Health worker dies in Khan Younis due to ‘extreme cold’: Gaza ministry

Al-Hakim Ahmed al-Zaharneh, who was among the crews working at the European Gaza Hospital, has died because of “extreme” weather conditions, according to a statement by the enclave’s Health Ministry.

His body was found inside his tent in al-Mawasi area, west of the city of Khan Younis, southern Gaza.

“This incident comes in light of the difficult humanitarian conditions that displaced citizens are experiencing, as the suffering of Gaza residents increases due to low temperatures and the lack of heating means in tents,” the ministry said.

Three people killed in house bombing in southern Gaza City: Civil defence

Killed and wounded Palestinians have been recovered from a house bombed by the Israeli army belonging to the “Harara family”, according to a statement from the civil defence on Telegram. It added that the house was located in the vicinity of the al-Istijabah Mosque in the Sabra area, southern Gaza City.

We keep going backwards with this war, suicide bombing makes a return

Qassam Brigades claims suicide attack in Jabalia

A fighter has managed to blow himself up with an explosive belt targeting five soldiers, killing and wounding them, according to a statement on Telegram.

The armed wing of Hamas said its snipers also shot two other soldiers among the rescuers arriving before attacking the group “with a number of grenades” in the Tel al-Zaatar area in the east of the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza.

15 bodies recovered after dawn attack in northern Gaza: Civil defence

A family house that was destroyed by an Israeli attack in the Sheikh Radwan area overnight was sheltering about 40 people who were displaced from other family homes, according to Gaza’s civil defence.

The bodies of the 15 people killed have been recovered, and the rest are now missing under the rubble, the agency’s spokesperson said on Telegram. “Our crews have been unable to recover them due to lack of heavy machinery and equipment,” it added.

The Israeli army has targeted various homes hosting displaced people in northern Gaza in recent days, the statement added.

Six people killed in Israeli attacks on Beit Hanoon

Our colleagues on the ground are reporting that six Palestinians have been killed and many wounded in Israeli raids on the city in the besieged north of the Gaza Strip.

UN issues warning as Israeli military violence escalates across the occupied West Bank

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has recorded a significant uptick in Israeli military violence across the occupied West Bank amid a large-scale operation in the Tulkarem and Nur Shams refugee camps.

Eight people were killed earlier this week during a 40-hour military raid into the refugee camps that involved drone strikes and armoured bulldozers causing widespread damage to infrastructure such as roads, water networks, sewage systems and electricity networks.

Ten Palestinians have now been killed and 36 others injured by the Israeli military over the last two weeks, according to the UN OCHA’s latest situation update.

Israeli settler attacks on Palestinian communities have also increased, with a mosque in Marda village set ablaze and racist graffiti scrawled on its walls, marking the third mosque to be attacked by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank this year.

Settlers also vandalised a building constructed by an NGO that was nearing the final stages of completion, and there was an attack on a Palestinian livestock tent that settler groups attempted to take over.

Upon being challenged, the settler group vandalised a Palestinian home near a new settler “outpost” in the area that had only been established on December 16, the UN reports.

Israeli settlers descend on archaeological site in occupied West Bank: Report

Israeli settlers have descended on an archaeological site in the Palestinian town of Halhul, north of Hebron, in the occupied West Bank where they chanted slogans against Arab and Palestinian people while holding prayer ceremonies.

Eight buses carrying the settlers arrived at the site, protected by the Israeli military, the Wafa news agency reports. Clashes with local Palestinian youths resisting the incursion broke out but there were no reports of casualties.

The town of Halhul is home to several sites of archaeological significance and is said to be the burial place of Nabi Yunus (also known as the biblical prophet, Jonah), who is mentioned in both the Hebrew Bible and the Quran.

The Nabi Yunus Mosque stands on this presumed burial site.

Palestinian Authority officer killed in Jenin: Report

The Wafa news agency reports that that First Lieutenant Ibrahim Jumaa Al-Qaddoumi, of the Palestinian Authority’s (PA) security forces, was killed in the occupied West Bank’s Jenin refugee camp.

Brigadier General Anwar Rajab, spokesman for the authority’s security forces, said the officer died while “performing his national duty defending the security and stability of his people”.

The PA’s security forces have been engaged in weeks of armed clashes with Palestinian resistance fighters in Jenin. The fighting comes amid a campaign by the PA, titled “Protecting the Homeland”, that the authority says is focused on pursuing “criminals” and preventing the camp from becoming a battleground like Gaza.

