Gazans say hunger is causing social breakdown, fueling fears of exodus into Egypt

Update International relief agencies said public order was disintegrating in Gaza as hunger spread, fueling fears of a mass exodus to Egypt. (AFP)
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International relief agencies said public order was disintegrating in Gaza as hunger spread, fueling fears of a mass exodus to Egypt. (AFP)
Update Gazans say hunger is causing social breakdown, fueling fears of exodus into Egypt
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Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters accompany a newly released Israeli hostage before handing her over to the Red Cross in Rafah, Gaza Strip, during a prisoner swap in Rafah,on November 28, 2023. (AFP/File)
Update Gazans say hunger is causing social breakdown, fueling fears of exodus into Egypt
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Israeli left-wing activists hold a demonstration near the Ministry of Defence in Tel Aviv on December 5, 2023, calling for a ceasefire and exchange of hostages amid continuing battles between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas. (AFP)
Update Gazans say hunger is causing social breakdown, fueling fears of exodus into Egypt
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Yocheved Lifshitz (C), who was released by Hamas after 16 days in captivity, attends a protest with others holding signs showing portraits of other Israeli hostages held in Gaza since the October 7 attacks during a demonstration in Tel Aviv on December 9, 2023. (AFP/File)
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Updated 12 December 2023
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Gazans say hunger is causing social breakdown, fueling fears of exodus into Egypt

Gazans say hunger is causing social breakdown, fueling fears of exodus into Egypt
  • The narrow coastal strip has been under a full Israeli blockade since the start of the conflict

GAZA: Hamas said it was striking back against Israeli forces across Gaza on Monday and Palestinians and international relief agencies said public order was disintegrating as hunger spread, fueling fears of a mass exodus to Egypt.
The narrow coastal strip has been under a full Israeli blockade since the start of the conflict more than two months ago and the border with Egypt is the only other way out.
Most of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been driven from their homes and residents say it is impossible to find refuge, or increasingly food, in the densely populated enclave, with around 18,000 people already killed and conflict intensifying.
Gazans said people forced to flee repeatedly were dying of hunger and cold as well as bombardment, describing desperate attacks on aid trucks and sky high prices.
“Had any of us expected that our people may die of hunger, had it crossed anyone’s mind before?” said Rola Ghanim, among many expressing bewilderment on social media.
Aid trucks risked being stopped by desperate residents if they even slowed down at an intersection, Carl Skau, said deputy executive director of the UN World Food Programme.
“Half of the population are starving, nine out of 10 are not eating every day,” he told Reuters on Saturday.
One Palestinian told Reuters he had not eaten for three days and had to beg for bread for his children.
“I pretend to be strong but I am afraid I will collapse in front of them at any moment,” he said by telephone, declining to be named for fear of reprisals.
After the collapse of a week-long cease-fire on Dec. 1, Israel began a ground offensive in the south last week and has since pushed from the east into the heart of the city of Khan Younis, with warplanes attacking an area to the west.
On Monday, militants and some residents said fighters were preventing Israeli tanks moving further west through the city and clashing with Israeli forces in northern Gaza, where Israel had said its tasks were largely complete.
Israel said dozens of Hamas fighters had surrendered and urged others to join them. The armed wing of Hamas said it had fired rockets toward Tel Aviv, where Israelis fled to shelters.
UN officials say 1.9 million people — 85 percent of Gaza’s population — are displaced and describe the conditions in the southern areas where they have concentrated as hellish.
“I expect public order to completely break down soon and an even worse situation could unfold including epidemic diseases and increased pressure for mass displacement into Egypt,” UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said on Sunday.

