Operation Iron Swords - Day 147 - 01 March 2024
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NEW - War Termination NEW - Operations NEW - Operations Maps NEW - By-Standers NEW - Axis of Resistance NEW - Allied for Democracy UPDATED - Oasis of Martyrs UPDATED - Hostages |
Extremist Israeli minister Itamar Ben Gvir described Israeli soldiers who opened fire on civilians in Gaza who gathered to try to obtain humanitarian aid as “heroes” and called for the aid to be halted. Ben Gvir said in a tweet on his account on the “X” platform: “Full support must be provided to our heroic fighters working in Gaza, who acted excellently against the mob of Gazans who tried to harm them.” He added: "It has been proven today that transferring humanitarian aid to Gaza is not only madness while our kidnappers are being held in the Strip in substandard conditions, but it also exposes IDF soldiers to danger." The extremist minister stressed, "This is another clear reason why we must stop transferring this aid, which actually amounts to harm to IDF soldiers and oxygen to Hamas."
US President Joe Biden announced that the United States will carry out an airdrop of food aid to Gaza , at a time when hunger is worsening and claiming the lives of more residents of the Palestinian Strip. Biden said in statements at the White House that the flow of aid to Gaza is not sufficient, and that his administration will do its best to deliver more of it. He added that Washington is trying to reach an agreement for an immediate ceasefire to allow more aid to enter the Gaza Strip.
For his part, Strategic Communications Coordinator for the US National Security Council, John Kirby, said that his country will carry out air drops of aid in coordination with its partners - especially Jordan - within days, adding that air drops of aid are not an alternative to delivering it by land. Kirby added that there will be more than one American airdrop, saying that Israel supports American efforts related to the expected landing operations. He stated that Washington will redouble its efforts to open a humanitarian sea corridor for large amounts of humanitarian aid to Gaza. Kirby said that the “incident” confirms the need to continue to find alternative ways to deliver humanitarian aid to the residents of Gaza, explaining that the United States called on Israel to investigate what happened, and wants answers as soon as possible. Available time.
According to the Wall Street Journal, some American officials believe that air drops are not effective in addressing the humanitarian crisis in the Strip. NBC reported that some US administration officials are angry at President Biden’s handling of the killing of civilians by Israeli army gunfire in the northern Gaza Strip.
The idea of an airdrop raises skepticism from some humanitarian groups. The report published by the Wall Street Journal indicates that American officials believe that “airdrops are not an effective way to address the humanitarian crisis inside Gaza, because each drop represents one to four trucks loaded with aid, while more than 250 trucks or Greater across land.”
Jeremy Konyndyk, head of Refugees International, told Reuters: “Airdrops are expensive and small in scale... and the fact that they even have to be contemplated represents a colossal failure of policy.” Richard Gowan, director of the International Crisis Group at the United Nations, told Reuters: “Humanitarian workers always complain that airdrops are just an opportunity to show off, but they are a poor way to deliver aid.” He added that the only way to bring in sufficient aid is through relief convoys that will follow the truce.
David Deptula, a retired US Air Force general who previously commanded the no-fly zone over northern Iraq, said the US military could carry out airdrops effectively. He added to Reuters, "They are experienced at this. There are many challenges with many details. But nothing is insurmountable."
In addition to the United States, Canada is also considering airdropping aid over the Gaza Strip, according to what the Associated Press reported from Canadian International Development Minister Ahmed Hussein. Jordan, with the participation of other countries, carried out several airdrops of aid over the Gaza Strip.
Washington announced that humanitarian aid will be delivered to Gaza, through “airdrops” and even “by sea,” not to mention the aid delivered by land via trucks. The use of these "expensive" methods of delivering aid recalls methods commonly used in times of natural disasters and the Cold War period, according to a Reuters report. Biden pledged that Washington would do its utmost to deliver more aid to the Gaza Strip, which is suffering from a deteriorating humanitarian situation and warnings of famine.
The US President's statements come at a time when the United Nations and several countries called for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip for humanitarian reasons, demanding an investigation after reports indicated that the Israeli army opened fire on Palestinian civilians and a stampede occurred during the distribution of aid on Thursday, leading to the deaths of more than 100. People, according to local authorities in Gaza, while Israel denied those accusations, and Washington said it was verifying “conflicting narratives.”
Biden considered that they were killed because the 2.4 million residents of Gaza were “stuck in a terrible war, unable to feed their families, and you saw what happened when they tried to get aid,” according to what was reported by Agence France-Presse. Biden expressed his hope to receive news "soon" about the discussions aimed at reaching a six-week humanitarian truce that would allow the release of Israeli hostages and the entry of aid into the Strip.
The US President pointed out that Washington would consider "the possibility of establishing a sea corridor" to deliver large amounts of aid to the besieged Palestinian Strip, according to Agence France-Presse. Kirby said that the United States would redouble its efforts to open a sea corridor to Gaza to deliver "hopefully large quantities" of humanitarian aid by sea. He added in a press briefing that the sea corridor will be at the forefront of efforts aimed at expanding the scope of aid delivery and that Washington "will continue to pressure Israel to facilitate the entry of more trucks and open more roads" to Gaza.
A report published by Reuters indicated that Washington may use supply ships from Cyprus to find ways to provide food to the residents of Gaza across the sea. The agency quoted an American official as saying that the other solution is to ship aid by sea from Cyprus, which is about 210 nautical miles from the coast of Gaza, adding that American officials visited Cyprus this week to discuss a possible process of sending humanitarian aid by sea.
The same official indicated that the US administration is examining the possibilities of using military or commercial ships, and that the matter will be “complicated in terms of securing the docking site.” The official said that no decision had been made regarding military participation in such an operation and that the Israelis were "very receptive" to the sea bridge option, because it would avoid disruption from protesters closing land crossings to aid convoys.
Biden stressed that the United States will "insist" on the need for Israel to allow additional amounts of aid to enter the Strip, which is facing catastrophic humanitarian conditions due to the war that has been ongoing for more than four months. He said in statements reported by the American ABC News network after his meeting with the Italian Prime Minister, on Friday: “In addition to expanding deliveries by land, as I said, we will insist that Israel facilitate more trucks and more ways to supply more.” More people will get the help they need."
He added, "There are no excuses, because the truth is that the aid flowing into Gaza is far from sufficient. The lives of innocent people are at stake, and the lives of children are at stake, and we will not stand idly by and leave them behind... until we can deliver more aid there. We must To deliver hundreds of trucks, not just a few trucks.”
US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said, without going into details, that American officials are studying a number of assistance measures, adding that Washington is holding talks with Israel to open a border crossing in northern Gaza. Miller added that there are "security and technical challenges" that hinder opening more border crossings, but Israel is ready to deal with them.
According to Israeli media, the fears of the Israeli security authorities regarding the upcoming Ramadan season in the West Bank and occupied Jerusalem are rising, amid warnings from the occupation that Hamas may exploit the most important time for Muslims as an opportunity to ignite the scene. The biblical holidays for the Jews this year intersect with the second week of Ramadan and Tarawih prayers, which may open the door to a new battle in Al-Aqsa Mosque. Ramadan is celebrated Mar 10, 2024 – Apr 9, 2024. Tarawih, also known as Taraweeh, is a voluntary (nafl) night prayer performed by Muslims during the Islamic month of Ramadan. Tarawih prayers are a sunnah of the Prophet, which means that it was his practice to perform them. Purim is a Jewish holiday that celebrates the survival of the Jewish people from annihilation in the 5th century BCE. The story is told in the Book of Esther and is known as the Feast of Lots. Purim dates are March 23–24, 2024.
Hamas called on 28 February 2024 for Palestinians to march to Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque at the start of Ramadan, raising the stakes. “This is a call on our people in Jerusalem and the West Bank to march to Al-Aqsa since the first day of Ramadan,” said Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh. “It is the duty of the Arab and Islamic nations to take the initiative to break the starvation conspiracy in Gaza,” Haniyeh said.
Israeli military and intelligence officials had recommended that restrictions be eased., The Israeli War Council had withdrawn powers regarding decisions in Al-Aqsa Mosque from extremist National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir.
Biden administration officials say they want to reach an agreement before the start of Ramadan. Israeli Defence Minister Gallant, asked about Biden’s optimistic, said: “Who am I to express an opinion about what the president said? I very much hope that he is right.” An Israeli official told the Hebrew Channel 12: Our goal is to reach a prisoner exchange deal before the month of Ramadan.
According to the HAMAS MoH in Gaza, the casualty toll from the incident on Rashid Street south of Gaza city on 29 February has risen to 112 fatalities and 760 injuries. A number of countries have called for an independent investigation into the circumstances surrounding the incident. Condemning the deaths, the UN Secretary-General stated that “the desperate civilians in Gaza need urgent help, including those in the besieged north where the United Nations has not been able to deliver aid in more than a week.”
The United States blocked consideration of a UN Security Council resolution blaming Israel for the dozens of deaths that occurred during the the delivery of humanitarian assistance in northern Gaza. While 14 of the 15 members of the Security Council favored approving the resolution, drafted by Algeria, the United States is one of five permanent members of the council with veto power. “We don’t have all the facts on the ground – that’s the problem” the deputy US ambassador, Robert Wood, said.
Israeli officials said shots fired as warnings were responsible for 10 Palestinian casualties, but said the vast majority of the deaths happened because of a chaotic stampede that they could not easily control.
War Termination
There is no end to the war in sight, as both sides still see the other as an “existential threat,” and there is no clear path to any kind of “permanent peace” between them.
Politico magazine quoted an American official as saying that Washington and Tel Aviv are awaiting the response of the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ) regarding a new proposal to exchange prisoners and stop the fighting for 6 weeks. On the other hand, Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Taiani called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, calling on Israel to protect civilians. “The tragic deaths in Gaza require an immediate ceasefire to facilitate the provision of more humanitarian aid, the release of hostages and the protection of civilians,” he wrote on the X platform.
