Hamas rejects Israeli allegation it abused hospitals
Updated 28 October 2023
AFP AP
TEL AVIV: The Israeli army accused Hamas on Friday of abusing hospitals in the Gaza Strip for military purposes, as war rages in and around the Palestinian territory.
The allegation was swiftly denied by Hamas, and the main UN agency working in Gaza said earlier it had mechanisms in place to prevent aid being diverted.
“Hamas wages war from hospitals” in Gaza, military spokesman Daniel Hagari told journalists, adding that the group was also using fuel stored in hospitals to help carry out its operations.
Hagari specifically identified Al-Shifa Hospital, the largest in Gaza, as one from which Hamas militants were operating.
“Terrorists move freely” in Shifa and other hospitals, he said.
Hagari said Hamas had relied on hospitals to maintain its war effort, charging that the group had used hospitals “as command and control centers and hideouts.”
The spokesman said some entrances to the sprawling network of tunnels Hamas has built under Gaza could also be found inside hospitals, calling it a “cynical” use of medical facilities to shield their operations.
“There is fuel in hospitals and Hamas is using it for its terror infrastructure,” he added.
A senior member of the Hamas political bureau, Izzat Al-Rishq, swiftly fired back at the allegations from the Israeli army, calling them unfounded.
“There’s no basis in truth in what the spokesman of the enemy army stated,” Al-Rishq said, accusing Israel of making up the allegations to “pave the way for a new massacre to be committed against our people.”
Earlier the commissioner general for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees or UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini, denied that any aid was being diverted.
“We have solid monitoring mechanisms ... UNRWA does not and will not divert any humanitarian aid into the wrong hands,” Lazzarini said.
Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza left a vacuum that Hamas quickly filled. The group won Palestinian parliamentary elections in 2006, and the following year violently seized control of Gaza from the Palestinian Authority.
Israel imposed a blockade, limiting movement in and out of Gaza in hopes of weakening Hamas. It waged a series of wars and smaller battles with Hamas — a policy known as “mowing the lawn” that was meant to keep the group in check.
Some Lebanese who fear war is coming have an unusual backup plan: Moving to Syria
Updated 8 sec ago
BEIRUT: Residents of Beirut’s southern suburbs have been scrambling to make contingency plans since an Israeli airstrike on an apartment building in a busy neighborhood killed a top Hezbollah commander and touched off fears of a full-scale war. For most, that means moving in with relatives or renting homes in Christian, Druze or Sunni-majority areas of Lebanon that are generally considered safer than the Shiite-majority areas where the Hezbollah militant group has its main operations and base of support. But for a small number, plan B is a move to neighboring Syria. Although Syria is in its 14th year of civil war, active fighting has long been frozen in much of the country. Lebanese citizens, who can cross the border without a visa, regularly visit Damascus. And renting an apartment is significantly cheaper in Syria than in Lebanon. Zahra Ghaddar said she and her family were shaken when they saw an apartment building reduced to rubble by the July 30 drone strike in her area, known as Dahiyeh. Along with Hezbollah commander Fouad Shukur, two children and three women were killed and dozens more were injured in the targeted Israeli attack. Previously, the Lebanese capital had been largely untouched by the near-daily cross-border clashes that have displaced around 100,000 people from southern Lebanon and tens of thousands more in Israel since Oct. 8. That’s when Hezbollah began firing rockets into northern Israel in support of its ally Hamas, which a day earlier led a deadly raid in Israel that killed some 1,200 people and took another 250 hostage. Israel responded with an aerial bombardment and ground offensive in Gaza that has killed more than 40,000 Palestinians. In recent weeks, the conflict in Lebanon appeared on the brink of spiraling out of control. Ghaddar said her family first considered moving within Lebanon but were discouraged by social media posts blaming displaced civilians, along with Hezbollah, for the threat of all-out war. Also, surging demand prompted steep rent hikes. “We found the rents started at $700, and that’s for a house we wouldn’t be too comfortable in,” she said. That amount is more than many Lebanese earn in a month. So they looked across the border. Ghaddar’s family found a four-bedroom apartment in Aleppo, a city in northwestern Syria, for $150 a month. They paid six months’ rent in advance and returned to Lebanon. Israel periodically launches airstrikes on Syria, usually targeting Iranian-linked military sites or militants, but Bashar Assad’s government has largely stood on the sidelines of the current regional conflict. Israel