Israel-Palestine: A life on the hyphen
Nineteen-year-old Roni Ashel’s last text message to her mother was on October 7 at 9.27 am: “Mom, I’m okay, don’t worry about me. Love you.” The 19-year-old soldier was on duty at the Israel-Gaza border that day when she was abducted by Hamas militants, one of about 200 Israelis who were taken hostage and are now believed to be in Gaza.
In Tel Aviv, Roni’s aunt Tair remembers her niece, who “loves Taylor Swift and Maroon 5”, as she says, “So far, no one knows anything about her. We are desperate to receive any sign of life.”
So the aunt sent Roni a text message: “Well, honey, we will find you. We will get you back. Your parents love you. Your family loves you. Stay strong. We know you have high resilience. Use it now. Till we come and get you…We love you.” She hasn’t heard back. (Read more)
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz criticised Israel's settlement policy in the occupied West Bank on Saturday and repeated calls for a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinians. "We don't want any new settlements in the West Bank, no violence by settlers against the Palestinians in the West Bank," Scholz said during a visit to Nuthetal in Brandenburg state. The best outcome for Israelis and Palestinians remains the two-state solution, he said. (Reuters)
Turkey will make efforts to rebuild damaged infrastructure, hospitals and schools in Gaza if a ceasefire is achieved there, Turkish media on Saturday reported President Tayyip Erdogan as saying. Speaking on his plane returning from a trip to Germany, Erdogan also said Turkey was making a call for nuclear weapons inspections to be carried out in Israel so no doubt is left on the issue, broadcaster A Haber said on its website. (Reuters)
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Israeli air strikes on residential blocks in south Gaza killed at least 32 Palestinians on Saturday, medics said, after Israel again warned civilians to relocate as it turns to attacking Hamas in the enclave's south after subduing the north. "We're asking people to relocate. I know it's not easy for many of them, but we don't want to see civilians caught up in the crossfire," Mark Regev, an aide to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told MSNBC on Friday. (Reuters)
An Israeli drone fired two missiles at an aluminum plant outside the southern Lebanese market town of Nabatiyeh early Saturday, causing a fire and widespread damage, National News Agency said. There was no word on casualties.The Israeli strike near the village of Toul is the first to hit the area since the 34-day war in 2006 between Israel and Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group, and far from the border. (AP)
Hezbollah and Israel traded rocket and missile fire in areas near the Lebanese-Israeli border on Saturday officials on both sides said, in the latest flare-up of violence. The Iran-backed Hezbollah said it shot down an Israeli drone near the border in the early hours of Saturday. Meanwhile, Israel's military said it intercepted a missile fired at an Israeli drone. Reuters could not verify either statement. (Reuters)
A top foreign policy adviser to the United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan said on Saturday that statements from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about a longer term presence in Gaza were worrying. "We hear now from the Israeli prime minister and indeed the Israeli president about the sort of longer term Israeli connection to Gaza. They are very worrying," Anwar Gargash said at the IISS Manama Security summit in Bahrain. (Reuters)
The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) has denied ordering the evacuation of the Al-Shifa, clarifying that it had agreed to the hospital's director's request for Gazans who wanted to evacuate to do so via a "secure route", the BBC reported. A statement released further said that medical staff would stay with patients who are unable to evacuate, adding that the IDF had been providing basic supplies like food, water and humanitarian assistance to the hospital. This comes after earlier reports suggested that the IDF had told everyone in the hospital to evacuate within an hour.
Internet and phone service was partially restored to the Gaza Strip on Saturday, ending a telecommunications blackout that forced the United Nations to shut down critical humanitarian aid deliveries because it was unable to coordinate its convoys. (AP)
An Israeli air strike killed five Palestinians and wounded two others in the occupied West Bank on Saturday, medics said, and the military described the target as a hideout for gunmen planning imminent attacks.
The Palestinian Red Crescent ambulance service described the casualties from the night-time strike on Balata, near the northern West Bank city of Nablus, as including five men whose ages ranged from 19 to 25. In a statement, the military said it struck "a number of terrorists ... and prevented terror attacks against Israeli civilians".
There were no immediate claims by armed Palestinian factions for any of the casualties. The military provided a name for one of the fatalities without citing a factional affiliation. (Reuters)
Israel issued a fresh warning to Palestinians in the southern city of Khan Younis to move out of the line of fire and closer to humanitarian aid, in the latest indication that it plans to attack Hamas in south Gaza after subduing the north, Reuters reported.
"We're asking people to relocate. I know it's not easy for many of them, but we don't want to see civilians caught up in the crossfire," Mark Regev, an aide to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told MSNBC on Friday.
About 26 Palestinians, mostly children, were killed in an Israeli bombardment of Khan Yunis city in south Gaza early on Saturday, the Palestinian news agency WAFA said. (Reuters)
With Al Ahli hospital shaking from Israeli tank fire and no more anaesthetics left to operate, British-Palestinian surgeon Ghassan Abu Sitta told his team it was time to leave the last fully functioning hospital in Gaza City.
