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☆ Israel’s Military Strikes Northern Gaza After Days of Deadly Bombardment
▼ + stars: | 2024-12-15 | by ( Hiba Yazbek | More About Hiba Yazbek | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Israel’s military said it carried out strikes and raids in northern Gaza on Sunday after days of deadly bombardments across the territory. The military said in a statement that it had targeted a “terrorist meeting point” in the northern town of Beit Hanoun, among other actions. Israel’s military did not directly address the report but said it had struck dozens of terrorists from the air and ground, and seized additional terrorists. In central Gaza, one Israeli strike killed a Palestinian cameraman who worked for Al Jazeera and other media outlets, Al Jazeera reported on Sunday. The cameraman, Ahmad Baker al-Louh, was killed in a strike in the Nuseirat refugee camp, the news agency said, along with five members of the Palestinian Civil Defense.

Persons: Al Jazeera, Ahmad Baker al Organizations: Al, Palestinian Civil Defense Locations: Gaza, Beit Hanoun

Nearly two weeks have passed and no large-scale response has materialized, leaving Israel and the wider Middle East on edge. But Mr. Haniyeh’s killing was seen as the greater blow to Tehran because it took place on Iranian soil. “Israel has checkmated Iran in this situation because Iran is left with no good options,” said Mr. Vaez. What could an Iranian response look like? U.S. and Israeli diplomats and security officials had some advanced knowledge of its scope and intensity of Iran’s attack in April, which facilitated defensive preparations.

Persons: Ismail Haniyeh, Masoud, Israel, Fuad Shukr, Haniyeh’s, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, analystsexperts, Nasser Kanaan, Sanam Vakil, Pezeshkian, Vakil, Ms, Ali Vaez, Vaez, “ Israel, ”, Benjamin Netanyahu, “, Keir Starmer, Nasser Kanani, Jordan, Mr, Haniyeh, Lloyd J, Austin III, Biden Organizations: Iran’s Foreign Ministry, Chatham House, Crisis, Diplomats, of Islamic Cooperation, United, Hamas Locations: Iran, Tehran, Israel, Masoud Pezeshkian, Beirut, Lebanon, Golan, East, London, Yemen, Western, Iranian, United States, Gaza, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Saudi Arabia

☆ Why Is Iran Expected to Attack Israel? What to Know About the Crisis.
▼ + stars: | 2024-08-05 | by ( Hiba Yazbek | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Less than a week after the killing of a top Hamas leader in Tehran and a top Hezbollah commander in Beirut, the entire Middle East is on edge. Fears of a broader regional war have been mounting amid vows of revenge from Iranian leaders that have left Israel in a state of deep uncertainty. Israeli leaders would not confirm or deny whether their country was behind the breach of Iran’s defenses, but Iranian leaders and Hamas officials immediately blamed Israel and vowed retaliation. Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, issued an order for Iran to strike Israel directly, according to three Iranian officials briefed on the order. And Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman, Nasser Kanaan, said on Monday that “Tehran is not interested in escalating the regional conflicts, but it is necessary to punish” Israel.

Persons: Ismail Haniyeh, Israel, Iran’s, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Nasser Kanaan, ” Israel Locations: Tehran, Beirut, Israel, Iranian, Iran

☆ Gaza’s Only Humanitarian Zone Has Shrunk by a Fifth Recently
▼ + stars: | 2024-07-30 | by ( Hiba Yazbek | Lauren Leatherby | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The Israeli military has designated just one area of the Gaza Strip as a “humanitarian zone” for displaced people — and that area keeps shrinking. In the latest downsizing, the military on Saturday ordered the evacuation of two more parts of central Gaza that had been part of the humanitarian zone. Similar orders have forced more than 200,000 Palestinians to relocate over the last week alone, according to the United Nations. A New York Times analysis of the latest orders showed that the zone has shrunk by more than a fifth in recent weeks, going from encompassing nearly 17 percent of the Gaza Strip to 13 percent now. Maps and analysis of satellite imagery show that the zone is already overcrowded, frequently damaged by strikes and lacking sufficient medical services.

Organizations: Saturday, United Nations, New York Times, Hamas Locations: Gaza

After two weeks of intense battles between Hamas militants and Israeli troops in the Gaza City neighborhood of Shajaiye, residents and rescue workers combed through the wreckage on Friday, a landscape of flattened buildings strewed with dozens of bodies. “The scale of destruction is immense.”More than nine months into the war in Gaza, Israeli troops are returning to areas they had previously conquered and encountering strong resistance from Hamas fighters. The offensive in Shajaiye was part of a wider Israeli effort to clamp down on a renewed Hamas insurgency in Gaza City, the military said. And Israel said on Friday that it had “eliminated” the deputy commander of Hamas’s Shajaiye Battalion, Ayman Showadeh. He had been “a key operative” at the group’s operations headquarters and had been involved in directing the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack that set off the war in Gaza, Israel said.