Israeli media covered the negotiations aimed at a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and concluding a prisoner exchange deal, as well as the possibility of the Israeli army launching a ground operation in the border city of Rafah with Egypt during the month of Ramadan, in addition to field developments and booby-trapping houses in Gaza.
According to the Hebrew channel "Kan 11", if a truce deal is not reached, "the army will head to the camps of the Central Governorate or to Rafah," revealing that there is a major dilemma regarding Rafah in light of the presence of one million and five hundred thousand people in it, and the necessity of evacuating it of the population.
The channel indicated that the War Council has not yet given the army approval for plans for a ground operation in Rafah, but it will be forced to make imminent decisions regarding the continuation of fighting and the expansion of the ground operation during the month of Ramadan, if a deal is not reached with the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ).
For its part, Israeli Channel 12 quoted its military affairs correspondent as saying that there are still gaps between the two sides that have not yet been bridged, especially the standards for the number of prisoners and humanitarian issues in Gaza, despite his acknowledgment of cautious optimism.
Operational Update
“There were 24 regional battalions in Gaza — we have dismantled 18 of them,” Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told foreign reporters. “Now, Rafah is the next Hamas center of gravity.”
Intense Israeli bombardment from air, land and sea continues to be reported across much of the Gaza Strip, resulting in further civilian casualties, displacement, and destruction of civilian infrastructure. Ground operations and heavy fighting between Israeli forces and Palestinian armed groups also continue to be reported.
Arab analysts and academics agreed that deterring Israel from committing more crimes against the Palestinians is through imposing international sanctions on it and stopping the supply of weapons. They stressed the importance of Arab countries, especially influential ones, putting pressure on Israel’s allies.
Commenting on the international reactions, Dr. Ziad Majed, professor of political science at the American University in Paris, said that there is a change in the international view of Israel because of its crimes in Gaza, but this change will not lead to curbing the Israeli killing machine without sanctions imposed on the occupation and stopping the export of The weapons are his, and without pushing the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court , Karim Khan, to carry out his duty related to investigating the crimes committed by Israel, including the recent crime in the north of the besieged Strip.
Dr. Majid pointed out that Israel will continue its crimes if international humanitarian intervention does not also occur, as happened during the siege of Sarajevo when the Europeans and Americans landed direct humanitarian aid. He stressed the importance of putting pressure on the rulers of Western countries, and that there be Arab pressure in this direction, highlighting that international movements have great value and played a role in isolating the apartheid regime in South Africa.
In the opinion of Professor of Political Science at An-Najah National University, Dr. Hassan Ayoub, the American administration often ignores the crimes committed by Israel in Gaza and the West Bank , so the occupation will continue to shed Palestinian blood. He said, “Since Israel does not pay a price, it will continue its aggression and commit more massacres against the Palestinians.”
The academic and expert on Israeli affairs, Dr. Muhannad Mustafa, went in the same direction, saying that the international pressures now being exerted on Israel are limited to political and diplomatic pressures and sometimes the hope that it will stop its aggression against Gaza, and as long as there is no serious pressure, Netanyahu will continue his crimes against the Palestinians. Especially since he markets himself internally as a solid and strong leader who stands up to the world.
Regarding the impact of the recent massacre in the northern Gaza Strip on the course of the war and the prisoner exchange deal between the Palestinian resistance and the occupation, Dr. Mustafa said that Israel is counting on the weapon of starvation to pressure the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ) and try to impose its conditions on the truce agreement that is being negotiated.
The Israeli forces had conflicting accounts of targeting Palestinian civilians at the Nabulsi roundabout in Gaza City while they were waiting for humanitarian aid. While the occupation army said that the stampede led to a large number of casualties, it published pictures from drones that did not show any stampede.
Agence France-Presse quoted the spokesman for the Secretary-General, Stephane Dujarric, as saying, “On Friday, a United Nations team visited wounded people in Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, and examined a large number of wounds that were the result of gunshot wounds.” He added, "200 wounded are still in this hospital, out of more than 700 who were transferred to it."
According to the American newspaper "The Washington Post", which based its account of the tragedy on 12 interviews with eyewitnesses, doctors, relief workers, and Israeli and United Nations military officials, analysis of dozens of video clips, including an edited video released by the Israeli army, reveals that the crowds ran and bent down while... Bodies were lying on the road near two Israeli armored vehicles, and seriously injured and bloodied people arrived at several hospitals.
The Israeli army spoke of expanding the scope of its operations in Khan Yunis in the past few days, and said that it entered parts of the city that were spared from the fighting, claiming that it killed and arrested many Palestinian militants.
Palestinian resistance factions confirm that they are engaged in fierce clashes with the Israeli forces penetrating Khan Yunis and its environs and are incurring losses. In addition to Khan Yunis, the pace of fighting has recently escalated in the Zaytoun neighborhood in Gaza City, and the Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas) , confirmed yesterday, Thursday, the bombing of two tunnel holes and a mine building by the occupation forces in the Zaytoun neighborhood, resulting in the killing and wounding of many of its members.
Israeli (unofficial) communication platforms reported that a “difficult event” occurred to Israeli occupation army soldiers east of the city of Khan Yunis after bombing a building containing soldiers, noting that the army does not announce its losses until after the end of Saturday vacation. Palestinian websites quoted Israeli media reports that an Israeli force was subjected to a precise ambush in Khan Yunis. Israeli sources reported that 15 soldiers were present in the building that was blown up by the resistance.
AMLAH in hiding apartments and terrorists hiding in schools: documentation of the activities of the 7th TZK fighters in Khan Yunis. The combat team of the Bislah Brigade (828) entered the heart of Khan Yunis last night and joined the fighting alongside other brigade combat teams under Division 98, which continue fighting to defeat the terrorist organization Hamas. In the last day, the brigade's forces identified two terrorists armed with weapons, one of them carrying a bag with a bomb in it. A helicopter A battle attacked and eliminated the terrorists.
During the last day, the forces of the 7th Brigade's combat team raided a series of terrorist infrastructures in western Khan Yunis, during which they located a weapons warehouse containing a large number of Kalashnikov-type weapons and ammunition. During the operation, the brigade's fire complex targeted an aircraft that eliminated four terrorists who were moving towards the brigade's fighters. Also in the Khan Yunis area, a fighter jet targeted the fire center of the 98th division and attacked a launch pit where rockets had been planted.
Following the launches carried out yesterday from the territory of the Gaza Strip into the territory of Israel, aircraft attacked the area from which the launches were carried out in the north of the Gaza Strip and a number of other targets in the area, including a tunnel shaft and military buildings used by the terrorist organization Hamas, directed by the fire center of the Southern Command.
In the center of the strip, the battle team of the Nahal Brigade eliminated a number of terrorists throughout the last day. In one of the activities, the force detected a terrorist squad approaching them, and eliminated it by firing mortars and a Gil missile.
Israeli army completed its preparations for the holy month of Ramadan, during which exercises were carried out simulating escalation scenarios in the West Bank. The Israeli army says it is prepared to confront escalation in the West Bank during the month of RamadanHe previously called for bombing Gaza with nuclear weapons. An Israeli minister demands “erasing the term Ramadan.”
The battalion commanders passed through a number of stations led by the brigade commanders, where different scenarios and methods of dealing were simulated. The training included simulations of ambushes, settlement protection, and scenarios of what the Hebrew media called “riots.” Chief of Staff Major General Herzi Halevy addressed the commanders, saying: “The intense activity carried out by the IDF in cooperation with the Shin Bet to combat terrorism in Eyush prevents security escalation and allows us to focus on the fighting in Gaza and Lebanon.” He added: "You have a great responsibility to arrive prepared and strong for every task, and this is even more important in the month of Ramadan."
On 29 February, two Israeli settlers, including a 16-year-old child, were killed when a Palestinian man from Qalandiya Refugee Camp opened fire at a gas station on Road 60 near Eli settlement in Nablus. The man was subsequently shot and killed by an Israeli settler at the scene. Israeli media reported that a settler was the one who shot the perpetrator of the attack, a former prisoner and Palestinian police officer from the Qalandiya camp, north of occupied Jerusalem. Following the incident, Israeli forces closed most of the checkpoints and roads that connect the northern West Bank to the central and southern governorates. Settlers also gathered in multiple areas, preventing Palestinian vehicles from using Road 60. On 29 February, Israeli forces shot at three Palestinian brothers near Beit ‘Awwa village in Hebron, reportedly for attempting to enter Israel through informal openings in the Barrier, killing two of them, aged 26 and 34 years, and injuring the third.
Israeli forces stormed the Qalandia camp, north of occupied Jerusalem , and confrontations broke out with Palestinian youths, while a second wounded man was killed when he was shot by the occupation soldiers at the entrance to the town of Beit Awa in Hebron , south of the West Bank , on Thursday evening.
The Israeli occupation forces withdrew from Qalandia camp in the West Bank after a military operation, while two young men were martyred and a third was injured after the occupation soldiers opened fire on a group of young men at the entrance to the town of Beit Awa, south of Hebron . The occupation forces stormed the camp with the aim of conducting an engineering survey of the house of the perpetrator of the shooting attack that occurred yesterday, Thursday, at a gas station in the “Eli” settlement, which resulted in the killing of two Israelis.
Also, the IDF forces arrested during the night in the village of Deir Abu Daif in the Menashe division a wanted person suspected of being involved in terrorist activity. IDF forces have now begun an activity to map the home of the terrorist Muhammad Manazar in Qalandiya in the Binyamin Brigade. The terrorist Muhammad of Nazareth carried out the shooting attack earlier today (Thursday) at the Baali gas station, in which two Israeli citizens were murdered.
Engineering forces, soldiers of the Devdavan unit and reserve forces operated tonight in Qalandia in the Binyamin Brigade area to map the home of the terrorist Muhammad of Nazareth, who carried out yesterday's shooting attack at the Ali gas station where he killed two Israeli citizens. During the mapping, the forces located a gun in the terrorist's house.
