Closing summary
It’s approaching 4.50am in Gaza City and Tel Aviv and we’ll close this blog in a moment. Our live coverage will resume later today. Here’s a roundup of the latest developments. And you can see all our Israel-Gaza war coverage here. Thanks for reading.
Israeli strikes killed 90 Palestinians in Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza on Sunday, the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry said. Videos posted online of what appeared to be the aftermath showed Palestinians digging through the rubble for survivors with shovels and their bare hands.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has said it is “appalled” after Israel’s deadly raid on northern Gaza’s Kamal Adwan hospital at the weekend. WHO chief Tedros Ghebreyesus said the “effective destruction” of the hospital over the past several days was “rendering it non-functional and resulting in the death of at least eight patients”.
The Israeli army has said it uncovered the biggest Hamas tunnel in the Gaza Strip so far, just a few hundred metres from a key border crossing. Such was its size that small vehicles would be able to travel within it, an AFP photographer granted access to it reported. The underground passage formed part of a wider branching network that stretched for more than 2.5 miles (4km) and came within 400 metres of the Erez border crossing, the army said. It would have cost millions of dollars and taken years to construct, Israeli forces said.
The United Nations security council could vote as early as Monday on a proposal to demand that Israel and Hamas allow aid access to Gaza – via land, sea and air routes – and set up UN monitoring of the humanitarian assistance delivered. Diplomats said the fate of the draft security council resolution hinges on final negotiations between Israel ally the US, which has council veto power, and the United Arab Emirates, which has drafted the text.
The Syrian army has said Israeli missiles launched from the occupied Golan Heights hit sites near Damascus that regional intelligences say targeted Iranian militias’ stronghold near Syria’s holiest Shia Muslim shrine. Syria’s air defences shot down some of the missiles that targeted the countryside around the capital in an incident that injured two soldiers, the army said in a statement on Sunday.
The Palestinian health ministry in the occupied West Bank is calling for an international investigation into reports that Israeli forces buried Palestinians alive in the courtyard of Gaza’s Kamal Adwan hospital via bulldozers amid its deadly raid over the weekend. Palestinian health minister Mai Alkaila cited reports from witnesses who said they saw Israeli forces burying Palestinians alive in the courtyard of one of the few remaining functioning hospitals in Gaza, Palestinian news agency Wafa reported. The Guardian could not confirm the reports and Israel had not responded to them.
The Kerem Shalom crossing between Israel and Gaza opened on Sunday for aid trucks for the first time since the outbreak of war, officials said, in a move intended to double the amount of food and medicine reaching the territory. Two sources in the Egyptian Red Crescent said trucks had crossed Kerem Shalom on Sunday on their way into Gaza. One said there were 79 trucks.
France said that one of its workers was killed by an Israeli attack in Rafah, Reuters reports. According to French foreign minister Catherine Colonna, who spoke to journalists following a visit to Israel and the West Bank, the man who was killed was a Palestinian national who worked for the French Institute for decades.
The director of Israeli spy agency Mossad has met the Qatari prime minister for talks on resuming indirect negotiations on the release of hostages, CNN has reported, quoting diplomatic sources. The sources said the meeting on Friday between David Barnea and Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim al-Thani was positive, the network said. Reuters has quoted two Egyptian security sources as saying Israel and Hamas are both open to a renewed deal involving a ceasefire and hostage release, although disagreements on detail remain. They said Hamas was insisting on setting the list of hostages to be released unilaterally and demanding Israel withdraw its forces behind pre-determined lines.
Former UK defence secretary Ben Wallace has warned Israel that it risks undermining the legal basis for its action in the Gaza Strip, adding to growing international pressure over the escalating conflict. Writing for Britain’s Telegraph, the senior Tory warned against a “killing rage” and said Israel’s “original legal authority of self-defence is being undermined by its own actions”.
The US is to announce the launch of an expanded maritime protection force involving Arab states to combat the increasingly frequent Houthi attacks being mounted from Yemen’s ports on commercial shipping in the Red Sea. The force is due to be announced by the defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, during his Middle East visit. Five big shipping companies have now stopped their ships using the Red Sea in the wake of attacks mounted by Houthis in protest at Israel’s efforts to eliminate Hamas in Gaza.
The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) has said of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza: “By any account, I haven’t seen anything of this scale.” Philippe Lazzarini went on to say in an interview with Al Jazeera: “Everything is absolutely unprecedented and staggering. The number of people who have been killed … in 40 days, more women and children killed than the number of civilians in the Ukraine war.”
Updated
The director of Israeli spy agency Mossad has met the Qatari prime minister for talks on resuming indirect negotiations on the release of hostages, CNN has reported, quoting diplomatic sources.
The sources said the meeting on Friday between David Barnea and Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim al-Thani was positive, the network said.
CNN’s report continues:
The meeting comes after another trip Barnea was meant to make to Doha was cancelled earlier in the week by the Israeli government.
This latest meeting was planned before the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) accidentally killed three Israeli hostages in Gaza on Friday, but that incident has added urgency to the conversations, the source said.
On Thursday an Israeli official told CNN that the war cabinet felt “conditions are not right” to try to restart the talks.
Qatar and the US have been working to try to resurrect the negotiations, with new proposals made to free more of the more than 100 hostages in Gaza.
As we reported earlier, Israel and Hamas are both open to a renewed deal involving a ceasefire and hostage release, although disagreements on detail remain, according to two Egyptian security sources.
Reuters said that according to the sources, Hamas is insisting on setting the list of hostages to be released unilaterally and demanding Israel withdraw its forces behind pre-determined lines.
Israel agreed on Hamas deciding the list and has asked for a timeline and to review the list in order to decide on ceasefire’s time and duration, the sources said. However, Israel has refused to withdraw, they said.
Israel's 'killing rage' risks undermining legality of Gaza offensive, says Ben Wallace
Former UK defence secretary Ben Wallace has warned Israel that it risks undermining the legal basis for its action in the Gaza Strip, adding to growing international pressure over the escalating conflict.
Writing for Britain’s Telegraph, the senior Tory warned against a “killing rage” and said Israel’s “original legal authority of self-defence is being undermined by its own actions”.
PA Media reports that intervention by Wallace, who left office earlier this year, is the latest warning to Benjamin Netanyahu’s government amid deepening concern over the scale of civilian casualties.
It comes after the British foreign secretary, David Cameron, called for a “sustainable ceasefire” as he warned that “too many civilians have been killed” in a joint article with his German counterpart in the Sunday Times.
Wallace warned:
Netanyahu’s mistake was to miss the [Hamas] attack in the first place.
But if he thinks a killing rage will rectify matters, then he is very wrong. His methods will not solve this problem. In fact, I believe his tactics will fuel the conflict for another 50 years.
Wallace said he was not “calling for a ceasefire with Hamas” but instead that Israel “needs to stop this crude and indiscriminate method of attack”.
Updated
In case you missed this earlier, the US is to announce the launch of an expanded maritime protection force involving Arab states to combat the increasingly frequent Houthi attacks being mounted from Yemen’s ports on commercial shipping in the Red Sea, Patrick Wintour reports.
