Polio vaccination starts in north Gaza despite obstacles

Polio vaccination starts in north Gaza despite obstacles
A Palestinian medic administers polio vaccines to youngsters at the Al-Daraj neighborhood clinic in Gaza City on Tuesday. (AFP)
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Updated 10 September 2024
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Polio vaccination starts in north Gaza despite obstacles

Polio vaccination starts in north Gaza despite obstacles

GAZA: A campaign to vaccinate a final 200,000 children in north Gaza against polio began on Tuesday although health and aid officials said the operation was complicated by access restrictions, evacuation orders, and shortages of fuel.

The campaign in north Gaza, the part of the territory hardest hit by Israel’s 11-month military offensive against Hamas, follows the vaccination of more than 446,000 Palestinian children in central and south Gaza earlier this month.

Medical staff had started administering vaccines in the north despite a dire need for fuel, among other challenges, said Dr. Moussa Abed of the primary care unit in Gaza’s Health Ministry.

Vaccination centers are in areas that are militarily very active, challenging to reach, and isolated if things go wrong, said Sam Rose, a deputy director of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA.

“There are some nerves, but we’ll have to make it work,” he texted Reuters.

On Monday, Israel stopped a convoy that included vehicles and fuel for the vaccination campaign as well as a World Health Organization team trying to get to Gaza’s Al-Shifa Hospital, and the mission had to be aborted, the WHO’s Tarik Jasarevic said.

Israel also issued an evacuation order in north Gaza, the first in more than two weeks, that included areas that are part of humanitarian pause zones agreed upon for the polio vaccinations, according to a UN update on Monday.

“The centralization of services in the south makes it extremely difficult for us to get fuel, to get access to vaccinations, and to all other logistics,” Mahmoud Shalabi of Medical Aid for Palestinians, a UK-based charity, said via a spokesperson, adding there was no fuel available for mobile vaccination teams.

Hossam Medhat Saleh, a Palestinian father, said he had to walk with his three children to reach a vaccination clinic because no transportation was available.

“The dangers of the road are big — as you can see, the destruction, the streets, and infrastructure, in addition to the missiles and cannons (shelling) which continue,” he told Reuters, standing on a dusty street surrounded by smashed cars and buildings.

The campaign to vaccinate some 640,000 children in Gaza under 10 years of age began on Sept. 1, following confirmation by the WHO last month that the type 2 polio virus had partially paralyzed a baby, the first such case in the territory in 25 years.

The campaign in north Gaza aims to conclude a first vaccination round, with a second set to commence after a month.

Israel began its military campaign in Gaza on Oct. 7 last year after Hamas led a shock incursion into southern Israel.

The resulting assault on Gaza has killed more than 40,900 Palestinians, according to the enclave’s Health Ministry, and reduced much of the territory to rubble.


A missile falls in Jordan

Updated 18 sec ago
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A missile falls in Jordan

A missile falls in Jordan
  • The missile was likely fired at Israel by Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group
AMMAN: Jordan’s military says a Grad missile fired from Lebanon fell in an open area without causing casualties or damage.
The missile was likely fired at Israel by Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group, which has intensified its rocket attacks after its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, was killed in an Israeli airstrike on Friday.
Jordan and Israel, which share borders, signed a peace treaty in 1994. The Western-allied Arab country also helped intercept missiles fired at Israel by Iran in April.
Jordan has been fiercely critical of Israel’s policies toward the Palestinians and has repeatedly called for a ceasefire in Gaza. It has also said it will not allow its territory to become a battlefield as tensions mount between Israel and Iran.

Lebanon’s top Christian cleric calls for diplomacy following Nasrallah’s killing

Lebanon’s top Christian cleric calls for diplomacy following Nasrallah’s killing
Updated 3 min 28 sec ago
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Lebanon’s top Christian cleric calls for diplomacy following Nasrallah’s killing

Lebanon’s top Christian cleric calls for diplomacy following Nasrallah’s killing

BEIRUT: Lebanon’s top Christian cleric urged diplomacy in the conflict between Israel and Lebanese group Hezbollah, and said Israel’s killing of the group’s chief, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, had wounded the hearts of the Lebanese people.


