German intellectuals call for an end to support for Israel

A group of prominent German intellectuals say their country should be held accountable for Israeli crimes in Gaza and be forced to pay reparations for the massive destruction.

“The endless massacres that have taken place in Gaza, but also in the West Bank and Lebanon, which have been broadcast virtually as a livestream around the world over the last 14 months, oblige Germany to finally stop supporting Israel, be it military, diplomatic or legal,” said Michael Barenboim of the Barenboim Said Academy at a news briefing in Berlin.

Barenboim is an acclaimed violinist and son of Daniel Barenboim, the world-renowned Argentinian Israeli pianist and conductor. His remarks were echoed by Hanna Kienzler of London’s King’s College.

“Germany bears considerable complicity in the campaign of extermination ordered by the Israeli state in Gaza under the leadership of Netanyahu and Gallant and carried out by the Israeli army. Germany, therefore, shares responsibility for the long-term consequences of this genocide,” she said.

Germany is a staunch ally of Israel. In 2023, the German government approved $356m worth of military equipment and war weapons for Israel. This year’s official figure was below $16.4m.

Wtf?

Dutch PM says Netanyahu could visit Netherlands without being arrested

Dick Schoof says there may be options for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to visit the Netherlands without being arrested despite an International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant against him.

“The most important thing is that we have obligations that come from the treaty and that we comply to them,” the Dutch prime minister said.

“In light of that, we would have to see how we act when the prime minister of Israel were to come to the Netherlands. There are possible scenarios, also within international law, in which he would be able to come to the Netherlands without being arrested.”

Schoof did not elaborate on the possible scenarios. The ICC issued arrest warrants last week for Netanyahu and his former defence chief Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza war.

Europe’s responses to Ukraine, Gaza wars reflect double standard

The outgoing EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell acknowledged criticism of the EU’s “double standards” in its inconsistent stance on the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, saying this notion spread widely in the countries of the Global South.

Borrell evaluated his five-year tenure and reflected on Gaza and other issues days before he is succeeded by former Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas.

He said the bloc has not managed to be consistent and effective in the Middle East, saying after October 7, 2023, “we were unable to speak with one voice or act effectively enough to help obtain a ceasefire, secure the release of the hostages, and ensure respect for international law and the decisions of the Security Council, the United Nations General Assembly, and the International Court of Justice in the region.”

Borrell said the EU’s “deep divisions” on this issue have largely prevented it from influencing the course of events, despite the growing number of civilian casualties.

European leaders like a good old colonial genocide :/ (As long as it's not right next door)

All bakeries shut in central Gaza due to supply shortages: WFP

All bakeries have shut down in central Gaza due to severe supply shortages, the World Food Programme (WFP) warns in a post on X.

“Bread is a lifeline for many families – often the only food they can access. Now, even that is slipping out of reach,” the UN agency said, urging vital aid to enter the besieged enclave.

18 killed in Beit Lahiya in Israeli air strikes

In northern Gaza’s Beit Lahiya, an Israeli strike targeted a residential building in which 18 Palestinians have been confirmed killed. We are also getting reports of attacks in another area of Beit Lahiya, an area seen as a last resort for Palestinians. Five civilians have been confirmed killed.

Meanwhile, the situation in Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya remains critical as it has suffered repeated Israeli attacks, including air strikes, artillery shelling and relentless drone fire on the courtyard.

Medical staff have been injured including the director of the hospital previously, Hussam Abu Safia. Now the head of the intensive care unit, Dr Ahmed el-Kahlout, was killed in an Israeli drone attack.

Kamal Adwan suffers from a chronic shortage of essential supplies and lack of medical staff. However, we have spoken to doctors there who say they’ll continue to work and not leave the hospital.

Israeli forces attack Gaza City area with artillery shelling

Our colleague at Al Jazeera Arabic report Israel’s army is firing artillery in central Gaza City’s Saftawi area.

