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

Iran says it backs Lebanon in ceasefire talks, seeks end to ‘problems’

Iran will support Lebanon in any decision it takes to secure a ceasefire with Israel, a senior Iranian government official has said.

Ali Larijani, a senior adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, arrived in Lebanon on Friday and has met with caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati and Lebanon’s parliament speaker, Nabih Berri.

On Thursday, the US ambassador to Lebanon, Lisa Johnson, presented a draft ceasefire proposal to Berri, who is endorsed by Hezbollah to negotiate, two senior Lebanese political sources told the Reuters news agency.

When asked by reporters if he had come to Lebanon to undermine Washington’s ceasefire efforts, Larijani said: “We are not looking to sabotage anything. We are after a solution to the problems.”

“We support in all circumstances the Lebanese government. Those who are disrupting are [Prime Minister] Netanyahu and his people,” he added.


End game for Israel is to have ‘permission to do whatever it wants’

Discussing Israeli attacks on Lebanon, Israeli political commentator Ori Goldberg says the “end game” for Israel is that it wants “permission to basically do whatever it wants”.

“It wants an official note written by the United Nations allowing it to exercise exclusive discretion. That is the end game,” he told Al Jazeera.

“The end game is not a stable Lebanese government or a stable Lebanese state. It’s providing Israeli citizens – and this for the political purposes of the current government – with the sense that only Israel ‘shapes its destiny’. That’s the end game.”


Malaysia PM says no recognition of Israel, support for Palestinians ‘matter of justice’

Malaysia does not recognise the state of Israel and supports the Palestinian people, the country’s Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has reiterated.

Anwar made the comments during a news conference at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Peru on Friday, according to the Malaysian Reserve, where he rejected any suggestion his government had plans to change its diplomatic distance towards Israel.

In a follow-up interview with US media, Anwar doubled down on his position saying that Malaysia had to maintain its position regarding Israel as “a matter of justice”.

“In the context of the international system, some say ‘de facto’ and some say ‘de jure’. Israel exists as a country in the context of membership in the United Nations (UN), but we still reject official recognition of the country,” he said.

Malaysia was the only country to raise questions about Israel’s escalating violence against Palestine at the APEC meeting, Anwar added.

“How can we talk about the economy and free trade if the rights of a nation are denied? This is a matter of justice. Malaysia will continue to voice support for the Palestinian people wherever it is needed,” he said.


New Trump administration ‘more pro-Israel than most Israelis’: Analysts

A re-elected Donald Trump will move his administration even closer to Israel and would feel no pressure to pretend there is a difference between the interests of the two countries, analysts say.

Speaking to the AFP news agency, Asher Fredman, director of the Israeli think tank the Misgav Institute for National Security and Zionist Strategy, said the incoming Trump administration looked “more pro-Israel than most Israelis”.

“There is really tremendous paradigm-shifting potential in a number of realms, such as advancing regional cooperation and putting maximum pressure on Iran,” Fredman said.

Elie Pieprz, director of international relations at the Israel Defense and Security Forum – an avowedly Zionist organisation, said Biden had a difficult relationship with Israel while Trump will likely seek to ease any friction.

Much like his domestic slogan, Pieprz said, Trump wants to “make the US-Israel relationship great again”.

Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and former US State Department adviser, said Trump has an “opportunistic, transactional and ad hoc” approach to international affairs and is unlikely to be able to stop Israel’s war on Gaza.

“He cannot end the war in Gaza and won’t pressure Netanyahu to do so,” Miller told AFP.



Trump pick for defense has long demonized Islam and worshipped Israel: Marwan Bishara



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Australian state premier says antiwar protest spoils ‘beautiful Christmas tradition’

Jacinta Allan, the premier of Australia’s southeastern Victoria state, has attacked pro-Palestinian protesters after a department store cancelled the launch of its Christmas window display due to a planned rally against the war in Gaza at the popular retail outlet in central Melbourne.

Allan labelled the protest “divisive” saying “blocking the Christmas windows won’t change a thing in the Middle East, but it will let down a bunch of kids in Melbourne”. “We cannot let ugly protests ruin a beautiful Christmas tradition,” she said.

Activist group Disrupt Wars called for a “Crash the Christmas Windows” rally on Sunday, encouraging people to bring banners, flags, placards and noise-makers to peacefully highlight that there should be no festive fun while children are being massacred in Gaza.

Australian department store chain Myer postponed the launch event on safety grounds while the protest organisers also announced they had called off their rally, saying they were pleased with the outcome and that children should be able to enjoy the window display without a “consumerist party”.


