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Post by Newsman on Oct 13, 2023 2:39:17 GMT -5
....we're now six days and counting since the events of this past Saturday, October 7th 2023, and the current state of hostilities between the state of Israel and the Islamic terrorist group Hamas...Background--The Gaza Strip and Israel have been in conflict since the Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in 2005 and Hamas gaining control of the Gaza Strip after winning Palestinian elections in 2006 and a civil war with Fatah in 2007. The Gaza Strip has been under an Egyptian and Israeli blockade since 2007, leading Human Rights Watch to call it an "open-air prison" and state that "Israel should end the generalized ban on travel to and from Gaza..." and allow widespread "freedom of movement" between Gaza and Israel. The blockade has caused significant economic hardship within Gaza, and was cited by Hamas as one of the reasons for its offensive. Israel said that the blockade was necessary to protect Israeli citizens from "terrorism, rocket attacks and any other hostile activity" and to prevent dual use goods from entering Gaza. In Egypt, Hamas is widely seen as closely associated with the Muslim Brotherhood, which they consider to be a terrorist organization. Israeli politics had traditionally been dominated by social democractic and secular parties throughout from its founding to the early 2000s. Israeli left politics collapsed after the Palestinian National Authority declared war on the country during the Second Intifada. The New York Times writes: "The waning of the left began in the 2000s, when a wave of Palestinian violence was interpreted by many Israelis as a rejection of efforts to peacefully resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. That discredited the left’s prior push for greater Palestinian sovereignty and boosted the right-wing narrative that Israel could not count on Palestinians to negotiate a lasting peace." After the 2022 Israeli legislative election in November, a Netanyahu-led right-wing government took office the following month. The government ramped up settlement construction in the Israeli-occupied West Bank; an increase in Israeli settler attacks there, which has displaced hundreds of Palestinians; and tensions flaring around a flashpoint Jerusalem holy site, the Al-Aqsa Mosque. According to the New York Times, "the Palestinian Authority hasn't held national elections since 2006, partly because Mr. Abbas fears losing to Hamas..." Peace negotiations with Israel officially ended in 2014. In Gaza and the West Bank, by the 2020s, Hamas had emerged the "dominant political force" within the Palestinian territories. The Palestinian Liberation Authority and Fatah became deeply unpopular among most Palestinians. According to Eado Hech, polling has indicated that the majority of Gazans support the agenda of Hamas, with its only significant political rival now being the Palestinian Islamic Jihad organization. A large majority in Gaza were found to support terror attacks on Israeli civilians in some form as well as a "Third Intifada" against Israel. In 2023, there were several violent flare-ups in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Prior to the attack, including combatants and civilians on both sides, at least 247 Palestinians had been killed by Israeli forces, while 32 Israelis and two foreign nationals had been killed in Palestinian attacks. Hamas stated that their attack was in response to Palestinian suffering under blockade and Israel's occupation, stating "Every day they build settlements, seize our lands, kill our people". Other analysts doubted this reasoning, suggesting it was a means of gathering Western sympathy, and that the ideology of Hamas was always what they called "genocidal". Bruce Hoffman stated: "In sum, [among Hamas], any compromise over this land, including the moribund two-state solution, much less coexistence among faiths and peoples, is forbidden". The attack took place during the Jewish holiday of Simchat Torah on Shabbat, and a day after the 50th anniversary of the start of the Yom Kippur War, which also began with a surprise attack. In September, two to three weeks of violence occurred at the Gaza–Israel barrier. On 29 September, Qatar, the UN, and Egypt mediated an agreement between Israel and Hamas officials in the Gaza Strip to reopen closed crossing points and de-escelate tensions. At the time of the attack, Israel and Saudi Arabia were conducting negotiations to normalize relations, with Saudi Arabian crown prince Mohammed bin Salman recently stating that normalization was "for the first time, real". Saudi Arabia's Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it had "repeatedly warned that Israel's ongoing occupation of Gaza would propel further violence."