What to know after Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah

What to know after Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah
Updated 26 min 34 sec ago
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What to know after Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah

What to know after Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah
  • It remains to be seen whether his death will be a trigger for an all-out war between the two sides
  • Iran is the main backer of Hezbollah and other anti-Israeli militant groups in the region

BEIRUT: Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah is a monumental and hugely demoralizing blow to the group he led for 32 years, marking a significant inflection point for Lebanon and the region.
Hezbollah’s announcement of his death Friday triggered tears and celebrations across the Arab world, pointing to the widespread reach and influence of a divisive man who has been at the forefront of Middle Eastern politics for decades.
The 64-year-old Nasrallah headed arguably the most powerful paramilitary force in the world — also a US-designated terror organization — that is now left without a clear successor at a critical juncture. It remains to be seen whether his death will be a trigger for an all-out war between the two sides that could potentially drag in Iran and the United States.
Here are some things to know about the situation:
Is it a decapitating blow?
Nasrallah’s assassination is a severe blow to the group, not a decapitating one. But analysts say Hezbollah will need some time to absorb the shock and recover.
“Nasrallah’s killing is a significant setback for Hezbollah, not only because of the pivotal role he played in Hezbollah’s strategy but also because his elimination reveals the extent of the group’s vulnerability vis-à-vis Israel,” said Lina Khatib, an associate fellow at Chatham House, an international affairs think tank.
“This will shake the confidence of Hezbollah’s Iran-backed allies across the Arab world, from the Houthis in Yemen to the Popular Mobilization Forces in Iraq, as well as Iran itself, sparking a tectonic shift in Iran’s network of influence in the Middle East,” she added.
It is not the first time Israel has killed a Hezbollah leader. Nasrallah took over from Abbas Mousawi, who was killed by an Israeli helicopter attack in 1992.
But Hezbollah today is very different from the ragtag organization it was in the ‘90s. In recent years, he has presided over an army-like group estimated to have tens of thousands of fighters and a sophisticated arsenal capable of reaching anywhere inside Israel.
It has become the chief part of a cluster of Iranian-backed factions and governments of the self-named “Axis of Resistance.”
“Hezbollah will not back down following the killing of its leader, as it will need to convey steadfastness in the face of Israel if it’s going to retain its credibility as the strongest ‘resistance’ actor in the region,” said Khatib.
Iran’s dilemma
In his first remarks Saturday following Nasrallah’s death, Iran’s supreme leader gave no indication of how Tehran will respond.
In a vague statement, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said, “all regional resistance forces” support and stand beside Hezbollah, but he did not elaborate.
Iran is the main backer of Hezbollah and other anti-Israeli militant groups in the region, but it has largely avoided clashing directly with Israel due to domestic considerations.
Hezbollah, however, is Iran’s chief ally and proxy group, and Tehran may have to respond to retain its credibility with its partners in the axis.
“Iran is very much in a policy dilemma right now,” said Firas Maksad, of the Middle East Institute. On one hand, clearly it very much has wanted to avoid an all-out and direct confrontation, given its long-standing preference for asymmetric warfare and using proxies.
“But on the other hand, a lack of a worthy response given the magnitude of the event will only encourage Israel to push deeper past Iran’s red lines,” he said. Not responding also sends a signal of weakness to its regional proxies.
Any direct Iranian involvement risks dragging Israel’s chief ally, the US, into the war, just over a month before the US elections and at a time Iran has signaled its interest in renewing negotiations with the US over its nuclear program.
Maksad said one possible scenario is a coordinated response from the entire axis. Whether that will be coupled with a direct response from Iran itself is an open question.
Who will succeed Nasrallah?
There is no one nearly as influential and respected among the group’s remaining leadership as Nasrallah.
The man widely regarded as his heir is Hashem Safieddine, a cousin of Nasrallah who oversees the group’s political affairs. It is not known if he survived Friday’s attack, and the Hezbollah statement announcing Nasrallah’s death Friday made no mention of a successor.
The group’s Shoura Council will have to meet in the coming days or weeks to choose its new leadership. Lebanese journalist and writer Maher Abi Nader said Safieddine or Nabil Kaouk, a member of the group’s executive council, were the likely successors.
Whoever ends up replacing Nasrallah in the current atmosphere will have to contend with a deeply weakened force facing growing anger and frustration on the home front.
In just over 10 days, the Iran-backed group has been hit by a series of devastating attacks that dealt a severe blow to its military structure and exposed deep intelligence failures.
Explosives hidden in the group’s pagers and walkie-talkies killed dozens of people and wounded thousands — many of them Hezbollah members. Israel has also rained down missiles on residential areas where the group has a strong presence, killing hundreds and displacing tens of thousands of people.
Nasrallah was regarded by supporters as a charismatic and shrewd leader. Despite being a divisive figure, he is credited with pushing Israeli forces from south Lebanon in 2000 following an 18-year occupation, as well as transforming the organization from a local militia to a major political player in Lebanon and a top armed force in the region.
He held tremendous sway over the group and the country’s Shiite community.
Orna Mizrahi, a senior researcher at the Tel Aviv-based think tank Institute for National Security Studies, noted that Nasrallah was sometimes a “voice of reason” who was interested in engaging Israel in a war of attrition, holding the militant group back from using the full force of their formidable arsenal against Israel.
Filling those shoes will be a tough act, analysts say.
Growing tensions in Lebanon
Any new Hezbollah leader will also have to contend with rising resentment and frustration among a significant section of the Lebanese population. For years, critics say, Hezbollah deprived Lebanon of its sovereignty by behaving as a state within a state and making unilateral decisions involving war and peace.
Many Christians and Sunnis, as well as a portion of the Shiite community, are opposed to the war and what they regard as Nasrallah’s unilateral decision to attack Israel in support of the Gaza front on Oct. 8, a day after the Hamas attack on Israel that ignited the war in the Palestinian territory.
Tensions are extremely high in tiny Lebanon, which is already drowning under the force of an economic meltdown and multiple other crises. A humanitarian crisis has rapidly unfolded with tens of thousands of people displaced, many of them sleeping in parks and makeshift shelters. Dozens of schools designated as sheltered became full within days.
The country is bankrupt and has been without a president and functioning government for two years. In the void, sectarian tensions and frustrations within the country could spiral into armed violence.
Maha Yahya, director of the Beirut-based Carnegie Middle East Center, said Hezbollah now has to contend with all of that as it struggles to regroup.
“And it will have to be more accommodating to Lebanon’s other political parties and communities,” she said.


