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

SvennoJ on 31 August 2024

Israel’s West Bank raids aimed at ‘crushing any resistance’ to occupation plans

Mustafa Barghouti, secretary-general of the Palestinian National Initiative, has condemned Israel’s mass raids in the occupied West Bank as a strategic move to expand control over the territory and displace more Palestinians.

“Israel’s goal is to break down any form of resistance to their political plan,” Barghouti told Al Jazeera. “And their political plan is nothing but expansion of settlements all over the West Bank, annexation of the West Bank… and destruction of any kind of Palestinian authority.”

In effect, Barghouti added, Israel is waging a war on occupied people, which is a violation of international law and represents a “fascist shift”.

“Why are they [Israeli authorities] doing it now?” said Barghouti. “Because they saw the weak reaction from the international community to the atrocities, the genocide in Gaza,” emboldening them to act violently in the West Bank.


Palestinians are stopped by Israeli security forces, during an Israeli raid in Jenin, in the occupied West Bank, August 31


West Bank assault part of plan to ‘ethnically cleanse’ Palestinians

Mohamad Elmasry, professor in the media studies programme at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, says Israel’s continuing assault in the occupied West Bank was planned before October 7.

“Israel’s plans involve annexing Palestinian land, ultimately over time getting rid of the Palestinian population and ethnically cleansing the West Bank and Gaza,” he told Al Jazeera. “From Israel’s perspective, right now is the perfect time to go to war with the West Bank because people are sort of distracted by what is happening in Gaza.”

Elmasry added that Israel has been emboldened by the lack of response by the US for its ongoing war in Gaza. “So if it can get away with it there, why [would Israel] not in the West Bank?” Elmasry said.


Netanyahu’s ‘problematic’ plan to weaken the Palestinian Authority

Alon Pinkas, former ambassador and Consul General of Israel in New York, says that he doesn’t believe there is a plan for Israel to annex “a wide swath of the West Bank”.

“This government is intent on weakening the Palestinian Authority,” he told Al Jazeera from Tel Aviv. “With this [West Bank] operation, Israel is weakening the Palestinian Authority to the point that there’s not going to be anyone to negotiate with, and that is the grand plan that the government has.”

“Mr Netanyahu is doing something very problematic here, very ominous here, in that he is creating a situation, an environment in which further negotiations with the Palestinians three, four, five years from now would probably be impossible because of the weakness and fragility of the Palestinian Authority.”



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SvennoJ on 31 August 2024

No aid, medics entering Jenin during raid

The raid in Jenin is continuing. There have been several gun battles or exchanges of fire between Israeli forces and Palestinian fighters. Videos emerging from the refugee camp show extensive damage, including to a mosque.

Palestinian residents continue to plea for access to food, water and paramedics, all of which are being obstructed. Residents of the refugee camp have pretty much no access to outside help.


Smoke rises next to an armoured vehicle during an Israeli raid in Jenin, in the occupied West Bank, August 31


Paramedics struggling to make contact with Jenin camp

Jenin is a ghost town. All of the shops are closed. Nobody is leaving their homes.

We’re right outside the refugee camp and we’ve been hearing exchanges of gunfire and loud explosions for the past 40 minutes. Israeli military jeeps and armoured personnel carriers have been zooming in and out of this area, leaving skidmarks on the road.

We are having difficulty getting information from inside the camp, as have paramedics. Telecommunications have been obstructed. There is no electricity. It’s difficult to ascertain whether there are people injured or not.

Paramedics have told me this is the most difficult assault on Jenin they’ve seen in a very, very long time.


Residents flee Jenin camp as Israel’s West Bank assault continues

Tensions continue to remain high in Jenin. We have seen residents from the refugee camp fleeing their homes. We have been hearing exchanges of gunfire and loud explosions coming closer to the entrance of the camp, where we are located.

Paramedics tell us they are trying to access an injured boy who was shot in the head. There are also reports of at least two men’s bodies lying on the street without moving as the camp remains isolated on the fourth day.


Ambulance shot at in Jenin: PRCS

The Palestine Red Crescent Society says Israeli forces have fired at one of its ambulances in Jenin, where a violent raid has reportedly caused Palestinian casualties and cut off electricity and telecommunications.

The ambulance was hit, PRCS says, despite its entry being coordinated ahead of time.

Since October 7, PRCS medics have been repeatedly targeted while on the job in the occupied West Bank, with at least 22 of them killed, according to the organisation.


‘This is not Gaza. This is Jenin’: Head of the Palestinian Mission to the UK

Husam Zomlot has posted a video on X from Israel’s siege on Jenin in the occupied West Bank. He wrote, “Israel’s occupation army invaded, killing and injuring dozens and destroying homes and infrastructure.”



