The New York Times reports that the Israeli Ministry of Diaspora Affairs has organised a campaign on social media to influence US lawmakers to support Israel’s actions in its war on Gaza.

Citing unnamed officials and documents, the US newspaper reported that the ministry paid $2m for the campaign and hired Stoic, a political marketing firm in Tel Aviv, to carry it out.

It said the campaign started in October and is still ongoing on X. It used hundreds of fake accounts that posed as real Americans on X, Facebook and Instagram to post pro-Israel comments.

The accounts reportedly targeted US lawmakers, especially those who are Black and Democrat, with posts urging them to continue funding Israel’s military.

Israeli government to call up 50,000 more reservists: Report

Israel’s military is winding down operations at the Sde Teiman detention camp, which has been dogged by allegations of abuse of Palestinian prisoners, according to Israeli justice officials.

State lawyers, responding to a petition filed by an Israeli rights group, said 1,200 prisoners in the camp have already been transferred out, leaving just 200 inmates there.

The reduced numbers will help officials improve conditions at the camp, whose ultimate future has yet to be decided, they say.

Inmates of Sde Teiman, located in the Negev desert, have experienced harrowing abuse, according to whistleblowers, including routine beatings, forced stress positions and amputations due to handcuff injuries.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) says it’s significantly stepped up its security measures after facing what it describes as “unprecedented attempts of intelligence gathering by countries hostile to the court”.

Media investigations published last week found that Israel used its intelligence agencies to threaten the ICC to drop war crimes investigations.

A former Meta engineer who is suing his employer for discrimination and wrongful termination says he was fired after trying to address irregularities in the handling of posts by Palestinian Instagram personalities, including Gaza-based photojournalist Motaz Azaiza, Reuters reports.

In one case, engineer Ferras Hamad alleges a video shared by Azaiza was “misclassified” as pornography even though it showed a destroyed building in Gaza, Reuters said.

In a complaint lodged in a California state court, Hamad said he believed he might have been fired after he noted irregularities in troubleshooting procedures where posts from Palestinian Instagram personalities were prevented from appearing in searches and feeds.

Hamad said Meta told him he was fired for violating a policy barring employees from working on issues with accounts of people they know personally, referring to Azaiza. Hamad said he had no personal connection to Azaiza.

Meta did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on Hamad’s allegations.

Marking World Environment Day, the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees has highlighted the harm Israel’s assault has done to the environment in the Gaza Strip in a post on X.

UNRWA said the war has caused “catastrophic damage to the natural environment” that Palestinians depend on for water, clean air, food and livelihoods.

It added that restoring environmental services to Gaza will take “decades” and can begin only when a ceasefire and an end to the war are achieved.

In late January this year, research found that the carbon footprint of Israel’s war on Gaza exceeded the annual emissions of 20 small countries.

Israeli settlers bulldozed Palestinian lands in the Wadi Qana area, northwest of Salfit in the West bank, Palestinian news agency Wafa reports.

Activist Nazmi al-Salman told Wafa that the goal of this attack is to place a fence along and create a buffer zone for the benefit of the illegal Yakir and Novim settlements.

Israel’s military bulldozed Palestinian-owned agricultural land and damaged infrastructure during a raid on the village of Kafr Dan, in the illegally occupied West Bank, the Wafa news agency is reporting.

The latest destruction comes as the World Food Programme reported in February that an estimated 600,000 Palestinians are experiencing food insecurity in the occupied West Bank, amid escalating Israeli military and settler violence, arbitrary arrests, and movement restrictions on the local population since October.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has issued an alert following reports of demolitions of Palestinian-owned property in the town of Duma, located about 25km (15.5 miles) southeast of Nablus city.

According to the OCHA, 10,794 Palestinian-owned structures have been demolished across the occupied West Bank by Israeli authorities since 2009. The demolitions have displaced 16,377 people.

“The threat of destruction of homes and sources of livelihood contributes to the generation of a coercive environment pressuring people to leave their areas of residence,” the OCHA said.

Confrontations broke out and gunfire was exchanged between Palestinian groups and the Israeli military as Israeli forces raided the Jenin area of the occupied West Bank, the Wafa news agency reports.

