Deadly Israeli strike on Gaza school draws global condemnation

Deadly Israeli strike on Gaza school draws global condemnation
A member of the UNRWA checks the courtyard of a school after an Israeli air strike hit the site, in Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip on Sept. 11, 2024. (AFP)
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Updated 12 September 2024
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Deadly Israeli strike on Gaza school draws global condemnation

Deadly Israeli strike on Gaza school draws global condemnation
  • UN chief Antonio Guterres branded the strike “totally unacceptable“
  • EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said he was “outraged” by the deaths and that the strikes showed a “disregard of the basic principles” of international humanitarian law

GAZA STRIP, Palestinian Territories: Israel faced international condemnation Thursday after a strike killed 18 people at a school-turned-shelter for displaced Palestinians in war-torn Gaza, where the Israeli military said it targeted Hamas militants.
The attack flattened part of the UN-run Al-Jawni school in Nuseirat on Wednesday, leaving only a charred heap of rebar and concrete.
“For the fifth time, Israeli forces bombed the UNRWA-run Al-Jawni School, killing 18 citizens,” Gaza civil defense spokesperson Mahmud Bassal wrote on Telegram, referring to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.
UNRWA later said six of its staff had been killed in two Israeli strikes on the school and its surroundings, calling it the highest death toll among its team in a single incident.
“Among those killed was the manager of the UNRWA shelter and other team members providing assistance to displaced people,” it said on X. “Schools and other civilian infrastructure must be protected at all times, they are not a target.”
The Israeli military said it had conducted a “precise strike” on Hamas militants within the school grounds. It did not elaborate on the outcome, but said “numerous steps” were taken to reduce the risk to civilians.
UN chief Antonio Guterres branded the strike “totally unacceptable.”
His condemnation was echoed by Israeli ally Germany, which said “humanitarian aid workers must never be victims of rockets.”
Jordan and the European Union also criticized the attack, while Israel’s main backer the United States called on it to protect humanitarian sites.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said he was “outraged” by the deaths and that the strikes showed a “disregard of the basic principles” of international humanitarian law.
US Secretary of State Blinken said: “We need to see humanitarian sites protected, and that’s something that we continue to raise with Israel.”
Israeli military spokesman Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani said UNRWA had not provided the names of its killed workers, “despite repeated requests.”
He said a military inquiry found that “a significant number of the names (of the dead) that have appeared in the media and on social networks are Hamas terrorist operatives.”
In response, UNRWA spokeswoman Juliette Touma said the agency was “not aware of any such requests,” that it provided Israel each year with a list of its staff and that it “called repeatedly” on Israel and Palestinian militants “to never use civilian facilities for military or fighting purposes.”
She said the agency was “not in a position to determine” if the school had been used by Hamas for military purposes, but UNRWA had “repeatedly called for independent investigations” into “these very serious claims.”
Israeli government spokesman David Mencer said the school was “no longer a school” and had become “a legitimate target” as it was used by Hamas to launch attacks.
UNRWA, which coordinates nearly all aid into Gaza, has been in crisis since Israel accused a dozen of its 30,000 employees of being involved in the October 7 Hamas attacks that sparked the war.
The UN immediately fired the implicated staff members, and a probe found some “neutrality related issues” but stressed Israel had not provided evidence for its chief allegations.
Survivors of the strike scrambled to recover bodies and belongings from the rubble, saying they had to step over “shredded limbs.”
“I can hardly stand up,” a man holding a plastic bag of human remains told AFP.
“We’ve been going through hell for 340 days now, what we’ve seen over these days, we haven’t even seen it in Hollywood movies, now we’re seeing it in Gaza.”
UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini said after the school strike that at least 220 members of the agency’s staff had been killed in the war.
“Endless & senseless killing, day after day,” he posted on X.
“Humanitarian staff, premises & operations have been blatantly & unabatedly disregarded since the beginning of the war.”
Across Gaza, many school buildings have been repurposed to shelter displaced families, with the vast majority of the territory’s 2.4 million people repeatedly uprooted by the war.
In Gaza City, civil defense spokesman Bassal said two strikes in the Zeitun neighborhood killed seven people — including two children.
Later, he said two people were killed in the Jabalia camp. Medical sources said five people were killed in strikes on the Khan Yunis area.
The bloodshed shows no signs of abating despite months of ceasefire negotiations mediated by Qatar, Egypt and the United States.
A Hamas delegation met Qatari and Egyptian mediators in Doha on Wednesday, the Palestinian Islamists said, though there was no indication of a breakthrough.
The October 7 Hamas attack on southern Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,205 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.
Among the dead included in that count were hostages killed in captivity.
Israel’s retaliation has killed at least 41,118 people in Gaza, according to the territory’s health ministry. The UN rights office says most of the dead are women and children.