The force, provisionally entitled Operation Prosperity Guardian, is due to be announced by the US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, when he visits the Middle East.
Much like the Task Force 153 already operating out of Bahrain, the larger protection force is designed to provide reassurance to commercial shipping companies that Houthi attacks will be seen off, and that the sea remains safe for commercial shipping.
Five big shipping companies have now stopped their ships using the Red Sea in the wake of attacks mounted by Houthis in protest against Israel’s efforts to eliminate Hamas in Gaza.
The full report is here:
Continuing on humanitarian aid as the UN security council moves towards voting on a resolution demanding aid access to Gaza, the Kerem Shalom crossing between Israel and Gaza opened on Sunday for aid trucks for the first time since the outbreak of war, officials said, in a move intended to double the amount of food and medicine reaching the territory.
The crossing was closed after Hamas’s 7 October attack and aid was being delivered solely through Gaza’s Rafah crossing with Egypt, which Israel said could only accommodate the entry of 100 trucks a day.
Reuters reports that Kerem Shalom, on the border of Egypt, Israel and Gaza, is one of the main transit points for goods in and out of the Palestinian territory, allowing much faster transit than the Rafah passenger crossing a few kilometres away.
Israel approved the entry of aid last week.
Cogat, the branch of military that coordinates humanitarian aid with the Palestinian territories, said in a statement:
Starting today [Sunday], UN aid trucks will undergo security checks and be transferred directly to Gaza via Kerem Shalom, to abide by our agreement with the US.
Asked if aid had crossed into Gaza, an Israeli official said yes.
A Palestinian border official confirmed Kerem Shalom was reopened earlier on Sunday in coordination with the UN Palestinian refugee agency and Israel. Part of the aid had arrived in Gaza by Sunday night, while the rest would be completed on Monday, the official said.
Two sources in the Egypt Red Crescent said trucks had crossed Kerem Shalom on Sunday on their way into Gaza. One said there were 79 trucks.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office has previously said the opening would allow Israel to maintain its commitments to permit the entry of 200 aid trucks a day, agreed on in the hostage deal brokered and implemented last month.
As Israel’s campaign in Gaza has gathered pace, the humanitarian situation in Gaza has worsened dramatically, with the UN and other world bodies warning of severe shortages of food, clean water and medicines.
UN security council moves towards vote on Gaza aid access
The United Nations security council could vote as early as Monday on a proposal to demand that Israel and Hamas allow aid access to Gaza – via land, sea and air routes – and set up UN monitoring of the humanitarian assistance delivered, Reuters reports.
Diplomats said the fate of the draft security council resolution hinges on final negotiations between Israel ally the US, which has council veto power, and the United Arab Emirates, which has drafted the text.
A US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said:
We have engaged constructively and transparently throughout the entire process in an effort to unite around a product that will pass. The UAE knows exactly what can pass and what cannot. It is up to them if they want to get this done.
The US wants to tone down language on a cessation of hostilities, diplomats said. The draft text, seen by Reuters, currently “calls for an urgent and sustainable cessation of hostilities to allow safe and unhindered humanitarian access”.
UN officials and aid agencies warn of a humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, including mass starvation and disease, with the majority of the Palestinian territory’s 2.3 million people driven from their homes during the two-month-long conflict.
A council resolution needs at least nine votes in favour and no vetoes by the US, China, the UK, France or Russia.
Earlier this month, Washington vetoed a resolution in the 15-member council that would have demanded an immediate humanitarian ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. The 193-member UN general assembly then demanded a ceasefire last week, with 153 states voting in favour.
On the Israeli army saying it has uncovered the biggest Hamas tunnel in the Gaza Strip so far, such was its size that small vehicles could drive in the tunnel, it has been reported.
The army said the tunnel was uncovered near a key border crossing and that it formed part of a wider branching network underground that stretched for more than 4km (2.5 miles).
The tunnel would have cost millions of dollars and taken years to construct, and the project was led by Mohamed Yahya, the brother of the Hamas chief, Yahya Sinwar, according to Israeli forces.
The passage came within 400 metres of northern Gaza’s Erez border with Israel.
The honeycomb of passageways features drainage and sewage systems, electricity, ventilation and a communication network as well as rails. The floor is compacted earth, the walls are reinforced concrete and the entrance is a metal cylinder with 1.5cm thick walls.
The army said it had found a large number of weapons stored in the tunnel.
The labyrinth of tunnels beneath Gaza, which the Israeli military has nicknamed the “Gaza Metro”, was initially devised as a way of circumventing the crushing Israeli-Egyptian blockade, in place since 2007.
The full story is here:
Updated
Returning to the situation in northern Gaza hospitals, al-Shifa hospital is providing only basic trauma stabilisation, has no blood for transfusions and hardly any staff to care for a constant flow of patients, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has said.
After a UN visit to deliver medicines and surgical supplies, the team described the emergency department in the territory’s main health facility as resembling a “bloodbath”, Reuters reports.
The WHO said on Sunday there were hundreds of wounded patients at the Gaza City hospital, with new ones arriving by the minute and trauma injuries being stitched on the floor, with almost no pain management available.
Only four hospitals of 24 working in north Gaza before the war with Israel began have even partial service, and three of those are barely functioning, the WHO said.
It said it was urgently gathering information at the Kamal Adwan hospital, where Gazan authorities said Israeli forces this week used a bulldozer to smash through the perimeter of a site Israel has said was used by Hamas fighters.
The militant group, which governs Gaza, has denied using the Kamal Adwan or other hospitals for its activities. Israel has also said al-Shifa, which it had occupied earlier in the war, had been used by Hamas.
Tens of thousands of Palestinians are believed to remain in north Gaza, after Israelis forces pushed most of the population to the south during the first days of the bombing campaign and ground war after Hamas’s bloody 7 October attack on southern Israel.
Updated
Israeli missiles hit sites near Damascus, says Syria
The Syrian army has said Israeli missiles launched from the occupied Golan Heights hit sites near Damascus that regional intelligences say targeted Iranian militias’ stronghold near Syria’s holiest Shia Muslim shrine.
Reuters reports Syria’s air defences shot down some of the missiles that targeted the countryside around the capital in an incident that injured two soldiers, the army said in a statement on Sunday.
It did not give any details on the location of the incident.
Since Hamas’s deadly 7 October attack, Israel has escalated its strikes on Iranian-backed militia targets in Syria and also struck Syrian army air defences and some Syrian forces.
The Israel Defence Force did not immediately comment on the attack.
Two regional intelligence sources said the strikes hit an outpost of the pro-Iranian Hezbollah group in the Sayeda Zainab neighourhood of southern Damascus, the site of Syria’s holiest major Shia shrine.
They say its main headquarters are in that neighbourhood, where it has a heavy presence and a string of underground bases.
The area has attracted thousands of pro-Iranian militia fighters from Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan who came into Syria to fight alongside Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s troops.