The Israeli military shot one man in the shoulder during its raid on Jenin, while another man and a child were also injured by shrapnel in the nearby town of Kafr Dan. Nine people have also been arrested during raids on homes in Kafr Dan, Wafa reports, while two men have been arrested in the town of Kafr Qaddum, east of Qalqilya.

Palestinian news agency Wafa reports that Israeli forces have rounded up 35 people in the town of Beit Ummar, 11km (6.8 miles) northwest of Hebron, where we earlier reported an Israeli army campaign was under way.

The arrests come during a familiar wave of raids across the occupied West Bank, with Israeli forces also moving into areas near Jenin, Nablus, Ramallah and Jericho.

Wafa news agency reports that nearly 800 far-right Israelis have stormed the mosque’s grounds, under the protection of Israeli police, ahead of the provocative “Flag March” taking place today in occupied East Jerusalem.

Sources told Wafa that sources said that one of the groups that entered the compound was accompanied by former lawmaker Moshe Feiglin.

Later today, a “Flag March” of thousands of far-right extremist Israelis will take place in occupied Jerusalem, commemorating “Jerusalem Day”, an Israeli public holiday that marks the day that Israel gained full control over Jerusalem in 1967.

The route takes marchers through the Damascus Gate and the city’s Muslim Quarter, past Al-Aqsa Mosque.

“The march of flags in occupied Jerusalem is an aggression against our peoples and holy sites”, a statement from Hamas says.

This “Flag March” in past years has prompted calls from both inside Israel and the international community for a change of route, due to the violence that often accompanies it. The march is expected to commence in the early afternoon, local time.

This march is definitely provocative. It marks the end of the 1967 war and the annexation of East Jerusalem. The march tends to be organised by young Israeli ultranationalist youth, many of whom shout out anti-Arab, anti-Palestinian slogans in reference to the Nakba.

Their route starts at Damascus Gate, one of the seven main entrances into the Old City. They go through the Muslim quarter, which is incredibly provocative, especially for the Palestinians who have shops there. And then they end up in the Western Wall. In previous years, the marchers have damaged property.

For many Palestinians, this day marks a tragedy. It also takes place in an area they hope will one day be the capital of a Palestinian state.

You’ve got far-right ministers like Itamar Ben-Gvir saying they will be attending this march. We’re yet to see him. But he is someone who has carried out many provocative moves, such as storming Al Aqsa Mosque compound.

Israeli attacks killed at least 38 Palestinians in Gaza on Tuesday. Among the dead were eight Palestinian policemen, who died when an Israeli attack hit their car in Deir el-Balah.

Al Jazeera’s Tareq Abu Azzoum reports from central Gaza:

Displaced Palestinians flee Bureij refugee camp as Israeli ground forces advance

Displaced people flee from the east of the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip amid Israeli bombardments and an incursion by ground troops on June 4, 2024

Israeli military attack kills 8 in Maghazi refugee camp: Report

Israel attacks central Gaza as civilian victims flood overwhelmed hospital

The Israeli Air Force carried out several air strikes on the Bureij refugee camp on Tuesday, including hitting a school compound, ahead of “follow-on ground operations” by Israeli troops, war monitors report.

The start of the incursion yesterday was the second ground attack on the refugee camp since December, when Israeli forces then sought to clear a Hamas battalion based in the Bureij area, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) and the Critical Threats Project (CTP) report.

Israel’s return to the Bureij camp “reflects that Palestinian militias remain combat effective there”, the US-based defence think tanks said in their latest battlefield assessment.

“Hamas retains a presence around Bureij in part because its fighters probably move into areas that Israeli forces are not actively clearing to preserve Hamas combat strength and facilitate later reconstitution efforts,” the ISW/CTP said.

Rockets continued to be fired at Israel from the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, with the Palestinian Mujahideen Movement behind the latest attack, the monitors said.

3/ Hamas remains confident that it will survive Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip and can therefore maintain its maximalist demands without granting major concessions.

Full update: https://t.co/g17iDEVCL1 pic.twitter.com/pFNM0RdXCl

— Institute for the Study of War (@TheStudyofWar) June 5, 2024

‘Shocking’ scene in Al-Aqsa Hospital as casualties continue to pour in

In a post on X, Israel’s far-right national security minister says he will continue to undermine Netanyahu’s fragile governing coalition until he sees the full details of a ceasefire plan currently under consideration.

