Palestinians look for survivors under the rubble of destroyed buildings following Israeli airstrikes in Jabaliya refugee camp, northern Gaza Strip. (Photo: AP)Israel-Hamas War News Highlights: People hoping to leave the Gaza Strip converged on the Rafah crossing to Egypt on Thursday, with those whose names were on an official list gradually passing through while others held up their foreign passports in vain. The crossing was open for limited evacuations for a second day under a Qatar-brokered deal between Israel, Egypt, Hamas and the United States, aimed at letting some foreign passport holders and their dependents.
What is the death toll? The death toll in Gaza has gone up to 9,061 people and 32,000 others are injured, the official spokesperson for the health ministry in Gaza said on Thursday. The dead include 3,760 children and 2,326 women, the spokesperson said.
What is the ground situation? US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will leave today for his second visit to Israel in less than a month, where he will meet Israeli officials including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and stop in Jordan, one of a handful of Arab states to have normalised relations with Israel.
Palestinians prepare the bodies of people killed in overnight airstrikes for burial at the hospital in Deir al-Balah, in the southern Gaza Strip, on Saturday, Oct. 28, 2023. (The New York Times)
Residents of Lebanese border village of Yater said they would rebuild their town once clashes between Hezbollah and Israel end, saying Israel's shelling of their homes would not push them off their land.
Heavily armed Hezbollah, which is part of an Iranian-backed regional alliance along with Gaza's ruling Hamas, has been engaged in daily exchanges of fire with Israeli forces along the frontier since war broke out between Israel and Hamas on Oct. 7.
Several homes in Yater, some seven kilometres from the Israeli-Lebanese border, lost windows and walls during Israeli shelling, pushing some residents to flee north while hardening the determination of others to stay put. "I'm convinced now that we will never leave this land," said Hiba, a 28-year-old mother whose home was hit by an Israeli shell on Sunday evening.
She and her five-year-old son were out visiting a relative when their home was hit. "We were supposed to be here when this shell hit. This house has civilians, it has a child, it wasn't an abandoned home," Hiba said. Hiba said her son was collecting rocks to rebuild the house.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken discussed the humanitarian situation in Gaza and the need to reinforce regional stability with Saudi Defense Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman Al Saud, the State Department said on Thursday.
"The secretary affirmed the importance of addressing humanitarian needs in Gaza, preventing further spread of the conflict, and reinforcing regional stability and security, including in Yemen," in Wednesday's meeting, the department said in a statement. "He also emphasized the importance of working toward sustainable peace between Israelis and Palestinians, a shared priority of both the United States and Saudi Arabia."
The death toll in Gaza has gone up to 9,061 people and 32,000 others are injured, the official spokesperson for the health ministry in Gaza said on Thursday. The dead include 3,760 children and 2,326 women, the spokesperson said.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Thursday that Israel's recommendation that its citizens leave Russia's North Caucasus region after a violent anti-Israeli protest in Dagestan on Sunday was "anti-Russian".
In a briefing with reporters, Zakharova said that an Israeli warning against travel in the mostly Muslim regions of the North Caucasus bore "no relation to reality". Dozens were arrested after hundreds of protesters stormed Makhachkala airport in Dagestan on Sunday, looking for Jewish passengers on board a plane arriving from Tel Aviv.
Israeli military said today that the number of hostages abducted by Hamas on October 7 and is presumably being held in Gaza has been confirmed at 242. The hostages are a mix of Israeli and foreign civilians and soldiers.
In Kolkata, various leftist organizations, left-leaning students, and human rights groups joined forces to hold a rally in solidarity with Palestine and to call for a ceasefire. Their primary focus was to condemn the loss of innocent lives, particularly children and women, resulting from the actions of Israeli forces. Additionally, the Tamil Nadu Muslim Association organized a protest in Chennai to express their support for Palestine, with VCK party leader Thol. Thirumavalavan addressed the rally and emphasized his solidarity with the cause.
After the October 7 attack by Iranian-backed Hamas forces on Israel, the US military has blamed other Iranian-backed proxy groups for near-daily attacks against its forces in Iraq and Syria.