This is Adam Fulton picking up our live coverage – stay with us for all the latest developments
Updated
Summary
Here is where the day stands:
The Palestinian health ministry in the occupied West Bank is calling for an international investigation into reports that Israeli forces buried Palestinians alive in the courtyard of Gaza’s Kamal Adwan hospital via bulldozers amid its deadly raid over the weekend. Palestinian health minister Mai Alkaila cited reports from witnesses who said they saw Israeli forces burying Palestinians alive in the courtyard of one of the few remaining functioning hospitals in Gaza, Palestinian news agency Wafa reports. The Guardian could not confirm the reports and Israel has not responded to them.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said that it is “appalled” following Israel’s deadly raid on Gaza’s Kamal Adwan hospital over the weekend. WHO chief Tedros Ghebreyesus said: “WHO is appalled by the effective destruction of Kamal Adwan hospital in northern #Gaza over the last several days, rendering it non-functional and resulting in the death of at least 8 patients.”
Israeli strikes killed 90 Palestinians in Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza on Sunday, a Gaza health ministry spokesperson told Reuters. Videos posted online of what appeared to be the aftermath of the latest Israeli strike showed Palestinians digging through the rubble for survivors with shovels and their bare hands. Since 7 October, Israel has attacked Jabalia refugee camp multiple time.
France said that one of its workers was killed by an Israeli attack in Rafah, Reuters reports. According to French foreign minister Catherine Colonna, who spoke to journalists following a visit to Israel and the West Bank, the man who was killed was a Palestinian national who worked for the French Institute for decades.
Israel and Hamas are both open to a renewed deal involving a ceasefire and hostage release, although disagreements on detail remain, two Egyptian security sources told Reuters on Sunday. According to the sources, Hamas is insisting on setting the list of hostages to be released unilaterally and demanding Israel withdraw its forces behind pre-determined lines.
In a new interview with Al Jazeera on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza as a result of Israel’s strikes, UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini said: “By any account, I haven’t seen anything of this scale.” He went on to add: “Everything is absolutely unprecedented and staggering. The number of people who have been killed … in forty days, more women and children killed than the number of civilians in the Ukraine war.”
The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) said that the aid that has been received in Gaza “doesn’t meet 10% of the needs”. It added that since 21 October, 4,367 aid trucks have entered the strip through the Rafah crossing, 60% of which were for the PRCS. It went on to call for “unconditional continued aid entry” into Gaza where more than 1.7 million Palestinians have been displaced as a result Israel’s attacks across the strip.
Updated
Palestinian health ministry calls for international investigation into reports of Israeli forces burying Palestinians alive at Kamal Adwan hospital
The Palestinian health ministry in the occupied West Bank is calling for an international investigation into reports that Israeli forces buried Palestinians alive in the courtyard of Gaza’s Kamal Adwan hospital via bulldozers amid its deadly raid over the weekend.
Palestine’s health minister Mai Alkaila cited reports from witnesses who said they saw Israeli forces burying Palestinians alive in the courtyard of one of the few remaining functioning hospitals in Gaza, Palestinian news agency WAFA reports.
Alkaila also urged the international comunity to “not ignore or remain silent about reports of war crimes coming from the Gaza strip”, WAFA added.
Writing on Twitter/X, the Palestinian foreign ministry also called for an “immediate international investigation into the initial reports that the occupation committed heinous and horrific crimes in the courtyard of Kamal Adwan hospital”.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates demands an immediate international investigation into the initial reports that the occupation committed heinous and horrific crimes in the courtyard of Kamal Adwan #Hospital.
— State of Palestine - MFA 🇵🇸🇵🇸 (@pmofa) December 16, 2023
تطالب وزارة الخارجية والمغتربين بتحقيق دولي فوري في…
Speaking to Al Jazeera, a witness said: “People were buried alive using bulldozers. Who could do that? All those who committed this crime should be brought to justice and taken to the international criminal court.”
Geneva-based Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor also called for an independent investigation into the reports, citing witnesses who said that Israeli bulldozers buried Palestinians alive and that least one of the bodies could be seen amid sand piles.
The World Health Organization has said that it is “appalled by the effective destruction” of the hospital, adding that “Gaza’s health system was already on its knees and the loss of another even minimally functioning hospital is a severe blow.”
The Guardian could not confirm the Palestinian reports. Israel has not responded to them.
Updated
France said that one of its workers was killed by an Israeli attack in Rafah, Reuters reports.
According to French foreign minister Catherine Colonna, who spoke to journalists following a visit to Israel and the West Bank, the man who was killed was a Palestinian national who worked for the French Institute for decades.
The French foreign ministry said earlier that the man was seeking refuge in the house of a colleague from the French consulate along with two other co-workers and several family members, Reuters reports.
“The house was hit by an Israeli air strike on Wednesday evening, which seriously hurt our agent and killed about 10 others,” the ministry said.
According to the ministry, the man later died from his wounds by the Israeli strike. It did not provide a date.
“We’ve asked for explanations as to why the house ... had been hit,” Colonna told reporters.
Updated
Brother of Israeli hostage accidentally killed by IDF says army 'murdered' him
The brother of Alon Shamriz, a 26-year-old Israeli hostage who was accidentally killed by the Israel Defense Forces and buried on Sunday, said that the Israeli army “abandoned” and “murdered” him.
Agence France-Presse reports:
Alon Shamriz, 26, was one of the three Israeli hostages shot dead by soldiers during an operation in the Gaza City suburb of Shejaiya, even as they carried a white flag and cried for help in Hebrew.
Shamriz, Yotam Haim and Samer Al-Talalqa were killed when troops mistook them for a threat and opened fire, the army said.
‘Those who abandoned you also murdered you after all that you did right,’ Ido, brother of Shamriz said at the funeral in kibbutz Shefayim north of Tel Aviv attended by dozens of relatives and family members.
‘You survived 70 days in hell,’ Shamriz’s mother, Dikla, said in her eulogy. ‘Another moment and you would have been in my arms.’
Israeli media reported that Al-Talalqa was buried on Saturday, while the funeral for Haim was scheduled on Monday.
The deaths of the three men, all in their twenties, have sparked protests in Tel Aviv as demonstrators demanded that the authorities offer a new plan for bringing home the remaining hostages held in the Gaza Strip.
Updated
Here are some images of pro-Palestine rallies held across the world this weekend as demonstrators demanded for a ceasefire in Gaza, where close to 19,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli airstrikes in the last two months:
Fears are growing of an all-out Israel-Hezbollah war as fighting escalates.
The Guardian’s Julian Borger reports:
When the news first broke of the Hamas attack early on 7 October, Itai Reuveni and the other reservists in his paratrooper battalion packed their bags and arrived at their muster point well before their call-up came from the army.
The paratroopers did not head south to Gaza but to the northern border, where they believed a far greater threat than Hamas was poised to join the fight: Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shia movement backed by Tehran.
‘We’re here to make sure that no one does to us in the north what they did to us in the south,’ said Reuveni, 40, a master sergeant who in his civilian life does thinktank research on terrorist financing.
