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☆ U.S. Troops Are Injured in Attack on Air Base in Iraq
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-21 | by ( Eric Schmitt | Alissa J. Rubin | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +7 min

Israel and Iran have been locked in a shadow war for years, long before the latest war in Gaza began. They have traded covert attacks by land, sea and air, as well as online. Israel has conducted targeted killings of key Iranian figures and strikes aimed at crippling Iran’s nuclear and military capabilities. Syria is a close ally of Iran and a conduit for Iranian weapons shipments to its proxies, especially Hezbollah. Iran and Pakistan Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza Clashes along Israel-Lebanon border Qatar Iranian strike targeting militants Saudi Arabia U.A.E.

Persons: Israel, Ebrahim Raisi, Israel —, SANA, Hojatallah Omidvar, Haj Sadegh Omidzade, General Omidvar, Sayyed Razi Mousavi, Ronen Bergman, Victoria Kim Organizations: Guards, Quds Force, Islamic, Hamas, Revolutionary Guards, Human Rights, SYria AFghanistan IRAQ Israel Iran Clashes, West Bank, Qatar, Qatar INdia Saudi Arabia U.A.E, Red Sea, TURKEY U.S, EGYPT Qatar Saudi Arabia U.A.E, SYria IRAQ Iran Israel Clashes, West Bank KUWAIT PAK, Qatar Iranian, Saudi Arabia U.A.E, Quds Forces, Brig, Senior Locations: Iran, Damascus, Israel, Gaza, Syria, Islamic Republic of Iran, Lebanon, Yemen, Gaza . Israel, Syrian, Britain, East TURKMENISTAN Syria, Iraq TURKEY Iran, SYria AFghanistan IRAQ Israel Iran, West, Gaza PAKISTAN KUWAIT Iran, Pakistan EGYPT, Qatar INdia Saudi Arabia, OMAN Red, YEMEN Sudan, Red, Red Sea U.S, Iraq TURKMENISTAN Iran, TURKEY, Gaza Iran, Pakistan KUWAIT PAKISTAN, EGYPT Qatar Saudi Arabia, Sudan YEMEN U.S, SYria IRAQ Iran Israel, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, OMAN, YEMEN, Iranian, Gen, Erbil, Kurdistan, Iraq, Israeli, United States

☆ In Strategic Bind, Israel Weighs Freeing Hostages Against Destroying Hamas
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-20 | by ( Ronen Bergman | Patrick Kingsley | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

After more than 100 days of war, Israel’s limited progress in dismantling Hamas has raised doubts within the military’s high command about the near-term feasibility of achieving the country’s principal wartime objectives: eradicating Hamas and also liberating the Israeli hostages still in Gaza. Israel has established control over a smaller part of Gaza at this point in the war than it originally envisaged in battle plans from the start of the invasion, which were reviewed by The New York Times. That slower than expected pace has led some commanders to privately express their frustrations over the civilian government’s strategy for Gaza, and led them to conclude that the freedom of more than 100 Israeli hostages still in Gaza can be secured only through diplomatic rather than military means. The dual objectives of freeing the hostages and destroying Hamas are now mutually incompatible, according to interviews with four senior military leaders, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they were not permitted to speak publicly about their personal opinions. There is also a clash between how long Israel would need to fully eradicate Hamas — a time-consuming slog fought in the group’s warren of underground tunnels — and the pressure, applied by Israel’s allies, to wrap up the war quickly amid a spiraling civilian death toll.

Persons: Israel’s Organizations: The New York Times Locations: Gaza, Israel, Hamas

One tunnel in Gaza was wide enough for a top Hamas official to drive a car inside. Under the house of a senior Hamas commander, the Israeli military found a spiral staircase leading to a tunnel approximately seven stories deep. These details and new information about the tunnels, some made public by the Israeli military and documented by video and photographs, underscore why the tunnels were considered a major threat to the Israeli military in Gaza even before the war started. Even some of the machinery that Hamas used to build the tunnels, observed in captured videos, has surprised the Israeli military. The Israeli military now believes there are far more tunnels under Gaza.

Organizations: Senior Locations: Gaza

Far beneath the Israeli military headquarters in Tel Aviv, in a bunker known as The Pit, commanders were trying to make sense of reports of Hamas rocket fire in southern Israel early on the morning of Oct. 7, when the call came in. It was a commander from the division that oversees military operations along the border with Gaza. It ordered all emergency forces to head south, along with all available units that could do so quickly. But the nation’s military leaders did not yet recognize that an invasion of Israel was already well underway. Roughly 1,200 people died as the Middle East’s most advanced military failed in its essential mission: protecting Israeli lives.