ISRAEL DENIES SEEKING TO EMPTY GAZA
Philippe Lazzarini, the commissioner general of UNRWA, the UN body responsible for the welfare of Palestinian refugees, wrote on Saturday that pushing Gazans closer and closer to the border pointed to “attempts to move Palestinians into Egypt.”
The border with Egypt is heavily fortified, but Hamas militants blew holes in the wall in 2008 to break a tight blockade. Gazans crossed to buy food and other goods but quickly returned, with none permanently displaced.
Egypt has long warned it would not allow Gazans into its territory this time, fearing they would not be able to return.
Jordan, which absorbed the bulk of Palestinians after the creation of Israel in 1948, accused Israel on Sunday of seeking “to empty Gaza of its people.”
Israeli government spokesperson Eylon Levy called the accusation “outrageous and false,” saying his country was defending itself “from the monsters who perpetrated the Oct. 7 massacre” and bringing them to justice.
Hamas gunmen on Oct. 7 killed 1,200 people and took 240 hostage, according to Israeli tallies. About 100 hostages were freed during the truce, some with relatives left behind.
“I am petrified I will get bad news that he is no longer alive,” Sharon Alony-Cunio, released with her two little girls, told Reuters of her husband, who is still being held.
Israel has vowed to annihilate the militant Islamist group, which has ruled Gaza since 2007 and is sworn to Israel’s destruction.
Since Oct 7. at least 18,205 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza and 49,645 wounded, according to the Gaza health ministry. The toll no longer includes northern Gaza and many people there and elsewhere remain trapped under rubble.
Israel says the instructions to move are among measures to protect the population. It accuses militants from Hamas, which controls Gaza, of using civilians as human shields and stealing humanitarian aid, which Hamas denies.
The Israeli military accused Hamas of hiding weapons in UNRWA facilities in Jabalia and distributed video purporting to show Hamas gunmen beating people and taking aid in the Gaza City district of Shejaia.
Israel has prevented most aid from moving into Gaza, saying it fears it will just fuel Hamas attacks.
Government spokesman Eylon Levy said Israel was working to open the Kerem Shalom crossing which processed most aid before the war and blamed international agencies for holdups at the crossing from Egypt, which is designed for pedestrians.
In the Israeli-occupied West Bank and neighboring Jordan, most shops and businesses closed in response to Palestinian calls for a strike but the impact on Israel was unclear.
The Gaza health ministry said 32 Palestinians were killed in Khan Younis overnight. The armed wing of Hamas said it had hit two Israeli tanks with rockets and fired mortars at Israeli forces.
Militants and residents said fighting was also fierce in Shejaia, east of the center of Gaza City, the northwestern Sheikh Radwan district and Jabalia further north.
In central Gaza, where Israel told people to move on Monday toward “known shelters in the Deir Al-Balah area” health officials said the Shuhada Al-Aqsa hospital had received 40 dead.
Medics also said an Israeli air strike had killed four in a house in Rafah, one of two places near Egypt where Israel says Palestinians should take refuge.


Lebanon rocket fire kills two in Israel: first responders

Lebanon rocket fire kills two in Israel: first responders
Updated 13 min 38 sec ago
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Lebanon rocket fire kills two in Israel: first responders

Lebanon rocket fire kills two in Israel: first responders
  • Emergency medic Dor Vakinin said a rocket hit a warehouse and that emergency teams arrived on the scene “quickly“
  • “There was a lot of destruction and an active fire,” he said

JERUSALEM: Rocket fire from Lebanon on Tuesday killed two men in their 40s in northern Israel, close to the town of Nahariya, first responders said.
Emergency medic Dor Vakinin said a rocket hit a warehouse and that emergency teams arrived on the scene “quickly.”
“There was a lot of destruction and an active fire,” he said. “We performed medical examinations on two men who were lying unconscious and suffering from severe injuries to their bodies. Unfortunately their injuries were too severe and after the examinations, we had to determine the death of both of them.”
The Israeli military said a barrage of 10 rockets was fired from Lebanon into northern Israel, some of which were intercepted, while “others fell in the area.”
It said sirens had sounded in central Israel, including in Tel Aviv and at Ben Gurion airport. Three projectiles that crossed from Lebanon were intercepted, it said.
Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah said it had fired missiles at an Israeli air base south of Tel Aviv.
The rocket fire came as Israel again pounded Hezbollah strongholds in south Beirut and south Lebanon, the military said.
Israeli and Hezbollah have been exchanging fire since Hamas militants from Gaza carried out an unprecedented attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.
Fighting has escalated since Israel launched an air and ground offensive against Hezbollah in September.


UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire

UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire
Updated 12 November 2024
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UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire

UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire
  • The Israel military also has begun demolishing villages in Lebanon, where other UN peacekeepers have come under fire
  • “Such severe violations of the (demilitarized zone) have the potential to increase tensions in the area and is being closely monitored by UNDOF,” it added
The Israel military also has begun demolishing villages in Lebanon, where other UN peacekeepers have come under fire
“Such severe violations of the (demilitarized zone) have the potential to increase tensions in the area and is being closely monitored by UNDOF,” it added

DUBAI: United Nations peacekeepers warned Tuesday that the Israeli military has committed “severe violations” of a ceasefire deal with Syria as its military continues a major construction project along the so-called Alpha Line that separates the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights from Syria.
The comments from the UN Disengagement Observer Force, which has patrolled the area since 1974, come after an Associated Press report Monday that published satellite imagery showing the extent of the works along the frontier.
The work, which UNDOF said began in July, follows the completion by the Israeli military of new roadways and what appears to be a buffer zone along the Gaza Strip’s frontier with Israel. The Israel military also has begun demolishing villages in Lebanon, where other UN peacekeepers have come under fire.
While such violence hasn’t broken out along the Alpha Line, UNDOF warned Tuesday the work risked further inflaming tensions in the region.
“Such severe violations of the (demilitarized zone) have the potential to increase tensions in the area and is being closely monitored by UNDOF,” it added.
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Syrian officials have declined to comment on the construction, though UNDOF described Syrian officials as having “strongly protested” the work.
As Israel conducted the construction work, which UNDOF described as “extensive engineering groundwork activities,” it has protected earth-moving equipment with armored vehicles and main battle tanks, the peacekeepers said. Troops and earth-moving equipment have crossed the Alpha Line into the demilitarized zone in Syria, known to UNDOF as the “area of separation.”
“Violations of the 1974 Disengagement Agreement have occurred where engineering works have encroached into the AOS,” the peacekeepers said in a statement, using an acronym for the area. “There have been several violations by (Israel) in the form of their presence in the AoS because of these activities.”
UNDOF has repeatedly protested the work, which it described as violating the ceasefire deal over the months of construction so far.
“Based on the engagement, (Israel) has indicated that the current earthworks are being carried out for defensive purpose to prevent unauthorized crossing and violations by civilians,” the peacekeepers added.
Israel sent a 71-page letter in June to the UN outlining what it described as “Syrian violations of the Alpha Line and armed presence in the area of separation (that) occur daily.” The letter cited numerous Israeli-alleged violations by Syrian civilians crossing the line.
Syria has constantly accused Israel of launching attacks against it from territory it occupies in the Golan Heights. Israel has frequently struck Syria over the years, particularly after the start of the Mideast wars following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, assault on Israel.
Israel seized control of the Golan Heights from Syria in the 1967 Mideast war. The UN Secretary Council voted to create UNDOF to patrol a roughly 400-square-kilometer (155-square-mile) demilitarized zone and maintain the peace there after the 1973 Mideast war. A second demarcation, known as the Bravo Line, marks the limit of where the Syrian military can operate.
UNDOF has around 1,100 troops, mostly from Fiji, India, Kazakhstan, Nepal and Uruguay, who patrol the area.
Israel annexed the Golan Heights in 1981 — a move criticized by a UN resolution declaring Israel’s action as “null and void and without international legal effect.” The territory, some 1,200 square kilometers (460 square miles) in size, is a strategic high ground that overlooks both Israel and Syria.
Around 50,000 Jewish settlers and Arabs who are mostly members of the Druze sect of Shiite Islam live there.
In 2019, President Donald Trump unilaterally announced that the United States would “fully recognize” Israel’s control of the territory, a decision that has been unchanged by the Biden administration. However, it’s the only other country to do so, as the rest of the world views it as occupied Syrian territory.