Tell that to the 17,000 orphans fending for themselves in Gaza

Dutch government defused crisis over Israeli football violence, prime minister says

Moroccan-born Nora Achahbar has unexpectedly quit her role as junior finance minister after far-right leader Geert Wilders blamed Moroccans for attacks on fans of Israeli football club Maccabi Tel Aviv in the Dutch capital on November 7.

Achahbar decided to exit the government on Friday after a heated cabinet meeting discussing the violence.

“The polarising interactions of the past weeks made such an impact on me that I am no longer able to effectively carry out my duties as deputy minister,”
Achahbar said in her resignation letter to parliament.

Achahbar’s resignation triggered an emergency meeting in which other cabinet members of her centrist New Social Contract (NSC) party also threatened to quit.

Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof said late on Friday that his cabinet had reached an agreement that no other NSC members would resign. Schoof had attributed the violence to people “with a migration background”, while Wilders claimed that the perpetrators were “all Muslims” and “for the most part Moroccans”.

Dutch authorities however reported that the Israeli fans set fire to a Palestinian flag before the match, chanted anti-Arab slurs and vandalised a taxi.


Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters gather at De Dam in Amsterdam ahead of the UEFA Europa League match between Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv on November 7

Western media didn’t do much more than ‘parrot Israeli propaganda’

Mohamad Elmasry, a media studies professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, has finished empirical studies looking at Western media coverage of Israel’s war on Gaza.

He found that Western media didn’t do much more than “parrot Israeli propaganda regarding al-Shifa Hospital [in Gaza City] and the war more generally”.

Western news outlets “tended to rely overwhelmingly on Israeli and pro-Israeli sources. Palestinian sources were mostly neglected as were pro-Palestinian sources,” he told Al Jazeera.

“It’s not a conspiracy; it’s not as though journalists are showing up to work and saying, we’re really going to make the Israelis look good today. But there is a structural problem here today,” Elmasry added.

“Western news organisations simply do not get Israel-Palestine right.”



EU foreign policy chief condemns Israel’s violence in Gaza, Lebanon, occupied West Bank

We reported earlier that EU foreign ministers will discuss a proposal to suspend political dialogue with Israel and ban imports to Europe from illegal Israeli settlements. EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell announced the proposed move on Friday.

Here are some extracts from Borrell’s lengthy statement lambasting Israel’s war on Gaza and attacks on Lebanon and Palestinian communities in the occupied West Bank.

  • As we run out of words to describe the ever-worsening situation in Gaza, people there are running out of everything. In many parts of the Gaza Strip, there is almost nothing that could sustain organised human life.
  • What we see of the tragedy of Gaza is, however, only the tip of the iceberg since the Strip has been sealed. There are hardly any journalists or international observers entering Gaza since more than one year. It is the longest information blackout ever imposed by a democratic state.
  • This pattern at play for too long in Gaza, is now being replicated elsewhere. In South Lebanon, some 30 villages have been obliterated – not as a result of heavy combat, but in a controlled way, posted on social media.
  • In the West Bank, extremist settlers’ violence is forcing many Palestinian farmers and herders off their land  … Israeli air strikes in Jenin and Tulkarem, the first in more than two decades, have added to the destruction of civilian infrastructure.
  • Based on this assessment, I will propose to EU Member States to suspend the political dialogue with Israel. After a year of unheeded pleas, we cannot continue with business as usual.


Horrors of Gaza now playing out in Lebanon, says UNICEF

“I don’t know whether to scream or to cry,” says UNICEF spokesperson James Elder in an impassioned plea for the war on children in Gaza and now Lebanon to stop.

Reflecting on the horrors that he witnessed in Gaza, where so many children have been killed and maimed by Israeli attacks, Elder says he is now witnessing that same horror in Lebanon.

“We have to ask ourselves, are those with power, those with influence to stop this, really going to watch in silence again? While these horrors play out again?” Elder says.


Incoming US Middle East envoy raises questions about neutrality on Gaza war

Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst Marwan Bishara has highlighted the incoming US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff’s apparent admiration for Netanyahu.

He suggests that such open reverence for Netanyahu raises questions about the envoy’s ability to maintain neutrality, objectivity, and credibility in shaping the US policy on the Israel-Palestine issue.


Police suppress pro-Palestine protest against Hillary Clinton in Belfast

Irish police pushed back pro-Palestine students and academics who held a protest inside the campus of Queen’s University in Belfast, denouncing the visit of former US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

Palestine supporters protested Clinton’s visit, accusing her of supporting the Israeli war on Gaza and Lebanon. The protest, which featured Palestinian flags and people drenched in fake blood, was met by police.