The PA’s Rajab has also characterised the fighters in Jenin as pro-Iranian and “mercenaries”, who are aiding the Israeli far-right’s attempts to weaken the PA. The Jenin Brigades, the main target of the PA, has ties to the Iran-backed Palestinian Islamic Jihad, but also has members affiliated with other Palestinian groups

Gideon Levy on Israel's "Moral Blindness": Gaza Babies Freeze; Strikes Kill Medical Staff, Reporters



In northern Gaza, the director of the besieged Kamal Adwan Hospital says five medical workers were among 50 people killed in Israeli strikes near the hospital. Israeli forces then stormed the hospital and forced hundreds, including patients, into the streets.

This all comes as The New York Times has confirmed past reporting by +972 Magazine that on October 7, 2023, Israel loosened military rules meant to protect noncombatants in Gaza.

Award-winning Israeli journalist Gideon Levy decries the moral decay of Israel, which has gone so far as to open a luxurious rest area for soldiers in northern Gaza: "It's the same moral blindness to what's going on around you." Levy also discusses his latest piece, headlined "The IDF's Own Sickening 'Zone of Interest' in the Heart of Gaza."

Greater Israel engulfs more of Syria



The Grayzone's Max Blumenthal and Aaron Mate discuss how the collapse of Syria's Assad government has made Israel's expansionist dreams come true.

Main events on December 27th

• Israeli forces raided and set fire to Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, and have forcibly moved out hundreds of patients and staff.
• The UN’s World Health Organization said the Israeli raid on Kamal Adwan has put the last major health facility in northern Gaza out of service.
• Gaza’s Ministry of Health said that Israeli forces have taken dozens of Kamal Adwan staff, including its director, Hussam Abu Safia, for interrogation.
• Saudi Arabia and Jordan have condemned the Israeli raid on the hospital and the torching of buildings.
• Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), said that babies are freezing to death due to cold weather and lack of shelter in Gaza.
• The UN’s World Food Programme says it has only been able to deliver “about a third of the food” trucks needed to support people in Gaza.
• Renewed air strikes have hit Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, for the second consecutive day, the Houthis said.
• Six Palestinians have been killed and many wounded in Israeli raids on Beit Hanoon in northern Gaza and two people have been killed in a drone strike in Gaza City.

Gaza Hospital on fire – Israeli forces attack Kamal Adwan

Kamal Adwan was once a place for healing but has now become a battleground.

One of the last working hospitals in Gaza is burning with members of staff managing to raise the alarm after the Israeli military began to raid the building on Friday. The fate of many of those inside is unknown, with witnesses who managed to escape describing how the raid began at dawn when a tank stormed the building.

Watch the latest report on the forced evacuation of Kamal Adwan Hospital:

‘Horror must end’: WHO statement on Kamal Adwan destruction

In a statement published to social media on Friday night, the WHO said Israel has “systematically” dismantled the health system in Gaza, condemning tens of thousands of Palestinians to a “death sentence”.

The UN agency said it was “deeply concerned” for the safety of 60 health workers and 25 patients in critical condition, including those on ventilators, who remained in the hospital. It was also concerned for staff and patients in moderate to severe condition who were forced to evacuate to the non-functional Indonesian Hospital.

“This raid on Kamal Adwan Hospital comes after escalating restrictions on access for WHO and partners, and repeated attacks on or near the facility since early October,” the statement said.

“Such hostilities and the raids are undoing all our efforts and support to keep the facility minimal functional,” the WHO said.

“This horror must end and health care must be protected. Ceasefire!”

This morning’s raid on Kamal Adwan Hospital has put this last major health facility in North #Gaza out of service. Initial reports indicate that some key departments were severely burnt and destroyed during the raid.

60 health workers and 25 patients in critical condition,… pic.twitter.com/bD5eJgnVkR

— World Health Organization (WHO) (@WHO) December 27, 2024

Israel bombed Yemen airport as Airbus 320 with hundreds of passengers was landing

Israeli warplanes bombed Yemen’s main airport as a civilian Airbus 320 with hundreds of passengers on board was coming in to land, a UN official said.

Julien Harneis, the UN’s top humanitarian official in Yemen, told reporters that the most frightening thing about the two air strikes on the international airport in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, on Thursday was the destruction of the airport control tower as a Yemenia Airways plane was taxiing in after touching down.

“Fortunately, that plane was able to land safely and the passengers were able to disembark, but it could have been far, far worse,” said Harneis, who was with WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in the lounge of the airport at the time of the attack.

A crew member from the UN Humanitarian Air Service, which was about to fly the UN delegation of some 20 people out of Sanaa, was injured in the attack.

He suffered a serious leg injury from shrapnel and lost a lot of blood, Harneis said, adding that the injured crew member was able to depart for treatment in Jordan on Friday afternoon – without an operating control tower – along with Tedros and other UN staff.

“I was not sure actually I could survive”: WHO chief on Israeli strike on Yemen

World Health Organization director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, did not know whether he would survive an air strike on Yemen’s main airport carried out by Israel on Thursday.