The Chief of Staff arrived tonight (Thursday) at the scene of the attack at the Baali gas station and held a situational assessment to strengthen security in the area, together with the commander of the Judea and Samaria Division, the commander of the Benjamin Brigade, representatives of the Central Command, the Shin Bet and the police. The Chief of Staff met Aviad Gazbar, a reserve officer in the Givati Brigade, who eliminated the terrorist, and praised his brave action that prevented a greater disaster and said: "This is a serious attack, in which two Israeli civilians were killed, and we mourn their deaths. With the professional action of a reserve officer who came out of fighting in Gaza, the event ended and an even bigger disaster was avoided." He continued "The countermeasure effort of the security forces at the Central Command continues all the time, and we will draw the lessons from this incident to strengthen the defense."
Al Jazeera's correspondent reported that the occupation forces raided last night the house of the martyr Muhammad Manasra, who carried out the operation, in the camp north of occupied Jerusalem during the storming. The reporter said that confrontations broke out between Palestinian youths and the occupation forces during the storming operation, adding that one of the youths was injured by bullets from the occupation forces after they opened fire on a car at the entrance to the camp.
There were conflicting reports about the number of perpetrators of this operation, as Israeli Army Radio said that the perpetrator was one person, a resident of Qalandiya near the city of Jerusalem, while Israeli media sources reported that “a cell of 3 gunmen carried out the shooting operation in the settlement.”
For its part, the Israeli newspaper Maariv said that the army activated warnings in the Eli settlement due to fears that another person among the perpetrators of the operation would infiltrate after he withdrew from the place.
Amid raids in various areas of the West Bank, the occupation forces killed two young men in Beit Awa. The Palestinian Red Crescent said that the two martyrs and the injured person were transferred to Dura Governmental Hospital.
This comes as the Jenin Brigade , affiliated with the Al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Jihad Movement, announced that its fighters clashed with the occupation forces in the Al-Fawwara axis and targeted its vehicles at the Sanour roundabout.
In related developments, the Israeli occupation authorities released about 40 Palestinian prisoners last night, as the Israeli Prison Service gathered the prisoners in the Ofer military prison, west of Ramallah, before releasing them from the prison gate all at once and suddenly. Citizens received the prisoners and some of them were transferred to their towns and families, and a number of them showed signs of torture and ill-treatment. Previously, the Israeli army explained in a statement that the security services decided to release administrative detainees whose detention period had expired, due to limited space in prisons and in order to make room for the most dangerous detainees, according to the statement.
For his part, the Israeli Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben Gvir , attacked the Israeli move on the “ X ” platform , and said that the administrative detainees were not released due to prison overcrowding, but rather in honor of the head of the Shin Bet in preparation for the month of Ramadan. Ben Gvir added that it is disturbing that they were released on the day Israelis were killed, in reference to the "Eli" settlement operation, considering that the head of the Shin Bet is thus honoring the killers, as he put it.
This comes at a time when Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich announced that he would ask the Council of Ministers for a “change of approach” in the West Bank, considering that the reason for what is happening is not the economy but rather a “deep hatred for Israel,” and that there is no difference between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. He added that Ramadan every year, and the period preceding it, cannot be turned into a bloodbath for the killing of Jews. He pointed out, "This is not an inevitable fate, but rather something that requires the army to expand its military efforts, not reduce them, and close roads, restore checkpoints, and expand settlement as an appropriate Zionist response."
Al Jazeera's correspondent reported that a young Palestinian man was injured after settlers attacked him near the entrance to the village of Al-Sawiya, south of the city of Nablus. Eyewitnesses said that masked settlers, who were in a vehicle on a street between the cities of Ramallah and Nablus, intercepted the young man on the road, beat him without any reason, and then fled.
Three Palestinians were also injured by bullets from the occupation forces in Jenin camp. Palestinian medical sources reported that one of the injured was seriously injured due to a head injury. An Israeli special force infiltrated a civilian vehicle into the Khallet Al-Souha area, west of the camp, and stormed a residential building before military forces arrived at the site. The occupation forces arrested a young man from inside the building, at a time when clashes broke out with Palestinian resistance fighters during the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the camp.
The Lebanese "Hezbollah" announced this evening, Friday, that it had targeted shelters at the Israeli Khirbet Ma'ar base with two "Falq" missiles, confirming that "it was a direct hit." In a statement, Hezbollah said: “In support of our steadfast Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip and in support of their valiant and honorable resistance, the Mujahideen of the Islamic Resistance targeted, at 09:20 pm, on Friday (today’s time), prison shelters. At the Khirbet Ma'ar base, he was hit by two Falaq missiles and was directly hit.
Fighter jets attacked a military structure of the terrorist organization Hezbollah in the area of Aita al-Sha'ab in southern Lebanon. In addition, warplanes attacked the organization's terrorist infrastructure in the Lavon area. In a combination of air and artillery strikes, the IDF attacked terrorist infrastructure and military structures of the Hezbollah terrorist organization and eliminated a number of terrorists who left a military structure. IDF warplanes and artillery attacked a terrorist infrastructure and two Hizbollah military buildings in the Ramya area. A number of terrorists were spotted leaving one of the military buildings, an aircraft attacked and eliminated them shortly after.
The Chief of Staff in training for the commanders of the PAKMZ : "The activity to counter terrorism prevents escalation and allows to focus on the fighting in Gaza and Lebanon." Fighter jets attacked a military structure of the Hezbollah terrorist organization in the area of Aita al-Sha'ab. Also, another military structure and terrorist infrastructure of the organization in the Jebel Balt area were attacked.
A number of launches from Lebanese territory into an open area in the Margaliot area have been detected. In the neighborhood from where they launched an attack on the Otaf settlements: this is how Givati SDF fighters attack terrorist infrastructures and eliminate terrorists.
Maps
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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 [in old days] 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.
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Bystanders
The risk of death from starvation in Gaza is reportedly growing, disproportionately affecting children and pregnant women, and is exacerbated by inadequate water, sanitation and health services, the severing of power and fuel supplies, and the decimation of food production and agriculture. The HAMAS Ministry of Health in Gaza reported that another four children have died of malnutrition and dehydration, bringing to 10 such child fatalities so far. Save the Children warned that Gaza is witnessing “a mass killing of children in slow motion because there is no food left and nothing getting to them,” echoing earlier warnings of the threat of malnutrition among children by UNICEF and the World Health Organization (WHO).
The Secretary General of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), Jan Egeland, reported witnessing “the children of Gaza visibly malnourished, reduced to searching the streets for food and assistance. … It is unimaginable that an entire population is left to starve while vast amounts of supplies sit waiting just a few miles away across the border." The NRC Secretary General called on all states supporting the parties to the conflict to “insist on a ceasefire and full humanitarian access and aid supplies. The human suffering in Gaza is already beyond belief, and this war on civilians must end immediately.”
On 29 February, the Union of Gaza Strip Municipalities appealed for the prompt entry of fuel to the Gaza city and northern Gaza governorates, to enable the municipalities to provide basic services including water, wastewater treatment and solid waste collection and transfer. Neither governorate has received fuel since the end of October 2023, compounded by the electricity cut, leading to a significant gap in service provision and a lack of water, and to the accumulation of waste and overflow of sewage. The union also appealed for the provision of heavy and medium machinery and back-up generators to replace destroyed equipment.
According to Care, an analysis of satellite images reveals that cities in the Gaza Strip have experienced an enormous decrease in electricity, with nighttime light reduced by 84 per cent, and Gaza city witnessing the largest reduction at 91 per cent. The analysis found that 70 per cent of hospitals had little or no nighttime light, with power outages being particularly severe in Gaza city and North Gaza. “Power means life or death in hospitals. We hear of newborns dying because there is no electricity for the incubators; children ceasing to breathe and mothers dying on the operation table simply because lifesaving machinery switched off,” the Care Country Director stated.
The storage and transport capacity inside Gaza remains challenging with ongoing assessments for identification of additional storage options. There is an urgent need to increase the fleet of delivery trucks. The food security situation in the Middle Area and southern governorates is also critical, with most of the population queuing for hours to receive food when trucks manage to enter. In Rafah, the situation is increasingly concerning, with growing reports of people stopping aid trucks to take food and eat it immediately.
Arab and Islamic countries and organizations denounced the “flour massacre,” amid demands for an independent investigation and action by the UN Security Council. In a statement, the Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs considered this targeting a heinous massacre, and an integral part of the genocidal war committed by the occupation government against our people to evacuate the entire area of the northern Gaza Strip of citizens.
For its part, Qatar condemned in the strongest terms Israel's perpetration of a "new massacre" in Gaza and demands urgent international action to end the aggression against the Gaza Strip immediately, according to a statement by the Qatari Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs affirmed, in a statement yesterday, that the continued brutal crimes of the occupation, as part of its brutal war on the Gaza Strip, prove day after day the urgent need for urgent international action to immediately end this unprecedented aggression in recent history, in preparation for addressing the catastrophic humanitarian conditions in the Strip, Which threatens a real famine in northern Gaza as a result of the siege, bombing, and failure.
As for Saudi Arabia , it said in a statement by its Foreign Ministry that it expresses strong condemnation and denunciation of the Israeli targeting of the aid gathering, stressing the Kingdom’s categorical rejection of violations of international humanitarian law by any party and under any pretext.
In a statement to its Foreign Ministry, the UAE strongly condemned the Israeli targeting, and demanded an independent and transparent investigation and the punishment of those responsible, warning of the catastrophic humanitarian situation that is extremely sensitive and dangerous in Gaza.
In a statement by its Foreign Ministry, Kuwait described the Israeli targeting as a new crime committed by the Israeli occupation forces against a number of unarmed Palestinian civilians, expressing its condemnation of it.
The Sultanate of Oman expressed , in a statement by its Foreign Ministry, its strong condemnation and denunciation of the targeting itself, and considered it a brutal attack.
