Operation Iron Swords - Day 104 - 18 January 2024

Contents

NEW - Operations NEW - Operations Maps NEW - By-Standers NEW - Axis of Resistance NEW - Allied for Democracy UPDATED - Oasis of Martyrs UPDATED - Hostages

The Israeli army found the bodies of 21 Israeli soldiers in Bani Suhaila in Khan Yunis and transferred them to Israel, according to what was announced by the Hebrew Channel 14. This report was not widely attested. The IDF appeared to confirm reports that its soldiers dug up some of the graves in a Gaza cemetery, explaining that it took the action in order to confirm that the bodies of hostages were not buried there. Responding to an NBC query on the matter, the IDF says in a statement that it is “committed to fulfilling its urgent mission to rescue the hostages and find and return the bodies of hostages that are held in Gaza.”

About half of the soldiers of a reserve battalion in the Israeli occupation army refused to fight in the Gaza Strip. Hebrew radio said that reserve soldiers were called in to form a new brigade to carry out protection missions in the areas surrounding Gaza and the West Bank. The radio added that the soldiers left the battalion with the approval of the officers responsible for them after it became clear that the army intended to bring them into the Gaza Strip to carry out combat missions for which they were not qualified. The reservists who were called for training were harshly criticized about serious gaps in equipment, professionalism and lack of human resources.

On the 105th day of the war on Gaza , the Al-Qassam Brigades , the military wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ), announced that it had killed and wounded dozens of Israeli soldiers in separate operations. Jabalia, in the northern Gaza Strip, witnessed clashes between Al-Qassam members and the occupation forces, and fierce battles took place in Khan Yunis in the south.

Operational Update

Israel's war is entering its "most dangerous phase" in the Gaza Strip, where "the army aims to control the vast maze of tunnels under the city of Khan Yunis, with refugees accumulating in the south of the Strip, and international anger over the death toll growing," according to a report by the Wall Street Journal. The Israeli army assigned General Dan Goldfus, who commands the 98th Parachute Division, to control Khan Yunis, the largest city in the southern Gaza Strip. According to the newspaper, the mission in the city of Khan Yunis "is to destroy Hamas above ground, and within the complex network of tunnels beneath it."

Israeli forces, which are still exploring the tunnel network, seek to "encircle Hamas fighters, and are maneuvering above and below ground to expel them." “It's a messy process,” Goldfus, a war veteran, said of the underground battle. The Israeli army largely controls the northern Gaza Strip, after heavy bombardment turned many urban areas into rubble, along with many tunnels as well. Tens of thousands of civilians also fled to the south of the Strip.

But the progress Israel is making in the south faces a dead end, according to a Wall Street Journal report. The army is tightening its grip on a large number of displaced Palestinians who cannot find places to flee again, at a time when international protests are escalating due to the large number of deaths and injuries among civilians, which increases pressure on Israel to change its tactics. The newspaper's report stated that Hamas is "capable of moving underground," likening its movements to those carried out by nearly two million displaced civilians above ground, in the Gaza Strip, since the outbreak of the war.

The war broke out after an unprecedented attack by Hamas on Israel on October 7, which led to the killing of about 1,140 people, the majority of them civilians and including women and children, according to an Agence France-Presse count based on official Israeli sources.

On the other hand, Israel declared war with the aim of "eliminating Hamas" and launched devastating air strikes on the Gaza Strip, accompanied by a large-scale ground intervention that began on October 27, resulting in 24,448 deaths, the majority of whom were women and children, according to the latest toll from the Ministry of Health in Gaza.

The Israeli operation risks “ending in a bloodbath greater than what happened in the north,” while “the ceasefire allows Hamas to survive and recover, which represents a strategic defeat for Israel,” according to the newspaper. “Now that people have gathered in the south, Israel cannot do what it did in the north without hundreds of thousands dead, something the United States will not support,” said Hasit Ibish, a senior researcher at the Gulf States Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank. "United."

Meanwhile, the political impasse between the Israeli government, the United States and key Arab states over who should run Gaza after Hamas further complicates the war. According to the Wall Street Journal report, “The lack of any government in Gaza makes it difficult to provide humanitarian aid, restore order and basic services, or facilitate the return of residents to the north.”

The Israeli army fears that Hamas will try to exploit the vacuum and return again to the areas vacated by the army. Khan Yunis, the second-largest city in the Gaza Strip, is where many senior Hamas leaders come from, including Yahya Sinwar, the mastermind of the October 7 attacks on Israel. Israeli officials believe that Sinwar is hiding somewhere in the tunnels under Khan Yunis, with some of the remaining hostages. “The maze here is more expansive and wider than in Gaza City,” Goldfus said of the underworld in Khan Yunis.

Of the four Hamas brigades [as receieved - probably battalions] in Khan Yunis, Goldfus said that his forces “destroyed or reduced the brigades in the east of the city,” adding that there is an active brigade in the south. Regarding the fourth region in the west, which includes a growing number of refugees, the Israeli general said: “We will have to make decisions.”

Israeli Defense Minister Galant said that there are developments that he described as dangerous, requiring Israel to be drawn into war on its northern borders to ensure the return of residents to their homes. Galant added - during his speech regarding military developments in Gaza - that Israel does not want to fight a war in the north, but it must prepare for the deterioration of the security situation there, referring to the ongoing confrontations for months between the Israeli army and the Lebanese Hezbollah.

Regarding the situation in Gaza, he said that there is no complete solution to what he called “pockets of resistance” in Gaza. The Israeli minister considered that Hamas is trying to manipulate the emotions of Israelis to divide society. He also considered that Hamas has become more weak in obtaining supplies and controlling matters in Gaza, saying that Israel destroyed the organizational frameworks of the Hamas movement in the northern Gaza Strip and killed thousands of its militants, as he put it.

Fighter jets of the Air Force attacked a terrorist infrastructure and a launch site of the terrorist organization Hezbollah in the areas of Eitaron and Al Adisa in southern Lebanon. In addition, IDF forces attacked during the day a number of launching positions of the terrorist organization Hezbollah, including a building from which an anti-tank missile was fired at the Manara area yesterday. Also, during the day, a number of launches were detected towards the Shtula, Malkiah, Menara and Har Dov areas. The IDF attacked the sources of the shooting.

Fighter jets of the Air Force attacked terrorist infrastructures of the Hezbollah terrorist organization in the Al Adisa region in southern Lebanon. In addition, the IDF attacked earlier today in the areas of Kfar Kila and Marj Eyon in southern Lebanon. Also, earlier today, two launches from Lebanese territory toward the Arab Al Aramsha area were detected that fell in open areas.

