Shelling, looting in Khartoum as military factions battle for eighth week
The conflict has uprooted more than 1.2 million people within Sudan and sent about 400,000 fleeing into neighboring countries
Updated 05 June 2023
Reuters
KHARTOUM: Shelling hit western areas of Sudan’s capital on Monday morning after rival military factions fought through the night, residents said, with reports of deepening lawlessness in Khartoum and in the western region of Darfur.
Fighting between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, who have been battling each other for more than seven weeks, intensified after the expiry late on Saturday of a ceasefire deal.
The conflict has uprooted more than 1.2 million people within Sudan and sent about 400,000 fleeing into neighboring countries, inflicting heavy damage on the capital where remaining residents are at the mercy of battles, air strikes and lawlessness.
Late on Sunday, residents reported intense fighting across the three cities that make up the nation’s wider capital — Khartoum, Omdurman and Bahri — and smoke could be seen rising from several areas early on Monday.
“The neighborhood where we live in the center of Omdurman is looted publicly on a daily basis without anyone intervening to prevent it, with clashes and shelling continuing around us,” said 37-year-old resident Mohammed Saleh.
In Khartoum East district, RSF troops who have spread out in neighborhoods across the capital were in full control and were looting extensively, said Waleed Adam, a resident of the area.
“You see them right in front of you, taking cars, money, gold — whatever they can get their hands on,” he told Reuters by phone. “I guess it’s just a matter of time until they come to my street.”
The RSF says it has been working to protect civilians by arresting looters.
The war has also triggered unrest in Darfur in Sudan’s far west, a region that was already suffering from mass displacement due to earlier conflict and where residents in several cities and towns have reported attacks by militias linked to tribes.
In recent days at least 40 people were killed and dozens more were wounded in Kutum in North Darfur State, according to activists who monitor the region.
Residents have also reported widespread looting and insecurity in the area.
On Monday, the RSF, which has its powerbase in Darfur and its origins in the Arab-dominated militias, released a video purporting to show that they had taken over the army headquarters in Kutum, a commercial hub and one of the larger towns in the state.
There was no immediate comment from the army, which had denied on Sunday that the RSF had taken the town.
There have been long communication blackouts in parts of Darfur, where aid groups have found it especially complicated to bring in new humanitarian supplies.
In El-Obeid, a city 360 km southwest of Khartoum and on a key route from the capital to Darfur, residents reported large deployments of RSF forces and the closure of some roads.
Recent days have brought the first showers of the year in Khartoum, marking the start of a rainy season likely to complicate a relief effort already hampered by bureaucratic delays and logistical challenges.
Families of Bedouin hostages wait for news as Gaza fighting resumes
“There were tough times, we always had hope”
Bedouin Arabs make up about 4 percent of Israel’s population
Updated 21 sec ago
Reuters
TIRABIN AL SANA, Israel: The family members of four Bedouin Arabs taken hostage on Oct. 7 during the assault on southern Israel by Hamas gunmen have welcomed the return of two of the captives but wait for news of the others as fighting resumes in the Gaza Strip.
Yosef Hamis Ziadna, his sons Hamza and Bilal and his daughter, Aisha, were working on the Holit farm on Israel’s border with Gaza when they were seized by the gunmen along with more than 200 other Israelis and foreigners.
Aisha and Bilal were handed over during the seven-day truce between Israel and Hamas that ended on Friday morning but Yosef and Hamza are still being held, along with two other Bedouins, Farhan Al-Qadi and Samer Al-Talalqa.
“There were tough times, we always had hope,” said their cousin Kamel Al-Ziadna. “We want the release of Yousef and Hamza and all those held hostages, and Samer and Farhan, may God bring them back to their families.”
Bedouin Arabs make up about 4 percent of Israel’s population, living mainly in the southern Negev desert and in northern Israel.
Kamel said the families were urging Hamas to release their hostages. “They are Arab, Muslim youth,” he said.
While they wait, like the families of other hostages released during the week-long pause, their emotions are mixed.
When the news came through that Aisha and Belal were to be released, there was a large gathering of family and friends that celebrated through the night.
“It was nice moments, but the happiness was missing something, so until the whole family is reunited with Hamza and Yousef, then we will hold a huge party, and we will gather with friends and family and all those who shared these difficult times with us,” he said.