US forces in Iraq and Syria have been attacked with drones or rockets at least 27 times in recent days, a Pentagon spokesman said on Tuesday (local time) as cited by a Voice of America report.
US personnel believe that retaliatory action is required before more powerful weaponry is used against the US military. (ANI)
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, in a post on social media site X, said the agency had "serious concerns" that Israel's "disproportionate attacks... could amount to war crimes".
The United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken dressed his four-year-old son as Ukrainian President Volodymyrr Zelenskyy for a Halloween party at the White House, New York Post reported. Blinken's three-year-old daughter was dressed in the Ukraine flag's blue and yellow colours.
For the Halloween event at the White House lawn that took place on Monday night, Blinken was accompanied by his wife, Evan Ryan, who is also Biden's White House cabinet secretary. US President Joe Biden himself donned a baseball cap bearing the presidential seal and dressed as himself. (ANI)
After the recent attack on Israel, Hamas released a disturbing video of three Israeli civilians taken hostage and dragged into Gaza. There were many other videos flooding social media depicting people in military fatigues as well as dead motorists and passengers on a highway in Israel. The visuals flagrantly disregard International agreements and conventions protecting civilian human rights during times of conflict. Are these visuals real? Who put them out? Their authenticity remained unconfirmed, yet they were circulated widely, leaving the intended impact on the target audience. Of late, whenever there is a conflict, there is a huge spike in videos and images, mostly unverified but linked to the conflict that inundates social media platforms. Very often these unverified images and videos trace their origin to verified accounts, revealing a complex web of intentions behind these posts.
The deceptive use of fabricated content is not just a battle of perception or effort to win a popularity contest — it is war. It is an information war which has the potential to and often does change the dynamics of a war. Information warfare is part of the changing battlefield. The initial use of social media as a weapon can be traced back a decade but its scale, scope and complexity have increased manifold since then. With its expanding footprint in the battlespace, militaries worldwide acknowledge that the physical and digital battlespaces are merging and are developing their own strategies in this field. (Read more)
More foreigners are prepared to leave the besieged Gaza Strip today. At least 320 foreign citizens on an initial list of 500, as well as dozens of severely injured Gazans, crossed into Egypt on Wednesday under a deal between Israel, Egypt and Hamas.
Passport holders from Australia, Austria, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Finland, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Jordan, the United Kingdom and the United States were evacuated.
Gaza officials said the Rafah border crossing would reopen on Thursday so more foreigners could exit. A diplomatic source said some 7,500 foreign passport holders would leave Gaza over about two weeks. (Reuters)
How did the Palestinian territories of Gaza and West Bank end up split between Hamas and Fatah? Why would Israel want to boost Hamas at the cost of Fatah? On what basis is this claim made?
Days after India abstained from voting at the United Nations General Assembly on a Jordan-introduced resolution that called for an immediate humanitarian truce in the Israel-Hamas conflict, Mohamed El Kayed, Amman’s Ambassador to Delhi, said India’s call was a sovereign decision and Jordan respected it.
“India had taken abstention to try to stay in the middle, to have a role in the future on both sides,” Kayed said in an interview to The Indian Express Wednesday.
Last week, India skipped the vote on the resolution which did not mention Hamas or the Israelis taken hostage during the Hamas attacks on October 7. The resolution, which was not binding, was carried with 120 votes in favour, 14 against, 45 abstentions.
“We understand very well that each country takes this position according to their interests. That’s India’s decision and we don’t interfere in that,” he said. (Read more)
Israel said its strikes on Tuesday and Wednesday killed two Hamas military leaders in Jabalia, Gaza's biggest refugee camp. Israel said the group had command centres and other "terror infrastructure under, around and within civilian buildings, intentionally endangering Gazan civilians".
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was due to depart today for his second visit to Israel in less than a month. He plans to meet Israeli officials including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday to voice solidarity but also to reassert the need to minimise Palestinian civilian casualties, his spokesperson said.
Blinken will also stop in Jordan, one of a handful of Arab states to have normalised relations with Israel. On Wednesday Jordan withdrew its ambassador from Tel Aviv until Israel ends its assault on Gaza. Israel said it regretted Jordan's decision. (Reuters)
Israel said its strikes on Tuesday and Wednesday killed two Hamas military leaders in Jabalia, Gaza’s biggest refugee camp. Israel said the group had command centres and other “terror infrastructure under, around and within civilian buildings, intentionally endangering Gazan civilians.”