US says Israel must improve Gaza’s humanitarian situation or risk aid -reports

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US says Israel must improve Gaza’s humanitarian situation or risk aid -reports

US says Israel must improve Gaza’s humanitarian situation or risk aid -reports
“We are writing now to underscore the US government’s deep concern over the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza,” they wrote
US officials earlier this year said Israel may have violated international humanitarian law using US-supplied weapons during its military operation in Gaza

WASHINGTON: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Israel must take urgent steps to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza to avoid legal action involving US military aid, according to news reports on Tuesday.
“We are writing now to underscore the US government’s deep concern over the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza, and seek urgent and sustained actions by your government this month to reverse this trajectory,” they wrote in an Oct. 13 letter to their Israeli counterparts, posted by an Axios reporter on X.
The State Department and Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Representatives for Israel’s government also could not be immediately reached for comment.
The report comes as Israeli forces expand operations into northern Gaza amid ongoing concerns about access to humanitarian aid throughout the enclave and civilians’ access to food, water and medicine.
US officials earlier this year said Israel may have violated international humanitarian law using US-supplied weapons during its military operation in Gaza.
This week’s letter cited Section 620i of the Foreign Assistance Act, which restricts (prohibits) military aid to countries that impede delivery of US humanitarian assistance.
It also cited a National Security Memorandum that US President Joe Biden issued in February that requires the State Department to report to Congress on whether it finds credible Israel’s assurances that its use of US weapons does not violate US or international law.

Israel’s demining near Golan signals wider front against Hezbollah, sources say

Israel’s demining near Golan signals wider front against Hezbollah, sources say
Updated 15 October 2024
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Israel’s demining near Golan signals wider front against Hezbollah, sources say

Israel’s demining near Golan signals wider front against Hezbollah, sources say
  • The move suggests Israel may seek to strike Hezbollah for the first time from further east along Lebanon’s border
  • Navvar Saban, a conflict analyst at the Istanbul-based Harmoon Center, said the operations in the Golan appeared to be an attempt to “prepare the groundwork” for a broader offensive