In turn, Egypt condemned the aforementioned Israeli targeting, and considered it a shameful crime and a blatant violation, calling on the main international parties and the Security Council to cease fire, and bear the humanitarian, moral and legal responsibility to stop the Israeli war against the Gaza Strip, and provide protection for the Palestinian people.
The Secretary-General of the Arab League , Ahmed Aboul Gheit , condemned the massacre and appealed to international powers to intensify pressure on the Israeli occupation to stop the daily massacres and comply with international law. In turn, the Gulf Cooperation Council , the Muslim World League , and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation expressed their strong condemnation of the targeting, considering it a brutal targeting of civilians. It renewed its urgent call to the international community to intervene urgently in order to stop the genocide crimes committed by the Israeli occupation and provide international protection for Palestinian civilians.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres expressed his "shock" at these events, which he condemned, calling for an "effective independent investigation" to determine the circumstances of what happened and those responsible for it.
United Nations Humanitarian Relief Coordinator, Martin Griffiths, expressed his feeling of “horror” after Israeli forces opened fire on Palestinians while they were waiting to receive aid in the besieged Gaza Strip. He added, "Even after nearly 5 months of brutal hostilities, there are still new shocks in Gaza." He continued, "I am horrified by reports that hundreds of people were killed and injured while transporting aid supplies in Gaza City today."
The United Nations Security Council held an emergency meeting on Thursday to discuss the repercussions of the “ flour massacre ,” in which the Israeli occupation army killed more than 100 Palestinians and wounded nearly a thousand when they gathered north of Gaza City to receive humanitarian aid.
During the session called by Algeria, the Palestinian delegate to the United Nations, Riyad Mansour, called for the issuance of a resolution calling for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. Mansour told reporters, "This brutal massacre is evidence that as long as the Security Council is paralyzed and the veto is imposed, the Palestinians are paying with their lives." The Palestinian official's statement came after the United States used its veto power last week for the third time to block a draft resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.
According to the text, the draft statement places responsibility for what happened on “the Israeli forces that opened fire,” but the text did not pass because presidential statements can only be approved unanimously. Mansour said after the meeting that “14 members supported the text,” while a diplomatic source stated that the United States voted against it because it refused to hold Israel responsible for what happened.
Robert Wood, Deputy US Ambassador to the United Nations, said, “The parties are working on the wording to see if we can reach a statement,” indicating the possibility that an agreement in this regard may be reached later.
Axis of Resistance
In an exclusive interview with Al Jazeera Net, Hamas leader Osama Hamdan said that Israel only wants to exchange prisoners, while the resistance wants to stop the aggression once and for all, withdraw from Gaza , bring in aid, rebuild and return the displaced to their homes, and that the prisoner exchange process comes within this context.
Hamdan, who follows the details of the indirect negotiations between Hamas and Israel through mediating countries, led by Qatar and Egypt, revealed that until now, the negotiations are still taking place within the general framework. He explained to Al Jazeera Net that there is no detailed discussion of names or even numbers, while the focus is on a general framework that is discussed until an agreement is reached on it. He stressed that the negotiations are not required to implement what Israel wants, but rather to achieve an end to the Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people.
The Hamas leader said that US President Joe Biden is not a mediator, but rather a partner in the aggression and may have bet on the Israelis to eliminate the resistance, “but he failed.” Hamdan also praised Hezbollah's resistance in southern Lebanon, stressing that the occupation is incapable of launching a widespread aggression against Lebanon.
The most prominent question today: Where have the negotiations reached regarding the exchange deal and truce with the Israeli occupation?
Talking about the issue of the exchange deal now is taking things in an inaccurate direction. For us, the talk is centered around stopping the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip, withdrawing Israeli forces, ending military operations and allowing the displaced to return to their homes, bringing in aid and rebuilding Gaza. The issue of prisoner exchange comes in this context and not It is the basic process.
Until this moment, the Israelis are still obstructing the negotiation process and trying to gain more time, and their philosophy throughout this path is to ensure the continuation of the aggression, and not stop it on the Gaza Strip.
What do the scenes of these negotiations reveal? What are the files that constitute the node in reaching the deal? Can it be overcome soon? The basic complex is that Israel does not want to stop the aggression, but rather wants to be able to continue it at any time, and Israel is focusing in this direction. As for us, we cannot and our people cannot accept the continuation of the Israeli aggression. Therefore, if Israel does not accept to stop the aggression, I do not think that there is a serious prospect of success in these negotiations.
Here comes the role of the mediators. The negotiation is not required to implement what Israel wants, but rather to end the Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people, allow the entry of relief to the Palestinians, end the siege, and launch the process of rebuilding the Gaza Strip. This is what is required and this is the normal situation that should occur.
US President Joe Biden said that it is possible to reach a ceasefire in Gaza early next week. How realistic does this date seem? Can the deal be completed in the coming days? There is a question that sometimes arises about Biden’s ability to focus, but I think that this statement in itself is an attempt by the American administration to put pressure on the Palestinian side by saying that things are about to get close, so that it appears that the Palestinian side is the one obstructing, and this means that Biden is not a mediator, but rather a mediator. A partner in the aggression, and he is also a partner in trying to pressure the Israelis. I believe that stopping the aggression does not need Monday or the following day, and if Biden decides publicly and through practice to stop supplying the Zionist entity with weapons, stop financing this war, and stop providing political cover for the Zionist entity to continue its aggression, the aggression will stop directly. But the aggression continues because all these issues exist, and Biden speaks in a way of political hypocrisy in an attempt to serve his deteriorating electoral reality, but in practice he still stands by the occupation in all its aggression. In fact, he is a partner in this aggression.
How do you read the change in the American position, which moved from the goal of eliminating Hamas to moving at a rapid pace to achieve a deal and ceasefire in Gaza, and what has changed?
The change that occurred is that the Americans discovered that the Israelis were unable to achieve the goals of the aggression, and that the entire Israeli operation launched against the Gaza Strip left behind destruction and a crime of genocide, but it did not end the resistance in the Gaza Strip, and it will not end it, whether in Gaza or in Palestine.
The Palestinian people have been resistant for 75 years. At every stage, the Israeli says that he wants to eliminate the resistance, and that he is close to eliminating the resistance. He discovers that he has failed, and that the resistance is increasing and its base is expanding.
I believe that the American may have bet on the Israeli that he might succeed in eliminating the resistance, and today the American is discovering that the idea of eliminating the resistance is not achievable, because the resistance is not a specific group within the Palestinian people. The resistance is the entire Palestinian people, and that the anomaly and discordance of the Palestinian people is Which comes out of the circle of resistance and leaves it, but everyone who remains in the circle of resistance in practice is the true expression of the Palestinian people.
It is not possible to defeat a people who have endured 75 years in the face of occupation, and who still cling to their rights despite the killing, deportation, displacement and asylum, and who still see Palestine as their homeland, and that their cause is to liberate Palestine.
There is a leak of information saying that Hamas implicitly agreed not to rule the Gaza Strip after the war, and requested that aid be sent directly to the Palestinian people. Are these leaks accurate?
Here there are 3 points:
- The first point relates to sending aid to the Palestinian people, and the movement’s policy has always been that whoever wants to provide aid to the Palestinian people should provide it directly. We do what we can to support the Palestinian people, but everyone is called to provide assistance to the Palestinian people, and we do not consider ourselves concerned with control or hegemony in the issue of supporting the Palestinian people. This is a right and a duty that should be done.
- The second point relates to the governance framework, not in Gaza, but rather to leadership at the Palestinian national level. We have always said that in the leadership of the Palestinian people there is a national program and decision, a popular decision, and the program must respect the will of the Palestinian people, and for that to be effective the people must elect them. The Palestinian leadership. Therefore, Hamas never had a problem with whether or not it was in leadership. The problem or issue was always that the Palestinian people must choose and elect their leadership.
- If I want to return to the question (the third point), we did not make a commitment to this or that. We said clearly that we support the choice of the Palestinian people, and therefore we discussed and are discussing with the Palestinian factions and presented an idea to them, and many of them responded to it and we hope that everyone will respond to it, which is that it should be There is a government that is formed by decision of the factions and with their authority, and its mission is to work for the relief of Gaza, rebuild it, and defend Jerusalem. Its second basic mission is also to arrange general Palestinian elections, in which the Palestinian people elect their representatives in the National Council, the Legislative Council, and in the Palestinian presidency.
Regarding the release of prisoners with high sentences, the occupation stipulated that they be deported outside Palestine. Can this condition be discussed or accepted by Hamas? Are there exceptions placed by the occupation on certain names?
Until now, we are still talking in the general framework. There has been no detailed discussion about names or even numbers. There is a general framework that is being discussed until an agreement is reached on it, then we can move on to the details. Therefore, the issue of deportation, names, and all these issues is too early to talk about now.
What the Israelis, perhaps the Americans, or some parties are spreading is an attempt to impose a mental image, as if the issue is only the issue of prisoners, while we affirm as a movement that the main issue is stopping the aggression, providing relief to the Palestinian people, returning the displaced to their homes, and rebuilding Gaza, and exchange is part of this and not all of it. The process we seek to achieve.
The occupation described Hamas's demands as unrealistic. What demands does the occupation refuse to respond to? To what extent is the movement prepared to negotiate and respond to Israeli intransigence?
If we come to reality, it is for the occupation to end, for Israel to disappear, and for the Palestinian people to regain their land and homeland. What is not reality is what the occupation wants, which is to remain in place and free to attack the Palestinian people, and to remain able to kill the Palestinians and expel them from their homes at any time and in any way he wanted.
In these negotiations, the Israelis want to continue the aggression, and they also want to recover the prisoners of war from their soldiers held by the resistance. The realistic issue that we have raised is stopping the aggression, which will lead to the completion of the prisoner exchange, the introduction of aid, and the reconstruction of Gaza.