Gaza’s government media office said on Thursday that at least 195 Palestinians were killed in the two Israeli attacks on Jabalia, with 120 still missing under the rubble. At least 777 more were wounded, it said in a statement.
Palestinians on Wednesday sifted through rubble in a desperate hunt for trapped victims. “It is a massacre,” said one witness. United Nations human rights officials said strikes on the camp could be a war crime. (Read more)
After Israel suffered the worst-ever attack on its territory under his watch, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to “crush and destroy” Hamas, the political and militant organisation in charge of the Gaza strip.
However, many are pointing out that it was the Israeli government that helped strengthen Hamas, in order to undermine Fatah, the more internationally accepted Palestinian political party.
How did the Palestinian territories of Gaza and West Bank end up split between Hamas and Fatah? Why would Israel want to boost Hamas at the cost of Fatah? On what basis is this claim made? (Read more)
The director of the New York office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Craig Mokhiber, has resigned in protest over the organisation’s inability to stop the “genocide” of Palestinian civilians in Gaza.
“We are seeing a genocide unfolding before our eyes, and the Organisation that we serve appears powerless to stop it,” he wrote in his resignation letter.
Citing the genocides against Tutsis, Bosnians, Muslims and Yazidi communities, Mokhiber said that “it became painfully clear that we had failed in our duty to prevent mass atrocities and protect the vulnerable.” (Read More)
Yemen’s Houthis have waded into the ongoing conflict in Palestine, declaring on Tuesday (October 31) that they had fired drones and missiles at Israel.
Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said in a televised statement the group had launched a “large number” of ballistic missiles and drones towards Israel, and there would be more such attacks to come “to help the Palestinians to victory”, Reuters reported. He said it was the Houthis’ third attack on Israel since the start of the conflict.
While the Houthis might not pose any real danger to the Israelis, roughly 2000 km away, the attacks have nonetheless set alarm bells ringing across the region. Why? We take a look. (Click here to read the full explainer)
The first foreign passport holders and injured Gazans to be evacuated from the Palestinian enclave passed through the Rafah crossing into Egypt on Wednesday, under a deal mediated by Qatar.
The limited evacuations come more than three weeks into a total blockade of Gaza by Israel, which has been bombarding the densely populated enclave and has sent in ground troops in response to an attack by Hamas fighters on Israel on Oct. 7.
The first group of foreign passport holders to reach the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing were undergoing security checks, according to a source at the border. Three buses carrying 160 foreign passport holders had set off from Gaza, an official on the Gazan side of the border said.
Earlier, a first group of injured people crossed in ambulances and were examined by Egyptian medical teams who directed them to different hospitals depending on the severity of their conditions. (Reuters)
Bolivia said on Tuesday it had broken diplomatic ties with Israel because of its attacks on the Gaza Strip, while neighbors Colombia and Chile recalled their ambassadors to the Middle Eastern country for consultations.
The three South American nations lambasted Israel’s attacks on Gaza and condemned the deaths of Palestinian citizens.
Bolivia “decided to break diplomatic relations with the Israeli state in repudiation and condemnation of the aggressive and disproportionate Israeli military offensive taking place in the Gaza Strip,” Deputy Foreign Minister Freddy Mamani said at a press conference. (Read More)
As the Israel-Hamas war escalates with each passing day, The Indian Express’ Diplomatic Editor Shubhajit Roy who has extensively covered Israel-Hamas war on-ground talks about the current situation pertaining in the war zone, how the Hamas attack surprised Israel and the plight of Gaza civilians who are stuck as Israel continues to strike.
Hamas, the group that controls the Gaza Strip and staged the surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7, and other Palestinian groups are believed to be holding more than 200 hostages — people taken after Hamas stormed across the border in a brazen assault that killed at least 1,400 people.
Here’s what we know about the captives.
How many hostages are there?
The Israeli military has notified the families of 240 people kidnapped during Hamas’ attack, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, the military’s chief spokesperson, said Tuesday. The count has risen as the army has collected more intelligence and accounted for the many foreign citizens who were kidnapped, Hagari said.