Iran’s parliament speaker says militant groups will go on confronting Israel

Iran’s parliament speaker says militant groups will go on confronting Israel
Updated 34 min 12 sec ago
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Iran’s parliament speaker says militant groups will go on confronting Israel

Iran’s parliament speaker says militant groups will go on confronting Israel
  • He also issued a warning to the United States

TEHRAN: Iran’s parliament speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf said on Sunday that militant groups would carry on confronting Israel with Tehran’s help following the killing of Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, Iranian state media reported.
An alliance known as the Axis of Resistance, built up over decades with Iranian support, includes the Palestinian group Hamas, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Yemen’s Houthis, and various Shiite Muslim armed groups in Iraq and Syria.
Israel said it killed Nasrallah in an airstrike on Hezbollah’s headquarters in Beirut’s southern suburbs on Friday. Hezbollah confirmed he had been killed, without saying how.
“We will not hesitate to go to any level in order to help the resistance,” Qalibaf said.
He also issued a warning to the United States.
“The US is complicit in all of these crimes and...has to accept the repercussions,” he said.
Also commenting on Nasrallah’s killing, Iranian Foreign minister Abbas Araqchi said Israel “will not rest” and the action would not go unanswered, state media reported on Sunday. He said the region was in a dangerous situation.
Iran Revolutionary Guards’ deputy commander Abbas Nilforoushan was also killed in the Israeli strikes on Beirut on Friday, Iranian media reported on Saturday.