I believe that what Hamas presented was very realistic and logical, but the Israeli, who enjoys a partnership from the Americans in his aggression, believes that this partnership can serve the continuation of the aggression.
Do you think that the occupation is serious about carrying out a military operation in Rafah in light of the density of displaced people in the region, despite the warnings of the United States, the West, and some Arab countries? Or is this out of pressure on the resistance?
The Israelis have not hidden for a moment since the start of the aggression that it is comprehensive, and all the statements of the leaders of the Zionist entity, starting from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu all the way to the Minister of War and the army commanders, talk about that, and what we are doing today in the negotiations is trying to prevent the aggression against Rafah.
The Israelis want this aggression and are preparing for it, and we are trying to precede this aggression by reaching a ceasefire agreement, but the Israeli intention is clear and declared, and our intention is also clear and declared, that we want to stop this aggression.
As for Rafah , it is full of displaced people, and the Israelis did not care about the killing or destruction. Until now, we are talking about about 120 thousand martyrs, missing persons and wounded. If the Israelis had cared about civilians, we might have found that the picture was different.
In what context does the resignation of the Shtayyeh government come? How do you expect the composition and program of the next government?
I believe that this resignation may have come at an inappropriate time, because it came in light of talk about a renewed authority, and I hope that this is not in response to American demands, while I stress that the Palestinian demand is to form a government agreed upon by the Palestinian factions, and whose mission will be to deal with Gaza relief and reconstruction. Preparing for the general Palestinian national elections.
What do you expect from the meeting of the Palestinian factions in Moscow, and what is the validity of discussing the formation of a unity government? Are the current conditions prepared to achieve this goal?
Talking about the Moscow meeting must pay attention to two issues:
First, we do not want to raise hopes too much about the possible outcomes of this meeting, as it is like all Palestinian national meetings, if no goal is achieved, this does not mean that it is the end.
Secondly, in our opinion, this meeting should be discussed realistically, meaning that it should focus on the current Palestinian reality that there is Israeli aggression against Gaza, the West Bank, and Jerusalem.
In light of the Israeli aggression on Gaza, which is the clearest picture, we must not forget that the Israelis have assassinated nearly 400 Palestinian resistance fighters and persecutors during these five months in the West Bank, and there are also a number of martyrs, perhaps close to half of this number, and there are also thousands of prisoners. The Palestinians may have exceeded 6,000 prisoners.
Meaning that the aggression in the West Bank is ongoing, perhaps not in the form we see in Gaza, but it is also an aggression that includes the entire West Bank, including areas classified as “A” in which the Palestinian National Authority and its security services control, and Jerusalem is also witnessing an ongoing aggression.
This meeting is required to focus on ending the Israeli aggression. In this sense, any arrangements based on this idea are headed in the right direction. Any discussion or dialogue in other directions, I believe, will be an expression of a lack of sense of responsibility towards the people and the Palestinian cause.
What are the real goals behind some countries suspending their financial aid to UNRWA?
It is no secret that there has been an American-Israeli program, for years, aimed at liquidating UNRWA as a legal witness to the refugee issue. Now, the Americans believe, in agreement with the Israelis, that it is a good and favorable opportunity to close this file and end UNRWA, by liquidating its financial situation.
Unfortunately, there are countries - without any logic - that responded to American pressures. It is understood that the Americans are fighting UNRWA, but for many countries to respond to American pressures and conditions (this) confirms that the path that America and Israel want is to liquidate UNRWA as part of the Palestinian refugee process.
In any case, I believe that if the Americans want to liquidate UNRWA, what is required nationally is that there be forms and patterns of Palestinian national action on the level of the refugee issue, and that it preserve this issue and perhaps strengthen efforts in this regard, in a better way than it was.
Where is the battle on the northern front with Hezbollah going, especially after the recent escalation in the bombing of Baalbek?
I believe that the northern Palestinian front and the southern Lebanese front played an important role in supporting and assisting the resistance, and Hezbollah provided martyrs, sacrifices, and wounded, which confirms the importance of this front, and the danger of the Zionist entity at the same time, to Lebanon and not to the resistance alone.
I believe that the Israeli was frank that he wanted to continue the aggression against Lebanon, but at the same time, he was unable to do so. The exhaustion that the occupation army is suffering from, which drives it to request a temporary truce in Gaza, clearly means that it is unable to launch a broad aggression against Lebanon, and it is fully aware The results will be disastrous for him and for the Zionist entity.
In any case, everyone must understand that the resistance - whether in Palestine or Lebanon - does not invite war. It is a natural reaction to the occupation. If the occupation is removed, the matter will end. Therefore, people must not stop when asking what the resistance will do. Rather, everyone must stop. When the most important question is how to end the occupation? Because that is what will bring reassurance and stability to the region.
How do you see the impact of the Ansar Allah group in Yemen opening a front in the Red Sea on the war in Gaza, in light of the American mobilization and some European countries to confront Houthi operations in one of the most important water straits?
I believe that what the brothers in Yemen, in (the Ansar Allah group ), did, was an influential and important effort in the confrontation with the Zionist entity, as they presented a clear title in this battle, which is that there is a Zionist siege on Gaza that must stop, otherwise the ships will not be allowed Which is heading to the Zionist entity in transit.
The American administration attempted to exaggerate the issue in the context of incitement against Yemen and “Ansar Allah,” and I believe it failed in that, because it only intervened in the battle of aggression with Britain only.
What the brothers in the “Ansar Allah group” do is important, and if it were not for its influence and importance, we would not have witnessed an American reaction such as the aggression targeting civilians in Yemen. The bombing of Sana’a or Hodeidah as densely populated cities expresses the same Israeli mentality in the aggression against civilians in Gaza to put pressure on the leadership. Political.
How do you read the Israeli War Council’s cancellation of Ben Gvir’s decision to restrict Palestinians’ access to Al-Aqsa Mosque during Ramadan?
I believe that there is an agreement within the occupation government to get rid of the Palestinian people, but the disagreement lies in the mechanisms and progression of that and the arrangements. There is a team in the government that believes that provoking the Palestinians in the territories occupied in 1948 may not serve the entire project, so it is trying to postpone it, had it not been for the occupation’s realization that this It will cause problems if he cancels this decision.
If the Palestinians move in defense of their rights, they constitute a real state of pressure on the occupation, and are capable of achieving an achievement in confronting it, no matter how loud the voices say that there is no point in resistance, confrontation, or defending rights. What achieves national demands and goals is for the occupation to realize that the price Its survival is expensive, and very expensive, with all possible forms of resistance.
What is your message today to the Palestinian people in Gaza?
The most important message is that the Palestinian people in Gaza have performed - I do not say their role - but rather the greatest form of steadfastness and sacrifice possible in Palestinian national history and in the history of the issue, and our responsibility, and what we are working on, is to stop the aggression, end the suffering, and stabilize our people, through urgent relief, the return of the displaced, and reconstruction. Gaza strip.
If the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip does not stop, the resistance will remain committed to confronting this aggression until this cessation is fully achieved, and the Palestinian people can live their lives away from the direct daily threat from the Israeli occupation forces.
Allied for Democracy
In a report by The New York Times, American Columnist Thomas Friedman highlighted that "Israel" is losing on three fronts. He suggests that the occupation entity is losing the global narrative that it is engaged in a just war, adding that "it has no plan to ever get out of Gaza, so it will eventually sink into the sands there with a permanent occupation that will surely complicate relations with all its Arab allies and friends across the globe."
Friedman explains that "Israel" is also losing regionally to Iran and the Lebanese Resistance in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen, who are pressuring the northern, southern, and eastern borders of occupied Palestine. According to him, the only solution for "Israel" is a "two-state solution", which he believes would strengthen the occupation's relationship with its Arab allies. However, he warns that if "Israel" fails to see the solution, it would be "imperiling decades of diplomacy to get the world to recognize the right of the Jewish people to national self-determination and self-defense in their historic homeland."
In a message to US President Joe Biden and the Israeli people, Friedman stressed that "I am seeing the increasingly rapid erosion of Israel’s standing among friendly nations — a level of acceptance and legitimacy that was painstakingly built up over decades," warning that "if Biden is not careful, America’s global standing will plummet right along with Israel’s."
The French Foreign Ministry said, "We are affected by reports of a very large number of civilian casualties during the distribution of aid in Gaza," adding that "the shooting by Israeli soldiers of civilians trying to obtain food is unjustified." Paris called on "Israel to comply with the rules of international law and protect the distribution of humanitarian aid," noting that "there is an urgent need for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza to allow the delivery of humanitarian aid."
French President Emmanuel Macron said that "the situation in Gaza is tragic," calling for the protection of civilians and an immediate ceasefire to allow the distribution of humanitarian aid. Macron expressed "deep dissatisfaction with the images that arrived from Gaza, where civilians were targeted by Israeli soldiers," and said, "I express my strong rejection of this targeting, and I demand truth, justice, and respect for international law."
European Commissioner for Foreign Policy, Josep Borrell, he condemned the "new massacre" and stressed that depriving people of food aid constitutes a serious violation of international humanitarian law. “I am horrified by reports of another massacre among civilians in Gaza who are in dire need of humanitarian aid,” Borrell said on the X platform, adding that the deaths were “completely unacceptable.” According to Borrell, "humanitarian aid must be allowed to reach Gaza without hindrance."
Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Jolie said that what happened in Gaza is a nightmare, and that international aid must be sent to the Strip and those who will receive it must be protected.
For his part, Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albarez condemned what happened, saying on the X platform that “the unacceptable nature of what happened in Gaza, where dozens of Palestinian civilians are dying while waiting for food, confirms the urgent need for a ceasefire.” He added that "humanitarian aid must enter without obstacles," stressing "the need to respect international humanitarian law."
British Foreign Secretary David, Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton, said "The deaths of people in Gaza waiting for an aid convoy yesterday were horrific. There must be an urgent investigation and accountability. This must not happen again. We can't separate what happened yesterday from the inadequate aid supplies. In February only half the number of trucks crossed into Gaza that did in January. This is simply unacceptable.
