Blinken again says opportunity for peace now that Sinwar ‘removed from equation’

Blinken told reporters that Washington is “intensely focused” on bringing Israeli captives home, ending the war and alleviating the suffering of Palestinians.

“The reason I believe there is opportunity now is that I believe the biggest obstacle to concluding that agreement was Sinwar and the fact that he is no longer with us perhaps creates an opening for actually moving forward and concluding the agreement,” he said about Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar, who was killed in Rafah last week.

“In our judgement, one of the things that Sinwar was looking at and hoping for was the potential for wider conflict. If he could create a multi-front war with Hezbollah attacking Israel, potentially Iran attacking Israel, then he could just sit back and wait and not make any decisions on a ceasefire.”

Blinken said Sinwar “has now been removed from the equation” which could allow Hamas to refocus and sign an initial agreement, as a base for a “sustainable” ceasefire to come later.

Spreading lies again, Hamas already accepted a ceasefire in May. Netanyahu only wants a temporary pause, if at all and keep the IDF in Gaza and continue the genocide after a hostage deal.

‘We can’t really believe anything the secretary of state says’

Talk of reviving a Gaza ceasefire is just “gaslighting” as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken travels through the Middle East, says the Israel-Palestine advocacy director at the US-based group Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN).

“We can’t really believe anything the secretary of state says at this point,” Adam Shapiro told Al Jazeera. “What Blinken says about Israel’s war goals doesn’t match what the Israelis say are their war goals. The Israelis are planning for a resettlement of parts of Gaza, if not the entirety of Gaza.”

He also noted the clearing out of the Lebanese population suggests “there’s real reason to believe the settlement of southern Lebanon is on the table”.

“It’s the complete failure of this administration, of this secretary of state, for over a year now to do something meaningful to stop the atrocities that are happening.”

Israeli delegation to travel to Qatar on Sunday

An Israeli delegation will travel to Doha on Sunday, a spokesperson for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is in Doha to meet with Qatari officials who have been key mediators seeking an end to Israel’s war on Gaza. Talks are expected to resume in the coming days.

A statement from the PM’s office said David Barnea, the head of Israel’s Mossad, will lead the delegation.

He’s expected to meet CIA chief William Burns, Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani, and the head of Egyptian intelligence Hassan Rashad.

“At the meeting, the parties will discuss the various options for starting the negotiations for the release of the abductees from the captivity of Hamas, against the background of the latest developments,” it said.

Netanyahu welcomes Egypt’s role in deal for captives’ release

Egypt’s “willingness to promote a deal” for the release of Israel captives has been praised by Israel’s prime minister.

“Following the meetings that took place in Cairo, the Prime Minister instructed the head of the Mossad to go to Doha and promote a series of initiatives on the agenda, with the backing of the cabinet members,” according to a statement from Benjamin Netanyahu’s office.

About 250 people were taken captive in the Hamas-led attack on October 7 last year. At least 100 of them are still believed to be held inside Gaza.

Talks for their release have largely stalled for months but have gained new impetus following the killing of Hamas’s leader Yahya Sinwar last week. Hamas officials say no exchange will take place until Israel permanently halts its war on Gaza.

Netanyahu doesn't even utter the word ceasefire anymore.

Israel kills at least 19 people in Lebanon in a day

The Israeli army has killed at least 19 people in Lebanon in the past 24 hours, according to the Lebanese government. This brings the total death toll since the start of the war in October to 2,593.

Hezbollah says Israeli troop casualties in tank attack in south Lebanon

Hezbollah says it destroyed an Israeli tank in Aita al-Shaab in southern Lebanon, killing and wounding the crew. The Lebanese group said it attacked the tank with a “guided missile”, causing it to catch fire.

Earlier, the group said its fighters were engaged in ongoing “intense” clashes at “point-blank range” using assault weapons and rocket-propelled grenades against Israeli army vehicles in Aita al-Shaab.