At least 55 people have been killed across the Gaza Strip since morning, medical sources told Al Jazeera.

Three Palestinians killed in Gaza bread stampede

https://www.cnn.com/2024/11/29/middleeast/gaza-bakery-crush-palestinians-killed-intl-latam/index.html

Two children and a woman were crushed to death as a crowd of Palestinians pushed to get bread at a bakery in the Gaza Strip during a worsening food crisis in the war-ravaged territory.

The bodies of two girls aged 13 and 17 and the 50-year-old woman were taken to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, where a doctor confirmed they died from suffocation because of crowding at the al-Banna bakery.

Osama Abu Laban, the father of one of the girls, wailed over the loss of her life outside the hospital. “She went to buy bread and she barely managed to get a loaf of bread before being swept away by the crowd of women. They brought her out a lifeless body,” he said.

The flow of food allowed into Gaza by Israel has fallen to nearly its lowest level of almost 14-month-old war for the past two months. UN and aid officials say hunger and desperation are growing among Gaza’s population, almost all of which relies on humanitarian aid to survive.


_{Palestinians gather for bread from a bakery in Khan Younis, southern Gaza}

Muslim charities face discrimination as Palestinians are desperate for aid

https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2024/11/29/muslim-charities-face-discrimination-as-palestinians-are-desperate-for-aid

As the people of Gaza face famine and the continued bombing of their homes by Israel, numerous Muslim charities and organisations are desperately trying to help keep Palestinians alive.

However, many of these groups have found over the past year that the banks they rely on to help get this aid to the people of Gaza do not want to work with charities run by Muslims – especially if they are focused on Gaza. This has become referred to as “Muslim while banking”.

“We used to joke when we started our company that we had 99 problems and payments wasn’t one of them, and that quickly changed,” says Amany Killawi, co-founder of LaunchGood, a crowdfunding platform for Muslims. “I do feel there’s additional scrutiny on Muslim organisations.”

_{Palestinians receive food cooked by a charity kitchen in Khan Younis, southern Gaza}

Gaza hunger: ‘Dreadful struggle for survival’

Ajith Sunghay, head of the UN Human Rights Office in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, expressed concern about the levels of hunger even in areas of central Gaza where aid agencies have teams on the ground.

“I was particularly alarmed by the prevalence of hunger,” Sunghay told a Geneva press briefing. “Acquiring basic necessities has become a daily, dreadful struggle for survival.”

Sunghay said the UN has been unable to take any aid to northern Gaza, where he said an estimated 70,000 people remain following “repeated impediments or rejections of humanitarian convoys by the Israeli authorities”.

Sunghay visited camps for people recently displaced from parts of northern Gaza. They were living in horrendous conditions with severe food shortages and poor sanitation, he said.

“It is so obvious that massive humanitarian aid needs to come in – and it is not. It is so important the Israeli authorities make this happen,” he said.

You mean Israeli authorities need to stop blocking aid. The aid is there, but can't get in where it's needed.

‘Ultimate solution’ in Gaza is peace, not aid: WHO

The chief of the World Health Organization says 90 percent of people in the coastal enclave are now living in tents, leaving them “vulnerable to respiratory and other diseases, food insecurity and malnutrition as winter approaches”.

“The ultimate solution to this suffering is not aid but peace,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

90% of people in #Gaza are now living in tents, leaving them vulnerable to respiratory and other diseases, food insecurity and malnutrition as winter approaches.

The ultimate solution to this suffering is not aid, but peace. pic.twitter.com/z6aj1QTOUW

— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) November 29, 2024

Palestine calls for emergency Arab League meeting

The request by the Palestinian presidency came after the Israeli army killed nearly 100 Palestinians in northern Gaza over the past 24 hours, including 75 killed in air strikes on two homes in Beit Lahiya.

A Palestinian presidency statement, cited by the official Wafa news agency, called on the Arab League “to hold an emergency meeting at the level of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs given the ongoing Israeli genocidal aggression, forced displacement, and starvation of the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip”.