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Post by Newsman on Oct 13, 2023 2:42:43 GMT -5
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:45:02 GMT -5
(The Guardian) 12:34am Summary--The United Nations says it has been told by the Israeli military that some 1.1 million Palestinians in Gaza should relocate to the enclave’s south within the next 24 hours, a request it considers to be impossible “without devastating humanitarian consequences.” “The United Nations considers it impossible for such a movement to take place without devastating humanitarian consequences,” UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in a statement. --“The United Nations strongly appeals for any such order, if confirmed, to be rescinded avoiding what could transform what is already a tragedy into a calamitous situation,” the UN spokesperson said. Dujarric said the order by the Israeli military also applied to all UN staff and those sheltered in UN facilities, including schools, health centres and clinics. --The Israeli air force has dropped 6,000 bombs on Gaza since Saturday, it said late on Thursday. “Dozens of fighter jets and helicopters attacked a series of terrorist targets of the Hamas terrorist organisation throughout the Gaza Strip. So far, the IAF has dropped about 6,000 bombs against Hamas targets,” the IAF said on X. The attacks have killed 1,500 Palestinians, a third of them children, according to the Palestinian health ministry. 6,6000 have been wounded. --The UN called for $294m for ‘urgent needs’ in Gaza and the occupied West Bank. The United Nations has issued an emergency appeal for $294m to address “the most urgent needs” in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, where more than 400,000 Palestinians have fled their homes in recent days. The funds would be used to help more than 1.2 million people, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said, adding that recent fighting in the region had left aid groups without adequate resources. --Israel’s parliament approved Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s emergency unity government on Thursday, including a number of centrist opposition lawmakers, to display its determination to fight the war with Hamas in Gaza. --As Israel’s unity government was sworn in, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered a speech in which he promised, referring to hostages taken by Hamas, “We will not slacken in the effort to bring them back home.” Referring to Hamas, he called for countries that “maintain their presence” to face sanctions. As he ended the speech, he said, “Difficult days await us”. --More than 1,300 people, including 222 soldiers, have been killed in Israel, according to the military. The majority of the dead were killed in a single day, when Hamas fighters broke through the border and attacked Israeli civilians. Scores of Israeli and foreign hostages were taken back to Gaza. Israel says it has so far identified 97 of them. --Israeli bombing has destroyed eleven mosques, damaged 90 schools, according to the UN. It has also destroyed 752 residential and non-residential buildings, comprising 2,835 housing units, the UN says, citing numbers from the Gaza Ministry of Public Works and Housing. Another nearly 1,800 housing units have been damaged beyond repair and rendered uninhabitable, it said. The UN agency also voiced alarm at the significant destruction of civilian infrastructure damaged in the shelling. --More than 423,000 people have been forced to flee their homes in the Gaza Strip, the United Nations said, following heavy Israeli bombardments in retaliation for Hamas’s attacks. As of late Thursday, the number of displaced in Gaza rose by 84,444 people to reach 423,378, the UN humanitarian agency OCHA said in a statement sent on Friday. --Hundreds of Australians are preparing to get on repatriation flights out of Israel, with two planes to depart Tel Aviv for London in the next 24 hours. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said 1600 people had registered in Israel or the West Bank, including 19 in Gaza, for repatriation in what was an “extraordinary logistical exercise”. --Iran’s foreign minister, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, warned that the “continuation of war crimes against Palestine and Gaza” could open a new front of war, and that Israel will be “responsible for the consequences”.
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:47:14 GMT -5
(The Guardian) IDF issues evacuation order for Gaza CityThe IDF has announced that it is calling for the evacuation of all civilians of Gaza City from their homes “southwards”. The IDF said, “will operate significantly in Gaza City in the coming days” and that Gazans, “will only be able to return to Gaza City when another announcement permitting”. “This evacuation is for your own safety,” the IDF said. It also warned Gazans “not to approach the area of fence with Israel”. From what we can tell, the order, which appears to apply only to Gaza city, differs from what the UN said it had been told, which was that everyone in northern Gaza must evacuate to the south. The UN said this was “impossible without devastating humanitarian consequences.” The population of Gaza municipality, which includes part of Gaza city, is about 677,000 people, according to NBC.