Nasrallah’s killing reveals depth of Israel’s penetration of Hezbollah

Nasrallah’s killing reveals depth of Israel’s penetration of Hezbollah
Updated 44 min 30 sec ago
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Nasrallah’s killing reveals depth of Israel’s penetration of Hezbollah

Nasrallah’s killing reveals depth of Israel’s penetration of Hezbollah
  • Nasrallah’s killing came just over a week after detonation of booby-trapped pagers
  • Israel has eliminated half Hezbollah’s leadership council, destroyed many of its weapons dumps

In the wake of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah’s killing, Hezbollah faces the enormous challenge of plugging the infiltration in its ranks that allowed its arch enemy Israel to destroy weapons sites, booby-trap its communications and assassinate the veteran leader, whose whereabouts had been a closely guarded secret for years. Nasrallah’s killing in a command HQ on Friday came barely a week after Israel’s deadly detonation of hundreds of booby-trapped pagers and radios. It was the culmination of a rapid succession of strikes that have eliminated half of Hezbollah’s leadership council and decimated its top military command.
In the days before and hours after Nasrallah’s killing, Reuters spoke to more than a dozen sources in Lebanon, Israel, Iran and Syria who provided details of the damage Israel has wrought on the powerful Shiite paramilitary group, including to its supply lines and command structure. All asked for anonymity to speak about sensitive matters.
One source familiar with Israeli thinking told Reuters, less than 24 hours before the strike, that Israel has spent 20 years focusing intelligence efforts on Hezbollah and could hit Nasrallah when it wanted, including in the headquarters.
The person called the intelligence “brilliant,” without providing details.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his close circle of ministers authorized the attack on Wednesday, two Israeli officials told Reuters. The attack took place while Netanyahu was in New York to speak at the UN General Assembly.
Nasrallah had avoided public appearances since a previous 2006 war. He had long been vigilant, his movements were restricted and the circle of people he saw was very small, according to a source familiar with Nasrallah’s security arrangements. The assassination suggested his group had been infiltrated by informants for Israel, the source said.
The Hezbollah leader had been even more cautious than usual since the Sept. 17 pager blasts, out of concern Israel would try to kill him, a security source familiar with the group’s thinking told Reuters a week ago, citing his absence from a commanders’ funeral and his pre-recording of a speech broadcast a few days before.
Hezbollah’s media office did not respond to a request for comment for this story. US President Joe Biden on Saturday called Nasrallah’s killing “a measure of justice” for his many victims, and said the United States fully supported Israel’s right to defend itself against Iranian-backed groups.
Israel says it carried out the hit on Nasrallah by dropping bombs on the underground headquarters below a residential building in southern Beirut.
“This is a massive blow and intelligence failure for Hezbollah,” Magnus Ranstorp, a veteran Hezbollah expert at the Swedish Defense University. “They knew that he was meeting. He was meeting with other commanders. And they just went for him.”
Including Nasrallah, Israel’s military says it has killed eight of Hezbollah’s nine most senior military commanders this year, mostly in the past week. These commanders led units ranging from the rocket division to the elite Radwan force.
Around 1,500 Hezbollah fighters were maimed by the exploding pagers and walkie talkies on Sept. 17 and Sept. 18.
On Saturday, Israel’s military spokesperson Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani told reporters in a briefing that the military had “real-time” knowledge that Nasrallah and other leaders were gathering. Shoshani did not say how they knew, but said the leaders were meeting to plan attacks on Israel.
Brig. Gen. Amichai Levin, commander of Israel’s Hatzerim Airbase, told reporters that dozens of munitions hit the target within seconds.
“The operation was complex and was planned for a long time,” according to Levin.
Depleted
Hezbollah has shown the ability to replace commanders quickly, and Nasrallah’s cousin Hashem Safieddine, also a cleric who wears the black turban denoting descent from Islam’s Prophet Muhammad, has long been tipped as his successor.
