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Forums - Politics Discussion - Israel-Hamas war, Gaza genocide

SvennoJ on 30 May 2024

Red Crescent paramedics killed in Rafah among latest to die in Israeli attacks

Israeli ground forces are blowing up buildings in the east of Rafah as artillery targeted western and central parts of the city in attacks overnight and into the early hours of this morning, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa and Al Jazeera Arabic.

Among those killed were two paramedic staff with the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) who died when their ambulance was bombed by Israeli forces in Rafah’s Tal as-Sultan area as they carried out their “humanitarian duty”, the organisation said.

Wafa reports that three people were also killed in an Israeli strike on a home in Tal as-Sultan on Wednesday evening, and at least five people were injured when their car was hit by Israeli forces as they travelled west of Rafah.

Israeli attack helicopters fired missiles at the Zeitoun neighbourhood, east of Gaza City, and dead and wounded people were recovered from the rubble of a separate house attacked in the east of the city, Wafa reports.


Palestinians flee after the Israeli army targeted a tent camp for the displaced in al-Mawasi, which was previously declared a ‘safe zone’ by Israel, near Rafah in southern Gaza, on May 28

Satellite images shows scale of displacement after Israeli strike on Rafah tent camp


This image shows dozens of tents set up near a UN facility in Tal as-Sultan on May 26, 2024, a day before Israel launched a deadly attack on the area


Two days after the missiles attack, on May 29, 2024, the ground appears charred while most of the tents housing the displaced have disappeared

USAID chief says conditions in Gaza ‘worse now than ever before’

Samantha Power, administrator at the US Agency for International Development (USAID), has said that the group’s partners have called conditions in Gaza “worse now than ever before”, adding that Israeli military operations are “making it extremely difficult to distribute aid”.

Children suffer ‘acute malnutrition’ as Israeli blockade slashes aid to Gaza: UN report

Many women and children were reported among the 121 Palestinians killed and 394 injured in Israeli attacks on Gaza between Monday and Wednesday afternoon, according to the latest situation report by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

OCHA also reports that the flow of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip has plummeted by almost 70 percent since May 7, and what was entering the Palestinian territory prior to that date was “already insufficient to meet the soaring needs”.

Since mid-January, more than 93,000 Palestinian children aged between six months and under five years have been screened for malnutrition, OCHA reports, with 7,280 diagnosed with acute malnutrition, including 1,676 with severe acute malnutrition.

‘Genocide by attrition’: Int’l community must end Israel’s ‘man-made famine’ in Gaza

A legal think tank focused on the global prevention of genocide has reiterated its condemnation of Israel’s use of “starvation as a weapon war”, pointing out that man-made famine is known as “genocide by attrition”.

The US-based Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention said that engineering a famine to “weaken or destroy a group” is a genocidal act.

“We are devastated that innocent civilians, including thousands of children, have already lost their lives in a situation that has been – and continues to be – predictable and preventable,” the institute said on social media.

“We call on the international community to end the blockade of humanitarian aid entering into Gaza and to initiate a permanent ceasefire throughout Israel and Palestine,” it said.



Israel will go down in history for causing the genocide that will prompt to add "using starvation against the group" to the genocide convention. It's a war crime already of course yet down at the bottom currently as laying a medieval siege to 2.3 million people was likely not thought all that possible...

Article 54(1) of the 1977 Additional Protocol I provides: “Starvation of civilians as a method of warfare is prohibited.” Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts (Protocol I), Geneva, 8 June 1977, Article 54(1).

https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/war-crimes.shtml

Yet Israel will likely 'upgrade' it from 2 (War crimes) b. (Other serious violations) XXV to a. (Grave breaches)

Anyway Israel is committing a ton of war crimes according to that list.



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SvennoJ on 30 May 2024

Belgian police crackdown on pro-Palestine protest in front of Israel’s embassy

Police in Belgium have fired tear gas and water cannon for a second day to disperse a pro-Palestine protest in front of the Israeli embassy in the country’s capital, Brussels, according to videos posted online.