No Christmas tree in Bethlehem as holiday pared down over war
Palestinians were in pain at the “many children, women, the elderly, the people who were martyred in this crazy war,” he said. Gazan authorities put the Palestinian death toll at more than 15,000
Updated 02 December 2023
Reuters
BETHLEHEM: There will be no Christmas tree in Bethlehem this year as the traditional site of Jesus’ birth holds pared-down celebrations “without the fanfare and too many lights” in the shadow of the Gaza war.
Bethlehem, which neighbors Jerusalem in the occupied West Bank, has been battered by Israeli-Palestinian clashes of years past. But many townspeople have been especially gripped by the current conflict in the Gaza Strip, 50 km away.
Triggered by an Oct. 7 killing and kidnapping spree in southern Israel by gunmen from Hamas, the war has seen much of the impoverished enclave devastated in an Israeli counter-offensive with no end in sight.
In the early days of every December, church leaders convene in Bethlehem to inaugurate the pre-Christmas Advent season, usually a major tourist draw.
We have never seen Bethlehem like this, not even during COVID. The town is empty, sad.
Father Ibrahim Faltas
But this year, the streets and plazas of the hilly town were largely empty and somber under a dry winter sun.
“We have never seen Bethlehem like this, not even during COVID. The town is empty, sad,” Father Ibrahim Faltas, a senior Franciscan friar, told Reuters in front of the Church of the Nativity. “Today was meant to be a joyous day.”
Palestinians were in pain at the “many children, women, the elderly, the people who were martyred in this crazy war,” he said. Gazan authorities put the Palestinian death toll at more than 15,000.
A Nov. 10 statement by church heads in the Holy Land voiced sympathy for people wracked by “the uncertain fate of those dear to them” — a possible reference to families and friends of some 240 people taken hostage by Hamas.
For the first time in many residents’ memories, no Christmas tree had been erected in Nativity Square, where the church prepared to hold religious services shorn of festive events.
“We will celebrate in sobriety,” said Father Francesco Patton of the Custody of the Holy Land church group.
“That means without the fanfare and too many lights, in the most spiritual way and more (among) families than in the square.”
Released Israeli hostages call for captives to be freed
Tens of thousands gathered at a rally in Tel Aviv outside Israel’s defense headquarters
A seven-day truce, during which Hamas had released more than 100 hostages, collapsed on Friday
Updated 02 December 2023
Reuters
TEL AVIV: Israeli hostages released in the past week by Hamas in Gaza called on Saturday for the immediate release of fellow captives left behind, a day after a temporary truce that had allowed scores to come home broke down.
Tens of thousands gathered at a rally in Tel Aviv outside Israel’s defense headquarters, where they cheered Yelena Trupanov, 50, standing on a stage just two days after being freed.
“I came to thank you because without you I wouldn’t be here. Now we must bring back my (son) Sasha, and everyone. Now.”
Similar pleas from other released hostages were shown on video.
A seven-day truce, during which Hamas had released more than 100 hostages, collapsed on Friday.
Israel said on Saturday it had recalled a Mossad intelligence agency team from Qatar, host of indirect negotiations with Hamas, accusing the Palestinian faction of reneging on a deal that would have freed all children and women held hostage.
More than 240 people — Israelis and foreign nationals — were abducted to Gaza on Oct 7. by Hamas militants who burst through the border with Israel and killed 1,200 people, according to local authorities.
Israel, vowing to wipe out Hamas, responded with a bombing campaign and ground offensive that has destroyed large areas of Gaza and killed more than 15,000 people, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run enclave.
Can US compel Israel to prioritize civilian protection and aid as Gaza truce gives way to renewed hostilities?
Israeli government faces pressure from Washington to have “clear plan” to protect civilians, avoid displacement and damage
War scholars say goal of destroying Hamas unrealistic, may prove impossible without very high civilian toll
Updated 02 December 2023
Alex Whiteman
LONDON: Just hours after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged Israel to prioritize civilians in its campaign against the Palestinian group Hamas, the Israeli military marked the end of a fragile truce in the Gaza Strip with renewed aerial bombardment.
By Saturday morning, 200 Palestinians had been killed, according to Hamas-run health ministry officials, as Israeli forces launched attacks on the Khan Younis area in southern Gaza, where it claimed to have targeted more than 50 Hamas sites.
The Israeli military said overall it hit more than 400 targets across the Gaza Strip, including strikes in the north, which suggested that no place in the besieged enclave was safe anymore.