Persons: ”, Karam Hassan, Israel, Hamas’s, Ayman Showadeh Organizations: Hamas Locations: Gaza City, Shajaiye, Gaza, Israel

Israel released the chief of the Gaza Strip’s largest hospital on Monday after more than seven months of detention, Palestinian health officials said, a move that drew an immediate outcry in Israel even though no charges against him have been made public. Mohammad Abu Salmiya, the director of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, was taken into custody in late November as he took part in an effort to evacuate patients from the hospital, which at the time was under siege by the Israeli military. The military said he was taken for questioning about Hamas operations at the hospital. Reaction to Dr. Abu Salmiya’s release underlined divergent views of the war both inside and outside Israel. Speaking at a news conference at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis after his release, Dr. Abu Salmiya, visibly frail, said that he had been released and returned to Gaza along with nearly 50 other Palestinian detainees, including other doctors and health ministry staff members.

Persons: Israel, Mohammad Abu Salmiya, Abu Salmiya’s, Benjamin Netanyahu’s, Khan Younis, Abu Salmiya Organizations: Al, Shifa, Nasser Hospital Locations: Gaza, Israel, Gaza City, Khan

“I swear our stomachs are decaying,” said Eman Abu Jaljum, 23, whose family in northern Gaza has been surviving off canned peas and beans. “We are living in a famine that is more extreme than ever before,” Ms. Abu Jaljum said. Credit... Omar Al-Qattaa/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesOne of his daughters, Mr. al-Sapti said, asked for eggs, but there were none to be found. In the north, bread has become more available as some bakeries in Gaza City reopen their doors, said Mr. al-Sapti. But Mr. al-Sapti worries that the bakeries may soon run out of fuel.

Persons: “, ”, Abu Jaljum, Ms, Omar Al, Sapti, ‘, Jana Ayad, Mohammed Salem, Khan Younis, Hammad, Mr Organizations: Hamas, Agence France, Integrated, International Medical Corps, Reuters Locations: Gaza, Israel, Gaza City, Jabaliya, Somalia, South Sudan, Deir al Balah

A panel of global hunger experts warned this week that the Gaza Strip was on the brink of famine, but to many Gazans, it feels as if it is already here. “I swear our stomachs are decaying,” said Eman Abu Jaljum, 23, whose family in northern Gaza has been surviving off canned peas and beans. In a report issued on Tuesday, the experts said that almost half a million people in the territory faced starvation. They stopped short of declaring a famine, a designation that depends on a variety of criteria being met. “We are living in a famine that is more extreme than ever before,” Ms. Abu Jaljum said.

Persons: “, ”, Abu Jaljum, Ms Organizations: Hamas Locations: Gaza, Israel, Gaza City

☆ As War Stretches On, Gaza’s High School Students Put Their Dreams on Hold
▼ + stars: | 2024-06-22 | by ( Hiba Yazbek | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Karim al-Masri was supposed to start his final exams on Saturday morning, just a few weeks shy of graduating. Instead, he spent his morning filling bags of water to freeze into ice, which he sold to support his family. “I should have been studying and preparing for my final exams,” said Mr. al-Masri, 18. The war has devastated Gaza’s education system which was already struggling after several wars and escalations since 2008. All of Gaza’s 12 universities have been severely damaged or destroyed by fighting, according to the United Nations.

Persons: Karim al, Masri, “, ”, Mr Organizations: Palestinian Education Ministry, Islamic, of Gaza, University College of Applied Sciences —, United Nations Locations: Gaza, Jordan

Bleeding and crying, Dr. Hani Bseso’s teenage niece Ahed called out for him as she slipped in and out of consciousness. A shell had ripped into their home, which had been surrounded by Israeli troops as fighting raged outside that December day. It was too dangerous to make the five-minute drive to Al-Shifa Hospital, where Dr. Bseso, 52, worked in orthopedics. So he grabbed a kitchen knife, scissors and sewing string — then amputated Ahed’s leg on the kitchen table, where her mother had just made bread. With “no tools, no anesthetic, nothing,” he explained, “I had to find a way to save her life.”

