Israeli army to ‘pull out the roots’ after ‘mowing the lawn’ in West Bank: Gallant

Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant says the military has been “mowing the lawn” during an ongoing major operation in the West Bank – that has killed at least 39 Palestinians – but will eventually need to “pull out the roots”.

Local media reported that Gallant, while speaking to senior military officers on Wednesday, said “the rise of terror” in the West Bank was the army’s main focus at present.

“The process is an attack to prevent terror. We are mowing the lawn, [but] the moment will also come when we will pull out the roots, that must be done.” He added that there was “no other option” but to use “all the forces, everyone who is needed, with full strength”.

Israel’s aim is to ultimately ‘swallow the entire West Bank’

Israel feels “empowered” to intensify its assaults in the occupied West Bank due to the lack of consequences for its mass onslaught in Gaza, says Tamer Qarmout, assistant professor of public policy at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies.

“Israel is importing the same war tactics it has been using in Gaza into the West Bank to crush the Palestinian resistance, to crush Palestinian liberation aspirations, and most importantly, to collectively punish Palestinian society,” Qarmout told Al Jazeera.

“There is no excuse for the ruthless destruction of civilian infrastructure,” he said, claiming it is part of Israel’s strategy to drive more Palestinians from their homes and ultimately “swallow the entire West Bank”.

No avoiding war with Hezbollah, says Israeli minister

Israel’s far-right finance minister Bezalel Smotrich said the country will inevitably go to war with Hezbollah, a fight he acknowledged will be “complex and costly”.

“We are now paying the price for 30 years of misconceptions and the unwillingness to bear the costs of war,” said Smotrich in comments carried by Israel’s Maariv news outlet. “The war must end with no Hamas and no Hezbollah.

“There is no choice. It [the war] will be complex and costly, but the time for change has come.”

Smotrich has repeatedly threatened the Hezbollah group during the war on Gaza, saying Israel might reoccupy the southern Lebanese territory it operates from.

Journalist Ali Dar Ali among Palestinians arrested in Ramallah

The Wafa news agency is reporting that Ali Dar Ali, a correspondent for Palestine TV, was among the five Palestinians taken into custody from the Ramallah and el-Bireh governorate.

The agency reported that Ali was detained following a raid on his home in the village of Burham.

Two killed near Rafah

An Israeli attack has hit southern Gaza’s Mosbeh neighborhood, near Rafah, killing at least two people, report the Wafa news agency and our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic.

Meanwhile in the north, Israeli forces launched more attacks in Gaza City’s Zeitoun neighbourhood, injuring several civilians with quadcopter shots, reports Wafa. Earlier as we reported, an Israeli air raid killed at least three people near a school in the neighbourhood.

Israeli warplanes bomb another Gaza City home: Report

Israeli forces are continuing to hammer Gaza City from the air. Their latest attack hit a residential apartment in the city’s Rimal neighbourhood, killing at least one person and injuring six, reports the Wafa news agency.

The injured have been brought to Al-Ahli Arab Hospital, where victims of earlier Israeli attacks in the city’s Zeitoun neighbourhood are also being treated, according to Wafa.

One killed in Israeli attack near Kamal Adwan Hospital

At least one Palestinian has been killed and many reported wounded in Israeli shelling targeting the vicinity of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza.

Death toll rises in attack near Kamal Adwan Hospital

The death toll from an Israeli attack near northern Gaza’s Kamal Adwan Hospital has now risen to three, report our colleagues on the ground. Many people have also been wounded in the attack.

Footage shared online, and verified by Al Jazeera, shows those wounded, including several children, being evacuated from the area.

Second phase of polio vaccination begins in southern Gaza

A day after the WHO completed the first phase of its polio vaccination campaign in Gaza, with more than 187,000 children below the age of 10 being inoculated, the drive has moved to southern Gaza.

The WHO targets to vaccinate an estimated 340,000 children in the second phase.

Al Jazeera’s Tareq Abu Azzoum, reporting from Deir el-Balah, said the campaign started in Khan Younis in southern Gaza.

“Our sources on the ground say large numbers of parents are bringing their children to be vaccinated. Medical teams are moving between tents to distribute vaccinations,” he said.

“However, the main challenge continues to be the untenable security conditions.”

The third and final phase will see the vaccination drive move to northern Gaza on September 9, targeting 150,000 children.

‘Very optimistic’ of vaccination programme in southern Gaza, says WHO

Hamid Jafari, director of polio eradication for the WHO’s eastern Mediterranean region, says there were “intense preparations” for starting the polio vaccination programme in southern Gaza.

“I think the most important aspect of all of this, both in the central zone and in the south, is the adherence to the humanitarian pause. That’s the most important thing that needs to sustain itself,” Jafari told Al Jazeera.