SvennoJ on 31 August 2024

To be a Palestinian child, trying to survive Israeli jail

https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2024/8/31/to-be-a-palestinian-child-trying-to-survive-israeli-jail

From beatings, to illness and hunger, freed Palestinian teen prisoners say abuse is rampant in Israeli jails.

For 10 long months, 16-year-old Hussein told Al Jazeera how he lived in the same clothes he was wearing when he was shot and detained by Israeli forces on October 3.

On that day, he was hit in the right thigh by Israeli forces stationed in a watchtower near the occupied West Bank city of Hebron. He fell to the ground. Two Israeli soldiers walked towards him, kicking him in the head until he lost consciousness.

He woke up three days later in a hospital after undergoing surgery and was about to be taken to Ofer Prison where he would stay for the next 10 months. Now, Hussein has a limp, needs crutches to walk, and spends most of his day lying on a mattress.


Israeli forces beat child, take bicycle near Ramallah: Report

Army troops have beaten a child while carrying out a raid in the town of Birzeit, north of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, leaving him bruised, reports Wafa.

The child was stopped by Israeli forces while riding his bicycle, which they also confiscated, said Wafa.

Children are regularly targeted in Israeli military raids across the occupied West Bank. Since October 7, Israeli forces have arrested 700 children, 250 of whom are still in Israeli custody, according to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society.



SvennoJ on 31 August 2024

Sanctions on Israel ‘must happen right now’

Saleh Hijazi, apartheid-free policy coordinator for the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement, said the international community needs to sanction Israeli now as the war in Gaza grinds on and the violence of the large-scale West Bank military incursion intensifies.

“Sanction Israel now,” Hijazi told Al Jazeera.

“We have two International Court of Justice orders confirming the possibility of genocide and ordering Israel to stop its genocidal acts, and that Israel’s presence in the occupied territories is illegal,” Hijazi said.

“It calls on third states to impose sanctions: economic, diplomatic, financial. And a military embargo on Israel. This must happen right now,” he said.


UN expert says countries helping ship explosives to Israel may violate Genocide Convention

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territory, has praised Namibia for “rightfully denying” port access to a ship reportedly carrying explosives to Israel.

“My hope is that Angola will follow Namibia’s example and not consent to harbour the ship,” Albanese said in a post on X.

Albanese said she had received information that the Portuguese-flagged Kathrin is carrying eight containers of explosives that are “reportedly key components in the aircraft bombs and missiles that Israel is deploying against besieged Gaza”.

She warned that countries potentially helping the ship, including Portugal, risk breaching the Genocide Convention as well as a UN Human Rights Council resolution “mandating an arms embargo on Israel”.


Israel works to discredit UNRWA with Google advertisements: Lazzarini

The head of the UN’s refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) has accused Israel of spreading “misinformation and disinformation” against the organisation.

Quoting an article from Wired magazine, he wrote on X that the government of Israel has been buying advertisements on Google as part of its campaign to undermine and discredit the UNRWA.

The campaign also aims to block users from giving donations to the agency, Philippe Lazzarini said, and added: “This does not just hurt the agency’s reputation but most importantly it puts the lives of our staff at risk.”

He stressed that Israel’s deliberate efforts to spread misinformation should stop and be investigated.

“Companies including social media platforms continue to make profit through spreading misinformation,” Lazzarini said. “More regulations are needed to combat disinformation and hate speech,” the UNRWA chief concluded.



SvennoJ on 31 August 2024

France condemns, concerned over Israeli actions in Gaza, West Bank, Jerusalem

The French Foreign Ministry has issued a statement expressing concern over the “deteriorating situation” in the occupied Palestinian territory, including Gaza, the occupied West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem.

Here are some of the key points:

  • France strongly condemned “shots fired by Israel at a World Food Programme vehicle in Gaza on [Tuesday], which led to the suspension of WFP’s activities in the Gaza Strip”.
  • France also stated that “large-scale Israeli military operations in several governorates are exacerbating the climate of unprecedented instability and violence” in the occupied West Bank.
  • France also condemned the “irresponsible remarks” of far-right Israeli Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir about the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound and said “now systematic challenge” to the status quo, regarding the holy site in Jerusalem, is contributing to widespread unrest.



FIFA pushes back review of Palestinian bid to suspend Israel

FIFA has announced it will address a Palestinian request to suspend Israel from international football competitions in October, delaying its previously scheduled response date of August 31.