The live footage, broadcast by the European Palestinian Media Centre (EPMC) and verified by Al Jazeera’s Sanad agency, showed dozens of young people chanting “Intifada” (uprising) as police in riot gear blocked their path towards the Israeli diplomatic mission.

Other videos, posted by the EPMC as well as the Russian Sputnik agency, showed the protesters running for cover after police deployed tear gas and water cannon.

The Brussels Times reported a similar crackdown on Tuesday, when hundreds of protesters gathered outside the Israeli mission, chanting, “Enough is enough, resistance is justified”. The news outlet said one protester who was struck in the face by a police baton required medical treatment.

Xi reiterates Chinese support for Palestine UN membership, commits $3m to UNRWA

President Xi Jinping has signalled China’s desire for closer ties with the Arab world in a speech to the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum in Beijing.

Speaking a little earlier today, Xi addressed Bahrain, Egypt, the UAE and Tunisia’s heads of state, as well as foreign ministers from other Arab League nations.

Among other proposals were several pledges to the Palestinian cause, including a donation of $3m to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) and a promise of Chinese support in the reconstruction of Gaza, the Reuters news agency reports.

Xi also reiterated Chinese backing for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state and full membership of the United Nations. He added that Israel’s war on Gaza cannot continue indefinitely and the “two-state solution” cannot be wavered.


Egypt’s el-Sisi calls on int’l community to ensure Palestinians not ‘forcibly displaced’

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has called on the international community to ensure that Palestinians are not displaced from war-torn Gaza.

“I call on the international community to immediately provide for long-term humanitarian assistance to the Gaza Strip and to end the Israeli siege, and to stop any attempt at forcing Palestinians to forcibly flee their land,” el-Sisi said at the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum in Beijing.

Earlier we reported that President Xi Jinping had signalled China’s desire for closer ties with the Arab world in a speech at the forum.

Last edited by SvennoJ - on 30 May 2024

SvennoJ on 30 May 2024

Two Israeli soldiers killed in occupied West Bank car ramming attack

The Israeli military identified the soldiers killed near the city of Nablus on Wednesday night as two 20-year-old sergeants in the Kfir Brigade.

According to reports, the vehicle attack occurred near the illegal Israeli settlement of Itamar outside the occupied West Bank city.

According to the Times of Israel, the suspected attacker later turned himself over to the Palestinian Authority security forces after fleeing into Nablus.

Fire breaks out at Ramallah market amid Israeli raids

Emergency workers in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah extinguished a fire at a central vegetable market caused by Israeli munitions, according to Al Jazeera Arabic and the Wafa news agency.

There were no immediate reports of casualties.

Wafa also reported clashes between Israeli forces and Palestinians in the city, with soldiers firing live bullets, stun grenades and tear gas. At least one Palestinian was wounded by the live fire, the news agency said.

The Israeli attack on Ramallah was part of a wave of military night raids across the occupied West Bank, according to Wafa.


Fighting rages in the occupied West Bank

Violent clashes appear to be ongoing between Palestinian fighters and Israeli forces in Tubas, a city located in the north of the occupied West Bank.

In videos posted on Telegram by local media sources and verified by Al Jazeera, rapid gunfire can be heard around Tubas after it was stormed by Israeli forces.



SvennoJ on 30 May 2024

Israeli military says soldier killed, 3 injured fighting in Gaza north and south

The Israeli military said a 21-year-old sergeant in the parachute brigade of the 101st Battalion was killed fighting in northern Gaza on Thursday while another member of the unit was seriously injured.

In southern Gaza, two soldiers with Israel’s Combat Engineering Corps were seriously wounded in fighting and evacuated to Israel for medical treatment.

As of Wednesday, 290 Israeli soldiers had been killed and 1,831 injured in fighting in Gaza or along the territory’s border with Israel since the ground invasion of the Palestinian enclave was launched in the aftermath of the October 7 attack.