At least 33 children are among the hostages, according to the Israeli government.
On Monday, the Israeli military said that it had rescued an Israeli soldier who was taken hostage from her army base Oct 7.
Hamas has released four hostages: an American Israeli mother and daughter on Oct. 20 and two Israeli women three days later, which raised hopes about the effectiveness of hostage negotiations. The Biden administration had advised Israel to delay a ground invasion of Gaza, hoping to buy time for such talks and allow more humanitarian aid to reach the sealed-off enclave. (Read More)
Three weeks after Hamas’s deadly attack on Israel and the subsequent siege of Gaza, the Rafah crossing was reopened today to allow limited evacuations even as Palestinians in the densely populated Gaza Strip faced a communication blackout. The move comes hours after an Israeli air raid on Gaza’s largest refugee camp Jabalia killed at least 50 people and injured scores of others, prompting international outrage. Israel said that the strike was targeted at a senior Hamas leader and a command centre set up in civilian houses and an underground tunnel network in the area.
Meanwhile, Israel continued to bombard Gaza via airstrikes and ground forces, with the Israeli military facing off with Hamas militants in Gaza City’s Zeitoun neighbourhood, as per an Al Jazeera report.
As the fighting continues, here are the key developments on day 26 of the war. (Click here to read more)
A first group of injured evacuees from Gaza crossed into Egypt on Wednesday under a Qatari-mediated deal, Egyptian local media and a source at the border said, as Israeli forces pressed their battle against Hamas militants in the Palestinian enclave.
The evacuees were driven in ambulances through the Rafah border crossing. Under the deal reached between Egypt, Israel and Hamas, a number of foreigners and critically wounded people will be allowed to leave the besieged territory.
The deal followed another day of bloodshed in Gaza in which an Israeli air strike killed about 50 people in a refugee camp, according to Palestinian health officials. Israel said the attack killed a senior Hamas commander and many other combatants.
Communications and internet services were completely cut off in Gaza again on Wednesday, telecommunications provider Paltel said. (Read More)
A 20-year-old Indian-origin Israeli soldier was among the Israeli combatants killed while fighting in Gaza, community members and the Mayor of the town said on Wednesday.
Staff-Sgt. Halel Solomon was from the southern Israeli town of Dimona.
“It is with great sorrow and grief that we announce the death of a son of Dimona, Halel Solomon, in the battle in Gaza,” Dimona’s Mayor, Benny Bitton said in a Facebook post on Wednesday.
“We share in the grief of the parents, Ronit and Mordechai, and the sisters: Yasmin, Hila, Vered, and Shaked …. Halel aspired to do a meaningful service and enlisted in the Givati (Brigade). Halel was a devoted son and had respect for his parents always in his eyes. Possessing immense good qualities he believed in endless giving, modesty, and humility. The whole city of Dimona is grieving his passing,” Bitton wrote. (Read More)
Thirty-four journalists have been killed in the war between Israel and Hamas, an international media freedom group said Wednesday, accusing both sides of committing possible war crimes.
Reporters Without Borders called on International Criminal Court prosecutors to investigate the deaths.
The organization said it already filed a complaint regarding eight Palestinian journalists it said were killed in Israel’s bombardment of civilian areas in the Gaza Strip, and an Israeli journalist killed during Hamas’ surprise attack in southern Israel.
“The scale, seriousness and recurring nature of international crimes targeting journalists, particularly in Gaza, calls for a priority investigation by the ICC prosecutor,” Christophe Deloire, director-general of the group also known by the French abbreviation RSF, said.(AP)
A first group of injured evacuees from Gaza crossed into Egypt on Wednesday under a Qatari-mediated deal, Egyptian local media and a source at the border said, as Israeli forces pressed their battle against Hamas militants in the Palestinian enclave.
The evacuees were driven in ambulances through the Rafah border crossing. Under the deal reached between Egypt, Israel and Hamas, a number of foreigners and critically wounded people will be allowed to leave the besieged territory.
