Summary
It’s after 3:21am in Gaza and Tel Aviv and this blog is now closing. But first, here’s a summary of the key moments today.
Israel’s defense minister Yoav Gallan on Monday said the next phase of the war in Gaza would be lower-intensity fighting against “pockets of resistance” and would require Israeli troops to maintain their freedom of operation, according to the Associated Press. “That’s a sign the next phase has begun,” he said. He’s pushed back against international calls to wrap up the country’s military offensive in the Gaza Strip, saying the current phase of the operation against the Hamas militant group will “take time.” In a briefing with the Associated Press, Gallant refused to commit to any firm deadlines, but he signaled that the current phase, characterised by heavy ground fighting backed up by air power, could stretch on for weeks and that further military activity could continue for months.
The White House said it is “concerned” over reports that Israel’s military is using white phosphorus bombs against target in Lebanon. At a morning briefing, John Kirby, strategic communications coordinator for the national security council, said use of the highly incendiary substance could legally be used for a smokescreen to conceal military operations, but that the US would seek clarification from Israel about how stocks were being used.
Israel’s defense minister Yoav Gallant gave a fleeting and noncommittal answer when asked at his Monday briefing about reports the country was using white phosphorus in military attacks. The Israeli Defense Forces operate “according to international law”, he said.
Gallant also said Israel had “no intention” of staying permanently in Gaza after the completion of its military campaign to eliminate Hamas. The country was open to discuss alternatives about who will control the territory as long as it is not a group hostile to Israel, he said, and would consider an agreement with Hezbollah in Lebanon if security guarantees were received.
Israel will open the Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza on Tuesday in an attempt to speed the security screening of humanitarian aid. A spokesperson for Cogat, the Israeli government department responsible for coordinating activities in the territories, said all aid will still enter via the Rafah crossing in Egypt, but the move to increase screening capacity will double the amount getting in.
European leaders Leo Varadkar of Ireland, Pedro Sanchez of Spain, Robert Abela of Malta and Alexander De Croo of Belgium, wrote to EU president Charles Michel calling for a discussion about a Gaza ceasefire at the union summit on 14 and 15 December. US network CNN said the letter expressed “alarm” over the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza and questions Israel’s military campaign and its effect on the civilian population.
The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry updated casualties since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on 7 October, stating that 18,205 Palestinians have been killed, and 49,645 injured. The reported death toll has risen by more than 500 in the two days from Saturday, when it stood at 17,700, the ministry said.
Qatar has spoken with Israel to gauge interest in talks about a possible new pause in the fighting in Gaza, according to a journalist for Axios. The report directly contradicts the position of diplomats at the annual Doha Forum conference in Qatar, who have said they are not expecting any reopening of Gaza ceasefire talks for some weeks.
At least 52 people were arrested in Washington DC on Monday at a protest calling for the US to push for a permanent ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Activists representing the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, Jewish Voice for Peace and other groups briefly protested in a Senate office building before police ended the demonstration and took dozens into custody.
Italy, France and Germany called on the European Union to impose ad hoc sanctions against Hamas and its supporters. “We express our full support for the … proposal to create an ad hoc sanctions regime against Hamas and its supporters,” they said in a letter to the EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell.
France is also considering imposing national sanctions on those involved in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, the French foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, has said.
Fighting continued on the ground in the Gaza Strip, accompanied by repeated aerial bombardments from Israel. Rockets have also been fired into Israel from Gaza, and from anti-Israeli forces in Lebanon. Some of the heaviest close-quarters fighting in more than two months of conflict took place over the weekend, as the Israel Defense Forces tried to consolidate control of urban centres in northern Gaza and pursued Hamas leaders in the heart of the biggest city in the south, Khan Younis.
Harvard University’s governing board faced mounting pressure on Monday to publicly declare support for, or oust the university president, according to a report by Reuters. It follows remarks she made last week at a congressional hearing on antisemitism.
Israel told the UN that it “must do better” at delivering aid to people in Gaza. The country said it was willing to double the number of inspections, but that “aid keeps waiting at the entrance of Rafah”. Since 7 October Israel has essentially blockaded Gaza, including at times cutting off telecommunications. The Rafah crossing with Egypt is the only entrance or exit to Gaza that has been open with any regularity, and Israel insists on inspecting all cargo being sent into the territory
Read our piece on how the Palestinian Keffiyeh has become a global symbol, by Niloufar Haidari:
Last month, three college students in Burlington, Vermont, were walking home after Thanksgiving – their second in the US, after applying to study abroad from their homes in the West Bank in 2021. According to police, the trio – Hisham Awartani, Kinnan Abdalhamid and Tahseen Ahmed – were allegedly approached by Jason J Eaton, who, without saying a word, began firing rounds from a pistol at them. Eaton did not know the students; all he could see was that two of them were wearing the keffiyeh, the black and white scarf that has been indelibly linked with Palestinian struggle for over half a century.
See below for the rest of Niloufar’s piece:
Aid agencies say hunger is worsening among Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip.
The UN World Food Programme has said half of the population is starving.
“Hunger stalks everyone,” UNRWA, the UN body responsible for Palestinian refugees, said on X.
“Too many people haven't eaten now for two, three days in the #GazaStrip”@UNRWA colleagues are doing everything they can with what little they have - but food, water and fuel are being systematically used as weapons of war in📍#Gaza
— UNRWA (@UNRWA) December 11, 2023
Hunger stalks everyone. https://t.co/PU3WcVuxOP
It is as the United Nations General Assembly is preparing to vote on Tuesday on an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in the two-month-old conflict between Israel and Hamas.
The 193-member General Assembly is likely to pass a draft resolution, Reuters reports, that mirrors the language of one that was blocked by the United States in the 15-member Security Council last week.
Harvard University’s governing board faced mounting pressure on Monday to publicly declare support for, or oust the university president, according to a report by Reuters.
It follows remarks she made last week at a congressional hearing on antisemitism.
The Harvard Corporation, the university’s governing body, has not yet addressed the public backlash Harvard President Claudine Gay received after her testimony, according to Reuters.
The 13-member governing body was due to hold a regular meeting on Monday, according to media reports. A representative for Harvard did not respond to a request for comment.
A petition urging her removal claimed over 1,100 alumni signatures as of midday Monday.
But the Harvard Alumni Association Executive Committee on Monday asked the Harvard Corporation to back Gay, the Harvard Crimson reported. Nearly 700 faculty members signed a petition supporting Gay as of Monday afternoon, while Black alumni and allies said on social media that they had gathered nearly 800 signatures on another petition supporting the president.
Read our latest report on this developing story here:
Meanwhile, congresswoman Elise Stefanik celebrated the resignation of the president of the University of Pennsylvania in a storm over campus antisemitism, but faced criticism regarding her support for Donald Trump, who associates with antisemites himself.
Referring to Liz Magill, who quit after a stormy congressional hearing last week, and the presidents of Harvard and MIT, who by Monday had not stepped down, Stefanik – the House Republican caucus chairperson – tweeted: “One down. Two to go.”
Read the rest of our report on this development here:
Updated
Our Gaza diary, part 33, details moments in the life of Ziad, a 35-year-old Palestinian living in Gaza:
2am My exhausted brain refuses to stop thinking about all the bad scenarios that I, my loved ones, and all Gazans face if this nightmare does not end soon. I got brief and temporary access to the internet, and I unintentionally saw videos and photos of horrible things Gazans are going through. They made me realise that death could be a merciful fate. Awake and terrified, I knew it was going to be another long night.
Read the rest of his experience of the war here:
It’s 1:33am in Gaza and Tel Aviv. Reged Ahmad here picking up the blog from Richard Luscombe.
Israel’s defense minister on Monday pushed back against international calls to wrap up the country’s military offensive in the Gaza Strip, saying the current phase of the operation against the Hamas militant group will “take time.”
Yoav Gallant is a member of Israel’s three-man war cabinet.
In a briefing with the Associated Press, Gallant refused to commit to any firm deadlines, but he signaled that the current phase, characterised by heavy ground fighting backed up by air power, could stretch on for weeks and that further military activity could continue for months.
“We are going to defend ourselves. I am fighting for Israel’s future,” he said.
Gallant said the next phase would be lower-intensity fighting against “pockets of resistance” and would require Israeli troops to maintain their freedom of operation. “That’s a sign the next phase has begun,” he said.
