war

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In taking alternative direction to likes of US and UK, group has played a role in shifting perspectives on the conflict

When the UN agency for Palestinian refugees became embroiled in a scandal last month, Britain and Germany quickly froze their funding, and other countries on the continent soon followed. But instead of joining the pack, Spain and Portugal decided to go in the opposite direction. They responded with promises to up their funding.

For years, but especially in the past few months, they have been part of a grouping of countries across Europe that have consistently sought to strike a different note when it comes to conflict in the Middle East. Others include Ireland, which has called for a review of the EU’s trade ties with Israel, and Slovenia, which said it expected Israel to swiftly implement provisional measures ordered by the international court of justice in a case looking into allegations of genocide.

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Labour withdraws support for Rochdale candidate after Israel-Gaza remarks

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Party no longer campaigning for Azhar Ali, who suggested Israel had allowed 7 October attack to happen

Labour has withdrawn its support for Azhar Ali, its candidate for the Rochdale byelection, just days before voters go to the polls in a key test for Keir Starmer’s party.

Senior Labour MPs and members had urged the leadership to confirm Ali would be disciplined if he won the byelection as comments he had made soon after the 7 October attacks surfaced over the weekend. In them, he suggested Israel had deliberately relaxed security after warnings of an imminent threat.

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Biden must do more to free Israeli-held US grandmother, rights group says

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Council for American-Islamic Relations calls for release of Samaher Esmail and other Palestinian Americans seized by IDF

An influential Arab-American group sought to increase pressure on Monday on the Joe Biden White House to use its influence with Israel to help free a US-Palestinian grandmother detained by Israeli soldiers in the occupied West Bank.

Samaher Esmail’s family also alleges that she has been beaten and denied access to medical attention.

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Biden joins international calls for Israel to halt planned Rafah offensive

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Politicians say Palestinians sheltering in the southern city in Gaza have nowhere else to go

Joe Biden has added his voice to growing international calls for Israel to drop plans for an all-out military assault on the city of Rafah, in southern Gaza, after a ferocious hostage rescue operation that killed dozens of Palestinians.

Speaking after talks with Jordan’s King Abdullah at the White House on Monday, the US president said: “A major military operation in Rafah should not proceed without a credible plan for ensuring the safety and support of more than 1 million people sheltering there.

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Open letter criticising PEN America’s stance on Israel-Gaza war reaches 500 signatories

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Writers including Roxane Gay have called on the organisation to ‘wake up from its silent, tepid, self-congratulatory middle of the road and take a stand’

An open letter from writers and literary professionals to PEN America calling on the organisation to take a stronger stance on the Israel-Gaza war has reached more than 500 signatories, including writers Roxane Gay, Maaza Mengiste and Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah.

The letter, dated 3 February but still open to signatures, condemns PEN America for being “silent” about “Palestinian journalists, writers, and poets murdered by Israel” outside of “press releases buried on its website”.

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Rafah’s 1 million refugees fear Israeli onslaught after night of bombardment

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Population crammed into Gaza’s southernmost city dread IDF assault after at least 67 killed during hostage rescue

Panic and despair spread across Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah after a night of intense bombardment where more than 1 million people – at least half of the territory’s population – fled seeking shelter but now fear an Israeli ground assault.

“Last night was the heaviest night that we witnessed since we fled to Rafah. It reminded us of what we endured in the northern parts of Gaza, in Gaza City and again in Khan Younis,” said Yousef Hammash of the Norwegian Refugee Council, sheltering in Rafah with his family.

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Thin, pale, but happy: freed Israeli hostages reunited with family

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Fernando Simon Marman and Louis Har’s family say they did not know about rescue before being told to go to hospital to see them

Emerging from captivity in Gaza after 129 days, Fernando Simon Marman and Louis Har appeared thin and pale but with happiness and relief in their eyes.

Their family said the two men are overjoyed at being reunited with their loved ones as they try to make sense of their four-month ordeal.

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Two Israeli hostages freed in Rafah, says IDF, as Palestinians report dozens of deaths

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Israel’s defence forces say hostages were freed during a special raid in Rafah as residents say two mosques and several houses were bombed

At least 37 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes on the southern city of Rafah, according to Gaza health officials, as the Israeli military said it had freed two hostages during a raid by special forces on the city.

The bodies of 20 Palestinians were at the Kuwaiti hospital, 12 at the European hospital, and five at the Abu Youssef Al-Najar hospital, officials at the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza told Reuters. Residents said two mosques and several houses were bombed.

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Middle East crisis: international concern grows over looming Rafah offensive as death toll from airstrike reportedly rises

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Hospital officials in Rafah say at least 50 people have been killed in the Israeli airstrikes that accompanied a hostage rescue operation, according to Associated Press.

Dr Marwan al-Hams, director of the Abu Youssef al-Najjar hospital, said Monday the dead included women and children. An Associated Press journalist also counted the bodies brought to hospital.

