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The US wants real and extended pauses in fighting in Gaza so assistance can get to people who need it, US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, told reporters on Wednesday.
More details to follow …
Continue reading...Category Archives: Lebanon
Aid entering Gaza is lowest in months, says Unrwa, as US deadline approaches – Middle East crisis, as it happened
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Images sent over the news wires show smoke billowing over Beirut after Israeli strikes on the southern suburbs of Lebanon’s capital.
Lebanese media is reporting that two people have been killed and six wounded in an Israeli airstrike on Hermel, which is in the north-east of the country near the border with Syria.
Continue reading...Israel says ‘certain progress’ made in Lebanon ceasefire talks
Foreign minister says talks continuing over Israel’s stated objectives of pushing Hezbollah away from Israeli border
Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Saar, said on Monday that “certain progress” had been made on ceasefire talks in Lebanon, where Israel has been engaged in fighting Hezbollah for more than 13 months.
“We will be ready to be there if we know, first of all, that Hezbollah is not on our border, is north of the Litani River, and that Hezbollah will not be able to arm with new weapons systems,” Saar said.
Continue reading...Middle East crisis: Iran says ‘world is waiting’ for Trump administration to stop wars in Lebanon and Gaza – as it happened
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Lebanon’s National News Agency reports Israeli planes carried out airstrikes again overnight on locations in the south of the country. There are, as yet, no reports of any casualties.
Here are some of the latest images sent to us over the news wires from the Kerem Shalom crossing between Gaza and Israel.
Continue reading...Dozens killed as Israeli strikes destroy home, Gaza officials say
Gaza’s civil defence agency says 25 people killed, including 13 children, as Israel continues attacks in north of territory
Israeli warplanes carried out more strikes in northern Gaza on Sunday, reportedly destroying a home in the Jabaliya area that had been under siege for weeks, killing and wounding dozens, including many women and children.
The death toll is one of the biggest in a single strike so far in Jabaliya, where hundreds of people have died since a major Israeli operation in the area began last month.
Continue reading...Trump’s win boosts chances of Netanyahu remaining in power until Israel’s 2026 elections
Wars in Gaza and Lebanon set to intensify after Israeli PM’s position is reinforced by Trump’s victory and ousting of defence minister
Benjamin Netanyahu is set to stay in power in Israel until elections due in 2026 and possibly longer, analysts and officials now believe, after a tumultuous week in which the 75-year-old veteran politician successfully fired his defence minister and was boosted by the results of the US election.
Netanyahu’s newly reinforced position could lead to further intensification of Israel’s campaign in Lebanon, and prolong the conflict in Gaza, critics fear – although the incoming US president Donald Trump has said he wants to swiftly end both wars.
Continue reading...Middle East crisis: Amsterdam officials ban protests after violence; Hamas says it has ‘not received’ request to leave Qatar – as it happened
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Israeli air strikes on the Lebanese coastal city of Tyre have now killed seven people.
Reuters reported that Lebanon’s health ministry said the death toll has risen from three to seven after the attack on Friday.
Continue reading...More than 60 arrests in Amsterdam after attacks on Israeli football fans – as it happened
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Reuters reports that the Israeli military said on Friday that all Israel Defense Forces (IDF) personnel have been banned from going to the Netherlands until further notice.
Human rights organisations say they are gravely concerned that a young Iranian woman arrested for stripping down to her underwear could be subjected to torture after she was transferred to a psychiatric hospital by the authorities.
Continue reading...Yoav Gallant reportedly says Israeli army has nothing left to do in Gaza
Ousted defence minister also quoted as saying Netanyahu rejected peace deal against advice of his security officials
Israel’s ousted defence minister, Yoav Gallant, has reportedly said the army has achieved all its objectives in Gaza and that Benjamin Netanyahu rejected a hostages-for-peace deal against the advice of his own security establishment.
Gallant was speaking to hostages’ families on Thursday, two days after being sacked by Netanyahu, and reports of his remarks quickly surfaced in Israeli media.
Continue reading...Middle East crisis live: Israeli airstrike kills 12 in Gaza City school; Ireland joins genocide case against Israel – as it happened
12 Palestinians killed in attack on al-Shati refugee camp; Irish foreign minister says country will join South Africa’s case in the international court of justice
Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson has said the presidential election result in the US is a chance for a new administration to “review the wrong approaches of the past”.
Reuters quotes Esmaeil Baghaei saying “We had bitter experiences with various US governments’ past policies and approaches. Elections are an opportunity to review the wrong approaches of the past. What is important for Iran will be how we evaluate the actions of the US government.”
Continue reading...Palestinians will not be allowed to return to homes in northern Gaza, says IDF
Brig Gen Itzik Cohen said in a briefing that aid would only be allowed to enter south of Gaza Strip, not the north
Israeli ground forces are getting closer to “the complete evacuation” of northern Gaza and residents will not be allowed to return home, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has said, in what appears to be the first official acknowledgment from Israel it is systematically removing Palestinians from the area.
In a media briefing on Tuesday night, the IDF Brig Gen Itzik Cohen told Israeli reporters that since troops had been forced to enter some areas twice, such as Jabaliya camp, “there is no intention of allowing the residents of the northern Gaza Strip to return to their homes”.
Continue reading...Netanyahu’s sacking of defence chief ‘last thing Israel needs’, says president
Critics dismayed at timing of dismissal amid war and on day of US election – and warn more may come for PM’s political gain
Many Israelis have been left reeling by Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to dismiss his popular defence minister in the midst of a multifront war, accusing him of carrying out the move for his own political gain.