The football governing body did not offer further details of the upcoming assessment, or state when in October it would occur.

The proposal by the Palestine Football Association (PFA) accuses its Israeli counterpart of complicity in violations of international law by the Israeli government, discrimination against Arab players, and inclusion in its league of clubs located in Palestinian territory.

The PFA also says that at least 92 Palestinian players have been killed in the Gaza war, football infrastructure has been destroyed, and its leagues have been suspended.



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SvennoJ on 31 August 2024

Head of US aid group targeted in lethal strike said Israeli military gave no ‘warning’

Sean Carroll, president and CEO of the aid organisation American Near East Refugee Aid, or Anera, told Al Jazeera that Israeli authorities had no communication and gave no warning before attacking his organisation’s aid convoy, killing four people in Gaza on Thursday.

“There was no communication from the Israeli authorities – from the military or from the administration for governance in the occupied territories,” Carroll told Al Jazeera from New York in the US.

“They did not, our understanding is, ask the convoy what was going on, nor did they provide any warning before they fired an air strike on one of the security cars in the convoy,” he said.

The lead security car in the aid convoy “was simply trying to ensure that the aid got to where it was needed. And this was to the Emirati field hospital”, Carroll said, lamenting the killing of the four Palestinians in the vehicle.

“It was medicines. It was fuel. To enable that hospital to continue serving patients and people in need of medical care. We’ve done this many, many times before. There has always been coordination and de-confliction, and in the past, there has been communication when there needed to be,” he said.

“In this case, there was no communication beforehand and suddenly our staff riding in that convoy witnessed – right in front of them – a lethal air strike”.


‘This isn’t normal’: Aid official speaks out after deadly Israeli attack on humanitarian convoy

More from Sean Carroll, president and CEO of the aid organisation American Near East Refugee Aid (Anera), who spoke to Al Jazeera earlier about the no-warning attack by Israeli forces on his organisation’s aid convoy that killed four security personnel in Gaza.

“This isn’t normal and the world needs to understand that this is not normal,” Carroll said of the humanitarian situation in Gaza.

“There are conflicts around the world. There are needs to provide humanitarian aid in the midst of conflicts, and in the vast majority of conflicts around the world, there is coordination, there is de-confliction to ensure that humanitarian aid workers and humanitarian aid work can proceed so that non-combatants receive the aid that they need,” Carroll said.

Not in Israel’s war on Gaza, however.

“In this case, it is just far too difficult, far too deadly and the number of attacks just this week puts in grave, grave jeopardy the ability to continue delivering aid,” he said.

“It is untenable.”

“This isn’t just about Palestinians. This is about humanity. This is about any shred of possibility of peaceful coexistence between Israelis and Palestinians,” he added.

Israel attacks relief convoys, doubles number of aid missions denied in August: UN

In tandem with Israeli attacks on humanitarian aid staff and relief convoys in Gaza, Israel’s denial of humanitarian missions in the war-torn Palestinian territory has almost doubled this month, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reports.

In its latest Gaza situation report, OCHA also said that between Monday and Thursday this week, a further 167 Palestinians were reported killed and 321 injured in Israeli attacks.

In August, the number of aid missions and movements by humanitarian workers denied permission by Israeli authorities almost doubled compared with July, including 68 denials in the north of the territory, compared with 30 last month, and 99 denials for the south of the territory, compared with 53 last month, OCHA reports.

“Attacks on humanitarian personnel and missions are increasing the risk of limiting access and delivering life-saving aid,” OCHA also said.



SvennoJ on 31 August 2024

WHO chief calls for protection of health teams ahead of polio vaccination rollout

World Health Organization director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said polio vaccination teams in Gaza must be “protected and allowed to conduct the upcoming campaign in Gaza safely”.

“We urge all parties to ensure their protection, and that of health facilities and children,” Tedros said in a post on social media, ahead of the first day of the campaign on Sunday.

The WHO chief made his call in a week that saw four security staff with an aid convoy killed in an Israeli air strike and a vehicle with the UN’s World Food Programme sprayed with Israeli bullets near a checkpoint.

The US-based director of American Near East Refugee Aid (Anera) told Al Jazeera earlier today that Israeli forces gave no prior warning or had any communication with his organisation’s aid convoy before striking the lead vehicle in the convoy and killing the four Palestinians on Thursday.


