The American writer, of Indian origin, Mehdi Hassan, published his first weekly article in his new position as a weekly columnist in The Guardian newspaper on Wednesday, under the title “Biden can end the bombing of Gaza now, and here’s how,” saying, “Imagine the scene: an Israeli prime minister who launches air strikes on the Arab population. Civilians are killed by the thousands. An American president, stunned and shocked by the scenes of massacre shown on his television screen, calls his Israeli counterpart and within minutes... the bombing ends." The writer wonders: “This seems crazy? Or perhaps a form of naivety? Or superficiality? But this is what happened.”

The year was 1982. What was supposed to be a limited incursion by Israel into southern Lebanon over the summer, under the command of Ariel Sharon, then Israel's defense minister (remember him?), turned into a months-long siege. Beirut and the comprehensive attack on the Palestine Liberation Organization. Between June and August, the Israelis cut off food, water, and electricity from the Lebanese capital in a brutal attempt to destroy the Palestine Liberation Organization, whose fighters were holed up inside a network of tunnels beneath Beirut. (Sound familiar?)"

According to the writer, “On August 12 (1982), in what was later called “Black Thursday,” Israeli planes bombed Beirut for 11 consecutive hours, killing more than 100 people. On the same day, Ronald Reagan (then US President) - He was horrified by what he saw - a phone call to Menachem Begin, then Israeli Prime Minister, to “express his anger” and condemn “the needless destruction and bloodshed.”

Reagan told Begin: “Menachem, this is a Holocaust.”

Yes, an American leader used the word Holocaust in a conversation with an Israeli leader. Begin responded sarcastically, telling the American president: “I think I know what the Holocaust is.” But Reagan did not budge, insisting on the “necessity” of a ceasefire in Beirut.

"Twenty minutes. That's all the time it took for Begin to call back and tell President Reagan that he had ordered Sharon to stop the bombing, and that was it. "I didn't know I had this kind of authority," Reagan told a surprised aide.

Forty-two years later, the Israeli attack on Gaza has now lasted twice as long as the siege of Beirut. In 1982, Reagan was said to have been moved by a photo of a wounded Lebanese child. As of last week, more than 12,300 Palestinian children had been killed in Gaza, and tens of thousands injured, in just four months.

The writer notes that President Reagan waited until the evening news then, but today everyone sees it happening (instantly) on social media.

It is noteworthy that Irish lawyer Blaine Ní Graaligh said before the International Court of Justice in The Hague last month: “The international community continues to fail the Palestinian people, despite the horror of the genocide against the Palestinian people that is broadcast live from Gaza to our homes through Cell phones, computers and TV screens. It is the first genocide in history in which its victims broadcast their devastation instantaneously and it occurs in the desperate, and yet vain, hope that the world might do something.

According to writer K., “Joe Biden, like Reagan before him, can end the current carnage with a single phone call to Benjamin Netanyahu. He, too, has “that kind of power.”

“Do not believe anyone who tells you otherwise. Those in the media who say that ‘America is discovering the limits of its influence over Israel.’” Those in Congress who say US presidents "don't have as much influence over Israel as they thought." Those in the White House who claim they are “unable to exert significant influence on America’s closest ally in the Middle East to change its course.”

This is all deceptive nonsense, according to the writer. It is, in the words of media critic Adam Johnson, a “feigned inability” that has been aided, he points out, by a series of “self-serving leaks” from the Biden White House that insist the president “may or may not be some kind of… “I am disturbed by Israel’s actions.

The truth is that the (American) commander-in-chief of the richest country in the history of the world is not powerless at all, and like every commander-in-chief before him, he wields a lot of influence.

The writer asks himself: “How do we know?” And he answers: “First, because members of the American defense establishment say so.” Take Bruce Riedel, who spent three decades at the CIA and the National Security Council, where he advised four different presidents. “The United States has enormous influence,” Riedel noted in a recent interview. “Every day we provide Israel with the missiles, drones and ammunition it needs to continue a major military campaign like the one in Gaza.”

However, Riedel acknowledged that “US presidents have been remarkably shy about using this influence for domestic political reasons.”

Second, we know that Biden has great influence because, as many observers have pointed out, members of the Israeli defense establishment say so, too. In late October 2023, Israeli lawmakers challenged Defense Minister Yoav Gallant over the decision to allow (small) humanitarian aid into Gaza, before releasing any hostages. How did Gallant respond by saying: “The Americans insisted and we are not in a place where we can refuse them. We depend on them for aircraft and military equipment. What should we do? Tell them no?”

The following month, retired Israeli Major General Yitzhak Brik went even further than Gallant. “All of our missiles, ammunition, precision-guided bombs, all aircraft and bombs are from the United States,” Brick said in an interview in November. "The minute they turn off the tap, you can't keep fighting. You don't have the ability... Everyone realizes we can't fight this war without the United States. Point below zero."

The writer, who was the host of a program on MSNBC until the end of last year when the network terminated his contract because he embarrassed Mark Regev, Netanyahu’s spokesman, says: “The Israelis cannot ‘reject’ the Americans. The truth is that the President of the United States He could “turn off the tap” – ammunition, bombs, intelligence – and thus end what the International Court of Justice deemed plausible genocide in Gaza.

Third, we know that Biden has the ability to stop Netanyahu from killing Palestinians en masse in Gaza because… he has done it before. In May 2021, Israel bombed the Strip for 11 straight days, killing more than 100 Palestinians, including 66 children. During the same period, Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups in Gaza fired more than 4,000 rockets into Israel, killing 14 civilians. As now, Netanyahu has rejected calls for a ceasefire – from Hamas, as well as from France, Egypt and Jordan.

"But guess who he can't say no to? Yes, the president of the United States. We need to get more done," Netanyahu said when Biden called him on May 19, according to journalist Franklin Foer. The president's response? "Man, the bombing is over, it's over." 

Two days later, a ceasefire was announced. Less than a month later, the Israeli Prime Minister was dismissed from office.

Why then, but not now? The writer says, “Perhaps because Biden, like millions of Americans and others around the world, was understandably terrified by the terrorism to which Israelis were subjected on October 7. But where is his horror at the ongoing terrorism in Gaza? Are there two Palestinian mothers being killed there every hour?” Or the ten Palestinian children who have one or both of their legs amputated every day, or the one in four Palestinians who are starving in Gaza right now?

“Could it be that Biden places less value on Arab lives than ... Reagan? The president does not seem to recognize the humanity of all parties affected by this conflict,” a former Biden administration official told Mother Jones in December. “He described Israeli suffering in great detail.” , while Palestinian suffering was left obscure, if mentioned at all.”

He ends by saying: “Biden now has the unique ability among the eight billion people living on this planet, which enables him to pick up the phone, dial a number starting with +972, and stop the daily killing of hundreds of wives and children.” “It really is that simple.”

Today, Thursday, the United Nations Security Council will hold its monthly session on the situation in the Middle East, especially the Palestinian issue, followed by a consultation session.

Members are scheduled to listen to a briefing from the General Secretariat on the latest developments in Gaza and the West Bank, including occupied Jerusalem.

On Tuesday, the UN Security Council failed to adopt a draft resolution calling for an end to the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip, after the United States used its veto.

Thirteen countries voted in favor of the draft resolution submitted by Algeria on behalf of the Arab Group, while the United Kingdom abstained from voting, and the United States used its “veto” to thwart the resolution.

The draft resolution rejects the forced displacement of the Palestinian civilian population, calls for adherence to international law, and renews its call for full, rapid, safe and unhindered access of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip and all its parts, and for sufficient humanitarian aid to be provided urgently, continuously, and in the appropriate size, to Palestinian civilians.

The project reaffirms its firm commitment to the vision of a two-state solution under which the democratic states of Israel and Palestine live side by side in peace and within secure and recognized borders.

Axios reported - from an informed source and an Israeli official - that CIA Director William Burns is expected to arrive in Paris tomorrow, Friday, to hold talks with Qatari, Egyptian and Israeli officials, while an Israeli minister spoke about the possibility of progress regarding exchanging prisoners with the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas).

The American news site said that the new talks in which Burns will participate will revolve around efforts to reach an agreement to ensure the release of prisoners.

The CIA director participated late last month - alongside the head of the Mossad (Israeli foreign intelligence), David Barnea - in talks that took place in Paris, followed earlier this month by meetings in Cairo regarding a possible agreement leading to a ceasefire and the exchange of prisoners.

The Paris talks resulted in a framework for a possible agreement, but the discussions that took place afterwards did not lead to progress.

While Israel and the United States want an interim agreement that includes a temporary truce during which the Israeli prisoners will be released, Hamas stresses that any agreement must lead to a final ceasefire, the withdrawal of the occupation forces from the Gaza Strip, and the release of a large number of Palestinian prisoners.

Attack on Rafah

Meanwhile, the American CNN network quoted an informed diplomat as saying that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu does not seem ready to reach any agreement at the present time.

The source said that if Israel launched an attack on Rafah, which is crowded with displaced persons (south of the Gaza Strip), then the possibility of concluding a deal regarding the detainees could be forgotten.

CNN quoted informed sources as saying that senior American officials believe that there is no chance for Israel to agree to a permanent ceasefire without releasing the detained Israelis in Gaza, and that through a pause, even if it is temporary, discussions can continue that would end the conflict. 

Yesterday evening, Israeli War Council member Benny Gantz said that there are preliminary indicators that enhance the possibility of progress in the negotiations towards a new exchange deal.

Gantz added that Israel will not hesitate to give up any opportunity to return its prisoners detained in Gaza.

For his part, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant said that he met with the families of the prisoners and discussed with them the difficulties facing the army and the practical and political efforts to return them.

The meeting was held amid criticism and protests over statements by Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich in which he said that the recovery of prisoners from Gaza is not the most important thing, but rather the victory over Hamas.

Last night, hundreds of Israeli demonstrators marched in Tel Aviv to demand that the government expedite the return of prisoners from the Gaza Strip.