‘We understand that Hezbollah is much more sophisticated [than Hamas]. We understand it’s not 3,000 fighters that come over the border, it will be much more, and you’ll also have Iran in the equation. We are here to deal with that.’
Reuveni is not alone in seeing Hezbollah as the greater danger to Israel. The Israeli defence minister, Yoav Gallant, and other hawks in the cabinet argued for a pre-emptive strike against the militant group in the immediate aftermath of the 7 October attack. That caused alarm in Washington, fearful of a regional war that could pull Iran into the fight. With US backing, Benjamin Netanyahu fended off the proposal, but the conviction has taken hold among Israeli politicians, generals and a widening slice of the public that a new war in Lebanon is inevitable.
Read the full story here:
World Health Organization 'appalled' by Israel's attack on Gaza's Kamal Adwan hospital
The World Health Organization (WHO) said that it is “appalled” following Israel’s deadly raid on Gaza’s Kamal Adwan hospital over the weekend.
After Israel’s destruction of the only working hospital in northern Gaza through which witness reports emerged accusing Israeli forces of crushing Palestinians, including wounded patients, using bulldozers, WHO chief Tedros Ghebreyesus said:
WHO is appalled by the effective destruction of Kamal Adwan hospital in northern #Gaza over the last several days, rendering it non-functional and resulting in the death of at least 8 patients.
Many health workers were reportedly detained, and WHO and partners are urgently seeking information on their status.”
We learned that many patients had to self-evacuate at great risk to their health and safety, with ambulances unable to reach the facility. Of the deceased patients, several died due to lack of adequate health care, including a 9-year-old child.
We are extremely concerned for the well-being of the internally displaced people who are reportedly sheltering in the hospital building.
Gaza’s health system was already on its knees, and the loss of another even minimally functioning hospital is a severe blow.
Attacks on hospitals, health personnel and patients must end. Ceasefire NOW.
.@WHO is appalled by the effective destruction of Kamal Adwan hospital in northern #Gaza over the last several days, rendering it non-functional and resulting in the death of at least 8 patients.
— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) December 17, 2023
Many health workers were reportedly detained, and WHO and partners are urgently…
Updated
Gaza health ministry: Israeli strikes kill 90 Palestinians in Jabalia refugee camp
Israeli strikes killed 90 Palestinians in Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza on Sunday, a Gaza health ministry spokesperson told Reuters.
Videos posted online of what appeared to be the aftermath of the latest Israeli strike showed Palestinians digging through the rubble for survivors with shovels and their bare hands.
Since 7 October, Israel has attacked Jabalia refugee camp multiple times.
Following one of Israel’s airstrikes on Jabalia refugee camp last month, the UN human rights office said that it had “serious concerns that these are disproportionate attacks that could amount to war crimes”.
Updated
Israel and Hamas are both open to a renewed deal involving a ceasefire and hostage release, although disagreements on detail remain, two Egyptian security sources told Reuters on Sunday.
According to the sources, Hamas is insisting on setting the list of hostages to be released unilaterally and demanding Israel withdraw its forces behind pre-determined lines.
Israel agreed on Hamas deciding the list and has asked for a timeline and to review the list in order to decide on ceasefire’s time and duration, the sources told Reuters.
However, Israel has refused to withdraw, they said.
The Palestine Red Crescent Society has said that it is pleased with the partial restoration of communications across the Gaza strip which has allowed it to connect with its colleagues.
The humanitarian organization had lost communication with its operations room in Gaza over the last four days as a result of heavy Israeli strikes across the strip.
🙏We are pleased with the partial restoration of communications to the #Gaza Strip, allowing us to connect with our colleagues there.
— PRCS (@PalestineRCS) December 17, 2023
👇In this video filmed today in the central operations room in Ramallah we illustrate the difficulty of communication with the #Gaza operations… pic.twitter.com/WV7Dj4ncxO
Qatar has recieved another group of injured Palestinians for medical treatment, Qatar’s assistant foreign minister Lolwah Alkhater said in a statement on Sunday.
She added that the group of Palestinians were accompanied by a medical team and vice-chairman of Qatar’s Gaza Reconstruction Committee, ambassador Khalid al-Hardan.
Alkhater went on to say that not all of the patients and those injured by Israel’s deadly raid on Gaza’s Kamal Adwan hospital – one of the strip’s last remaining functioning hospitals – on Saturday have been found as rescue teams were prevented from reaching it.
#اوقفوا_العدوان_على_غزة 🇵🇸
— لولوة الخاطر Lolwah Alkhater (@Lolwah_Alkhater) December 17, 2023
حفظ الله الجميع.
بفضل الله ومنته وصول مجموعة جديدة من الأشقاء المصابين من غزة إلى دولة قطر على متن طائرة تابعة للقوات الجوية الأميرية وبرفقة طاقم طبي ونائب رئيس لجنة إعمار غزة السفير خالد الحردان. في سياق آخر أنوّه أنه حتى هذه اللحظة لم يتم العثور على… https://t.co/NgqyTppN8v pic.twitter.com/EBY0yCxnip
Updated
The continued bombardment of Gaza by Israeli forces has severely limited humanitarian supplies entering the strip where over 1.7 million Palestinians have been displaced as a result of Israel’s strikes, UNRWA said.
It added that Gaza is “becoming the graveyard of a population trapped between war, siege and deprivation”.
In a recent statement, Juliette Touma, the spokesperson for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees said:
You cannot deliver aid under a sky full of airstrikes.
Continued heavy Israeli Forces’ bombardments of the 📍#GazaStrip, imposed access restrictions and limited humanitarian supplies detrimentally impedes @UNRWA's ability to provide aid.#Gaza is becoming the graveyard of a population trapped between war, siege and deprivation. pic.twitter.com/ZfYU9vO6Qh
— UNRWA (@UNRWA) December 17, 2023
Updated
UNRWA chief on Gaza humanitarian crisis: 'Everything is absolutely unprecedented and staggering'
In a new interview with Al Jazeera on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza as a result of Israel’s strikes, UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini said: “By any account, I haven’t seen anything of this scale.”
He went on to add:
Everything is absolutely unprecedented and staggering. The number of people who have been killed … in forty days, more women and children killed than the number of civilians in the Ukraine war.
The level of destruction, it is said today that more than 60% of the infrastructure has been destroyed. The level of displacement of the population, more than 90% of the population has now been displaced … The number of UN staff which have been killed is absolutely unprecedented …
Conditions are absolutely appalling. The sanitary conditions are terrible … There is hardly clean water … Sewage water [is] appearing in the shelter.”
"Everything is absolutely unprecedented & staggering"
— UNRWA (@UNRWA) December 17, 2023
🆘Number of civilians killed
🆘Number of @UN staff killed
🆘Level of destruction; +60% of infrastructure destroyed
🆘+90% of population displaced
By any account, #Gaza situation is unprecedented@UNLazzarini @TalktoAlJazeera pic.twitter.com/zNGO4ZBTrT
Updated
Over in Cyprus, president Nikos Christodoulides has hinted there could be movement on plans to get aid to Gaza via a humanitarian sea corridor from the eastern Mediterranean island.
