Israeli strikes in northern Gaza kill at least 88, officials say

Israeli strikes in northern Gaza kill at least 88, officials say
Palestinian mourn over the bodies of relatives after an Israeli strike in Beit Lahia, in the northern Gaza Strip, on October 29, 2024, amid the ongoing war in the Palestinian territory between Israel and Hamas. (AFP)
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Updated 30 October 2024
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Israeli strikes in northern Gaza kill at least 88, officials say

Israeli strikes in northern Gaza kill at least 88, officials say
  • The intense fighting is raising alarm about the worsening humanitarian conditions for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians still in northern Gaza

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip: Two Israeli airstrikes in the northern Gaza Strip on Tuesday killed at least 88 people, including dozens of women and children, health officials said, and the director of a hospital said life-threatening injuries were going untreated because a weekend raid by Israeli forces led to the detention of dozens of medics.
Israel has escalated airstrikes and waged a bigger ground operation in northern Gaza in recent weeks, saying it is focused on rooting out Hamas militants who have regrouped after more than a year of war. The intense fighting is raising alarm about the worsening humanitarian conditions for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians still in northern Gaza.
Concerns about not enough aid reaching Gaza were amplified Monday when Israeli lawmakers passed two laws to cut ties with the main UN agency distributing food, water and medicine, and to ban it from Israeli soil. Israel controls access to both Gaza and the occupied West Bank, and it was unclear how the agency known as UNRWA would continue its work in either place.
“The humanitarian operation in Gaza, if that is unraveled, that is a disaster within a series of disasters and just doesn’t bear thinking about,” said UNRWA spokesperson John Fowler. He said other UN agencies and international organizations distributing aid in Gaza rely on its logistics and thousands of workers.
In Lebanon, the militant group Hezbollah said Tuesday it has chosen Sheikh Naim Kassem to succeed longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in an Israeli airstrike last month. Hezbollah, which has fired rockets into Israel since the start of the war in Gaza, vowed to continue with Nasrallah’s policies “until victory is achieved.”
A short while later, eight Austrian soldiers serving in the UN peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon were reported lightly injured in a midday missile strike.
The peacekeeping force, known as UNIFIL, said the rocket that struck its headquarters in Lebanon was “likely” fired by Hezbollah, and that it struck a vehicle workshop.
Strike in northern Gaza comes as Israel wages a major operation there
The Gaza Health Ministry’s emergency service said at least 70 people were killed and 23 were missing in the first of Tuesday’s strikes in the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya. More than half of the victims were women and children, the ministry said. A mother and her five children — some of them adults — and a second mother with six children, were among those killed in the attack on a five-story building, according to the emergency service.
A second strike on Beit Lahiya on Tuesday evening killed at least 18 people, according to the Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and militants in its count.
The nearby Kamal Adwan Hospital was overwhelmed by a wave of wounded women and children, including many who needed urgent surgeries, according to its director, Dr. Hossam Abu Safiya. The Israeli military raided the hospital over the weekend, detaining dozens of medics it said were Hamas militants.
“The situation is catastrophic in every sense of the word,” Safiya said, adding that the only remaining doctor at the hospital was a pediatrician. “The health care system has collapsed and needs an urgent international intervention.”
US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller referred to the “horrifying incident” in Beit Lahiya in comments to reporters. He said Israel’s yearlong campaign against Hamas has ensured it cannot repeat the type of attack that started the war in Gaza, but that “getting to here came at a great cost to civilians.”
The Israeli military said it was investigating the first Beit Lahiya strike; it did not immediately comment on the second.
Israel’s recent operations in northern Gaza, focused in and around the Jabaliya refugee camp, have killed hundreds of people and driven tens of thousands from their homes.
The Israeli military has repeatedly struck shelters for displaced people in recent months. It says it carries out precise strikes targeting Palestinian militants and tries to avoid harming civilians, but the strikes often kill women and children.
On Tuesday, Israel said four more of its soldiers were killed in the fighting in northern Gaza, bringing the toll since the start of the operation to 16, including a colonel.
As the fighting raged, Hamas signaled it was ready to resume ceasefire negotiations, although its key demands — a permanent ceasefire and full withdrawal of the Israeli military — do not appear to have changed, and have been dismissed in the past by Israel. Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said on Tuesday the group has accepted mediators’ request to discuss “new proposals.”
Hezbollah’s new leader has vowed to keep fighting Israel
Hezbollah said in a statement that its decision-making Shoura Council elected Kassem, who had been Nasrallah’s deputy leader for over three decades, as the new secretary-general.
Kassem, 71, a founding member of the militant group established following Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon, had been serving as acting leader. He has given several televised speeches vowing that Hezbollah will fight on despite a string of setbacks.
Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel, drawing retaliation, after Hamas’ surprise attack out of Gaza on Oct. 7, 2023. Iran, which backs both groups, has also directly traded fire with Israel, in April and then again this month.
The tensions with Hezbollah boiled over in September, as Israel unleashed a wave of heavy airstrikes and killed Nasrallah and most of his senior commanders. Israel launched a ground invasion into Lebanon at the start of October.
Hezbollah fired dozens of rockets into northern Israel on Tuesday, killing one person in the northern city of Maalot-Tarshiha, authorities said. Israeli strikes in the coastal city of Sidon killed at least five people, the Lebanese Health Ministry said.
Israeli laws targeting UN agency could further restrict aid
UNRWA and other international groups continued to express outrage Tuesday about the Israeli parliament’s decision to cut ties to the agency.
Israel says UNRWA has been infiltrated by Hamas and that the militant group siphons off aid and uses UN facilities to shield its activities, allegations denied by the UN agency.
Israeli government spokesperson David Mencer vowed that aid will continue to reach Gaza, as Israel plans to coordinate with aid organizations or other bodies within the UN “Ultimately, we will ensure that a more efficient replacement for UNRWA takes its role, not one which is infiltrated by the terrorist organization,” he said.
Multiple UN agencies rallied Tuesday around UNRWA, calling it the “backbone” of the world body’s aid activities in Gaza and other Palestinian areas. UNRWA provides education, health care and emergency aid to millions of Palestinian refugees from the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s creation and their descendants. Refugee families make up the majority of Gaza’s population.
Israel has sharply restricted aid to northern Gaza this month, prompting a warning from the United States that failure to facilitate greater humanitarian assistance could lead to a reduction in military aid.
In its attack on Israel last year, Hamas killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took around 250 as hostages. Some 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, a third of whom are believed to be dead.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed over 43,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities. Around 90 percent of the population of 2.3 million have been displaced from their homes, often multiple times.