“This is a community that is very health literate, it values vaccination and so the way we saw the community response and the diligence of health workers, community health workers in the central zone, we are very optimistic that this will sustain in the south zone as well,” he said.

Jafari added that the WHO would receive a report by the end of the day if there were any “operational issues”, but the first phase of the vaccination programme has built “confidence both among the communities and the health workers to go forward”.

Israel refusing entry to medical teams amid polio campaign: Gaza officials

The Israeli army is refusing to coordinate the entry of medical teams affiliated with the emergency polio vaccination campaign into some areas, the Palestinian Health Ministry said, as inoculation efforts kicked off in southern Gaza.

“We appeal to all concerned institutions and authorities to intervene urgently to ensure the success of the vaccination campaign by reaching all children wherever they are,” the ministry said in a statement.



CNN has gone dormant again after running out of stories about the dead hostages. Not interested in what's going on in Gaza and the West Bank.

The SHOCKING Truth Israel Hides from World

Rifat Jawaid exposes hypocrisy of Blinken, Starmer, Sunak over hostages’ deaths



Antony Blinken, Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak have reacted with shock over the deaths of six Israeli hostages including one Hersh Goldberg-Polin, an American/Israeli National who served with the IDF in the past. Rifat Jawaid exposes the hypocrisy of the western leaders over their fake concerns since they haven’t been consistent with their reaction on other American/British nationals.

U.S. Media's Complicity in Israel's Genocide w/ Sana Saeed

Understanding U.S. News Media's Complicity in Israel's Genocide

Israel forces six families to leave their homes in Jenin refugee camp: Report

Israeli soldiers have forced Palestinian families to evacuate their homes in the al-Damaj and Jorat al-Dahab neighbourhoods of the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, Wafa reports.

Local sources told the news agency that six families were forced to leave their residences in these neighbourhoods and were told to travel to villages west of Jenin using ambulances.

Wafa reported that since Israeli forces’s assault on the city of Jenin and its refugee camp, they have displaced hundreds of residents.

Israel creating ‘formula of explosion’ in West Bank, former negotiator says

Former Israeli captive negotiator Gershon Baskin has issued what he calls “words of warning” as about 200,000 Palestinians have not been able to work in Israel and the government withholds taxes and customs duties from the Palestinian Authority.

In a post on X, Baskin said the lack of work is causing “despair” and now “hundreds of thousands of young Palestinians are on the streets of the West Bank with nothing to do and with a lot of frustration and anger.”

Alongside that, the war on Gaza continues, and the death toll increases, creating what Baskin said is “the formula of explosion”.

“There are those in the Israeli government who want this explosion to occur and they add fuel to the fire by encouraging and allowing settler violence against innocent Palestinians. This is insane and super dangerous. If there are any responsible decision-makers left in the Israeli government, it is time to wake up and end this insanity,” he added.

Israel’s end game in the occupied West Bank is to ‘take over’

Mohamad Elmasry, professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, says that as Israel continues its military operation in the occupied West Bank, it’s clear that Israel’s “end game, ultimately, is to take over”.

“Israel has made this intention clear on numerous occasions. The idea of greater Israel is deeply rooted in Israeli politics. You have [Finance Minister] Bezalel Smotrich, who put out a plan just a few years ago about how Israel should annex the West Bank. So Israel’s always at war with the West Bank … it’s just being ratcheted up right now,” Elmasry said to Al Jazeera.

He added that the US’s response to Israel’s operation in the occupied West Bank would be “more of the same” as its response to the war on Gaza.

“[Netanyahu] is quite literally carrying out a genocide … and the US continues to stand by Netanyahu. I think it’s probably foolish at this point to think the US is going to change course in any meaningful way,” he said.

Netanyahu dismisses reports of possible ceasefire deal: Report

Netanyahu tells Fox News that reports of a possible ceasefire deal being reached are a “false narrative”.

During the interview with the US news channel, Netanyahu said Israel had agreed to several deals but Hamas had “consistently said no to every one of them”.

“They don’t agree to anything: not to the Philadelphi Corridor, not to the keys of exchanging hostages for jailed terrorists, not to anything,” he said, adding that Hamas wants Israel out of Gaza so that it can take the enclave “as they vowed to do”.

The Israeli leader also reiterated that the only way to ensure Israel’s security was through controlling the Philadelphi Corridor, and he claimed that most of the Israeli public supports the plan to remain at the Gaza-Egypt border in the future.

‘Blind bias’: Hamas tells US to ‘exert real pressure’ on Israel

Hamas’s lead negotiator has urged the US to press Israel for a truce in Gaza.

“If the US administration and its President Biden really want to reach a ceasefire and complete a prisoner exchange deal, they must abandon their blind bias towards the Zionist occupation and exert real pressure on Netanyahu and his government,” Qatar-based Khalil al-Hayya said in a statement.

