David Cameron says ‘extremist’ settlers responsible for human rights abuses against West Bank residents
The UK has imposed sanctions against four Israeli nationals, saying they were “extremist settlers” who had violently attacked Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
The measures impose strict financial and travel restrictions on the four individuals, who Britain said were involved in “egregious abuses of human rights”.
Continue reading...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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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
Continue reading...Failure to ensure special care for more than 1 million civilians in the area would ‘cause serious harm to Israel’s own interests’, foreign minister, Penny Wong, says
The Australian government has warned that Israel’s plans for a military offensive on the southern Gaza town of Rafah could have “devastating consequences” for Palestinian civilians sheltering there.
The foreign minister, Penny Wong, also suggested on Monday that a failure to ensure special care for more than 1 million civilians in the area, many in makeshift tents, would “cause serious harm to Israel’s own interests”.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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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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”.
Continue reading...Girl who pleaded with Red Crescent to rescue her found dead along with several relatives and two paramedics who tried to save her
“I’m so scared, please come,” were some of the last words six-year-old Hind Rajab said in a telephone call to rescuers after her family’s car came under fire in Gaza City.
Trapped in the vehicle and surrounded by her dead relatives, for three hours she pleaded with the Red Crescent to save her.
But the aid agency lost contact with the ambulance dispatched to her aid on 29 January and its crew and Hind remained missing.
Now Hind’s family has said that she was found dead inside the car in the Tel al-Hawa area of Gaza City on Saturday morning.
Continue reading...More than a million civilians sheltering in Gaza’s last place of relative safety brace for all-out assault
Airstrikes on the Gaza Strip’s southernmost town of Rafah have killed at least 44 people as more than a million civilians sheltering in the area brace for the possibility of a full-scale Israeli ground offensive on the territory’s last place of relative safety.
As Israeli forces have expanded ground operations steadily southwards in their war against Hamas over the past four months, Rafah – situated on the border with Egypt, and home before the war to about 280,000 people – has become the last refuge for more than half of the strip’s population of 2.3 million.
Continue reading...Human rights groups also want to see executive order used to stop US groups from donating millions of dollars each year to settlers
There are growing calls for Joe Biden to use his new executive order sanctioning violent Israeli settlers to also target political leaders, including government ministers, responsible for driving attacks against Palestinians.
Pro-Israel groups and others in the US say the order is potentially a severe blow to the settlement movement in the West Bank, in part because financial sanctions could block even Israeli banks from doing business in parts of the occupied territories.
Continue reading...Special rapporteur cites lack of medical supplies, food and clean water, and continued demolition of infrastructure
Israel appears to be in breach of the orders issued a fortnight ago by the international court of justice requiring it to take immediate steps to protect Palestinians’ rights and cease all activities that could constitute genocide, the UN special rapporteur on the occupied territories, Francesca Albanese, has said.
The Israeli government was given until 23 February to report to the ICJ on what it has done to comply with six orders the court issued, including one relating to ending incitement to genocide and another requiring immediate steps to improve the supply of humanitarian aid.
Continue reading...Philippe Lazzarini says summary dismissal of nine employees was ‘reverse due process’ after Israel’s claims they aided Hamas attack
The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees has said he followed “reverse due process” in sacking nine staff members accused by Israel of being involved in Hamas’s 7 October attacks.
Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA’s commissioner general, said he did not probe Israel’s claims against the employees before dismissing them and launching an investigation.
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The Ireland women’s basketball team chose not to shake hands with the Israel players at their EuroBasket 2025 qualifier in Riga on Thursday in response to an allegation by an Israeli player about antisemitism, reports Reuters.
The Israeli Basketball Association published an interview with player Dor Saar on Tuesday, during which she said: “It’s known that they are quite antisemitic, and it’s no secret; maybe that’s why a strong game is expected.”
Continue reading...Biden and UN say assault on city where 1.3m civilians are sheltering would be disastrous
Israel has moved closer to a full-scale ground offensive against the southern Gaza city of Rafah, as Benjamin Netayahu ordered military leaders to present a plan to evacuate civilians from the area.
Despite warnings from a senior aid official that an assault on Rafah – where about 1.3 million displaced Palestinians are sheltering – would lead to a “bloodbath”, and the UN urging against forced mass displacement, Israel appeared determined to push ahead.
Continue reading...Ahmad Khalefa, human rights lawyer of Palestinian heritage, released to house arrest after organising anti-war protest
A prominent Israeli human rights lawyer of Palestinian heritage has been released to house arrest after spending 110 days in prison for organising a peaceful protest against the war in Gaza.
A supreme court judge ruled on Wednesday that Ahmad Khalefa, 42, a lawyer working with Human Rights Defenders Fund, an Israeli non-governmental organisation, should be detained at home subject to electronic monitoring while his case is pending.
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A journalist and his son have been killed in an Israeli airstrike on a residential building in the central Gaza Strip, reports Al Jazeera.
Nafez Abdel Jawad, who worked for Palestine TV, was killed in a bombing of a residential building in the al-Salam neighbourhood in Deir el-Balah in the central Gaza Strip last night, says Al Jazeera. The news organisation said that his only son also died in the airstrike and other injuries had also been reported.
Continue reading...Families fear remaining hostages will pay price for prime minister’s pursuit of ‘absolute victory’ over Hamas
Moments after Benjamin Netanyahu publicly rejected the terms of a ceasefire in Gaza proposed by Hamas, five Israeli hostages who were freed in November pleaded with him to push for a deal.
“Everything is in your hands,” a tearful Adina Moshe, 72, said in a direct appeal to the Israeli prime minister at an emotional press conference in Tel Aviv. She said she feared the remaining hostages and their families would pay the price for Netanyahu’s pursuit of “absolute victory” over the militant group.
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