The deal followed another day of bloodshed in Gaza in which an Israeli air strike killed about 50 people in a refugee camp, according to Palestinian health officials. Israel said the attack killed a senior Hamas commander and many other combatants. (Reuters)
According to a Reuters report, a list of people with foreign passports who can leave Gaza via the Rafah crossing has been agreed between Israel and Egypt and relevant embassies have been informed in advance, a Western official said on Wednesday.
Gaza was plunged into another communications blackout on Wednesday, with internet and phone service cut for several hours as Israeli troops battled Hamas militants. Meanwhile, dozens of foreign passport holders crowded into a border crossing ahead of what could be the first such departure from the besieged Palestinian enclave.
Communications began to be restored later in the day, but aid agencies warned that such blackouts severely disrupt their work in an already dire situation. Daily airstrikes have displaced more than half of the population and basic supplies are running low. On Tuesday, an Israeli barrage levelled apartment buildings in a refugee camp near Gaza City, killing an unknown number of people.
No one has been allowed to leave Gaza, except for four hostages released by Hamas, since Israel declared a total siege in the wake of the militants' bloody October 7 rampage into southern Israel. (AP)
Pakistan’s interim Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar today denounced the latest Israeli airstrikes on a refugee camp near Gaza City, urging the international community to play its role in ending such strikes.
“Yesterday’s air raid on Jabalia camp, where hundreds of lives were lost, including women and children, was a stark reminder of ongoing Israeli brutalities and war crimes in Gaza,” Kakar said in a statement. He said that “such reprehensible acts can never be condoned or forgotten. The world must act now to end this carnage.” (AP)
The Israeli military said it had deployed missile boats in the Red Sea today as reinforcements, a day after the Iran-aligned Houthi movement said it had launched missile and drone attacks on Israel and vowed to carry out more.
Images disseminated by the military showed Saar-class corvettes patrolling near Eilat port in the Red Sea, which Israel sees as a new front as its war in Gaza draws retaliation from Iran-aligned pro-Hamas forces elsewhere in the region.
The Houthi movement said on Tuesday they had launched three drone and missile attacks towards Israel since the start of the Hamas-Israel war on Oct. 7. It vowed there would be more such attacks to come "to help the Palestinians to victory". (Reuters)
Dozens of foreign passport holders could be seen entering the Rafah crossing from Gaza to Egypt today.
It appeared to be the first time foreign passport holders have been allowed to leave the besieged territory since the start of the Israel-Hamas war more than three weeks ago. (AP)
The news became personal for a broadcast engineer working with Al Jazeera after 19 members of his family, including his father and two sisters, were killed in the Israeli air strikes at the Jabalia refugee camp in Gaza on Tuesday.
Mohamed Abu Al-Qumsan, who works with the Al Jazeera bureau in Gaza, lost his father, two sisters, eight nephews and nieces, brother, brother’s wife, and their four children, his sister-in-law, and one uncle in the air strike. Israel has claimed that the strike was targeted at a senior Hamas leader and a militant command centre set up in civilian houses and an underground tunnel network in the camp premises. (Read more)
Israel accused Bolivia today of "capitulation to terrorism and to the ayatollah regime in Iran" after the South American nation cut ties in protest at civilian casualties from Israel's war with Tehran-backed Palestinian militants in Gaza.
A statement by the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem also sought to play down Tuesday's decision by Bolivia, saying "relations between the countries had been devoid of content anyway" since a government handover there. (Reuters)
Qatar has mediated an agreement between Egypt, Israel and Hamas, in coordination with the US, to allow for the movement of foreign passport holders and some critically injured people out of besieged Gaza, a source briefed on the deal told Reuters today.
There is no timeline for how long the vital Rafah border crossing will remain open for evacuation, the source added. (Reuters)
The Kolkata police Tuesday detained four spectators from the Eden Gardens cricket stadium during the Pakistan-Bangladesh World Cup match for allegedly waving the Palestinian flag from the gallery. The police later released them without filing any cases.
According to the police, one of the detainees hailed from Bally in the Howrah district, and another was a resident of the Ekbalpore area in the city. Two others were political workers who had attended a protest march before entering the stadium. They allegedly waved the Palestinian flag when Bangladesh were batting during the first innings of the match. It was displayed as a mark of support for the Palestinian cause in the backdrop of the ongoing Israel-Hamas war, mainly in the Gaza Strip. (Read more)
Gaza has once again suffered a communication blackout, providers Paltel and Jawwal said early today.
