A building housing various international media, including The Associated Press, collapses after an Israeli airstrike on Saturday in Gaza City(File)An Israeli airstrike has destroyed a high-rise building that housed The Associated Press offices in the Gaza Strip. The airstrike Saturday came roughly an hour after the Israeli military ordered people to evacuate the building. There was no immediate explanation for why the building was targeted. The building houses The Associated Press, Al Jazeera and a number of offices and apartments.
The development comes hours after an Israeli air strike in Gaza city on Saturday killed at least 10 Palestinians, a majority of whom were children, AP reported.
Responding to the development, AP said in a statement: “This is an incredibly disturbing development. We narrowly avoided a terrible loss of life. A dozen AP journalists and freelancers were inside the building and thankfully we were able to evacuate them in time.”
As the conflict between Israel and the Hamas continues to escalate, Palestine witnessed some of its most widespread protests in years. Hundreds of young demonstrators clashed with Israeli troops, leading to the death of at least 11 people so far, AP reported.
Since Monday night, Hamas has fired hundreds of rockets into Israel, which has pounded the Gaza Strip with strikes. In Gaza, at least 139 people have been killed, including 39 children and 22 women; in Israel, eight people have been killed, including the death Saturday of a man killed by a rocket that hit in Ramat Gan, a suburb of Tel Aviv.
Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia has called for foreign ministers of the world’s largest body of Muslim nations to hold a meeting Sunday. The gathering is to discuss Israeli acts of violence against Palestinians and the Israeli police’s use of force against protesters at Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem.
The kingdom will host the virtual summit, gathering ministers of the 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation “to discuss the Israeli aggression in the Palestinian territory,” particularly acts of violence in the vicinity of Al-Aqsa Mosque, the body said Saturday.
The communications director to Turkey's president tweeted that Israel's targeting of The Associated Press and Al Jazeera offices in the Gaza Strip were a blow on the freedom of press. The airstrike on Saturday targeted and destroyed a high-rise building in Gaza City that housed offices of The Associated Press and other media outlets.
Fahrettin Altun said after the attack: "I curse these lowly attacks by Israel hitting press centers to cover up its massacres." He also claimed that "Israel is continuing its massacres and war crimes."
The Israeli military said on Saturday that it bombed the home of Khalil al-Hayeh, a top leader of Gaza's ruling militant Hamas group.
The military alleged that the home served as part of what it said was the militant group's "terrorist infrastructure."
Al-Hayeh is a senior figure in the Hamas political leadership in Gaza. His fate after the strike was not immediately known. Earlier on Saturday, an Israeli airstrike targeted and destroyed a high-rise building in Gaza City that housed offices of The Associated Press and other media outlets. (AP)
The White House says Israel has a "paramount responsibility" to ensure the safety of journalists covering the spiraling conflict. White House press secretary Jen Psaki tweeted on Saturday that the U.S. has "communicated directly to the Israelis that ensuring the safety and security of journalists and independent media is a paramount responsibility."
President Joe Biden has urged a de-escalation, but has publicly backed Israel's right to self-defense from Hamas rockets fired from Gaza. The White House statement followed an Israeli airstrike that targeted and destroyed a high-rise building in Gaza City that housed offices of The Associated Press and other media outlets. AP's president and CEO Gary Pruitt said the agency was "shocked and horrified" at the strike.
Marches in support of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip were being held Saturday in a dozen French cities, but the focus was on Paris, where riot police got ready as organisers said they would defy a ban on the protest.
Paris police chief Didier Lallement ordered shops closed around the starting point of the planned march in a working-class neighbourhood in northern Paris after an administrative court confirmed the ban. Authorities noted a banned July 2014 pro-Palestinian protest against an Israeli offensive in Gaza that degenerated into violence and running battles with police to justify the order against Saturday's march.
Organisers said they intend to "denounce the latest Israeli aggressions" and mark the fleeing of Palestinians after Israel declared independence in 1948. (AP)
An Israeli airstrike destroyed a high-rise building in Gaza City that housed offices of The Associated Press and other media outlets on Saturday. All AP employees and freelancers evacuated the building safely.