Some 2 million people — almost Gaza’s entire population — poured into the territory’s south after Israel asked Palestinian civilians to relocate from other places at the military campaign’s start.
The question many were asking on Saturday was whether the Israel War Cabinet would heed the call of America’s top diplomat to have “a clear plan in place” for protecting civilians and avoid further mass displacement and damage to critical infrastructure, like hospitals, power stations and water facilities.
The Israeli military said overall it hit more than 400 targets across the Gaza Strip since the end of the truce. (AP/File)
Blinken’s comments, meant perhaps to shield the Biden administration from fresh criticism both at home and abroad, have left opinions divided among experts in war studies and geopolitics.
Tobias Borck, senior research fellow for Middle East security at RUSI, suspects that world leaders knew what was coming next after hearing those words, spoken to reporters in Jerusalem and Dubai.
“Blinken’s comments were made in anticipation of the truce coming to an end. This was the sense in Washington but also among the mediators, Egypt and Qatar,” he told Arab News.
“The option of a permanent ceasefire just did not seem viable to the Israeli government, which still felt it had a lot to do militarily. So, for Blinken the objective was to frame what came next, and was intended to show that the US was repositioning itself and making clear what its expectations were.”
Initially pegged as a four-day humanitarian pause to allow for the exchange of hostages by Hamas for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel, including many minors held in Israeli prisons without trial, the ceasefire lasted a week thanks to two extensions brokered by Qatar and Egypt.
After the end of the truce, militants in Gaza resumed firing rockets into Israel, and fighting also broke out between Israel and Hezbollah militants operating along its northern border with Lebanon, according to an Associated Press report.
Opinion
This section contains relevant reference points, placed in (Opinion field)
With 110 of the 240 hostages taken by Hamas returned, the Israeli military announced officially that the truce was broken, saying it had intercepted rockets fired from Gaza a little after 6 a.m. on Friday morning.
The military subsequently dropped leaflets in densely populated parts of southern Gaza urging residents to leave, indicating an imminent widening of the offensive, and noting that Khan Younis was a “dangerous battle zone.”
As per reports, Blinken told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that were fighting to continue, Israel would need to find more effective measures for protecting civilians.
This meant acting in “compliance with international humanitarian law” and provision of “every possible measure to avoid civilian harm.” He also emphasized the need for “sustaining and building on humanitarian assistance getting to Gaza.”
While criticizing Hamas for a deadly attack in occupied Jerusalem on Thursday and the renewed rocket strikes, Blinken alluded to the leaflets and Israel’s publishing of an interactive map detailing safe sites for civilians to relocate to.
Israeli soldiers work on armored military vehicles along Israel's border with the Gaza Strip. (AP)
Released on social media and in Arabic, the Israeli military tweeted that the map “divides the territory of Gaza into zones according to recognizable areas. This enables the residents of Gaza to orient themselves and to evacuate from specific places for their safety if required.”
Sources linked to aid efforts in Gaza, however, rubbished the idea, one telling Arab News that aid blockages probably meant little fuel was available, leaving most people unable to charge devices to even see such a map.
Borck said a central problem when it came to the protection of civilians concerned merging of the political objective, “namely, destroying Hamas,” with the military objective, and in turn trying to ascertain whether there was a wider strategy beyond this.
“The purported aim, destroying Hamas, is a pretty maximalist one, both in the political sense and the military sense,” he said.
“But you must ask what it means by destroying Hamas. Does the killing of Mohammed Deif and Yahiya Sinwar, the two considered to have masterminded the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks, achieve the objective? If so, you need look only to the hunt for Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden for a potential time scale.”
Oubai Shahbandar, a former Middle East defense adviser at the Pentagon, believes that in seeking to achieve its stated objective, Israel’s military will not be satisfied with simply “decapitating” the Hamas leadership hierarchy.
Rather, the intention is likely to ensure that Hamas’ capacity to put up any major asymmetrical military challenge is “totally degraded.” However, he said such a course of action was likely to play into Hamas’ hands.
“Sinwar probably had no illusions about the Israeli response to what happened on Oct. 7,” Shahbandar said.
“There aren’t any real signs that Netanyahu is going to seriously curtail the scope of airstrikes, artillery strikes and infantry assaults into southern Gaza to match the requests coming from the Biden White House.”