“There are developments on this issue, there may be some announcements today,” the leader told reporters.
A government spokesperson said that an announcement will likely be made later tonight.
Israel has given the initiative its blessing, although it has also insisted that aid shipments be inspected on the ground before they leave Cyprus and again on any vessel due to make the journey.
Earlier today, Christodoulides appeared to imply Israeli inspectors had arrived on the island:
A group of Israelis has come to Cyprus, and a new group will come in the coming days. We are ready, as soon as there is the green light from Israel, to send humanitarian aid. It is a tragic situation especially for civilians, I believe that much more needs to be done to protect civilians, there is no justification for killing civilians and within this framework is our approach to providing untied humanitarian aid.
Cyprus has proposed establishing a maritime aid corridor from its port of Larnaca to the coastal strip. Earlier this week Britain’s minister of state in the foreign, commonwealth and development office, Andrew Mitchell, confirmed that 82 tonnes of humanitarian supplies had been flown out from the UK to the island and were “ready to go” alongside five tonnes of medical assistance also earmarked for Gaza. “As soon as there us the possibility of getting more aid and support into Gaza we will be using those supplies to do exactly that,” he told the House of Commons.
The Greek prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has said Greece would also be willing to participate in the sea corridor telling Politico: “The advantage of a corridor is that you can pack much more humanitarian aid in a ship than in a truck.”
Updated
Turkish foreign minister Hakan Fidan has asked his US counterpart Antony Blinken for Washington to help halt Israeli attacks across Gaza and the West Bank, Reuters reports a Turkish diplomatic source saying.
According to the source, Fidan told Blinken that the humanitarian situation in Gaza and the West Bank are deteriorating as a result of Israel’s attacks.
The source added that Israel should be made to sit at the negotiating table to discuss a two-state solution after a full ceasefire has been achieved, Reuters reports.
Palestinians in Gaza are using eSim cards to navigate through communication blackouts as a result of Israel’s attacks across the strip.
Rasha Aly reports for the Guardian:
Ahmed El-Madhoun has been tweeting videos of the devastation in Gaza since the war between Israel and Hamas began. In one clip, he asks hospital staff whether the condition of a baby girl, Misk Abu Aisha, is serious. She’s wrapped in pajamas and a blanket El-Madhoun bought for her. The healthcare workers answer that she’s stable.
El-Madhoun sourced the funding for Aisha’s clothes and milk from someone who got in touch via X, formerly Twitter, although only after his phone could pierce the communications blackout that has enshrouded Gaza in the wake of Israel’s invasion.
He credits an Egyptian activist, Mirna El Helbawi, with restoring his access to the internet. El Helbawi has been spearheading a Twitter campaign, #ConnectingGaza, to give Palestinians embedded SIMs (eSIMs), a software version of the insertable chip used to connect a phone to cellular networks and the internet.
To date, El Helbawi and her group, the Cairo-based Connecting Humanity, say they have connected more than 50,000 Palestinians via donated eSIMs.
Read the full story here:
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The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) said that the aid that has been received in Gaza “doesn’t meet 10% of the needs”.
It added that since 21 October, 4,367 aid trucks have entered the strip through the Rafah crossing, 60% of which were for the PRCS.
It went on to call for “unconditional continued aid entry” into Gaza where more than 1.7 million Palestinians have been displaced as a result Israel’s attacks across the strip.
How many aid trucks entered the #Gaza Strip since the beginning of the escalation❓
— PRCS (@PalestineRCS) December 17, 2023
How aid is distributed❓
👇
🚨The aid that has been received doesn’t meet 10% of the needs.
📢 PRCS calls for unconditional continued aid entry into #Gaza .#Humantarianaid pic.twitter.com/4uFPZHnQxH
Updated
Pope Francis condemns Israeli killings of civilians at Gaza church
Pope Francis has condemned the Israeli killings of two Christian women who were sheltering at a Gaza church, suggesting Israel was using “terrorism” tactics across the strip.
Reuters reports:
At his weekly blessing, Francis referred to a statement about an incident on Saturday by the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, the Catholic authority in the Holy Land.
The Patriarchate said an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) ‘sniper’ killed the two women, whom the pope named as Nahida Khalil Anton and her daughter Samar, as they walked to a convent of nuns in the compound of the Holy Family Parish.
The Patriarchate statement said seven other people were shot and wounded as they tried to protect others.
‘I continue to receive very grave and painful news from Gaza,’ Francis said. ‘Unarmed civilians are the objects of bombings and shootings. And this happened even inside the Holy Family parish complex, where there are no terrorists, but families, children, people who are sick or disabled, nuns.’
Francis said they were killed by ‘snipers’ and also referred to the Patriarchate’s statement that a convent of nuns of the order founded by Mother Teresa was damaged by Israeli tank fire.
‘Some would say “It is war. It is terrorism.” Yes, it is war. It is terrorism,’ he said. An Israeli foreign ministry spokesperson said the incident was still under review and had no immediate comment on the pope’s words.
It was the second time in less than a month that the pope used the word ‘terrorism’ while speaking of events in Gaza.
On Nov. 22, after meeting separately with Israeli relatives of hostages held by Hamas and Palestinians with family in Gaza, he said: ‘This is what wars do. But here we have gone beyond wars. This is not war. This is terrorism.’
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Summary
The Israeli army has said it has uncovered the biggest Hamas tunnel in the Gaza Strip so far, AFP reported. The underground passage formed part of a wider network that stretched for over 2.5 miles and came within 400 metres of the Erez border crossing, the army said.
Israeli opposition leader and former prime minister, Yair Lapid, called for Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to step down. “We have a prime minister who lost the trust of the people, lost the trust of the world and lost the trust of the security establishment,” he said.
The Kerem Shalom border crossing between Israel and Gaza opened on Sunday for the first time for aid trucks since the outbreak of the war, a spokesperson from the prime minister’s office said.
France’s foreign ministry has said one of its workers died as a result of injuries sustained from an Israeli attack in Rafah, in the south of the Gaza Strip. In a statement, the ministry said the man had sought refuge in a colleague’s house, alongside two other colleagues and a number of their family members.
The emergency department at the al-Shifa hospital in northern Gaza is “a bloodbath” and the facility is “in need of resuscitation”, the World Health Organization warned. The WHO said “tens of thousands of displaced people are using the hospital building and grounds for shelter”, and that there is “a severe shortage” of drinking water and food.
Israel’s military said two more Israeli soldiers were killed in fighting in the Gaza Strip, bringing the total number of soldiers who have died since Israel launched its ground offensive in Gaza to 121.
Al Jazeera is preparing a legal file to send to the international criminal court over what it called the “assassination” of one of its cameramen in Gaza, the network said. The cameraman, Samer Abu Daqqa, was killed by a drone strike on Friday while reporting on the earlier bombing of a school used as a shelter for displaced people in the southern Gaza Strip, according to the Qatar-based broadcaster.