AP President and CEO Gary Pruitt has released the following statement: "We are shocked and horrified that the Israeli military would target and destroy the building housing AP's bureau and other news organizations in Gaza. They have long known the location of our bureau and knew journalists were there. We received a warning that the building would be hit. We are seeking information from the Israeli government and are engaged with the US State Department to try to learn more. This is an incredibly disturbing development. We narrowly avoided a terrible loss of life. A dozen AP journalists and freelancers were inside the building and thankfully we were able to evacuate them in time. The world will know less about what is happening in Gaza because of what happened today." (AP)
Hundreds of people have participated in the funeral of a Hezbollah fighter who was shot dead along the Lebanon-Israel border during a rally denouncing Israeli airstrikes on Gaza.
The funeral of Mohammed Tahhan was held in his hometown of Adloun in southern Lebanon on Saturday afternoon. The 21-year-old man died of wounds sustained on Friday, shortly after he was struck during the protest at the border. (AP)
The United Nations' human rights chief is urging all in what has developed into a battle between Israel and Gaza's militant Hamas rulers to lower tensions, and faulted actions by both sides.
Michelle Bachelet, the UN high commissioner for human rights, said in a statement issued in Geneva on Saturday that "rather than seeking to calm tensions, inflammatory rhetoric from leaders on all sides appears to be seeking to excite tensions rather than to calm them."
Bachelet's statement was issued on Saturday, shortly before an Israeli airstrike destroyed a high-rise building in Gaza City that housed offices of The Associated Press and other media outlets.
In the statement, Bachelet "warned that the firing of large numbers of indiscriminate rockets by Palestinian armed groups into Israel, including densely populated areas, in clear violation of international humanitarian law, amounts to war crimes." (AP)
An Israeli airstrike has destroyed a highrise building that housed The Associated Press offices in the Gaza Strip. The airstrike Saturday came roughly an hour after the Israeli military ordered people to evacuate the building. There was no immediate explanation for why the building was targeted. The building houses The Associated Press, AlJazeera and a number of offices and apartments. (AP)
Saudi Arabia has called for foreign ministers of the world's largest body of Muslim nations to hold a meeting Sunday. The gathering is to discuss Israeli acts of violence against Palestinians and the Israeli police's use of force against protesters at Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem.
The kingdom will host the virtual summit, gathering ministers of the 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation "to discuss the Israeli aggression in the Palestinian territory," particularly acts of violence in the vicinity of Al-Aqsa Mosque, the body said Saturday. The Saudi-headquartered OIC includes countries Iran, Turkey, Indonesia and a range of Muslim majority nations. (AP)
Iran's foreign minister has called off a planned visit to his Austrian counterpart in Vienna. The decision came after Austria's chancellery and foreign ministry flew the Israeli flag as a signal of solidarity in Israel's conflict with the militant Hamas group.
Austrian daily Die Presse reported Saturday that Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif was due to meet Austrian counterpart Alexander Schallenberg on Saturday morning. But he called off the trip over the Austrian leaders decision to fly the Israeli flag on Friday. (AP)
An Israeli air raid in Gaza City killed at least 10 Palestinians, mostly children, early Saturday in the deadliest single strike since the battle with Gaza's militant Hamas rulers erupted earlier this week. Both sides pressed for an advantage as cease-fire efforts gathered strength.
The latest outburst of violence began in Jerusalem and has spread across the region, with Jewish-Arab clashes and rioting in mixed cities of Israel. There were also widespread Palestinian protests Friday in the occupied West Bank, where Israeli forces shot and killed 11 people. (AP)
Thousands of Palestinians grabbed children and belongings and fled their homes Friday as Israel barraged the northern Gaza Strip with tank fire and airstrikes, killing a family of six in their house and heavily damaging other neighbourhoods in what it said was an operation to clear militant tunnels.
As international efforts at a cease-fire stepped up, Israel appeared to be looking to inflict intensified damage on the Islamic militant group Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip and has fired hundreds of rockets into Israel.