Summary
It’s 1am on Tuesday in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Gaza City. Here’s are the main developments in the Israel-Gaza war:
The White House said it is “concerned” over reports that Israel’s military is using white phosphorus bombs against target in Lebanon. At a morning briefing, John Kirby, strategic communications coordinator for the National Security Council, said use of the highly incendiary substance could legally be used for a smokescreen to conceal military operations, but that the US would seek clarification from Israel about how stocks were being used.
Israel’s defense minister Yoav Gallant gave a fleeting and noncommittal answer when asked at his Monday briefing about reports the country was using white phosphorus in military attacks. The Israeli Defense Forces operate “according to international law”, he said.
Gallant also said Israel had “no intention” of staying permanently in Gaza after the completion of its military campaign to eliminate Hamas. The country was open to discuss alternatives about who will control the territory as long as it is not a group hostile to Israel, he said, and would consider an agreement with Hezbollah in Lebanon if security guarantees were received.
Israel will open the Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza on Tuesday in an attempt to speed the security screening of humanitarian aid. A spokesperson for Cogat, the Israeli government department responsible for coordinating activities in the territories, said all aid will still enter via the Rafah crossing in Egypt, but the move to increase screening capacity will double the amount getting in.
European leaders Leo Varadkar of Ireland, Pedro Sanchez of Spain, Robert Abela of Malta and Alexander De Croo of Belgium, wrote to EU president Charles Michel calling for a discussion about a Gaza ceasefire at the union summit on 14 and 15 December. US network CNN said the letter expressed “alarm” over the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza and questions Israel’s military campaign and its effect on the civilian population.
The Gaza health ministry updated casualties since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on 7 October, stating that 18,205 Palestinians have been killed, and 49,645 injured. The reported death toll has risen by more than 500 in the two days from Saturday, when it stood at 17,700, the ministry said.
Qatar has spoken with Israel to gauge interest in talks about a possible new pause in the fighting in Gaza, according to a journalist for Axios. The report directly contradicts the position of diplomats at the annual Doha Forum conference in Qatar, who have said they are not expecting any reopening of Gaza ceasefire talks for some weeks.
At least 52 people were arrested in Washington DC on Monday at a protest calling for the US to push for a permanent ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Activists representing the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, Jewish Voice for Peace and other groups briefly protested in a Senate office building before police ended the demonstration and took dozens into custody.
Italy, France and Germany called on the European Union to impose ad hoc sanctions against Hamas and its supporters. “We express our full support for the … proposal to create an ad hoc sanctions regime against Hamas and its supporters,” they said in a letter to the EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell.
France is also considering imposing national sanctions on those involved in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, the French foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, has said.
Fighting continued on the ground in the Gaza Strip, accompanied by repeated aerial bombardments from Israel. Rockets have also been fired into Israel from Gaza, and from anti-Israeli forces in Lebanon. Some of the heaviest close-quarters fighting in more than two months of conflict took place over the weekend, as the Israel Defense Forces tried to consolidate control of urban centres in northern Gaza and pursued Hamas leaders in the heart of the biggest city in the south, Khan Younis.
UN security council ambassadors arrived in Egypt to visit the Rafah border crossing. An Egyptian foreign ministry official told the envoys during a briefing: “There is no justification to turning a blind eye to the pain and suffering inflicted on the Palestinian people in Gaza.”
Israel told the UN that it “must do better” at delivering aid to people in Gaza. The country said it was willing to double the number of inspections, but that “aid keeps waiting at the entrance of Rafah”. Since 7 October Israel has essentially blockaded Gaza, including at times cutting off telecommunications. The Rafah crossing with Egypt is the only entrance or exit to Gaza that has been open with any regularity, and Israel insists on inspecting all cargo being sent into the territory.
Israel’s military said 104 members of its forces have been killed in Gaza since the ground operation began. In addition the IDF said 582 soldiers were injured inside the Gaza Strip. It gives its total casualties since 7 October as 433 soldiers killed, and 1,645 wounded.
The mayor of the south Lebanon village of Taybeh, Hussein Mansour, and a family member died when a missile fired by Israel’s military struck his home a few kilometers from the Israel border, a relative and Lebanon’s national news agency told Reuters. The shell did not explode, the relative said, but struck Mansour directly.
A French frigate that shot down two drones in the Red Sea on Sunday was acting in self-defence after coming under attack from the unmanned aerial vehicles, France’s foreign ministry in Paris said on Monday.
Sweden demanded the immediate release of an EU diplomat who has been held in an Iranian jail for more than 600 days and is facing trial on charges of spying for Israel.
More than 200 people blocked entry to the ruling Conservative party’s headquarters in London before delivering an open letter to 10 Downing Street that calls on UK prime minister Rishi Sunak to back a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
Here are some more images of the Israel-Gaza war, sent to us over the news wires today:
EU leaders call for ceasefire discussion at summit
Four European leaders, Leo Varadkar of Ireland, Pedro Sanchez of Spain, Robert Abela of Malta and Alexander De Croo of Belgium, have written to EU president Charles Michel calling for a discussion about a Gaza ceasefire at the upcoming union summit, CNN reports.
According to the US network, the letter expresses the “alarm” over the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza. The four have been among the most vocal of Europe’s leaders in questioning Israel’s military campaign and its effect on the civilian population.
“Given the gravity of the situation and the potential of an escalation in the West Bank and regionally, it is imperative for us to hold a serious debate on the war during the upcoming European Council that will take place on December 14 and 15,” the leaders wrote to Michel.
Updated
Qatar has been talking with Israeli authorities to see if it has any interest in resuming negotiations over a possible new pause in the fighting in Gaza, according to a journalist for Axios who says he has spoken with two sources in Israel who have knowledge.
The report directly contradicts the position of diplomats at the annual Doha Forum conference in Qatar, who have said they are not expecting any reopening of Gaza ceasefire talks for some weeks.
Axios correspondent Barak Ravid posted a series of messages to his X account on Monday afternoon claiming that he learned from his sources that Qatari mediators “contacted Israel over the weekend”.
Israel, he said, expressed a willingness to engage in discussions as long as any agreement included the release of women still being held hostage by Hamas, as well as elderly, sick or wounded men. There is no way to immediately independently verify the claim.
The official stance of Qatar, as the Guardian’s Patrick Wintour reports, is that negotiations over any new ceasefire are far off and probably would not happen until Israel can point to the killing or capture of some of Hamas’s key leaders as a sign its military operation has achieved its purpose.
Read the full story:
Updated
Dozens arrested at ceasefire protest in Washington DC
Several dozen people were arrested in Washington DC on Monday at a protest calling for the US to push for a permanent ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
Activists representing the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, Jewish Voice for Peace and other groups briefly protested in a Senate office building before police ended the demonstration and took dozens into custody.
US Capitol police said they arrested 51 people, Reuters said. One climbed 51ft (15.5 meter) black steel sculpture. Others chanted “ceasefire now” and wore shirts with the slogan “invest in life” as they linked arms.
The protestors want Congress to reject a $106bn budget request from Joe Biden, including money for Israel.
Sandra Tamari, executive director of the Adalah Justice Project, said: “Funding more death and destruction of human life ... makes no one secure and instead fuels hatred and continued war.
“The Senate must heed our urgent demand to stop funding militarism and instead invest in life.”
Updated
US cautions Israel over white phosphorus
A second US official has expressed concern over Israel’s reported use of white phosphorus in military operations in Lebanon, adding that the Biden administration had been forthright over the obligations of international humanitarian law.
State department spokesperson Matthew Miller, in a lunchtime briefing to reporters, echoed the position of National Security Council representative John Kirby, who told journalists aboard Air Force One en route to Pennsylvania earlier that the US would be asking questions of Israel to clarify how white phosphorus it supplied had been used.
Miller said:
Obviously there is a legitimate military use for white phosphorus. But that does not include using them on civilians. It means that if you use them, you have to do everything you can to minimize civilian harm.
Anytime that we provide items like white phosphorus, or really anything to another military, we do it with the expectation that it will be used for legitimate purposes, and in full keeping with international humanitarian law and the law of armed conflict.
We have been clear in all our conversations with [Israel] that they need to comply. We have been quite clear in that at the highest possible levels of this government.
On Monday, the Washington Post reported that Israel had used “US-supplied white phosphorus munitions” in a military operation in southern Lebanon in October. Nine people were reportedly injured in the attack.
