Borrell reiterates that EU states must respect ICC arrest warrants

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell called on all EU member states to respect decisions by the International Criminal Court, including the arrest warrant against Netanyahu.

“We cannot undermine the International Criminal Court. It is the only way of having global justice,” said Borrell. “They’re not political. It’s a legal body formed by respected people who are the best among the profession of judges.”

While all EU member states are signatories to the ICC’s founding treaty, France said yesterday it believed Netanyahu had immunity to actions by the ICC, given Israel has not signed up to the court statutes. Italy, meanwhile, has said it is not feasible to arrest Netanyahu as long as he remains head of Israel’s government.

Israeli foreign minister says ‘no justification’ for ICC arrest warrants: Report

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar says that ICC had “no justification” for issuing arrest warrants for Israeli leaders, in a joint news conference with Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky, the Reuters news agency reported.

Saar told Reuters Israel has appealed the decision, claiming that it set a dangerous precedent.

The foreign minister also told the agency that Israel would finish the war on Gaza when it “achieves its objectives” of returning captives being held in Gaza and ensuring Hamas no longer controls the Strip. Saar added that Israel does not intend to control civilian life in Gaza and that he believes peace is “inevitable” but that it can’t be based on “illusions”.

No recognition of Palestinian statehood during US government transition: Smotrich

Far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich says Israel has “thwarted a great threat to the settlements and the state of Israel this evening in a smart and quiet way”.

He wrote in a post on X that Israel has ensured a resolution recognising Palestinian statehood in the UN Security Council would not be passed during the period leading up to Donald Trump taking over the White House again in January,

“We will continue to develop the settlements, fortify Israel’s security and prevent the establishment of a terrorist state that will endanger our existence and the future of our children,” Smotrich said.

The minister has called for the military occupation of Gaza and is a staunch supporter of rapidly expanding Israeli settlements on Palestinian land, which are illegal under international law.

Egypt, Qatar discuss Gaza ceasefire efforts after Lebanon truce

Qatar’s Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani and Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty discussed ceasefire efforts in Gaza after a truce deal was reached in Lebanon.

“We discussed the truce agreement in Lebanon. And we express our hope that this agreement will result in a real ceasefire, and also that its effect will extend to the Gaza Strip – ending this human suffering as soon as possible,” Qatar’s prime minister said at a joint news conference in Egypt’s New Administrative Capital in the Cairo governorate.

“We talked about the sincere and tireless Egyptian-Qatari efforts that continued for more than a year in order to quickly reach a deal that would guarantee an immediate ceasefire and stop the bloodshed of the brotherly Palestinian people with the release of all hostages and a number of Palestinian prisoners,” Egypt’s Foreign Minister Abdelatty added.

Israel agreed to a ceasefire in Lebanon in order to increase fire in Gaza

Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst Marwan Bishara says that Netanyahu has been clear one of the reasons for the ceasefire deal with Lebanon was in order to free up Israeli troops to continue the war on the Gaza Strip.

‘Israel has no intention of withdrawing from Gaza’

We’ve spoken to Gideon Levy, a columnist with Israeli newspaper Haaretz, to find out whether he holds any hope that a deal like the one struck between Israel and Hezbollah can also be reached to end the Israeli war on Gaza any time soon.

Here’s what he had to say:

“It is impossible that this government will approve any kind of deal which will include, like in Lebanon, the withdrawal of the Israeli forces.

“And as long as this is the case, it cannot be a real deal; it can be a pause, and we’ve heard now about one suggestion – the Egyptian offer – to make a pause, to release some hostages, to release some Palestinian prisoners and to go on.

“But unlike in Lebanon, Israel has no intention to evacuate the Gaza Strip. The northern part of Gaza is now totally in ruins and I don’t see a situation in which Palestinians will be allowed to get back to the northern part of Gaza – so the future looks much more problematic in Gaza than in Lebanon.

“As long as the army stays there, there will be resistance – and as long as there is resistance, there will be retaliation. That’s the logic.

