Page 9 - Gaza Conflict

5 IDF soldiers killed overnight in north Gaza, 18 dead in Israeli strikes

Five Israeli soldiers were killed overnight in northern Gaza, the Israeli military said Tuesday. Two other soldiers were seriously wounded. Meanwhile, health officials in Gaza said Israeli strikes at two locations in the territory killed 18 people. Israeli media said the infantry soldiers were on patrol when explosive devices were detonated against them. Media said militants also opened fire on the reinforcements sent to evacuate the dead and wounded. The latest violence comes as Israel and Hamas consider a U.S.-backed ceasefire proposal to pause the 21-month conflict in the territory The soldiers' deaths came roughly two weeks after Israel reported once of its deadliest days in months in Gaza, when seven soldiers were killed when a Palestinian attacker attached a bomb to their armoured vehicle. Health officials at the Nasser Hospital, where victims of the Israeli strikes were taken, said one of the strikes targeted tents sheltering displaced people in Khan Younis in southern Gaza

Israeli airstrikes kill 38 Palestinians as negotiation team heads to Qatar

Israeli airstrikes killed at least 38 Palestinians in Gaza, hospital officials said on Sunday, as Israel's military said it has struck over 100 targets in the embattled enclave in the past day. The strikes came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was preparing to fly to Washington for talks at the White House aimed at pushing forward ceasefire efforts. Separately, an Israeli official said the Israeli security Cabinet on Saturday night approved sending aid into the northern part of Gaza, where civilians are suffering from acute food shortages. The official declined to offer more details. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to discuss the decision with the media. In Yemen, a spokesperson for the Houthi rebel group announced in a prerecorded message that the group had launched ballistic missiles targeting Ben Gurion airport overnight. The Israeli military said these had been intercepted. President Donald Trump has floated a plan for

Hamas agrees to 'immediately' enter talks on 60-day Gaza ceasefire plan

A deal on the framework would see Hamas return half of the 50 hostages it still holds and pursue mediated talks with Israel to end the war

Strikes kill 94 Palestinians in Gaza, 45 waiting for aid, say authorities

Israeli airstrikes and shootings killed 94 Palestinians in Gaza late Wednesday and Thursday, including 45 who were attempting to get much-needed humanitarian aid, hospitals and the Health Ministry said Thursday. Families wept over the bodies from a strike that hit a tent camp during the night as displaced people slept in southern Gaza. At least 13 members of a single family were killed, including at least six children under 12. My children, my children my beloved, wailed Intisar Abu Assi, sobbing over the bodies of her son and daughters and their young children. Another woman kissed the forehead of a dead little girl wrapped in a blanket on the floor of the morgue at Nasser Hospital in the city of Khan Younis. In central Gaza, a boy stroked the face of his dead sister, 6-year-old Heba Abu Etiwi, in a morgue at Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Hospital. The girl and another of her brothers were among eight people killed when a strike Wednesday evening hit near a stand selling falafel. A separate .

Israeli strikes kill 82 in Gaza, including 38 waiting for aid: Officials

Airstrikes and shootings killed 82 Palestinians in Gaza overnight, including 38 while attempting to get much-needed humanitarian aid, hospitals and the Health Ministry said on Thursday. Israel's military did not have immediate comment on the strikes Wednesday night and Thursday morning. Five people were killed around sites associated with the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, the newly created, secretive American organization backed by Israel to feed the Gaza Strip's population, while 33 others were killed waiting for aid trucks in other locations across the Gaza Strip.

Hamas says it's ready for ceasefire but wants complete end to war in Gaza

Hamas suggested Wednesday that it was open to a ceasefire agreement with Israel, but stopped short of accepting a US-backed proposal announced by US President Donald Trump hours earlier, insisting on its longstanding position that any deal bring an end to the war in Gaza. Trump said Tuesday that Israel had agreed on terms for a 60-day ceasefire in Gaza and urged Hamas to accept the deal before conditions worsen. The US leader has been increasing pressure on the Israeli government and Hamas to broker a ceasefire, and hostage agreement and bring about an end to the war. Trump said the 60-day period would be used to work toward ending the war something Israel says it won't accept until Hamas is defeated. He said that a deal might come together as soon as next week. But Hamas' response, which emphasised its demand that the war end, raised questions about whether the latest offer could materialise into an actual pause in fighting. Hamas official Taher al-Nunu said that the militant gro

