Modiin, Israel:

On a Tel Aviv overpass, former spy Gonen Ben Itzhak addresses a small gathering of flag-waving protesters worried about the future of Israel under longest-serving premier Benjamin Netanyahu. Motorists honk enthusiastically to the group from the road as they drive past, and a man on a scooter passing underneath shouts “Traitor!”

A former Shin Bet intelligence agent, Ben Itzhak once handled the son of a Hamas co-founder as an informant, to prevent attacks in the occupied West Bank.

Now he protests on the streets against Netanyahu and his right-wing coalition government.

“Netanyahu is really the biggest danger to the state of Israel, and believe me I arrested some of the biggest terrorists during the Second Intifada,” the 53-year-old told AFP at his home in Modiin, referring to the 2000-2005 Palestinian uprising.

“I know what is a terrorist. I think Netanyahu is dragging Israel into destruction.”

He cites Netanyahu’s recent tensions with US President Joe Biden — he accused him of delaying American arms deliveries for Israel’s Gaza war — as an example of why many believe the Israeli leader must go.

“Biden is the biggest supporter of Israel… and Netanyahu spit on his face,” said Ben Itzhak.

“He’s destroying the very important relationship with the United States.”

 ‘The Green Prince’ 

Ben Itzhak — who joined the security services in the 1990s after premier Yitzhak Rabin’s assassination — has become a leading figure in protests against Netanyahu.

He is part of the “Crime Minister” movement, and once stepped in front of the premier’s motorcade during a 2018 anti-corruption protest.

He ended up being tackled by the very security service he once worked for.

Prosecutors are still pressing ahead with a corruption trial against Netanyahu despite the war, and some protesters have tried to break through police lines to get to his home.

Years before his own protest, Ben Itzhak was the handler for Mosab Hassan Yousef, known as “The Green Prince” and the eldest offspring of Hamas co-founder Sheikh Hassan Yousef.

He worked with the Hamas collaborator to follow Palestinian militants to thwart suicide operations, including arresting jailed Fatah figurehead Marwan Barghouti.

Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel could have been prevented by a double agent like Yousef reporting the plan, and the country’s security elite underestimated Hamas, the former spy believes.

“You need an old asset to call you and to tell you something is going wrong. And it seems like we didn’t have it,” he said.

“We think that our enemy is stupid. In the end, Hamas was smarter. It’s very hard to say.”

Ben Itzhak believes it is time to “change the equation” in Gaza — end the war and rally international support to put Mahmud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority in charge.

 ‘Everything is explosive’ 

“The military rules the West Bank, rules Gaza. Enough. We need to find the solution,” he said.

Ben Itzhak accuses Netanyahu of propping up Hamas while seeking to nix any peace process so he can stay in power.

“Netanyahu thinks only about himself, about his criminal problems, how to survive politically in Israel,” he said.

Netanyahu has repeatedly denied allegations of corruption, and on Monday reiterated that Israeli forces will eliminate Hamas.

“We will not end the war (in Gaza) until we eliminate Hamas, and until we return residents of the south and north to their homes securely,” he told parliament.

The former agent also claims the Israeli leader has let ultranationalist security minister Itamar Ben Gvir use the police as his own “militia” to disrupt weekly anti-government protests in Tel Aviv.

He questions Netanyahu’s allegiance with the far-right Jewish Power party frontman who was once barred from the Israeli military and investigated by the country’s security services for extremism.

“God… didn’t help us on October 7, the way he didn’t help us in Auschwitz,” he said.

Ben Itzhak said he himself has jumped in front of a water cannon to protect protesters from increasing police brutality, which landed him with a conviction that was overturned in March.

“Today Israel from the inside is destroyed. He (Netanyahu) is destroying everything,” he said.

The more Netanyahu bends to the ultranationalist allies, the weaker Israel’s security, says Ben Itzhak, claiming that they are also taking control of the army and prison service.

“Everything is explosive now,” he said.

“I will tell Netanyahu… resign. This will be the biggest help you can do to the people of the State of Israel.”

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Nearly 166 million people worldwide are estimated to need urgent action against hunger, according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), a global partnership which measures food insecurity.

That includes nearly everyone in the Gaza Strip, where the Israeli military launched an offensive in October following an attack on Israel by Hamas militants. More than one million of Gaza’s inhabitants face the most extreme form of malnutrition – classified by the IPC as ‘Catastrophe or Famine.’

Seven-month-old Majd Salem is one of them.

Born on Nov. 1, three weeks after Israel launched the offensive, the child was being treated for a chest infection in the neonatal ICU at Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza on May 9. The nurse caring for him said he was suffering from severe malnutrition.

Majd was born at a healthy weight of 3.5 kg (7.7 pounds), said his mother, Nisreen al-Khateeb.

By May, when he was six months old, his weight had barely changed to 3.8 kg, she said – around 3 kg less than would be expected for a baby his age.

Majd, whose eyes keenly followed visiting reporters in the ward, had to be given antibiotics for the infection and fortified milk to boost his weight, his mother said. Reuters was unable to trace them after May 21, when the hospital was evacuated following an Israeli raid.

One in three children in northern Gaza are acutely malnourished or suffering from wasting, according to the U.N. children’s agency UNICEF, citing data from its partners on the ground. Ismail Al-Thawabta, director of the Hamas-run government media office, said their records showed 33 people had died of malnutrition in Gaza including 29 children, but added that the number could be higher.