He said Hamas still supports a proposal backed by Biden and a UN Security Council resolution for a ceasefire in Gaza.

“We confirm our adherence to what was agreed upon after President Biden-backed proposal at the end of May, and UN Security Council Resolution No 2735, which the movement agreed to on July 2,” al-Hayya said.

“We warn against falling into the trap of Netanyahu … who uses negotiations to prolong the aggression against our people.”

Hamas releases video of killed American-Israeli captive

Hamas released a video of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, an Israeli-American man who was held captive in the Gaza Strip for the duration of Israel’s war on the enclave.

His body was recovered along with the bodies of five other captives on September 1 from a tunnel in southern Gaza. Senior Hamas official Izzat al-Risheq said at the time the six captives were killed in Israeli air strikes. The Israeli military says they were shot dead.

In the video marking some of his final words, Goldberg-Polin said Israel “has been trying to bomb me nonstop”.

“I am asking you, Mr President Joe Biden and Antony Blinken and all my fellow Americans, citizens – to do everything you can stop the war, stop this madness, and to bring me home now,” he said.

‘Nothing is negotiated until everything is negotiated’

US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby says the Biden administration believes an Israel-Hamas ceasefire deal is 90 percent agreed on.

“You call that optimistic. I call that accurate. That’s how close we believe we are. That’s where we have gotten to. The basic framework of the deal has been agreed to,” Kirby said.

“What we’re talking about now is the implementing details and specifically the exchange of prisoners. And now that calculus is different because of what happened over the weekend,” he said, referring to the recovery of the bodies of six captives from Gaza by Israeli forces.

But he added: “Nothing is negotiated until everything is negotiated, and the things that are still in play right now are very, very detailed … issues and that’s when things get difficult.”

UK doctor: 80% of Gaza victims I treated were children

Dr Victoria Rose has just returned to the United Kingdom after working in Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis. She says children are increasingly suffering life-altering wounds in Israeli attacks compared with her stint in Gaza in March.

“What shocked me the most is that about 80 percent of everyone I treated was under the age of 16,” Rose told Al Jazeera.

“All of the injuries were explosive-related and burns. I saw a lot of limb trauma, children losing their legs and arms. A lot of facial injuries. I had a seven-year-old child that had most of his nose blown off.”

Asked if she’s ever seen anything like the situation in Gaza, the doctor responded: “No, never.”

Fear of infection leads to amputations for Gaza’s wounded: Doctor

The wounds of victims of Israeli attacks in Gaza are becoming infected because of a lack of clean shelter and medical supplies and burgeoning malnutrition, a British doctor who recently worked there says.

"A lot of the children are so young, I don’t think they understand the significance of the injuries they’ve sustained,” Dr Victoria Rose told Al Jazeera.

“There were a lot of situations where we amputated because we didn’t have the ability to do the reconstruction. We knew if we didn’t do the amputation, the risk of infection and then death from sepsis was a possibility.”

‘Beyond catastrophic’: UN demands Israel allow access for aid work

The UN has pressed the Israeli government “as the occupying power in Gaza” to ensure humanitarian organisations can carry out their crucial work.

At a news conference, spokesman Stephane Dujarric emphasised the critical role of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, as the “backbone, heart, lungs and arms” of humanitarian aid in Gaza.

“We are in constant contact with Israeli counterparts, notably COGAT [the Israeli military’s Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories] on how to improve the system,” Dujarric said.

“[The] humanitarian situation in Gaza remains beyond catastrophic.”

The comments came after Gaza’s Health Ministry accused Israel of blocking polio vaccination teams from entering the territory.

Dujarric noted that more than one million people in central and southern Gaza did not receive any food rations in August. An ongoing blockade of the enclave has led to severe shortages of food, clean water and medicines.

Rush to vaccinate children as polio drive continues

At tent camps for the displaced, schools-turned-shelters and health centres, parents have brought babies, toddlers and teenagers for polio vaccines provided by UN agencies.

“I live in a tent next to a sewage pond with significant disease and epidemic issues, and mosquitoes and worms have affected us,” said Amani Ashur, 37, who brought his one-year-old son, Abdul Rahman, to be vaccinated.

Like most Palestinians, Ashur has been displaced at least once, finding shelter in the al-Amal neighbourhood of southern Khan Younis. His child, like many others, has fallen ill from sickness spreading through the unsanitary makeshift shelters.

“I was worried about my child, so I brought him to be vaccinated,” said Safaa al-Balbisi, 34, about her two-year-old son, Yahya. “The war, lack of cleanliness and living in tents and on streets along with the widespread sewage issues have all contributed to the spread of disease.”

_{Palestinians face the risk of epidemics from uncollected garbage and accumulated sewage}