The UK’s foreign minister, David Cameron, and his German counterpart, Annalena Baerbock, published a joint article calling for a “sustainable” ceasefire, saying the goal must be peace lasting “generations”. France’s foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, later pressed for an “immediate and durable” truce in the Gaza war while visiting Israel. She was quoted as saying that Paris is “deeply concerned” over the situation in the Palestinian territory, and that too many civilians were being killed.
Updated
Israel says it has uncovered 'biggest Hamas tunnel' near Gaza border
The Israeli army has said it has uncovered the biggest Hamas tunnel in the Gaza Strip so far, AFP reports.
The underground passage formed part of a wider network that stretched for over 2.5 miles and came within 400 metres of the Erez border crossing, the army said.
It cost millions of dollars and took years to construct, Israeli forces said, with the passageways featuring drainage systems, electricity, ventilation, sewage and a communication network.
It was “the biggest tunnel we found in Gaza … meant to target the (Erez) crossing,” chief military spokesperson Rear Adm Daniel Hagari said, without specifying whether it was used by Hamas for the 7 October attack.
“Millions of dollars were invested in this tunnel. It took years to build this tunnel … Vehicles could drive through.”
Updated
Israeli opposition leader calls on Netanyahu to step down as prime minister
Israeli opposition leader and former prime minister, Yair Lapid, has called for Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to step down.
“We have a prime minister who lost the trust of the people, lost the trust of the world and lost the trust of the security establishment,” he wrote in a post on X.
“Netanyahu cannot continue to be prime minister in the current situation.”
Speculation over whether Netanyahu can maintain his wartime coalition has been rife. Parties could walk away, potentially collapsing the government.
Netanyahu has been fiercely criticised for not taking responsibility for failing to prevent the 7 October attack.
All Palestinian factions, including Hamas, must seriously consider the failure of their policies to achieve freedom for their people after the war in Gaza ends, a top Palestinian Authority official has said.
Hussein al-Sheikh, 63, said war in Gaza after the 7 October attacks on southern Israel meant Hamas should make a “serious and honest assessment and reconsider all its policies and all its methods” once fighting subsides.
On 7 October, Hamas gunmen from the Gaza Strip killed 1,139 Israelis in a devastating surprise attack.
Sheikh, the general secretary of President Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Liberation Organization, said the Palestinian Authority was the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people and would be ready to take control of Gaza after the war.
Referring to Hamas, Sheikh told Reuters:
It is not acceptable for some to believe that their method and approach in managing the conflict with Israel was the ideal and the best.
After all this (killing) and after everything that’s happening, isn’t it worth making a serious, honest and responsible assessment to protect our people and our Palestinian cause?
Isn’t it worth discussing how to manage this conflict with the Israeli occupation?
Col Elad Goren, the head of the civil department at Cogat, the Israeli defence ministry body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs, has spoken with Reuters.
He said humanitarian agencies in Gaza had not increased their capacity to distribute aid to meet the demand from the influx of people in Gaza who had fled to the south of the territory on Israeli advice.
“If the UN won’t have the capacity to collect and to distribute, it doesn’t matter how many crossings we will open,” Goren said.
“They cannot rely upon the same mechanism they had before the war.”
His comments came as officials said the Kerem Shalom crossing between Israel and Gaza opened on Sunday for aid trucks for the first time since the outbreak of war (see earlier post at 12.20).
Updated
Amid the escalating humanitarian crisis in Gaza, there have been reports of dozens of Palestinians surrounding aid trucks after they drove in through the Rafah crossing with Egypt.
People were seen climbing onboard the trucks, pulling down boxes and carrying them off.
Other trucks appeared to be guarded by masked people carrying sticks, the Associated Press reports.
Updated
A source in the Egyptian Red Crescent has told Reuters that 79 aid trucks have entered the Kerem Shalom crossing on their way into Gaza [see post at 12.20]. The crossing had been closed after the 7 October attack by Hamas and aid was being delivered solely through Gaza’s Rafah crossing with Egypt, which Israel said could only accommodate the entry of 100 trucks a day.
Updated
Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, read out a letter at his weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday that he said was written by relatives of dead soldiers.
“You have a mandate to fight. You do not have a mandate to stop in the middle,” he quoted them as saying, responding: “We will fight to the end.”
Updated
Aid enters Gaza through Kerem Shalom border crossing for first time since war began, says Israel
The Kerem Shalom border crossing between Israel and Gaza opened on Sunday for the first time for aid trucks since the outbreak of the war, a spokesperson from the prime minister’s office said, according to Reuters.
The crossing – which Israel had agreed to reopen to aid trucks last week – had been closed to aid trucks since the 7 October attacks by Hamas.
The Kerem Shalom crossing was used to carry more than 60% of the truckloads going into Gaza before the current conflict.
Updated
The Associated Press has full quotes from France’s foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, given at the news conference held with her Israeli counterpart in Tel Aviv (see earlier post at 10.18).
She said:
An immediate truce is necessary, allowing progress to be made toward a ceasefire to obtain the release of the hostages, to allow access and the delivery of more humanitarian aid to the suffering civilian population of Gaza, and in fact to move toward a humanitarian ceasefire and the beginning of a political solution.
Updated
Summary of the day so far...
France’s foreign ministry has said one of its workers died as a result of injuries sustained from an Israeli attack in Rafah, in the south of the Gaza Strip. In a statement, the ministry said the man had sought refuge in a colleague’s house, alongside two other colleagues and a number of their family members.
The emergency department at the al-Shifa hospital in northern Gaza is “a bloodbath” and the facility is “in need of resuscitation”, the World Health Organization warned. The WHO said “tens of thousands of displaced people are using the hospital building and grounds for shelter”, and that there is “a severe shortage” of drinking water and food.
Israel’s military said two more Israeli soldiers were killed in fighting in the Gaza Strip, bringing the total number of soldiers who have died since Israel launched its ground offensive in Gaza to 121.
Al Jazeera is preparing a legal file to send to the international criminal court over what it called “the assassination” of one of its cameramen in Gaza, the network said. The cameraman, Samer Abu Daqqa, was killed by a drone strike on Friday while reporting on the earlier bombing of a school used as a shelter for displaced people in the southern Gaza Strip, according to the Qatar-based broadcaster.
The UK’s foreign minister, David Cameron, and his German counterpart, Annalena Baerbock, published a joint article calling for a “sustainable” ceasefire, saying the goal must be peace lasting “generations”. France’s foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, later pressed for an “immediate and durable” truce in the Gaza war while visiting Israel. She was quoted as saying that Paris is “deeply concerned” over the situation in the Palestinian territory, and that too many civilians were being killed.
Updated
A British MP has said there is a sniper shooting at people in the church compound where her family are sheltering in Gaza City.
Layla Moran’s relatives have been trapped alongside hundreds of other civilians in a Catholic church in Gaza City since almost the start of the conflict.
The Liberal Democrat MP for Oxford and Abingdon said her family’s situation had worsened over the past week but that things had escalated again “in the last 48 hours”.