It cited Israel’s “aggressive policies” aimed at separating the north from the rest of the Strip as it deploys “starvation as a method of warfare against Palestinians to displace them from their lands and houses”.

In early October, Israel launched a large-scale ground operation in northern Gaza. Residents have accused the army of depopulating the towns of Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoon as well as the Jabalia refugee camp.

Main points for November 29th

• The Israeli military has intensified its deadly assault on northern Gaza, killing more than 100 people over the past 24 hours, including at least 75 people in two separate attacks on residential buildings in Beit Lahiya.
• At least 2,700 Palestinians have now been killed since Israel’s brutal ground and aerial assault of the north began on October 5, according to Gaza’s civil defence agency.
• Two teenage girls and a woman have been crushed to death as a crowd of Palestinians rushed to get bread at a bakery in central Gaza during a worsening food crisis in the war-ravaged territory.
• Gaza’s Government Media Office has said hunger in the besieged enclave has reached “catastrophic” levels and called on the World Food Programme to “uphold its duty” and resume the distribution of much-needed flour.
• The Israeli military has reportedly breached its fragile ceasefire with Hezbollah several times in Lebanese villages and towns on the border, including with artillery fire and tank shelling.
• Hezbollah’s Secretary-General Naim Qassem has declared “divine victory” after months of cross-border attacks and fighting with Israeli forces.

Trump wants Gaza ceasefire before inauguration: Report

President-elect Donald Trump wants to secure a ceasefire and captives deal in Gaza before he takes office, according to US Senator Lindsey Graham.

Graham, who was in Israel this week, told US-based media outlet Axios that Trump was “more determined than ever to release the hostages and supports a ceasefire that includes a hostage deal”.

“He wants to see it happening now,” Graham said. “I want people in Israel and in the region to know that Trump is focused on the hostages issue. He wants the killing to stop and the fighting to end.”

Graham said Trump was seeking a ceasefire as a first step before he can focus on goals such as Israel-Saudi normalisation and a regional military alliance against Iran.

Hamas accuses Israel of using internationally prohibited weapons in northern Gaza

Hamas has demanded the formation of an international committee to investigate the use of internationally prohibited weapons by the Israeli army in the northern Gaza Strip, according to the group’s statement cited by our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic.

The group said it collected “horrific testimonies” from doctors and residents in the besieged territory who recounted “the evaporation of bodies” after Israeli attacks there.

The accounts “strongly indicate” that Israel is using “international prohibited weapons during the brutal extermination campaign that has been ongoing for 53 days in the northern Gaza Strip”, the statement said.

Hamas officials in Egypt for ceasefire talks

A Hamas delegation has arrived in Cairo to discuss proposals for a ceasefire in Gaza, following talks earlier this week between Egyptian and Israeli negotiators. Unnamed sources told The National newspaper the Hamas delegation is led by Khalil al-Hayah, Zaher Jabareen, and Moussa Marzouq.

The proposal is thought to include a 20-to-30-day truce. During that time, Hamas would try and identify the location of the estimated 100 captives it’s holding. If a ceasefire is reached, the two sides would exchange hostages for Palestinian prisoners.

While it remains uncertain whether Hamas and Israel will accept the plan, Egyptian officials want to build on the momentum from Tuesday’s ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.

Egypt, Qatar and the United States have been trying for almost a year, without success, to broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.

Israeli military issues new order banning Lebanese residents returning to dozens of villages

The Israeli military has warned residents of southern Lebanon not to return to dozens more villages “until further notice” despite the ceasefire. In a notice published on social media, a military spokesman said residents would be at risk of attack by Israeli forces if they attempt to return home.

The announcement draws a no-go zone line through the villages of Shebaa, Hebbariyah, Marjayoun, Arnaoon, Yohmor, al-Qantara, Chaqra, Baraashit, Yatar and al-Mansouri.