Persons: Hani Bseso’s, Ahed, Bseso, ”, “ Organizations: Shifa Locations: orthopedics

It was not immediately clear how many weapons Hezbollah, a powerful militia and political faction backed by Iran, launched into Israel on Thursday. The assault included a number of drones aimed at Israel’s northern military headquarters, Hezbollah said. Israel’s military said in the afternoon that Hezbollah had sent more than 40 rockets across the border, but the barrage continued well into the evening. Hours later, Israel had not updated that number, but a military spokesman called it Hezbollah’s most serious attack since October. At least four people were injured in the assault on Thursday, according to Israel’s military and its emergency service, Magen David Adom.

Persons: Israel, Magen David Adom Organizations: Hamas Locations: Lebanon, ramped, Gaza, Iran, Israel

After eight months of devastating bombardment by Israeli forces, some Gazans are urging Hamas to accept a cease-fire plan outlined by President Biden, but many remain deeply skeptical that the United States, as Israel’s chief ally, would truly bring an end to the war. “I am hopeful that Hamas will accept this deal,” said Ayman Skeik, a 31-year-old merchant driven out of his home in Gaza City by the fighting. “But I am still scared it would not be achieved.”Like other Gazans, Mr. Skeik, who is now sheltering in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, said he had grown frustrated by the long and generally fruitless cease-fire talks. He noted pointedly that months ago, in February, Mr. Biden suggested that a deal was imminent. “The United States used to have a strong word when it wanted to stop any crisis in the world,” Mr. Skeik said.

Persons: President Biden, “, ”, Ayman Skeik, Skeik, Biden, Mr Organizations: Mr, White Locations: United States, Gaza City, Deir al, Gaza, Israel

Israel’s military said it was pressing on with its ground assault in the southern Gaza Strip on Tuesday despite mounting international outrage over its operations there, including an airstrike over the weekend that killed dozens of civilians. The military said its troops were engaging in close-quarters combat with Hamas fighters and that it had deployed an additional “combat team” to Rafah, without specifying how many more soldiers were sent to the southern city. The military has said that its strike on Rafah on Sunday — which ignited a deadly fire that killed at least 45 people — targeted a Hamas compound. On Monday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said it was a “tragic accident” that civilians in the camp, many of them displaced from other parts of Gaza, had been killed.

Persons: Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel Organizations: Hamas Locations: Gaza, Rafah

☆ Some Gazans Say U.S. Campus Protests Give Them ‘Hope’
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-01 | by ( Hiba Yazbek | More About Hiba Yazbek | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Thousands of miles away from the campus protests that have divided Americans, some displaced Palestinians are expressing solidarity with the antiwar demonstrators and gratitude for their efforts. “Thank you, American universities,” read one message captured on video by the Reuters news agency. “Thank you, students in solidarity with Gaza your message has reached” us, read another nearby. The protesters have been calling for universities to divest from companies with ties to Israel, and some have vowed not to back down. “I’ve lived my whole life in Gaza Strip and I’ve never felt hope like now,” said Ms. Owda.

Persons: ”, Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel, Mohammed al, Akram al, Bisan, “ I’ve, I’ve, Owda, Nader Ibrahim Organizations: Reuters, Columbia University, Al, Azhar University Locations: Rafah, Gaza, United States, Israel, America, London

☆ Baby Born in Gaza After Her Mother Was Killed Has Died
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-26 | by ( Hiba Yazbek | More About Hiba Yazbek | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

A baby who was born premature after her mother was killed in an Israeli strike died on Thursday, a relative said, less than a week after news of her birth brought a glimmer of hope to war-torn Gaza. The baby, who was born after a strike in southern Gaza that also killed her father and sister, suffered respiratory problems and doctors were unable to save her, said her uncle, Rami al-Sheikh. The mother, Sabreen al-Sakani, was killed along with her husband, Shukri, and their 3-year-old daughter Malak when an Israeli strike hit their home in the city of Rafah shortly before midnight last Saturday. Instead of a name, doctors initially wrote, “The baby of the martyr Sabreen al-Sakani” on a piece of tape across her chest. “The baby was delivered into a tragic situation,” Dr. Salama told Reuters after her birth, adding, “Even if this baby survives, she was born an orphan.”

Persons: Rami al, “, ”, Sabreen, Shukri, Malak, Rouh, Mohammed Salama, Dr, Salama Organizations: Emirati, Emirati Hospital, Reuters Locations: Gaza, Israeli, Rafah

Palestinian officials in Gaza on Thursday increased the tally of bodies discovered in a mass grave on the grounds of a hospital to 392 from 283, amid conflicting accounts between Israel and the Gazan authorities over how and when some of the bodies were buried. “This is the biggest mass grave since the beginning of the war,” Mahmoud Basal, spokesman for Gaza’s Civil Defense, a search and rescue department within the Hamas-controlled territory, said Thursday before calling for an international investigation. Gazan authorities say that mass graves had been dug on the hospital grounds before an Israeli raid there in February but accuse Israel of later opening the site to add bodies. It was not clear how those who were buried at the Nasser Medical Complex in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, had died or exactly when. While The Times could not determine the cause of death for individual people, the initial burials took place amid a weekslong Israeli offensive in the city that began in mid-February.