Some 2 million people — almost Gaza’s entire population — poured into the territory’s south. (AP)
President Biden himself warned in the wake of the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas it would be smart were Israel to learn from the mistakes the US had made in hunting the perpetrators of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
That warning, though, had another meaning for Borck: the US, among numerous allies of Israel, was urging Netanyahu to think about “the day after Day 1,” specifically about where it wanted to be when the war ended, adding this was pivotal for Gaza’s civilian population.
Michael Pregent, a former US intelligence officer and senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, said Blinken’s demands were not a “serious ask” but reflected the opinion of a swathe of the international community.
He argues that there is a certain impossibility in minimizing civilian casualties, adding that Hamas is following a playbook he saw in Afghanistan, Iraq and Somalia, where groups with similar ideologies “invited civilian death” as it earned them capital in the international news media.
He also noted that in response to similar tactics adopted by Daesh in Iraq, the US itself ended up decimating more than 80 percent of the city of Mosul in its nine-month campaign to rout the militants beginning in October 2016.
INNUMBERS
• 170 People killed in Gaza since resumption of fighting.
• 14,800 People killed in Gaza since start of Israeli assault.
• 136 Hostages seized by Hamas on Oct. 7 still in Gaza.
Asked whether greater thought ought to be put into forging strategies in response to attacks like that of Oct. 7, and in general the threat posed by Hamas and its militant allies to both Israeli and Palestinian civilians alike, Pregent said one option was to exhort the people of Gaza to reject Hamas. But history showed that it did not work, he said.
“One need only look at Afghanistan, where the Taliban is back. Groups such as the Taliban and Hamas are familiar with the precedents. They tell civilians, ‘You support an uprising, but our opponents will eventually leave and we will still be here. And when they go, we will be back and we will kill you and your whole family.’”
Significantly, during his meeting with Netanyahu, Blinken said the US remained committed to supporting Israel’s right to self-defense and assured him that he could count on US support.
The Biden administration has rejected calls for a long-term ceasefire and backed Israel’s fight to remove Hamas from power in Gaza with no “red lines” as it were that would trigger US penalties.
Despite the US emphasis on protection of civilians, the Wall Street Journal reported that Washington had disclosed little about how many and what types of weapons it had sent to Israel during the Gaza conflict.
Residents of Hamad Town residential complex in Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip, sit with some of their belongings as they flee their homes after an Israeli strike. (AFP)
“The arsenal of artillery, bombs and other weapons and military gear that have been used by the US in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia and Libya, among other places, usually target large groups of gathered enemy forces. In Gaza, by contrast, Israel is battling militants who are among civilians in dense urban environments,” the report said.
Against this backdrop, Shahbandar said history had repeatedly shown that Israel’s only realistic chance of dismantling Hamas as a military and political entity would not be found in the use of force.
“The way for Israel to achieve its aim is by helping to empower a Palestinian alternative to Hamas with real legitimacy,” he said. “But there seems very little appetite in the Netanyahu administration to pursue such a path.”
On Saturday, the International Rescue Committee, an aid group operating in Gaza, said the return of renewed fighting would “wipe out even the minimal relief” provided by the truce and “prove catastrophic for Palestinian civilians.”
Before the temporary truce took effect on Nov. 24, more than 13,300 Palestinians had been killed in Israel’s assault, roughly two-thirds of them women and minors, according to Gaza health officials.
The renewal of hostilities has also heightened concerns for the 136 Israelis and foreigners who are still held captive by Hamas and other militant groups.
Although little optimism concerning the fate of Gazans can be discerned in the immediate term, Borck said he saw a “sliver” of it in the future.
With 110 of the 240 hostages taken by Hamas returned, the Israeli military announced officially that the truce was broken. (AP)
Whereas the prevailing logic had been that the Middle East conflict could at best be “managed,” the past 54 days had “thoroughly dispelled that notion,” with governments in Washington, Paris and London, as well as Tel Aviv and Ramallah conscious now that it needed to end.
“Because of this recognition, I have been left slightly more confident we’ll see a resumption of work toward the two-state process,” Borck said.
“Look at the comments from Kier Starmer (UK opposition leader and odds-on favorite to win the next election) when he said Europe and the UK had given up on seeking peace in the Middle East because they felt it was too intractable.
“You sense, were he to become prime minister, this may lead to a change but, of course, he’s not as important as the person in the White House.”