COGAT, an Israeli defence ministry agency tasked with coordinating aid deliveries into Palestinian territories, did not respond to a request for comment for this story. Israel’s foreign ministry in late May issued a detailed statement questioning the IPC’s methods of analysis, which it said omitted measures Israel had taken to improve access to food in Gaza. The IPC declined to comment.

The plight of Gaza’s children is part of a bigger trend. Globally last year more than 36 million children under 5 were acutely malnourished, nearly 10 million of them severely, according to the Global Report on Food Crises, a collaborative analysis of food insecurity by 16 international organizations.

The food shortage in Gaza, while particularly widespread, comes amid a broader spike in extreme hunger as conflicts around the world intensify.

Two other countries – South Sudan and Mali – each have thousands of people living in zones listed on the IPC website as facing famine. Another 35 – including Sudan, Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo – have many people in the IPC’s next-most acute category of food deprivation.

The IPC, a grouping of United Nations agencies, national governments and non-governmental organizations, is expected to update its assessment of the picture in war-torn Sudan in the coming weeks. A preliminary projection reported by Reuters earlier this month said as many as 756,000 people in Sudan could face catastrophic food shortages by September.

Gaza’s hunger crisis is also a product of war. The Israeli military invaded the Strip in response to the Oct. 7 cross-border assault by Hamas on Israel. More than 37,000 Palestinians and nearly 1,500 Israelis have been killed since then, Gazan and Israeli tallies show.

The Israeli assault has destroyed swathes of Gazan farmland. In the early days of the war, Israel imposed a total blockade on Gaza. It later allowed some humanitarian supplies to enter but is still facing international calls to let in more.

The International Criminal Court’s prosecutor, in seeking arrest warrants for Israeli and Hamas leaders, last month accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Yoav Gallant of using starvation of civilians as a method of warfare, among other alleged crimes. Netanyahu, calling that move “a moral outrage of historic proportions,” said Israel is fighting in full compliance with international law and taking unprecedented measures to ensure aid reaches those in need.

Israel has accused Hamas of stealing aid, which Hamas strongly denies. Israel has also said any distribution problems within Gaza are the fault of the international agencies.

Even when children survive, nutrition experts say food deprivation in the early years can do lasting damage.

A child’s brain develops at its fastest rate in the first two years of life. So even if they don’t starve to death or die from illness due to their weakened immune system, children may face delays in growth and development, said Aashima Garg, adviser on nutrition at UNICEF for the Middle East and North Africa.

“While they may be alive, they may not thrive that well in childhood and beyond,” she said.

Three families in Gaza told Reuters about their day-to-day diets, and four global health experts explained how such deprivation affects the growing body. Damage done in weeks manifests over years, they said.

“It can have a long-term impact on their immune system, their ability to absorb good nutrition, and on their cognitive and physical development,” said Hannah Stephenson, global head of nutrition and health at Save The Children, a non-profit.

FIRST DAYS

Gaza has the most households globally in the most extreme stage of food poverty, according to the IPC, which classifies levels of hunger in five categories, the worst of which is famine.

Households in North Gaza, where Majd lives, are already suffering a full-blown famine, Cindy McCain, Executive Director of the World Food Programme, said on May 5.

It can take months for the international measurement system to declare a famine. But the first damage to a child’s body is counted in days.

Nine out of 10 children aged 6 months to 2 years in Gaza live in severe child food poverty, a UNICEF survey in late May found. This means they are eating from two or fewer food groups a day, which UNICEF’s Garg said means grains or some form of milk.

This has been the case since December 2023, with only a slight improvement in April 2024, she said. As many as 85% of children of all ages did not eat for a whole day at least once in the three days before the survey was conducted.

The main cause of acute malnutrition in North Gaza is a lack of diversity in the diets of children and pregnant and breastfeeding women, according to a report in February 2024 from the Global Nutrition Cluster, a group of humanitarian agencies led by UNICEF.

This deficient intake, both prior to and during pregnancy and breastfeeding, harms both mothers and infants.

Abed Abu Mustafa, 49, a father of six, was still living in Gaza City in early April. He said people there already had eaten “almost every green plant we could find” and he hadn’t had meat or chicken for at least five months.

In Rafah in the south, Mariam, 33, a mother of five, has been living in a school along with two dozen of her relatives. She described a typical meal for her family before the conflict and what they are currently eating, shown below.

Before the war, Majd’s mother said an average family meal consisted of rice with chicken or meat, along with vegetables such as okra, cauliflower or peas. During the war, flour scarcity forced the family to make bread from animal feed. Recently, bread and canned goods like tuna and beans started to reappear, but these are not widely available.

Unable to find food to feed herself and forced to flee Israeli bombardment early in the war, Khateeb said she had found great difficulty in breastfeeding Majd.

She said she could find neither good quality baby formula nor clean water to mix it, so she fed him various types of powdered feed mixed with rainwater or brackish water from Gaza’s polluted wells, causing diarrhoea.

“There is no chance to get proper food to have breastmilk, there is no meat, no proteins, no calcium, none of the elements that produce good milk for the child,” she said.

Garg, the UNICEF adviser, said the nutrition of breastfeeding mothers in Gaza was severely compromised, and with it their ability to produce milk.