Organizations: Hamas Locations: Tel Aviv, Israel, Gaza

Listen and follow The DailyApple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon MusicIn the weeks since Hamas carried out its devastating terrorist attack in southern Israel, Times journalists have been trying to work out why the Israeli security services failed to prevent such a huge and deadly assault. Ronen Bergman, a correspondent for The New York Times, tells the story of one of the warnings that Israel ignored.

Persons: Ronen Bergman, Israel Organizations: Spotify, Times, The New York Times Locations: Israel

Israeli officials obtained Hamas’s battle plan for the Oct. 7 terrorist attack more than a year before it happened, documents, emails and interviews show. But Israeli military and intelligence officials dismissed the plan as aspirational, considering it too difficult for Hamas to carry out. The approximately 40-page document, which the Israeli authorities code-named “Jericho Wall,” outlined, point by point, exactly the kind of devastating invasion that led to the deaths of about 1,200 people. Hamas followed the blueprint with shocking precision. The document called for a barrage of rockets at the outset of the attack, drones to knock out the security cameras and automated machine guns along the border, and gunmen to pour into Israel en masse in paragliders, on motorcycles and on foot — all of which happened on Oct. 7.

Organizations: The New York Times, Hamas Locations: Gaza, Israel, paragliders

While the hostage negotiations between Israel and Hamas have continued, the Israeli military hasn’t let up on airstrikes in Gaza. The Israeli military also said that it “continued to fight in the Gaza Strip,” highlighting that the agreement to pause the fighting was not yet in place. The Israeli government said in a statement that the hostages would be released in four phases during the pause in fighting, with at least 10 hostages released at each stage. The pause would allow for an increase in humanitarian aid to Gaza, through both the Egyptian and Israeli borders. If the multiday pause holds, it would be the longest halt in hostilities since the start of the 47-day war.

Persons: Israel, “, Benjamin Netanyahu, ”, Isabel Kershner, Gabby Sobelman, Sheikh Ahmad Organizations: Hamas, National Security Council Locations: Israel, Gaza, Qatar

The Israeli decision on Wednesday to pause the invasion of Gaza to allow Hamas to release some hostages, a move now strongly supported by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, was the culmination of a weekslong dispute among Israel’s civilian and military leaders about whether such a deal would strengthen Hamas and endanger the remaining hostages. The first group initially took the upper hand, persuading Mr. Netanyahu to delay a cabinet vote originally planned for Nov. 14, according to three of the officials. They hoped that more military pressure might give Israel more influence at the negotiating table, allowing more hostages to be freed. But the second group eventually won out, leading Mr. Netanyahu to hold the vote early Wednesday, setting the stage for a four-day truce and prisoner exchange that could begin this week. Mr. Netanyahu’s office, the Israeli military and the Mossad all declined to comment.

Persons: Benjamin Netanyahu, Yoav Gallant, David Barnea, Mr, Netanyahu Locations: Gaza, Israel

That strategy has unfolded over the past three weeks as more than 40,000 Israeli soldiers encircled Gaza City, where Israeli officials say Hamas commanders were concentrated. The soldiers then attacked fighters and bunkers, all while targeting a vast tunnel network that Israeli officials say enables Hamas forces to hide and carry out operations. Israeli officials also assessed that striking so deeply in the heart of Gaza City would pressure Hamas to reach a deal on hostage releases. Al-Shifa became Exhibit A in this narrative, as the Israeli military claimed Hamas used a vast maze of tunnels underneath the hospital as a base. So far it is not clear that the Israeli strategy is working.

Persons: Shifa, Daniel Hagari, Yoav Gallant, Israel Organizations: Shifa, Israel, Hamas Locations: Gaza City, Gaza, Al, Israel

The militants, Israeli security officials say, have spent the better part of 16 years building a vast command complex under the hospital, and setting up similar bases underneath other medical facilities in the enclave. Hamas denies doing anything of the sort, and hospital officials say the facility houses nothing but the sick and injured and the medical professionals dedicated to helping them. In the estimation of most Palestinians, the obsession with Al Shifa is evidence of Israel’s willingness to target even the most helpless civilians without justification. The hospital, Israeli officials said, was spared in past Israeli operations out of concern for civilian life, but at the cost of leaving whatever may be underneath it intact. They say that the complex under Al Shifa is one of the principal Israeli targets of the war and will not be left untouched, despite the growing international outcry to spare Al Shifa and other hospitals.