The Gaza violence increasingly spilled over into turmoil elsewhere. Across the West Bank, Palestinians held their most widespread protests since 2017, with hundreds in at least nine towns burning tires and throwing stones at Israeli troops. Soldiers opening fire killed six, according to Palestinian health officials, while a seventh Palestinian was killed as he tried to stab an Israeli soldier. (AP)
Early Friday, just after midnight, the Israeli military put out an ominous statement to the media: “IDF air and ground troops are currently attacking in the Gaza Strip.”
The terse statement set off frenzied speculation that Israel had launched a ground invasion of Gaza — a much-feared scenario that would mark a bloody escalation of this week’s operation against Hamas militants. Some reporters were even told outright the incursion had begun.
Hours later, the military issued a “clarification.” There were no troops inside Gaza. But by then, several major news outlets had erroneously reported the ground offensive was under way.
While the army attempted to play down the incident as a misunderstanding, well-placed Israeli military commentators said the media had been used as part of an elaborate ruse to lure Hamas militants into a deadly trap that may have killed dozens of fighters.
“They didn’t lie,” said Or Heller, a veteran military correspondent on Israel’s Channel 13 TV. “It was a manipulation. It was smart and it was successful.” (AP)
Turmoil from the battle between Israel and Hamas spilled over into the West Bank, sparking the most widespread Palestinian protests in years as hundreds of young demonstrators in multiple towns clashed with Israeli troops, who shot and killed at least 11 people.
Israel's bombardment of the Gaza Strip continued into early Saturday, when an airstrike on a house in Gaza City killed at least seven Palestinians -- the highest number of fatalities in a single hit. That strike came a day after a furious overnight barrage of tank fire and airstrikes that wreaked destruction in some towns, killed a family of six in their house and sent thousands fleeing their homes.
The Israeli military said the operation involved 160 warplanes dropping some 80 tons of explosives over the course of 40 minutes and succeeded in destroying a network of tunnels used by Hamas to elude airstrikes and surveillance. (AP)
Morocco's King Mohammed VI on Friday ordered 40 tonnes of aid for Palestinians to be shipped to the West Bank and Gaza following recent violence.
The aid includes food, medicine and blankets and will be carried by military aircrafts, the foreign ministry said in a statement.Morocco also denounced "the violent acts perpetrated in occupied Palestinian territories," and reiterated support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Morocco resumed ties with Israel in December as part of a deal brokered by the United States that also includes Washington’s recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara. (Reuters)
The number of Palestinians killed in the West Bank has risen to seven. The Israeli army says one was killed after attempting to stab a soldier. Palestinian health officials confirmed that death and said six other Palestinians were killed by Israeli army fire in the occupied West Bank. (AP)
Hundreds of Muslims in Turkey have rallied urging Palestinians to continue resistance against Israel. They shouted support for militant Hamas leaders on Friday at a symbolic funeral prayer for Palestinians killed in the spate of violence this week between Israel and the Gaza Strip.
About 300 Muslims at the event hollered slogans in Turkish including Greetings to Hamas continue resistance. They called on Turkish soldiers to go to Gaza to help fight Israel and sang of the domed mosque in contested Jerusalem AlAqsa will be saved if blood flows in streams.
Some also waved Palestinian flags and chanted slogans in Arabic. People in Turkey have been demonstrating against Israel this week gathering without much interference from the police despite a strict lockdown to curb COVID-19 infections. (AP)
Israel's army says a soldier has shot and killed a Palestinian who tried to ram his car into a military post in the occupied West Bank, then got out and attempted to stab the soldier. The incident took place on Friday north of the city of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank. The Palestinian health ministry confirmed the death but no other details were immediately available. Rights groups have complained about past shootings of Palestinians by the Israeli military under questionable circumstances. (AP)
Civil unrest between Jews and Arabs in Israel dealt a strong blow to efforts by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's opponents to unseat the Israeli leader after a series of inconclusive elections.