In an email to The Associated Press, internet-access advocacy group NetBlocks.org confirmed that Gaza “is in the midst of a total or near-total telecoms blackout consistent with” the weekend blackout.
Connectivity was previously cut from late Friday to early Sunday, coinciding with the entry of large numbers of ground troops into Gaza in what Israel at the time described as a new stage in the war. Attempts to reach Gaza residents by phone were unsuccessful early Wednesday. Humanitarian aid agencies have warned that such blackouts severely disrupt their work in an already dire situation in Gaza. (AP)
The Israeli military said today that nine soldiers had died in Gaza fighting, without immediately providing details on where or when, reports the news agency Reuters.
As the source of one of the largest groups of international students at universities in the West, India should take note of the recent developments on college campuses concerning the safety of students who belong to groups defined as “oppressors” by academics.
Since the massacre that killed at least 1,200 Israeli civilians a few days ago, there have been many attacks against the Jewish community under the guise of “anti-Zionist” protests. What does this mean for the tens of thousands of Indian students in these colleges?
Indian students and parents are probably not aware but universities have been teaching almost exactly the same things about India, and Hindus in particular, as they have about Jews and Israel for several years now, writes Vamsee Juluri.
Yemen’s Houthi rebels for the first time on Tuesday claimed missile and drone attacks targeting Israel, drawing their main sponsor Iran closer into the ongoing Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip and further raising the risks of a regional conflict erupting.
The Houthis had been suspected of an attack earlier this month targeting Israel by sending missiles and drones over the crucial shipping lane of the Red Sea, an assault that saw the US Navy shoot down the projectiles.
This time on Tuesday, however, Israel said its own fighter jets and its new Arrow missile defense system shot down two salvos of incoming fire hours apart as it approached the country’s key Red Sea shipping port of Eilat. (Read more)
Federal prosecutors have charged a Cornell University student for allegedly making online threats against Jewish students at the Ivy League school over the weekend.
A federal complaint identified the Cornell suspect as Patrick Dai, 21, charging him with posting threats to kill or injure another person using interstate communications. New York Governor Kathy Hochul had previously said a "person of interest" was in New York State Police custody for questioning.
The US Justice Department accused him of posting messages to the Cornell section of an online discussion site that included calls for the deaths of Jewish people and threats to "shoot up" a campus dining hall serving Kosher food. (Reuters)
In Washington, a group of anti-war protesters raised red-stained hands to interrupt a hearing in Congress on providing more aid to Israel. They shouted slogans including, "Ceasefire now!" "Protect the children of Gaza!" and "Stop funding genocide." Capitol police removed them from the room.
Power generators in al Shifa Medical Complex and the Indonesian Hospital in Gaza will stop in hours, Ashraf Al-Qidra, spokesperson for the health ministry in Gaza said late last night. He called on petrol station owners in the enclave to urgently feed the two hospitals with fuel if possible.
UN and other aid officials said civilians in the besieged Palestinian enclave were engulfed by a public health catastrophe, with hospitals struggling to treat casualties as electricity supplies petered out.
After the attack on Jabalia, dozens of bodies lay shrouded in white, lined up against the side of the Indonesian Hospital, footage obtained by Reuters showed.
Juggling dwindling supplies of medicines, power cuts and air or artillery strikes that have shaken hospital buildings, surgeons in Gaza have worked night and day trying to save a constant stream of patients. "We take it an hour at a time because we don't know when we will be receiving patients. Several times we've had to set up surgical spaces in the corridors and even sometimes in the hospital waiting areas," Dr. Mohammed al-Run said. (Reuters)
Bolivia said it had broken diplomatic ties with Israel because of its attacks on the Gaza Strip, while neighbours Colombia and Chile recalled their ambassadors to the Middle Eastern country for consultations.
The three South American nations lambasted Israel's attacks on Gaza and condemned the deaths of Palestinian citizens. The three countries called for a ceasefire, with Bolivia and Chile pushing for the passage of humanitarian aid into the zone and accusing Israel of violating international law.