Persons: Al Shifa, Mohammed Abu Salmiya, ”, Chuck Freilich, “, —, Freilich, “ it’s Organizations: Israel Locations: Gaza, Israel

☆ Israel-Hamas War Israel Brings Reporters to Combat Zone Inside Gaza
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-05 | by ( Ronen Bergman | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +6 min

Image Journalists were taken into northern Gaza for four hours on Saturday to see the extent of the Israeli military’s advance. Israeli military leaders brought a small group of foreign journalists into northern Gaza on Saturday for four hours to witness the extent of the advance. On Saturday, it was a giant Israeli military camp. Bloodier battles await the Israelis in Gaza City, where Hamas fighters are entrenched in their subterranean fortifications and are thought to be planning many more ambushes. Saher Abu Adgham, 37, a Palestinian graphic designer, had been searching the streets of Gaza City for firewood to boil some rice.

Persons: Ronen Bergman, Iddo Ben, Anat, Ben, he’s, —, ”, Eitan, “ We’ll, Abu Adgham, “, Mr, Majdi Ahmed, ” Mr, Ahmed, ” Iyad Abuheweila, Abu Bakr Bashir, Patrick Kingsley Organizations: New York, The New York Times, New York Times, “, The Times, Protect Journalists, Hamas Locations: Gaza, Israel, Gaza City, Hamas’s, Gaza . Credit, Cairo, London, Jerusalem

☆ Blinken Travels to Israeli-Occupied West Bank
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-05 | by ( Ronen Bergman | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +7 min

Image Journalists were taken into northern Gaza for four hours on Saturday to see the extent of the Israeli military’s advance. Israeli military leaders took a small group of foreign journalists into northern Gaza on Saturday for four hours to witness the extent of the advance. A reporter for The New York Times was among them. On Saturday, it was a giant Israeli military camp. Saher Abu Adgham, 37, a Palestinian graphic designer, had been searching the streets of Gaza City for firewood to boil some rice.

Persons: Ronen Bergman, Iddo Ben, Anat, Ben, he’s, —, ”, Eitan, “ We’ll, Abu Adgham, “, Mr, Majdi Ahmed, ” Mr, Ahmed, ” Iyad Abuheweila, Abu Bakr Bashir, Patrick Kingsley Organizations: New York, The New York Times, New York Times, “, Times, The Times, Protect Journalists, Hamas Locations: Gaza, Israel, Gaza City, Hamas’s, Gaza . Credit, Cairo, London, Jerusalem

Ghazi Hamad, one of the top leaders, said the group would carry out further attacks on Israel until the nation was annihilated. On Thursday, Hamas released footage that it said showed its fighters firing a grenade launcher at an Israeli tank. After three consecutive days of Israeli airstrikes in the Jabaliya neighborhood of northern Gaza, rescuers were searching for survivors in the rubble of collapsed buildings. The troops have cut the main north-south roads to Gaza City, depriving Hamas of equipment, vehicles and other reinforcements carried above ground. It also helped prevent them from broadcasting images of the assault to the world, which could have raised pressure on Israel to stop.

Persons: Ghazi Hamad, Blinken, Biden’s Organizations: United Nations, Hamas, West Bank Locations: Israel, Jabaliya, Gaza, Gaza City, Lebanon, Israel’s, Lebanese

When Israeli ground forces advanced en masse into the Gaza Strip on Friday evening, just after the Jewish Sabbath began, they did it so secretly that it was hours before the outside world understood what had happened. In the three days since the long-anticipated invasion began, Israel’s military has operated with a similar ambiguity, defying expectations by carrying out a more incremental ground operation than was initially anticipated. While it has continued to decimate Gaza and its people with aerial bombardments, much of the ground force appears to have hung back from Gaza City, Hamas’s stronghold in northern Gaza, and stayed instead in the countryside on the city’s fringes. Under U.S. pressure to temper their response to the Hamas killing of more than 1,400 people on Israeli soil, Israel has even avoided describing the operation as an invasion. The loss of life, though, in Gaza continues to rise, with the Palestinian death toll so far over 8,000, according to Hamas officials.