Four Palestinians killed in Israeli attack on Nuseirat

Our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic are reporting that Israeli shelling of a house in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza has killed four people and wounded 14 others. Al Jazeera correspondents also reported that an Israeli strike on a residential building in Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza caused casualties. The toll was not immediately clear.


Control of Philadelphi Corridor will not stop Hamas efforts to ‘reconstitute’ forces: Monitors

Israeli military officials believe that controlling the Philadelphi Corridor between Gaza and the Egyptian border will prevent Palestinian armed groups from importing weapons into the territory.

However, US-based defence think tanks – the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) and the Critical Threats Project (CTP) – said Hamas “will continue its efforts to reconstitute throughout the Gaza Strip, despite these efforts”.

In their latest joint battlefield assessment, the ISW/CTP note that Israeli forces controlled 70 percent of the corridor by May 22 – two weeks after first launching their ongoing ground invasion of Rafah.

Israel’s military claimed that Hamas had used the corridor area to launch rocket attacks in recent weeks and had likely assumed that Israeli forces would avoid carrying out strikes in the area for fear of accidentally hitting nearby Egyptian territory, the ISW/CTP report.

In the ongoing fighting for Rafah city, Hamas fighters have used “house-borne improvised explosive devices” which are detonated when Israeli troops enter and have been used to lethal effect, killing three soldiers and injuring five others so far, the monitors add.


Israeli military renews offensive in Gaza City’s Zeitoun

We have confirmed reports of the Israeli military pushing more ground forces into the eastern part of Gaza City, mainly the Zeitoun neighbourhood, in what seems to be a renewed invasion of the area. In doing so, it’s destroying the vast majority of the remaining public facilities and infrastructure.

The Zeitoun neighbourhood has been stormed and invaded many times before – and every time the level of destruction becomes much more visible. It’s causing further civilian casualties and creating more tragedies on the ground for people already displaced and traumatised.

 



SvennoJ on 30 May 2024

‘Unprecedented hardship’ as Israeli forces take control of Jabalia

For 16 days, Israeli forces have advanced into the central areas of the northern Gaza Strip and now have full military control all over Jabalia refugee camp, Sheikh Zayed and Beit Lahiya.

In addition to that, al-Faluja is under heavy artillery and aerial attacks right now. Snipers and quadcopters are shooting everyone who moves in these areas, and civil defence cannot reach the dead bodies in the streets because of the heavy fire.

Some 200,000 Palestinians have had to flee the northern Gaza Strip and the east of the northern Gaza Strip to the west – on the orders of the Israeli forces – in order to have a safer place or a shelter.

All of these people had to flee without water, food or even batteries to light up the dark nights there.

These people are experiencing unprecedented hardship and crushing humanitarian circumstances. And when it comes to food here, famine stalks northern Gaza again as nothing has entered the territory for a very long time, and people here are asking when this will end.

Bodies of killed Palestinian medics recovered

The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) has recovered the bodies of two of its paramedics who were killed in Rafah’s Tal as-Sultan area last night. As we reported earlier, the paramedics – Haitham Tubasi and Suhail Hassouna – were killed when Israeli forces bombed their ambulance, according to PRCS.

“The Israeli occupation forces deliberately bombed the ambulance vehicle despite it bearing the internationally protected Red Crescent emblem,” PRCS said in a post on X.



Three killed by sniper fire in Gaza City: Report

Israeli snipers have shot dead at least three civilians in Gaza City’s Tal al-Hawa neighbourhood, reports the Wafa news agency.

The civilians were shot in the street near the University of College of Applied Sciences (UCAS), Wafa said.


Israeli warplanes strike northern Gaza home, kill one

Our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic are reporting more casualties in northern Gaza. According to their reports, Israeli air strikes have hit a home in Shati camp, to the west of Gaza City, killing at least one person and injuring six.

In Gaza City’s nearby Zeitoun neighbourhood, as we previously reported, Israel has renewed a ground offensive, invading the area for the fourth time during the war.