On Wednesday, Hezbollah said its fighters have killed more than 70 Israeli troops in its clashes. Israel says it’s lost about 20 soldiers inside Lebanon since its ground operations began, and 30 more in Hezbollah attacks on northern Israel.

Israeli army issues new evacuation orders for southern Beirut

The Israeli army issued new evacuation orders for residents of two areas in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, as it prepares to strike them.

“You are located near facilities and sites belonging to Hezbollah, which the Israeli [military] will be targeting in the near future,” said its Arabic-language spokesman Avichay Adraee in a post on X.

Israel has repeatedly hit Beirut’s southern suburb known as Dahiyeh, a densely populated neighbourhood. Explosions were heard and several large plumes of smoke rose after heavy Israeli strikes overnight.

Israeli tank fires on northern Gaza hospital

Video from the besieged northern Gaza Strip shows Israeli tanks firing shells at the Kamal Adwan Hospital.

Kamal Adwan Hospital is one of the few remaining operational medical facilities and has been overwhelmed with casualties during the Israeli army’s 20-day ground incursion in the north.

North Gaza hospital ‘directly targeted’ by Israeli forces

Hussam Abu Safia, director at the Kamal Adwan Hospital, told Al Jazeera the Israeli attack caused severe damage to the facility’s intensive care unit.

“The hospital was directly targeted,” he said.

It’s not the first time hospitals have been attacked in northern Gaza. Last week, Israeli forces bombed al-Awda Hospital in Jabalia and also shelled Kamal Adwan and the Indonesian hospitals in Beit Lahiya.

Tanks move closer to northern Gaza hospital after opening fire

This is an evolving story with Israeli tanks firing on the Kamal Adwan Hospital. Over the last 48 hours, the surrounding residential buildings have been destroyed, blocking all entry points into the hospital.

Over the past 20 minutes, there’s been constant machine gun fire. There are people still inside the hospital – medical staff, patients and the wounded. The tanks are advancing very close to the facility.

A car was set on fire outside the entrance. Tanks shelled the fence surrounding the hospital and the main building itself. Fuel trucks were supposed to enter the facility today so generators could be refuelled so life-saving operations could continue.

Gaza hospital unable to perform surgeries as Israeli forces arrest surgeons

Hussam Abu Safia, director of the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, says most of the surgeons have been arrested by Israeli forces and urgent surgeries for the many wounded cannot be performed.

“There are more than 15 cases that need surgeries that we cannot perform in the hospital,” he told Al Jazeera, adding the Israeli army refuses to evacuate patients in need or bring in any aid.

Abu Safia earlier said tank shelling on the hospital caused severe damage to its intensive care unit.

‘Massacres’ committed by Israeli forces near north Gaza hospital

Israeli soldiers and tanks continue to attack the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza. “The occupation is committing massacres against innocent people around Kamal Adwan Hospital,” one civil defence worker told Al Jazeera.

The hospital’s director added, “What the occupation forces are committing is deliberate murder.”

Israeli drones targeted the facility’s water tanks, an Al Jazeera correspondent reported.

‘We lose at least one person every hour’: Medical supplies run out in Gaza

Health workers in besieged northern Gaza warned of a catastrophic situation as Israel’s army continues its ground incursion and air strikes for a 20th day.

Nearly 800 people have been killed and tens of thousands have fled their homes in the north in recent days.

Dr Hussam Abu Safia, director of the besieged Kamal Adwan Hospital, said about 150 wounded people are being treated there, including 14 children in intensive care or the neonatal department. Israeli tanks shelled the intensive care unit earlier.

“There is a very large number of wounded people, and we lose at least one person every hour because of the lack of medical supplies and medical staff. Our ambulances can’t transfer wounded people. Those who can arrive by themselves to the hospital receive care. But those who don’t just die in the streets.”