“I don’t see a leverage of the Egyptians over the Netanyahu government. The Americans didn’t say anything, and it depends much on them because in Lebanon it was very clear it was the American leverage which made the difference.

“The Americans were very clear about the deal in Lebanon, I’m not sure they will be so devoted about Gaza, especially not in the coming weeks until the new president gets into office.

“And in any case, it will be a very, very limited deal – let’s not have too many expectations about it.”

Netanyahu says ready for Gaza ceasefire, but not an end to the war: Report

The Israeli prime minister made a distinction between a ceasefire agreement in Gaza and a permanent end to the war during the interview with Channel14, his first since the Lebanon ceasefire agreement.

Netanyahu said that Israel intends to continue its war with Hamas and added that he is optimistic about efforts to release the captives held by Hamas.

“The answer is clear: I am ready for a ceasefire in the south, one that we think can achieve the release of the abductees.”

Israeli forces detain Palestinian men as hundreds of civilians flee besieged Beit Lahiya

Israeli forces separated Palestinian women and children from men when hundreds of civilians fled the war-torn and besieged northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya on Wednesday, The Associated Press (AP) news agency reports.

Many of those fleeing Beit Lahiya, which has been under an Israeli military siege for more than 50 days, crowded onto donkey carts with their belongings in their arms. Others walked on foot, some holding the hands of their small children, as they approached Israeli forces who had encircled the town and prevented food, water and medicine from entering.

“We left, and here we are sitting, with no shelter or food, and we do not know where to go,” Umm Saleh al-Adham, a woman who fled Beit Lahiya, told the AP news agency She said Israeli troops separated the Palestinian men and only allowed the women and children to travel onward to Gaza City.

The Israeli military said it facilitated the evacuation of thousands of civilians from Beit Lahiya and also detained dozens of Palestinians who were taken to Israel for questioning, the AP reports.

Palestinian child among 2 killed in northern Gaza

Wafa reports that a child has been killed in Israeli shelling of his family home in the Zeitoun neighbourhood of Gaza City. Another Palestinian was also killed in Israeli shelling in the Jabalia refugee camp, Wafa’s correspondent said.

Earlier, we reported that four people were killed in Israeli attacks on two homes in Beit Lahiya, also in the north of the Gaza Strip.

Israel fighter jets carry out intense bombing of Gaza

This started in the early hours of this morning across the Gaza Strip. We can confidently say that the entire Gaza Strip has been bombed equally since the early hours of this morning. We can still clearly hear the sound of the fighter jets flying at a very, very low level across the central area of Gaza and Deir el-Balah city.

Reports were received from the northern part of the Strip, particularly from Jabalia and the city of Beit Lahiya. These fighter jets carried out deadly attacks that destroyed the remaining residential buildings in Jabalia refugee camp, Jabalia town as well as the northern part of Beit Lahiya Project area and Beit Lahiya city.

This is just pushing people into further internal displacement and causing massive civilian casualties.

In the Nuseirat refugee camp, particularly in the northern area of the camp, very close to the Netzarim junction, the Israeli military on the ground is conducting a policy to expand the junction. In doing so, it carries out these attacks to destroy remaining residential buildings.

These buildings are residential homes and residential towers that the Israeli military claims are being used as observation points by Palestinian fighters. But from what we’ve heard from witnesses, there were massive numbers of civilians inside these residential buildings.

One killed, Al Jazeera cameraman injured in latest Israeli attack on Gaza’s Nuseirat

Within the past few minutes, we received a confirmed report of another attack on the Nuseirat refugee camp. The attack injured our colleague, the cameraman for Al Jazeera Mubasher, and another person passing was killed by flying shrapnel.

In the past couple of hours, an intense bombing campaign coupled with heavy artillery has been targeting not only residential buildings and homes, but also mosques and other public facilities.

One of these attacks was on a residential home that was full of displaced people, including a displaced family from Gaza City. Seven members of that family were killed right away, and others are still missing and trapped under the rubble.

Attacks are also continuing in Beit Lahiya, an area that is accommodating the majority of people who were displaced from Jabalia refugee camp and Jaballa town, in the almost 56 days of military siege of the northern part of the Strip.