Updated
Israel to open Kerem Shalom crossing on Tuesday to increase aid deliveries
Israel is bowing to international pressure to speed up the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza by announcing it will open a new site for the security screening of supplies.
A spokesperson for Cogat, the Israeli government department responsible for coordinating activities in the territories, said that the Kerem Shalom crossing between Israel and Gaza will be open for “security screening to increase humanitarian aid for Gaza”.
The spokesperson said it would double the amount of aid getting in, although it will not enter Gaza at the crossing.
Beginning tomorrow, Kerem Shalom Crossing will open for security checks on aid shipments from Al-Arish.
— COGAT (@cogatonline) December 11, 2023
The simultaneous security checks at Kerem Shalom and Nitzana crossings will DOUBLE the volume of aid delivered through the Rafah Crossing and admitted into the Gaza Strip. pic.twitter.com/76CYsaSIT4
Trucks containing water, food, medical supplies and shelter equipment will be screened there, the spokesperson said, then join other aid screened at the more southerly Nitzana crossing to be transported to the Rafah crossing in and then into Gaza.
The Times of Israel reported that Kerem Shalom will open on Tuesday. The newspaper further reported that Israel is blaming the United Nations for the hold up in aid, claiming it wasn’t getting supplies to the region quickly enough.
On Sunday, only about 100 trucks carrying aid entered Gaza, dropping to little more than 60 on Monday, UN sources said, well below 20% of the daily total before the 7 October Hamas attack.
Updated
EU chief: Action needed on West Bank violence
Josep Borrell, foreign policy chief of the European Union, has been speaking about a proposal to impose sanctions against Jewish settlers responsible for violence against Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
He was speaking to reporters in Brussels after EU foreign ministers debated possible next steps in their response to the crisis sparked by Hamas’s 7 October attack on Israel. His plan, backed by France, Germany and Italy, adds sanctions against violent settlers to those on Hamas.
Reuters said Borrell did not give specifics, but spoke in general terms about the neet for sanctions:
The time has come to move from words to actions... and to start adopting the measures we can take with regard to the acts of violence against the Palestinian population in the West Bank.
Daily settler attacks have more than doubled since the Hamas attack and Israel’s assault on Gaza, the United Nations says.
Borrell said the ministers had not yet shown the unanimous support that would be necessary to pass sanctions but stressed he had not yet submitted a formal proposal.
He said EU officials would draw up a list of people known for attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank and he would then propose they be sanctioned for human rights abuses.
More than a dozen members from the group Jewish Elders for Palestinian Freedom have chained themselves to railings at the White House to protest Joe Biden’s request to Congress for funds for Israel.
“We are Jewish elders, bubbies, tetas, and grandmothers chaining ourselves to the White House, demanding the US stop funding and arming genocide against Palestinians,” the elders said in a tweet.
Demanding a ceasefire in Gaza, the tweet added: “This is not complicated. Never again means never again for anyone”.
According to a separate post by Jewish Voice for Peace, the protest involved 18 elders. It comes and was planned to coordinate with the US president’s Hannukah Party at the White House later on Monday.
BREAKING: Hours before the annual White House Hanukkah party, 18 Jewish elders chain themselves to the White House gates demanding @POTUS stop funding and arming the genocide in Gaza.
— Jewish Voice for Peace (@jvplive) December 11, 2023
Follow @JewishElders for more pic.twitter.com/OmA5bNO9PX
Updated
Here’s the latest report from the Guardian’s Julian Borger in Jerusalem on the 66th day of the Israel-Gaza war:
Israel has rejected suggestions it is trying to force Palestinians out of Gaza as Arab leaders and aid officials warn its intensifying ground offensive could leave civilians with few other options.
Some of the heaviest close-quarters fighting in more than two months of conflict took place over the weekend, as the Israel Defense Forces tried to consolidate control of urban centres in northern Gaza and pursued Hamas leaders in the heart of the biggest city in the south, Khan Younis.
The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, claimed dozens of Hamas fighters had surrendered, calling it the beginning of the end for the militant group that has controlled Gaza since 2007. Hamas called the claim “false and baseless”.
Meanwhile, the group issued fresh demands for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails to be released and threatened the lives of the hostages it holds if they were not.
Israel believes Hamas is still holding about 137 hostages, while there are thought to be 7,000 Palestinians in Israeli prisons, many detained without charge. Family members of the hostages protested at the Knesset on Monday after being refused admission to a meeting the foreign affairs and defence committee held with Netanyahu, where they sought to keep pressure on the prime minister to keep the lives of hostages central to his decisions.
Read the full story:
Summary of the day so far...
It’s 9.30pm on Monday in Tel Aviv and Gaza City. Here’s what we’ve been following today:
The White House said it is “concerned” over reports that Israel’s military is using white phosphorus bombs against target in Lebanon. At a morning briefing, John Kirby, strategic communications coordinator for the National Security Council, said use of the highly incendiary substance could legally be used for a smokescreen to conceal military operations, but that the US would seek clarification from Israel about how stocks were being used.
Israel’s defense minister Yoav Gallant gave a fleeting and noncommittal answer when asked at his Monday briefing about reports the country was using white phosphorus in military attacks. The Israeli Defense Forces operate “according to international law”, he said.
Gallant also said Israel had “no intention” of staying permanently in Gaza after the completion of its military campaign to eliminate Hamas. The country was open to discuss alternatives about who will control the territory as long as it is not a group hostile to Israel, he said, and would consider an agreement with Hezbollah in Lebanon if security guarantees were received.
The Gaza health ministry updated casualties since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on 7 October, stating that 18,205 Palestinians have been killed, and 49,645 injured. The reported death toll has risen by more than 500 in the two days from Saturday, when it stood at 17,700, the ministry said.
Italy, France and Germany called on the European Union to impose ad hoc sanctions against Hamas and its supporters. “We express our full support for the … proposal to create an ad hoc sanctions regime against Hamas and its supporters,” they said in a letter to the EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell.
France is also considering imposing national sanctions on those involved in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, the French foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, has said.
Fighting continued on the ground in the Gaza Strip, accompanied by repeated aerial bombardments from Israel. Rockets have also been fired into Israel from Gaza, and from anti-Israeli forces in Lebanon. Some of the heaviest close-quarters fighting in more than two months of conflict took place over the weekend, as the Israel Defense Forces tried to consolidate control of urban centres in northern Gaza and pursued Hamas leaders in the heart of the biggest city in the south, Khan Younis.
UN security council ambassadors arrived in Egypt to visit the Rafah border crossing. An Egyptian foreign ministry official told the envoys during a briefing: “There is no justification to turning a blind eye to the pain and suffering inflicted on the Palestinian people in Gaza.”
Israel told the UN that it “must do better” at delivering aid to people in Gaza. The country said it was willing to double the number of inspections, but that “aid keeps waiting at the entrance of Rafah”. Since 7 October Israel has essentially blockaded Gaza, including at times cutting off telecommunications. The Rafah crossing with Egypt is the only entrance or exit to Gaza that has been open with any regularity, and Israel insists on inspecting all cargo being sent into the territory.
Israel’s military said 104 members of its forces have been killed in Gaza since the ground operation began. In addition the IDF said 582 soldiers were injured inside the Gaza Strip. It gives its total casualties since 7 October as 433 soldiers killed, and 1,645 wounded.
The mayor of the south Lebanon village of Taybeh, Hussein Mansour, and a family member died when a missile fired by Israel’s military struck his home a few kilometers from the Israel border, a relative and Lebanon’s national news agency told Reuters. The shell did not explode, the relative said, but struck Mansour directly.
A French frigate that shot down two drones in the Red Sea on Sunday was acting in self-defence after coming under attack from the unmanned aerial vehicles, France’s foreign ministry in Paris said on Monday.
Sweden demanded the immediate release of an EU diplomat who has been held in an Iranian jail for more than 600 days and is facing trial on charges of spying for Israel.
More than 200 people blocked entry to the ruling Conservative party’s headquarters in London before delivering an open letter to 10 Downing Street that calls on UK prime minister Rishi Sunak to back a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
Updated
White phosphorus: minister says Israel operates 'according to international law'
The Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant was guarded, and fleeting, when asked at his Monday briefing about reports of Israel using white phosphorus in military attacks.