Medicines for prisoners

On the other hand, Israeli Channel 12 quoted a senior French Foreign Ministry official as saying that Paris had obtained sufficient evidence proving the arrival of medicines to Israeli prisoners in the Gaza Strip.

Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesman Majid Al-Ansari said on Tuesday that Doha had received assurances from Hamas regarding the receipt of a shipment of medicines based on a Qatari-brokered agreement, and that the movement had begun delivering them to detainees in the Gaza Strip.

Al-Ansari added that Qatar received these assurances as a mediator in the agreement, which includes the introduction of medicines and a shipment of humanitarian aid to civilians in the Gaza Strip, especially the most affected and damaged areas, in exchange for delivering the medicines needed by detainees in the Strip.

A few days ago, Hamas warned that the continued Israeli aggression and the prevention of the entry of aid threaten the lives of many sick or injured Israeli prisoners, stressing that it is doing everything in its power to preserve their lives.

Israel estimates the number of its remaining prisoners in the Gaza Strip at about 130, but it is likely that a number of them were killed.

In 1956, the stance of the US turned Israel’s military victory into a political defeat. Indeed, at the insistence of President Eisenhower and his administration, the countries that had launched the "Tripartite Aggression" against Egypt (Britain, France, and Israel) were made to suffer a humiliating setback that led to British Prime Minister Anthony Eden’s resignation.

As for David Ben-Gurion, he drew a crucial lesson that would later become a foundation pillar of Israeli state policy. He understood that the US ultimately called the shots in the Middle East - after Britain and France once played this role, the important decisions now were made by the United States alone.

Following the Second World War, the latter, alongside with the Soviet Union, had become the world’s two ascending powers. Because of this lesson, Ben-Gurion led the shift that made Washington, instead of the declining powers in London and Paris, the political reference point of Tel Aviv. This path was not without its fair share of supplication and grovelling, requirements imposed by the fact that, at the time, Washington had been more concerned with shoring up alliances with the Arab and Muslim worlds than Israel.

In doing so, Ben-Gurion showed himself to be adept at adapting to changes in the balance of power and fine-tuning the diplomatic adjustments they demanded. Israel reaped the benefits of his capacity for adaptation, which was never more evident than in the 1967 War.

Indeed, military and technological superiority combined with reliance on the United States - two factors that are ultimately intertwined - to allow the Jewish state consistent success, which was also helped by parliamentary democracy that governed and organized the country.

However, one wouldn’t find a trace of Ben-Gurionism in the approach of Benjamin Netanyahu, who was raised in the Revisionist tradition of Jabotinsky. Political nihilism has accompanied the humanitarian horrors of the conflict since that war began, as reflected by the objectives of annihilating Hamas and getting the hostages back without negotiations.

Although subsequent developments have demonstrated that it will be difficult to continue to cling to both objectives absolutely, the potential campaign on Rafah would reinvigorate the notion of total war and bring us back to a political void.

Benny Gantz has announced that unless all the hostages are released before Ramadan, the war cabinet will launch its campaign on Rafah, in which a massive number of Gazan civilian victims are now crammed. However, Netanyahu reiterated his unequivocal rejection of a Palestinian state in conjunction with this announcement, calling it a reward for terrorism, and his finance minister, Smotrich, urged him to withdraw from the Oslo Accords if a Palestinian state is unilaterally recognized.

While this hubris ignores the United States’ publicly stated position, as well as that of countless countries, governments, and peoples around the world, another minister, Ben-Gvir, voiced reservations about allowing Muslim worshippers into the Al-Aqsa Mosque during Ramadan, which the Haaretz columnist Amos Harel warned would risk igniting a religious conflict.

And all this comes as the government pursues an approach that ranges from encouraging the actions of settlers to turning a blind eye to them. In turn, domestic headlines suggest contradiction and volatility far more than they do cohesion: this is evident in the reporting on the West Bank, which is being violated on a regular basis, while getting the hostages back seems increasingly at odds with the war Israel is waging.

Netanyahu and his coalition government have now become a burden on politics and political process as such. They are undermining the foundational pillars upon which the Israeli state was built, foremost among them its special relationship with the United States and its excellent relations with Western European countries.

However, their actions are raising serious questions at the regional level as well, putting the future of its peace with Egypt and Jordan in jeopardy, and perhaps the agreements concluded with the countries that normalized relations later on too, to say nothing about weakening the prospects for peace and normalization with countries that, under different circumstances and if different stances had been taken, might have been inclined to make peace and normalize relations.

By slamming the doors to politics shut and choosing total war, the Jewish state is making the world more tolerant of the actions of Iran's proxies in Lebanon, Yemen, and Iraq, and granting the narratives of these parties, including their misrepresentations and lies, more acceptance. This Netanyahu-led Israel would seem like brainless tongueless muscle, especially if the Palestinians manage to get their affairs in order and agree to a framework that brings Hamas into the Palestine Liberation Organization following its adoption of the latter’s program.

Thus, even if Israel were to emerge victorious after another extremely bloody and brutal campaign in Rafah, many actors could reconsider their calculations in ways that harm the country: we see this in the wobbling of the foundations that have underpinned its policy since the era that began 1956, especially its relationship with the US, and in new considerations linked to the region and Israel's place within it.

Set their stance on Palestinian rights aside, Israelis who care about their country and want to protect it inevitably fear that there will come a day when sacrificing Netanyahu and his coalition is no longer enough to save what Israel stands for, or to salvage what remains of its meaning from the clutches of total war and its repercussions.

What we are seeing, in essence, is the accelerating demolition of what the country’s founders had built, or the antithesis of Ben-Gurionism. Israel’s founding father, after having retired from politics, called for a withdrawal from the territories occupied in 1967, with the exception of segments of Jerusalem, demanding nothing more than practical and viable armistice arrangements in return. He certainly did not do so out of concern for the Palestinians or the Arabs. It was his keenness on Israel's interests that drove him, and it took him in the opposite direction of that which Netanyahu’s primitive view of these interests is leading the country.

Source: Alsharq Alawsat

On the 139th day of the war, the Israeli army continues its aggression against the Gaza Strip, leaving killed and wounded, amid warnings from international relief agencies of a disaster in the Strip.

The Israeli forces intensified their raids on Rafah and Khan Yunis, south of Gaza, while the Israeli army suffered losses yesterday, Wednesday, during ongoing fierce battles in the Zaytoun neighborhood in Gaza City. The Al-Qassam Brigades also announced that they had killed Israeli soldiers in Khan Yunis.

A statement by the UN humanitarian agencies warned of the situation in the Gaza Strip, and stressed the need to provide security guarantees for them to distribute aid on a large scale throughout Gaza.

For his part, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant admitted that Israel is facing difficulties, and is making practical and political efforts to return detainees from the Gaza Strip.

Civil rights icon spent time in Khan Younis refugee camp and listened to Palestinian poetry, inspiring him to write an essay about the Israeli occupation

By Rayhan Uddin

The human rights activist and Muslim preacher Malcolm X was killed 59 years ago today, on 21 February 1965. 

Though mainly known for his advocacy for the civil rights of Black communities in the United States, he also spent much of his life speaking on the struggles of peoples worldwide. 

Particularly during the latter years of his life - after breaking away from the Black nationalist and separatist Nation of Islam - Malcolm began to interact with leaders and organisers across the globe. 

During extensive travels in Africa and the Middle East in 1964, he met several postcolonial pan-African and pan-Arab leaders, including then-Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, Ghanian Prime Minister Kwame Nkrumah, and Guinea President Ahmed Sekou Toure.

"I, for one, would like to impress, especially upon those who call themselves leaders, the importance in realising the direct connection between the struggle of the Afro-American in this country and the struggle of our people all over the world," Malcolm said upon his return to America in New York in December 1964.

Among those international causes was the struggle of the Palestinian people, which the civil rights figure was most vocal about in the final six months of his life. 

In 1948, in what came to be known as the Nakba (or catastrophe), 750,000 Palestinians were ethnically cleansed from their homes to make way for the newly created state of Israel. 

In the years that followed, displaced Palestinians were forced to live in refugee camps in Gaza, the West Bank, and neighbouring countries including Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. 

It was in that context that Malcolm visited Palestine twice. He went to Jerusalem in 1959 and then to Gaza for two days in September 1964.

Little is known about the first trip, however, his time spent in Gaza is well documented. 

Visit to Gaza

Malcolm travelled from Egypt to Gaza on 5 September 1964.

At the time, the Gaza Strip was under the control of Egypt (which took over the enclave in 1948) and therefore travel between the two territories was relatively smooth. 

According to his travel diaries, Malcolm visited the Khan Younis refugee camp, which was created in 1949 following the Nakba to house people displaced from other parts of Palestine. 

He also visited a local hospital and dined with religious leaders in Gaza. 

Later in the evening, the American preacher met renowned Palestinian poet Harun Hashem Rashid, who described to him how he narrowly escaped the Khan Younis massacre of 1956. 

During the massacre, which took place in the one-week war which came to be known as the Suez Crisis, Israeli forces went house-to-house executing a total of 275 Palestinians (the majority of whom were civilians) in southern Gaza.

Rashid went on to recite a poem about Palestinian refugees returning to their lands, which Malcolm copied into his diary, according to a 2019 paper on Malcolm and Palestine by Hamzah Baig. 

"At 8:25 pm we left for the mosque to pray with several religious leaders. The spirit of Allah was strong," Malcolm wrote in his diary.  

To conclude the trip, he visited Gaza's parliamentary building and held a press conference with the various local figures. 

“There they showered gifts upon me," he wrote, which included a picture of the Aswan High Dam taken down from a wall in the parliament building. 

He left Gaza on 6 September at noon and headed back to Cairo. 

On 15 September, in Cairo's Shepheard's Hotel, Malcolm met with members of the newly formed Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO), including Ahmad al-Shukeiri, the group's first chairman.

'Zionist Logic' essay

Days after the trip to Gaza, Malcolm would pen his most extensive article on the Palestinian cause. 

