2024-02-22 10:45:48
22 February 2024, 08:53 GMT
Last updated 21 minutes ago
On the 139th day of the war in Gaza, the continuous Israeli raids on several sites in the Strip killed dozens of Palestinians and injured hundreds, according to the Ministry of Health in Gaza, while many victims are still under the rubble.
On Thursday night, Israel carried out dozens of raids on the densely populated city of Rafah in the south of the Gaza Strip, according to the French news agency.
The Gaza Ministry of Health reported that 99 people were killed and 132 injured during the past 24 hours. Thus, the death toll in the Gaza Strip since the start of the war rose to 29,410, while the number of wounded reached 69,465.
“Escalation of violence in the occupied West Bank”
The Israeli raids in the Gaza Strip coincide with an escalation in the wave of violence in the occupied West Bank, where one person was killed and eight others were injured, today, Thursday, following three gunmen opened fire on a vehicle near the Maale Adumim settlement, east of Jerusalem, according to Israeli police.
The Shin Bet Internal Security Agency announced that the perpetrators of the attack were three Palestinians from the city of Bethlehem.
National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir pledged to continue supplying the Israelis with weapons. He told reporters from the site of the attack, “We need to distribute more weapons. There must be more restrictions, put up barriers around villages and limit the freedom of movement of West Bank residents.” He also added, “Our right to life is superior to freedom of movement.”
Hamas commented on the attack east of Jerusalem, saying, “The heroic operation is a natural response to the occupation’s massacres and crimes in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.”
The United Nations says that at least 100 children are among 394 Palestinians killed in the occupied West Bank since October 7.
Image source: Reuters
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One person was killed and eight others were injured near the Maale Adumim settlement, east of Jerusalem
“Aid dropped over Tal al-Hawa Hospital”
The British Foreign Office said on Wednesday that the British Army, in cooperation with Jordan, carried out an airdrop of four tons of relief aid over Tal al-Hawa Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip.
The Jordanian Air Force dropped UK-funded aid, which included medicines, fuel and food for patients and staff.
British Foreign Secretary David Cameron said, “Thousands will benefit from the aid, while the fuel will help the vital hospital continue to provide its life-saving services.”
Cameron added, “Despite the recent assistance, the situation in Gaza is desperate and there is a great need for more aid urgently,” calling for “an immediate humanitarian truce to allow additional aid to enter Gaza as soon as possible, and for the hostages to return to their homeland.” .
Only four trucks loaded with vital humanitarian aid were able to enter Gaza on Wednesday, while regarding 133 trucks were entering in early February, according to data issued by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
“Eager efforts to reach a deal”
On the diplomatic level, the American coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa, Brett McGurk, arrives today in Israel following a stop in Egypt, where new talks are being held in an effort to reach a truce.
US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters, “We want to reach an agreement…as quickly as possible.”
On Wednesday, Qatar and Egypt conveyed to Israel a message stating that Hamas has shown a willingness to “soften” its position, with regard to two basic demands, which Israel considers “impossible” demands, in reference to the issue of ending the war and “whitewashing prisons,” according to what the official Israeli Broadcasting Corporation announced.
Israel’s decision to send a high-level negotiating delegation to Paris depends on Hamas’s final response, which Hamas is supposed to deliver to Israel within the next 48 hours.
The sources expect that a deal will be reached within three weeks, until the beginning of the month of Ramadan.
While Hamas seeks to prevent a ground operation in Rafah, Israel wants to ensure the release of the hostages and work to reduce the possibility of escalation in more than one arena inside and outside its borders.
A member of the Israeli War Council, Benny Gantz, said that reaching an agreement to release the Israeli hostages in the Gaza Strip in exchange for an extended ceasefire may be a little closer.
He added in a televised speech that there were “promising early signs of progress” to move forward with concluding a new agreement to release hostages from the Gaza Strip.
He continued: “We will not miss any opportunity to return our daughters and sons to the homeland,” without talking regarding any details.