The Israeli Defense Forces operate “according to international law”, he said, before moving on to other topics.
White phosphorus is, according to the World Health Organization, a chemical, waxy solid substance that “ignites instantly upon contact with oxygen. It is often used by militaries to illuminate battlefields, generate a smokescreen and as an incendiary”.
Once ignited, white phosphorus is very difficult to extinguish. It sticks to surfaces like skin and clothing, and can cause deep and severe burns, penetrating even through bone, the WHO says.
Its use is banned in civilian, populated areas, and Israel has denied using stocks of white phosphorus it obtained from the US as a weapon. It can be used legally as a smokescreen on the battlefield.
Critics, however, accuse Israel of using white phosphorus bombs in Gaza and Lebanon, causing hospitalization of several civilians with severe burns, and the burning down of numerous properties.
Human Rights Watch tweeted the allegation in October:
BREAKING: Israel has used white phosphorus in military operations in Gaza and Lebanon, putting civilians at risk of serious and long-term injuries.
— Human Rights Watch (@hrw) October 12, 2023
White phosphorus causes excruciating burns and can set homes afire. Its use in populated areas is unlawful.https://t.co/TbCVA5Qynp pic.twitter.com/4UKANHTwI2
Defense minister: Israel has 'no intention' of staying in Gaza
Israel has “no intention” of staying permanently in Gaza after the completion of its military campaign to eliminate Hamas, and is open to discuss alternatives about who will control the territory as long as it is not a group hostile to Israel, a senior government official said.
According to Reuters, defense minister Yoav Gallant also told reporters in Israel on Monday that the country was open to a possible agreement with Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah in Lebanon, on condition any agreement included a safe zone along the border and proper security guarantees.
Steven Spielberg, director of the multiple Oscar-winning 1993 movie Schindler’s List, has spoken out against the “unspeakable barbarity” of Hamas’s 7 October attacks on Israel.
According to Haaretz, the Hollywood veteran made the remarks, his first since the Israel-Gaza war began, in a story featured on the website of the University of California’s Shoah Foundation that he founded. The center is collecting and acquiring testimonies from survivors and witnesses of the Hamas attacks, as it already does from Holocaust survivors.
Spielberg said:
I never imagined I would see such unspeakable barbarity against Jews in my lifetime.
He said the war in Gaza had reopened old wounds for Jewish people, and that testimony from those caught up in it was equally as important as that from the Second World War:
Both initiatives – recording interviews with survivors of the October 7 attacks and the ongoing collection of Holocaust testimony – seek to fulfill our promise to survivors: that their stories would be recorded and shared in the effort to preserve history and to work toward a world without antisemitism or hate of any kind.
We must remain united and steadfast in these efforts.
John Kirby, the National Security Council spokesperson, also clarified the US position between a ceasefire and a humanitarian pause in fighting in Gaza:
We still don’t support a general ceasefire that leaves Hamas in control of Gaza. But we absolutely do support additional humanitarian pauses and we are in active, I mean daily conversations, with our partners in the region, from the Arab states as well as in Israel, about the likelihood of getting humanitarian pauses back in place.
Even absent a humanitarian pause, and again, we want to get one back because we want to get those hostages out, we are still working with the Israelis to get humanitarian assistance in.
There was a big backlog of trucks over the weekend that are starting to flow in now. It looks like Kerem Shalom [a crossing on the Egypt-Gaza border] will be available for additional humanitarian assistance convoys in the near future. So even without a pause, we haven’t let up off the gas in terms of humanitarian assistance.
White House 'concerned' by reports Israel military is using white phosphorus
The White House says it is “concerned” over new reports that Israel used US-supplied white phosphorus in a bombing attack in Lebanon that injured civilians and burned down houses.
John Kirby, strategic communications coordinator for the National Security Council, has just been briefing reporters aboard Air Force One, and was asked about the allegations.
Israel has previously denied it uses white phosphorus, which critics say put civilians at risk of serious and long-term injury, and is banned from use in civilian areas. On at least three occasions, 10, 11 and 16 October, Israel launched attacks in southern Lebanon, with Human Rights Watch posting links to video of “155mm white phosphorus artillery projectiles being used, apparently as smokescreens, marking or signaling”.
Kirby said the Biden administration would be raising the new report with Israel’s government:
We’ve seen the reports, we’re certainly concerned about that. We’ll be asking questions and trying to learn a little bit more.
It’s important to remind that white phosphorus does have a legitimate military utility in terms of illumination and reducing smoke to conceal movements.
And obviously any time that we provide items like white phosphorus to another military, it is with full expectation that it’ll be used for legitimate purposes and in keeping with the law of armed conflict.
Updated
Lebanon mayor and relative 'killed by Israeli airstrike'
Here’s more on the reported death on Monday of the mayor of the south Lebanon village of Taybeh.
Hussein Mansour and a family member died when a missile fired by Israel’s military struck his home a few kilometers from the Israel border, a relative and Lebanon’s national news agency told Reuters.
The shell did not explode, the relative said, but struck Mansour directly.
Violence escalated at the Israel-Lebanon border on Sunday, with the Iran-backed Hezbollah launching explosive drones and powerful missiles at Israeli positions, and Israeli air strikes rocking several towns and villages in south Lebanon.
A Hezbollah official said Israel had stepped up its attacks in Lebanon, while Israeli government spokesperson Eylon Levy accused Hezbollah of “escalating its aggression”.
Levy said “the consequences will be severe for Hezbollah and for the state of Lebanon” if the rocket attacks continued, Reuters reported.
Monday’s Capitol Hill protest in Washington DC calling for a Gaza ceasefire includes members of the “anti-militarism youth group” Dissenters, it said in a post on X.
Dissenters say the aim of the action at the US Senate is to disrupt congressional business, including discussion of Joe Biden’s $106bn (£845m) supplemental budget request that includes money for Israel, as well as humanitarian relief in Gaza.
BREAKING: 100+ protesters are at the Senate disrupting business as usual while members of Congress negotiate Biden's $106B military spending package.
— Dissenters 🌊 (@wearedissenters) December 11, 2023
We’re demanding that Congress CHOOSE LIFE, NOT WEAPONS, WAR, and GENOCIDE! #CeasefireNow #DivestFromDeath #StopArmingIsrael pic.twitter.com/I086KUhYEk
The group says more than 100 people are involved in the protest. Capitol police have closed the first floor of the Hart office building and are “forcing everyone who has not already been arrested to leave, including press”, it said in a second tweet.
Updated
A number of protesters calling for a new ceasefire in Gaza have been arrested on Capitol Hill in Washington DC, Reuters reports.
The news agency says a number of individuals have gathered at the Hart office building, and posted video clips of what appeared to be a sit-in protest.
LIVE: Protesters demanding Gaza ceasefire arrested on Capitol Hill https://t.co/DZoEtHlr8F
— Reuters (@Reuters) December 11, 2023
According to Reuters, officers from the Capitol police moved in to arrest an unknown number of the protesters. The incident appears to be ongoing.
Updated
The globally prominent fashion retailer Zara has withdrawn an advertising campaign featuring mannequins with missing limbs from its website and apps amid a backlash by protestors claiming it was mocking victims of the Israel-Hamas war.
The photographs, also featuring statues wrapped in white, resembling shrouded corpses, were removed “as part of its normal procedure of refreshing content” its corporate parent Inditex said, according to Reuters.
The Spanish company did not comment on calls for a customer boycott, but said the “Atelier” collection had been conceived in July and the photos taken in September, before the Hamas terror attacks on Israel.
Updated
Health ministry: Gaza death toll tops 18,000
The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry has released its daily update on casualties since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on 7 October, stating that 18,205 Palestinians have been killed, and 49,645 injured.
The reported death toll has risen by more than 500 in the two days from Saturday, when it stood at 17,700, the ministry said.
Updated
Zineb El Rhazoui, a French journalist and anti-Islamism activist, has been stripped of a prestigious award named for a French Holocaust survivor for sharing a controversial social media post attacking Israel, AFP reports.
The Moroccan-born writer and television commentator on Saturday reposted a statement on X, formerly Twitter, comparing Israel’s bombardment of Gaza to the Holocaust, and accusing it “genocide”.
In 2019, she won the Simone Veil prize, named after the trailblazing feminist politician, for her work “defending secularism, fighting against all forms of obscurantism and for equality between women and men”.