On 17 September 1964, he published the essay, "Zionist Logic", in the Cairo-based newspaper, the Egyptian Gazette. 

In the piece, he describes Zionism as "a new form of colonialism" which appears to be "benevolent" and "philanthropic". He warned that newly-independent African countries in economic difficulty were being exploited by Israel through economic aid and assistance. 

He also accused the West of strategically attempting to divide Africans and Asians, through the creation of the state of Israel. 

"The ever-scheming European imperialists wisely placed Israel where she could geographically divide the Arab world, infiltrate and sow the seed of dissension among African leaders and also divide the Africans against the Asians," he wrote. 

"The continued low standard of living in the Arab world has been skillfully used by the Zionist propagandists to make it appear to the Africans that the Arab leaders are not intellectually or technically qualified to lift the living standard of their people. 

'[The] occupation of Arab Palestine has no intelligent or legal basis in history' - Malcolm X

"Thus, indirectly inducing Africans to turn away from the Arabs and towards the Israelis for teachers and technical assistance."

In the essay's final section, he questioned Israel's justification of a state based on a "promised land". 

"If the 'religious' claim of the Zionists is true that they were to be led to the promised land by their messiah, and Israel's present occupation of Arab Palestine is the fulfillment of that prophesy: where is their messiah[?]" he asked. 

He then drew a comparison with Muslim rule over Spain, and whether that period would give Muslims the right to invade Iberia in the present day.

"Only a thousand years ago, the Moors lived in Spain. Would this give the Moors of today the legal and moral right to invade the Iberian Peninsula, drive out its Spanish citizens, and then set up a new Moroccan nation... where Spain used to be, as the European Zionists have done to our Arab brothers and sisters in Palestine?"

He concludes by stating that Israel's argument to justify its "present occupation of Arab Palestine has no intelligent or legal basis in history". 

Malcolm was assassinated on 21 February 1965, after being shot multiple times while delivering a speech in Manhattan's Audubon Ballroom. 

His pro-Palestine approach was later continued by prominent Black-American activists, including Stokely Carmichael, Angela Davis and other figures within the Black Panther movement, including Eldridge Cleaver.

In 1969, Cleaver would go on to meet Yasser Arafat, leader of the PLO, and set up an international section of the Panther party in Algeria. 

An Israeli soldier was killed and 8 others were injured of varying severity on Thursday in shooting at a military checkpoint near the Maale Adumim settlement, east of occupied Jerusalem.

Israeli media reported that one of the seriously injured soldiers had died.

Earlier, Israeli Army Radio reported that 9 soldiers were injured, including 3 in critical condition, in shooting at a military checkpoint near the settlement.

The Israeli police said that they killed the perpetrators of the attack, and that 3 of the injured Israelis were in serious condition.

Al Jazeera bureau director Walid Al-Omari, citing Israeli sources, said that two Palestinian gunmen opened fire on a military checkpoint near the village of Al-Za'im, wounding 8 soldiers.

Al-Omari added that the Israeli forces sent large reinforcements to the area where the attack occurred and closed the road routes there.

According to Israeli media, two who were accompanying the perpetrators of the shooting attack near the settlement were arrested.

Hebrew sources reported that the Maale Adumim municipality called on residents to remain in their homes after suspecting the presence of a third gunman.

The Maale Adumim operation comes days after the operation that took place in the Kiryat Malachi settlement, east of Ashdod, which resulted in the killing of two Israelis.

Source: Al Jazeera

France's representative before the International Court of Justice, Diego Colas, said on Wednesday that Israel's continued construction of settlements "undermines the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state."

This came in a speech during hearings held by the International Court of Justice in The Hague, based on a request from the United Nations General Assembly to provide advisory opinions regarding the legal consequences arising from Israel’s policies and practices in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Colas stated that France affirms its “steadfast support for the two-state solution, ensuring the security of Israel and the aspirations of the Palestinians to establish an independent state.”

He explained that “the continuation of the Israeli occupation and settlement building undermines the establishment of a Palestinian state.”

More than 50 countries will participate in the sessions, which began on Monday and will continue until February 26, and will present arguments regarding Israel’s practices in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Among those countries are Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Egypt, the Emirates, and Jordan, in addition to the United States, Britain, Canada, Russia, and China, according to the court’s website.

In a similar advisory opinion, the International Court of Justice ruled in 2004 that the construction of the separation wall in the occupied West Bank was illegal, and demanded that Israel remove it from all Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem and its suburbs, with compensation for those affected, but Tel Aviv did not implement the court’s request.

Nine settlers, including soldiers, were injured, described as moderate to very serious, on Thursday morning, as a result of a shooting attack that took place near the “Maale Adumim” settlement and the Al-Za’im checkpoint, east of occupied Jerusalem.

The Israeli police announced that the shooting attack east of occupied Jerusalem was carried out by three young men, while their death was later announced.

According to preliminary investigations, the perpetrators arrived in a car, taking advantage of the traffic congestion in the area. They got out of the car and began shooting at those who were driving in the traffic jam. While others who were in traffic and carrying weapons got out of their car and neutralized the perpetrators.

The Israeli ambulance reported that the operation resulted in 9 injuries, 3 in serious condition, 2 in moderate condition, and 3 in minor condition.

A diplomatic source told CNN that if Israel launches a military operation in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, there will be no deal to release the hostages.

The diplomatic source familiar with the progress of the indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas, mediated by Egypt, Qatar and the United States in Cairo, told CNN: “If there is an operation against Rafah, we can forget about achieving any deal.”

The source indicated that the remaining period until the beginning of Ramadan on March 10 will be “decisive” for the negotiations, and that any Israeli military operation during Ramadan will increase tensions in the region.

The diplomat said, "It does not seem that (Israeli Prime Minister) Netanyahu wants any deal at the moment."

In this context, the US envoy for Middle East affairs, Brett McGurk, returned to Cairo on Wednesday, heading to Israel on Thursday to continue efforts aimed at concluding a deal that is expected to include a ceasefire and the exchange of detainees between Israel and Hamas.

19 citizens were killed, and dozens were injured, as a result of an Israeli bombing that targeted the Nuseirat camp and the Zaytoun neighborhood in the Gaza Strip.

Israeli warplanes launched raids on a house for the Al-Dalis family, west of the Nuseirat camp in the middle of the Gaza Strip, killing 17 citizens and wounding dozens. They were taken to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the neighboring city of Deir Al-Balah.

Medical sources also announced that journalist Ihab Nasrallah and his wife were killed, and his three children were seriously burned, after they were targeted by the Israeli forces penetrating into the Al-Zaytoun neighborhood in Gaza City.

A number of citizens were injured as a result of the Israeli army targeting a group of residents in the Al-Brahma neighborhood, south of Rafah. Artillery also targeted a tower in Hamad City, west of Khan Yunis.

A US State Department spokesman said that Israel did not present a plan to protect civilians in Rafah, south of the Gaza Strip, before its threatened attack on the city, while Bloomberg reported that the British government is considering restricting some arms supplies to Israel if it launches this attack.

NBC News quoted US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller as saying during a press conference that he followed news that Israel was developing a plan to protect civilians in Rafah, but he did not know its content.

Miller added, "We want to get it as soon as possible, and this is what we will continue to work for. At the same time, we have made clear that Israel should not launch a comprehensive military operation in Rafah unless it has a reliable and realistic humanitarian plan that it can implement."

Israel is threatening to invade Rafah, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says that refraining from carrying out a military operation there may mean losing the war, while regional and international parties warn that the attack will lead to genocide and an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe in the city where about 1.4 million forcibly displaced Palestinians are taking refuge from the north and center of the Gaza Strip.

But the United States, Israel's biggest backer in its war on Gaza, has not indicated that it might stop or restrict the flow of weapons to the Israeli army.

On the other hand, Bloomberg quoted sources as saying that the British government is considering restricting some arms exports to Israel if it launches an attack on Rafah, or obstructs the entry of aid trucks into the Gaza Strip.

British officials told the network - on condition that their names not be published - that the escalation of Israeli military operations in Gaza without efforts to protect civilians may constitute a violation of international humanitarian law, depending on the way those operations are carried out.

For more than 4 months, the occupation army has been waging a devastating war on Gaza, which, according to the Palestinian authorities, has led to the death of 29,313 Palestinians and the injury of 69,333, as of today, Wednesday, and most of the victims are children and women.

Minister of the Israeli War Council, Benny Gantz, said that there are ongoing attempts to reach a new prisoner exchange deal with the Palestinian factions, and there are initial indications of the possibility of moving forward with it.

This came in a press conference held by Gantz, head of the opposition National Unity Party, on Wednesday evening.

He said: "There is no stone left unturned in order to achieve the mission of returning the abductees, which concerns the entire Israeli society, and for which the leadership bears responsibility."

He added: "There are attempts these days to push for a new deal, and initial signs indicate the possibility of moving forward. We will not stop searching for the way (for the Israeli prisoners detained in Gaza), and we will not waste any opportunity to return the girls and boys to their homes."

Gantz continued: “On the battlefield, we are embarking on an operation in Rafah (south of the Gaza Strip), which will begin after the area is evacuated of residents (displaced Palestinians).”

He went on to say: "The importance of clearing Rafah lies in the ability to strike Hamas forces operating there, and the need to disarm the Gaza Strip."

He continued threateningly: "I repeat, if there is no deal to return the kidnapped people, we will (continue the war on the Gaza Strip) also during the month of Ramadan."

Gantz said: “Today (Wednesday) we voted in the Knesset (Parliament) by a large majority on a resolution opposing the unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state.”

He added, "After October 7, it would be wrong to provide such support (a Palestinian state) to terrorism. Political settlements must be made directly, otherwise they will not be sustainable."

According to Gantz: “In any future situation, Israel will maintain its superiority and ability to conduct security operations in the entire Gaza Strip. Our mission is 100 percent security control without civilian control.”

He said that "many parties can operate civilianly in the Gaza Strip, but not Hamas."