and Hezbollah fought a bruising monthlong war in 2006 that demolished much of southern Lebanon and Beirut’s southern suburbs. At the time, some 180,000 Lebanese took refuge in Syria, many taking shelter in schools, mosques and empty factories. Those who could afford it rented houses. Some put down permanent roots. Rawad Issa, then a teenager, fled to Syria with his parents. They returned to Lebanon when the war ended, but Issa’s father used some of his savings to buy a house in Syria’s Hama province, just in case. “That way, if another war happened, we would already have a house ready,” Issa said. The house and surrounding area were untouched by Syria’s civil war, he said. A few weeks ago, his sister and her husband went to get the house ready for the family to return, in case the situation in Lebanon deteriorated. Issa, who works in video production, said he initially planned to rent an apartment in Lebanon if the conflict expanded, rather than joining his family in Syria. But in “safe” areas of Beirut, “they are asking for fantastic prices,” he said. One landlord was charging $900 for a room in a shared apartment. “And outside of Beirut, it’s not much better.” Azzam Ali, a Syrian journalist in Damascus, told The Associated Press that in the first few days after the strike in Dahiyeh, he saw an influx of Lebanese renting hotel rooms and houses in the city. A Lebanese family — friends of a friend — stayed in his house for a few days, he said. In a Facebook post, he welcomed the Lebanese, saying they “made the old city of Damascus more beautiful.” After the situation appeared to calm down, “some went back and some stayed here, but most of them stayed,” he said. No agency has recorded how many people have moved from Lebanon to Syria in recent months. They are spread across the country and are not registered as refugees, making tracking the migration difficult. Anecdotal evidence suggests the numbers are small. Of 80 people displaced from southern Lebanon living in greater Beirut — including Lebanese, Syrians and Palestinian refugees — at least 20 said they were considering taking refuge in Syria if the war in Lebanon escalated, according to interviews conducted by researchers overseen by Jasmin Lilian Diab, director of the Institute for Migration Studies at the Lebanese American University. Diab noted that the Lebanese considering this route were a niche group who had “existing networks in Syria, either business networks, family or friends.” The threat of war has also not prompted a mass reverse migration of Syrians from Lebanon. Some 775,000 Syrians are registered with the UN Refugee Agency in Lebanon, and hundreds of thousands more are believed to be unregistered in the country. While fighting in Syria has died down, many refugees fear that if they return they could be arrested for real or perceived ties to the opposition to Assad or forcibly conscripted to the army. If they leave Lebanon to escape war they could lose their refugee status, although some cross back and forth via smuggler routes without their movements being recorded. Many residents of Dahiyeh breathed a sigh of relief when an intense exchange of strikes between Israel and Hezbollah on July 25 turned out to be short-lived. But Ghaddar said she still worries the situation will deteriorate, forcing her family to flee. “It’s necessary to have a backup plan in any case,” she said.
Israelis erupt in protest to demand a ceasefire after 6 more hostages die in Gaza
Protesters demand Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reach a ceasefire with Hamas to bring the remaining captives home
Many blame Netanyahu for failing to reach a ceasefire during nearly 11 months of war with negotiations dragging on
Updated 30 min 12 sec ago
AP
JERUSALEM: Grieving and angry Israelis surged into the streets Sunday night after six more hostages were found dead in Gaza, chanting “Now! Now!” as they demanded that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reach a ceasefire with Hamas to bring the remaining captives home.
Israel’s largest trade union, the Histadrut, also pressured the government by calling a general strike for Monday — the first since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack that started the war. The strike aims to shut down or disrupt major sectors of the economy, including banking, health care and the country’s main airport.
Tens of thousands of Israelis were expected to protest. Many blame Netanyahu for failing to reach a ceasefire during nearly 11 months of war. Negotiations have dragged on for months. Israel’s army has acknowledged the difficulty of rescuing dozens of remaining hostages and said a deal is the only way to bring a large-scale return.
“I’m crying the cry of humanity,” said one protester who gave his name as Amos as thousands, some of them weeping, gathered outside Netanyahu’s office in Jerusalem.
The military said all six hostages were killed shortly before Israeli forces arrived. Netanyahu blamed the Hamas militant group for the stalled negotiations, saying “whoever murders hostages doesn’t want a deal.”