She was a columnist at the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, which was the target of a 2015 terror attack by extremists angered by its caricatures of the prophet Muhammad. El Rhazoui was not in Paris on the day of the attack.
Summary of the day so far …
It is 5pm in Gaza City and in Tel Aviv. Here are the latest headlines …
Italy, France and Germany are calling on the EU to impose ad hoc sanctions against Hamas and its supporters. “We express our full support for the … proposal to create an ad hoc sanctions regime against Hamas and its supporters,” they said in a letter to the EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell
France is also considering imposing national sanctions on those involved in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, the French foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, has said.
Fighting continues on the ground in the Gaza Strip, accompanied by repeated aerial bombardments from Israel. Rockets have also been fired into Israel from Gaza, and from anti-Israeli forces in Lebanon. Some of the heaviest close-quarters fighting in more than two months of conflict took place over the weekend, as the Israel Defense Forces tried to consolidate control of urban centres in northern Gaza and pursued Hamas leaders in the heart of the biggest city in the south, Khan Younis.
UN security council ambassadors have arrived in Egypt to visit the Rafah border crossing. An Egyptian foreign ministry official told the envoys during a briefing: “There is no justification to turning a blind eye to the pain and suffering inflicted on the Palestinian people in Gaza”. In its latest OCHA said “On 10 December, as of 10pm, 100 trucks carrying humanitarian supplies entered from Egypt into Gaza … well below the daily average of 500 truckloads (including fuel) that entered every working day prior to 7 October.”
Israel has told the UN that it “must do better” at delivering aid to people in Gaza. Cogat complained that it was willing to double the number of inspections, but that “aid keeps waiting at the entrance of Rafah”. Since 7 October Israel has essentially blockaded Gaza, including at times cutting off telecommunications. The Rafah crossing with Egypt is the only entrance or exit to Gaza that has been open with any regularity, and Israel insists on inspecting all cargo being sent into the territory.
Israel’s military says that 104 members of its forces have been killed in Gaza since the ground operation began. In addition the IDF states that 582 soldiers have been injured inside the Gaza Strip. It gives its total casualties since 7 October as 433 soldiers killed, and 1,645 wounded. Authorities in Gaza say that nearly 18,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli military action there since 7 October. In addition, more than 200 Palestinians have been killed in the occupied West Bank over the same period. It has not been possible for journalists to independently verify the casualty figures being issued during the course of the conflict.
The Lebanese state news agency has reported that the mayor of the village of Taybeh in south Lebanon has been killed by an Israeli strike on Monday.
A French frigate that shot down two drones in the Red Sea on Sunday was acting in self-defence after coming under attack from the unmanned aerial vehicles, France’s foreign ministry in Paris said on Monday.
Sweden has demanded the immediate release of an EU diplomat who has been held in an Iranian jail for more than 600 days and is facing trial on charges of spying for Israel.
More than 200 people blocked entry to the ruling Conservative party’s headquarters in London before delivering an open letter to 10 Downing Street that calls on UK prime minister Rishi Sunak to back a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
The mayor of the south Lebanese village of Taybeh was killed by an Israeli strike on Monday, Reuters reports, citing the Lebanese state news agency.
More details soon …
Here are some of the latest images sent to us from Israel and Gaza over the news wires.
A French frigate that shot down two drones in the Red Sea was acting in self-defence after coming under attack from the unmanned aerial vehicles, France’s foreign ministry in Paris said on Monday.
The French general staff reported on Sunday that the Languedoc frigate, operating in the Red Sea, had opened fire on two drones heading straight towards it from the Yemen coast, destroying both.
AFP reports the foreign ministry said the drones were engaged in an “attack” on its vessel and had been downed in “legitimate defence”.
The incident occurred amid “attacks and acts of piracy committed by Houthi rebels in the Red Sea”, which represented a “worrying increase of assaults on the freedom of navigation in that zone”, it added.
The ministry urged the Houthis to “immediately stop attacks on civilians” and the freedom of movement.
Updated
More than 200 people blocked entry to the Conservative party’s headquarters in London before delivering an open letter to 10 Downing Street that calls on Rishi Sunak to back a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
The action was organised by the group Parents for Palestine and its letter has been signed by more than 12,000 parents.
The protest took place as the UK parliament is scheduled to debate a ceasefire in Gaza and to end the Israeli occupation of Gaza and the West Bank later today.
Kate Joseph of Parents for Palestine said:
“We cannot imagine the pain and fear that parents in Gaza are going through. As parents, we demand that the UK government immediately ends arms sales to Israel and calls for a ceasefire.
How are we to explain to our children that our government is actively endorsing the murder of thousands of children in Palestine? That we are exporting bombs and refusing to call for a ceasefire? For the sake of all children everywhere, the siege on Gaza must end and the occupation must end.”
Updated
Israel has told the UN that it “must do better” at delivering aid to people in Gaza.
In a message posted to social media by the Israeli defence ministry unit known as the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (Cogat), it said:
We have expanded our capabilities to conduct inspections for the aid delivered into Gaza. Kerem Shalom is to be opened, so the number of inspections will double. But the aid keeps waiting at the entrance of Rafah. The UN must do better – the aid is there, and the people need it.
In its latest update the UN office for the coordination of humanitarian affairs (OCHA) said:
On 10 December, as of 10pm, 100 trucks carrying humanitarian supplies entered from Egypt into Gaza, the same volume as in most days since the resumption of hostilities on 1 December. This is well below the daily average of 500 truckloads (including fuel) that entered every working day prior to 7 October. The ability of the UN to receive incoming aid has been significantly impaired over the past few days by several factors. These include a shortage of trucks within Gaza; telecommunications blackouts; and the increasing number of staff who were unable to travel to the Rafah crossing due to the intensity of hostilities.
Since the 7 October Hamas attack inside southern Israel, Israel has essentially blockaded Gaza, including at times cutting off telecommunications. The Rafah crossing with Egypt is the only entrance or exit to Gaza that has been open with any regularity, and Israel has insisted on inspecting all cargo being sent into the territory.
Updated
Sweden has demanded the immediate release of an EU diplomat who has been held in an Iranian jail for more than 600 days and is facing trial on charges of spying for Israel.
Ulf Kristersson, the Swedish prime minister, said on Monday that intensive work was under way to try to free Johan Floderus from Tehran’s Evin prison after Iran said on Sunday that a trial of the Swedish national had begun.
Floderus is charged with spying for Israel and “corruption on Earth”, a crime that carries the death penalty.
Read more of Miranda Bryant and Lisa O’Carroll’s report here: Sweden demands immediate release of EU diplomat from Iran jail
Updated
UN security council ambassadors have arrived in Egypt to visit the Rafah border crossing with the besieged Gaza Strip.
The informal one-day trip organised by the United Arab Emirates and Egypt comes amid the spiralling humanitarian crisis, and just days after the US vetoed a council resolution for a ceasefire.
AFP reports an Egyptian foreign ministry official told the envoys during a briefing after their arrival: “There is no justification to turning a blind eye to the pain and suffering inflicted on the Palestinian people in Gaza.”
Lana Nusseibeh, the UAE’s envoy to the security council, said member states were taking part in the trip in their “national and personal capacities”.
She said the visit aimed to help them “understand not only the suffering and destruction experienced by the people of Gaza but also their hope and their strength”.
Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the UN’s Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA, briefed the envoys. He said there was “deep frustration disappointment, and some outrage also that … we can’t even reach a consensus for a ceasefire”.
Updated
IDF: 104 Israeli soldiers killed, 582 wounded in ground campaign in Gaza
Israel’s military has issued updated casualty statistics for its campaign against Hamas in Gaza. It says that 104 members of its forces have been killed since the ground operation began.
In addition the IDF states that 582 soldiers have been injured inside the Gaza Strip.
It gives its total casualties since 7 October as 433 soldiers killed, and 1,645 wounded. That total is likely to include those killed directly in the 7 October Hamas attack inside southern Israel, and also casualties from northern Israel, where there have been frequent exchanges of fire over the UN-drawn blue line that separates Israel and Lebanon.
Haaretz reports that according to the IDF’s data, there are currently 34 soldiers hospitalised in serious condition, 210 in moderate condition, and 149 in good condition.
Authorities in Gaza say that nearly 18,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli military action there since 7 October. In addition, more than 200 Palestinians have been killed in the occupied West Bank over the same period.