The message from the IDF to Gazans continued: “The Hamas terrorist organisation waged a war against the state of Israel, and Gaza City is an area where military operations are taking place. This evacuation is for your own safety. You will be able to return to Gaza city only when another announcement permitting it is made. Do not approach the area of the security fence of Israel. Hamas terrorists are hiding in Gaza city, inside tunnels, underneath houses and inside buildings populated with innocent civilians who are using you as human shields. In the following days the IDF will continue to operate with significant force in Gaza city and will make extensive efforts to avoid harming civilians.”IDF Spokesman Jonathan Conricus gestured towards a map, showing that Gazans must travel south, rather than towards the fence. The fence is a far shorter distance from Gaza city than the river they have been told to cross.
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:49:13 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Conricus said, “we understand that this will take time, it’s not an easy process”. He said that the evacuation message was communicated to the UN. He did not indicate how long the IDF would give Gazans to evacuate. The UN has said it has been told the evacuations must take place in 24 hours, a task it called “impossible without devastating humanitarian consequences”.
“Our aim is to take all of Hamas’s military abilities and strip them away,” IDF spokesperson Jonathan Conricus said.
The United Nations Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) said it relocated its central operations centre and international staff to Gaza’s south to continue its humanitarian operations and support its staff and Palestinian refugees. “We urge the Israeli Authorities to protect all civilians in UNRWA shelters including schools,” the agency said on social media platform X.
“This is chaos, no one understands what to do,” said Inas Hamdan, an officer at the UN Palestinian refugee agency in Gaza City told an Associated Press reporter while she grabbed whatever she could throw into her bags as the panicked shouts of her relatives could be heard around her. She said all the UN staff in Gaza City and northern Gaza had been told to evacuate south to Rafah.
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:51:07 GMT -5
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:51:58 GMT -5
(The Guardian) The Israeli air force has released an update on X, saying 750 “targets” were struck in Gaza overnight, “including underground Hamas terror tunnels, military compounds and posts, residences of senior terrorist operatives used as military command centres, weapons storage warehouses, comms rooms and targeted senior terrorist operatives”.
Nebal Farsakh, a spokesperson for the Palestinian Red Crescent in Gaza City, told the Associated Press there was no way more than 1 million people could be safely moved that fast. “Forget about food, forget about electricity, forget about fuel. The only concern now is just if you make it, if you’re going to live,” Farsakh said, breaking into heaving sobs. “What will happen to our patients?” she asked. “We have wounded, we have elderly, we have children who are in hospitals.” Farsakh said many of the medics were refusing to evacuate hospitals and abandon patients. Instead, she said, they called their colleagues to say goodbye.