Persons: Mahmoud Basal, Israel, Khan Younis Organizations: Gaza’s Civil Defense, New York Times, Nasser Locations: Gaza, Israel, Khan

The United Nations’ human rights office on Tuesday called for an independent investigation into two mass graves found after Israeli forces withdrew from hospitals in Gaza, including one discovered days ago over which Israeli and Palestinian authorities offered differing accounts. He accused Israeli forces of killing and burying them. It did not comment on the report of the mass grave at Al-Shifa. It also did not say how the bodies had been examined to determine if they were those of Israeli hostages. “Bodies examined, which did not belong to Israeli hostages, were returned to their place.”

Persons: Khan Younis, —, ” Organizations: United Nations, Palestinian Civil Defense, Nasser Hospital, Shifa, Palestinian Authority Locations: Gaza, Khan, Al, Gaza City, Mahmoud

A Palestinian man inspecting damage on Saturday after Israeli settlers attacked the village of Al Mughayir, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. The Israeli military announced on Saturday that it would bolster its forces in the West Bank with additional companies and police. Israeli settlers, some of them armed, entered the villages, the official added, and there were reports that they had opened fire. At one point, “rocks were hurled” at Israeli soldiers, leading them to open fire in response, the Israeli military said. Last February, an attack by Israeli settlers devastated the Palestinian town of Huwara in the northern West Bank.

Persons: Al Mughayir, Binyamin Achimair, Yesh Din, Abu Aliya —, Amin Abu Aliya, Binyamin’s, Naser Dawabsheh, “, ”, Na’asan Na’asan, Shaul Golan, Golan, Biden, Binyamin, Abu Aliya, Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel, Yair Lapid, ” Mr, Na’asan Organizations: West Bank ., West Bank, United Nations, Duma Locations: Al, Palestinian, Ramallah, torching, East Jerusalem, Gaza, Al Mughayir, “, Israel, Huwara, West Bank

☆ Palestinians Return to an Unrecognizable City After Israelis Withdraw
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-08 | by ( Hiba Yazbek | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The withdrawal of Israeli ground troops from southern Gaza over the weekend allowed some Palestinians to return to the city of Khan Younis and check on their homes. But in the aftermath of a fierce, monthslong battle and Israeli bombings, some found only destruction. “I completely collapsed and nearly fainted,” he said in a phone call on Monday, adding that his wife and two teenage daughters burst into tears when they saw what was left of their home. “I worked for 20 years to build this house,” said Dr. al-Farra, 54, who ran the pediatric ward at Nasser Hospital before the family fled south to Rafah in January. “You build a home corner by corner, stone by stone.”

Persons: Khan Younis, ”, Ahmad al, “ Organizations: Nasser Hospital Locations: Gaza, Farra, Rafah

At least three senior commanders and four officers overseeing Iran’s covert operations in the Middle East were killed on Monday when Israeli warplanes struck a building in Damascus that is part of the Iranian Embassy complex, according to Iranian and Syrian officials. The strike in Damascus, the Syrian capital, appeared to be among the deadliest attacks in a yearslong shadow war between Israel and Iran that has included the assassinations of Iranian military leaders and nuclear scientists. That covert war has moved into the open as tensions between the countries have intensified over Israel’s military campaign in the Gaza Strip against Hamas, the Iranian-backed militia that led the Oct. 7 attack on Israel. Four Israeli officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence matters, confirmed that Israel had been behind the strike in Damascus, but denied that the building had diplomatic status.

Persons: Israel Organizations: Iranian Embassy, Hamas, Israel . Locations: Damascus, Iranian, Israel, Iran, Gaza

Israeli troops and Hamas fighters waged deadly battles in and around two of the Gaza Strip’s major hospitals on Thursday as the Israeli government came under growing pressure at home and abroad to moderate its approach to a war that has devastated the enclave. Fighting raged for the 11th day at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City in an area Israeli forces first seized in November. The clashes illustrated the difficulty the Israelis are having in keeping control of places they had already taken as Palestinian militants melt away and then return. In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, increasingly unpopular and facing criticism on multiple fronts, met for the first time with the families of kidnapped soldiers being held in Gaza, who accused him before the meeting of ignoring their plight for nearly six months. The soldiers’ relatives had largely remained silent in public while other families of captives spoke out, many of them saying the prime minister should agree to a truce with Hamas if that was what it would take to free their relatives.