He continued: "We will not allow the killers to return to control the places where the Israeli army was operating, and we are studying a number of options until aid is delivered to Gaza through an international administration from moderate Arab countries with the support of the United States."

Gantz added: “We are working to strengthen the moderate axis in confronting Iran, and to establish a regional administration that will help the Palestinians form another ruling system in Gaza, and ensure that investments are also directed to changing school curricula, as our friends did in the United Arab Emirates.”

Gantz touched on what was raised about the Israeli government adopting decisions to restrict the entry of Palestinians to Al-Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem during the upcoming month of Ramadan.

He claimed that "Israel respects freedom of worship, and will work to allow the largest possible number of believers to ascend to the Holy Mosque in safety and security during the month of Ramadan. Even in light of the security situation, we will preserve religious freedom and the sanctity of the month and will only move against those who expose us to danger."

The US administration is preparing to issue a second batch of sanctions on Israeli settlers who carried out violent acts in the West Bank, according to Hebrew media.

The Times of Israel, citing informed American officials, said that new American sanctions against settlers will be issued within the next few weeks.

According to the same source, many Israeli extremists will be targeted with sanctions, joining the four to whom Washington imposed sanctions in the first batch.

At the beginning of this February, US President Joe Biden signed an executive order imposing sanctions on 4 settlers involved in acts of violence against Palestinians in the West Bank.

This paved the way for unprecedented sanctions on the grounds that settler violence threatens regional security as well as American interests, according to the Israeli newspaper.

The newspaper, quoting the same sources, said that the expected second batch of sanctions indicates that Washington intends to escalate its pressure on Israel to address this phenomenon (settler violence), which continued in the weeks after Biden signed the executive order without Tel Aviv carrying out any arrests against the settlers.

It considered that the new sanctions would be “further evidence of the United States’ lack of confidence in Israeli law enforcement authorities, which rarely succeed in prosecuting Israeli suspects while Palestinians are convicted of committing attacks against Israelis at much higher rates.”

The sources said that prominent Israeli extremists are likely to be punished in the second batch, although government officials will not be targeted yet.

A senior US official told the newspaper that the Biden administration in the first batch of sanctions seriously considered including far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, who has a long history of inflammatory comments and was also convicted on several terrorism-related charges before entering politics.

The same official added that far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich is not subject to sanctions, even though Washington considered rejecting his application for a visa to enter the United States last year.

The two American officials told the newspaper that the Biden administration is also considering canceling the so-called “Pompeo Doctrine,” which considers settlements “not in themselves inconsistent with international law.”

A policy followed in 2019 by then US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo canceled a memorandum submitted by the Legal Advisor of the State Department, Herbert Hansell, in 1978, which considered the settlements “legal.”

The Director-General of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, confirmed today, Wednesday, that the situation in the Gaza Strip is “inhumane,” more than four months after the start of the Israeli aggression.

“In what world do we live when people cannot get food and water or when people who cannot even walk cannot get care?” Ghebreyesus said at a press conference in Geneva.

He added: "In what world do we live when medical teams are exposed to the danger of (Israeli) bombing while doing their work? In what world do we live when hospitals are forced to close their doors because there is no longer electricity or medicine to save patients, and because they are targets of the Israeli army?"

He considered that "the health and humanitarian situation in Gaza is inhumane and continues to deteriorate."

He stressed that "the Gaza Strip has become a death zone," adding, "A large portion of the territory was destroyed, more than 29,000 people were killed, many others were missing, presumed dead, and a very large number were injured."

He pointed out that the levels of acute malnutrition in the Gaza Strip have risen significantly since the beginning of the aggression, from less than 1% to more than 15% in some areas.

He said: "We need a ceasefire now!... The bombs must stop falling, and access to humanitarian aid must be possible. Humanity must prevail."

The ongoing Israeli aggression since October 7 has pushed 2.2 million people to the brink of famine, and three-quarters of the population in the devastated Strip have been displaced, according to United Nations estimates.

Martin Griffiths, United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, said that half a million people in Gaza are on the brink of famine, and lack the most basic needs of food, water and health care.

In an article, Griffiths said that the deprivation suffered by the people of Gaza is severe and profound, and any amount of aid will not be sufficient for their needs, noting that Israel, as the occupying power in Gaza, was asked to facilitate the arrival of aid, to no avail.

He stressed that entire neighborhoods in the Gaza Strip had been wiped out, and he appealed to the members of the “Group of 20” on the occasion of their meeting in Brazil to use their political positions and influence to help stop this war and save the people of Gaza, stressing that these members have the ability to make a difference, and he asked them to use it. .

Addressing the group members, Griffiths said, “Your silence and inaction will only lead to more women and children being thrown into open graves in Gaza.”

Griffiths presented a general picture of the tragic situation in Gaza, saying that at the time the “G20” was meeting, the reported death toll there had reached 30,000.

It is unparalleled in its intensity and brutality

He added that what has been unfolding in Gaza for 137 days is unparalleled in its intensity, brutality and scope. Tens of thousands of people were killed, injured or buried under the rubble. Entire neighborhoods were destroyed to the ground. Hundreds of thousands of displaced people are living in the harshest conditions with the arrival of winter. Half a million people are on the brink of famine. Basic needs are inaccessible: food, water, health care and toilets. The entire population is stripped of their humanity.

He also said that the atrocities befalling the people of Gaza and the human tragedy they endure are before the world, documented by brave Palestinian journalists, many of whom were killed while doing so, and no one in the world can pretend not to know.

He expressed his hope that this tragic situation would give the foreign ministers meeting in Rio de Janeiro a reason to reflect on what their countries did or did not do to stop this.

A warning of what comes tomorrow

The UN official continued to say that talk about the war in Gaza being ruthless and an example of absolute humanitarian failure is not news. “Instead, allow me, on behalf of my colleagues working in the humanitarian field, to warn you, not only about today, but about what I fear for tomorrow.”

He pointed to the efforts made by humanitarian aid agencies, adding that it is an effort that everyone knows about and no one can claim not to know about it. He stated that 160 workers in these agencies have been killed, yet their work continues to provide food, medical supplies and safe drinking water.

He added that they are doing their work despite security risks, the collapse of law and order, access restrictions and personal tragedies, despite the halting of funding for the largest UN organization in Gaza, and despite deliberate attempts to discredit it.

We demand what is reasonable

He said they were demanding reasonable things: security guarantees, a better humanitarian notification system to reduce risks, telecommunications equipment, the removal of unexploded ordnance, and the use of all possible entry points.

He expressed his despair for the relevant authorities to give them what they need to work, adding that the obstacles they face every step of the way are so enormous that they can only provide the bare minimum.

He said the October 7 attack on Israel is horrific, but it does not justify what is happening to every child, woman and man in Gaza.

No avail

He explained that they had been calling on Israel, as the occupying authority in Gaza, to facilitate the delivery of aid, and had been calling for the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages. They were still urging both parties to adhere to their obligations under international humanitarian law and human rights law, and they were urging countries that had stopped funding UNRWA. “She decided to rescind her decision, to no avail.

By Piotr Smolar 

For the third time since the start of the war, the United States vetoed a draft resolution at the UN on a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. But this time, the White House proposed its own text, which links the end of the fighting to the release of all the hostages.

Distancing yourself without letting go of Israel's hand: this is the impossible maneuver that the Biden administration is undertaking. Faced with glaring diplomatic isolation, the United States is trying to qualify – without calling it into question – its support for the Jewish state, while the open war in Gaza after the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023 has caused some 29 000 Palestinian deaths, mostly civilians. For the third time since the start of the war, on Tuesday February 20, Washington blocked with its veto a draft resolution in the UN Security Council, calling for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire. The text, carried by Algeria, was supported by thirteen out of fifteen countries, with the United Kingdom abstaining.

“We simply were not in a position to support a resolution today that would have jeopardized sensitive negotiations,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Tuesday. The latter referred to ongoing diplomatic contacts to secure a temporary ceasefire lasting several weeks in Gaza, in exchange for the release of hostages held by Hamas. To this end, Brett McGurk, Joe Biden's Middle East advisor, is expected back in Cairo on Wednesday to meet with the powerful head of Egyptian intelligence, Abbas Kamel, one of his main interlocutors. On Tuesday, Ismaïl Haniyeh, the head of the Hamas political bureau, was in the Egyptian capital.

On Wednesday, Brett McGurk will also be in Israel, as the country plans a military offensive in the Rafah region, south of the Palestinian enclave, to complete its land operation. After a telephone conversation the week of February 12 between Joe Biden and Benjamin Netanyahu, the White House renewed its opposition to such an offensive on Tuesday. It would be "a disaster", said the spokesperson, for lack of a "credible plan" for the approximately 1.4 million Palestinian refugees squeezed in the south of the strip in absolute distress.

The presidents of Colombia and Bolivia expressed their “full solidarity” with their Brazilian counterpart, Lula, after his statements comparing the war in Gaza to the Holocaust.

Relations between Israel and Brazil have continued to worsen since Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, known as Lula, drew parallels between the Holocaust and the conflict in Gaza in a public statement on Sunday, February 18. In response, Israel declared the Brazilian president “persona non grata” until he apologizes.

This diplomatic crisis could extend to South America. The presidents of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, and Bolivia, Luis Arce, supported their Brazilian counterpart on X on Tuesday, February 20.

By Aseel Mousa, Alice Speri

Palestinians in Rafah’s rapidly growing makeshift camps talk about all they have lost and endured throughout four months of Israel’s war on Gaza.

IT WAS A night of terror in Rafah. Early Monday morning, the Israeli military rained bombs on the city in southern Gaza that borders Egypt. The ground shook, the sound of fighter jets dropping bombs so intense and persistent that some described it as a “fire belt,” a term Palestinians use to describe the prolonged targeting of nearby areas. At least 100 people were killed in the bombings, which some of Rafah’s inhabitants said were among the worst of the war.

They would know. Rafah is the last available refuge for at least 1.3 million Palestinians who have fled their homes since October. They have been repeatedly displaced from across the rest of the occupied territory, making their way to an area that the Israeli military had designated a “safe zone.”