“They are not eating fruits and vegetables. They are not eating meat. They are not having much milk,” she said. This lack of nutrients translates into poor quality breast milk. Diluted formula is not safe and risks diarrhoea, which itself can be deadly.

Moderately malnourished mothers can still breastfeed, with their bodies effectively sacrificing their own nutritional needs to save the child. But severely malnourished women struggle.

Ahmed al-Kahlout, the nurse who heads the unit, said Majd’s infection was due to malnutrition.

“There is no immunity, so any disease that the child catches in the shelters … afflicts the child with these severe lung infections,” he said.

Susceptibility to infections typically increases after two weeks with insufficient food.

The body’s consumption of its fat reserves eats away muscle tissue, which is why aid workers in the field use basic tape measures to assess the gravity of children’s conditions.

The tapes measuring Mid-Upper Arm Circumference (MUAC) have been used for decades. If the upper arm’s circumference is 11.5 cm (4 1/2 inches) or smaller for a child between 6 months and 5 years old, the child is assessed as having severe acute malnutrition, according to standards drawn up by the United Nations.

MUAC screening data across Gaza since mid-January found more than 7,000 children aged 6 months to about 5 years were already acutely malnourished as of May 26, the United Nations humanitarian agency OCHA said.

This is how that looks.

Gaza has the most people at risk of starvation, but according to the IPC classifications, many millions are one step behind the enclave in food poverty.

The IPC categorises the severity and scale of food insecurity and malnutrition. Readings of 3, 4 or 5 on the five-category scale require urgent action.

Households in Phase 3 are in “Crisis,” the IPC says. They have high or more than usual acute malnutrition, or can meet their minimum food needs but only by selling assets or through crisis measures.

Phase 4 is an “Emergency.” Households have either “very high” acute malnutrition and death rates or are only able to make up for the lack of food by taking emergency measures and selling assets.

Phase 5 is “Catastrophe” or “Famine.” Households have an extreme lack of food and/or other basic needs and starvation, death, destitution and extremely critical acute malnutrition levels are evident. An entire area is only classified as in Famine if high food insecurity comes with certain levels of acute malnutrition and mortality.

For the IPC, areas in Famine meet at least two of the following three criteria:

* the area has at least 20% of households facing an extreme lack of food,

* About one in three children there suffer from acute malnutrition,

* Two adults or four children out of every 10,000 die each day due to outright starvation, or to the interaction of malnutrition and disease.

The IPC report issued in March projected that the entire population of the Gaza Strip would fall into Phases 3 to 5 between March and July. U.N. officials told Reuters they expect the next IPC analysis on Gaza to be released on June 25.

South Sudan and Mali are the other two other countries with households projected to fall into the same Phase 5 category as Gaza, based on the IPC’s latest published analyses.

Overall, the three countries with the largest numbers of people at Phase 3 and above are Nigeria (25 million), the Democratic Republic of Congo (23.4 million) and Sudan (17.7 million), according to the IPC website.

The IPC said its latest analysis of Sudan, conducted in December, was too outdated to include in the tables Reuters used for this chart.

As a consequence of severe malnutrition, various complications arise.

This is the impact of starvation after just three weeks. Like many children in Gaza, Majd’s lack of adequate food dates back months.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Students raise slogans during a protest over the alleged irregularities in NEET 2024 results.
| Photo Credit: –

48% of 1,563 candidates skip NEET-UG re-exam

Of the 1,563 candidates eligible to appear for the re-exam of the undergraduate National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET-UG), only 813 (approximately 52%) took it on Sunday. Another 750 candidates (approximately 48%) remained absent. The three-and-a-half hour long exam was conducted across seven centres in the States of Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, Meghalaya, and the Union Territory of Chandigarh. 

Centre’s high-level panel on exam reforms likely to meet on June 24

The Union education ministry’s high-level panel for suggesting exam reforms and reviewing functioning of the National Testing Agency will meet on June 23, sources said. Amid a row over irregularities in competitive exams, the ministry on Saturday notified a seven-member panel headed by former Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chief K. Radhakrishnan to ensure transparent, smooth and fair conduct of examinations through the National Testing Agency (NTA).

Kallakurichi hooch tragedy: Suspected main supplier of methanol held in Chennai

The police on Sunday arrested Sivakumar, 30, suspected to be one of the main suppliers of methanol to the sellers of illicit liquor, even as the death toll in the hooch tragedy in Kallakurichirose to 56. A central investigation unit of the Enforcement wing of the Tamil Nadu police nabbed Sivakumar, who was hiding in his sister’s house at Sulapallam in Chennai, in the early hours of Sunday.

Delhi excise case: Arvind Kejriwal moves SC against HC’s interim stay on bail order in ED case

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal urgently approached the Supreme Court on June 23 against the Delhi High Court’s suspension of bail granted to him by a trial court in the excise policy case .Mr. Kejriwal’s lawyers said the petition would be mentioned orally for early hearing on June 24 before a Vacation Bench of the Supreme Court.

Union Tribal Affairs Minister promises to look into Great Nicobar clearances

The Union Tribal Affairs Ministry will be looking into the forest clearance paperwork of the ₹72,000-crore infrastructure project on Great Nicobar Island that the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government has been pushing for, and accordingly determine next steps, Tribal Affairs Minister Jual Oram has said. In an exclusive interaction with The Hindu last week, he outlined his intent to give special attention to forest and land rights of tribal communities during his term. 