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SvennoJ on 30 May 2024

UK’s Labour blocks politician from elections for liking tweet critical of Israel

Faiza Shaheen said the Labour Party has blocked her from standing in the upcoming elections in the United Kingdom, over a series of posts she liked on X, including ones that were critical of Israel and detailed her own experiences of Islamophobia.

The tweet on Israel referenced a sketch by the American comedian Jon Stewart and said:

“Every time you say something even mildly critical of Israel, you’re immediately assailed by scores of hysterical people who explain to you why you’re completely wrong, how you’re biased against Israel. Moreover, you can’t easily ignore them because those are not just random people. They tend to be friends or people who move in the same circles as you. Those people are mobilised by professional organisations.”

Shaheen told BBC Newsnight that she does not remember liking the post, and said she was told the line about professional organisations plays into anti-Semitic tropes.

Shaheen, a former Labour candidate in the north London constituency of Chingford & Woodford Green, said she was still in a state of shock over the Labour Party’s move.

UN special rapporteur calls out women leaders’ support for Israel’s war on Gaza

Francesca Albanese, the UN’s expert on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territory, has taken aim at the EU’s top female leader, Ursula von der Leyen, and recent US presidential hopeful Nikki Haley.

In a post on social media, Albanese said that she was “proud” when women leaders speak. But not always.

“Sometimes, I am painfully ashamed,” she wrote in a post above the tagged social media accounts of the EU Commission President von der Leyen and Haley, a former US ambassador to the UN under then-President Donald Trump.

Von der Leyen has come under stinging criticism for what was described as her “uncontrolled” support for Israel at the start of the war on Gaza, including a letter signed by more than 800 EU officials criticising her apparent “indifference” to the slaughter of Palestinian civilians in Gaza.

Haley, who pulled out of the presidential race in March due to lack of support, was photographed writing “Finish Them!” on an Israeli artillery shell while visiting Israel.



Hilary Clinton is just as bad.



US' weakness leads to Iran recruiting from the USA... How far things have gone

Khamenei welcomes US students into Iran-backed ‘Resistance Front’

In an open letter to student protesters in the US, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has told them that they have “now formed a branch of the Resistance Front”.

Khamenei described his letter as an “expression of our empathy and solidarity” with the protesters, who set up pro-Palestine encampments on university campuses across the US this month, until they faced violent eviction by authorities.

“The greater Resistance Front which shares the same understandings and feelings that you have today, has been engaged in the same struggle for many years in a place far from you,” Khamenei wrote, referring to the collection of Iran-backed militias and terror groups around the Middle East.



Satire turned real life. Not helping the protests in the slightest, just more ammo for Fox to paint student protests as Iran backed protests.

Australian public servants urge government to end arms exports to Israel

More than 300 Australian public servants have signed an open letter condemning Australia’s complicity in Israel’s “genocide” in Gaza and urging the government of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to halt all military exports to Israel.

“The bombs killing and maiming a population that is nearly 80% refugees and nearly 50% children are dropped by F-35 warplanes with parts exclusively manufactured in Australia,” the letter said.

“Rosebank Engineering in Victoria is the only company in the world that makes the mechanism that allows the F-35 to drop bombs,” it said.

The letter said Australia has increased arms exports to Israel since the hostilities began, despite countries like Canada, Belgium, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands having suspended arms exports to Israel.

It went on to warn that Australian state officials who fail to stop exporting weapons or munitions to Israel may be criminally liable for aiding and abetting war crimes.



SvennoJ on 30 May 2024

Israeli seizure of Philadelphi Corridor a “red line” for Egypt

Tamer Qarmout, assistant professor in public policy at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, spoke to Al Jazeera about the Israeli military’s recent announcement that they had taken control of the Philadelphi Corridor.

He said this move signals a “red line” for the Egyptian government, adding that they are concerned about how it will impact their Camp David peace agreement with Israel.

Israel has crossed many red lines laid out by the international community, he said,  and the failure of the United States to stop them has given Israel the “upper hand” in the war.