_{A wounded Palestinian child from Beit Lahiya arrives at the Kamal Adwan Hospital}

‘Children torn to pieces’ in Israeli strike in central Gaza attack

Earlier, we reported Israeli air strikes on the Shuhadaa al-Nuseirat school in the central part of Gaza killed at least 17 people.

Palestinian woman Umm Muhammad says she was at the school at the time of the strike, and described a terrifying scene with “stones and glass” falling from above.

“I hugged my little girl. I couldn’t see anything through the thick plume of smoke. I ran and screamed for my sister and found her alive downstairs,” Umm Muhammad said. “But there were children torn to pieces.”


_{Palestinians inspect the site of an Israeli strike on a school sheltering displaced people, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip, October 24}

Israeli army threatened to ‘kill and bomb’ Gaza rescuers

Gaza’s Civil Defence agency says Israeli forces are deliberately attacking rescue teams in northern Gaza.

Mahmoud Basal, the agency’s spokesman, said first responders have been “targeted” on several occasions, leaving “several members injured, and others are left bleeding on the streets with no one able to rescue them”.

Bassal published a photograph of a burned truck on social media saying it was “the only civil defence vehicle in the northern Gaza Strip governorate”. The truck was “targeted by the Israeli army” in the northern city of Beit Lahiya, just north of Jabalia and near Gaza’s northern border with Israel.

“We are unable to provide humanitarian services to citizens in the northern governorate of the Gaza Strip due to threats from Israeli occupation forces, who have threatened to kill and bomb our teams if they remain inside Jabalia camp,” he said.

‘Everyone paying the price in northern Gaza’

At the besieged Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, footage shows medical staff tending to premature babies and several older children in hospital beds, some with severe burns.

One child is seen attached to a breathing machine with bandages on her face and flies hovering over her.

“We are providing the bare minimum to patients. Everyone is paying the price of what is happening now in northern Gaza,” said hospital director Dr Hussam Abu Safia.

‘Major massacre’ in Jabalia refugee camp: Palestinian Civil Defence

Gaza’s Civil Defence agency says an Israeli army attack in the besieged camp killed a “large number of people” in what it described as a “major massacre”. In a statement on its Telegram channel, it said Israeli forces blew up 11 houses in the al-Hawaja residential area inside the Jabalia refugee camp.

“Citizens are sending distress calls to head to the place to help transport the wounded,” said the statement.

Israeli air strikes destroy block of flats in Gaza’s Jabalia camp

The Israeli military carried out a major attack on al-Hawaja Street, in the western part of Jabalia, causing a sheer level of destruction. At least a dozen residential buildings were blown up.

Based on an assessment the Civil Defence agency, an estimated 150 people were either killed or wounded. Rescue teams are unable to approach the bomb site to bring the injured to hospital.

These are people who refused to leave the Jabalia refugee camp simply because they are exhausted and the road to evacuate was not safe for them. They haven’t been eating or provided with water supplies. So they’re exhausted and decided to remain in their homes.

Israeli shelling kills 2 Palestinians, wounds 20 in Gaza’s Khan Younis

Two Palestinians were killed and 20 others – including children and women – were injured as a result of Israeli artillery fire on the southern city of Khan Younis.

A medical source at Nasser Hospital told the Anadolu news agency that two bodies and 20 victims were brought in following attacks on eastern parts of Gaza’s second-largest city.

Earlier, Israeli forces targeted the city’s neighbourhoods of al-Manara, Maen, Sheikh Nasser, and Qizan an-Najjar. Witnesses reported mass displacement of hundreds of Palestinians following the attacks.



Israeli army says it killed UNRWA staffer, alleging he’s a Hamas commander

The Israeli army says it killed “a Hamas commander”, alleging he was also an employee of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) and responsible for the killing and kidnapping of Israeli civilians during the October 7, 2023, attack.

Asked about the allegations, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees confirmed that Muhammad Abu Atiwi was a staff member. It said his name was included on a list sent by the Israeli government to the agency alleging 100 UNRWA employees were members of Palestinian armed groups, including Hamas.