Militant killed close to LoC in Uri sector, says Army

One militant was killed in an ongoing anti-militancy operation in north Kashmir’s Baramulla on June 23. “One terrorist has been killed in the ongoing anti-infiltration operation that was launched on June 22 in the Uri Sector. Operations are continuing,” an Army spokesman said. 

Saudi says 1,301 deaths during hajj, mostly unregistered pilgrims

Saudi Arabia said Sunday that more than 1,300 faithful died during the hajj pilgrimage which took place during intense heat, and that most of the deceased did not have official permits. “Regrettably, the number of mortalities reached 1,301, with 83 percent being unauthorised to perform hajj and having walked long distances under direct sunlight, without adequate shelter or comfort,” the official Saudi Press Agency reported.

Sri Lankan president reiterates support for separate state of Palestine

President Ranil Wickremesinghe on June 23 reiterated Sri Lanka’s unwavering support for a separate Palestinian state to be established “within five years.” The president also said that despite the country’s current bankrupt economy, generous public contributions collected a million dollars in response to his government’s Gaza Children’s Fund that was donated.

Russia approves draft logistics agreement to be signed with India

After being held up for several years, the India-Russia mutual logistics agreement is ready for conclusion, with Russia approving the draft agreement over the past week. The agreement will simplify military-to-military exchanges for exercises, training, port calls and Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) efforts. It is similar to a series of such agreements that India has signed with a number of countries, beginning with the United States in 2016.

Former Israeli Ambassador says India may be ‘returning the favour’ with military supplies for Israel

Former Israeli Ambassador to India, Daniel Carmon, speaking with the leading Israeli publication Ynetnews, has said that India might be supplying weapons to Israel as a sign of gratitude for Israeli assistance during the Kargil war of 1999. The seasoned diplomat’s comments came in the backdrop of speculation that India has supplied drones and artillery shells to Israel as the latter ran short of the items with its war against the Hamas continuing for more than eight months.

Albania player Mirlind Daku banned by UEFA for two Euro 2024 games after nationalist chants

Albania player Mirlind Daku was banned on Sunday for two games after leading fans in nationalist chants at the European Championship, that UEFA said brought soccer into disrepute .Daku took a megaphone after Albania’s 2-2 draw with Croatia on Wednesday in Hamburg and joined in chanting slogans against Serbia and North Macedonia.

T20 World Cup 2024: Near perfect India could play party poopers to under pressure Australia

India will be out to derail Australia’s T20 World Cup campaign when they take on their shocked and under-pressure opponents in their final Super 8 game in Saint Lucia on June 24. A third straight win for India will not only make them the group toppers and send them to the semifinals, it will also substantially threaten Australia’s chances of progressing through to the semifinals following the unexpected loss to Afghanistan in Saint Vincent on Saturday night.

Euro 2024: Croatia faces Italy in crunch survival clash

Group B was dubbed Euro 2024’s ‘Group of Death’ but while Spain soared through with a game to spare, heavyweights Italy and Croatia meet on June 24 fighting to stay in the competition. Both sides were outclassed by Spain, and while reigning champions Italy edged Albania 2-1, Croatia could only draw 2-2 with the minnows.

Palestinian men walk along a narrow street past destroyed buildings in Khan Yunis, in the southern Gaza Strip
| Photo Credit: AFP

At least 39 people were killed by Israeli strikes across northern Gaza on Saturday, as rescue workers scrambled to find survivors beneath the rubble, according to Palestinian and hospital officials.

Fadel Naem, director of the al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City, told The Associated Press that more than three dozen bodies arrived at the hospital. The Palestinian Civil Defense, an emergency group active in Gaza, said its emergency workers were digging for survivors at the site of a strike in the Shati refugee camp west of Gaza City and that it had pulled several dozen bodies from a building hit by an Israeli strike in an eastern neighborhood of Gaza City.

Israel said Saturday that its fighter jets struck two Hamas military sites in the Gaza City area but did not elaborate further.

The deaths come a day after at least 25 people were killed in strikes on tent camps and 50 wounded near the southern city of Rafah. Israel said Saturday that it was continuing to operate in central and southern Gaza and has pushed ahead with its invasion of Rafah, where over a million Palestinians had sought refuge from fighting elsewhere. Most have now fled the city, but the United Nations says no place in Gaza is safe and humanitarian conditions are dire as families shelter in tents and cramped apartments without adequate food, water or medical supplies.

A separate Israeli strike Saturday in Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa Valley killed a member of the military wing of al-Jamaa al-Islamiya, or the Islamic Group, a Sunni Muslim faction closely allied with Hamas, according to the group. The member was the seventh killed by Israeli strikes in Lebanon since the war began.

The Israel-Hamas war erupted on Oct. 7. when Hamas militants who stormed southern Israel killed about 1,200 people and took some 250 others hostage. Israel has responded by bombarding and invading the enclave, killing more than 37, 400 Palestinians there according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between combatants and civilians in its count.

Also Saturday, Israel’s army said an Israeli man was fatally shot in the northern West Bank town of Qalqilya, where Israeli forces fatally shot two militants Friday, the latest flare of violence in the territory since the Israel-Hamas war erupted.