Another attack on Gaza City, in an area between Khan Younis city and Rafah killed four people. A combination of the continuing bombings and the worsening weather conditions are creating a recipe for deepening suffering for already displaced, traumatised populations across the Gaza Strip.

Israeli strikes targeting ‘many locations across the Gaza Strip’

The Israeli military is still massively targeting many locations across the Gaza Strip. Since the early hours of this morning, there has been a … wide-scale concentration on Nuseirat refugee camp.

The army is effectively targeting the northern part of the camp, especially high rise buildings, and they are deploying quadcopter drones in a very extensive manner.

We have heard in the past hour more explosions taking place in the camp … in the field hospital that is located close to al-Awda hospital in Nuseirat refugee camp.

Two Palestinians were confirmed injured in that attack, and an elderly man was killed by the fire of the drones in the streets of the Nuseirat refugee camp.

We have been getting distressing calls from civilians who are trapped in al-Urouba school, which is in the northern part of Nuseirat. Witnesses told us that they are unable to get out from the gate of that school because of the Israeli quadcopter drones that shoot anyone who’s moving.

Sixteen Palestinians were killed so far in the camp, while 55 others were wounded.

Video shows moment Israeli quadcopter fires on Gaza journalists

A Palestinian journalist has posted the video below, which has been verified by Al Jazeera’s Sanad agency, showing the moment Israeli forces fired at journalists as they worked in Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza Strip.

Earlier today, Al Jazeera Mubasher correspondent Talal al-Arouqi was injured in an Israeli attack in Nuseirat, and a civilian was killed by flying shrapnel.

Families in battered northern Gaza living off ‘water and dates’

We’ve been hearing lots of tragic stories coming from families who are trapped in the city of Beit Lahiya. Even our colleagues there are still trapped. We’ve heard stories from families who’ve gone days without having any sort of food, and they have been depending on drinking water and eating dates.

Also, civilians have been reporting on their family members being buried under the debris of their houses after being targeted by Israeli artillery and fighter jets without being able to be rescued.

Civil defence members and crews cannot effectively operate in the north of the Strip because this area is no longer recognisable. All the landmarks [in Jabalia and Beit Lahiya] … have been completely changed forever due to the widespread destruction in that area.

These attacks continue to hammer residential buildings, destroying what’s been left of the northern part of Gaza. What’s so grim is that we continue to hear from families that they are not even able to go to Gaza City, given the fact that it has also been under relentless attacks on evacuation centres.

Israeli forces infiltrate Nur Shams refugee camp, arrest 4 men

Israeli special forces have infiltrated the Jabal an-Nasr area in the Nur Shams refugee camp, east of Tulkarem in the occupied West Bank, and arrested four men after besieging their homes.

The al-Quds Brigades –Tulkarem Battalion said its fighters opened fire on Israeli forces in Jabal an-Nasr, while also detonating an explosive device on an Israeli military vehicle, achieving “confirmed casualties”.

Israeli military raids have been reported in other locations across the occupied West Bank, including:

Western Media COVERS UP Israeli Finance Minister Call For Genocide



Outright genocidal intent from Bezalel Smotrich - and the Western media covers it up.

Ta-Nehisi Coates: I Was Told Palestine Was Complicated. Visiting Revealed a Simple, Brutal Truth

As the war on Gaza spans a second year, we continue our conversation with the acclaimed writer Ta-Nehisi Coates. His new book, _The Message_, is based in part on his visit last year to Israel and the occupied West Bank, where he says he saw a system of segregation and oppression reminiscent of Jim Crow in the United States. "It was revelatory," says Coates. "I don't think the average American has a real sense of what we’re doing over there — and I emphasize 'what we're doing' because it's not possible without American support."

Israeli army orders Lebanese to stay away from villages not previously invaded

Al Jazeera’s verification agency Sanad has revealed that some 20 villages in southern Lebanon, not previously invaded by Israeli ground troops, are among a list of locations Israel’s military has warned residents not to return to after the ceasefire came into effect.

