More Gaza hospitals suspend operations as Israel hunts Hamas

People stand over a crater following an Israeli bombardment in Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip on November 12, 2023, amid the ongoing battles between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas. (AFP)
People stand over a crater following an Israeli bombardment in Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip on November 12, 2023, amid the ongoing battles between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas. (AFP)
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Updated 13 November 2023
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More Gaza hospitals suspend operations as Israel hunts Hamas

More Gaza hospitals suspend operations as Israel hunts Hamas
  • Hospitals in the north of the Palestinian enclave are blockaded by Israeli forces and barely able to care for those inside
  • Battles around Gaza’s largest Al-Shifa hospital leave many trapped

GAZA/JERUSALEM: Two more major hospitals in Gaza closed to new patients on Sunday, with staff saying that Israeli bombardment plus lack of fuel and medicine meant more babies and others could die.
Hospitals in the north of the Palestinian enclave are blockaded by Israeli forces and barely able to care for those inside, medical staff said. Israel says it is homing in on Hamas militants in the area and the hospitals should be evacuated.
Gaza’s largest and second largest hospitals, Al-Shifa and Al-Quds, said they were suspending operations. With more people killed and wounded daily but half of the territory’s hospitals now out of action, there are ever fewer places for the injured.




Newborns are placed in bed after being taken off incubators in Gaza's Al Shifa hospital after power outage, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas, in Gaza City, Gaza November 12, 2023. (REUTERS)

“My son was injured and there was not a single hospital I could take him to so he could get stitches,” said Ahmed Al-Kahlout, who was fleeing south in accordance with Israeli advice while fearing that nowhere in Gaza was safe.
A plastic surgeon in Shifa said bombing of the building housing incubators had forced them to line up premature babies on ordinary beds, using the little power available to turn the air conditioning to warm.
“We are expecting to lose more of them day by day,” said Dr. Ahmed El Mokhallalati.
Israel says Hamas has placed command centers under and near the hospitals and it needs to get at them to free around 200 hostages the militants took in Israel in an attack just over a month ago. Hamas has denied using hospitals in this way.
On Sunday, a Palestinian official briefed on talks over the release of hostages said Hamas had suspended the negotiations because of the way Israel had handled Shifa hospital.
There was no immediate comment from either Hamas or Israel.

’NO ONE IS ALLOWED IN, NOBODY IS ALLOWED OUT’
Israel’s military said it had offered to evacuate newborn babies and had placed 300 liters of fuel at Shifa’s entrance on Saturday night, but that both gestures had been blocked by Hamas.
Muhammad Abu Salmiya, director of Shifa, said reports of refusing to leave the diesel were “lies and slander.” Ashraf Al-Qidra, spokesperson for the Health Ministry in Hamas-controlled Gaza, said that of 45 babies in incubators at Shifa, three had already died.




Israeli army soldiers attend an armed first response group training session in the Druze village of Hurfeish, which has garnered the name "Tsahal village" (a Hebrew-language acronym for the "Israel Defence Forces"), near the border with Lebanon in northern Israel on November 10, 2023. (AFP)

Shifa was out of reach for the newly wounded, said Mohammad Qandil, a doctor at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis in south Gaza, who is in touch with colleagues there.
“Shifa hospital now isn’t working, no one is allowed in, nobody is allowed out,” he said.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said Al-Quds hospital was also out of service, with staff struggling to care for those already there with little medicine, food and water.
“Al Quds hospital has been cut off from the world in the last 6-7 days. No way in, no way out,” said Tommaso Della Longa, spokesperson for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.




Men check the bodies of people killed in bombardment that hit a school housing displaced Palestinians, as they lie on the ground in the yard of Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City on November 10, 2023, amid ongoing battles between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)

Three UN agencies expressed horror at the situation in the hospitals, saying it had in 36 days registered at least 137 attacks on health care facilities, resulting in 521 deaths and 686 injuries — including 16 dead and 38 wounded medics.
“The world cannot stand silent while hospitals, which should be safe havens, are transformed into scenes of death, devastation, and despair,” it said, saying half of Gaza’s hospitals were now closed.
With the humanitarian situation across Gaza worsening, 80 foreigners and several injured Palestinians crossed into Egypt in the first evacuations since Friday, four Egyptian security sources said.
Poland said 18 of them were its citizens, and US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told CBS News American citizens would be moved out of Gaza during Sunday.