The combat teams of the 36th Division, in cooperation with Yehlam and Shelad fighters, exposed and destroyed the heart of the Hamas munitions manufacturing industry near the Salah al-Din axis. The area consists of factories and lathes, surface and underground that provided ammunition and weapons to the Hamas terrorists.

The IDF troops operating in the Khan Yunis area have killed about 40 terrorists in the last day. With a tip, the fighters of the Egoz unit raided a terrorist's house and found ten grenades, a Kalashnikov rifle, military equipment and technological means. Cartridges, grenades, Kalashnikov rifles and maps were also located in the Khan Yunis area by the forces. Fighters from the 7th Brigade Combat Team eliminated four terrorists who advanced towards them using tank fire.

In the north of the Gaza Strip, the 5th Brigade Combat Team eliminated two armed terrorists who were in ambush against Israeli forces using armored force. Also, several air strikes were carried out using an aircraft that attacked and eliminated armed terrorists who posed a threat to the forces, some of whom were operating near a school in the sector. In the Zabara neighborhood area, fighters from the 179th Brigade Combat Team located anti-tank charges, RPG munitions, military equipment and technological means.

In an operation in the northern Gaza Strip, the fire complex of the Yiftach Brigade detected terrorists booby trapping a vehicle and entering a building known as belonging to GAP activity. A short time later, when one of the terrorists left the building, an Air Force aircraft attacked the terrorist and killed him. Later, shots were fired at the vehicle , and the thrust created by the explosion indicates that the vehicle was a booby trapped vehicle.

The military and strategic expert, Major General Fayez Al-Duwairi, said that the return of qualitative resistance operations against the occupation forces in the northern Gaza Strip comes as a translation of redrawing the lines of contact to develop the defensive battle. Al-Duwairi explained - during his analysis to Al-Jazeera - that the resistance, according to its new tactic, allows the occupation forces to enter and go deeper into the areas of northern Gaza, before confronting them with a new reality based on luring, ambushes, and killing.

Despite their withdrawal from the northern Gaza Strip, the occupation forces - according to Al-Duwairi - remained in a state of combat readiness through systematic bombing from a distance or pushing forces into Gaza, indicating that the first option is bad for the resistance because it will receive strikes without any reaction.

He pointed out that there are two brigades in northern Gaza that include 12 battalions with an average of 800 to 1,250 fighters per battalion, indicating that the Al- Qassam Brigades - the military wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ) - have returned with combat readiness that enables them to successfully manage the defensive battle, “although not with the same absolute readiness before.” October 27, which makes sense.” But he said that the talk about rehabilitation applies more to the Israeli 36th Division, which was withdrawn from northern Gaza, where it is currently in a defensive standby position, and the damage it sustained is being compensated.

Regarding the Al-Qassam video east of the Al-Tuffah and Al-Daraj neighborhoods in Gaza, he said that it is linked to the entry of an Israeli armored battalion, stressing that the video shows that the management of the battle changed and became dependent on defensive complexes and lures. He also praised the accuracy of the filming and monitoring of the projectile’s movement until the military vehicle was hit.

Commenting on Israel's return to demolishing entire residential squares in Beit Hanoun in the north, Al-Duwairi stated that the step came after the reactivation of the Beit Hanoun Al-Qassam Brigade and restoring its combat readiness so that it would be similar to other Al-Qassam brigades. Regarding what was stated by Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant , who said that there is no complete solution to the pockets of resistance in Gaza, Al-Duwairi described the statements as “a rare moment of honesty with himself,” in defiance of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu , who uses his convictions to serve personal purposes in order to avoid going to prison.

It should be noted that the Al-Qassam Brigades announced - throughout the day - several specific operations in the northern Gaza Strip, such as the bombing of an Israeli troop carrier with an “ Al-Yassin 105 ” shell near the Eastern Cemetery, east of Jabalia, as well as a clash with an Israeli foot force of 12 soldiers, and the killing of 4 soldiers. From a distance of zero near the same area. Al-Qassam also announced that it had targeted a second Israeli force barricaded inside a building in the Sheikh Ajlin area, southwest of Gaza, with an anti-fortified shell and clashed with it, in addition to blowing up a tunnel mouth with an Israeli foot force east of the Al-Tuffah neighborhood in Gaza.

The French newspaper Le Monde said that residents of the neighborhoods occupied by Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip are subjected to mass arrest campaigns, including men from their teens to their sixties, where they are stripped of their clothes and subjected to beatings, intimidation, and humiliating treatment, according to some of those who were released.

The newspaper began - in a report written by Clotilde Mravko from occupied Jerusalem - the occupation soldiers took the residents of Beit Lahia out of their homes at gunpoint, one after the other, and stripped the men of their clothes, so that the lawyer and researcher at the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, Ayman Labad (31 years old), found himself in his underwear, kneeling. On the sidewalk among all his neighbors.

Dozens of video clips, often filmed by the soldiers themselves - as the newspaper says - have revealed mass arrests in Gaza, where soldiers surround a group of homes, chant the names of families in the area over loudspeakers, isolate children aside, and sometimes women are separated from them. Some of them remove their veils and are arrested.

He systematically stripped the men of their clothes “to make sure they were not wearing explosive belts, and then allowed them to get dressed as quickly as possible,” the occupation army claims. But videos and testimonies collected by Le Monde show that prisoners remained half-naked for hours, and the head of the commissioner’s office said. United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories Ajith Songai said: “Some of the videos are extremely offensive and are a clear violation of international law.”

Once the Palestinian detainees are collected, they are identified using a facial recognition system - according to the newspaper’s report - and then most of the time they are transferred outside the neighborhood in which they live. Some of them reported that they heard gunfire and that the people who were with them did not return, and the director of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights assumes Raji Al-Sourani said that many of them were killed in extrajudicial executions. “We have no video clips and no direct witnesses,” he says from Cairo, “but naked bodies were found, riddled with bullets.”

For its part, the High Commissioner for Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories stated that it “received disturbing reports indicating that Israeli forces killed at least 11 unarmed men in front of their family members in the Al-Rimal neighborhood in Gaza.” The statement referred to other incidents of “targeting and killing of civilians in a manner Deliberately committed by Israeli forces.

Freelance photojournalist Saeed Kilani, who was arrested in the Israeli raid on Kamal Adwan Hospital, says that one of the soldiers threw his press card on the ground before transporting him to a nearby field with other Palestinians. He was released after 24 hours without being interrogated, and he says, “Two soldiers beat me in an ugly way. He threatened to kill me."