At least 549 Palestinians in the territory have been killed by Israeli fire since the war began, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry, which tracks the killings. Over the same period, Palestinians in the West Bank have killed at least nine Israelis, including five soldiers, according to U.N. data.

Israeli nationals are prohibited from entering Qalqilya and other areas of the West Bank that fall under the under the control of the Palestinian Authority.

In April, the death of a 14-year-old Israeli settler sparked a series of settler attacks on Palestinian towns in the territory. The army said a Palestinian was later arrested in connection with the killing.

On Saturday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said a 12-year-old Palestinian boy died from his wounds after being shot by Israeli forces in Ramallah last week. Commenting on the shooting, the Israeli army said its forces raided al-Amari refugee camp near Ramallah to arrest a suspect Friday and then opened fire on a group of Palestinians who were pelting them with stones.

Israel said Saturday that it was investigating a separate incident into conduct of its soldiers after a video surfaced online showing an injured Palestinian being transported on the hood of an Israeli armored car in the northern West Bank. The army said the man in the video was a wanted suspect and injured during an exchange of fire between Palestinian militants and Israeli forces near the city of Jenin. The man was being transported to a Red Crescent ambulance situated nearby, it said. The army said the conduct in the video didn’t “conform to the values” of the army.

Anger across the country is growing at the government’s handling of the war in Gaza and the hostage crisis.

On Saturday, tens of thousands of people demonstrated in Tel Aviv calling for new elections and for the government to bring the hostages home. Among the families were the parents of Naama Levy, an Israeli soldier who marked her 20th birthday in captivity.

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Jeffery reported from Ramallah and Associated Press writers Bassem Mroue in Beirut and Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv contributed to this report.

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Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Gaza at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war

Cairo:

Israeli forces pounded Rafah in southern Gaza on Friday, as well as other areas across the enclave, killing at least 45 Palestinians as troops engaged in close-quarter combat with Hamas group operatives, residents and Israel’s military said.

Residents said the Israelis appeared to be trying to complete their capture of Rafah, which borders Egypt and has been the focus of an Israeli assault since early May.

Tanks were forcing their way into the western and northern parts of the city, having already captured the east, south, and centre.

Firing from planes, tanks, and ships off the coast caused more people to flee the city, which a few months ago was sheltering more than a million displaced people, most of whom have now relocated again.

The Gaza health ministry said at least 25 Palestinians had been killed in Mawasi in western Rafah and 50 wounded. Palestinians said a tank shell hit a tent housing displaced families.

“Two tanks climbed a hilltop overseeing Mawasi and they sent balls of fire that hit the tents of the poor people displaced in the area,” one resident told Reuters over a chat app.

The Israeli military said that the incident was under review. “An initial inquiry conducted suggests that there is no indication that a strike was carried out by the IDF (Israel Defence Forces) in the Humanitarian Area in Al-Mawasi,” it said.

Earlier, the military said its forces were conducting “precise, intelligence-based” actions in the Rafah area, where troops were involved in close-quarter combat and had located tunnels used by Hamas.

Over the past week, the military said, troops targeted a university that served as a Hamas headquarters from which Hamas operatives fired on soldiers and found weapons and barrel bombs. It did not name the university.

In the central Gaza area of Nusseirat, the military said soldiers killed dozens of operatives over the past week and found a weapons depot containing mortar bombs and military equipment belonging to Hamas.

Some residents said the Israeli onslaught on Rafah had intensified in the previous two days and that the sounds of explosions and gunfire had hardly stopped.

“Last night was one of the worst nights in western Rafah: Drones, planes, tanks, and naval boats bombarded the area. We feel the occupation is trying to complete the control of the city,” said Hatem, 45, reached by text message.

“They are taking heavy strikes from the resistance fighters, which may be slowing them down.”

STRIKES ON KHAN YOUNIS AND GAZA CITY

More than eight months into the war in Gaza, Israel’s advance is now focused on the two last areas its forces had yet to seize: Rafah on Gaza’s southern edge and the area surrounding Deir al-Balah in the centre.

“The entire city of Rafah is an area of Israeli military operations,” Ahmed Al-Sofi, the mayor of Rafah, said in a statement carried by Hamas media on Friday.

“The city is living through a humanitarian catastrophe and people are dying inside their tents because of Israeli bombardment.”

Sofi said no medical facility was functioning in the city, and that remaining residents and displaced families lacked the minimum daily needs of food and water.

Palestinian and U.N. figures show that fewer than 100,000 people may have remained in the far western side of the city, which had been sheltering more than half of Gaza’s 2.3 million people before the Israeli assault began in early May.

In nearby Khan Younis, an Israeli air strike on Friday killed three people, including a father and son, medics said.

In parallel, Israeli forces continued a new pushback into some Gaza City suburbs in the north of the enclave, where they fought with Hamas-led operatives.

On Friday, an Israeli air strike on a Gaza City municipal facility killed five people, including four municipal workers, the territory’s Civil Emergency Service said. Rescue teams were searching the rubble for more missing victims.

In the nearby Beach camp, an Israeli air strike on a house killed at least seven people, medics said.

Palestinian health officials said at least 45 Palestinians were killed in Israeli strikes across Gaza on Friday.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said its Gaza office was damaged when heavy-calibre projectiles landed nearby, in an area where hundreds of displaced Palestinians are living in tents.