AMMAN/BEIRUT: In a sign Israel may expand its ground operations against Hezbollah while bolstering its own defenses, its troops have cleared land mines and established new barriers on the frontier between the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights and a demilitarised strip bordering Syria, security sources and analysts said.
The move suggests Israel may seek to strike Hezbollah for the first time from further east along Lebanon’s border, at the same time creating a secure area from which it can freely reconnoitre the armed group and prevent infiltration, the sources said.
While demining activity has been reported, sources who spoke to Reuters — including a Syrian soldier stationed in south Syria, a Lebanese security official and a UN peacekeeping official — revealed additional unreported details that showed Israel was moving the fence separating the DMZ toward the Syrian side and digging more fortifications in the area. Military action involving raids from the Israeli-occupied Golan and possibly from the demilitarised zone that separates it from Syrian territory could widen the conflict pitting Israel against Hezbollah and its ally Hamas that has already drawn in Iran and risks sucking in the US
Israel has been trading fire with Tehran-backed Hezbollah since the group began launching missiles across Lebanon’s border in support of Hamas after its deadly attack on southern Israel triggered Israel’s military campaign on Gaza.
Now, in addition to Israeli aerial strikes that have caused Hezbollah significant damage in the past month, the group is under Israeli ground assault from the south and faces Israeli naval shelling from the Mediterranean to the west. By extending its front in the east, Israel could tighten its squeeze on Hezbollah’s arms supply routes, some of which cut across Syria, Lebanon’s eastern neighbor and an ally of Iran.
Navvar Saban, a conflict analyst at the Istanbul-based Harmoon Center, said the operations in the Golan, a hilly, 1,200 square km (460 square mile) plateau that also overlooks Lebanon and borders Jordan, appeared to be an attempt to “prepare the groundwork” for a broader offensive in Lebanon.
“Everything happening in Syria is to serve Israel’s strategy in Lebanon — hitting supply routes, hitting warehouses, hitting people linked to the supply lines to Hezbollah,” he said.
Israel’s mine removal and engineering works have accelerated in recent weeks, according to a Syrian intelligence officer, a Syrian soldier positioned in southern Syria, and three senior Lebanese security sources who spoke to Reuters for this story.

FORTIFICATIONS
The sources said the demining had intensified as Israel began ground incursions on Oct. 1 to fight Hezbollah along the mountainous terrain separating northern Israel from southern Lebanon around 20 km (12 miles) to the west.
In the same period, Israel has ramped up strikes on Syria, including its capital and the border with Lebanon, and Russian military units — stationed in Syria’s south in support of Syrian troops there — have withdrawn from at least one observation post overlooking the demilitarised area, the two Syrian sources and one of the Lebanese sources said.
All of the sources spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss their monitoring of Israel’s military operations in the Golan, most of which was seized by Israel from Syria in 1967.
The Syrian soldier stationed in the south said Israel was pushing the fence separating the occupied Golan and the demilitarised zone (DMZ) further out and erecting their own fortifications near Syria “so there would not be any infiltration in the event this front flares up.”
The soldier said Israel appeared to be creating “a buffer zone” in the DMZ. A second senior Lebanese security source told Reuters that Israeli troops had dug a new trench near the DMZ in October.
One senior Lebanese security source said the demining operations could allow Israeli troops to “encircle” Hezbollah from the east.
The DMZ has been home for the last five decades to the UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF), mandated to oversee disengagement of Israeli and Syrian forces after a 1973 war.
A UN peacekeeping official in New York said that UNDOF had “recently observed some construction activity being carried out by Israeli military forces in the vicinity of the area of separation,” but did not have further details.

RUSSIA LEAVES OVERLOOK POINT
Asked about the demining, the Israeli military said it “does not comment on operational plans” and it “is currently fighting against the terrorist organization Hezbollah in order to allow for the safe return of northern residents to their homes.”
UNDOF, Russia, and Syria did not respond to requests for comment by Reuters.
A report to the UN Security Council on the activities of UNDOF, dated Sept. 24 and seen by Reuters on Oct. 4, cited violations on both sides of the demilitarized zone.
Russian troops, meanwhile, have left the Tal Hara outpost, the highest point in Syria’s southern Daraa governorate and a strategic overlook point, according to the two Syrian sources and one of the Lebanese sources.
The Russians had left because of understandings with the Israelis to prevent a clash, a Syrian military officer said. Syrian authorities, whose country is part of Iran’s ‘Axis of Resistance’, have sought to remain out of the fray since regional tensions soared after Hamas’s Oct. 7 assault last year. Reuters reported in January that Assad had been discouraged from taking any action in support of Hamas after he received threats from Israel. Hezbollah too had “steered away” from building up any forces in the Syrian-held Golan.
Syria’s army has not made additional deployments, the Syrian military intelligence officer told Reuters.