Sudan is experiencing some of the most extreme violence in 18 months of war, UN warns

Sudan is experiencing some of the most extreme violence in 18 months of war, UN warns
Updated 21 sec ago
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Sudan is experiencing some of the most extreme violence in 18 months of war, UN warns

Sudan is experiencing some of the most extreme violence in 18 months of war, UN warns
  • Need for international unity to help end the civil war is ‘blindingly clear,’ says organization’s political chief 
  • At least 20,000 people have been killed during the conflict, thousands more injured and millions displaced 

NEW YORK CITY: The UN warned on Tuesday that the civil war in Sudan, which began in April 2023, continues to inflict “unrelenting violence and suffering” on millions of civilians in the country. 

It said that as clashes between two rival factions of the military government, the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, continue unabated, the latest wave of attacks by the latter in the eastern state of Al-Gazira has been marked by “some of the most extreme violence witnessed in the past 18 months.” 

Rosemarie DiCarlo, the UN’s undersecretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs, told a meeting of the Security Council on Tuesday, that Sudan is “trapped in a nightmare,” as she condemned recent atrocities that have resulted in large numbers of civilian deaths. 

During more than a year-and-a-half of conflict, at least 20,000 people have been killed and more than 33,000 injured. The war has created the worst displacement crisis in the world; more than 11 million people have fled their homes to other parts of Sudan, and 3 million have sought refuge in neighboring countries. 

Human rights groups have reported horrific violations of international law as the warring factions continue to wreak havoc across the country, including widespread sexual violence primarily targeting women and girls. 

Describing the violence as “appalling,” DiCarlo condemned relentless attacks by the RSF and indiscriminate SAF airstrikes on populated areas. 

“This is a man-made disaster. Both warring parties bear responsibility for the atrocities and must be held accountable,” she said as she called for an immediate ceasefire to protect civilians. 

Ramesh Rajasingham, director of the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, warned of widespread food insecurity in the war-ravaged country.  

Conditions are particularly troubling in Darfur and Khartoum, he said, where thousands have died and malnutrition rates are surging, especially among children. 

According to his office, there are rising levels of malnutrition in the Zamzam displacement camp in North Darfur, which was already facing famine conditions, affecting 34 percent of children, 10 percent of whom are severely malnourished. 

Rajasingham stressed the urgent need for improved humanitarian access, as many conflict zones remain completely cut off or are difficult to reach because of difficult or delayed procedures. While the opening of the Adre border crossing from Chad has helped to provide “vital relief,” he said this alone is not sufficient given the scale of the crisis. 