Israel began its campaign after the surprise 7 October attack inside Israel, which killed at least 1,200 people, and during which an estimated 240 people were seized as hostages. Israel believes that Hamas is still holding 137 people in captivity inside Gaza.
It has not been possible for journalists to independently verify the casualty figures being issued during the course of the conflict.
Updated
Usaid Siddiqui has spoken to Alia Kassan, a 22-year-old university student in Gaza, for the Al Jazeera news network. She has relocated to Deir el-Balah from northern Gaza, and told him:
We are about 40 people at my uncle’s small home. We don’t have fuel. We cook using wood which is very unhealthy. Food is really expensive, and even when they send aid, people steal it and sell it at a very high price. Words are not enough to describe what we have been through. I recharge my phone every day with the help of our neighbours. To access the internet, I have to walk 30 minutes and pay to get connected.
The Israeli military has been issuing maps to guide Gaza residents – like the one illustrated below – to move around different numbered blocks in the territory for safety. The maps include QR codes, which require internet connectivity to use. Rohan Talbot, advocacy director at the charity Medical Aid for Palestinians, has described is as “akin to a macabre game of Battleships”.
UNRWA’s latest estimate is that almost 1.9 million people in Gaza, or nearly 85% of the population, have been internally displaced.
Updated
Israel’s military has provided what it says are details of the deaths of five soldiers in a battle it claims took place on Sunday near a school in the southern Gaza Strip.
On the Telegram messaging app, the IDF said:
Over the past day, shots were fired at the forces from a school in the southern Gaza Strip. Soldiers of Battalion 8111 initiated a targeted raid on terror infrastructure sites in the area of the school. Yesterday, during the battle, an explosive device was detonated at the forces and terrorists were identified in the area. The troops responded with live fire, directed aircraft and tanks, initiated contact, killed the terrorists, and struck the terror infrastructure in the area.
It goes on to say the families of five soldiers killed in the battle have been notified.
The statement continues:
In parallel, soldiers of the 4th Brigade conducted a targeted raid on an Islamic Jihad command centre where they located numerous weapons, mortar shells, explosive devices, technological equipment such as detonation systems, intelligence-gathering documents, and a tunnel shaft leading to underground infrastructure that was struck.
The claims have not been independently verified.
The Russian deputy foreign minister Mikhail Bogdanov demanded the release of hostages held in Gaza in telephone calls on Sunday and Monday with Hamas and other Palestinian factions, the Russian foreign ministry said.
Reuters reports he statement followed a series of meetings and calls between president Vladimir Putin and Middle East leaders, which included Benjamin Netanyahu.
In somewhat terse readouts from either side of the Putin-Netanyahu call on Sunday, Israel said its prime minister had raised Russia’s “dangerous” cooperation with Iran and “anti-Israel” stance at the UN over ceasefire calls as issues. Putin, for his part, raised the need for Israel to avoid “dire consequences for the civilian population”.
Updated
Summary of the day so far …
It has 1pm in Gaza City and Tel Aviv. Here are the latest headlines …
Italy, France and Germany are calling on the EU to impose ad hoc sanctions against Hamas and its supporters, the foreign ministers of the three nations wrote in a joint letter to the EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell. “We express our full support for the … proposal to create an ad hoc sanctions regime against Hamas and its supporters,” said the letter.
France is also considering imposing national sanctions on those involved in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, the French foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, has said.
Israel’s military has claimed that it came under fire inside the Gaza Strip from people “armed with shoulder-fired missiles”. It writes that an airstrike was then directed at the combatants. Continued Israeli airstrikes are targeting the Gaza Strip, with authorities there claiming that nearly 18,000 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the war on 7 October.
The Palestine Red Crescent Society has posted to social media to state that fighting is taking place close to Al-Amal hospital in Khan Younis, in the south of the Gaza Strip.
A Hamas spokesperson has issued a warning over the lives of hostages still being held in Gaza. In a televised statement, a Hamas spokesperson said Israel would not receive “their prisoners alive without an exchange and negotiation and meeting the demands of the resistance”. Israel says there are still 137 hostages in Gaza, while activists say about 7,000 Palestinians are in Israeli jails. The Hamas attack inside Israel on 7 October killed about 1,200 people, and an estimated 240 people were seized and abducted back into Gaza.
The UN general assembly, which comprises 193 member states, is likely to vote on a draft resolution calling for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in the Israel-Gaza war on Tuesday. The potential vote will follow the US’s veto of a UAE-led UN security council resolution that called for a ceasefire in Gaza on Friday.
A dozen UN security council envoys were due to visit the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip on Monday. The United Arab Emirates arranged the trip to Rafah – where limited humanitarian aid and fuel deliveries have crossed into Gaza.
Israel has announced the deaths of four more soldiers. It said three of them were killed fighting in the southern Gaza Strip on Sunday. It brings the total IDF death toll during Israel’s ground offensive inside Gaza to 101.
Haaretz reports that on Monday morning eight launches from Lebanon towards the western Galilee region of Israel were detected, of which six were intercepted and two fell into open areas. Hezbollah said two more of its fighters had been killed.
Here are some of the latest images of Gaza sent to us over the news wires.
Updated
Israel has announced the deaths of four more soldiers.
It said three of them were killed fighting in the southern Gaza Strip on Sunday. It brings the total IDF death toll during Israel’s ground offensive inside Gaza to 101.
France is considering imposing national sanctions on those involved in illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank, the French foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, has said ahead of an EU meeting on Monday.
“The situation in the West Bank is worrying us, in particular because of the too numerous cases of violence committed by extremist settlers,” Reuters reports Colonna said.
Updated
Italy, France and Germany call on EU to impose 'an ad hoc sanctions regime' against Hamas
Italy, France and Germany are calling on the EU to impose ad hoc sanctions against Hamas and its supporters, the foreign ministers of the three nations wrote in a joint letter to the EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell.
“We express our full support for the … proposal to create an ad hoc sanctions regime against Hamas and its supporters,” said the letter, seen by Reuters.
“The swift adoption of this sanctions regime will enable us to send a strong political message about the EU’s commitment against Hamas and our solidarity with Israel,” the letter said.
On Sunday, Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said he had criticised western leaders, telling his cabinet that they were being inconsistent with their support for Israel’s stated war aim of destroying Hamas.
Briefing his cabinet, he said he had told the leaders of France, Germany and other countries: “You cannot on the one hand support the elimination of Hamas, and on the other pressure us to end the war, which would prevent the elimination of Hamas.”
Updated
In the occupied West Bank today there is a general strike in protest against Israel’s war in Gaza. Palestinian news agency Wafa reports:
The local strike, called for by the national and Islamic forces in the West Bank, paralysed all aspects of life, including public transportation, education, the financial sector, shops, and all sorts of businesses, amid calls from mass protests in all cities.
Here are some of the images sent to us over the news wires of businesses shuttered and empty streets in Hebron, Nablus and Ramallah.
Updated
Associated Press has spoken to Gaza residents in Khan Younis.
“The situation is extremely difficult,” said Hussein al-Sayyed, who is staying with relatives in Khan Younis after fleeing Gaza City earlier in the war. “I have children and I don’t know where to go. No place is safe.”
He and his three daughters are staying in a three-story home with about 70 others, most of whom have fled from the north, and said they have been rationing food for days. “Over many days, I have eaten just one meal a day to save food for the girls. They are still young,” he said.
Another Khan Younis resident, Radwa Abu Frayeh, witnessed heavy Israeli strikes around the European hospital, where the UN humanitarian office says tens of thousands of people have sought shelter. She said a strike hit a home close to hers late Sunday.
“The building shook,” she said. “We thought it was the end and we would die.”
Haaretz reports that on Monday morning eight launches from Lebanon towards the western Galilee region of Israel were detected, of which six were intercepted and two fell into open areas.
Emanuel Fabian, military correspondent for the Times of Israel, has posted a video that purports to show Israel’s Iron Dome system in action in the north of the country.
Multiple Iron Dome interceptions after a barrage of rockets is launched from Lebanon at Ma'alot-Tarshiha in northern Israel. No reports of injuries. pic.twitter.com/Bc3Cy8VTl8
— Emanuel (Mannie) Fabian (@manniefabian) December 11, 2023
Fabian also reports that Hezbollah has named another two members killed by Israeli strikes, which would bringing its total death toll since 7 October to 100 combatants, although the Israeli military has put the figure higher.