Mass displacement in Lebanon war revives spectre of sectarian strife

Mass displacement in Lebanon war revives spectre of sectarian strife
Updated 15 October 2024
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Mass displacement in Lebanon war revives spectre of sectarian strife

Mass displacement in Lebanon war revives spectre of sectarian strife
  • Some residents were uneasy, worried that those seeking refuge could include people linked to Hezbollah, the Shiite Muslim militia and political party at war with Israel
  • Marjayoun had been spared the brunt of Israel’s attacks on Hezbollah during the past year. But residents soon felt that war had arrived

BEIRUT: Marjayoun, a majority Christian town in southern Lebanon, opened its schools and a church last month to house scores of people fleeing Israel’s bombardment of Muslim villages, extending a hand across the country’s sectarian divide.
Some residents were uneasy, worried that those seeking refuge could include people linked to Hezbollah, the Shiite Muslim militia and political party at war with Israel, seven of them told Reuters. But they wanted to uphold local customs of good neighborliness and they knew that those fleeing the widening Israeli offensive had nowhere to go.
Marjayoun had been spared the brunt of Israel’s attacks on Hezbollah during the past year. But residents soon felt that war had arrived.
On Oct. 6, two locals — a teacher and a police officer — were killed on Marjayoun’s outskirts by Israeli drone strikes targeting a Shiite man on a motorbike, according to two security sources and local residents. The Israeli military did not respond to a request for comment. Later that day, a displaced man who sought to shelter in Marjayoun’s bishopric fired a gun in the air and threatened staff after he was asked to move to a different location, according to three residents and Philip Okla, the priest of Marjayoun’s Orthodox Church.
Marjayoun’s welcoming spirit swiftly evaporated.
“You can’t invite fire to your home,” Okla told Reuters, speaking via phone from the town, expressing the fears of some residents that the displaced people would attract violence.
Following calls from locals for them to leave, dozens of displaced people departed the village, along with many of the town’s terrified inhabitants, according to Okla and six residents, who asked not to be identified.
Lebanon’s population is a mosaic of more than a dozen religious sects, with political representation divided along sectarian lines. Religious divisions fueled the ferocity of a brutal 1975-1990 civil war, which left some 150,000 people dead and drew in neighboring states.
Reuters spoke to more than a dozen lawmakers, politicians, residents and analysts who said that Israel’s military offensive across Shiite-majority areas of Lebanon, which has displaced more than a million people into Sunni and Christian areas, has brought sectarian tensions to the fore, posing a threat to Lebanon’s stability. The antipathy is being fueled by repeated Israeli attacks on buildings housing displaced families, giving rise to concerns that hosting them can make you a target, the sources said.
“Now, barriers are going up and fears are rising because no-one knows where we are going,” said Okla, who expressed regret for the increasing hostility.

A FRAGILE FABRIC
Lebanese militias linked to religious groups fought a 15-year civil war. The conflict ended with the disarmament of all save Hezbollah, which kept its weapons to resist Israel’s ongoing occupation of the south.
Israel withdrew in 2000 but Hezbollah retained its arms. It fought a border war against Israel in 2006 and turned its weapons on political opponents inside Lebanon in 2008 in street battles that cemented its ascendency.
A UN-backed court convicted Hezbollah members for the 2005 assassination of Sunni Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and opponents blame it for a string of other assassinations of mostly Christian and Sunni politicians. It has always denied responsibility for any of them.
With support from Iran, Hezbollah grew into a regional force, fighting in Syria to help quash an uprising against President Bashar Assad, while maintaining effective veto power over decision-making inside Lebanon, including over the presidency, which is reserved for a Maronite Christian by convention.
The position has been vacant since 2022.
With Hezbollah’s Shiite support base reeling from Israel’s blows, Lebanon’s leaders — including caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, a Sunni Muslim businessman — have stressed the importance of maintaining “civil peace.”
Even Hezbollah’s rivals, including the Christian Lebanese Forces party, have largely complied by moderating their political rhetoric and urging supporters not to stoke tensions.
But on the ground, those tensions are real, including around schools that have welcomed displaced people in Beirut. Members of Hezbollah-allied parties have seized control of who comes and goes and what enters some of those institutions, according to several residents.
Main thoroughfares clogged only during rush hour are now lined day and night with cars belonging to people who fled Israeli bombing, straining the city’s already-crumbling infrastructure.
In the Christian Beirut suburb of Boutchay, aggravated residents on Friday stopped a truck from unloading a container into a depot rented to someone from outside the area, suspecting it might contain Hezbollah weapons, mayor Michel Khoury said.
“There is tension. Everyone is scared today,” Khoury said, adding that the vehicle was turned away without being searched
Druze lawmaker Wael Abu Faour said politicians from all sides needed to work to preserve national unity.
“Beirut could explode because of the displaced, because of the friction, because of the disputes over properties — because the South, the Bekaa and the suburbs are all in Beirut,” he said.
Lebanon was already reeling from the August 2020 Beirut port blast and a half-decade economic crisis — which has impoverished hundreds of thousands — when Hezbollah opened a second front against Israel the day after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack.
Asked about the risks of sectarian tensions, United Nations refugee chief Filippo Grandi told Reuters that Lebanon is a “fragile country.”
“Any shock, and this is a major shock, can really make the country backtrack... and can cause big problems,” Grandi said

