Israel continues killing civilians in Gaza, Lebanon
The Gaza conflict has now entered its 379th day, with Israeli forces continuing their assaults and maintaining a siege on the northern areas of the strip. A recent airstrike in the Jabalia refugee camp resulted in dozens of casualties, including many women and children.
In addition, the Israeli military has intensified its air and ground operations in the northern Gaza Strip, particularly in the Jabalia camp. The area has been under siege for over two weeks. On Friday, the Israeli army deployed the Givati Brigade to join the 162nd Division in Jabalia, indicating a potential escalation of military activities.
On Saturday, the Ministry of Health in Gaza announced that the Israeli occupation committed 3 massacres in the Strip, of which 19 dead and 91 wounded arrived at hospitals during the past 24 hours. The ministry added that the death toll from the Israeli aggression has risen to 42,519 dead and 99,637 injured since October 7, 2023.
The communications networks were also out of service in northern Gaza, which Hamas considered an attempt to “isolate and displace Palestinians there, and an attempt to hide the crimes committed by the occupation.”
It came at a time when tens of thousands of Palestinians were trapped inside their homes in the Jabalia camp and its surroundings, and they refused to leave, defying Israeli evacuation orders since the start of its ground attack.
While the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) officially announced on Friday the assassination of its leader Yahya Sinwar, several countries expressed their hope for reaching a ceasefire. In this context, the American and French presidents, the German Chancellor and the British Prime Minister called for an end to the Gaza war after a meeting in Berlin.
The German government said in a statement after the meeting that Joe Biden, Emmanuel Macron, Olaf Scholz and Keir Starmer stressed “the immediate need to return the (Israeli) hostages to their families, stop the war in Gaza and ensure that humanitarian aid reaches civilians.”
For his part, the UN independent investigator on the right to food, Michael Fakhri, confirmed that Israel is still waging a “starvation campaign” in Gaza, despite delivering more than a million tons of aid, including 700,000 tonnes of food to the Strip since it launched its war a year ago.
On the ground, the Al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Jihad movement, announced the destruction of an occupation military vehicle of the “Merkava” type by detonating a “Thaqib-barrel” explosive device, in the vicinity of the Al-Zawiya Mosque in the Tal al-Zaatar area east of the Jabalia camp in the northern Gaza Strip.
The Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, announced that it targeted a D9 military bulldozer with a tandem missile, and detonated a Shawaaz explosive device in a Merkava tank while it was pulling the targeted bulldozer, near the Sardah station west of the Jabalia camp in the northern Gaza Strip.
In Lebanon, the Israeli occupation army said that it intercepted two drones launched from Lebanon towards northern Israel on Saturday morning. Meanwhile, a third drone exploded in a building in the city of Caesarea, south of Haifa. In an unprecedented event, the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged that a drone was launched towards the Prime Minister’s house in Caesarea, noting that the Prime Minister and his wife were not present at the site. The attack left no injuries.
In turn, Hezbollah announced that it had bombed the city of Safed in northern Israel with missiles on Saturday, shortly after claiming responsibility for targeting the Haifa area.
Meanwhile, Israeli raids on Lebanon continue, especially in the south and the Bekaa in the east. After 18 days of attempts by the Israeli occupation army to penetrate southern Lebanon by land, Hezbollah announced on Friday that it was moving to a “new and escalating phase in the confrontation with it,” while the Israeli occupation army announced the deployment of an additional reserve brigade to the northern front.
This comes as Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati confirmed, after meeting with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Friday, that “there is no priority above the ceasefire, targeting civilians, and destroying towns and villages,” adding that he stressed in the meeting “Lebanon’s commitment to the full implementation of all international resolutions, especially Resolution 1701, and I expressed my readiness to strengthen the army’s presence in the south.”
Mikati stressed that Lebanon adheres to international legitimacy, and rejects Israel’s threat to UNIFIL forces to leave and the attacks they are subjected to, which constitute a blatant coup against international legitimacy, which requires everyone to stand together against this blatant encroachment on the role of UNIFIL and its great mission in standing by Lebanon and the Lebanese.
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