“This grave security incident is one of several in recent days; previously stray bullets have reached ICRC structures,” the organization said in a post on X on Friday. “We decry these incidents that put the lives of humanitarians and civilians at risk.”

Israel’s ground and air campaign was triggered when Hamas-led operatives barged into southern Israel on Oct. 7, killing around 1,200 people and seizing more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.

The offensive has left Gaza in ruins, killed more than 37,400 people, according to Palestinian health authorities, and left nearly the entire population homeless and destitute.

The United Nations said on Friday it is Israel’s responsibility – as the occupying power in the Gaza Strip – to restore public order and safety in the Palestinian territory so humanitarian aid can be delivered, amid warnings of imminent famine.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Israeli soldiers stand on a tank near the border with the Gaza Strip. File.
| Photo Credit: Getty Images

Eight Israeli soldiers were killed in the southern Gaza Strip on June 15, the military said, as forces continued to push in and around the southern city of Rafah and strikes hit several areas of Gaza, killing at least 19 Palestinians.

The soldiers, all members of a combat engineering unit, were in an armoured carrier that was hit by an explosion that detonated engineering materials being carried on the vehicle, apparently in contravention of standard practice, the military said. It said the early morning incident, in the Tel al-Sultan area in the west of Rafah, was being investigated.

Also read | Israel, Hamas committed war crimes, says UN

The armed wing of the Palestinian militant group Hamas said the vehicle had been trapped in a prepared minefield that set off the explosion.

Israeli tanks advanced in Tel al-Sultan and shells landed in the coastal area, where thousands of Palestinians, many of them displaced several times already, have sought refuge.

Despite growing international pressure for a ceasefire, an agreement to halt the fighting still appears distant, more than eight months since the start of the war in October, with the near-daily cross-border exchanges of fire with Hezbollah militia fighters in southern Lebanon intensifying.

In Israeli airstrikes on two houses in Gaza City suburbs, residents said at least 15 people were killed. Four others were killed in separate attacks in the south, medics said.

The Israeli military on Saturday said its forces in Rafah, the southernmost city in Gaza, close to the border with Egypt, had captured large quantities of weapons, both above ground and concealed in the extensive tunnel network built by Hamas.

It said militants had on Friday fired five rockets from the humanitarian area in central Gaza, two of which fell in open areas in Israel and three fell short in Gaza.

“This is a further example of the cynical exploitation of humanitarian infrastructure and the civilian population as human shields by terror organizations in the Gaza Strip for their terrorist attacks,” the military said.

Protests

The deaths of the eight soldiers, pushing the total number of Israeli troops killed in Gaza past 300, may complicate the political situation facing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a week after centrist former general Benny Gantz quit the government, accusing Netanyahu of having no proper strategy for Gaza.

Protests by families of hostages still held by Hamas, demanding an agreement to bring them home, have become weekly events, underscoring the divisions in Israeli society which have reopened following a period of unity at the start of the war.

The Islamic Jihad armed wing, Al-Quds Brigades, said on Saturday Israel could only regain its hostages in Gaza if it ended the war and pulled out forces from the enclave.

Islamic Jihad is a smaller ally of Hamas, which led a rampage in southern Israel on Oct. 7 in which 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies. More than 100 hostages are believed to remain captive in Gaza, although at least 40 have been declared dead in absentia by Israeli authorities.

Since a week-long truce in November, repeated attempts to arrange a ceasefire have failed, with Hamas insisting on a permanent end to the war and full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. Netanyahu refuses to end the war before Hamas is eradicated.

At least 37,296 Palestinians, at least 30 of them in the past 24 hours, have been killed in Israel’s military campaign to eliminate Hamas, according to the Gaza health ministry.

We return to Israel’s bombardment of Gaza- now nearly 250 days of it- in retaliation for the October 7 terror attacks by Hamas- the latest civilian casualties, after Israel Defence Forces launched strikes on a refugee tent city in Rafah, an area designated a safe zone by Israel itself- killing about 45, many burnt to death while asleep and injuring 200.

– The death toll now from 7 months of Israeli operations- more than 36,000, including civilians, UN workers and journalists.

– Israel that lost 1200 civilians in the Hamas attacks, still awaits the return of about 125 hostages.

– Starvation also stalks Palestinians with Israel blocking food and humanitarian supply routes- a UN survey found that 85 per cent of children did not eat for a whole day at least once in the three days before its survey was conducted.

Global Response to Rafah:

1. Israel’s PM Benjamin Netanyahu called the Rafah strike a tragic mistake, even as IDF claimed the camp had a weapons dump that caused the deaths. His NSA said the war would continue at least another 7 months- until end 2024

 2. The latest civilian killings even prompted the US to issue a strong statement, but said no “red lines” had been crossed by Israel yet

3. The strike came even as the ICC prosecutor applied for arrest warrants against Israel PM Netanyahu, Defence Minister Gallant and Hamas Leaders for war crimes- once those are issued, it will become difficult for them to travel to other countries who are signatories- as it has been for Russian President Putin

4. Meanwhile the ICJ- that continues to deliberate on South Africa’s petition on terming Israel’s war as a genocide, issued a special order on Rafah- ordering Israel to stop its operations in the southernmost area of Gaza in Rafah, its last refuge for Palestinians

The Hindu in focus Podcast this week has more

5. Ireland, Norway and Spain joined 140 countries worldwide that have already recognised the state of Palestine, saying this was part of a symbolic push on Israel for the 2-state solution.