An Israeli military official described Monday’s bombing as a “diversion,” part of an effort to rescue two Israeli hostages. The intense assault appeared to be a prelude to many more horrors to come, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced on Friday that a long-feared ground invasion of the city is imminent. He ordered a mass evacuation of civilians there — a prospect that is, simply put, impossible, given the number of displaced people currently in Rafah and the fact that there is nowhere left to go.

Since the beginning of the war, Rafah has transformed into a tent city that United Nations officials warned is a “pressure cooker of despair.” As the number of people killed, missing, or wounded during Israel’s four-month war recently topped 100,000, some 1.9 million people — more than 85 percent of Gaza’s population — have been internally displaced. The vast majority of them are crammed at the border with Egypt, where they face an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe that has been compounded in recent days by the uncertainty of Rafah’s viability as the last refuge in Gaza.

In the days preceding Monday’s assault, humanitarian and human rights organizations, as well as the U.S. government, had issued urgent warnings that a full-scale attack on the city would be the most devastating yet. “This escalation would significantly exacerbate the ongoing genocidal acts perpetrated by the Israeli military and authorities against the Palestinian population in Gaza,” a coalition of Palestinian human rights groups warned last week, noting that the feared ground invasion would be in violation of the measures ordered by the International Court of Justice last month.

International Criminal Court prosecutor Karim Khan, meanwhile, issued a rare warning on Monday implying that the latest assault on Rafah might amount to war crimes under the court’s jurisdiction. It was a notable statement from Khan, who has mostly remained silent on Israeli actions during the current war in Gaza, and under whose leadership the ICC investigation into crimes committed in Palestine has largely stalled.

In recent days, as people currently seeking safety in Rafah braced for the incoming assault, a single question echoed across the city: “Where can we go?”

The prospect of more loss is unfathomable. Already, Palestinians are struggling to survive in Rafah, where food and water are scarce, and the city’s overburdened health infrastructure is on the brink of collapse. Even before Netanyahu announced the incoming invasion, life in Rafah had grown unbearable. In interviews conducted last month, people living in the city’s rapidly growing makeshift camps talked about all they had lost since October, their harrowing escapes and repeated displacements, and the uncertainty of their life in what has become the world’s largest refugee camp.

Dreams Destroyed

Shahad Abu Hussein and Ahmed Qadouha were ready for their wedding. She had her dress and he his suit, and the expenses for the seaside wedding hall were already paid. Abu Hussein was looking forward to moving into their new home, which Qadouha, who worked in a television repair shop in the Tel al-Hawa neighborhood of Gaza City, had saved for years to buy. She carefully packed clothes and accessories ahead of the wedding. “My fiancé and I were supposed to begin our life together,” she said. “I couldn’t wait for this day. I had picked out my wedding dress and was so excited to begin a life with Ahmed, in our own home.”Israel’s war on Gaza brought those plans to an abrupt halt. Their wedding, once scheduled for October 12, is indefinitely postponed. Much of the life they had planned for no longer exists: Abu Hussein’s neighborhood was “completely wiped out,” she said. She fled with her family on the first day of Israel’s assault, taking only documents and basic necessities. She heard early on in the war that her family’s home had been severely damaged. “Everything I had prepared for my new home has likely been destroyed,” she said.

Abu Hussein had dreamed of becoming a lawyer. She had recently graduated from high school and had plans to enroll at Al-Azhar University in Gaza City. In November, the university was destroyed. Their wedding hall was another casualty of Israel’s bombs. Qadouha’s shop and the home he built to share with his future wife are also gone. “I worked very hard to save enough to pay for the house, the furniture, and the appliances. I spent years of my life working day and night for it, and my entire house was leveled to the ground,” he said. “All the work I did was for nothing.”

For some time, Abu Hussein and Qadouha thought they might have lost each other too. He fled the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood with some 130 members of his extended family, after Israeli forces ordered them to evacuate in October.

At first, Qadouha relocated to a refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, but he was forced to once again move south as Israeli forces advanced. With most communication lines down because of the heavy shelling, the couple went days without knowing whether the other was alive. “I could not reach Shahad,” he said. “I was terrified that something would happen to her.”It wasn’t until they both reached Rafah that they were reunited. Still unmarried, they now live with a dozen relatives across from a U.N.-run school turned shelter for thousands of displaced people. Their nylon tent has been reinforced with wood and staples to give it a semblance of structure. They sleep on the ground, in the freezing cold. When it rains, the tent gets soaked, and they look for shelter along the walls of the school. Even without the prospect of the imminent Israeli invasion of Rafah forcing them to flee once again, it’s hard for them to imagine what their future may hold.“I cannot fathom that we might have to endure life in this tent for a long time,” said Qadouha. “I feel utterly helpless.”

Another Nakba

At a different encampment for displaced people on the other side of Rafah, 71-year-old Riyad Al Afghani shares another tent with some 30 other people, including his wife and one of his sons. Rafah, where they arrived in late December, was the last possible stop in a weekslong exodus that began when Israeli forces destroyed their home in Gaza City in November.Before the war started, Al Afghani lived in a 14-floor building in Rimal, a buzzy neighborhood in Gaza’s most populated city, once dotted with high-rises and bustling with restaurants and shops and now reduced to rubble. In mid-November, Israeli forces called one of Al Afghani’s sons and ordered him to evacuate. Later, Al Afghani also got a call. He told the soldiers that there were many women and children living in the building, but they told him to just leave, he said.

The Israeli military targeted the building that night, and the smell of smoke filled the air. “We fled the tower with children crying and women screaming,” he recounted. As they ran, Israeli snipers fired on them, killing one of the women in the group, a mother of eight, in front of her husband and children. “My son Muhammed carried her and buried her body,” Al Afghani recalled. They sought refuge at a neighbor’s home, where they spent a “terrifying” night as bombs and gunfire relentlessly pounded the area. “Entire neighborhoods were completely devastated,” Al Afghani said.

Another of Al Afghani’s sons, Abdullah, a father of five, was also killed during the November assault. Al Afghani has few details about the circumstances of his son’s killing, and he has not heard of his grandchildren’s fate. Al Afghani and his family made their way south from Gaza City on foot. He had trouble walking so his son carried him for a while, but they eventually separated so his son and wife could escape faster. Al Afghani joined a different group of thousands of people walking toward the Egyptian border. For hours they moved through a landscape of residential buildings reduced to rubble, cement blocks and dead bodies all around them, he recalled.

As they crossed what the Israeli military had declared to be a “safe passage,” an Israeli tank opened fire at the group, even as they waved a white flag and clutched their ID cards. Later, Israeli soldiers stopped the group and made people stand apart from each other, then proceeded to call young men out, beat them, and arrest them, Al Afghani recalled, echoing reports made by many others in Gaza and documented by human rights groups. Al Afghani eventually made his way to Rafah in late December, where he was finally reunited with his wife and son. But he’s heard nothing from or about his five daughters and their families, who stayed in Gaza City after Israeli forces began shelling and later invaded the city. Because Israeli strikes have led to frequent communications blackouts, it’s virtually impossible to get in touch with people in Gaza City. “We are scattered, each member of my family is somewhere in the Gaza Strip,” he said. “I do not know if they are alive or not.”In Rafah, he and his relatives have little access to food and water, and the sound of Israeli airstrikes nearby is terrifying — a relentless reminder that beyond Rafah, there is nowhere else for people to run. 

“The danger of being bombed is constant,”

Al Afghani said. He can’t afford the exorbitant cost of crossing into Egypt, with smugglers asking for up to $10,000 per person. Even if he could, he doesn’t want to leave Gaza, where he has endured decades of Israeli occupation and several wars, although none more devastating than the current one. Al Afghani’s family, like that of many Palestinians in Gaza, is originally from Yafa, a city that is now part of Tel Aviv. They were expelled, along some 750,000 other Palestinians, in 1948, when Israel established a state by forcibly displacing Palestinians in a manner reminiscent of today’s effort to drive them into Egypt. Al Afghani was born a refugee, and as a teenager, he witnessed the 1967 war that culminated in the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. “I lived through 1967 at the age of 15; my father has told me about the Nakba, when the Israelis expelled him from Yafa in 1948,” he said. “Still, I have never witnessed anything more horrific and cruel than this current Israeli aggression. This is genocide.”

More Than Emergency

UNRWA, the United Nations agency that’s been the primary service provider for Palestinian refugees since shortly after the establishment of the Israeli state, has struggled to keep up with the enormous humanitarian crisis in Rafah and across Gaza since the beginning of the war. Israel launched an aggressive lobbying campaign against the relief agency several weeks ago, leveling yet unproven accusations that several agency employees were involved in the October 7 assault on Israel. Israel’s Western allies took the bait and suspended their funding. But even before the cuts, the crisis in UNRWA-run centers was dire. 

There are 15 UNRWA shelters in Rafah, set up after previous Israeli assaults and each with a capacity of about 3,000 people — a fraction of the number they are accommodating now. At one of them, a former school building with 40 classrooms that now houses some 25,000 people, the director described an untenable situation. “We are not in a state of emergency; we find ourselves in a situation best described as a catastrophe,” said the director, who requested anonymity out of fear of being targeted by Israel. “All the centers combined can only house 45,000 people. This falls significantly short of the over 1 million and a half people displaced from across the strip.”

Already before this week’s bombings, the crisis had forced agency staff to make dramatic decisions. At the beginning of the war, the director noted as an example, UNRWA allocated half a can of meat for each displaced person. Today, one can has to be shared among 10 people. “The conditions in the school are catastrophic,” he said. “The food we provide for the displaced is insufficient to cover even 5 percent of what they need.” Only one doctor and one nurse are on site, and essential medicine is hard to come by, the director said. Despite that, they are doing their best to tend to people’s needs. At least 18 women have gone into labor while displaced at the school, the director said. Early on, the shelter’s staff drove them by ambulance to a hospital in Rafah, but as fuel grew scarce, many of them turned to donkey-drawn carts.