The newspaper quoted the testimony of Ayman Labad, who was transferred with his companions in distress from one street to another, then the soldiers blindfolded him and tied his hands. He believes that they were transferred first to the Zikim military base in northern Gaza, then they were transferred on a bus in a cold atmosphere, stripped of their clothes, and “they were placed In the hallway with my hands behind my back and my head down, the soldiers walked over my body, over my shoulders and over my head. I was their rug.” After a long journey, the prisoners arrived at the “Sde Teman” camp, which is three pens built in the middle of the desert between Beersheba and Gaza in southern Israel. The army transports the men to it, while the women are detained in the Anatot military camp near Jerusalem.

In Sde Timan, the lawyer who was sent to be punished three times without knowing why says, “From five in the morning until midnight you have to stay on your knees. They force you to stand in front of the fence with your arms raised for two or three hours,” and one of them “answered to the soldiers We heard the sound of gunfire, but we don't know what happened to him."

A man said that he was subjected to “torture with electricity,” and added, “Two of us died due to the cold and lack of care.” Indeed, the army admitted the death of a number of prisoners in “Sde Timan” without specifying their number, and confirmed that an investigation had been opened in each case, knowing that all Prisoners spoke of lack of food, difficulty accessing toilets, and being beaten. Although the army denies these accusations, the testimony of an Israeli reserve soldier in charge of security adds credibility to the prisoners’ story.

Israel refuses to talk about prisoners, but the Israeli Prison Service reported the detention of 661 “unlawful combatants” as of January 1, and this situation is outside the scope of international law, as Israel is holding detainees that it does not recognize as prisoners of war, and the International Committee of the Red Cross has not been able to From contacting any Palestinian detainee in Israeli prisons since October 7, 2023. The newspaper’s report mentioned many cases of journalists or doctors who were arrested and whose families knew nothing about them since last October 7. However, Ayman Labad was released after a week of arrest at the Kerem Shalom crossing between Gaza and Israel, and he walked several kilometers in the open to reach Rafah. He cannot join his family, which remains in closed northern Gaza.

The HAMAS spokesman for the Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip, Dr. Ashraf Al-Qudra, said that the Ministry recorded more than 8,000 cases of viral hepatitis A infection as a result of overcrowding and low levels of personal hygiene in displacement sites monitored by government medical teams only. He said that the Ministry expects the number of hepatitis A infections to double in places. Various displacements in the Gaza Strip.

Al-Qudra confirmed that the Ministry of Health recorded hundreds of cases of miscarriage and premature birth as a result of panic and forced flight under brutal bombing. He pointed out that the lack of health care in places of displacement and the difficulty of reaching hospitals put the lives of about 60,000 pregnant women at risk due to pregnancy complications.

The Ministry of Health warned of the serious repercussions of running out of nitrous gas in operating rooms, which endangers the lives of hundreds of wounded and life-saving cases. It added: “We warn of serious health complications to which 350,000 chronic patients are exposed as a result of the lack of availability of medicines and their failure to enter the Gaza Strip.”

The Ministry of Health pointed out that hospital laboratories are unable to conduct the laboratory blood test (CBC) as a result of the shortage of materials for it, as well as the exhaustion of 60% of the materials for various laboratory and viral tests. It said that 10,000 cancer patients are still exposed to serious complications that kill dozens of patients every day as a result of the lack of medicines. And the lack of health care in places of displacement after the Turkish Friendship Hospital went out of service.

Al-Qudra added that the direct and continuous targeting of the vicinity of Al-Wusta and Khan Yunis hospitals threatens the lives of thousands of wounded, sick, premature and displaced children, and causes the loss of the lives of dozens of them as a result of their families being forced to flee with them under bombardment.

For years, the West Bank has witnessed a noticeable escalation of military resistance against the occupation. Over these years, environments and incubators of resistance have grown, especially in the cities and camps of the northern West Bank. Several military formations and groups affiliated with Palestinian and cross-factional factions have also emerged. These groups have posed a real challenge to the occupation in recent years, which prompted it to launch military operations to confront the growth of military groups, similar to Operation Breakwater, which began at the end of March 2022 with the aim of dismantling the resistance structure in the northern West Bank.

With the start of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood - launched by the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ) in the Gaza Strip - and despite the major shock suffered by the Israeli security services, they kept their eyes open on the West Bank, strengthened their procedures, and carried out thousands of arrests in the first days of the Battle of Al-Aqsa Flood.

In light of the continued fear that the situation would explode in the West Bank, the occupation forces carried out a series of special operations and raids into the camps and cities of the West Bank, which are home to resistance groups. These raids and attacks resulted in more than 371 martyrs and approximately 3,720 wounded. The Prisoners’ Club and the Prisoners’ Affairs Authority reported - last Sunday - that “the number of arrests rose after last October 7 to about 5,875 people.”

More than 100 days after the start of the war in the Gaza Strip and the accompanying massive attack by the occupation army in the West Bank, the Chief of Staff of the Israeli occupation army Herzi Halevy and a number of senior officers repeated their warnings to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the war ministers on several occasions that the West Bank is about to explode.

According to a report by Israeli Channel 12, the military level specifically warned of the explosion in the West Bank, which means another front that the occupation must deal with with high intensity. Senior officials in the military establishment told the political echelon in closed rooms that "the West Bank is on the verge of exploding in a third and comprehensive intifada, due to the deterioration of economic conditions and the prevention of workers from entering to work in Israel."

The main significance of the repeated warning by the military and security levels about an imminent “explosion” in the West Bank is based on the limited military and security operations carried out by the occupation in the West Bank in eliminating the Palestinian resistance as a national culture and groups as organizational formations.

The basis for the assessment of the Israeli security services is their realization that the military solution is not effective in light of the continuing settler attacks, the continued aggression against the Gaza Strip, the deteriorating economic conditions in the West Bank, and the decline of the Palestinian Authority’s control in the camps in the northern West Bank, which witness the presence of resistance groups.

This warning also comes after a noticeable increase in the number of operations carried out by resistance fighters in the West Bank, in addition to the development witnessed in operations to confront Israeli incursions into camps and cities in the northern West Bank, as a noticeable increase began months ago in the use of homemade explosive devices by resistance factions, which began It poses a real threat to the invading forces.

The operation to detonate a homemade explosive device in Nour Shams camp resulted in the death of a female soldier and the wounding of a number of other occupation soldiers as the resistance confronted them. The West Bank and Jerusalem also witnessed a number of specific operations carried out by the resistance, some of which carried signs of organized action, instead of the Qassam Brigades in the West Bank adopting a number of these operations. Raanana operation resulted in the death of a female settler, 4 seriously injured, and 9 moderately injured.