RISKS FOR HEZBOLLAH
The displacement crisis also presents a challenge for Hezbollah, which has long prided itself on providing for its community but now faces escalating needs and a lacklustre response from a near-bankrupt state.
A Lebanese official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter, told Reuters Hezbollah’s softening stance on a Lebanon ceasefire was in part driven by the pressure created by the mass displacement.
Hezbollah did not respond to a request for comment.
During a visit to a school hosting displaced people last week, Hezbollah lawmaker Ali Moqdad insisted the group’s supporters “are ready for the harshest conditions and most difficult circumstances.”
“This calamity brought us closer together,” he said, adding Lebanon had withstood a “test.”
But Neamat Harb, a Shiite woman who fled the southern town of Harouf with her extended family, said living in a school was tiring and people there required more support from Hezbollah and the government.
“They should be very mindful of their support base,” she said. “They should negotiate as much as possible (for a ceasefire) so people can go home sooner,” she said.
Most displaced people who can afford rent have found apartments to stay in, though landlords are often demanding a minimum three-month payment on the spot, according to landlords and prospective tenants.
But some residences refuse to house displaced, according to four landlords or prospective tenants.
Others sent their tenants notices urging them to “KNOW YOUR NEIGHBOURS” and limit visits “to preserve everyone’s safety,” according to a notice seen by Reuters.

MEMORIES OF CIVIL WAR
For some, the mass displacement and demographic tensions have brought back unwelcome memories of state breakdown and mass squatting that took place during Lebanon’s civil war.
At least half a dozen apartment blocks and hotels in Beirut’s Hamra district were broken into and turned into shelters by the Hezbollah-allied Syrian Socialist Nationalist Party, members of the group and local residents said. The SSNP mobilized dozens of its members in the effort, according to the party officials.
A Reuters reporter saw members of the SSNP, identified by party armbands, standing guard at two buildings.
One of them, a 14-story hotel put out of commission by Lebanon’s half-decade economic crisis, now hosts 800 people, according to the SSNP member in charge there, Wassim Chantaf.
“There is no state. Zero. We are taking the place of the state,” he said, as party members directed traffic and unloaded a truck of donated bottled water.
Another Saudi-owned building nearby had only a few years ago managed to relocate squatters dating back to Lebanon’s civil war.
Then last month, more than 200 people fleeing Israel’s escalating strikes broke in, said Rebecca Habib, a lawyer who filed a suit to get them out. She succeeded after authorities secured a different place for them to stay.
“We’re scared history is repeating itself,” she said.