One of those women is Sahar, whose husband was killed in October while waiting in line to buy bread at a bakery Israeli forces bombed. Pregnant at the time, she fled to Rafah with her two children and made her way to the school, where she gave birth to a third. At the time, she had not heard from her parents and siblings since shortly after the war started. She now shares a classroom with 40 other women and children, and she was embarrassed because her baby wouldn’t stop crying. “I cannot find milk or diapers for him,” she said to the director.

He told her that the staff distributed one diaper at the time to stretch out supplies, but when Sahar came in, there were none left. “I’m sorry,” he said. Sahar’s ordeal is a somber reminder that women and children are facing the brunt of Israel’s assault. They make up 70 percent of those killed, according to U.N. figures, and are at greater risk of starvation. “We can barely provide enough water for basic use,” the director said. “I did eight years of training in disaster and crisis management but what we are currently enduring in Gaza, with Israel’s systematic destruction of the Gaza Strip, is beyond description,” he added. “No human can bear it.”

Today, Wednesday, the Israeli Knesset (Parliament) approved a draft resolution submitted by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to confront what was described as “international dictates and the unilateral declaration of a Palestinian state.”

99 deputies voted in favor of the draft resolution, while 21 other deputies opposed it.

From the Knesset podium, Netanyahu addressed the international community, saying that the people of Israel and their representatives are more united than ever before imposing the establishment of a Palestinian state.

He considered that these dictates would not lead to the establishment of a Palestinian state, considering that “reaching this solution can only be achieved through the destruction of Hamas and direct negotiations without preconditions,” as he described it.

Opposition leader Yair Lapid said in his response to Netanyahu: “My party and I voted for this proposal, because I and my party are against unilateral measures. But as you and I know very well, there is really no such thing. This is an invention. I invented a threat that does not exist.” About What are we talking about? There is not a single official in the world who proposes to recognize Palestine unilaterally. I came up with an idea so that they do not raise banners "You are guilty."

On Sunday, the Israeli government unanimously approved a resolution regarding its opposition to “unilateral recognition of the Palestinian state.”

International and regional calls have escalated for the establishment of a Palestinian state within the framework of the two-state solution proposed by international and Arab bodies and organizations, with the aim of ending the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Last November, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken announced that the United States “has begun work to lay the foundations for building two separate states” to end the conflict in the long term, and he considered that “the two-state solution is the only path to peace in the Middle East.”

On Monday, the European Union entered into the proposal, as EU Foreign Policy Commissioner Josep Borrell announced that he had received a request from two European countries to discuss recognition of a Palestinian state, without naming them.

Borrell said that the European Union must "support the Arab initiative" which stipulates the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

In light of continued international pressure on Israel, Netanyahu pledged to move forward with the war in Gaza and carry out a planned ground operation in the border city of Rafah with Egypt, in the far south of the Strip, where more than a million people are gathered, most of them displaced people who left their areas to escape the fighting.

The United States announced its rejection of the statements of Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, in which he likened the Israeli military campaign in Gaza to the Holocaust, on the eve of his meeting with US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken.

US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said in response to a question regarding what the Brazilian president said: “It is clear that we do not agree with these statements. We have been very clear that we do not believe that genocide has occurred in Gaza.”

Miller added: "We want to see the conflict end as soon as possible. We want to see an increase in humanitarian aid in a sustainable way for innocent civilians in Gaza. But we do not agree with those comments."

The United States refuses to describe what is happening in Gaza as “genocide,” knowing that at least more than 30,000 Palestinians have been killed so far, and at least 10,000 are missing, 65,000 wounded, and more than 1.8 million displaced, while more than 80% of Gaza has been destroyed. At the hands of the Israeli war machine, with its weapons, equipment, and American funding, since Israel launched its war on the Gaza Strip 138 days ago.

Washington used its veto power against the draft ceasefire resolution in the United Nations Security Council on Tuesday, submitted by Algeria on behalf of the Arab group, with the approval of 13 other members of the Council and Britain abstaining from voting, and began promoting an alternative draft resolution that uses “Temporary ceasefire,” instead of the word temporary truce, or a break in the fighting, which the US administration has been using until today.

Regarding the use of the word “ceasefire” in a draft resolution before the United Nations Security Council, and whether this change in wording recently used by US President Joe Biden indicates a change in US policy towards the Israeli war on Gaza, US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said: ) Tuesday “Obviously the word 'temporary' does that. The president made that point last week, and now you've seen the draft resolution that we're working on. But this is an issue that we've been working on for some time, trying to get a temporary ceasefire in exchange for the release of "Hostages, which is something that we think is critical to try to achieve and that we will continue to focus on."

Regarding whether the use of the term “ceasefire,” even if it was conditional on the word temporary, came as a result of local and international pressure on the administration, Miller said: “No, I think it is related to how we respond to the situation on the ground and the situation in the region. We are trying to reach a temporary ceasefire or you can call it a pause; you can call it by whatever name you prefer - to secure the release of the hostages."

"We worked on a humanitarian truce last year, and we were successful in doing that," Miller added. "It didn't go as well as we wanted. We took some hostages out. We didn't get them all out. Now we're back trying to get a longer pause, a longer temporary ceasefire," Miller added, and to secure the release not only of some hostages, but of all hostages.”

He said: "I would like to say that we have made it very clear that we do not want to see just a temporary ceasefire, but we want to see ultimately a permanent end to hostilities, an end that guarantees the protection of Palestinian civilians, and that we obtain humanitarian assistance for them."

Miller reiterated: "This is one of the reasons why we oppose resolutions at the United Nations, not only today but in the past, because we believe that a mere unconditional ceasefire will only benefit Hamas."

It is noteworthy that the American draft resolution regarding the war in Gaza, according to Washington’s ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, calls for a temporary ceasefire in the Strip as soon as possible, based on the formula of releasing all hostages.

The project also calls on the Security Council to condemn the Hamas movement, with Greenfield saying, “Most of us agree that it is time for this council to condemn Hamas.”

It is noteworthy that if the American resolution is adopted, it will be the first Security Council resolution condemning Hamas.

The American text also makes clear that Hamas has no place in the future governance of Gaza, and that Hamas does not represent the Palestinian people or their right to self-determination.

In addition, the American project states that “the area of land in the Gaza Strip cannot be reduced” and rejects any forced displacement of civilians in Gaza. The project also highlights concerns about the fate of civilians in Rafah, and makes clear that, under the current circumstances, a major ground attack on Rafah should not be launched.

Greenfield stressed in this regard, saying, “This is not an effort to cover up an imminent ground incursion, but rather an honest statement of our concern for the 1.5 million civilians who have taken refuge in Rafah.”

"Civilians must be protected and given access to humanitarian assistance and basic services," she added.

In this regard, the US text sets out a path for implementing Resolutions 2712 and 2720, including provisions calling for expanding the scope of aid.

The decision also advances the mandate of the Chief Humanitarian and Reconstruction Coordinator in Gaza, Sigrid Kaag.

As in previous resolutions, the new American resolution focuses on protecting civilians and humanitarian workers, and calls for lifting all barriers to providing humanitarian assistance, opening additional humanitarian routes, and keeping current border crossings open.

The American draft also aims to support the Secretary-General's efforts to investigate UNRWA employees accused of participating in the October 7 attack on Israel, and also supports the work of the Independent Review Group led by Catherine Colonna, which focuses on ensuring UNRWA's neutrality.

The American draft affirms "the United States' firm commitment to the vision of a two-state solution: where two democratic states, Israel and Palestine, live side by side in peace, within secure and recognized borders under renewed Palestinian authority."

All the stars are aligning. President Biden announced his Middle East Doctrine, the Saudis signaled their intentions to normalize relations with Israel, and all the other Arab countries, including Egypt, Jordan and UAE, are willing to engage in a new regional arrangement that will be able to guarantee security to Israelis and national aspirations to Palestinians.

Peace between Palestinians and Israelis based on the two-state solution is on the horizon, and it starts with the Biden administration immediately recognizing a Palestinian state.

Such a recognition—indeed, the creation of a Palestinian state itself—would kill three birds with one stone. It would isolate Iran's proxies and agents in the region, of strategic interest not just to Israel but to the U.S. as well. It would also open the door for a U.S.-Saudi security alliance involving Saudi normalization with Israel. Most importantly, it would end the war, ensuring the release of all remaining Israeli hostages and the comprehensive Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.

It is imperative to ensure that Israeli forces do not have cause to return to Gaza and to end the Israeli siege. Security arrangements must include an Arab transitional force with the task of securing borders and controling those who threaten Palestinians or Israelis. The formation of this Arab force comes with a clear mandate and specific timeframe: Its main task is to receive Gaza from the Israeli forces in an organized way and hand it over to the new Palestinian government, to ensure security arrangements on the Gaza border with Israel and guarantee security for both peoples.

In line with these international and regional intentions, the plan must include two Palestinian leaders who are both opponents of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas—Mohammed Dahlan, currently one of the most influential Palestinian political leaders, and Dr. Naser Al Kidwa, the strongest candidate to lead a potential day after unified reform government.

The day after this war will require an enhanced PA with appropriate powers. Mr. Abbas should remain President of the Palestinian Authority with all the current symbols and privileges of that office, including his residence, office, staff, transport, and a budget. The President as nominal Head of the Palestinian institutions would carry out a ceremonial role like the presidents of Italy or Germany.

But executive and legislative powers must pass to a new unified government and be transferred through a prime minister responsible for the West Bank and Gaza.

Much of Gaza has faced severe destruction. The north is largely uninhabitable and without water, sewage, or power. We should comprehensively assess the power plants and electrical lines, desalination plants, reservoirs and water carriers, housing stock, hospitals, schools, farmlands, and all critical infrastructure. We should start planning this immediately, relying on satellite imagery and crowd sourced analysis.