Trump signals Gaza ceasefire 'close,' likely in a week amid renewed talks

Trump signals a possible ceasefire in Gaza within days, though Israel and Hamas remain at odds as US and regional efforts to end hostilities intensify

Netanyahu denies claim that troops have orders to shoot Gazans seeking aid

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Israel Katz emphatically rejected a report in the left-leaning Israeli daily Haaretz on Friday, which claimed Israeli soldiers were ordered to shoot at Palestinians approaching aid sites inside Gaza. They called the report's findings malicious falsehoods designed to defame the military. More than 500 Palestinians have been killed and hundreds more wounded while seeking food since the newly formed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation began distributing aid in the territory about a month ago, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. Palestinian witnesses say Israeli troops have opened fire at crowds on the roads heading toward the sites. Reacting to the Haaretz piece, Israel's military confirmed that it was investigating incidents in which civilians had been harmed while approaching the sites. It rejected the article's allegations of deliberate fire toward civilians. The foundation, which is backed by an American private contractor, h

Israel says remains of three hostages have been recovered from Gaza

The Israeli military says it has recovered the remains of three hostages held in the Gaza Strip. It identified them as Yonatan Samerano, 21; Ofra Keidar, 70; and Shay Levinson, 19. Kobi Samerano said in a Facebook post that his son Yonatan, was killed during Hamas' October 7, 2023, attack and his body was taken into Gaza. Samerano said the remains were returned on what would have been his son's 23rd birthday.

Sonia slams govt's silence on Gaza, Iran, calls it 'surrender of values'

Congress Parliamentary Party chairperson Sonia Gandhi on Saturday strongly criticised India's silence on Israel's devastation in Gaza and Iran as "not just a loss of its voice, but also a surrender of values". In an article - "It is still not too late for India's voice to be heard", she accused the Narendra Modi government of abandoning India's long-standing and principled commitment to a peaceful two-nation solution envisioning an independent Palestine along with Israel. Gandhi, in the article, was also critical of US President Donald Trump for following a "destructive path" in West Asia, after having spoken against America's endless wars. "New Delhi's silence on the devastation in Gaza and now on the unprovoked escalation against Iran reflects a disturbing departure from our moral and diplomatic traditions. This represents not just a loss of voice but also a surrender of values," the Congress leader said in her article in 'The Hindu'. "It is still not too late. India must speak .

At least 51 killed and 200 wounded while waiting for aid trucks in Gaza

At least 51 Palestinians were killed and more than 200 wounded in the Gaza Strip while waiting for UN and commercial trucks to enter the territory with desperately needed food, according to Gaza's Health Ministry and a local hospital. Palestinian witnesses told The Associated Press that Israeli forces carried out an airstrike on a nearby home before opening fire toward the crowd in the southern city of Khan Younis. The Israeli military said soldiers had spotted a gathering near an aid truck that was stuck in Khan Younis, near where Israeli forces were operating. It acknowledged several casualties as Israelis opened fire on the approaching crowd and said authorities would investigate what happened. The shooting did not appear to be related to a new Israeli- and US-supported aid delivery network that rolled out last month and has been marred by controversy and violence. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian affairs, or OCHA, said the people killed were waiting for food .

Trump in dilemma as Israel seeks more US help to crush Iran's nuclear prog

President Donald Trump in about eight hours Monday went from suggesting a nuclear deal with Iran remained achievable to urging Tehran's 9.5 million residents to flee for their lives as he cut short his visit to an international summit to return to Washington for urgent talks with his national security team. He was expected to arrive at the White House early Tuesday at a moment of choosing in his presidency. Israel, with four days of missile strikes, has done considerable damage to Iran and believes it can now deal a permanent blow to Tehran's nuclear programme particularly if it gets a little more help from Trump. But deepening American involvement, perhaps by providing the Israelis with bunker-busting bombs to penetrate Iranian nuclear sites built deep underground or offering other direct US military support, comes with enormous political risk for Trump. He appears to be gradually building the public case for more direct American involvement. Iran should have signed the deal' I t

Israeli forces recover bodies of two hostages after 613 days in captivity

One of the hostages was killed while defending his family during the Hamas-led abduction of Nir Oz residents on October 7. The identity of the second hostage has not been disclosed

Trump believes Israel has enough problems without kidnapping Greta Thunberg

Speaking to journalists, Donald Trump described activist Greta Thunberg as 'a strange person.' Questioning the authenticity of her anger, Trump said Thunberg needs to go to an anger management class