Naftali Bennett, head of the ultranationalist Yamina party, said he was abandoning efforts to form a coalition with centre and left-wing parties to form a new government. The post-election landscape remains largely the same: Netanyahu was given a chance to form a government, and failed. Now the main anti-Netanyahu bloc led by Yair Lapid's centrist Yesh Atid - 'There is a Future' - party also has no obvious route to putting together a majority in the 120-member Knesset.
Bennett, a rightist who was always an unlikely bedfellow with the more moderate Lapid, said he was abandoning those coalition talks in favour of putting together a wider unity government in the nation's interests at a time of crisis. It leaves open the very real possibility of another election - an unprecedented fifth in just over two years. (Reuters)
Lufthansa has extended its suspension of flights to Tel Aviv until May 17, the German carrier said on Friday, as Israeli-Palestinian conflict escalates. Lufthansa had said on Thursday it was suspending all flights to Tel Aviv through May 14. (Reuters)
The escalation of violence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is dismaying American Muslims and Jews who've been working to build bridges between their communities and are now struggling to quell fear and anger in their own circles.
"We're heartbroken," said Muslim attorney Atiya Aftab, the New Jersey-based co-founder of a major interfaith group the Sisterhood of Salaam Shalom. She added that the situation threatens to derail the groups work.
The organization, which seeks to build trust and friendships between Muslim and Jewish women and teenage girls, issued a statement regretting the violent response by Hamas the Islamic militant group ruling Gaza but was more expansive and forceful in condemning actions by Israeli security forces.
The Israeli government has a responsibility to stop settlers and extremists from taking over the land and allow those who live in East Jerusalem to rightfully live there in peace, the group said. "As Muslim and Jewish women of faith, we have a responsibility to rise up and respond to injustice and prejudice."
The grim events in Israel and Gaza have fueled raw discussions among members of another Muslim-Jewish partnership Los Angeles-based New Ground, according to its executive director Aziza Hasan. (AP)
Israeli Justice Minister Benny Gantz has called on the chief's of big social media platforms to quickly remove content from their sites that incites violence or spreads disinformation.
A spokesman for Gantz said he told executives of Facebook and Tik Tok during a Zoom meeting Thursday that the current round of violence is being intentionally stirred through social media by extremist elements sworn to damage Israel. Gantz called the current round of fighting a moment of social emergency and we expect your assistance.
The spokesman said the executives expressed their commitment to act quickly and effectively to prevent incitement on their networks. (AP)
Palestinians grabbed their children and belongings and fled neighborhoods on the outskirts of Gaza City on Friday as Israel unleashed a heavy barrage of artillery fire and airstrikes killing a family of 6 in their home. Israel said it was clearing a network of militant tunnels ahead of a possible ground invasion.
Israel has massed troops along the border and called up 9000 reservists as fighting intensifies with the Islamic militant group Hamas which controls the Gaza Strip. Palestinian militants have fired some 1800 rockets and the Israeli military has launched more than 600 airstrikes toppling at least three high-rise apartment buildings and has shelled some areas with tanks stationed near the frontier. (AP)
Thousands of Muslims led by activists from an Islamic political party demonstrated in Bangladesh's capital on Friday to denounce attacks by Israel against Palestinians.
After the end of Eid a-Fitr prayers at Dhaka's main Baitul Mokarram Mosque, activists from the Islamic Andolan Bangladesh, or Islamic Movement Bangladesh, began protesting and were joined by thousands of others.
Muslim-majority Bangladesh celebrated the key festival of Eid a-Fitr in a subdued manner after the government urged people to avoid large gatherings. Authorities arranged prayers in phases at the Baitul Mokarram Mosque, where devotees maintained distancing to avoid spreading the coronavirus. Afterward, protesters crowded together outside, carrying signs reading "Boycott terrorist state Israel" and chanting "Down with Israel." (AP)
Israel fired artillery and mounted extensive air strikes on Friday against a network of Palestinian militant tunnels under Gaza that it dubbed "the Metro", amid persistent rocket attacks on Israeli towns.
An Israeli military spokesman said that while ground forces had taken part in the 40-minute, pre-dawn offensive, none had crossed into the Gaza Strip, as hostilities entered their fifth day with no sign of abating.Health officials in northern Gaza said a woman and her three children were killed during the Israeli operation and that their bodies were recovered from the rubble of their home.