Other Latin American countries, such as Mexico and Brazil, have also called for a ceasefire. "What we have now is the insanity of Israel's prime minister, who wants to wipe out the Gaza Strip," said Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva today. (Reuters)
On the 25th day of the Israel-Hamas conflict, the death toll continues to rise, with over 8,300 Palestinians, including nearly 3,500 children, losing their lives. Kuwait has strongly condemned Israel's actions and called for a ceasefire. The UN agency for Palestinian refugees also urgently called for a humanitarian ceasefire, characterizing it as a matter of life and death for millions. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has rejected calls for a ceasefire and pledged to continue the ground invasion.
A deluge of Israeli airstrikes last night on a refugee camp near Gaza City demolished apartment buildings, leaving gaping holes where they once stood, while ground troops battled Hamas militants across northern Gaza.
In the Jabaliya refugee camp on Gaza City’s outskirts, at least six airstrikes Tuesday levelled a number of apartment blocks in a residential area, the Interior Ministry said. It reported a large number of casualties but did not immediately provide details.
Footage of the scene from Al Jazeera TV showed at least four large craters where buildings once stood, amid a large swath of rubble surrounded by partially collapsed structures. Dozens of rescue workers and bystanders dug through the wreckage, searching for survivors beneath the pancaked buildings. A group of young men pulled two children from the upper floors of a damaged apartment block, cradling them as they climbed down. (AP)
Israeli National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi held a televised briefing on Tuesday. Here is what he has said:
? He said there was "no deal in sight" for the release of hostages held in Gaza as Israel continues its ground invasion of the enclave.
? Hanegbi said attacks against Israel by the Houthi militant group in Yemen were "intolerable" but declined to elaborate when asked what an Israeli response might be.
? He said Egyptian hospitals should serve as an alternative for treating Gaza casualties, with hospitals in the enclave under pressure and suffering power cuts
? He also said the Israeli military's focus was on fighting Hamas militants in northern Gaza, but that it would shift to the southern part of the strip at a later stage
The director of Gaza's Indonesian hospital told Al-Jazeera on Tuesday that at least 50 Palestinians were killed and 150 were wounded in Israeli air strikes on Jabalia refugee camp. (Reuters)
Russia tightened security in its Muslim-majority North Caucasus region on Tuesday after a weekend anti-Semitic riot there, and the Kremlin-backed leader of Chechnya ordered that rioters be shot dead if they fail to heed warnings.
President Vladimir Putin held an emergency meeting with top security officials on Monday evening after rioters in the southern region of Dagestan stormed an airport on Sunday to “catch” Jewish passengers arriving on a flight from Tel Aviv.
The unrest followed several other anti-Semitic incidents in recent days in North Caucasus in response to Israel’s war against Palestinian Hamas militants in Gaza. Israel has urged Moscow to protect Israelis and Jews in Russian jurisdictions. (Read More)
Air raid sirens went off in the area of the Red Sea city of Eilat on Tuesday and Israel's military said it downed an approaching "aerial target".
After an initial warning of a possible "hostile aircraft intrusion", which sent residents of the popular tourist resort running for shelter, the military said its "systems identified an aerial target approaching Israeli territory".
"There was no threat or risk to civilians," it added. There was no immediate claim of responsibility. (Reuters)
Israeli troops battled Hamas militants and attacked underground compounds on Tuesday with a focus on northern Gaza, from which an estimated 800,000 Palestinians have fled south despite continued Israeli bombardment across the besieged enclave.
Buoyed by the first successful rescue of a captive held by Hamas, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected calls for a cease-fire and again vowed to crush Hamas’ ability to govern Gaza or threaten Israel following its bloody Oct. 7 rampage, which ignited the war.
More than half the territory’s 2.3 million Palestinians have fled their homes, with hundreds of thousands sheltering in packed UN-run schools-turned-shelters or in hospitals alongside thousands of wounded patients. Israeli strikes have hit closer to several northern hospitals in recent days, alarming medics. (Read More)
Israeli troops on Tuesday destroyed the family home of Saleh al-Arouri, the exiled commander of Hamas forces in the occupied West Bank as security forces continued their crackdown on leaders of the militant Islamist group.