The most prominent of these operations, according to data from the Palestinian Information Center, were:

• On October 19, the resistance fighters carried out a shooting operation and detonated an explosive device in an occupation army force near the town of Burqa, north of Nablus, wounding a number of its soldiers.
• A resistance cell from Tulkarm carried out a shooting operation on November 2, followed by an operation to lure and detonate an explosive device with occupation soldiers near the Beit Lid settlement near Tulkarm, which resulted in the killing and wounding of 6 soldiers and settlers. The Qassam Brigades claimed responsibility for the operation in a video recording.
• On November 6, the martyr Muhammad Omar Al-Faroukh (16 years old), from the town of Sa’ir, north of Hebron, carried out a stabbing attack near a police station at Bab Al-Sahira in the Old City of occupied Jerusalem, which resulted in the death of a female soldier and the serious injury of another.
• A resistance group that included Abd al-Qadir Abd Allah al-Qawasmi, Hassan Mamoun Qafisha, and Nasr Abd al-Af al-Qawasmi carried out a shooting operation at the military tunnel checkpoint separating the city of Bethlehem and southern occupied Jerusalem, which resulted in the death of a soldier and the injury of 6 others - some of them in serious condition - and the perpetrators were martyred by bullets. The occupation forces, and the Al-Qassam Brigades claimed responsibility for the operation.
• The freed prisoners, brothers Murad and Ibrahim Nimr, carried out a shooting operation in occupied Jerusalem that resulted in the killing of 4 settlers, the injury of 12 others - including serious cases - and the martyrdom of the perpetrators. The operation was claimed by the Al-Qassam Brigades.
• It was followed by a ramming attack near the Baqaot settlement in the northern Jordan Valley, carried out by the martyr Karem Bani Odeh from Tammoun in Tubas, which resulted in two soldiers being injured.
• On December 28, the martyr Ahmed Adeeb Alyan carried out a stabbing attack in occupied Jerusalem, which resulted in two occupation soldiers being moderately injured and the perpetrator being martyred.
• It was followed by a ramming attack carried out by the martyr Amr Abdel Fattah Abu Hussein, targeting occupation soldiers near Dura, south of Hebron, resulting in the injury of 4 of them.
• On December 30, the martyr Muhammad Hussein Masalmeh carried out a run-over attack targeting occupation soldiers at the entrance to Al-Fawwar in Hebron, resulting in the injury of two soldiers.
• On January 13, three Palestinian youths carried out a storming operation into the Adora settlement, west of Hebron, which resulted in the death of the three young men and the wounding of a number of settlers.
• On January 15, a female settler was killed and 4 were seriously injured and 9 were moderately injured in stabbing and ramming attacks in the city of Raanana in Tel Aviv.

Warnings from the security and military levels of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu regarding the situation in the West Bank indicate a difference in views within the Israeli government about allowing Palestinian workers to enter to work. The Israeli Channel 13 published a report talking about a “dramatic warning from the Shin Bet to Netanyahu” indicating “the fear of an immediate escalation in the West Bank.”

This dispute comes in a broader context of disagreements and discrepancies between the leaders of the government and the war council in the Israeli occupation state. The security services are exploiting the escalation of resistance in the West Bank to put pressure on Netanyahu’s allies from the extreme religious right who want to put more pressure on the Palestinians in the West Bank and expand settlement projects.

The assassination of Sheikh Saleh Al-Arouri, Deputy Head of the Political Bureau of the Hamas movement , constituted a defining moment in the course of the war on Gaza and in the confrontation related to the West Bank, as he heads the West Bank “region” in Hamas. The Israeli occupation accuses Sheikh Al-Arouri of being responsible for restoring the resistance infrastructure in the West Bank and arming resistance groups and formations in the West Bank, instead of accusing him of direct responsibility for a number of operations that targeted settlers and occupation soldiers in the West Bank and the formation of cells spread throughout all West Bank cities.

Given the symbolism and status of Sheikh Al-Arouri among the resistance movements in the West Bank, it is expected that the West Bank will witness more operations in response to his assassination, the harbingers of which began with the “Adora” and “Raanana” operations, which is the opposite of the trend promoted by the Israeli political and security leadership that The assassination of Sheikh Al-Arouri will weaken the resistance in the West Bank.

In this context, the continued warning by the military and security institutions of the imminent explosion in the West Bank indicates the limited impact of the assassinations on the rising trend of resistance, rather than considering them among a large sector of Palestinians as a reason for continuing and escalating resistance.

All the drivers for the escalation of resistance action in the West Bank remain present and their influence is strengthening, but the two factors of the war on Gaza and the escalation of settler attacks will make the West Bank an arena of open confrontation between the Palestinians and the occupation. In previous experiences, such as in the 2014 war, the West Bank witnessed a major popular uprising in the summer of the following year, and in analyzing the outbreak of the uprising, the effects of the war on Gaza in 2014 were one of the most important inspirations for young Palestinians who took the initiative to carry out operations in the following months.

The Palestinians in the West Bank receive two images from the war in Gaza: the massacres, killing, siege, and humiliation to which the Palestinians are exposed in the Gaza Strip, and the images of battles and targeting published by the resistance factions and the inspiration they represent for youth in the West Bank. In light of the growing conviction among Palestinians that the security system and the Israeli army failed miserably on October 7 and beyond, the courage of Palestinian youth to carry out more operations increases.

The Leader of Yemen’s resistance movement Ansarullah Abdul-Malik al-Houthi said attacks on ships bound for Israeli ports in the occupied Palestinian territories will continue despite recent airstrikes on the Yemeni territory by US and UK warplanes. Abdel Malek al-Houthi said in an hour-long televised speech on Thursday that the attacks would “also include American and British ships.” He said Yemen will continue to strengthen its military. The recent airstrikes by the United States and Britain, he said, are not going to “scare us.”

“The issue that America and Britain have joined the war directly and that we are now in direct confrontation with the Americans, British and Israelis does not scare us at all.... The aggression towards our country and our people will enhance the development of our military capabilities.”

Houthi also made it clear that the US-UK strikes will not influence Yemen’s position in supporting the Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip. “First, this aggression will not change anything in the stance of our people and its spiritual obligation in supporting the Palestinian people and the residents of Gaza as well as the continuous targeting of ships linked to Israel, and this is clear in our continuous operations and the last one was last night against the ships, but it will also include the American and British ships.”

The Yemeni leader said the US-led aggression against Yemen has been meant to divert the world's attention from Israel’s genocidal campaign in Gaza. “The Americans need to be sure that by continuing the aggression they meant to protect the Zionist crimes against the Palestinian people.”