Militants seized Israeli-American Hersh Goldberg-Polin, 23, and four other hostages at a music festival in southern Israel. The native of Berkeley, California, lost part of his left arm to a grenade in the attack. In April, a Hamas-issued video showed him alive, sparking new protests in Israel.
The army identified the other dead hostages as Ori Danino, 25; Eden Yerushalmi, 24; Almog Sarusi, 27; and Alexander Lobanov, 33; also taken from the festival. The sixth, Carmel Gat, 40, was abducted from the nearby farming community of Be’eri.
The army said the bodies were recovered from a tunnel in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, around a kilometer (half a mile) from where another hostage was rescued alive last week.
Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, a military spokesperson, said Israeli forces found the bodies several dozen meters (yards) underground as “ongoing combat” was underway, but that there was no firefight in the tunnel itself. He said there was no doubt Hamas had killed them.
Hamas has offered to release the hostages in return for an end to the war, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza and the release of a large number of Palestinian prisoners, including high-profile militants.
Izzat Al-Rishq, a senior Hamas official, said the hostages would still be alive if Israel had accepted a US-backed ceasefire proposal that Hamas said it had agreed to in July.
Funerals began for the hostages, with more outrage. Sarusi’s body was wrapped in an Israeli flag. “You were abandoned on and on, daily, hour after hour, 331 days,” his mother, Nira, said. “You and so many beautiful and pure souls. Enough. No more.” Hostages’ families urge a ‘complete halt of the country’
Netanyahu has vowed to continue the war until Hamas is destroyed.
Critics have accused him of putting his personal interests over those of the hostages. The war’s end likely will lead to an investigation into his government’s failures in the Oct. 7 attacks, the government’s collapse and early elections.
“I think this is an earthquake. This isn’t just one more step in the war,” said Nomi Bar-Yaacov, associate fellow in the International Security Program at Chatham House, shortly before Sunday’s protests began.
Israel’s Channel 12 reported that Netanyahu got into a shouting match at a security Cabinet meeting Thursday with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who accused him of prioritizing control of a strategic corridor along the Gaza-Egypt border — a major sticking point in the talks — over the lives of the hostages.
An Israeli official confirmed the report and said three of the hostages — Goldberg-Polin, Yerushalmi and Gat — had been slated to be released in the first phase of a ceasefire proposal discussed in July. The official was not authorized to brief media about the negotiations and spoke on condition of anonymity.
“In the name of the state of Israel, I hold their families close to my heart and ask forgiveness,” Gallant said Sunday.
A forum of hostage families has demanded a “complete halt of the country” to push for a ceasefire and hostage release. “Were it not for the delays, sabotage and excuses, those whose deaths we learned about this morning would likely still be alive,” it said in a statement.
Even a mass outpouring of anger would not immediately threaten Netanyahu or his far right government. He still controls a majority in parliament. But he has caved in to public pressure before. Mass protests led him to cancel the dismissal of his defense minister last year, and a general strike last year helped lead to a delay in his controversial judicial overhaul. A family’s high-profile campaign
Goldberg-Polin’s parents, US-born immigrants to Israel, became perhaps the most high-profile relatives of hostages on the international stage. They met with US President Joe Biden and Pope Francis and on Aug. 21, they addressed the Democratic National Convention — after sustained applause and chants of “bring him home.”
His mother, Rachel, who bowed her head during the ovation and touched her chest, said “Hersh, if you can hear us, we love you, stay strong, survive.”
Biden on Sunday said he was “devastated and outraged.” The White House said he spoke with Goldberg-Polin’s parents and offered condolences.
Some 250 hostages were taken on Oct. 7. Israel now believes 101 remain in captivity, including 35 who are thought to be dead. More than 100 were freed during a ceasefire in November in exchange for the release of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. Eight have been rescued by Israeli forces. Israeli troops mistakenly killed three Israelis who escaped captivity in December.
Hamas-led militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, when they stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7. Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza has killed over 40,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials, who do not say how many were militants. It has displaced the vast majority of Gaza’s 2.3 million people, often multiple times, and plunged the besieged territory into a humanitarian catastrophe.