6. Spain has also announced it will deny port facilities to any ship carrying weapons for Israel, and stopped a shipment from Chennai carrying explosive material

7. While UN members keep urging the UN Security Council to reconsider the appeal for full membership status for Palestine, the UNSC has a new proposal by Algeria calling for Israel to stop it offensive on Rafah. A UNSC hearing saw a particularly fierce debate between the Israeli and Palestinian Ambassadors

All this happened in the past week- what’s India’s position?

1. The MEA called the Rafah strike killings, heartbreaking:

Randhir Jaiswal: “The heartbreaking loss of civilian lives in the displacement camp in Rafah is a matter of deep concern for us. We have consistently called for protection of civilian population and respect for international humanitarian law in the ongoing conflict..”

2. India is not a signatory, so will not be bound by the warrants, if issued

3. However, India does adhere to the ICJ, and an Indian judge was amongst those presiding on the ruling- it is also clear that South Africa has gained much standing in the global south over its tough position at ICJ, and India will watch that keenly

4. The MEA also pointed out that India was among the first countries to recognise Palestine – way back in 1988. India hosts and supports the Palestinian embassy in Delhi

5. India will watch all peace moves closely- especially the Chinese one, given China’s role in the Saudi-Iran rapprochement last year. PM Modi even declared this week that he had sent his envoy, believed to be NSA Ajit Doval who met with PM Netanyahu to urge him not to bomb Gaza during the month of Ramzaan. Given that Israel continued its bombing, it remains to be seen whether the newly elected PM post elections will take a more engaged role.

6. Grand connectivity projects I2U2 and IMEEC have been forced into an indefinite pause, trade costs through the Red sea and Persian gulf have skyrocketed, and US plans to extend the Abraham Accord have floundered

WV Take: Despite the backing of the US, Israel is fighting a losing global battle of perception – and the losses mount with each passing day of civilian casualties. In that sense, Rafah is not just the final front for Palestinian refugees fleeing the bombardment, it could be Israel’s last chance to turn the tide, accept a ceasefire, negotiate a hostage release and end the suffering of civilians. India must play its role, if at all, to that end.

WV Reading Recommendations: I’ve already recommended a number of books in recent episodes. So as not duplicate, here are some books expected in the next few months:

1. The Killing of Gaza: Reports on a Catastrophe by Gideon Levy

2. The Gates of Gaza: Critical Voices from Israel on October 7 and the War with Hamas (De Gruyter Disruptions Book 4) Kindle Edition by Lihi Ben Shitrit

3. The Abraham Accords: The Gulf States, Israel, and the Limits of Normalization by Elham Fakhro

4. Spies Among The Sands: Assessing Seven Decades of the Mossad and Israeli National Security by Prem Mahadevan

5. From Beirut to Jerusalem (With a New Preface) Paperback – October 1, 2024 by Thomas L. Friedman

6. HAMAS: The Quest for Power 1st Edition by Beverley Milton-Edwards (Author), Stephen Farrell

Script and Presentation: Suhasini Haidar

Production: Gayatri Menon and Shibu Narayan

Washington:

The US military has suspended aid deliveries into the Gaza Strip by sea, the Pentagon said on Tuesday, after its temporary pier was damaged by bad weather.

Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh told reporters high seas and a North African weather system had caused a section of the pier to come away on Tuesday morning.

“The rebuilding and repairing of the pier will take at least over a week, and, following completion, will need to be re-anchored to the coast of Gaza,” she said.

“Thus, upon completion of the pier repair and reassembly, the intention is to re-anchor the temporary pier to the coast of Gaza and resume humanitarian aid to the people who need it most.”

The damage is the latest setback to the pier, which opened two weeks ago.

US Central Command (CENTCOM) said Saturday four US Army vessels supporting the pier broke free from their moorings and ran aground in heavy seas.

Two beached in Gaza while the other two washed up on the coast of Israel, 30 miles (50 kilometers) south of Tel Aviv. One has been recovered and the other three will be brought back in within 48 hours, Singh said.

Gaza is suffering through its bloodiest ever war, which broke out after Hamas’s unprecedented October 7 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of more than 1,170 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official figures.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 35,800 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.

Israel has imposed a siege on Gaza that has deprived the territory’s 2.4 million people of most clean water, food, medicines and fuel.

US President Joe Biden had said in March the pier would be built to alleviate restrictions imposed by Israel on aid delivery by land to Gaza.

CENTCOM said 1,005 metric tons of aid had been delivered from the sea to the beach transfer point as of Friday, with 903 metric tons distributed from the transfer point to the UN warehouse.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Norway’s Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store speaks during a news conference in Oslo, Norway, Wednesday, May 22, 2024. Norway said it would recognise a Palestinian state and Ireland was expected to do the same.
| Photo Credit: AP

Norway, Ireland and Spain said Wednesday they are recognising a Palestinian state in a historic move that drew condemnation from Israel and jubilation from the Palestinians. Israel immediately ordered back its ambassadors from Norway and Ireland.

The formal recognition will be made on May 28. The development is a step toward a long-held Palestinian aspiration that came against the backdrop of international outrage over the civilian death toll and humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip following Israel’s offensive there.