Police arrested several protesters leading dozens to demonstrate in Belfast for their release. The former US secretary of state’s visit to Belfast was to participate in the Global Innovation Summit.



Latest update from our team in Gaza

  • Israeli ground forces have demolished many residential buildings in northern Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp.
  • The air force has attacked a group of Palestinians in northern Gaza’s Beit Lahiya town, killing three civilians.
  • Israeli artillery has bombed the as-Saftawi neighbourhood in northern Gaza, causing significant damage to civil infrastructure.
  • Many Palestinians are injured following a strike on a residential building in Gaza City’s Shujayea neighbourhood.
  • Naval warships have opened fire at the coast of central Gaza’s Nuseirat refugee camp.
  • Israeli forces are demolishing residential neighbourhoods in southern Gaza’s Rafah city adjacent to the Philadelphi Corridor, an area bordering Egypt.


At least three people have been killed and others injured in Israeli attacks targeting the city of Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza, our Al Jazeera Arabic colleagues report.

The Israeli military bombed residential buildings in the vicinity of the Musab bin Omair Mosque, leading to casualties, including children, the Wafa news agency also reports.


Tents of displaced Palestinians become canvas for art of resistance in Gaza


University lecturer Majdi Abu Shinar paints scenes and symbols of Palestinian life and culture on the tent homes of people forcibly displaced by Israeli attacks and evacuation orders in Gaza City, November 14


Artists draw images and motifs of Palestinian life and culture on tents for displaced people as an act of resistance in the face of Israel’s war on Gaza


Israeli forces destroy residential buildings in Jabalia camp

Palestinian journalist Muhammad al-Sharef has shared a video on Instagram, showing a large cloud of smoke rising in northern Gaza following Israeli attacks.

Al-Sharef wrote that Israeli forces blew up residential buildings in the Jabalia refugee camp. The video has been verified by Sanad, Al Jazeera’s fact-checking agency.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DCa-m8ytDkI



Israeli attacks kill 5 people in southern Gaza’s Rafah

At least five people have been killed and others injured in Israeli attacks in Rafah city in southern Gaza. Medical sources in Gaza told the Wafa news agency that three young men were killed and others were injured after a drone hit a group of people in the al-Jnaina area, east of Rafah.

They added that two civilians were killed by Israeli warplanes in the Khirbet al-Adas area, north of the city.


Khan Younis runs out of fuel to operate water, sewage facilities

The Khan Younis municipality in southern Gaza has announced it ran out of fuel to keep water and sewage facilities working.

Basic services such as sanitation, waste collection, and transport are no longer in service, which will result in the spread of health hazards and disease among residents, Palestinian media quoted the municipality as saying.

The inability to operate water wells and desalination plants deprives more than 1.2 million residents of their basic rights to obtain clean water for drinking and other uses, it said.


Gaza death toll hits 43,799; 35 killed in the past day

The number of people killed in Israel’s war on Gaza has reached 43,799, its Health Ministry says. Another 103,601 Palestinians have been wounded in the ongoing attacks that began in October 2023.

The latest casualty figures include 35 killed and 111 injured over the past 24 hours, the ministry said in a statement. The death toll is presumed to be much higher with an estimated 10,000 bodies buried in the rubble of destroyed buildings in Gaza.


Attack on Gaza City’s Shujayea kills 3 Palestinians

At least three Palestinians have been killed and others wounded after Israeli warplanes bombed a house in eastern Gaza City. Medical sources told Wafa the targeted home belonged to the Samara family in the Shujayea neighbourhood.

Thousands of Palestinians have fled northern Gaza after Israel stepped up a forced displacement campaign in early October. Civilians who remain are under constant bombardment and cut off from food, water, and medical support.


Israel’s destruction of al-Shifa: One year since siege of Gaza’s largest hospital

It has been a year since Israeli forces laid siege to Gaza’s largest hospital and destroyed it. Denounced as “barbaric” by doctors, multiple investigations have debunked Israeli claims that it was a Hamas command centre.

Israel has not been able to provide evidence to back those claims either.

But the iconic al-Shifa Hospital is far from forgotten, as medical workers all over the world continue to rally for those who destroyed it to face justice.



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Israel seeks to undermine Palestinian ‘will of resistance’ by attacks on hospitals: Physician

The Israeli attack on al-Shifa Hospital a year ago has had a major impact on Gaza’s healthcare capacity, says physician Mads Gilbert, who has worked in Gaza over the last 20 years, including at al-Shifa Hospital.