Humanitarian organizations require safe, unimpeded access so that they can deliver aid, he added as he called for agreements on humanitarian pauses in the fighting so that assistance can be delivered and civilians can move safely out of conflict zones. 

Rajasingham also urged the international community to provide flexible financial support for relief operations, and to push for a ceasefire agreement. 

“The conditions are there for the conflict to claim even more lives,” he warned as he called for an “immediate shift” in the way the international community is responding to the unfolding crisis. 

Despite international pressure, there has been little progress toward peace talks. Both the RSF and the SAF continue to escalate their military operations, bolstered by external support including a steady flow of weapons into the country. 

“Certain purported allies of the parties are enabling the slaughter in Sudan,” DiCarlo said as she called for this “unconscionable and illegal” external support that is fueling the violence to end. 

Efforts to mediate the conflict have been fragmented to date. The international community has struggled to present a unified front and the warring factions have profited from this lack of unity. 

However, DiCarlo pointed to a glimmer of hope in the form of ongoing efforts by the African Union and the Intergovernmental Authority on Development to restore a process for political dialogue and facilitate a peaceful resolution to the conflict. 

She also acknowledged the work being done by the Aligned for Advancing Lifesaving and Peace in Sudan Group to promote key peace initiatives, including the Jeddah Declaration, which aims to establish mechanisms for protect civilians. 

“The need for greater convergence is blindingly clear,” DiCarlo said. With the conflict showing no sign of abating, she also called for the implementation of local ceasefire agreements to offer some respite to civilians. 

The UN has also proposed the establishment of a compliance mechanism, she added, to hold the warring parties accountable for their commitments to the protection of civilians under the Jeddah Declaration.


Lebanon rocket fire kills two in Israel: first responders

Lebanon rocket fire kills two in Israel: first responders
Updated 12 November 2024
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Lebanon rocket fire kills two in Israel: first responders

Lebanon rocket fire kills two in Israel: first responders
  • Emergency medic Dor Vakinin said a rocket hit a warehouse and that emergency teams arrived on the scene “quickly“
  • “There was a lot of destruction and an active fire,” he said

JERUSALEM: Rocket fire from Lebanon on Tuesday killed two men in their 40s in northern Israel, close to the town of Nahariya, first responders said.
Emergency medic Dor Vakinin said a rocket hit a warehouse and that emergency teams arrived on the scene “quickly.”
“There was a lot of destruction and an active fire,” he said. “We performed medical examinations on two men who were lying unconscious and suffering from severe injuries to their bodies. Unfortunately their injuries were too severe and after the examinations, we had to determine the death of both of them.”
The Israeli military said a barrage of 10 rockets was fired from Lebanon into northern Israel, some of which were intercepted, while “others fell in the area.”
It said sirens had sounded in central Israel, including in Tel Aviv and at Ben Gurion airport. Three projectiles that crossed from Lebanon were intercepted, it said.
Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah said it had fired missiles at an Israeli air base south of Tel Aviv.
The rocket fire came as Israel again pounded Hezbollah strongholds in south Beirut and south Lebanon, the military said.
Israeli and Hezbollah have been exchanging fire since Hamas militants from Gaza carried out an unprecedented attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.
Fighting has escalated since Israel launched an air and ground offensive against Hezbollah in September.


UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire

UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire
Updated 12 November 2024
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UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire

UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire
  • The Israel military also has begun demolishing villages in Lebanon, where other UN peacekeepers have come under fire
  • “Such severe violations of the (demilitarized zone) have the potential to increase tensions in the area and is being closely monitored by UNDOF,” it added
The Israel military also has begun demolishing villages in Lebanon, where other UN peacekeepers have come under fire
“Such severe violations of the (demilitarized zone) have the potential to increase tensions in the area and is being closely monitored by UNDOF,” it added