“The UNRWA commissioner general responded to that letter immediately stating that any allegation is taken seriously. He urged [Israel’s government] to cooperate with the agency by providing more information so he could take action. To date, UNRWA has not received any response to that letter,” it said in a statement to Al Jazeera.

No evidence has yet been “authenticated and corroborated” proving any UNRWA staff members were involved in the attacks on October 7, the agency said.

More than 150 casualties following Israeli ‘massacre’ in Jabalia: Report

As we have been reporting, Gaza’s Civil Defence agency has said the Israeli military has carried out a “major massacre” in the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza in recent hours, levelling at least 10 residential buildings.

The Wafa news agency, citing local sources, reports that around 150 people, including women and children, have been killed and injured in the attack. It did not specify how many have been killed and how many injured.

The final death toll could rise, with ambulance and rescue crews facing difficulty reaching the site of the attack in the al-Hawaja area in the centre of the Jabalia camp due to restrictions imposed by Israeli forces who laid siege to northern Gaza for three weeks.

Wafa reports that the bombed buildings belonged to the following families: Al-Najjar, Abu Al-Auf, Salman, Hijazi, Abu Al-Qumsan, Aql, Abu Rashid, Abu Al-Tarabish, Zaqoul, and Shaalan.

US Jewish group demands ‘end to Palestinian genocide’

The US-based Jewish Voice for Peace has demanded an arms embargo by the US government against Israel, comparing its war on Gaza to “the Nazi holocaust”.

“Many of us have parents, grandparents and great-grandparents who survived or perished in Nazi death marches and we have all grown up in the shadow of the Nazi holocaust. The state of Israel is currently perpetrating a holocaust, the deliberate mass slaughter of Palestinian people, with weapons provided by the United States,” the group said in a statement.

The images coming out of northern Gaza “are a terrifying echo of all-too-familiar images of European ghettos and Nazi concentration camps in the 2nd World War,” it added.

“Today we stand with our ancestors at our backs, in solidarity with our Palestinian siblings, demanding an immediate weapons embargo and an end to genocide — we will not act with indifference toward Palestinian suffering.”

Gaza ceasefire talks positive but ‘maximalist positions’ remain

PJ Crowley, a former US State Department spokesman, says the resumption of talks for a possible deal between Hamas and Israel is positive, but he downplayed “a breakthrough”.

“Anytime you have negotiators at various tables communicating through their respective channels, you know that is good news,” Crowley told Al Jazeera.

“However, let’s understand these are talks about talks. They’re discussions on how to resume formal ceasefire negotiations and that gives all the parties the opportunity to reiterate their maximalist positions,” Crowley said.

“And so I think while this will be a promising development, I think we’re still some time off from the prospect of a breakthrough.”

Main points for October 24th

• The Israeli army has committed a “major massacre” in the Jabalia refugee camp, according to Gaza’s civil defence agency, with initial estimates placing the number of casualties at more than 150.
• Israeli tanks have attacked northern Gaza’s Kamal Adwan Hospital, causing severe damage to the facility’s intensive care unit as it struggles with an influx of wounded.
• Gaza ceasefire talks are set to resume in the coming days, but senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan has said there is no change in the group’s position that captives will only be freed if Israel ends its war on the Palestinian enclave.
• Israeli strikes in Lebanon have killed at least 19 people over the past 24 hours, with Beirut bracing for another night of attacks as the Lebanese capital’s southern suburbs face bombardment again.
• The Israeli military has said five of its soldiers have been killed and seven seriously injured in southern Lebanon over the past day in clashes with Hezbollah.
• The Committee to Protect Journalists has denounced Israeli allegations against six Palestinian journalists working for Al Jazeera in Gaza after Israel’s military accused them of being “terrorists”.
• Germany authorised more than $100m in military exports to Israel in the last three months, Foreign Office data showed.