The military spokesman for Ansar Allah Houthis, Yahya Saree, confirmed that a response to the American and British attacks is inevitably coming. Saree indicated that they are continuing to implement defensive and offensive measures within the legitimate right to defend Yemen. He announced that the American ship Kim Ranger was targeted in the Gulf of Aden with naval missiles and that it was being hit directly.

Ansar Allah Houthi spokesman, Mohammed Abdel Salam, stressed “freedom of maritime navigation for all ships in the world except for ships heading to Israel.” Abdel Salam said, on the “X” platform, “The continuation of the American-British aggression in launching raids with approximately 13 missiles last night on our country represents an insistence on continuing the aggression for a week in order to protect the Zionist enemy entity.” He added, "This will not prevent our dear people from continuing support operations for the Palestinian people and the steadfastness of Gaza."

A US official told Al Jazeera, "We are following a security incident related to an attack on a ship from areas controlled by the Houthis in Yemen." A Yemeni military source had told Al Jazeera that Ansar Allah Houthi forces targeted an American ship near the Yemeni coast of Mukalla. A short while ago, the British Maritime Trade Operations Authority said that it had received a report of an accident 85 miles southeast of the Yemeni city of Al-Shihr.

The " Houthi " group in Yemen announced that it targeted and directly hit an American ship in the Gulf of Aden, in a naval attack in a region of strategic importance. The military spokesman for Ansar Allah "Houthis", Yahya Saree, said on the "X" platform that the group's fighters targeted the American ship "Kim Ranger" with naval missiles in the Gulf of Aden and hit it directly. The spokesman added that the response to what he described as American and British attacks is “inevitably coming,” as he put it. Sarie reiterated "the continuation of navigation traffic in the Arab and Red Bahrain to all destinations except the ports of occupied Palestine."

Earlier, the British Maritime Trade Operations Authority said on Thursday that it had received a report about an incident 115 nautical miles southeast of the city of Aden in Yemen, and added in a warning note that the authorities were investigating the matter. For its part, Embrey Maritime Security said in a memorandum it issued that a tanker of chemical products flying the flag of the Marshall Islands reported what was described as a “suspicious approach” of drones 103 miles southeast of Aden.

During the past weeks, the Houthis in Yemen launched attacks on ships in the Red Sea that they said were linked to Israel and American ships that support Tel Aviv in its ongoing war on the Gaza Strip. On the other hand, the United States and Britain launched several rounds of raids against Houthi sites in Yemen, which they said were targeting the group's missile capabilities to protect global shipping traffic in the region. Washington had announced the re-listing of the Houthis in Yemen as a “global terrorist organization,” in light of the recent attacks launched by the group on ships in the Red Sea.

Iraqi resistance fighters launched drone strikes on a military facility occupied by US forces near the northeastern Syrian city of Qamishli on the Turkish border. Lebanon’s al-Mayadeen news channel reported that the attacks targeted Hemo base, situated west of Qamishli Airport. The report added that Hemo was also a "US spy base housing elements of the Zionist regime". Hemo base, which hosts close to 350 American soldiers, is believed to be a vital one for the US occupation forces in Syria since it serves as a special training camp for the US-backed so-called Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). This comes as news reports by Arab media said two days ago that troops were evacuated as a result of attacks by resistance factions in Iraq.

Maps

All maps are lies. “Not only is it easy to lie with maps, it is essential,” wrote cartographer Mark Monmoneir in his book How to Lie with Maps. He showed that condensing complex, three-dimensional spaces onto a two-dimensional sheet of paper is bound to be reductive. But it is impossible to comprehend the war in Gaza without reference to maps, otherwise the entire conflict is reduced to an endless series of meaningless acts of random violence and the suffering of civilians. The first characteristic of guerrilla warfare is the loss of a front line. Evidently, different mappers have different ideas of how to depict the war in Gaza, notably those that seek to depict Israeli progress in the ground campaign. Part of the problem is latency. The news that forms the basis of the maps takes time to filter out to mappers, and the cartographers take time in crafting their maps, and it takes time to curate them. These processes are uneven among mappers, so their maps may differ in detail. Probably there is some ideological bias, or at least thematic apperception, which is understandable in wartime. It may come as no surprise that al-Jazeera maps depict rather less Israeli territorial progress than other sources. Finally, there remains the epistemological question of just exactly what are the colored in areas depicting. Naively, this might be understood as areas of Israeli control, that are no longer contested by the HAMAS. Or possibly these are areas of Israeli presence, in many of which the possibility of an RPG-wielding HAMAS militant popping out of a tunnel unexpectedly remains a live possibility. With the "zero-range" combat characterized by small unit tactics on both sides, maps may be prey to a fallacy of misplaced concreteness.

Bystanders

Axis of Resistance

Iran called on members of the Non-Aligned Movement to renew their solidarity with the Palestinian nation, as the Israeli regime’s onslaught on Gaza continues to claim innocent Palestinian lives in the besieged coastal territory. Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Legal and International Affairs, Reza Najafi, made the remarks addressing the 19th Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) foreign ministers in Kampala, Uganda.

“The message of the Non-Alignment Movement must be loud and clear so as to show that the movement stands with the Palestinian nation,” Najafi stated. The Iranian diplomat further said that the summit shows the solidarity between NAM members and the promotion of cooperation between them to protect their nations’ interests.

Najafi pointed out that the emerging challenges facing the world require concerted efforts by NAM members to be resolved in an effective and appropriate manner. “The Non-Aligned Movement has to have an active role in forming the new world order,” he said, adding that solving global issues requires global solutions. He further explained that strengthening solidarity between NAM members and making joint progress toward resolving global issues require the true political will of all Non-Alignment Movement members.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Najafi rebuked unilateral US sanctions as a “tool of Western hegemony,” urging NAM members to firmly oppose the sanctions. Najafi also called for an immediate and unconditional end to the Israeli regime’s genocide of Palestinian people, highlighting the NAM’s support for South Africa’s filing of a genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

Palestinian presidential spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeina said that there will be no security and stability in the region without the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital on the 1967 borders. Abu Rudeina's statements came in response to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who said that there will be no Palestinian state.

Arif Al-Amiri, spokesman for the coalition of Yemeni anti-aggression political forces and parties, confirmed that the Yemeni authority in Sanaa does not care about the decisions issued by the American administration, as Washington is trying to blackmail Sanaa by using classification decisions, whether in the past or in the future. The Ansar Allah movement confirmed that the American decision is politicized, and it is a badge of honor that it wears for its position in support of the Palestinian people.