Gaza aid boat with Greta Thunberg on board reaches Israel after its seizure

A Gaza-bound aid boat carrying Greta Thunberg and other activists arrived at an Israeli port on Monday after Israeli forces stopped and detained them enforcing a longstanding blockade of the Palestinian territory that has been tightened during the Israel-Hamas war. The boat, accompanied by Israel's navy, arrived in Ashdod in the evening, according to Israel's Foreign Ministry. It published a photo on social media of Thunberg after disembarking. The 12 activists were undergoing medical checks to ensure they are in good health, the ministry said. They were expected to be held at a detention facility in Ramle before being deported, according to Adalah, a legal rights group representing them. The activists had set out to protest Israel's military campaign in Gaza, which is among the deadliest and most destructive since World War II, and its restrictions on the entry of humanitarian aid. Both have put the territory of around 2 million Palestinians at risk of famine. The Freedom Flotill

Body of Thai hostage taken on Oct 7 recovered from Gaza, says Israel

Israel says it has retrieved the body of a Thai hostage kidnapped into Gaza on Oct 7, 2023. The Prime Minister's office said Saturday that the body of Thai citizen Nattapong Pinta was returned to Israel in a special military operation. Pinta was kidnapped from Kibbutz Nir Oz and killed in captivity near the start of the war, said the government. Thais were the largest group of foreigners held captive by Hamas militants. This comes two days after the bodies of two Israeli-American hostages were retrieved. Fifty-five hostages remain in Gaza, of whom Israel says more than half are dead. The defence minister said Saturday that Pinta's body was retrieved from the Rafah area. He had come to Israel from Thailand to work in agriculture. On Thursday, Israel retrieved the bodies of Judih Weinstein and Gad Haggai, both of whom had Israeli and US citizenship. This comes as Israel continues its operation in Gaza. At least 22 people were killed by Israeli strikes overnight Friday into Saturda

UNGA set to push for two-state solution to Israeli-Palestinian conflict

The United Nations chief on Thursday urged world leaders and officials attending an upcoming UN conference on ending the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict to keep the two-state solution alive. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told reporters that the international community must not only support a solution where independent states of Palestine and Israel live side-by-side in peace but materialize the conditions to make it happen. France and Saudi Arabia are co-chairing the conference, which the U.N. General Assembly is holding from June 17 to June 20 in New York. French President Emmanuel Macron will attend and other leaders are expected, but Israel will not be there. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected the creation of a Palestinian state, a position that was overwhelmingly adopted by Israel's parliament in a vote last year. We won't be taking part in a conference that doesn't first urgently address the issue of condemning Hamas and returning all of the .

US vetoes UN Security Council resolution for an immediate Gaza ceasefire

The United States on Wednesday vetoed a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza because it was not linked to the release of hostages. The resolution before the UN's most powerful body also did not condemn Hamas' deadly attack in Israel on October 7, 2023, which ignited the war, or say the militant group must disarm and withdraw from Gaza two other US demands. The 14 other members of the 15-nation council voted in favour of the resolution, which described the humanitarian situation in Gaza as catastrophic and called on Israel to lift all restrictions on the delivery of aid to the 2.1 million Palestinians in the territory. The US vetoed the last resolution on Gaza in November, under the Biden administration, also because the ceasefire demand was not directly linked to the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages. Similarly, the current resolution demands those taken by Hamas and other groups be released, but it does not make it

US judge halts deportation of family of Boulder firebombing suspect

A federal judge issued an order Wednesday to prevent the deportation of the wife and five children of an Egyptian man charged in the firebombing attack in Boulder, Colorado. US District Judge Gordon P. Gallagher granted a request from the family of Mohamed Sabry Soliman to halt deportation proceedings of his wife and five children who were taken into federal custody Tuesday by US immigration officials. The family members have not been charged in the attack on a group demonstrating for the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza. Soliman faces federal hate crime charges and state charges of attempted murder in the Sunday attack in downtown Boulder. US Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem said Wednesday that they are being processed for removal proceedings. It's rare that family members of a person accused of a crime are detained and threatened with deportation. Soliman's wife, 18-year-old daughter, two minor sons and two minor daughters all are Egyptian citizens, the Department of

Israel targets Hamas in Gaza, rejects UN criticism over aid distribution

In one incident, forces struck a Hamas operative positioned near a weapons depot, triggering secondary explosions that confirmed the presence of stored munitions