Israel and anti-Israeli forces have regularly been exchanging fire over the UN-drawn blue line that separates Israel and Lebanon since the surprise Hamas attack inside southern Israel on 7 October.
Updated
The Palestine Red Crescent Society has posted to social media to state that fighting is taking place close to Al-Amal hospital in Khan Younis, in the south of the Gaza Strip:
It posted:
Today at dawn, occupation aircraft launched several violent raids in the vicinity of Al-Amal hospital, and artillery shelling continued in the city centre and in the northern areas of the association’s headquarters, which houses 13,000 displaced people.
🚨 شنت طائرات الاحتلال فجر اليوم عدة غارات عنيفة في محيط مستشفى الامل في محافظة #خانيونس، وتواصل القصف المدفعي وسط المدينة وفي المناطق الشمالية لمقر الجمعية الذي يأوي 13 الف نازح.#غزة
— PRCS (@PalestineRCS) December 11, 2023
Israel’s military has posted an operational update, in which it has claimed that it came under fire inside the Gaza Strip from people “armed with shoulder-fired missiles”. It writes that an airstrike was then directed at the combatants.
The statement on the Telegram messaging app adds:
In the Jabaliya area, the soldiers located explosive devices, AK-47 rifles, and an RPG which were hidden inside UNRWA-labeled bags inside a civilian residence. A truck containing long-distance rockets was also found near a school in the area.
During activity to clear an area in Jabalya from the danger of tunnel shafts and explosive devices, IDF troops located a lathe used for weapons production, as well as a Hamas launch site containing approximately 50 projectiles, some of which were loaded and ready to fire.
Over the past day, IDF ground troops also directed aerial strikes on dozens of terrorists in the Gaza Strip. In one incident, armed terrorists spotted exiting a medical clinic during operational activity were struck by the IDF.
None of the claims have been independently verified.
Summary of the day so far
It’s coming up to 9am in Gaza and Tel Aviv and here is what we know about the most recent events:
A Hamas spokesperson has issued a warning over the lives of hostages still being held in Gaza. In a televised statement, a Hamas spokesperson said Israel would not receive “their prisoners alive without an exchange and negotiation and meeting the demands of the resistance”,” Agence France-Press reports. Israel says there are still 137 hostages in Gaza, while activists say about 7,000 Palestinians are in Israeli jails.
The UN general assembly, which comprises 193 member states, is likely to vote on a draft resolution calling for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in the Israel-Gaza war on Tuesday, Reuters reports diplomats saying on Sunday. The potential vote will follow the US’s veto of a UAE-led UN security council resolution that called for a ceasefire in Gaza on Friday.
A dozen UN security council envoys were due to visit the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip on Monday, Reuters is reporting. The United Arab Emirates arranged the trip to Rafah – where limited humanitarian aid and fuel deliveries have crossed into Gaza.
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has urged Israel to do more to protect Palestinian civilians in its war with Hamas. Two days after the US vetoed a proposed United Nations demand for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, Blinken told CNN Israel needs to put “a premium” on protecting Gaza civilians and making sure humanitarian assistance can reach those who need it.
In his interview with CNN on Sunday, Blinken also said: “We’re not going to have durable security for Israel unless and until Palestinian political aspirations are met.” Blinken added: “When the major military operation is over … we have to make sure that we’re on a path to a durable and sustainable peace. From our perspective, I think from the perspective of many around the world, that has to lead to a Palestinian state.”
Mediation efforts are continuing to secure a new Gaza ceasefire and free more hostages held by Hamas despite the ongoing Israeli bombardment that is “narrowing the window” for a successful outcome, Qatar’s prime minister said Sunday. “Our efforts as the state of Qatar along with our partners are continuing. We are not going to give up,” sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani told the Doha Forum, adding that “the continuation of the bombardment is just narrowing this window for us”.
Israeli tanks have reached the heart of Gaza’s southern city of Khan Younis, as Hamas issued fresh demands for Palestinian prisoners to be released while at the same time threatening the lives of the hostages they continue to hold.
The Biden administration’s support for Israel’s war in Gaza has come under intensified scrutiny after it revealed it had bypassed Congress to supply tank shells, and was reported not to be carrying out continual assessments of whether Israel was committing possible war crimes.
“Gaza’s health system is on its knees and collapsing,” said the World Health Organization chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, with only 14 of 36 hospitals functioning at any capacity. Ghebreyesus also said that the WHO and its partners in Gaza managed to deliver essential trauma and surgical supplies to Gaza’s al-Ahli hospital to cover the needs of 1,500 people, as well as transfer 19 critical patients.
The World Health Organization’s executive board on Sunday adopted a resolution on tackling the worsening health situation in the Gaza Strip, calling for immediate and unimpeded humanitarian access. The 34 countries on the WHO’s executive board adopted by consensus a resolution calling for the “immediate, sustained and unimpeded passage of humanitarian relief” into Gaza, Agence France-Presse reports.
Benjamin Netanyahu called on Hamas to lay down its arms and “surrender now”. In an address on Sunday reported by Agence France-Presse, the Israeli prime minister said: “The war is still ongoing but it is the beginning of the end of Hamas. I say to the Hamas terrorists: It’s over. Don’t die for [Yahya] Sinwar. Surrender now,” referring to the chief of Hamas in Gaza.
Hezbollah launched explosive drones and powerful missiles at Israeli positions and Israeli airstrikes rocked several towns and villages in south Lebanon, Reuters reports. An Israeli airstrike on the town of Aitaroun destroyed five homes and damaged many more, Ali Hijazi, a local official, said. The Israeli army did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But the Israeli army earlier said “suspicious aerial targets” had crossed from Lebanon and two were intercepted. Israeli fighter jets carried out “an extensive series of strikes on Hezbollah terror targets in Lebanese territory”, it said. Sirens sounded in Israel at several locations at the border.
Israel has carried out airstrikes near Syria’s capital, Damascus, late on Sunday, the Syrian state news agency Sana said. The Israeli army declined to comment on the incident, but said separately that shots had been fired from Lebanon towards northern Israel on Sunday evening.
Updated
Here’s some more detail on the UN general assembly meeting scheduled for Tuesday.
A special meeting of the general assembly has been called by the representatives for Egypt and Mauritania “in their respective capacities as chair of the Arab Group and chair of the Organization for Islamic Cooperation”, a spokesperson for the assembly president said.
According to diplomatic sources, the general assembly, whose resolutions are non-binding, could vote on a text for a ceasefire resolution at the meeting, says Agence France-Presse.
A draft of the text seen by AFP closely follows the language of Friday’s vetoed security council resolution, “expressing grave concern over the catastrophic humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip”.
It calls for “an immediate humanitarian ceasefire” as well as the “immediate and unconditional release of all hostages”.
On Friday, the US blocked the ceasefire resolution, which came after the UN secretary general António Guterres called an emergency meeting of the security council, deploying the rarely used article 99 of the UN charter to bring to the council’s attention “any matter which in his opinion may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security”.
Updated
A dozen UN security council envoys were due to visit the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip on Monday, Reuters is reporting. The United Arab Emirates arranged the trip to Rafah – where limited humanitarian aid and fuel deliveries have crossed into Gaza.
It is as the 15-member council negotiates a UAE-drafted resolution that demands the warring parties “allow the use of all land, sea and air routes to and throughout” Gaza for aid, according to Reuters.
UAE United Nations Ambassador Lana Nusseibeh said the aim of the visit was:
To learn first-hand what is needed in terms of a humanitarian operations scale-up that meet the needs of the Palestinian people in Gaza.
She noted it was not an official Security Council visit.
The United States is not sending a representative on the trip. Nate Evans, spokesperson for the US Mission to the United Nations said:
The United States is keenly aware of the very difficult situation at Rafah and is working around the clock to try to improve the situation on the ground.
He said US diplomacy “continues to produce results” and that Washington has been “clear that more assistance is needed and continue to support humanitarian pauses during which hostages can be released and aid can be surged.”
France and Gabon are also not sending representatives on the trip to Rafah. The French UN mission did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The US president, Joe Biden, is hosting a White House reception on Monday to mark Hanukkah, celebrating the holiday as he has continued to denounce rising antisemitism in the US and abroad, Associated Press reports.