Al-Amiri pointed out that Washington pushed and instructed the former Yemeni regime to fight six battles against the group, all of which resulted in a huge loss for that regime. It also paid the Saudi and Emirati regimes to fight a global war of siege, destruction and killing that lasted for more than eight years and we are at the end of the ninth year.

Al-Amiri pointed out that after the failure of all these systems and after the failure of the American military policy in the region, the American administration and the British regime came today for direct entry, and this happened after they sensed that there was a danger affecting the security of the Zionist entity, which had become threatened, as today the Republic of Yemen is threatening this. The entity threatens its presence in the region by leading this battle by preventing, stopping, and cutting off the lifeline that is trying to extend to the Zionist entity if it continues its aggression against the Palestinians and its aggression in its systematic killing of the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip.

Allied for Democracy

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the war in Gaza will continue for additional months, while his Defense Minister Yoav Galant spoke about the possibilities of a comprehensive confrontation with the Lebanese Hezbollah. Netanyahu added - in statements published by Israeli media - that the war on Gaza will continue until its goals of “decisive victory” over Hamas and the recovery of those he described as kidnapped are achieved. He added that stopping the war before achieving the goals would be a message of weakness and harm Israel for generations to come.

The Israeli Prime Minister also said that the war will continue on all fronts until the goals that have been set are achieved, indicating that a huge budget has been passed to achieve those goals. He pointed out that he informed the United States that he opposes the establishment of a Palestinian state as part of any post-war scenario. Regarding what was said about disagreements within his government, he denied that he had initiated the removal of Defense Minister Gallant.

On another topic, Netanyahu accused Iran of being behind Hezbollah attacks on the northern border and Houthi attacks in the Red Sea .

For his part, member of the Security Ministerial Council, Gideon Sa'ar, said that stopping the war now means complete surrender to Hamas, adding that this is the greatest strategic harm to Israel. On the other hand, Israeli member of the Knesset from the Labor Party, Efrat Raitin, expressed her support for stopping the fighting in Gaza in order to return the Israelis detained there, and called for taking what she described as strict and courageous decisions on the part of the war government. Raitin said that since Israel was dragged into the ground war, many Israeli soldiers have lost their lives, adding that detainees return dead and even their bodies remain in Gaza.

Meanwhile, Israeli Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir said that his vision for the day after the war on Gaza is for continued control of the Strip, and he repeated his call for the displacement of hundreds of thousands of residents of the Strip, in addition to the elimination of the head of Hamas’s political bureau in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar. Ben Gvir believed that Netanyahu must choose between the old method of War Council member Benny Gantz and opposition leader Yair Lapid and the method of decisiveness in the north and south and achieving victory over those he described as Israel's enemies. Regarding the West Bank , the Israeli minister said that Palestinian workers should not be allowed to return to work in Israel because this poses a danger to the lives of Israelis, as he put it.

Itamar Ben Gvir directed settlers and the Israeli occupation army in the West Bank to shoot Palestinians even if they did not pose a threat to their lives. After that, be sure that the Israeli people will thank you.” He said: “When you see a terrorist, even if he does not endanger you, shoot him.” According to what was reported in the Hebrew newspaper “Yedioth Ahronoth.”

These statements were in conjunction with 150 weapons that were distributed in the West Bank to settlers, meaning that Ben Gvir is now giving the Israeli settlers a green light to kill any Palestinian present in the occupied West Bank, whether he puts their lives in danger or not, which may open the door to the killing of more innocent Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.

Israeli media continued to highlight the escalating dispute between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Defense Minister Yoav Galant , which analysts said creates a security and existential risk to Israel. The Israeli Channel 13 discussed the crisis of Gallant’s recent withdrawal from the War Council meeting, where the channel’s correspondent Moria Wahlberg said that the head of the National Security Council, Tzachi Hange, asked the head of the Defense Minister’s office to leave the meeting, noting that Gallant said that he did not accept that and left with his aides after he attacked Netanyahu and Hange.

Walberg said that Gallant asked them (Netanyahu and Henge) to stop obstructing his work, describing the matter as “evidence of the extent of tension between the prime minister and the defense minister.” He added, "This tension began long before October 7, but it has become increasing these days more than ever before."

During a discussion on the same channel, Ariel Kahane, a journalist for the "Israel Today" newspaper, said that the War Council had recently witnessed an unkind situation, stressing that "this is not the first time. We know that there are accumulations and tensions between the two men." He added, "While we are in the hundredth day of the war, the war council is considered an asset to Israel, and the two men must act as adults." Kahane continued, "Try to rise above the personal differences between you, and preserve this council for the sake of victory and for the sake of the people of Israel."

As for Avigdor Lieberman, former Minister of Defense and head of the “Yisrael Beytenu” party, he said that he had “never witnessed an event like this before in which a defense minister left the war council during battles.” Lieberman said, “When I follow the discussions, I find that what is happening sends two messages about a war between the Jews to both Hassan Nasrallah (Secretary General of the Lebanese Hezbollah ) and Yahya Sinwar (head of the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ) at home), adding, “This is not how the war is managed.”

In the same context, former Chief of Staff Aviv Kochavi said, “Do not give the enemy a chance to touch us again because of the lack of unity,” adding, “All those who take the path of division - led by influential people elected by the public - undermine the principle of unity and create a security and existential threat.”

Commenting on this dispute, Yaron Abraham said on Channel 12 that there is tension between the political elite due to stopping or continuing the war, and the method of recovering the kidnapped (prisoners). He added, "The state set these two goals as one and equal package in the past three months," while the channel confirmed that "after many quarrels in closed rooms, tension exploded between Likud and the official camp inside the Knesset."

Israeli philosopher and researcher Asa Kasher said that incidents in which poor military order was used during the October 7 attack , which caused the deaths of civilians or military personnel by friendly fire, must be investigated immediately. On the "The Week" program broadcast by the Israeli newspaper "Haaretz", Kasher - a senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies and the architect of the Israeli army's ethics code known as the "Hannibal Directive" - discussed the issue of using the code's rules in an attack by the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ).

Kasher wrote the IDF Code of Conduct, which was developed by the Israel Defense Forces in 1986 in response to an attempt by Lebanese Hezbollah to kidnap two soldiers in southern Lebanon. In the original version, the directive specified the procedures that must be followed when a soldier is at risk of capture in enemy territory. The directive - which was drafted by the commander of the IDF's Northern Command at the time, Yossi Peled, along with Colonel Gabi Ashkenazi and Colonel Yaakov Amidror - stressed the priority of rescuing captured soldiers. from their captors, even if it means risking harm to the captured soldiers themselves.