It was a lightning cascade of announcements. First was Norway, whose Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store said, “There cannot be peace in the Middle East if there is no recognition.”

ALSO READ | India backs Palestine’s bid for full U.N. membership

In making his announcement, Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris said the move was coordinated with Spain and Norway — and that it was a “historic and important day for Ireland and for Palestine.” He said it was intended to help move the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to resolution through a two-state solution.

Mr. Harris said he thinks other countries will join Norway, Spain and Ireland in recognizing a Palestinian state “in the weeks ahead.”

In response, Israel’s Foreign Minister Israel Katz has ordered Israel’s ambassadors from Ireland and Norway to immediately return to Israel.

“Ireland and Norway intend to send a message today to the Palestinians and the whole world: terrorism pays,” Mr. Katz said.

He said that the recognition could impede efforts to return Israel’s hostages being held in Gaza and makes a ceasefire less likely by “rewarding the jihadists of Hamas and Iran.” He also threatened to recall Israel’s ambassador to Spain if the country takes a similar position.

ALSO READ | Rediscovering Palestinian statehood 

Several European Union countries have in the past weeks indicated that they plan to make the recognition, arguing a two-state solution is essential for lasting peace in the region. The decision may generate momentum for the recognition of a Palestinian state by other EU countries and could spur further steps at the United Nations, deepening Israel’s isolation.

In favour of two-state solution

Norway, which is not a member of the European Union but mirror its moves, has been an ardent supporter of a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians.

“The terror has been committed by Hamas and militant groups who are not supporters of a two-state solution and the state of Israel,” the Norwegian government leader said.

“Palestine has a fundamental right to an independent state,” Gahr Støre told a news conference.

The move comes as Israeli forces have led assaults on the northern and southern edges of the Gaza Strip in May, causing a new exodus of hundreds of thousands of people, and sharply restricted the flow of aid, raising the risk of famine.

The Scandinavian country “will therefore regard Palestine as an independent state with all the rights and obligations that entails,” Gahr Store said.

Norway’s recognition of a Palestine state comes more than 30 years after the first Oslo agreement was signed in 1993.

Since then, “the Palestinians have taken important steps towards a two-state solution,” the Norwegian government said.

It said that the World Bank determined that Palestine had met key criteria to function as a state in 2011, that national institutions have been built up to provide the population with important services.

“The war in Gaza and the constant expansion of illegal settlements in the West Bank still mean that the situation in Palestine is more difficult than it has been in decades,” the Norwegian government said.

People taking part in a march in support of the Palestinian people ahead of the Nakba day at the Al Kasayir village, in Haifa on May 14, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

Palestinians on Wednesday will mark the 76th year of their mass expulsion from what is now Israel, an event that is at the core of their national struggle. But in many ways, that experience pales in comparison to the calamity now unfolding in Gaza.

Palestinians refer to it as the Nakba, Arabic for catastrophe. Some 7,00,000 Palestinians — a majority of the pre-war population — fled or were driven from their homes before and during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war that followed Israel’s establishment.

After the war, Israel refused to allow them to return because it would have resulted in a Palestinian majority within its borders. Instead, they became a seemingly permanent refugee community that now numbers some 6 million, with most living in slum-like urban refugee camps in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Thorny issue

Israel’s rejection of what Palestinians say is their right of return has been a core grievance in the conflict and was one of the thorniest issues in peace talks that last collapsed 15 years ago.

Now, many Palestinians fear a repeat of their painful history on an even more cataclysmic scale.

Also read: ‘The Nakba was the core of our feelings and thinking’

All across Gaza, Palestinians in recent days have been loading up cars and donkey carts or setting out on foot to already overcrowded tent camps as Israel expands its offensive. The images from several rounds of mass evacuations throughout the seven-month war are strikingly similar to black-and-white photographs from 1948.

Mustafa al-Gazzar, now 81, still recalls his family’s monthslong flight from their village in what is now central Israel to the southern city of Rafah, when he was 5. Mr. al-Gazzar, now a great-grandfather, was forced to flee again over the weekend. He says the conditions are worse than in 1948, when the UN agency for Palestinian refugees was able to regularly provide food and other essentials.

“My hope in 1948 was to return, but my hope today is to survive,” he said. “I live in such fear,” he added, breaking into tears.

The war has forced some 1.7 million Palestinians — around three quarters of the territory’s population — to flee their homes, often multiple times. That is well over twice the number that fled before and during the 1948 war.

Fearing exodus

Israel has sealed its border. Egypt has only allowed a small number of Palestinians to leave, in part because it fears a mass influx of Palestinians could generate another long-term refugee crisis.

The international community is strongly opposed to any mass expulsion of Palestinians from Gaza — an idea embraced by far-right members of the Israeli government, who refer to it as “voluntary emigration.”

Israel has long called for the refugees of 1948 to be absorbed into host countries, saying that calls for their return are unrealistic and would endanger its existence as a Jewish-majority state. It points to the hundreds of thousands of Jews who came to Israel from Arab countries during the turmoil following its establishment, though few of them want to return.

Even if Palestinians are not expelled from Gaza en masse, many fear that they will never be able to return to their homes or that the destruction wreaked on the territory will make it impossible to live there. A recent UN estimate said it would take until 2040 to rebuild destroyed homes.