Dr Gilbert, who was denied access to Gaza by the Isreali army after October 7 last year, has told Al Jazeera from Tromso, Norway, that “by attacking healthcare [facilities] and ambulances, killing healthcare workers and diminishing capacity, and producing hundreds of thousands of people in need through the bombing and all the diseases [present] imposed by the siege, they are actually undermining the will of resistance in the people”.

Still, Palestinians have reopened the emergency department, three operating rooms and have about 40 doctors and 70 nurses working at al-Shifa, he said, adding that “this willingness to restore function is an amazing, impressive capacity from our Palestinian colleagues in Gaza”.

Gilbert said the only medical solution is for an immediate, lasting ceasefire to be implemented, an immediate opening of Gaza and an end to the siege.

“[It is] costing thousands of lives that we do not report because they are dying from infections, from maltreated or untreated diabetes, from cancer, who cannot be treated because the healthcare system is broken down systematically by Israeli occupation forces.”


Dozens of premeditated murder, field executions documented in northern Gaza: Monitor

Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, a Geneva-based human rights organisation, says it has documented dozens of premeditated murders and field executions in northern Gaza.

As Israeli forces continue to lay siege to the northern part of the enclave for 43 days now, the monitor said it found that among the many crimes committed by Israeli forces, including mass displacement and targeting shelters, it has documented cases of direct killing and extrajudicial executions “without any justification”.

On Wednesday, the monitor documented the killing of Khaled Mustafa Ismail al-Shafei, 58, and his eldest son Ibrahim, 21, who was shot by the Israeli army inside their home in front of their family in the town of Beit Lahiya.

The monitor said that the family members were still suffering from severe nervous shock about the attack, and the bodies of the man and his son remained at the house as neither the family nor rescue crews had been able to reach them.

Euro-Med urged the UN and the international community to intervene and stop the “genocide” in Gaza and the siege in the north.


In north Gaza, Palestinians plead to be evacuated

The northern Gaza Strip has been under siege for more than 40 days.

Israeli soldiers have surrounded and imposed a strict blockade on Palestinians in Beit Lahiya, Jabalia and Beit Hanoon, where Palestinians are unable to evacuate their besieged homes.

We have received many appeals from people in Beit Lahiya who say they’re stuck and need rescuing. They have no food, water or medical aid.

Other than air strikes and continuing artillery shelling, the military has extensively deployed quadcopters that Israeli forces use to fire live ammunition at
Palestinians and kill them in different areas across the Gaza Strip.

They’re using the small drones a lot in the north where people are saying even if they try to move or search for food they’re being shot by those quadcopters.



Global response needed to stop Israeli settler violence in West Bank: Palestinian official

Nabil Abu Rudeineh, the spokesperson for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, has said the escalation of settler violence in the occupied West Bank requires an international response, according to the Wafa news agency.

Abu Rudeineh was explicitly referring to the village of Beit Furik, east of Nablus, where settlers attacked Palestinian homes and set on fire several agricultural farms.

He added the continuation of the “genocide” in Gaza also required an international position to stop the violence.

Abu Rudeineh held the US responsible for Israel’s persistence in defying international law due to their continuous support through money, weapons and political cover.

“Our people will remain steadfast in the face of the occupation and its crimes, and will confront these crimes, clinging to their land, holy sites and rights, stressing that Israeli terrorism by the occupation army and colonists, and American support will not achieve security and stability in the entire region,” he said.


Israeli military carries out raids across the West Bank

The Israeli military has carried out raids in locations across the occupied West Bank in recent hours, including:

  • The city of Tulkarem, where Israeli forces have fired live bullets and sound bombs, without any injuries being reported
  • The town of al-Khader, south of Bethlehem
  • The Old City in Nablus, where Palestinian fighters have targeted Israeli forces with an explosive device
  • The al-Ein refugee camp near Nablus city
  • The city of Jenin, where Palestinian fighters have targeted Israeli forces with an explosive device and volleys of bullets


Israeli soldiers arrest 12 Palestinians in West Bank

Israeli forces arrested at least 12 people from the occupied West Bank, including former prisoners, Wafa reports.

The Palestinian Prisoner’s Society said Israeli troops conducted arrests in governorates of Hebron, Nablus, Jenin, Qalqilya and Salfit, while also destroying Palestinian homes.

Since October 7, 2023, Israeli forces have arrested more than 11,700 citizens of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.



Last edited by SvennoJ - 1 hour ago