President Biden needs to decide if he wants to go down in history as the president who signed the two state solution's birth certificate and laid out the foundation of a new Middle East built on stability, integration, cooperation, security and economic development—or if he wants to be remembered as the president who signed the death certificate of the two state solution and left the region sinking in its own misery.

We have a small window to end all this madness. The time is now.

The United Nations World Food Program (WFP) has announced that it will once again suspend the distribution of aid in the northern Gaza Strip.

The United Nations World Food Program (WFP) announced on Tuesday February 20 that it was once again suspending the distribution of aid in the northern Gaza Strip. Three weeks ago, he had already suspended the sending of food aid to the north of the enclave, ravaged by more than four months of war, after an Israeli strike against a truck from another UN agency. However, WFP resumed deliveries on Sunday, but since then its trucks have been "looted" or fired upon amid "total chaos and violence", it said in a statement.

The goal was to bring ten trucks of food aid into this region of the small Palestinian territory per day for seven consecutive days, in order to “help stem the tide of hunger and despair and begin to build confidence among the population in the fact that there would be enough food for all”.

But on Sunday, a convoy heading toward Gaza City “was surrounded by a crowd of hungry people.” WFP staff managed to repel attackers attempting to board trucks before “coming under fire” in Gaza. And on Monday, several trucks “were looted” between the towns of Khan Younes and Deir Al-Balah, and a driver was molested.

An “explosion” in the number of child deaths in the gang

“The decision to suspend deliveries to the northern Gaza Strip was not taken lightly, as we know that this means that the situation there will deteriorate further, and more people will be at risk to die of hunger,” the agency underlines.

The WFP warned on Monday that an alarming lack of food, rampant malnutrition and rapid spread of disease could lead to an “explosion” in the number of child deaths in the strip.

At least 90% of children under the age of five in Gaza are affected by one or more infectious diseases, according to a report by Unicef, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the WFP. “Hunger and disease are a deadly combination,” WHO emergency manager Michael Ryan said in a statement.

A total of 2.2 million people are at risk of starvation in the Gaza Strip, according to the UN.

Twenty years after the International Court of Justice issued an Advisory Opinion on Israel's Separation Wall, the ICJ is now considering the legality of Israel's 56-year belligerent occupation of the Palestinian territories.  

BY DAVID KATTENBURG   

Acquisition of territory by force, persecution, racial discrimination and apartheid, denial of self-determination – these are the crimes Israel has committed against the Palestinian people, Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki told the International Court of Justice this morning, in the Dutch administrative capital, The Hague, on the first day of Advisory Opinion hearings on the legality of Israel’s prolonged occupation of the Palestinian territories.

“For over a century, the inalienable right of the Palestinian people to self-determination has been denied and violated – their very existence negated,” al-Maliki told the court, flanked by Palestine’s 25-member delegation, many of them draped in keffiyehs.

“Palestine was not a land without a people,” al-Maliki added, the court’s fifteen justices listening closely.

“It was not, as Israeli leaders described it, ‘the wasteland’. There was life on this land. There was a political life, a cultural life, a social life, a religious life. It had schools and universities, cinemas and cultural halls. It had villagers and villagers, families and communities whose lives were disrupted by the impact of a promise made thousands of miles away over a hundred years ago.”

In handing historic Palestine to European colonists, al-Maliki told the court, Great Britain committed a “breach of sacred trust,” sowing the seeds of settler colonialism and apartheid.

“There are those who are outraged by the use of these words,” said al-Maliki, leaning over the court rostrum. “They should instead be outraged by the reality we are living … This occupation is annexationist and supremacist in nature. It is a deliberate, cynical perversion of international law. It is thus illegal. The only solution consistent with international law is for this illegal occupation to come to an immediate, unconditional and total end.”     

The international community’s supreme judicial body may well order this to happen. An Advisory Opinion is likely to be issued within six months, a court staff member told media.

The ICJ initiated this week’s proceedings in response to a late December UN General Assembly resolution, requesting an Advisory Opinion from the court on the legal status of Israel’s 56-year occupation. Israel moved heaven and Earth to stave it off. The resolution ended up passing by a vote of 87 to 26, with 53 abstentions. Among those joining Israel in opposing the Advisory Opinion request: the U.S., Canada, UK, Germany, Italy, Hungary, and Australia.

In contrast to the provisional measures order issued to Israel by the court on January 26, granting South Africa’s application under the Genocide Convention, ICJ Advisory Opinions are not binding, but their potential political impact is enormous.

Formally entitled “Legal Consequences arising from the Policies and Practices of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem,” the General Assembly’s Advisory Opinion request asked the ICJ to opine on the legality of Israel’s military occupation of the Palestinian territories, now into its 56th year, and the settlement enterprise that has turned occupation into effective annexation.

The resolution’s reference to “discriminatory legislation and measures” opens the door for the ICJ to weigh in on the question of Israeli apartheid.

“Using a toolbox of population control and inhumane acts amounting to aggravated forms of racial discrimination, Israel restricts every aspect of Palestinian life, from birth to death, resulting in manifest human rights violations and an overt system of repression and persecution,” Namira Negm, Legal Counsel for the African Union and a member of the Palestinian delegation, told the court today.

In the occupied Palestinian territory, Negm said, citing past reports by the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD), there exists “an exclusive right of one group and complete denial of the rights of another, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.”

“If this is not apartheid, what is?” Negm asked. 

The core of the Advisory Opinion the ICJ has been asked to issue: whether or not Israel’s 56-year belligerent occupation of the Palestinian territories is legal, as occupations are defined under the Fourth Geneva Convention (1949) and customary international law.

In a Fall 2017 report to the UN Human Rights Council, then Special Rapporteur Michael Lynk weighed in on that question, presenting a four-part test. Israel failed, Lynk declared: a) by annexing portions of the territory it occupied in June 1967 (East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights); b) by failing to return the territory to sovereign Palestinian rule in a reasonable amount of time; c) by failing to act in the best interests of the Palestinian people (referred to under the Fourth Geneva Convention as a ‘protected people’); and d) by failing to act in good faith, “in full compliance with its duties and obligations under international law,” and as a UN member state.

Seconding Lynk’s observation in court today, American attorney Paul Reichler told the ICJ’s judges that a permanent occupation is a “legal oxymoron”; that “Israel’s 56-year occupation of Palestinian territory is manifestly and gravely unlawful,” and that “international law requires that [it] be brought to an end completely and unconditionally.” 

Permanent occupation is precisely what Israel has in mind, Reichler told the court, citing insistence by Benjamin Netanyahu, Naftali Bennett, and other Israeli cabinet ministers that ‘Judea,’ ‘Samaria,’ the Jordan Valley, and all of Oslo Area C will forever remain a part of Israel. 

“Under the umbrella of its prolonged military occupation,” Reichler said, “Israel has been steadily annexing the occupied Palestinian territory, and it continues to do so. Its undisguised objective is the permanent acquisition of this territory and the exercise of sovereignty over it in defiance of the prohibition on acquisition of territory by force.”

Having received Palestine’s arguments today, the court will hear those from 50 more states and three organizations (League of Arab States, Organization of Islamic Cooperation, and African Union) over the next week. The U.S., UK, Russia, and ten European states are among these.

In an apparently last-moment decision, Canada has opted not to deliver an oral ‘pleading.’ In a July 23, 2023, written statement to the court, however, Canada argued that the court should refrain from issuing an advisory opinion. The UN Security Council is ‘seized’ with the issue, the Canadian government says, and it is the best placed to resolve the conflict. An ICJ ruling would only polarize the situation, Canada says. 

Washington’s position is even worse. The Biden administration denies Israel’s occupation is unlawful. 

“This is truly stunning,” American attorney Paul Reichler told the court today. “Just how far in disregarding the international legal order will the United States go to exempt Israel from the consequences of its ongoing violation of peremptory norms, including the prohibition on acquisition of territory by force? Apparently, very far indeed.”

For Palestine’s Ambassador to the UN, Western contempt for international law is more than just stunning, it’s emotionally triggering. Delivering Palestine’s closing statements to the court, Riyad Mansour struggled for composure, then choked and paused for a few seconds.  

“What does international law mean for Palestinian children in Gaza today,” Mansour asked, fighting back tears. “It has protected neither them, nor their childhood. It has not protected their families or communities. It has not protected their lives or limbs, their hopes or homes. We are a proud and resilient people that has endured more than its share of agony. It is so painful to be Palestinian today.” 

Israel will shed no tears before ICJ judges. Having pleaded its case against genocide in mid-January (a remarkable event; never before has it submitted itself to the judgment of an international tribunal, much less the UN’s top court), Israel is taking a pass on these hearings. Advisory Opinion requests involve disputes between two state parties, Israel says. It’s not a party to any dispute, and Palestine is not a full UN member state.  

The ICJ will wrap up its Advisory Opinion hearings a week from today. Then, it will be time to read. Over 15,000 pages of UN reports and resolutions have been submitted to it by the UN Secretary General, documenting the full spectrum of Israeli practices over 56 years of Israeli military occupation: ceaseless settlement expansion; the living conditions of the Palestinian people; the status of Palestinian natural resources and their right to self-determination, and the wider ‘Question of Palestine’ and ‘situation in the Middle East’.

The ICJ is not obliged to render an Advisory Opinion on the extraordinarily documented narrative of Israel’s half-century occupation but is unlikely to refuse (notwithstanding requests it does so by Canada, the UK, and a few other Western states).

This will be the second time it rules on Israel-Palestine. In July 2004, it issued an Advisory Opinion on Israel’s Separation Barrier – a narrower issue than the questions it has just been asked to consider. Israel’s wall was illegal, the court ruled, in a 14-1 vote. Israel ignored the ruling. Its Western allies acknowledged the 2004 Wall ruling, but did not enforce it.

Still, Michael Lynk is hopeful.

“One should never be starry-eyed about what international law can achieve,” the Canadian legal scholar and former UN Special Rapporteur told Mondoweiss, standing on the steps of the court following today’s first Advisory Opinion session.