"Israel has an obligation to ensure that significantly more humanitarian aid reaches the people of Gaza. We have identified a series of bottlenecks that need addressing: Israel must urgently open more crossings into Gaza; eliminate bureaucratic obstacles; enable aid operations in Gaza; and ensure there is a robust de-confliction mechanism in place to protect ordinary Palestinians, NGOs, medics and others providing aid.
"This tragedy only serves to underscore the importance of securing an immediate humanitarian pause. A sustained pause in the fighting is the only way to get lifesaving aid in at the scale needed and free the hostages cruelly held by Hamas."
Politician George Galloway won about 40% of the votes in the by-elections for the British Parliament for the city of Rochdale, which was dominated by the devastating Israeli war on the Gaza Strip. Galloway targeted British Labor Party leader Keir Starmer in his victory speech and said, "Keir Starmer, this is for Gaza," and added, "You will pay a heavy price for the role you played in enabling, encouraging and covering up the catastrophe that is currently occurring in occupied Gaza in the Gaza Strip."
Galloway, a former Labor MP, has ousted his former party in three elections and will return to Parliament for the fourth time in 37 years. "The Labor Party realizes that it has lost the trust of millions of its voters who have voted loyally for it, generation after generation," Galloway said. Despite a campaign dominated by events in the Middle East, Galloway said he hoped to form a “grand coalition” with Rochdale councilors to work on local issues.
His victory comes after one of the most controversial by-elections in recent memory. Galloway's team was so confident that they told reporters within an hour of polls closing that he had won "comfortably".
The Labor Party, which was defending a majority of close to 10,000 votes and ranks high in opinion polls, was expecting a direct competition to replace the current MP, Tony Lloyd, who died on January 17 due to leukemia. But the campaign was thrown into disarray when it emerged that its candidate, Azhar Ali, had repeated anti-Israel conspiracy theories regarding the Al-Aqsa Flood operation on October 7, 2023, launched by the Al-Qassam Brigades - the military wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) - and factions of the Palestinian resistance in response to the attacks. The Israeli escalation in Jerusalem and the West Bank.
Labor was eventually forced to disavow Ali and abandon his campaign after only one week of competition. Although Ali's name was on the ballot, it was too late to choose another candidate, as the Labor Party suspended all election campaigns in the city nearly 3 weeks ago.
Galloway, on the other hand, was impulsive and enthusiastic, touring Rochdale with a megaphone, describing the by-election as a “referendum on Gaza” and an opportunity to organize an anti-Labour protest. Galloway remained one of the most prominent supporters of the Palestinian cause, as he led international lifeline convoys to Gaza, which he visited with solidarity activists, and obtained Palestinian citizenship given to him by Ismail Haniyeh , who was serving as Prime Minister of the government at the time.
Previously, in 2012 British solidarity organizations and anti-war movements in the United Kingdom welcomed the return of veteran politician and Respect Party candidate George Galloway to Parliament, when he won a parliamentary seat in the district west of the city of Bradford in northern Britain, in the by-elections. Galloway was able to win by a large margin over Labor Imran Hussein and overthrow the Labor Party , which had controlled this seat for decades, as he obtained 56% of the total votes cast.
By-elections were held in Bradford after Labor MP Marasha Singh resigned - for health reasons - after she won the seat in the general elections that took place in 2010. The victory of Galloway (57 years old) and his return to Parliament was considered a thorn in the side of the three main parties, especially the Labor Party, from which he was expelled in October 2003 following his frank comments on the war in Iraq.
Director of the Middle East Observatory, Dawoud Abdullah, told Al Jazeera Net that Galloway's success surprised many politicians, official institutions, and major parties in Britain, but it did not surprise analysts interested in British affairs because the major parties betrayed the people and focused on their own narrow affairs. Abdullah added that many of the leaders of those parties were involved in corruption cases, collected money, and abandoned the interests of the country, pointing out that this is what happened in Bradford, which is a poor, marginalized city that was not given attention.
He explained that Galloway entered the arena and took advantage of the gap that existed in Bradford, and raised issues such as university fees, which are expected to rise next year to nine thousand pounds ($14.4 thousand) per student.
Galloway once again dealt a painful blow to the Labor Party in one of its most important electoral battles in northern Britain since World War II. This is the second time that Galloway has taken revenge on the leadership of the Labor Party after his dismissal from the party. In 2005, he defeated the party’s deputy in Parliament for the Bethnal Green and Bow area in east London, Oona King, who supported the former Prime Minister’s policy in the war on Iraq. And Afghanistan.
It is noteworthy that Galloway is a long-standing advocate for Arab issues for more than 30 years. He played an active role in making the unusual decision to establish twinning ties between the city of Dundee and the Palestinian city of Nablus, and he led a campaign to end British sanctions against Iraq, as he visited Baghdad in 2017. He met with former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. Galloway remained one of the most prominent supporters of the Palestinian cause, as he led international lifeline convoys to Gaza, which he visited with solidarity activists, and obtained Palestinian citizenship offered to him by the Prime Minister of the dismissed government, Ismail Haniyeh.
US President Joe Biden held two separate calls with the Emir of the State of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, during which they discussed reaching a possible ceasefire agreement in the Gaza Strip. A statement from the Qatari Emiri Diwan stated that the talks addressed Qatar's efforts aimed at reaching an immediate and permanent ceasefire agreement in Gaza. For its part, the Egyptian presidency said that Sisi stressed the need to reach an immediate and sustainable ceasefire that “allows adequate and appropriate access to humanitarian aid.”
As for the White House, he said that the US President is working to reach an agreement for a ceasefire for at least 6 weeks in exchange for the release of Israeli detainees in Gaza. He added, in a statement, that Biden also discussed with the Emir of the State of Qatar and the Egyptian President “the tragic and disturbing incident during the delivery of aid in the northern Gaza Strip,” referring to the “flour massacre” committed by the Israeli occupation forces on Wednesday night, as they targeted hundreds of Palestinians as they gathered to receive food. Receiving aid at the Nabulsi roundabout in Gaza City.
Anger escalated among prominent politicians in Washington, most of them from the Democratic Party, toward the administration of US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu , accusing them of causing a disaster in the Gaza Strip. Democratic Senator Jeff Merkley said that the United States is complicit in the famine and humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, and it is the one who has the influence to address the situation there and the world expects it to do so. Merkley added that it is unacceptable for the United States to rely on the aid system established by Israel, calling on the American administration to bypass Israel and provide aid to Gaza directly.
For her part, Democratic Senator Patty Murray said that the continuation of the war by Benjamin Netanyahu's far-right government is an undoubted strategic failure.
Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren, in turn, said that Netanyahu and his right-wing government had caused a disaster in Gaza. Warren called on President Biden's administration to press for an immediate ceasefire and return the hostages, and to link its military support for Israel to the pursuit of a two-state solution to achieve lasting peace.
In this context, Jack Reed, Chairman of the US Senate Armed Services Committee, called on President Biden to send a floating military hospital to help the residents of Gaza in the wake of the new Israeli massacre. Democratic Senator Chris Murphy said that the Biden administration must make every effort to temporarily stop Israel's military operation as soon as possible, while the US President said that "the aid incident will complicate negotiations regarding the hostages."
For his part, independent Senator Angus King called on the White House to send a medical ship from the US Navy to alleviate the suffering in Gaza, in the wake of what was called the “flour massacre” in the northern Gaza Strip, which caused the death and injury of hundreds, most of whom sustained critical wounds. In the same regard, independent US Senator Bernie Sanders said that Israeli soldiers opened fire on those trying to get food instead of bringing in aid. He called on the United States to intervene immediately and provide aid directly to those in need in Gaza, saying that hundreds of thousands of Palestinian children in the Strip are on the brink of starvation, and that the United States cannot continue to fund Netanyahu’s war machine.
Agroups of 28 Democratic representatives in the US House of Representatives sent a letter to President Joe Biden supporting a temporary ceasefire between the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ) and Israel. The lawmakers, who are supportive of Israel, wrote that a temporary truce would not only help release detainees and provide relief to millions of civilians, but would also open a path to ending the conflict permanently, according to their opinion.
The lawmakers added that in order to achieve this outcome, the United States must work with the Palestinians and Israelis to create an interim recovery administration to secure Gaza until a permanent government is formed. The letter also urged Israel to work with Egypt and the United States to facilitate the sustainable entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza. Recently, anger has escalated among prominent politicians in Washington, most of them from the Democratic Party, towards the administration of US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu , accusing them of causing a disaster in the Gaza Strip.
Since the beginning of the war on Gaza, US President Joe Biden has taken a completely pro-Israel position. He traveled to Tel Aviv, supplied the Israeli army with huge quantities of weapons, refused to publicly call for an indefinite ceasefire, and used his veto power against... United Nations resolutions on multiple occasions. A report published by the American “Fox” website, by writer Zach Beauchamp, stated that all of this reflects Biden’s strong personal beliefs about the need to support Israel.
The writer added that for those who wish that Washington would put more pressure on Tel Aviv to stop the killings, this raises a fundamental question: If the president had been Donald Trump, would he have handled matters differently? According to the report, the answer is almost certainly yes, as Biden only exerted slight pressure on Israel, while Trump would not have exerted any pressure at all, according to him.
He explained that everything that is known about the former president indicates that he will not have any concerns about completely siding with the far-right government in Israel. While Biden achieved some what can be described as limited success with Israel, especially on the issue of bringing in some aid, it is difficult to imagine Trump defending civilians in Gaza when he wanted to prevent them from entering the United States in the first place.
The writer continued that the Israeli right understands this and yearns for Trump's return. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal in early February, Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir made his point clear, saying that “instead of giving us his full support, Biden is busy providing humanitarian aid and fuel to Gaza, which goes to Hamas .” "If Trump were in power, the United States' behavior would have been completely different."