Tedros told the Reuters news agency that he had received no warning of the Israeli strike and the nearby explosion was so loud it left his ears ringing for more than a day later. “I was not sure actually I could survive because it was so close, a few metres from where we were,” he said. “A slight deviation could have resulted in a direct hit.”

Tedros said he and his UN colleagues were stuck at the stricken airport for the next hour or so and could hear what was thought to be drones flying overhead, which fed concerns they could open fire again. Among the debris in the airport terminal, Tedros and his colleagues saw missile fragments.

The WHO chief said his travel itinerary to Yemen had been shared publicly and he expressed surprise that civilian infrastructure was targeted.

“So a civilian airport should be protected, whether I am in it or not,” he said. “One of my colleagues said we narrowly escaped death. I’m just one human being. So I feel for those who are facing the same thing every single day. But at least it allowed me to feel the way they feel,” he added.

https://x.com/QudsNen/status/1872783290584973458

Houthi-affiliated media reports Western air attacks on Yemen

Al Masirah TV, a network close to the Yemeni rebel movement, says “an American-British aggression” targeted the Midi area of the Hajjah governorate in the northwest of the country.

The report said there were two attacks.

The US, UK and Israel have been carrying out heavy attacks on Houthi positions in Yemen for months, as the group continues to launch missile and drone attacks against Israel.

‘Made in the West’ genocide taking place in Gaza: UN special rapporteur

Francesca Albanese, the UN’s special rapporteur on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories, has condemned the Israeli military’s forced displacement of staff and patients from Kamal Adwan Hospital, which was northern Gaza’s last medical facility.

“Israel is writing one of the darkest pages in the history of genocides, with “Made in the West” ink,” Albanese wrote on X, alongside a video showing a line of Palestinian men, stripped down to their underwear, walking with arms raised between Israeli battle tanks.

Earlier this year, Albanese published a report that found “reasonable grounds to believe that the threshold indicating the commission of … acts of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza has been met”.

US-funded north Gaza famine report retracted after pressure from Washington: Report

The US-funded Famine Early Warning Systems report that found famine was imminent in Israeli-besieged northern Gaza was retracted after the White House asked for it, US officials told The Associated Press.

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) also confirmed to the AP that it had asked the famine-monitoring organisation to withdraw its report, which was issued on Monday.

The report is meant to reflect the data-driven analysis of unbiased experts, and the US is now being accused by aid and human rights figures of more political interference amid the war on Gaza.

The retraction came after public, scathing criticism from US Ambassador to Israel Jacob Lew, who called the report “irresponsible”. An adjusted report is expected to be released in January.

Many warnings given that Israeli ‘strangulation of Gaza’ would lead to babies freezing to death: NRC

Jan Egeland, secretary-general of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), said the deaths of babies in Gaza due to hypothermia is a “man-made” catastrophe. In a short post on social media, Egeland said warnings that children would freeze to death had been given “many times”.

“We warned of this many times: the Israeli strangulation of Gaza, where neither shelter nor food reach the innocent, had led to babies freezing to death,” he said. “This catastrophe is man-made from A to Z,” he added.

At least four Palestinian infants have frozen to death over recent days as temperatures plummet in Gaza, which is in the grips of winter.

A Palestinian healthcare worker also died due to “extreme” weather conditions in the territory, where hundreds of thousands are living in flimsy tents and other makeshift shelters.

The body of Al-Hakim Ahmed al-Zaharneh, who worked at the European Gaza Hospital, was found inside his tent in the al-Mawasi area where he had died from the cold, Gaza’s Health Ministry said.

Palestinian families endure freezing cold conditions on Gaza’s windswept coast

Displaced Palestinian families living in makeshift tent camps along the desolate beach in central Gaza’s Deir el-Balah have told The Associated Press news agency that there is no way to stay warm as winter hits.

Wind from the sea whips through shelters of torn tarps and bedsheets, held together with rope and wooden frames, offering little protection from the cold.

Muhammad al-Sous, his wife and their five children live in a tent right on the beach, just metres from the waves, which, during high seas, have washed away their belongings.

“Their mother and I cover ourselves with one blanket and we cover them [the children] with three blankets that we got from neighbours,” al-Sous told AP, adding that his children collect plastic bottles to burn for warmth in front of their tent.

“Everyone has nothing but what they are wearing,” he said.

Atta al-Hassoumi, also displaced by Israel’s war, lives along the beach with eight family members.

“We are shivering from the cold and from the situation that we are in. … I’m unable to work or do anything in war, and I am unable to do anything for them,”

🌐 متابعة |
مشاهد قاسية.. غرق خيام النارحين في قطاع غزة بفعل الأحوال الجوية وتساقط الأمطار pic.twitter.com/sXkssMeYVK

— المركز الفلسطيني للإعلام (@PalinfoAr) December 28, 2024

Gaza authorities warn of ‘disaster’ amid freezing temperatures, decaying tents

The Government Media Office reports that 110,000 out of 135,000 tents used by displaced Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are now out of service and have “completely deteriorated”.