AID DELIVERIES BY TRUCK AND PARACHUTE
At least 80 aid trucks had also moved from Egypt into Gaza by Sunday afternoon, two of the sources said. Jordan said earlier it had air-dropped a second batch into a field hospital.
Very little aid has entered Gaza since Israel declared war on Hamas more than a month ago after militants rampaged through southern Israel, killing about 1,200 people and taking more than 200 hostages, according to Israeli officials.




White phosphorus fired by Israeli army to create a smoke screen, is seen on the Israel-Lebanon border in northern Israel, November 12, 2023. (REUTERS)

Palestinian officials said on Friday that 11,078 Gaza residents had been killed in air and artillery strikes since then, around 40 percent of them children.
Disease is spreading among evacuees packed into schools and other shelters and surviving on tiny amounts of food and water, international aid agencies say.
Speaking from inside Gaza City, Jamila, 54, said she and her family could hear the roar of tanks nearby.
“During the day, people try to look for essential items such as bread and water, and at night people try to stay alive,” she said. “We hear explosions throughout the night, sometimes we can tell that some of these explosions are exchanges of fire between the resistance fighters and the Israeli forces.”
Palestinian health officials said 13 people had been killed in an Israeli air strike on a house in Khan Younis in southern Gaza on Sunday.
Residents reported increased fighting around Al-Shati refugee camp, by the coast in northern Gaza. The Israeli military said it had killed a number of militants there and called on civilians to use a four-hour pause to evacuate south.
The Gaza fighting has reignited conflict on Israel’s northern border with Lebanon, which has seen the worst cross-border clashes since 2006.
Lebanon’s Hezbollah group, which like Hamas is backed by Iran, said it attacked Israeli army troops near the Dovev Barracks on Sunday, inflicting casualties.
The Israeli military said earlier that anti-tank missiles fired by militants had hit a number of civilians, adding that it was retaliating with artillery fire.
The UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon said one of its members near the town of Al-Qawzah in southern Lebanon had been wounded by a bullet overnight.

 

 


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Hezbollah does not pin ceasefire hopes on any US administration, lawmaker says

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Updated 17 min 44 sec ago
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France sees ‘window’ to end Gaza, Lebanon wars after Trump win

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JERUSALEM: French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said Thursday in Jerusalem he saw prospects for ending Israel’s wars in Gaza and Lebanon after Donald Trump was elected US president.
“I believe a window has opened for putting an end to the tragedy in which Israelis, Palestinians and the entire region have been immersed since October 7” last year, Barrot told reporters in Jerusalem.
Speaking alongside outgoing Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz, Barrot cited Trump’s “wish to see the end of the Middle East’s endless wars” as well as Israel’s recent “tactical successes.”
Barrot said he hoped a “diplomatic solution” would emerge “in the coming weeks.”
“Force alone will not be enough to guarantee Israel’s security,” he said, adding that “military success could not be a substitute for a political perspective.”
“It is time to move toward a deal that would allow for the liberation of all hostages, a ceasefire and the mass entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza, and to prepare for the day after.”
Barrot said “Israel has the right to defend itself” but pointed to “colonization,” “humanitarian aid restrictions” and “the continuation of air strikes in north Gaza” as risk factors for Israel’s security.
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Israel signs $5.2 billion deal to acquire 25 F-15 fighter jets from Boeing

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Updated 38 min 22 sec ago
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Israel signs $5.2 billion deal to acquire 25 F-15 fighter jets from Boeing

Israel signs $5.2 billion deal to acquire 25 F-15 fighter jets from Boeing
  • The $5.2 billion agreement was part of a broader package of US aid
  • Delivery of the new F-15IA aircraft will begin in 2031