The report stated that an article published by “New Republic” magazine in which two former high-ranking American officials confirmed that the difference between Biden and Trump is still enormous, “and no matter how much we criticize the Biden administration’s policy in dealing with Israel and Gaza, the only hope is to undo recent mistakes and achieve results.” "The positive lies in maintaining the current American leadership. Trump will be many times worse and more accommodating of the extremist elements in Netanyahu's government."
He added that Trump loves making deals, and the “Israeli-Palestinian peace” agreement will be the “deal of the century,” as he likes to say. But bringing the Palestinians to the negotiating table requires a fairer policy than that pursued by Trump, who described himself as the most pro-Israel president ever. There's a reason why the Israeli prime minister openly campaigned for Trump against Biden in 2020.
The report added that American policy during the Trump administration was like a list of gifts to the Israeli right, during which a “peace plan” was formulated without Palestinian input, and the Palestinians were also excluded from the negotiations on the so-called Abraham Accords , in addition to achieving the Israeli goal of achieving diplomatic progress. With Arab countries.
In addition to this is the recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Syrian Golan Heights , the abandonment of the American position that has persisted for decades, which considers the West Bank settlements to be a major obstacle to peace, the removal of long-imposed restrictions on spending American taxpayers’ money there, and the transfer of the American embassy in Israel to occupied Jerusalem. With the closure of the American mission to Palestine in the same city.
In a consistent policy that Jared Kushner (Trump's son-in-law) stressed during his appearance at Harvard University in February, he expressed his explicit opposition to Biden's current efforts to establish a Palestinian state as part of any settlement after the war in Gaza. As for the American ambassador to Israel, David Friedman - according to the author - he went further and accused the Biden team of “obstructing the war effort” by pressuring Israel to reduce the number of civilian casualties in the bombing campaign. He added in an interview with Israeli Channel 12 news, "At no time did the United States place any restrictions on Israel's ability to respond." The writer explains that Trump's advisors adopt the same proposal, and there is no indication that he plans to choose a different type of these advisors.
A member of the editorial board of the Washington Post and its columnist, Shadi Hamed, said that the United States is a country divided against itself, not only because of the war that Israel is waging in the Gaza Strip ; But also because of its contradictory view of the two incidents of self-immolation, one of which occurred a few days ago in front of the Tel Aviv Embassy in Washington, and the other in Tunis, the capital, in 2010.
The American writer explained that some of the reactions to US Air Force soldier Aaron Bushnell recently burning himself in front of the Israeli embassy in Washington while shouting “Free Palestine” were not limited to rejection, but also included - She was angry at what he did. The writer commented on these reactions by saying that some people's quickness to explain Bushnell's behavior as resulting from a psychological illness suggests double standards.
He cited this as evidence by Michael Starr, in his article in the Jerusalem Post, describing the suicide incident in protest against the Gaza war as “a state of hysteria,” while journalist Mark Joseph Stern described those who commit this act as “suffering from mental disorder.”
When it came to the suicide of Tunisian street vendor Mohamed Bouazizi by setting himself on fire on December 17, 2010 in protest against the police’s confiscation of his small cart - an incident that sparked the Arab Spring revolutions - no one questioned whether he was suffering from a mental illness, and even President Barack Obama He praised him at the time as a “hero,” according to the Washington Post article.
Western media rarely described Bouazizi's death as a suicide, and in the face of this double standard, writer Shadi wonders: How can one suicide incident be a heroic act, while another is considered an act of madness? Psychopathy?
The article compares Bushnell's suicide with Bouazizi's suicide, noting that the American soldier apparently thought carefully and alerted the media to it hours before carrying out his act, unlike the Tunisian street vendor whose action was in response to the authorities confiscating his goods and the police's mistreatment of him.
One critic noted that while Bouazizi was protesting against his government, Bushnell was preoccupied with a “distant ethnic and religious conflict.” In his article, the writer believes that the American soldier has no “kinship ties” to the region, “so why does he have an overwhelming feeling about other people’s problems?” This leads us - according to the author - to the existence of a fundamental division related to how the Americans interpret the war on Gaza. According to the article, this war is not just an external conflict that has claimed the lives of tens of thousands, and it is not far away, as some analysts believe.
Shadi goes on to say that the United States is Israel's main military sponsor, providing it with the "emergency" weapons and supplies it needs to continue its war. What is more, according to Shadi, is that the US Air Force, of which Bushnell was a soldier, provides Israel with intelligence information that helps it target a site in Gaza with intense aerial bombardment.
Bushnell did not view the war in Gaza as a conflict far from him. Rather, he said, “I will no longer be involved in genocide ,” warning at the same time that he was about to carry out “extremist protest” action, but he added that in comparison with what people in Palestine continued to witness, “At the hands of those who occupy their land, (the protest) is not extremism at all, as our ruling elite has always accepted as normal.”
According to the Washington Post article, it may be illogical or even crazy to think about doing what Bushnell did, but it is inconceivable that Bushnell - and millions of other Americans - do not feel a growing sense of helplessness over their government's facilitation of the mass killing of unarmed people. to a big limit.
Butcher's Bill / Oasis of Martyrs
On 7 October 2023, Hamas and other armed groups present in the Gaza Strip carried out an attack in Israel, killing more than 1,200 persons, injuring thousands and abducting some 240 people, many of whom continue to be held hostage. It was the second largest loss inflicted on the Israeli forces after the 1973 war. Palestinian armed groups launched thousands of missiles at Israel Following this attack, Israel launched a large-scale military operation in Gaza, by land, air and sea.
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."
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant considered 05 February 2024 that half the number of Hamas militants were killed or seriously injured by Israeli army forces.
A Hamas official based in Qatar told Reuters 19 February 2024 that the group estimated that 6,000 of its fighters have been killed by Israeli forces. That number is about half of the 12,000 terrorists that Israel said it has killed since the Oct. 7 Hamas-led massacre,
As of 15 February 2024, The Director-General of the HAMAS Government Information Office in the Gaza Strip , Ismail Al-Thawabta, stated "the toll of the aggression had risen to about 35,500 martyrs and missing persons, including 28,663 martyrs and 68,395 injuries. There are about 2,493 massacres committed by the occupation army. Among the martyrs were about 12,400 children, 8,450 women, 340 medical personnel, 46 civil defense personnel, and 126 journalists. There are approximately 11,000 wounded people who need to travel for treatment.... we received live testimonies stating that the occupation army committed field executions against more than 137 Palestinian civilian detainees in the Gaza and North governorates."
The HAMAS Ministry of Health in the besieged sector announced that the number of victims of the Israeli operation between 7 October 2023 and 12:30 on 1 March 2024, at least 30,228 Palestinians martyred in Gaza, "including 12,300 dead children, 8,400 women, 340 medical personnel, 46 civil defense, and 124 journalists." He pointed out that "7,000 people are missing, 70% of whom are children and women, The ministry does not distinguish between civilians and combatants.
The number wounded was 71,377. 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 this figure.
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 405 [399?] Palestinians, including 102 children, the injury of about 4,592, including 708 children, and the arrest of 7,120, according to official HAMAS sources.
By another acccount, since 7 October 2023, 409 Palestinians had been killed, including 103 children, and 4,611 Palestinians have been injured, including 709 children, in conflict-related incidents across the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Israel. Since the beginning of the year, 96 Palestinians have been killed, including 26 in refugee camps. During the same period, 15 Israelis, including four members of Israeli forces, were killed and 86 injured in conflict-related incidents in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Israel.
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.
In the first two years of the Daesh insurgency in Iraq, the UN stated that some 18,800 civilians were killed by the terrorist organization, while the Israeli military has killed well over 30,000 Palestinians in around 5 months. In fact, the true death toll in the Gaza Strip, accounting for those reported missing and buried under the rubble, is most likely closer to 40,000.
More than 202 Hezbollah fighters were killed in Lebanon during exchanges of bombing operations with Israel.
In first two days, the IDF killed 1,609 terrorists. Israel initially 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 would increas to about 1,700.
The total announced number of Israeli officers and soldiers killed had risen to 575 since the start of the war on October 7, including 240 [243?] killed since the ground invasion as a result of the ongoing clashes with the Palestinian resistance. Among them were at least 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.
Haaretz newspaper quoted the Israeli Ministry of Defense as saying that the Medical Rehabilitation Department has treated more than 5,500 wounded since the beginning of the war on the Gaza Strip on October 7. Israeli Army Radio reported that the Rehabilitation Department of the Ministry of Defense is preparing to receive 20,000 wounded this year, compared to 5,500 wounded received last year since the start of the war.
It was announced that soldiers wounded in the Gaza Strip battles numbered to 2,962 since the beginning of the war, including 1,429 who had been wounded since the start of the ground attack on October 27, 2023.
The Israeli army reported that 407 who are still receiving treatment for their injuries in the Gaza battles, and the condition of 48 of them is serious. The number of injured among the Israeli army since the start of the ground operation in the Gaza Strip on October 27 included 602 minor cases, 430 moderate cases, and 264 critical cases.
The Israeli army published new data about those wounded in the military operation in the Gaza Strip. The Israeli army announces that 540 soldiers were injured in the Gaza Strip. According to army data, 540 soldiers, including 27 seriously injured, were injured in operational incidents since the start of the bombing of the Gaza Strip. There were also 21 accidental shooting incidents in the Gaza Strip, 54 bilateral shooting incidents and 31 traffic accidents. In addition, 388 incidents occurred, including ramming anti-tank rifles, anti-aircraft guns, weapons and machine guns.
At least 14,391 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."
By 28 February 2024 about 85% of the fighters who needed mental health treatment returned to combat: the Technology and Logistics Division is establishing a center for mental health services.
The Palestinian resistance says that the losses of the occupation forces are much greater than what is announced. 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.