Ben-Gvir, who has advocated for “resettling” Gaza, has repeatedly threatened to topple Netanyahu’s government if the PM agrees to any deal to end the war before defeating Hamas.

Netanyahu, for his part, has maintained that the prospective plan would enable Israel to complete its war aims, including “eliminating Hamas”, before reaching a final ceasefire.

But it’s unclear how this scenario would play out as the deal, as outlined by Biden, stipulates a six-week ceasefire in stage one and then negotiations for a permanent ceasefire in stage two.

Israeli court upholds 35-day ban on Al Jazeera operations in Israel

Arab League calls for ‘immediate and permanent cessation of Israeli war on Gaza’

An Al Jazeera correspondent reports that the Israeli army has bombed the outskirts of the town of Kfarchouba in southern Lebanon with incendiary shells.

The Lebanese News Agency also confirmed that Israeli artillery bombarded the town of Aita al-Shaab in the south of the country with firebombs, causing fires to break out in the surrounding woods.

UK embassy denies it warned Lebanon of upcoming Israeli attack

On potential Israel-Lebanon escalation, ‘actors are no longer rational’

At least 10 injured in drone attack in Galilee: Report

Shells fired from Lebanon hit Hurfeish without activating the sirens: Army spokesperson

The authority says, in a statement carried by the Wafa news agency, that Israel’s Mekorot water company has reduced the volume of water allocated to the Hebron and Bethlehem governorates in the occupied West Bank.

The statement says approximately 35 percent less water was pumped from the main source for the two governorates, Deir Shaar.

The Palestinian Water Authority stressed that this reduction, coming at the beginning of summer’s hot and dry season, will exacerbate the yearly water shortage experienced by communities in the West Bank.

If war continues unabated, more than one million Palestinians in Gaza could suffer the highest level of starvation by mid-July, according to a report by the UN’s World Health Organization (WHO) and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

That would be an increase from 677,000 people who were experiencing famine-level conditions in March, as documented by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification.

The joint WHO-FAO report said hunger in Gaza is being exacerbated by intensive restrictions on aid access and the collapse of its local food system. “In the absence of a cessation of hostilities and increased access, the impact on mortality and the lives of the Palestinians now, and in future generations, will increase markedly with every day, even if famine is avoided in the near term,” the report said.

Saleem Oweis, spokesperson for UNICEF’s Middle East and North Africa office, says children in Gaza are “forced to deal with the horrific reality of loss, of trauma, of total destruction”.

“The whole story is even darker than what we see. [The trauma] runs deeper as they grow up,” he told Al Jazeera.

Oweis said that before October 7, about 5,000 children in Gaza needed some kind of mental health support. Today, all children in Gaza need mental health support and, in many cases, specialised support because the war has had “a profound impact on their psychological wellness”.

“The services on the ground are almost nonexistent. The only psychiatric hospital in Gaza has been out of service early on in this escalation, and that means the basic needs of mental health can’t be met,” he said.

As long as children continue to witness and experience the war, “it’s really hard to deal with the trauma.”

“The first of the eight principles of trauma is to remove the person from the environment of the trauma. That’s impossible in Gaza. There’s no place that feels safe,” Oweis said.

Hamas has said it will respond “seriously and positively” with any ceasefire proposal that is based on the total halt of war, complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and an Israeli captives-Palestinian prisoners swap deal.

Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh said in a statement that the group is engaging in negotiations “guided by this stance which reflects the will of our people and its valiant resistance”.

A resumption of mediated talks between Israel and Hamas on a hostage-release deal would not mean a suspension of the war, Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant has said.

“Any negotiations with Hamas would be conducted only under fire,” Gallant said in remarks carried by Israeli media.

Israel’s hardline Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich says the Hamas attack on October 7 “has nothing to do with me” as he opposed a truce deal in the war on Gaza.

“There are prices that a nation that loves life cannot afford,” Smotrich told Kan radio.

Smotrich said the Hamas attack that killed more than 1,110 people “was an insane intelligence-operational failure”.

“Those who are responsible should have gone home a long time ago,” he said.