"We Have Lost All Credibility": Hala Rharrit on Quitting State Dept. & Ending Complicity in Gaza

BBC reporter’s question leaves Blinken stumped, exposes America’s Israel biases | Janta Ka Reporter

Blinken talks like the war genocide is over and was a success... He keeps repeating the same lies, nothing but stalling for Israel to keep killing, starving and displacing more civilians with full US support.

2021 documentary about the origin of the ongoing conflict

How Britain Started the Arab-Israeli Conflict | Free Documentary History

The bitter struggle between Arab and Jew for control of the Holy Land has caused untold suffering in the Middle East for generations. It is often claimed that the crisis originated with Jewish emigration to Palestine and the foundation of the state of Israel. Yet the roots of the conflict are to be found much earlier – in British double-dealing during the First World War. This is a story of intrigue among rival empires; of misguided strategies; and of how conflicting promises to Arab and Jew created a legacy of bloodshed which determined the fate of the Middle East.

Israeli military bombs hotel in southern Lebanon, killing journalists: Reports

The Israeli military has shelled a hotel in the town of Hasbaiyya in southern Lebanon, killing an unknown number of journalists, according to Al Mayadeen and several other news outlets.

Israeli air attack kills 3 journalists in southern Lebanon’s Hasbaiyya

At around 4am, an Israeli – either air strike or drone strike – came into the compound where journalists are being housed in a series of villas. We are hearing that three people have been killed – two cameramen and a technician.

We are not naming the people or the organisations that they work for. But, suffice to say, that these are the people that I have been working with almost every single day. We’ve all been doing our jobs here in Hasbaiyya.

This is a very serious incident. Israel didn’t give any warning. Hasbaiyya is under no evacuation orders and, in fact, it has been relatively calm. So this was, we are thinking, a targeted strike against a particular news organisation. But we will let that news organisation make that conclusion.

But right now, a very serious incident came without warning in a place that is not under Israeli evacuation orders.


_{Lebanese people and army soldiers inspect a site damaged in an Israeli raid that killed a journalist and wounded several others as they slept in guesthouses used by media}

Israeli military targets journalists in Gaza, now it’s ‘coming to southern Lebanon’

The Gaza war is one of the worst wars for journalists, I think, in history. Certainly in modern history.

Al Jazeera’s journalists have been threatened. Israel has said that they are members of Hamas, which is plainly and clearly not true and has been denied by the network and the journalists involved.

And, now, that is coming to southern Lebanon. Al Mayadeen, which is a television channel linked to Hezbollah, its offices were attacked just within the last few days. Israeli media has singled out al-Manar, which is another Hezbollah-affiliated channel, as being part of the “terrorist structure”, as they call it.

But these are guys just doing their jobs like all of the journalists here, and there’s people from various different teams across Lebanese news organisations. I have to say that the only international news organisation here is Al Jazeera English.

Al Mayadeen TV channel confirms cameraman killed in Israeli strike in south Lebanon

Pan-Arab TV channel Al Mayadeen says its cameraman was killed in an Israeli air strike on a residence housing journalists in southern Lebanon’s Hasbaiyya town overnight. Two other journalists were also reported killed in the attack that appears to have targeted the media workers.

The killing comes just two days after Israel carried out an air strike on an office belonging to Al Mayadeen, which is politically allied with Hezbollah and is based in Beirut.

“Al Mayadeen holds the Israeli occupation accountable for the attack on a known media office for a known media outlet,” Al Mayadeen TV said, following the Israeli strike on its office on the outskirts of Beirut’s southern suburbs.

Two Al Mayadeen journalists reporting on military activity along the southern Lebanese border with Israel were killed in an Israeli strike on November 21, 2023.

_{A protective vest of one of the two journalists from Al Mayadeen who were killed by an Israeli strike near the Lebanese border village of Tayr Harfa in November 2023}