In an interview with RT, Military strategist retired Tunisian Brigadier General Tawfiq Didi said that the number of Israeli army deaths in the Gaza battles is much greater than what Israel announces. Didi explained in an interview with the “Best Saying” program on RT channel, “The number of people killed in battles can be easily known, as the equation in wars is that for every 3 wounded there is a dead person, and the numbers now in Israel hover around 12,500 wounded and disabled people, and when we divide by Three, we find that the death toll exceeds 4,000, especially after eliminating more than a thousand tanks and armored vehicles, and I know what happens when Kornet missiles hit a tank. Its ammunition explodes and no one is left alive.”
He added, "The Israelis announce their dead only of those of Jewish origin and of the first race, meaning all Arabs, Falash, and those who are among them. They are not counted because they are of the second category. So I am sure that the number exceeds 4 thousand dead, and this is a very easy military calculation."
He pointed out, "The Palestinian resistance documented everything it did, unlike the Israelis. The resistance documented shooting at tanks and armored vehicles and destroying the houses in which the Israeli soldiers were holed up, and we saw them being killed... We saw the Kornet hitting the tanks, we saw Al-Yassin 105, so the difference is clear."
Hostages
The Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades , the military wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ), announced that it would tonight reveal the fate of 3 Israeli prisoners who had announced the loss of contact with the group responsible for their detention. Al-Qassam military media broadcast a new video clip of the three prisoners, entitled “What do you think?” It included three options: “They were all killed, or some of them were killed and the other was injured, or they are still alive.”
Al-Qassam concluded the video with, “Tonight we will tell you their fate,” a day after she published a video about these prisoners and her intention to reveal their fate today, Friday. On December 23, Al-Qassam Brigades spokesman Abu Ubaida suggested that 5 Israeli prisoners were likely killed as a result of the occupation’s ongoing raids on the Gaza Strip, after the brigades announced that they had lost contact with the group responsible for them. Abu Ubaida added at the time that among these prisoners were Haim Peri, Yoram Metzer, and Amiram Cooper, who appeared in a video clip broadcast by Al-Qassam earlier, demanding that their leaders not leave them in captivity and “not to grow old in it.”
Al-Qassam Brigades spokesman, Abu Ubaida, announced the death of 7 Israeli prisoners, along with the groups assigned to protect them, as a result of the ongoing Israeli bombing of the Gaza Strip. Abu Ubaida said in a statement on his Telegram channel: “We previously announced that our contact has been cut off with our mujahideen who are guarding a number of enemy prisoners in our honest sector, and that we believe that a number of prisoners have been killed as a result of the Zionist bombing.”
He added: "After examination and scrutiny during recent weeks, we have confirmed the martyrdom of a number of our mujahideen and the killing of seven enemy prisoners in the Gaza Strip as a result of the Zionist bombing, including: Haim Gershon Peri, Yoram Itak Metzger, and Amiram Israel Cooper." We will later announce the names of the other four dead after confirming his identity.”
Abu Ubaida stressed that "the number of enemy prisoners who were killed as a result of the military operations of the enemy army in the Gaza Strip may exceed seventy prisoners. We have been keen all along to preserve the lives of the prisoners, but it has become clear that the enemy leadership is deliberately killing its prisoners to get rid of this file." He stressed, "At the same time, we affirm that the price we will take for five or ten living prisoners is the same price we would have taken for all the prisoners if the enemy's bombing operations had not killed them."
Abu Obeida's message on Friday served as a "correction" to several paths that governed the political approach to the war on Gaza, the expert in Palestinian Resistance affairs, Hani al-Dali, told Al Mayadeen following a release by the spokesperson for Hamas' al-Qassam Brigades. Al-Dali said that the message underscores the need to focus on "ending the war on the basis of [awarding the Resistance] political gains," adding that Abu Obeida definitively linked a prisoner exchange deal to advancing and enhancing the Resistance's political position.
Additionally, al-Dali believes that the video released by the group's Military Media of the three killed captives is part of a tactic to add pressure on Israelis to agree to a prisoner exchange deal aiming to mobilize and escalate the captive's issue within Israeli politics. He explained that the Resistance, via releasing the video, is engaged in "psychological warfare" against Israeli authorities.
On the mounting deaths of Israeli captives, al-Dali said that Netanyahu and the Israeli government and military are "clearly lying and directly targeting the captives." He noted that Israeli occupation forces deliberately targeted captives after locating them, with the hope of killing them and their captors. According to al-Dali, this indicates that the Israeli regime "is not concerned with the prisoners' issue and it is not a priority for them."
Three prisoners, Chaim Ben Nechama (Peri), 79, Yoram Ben Miriam (Metzger), 80, and Amiram Ben Sara (Cooper), 84, hold significant importance for Israeli society, as they have played key roles in the initial stages of the establishment of Israel. According to one of the three, he and his fellow captives were "of the generation that built the state of Israel." Al-Dali said that they are recognized "as fathers" of the Israeli forces.
Furthermore, he revealed that the number of "enemy prisoners" killed by Israeli occupation forces "may have exceeded seventy." "Throughout this time, we have sought to preserve the lives of the prisoners. However, it is evident that the enemy's leadership deliberately intends to eliminate this issue by killing its captives." However, the military spokesperson confirmed that the Resistance would only exchange the same number of Palestinian detainees for the same number of Israeli captives, be they dead or alive.
Immediately after Abu Obeida's statement, al-Qassam Brigades' Military Media released footage of the three captives, featuring three phrases written in Arabic, English, and Hebrew. The phrases stated, "We tried to keep them alive, but Netanyahu insisted on killing them. All 7 killed by IDF weapons." A poster al-Qassam Brigades published today showed the Israeli Prime Minister crossing off a picture of his "buddy" Yoram Itak Metzger with a red marker. "Netanyahu abandoned his buddies to face their fate alone without saving them," the poster read.
The Israeli media discussed the Qatari-Egyptian-American document for the expected exchange deal, which stipulated that 7 Israeli female detainees who were supposed to be released last December, but Tel Aviv refused at the time, would be released. Channel 13 political program presenter Rafif Druker said that everyone who was involved in the decision to abort the previous truce deal and refused to release the female detainees is a criminal with blood on his hands. In this context, the former head of the Israeli Foreign Intelligence Service, Mossad, Danny Yatom, described the decision to abort the previous deal as a mistake after “Israeli prisoners continued to rot in Hamas’ captivity.”
Israel announced 12 February 2024 that the total number of prisoners that the army was able to recover in exchange deals and through military operations was 126 people, including 91 Israelis, 11 bodies, and 24 foreign workers.
Avera Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed have been held as hostages in Gaza since 2014 and 2015, respectively. Unlike the roughly 240 people kidnapped in the Hamas October 7 terrorist attacks, the campaign for the release of Mengistu and al-Sayed has received little publicity. Mengistu is known to suffer from what HRW deemed "serious" mental health issues. "Avera crossed one of the safest borders in the world, under the eyes of the security services," recalled Gil Elias, a relative. "We're talking about a mentally ill person who got lost." The calls for the release of Mengistu and al-Sayed have been barely audible during the many years they have been held captive in Gaza.
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.
Israeli army spokesman Daniel Hagari announced on 07 February 2024 that 31 hostages detained in Gaza had died. He added in a press conference, "We informed 31 families that their detained relatives had died, and thus we announce their deaths."
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 Al-Qassam Brigades announced on 11 February 2024 that the continuous Israeli bombing of the Gaza Strip during the past 96 hours led to the death of 2 prisoners and the serious injury of 8 others.
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 number of people arrested by the Israelis in the West Bank since that date has exceeded 7,325. The total number of prisoners in Israeli prisons exceeds 9,000 Palestinians. Palestinian prisoner institutions said 661 were classified as “unlawful combatants” from Gaza, and this is the number available only as a clear given.
The Palestinian Prisoners' Club said that there has been a significant increase in the number of Palestinian administrative detainees in Israeli prisons since October 7, with 3,484 detainees recorded, including children and women. The club added in a statement that "this number was not actually recorded even during the years of the 1987 uprising."
Israel said on 19 February 2024 that, since the beginning of the war, approximately 3,200 wanted persons have been arrested throughout the Judea and Samaria Division and the Bekaa and Valleys Division, over 1,350 of whom are associated with the terrorist organization 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.
The institutions added in the statement that “the occupation arrested 210 women during the aforementioned period, and this statistic includes women who were arrested from the territories in 1948, and more than 355 children,” pointing out that “the outcome of the arrest campaigns includes all those who were arrested from homes, and through military checkpoints, Those who were forced to surrender themselves under pressure, and those who were detained.” It explained that "the number of arrests among journalists reached 50, of whom 35 remain in detention, and 20 of them were transferred to administrative detention."
The announced numbers of detainees do not include those who were detained from Gaza since the start of the operation in the Gaza Strip, as there is no accurate census of these numbers. As of 15 February 2024, the Director-General of the HAMAS Government Information Office in the Gaza Strip , Ismail Al-Thawabta, stated "the information available to us is that the occupation arrested approximately 2,600 people, including 99 medical personnel and 10 journalists."
Israel has rejected international legal adaptations since 1967, and has treated the Palestinians as criminals, and tried them before military courts and not as prisoners of war. Because the POW is not tried, but is released when the war stops, or as a result of a political agreement.
But international humanitarian law sets clear conditions relating to the Palestinians, whether as prisoners of war or organized groups with one leadership and carrying a unified slogan, and these conditions apply to Palestinian resistance fighters, specifically armed groups. International law, through the Third Geneva Conventions, which relate to prisoners of war and armed conflicts, and the Fourth Geneva Convention, which relates to civilians under occupation; Provide full protection to Palestinian prisoners and groups, including resistance factions.
The obstacles imposed by the Israeli occupation authorities became very different after the seventh of last October. They decided to cancel all trials in order to double the sentences issued against detainees, and now The scope of arguments before lawyers is very limited, due to military orders, and not according to legal data.
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