Hezbollah’s Naim Qassem highlights strong ties with Iran, reaffirms resistance against Israel

Hezbollah’s Naim Qassem highlights strong ties with Iran, reaffirms resistance against Israel
Updated 15 October 2024
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Hezbollah’s Naim Qassem highlights strong ties with Iran, reaffirms resistance against Israel

Hezbollah’s Naim Qassem highlights strong ties with Iran, reaffirms resistance against Israel
  • Qassem reinforced Hezbollah’s belief in the legitimacy of their resistance against Israel

DUBAI: Hezbollah’s Deputy Secretary-General Naim Qassem highlighted on Tuesday the group’s close alliance with Iran, stating that the group was “proud of Iran and its role in the region.” 
He reinforced Hezbollah’s belief in the legitimacy of their resistance against Israel, stating that “Lebanon cannot be separated from Palestine.” 
Qassem’s remarks come amid expanding conflict with Israel, as he recounted the beginning of Hezbollah’s conflict: “Our war with Israel began with the pager bombing.”
An estimated 3,000 pagers carried by Hezbollah members beeped several times before exploding simultaneously last month, killing at least 12 people and injuring thousands more across Lebanon and parts of Syria.
Israel’s Mossad spy agency reportedly planted a small amount of explosives inside the Taiwan-made pagers ordered by Lebanese group Hezbollah months before the detonations, security sources claimed.
He further noted that Hezbollah elements have been making progress along the border, signaling ongoing clashes in the region.
“Our missiles reach Haifa and beyond,” Qassem said, highlighting the group’s potential to strike deep within Israeli territory.
He also issued a statement regarding the situation for Israeli civilians: “The residents of northern Israel cannot return except with a ceasefire.”
Qassem was critical of Israel’s actions, describing them as “destructive” and accusing Israel of working with the United States to eliminate Hezbollah. “Israel seeks to eliminate Hezbollah with American support,” he said.
Reflecting on recent losses, Qassem acknowledged the toll on Hezbollah’s leadership: “Israel’s strike on our leadership was severe,” he admitted, adding, “We felt deep pain after the blow to our leadership.”

Iran and Iraq will both stage funerals for Revolutionary Guard General Abbas Nilforushan, killed in an Israeli airstrike alongside Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, the Guards' news agency said Sunday.

Nilforushan, a top commander in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force foreign operations arm, was killed on September 27 alongside Nasrallah in the strike on south Beirut.

Qassem also questioned the absence of key international powers in addressing the ongoing conflict: “Where are America, Britain, and France in all of this?”


Second phase of Gaza polio campaign starts well despite Israeli strikes: WHO

Second phase of Gaza polio campaign starts well despite Israeli strikes: WHO
Updated 15 October 2024
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Second phase of Gaza polio campaign starts well despite Israeli strikes: WHO

Second phase of Gaza polio campaign starts well despite Israeli strikes: WHO
  • Aid groups carried out a first round of vaccinations last month

GENEVA: The World Health Organization said on Tuesday it had been able to start its polio campaign in central Gaza and vaccinate tens of thousands of children despite Israeli strikes in the designated protected zone hours before.
As part of an agreement between the Israeli military and Palestinian militant group Hamas, humanitarian pauses in the year-long Gaza war had been due to begin early on Monday to reach hundreds of thousands of children.
However, hours before then, the UN humanitarian office said Israeli forces struck tents near al Aqsa hospital, inside in the zone, where it said four people were burned to death.
The UN Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA said one of its schools in the central Gazan city of Nuseirat, intended as a vaccination site, was hit overnight between Sunday and Monday, killing up to 22 people.
WHO spokesperson Tarik Jašarević told a Geneva press briefing that over 92,000 children, or around half of the children targeted for polio vaccines in the central area, had been inoculated on Monday.
“What we have received from colleagues is that the vaccination went without a major issue yesterday, and we hope It will continue the same way,” he said.
Other humanitarian agencies have previously voiced concerns about the viability of the polio campaign in northern Gaza, where an Israeli offensive is under way.
Aid groups carried out an initial round of vaccinations last month, after a baby was partially paralyzed by the type 2 polio virus in August, in the first such case in the territory in 25 years.