DUBAI: United Nations peacekeepers warned Tuesday that the Israeli military has committed “severe violations” of a ceasefire deal with Syria as its military continues a major construction project along the so-called Alpha Line that separates the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights from Syria.
The comments from the UN Disengagement Observer Force, which has patrolled the area since 1974, come after an Associated Press report Monday that published satellite imagery showing the extent of the works along the frontier.
The work, which UNDOF said began in July, follows the completion by the Israeli military of new roadways and what appears to be a buffer zone along the Gaza Strip’s frontier with Israel. The Israel military also has begun demolishing villages in Lebanon, where other UN peacekeepers have come under fire.
While such violence hasn’t broken out along the Alpha Line, UNDOF warned Tuesday the work risked further inflaming tensions in the region.
“Such severe violations of the (demilitarized zone) have the potential to increase tensions in the area and is being closely monitored by UNDOF,” it added.
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Syrian officials have declined to comment on the construction, though UNDOF described Syrian officials as having “strongly protested” the work.
As Israel conducted the construction work, which UNDOF described as “extensive engineering groundwork activities,” it has protected earth-moving equipment with armored vehicles and main battle tanks, the peacekeepers said. Troops and earth-moving equipment have crossed the Alpha Line into the demilitarized zone in Syria, known to UNDOF as the “area of separation.”
“Violations of the 1974 Disengagement Agreement have occurred where engineering works have encroached into the AOS,” the peacekeepers said in a statement, using an acronym for the area. “There have been several violations by (Israel) in the form of their presence in the AoS because of these activities.”
UNDOF has repeatedly protested the work, which it described as violating the ceasefire deal over the months of construction so far.
“Based on the engagement, (Israel) has indicated that the current earthworks are being carried out for defensive purpose to prevent unauthorized crossing and violations by civilians,” the peacekeepers added.
Israel sent a 71-page letter in June to the UN outlining what it described as “Syrian violations of the Alpha Line and armed presence in the area of separation (that) occur daily.” The letter cited numerous Israeli-alleged violations by Syrian civilians crossing the line.
Syria has constantly accused Israel of launching attacks against it from territory it occupies in the Golan Heights. Israel has frequently struck Syria over the years, particularly after the start of the Mideast wars following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, assault on Israel.
Israel seized control of the Golan Heights from Syria in the 1967 Mideast war. The UN Secretary Council voted to create UNDOF to patrol a roughly 400-square-kilometer (155-square-mile) demilitarized zone and maintain the peace there after the 1973 Mideast war. A second demarcation, known as the Bravo Line, marks the limit of where the Syrian military can operate.
UNDOF has around 1,100 troops, mostly from Fiji, India, Kazakhstan, Nepal and Uruguay, who patrol the area.
Israel annexed the Golan Heights in 1981 — a move criticized by a UN resolution declaring Israel’s action as “null and void and without international legal effect.” The territory, some 1,200 square kilometers (460 square miles) in size, is a strategic high ground that overlooks both Israel and Syria.
Around 50,000 Jewish settlers and Arabs who are mostly members of the Druze sect of Shiite Islam live there.
In 2019, President Donald Trump unilaterally announced that the United States would “fully recognize” Israel’s control of the territory, a decision that has been unchanged by the Biden administration. However, it’s the only other country to do so, as the rest of the world views it as occupied Syrian territory.

Lebanon says five killed in Israel strike on southern village

Lebanon says five killed in Israel strike on southern village
Updated 12 November 2024
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Lebanon says five killed in Israel strike on southern village

Lebanon says five killed in Israel strike on southern village
  • Israeli warplanes hit a house between Baalshamieh and Dhour Al-Abadiyah
  • “The Israeli enemy strike on Tefahta killed five people,” the ministry said

A Lebanese security official said an Israeli strike hit a villa east of Beirut on Tuesday, with state media confirming the rare attack outside Hezbollah’s traditional strongholds.
The security official, who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, said the “Israeli strike caused an unspecified number of casualties.”
The National News Agency later said Israeli warplanes hit a house between Baalshamieh and Dhour Al-Abadiyah
At least five people were killed and two were injured in the strike, the Lebanese health ministry said.
Later Tuesday, the ministry added that five people were killed in another Israeli strike on a village about 25 kilometers (15 miles) from the Israeli border, which state-run media said targeted a house.
“The Israeli enemy strike on Tefahta killed five people,” the ministry said in a statement, with the official National News Agency reporting that “enemy aircraft launched a strike a short while ago on the town of Tefahta, targeting an inhabited house.”


Iranian capital builds ‘defensive tunnel’ after Israeli strikes

Iranian capital builds ‘defensive tunnel’ after Israeli strikes
Updated 12 November 2024
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Iranian capital builds ‘defensive tunnel’ after Israeli strikes

Iranian capital builds ‘defensive tunnel’ after Israeli strikes

DUBAI: Iran is building a “defensive tunnel” in the capital Tehran, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported on Tuesday, following strikes by Israel on targets in the country.
The tunnel, located near the city center, will link a station on the Tehran metro to the Imam Khomeini hospital, thus allowing direct underground access to the medical facility.
“For the first time in the country, a tunnel with defensive applications is being built in Tehran,” the head of transport for Tehran City Council told Tasnim.
Last month, Israel carried out its first officially-recognized strikes in Iran, hitting missile factories and other sites near Tehran and in the country’s west, as a response to Iran’s Oct.1 attack on Israeli territory.