“You are prohibited at this stage from returning to your homes from this line south until further notice,” the military spokesman said in the post which names dozens of villages that are off-limits to their residents.

The off-limits villages include:

‘Double standard’ built into Lebanon ceasefire agreement

The success of the ceasefire in Lebanon, in some ways, “is in Hezbollah’s court”, due to Israeli violations of it, says Mohamed Elmasry, a professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies.

“[Hezbollah] could certainly attack Israel right now on the basis that Israel has already violated the agreement, but so far, they have not,” Elmasry told Al Jazeera.

The US, additionally, is “not a neutral arbiter” in the ceasefire process, the professor said.

“It’s very clear that, from the US perspective, Israel has the right to engage Hezbollah, to attack Hezbollah, but Hezbollah does not reserve the same right to do to Israel,” he said. “So there’s already this kind of built-in double standard.”

Child among three injured in Israeli strikes on southern Lebanon: Ministry

Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health says an Israeli strike on a vehicle in south Lebanon has injured three people, including a child, amid a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.

“An Israeli enemy strike on a car in Majdal Zoun wounded three people including a seven-year-old child,” the Health Ministry said in a statement.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.

Israel claims its strikes in Lebanon sought to prevent Hezbollah’s ceasefire violations

The Israeli military says in a statement on X that its forces conducted several operations in Lebanon today against a threat to Israel “in violation of the ceasefire agreement”.

“We bombed militants in southern Lebanon who were loading a car with RPG weapons, ammunition boxes, and other military equipment,” it said.

“We attacked Hezbollah elements after they arrived at the organisation’s facilities, and the force that arrived at the scene found weapons, including hand grenades,” the statement added.

The military also claimed to have attacked “a Hezbollah facility” in the Sidon area, targeting “rocket launch platforms”. “We attacked a military vehicle operating in the missile production infrastructure area of Hezbollah,” it added.

We have reported earlier that a seven-year-old child was among three people injured in a vehicle struck by Israel in southern Lebanon’s Majdal Zoun, according to the country’s Health Ministry.

Israeli military renews curfew on southern Lebanese residents

Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee has issued renewed restrictions on residents of southern Lebanon.

“It is strictly forbidden to move or travel south of the Litani River starting from 5pm [14:00 GMT] until 7am [4:00 GMT] tomorrow,” Adraee said on X. “Those south of the Litani River must remain where they are.”

The Israeli military has been placing these restrictions since the ceasefire began on Wednesday, and striking at those it perceives to be violating them.

At least two killed in Israeli drone attack on Lebanon’s Nabatieh: Report

An Israeli drone attack on the village of Rab el-Thalathine in southern Lebanon’s Nabatieh governorate has killed two people and injured two others. That’s according to the country’s National News Agency (NNA).

Palestinian solidarity events held in Mexico, Venezuela, US

_{A demonstrator holds a flag during a protest to mark the United Nations’ International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People in Mexico City}

_{Pro-Palestinian protesters attend a demonstration on Black Friday in the Georgetown neighbourhood of Washington, DC}

Crowds rally in Yemen in support of Palestine, Lebanon

Protesters rallied once again in the Yemeni capital of Sanaa to show their support for Gaza and Lebanon amid Israel’s attacks. The rally, attended mostly by members of the Houthi armed group, takes place every Friday and always attracts large crowds.


_{Protesters gather in Sanaa, Yemen, on Friday in solidarity with Palestinians and the people of Lebanon}

Protesters march in London in support of Palestine, Lebanon

A demonstration has taken place in the British capital’s centre in support of Palestine and Lebanon.

Thousands march through Rome in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza

As many as 15,000 people marched through Rome, Italy, in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza. The demonstration started in Piazza Vittorio and ended at the Piazzale Ostiense.

_{Demonstrators hold a giant Palestinian flag during a rally in support of Palestinians in Rome on Saturday}