Persons: ”, Andreas Krieg Organizations: U.S, King’s College, London Locations: Gaza, Gaza City, Hamas’s, Israel

But Hamas’s attack exposed the fragility of that technology. The group used explosive drones that damaged the cellular antennas and the remote firing systems that protected the fence between Gaza and Israel. To get around Israel’s powerful surveillance technology, Hamas fighters also appeared to enforce strict discipline among the group’s ranks to not discuss its activities on mobile phones. This allowed them to pull off the attack without detection, one European official said. The group most likely divided its fighters into smaller cells, each probably only trained for a specific objective.

Persons: — Locations: Israel, Gaza

A Palestinian fighter of the Al-Quds brigade in a military tunnel in the northern Gaza Strip last year. Overnight on Saturday, Israeli fighter planes struck 150 underground targets in the northern Gaza Strip, the Israeli military said. The group’s leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, said in 2021 that there were 310 miles of tunnels in Gaza. Ben Milch, an Israeli American who cleared tunnels with the Israeli military during the 2014 Gaza War, said his unit came under fire repeatedly while working to destroy some 13 tunnels. After the Israeli military announced on Tuesday that it had destroyed the tunnel to the sea, it released a video of another incident.

Persons: “, Israel, ”, Joseph L, Sergey Ponomarev, Yocheved, Daniel Hagari, Votel, Joel Roskin, Roskin, Ali Ali, Daphne Richemond, Barak, Yahya Sinwar, Yousef Masoud, ” Ms, Richemond, Ms, Amir Olo, Olo, Ben Milch, Milch, Uriel Sinai, Jeffrey Gettleman, Gal Koplewitz Organizations: Hamas, Israel Defense Forces, U.S, United States Central Command, The New York Times, Islamic, Iraqi, ISIS, Bar, Ilan University, European Pressphoto Agency, Reichman University, telltale, RAND Corporation, West Bank, Officials Locations: Al, Quds, Gaza, Israel, Israeli, Iraqi, Mosul, Al Shifa, Israel’s, Egypt, Northern Sinai, Khan Younis, Col, Israeli American, Kissufim, The, Zikim Beach, Jerusalem

An Israeli official said that the government was assessing the data, which was released before Friday’s bombardment. The high number of children reported killed — about 40 percent of the total — is broadly in line with the high share of children in the Gazan population. In total, the list named 2,665 children who have been killed and 2,902 women and girls. The date of death is not listed for each individual, but a separate summary of the deaths from the health ministry indicates that the toll has been increasing in recent days. The ministry said the list did not include an additional 281 people who had been killed but could not be identified, bringing the total number to 7,028.

Persons: —, Biden, Mr, ”, “, Omar Shakir Organizations: Hamas, Gaza, Ahli Arab Hospital, U.S, Rights Watch, UNICEF Locations: Gaza, Al, Ahli, Israel, Palestine, Afghanistan, Africa

The shock of the attack has shaken Israelis’ sense of invincibility and raised doubts and debate about how their country should best respond. Immediately afterward, the government called up around 360,000 reservists and deployed many of them at the border with Gaza. Senior officials soon spoke of removing Hamas from power in the enclave, raising expectations of an imminent ground operation there. When asked what the military objectives of the operation are, an Israeli military spokesman said the goal was to “dismantle Hamas.” How would the army know it had achieved that goal? The Israeli government wants to allow more time for those talks to make headway, perhaps to secure the release of captured women and children.

Persons: Netanyahu, Richard Hecht Organizations: United Locations: Israel, Gaza, United States, Qatar

The Biden administration has advised Israel to delay a ground invasion of Gaza, hoping to buy time for hostage negotiations and to allow more humanitarian aid to reach Palestinians in the sealed-off enclave, according to several U.S. officials. American officials also want more time to prepare for attacks on U.S. interests in the region from Iran-backed groups, which officials said are likely to intensify once Israel moves its forces fully into Gaza. Mr. Biden also spoke to the leaders of Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Britain. When Mr. Biden met with the Israeli war cabinet during his trip to Tel Aviv last week, he avoided making requests of Mr. Netanyahu, officials said. Instead, the president offered a series of questions that should be answered before a ground invasion starts.