It said in a statement on its Telegram channel that the Israeli military is “causing a tragic humanitarian crisis” that is once again threatening the lives of thousands of civilians as the freezing winter cold sets in.

“This catastrophic humanitarian situation is a direct result of the genocide committed by the ‘Israeli’ occupation army, which has completely destroyed hundreds of thousands of homes of these citizens, forcing them to resort to living in tents that lack the minimum requirements for a decent life.”

Several Palestinian babies have frozen to death in the past few nights. About 2 million Palestinians in the enclave have been displaced, many numerous times, as a result of devastating Israeli military attacks that have killed more than 45,000 people so far.

Medical sources claim staff members killed in Kamal Adwan Hospital fire

Medical sources have told Al Jazeera that at least five staff members at the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza were burned alive after Israeli forces set fire to several different parts of the medical facility.

The Israeli military released a statement on Friday saying that they are conducting the operation in and around the hospital in northern Gaza because they claim that Hamas is using it as a stronghold and that fighters are also using the hospital for military activities.

The Israeli army often uses these claims about hospitals, but they have never proved them.

Most notable was the raid on al-Shifa Hospital back in 2023 when the military said Hamas was using al-Shifa as a command and control centre, claims that to this day have still never been proven.

Now, Kamal Adwan was the last functioning Hospital in northern Gaza, but again, it was barely functioning because of the siege that was put forward by Israeli forces – a siege on food, water, and all other sorts of medical supplies.

Israel using remote-controlled APCs to deliver explosives in assaults on Gaza

Witnesses inside the Kamal Adwan Hospital reported this week that Israel was using “robots” to attack the medical facility which had resulted in huge explosions that caused casualties among patients and medical staff.

Israeli media organisation Ynet now reports that remotely-controlled armoured vehicles (APC) packed with explosives are a new tactic developed by the Israeli military to clear areas in Gaza they believe have been booby-trapped with explosives.

A video shared with Al Jazeera earlier this week showed the moment an APC deposited a box marked “danger” outside the hospital, which later exploded injuring patients and staff in a hail of shrapnel.

Ynet said the new tactic involves packing old Israeli M-113 APCs with explosives, which are then driven by remote control to a location. The explosives are then detonated to clear the way for infantry to advance.

The news site said Israelis had felt the shockwaves from the “earth-shaking” blasts as far away as Tel Aviv.

Israeli officer denies soldiers stormed, set fire to Gaza hospital: Report

Israeli army Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani said a preliminary investigation found “no connection” between Israel’s military activity and “a small fire” that broke out in the Kamal Adwan Hospital, The Times of Israel reports.

Shoshani told the Israeli news outlet that reports of Israeli soldiers setting fire to the hospital were “unsubstantiated”.

Witness accounts collected by Al Jazeera and other media outlets contradict these claims, while the UN’s World Health Organization said reports indicate that “key departments were severely burnt and destroyed during the raid”.

Shoshani claimed that Israeli forces had “facilitated the secure evacuation of civilians, patients and medical personnel prior to the operation” against the hospital, which has been under regular and deadly attack by Israel’s military for weeks.

Palestinians displaced from Kamal Adwan Hospital suffered beatings, cold

Al Jazeera correspondents are reporting that about 400 people including medical staff, patients and the displaced were released after being detained by the Israeli military during the storming of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza.

Some arrived in the Jabalia an-Nazla area of northern Gaza on foot. They said they were beaten with rifle butts and left out in the cold for long hours, including those who were injured and the elderly.

Medical staff said direct bombing hit the archive, sterilisation and maintenance departments, igniting a fire that quickly spread to the patients’ wards, operating rooms and laboratory.

Some attempted to extinguish the flames using water from the dialysis machine, which was mixed with chlorine, and suffered burns to their hands and faces.

The fate of the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, Dr Hussam Abu Safia, is still unknown.

Civil defence says north Gaza director arrested by Israeli military

The Palestinian Civil Defence said its director in the north of the war-torn territory, Ahmed Hassan al-Kahlout, has been arrested by the Israeli military.

The organisation, which is responsible for responding to civil emergencies in Gaza, did not provide details on al-Kahlout’s arrest, which comes a day after Israeli troops stormed the Kamal Adwan Hospital, ordering staff and patients to leave and setting fire to parts of the facility.

The arrest is part of Israel’s “destructive approach to the humanitarian and relief work system in the [northern] governorate”, the civil defence said, adding that 22 staff members had already been arrested by Israeli forces and their whereabouts were still unknown. Dozens of staff have also been killed.