But Gantz added that if a new Israeli agreement is not reached, the army will continue fighting in Gaza even during Ramadan, which begins next month.
A delegation from the US Congress met with Qatari officials in Doha to discuss developments in the situation and mediation efforts in Gaza.
The Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesman, Majid bin Muhammad Al-Ansari, confirmed the continuation of Qatari efforts despite the challenges it faces, and coordination with the United States of America and the rest of the regional and international partners, to reach a humanitarian truce agreement.
Image source: EPA
Gaza has become a “death zone”
For his part, Director-General of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said that Gaza has become a “death zone”, following “a large part of it was destroyed.”
Ghebreyesus confirmed during a press conference that the health and humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip, which has been experiencing war for more than 4 months, “continues to deteriorate,” noting that “more than 29 thousand people were killed and many more were injured” as a result of this war.
The UN official explained that regarding 130 patients, and at least 15 doctors and nurses, are still in Nasser Hospital, which is under siege and subject to attacks by the Israeli army, despite the emergency operations carried out by the organization in the hospital located in the city of Khan Yunis, south of the Gaza Strip, during the last three days to transfer… Patients to other hospitals.
Ghebreyesus warned that “acute malnutrition has increased rapidly since the beginning of the war,” calling for a ceasefire and unlimited humanitarian aid.
Palestinian Water Minister Mazen Ghoneim said that the disaster that the residents of the Gaza Strip are experiencing is “unprecedented,” and that its effects will extend for many years. The necessities of life are non-existent, water has run out, food is not available, and diseases have spread as a result of the collapse of the health sector and the lack of water.
He said that the water sector has become completely disrupted, with water facilities being targeted, desalination plants stopping work as a result of fuel running out, and that Israeli forces are obstructing any attempt to rehabilitate and repair water lines.
Meanwhile, the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, voted 80 percent in favor of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s announcement that he opposes the establishment of a Palestinian state, in the wake of growing international calls to revive efforts to reach a two-state solution to the conflict that has been going on for decades.
Netanyahu’s Likud party said in a statement that 99 out of 120 lawmakers voted in favor of the declaration approved by the government earlier this week.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid, who voted in favor of the resolution, told lawmakers that despite his support, he did not believe there was any intention on the American side to recognize a Palestinian state if it was declared unilaterally.
Image source: Reuters
At the level of the International Court of Justice in The Hague, which has been holding hearings over the past days, the representative of France said that his country fully supports the two-state solution.
Diego Colas pointed out that the Palestinian right to self-determination is no longer an issue for discussion, and the court confirmed it in its decision in 2004, continuing: “The continuation of the Israeli occupation and building of settlements undermines the establishment of a Palestinian state.”
He said, “Only the two-state solution will satisfy Israel’s right to security and the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinians to establish an independent, geographically contiguous and viable state. To this end, France calls for the resumption of the peace process in a decisive and credible manner.”
For his part, Russia’s representative said before the same court that Israeli settlement in the occupied Palestinian territories reduced Palestinian lands, “which undermined any negotiated solutions.”
Vladimir Trabrin explained that Israeli settlement undermines the two-state solution and the Palestinians’ right to self-determination, and forced them to leave their lands, which contradicts international laws, which prevent the forced deportation of civilians.
In her speech before the court, the representative of Egypt stressed the illegality of what she described as “systematic Israeli practices” once morest the legitimate and inalienable rights of the Palestinian people.
This came in Egypt’s oral argument, presented by the legal advisor at the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Yasmine Moussa.
Yasmine explained in the plea that “it has become impossible to ignore the responsibility of international parties to change the status quo in Gaza.”
She pointed out that this situation, which she described as “catastrophic,” has extended to include the West Bank, warning that this threatens “the foundations of international legitimacy decisions (represented) as a two-state solution, and undermines the prospects for establishing permanent peace and coexistence among the peoples of the region.”
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