Rocket barrages against southern Israel swiftly followed the Israeli strikes, which the spokesman said included artillery and tank fire from inside Israeli territory. (Reuters)
In a tweet shared in Arabic and Hebrew, French President Emmanuel Macron called for an immediate ceasefire between Israeli forces and Palestinian militants. "The spiral of violence in the Middle East must stop. I strongly call for a ceasefire and for dialogue. I call for calm and peace," his tweet read.
Israeli artillery pounded northern Gaza early Friday in an attempt to destroy a vast network of militant tunnels inside the territory, the military said, bringing the front lines closer to dense civilian areas and paving the way for a potential ground invasion.
Israel has massed troops along the border and called up 9,000 reservists following days of fighting with the Islamic militant group Hamas, which controls Gaza. Palestinians militants have fired some 1,800 rockets and the military has launched more than 600 airstrikes, toppling at least three apartment blocks. The stepped-up fighting came as communal violence in Israel erupted for a fourth night, with Jewish and Arab mobs clashing in the flashpoint town of Lod.
The fighting took place despite a bolstered police presence ordered by the nation's leaders. Masses of red flames illuminated the skies as the deafening blasts from the outskirts of Gaza City jolted people awake. (AP)
The Palestinian Health Ministry said, as of Friday morning, 119 Palestinians have died and 830 have been injured since the conflict erupted last week.
Health officials in northern Gaza said a woman and her three children were killed during the Israeli airstrikes overnight, that targeted a network of Palestinian militant tunnels. Their bodies were recovered from the rubble of their home.
Nine Israelis have been killed, according to Israeli media. The most recent were the deaths of two women — one elderly — while running to air-raid shelters. (DW)
Clashes broke out early Friday between Palestinians and Israeli forces in several parts of the West Bank where a protest had been taking place, the Maan news agency reported.
Earlier, the agency said on Facebook that similar clashes were underway at a refugee camp in Hebron and in the northern city of Jenin. The WAFA news agency said 10 Palestinians were injured by live fire from Israeli soldiers near the separation barrier in northeast Jenin. (DW)
US President Joe Biden said that while he was working towarding restoring calm in the Middle East, US officials believed that the conflict was bound to continue for some more days.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke by phone with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday, but U.S. officials said Abbas seems either unable or unwilling to rein in Hamas-led rocket attacks on Israeli targets. As a consequence, the Biden administration has reached out to a number of regional Arab states to get them to exert influence on Hamas -- labeled a terrorist organization by Washington -- to stop the violence. (With Reuters inputs)
Israel fired artillery and mounted more air strikes on Friday against Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip amid constant rocket fire deep into Israel's commercial centre.
As hostilities entered their fifth day, with no sign of abating, the Israeli military said in a statement shortly after midnight that air and ground forces were attacking the Hamas-run enclave.
Rocket barrages from Gaza swiftly followed. Although the statement gave no further details, Israeli military affairs correspondents who are briefed regularly by the armed forces said it was not a ground invasion, and that troops were firing artillery from Israel's side of the border.
Residents of northern Gaza, near the Israeli frontier, said they had seen no sign of Israeli ground forces inside the enclave but reported heavy artillery fire and dozens of air strikes.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday the campaign "will take more time". (Reuters)
The U.N. Security Council will publicly discuss the worsening violence between Israel and Palestinian militants on Sunday, diplomats said, reaching a compromise over U.S. objections to a meeting on Friday.
Diplomats said the United States, a close ally of Israel, had initially suggested a virtual public meeting could be held on Tuesday.U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Thursday he hoped waiting a few days would allow for “diplomacy to have some effect and to see if indeed we get a real de-escalation,” adding that Washington was “open to and supportive of a discussion, an open discussion, at the United Nations."Hostilities entered their fifth day on Friday, with no sign of abating.
Israel fired artillery and mounted more air strikes against Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip amid constant rocket fire deep into Israel's commercial centre. (Reuters)