In numbers: The plan to vaccinate 640,000 children in Gaza against polio

  • 640,000 children under age 10 need to be vaccinated.
  • 1.26 million doses have been delivered to Gaza, so children can receive the required two doses, four weeks apart.
  • 2,700 health workers will help administer the vaccines in the plan coordinated by Gaza’s Ministry of Health together with the WHO, UNICEF, UNRWA and others.
  • 3 days – the initial length of a “humanitarian pause”, from 6am to 3pm, to allow the vaccination plan rollout, although WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus says only a ceasefire will protect the health of Gaza’s children.
  • 99 percent – Gaza’s vaccination rate against polio before the war.
  • 25 years – how long Gaza went without any cases of polio.
  • 10 months – the age of Abdel-Rahman, the Palestinian baby who is now partially paralysed from polio.


Humanitarian pauses for polio vaccinations a ‘very positive sign’

We can see more preparations by Gaza’s Health Ministry and coordination with UNICEF, UNRWA and WHO in Deir el-Balah, which is the first place where the vaccination campaign will begin.

We can see that UN-affiliated evacuation centres are being equipped with the essential medical supplies to start the vaccination process tomorrow. We know the vaccinations will occur in primary healthcare centres and a few hospitals.

The vaccination will be two drops of oral vaccination and will take place in three phases. The first one will start in the central area for three days, the second in Khan Younis and the southern part, and the third in the north of the Strip.

Palestinians see this kind of agreement that Israel and Hamas have been reaching in terms of some sort of humanitarian pauses as a very positive sign that some sort of ceasefire can be prepared.



SvennoJ on 31 August 2024

Nearly a dozen polio vaccines administered at Nasser Hospital ahead of official campaign

The rollout will officially start tomorrow in many of the designated sites in the central area of the Gaza Strip. This will be the first location of the entire rollout in the coming four days—vaccinations for children under the age of 10.

By designated sites, we’re talking about UNRWA schools that have turned into evacuation centres and public schools that are still intact. The other four days will be in Khan Younis and the last rollout will be in the northern part of the Strip.


A Palestinian woman holds a baby as children receive vaccinations against polio at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, on August 31




Dozens of dead brought to Nasser Hospital

The bodies of 27 people killed have been taken to Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis today, report our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic. They are among at least 40 people to have been killed by Israeli attacks since early this morning, with air raids concentrated in Khan Younis in southern Gaza, along with Nuseirat camp in central Gaza.


Two killed by Israeli air strike in Rafah: Report

Two Palestinians have been killed and several others injured in an Israeli air strike on the city of Rafah in the south of the besieged enclave, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa.

The agency, citing local sources, reported it was a drone that struck a group of individuals in the Shakoush area.


Israel’s war is ‘against the civilian population’

Very tragic situations unfolded in the early hour of this morning as the Israeli military carried out air strikes, coupled with heavy artillery, on residential homes.

It’s a pattern that’s been going on for the past month. These attacks occur without any prior warning.

In the early hours of this morning, people were still inside these residential homes, and children were still in bed, still sleeping, when the heavy artillery and the bombs fell. Nine members of one family were killed right at the spot of the attacks, and several others were critically injured.

There were three attacks separate attacks on refugee camps in what the Israeli military described as targeted killings, but children and women are making up the majority of the casualties arriving here at the hospital.

The patterns of these attacks suggest that the Israeli military doesn’t have any military objective right now. When you see children and young adults brought to the hospital, shredded into pieces, the conclusion is that this war is against the civilian population.



SvennoJ on 31 August 2024

Hezbollah claims it struck Israeli army site

The Lebanese group says on Telegram that its fighters targeted “al-Marj” military outpost in northern Israel with rockets.

Hezbollah added it carried out the attack at 8:50am (05:50 GMT) and hit the site directly.


Israeli military strikes southern Lebanon: Report

Israeli warplanes have carried out an attack on the outskirts of the southern Lebanese town of Markaba, reports Lebanon’s National News Agency. It is unclear if there are any casualties from the attack.

Since the start of the Gaza war, Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah have regularly traded cross-border fire, with Israel’s strikes killing more than 430 of the Lebanese group’s members.


Israeli jets attack fighters in southern Lebanon: Army

Warplanes have attacked a building where members of the Hezbollah group were located in the Markaba area in the morning, according to a military statement.

The Israeli forces also attacked Hezbollah infrastructures in southern Lebanon with artillery fire, it added. The army also said a suspicious aerial target was identified before crossing into the Israeli airspace and falling in the Beit Hillel area without causing any casualties.



SvennoJ on 31 August 2024

Pro-Palestinian protest held in Dublin, Ireland






People hold placards with pictures of AJ+ contributor Bisan Owda and Al Jazeera journalists Hind Khoudary and Anas al-Sharif during a protest calling for an end to Israel’s war on Gaza during a demonstration in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza in Dublin, Ireland, August 31