“But one should never be cynical about the aspirations of international law,” Lynk added. “At its very best, international law represents the very best in humanity. And I’d like to think that’s some of what we heard today: people striving for freedom; a long-held promise to them that’s gone on unfulfilled by the international community. And hopefully these hearings this week and the judgment when it comes in a couple of months time, will bring us that much closer to finding justice for the Palestinian people and a way to find a path for peace in the Middle East.”

Will Israel’s allies finally agree to hold Israel accountable for its actions, under international law, or will they continue to insist that the UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Fourth Geneva Convention only ‘get in the way’ of a negotiated solution to what they refer to as the Palestine-Israel conflict?

“It was the Americans and the Europeans who set up the modern international legal system that we’ve had since the end of the Second World War,” Michael Lynk told Mondoweiss. “And when the colonial powers achieved their independence in the 1960s and 70s and 80s, they pushed that law further. And they said self-determination isn’t simply self-determination for European people … That’s what the Palestinians are asking for today at the court. When you stop and think about it, this is a 20th-century political problem that has drifted well into the 21st century. And it’s about time that the political order follows the legal demands of allowing self-determination for people they’ve long promised it to.”

A report prepared by independent researchers from the United States and Britain showed that about 8,000 more people could still die in the Gaza Strip during the next six months, even if the aggression stops now due to the crisis in the public health sector resulting from the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip since October 7, 2023.

Hospitals in Gaza were destroyed due to the aggression, and more than 85% of the Strip’s population of 2,300,000 people became homeless amid a rise in disease cases. Such as: diarrhea and malnutrition in overcrowded refugee areas.

These numbers were contained in a report prepared by academics at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and the Johns Hopkins Center for Humanitarian Health in the United States, and are part of larger estimates of the additional number of deaths that the aggression in Gaza may cause during the next six months.

The report published last Monday indicates that it does not include Israel. Because its public health system has not been touched.

Malnutrition

Researchers expect that severe injuries will be the cause of the majority of additional deaths in Gaza if the aggression continues or escalates. But deaths from malnutrition and infectious diseases; Such as: cholera and the inability to receive care for diseases - such as diabetes - will also kill thousands.

The report says that in the worst case scenario, if the pace of aggression escalates, or a large outbreak of disease occurs, approximately 85,570 people may die by early August, including 68,650 deaths from causes related to severe injuries.

Even under a ceasefire, about 11,580 people could still die in the same period if disease outbreaks exacerbate the challenges related to rehabilitating the sanitation and health systems in Gaza. The report estimates that approximately 3,250 of these deaths will be due to long-term complications resulting from severe injuries, and 8,330 will be due to other causes.

Official figures issued by the Ministry of Health in Gaza showed that more than 29,000 people were killed as a result of the aggression since last October 7.

The researchers caution that the unpredictable nature of aggression and disease outbreaks means they have a wide range of estimates.

The report, funded by the British government, indicates that counting the number of martyrs in Gaza represents a challenge, and that its aim is to provide greater clarity.

The Prisoners' and Ex-Prisoners' Affairs Authority and the Prisoners' Club announced today, Wednesday, the death of detainee Khaled Al-Shawish from Al-Fara'a camp, north of Tubas. He has been detained since May 28, 2007, and has been sentenced to 11 life imprisonments.

Prisoner Al-Shawish was born on January 14, 1971. He studied in UNRWA schools in the camp. He is married and has four children, one of whom is his son Qutaiba, who spent 5 and a half years in the occupation prisons.

Prisoner Al-Shawish was seriously injured by bullets from the Israeli army in 2001, which led to his paralysis. Six years after his injury, the occupation forces arrested him on May 28, 2007, and sentenced him to life imprisonment (11) times.

Since the date of his arrest until today, prisoner Khaled Al-Shawish has been facing chronic and serious health conditions that resulted mainly from being shot by bullets.

The Israeli army committed 11 massacres against families in the Gaza Strip, claiming 118 killed and 163 injuries during the past 24 hours.

According to the Ministry of Health, there are still a number of victims under the rubble and on the roads, and Israeli  army prevents ambulance and civil defense crews from reaching them.

She pointed out that the toll of the Israeli aggression rose to 29,313 killed and 69,333 injuries since the seventh of last October.

Following the US veto of a draft resolution in the UN Security Council that had called for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza, a Chinese envoy said that objecting to a ceasefire in Gaza is no different from giving the green light to the continuation of the massacre.

The draft resolution received 13 supportive votes from among the 15 members of the Council. Britain abstained from voting.

Zhang Jun, China's permanent representative to the United Nations, said that China expresses its deep disappointment and dissatisfaction with the American "veto."

He explained in an explanation of the vote after the vote that Algeria, on behalf of the Group of Arab States, presented the draft resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, the immediate release of all hostages, ensuring the arrival of humanitarian supplies, and rejecting forced displacement, adding that such a resolution, which is based To the minimum humanitarian requirements, it is urgently needed due to the situation on the ground and deserves the support of all members of the Security Council.

He stated that Algeria, which showed wisdom, sincerity and an open position, conducted lengthy and extensive consultations with all parties on the draft resolution and took into account many constructive ideas, which made the draft resolution more balanced, adding that “the result of today’s vote clearly shows that with regard to the issue of a ceasefire The fire to stop the fighting in Gaza is not that the Security Council does not have an overwhelming consensus of opinions, but rather the exercise of its veto power by the United States is what is stifling the Council’s consensus.”

Zhang pointed out that the US "veto" sends the wrong message, which pushes the situation in Gaza to a more dangerous situation.

He stated that the United States’ claim that the resolution would conflict with ongoing diplomatic efforts is completely indefensible, indicating that, given the situation on the ground, the continued passive avoidance of an immediate ceasefire is no different from giving the green light for the continuation of the massacre.

Zhang pointed out that with the veto of the draft resolution, the repercussions of the conflict destabilize the entire Middle East region, leading to increased risks of a broader war. The world cannot prevent the fires of hell from sweeping the entire region except by extinguishing the fire of war in Gaza, explaining that the Security Council must move quickly to stop this massacre.

He stressed that the Security Council must take measures to pressure for a ceasefire, and this should not be a topic of discussion, but rather it is considered a moral obligation that the Council cannot ignore. It is a legal responsibility that must be undertaken by the Council. Even more than that, this is a political demand that the Council must fulfill in accordance with the United Nations Charter.

He said, "The veto cannot silence the strong call for a ceasefire and an end to the war. The Security Council cannot stop its work to uphold justice and fulfill its responsibilities just because of the use of the veto."

Zhang stated that China urges Israel to respond to the call of the international community, abandon its plans to launch an attack on the city of Rafah, and stop the collective punishment of the people of Palestine. China expects countries with great influence to have less political calculations, but rather to be truly neutral and responsible, and to take action. The right choice to push for a ceasefire in Gaza, adding that China calls on the international community to mobilize all diplomatic efforts to give the people of Gaza a chance to survive, and to give the peoples of the entire Middle East region a chance to enjoy peace, and to give them a chance to obtain justice.

The Ministry of Health announced the death of the young man, Arif Marwan Arif Ali (26 years old), from the village of Kafr Qaddum in Qalqilya, during the Israeli forces’ storming of the city of Jenin and its camp, last night.

Large forces from the Israeli army stormed the city of Jenin and its camp from Nazareth and Haifa Streets, after a special Israeli force, “Musta'arabiun,” besieged two houses in the camp, which led to the outbreak of violent confrontations, during which three citizens were injured, the wounds of one of whom were described as serious.

The Israeli forces began to destroy the infrastructure in the city of Jenin and its camp, especially on Haifa Street at Al-Ahmadin Roundabout, Military Street, Yahya Ayyash Roundabout, Al-Jalbouni Roundabout, Watermelon Roundabout, and Al-Hathnawi Roundabout. They also destroyed Baskets. Citizens near “Al-Hamamah Roundabout” and “Zayed Roundabout” area in the city. A vehicle was also burned and other vehicles were destroyed.

The Israeli forces bombed with a missile a house in the Al-Samran neighborhood in the camp belonging to the citizen Muhammad Abu Jaber, and subjected dozens of young men to field investigation.

The Israeli forces launched a massive campaign of raids on homes in the camp, and arrested eight citizens, namely: Abdul Rahman Nidal Sabaya, Fadi Issam Sabaya, Hatem Sabri Masharqa, Tawfiq Muhammad Murad, Adham Samir Abu Tabikh, Adham Mutee Al-Saadi, and the two brothers Fares and Imran Jaber Al-Shalabi.

Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on Tuesday that the destruction of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) is more important than the return of those he called kidnapped from Gaza, to which opposition leader Yair Lapid responded by saying that his position regarding the detainees is a “moral disgrace.”

Smotrich explained, "The return of the kidnapped people at all costs is not the most important matter, but rather the destruction of Hamas," adding, "Whoever calls for a (prisoner) exchange deal at any price will bring loss to Israel and reduce the possibility of returning the kidnapped ones," he said.

Smotrich - who heads the "Religious Zionism" party - usually raises controversy with his statements, and he previously acknowledged to the families of Israeli detainees held by the Palestinian resistance in Gaza that he cannot promise them to return all the prisoners alive.

He added, "In my estimation, what is happening to manage this war is correct, and there is a clear policy that we will follow until the end, and we are prepared to pay prices for that."

'Moral disgrace'

The statements of the Israeli Finance Minister on Tuesday quickly sparked a response from opposition leader Yair Lapid, who said that "Smotrich's position on the return of the kidnapped people is a moral disgrace."

Lapid previously said that Israel "will neither be safe nor a moral state nor will it win the war unless the kidnappers return."

Lapid's statements coincided with previous statements by the Minister of Heritage in the Israeli government, Amichai Eliyahu, in which he said that "dropping a nuclear bomb on Gaza is a possible solution."

The Israeli opposition leader also previously called for the formation of a new government, and believed that the time had come for Benjamin Netanyahu's government to step down, stressing that the person during whose term "the greatest catastrophe we have witnessed occurred must leave our lives."

Source: Al Jazeera + agencies