Currently thought to be living in southern Lebanon, Arouri, the deputy to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, is among a group of leaders singled out by Israeli officials who have vowed to destroy Hamas in retaliation for the deadly October 7 attack on southern Israel.
A veteran Hamas leader who has spent 17 years in Israeli jails, Arouri rose to prominence in 2014 by admitting to the abduction and killing of three Israeli teenagers from a West Bank settlement.
Since then he has been behind a steady expansion of Hamas political cadres and gunmen throughout the West Bank, where the rival Fatah faction of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas controls the Palestinian Authority. (Reuters)
UN humanitarian affairs chief Martin Griffiths today said he spoke to families in Gaza over the phone this morning and said "what they’ve endured since October 7 is beyond devastating."
"I had the sad privilege of speaking to families in Gaza over the phone this morning. What they’ve endured since October 7 is beyond devastating. And when an 8-year-old tells you that she doesn’t want to die, it’s hard not to feel helpless," he posted on X.
The Israel-Palestine conflict continues to dominate the news cycle with a rising number of casualties. Here’s a snapshot comparison of the two economies based on data from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). It will be followed by some more detailed analysis of Gaza’s economy based on the World Bank’s latest assessment which was published in September, just days before the latest round of violence.
#1 Population size
Before looking at any economic parameter, one must look at the population size. This demographic variable is often a key contributor to an economy’s economic fortunes.
As CHART 1 shows, at 9.81 million, the population of Israel in 2023 is almost double that of West Bank and Gaza (5.48 million). (Click here to read the full explainer)
More than three weeks after the deadly Hamas attack on Israel, the Israeli ground forces today attacked the militant groups’ infrastructure in Gaza City as the UN warned of further devastation among the Palestinian civilian population and called for a ceasefire. Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, however, rejected the idea of a ceasefire, saying, “Calls for a cease-fire are calls for Israel to surrender to Hamas. That will not happen.”
Meanwhile, Israel’s offensive to the October 7 Hamas attack has killed more than 8,306 Palestinians, including 3,457 children, according to the Gaza Health Ministry’s latest update. Of this, 329 Palestinians were killed in West Bank and the rest in Gaza City. As many as 1,400 Israelis were killed in the Hamas attack and nearly 240 others are being held hostage by the military group.
As the conflict continues, here are the key updates from Day 25 of the war. (Click here to Read More)
Speaking about the Israel Hamas war, the head of the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNWRA) on Monday warned that “an immediate humanitarian cease-fire has become a matter of life and death for millions," stressing that “the present and future of Palestinians and Israelis depend on it.”
He said that a further breakdown of civil order, following the recent break-ins at the agency's warehouses by panicked Palestinians searching for food and other aid, will make it extremely difficult for the largest UN agency in Gaza to continue operating.
He said most Palestinians in Gaza “feel trapped in a war they have nothing to do with” and “they feel the world is equating all of them to Hamas.” He stressed that the Oct. 7 Hamas atrocities in Israel don’t absolve Israel from its obligations under international humanitarian law, starting with the protection of civilians.
In the 23 harrowing days since Hamas attacked Israeli civilians and soldiers, Israel’s Western allies have had to perform a delicate balancing act: expressing steadfast support for the country during its darkest hours, while navigating the growing public anger on their streets over the intensifying bombardment of the Gaza Strip.
Israel’s neighbours in the Middle East have walked a different tightrope: managing outraged populations and, in some cases, proxy militant groups, which threaten to drag them into a broader war with Israel that they may not seek.
For both, Israel’s unfolding ground invasion of the densely populated Gaza Strip has complicated their calculations. (Read more)
Kuwait's crown prince Sheikh Meshal al-Ahmad al-Sabah said on Tuesday that his country condemns Israeli "aggression" on Gaza and called for a ceasefire.
Al-Sabah was addressing the parliament on behalf of the Emir in the opening of the parliament regular second session. (Reuters)
Air raid sirens went off in the area of the Red Sea city of Eilat today and Israel's military said it downed an approaching "aerial target".
After an initial warning of a possible "hostile aircraft intrusion", which sent residents of the popular tourist resort running for shelter, the military said its "systems identified an aerial target approaching Israeli territory".
"There was no threat or risk to civilians," it added. (Reuters)