It is noteworthy that the directive was drafted without consulting legal experts. For years, the content of the Hannibal Directive and its use by the Israeli military was shrouded in secrecy, and it is rumored to have been invoked only a few times between 1986 and 2016 when it was officially rescinded by the military.

According to Kasher, one of the difficulties in assessing the legality and morality of the “Direct of Hannibal” is the wide range of versions and interpretations. There are several different versions depending on the unit or forces that have to deal with it, and it changes depending on the command or region. He explained that there are contradictions between the versions, but he said that there is absolutely nothing in all versions that allows someone to kill any Israeli, whether civilian or military.

But accounts of what happened at one site on Kibbutz Be'eri during the Hamas attack indicate that no code of conduct was implemented. Kasher wondered whether Hannibal's directives had been misunderstood in a previous incident that occurred at the Cohen family home, where 14 Israelis were held hostage, according to the testimony of Yasmin Porat and Hadas Dagan, the only survivors of the incident.

According to Porat, after a Hamas fighter released her, she was interrogated by the police’s anti-terrorism unit, who told them that there were about 40 Palestinian fighters and 14 Israeli civilian detainees still in the house. Dagan was among the hostages inside the house, where an Israeli tank fired two shells at him, according to what she said. She was the only Israeli who survived the incident, and she confirmed Borat’s story.

The families of the dead demanded that the Israeli army open an investigation into the incident, and according to a New York Times report, the commander of the 99th Division, General Barak Hiram, said that he ordered a tank commander to fire on Cohen’s house, “even at the cost of civilian casualties.” Kasher hesitated to confirm the details of the incident before conducting the investigation, but he raised a different point, saying, "I have looked at all copies of Hannibal's directive and I have never seen any mention of its use," referring to attempted kidnappings of civilians.

Kasher strongly agreed with the families on the need for an immediate investigation, starting with the Military Defense Council and, if necessary, moving it to the State Attorney General. How could a high-ranking military official in the Israeli army issue an order that would certainly put the lives of many Israeli civilians in danger? While the army said it would investigate the incident after the war ended, Kashir responded, "This is their approach. We hear it all the time from the army spokesman."

But Kasher believes that this incident calls for an immediate investigation, just as happened when 3 detainees held by Hamas were mistakenly killed by the Israeli army. Kasher spoke about another incident that occurred last October 7 on the Israeli border with Gaza, and according to an investigation conducted by the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, the forces received orders to prevent detainees from being taken to Gaza by force if necessary. At noon on October 7, Israeli army helicopters bombed cars trying to cross the border, and there is unconfirmed evidence that detained Israeli civilians were injured. Kasher believes that the entire culture of the Israeli army needs to change.

A US State Department spokesman said that there is “no way” to end the long-term security challenges facing Israel in the region and the short-term challenges of rebuilding Gaza, without establishing a Palestinian state. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that he informed Washington of his refusal to establish a Palestinian state.

US Senator Bernie Sanders said that the United States is complicit in the nightmare experienced by the Palestinian people. Sanders added that he finds it difficult to understand why Congress does not act to stop the suffering of the Palestinians and deal with the humanitarian catastrophe.

For her part, US Senator Elizabeth Warren described Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's refusal to establish a Palestinian state within any post-war arrangements as "dangerous." She said that this refusal contradicts American policy. Warren stressed that Washington supports the two-state solution because it is the only way to guarantee peace, security, and dignity for Israelis and Palestinians.

Butcher's Bill / Oasis of Martyrs

Palestinian armed group Hamas launched thousands of missiles at Israel and deployed its militants to infiltrate Jewish settlements near the country’s border with Gaza on 07 October 2023. The 1,200 Israelis killed on the first day would be the equivalent of 36,000 Americans killed in an attack, as a proportion to Israel’s population of 9.3 million people (compared to 332 million in the USA). Israeli President Isaac Herzog stated: “Not since the Holocaust have so many Jews been killed in one day". PM Netanyahu stated "On October 7th, Hamas murdered 1,400 Israelis. Maybe more. This is in a country of fewer than 10 million people. This would be equivalent to over 50,000 Americans murdered in a single day. That’s twenty 9/11s. That is why October 7th is another day that will live in infamy."

It is the second largest loss inflicted on the Israeli forces after the 1973 war, as the Palestinian resistance killed more than 1,200, wounded more than 5,132 others, and captured more than 250, most of them military personnel, some of whom were high-ranking officers in the army.

The HAMAS Ministry of Health in the besieged sector announced that the number of victims of the Israeli operation its beginning had risen to 24,620 martyrs, and the killing of nearly 10,000 Palestinian children and 6,600 women killed. The ministry does not distinguish between civilians and combatants.

The number wounded was 61,830. The Palestinian Government Media Office in Gaza had said much earlier that the number of missing people had risen to more than 8,000, including including 4,700 children and women, amid expectations that the toll will be double thi figures.

The IDF intensified its military operations in the West Bank, and increased the pace of incursions and raids into cities, towns, and camps, resulting in the martyrdom of 342 Palestinians, the injury of about 3,950, and the arrest of 5,780, according to official HAMAS sources. As of 17 January 2023, the Israeli escalation in the West Bank led to the death of 360 Palestinians, the injury of nearly 2,200, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, and the arrest of about 6,000, according to the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club.

More than 130 Hezbollah fighters were killed in Lebanon during exchanges of bombing operations with Israel.

Israel revised down the death toll from the October Hamas attacks in southern Israel from 1,400 to 1,200. IDF had said previously it was holding 1,500 bodies of terrorists, a total that now would increas to about 1,700.

The officially announced number of deaths among the Israeli army since the start of the ground incursion on October 27th to 195, and 529 deaths since the Al-Aqsa Flood operation on the 7th of the same month. Among them are 56 with the rank of platoon commander, 43 with the rank of company commander, 9 with the rank of battalion commander, and 5 with the rank of brigade commander. These officers constitute 23% of the total deaths of the Israeli army in the war on Gaza.

Israeli media reported that 27% of the Israeli military casualties in the war were officers. In detail, the media highlighted that three brigade commanders, four battalion commanders, and other senior officers have been killed in the war so far.

The Israeli Broadcasting Corporation reported that 29 of the army's deaths were caused by "friendly fire" and operational incidents since the start of the ground war in Gaza, late last October. The Israeli authority explained that "18 army soldiers were killed by friendly fire, two were killed as a result of gunfire (without explanation), and 9 Israeli soldiers were killed in ammunition, weapons, or run-over accidents." The Jerusalem Post newspaper revealed that 15 soldiers were killed in the Strip without their bodies being found.

