2024-01-08 12:20:00
The head of American diplomacy, Antony Blinken, is expected in Israel to try to obtain a de-escalation of the war in Gaza and prevent its contagion in Lebanon, where, according to a security source, an Israeli strike killed a military leader of the Hezbollah.
This military official “played a leading role in directing operations” in southern Lebanon, where cross-border exchanges of fire are almost daily between the Lebanese pro-Iranian movement and the Israeli army, said this source. According to her, he was killed in the village of Kherbet Selm, regarding ten kilometers from the border with Israel.
The rise in tension in this area is fueling fears of a regional conflagration, as Israel’s war once morest Palestinian Hamas in the Gaza Strip has entered its fourth month.
The US Secretary of State, whose country is Israel’s main supporter, warned that the conflict might “easily metastasize” at the end of the Qatari leg of his tour of the region on Sunday, the fourth since the start of the war.
According to American officials, Mr. Blinken wants to prevent Lebanon from being drawn into war, press Israel to enter a new military phase less costly in Palestinian lives and engage in a “difficult” dialogue on the post-war period.
Around 250 people were kidnapped and taken to Gaza, including around 100 released in exchange for Palestinian prisoners during a truce in late November.
Qatar, which then played a key mediating role, is continuing its efforts to free the hostages still held, said the father of one of them, Ruby Chen, who met with Qatari leaders.
The Israeli offensive left 23,084 dead in Gaza, where Hamas took power in 2007, mainly civilians, according to a new report Monday from the Islamist movement’s Ministry of Health.
The bombings razed entire neighborhoods there, displaced 85% of the population and caused a catastrophic humanitarian crisis according to the UN.
“No safe place” –
Smoke rises above the town of Khan Yunis in southern Gaza during an Israeli bombardment on January 8, 2024.
According to the Hamas Ministry of Health, Israeli operations, which continue without respite, have left 73 dead and 99 injured in the last 24 hours in central Gaza.
The Israeli army announced strikes in Khan Younes, the main city in the south of the besieged territory and the new epicenter of the fighting, killing “ten terrorists preparing to fire rockets at Israel”.
“We were told that Rafah was safe, but where is the security, there is no safe place, we don’t know what to do,” laments a witness, Mohammad Hejazy. Hundreds of thousands of Gazans have flocked to the city fleeing fighting further north.
Two journalists working for Al Jazeera were killed there on Sunday by an Israeli strike on their vehicle, according to the Qatari channel. A third journalist on board, Hazem Rajab, was seriously injured.
The widow of Al Jazeera journalist Hamza Wael Dahdouh, killed during an Israeli strike in Rafah, January 7, 2024 in Rafah
The second is the son of the head of the Al Jazeera bureau in the Palestinian territory, Waël Dahdouh, who already lost his wife and two of his children at the end of October in an Israeli strike.
These deaths bring to at least 79 the number of journalists and media professionals, mainly Palestinian, killed since October 7, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
International humanitarian organizations also continue to warn of the ongoing health disaster in the small, overpopulated and besieged territory.
A displaced Palestinian sits among items recovered from a house destroyed in an Israeli strike on Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, January 7, 2024
In Deir al-Balah, in central Gaza, more than 600 patients at al-Aqsa hospital had to leave the premises in the face of “the intensification of hostilities”, according to the World Health Organization.
High voltage border-
The conflict has also increased violence to a level not seen in nearly twenty years in the West Bank, territory occupied by Israel since 1967.
Nine Palestinians were killed there on Sunday, including seven in an Israeli raid in Jenin, a stronghold of Palestinian armed factions in this territory where the violence also caused the death of a policewoman and an Israeli civilian.
Clashes in this area further intensified following the assassination attributed to Israel, Tuesday in a Hezbollah stronghold in Beirut, of Saleh al-Arouri, number two in Hamas, an organization classified as terrorist by the United States and the European Union. .
Smoke rises above buildings in a village in southern Lebanon, following an Israeli bombardment, January 7, 2024
In northern Israel, nine soldiers and five civilians were killed, according to authorities.
burs-cab/feb
1704717262
#Antony #Blinken #expected #Tel #Aviv #Hezbollah #military #leader #killed #Lebanon