JERUSALEM: The Israeli defense ministry said on Thursday it had signed an agreement to acquire 25 next generation F-15 fighter jets from Boeing Co.
It said the $5.2 billion agreement was part of a broader package of US aid approved by the US administration and Congress earlier this year and included an option for 25 additional aircraft.
Delivery of the new F-15IA aircraft will begin in 2031, with 4-6 aircraft to be supplied annually, it said.
The aircraft will be equipped with weapons systems integrated with existing Israeli weapons as well as having increased range and payloads.
“These advantages will enable the Israeli Air Force to maintain its strategic superiority in addressing current and future challenges in the Middle East,” the ministry said in a statement.
“This F-15 squadron, alongside the third F-35 squadron procured earlier this year, represents a historic enhancement of our air power and strategic reach — capabilities that proved crucial during the current war,” the director general of the defense ministry, Eyal Zamir, said in the statement.
Zamir said that the government has secured procurement agreements worth nearly $40 billion since the onset of the war in Gaza that began Oct. 7, 2023.
“While focusing on immediate needs for advanced weaponry and ammunition at unprecedented levels, we’re simultaneously investing in long-term strategic capabilities,” he said.
For Boeing, the F-15 agreement is the second major deal this year. In August, flag carrier El Al Israel Airlines, signed a deal with Boeing for the purchase of up to 31 737 MAX aircraft worth as much as $2.5 billion, beating out rival Airbus.
Ido Nehushtan, president of Boeing Israel, said the company’s relationship dates back to Israel’s establishment and “will continue working with the US and Israeli governments to deliver the advanced F-15IA aircraft through standard military procurement channels.”


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Erdogan phones Trump to discuss cooperation

Erdogan phones Trump to discuss cooperation

ISTANBUL: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has spoken by phone with US president-elect Donald Trump to discuss cooperation between the two countries, the presidency said on Thursday.
Erdogan “congratulated Trump on his election victory” and “expressed his desire to develop cooperation between Turkiye and the United States in the period ahead,” it said in a statement.
Erdogan was twice hosted at the White House by Trump during his first term, but has never been received there by current President Joe Biden.


Israel passes law that would allow it to deport the families of Palestinian attackers

Israel passes law that would allow it to deport the families of Palestinian attackers
Updated 07 November 2024
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Israel passes law that would allow it to deport the families of Palestinian attackers

Israel passes law that would allow it to deport the families of Palestinian attackers
  • They would be deported, either to the Gaza Strip or another location, for a period of 7 to 20 years

JERUSALEM: Israel’s parliament passed a law early Thursday that would allow it to deport family members of Palestinian attackers, including the country’s own citizens, to the war-ravaged Gaza Strip or other locations.
The law, which was championed by members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party and his far-right allies, passed with a 61-41 vote but is likely to be challenged in court.
It would apply to Palestinian citizens of Israel and residents of annexed east Jerusalem who knew about their family members’ attacks beforehand or who “express support or identification with the act of terrorism.”
They would be deported, either to the Gaza Strip or another location, for a period of 7 to 20 years. The Israel-Hamas war is still raging in Gaza, where tens of thousands have been killed and most of the population has been internally displaced, often multiple times.
It was unclear if it would apply in the occupied West Bank, where Israel already has a longstanding policy of demolishing the family homes of attackers. Palestinians have carried out scores of stabbing, shooting and car-ramming attacks against Israelis in recent years.
Dr. Eran Shamir-Borer, a senior researcher at the Israel Democracy Institute and a former international law expert for the Israeli military, said that if the law comes before the Supreme Court, it is likely to be struck down based on previous Israeli cases regarding deportation.
“The bottom line is this is completely non-constitutional and a clear conflict to Israel’s core values,” said Shamir-Borer.
Israel captured Gaza, the West Bank and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war, territories the Palestinians want for their future state. It withdrew settlers and soldiers from Gaza in 2005 but has reoccupied parts of the territory since Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack triggered the war.
Israel annexed east Jerusalem in a move not recognized by most of the international community. Palestinians there have permanent residency and are allowed to apply for citizenship, but most choose not to, and those who do face a series of obstacles.
Palestinians living in Israel make up around 20 percent of the country’s population. They have citizenship and the right to vote but face widespread discrimination. Many also have close family ties to those in the territories and most sympathize with the Palestinian cause.