Asked what he thought the agenda would be for the US when this war ends, Borck said that if Donald Trump returned, “all bets were off,” but were Biden to remain, he expected a greater focus on seeking peace, bringing the biggest win to Gaza’s embattled population.
Israeli military attacks southern Lebanon for second day running
Lebanese PM highlights environmental deterioration due to Israeli hostilities
Use of prohibited weapons including white phosphorus denounced
Updated 02 December 2023
NAJIA HOUSSARI
BEIRUT: Israeli forces and Hezbollah militants exchanged fire across the Israel-Lebanon border on Saturday in a second day of hostilities.
Israeli airstrikes hit multiple border towns as the Israeli army said that it had “retaliated against attacks originating from southern Lebanon.”
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said Israeli aggression against Lebanon was not only affecting its people but also causing environmental damage.
“Large areas in Lebanon have been exposed to severe impacts, leading to environmental deterioration resulting from the ongoing Israeli hostilities,” Mikati, who is currently attending the COP28 conference in Dubai, said.
He said Israeli violations included the use of prohibited weapons such as white phosphorus, which killed civilians and caused irreparable damage to more than 5 million square meters of forest, agricultural land, and thousands of olive trees, all of which would lead to the destruction of livelihoods and sources of income and the displacement of tens of thousands of Lebanese.
Prime Minister Mohamad Najib Mikati speaks at the UN climate summit in Dubai. (AFP)
Mikati met with Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar at the conference and praised Ireland for its active contribution to the UN’s Interim Force in Lebanon.
Mikati also discussed the situation in Gaza and southern Lebanon with French President Emmanuel Macron on the sidelines of COP28. The results of French special envoy Jean-Yves Le Drian’s visit to Beirut were also explored.
According to local media, during his visit Le Drian had discussed the possibility of amending UN Resolution 1701 at Israel’s request so that Hezbollah had to retreat at least 15 km from the border.
MP Waddah Sadek, who met Le Drian, told Arab News that the envoy “did not tackle the issue, but we announced that we are committed to the resolution and its implementation as it is, in light of Israel’s request to amend it for its benefit.”
He added that Le Drian “did not comment on our stance, and what was said came as part of the discussion regarding the course of the implementation of Resolution 1701.”
Nabil Kaouk — a member of Hezbollah’s central council — said the party “will not allow any Israeli gains or any new Israeli equation at the expense of Lebanese sovereignty, because the Lebanese people have the right to exist and move on any inch of our land in the south.”
He asserted that Hezbollah “was, is, and will remain the biggest supporter of the people of Gaza.”
Speaking on behalf of Hezbollah, Kaouk also said: “Some people are promoting Israeli demands and goals inside and outside the country by requesting the amendment of Resolution 1701 to create a buffer zone on the border to reassure the settlers who are afraid to return to their settlements due to Hezbollah’s presence on the border.”
Kaouk’s remarks came as the Israeli military launched flare shells on Saturday at Wadi Hamoul and Al-Labouneh, located east of Naqoura.
Israeli airstrikes also targeted several valleys in Aita al-Shaab and Ramiya.
Hezbollah has repeatedly declared that it has attacked previously targeted Israeli military locations over the last 50 days, including Khirbet Maar, Ruwaisat Al-Alam in the Kfar Shuba Heights, the 91st Division headquarters in the Branit barracks, and the Al-Raheb military site and its garrison.
On Saturday, Hezbollah held funerals for three of its members who were killed on the border with Israel during confrontations on Friday after the end of the truce in the Gaza Strip:
Khader Salim Abboud, Mohammed Hussein Mazraani, and Wajih Shehada Mishik. Eighty-eight Hezbollah members have reportedly been killed between the opening of the southern Lebanese front on Oct. 8 and Dec. 2.
Nassifa Mazraani, a civilian, and her son were killed on Friday inside their house by an Israeli shell in the town of Hula. Mazraani had survived the July 2006 war, in which she suffered burns, and had been detained by Israeli forces before they withdrew from southern Lebanon in 2000. She was one of those freed in prisoner-exchange agreements.
Israeli media reported that the Israeli military has asked residents of the northern border region near southern Lebanon to refrain from traveling to and from towns that have been evacuated due to a security assessment.
The military advised individuals to limit movement within settlements and remain in protected areas. Israeli authorities have also banned agricultural activity in the area.