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:52:59 GMT -5
(The Guardian) 1:58am Summary--Israel’s military delivered sweeping evacuation orders for almost half of Gaza’s 2.3 million people Friday ahead of a feared ground offensive aiming to eradicate the Hamas militant group after its grisly assault into Israel, UN officials said. --The order sent panic through civilians and aid workers already struggling under Israeli airstrikes and a blockade. Israel’s directive charged that Hamas militants were hiding in tunnels under the city. “This evacuation is for your own safety,” the Israeli military said, in a warning it said was sent to Gaza City civilians. --The United Nations said it was told by the Israeli military that some 1.1 million Palestinians in northern Gaza should relocate to the enclave’s south within the next 24 hours. --The UN statement said that they had been informed that “The entire population of Gaza north of Wadi Gaza” must evacuate to southern Gaza. Wadi Gaza is the river that divides Gaza roughly into north and South. The order applied to the Gazans sheltering in UN facilities, and to UN staff. The spokesperson for the UN Secretary General said that the area included 1.1 million people, and that the task would be “impossible without devastating humanitarian consequences”. --The UN asked that the order be rescinded, saying, “The United Nations strongly appeals for any such order, if confirmed, to be rescinded avoiding what could transform what is already a tragedy into a calamitous situation,” a UN spokesperson said. --The IDF order did not specify a timeframe. In a video update, an IDF spokesperson said only, “we understand that this will take time, it’s not an easy process”. --The United Nations Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) said it relocated its central operations centre and international staff to Gaza’s south to continue its humanitarian operations and support its staff and Palestinian refugees. “We urge the Israeli Authorities to protect all civilians in UNRWA shelters including schools,” the agency said on social media platform X. --The Israeli air force has dropped 6,000 bombs on Gaza since Saturday, it said late on Thursday. “Dozens of fighter jets and helicopters attacked a series of terrorist targets of the Hamas terrorist organisation throughout the Gaza Strip. So far, the IAF has dropped about 6,000 bombs against Hamas targets,” the IAF said on X. Israel’s attacks have killed 1,500 Palestinians, a third of them children, according to the Palestinian health ministry. 6,6000 have been wounded. --The UN called for $294m for ‘urgent needs’ in Gaza and the occupied West Bank. The United Nations has issued an emergency appeal for $294m to address “the most urgent needs” in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, where more than 400,000 Palestinians have fled their homes in recent days. --Israel’s parliament approved Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s emergency unity government on Thursday, including a number of centrist opposition lawmakers, to display its determination to fight the war with Hamas in Gaza. --As Israel’s unity government was sworn in, Netanyahu delivered a speech in which he promised, referring to hostages taken by Hamas, “We will not slacken in the effort to bring them back home.” Referring to Hamas, he called for countries that “maintain their presence” to face sanctions. As he ended the speech, he said, “Difficult days await us”. --More than 1,300 people, including 222 soldiers, have been killed in Israel, according to the military. The majority of the dead were killed in a single day, when Hamas fighters broke through the border and attacked Israeli civilians. Scores of Israeli and foreign hostages were taken back to Gaza. Israel says it has so far identified 97 of them. --Israeli bombing has destroyed eleven mosques, damaged 90 schools, according to the UN. It has also destroyed 752 residential and non-residential buildings, comprising 2,835 housing units, the UN says, citing numbers from the Gaza Ministry of Public Works and Housing. Another nearly 1,800 housing units have been damaged beyond repair and rendered uninhabitable, it said. The UN agency also voiced alarm at the significant destruction of civilian infrastructure damaged in the shelling. --More than 423,000 people have been forced to flee their homes in the Gaza Strip, the United Nations said, following heavy Israeli bombardments in retaliation for Hamas’s attacks. As of late Thursday, the number of displaced in Gaza rose by 84,444 people to reach 423,378, the UN humanitarian agency OCHA said in a statement sent on Friday. --Iran’s foreign minister, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, warned that the “continuation of war crimes against Palestine and Gaza” could open a new front of war, and that Israel will be “responsible for the consequences”.
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:53:39 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Civilians inside Gaza confused and terrifiedTurkey’s Anadolu news agency is already reporting that hundreds of thousands of people have begun moving towards the Al Shifa medical complex in Gaza City, following the news of the evacuation order. Civilians inside Gaza are confused and terrified, with fears about being unable to flee from what would amount to the largest displacement in the decades, in a tiny enclave that is just 365 sq km in total. An estimated 1.1. million people live in the northern part of the Gaza Strip, which includes Gaza City and its outskirts. The Al Shifa medical complex is Gaza’s largest, a nerve centre of Gaza city’s medical infrastructure that has often provided shelter for civilians in the city during attacks or in moments of crisis. Thousands were already sheltering there, and the hospital has sustained damage from nearby airstrikes. Doctor Ghassan Abu-Sittah at Shifa hospital said yesterday: “We are at breaking point. There are wounded patients in the corridors and no beds left. The nearby refugee camp was hit, and all hospitals are beyond, beyond capacity.”