“Now they are without water, without food and there is a sniper inside the compound,” she told the BBC.
Updated
Al Jazeera has further details on the French foreign ministry worker who died as a result of injuries sustained from an Israeli attack in Rafah (see earlier post at 09.44).
The outlet says that he had stayed in the strip to report on what was happening on the ground.
“France always kept cultural diplomatic antennas in Gaza through a French centre,” Renaud Girard, the chief foreign affairs correspondent for Le Figaro, told Al Jazeera.
Girard said the employee worked for that centre, while his family had left Gaza.
“France is very concerned by the humanitarian situation in Gaza that’s why it was useful for France to have a reliable witness to tell the French embassy what was happening there,” Girard added.
Updated
The UK’s deputy prime minister, Oliver Dowden, has said that Hamas needs to be removed as a “threat” from Israel in order for a ceasefire to be sustainable (in reference to Lord Cameron’s comments).
He told the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg:
In order for a ceasefire to be sustainable, we have to ensure we remove the threat of Hamas from Israel, and indeed the wider Middle East.
You saw what happened on that terrible day on 7 October when Hamas were able to penetrate the border of Israel and indiscriminately murder 1,400 men, women and children, and until we deal with that any ceasefire will not ultimately be sustainable.
So, that’s why we continue to support Israel in its right to self-defence, to remove the threat of Hamas, and at the same time to get those hostages back. Those are the two things that ensure we have a sustainable ceasefire …
The difference between those calling for a ceasefire now and the position of the UK government is that a ceasefire can’t be sustainable until we’ve dealt with Hamas.
Asked if the change of tone was because the UK government believes Israel has gone too far, Dowden replied: “I wouldn’t characterise it as Israel going too far. Israel is dealing with a very difficult situation.”
Dowden added: “If you’re going after an enemy that literally hides underneath hospitals, hides amongst the civilian population, you are going to sustain high levels of civilian casualties.” He said the UK has urged Israel to exercise restraint.
Updated
The Palestinian news agency Wafa has said that 35 people have been killed in strikes on several houses in the Jabalia refugee camp in Gaza, BBC News reports.
The largest of the Palestinian refugee camps in Gaza, Jabalia is home to more than 100,000 people, who live in a dense network of lanes and streets occupying 1.4 square kilometres. It is the closest of Gaza’s refugee camps to the Israeli border.
Updated
France calls for 'immediate and durable' truce in Israel-Gaza war
France’s foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, arrived in Israel where she pressed for an “immediate and durable” truce in the war with Hamas.
“Too many civilians are being killed,” Colonna was quoted by AFP as having said during remarks in Tel Aviv with her Israeli counterpart Eli Cohen.
Colonna, who is due to meet the families of French hostages still held in Gaza, is also quoted as saying that Paris is “deeply concerned” over the situation in the territory.
She also stressed that the victims of Hamas’s attacks must not be forgotten, including those subjected to sexual violence.
Updated
Gaza has remained under a communications blackout for a fourth straight day – the longest of several outages over the course of the war.
Aid groups say this hampers rescue efforts after bombings, can impede life-saving operations and makes it even more difficult to monitor the war’s toll on civilians.
France's foreign ministry says worker killed by an Israeli attack in Rafah
France’s foreign ministry has said one of its workers died as a result of injuries sustained from an Israeli attack in Rafah, in the south of the Gaza Strip.
In a statement, the ministry said the man had found refuge in a colleague’s house, alongside two other colleagues and a number of their family members.
“The house was hit by an Israeli airstrike on Wednesday evening, which seriously hurt our agent and killed about 10 others,” it said, adding he had later died of his injuries.
“We demand that the Israeli authorities shed full light on the circumstances of this bombing, as soon as possible.”
Updated
The World Health Organization said it would “strengthen” the al-Shifa hospital “in the coming weeks” in order for it to resume basic services.
“Up to 20 operating theatres in the hospital, as well as post-operative care services, can be activated if provided with regular supplies of fuel, oxygen, medicines, food, and water,” the WHO said, along with the necessary staff.
Al-Ahli Arab is the only hospital “partially functioning” in the entire north of the Gaza Strip, while three hospitals – al-Shifa, al Awda and al Sahaba medical complex – are functioning at a minimum, according to AFP.
Emergency department at al-Shifa hospital is 'a bloodbath', warns WHO
The emergency department at the al-Shifa hospital in northern Gaza is “a bloodbath” and the facility is “in need of resuscitation”, the World Health Organization has warned.
The WHO said “tens of thousands of displaced people are using the hospital building and grounds for shelter”, and that there is “a severe shortage” of drinking water and food.
The operating theatres are not functioning due to a lack of fuel, oxygen and other supplies, said the WHO after one of its teams delivered medical supplies to the hospital yesterday, along with other UN agencies.
In a statement, the WHO said:
The team described the emergency department as a “bloodbath”, with hundreds of injured patients inside, and new patients arriving every minute.
Patients with trauma injuries were being sutured on the floor, and limited to no pain management is available at the hospital.
The al-Shifa hospital, Gaza’s biggest, is seen as a key objective because it dominates a sector of Gaza City where many government buildings are located.
Israel has said there is an Hamas command centre in bunkers underneath, something that Hamas and hospital staff have denied.
Updated
The Palestinian health ministry now said at least five Palestinians were killed on Sunday in an Israeli attack on Tulkarm in the occupied West Bank (see this post for what the ministry reported earlier).
Updated
Two more Israeli soldiers killed in Gaza, bringing total to 121, says military
Israel’s military said on Sunday that two more Israeli soldiers were killed in fighting in the Gaza Strip, bringing the total number of soldiers who have died since Israel launched its ground offensive in Gaza to 121.
Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has said Israel would wage war “until absolute victory”. Israeli officials have said it could take months before being complete.
Updated
Three Palestinians from Tulkarm in the occupied West Bank were killed in clashes with Israeli forces, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
The ministry said two people were fatally shot by Israeli forces on Sunday, and that a fourth Palestinian died on Sunday from injuries after an Israeli attack on the West Bank city of Jenin a few days ago.
Updated
Below are some of the latest pics coming in from global news agencies:
Al Jazeera promises to refer killing of cameraman in Gaza to ICC
Al Jazeera is preparing a legal file to send to the international criminal court (ICC) over what it called “the assassination” of one of its cameramen in Gaza, the Qatari-based network has said.
The cameraman, Samer Abu Daqqa, was killed by a drone strike on Friday while reporting on the earlier bombing of a school used as a shelter for displaced people in the southern Gaza Strip, according to the Qatar-based broadcaster.
Al Jazeera said Israeli drones fired missiles at the school that left Abu Daqqa with fatal injuries. It was not possible to verify the details of the incident.
“The Network established a joint working group, which comprises of its international legal team and international legal experts who will collaboratively initiate the process of compiling a comprehensive file for submission to the court’s prosecutor,” Al Jazeera said in a statement on Saturday.
You can read our full story below:
More now from that Netanyahu press conference and what he said on any new negotiations to recover hostages held by Hamas.