An Israeli army spokesperson warned residents against entering 62 villages in southern Lebanon, covering an area of about 500 square kilometres (193sq miles).

According to Sanad, only 42 of those villages had been previously invaded by Israeli ground troops, or at least witnessed clashes.

It's a buffer zone, it wouldn't surprise me if Israel extends it further to the Litani river.
Weird ceasefire where one party can dictate what happens.

Lebanese armed forces only playing ‘symbolic, political role’

Rami Khouri, a Middle East analyst and fellow at the American University of Beirut, says the Lebanese army is working under the ceasefire agreement “as an important political element for the Lebanese” people.

“The Lebanese army has never been able to play a decisive role because they’ve been deliberately kept well below the power of the Israeli army as a decision of the major Western military powers,” such as the US, France, Britain and others, Khouri told Al Jazeera.

It, however, plays a significant “symbolic, political role and … [a] practical role”.

“When Lebanese civilians see the army walking around … it makes them feel a little bit safe, it makes them feel like there is some sort of sovereign Lebanese authority,” Khouri said.

But people know this authority cannot confront Israel, he added, which is why Hezbollah “had to be born”.

EU says ceasefire in Lebanon ‘significant achievement’

In a statement, the European Union says it is now “crucial” that the ceasefire holds to guarantee the safety of civilians and to allow those internally displaced people “on both sides of the border to return to their homes”.

It said the EU and its member states are committed to “mobilising a wide range of EU instruments” to support the Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers on the ground.

In the statement, the EU urged Lebanon to elect a president to start rebuilding a “strong and sovereign Lebanese State”.

EU’s Borrell says Israeli society being ‘colonised from the inside’ by extremists

Josep Borrell, the EU’s foreign affairs high representative, has called out the rise of extremism and violence in Israel, where “the colonisation of the mind of the people is the most dangerous thing that Israeli society is facing”.

“Israeli society is being colonised from the inside by the extremist and violent people,” Borrell said on Thursday at the opening of the second meeting of the Global Alliance for the Implementation of the Two-State Solution.

“It is undermining the foundations of their democracy,” Borrell said, adding that without a two-state solution for Palestine, “there will not be peace in the Middle East”.

“Now is the time to act. There is a light of hope,” he said, referring to the days-old ceasefire in Lebanon between Hezbollah and Israel.

The EU foreign policy chief also said the international community, and in particular EU states, should not undermine the work of the International Criminal Court (ICC), which recently issued arrest warrants for Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defence chief Yoav Gallant.

The ICC is “the only way of having global justice”, he said.

Main points on November 28th

• The Israeli military has launched multiple attacks on what it claims are Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon, as both sides accuse one another of violating a fragile US-brokered ceasefire agreement.
• The Israeli military has also renewed a curfew imposed on residents in southern Lebanon after thousands of civilians returned to their damaged homes in the area.
• Israeli forces have continued their bombardment of Gaza, killing at least 42 people over several deadly attacks on Thursday, medical sources have told Al Jazeera.
• Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Israel is “ready for a ceasefire” in Gaza, but not an end to the war with Hamas, during his first interview since the truce with Hezbollah came into effect.
• An Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps general has been killed in Syria amid an ongoing assault by armed groups opposed to President Bashar al-Assad. Tehran has labelled the offensive a “ploy” by the United States and Israel to destabilise the region.
  

ISRAELI Lawmaker: Netanyahu is ‘POISONING’ Israel

“[Benjamin Netanyahu] doesn’t care about anyone. He doesn’t care about the well-being and lives of the hostages ... He wants to be in power, first, because he’s in love with power, secondly, because he’s terrified — he’s a coward — he’s terrified to be behind bars, as he should be.”

Israeli politician Ofer Cassif joins Mehdi Hasan to discuss his suspension from the Knesset, his denunciation of the genocide in Gaza, and his criticisms of his country’s ‘fascist’ government.

Cassif outspokenly opposes Israel’s occupation of Gaza and the West Bank and is the only Jewish member of the Knesset, Israel’s Parliament, to support South Africa’s genocide case at the ICJ (This was recorded before ICC arrest warrants were issued).