Lebanon says five killed in Israel strike on southern village

Lebanon says five killed in Israel strike on southern village
Updated 45 min 17 sec ago
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Lebanon says five killed in Israel strike on southern village

Lebanon says five killed in Israel strike on southern village
  • Israeli warplanes hit a house between Baalshamieh and Dhour Al-Abadiyah
  • “The Israeli enemy strike on Tefahta killed five people,” the ministry said

A Lebanese security official said an Israeli strike hit a villa east of Beirut on Tuesday, with state media confirming the rare attack outside Hezbollah’s traditional strongholds.
The security official, who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, said the “Israeli strike caused an unspecified number of casualties.”
The National News Agency later said Israeli warplanes hit a house between Baalshamieh and Dhour Al-Abadiyah
At least five people were killed and two were injured in the strike, the Lebanese health ministry said.
Later Tuesday, the ministry added that five people were killed in another Israeli strike on a village about 25 kilometers (15 miles) from the Israeli border, which state-run media said targeted a house.
“The Israeli enemy strike on Tefahta killed five people,” the ministry said in a statement, with the official National News Agency reporting that “enemy aircraft launched a strike a short while ago on the town of Tefahta, targeting an inhabited house.”


Iranian capital builds ‘defensive tunnel’ after Israeli strikes

Iranian capital builds ‘defensive tunnel’ after Israeli strikes
Updated 12 November 2024
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Iranian capital builds ‘defensive tunnel’ after Israeli strikes

Iranian capital builds ‘defensive tunnel’ after Israeli strikes

DUBAI: Iran is building a “defensive tunnel” in the capital Tehran, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported on Tuesday, following strikes by Israel on targets in the country.
The tunnel, located near the city center, will link a station on the Tehran metro to the Imam Khomeini hospital, thus allowing direct underground access to the medical facility.
“For the first time in the country, a tunnel with defensive applications is being built in Tehran,” the head of transport for Tehran City Council told Tasnim.
Last month, Israel carried out its first officially-recognized strikes in Iran, hitting missile factories and other sites near Tehran and in the country’s west, as a response to Iran’s Oct.1 attack on Israeli territory.


Wave of Israeli strikes hit south Beirut after evacuation warning

Wave of Israeli strikes hit south Beirut after evacuation warning
Updated 12 November 2024
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Wave of Israeli strikes hit south Beirut after evacuation warning

Wave of Israeli strikes hit south Beirut after evacuation warning
  • Since September 23, Israel has intensified its air campaign, mainly targeting Hezbollah strongholds

BEIRUT: Israel launched at least 10 air strikes on south Beirut Tuesday morning, Lebanese state media said, shortly after Israel’s army urged residents of several neighborhoods to evacuate the Hezbollah bastion.
“Israeli warplanes launched a very violent tenth strike on Beirut’s southern suburbs,” the official National News Agency reported.
AFPTV footage showed grey smoke covering the area, with big plumes rising after each strike.
Earlier Tuesday, the Israeli army told residents of four south Beirut neighborhoods to leave immediately, warning it would strike Hezbollah targets there.
“You are located near facilities and interests affiliated with Hezbollah, against which the Israel Defense Forces will act in the near future,” military spokesman Avichay Adraee said in a post on X.
The post included a map showing the buildings it would target in the Lebanese capital’s south.
Witnesses told AFP they heard gunfire in the area ahead of the strikes — warning shots by residents for people to leave following the evacuation call.
NNA also reported Israeli strikes across Lebanon’s south that destroyed a building in the main southern city of Nabatiyeh and also targeted the eastern city of Hermel.
Last month, Israeli strikes razed Nabatiyeh’s historic marketplace, with another wave of attacks also hitting its municipality building and killing several including the mayor.
Since September 23, Israel has intensified its air campaign, mainly targeting Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon’s east and south and in southern Beirut. A week later, it sent in ground troops.
It came after nearly a year of cross-border exchanges of fire, launched by Hezbollah in support of its Palestinian ally Hamas following their October 7, 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the Gaza war.
More than 3,240 people have been killed in Lebanon since the clashes began last year, according to the health ministry, the majority of them since late September.