Persons: Biden, Benjamin Netanyahu, Lloyd J, Austin III, Austin, Yoav Gallant, Gallant, ”, Antony J, Blinken, “, Mr, Netanyahu Organizations: Sunday, U.S, Defense, Pentagon, Embassy, Hamas, CBS, Biden, Press, State Department, Consulate Locations: Israel, Gaza, Iran, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Britain, U.S, Washington, Qatar, United States, Baghdad, Erbil, Iraq, ”, Tel Aviv

President Biden and his top aides have been urging Israeli leaders against carrying out any major strike against Hezbollah, the powerful militia in Lebanon, that could draw it into the Israel-Hamas war, American and Israeli officials say. The Americans are conveying to the Israelis the difficulties of battling both Hamas in the south and a much more powerful Hezbollah force in the north. U.S. officials believe Israel would struggle in a two-front war and that such a conflict could draw in both the United States and Iran, the militia’s main supporter. American officials want to rein in Hezbollah too. U.S. officials feared that Mr. Netanyahu might approve a pre-emptive strike on Hezbollah in the immediate aftermath of the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas, which killed more than 1,400 people.

Persons: Biden, Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, Mr, Netanyahu Organizations: U.S, Hamas Locations: Lebanon, Israel, U.S, United States, Iran, East, Gaza

In the dense warrens of Gaza, Hamas is believed to hold at least 199 people hostage, guarded by gunmen and booby traps, likely scattered and hidden from any would-be rescuers as Israel readies a ground invasion. Israeli and U.S. commandos have pulled off extraordinary hostage rescues before. That has left desperate, complex diplomacy — led by the United States and Qatar, a tiny nation with extensive ties to militant groups — as the best option to save hostages in the eyes of many current and former officials. In the talks so far, Qatar is acting as a mediator between Hamas and officials from the United States, which like Israel and the European Union considers Hamas a terrorist group. Adding even more complexity to the talks, there are people from more than 30 countries among the hostages.

Persons: — Organizations: U.S, Hamas, European Union Locations: Gaza, Israel, United States, Qatar

Israel Ziv, a former general, reached a nearby battle in his Audi. “We are brought up to run as fast as possible toward the fire,” said General Goldfus. The camera mounted on the Hamas commander’s head captured the moment he was shot and killed. By the time the video stops, the commander can be seen slumped on the ground, revealing his long beard and thinning hairline. In other parts of southern Israel, the first formal reinforcements came from an Israeli commando unit that arrived in helicopters, according to the senior Israeli officer.

Persons: Israel Ziv, Yair Golan, ”, Goldfus Organizations: Audi, Hamas Locations: Gaza, Israel

The United States government has seized nearly one million barrels of Iranian crude oil that it says was being smuggled to China in violation of U.S. sanctions against Iran, after it raised the threat of prosecution to get the tanker brought to American waters, newly unsealed court papers show. The seizure of the oil from the vessel, the M/T Suez Rajan, is part of a larger and shadowy conflict with Iran. After the tanker began to steam toward the United States last spring, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps seized two oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, prompting the U.S. military to increase patrols and deploy additional assets to protect shipping lanes. In July, Iranian state news media said the Guards’ navy commander had warned that Tehran would hold Washington responsible if the tanker’s oil was unloaded, without giving further details. On Wednesday, a high-ranking Israeli defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that the seizure raised new fears that Iran could hijack more tankers in an effort to deter the United States from repeating the move.

Persons: Suez Rajan Organizations: United, Iran, Revolutionary Guards Corps, U.S, Guards Locations: United States, China, Iran, Strait, Hormuz, Tehran, Washington

☆ ‘Es una revelación’: miles de mensajes de texto dan nuevas pistas del caso Ayotzinapa
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-02 | by ( Natalie Kitroeff | Ronen Bergman | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

Map highlighting the city of Iguala in the Mexican state of Guerrero where college students on a bus trip to Mexico City were kidnapped, and many killed. Also located is the nearby city of Cocula where remains of some of the students were found, as well as Chilpancingo, the capital of Guerrero. 100 miles Mexico City MEXICO Iguala Cocula GUERRERO Chilpancingo Pacific Ocean Acapulco U.S. Gulf of Mexico MEXICO Pacific Ocean Detail area 400 miles

Persons: Cocula GUERRERO Organizations: Mexico City Locations: Iguala, Mexican, Guerrero, Mexico, Cocula, Mexico City MEXICO, Acapulco, Gulf of Mexico MEXICO

Several miles away, more police officers stopped another bus of students, used tear gas to get them off, then snatched them away. One of the police commanders asked him “who he should hand over the ‘packages’” to, referring to the hostages. A cartel assassin also called, asking who was bringing him “the packages,” according to his sworn statement. According to one cartel member whose testimony has become key to the case, some of the students were taken to a house, killed and dismembered. Machete hacks left gashes in the floor, the witness said, and the students’ remains were later burned in the crematory owned by the coroner’s family.

Persons: “, Machete Locations: Mexican

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