In a surprise announcement late on Tuesday, the prime minister said that he had fired Yoav Gallant over what he described a “crisis of trust” in the past few months. Gallant, a member of Netanyahu’s Likud party and a senior general, has been replaced by the foreign minister, Likud lawmaker and loyalist Israel Katz, who has little military background.
Continue reading...Protests in Israel after defence minister sacked – as it happened
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Al Jazeera reports that the death toll from an Israeli strike on tents housing displaced people in central Gaza has risen to six, and includes a six-year-old and a four-year-old child.
Lebanon’s Nation News Agency has reported that the Israeli army, which has been staging incursions inside the south of the country, “is booby-trapping and destroying entire neighbourhoods in cities and towns, such that more than 37 towns have been wiped out and their homes destroyed, and more than 40,000 housing units have been completely destroyed.”
Continue reading...Full-scale war in Middle East involving Israel and Iran likely, say most Europeans in poll
Large majorities in seven countries condemn 7 October attacks – but most common view is Israel’s response in Gaza is also unjustified
Full-scale war in the Middle East involving Israel and Iran is now likely, most western Europeans responding in a poll believe, with many criticising Israel’s conduct thus far and saying that if such a war did occur, the US and Europe should not provide it with military aid.
A YouGov Eurotrack survey in France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Sweden, Denmark and the UK found that strong majorities in all seven countries, ranging from 65% in France to 82% in Spain, felt the Hamas attacks on Israel on 7 October 2023 were not justified.
Continue reading...Middle East crisis live: Leaks from Netanyahu’s office may have compromised peace deal, Israeli court finds – as it happened
Breakdown in peace negotiations may have been caused by leaked and falsified documents involving close aide to Israeli PM
Israeli media reports that prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu will meet today with opposition leader Yair Lapid for a security briefing.
The Palestinian Authority’s foreign ministry has issued a statement condemning the reported burning of cars by Israeli settlers in Al-Bireh in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
The ministry affirms that the Jewish terrorist elements who stormed Al-Bireh would not have committed this heinous crime had they not felt protected, supported and immune from the political level in the occupying state, especially the ministers of the extreme Israeli right who openly incite against Palestinian citizens, their land and their property in full view.
Continue reading...Middle East crisis: Israeli attacks kill at least 31 people in Gaza, medics say – as it happened
Nearly half of those killed were reported to be in northern Gaza, where the IDF has been conducting an intense assault
There are mounting concerns over whether the Israeli government’s ultimate war aims in Gaza include territorial expansion, as the IDF’s siege on the northern part of the territory – under sweeping evacuation orders - intensifies.
Here is an extract from a report by my colleagues Malak A Tantesh and Julian Borger, who explore these concerns further:
The IDF says it is hunting Hamas militants but suspicions are growing that Israel is putting into practice a blueprint it had officially distanced itself from, known as the “generals’ plan”.
The plan, named after the retired senior officers promoting it, was intended to depopulate northern Gaza by giving the Palestinians trapped there an opportunity to evacuate and then treating those that stayed as combatants, laying total siege.
Continue reading...Israel abducts alleged Hezbollah official in unprecedented sea raid
Commandos land in northern Lebanon in highly unusual operation to capture supposed militant group member
The Israeli military abducted who it said was a senior Hezbollah official in an unprecedented operation on Saturday morning during which Israeli commandos landed on the shores of Batroun, northern Lebanon, captured the alleged official and escaped via speedboat.
In a statement, an Israeli military official said its forces captured a “senior operative of Hezbollah” and transferred him to its territory to be investigated by military intelligence. The media outlet Axios cited Israeli sources as saying the captured man – Imad Amhaz – was responsible for Hezbollah’s naval operations.
Continue reading...Michigan congresswoman Rashida Tlaib declines to endorse Kamala Harris
The Palestinian American ‘squad’ member has been critical of Harris and the Democratic party’s inaction on Gaza
Michigan congresswoman Rashida Tlaib declined to endorse Kamala Harris at a union rally in Detroit, where the war in Gaza is the top issue for the largest block of Arab American voters in the country.
Tlaib, the first Palestinian American woman to serve in Congress, is the only one of the so-called leftist “Squad” that has not endorsed the Democrat candidate. The other three members – Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York – endorsed Harris in July.
Continue reading...Israel captures Lebanese sea captain and claims he is a Hezbollah operative – as it happened
Navy confirms it landed in Batroun, 30km north of Beirut, and took him to Israel to be ‘investigated’
Troops were also operating in central Gaza and Rafah in the territory’s far south, the Israeli military said, while witnesses told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that Israeli drones and boats opened fire on al-Mawasi in south Gaza.
Medics and Gaza’s civil defence rescuers on Saturday reported three people killed in a strike on Nuseirat, in central Gaza, a day after AFP images showed the blood-stained shrouds of several people killed there in an Israeli strike.
The entire Palestinian population in north Gaza is at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine and violence.”
Continue reading...Israeli airstrikes on Lebanon and Gaza kill dozens as rockets are fired into Israel
Israel targets north-eastern Lebanon and Beirut, while bombardment of Gaza raises fears of worsening humanitarian conditions for civilians
Israeli airstrikes on Friday killed at least 52 people and wounded scores more, the Lebanese health ministry said, while rockets fired from Lebanon fell on Israel on Saturday.
Israeli police said 19 people were injured before dawn on Saturday in the central town of Tira. Three projectiles crossed into Israel from Lebanon, Israel’s military said, and some were intercepted.
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