"It has been a living nightmare - leaving 500 wounded knowing that there's nothing left for you to be able to do for them, it's just the most heartbreaking thing I ever had to do," Abu Sitta told Reuters on Friday, a day after leaving the hospital and walking to Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.
In a post on X, he wrote: "No longer able to provide surgeries at Ahli Hosp. The hospital is now effectively a first aid station. Hundreds of wounded now at hospital with no access to surgery. They will die from their wounds."
Pope Francis will meet next week with relatives of Israeli hostages held by Hamas militants in Gaza, Reuters reported quoting a source on Friday.
The source, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to discuss papal plans, said 12 relatives would meet the pope early on Wednesday morning before his weekly general audience. The source said they would be a mix of relatives who met with Italian leaders last month and others who were not among the first group.
The Vatican's number two, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, said on Friday the Holy See believed the release of the hostages and a ceasefire - which Israel has so far ruled out - were two "fundamental points" to resolve the crisis.
The families of Israeli hostages and thousands of supporters marched towards Jerusalem on Friday, increasing pressure on the government to secure the captives' release nearly six weeks after Hamas militants abducted them and took them into Gaza.
The procession left Tel Aviv three days ago. Police blocked off parts of the main highway as the marchers began to ascend the foothills leading to Jerusalem. They held up pictures of their loved ones, waved Israeli flags, and chanted "We won't give up, we demand the hostages' release!"
Hamas fighters took around 240 people hostage during their Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel. The captives - ranging from babies to grandparents - are believed to be held in tunnels deep under the Gaza Strip. (Reuters)
The World Health Organization said on Friday it was very concerned about the spread of disease of Gaza as weeks of Israeli bombardments have caused the population to crowd in shelters with scarce food and clean water, Reuters reported.
"We are extremely concerned about the spread of the disease when the winter season arrives," said Richard Peeperkorn, WHO Representative in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
He said that more than 70,000 cases of acute respiratory infections and over 44,000 cases of diarrhoea had been recorded in the densely populated enclave, figures higher significantly higher than expected.
Despite the dire need for humanitarian aid in Gaza, there would be no deliveries across the Rafah border crossing from Egypt on Friday, according to the communications director for the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees.
Gaza appeared to be left with downed communications systems for a second day Friday, halting cross-border deliveries of humanitarian supplies even as aid agencies warned that most people in the Gaza Strip already do not have adequate food or clean water. (AP)
Syria’s state news agency says Israel’s military has carried out strikes that hit several posts near the capital, Damascus, causing material damage but no casualties. SANA quoted an unnamed military official as saying that Syrian air defenses shot down most of the missiles before they reached their targets early Friday.
There has been no confirmation from the Israeli military. In the weeks since the latest war between Israel and Hamas broke out, Syria reported Israeli airstrikes that hit the international airports in Damascus and the northern city of Aleppo, damaging their runways and putting them out of service. Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes on targets inside government-controlled parts of Syria in recent years, including attacks on the Damascus and Aleppo airports, but rarely acknowledges or discusses the operations. (AP)
Amid the ongoing fighting in Gaza, Israel is reportedly looking to hire construction workers to replace Palestinians.
It is believed that as many as 90,000 Palestinians had been working in the construction sector in Israel, but the terrorist attack by the Hamas militants in October prompted Israeli authorities to revoke their work permits.
According to media reports, the Israeli Builders Association has since urged the government to take steps towards hiring up to 100,000 workers from India. (Read more)
Malaysia’s former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said today that a physiotherapy centre established by his foundation in Gaza has been destroyed by Israeli bombing.
"I am extremely perturbed to learn of the destruction, due to Israeli bombing, of the Dr Siti Hasmah and Enaya Physiotherapy Centre in Gaza on Nov 7, 2023," he wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter. "The bombings of hospitals and residences, and now a physiotherapy centre, proved that Israel is targeting these centres intentionally and wilfully," he added.
British opposition Labour leader Keir Starmer was under pressure yesterday after 56 of his lawmakers, including several of his policy team, voted with another opposition party to demand the government call for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas conflict.
The so-called amendment — a proposed addition to the government's legislative agenda for the next year — to call for a ceasefire in the violence did not pass and so will not become law. But the backing of so many Labour lawmakers showed the levels of disquiet in the party over the Middle East conflict. Starmer, like Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, the United States and the European Union, has called for "humanitarian pauses" to help aid reach Gaza rather than a ceasefire.
Nearly a third of Labour's 198 lawmakers backed the amendment introduced by the Scottish National Party which said: "(We) call on the government to join with the international community in urgently pressing all parties to agree to an immediate ceasefire". (Reuters)
The Israeli military said today it retrieved the body of a soldier, who had been held captive by the Palestinian militant group Hamas, in a building near Gaza's Al Shifa hospital.