The president, the first lady Jill Biden and second gentleman Doug Emhoff will attend the reception. Hanukkah continues through Friday.
The husband of the vice-president, Kamala Harris, Emhoff is the first Jewish person to be the spouse of one of the country’s nationally elected leaders. Last week, he presided over the lighting ceremony of a massive menorah in front of the White House to mark Hanukkah’s first night, saying then that American Jews were “feeling alone” and “in pain”.
The Biden administration in May announced what it called the first-ever national strategy to counter antisemitism.
Meanwhile, Holocaust survivors from around the globe will mark the start of the fifth day of Hanukkah together with a virtual ceremony.
Survivors can join an online ceremony of a menorah lighting on Monday night to pay tribute to the 6 million European Jews killed by the Nazis during the second world war, reports Associated Press.
Updated
Israeli tanks have reached the heart of Gaza’s southern city of Khan Younis, as Hamas issued fresh demands for Palestinian prisoners to be released while at the same time threatening the lives of the hostages they continue to hold.
Residents of Khan Younis said tanks had reached the main north-south road through the city on Sunday after intense combat through the night that had slowed the Israeli advance from the east. Warplanes were reported to be pounding the area west of the assault.
See the rest of our full report here:
Several hundred faculty members at Harvard University signed a petition on Sunday asking school administrators to not bend to political pressure and fire the school’s president over her congressional testimony about antisemitism on campus.
Reuters is reporting that a petition was signed by at least 570 professors and was delivered Sunday evening to the 13-member Harvard Corporation, which has the power to fire the university president, Claudine Gay.
The presidents of three of the nation’s top universities have been facing intense backlash, including from the White House, after being accused of evading questions during a congressional hearing about whether calls by students for the genocide of Jews would constitute harassment under the schools’ codes of conduct.
For more background to this story – see our report from Friday:
Updated
It’s well after sunrise in Gaza and Tel Aviv now and approaching 8am. This is the scene live over the Israel-Gaza border, as seen from Israel. At times you can see grey smoke billowing out over the buildings and you can hear the faint sound of explosions.
Heavy fighting has been taking place in and around the southern city of Khan Younis. Residents said there was still heavy fighting in the north, in the Gaza City neighbourhood of Shijaiyah and the Jabaliya refugee camp, a dense urban area.
Updated
Let’s get a bit more on that UN general assembly emergency meeting scheduled on Tuesday.
It’s possible that the general assembly will vote on a draft resolution demanding an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza. Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian ambassador to the UN, has told the Associated Press that the resolution is similar to the security council resolution that the US vetoed on Friday.
There are no vetoes in the General Assembly but unlike the Security Council its resolutions are not legally binding. But they are important as a barometer of global opinion.
A Hamas spokesperson has issued a warning over the lives of hostages still being held in Gaza.
In a televised statement, a Hamas spokesperson said Israel will not receive “their prisoners alive without an exchange and negotiation and meeting the demands of the resistance,” Agence France-Press reports.
Israel says there are still 137 hostages in Gaza, while activists say about 7,000 Palestinians are in Israeli jails.
Qatar is continuing mediation in an effort to release more hostages – but prime minister, sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani says “unfortunately, we are not seeing the same willingness that we had seen in the weeks before.”
Welcome and opening summary
Hello and welcome to our blog on the Israel-Hamas war. It’s 7:08am on Monday in Gaza and Tel Aviv and after sunrise. My name is Reged Ahmad and I’ll be with you for the next while.
Hamas has warned that no hostages will leave Gaza alive unless its demands for prisoner releases are met. A Hamas spokesperson made the threat on Sunday.
More on that in a moment but first here’s a summary of the day’s events:
The UN general assembly, which comprises 193 member states, is likely to vote on a draft resolution calling for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in the ongoing Israel-Gaza war on Tuesday, Reuters reports diplomats saying on Sunday. The potential vote will follow the US’s veto of a UAE-led UN security council resolution that called for a ceasefire in Gaza on Friday.
The US secretary of state Antony Blinken has urged Israel to do more to protect Palestinian civilians in its war with Hamas. Two days after the United States vetoed a proposed United Nations demand for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, Blinken told CNN Israel needs to put “a premium” on protecting Gaza civilians and making sure humanitarian assistance can reach those who need it.
In his interview with CNN on Sunday, US secretary of state Antony Blinken also said: “We’re not going to have durable security for Israel unless and until Palestinian political aspirations are met.” Blinken added: “When the major military operation is over … we have to make sure that we’re on a path to a durable and sustainable peace. From our perspective, I think from the perspective of many around the world, that has to lead to a Palestinian state.”
Mediation efforts are continuing to secure a new Gaza ceasefire and free more hostages held by Hamas despite the ongoing Israeli bombardment that is “narrowing the window” for a successful outcome, Qatar’s prime minister said Sunday. “Our efforts as the state of Qatar along with our partners are continuing. We are not going to give up,” sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani told the Doha Forum, adding that “the continuation of the bombardment is just narrowing this window for us”.
Israeli strikes on Monday hit the city of Khan Yunis, an AFP correspondent reported, while Palestinian militants Islamic Jihad said they had blown up a house where Israeli soldiers were searching for a tunnel shaft. The Israeli army reported rocket fire from Gaza into Israel on Monday, and said fierce fighting had taken place on Sunday around Gaza City and Khan Yunis.
Israel has indicated it was prepared to fight for months or longer to defeat Hamas in Gaza. According to Associated Press, Israel’s national security adviser, Tzachi Hanegbi, told the country’s Channel 12 TV that the US has set no deadline for Israel to achieve its goals. “The evaluation that this can’t be measured in weeks is correct, and I’m not sure it can be measured in months”, he said.
The Biden administration’s support for Israel’s war in Gaza has come under intensified scrutiny after it revealed it had bypassed Congress to supply tank shells, and was reported not to be carrying out continual assessments of whether Israel was committing possible war crimes.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday spoke to Russian President Vladimir Putin and expressed dissatisfaction with “anti-Israel positions” taken by Moscow’s envoys at the U.N. and elsewhere, an Israeli statement said.
European Union foreign ministers on Monday are considering a crackdown on Hamas’s finances and travel bans for Israeli settlers responsible for violence in the West Bank, Reuters is reporting. Ministers will be considering a discussion paper from the EU’s diplomatic service that outlines a broad range of possible next steps. Hamas is already listed by the European Union as a terrorist organisation, meaning any funds or assets that it has in the EU should be frozen.
“Gaza’s health system is on its knees and collapsing,” said World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, with only 14 of 36 hospitals functioning at any capacity. Ghebreyesus also said that the WHO and its partners in Gaza managed to deliver essential trauma and surgical supplies to Gaza’s al-Ahli hospital to cover the needs of 1,500 people, as well as transfer 19 critical patients.
The World Health Organization’s executive board on Sunday adopted a resolution on tackling the worsening health situation in the Gaza Strip, calling for immediate and unimpeded humanitarian access. The 34 countries on the WHO’s executive board adopted by consensus a resolution calling for the ‘immediate, sustained and unimpeded passage of humanitarian relief’ into Gaza, Agence France-Presse reports.
Benjamin Netanyahu called on Hamas to lay down their arms and “surrender now.” In an address on Sunday reported by Agence France-Presse, the Israeli prime minister said: “The war is still ongoing but it is the beginning of the end of Hamas. I say to the Hamas terrorists: It’s over. Don’t die for [Yahya] Sinwar. Surrender now,” referring to the chief of Hamas in Gaza.
Hezbollah launched explosive drones and powerful missiles at Israeli positions and Israeli airstrikes rocked several towns and villages in south Lebanon, Reuters reports. An Israeli airstrike on the town of Aitaroun destroyed five homes and damaged many more, Ali Hijazi, a local official, said. The Israeli army did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But the Israeli army earlier said “suspicious aerial targets” had crossed from Lebanon and two were intercepted. Israeli fighter jets carried out “an extensive series of strikes on Hezbollah terror targets in Lebanese territory”, it said. Sirens sounded in Israel at several locations at the border.
Israel has carried out airstrikes near Syria’s capital Damascus late on Sunday, Syrian state news agency SANA said. The Israeli army declined to comment on the incident, but said separately that shots had been fired from Lebanon towards northern Israel on Sunday evening.