The Israeli military said it rescued two hostages held in the territory in a raid that was backed up by Israeli strikes.

This is a developing story and we will bring you more when we have it

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Biden warns Netanyahu against Rafah operation without ‘credible’ safety plan

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UN officials and Biden have said an offensive in city, where about 1.3 million Palestinians are sheltering, would lead to a ‘bloodbath’

In a call Sunday with Benjamin Netanyahu, Joe Biden told the Israeli prime minister that Israel should not launch a military operation in Rafah “without a credible and executable plan for ensuring the safety of and support for the more than one million people sheltering there”.

The call between the US president and Netanyahu was the first between the two leaders since Biden on Thursday used the phrase “over the top” to describe Israel’s military strikes in Gaza in response to the 7 October attack by Hamas.

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Cousin of Hind Rajab, 6, haunted by her last call after family car shot at in Gaza

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Mohammed Hamada says he is devastated by death of Palestinian girl and relatives, whose bodies have now been recovered

The cousin of a six-year-old Palestinian girl who died in Gaza after her family’s car appeared to come under fire from Israeli tanks has told how he spoke to her as she waited to be rescued and said he was haunted by her last words.

Hind Rajab’s body was recovered on Saturday, alongside those of six of her relatives, and two Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) paramedics, Yusuf Al-Zeino and Ahmed Al-Madhoun, sent to find her in Gaza City.

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Middle East crisis live: ‘Enough’ hostages alive to warrant war, says Netanyahu – as it happened

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Israeli prime minister says country ‘will do our best to get all those who are alive back,’ ahead of expected ground invasion of Rafah

Israeli forces have discovered a tunnel network hundreds of metres long and running partly under the UN’s Relief and Works Agency for Palestine’s (UNRWA) Gaza headquarters, the military claimed, calling it new evidence of Hamas exploitation of the main relief agency for Palestinians.

In late January, Britain, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Finland joined the US, Australia and Canada in pausing funding after UNRWA revealed an investigation had been launched into 12 members of staff who allegedly took part in the 7 October attack led by Hamas that killed 1,140 people.

Reporters on the closely escorted trip entered a shaft next to a school on the periphery of the UN compound, descending to the concrete-lined tunnel.

Twenty minutes of walking through the stifling hot, narrow and occasionally winding passage brought them underneath UNRWA headquarters, an army lieutenant-colonel leading the tour said.

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Netanyahu reiterates intent to press on with ground offensive on Rafah

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Israeli PM brushes aside warnings that assault on Gaza’s southernmost town would be a ‘human catastrophe’

Benjamin Netanyahu appears determined to push ahead with a ground offensive against Gaza’s southernmost town of Rafah but has claimed Israel will provide safe passage to the 1.3 million displaced Palestinians sheltering there.

Despite mounting warnings from aid agencies and the international community that an assault on Rafah would be a catastrophe, Netanyahu has reiterated his intention to extend Israel’s military operation against Hamas. Hamas stated that a new advance into Rafah would “blow up” ongoing negotiations to return hostages in return for a ceasefire.

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‘It’s completely divided’: British Iranians torn over Middle East crisis

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Escalation of conflict causing tensions within community and fears about war spreading to Iran

Iranians living in the UK have described deep divisions in the community since the escalation of the conflict in the Middle East.

The deadly attack by Hamas in Israel on 7 October and the subsequent bombardment of Gaza have led to tense conversations among British Iranians, they say.

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‘Hamas have held my son hostage for nine years’: father of detained Israeli Bedouin speaks out

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Sha’ban al-Sayed, whose mentally ill civilian son entered Gaza in 2015, says he has found allyship among families of kidnapped Israelis

In Israel it’s impossible to miss the faces of the 130 or so Israeli hostages held in the Gaza Strip by Hamas: they are plastered across walls, hung from balconies, and digital versions are now screensavers on passport reading machines at the airport. “Bring them home now!” the posters say. The families’ rallying cry is repeated everywhere, chanted at demonstrations and printed on restaurant receipts and the shells of supermarket eggs.

The fate of the captives seized on 7 October has gripped Israeli society. One face that does not appear among the rows of missing people is that of Hisham al-Sayed, a 36-year-old Israeli Bedouin held by Hamas almost completely incommunicado for the last nine years.

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Middle East crisis: UN agency says Israel blocking food aid to Gaza as starvation fears grow – as it happened

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This live blog is now closed, you can read more of our Israel-Gaza war coverage here

Children are going without food for days and some people are resorting to grinding animal feed into flour to survive, says the BBC who spoke to people living in north Gaza. People also described digging down into the soil to access water pipes, for drinking and washing.

International charity ActionAid has said that food is becoming so scarce in Gaza that people are resorting to eating grass. “Every single person in Gaza is now hungry, and people have just 1.5 to 2 litres of unsafe water per day to meet all their needs,” said ActionAid in a statement published that warned intensifying attacks in Rafah would have “disastrous consequences”.

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