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:54:30 GMT -5
A UN vehicle moves as the Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) says it relocated its central operations centre and international staff to the south of Gaza Strip, amid Israeli strikes. Photograph: Ahmed Zakot/Reuters Residents of the Israeli kibutz of Shaar HaGolan, near the Sea of Galilee, attend a flag ceremony yesterday to pay tribute to Israelis killed during the Hamas attack. Photograph: Thomas Coex/AFP/Getty Images
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:55:15 GMT -5
(The Guardian) UN: 400,000 people displaced and 23 aid workers killed in Gaza since weekendThe UN humanitarian office (OCHA) said early on Friday that more than 400,000 people had fled their homes in the Gaza Strip and 23 aid workers had been killed since the start of Israeli retaliatory strikes in response to the Hamas attack on Saturday. The agency launched an appeal for nearly $294m (£241m/€279m) to help the 1.3 million people in Gaza and the West Bank, of which nearly half was designated for food aid as supplies run out. “Mass displacement continues. In the Gaza Strip, the cumulative number of internally displaced persons increased by 25% over the past 24 hours, now exceeding 423,000, of whom over two-thirds are taking shelter in UNRWA schools,” Reuters reports OCHA said, referring to the UN Palestinian refugee agency. It said 23 aid workers had been killed since the weekend, including 11 health workers and 12 UNRWA employees.
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:56:35 GMT -5
(The Guardian) The UK’s Foreign Office has updated its advice for British citizens within Gaza, stating: The Israeli military announced on the morning of 13 October that the entire population of Gaza north of Wadi Gaza should relocate to southern Gaza within the next 24 hours. We advise following this advice issued by the Israeli authorities. We recognise this a fast-moving situation that poses significant risks.
Hungary will not allow any rallies supporting “terrorist organisations”, its prime minister, Viktor Orbán, told public radio on Friday, adding that all Hungarian citizens should feel safe, regardless of their faith or origin. “It is shocking that there are sympathy rallies supporting the terrorists across Europe,” Reuters reports Orbán said. “There have been attempts even in Hungary. But we will not allow sympathy rallies supporting terrorist organisations as that would entail a terror threat to Hungarian citizens.”
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:57:27 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Hamas calls on people to stay home and ignore Israeli evacuation ordersHamas has called on Palestinians to stay in their homes after Israel issued sweeping evacuation orders in Gaza. The Hamas authority for refugee affairs on Friday called on residents of the north of the territory to “remain steadfast in your homes and to stand firm in the face of this disgusting psychological war waged by the occupation”, AP reports. Israel has ordered the evacuation of northern Gaza, including Gaza City, home to hundreds of thousands of people. Palestinians would only be able to flee south within Gaza as Israel has completely sealed off the territory. The UN says that 400,000 Palestinians have already been displaced.
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:58:25 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Israel’s foreign ministry on Friday said it expressed “deep disappointment” in a call with the Chinese envoy to the Middle East over China’s lack of condemnation of Hamas’s weekend attack. “The ambassador expressed Israel’s deep disappointment with Chinese announcements and statements about the recent events in the south, where there was no clear and unequivocal condemnation of the terrible massacre committed by the terrorist organization Hamas against innocent civilians and the abduction of dozens of them to Gaza,” Reuters reports the statement said. Meanwhile, at a press conference in Tokyo, the local representative of Palestine’s permanent mission spoke out against the west’s support of Israel, but said Japan could continue to play a neutral role. “It is really pathetic that we hear many voices from the west, leaders unfortunately … that call on Israel to bombard Gaza more,” Waleed Siam said. “This violence has to stop on both sides.”
(Guardian correspondent) Bethan McKernan reports that in a highly unusual move, trains will be operating during Shabbat in Israel. Services will run from Ben Gurion airport to Tel Aviv and to Beersheba. The Jeruslam Post reports that the transportation ministry has said the trains are in order to aid the war effort, and that journeys will be free.
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Post by Webster on Oct 13, 2023 2:58:51 GMT -5
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