According to some reports statistics indicate that 20% of the Israeli losses were due to friendly fire. Because the nature of the battle has become completely different from what was expected, and it lacks a front line.

According to the latest data published by the army, the number of wounded soldiers and officers has risen to 1,152 since the start of its ground attack on Gaza on October 27, including 228 seriously wounded, while the total number has reached 2,602 wounded since the outbreak of the war on the 7th of October.

The Israeli army reported that 2,438 soldiers - including 355 seriously injured - have been injured since the beginning of the war on Gaza, including earlier reports of 576 moderate, and 1,161 minor. The number of wounded since the start of the ground operation in the Gaza Strip on October 27 had risen to 1,042.

At least 12,957 Israelis were injured, according to i24 TV.

Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper had reported that 5,000 soldiers had been wounded since the beginning of the war on October 7, and that the Ministry of Defense had recognized 2,000 soldiers as disabled so far.

An estimate by the Israeli Ministry of Defense expected that the number of soldiers with disabilities in the war taking place in the Gaza Strip since October 7 of last year would reach 12,500 soldiers. The Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth said that the Soldiers' Rehabilitation Department of the Ministry of Defense has dealt with 3,400 soldiers who were classified as disabled in the army since last October 7.

The Israeli army revealed that about 9,000 of its soldiers have received “psychological assistance” since the beginning of the war on the Gaza Strip on October 7, and about a quarter of them have not returned to combat. This came according to a new statement revealed by the Army Medical Corps, according to Channel 12 and the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth. According to the statement, nearly 9,000 soldiers have applied for psychological assistance since the beginning of the war, and approximately a quarter of them have not returned to combat.

The statement continued, "In total, about 13,000 regular and reserve soldiers required accompaniment or medical treatment at some level during the fighting, and thousands of them were injured in the battles."

Al Jazeera military and strategic expert Major General Fayez Al-Duwairi expressed his conviction that the numbers of dead and wounded announced by Israel “cannot represent the truth,” due to a discrepancy between the Israeli army’s data and the Walla website, which is close to the army itself.

Hostages

Al-Qassam Brigades publishes a video clip of Israeli prisoners and hostages: “Tomorrow we will inform you of their fate.” In the clip, the prisoners called on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to stop the war in order to return them to their families. An Israeli prisoner said in the clip: “Stop this madness and return us to our families.”

Earlier, Abu Ubaida, spokesman for the Al-Qassam Brigades, said in an audio recording, “The fate of many of the enemy’s prisoners and detainees has become unknown in recent weeks, but the rest have all entered the tunnel of the unknown due to the Zionist aggression.” He added, "Most likely, many of them will have been killed recently, while the rest are still in imminent and great danger every hour, and the enemy's leadership and army bear full responsibility."

Abu Ubaida continued, "We were informed from several parties on the resistance fronts that they are seeking to expand their strikes against the enemy in the coming days in light of the continued aggression against Gaza." He declared, "After a hundred days of battle, confrontation, and confrontation of aggression, this is the enemy's leadership swallowing pain and wading through the mire of failure and failure."

Israel had previously estimated there were 116 living hostages in Palestinian custody. Israel declared 20 out of 136 people in Gaza captivity dead in absentia, after announcing its forces had recovered the bodies of two hostages. By another count, 132 of them are still being held in Gaza, and 25 of them have been confirmed dead. Israel considers those still held by Hamas to be hostages regardless of whether they are dead or alive.

Israeli government spokesperson Eylon Levy earlier had told reporters that Hamas still held 137 captives. The resistance released 10 Israeli detainees, 4 Thais and 2 Russian women, who were released outside the agreement. Over the course of 6 days, Israel has received 102 detainees, women and children, including 78 Israelis, in exchange for the release of 234 Palestinian prisoners, women and children.

Eylon Levy, the Israeli government spokesperson, told reporters 01 December 2023:

• Hamas still held 137 hostages from the October attacks, in addition to four others who went missing before the war
• The hostages include two children aged four and 10 months, who, Hamas now claims, are dead
• 117 male hostages are still kept in Gaza, including the two children, as well as 20 females
• 126 hostages are Israelis, and 11 others are foreign nationals
• Foreign nationals are eight Thais, one Nepalese, one Tanzanian and one French Mexican citizen
• Ten of the remaining hostages are 75 and older.
• There are seven missing people since the October 7 attack
• Hamas had released 110 hostages so far – 86 Israelis and 24 foreign nationals.

Some of the rest are soldiers, seized when Hamas raided military bases in Israel. They may end up being held the longest. The Israeli military had not specified how many soldiers were captured, nor their ranks.

According to some estimates, Hamas was initially holding nearly 210 of the 240 hostages, while Palestinian Islamic Jihad was holding the remaining 30. About 40 Israelis remained missing. More than 40 hostages taken from Israel into Gaza on October 7th are not currently in the custody of Hamas, the group responsible for the attack, according to a CNN report based on a diplomatic source briefed on the negotiations, CNN's prior reports had indicated that an estimated 40 to 50 hostages were held by Palestinian Islamic Jihad or other unidentified groups or individuals.

Abu Ubaida, the spokesperson for the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, said on Hamas’ telegram account that 23 bodies of the 60 missing Israel hostages were trapped under the rubble. “It seems that we will never be able to reach them due to the continued brutal aggression of the occupation against Gaza,” he said.

The Palestinian Prisoners' Club revealed that about 11,000 arrests were carried out by the Israeli army during the year 2023 in the West Bank, including occupied Jerusalem, in addition to arrests from the Gaza Strip before the seventh of last October. The total number of prisoners in Israeli prisons is 8,800, as documented by the club until the end of December 2023. The Prisoners' Club explained that arrests after the 7th of October amounted to more than 5,975, in contrast to the detainees in Gaza after the 7th of the same month. The Prisoners' Club stated that cases of arrest among women amounted to (300), and this toll includes women from the occupied interior detained after October 7, while the number of cases of children reached 1,085. The arrest campaigns affected all groups, including women and children, as the number of women who were arrested reached about 200, while the number of arrests among children until the end of last December exceeded 355 children. The number of administrative detainees in Israeli prisons reached more than 3,290, which is the highest percentage since the years of the 1987 Intifada.

Israel said on 14 January 2024 that, since the beginning of the war, approximately 2,650 wanted persons have been arrested throughout the Judea and Samaria Division and the Bekaa and Valleys Division, approximately 1,300 of whom are affiliated with Hamas. On 08 January 2024 it was reported that more than 1,350 wanted persons had been arrested throughout the Judea and Samaria Division and the Bekaa and Valleys Division, more than 870 of whom are associated with the terrorist organization Hamas.