The Israeli military on Tuesday confirmed the death of the soldier after Hamas issued a video of her alive followed by images of what the Palestinian faction said was her body after she was killed in an Israeli strike. (Reuters)
As India hosted the second Voice of Global South Summit (VOGSS) in virtual mode on Friday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi condemned the Hamas attacks of October 7 and called for restraint, dialogue and diplomacy in resolving the Israel-Hamas conflict.
Expressing concern over civilians suffering in the conflict, PM Modi also recalled his conversation with Palestinian Authority’s President Mahmoud Abbas and India’s humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza.
PM Modi inaugurated a global centre for excellence for the Global South countries called DAKSHIN and said that the Global South has, for the first time, a voice on the global stage. He also called for 5 ‘Cs’ for the Global South: consultation, cooperation, communication, creativity and capacity building. (Read more)
Israeli soldiers are continuing to comb through Gaza's Al-Shifa Hospital for the second day, claiming that Hamas has been using the hospital and its premises as a command centre.
A New York Times report quoted an Israeli military spokesman as saying that the search of the hospital grounds would take time because “Hamas knew we were coming” and had made off with or hidden traces of their presence there.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in an interview that Israel is seeking ‘minimal civilian casualties, but unfortunately we’re not successful’.
“We are closer than before we began the ground action,” he told CBS News on finding the 240 people being held hostage by Hamas. “The ground action has put pressure on Hamas to achieve a ceasefire. We’ll have a temporary ceasefire if we can get our hostages. I don’t think it serves that purpose for me to elaborate further on that.”
The general manager of Palestine Telecommunications Company, Paltel, said he has urged international bodies to persuade Israel to allow fuel to enter Gaza in order to restore phone and internet to the besieged enclave.
“We asked all international bodies to intervene with Israel in order to allow the entry of fuel,” Abdulmajeed Melhem told The Associated Press. Earlier Thursday, Paltel announced that all communication services — landlines, mobile phones and internet connections — were down due to a lack of fuel.
“Since the outbreak of the war, there has been no electricity, therefore we have relied on alternative sources to operate the generators,” Melhem said. “If they (Israel) allow the entry of fuel, this problem will be solved.”
Until this week, Israel had completely prohibited fuel from going into Gaza, fearing it could be commandeered by Hamas. But on Wednesday the Israeli government allowed the UN agency for Palestinian refugees to receive 23,000 liters of fuel, but under the restriction that it be used only for vehicles delivering aid. (AP)
Journalist Hazem Balousha has been reporting from the Gaza Strip since 2012. He was able to escape after nearly a month of struggling with displacement and shortages of water, food and electricity.
Three Palestinians have been killed in an Israeli drone strike in Jenin in the West Bank, the head of the Palestinian ambulance service told Reuters today.
Waterborne infectious diseases like cholera and typhoid will soon start spreading though Gaza because people don’t have access to clean water, Human Rights Watch said Thursday.
Israel imposed a siege on Gaza after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, severing the crowded strip’s access to water, power and fuel. A limited amount of water now comes in through Israel and Egypt but most people must drink from the local water supply — 96% of which is “unfit for human consumption,” according to the UN.
“The lack of clean water is resulting in ‘grave concerns’ by public health experts of an imminent infectious disease outbreak in Gaza,” Human Rights Watch said in a statement. The New York-based group called on Israel to immediately end its blockade of Gaza. (AP)
TikTok will prohibit content that promotes Osama bin Laden's 2002 letter detailing the former al Qaeda leader's justifications for attacks against Americans, the short-form video app said on Thursday.
Discussions of the 20-year-old letter have spread on the platform this week in the context of the debate over the Israel-Hamas war, with some users in the West praising its contents.
The letter, which was written after al Qaeda's attack on the United States that killed nearly 3,000 people, criticised US support for Israel, accused Americans of financing "oppression" of Palestinians, and contained antisemitic comments. Bin Laden was killed in 2011 in Pakistan by a US military special operations unit. (Read more)
The Palestinian health authorities said yesterday that 11,470 Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the Israel-Hamas war broke out six weeks ago. The vast majority have been killed in Israeli airstrikes.
The ministry said 4,707 of the dead were children and minors and that 3,155 were women. The ministry does not differentiate between combatants and civilians. In recent days, the Palestinian Health Ministry in the West Bank has started updating the Gaza death toll. Until last week, the Health Ministry in Hamas-run Gaza was the main official source for the Palestinian death toll. It stopped publishing updates after key ministry officials based in Gaza City’s Shifa Hospital lost electricity and connectivity.
Hamas runs the Gaza Strip while its political rival, the internationally recognised Palestinian Authority, runs parts of the occupied West Bank. However, the health and education ministries in the two territories continue to cooperate. (AP)
A dire lack of fuel in the Gaza Strip shut down all internet and phone networks yesterday, the main Palestinian telecom provider said, effectively cutting off the besieged territory from the outside world.