He said the latest seizure of the Philadelphi Corridor “signals a new stage” which will likely lead to “a long presence of Israeli troops in Gaza” and “reoccupation of the Gaza Strip”.

More damage to hospitals, schools as Israel takes control of Philadelphi Corridor

The Israeli military is continuing to carry out air strikes and artillery shelling on Rafah city.

At the same time, it is quietly taking over the Philadelphi Corridor in what looks like part of its strategy of building a buffer zone, a demilitarised area on the Egyptian border.

We’re looking at a depth of at least 1km (0.6 miles), extending from the northern part of the Philadelphi Corridor into Rafah city.

This means the majority of residential buildings and public facilities there, including schools, hospitals and privately owned clinics, will be destroyed for this demilitarised area.




LurkerJ on 30 May 2024

So it's confirmed, Diane was actually banned from running, what? British AIPAC/labour friends of Israel didn't approve? 

Scandalous. The way Labour is willing to take all the negative PR and sacrifice seats for a foreign ultra right religious government is insane. Less insane than what Biden is doing giving the competition, but still.....



SvennoJ on 30 May 2024

Ramallah vegetable market ‘in ruins’ after fire

We are now at the vegetable market, where civil defence teams are still trying to put out a fire that erupted after Israeli forces raided this area.

They raided the area at about midnight, throwing tear gas and stun grenades, causing fire to erupt. No one was able to get to the area until the Israeli raid was over. They are still putting it out after hours and hours.

Vendors usually come here every day to work. For some of them, it is their only source of income. Now it’s all in ruins.

In addition to the vegetable market, buildings nearby were also affected. A civil defence crew member is warning us that they expect one of the buildings to fall down.

Twenty arrested in latest West Bank raids

Israeli forces have rounded up 20 people across the occupied West Bank since last night, according to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society, which keeps a daily record of arrests.

Two women and one child were among those arrested, according to the group, adding that one of the women was later released.

The majority of those apprehended were in the Hebron governorate, while the others were in the governorates of Qalqilya, Bethlehem, Tubas and Jerusalem, it said.

Since October 7, Israeli forces have made 8,955 arrests in near daily raids across the West Bank, according to the Prisoner’s Society.


The aftermath of Israeli raid in el-Bireh area of Ramallah








SvennoJ on 30 May 2024

Victims of Rafah strikes rushed to Nasser Hospital

Palestinians killed and wounded in recent strikes in Rafah are being brought to Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, according to video footage verified by Al Jazeera’s Sanad fact-checking agency.

The footage, shared on Palestinian social media channels, shows a group of people, some with shirts stained with blood, crying while huddled around the bodies of several men apparently killed.

According to the Wafa news agency, Israeli attacks in Rafah have already killed 12 people since dawn today. Many of those victims, it said, were targeted while trying to retrieve the body of a person killed in Rafah centre.

Israeli drone strike kills seven in northern Gaza

The attack hit a centre where displaced people were sheltering, our colleagues on the ground have reported.

The attack follows our reports of another strike in the Shati camp to the west of Gaza City, which killed at least one person.

In recent weeks, Israeli forces have repeatedly attacked shelters housing displaced people in the north. On May 25, at least 10 people, including numerous children, were killed in a UN-run school turned shelter in Jabalia.


Palestinians sift through rubble after Israeli strike on Nuseirat

Palestinians check the rubble of the Zaqout family’s house hit during an overnight Israeli bombardment in Nuseirat, in the central Gaza Strip, on May 30



Gaza residents face health crisis from makeshift landfills

Maghazi camp in central Gaza has been turned into a landfill, with dozens of tonnes of waste dumped there every day. To stop the rubbish from piling up, much of it is burned, posing severe health risks to the surrounding population.

Gaza’s death toll rises

At least 36,224 Palestinians have been killed and 81,777 wounded in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7, its Health Ministry says. The ministry added that 53 people were killed and 357 injured in the latest 24-hour reporting period.