Reuters reports the head of Israel’s Mossad spy agency, David Barnea, met Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani late on Friday, according to a source with knowledge of the matter, as pressure mounts for a possible Gaza truce and a prisoner and hostage deal.
The meeting in Europe was apparently the first between senior officials from Israel and Qatar, which has been acting as a mediator, since the collapse of a seven-day ceasefire in late November.
Netanyahu sidestepped a question about the meeting but confirmed he had given instructions to the negotiating team.
“We have serious criticisms of Qatar,” he said, alluding to the gas-rich Gulf state’s ties to Hamas and Israel’s arch-foe Iran. “But right now we are trying to complete the recovery of our hostages.”
Hamas said in a statement it “affirms its position not to open any negotiations to exchange prisoners unless the aggression against our people stops once and for all,” adding: “The movement communicated this position to all mediators.”
UK and Germany call for 'sustainable' ceasefire in significant tonal shift
UK foreign minister David Cameron and his German counterpart Annalena Baerbock have published a joint article calling for a “sustainable” ceasefire, saying the goal must be peace lasting “generations”.
In a significant shift in tone by the UK government, the article reads: “Our goal cannot simply be an end to fighting today. It must be peace lasting for days, years, generations. We therefore support a ceasefire, but only if it is sustainable.
“We know many in the region and beyond have been calling for an immediate ceasefire. We recognise what motivates these heartfelt calls.
“It is an understandable reaction to such intense suffering, and we share the view that this conflict cannot drag on and on. That is why we supported the recent humanitarian pauses.”
The article was published in The Sunday Times and Welt am Sonntag in Germany. It further said: “Israel will not win this war if their operations destroy the prospect of peaceful coexistence with Palestinians. They have a right to eliminate the threat posed by Hamas. But too many civilians have been killed.”
Following Biden’s comments last week that Israel was losing international support because of its “indiscriminate bombing”, US officials have also told Israel that its window for conducting major combat operations in Gaza is fast closing.
You can read Peter Beaumont’s full story on this below:
Netanyahu says government ‘committed as ever’ to war
Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has vowed to keep up the military pressure on Hamas, despite anguished appeals from relatives of hostages held in Gaza for a return to negotiations after friendly fire killed three captives.
He told a press conference late Saturday that they were as “committed as ever” to war. He said they were determined to fight to the end and Gaza “will be demilitarised and under Israeli security control following the defeat of Hamas”.
The killing of the three hostages – who were kidnapped by Hamas on 7 October during its assault on southern Israel – has triggered widespread anger and incredulity in Israel amid a mounting sense of anxiety over the safety of the remaining hostages in Gaza.
According to reports of the IDF probe in the Israeli media, the three men Yotam Haim, Samer El-Talalka and Alon Shamriz – all in their 20s – had somehow escaped their captors and were approaching an IDF position in the Shejaiya area of Gaza City where there has been heavy fighting.
One of the men was carrying a stick with a white cloth tied to it and all had removed their shirts. Spotting the three, an Israeli soldier on a rooftop opened fire, shouting “Terrorists!”
You can read our full story here:
Opening summary
Welcome to our continuing live coverage of the Israel-Gaza war. My name is Christine Kearney and here’s a rundown of the latest news.
Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in an address that the killings of three Israeli hostages in Gaza “broke the entire nation’s heart,” but he indicated no change in Israel’s intensive military campaign, after it emerged that the three Israeli hostages killed by the Israel Defence Forces were shirtless and carrying a white flag when they were shot, according to an initial military investigation.
“We are as committed as ever to continue until the end, until we dismantle Hamas, until we return all our hostages,” he told a press conference.
Meanwhile, Israel appeared to confirm that new negotiations were under way to recover hostages held by Hamas, after a source said Israel’s intelligence chief met the prime minister of Qatar, a country mediating in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The head of Israel’s Mossad spy agency, David Barnea, met Qatari prime minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani late on Friday, according to a source with knowledge of the matter, Reuters reports, as attention turned to a possible Gaza truce and a prisoner and hostage deal.
More on those stories soon. In other developments as it turns just past 8.30am in Gaza City and Tel Aviv:
The UK and Germany have called for a “sustainable” ceasefire in the Gaza conflict, warning that “too many civilians have been killed” by Israel in spite of its right to eliminate the threat posed by Hamas. In a significant shift in tone, the UK’s foreign secretary, David Cameron, in a joint article with the German foreign affairs minister, Annalena Baerbock, wrote: “Our goal cannot simply be an end to fighting today. It must be peace lasting for days, years, generations. We therefore support a ceasefire, but only if it is sustainable.
“There is a prolonged communications blackout across the Gaza strip that started on Thursday night and has continued over the past 48 hours,” the UNRWA said on Saturday. “Once again, Gazans find themselves completely isolated – cut off from their loved ones and from the rest of the world.”
Al Jazeera has instructed its legal team to refer the case of what it called “the assassination” of its journalist Samer Abudaqa to the International Criminal Court. In a statement released on Saturday, the network said: “In addition to the assassination of Abudaqa by the Israeli occupation forces in the Gaza strip, the legal file will also encompass recurrent attacks on the network’s crews working and operating in the occupied territories through killing or intentionally physical assault constitutes a war crime.”
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to continue Israel’s war in Gaza while mourning the accidental killing of three Israeli hostages by Israeli forces. Speaking at a press conference on Saturday about Yotam Haim, Samar Al Talalka and Alon Shamriz – the three hostages who were killed by Israeli forces – Netanyahu said that their deaths “broke the hearts of the nation” but vowed to “continue until victory”.
Hundreds of protesters took to the streets in Tel Aviv in anger and frustration over the Israeli government’s handling of the hostage crisis. Many chanted “Deal now!” in calls for a deal to be agreed upon as soon as possible to rescue the remaining hostages.
A contractor working for the US Agency for International Development in Gaza was killed alongside his wife and two daughters in an Israeli airstrike in November, said his employer.“We are deeply saddened to confirm the tragic loss of our colleague, Hani Jnena (33), along with his family in Gaza, including his wife, Abeer (32), and their two young daughters, Mariam and Zayna, aged 4 and 2,” Reuters reports non-profit organization Global Communities as saying in a statement.
Two Palestinian men were killed by Israeli forces in separate incidents in the West Bank on Saturday, Reuters reports the Palestinian health ministry as saying. A 20-year-old man who was identified as Aziz Abdulrahim Elkhlail by the Palestinian news agency WAFA was shot in the abdomen by Israeli forces in the town of Beit Ummar. He later died from his injuries. Another 25-year-old man was killed by Israeli forces in the city of Tulkarm, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
Philippe Lazzarini, the chief of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, has condemned the “smear campaigns that target Palestinians and those who provide aid to them”, saying that he is “horrified”. Speaking to reporters at the Global Refugee Forum, Lazzarini said: “This war is also fought on TV screens and on social media. It’s also a media war. I am horrified at the smear campaigns that target Palestinians and those who provide aid to them.”