Israeli finance minister asks attorney general to submit request to courts to halt strike
The call for a one-day general strike by Arnon Bar-David, whose Histadrut union represents hundreds of thousands of workers, was backed by Israel’s main manufacturers and entrepreneurs in the high-tech sector
Updated 02 September 2024
Reuters
JERUSALEM: Israeli finance minister Bezalel Smotrich has asked the country’s attorney general to submit an urgent request to courts to block a planned nationwide strike on Monday that aims to pressure Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to bring back Israeli hostages still held by Hamas in Gaza.
In his letter to Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, Smotrich argued that a strike had no legal basis since it aimed to improperly influence significant policy decisions of politicians on issues related to state security.
He also said that a broad strike — which would shut the country including outgoing flights — has significant economic consequences which would cause unnecessary economic damage in wartime.
The call for a one-day general strike by Arnon Bar-David, whose Histadrut union represents hundreds of thousands of workers, was backed by Israel’s main manufacturers and entrepreneurs in the high-tech sector. The stoppage would begin at 6 a.m. (0300 GMT).
There was no immediate response from Baharav-Miara.
Thousands of Turks protest controversial law to remove stray dogs
A report released by the Safe Streets and Defense of the Right to Life Association, an organization campaigning for the removal of all stray dogs from the streets, says that 65 people have died in street dog attacks since 2022
Updated 02 September 2024
AP
ISTANBUL: Thousands of demonstrators gathered in Istanbul on Sunday to protest recent legislation that critics say is leading to the killing of stray dogs across Turkiye.
Last month, legislators approved the new law aimed at removing millions of stray dogs from Turkish streets citing safety concerns. Animal-lovers fear it will lead to widespread culling or dogs ending up in disease-ridden and overcrowded shelters.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the law was necessary to deal with the country’s “stray dog problem.”
Sunday’s protesters called for the law to be repealed, brandishing posters reading ‘shelters are death camps’ and ‘withdraw the bloody law.’
“We want this law to be withdrawn immediately,” protester Hasan Kizilyatak, 64, told The Associated Press. “They (stray dogs) are living beings, just like us. We are here because we are against them being annihilated.”
Ayten Arslan, 55, who said she supports Erdogan, also showed up to protest.
“Just like we stood beside our president on July 15 (2016) when there was a coup attempt, we are here for the stray animals,” she told the AP. “I say as an AK Party supporter, this law, is a bloody law.”
The main opposition Republican People’s Party moved to repeal the law in the Constitutional Court less than two weeks after it passed.
The government estimates that around 4 million stray dogs roam Turkiye’s streets and rural areas. Although most are harmless, several people, including children, have been attacked.
A report released by the Safe Streets and Defense of the Right to Life Association, an organization campaigning for the removal of all stray dogs from the streets, says that 65 people have died in street dog attacks since 2022.
The new legislation requires municipalities to collect stray dogs and house them in shelters to be vaccinated, neutered and spayed before making them available for adoption. Dogs that are in pain, terminally ill or pose a health risk to humans will be euthanized. The initial draft bill included cats, but that article was changed after a public outcry.
However, many question where cash-strapped municipalities would find the money to build the necessary extra shelters required.
Animal rights activists worry that some municipalities might kill dogs on the pretext that they are ill rather than allocate resources to shelter them.
Videos showing dead cats and dogs buried in ditches have been circulating on social media recently. Animal rights activists say the animals were indiscriminately killed after the passage of the law.
Iraq has regained some semblance of stability in recent years, despite sporadic violence and political turmoil
Updated 02 September 2024
AFP
BAGHDAD: Iraq will impose a two-day curfew in November for the country’s first census in 27 years, the authorities announced on Sunday.
The “curfew will be imposed in all provinces of Iraq on November 20 and 21 to conduct a population census,” Prime Minister Mohamed Shia Al-Sudani said in a statement.
Ravaged by decades of conflict and violence, Iraq has postponed a census several times, most notably in 2010 because of tensions between communities over disputed territories.
The last general census was held in 1997 in 15 Iraqi provinces — excluding the three northern provinces that made up the autonomous Kurdistan Region.
Iraq has regained some semblance of stability in recent years, despite sporadic violence and political turmoil.
Current estimates put today’s population at around 43 million.
The authorities have partnered with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) for the upcoming census.
The initiative “plays a crucial role in equipping Iraq with accurate demographic information, facilitating effective policymaking, and promoting inclusive growth,” the agency has said.
In the past, Iraq held a census every 10 years. A count could not be organized in 2007, when the country was embroiled in sectarian violence.