“You kill one, they get a new one,” said a European diplomat of the group’s approach. The group, whose name means Party of God, will fight on: by US and Israeli estimates it had some 40,000 fighters ahead of the current escalation, along with large weapons stockpiles and an extensive tunnel network near Israel’s border.
Founded in Tehran in 1982, the Shiite paramilitary outfit is the most formidable member of Iran’s so-called Axis of Resistance of anti-Israel allied irregular forces, and a significant regional player in its own right.
But it has been materially and psychologically weakened over the past 10 days.
Thanks to decades of backing from Iran, prior to the current conflict Hezbollah was among the world’s most well-armed non-conventional armies, with an arsenal of 150,000 rockets, missiles and drones, according to US estimates.
That is ten times the size of the armory the group had in 2006, during its last war with Israel, according to Israeli estimates.
Over the past year, even more weapons have flowed into Lebanon from Iran, along with significant amounts of financial aid, a source familiar with Hezbollah’s thinking said.
There have been few detailed public assessments of how much this arsenal has been damaged by Israel’s offensive over the past week, which has hit Hezbollah strongholds in Bekaa Valley, far from Lebanon’s border with Israel.
One Western diplomat in the Middle East told Reuters prior to Friday’s attack that Hezbollah had lost 20 percent-25 percent of its missile capacity in the ongoing conflict, including in hundreds of Israeli strikes this week. The diplomat did not provide evidence or details of their assessment.
An Israeli security official said “a very respectable portion” of Hezbollah’s missile stocks had been destroyed, without giving further specifics.
In recent days, Israel has struck more than 1,000 Hezbollah targets. The security official, when asked about the military’s extensive target lists, said Israel had matched Hezbollah’s two-decade build up with preparations to prevent it launching its rockets in the first place — a complement to the Iron Dome air defense system that often downs missiles fired at the Jewish state.
Israeli officials say the fact that Hezbollah has only been able to launch a couple of hundred missiles a day in the past week was evidence its capabilities had been diminished.
Iran connection
Before the strike on Nasrallah, three Iranian sources told Reuters Iran was planning to send additional missiles to Hezbollah to prepare for a prolonged war. The weapons that were to be provided included short-to-medium-range ballistic missiles including Iranian Zelzals and an upgraded precision version known as the Fateh 110, the first Iranian source said.
Reuters was unable to reach the sources after the Nasrallah assassination.
While Iran is willing to provide military support, the two Iranian sources said it does not want to be directly involved in a confrontation between Hezbollah and Israel. The rapid escalation in hostilities over the past week follows a year of skirmishes tied to the Gaza war.
Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ deputy commander Abbas Nilforoushan was killed in the Israeli strikes on Beirut on Friday, Iranian media reported on Saturday, citing a state TV report.
Hezbollah may need certain warheads and missiles along with drones and missile parts to replenish those destroyed by Israeli strikes across Lebanon last week, a senior Syrian military intelligence source added. Iranian supplies have in the past reached Hezbollah by air and sea. On Saturday, Lebanon’s transport ministry told an Iranian aircraft not to enter its airspace after Israel warned air traffic control at Beirut airport that it would use “force” if the plane landed, a source at the ministry told Reuters.
The source said it was not clear what was on the plane.
Land corridors are currently the best route for missiles, parts and drones, through Iraq and Syria, with the help of allied armed groups in those countries, an Iranian security official told Reuters this week. The Syrian military source, however, said Israeli drone surveillance and strikes targeting convoys of trucks had compromised that route. This year, Israel stepped up attacks on weapons depots and supply routes in Syria to weaken Hezbollah ahead of any war, Reuters reported in June.
As recently as August, an Israeli drone hit weapons concealed in commercial trailers in Syria, the source said. This week, Israel’s military said its warplanes bombed unspecified infrastructure used to transfer weapons to Hezbollah at the Syria-Lebanon border.
Joseph Votel, a former army general who led US forces in the Middle East, said Israel and its allies could well intercept any missiles Iran sent by land to Hezbollah now.
“That might be a risk they’re willing to take, frankly,” he said.