Persons: Benjamin Netanyahu Organizations: Shifa Locations: Gaza, Al, Gaza City, Israel

☆ Threat of Unrest Looms Over Al Aqsa Mosque on First Friday of Ramadan
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-15 | by ( Hiba Yazbek | More About Hiba Yazbek | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

A heavy Israeli police contingent checked worshipers on Friday entering the Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem, where the threat of unrest loomed over the conclusion of Ramadan, the holiest month for Muslims and one that has taken on added significance during the war in Gaza. Al Aqsa is one of the holiest sites for Muslims and part of a compound that is sacred to Jews, who call it the Temple Mount. The rules have tightened further since Oct. 7, and most Palestinians may not be able to answer Hamas’s call to flock to Al Aqsa even if they want to. Israel’s agency overseeing policy for the Palestinian territories said on Monday that only men over age 55, women over 50 and children under 10 would be allowed to enter Israel from the West Bank to pray at Al Aqsa on Fridays during Ramadan. The group has issued similar statements during its war with Israel.

Persons: Israel, ”, Al Aqsa, “, Ayman Abu Ramouz, Rami Nazzal Organizations: West Bank Locations: Aqsa, Jerusalem, Gaza, Hamas, Israel, Al Aqsa, Al, Ramallah

☆ Thousands of pregnant women in Gaza suffer from malnutrition, health authorities say.
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-10 | by ( Hiba Yazbek | Ameera Harouda | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

When Wafaa al-Kurd was nearly due to give birth, she said, she weighed less than she did before becoming pregnant and was surviving on rice and artificial juice. She gave birth to a girl weighing nearly six pounds, named Tayma, just over two weeks ago, she said. Since then, her husband has spent his days scouring markets in northern Gaza, where the family lives, trying to find enough food for his wife to breastfeed and keep Tayma alive. Nearly 60,000 pregnant women in Gaza are suffering from malnutrition, dehydration and lack of proper health care, according to the Gaza health ministry. In a statement on Friday, the ministry said that about 5,000 women in Gaza were giving birth every month in “harsh, unsafe and unhealthy conditions as a result of bombardment and displacement.”The ministry added that about 9,000 women, including thousands of mothers and pregnant women, had been killed since Israel’s bombardment and invasion began in early October.

Persons: Wafaa al, Kurd, breastfeed, Deborah Harrington Organizations: United Nations, Al Locations: Gaza, Al Aqsa

☆ Middle East Crisis Gaza Authorities Say Accident Involving Airdropped Aid Kills 5
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-08 | by ( Hiba Yazbek | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +4 min

The authorities in Gaza said at least five Palestinians were killed and several others were wounded on Friday after packages of humanitarian aid that had been airdropped fell on them in Gaza City. A video, circulating on social media and purporting to depict the incident, shows a plane releasing parachutes carrying aid packages over northern Gaza. They have urged Israel to open up more border crossings and to speed up inspections of the aid shipments. But dangers posed by failed parachutes and falling pallets of food, water and other aid are also a major risk in airdrop operations. On Sunday, he said, he bought three bags of food at a market that had been airdropped by the United States.

Persons: Patrick S, Ryder, —, James McGoldrick, ”, “, ” Saleh Eid, Eid, Lajka Organizations: Pentagon, The New York Times, United Arab Locations: Gaza, Gaza City, United States, Al, Jordan, United Arab Emirates, Egypt, France, U.N, Israel, Jabaliya

A day after President Biden announced plans for maritime aid delivery to the Gaza Strip, European leaders said Friday they would deliver aid by ship as early as the weekend. But aid groups and Gaza officials criticized shipments by air or sea as too cumbersome, urging that vastly more food and medicine be supplied by trucks. The complications of delivering aid to the hungry residents of Gaza were underlined on Friday when the authorities in Gaza said at least five Palestinians were killed and several others were wounded after they were struck by packages of humanitarian aid that were dropped from an aircraft. Israel insists on inspecting all supplies going into Gaza, and aid trucks have been allowed in through just two border crossings — one from Egypt and one from Israel — in southern Gaza. President Biden on Thursday night outlined a U.S. military plan to build a floating pier on Gaza’s Mediterranean coast to supply food, water, medicine and other necessities to civilians, saying the operation would “enable a massive increase” in the assistance entering the territory.

Persons: Biden, Israel Organizations: United Nations Locations: Gaza, Egypt, Israel, U.S

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