Tag: Hamas

  • Hamas announces ‘national unity’ deal with Palestinian rivals

    Hamas announces ‘national unity’ deal with Palestinian rivals

    Hamas announced Tuesday it had signed an agreement in Beijing with other Palestinian organizations, including rivals Fatah, to work together for “national unity”, with China describing it as a deal to rule Gaza together once the war ends.

    Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, who hosted senior Hamas official Musa Abu Marzuk, Fatah envoy Mahmud al-Aloul and emissaries from 12 other Palestinian groups, said they had agreed to set up an “interim national reconciliation government” to govern post-war Gaza. “Today we sign an agreement for national unity and we say that the path to completing this journey is national unity. We are committed to national unity and we call for it,”

    Abu Marzuk said after meeting Wang and the other envoys. The announcement comes more than nine months into the genocide.

    Israel’s retaliatory military campaign in Gaza has killed more than 39,000 people, also mostly civilians, according to data from the health ministry in Gaza.

    The relentless fighting has plunged Gaza into a severe humanitarian crisis. China has sought to play a mediator role in the conflict, which has been rendered even more complex due to the intense rivalry between Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, and Fatah, which partially governs the occupied West Bank.

    Israel has vowed to keep fighting until it destroys Hamas, and world powers, including key Israeli backer the United States, have scrambled to imagine scenarios for the governance of Gaza once the war ends. As Tuesday’s meeting wrapped up in Beijing, Wang said the groups had committed to “reconciliation”.

    “The most prominent highlight is the agreement to form an interim national reconciliation government around the governance of post-war Gaza,” Wang said following the signing of the “Beijing Declaration” by the factions in the Chinese capital.

    “Reconciliation is an internal matter for the Palestinian factions, but at the same time, it cannot be achieved without the support of the international community,” Wang said. China, he added, was keen to “play a constructive role in safeguarding peace and stability in the Middle East”. Beijing, Wang said, called for a “comprehensive, lasting and sustainable ceasefire”, as well as efforts to promote Palestinian self-governance and full recognition of a Palestinian state at the UN.

    Hamas and Fatah have been bitter rivals since Hamas fighters ejected Fatah from the Gaza Strip after deadly clashes that followed Hamas’s resounding victory in a 2006 election.

    Fatah controls the Palestinian Authority, which has partial administrative control in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Several reconciliation bids have failed, but calls have grown since October 7, with violence also soaring in the West Bank, where Fatah is based.

    China hosted Fatah and Hamas in April, but a meeting scheduled for June was postponed. China has historically been sympathetic to the Palestinian cause and supportive of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

  • Amid Gaza genocide, Israel aims to send Lebanon “back to Stone Age”

    Amid Gaza genocide, Israel aims to send Lebanon “back to Stone Age”

    Israel launched air strikes on Gaza Thursday after warning Hezbollah, Hamas’s ally in Lebanon, to avoid a large-scale war that would send the neighbouring country “back to the Stone Age”.

    Defence Minister Yoav Gallant made the comment during a visit to Washington, where he discussed the Gaza war, long-running efforts toward a truce, and ways to avoid a wider regional conflagration.

    As cross-border tensions between Israel and Hezbollah have risen, Gallant stressed that “we do not want war, but we are preparing for every scenario”.

    Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant during his visit to Washington this weekDrew ANGERER

    “Hezbollah understands very well that we can inflict massive damage in Lebanon if a war is launched,” he said of the fighter group.

    Israel and Hezbollah have traded near daily cross-border fire since October 7.

    But tensions have surged since Israel said this month that its Lebanon war plans are ready, sparking threats from Hezbollah that, in the event of all-out war, none of Israel would be safe.

    US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told Gallant this week that a war with Hezbollah could have “terrible consequences for the Middle East” and urged a diplomatic solution.

    A Palestinian boy sits on a war-damaged road at al-Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on June 26, 2024Eyad BABA

    UN humanitarian coordinator Martin Griffiths warned that Lebanon was “the flashpoint beyond all flashpoints” and that a full war would be “potentially apocalyptic”.

    Germany has joined Canada in advising its citizens in Lebanon to leave the country, reiterating warnings first issued shortly after October 7.

    In the latest clashes on Wednesday, Lebanese media reported about 10 Israeli strikes near the border, while Hezbollah claimed six attacks against Israeli military positions.

    A US official said Washington was engaged in “fairly intensive conversations” with Israel, Lebanon and other actors and believed that no side sought a “major escalation”.

    Meanwhile, the Gaza war at the heart of regional tensions ground on, despite comments Sunday by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the “intense phase” of the assault on Gaza was nearing an end.

    An Israeli Air Force F-16 Jet fighter aircraft flies over the border area between northern Israel and southern LebanonJACK GUEZ

    Israeli air strikes overnight and early Thursday killed at least five people in Gaza City, said Gaza’s civil defence agency and Al-Mamdani hospital medics.

    One person was killed when a warplane bombed a house in Beit Lahia, paramedics said.

    Heavy fighting, artillery shelling and helicopter fire were reported Thursday around northern Gaza’s Shujayia market, as well as approaching Israeli ground vehicles.

    Hamas’ press office in Gaza reported “a significant displacement of residents” there and said people “are fleeing to areas of refuge in Gaza City that are already overcrowded”.

    An anonymous witness told AFP the situation was “very difficult and frightening in Shujayia after the arrival of occupation (Israeli) vehicles and air fire.”

    “Residents are running through the streets in terror… a number of wounded and martyrs lie in the streets.”

    A handout picture released by the Jordanian army shows humanitarian aid being airdropped from a military aircraft over southern Gaza on June 25, 2024-

    Shelling also targeted Gaza City, sending plumes of smoke into the sky, and Israeli forces blew up several buildings in far-southern Rafah, witnesses said.

    The Israeli military also said it had “attacked terrorists who were in a school complex in Khan Yunis” in the south, where the civil defence agency said it had recovered several bodies.

    US officials, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, have voiced hope a Gaza ceasefire could also lead to a reduction in hostilities on the Lebanese border.

    However, months of talks towards a truce and hostage release deal have so far failed as Israel has rejected Hamas’ demands for a permanent end to fighting and full troop withdrawal.

    Israel has killed at least 37,765 people, also mostly civilians, according to data from Gaza’s health ministry.

    This handout picture released by the Israeli army on June 25, 2024 shows an Israeli army tracked vehicle during operations in the Gaza Strip-

    The war and siege have triggered a dire humanitarian crisis, with Gaza hospitals struggling to function and food, drinking water and other essentials hard to come by.

    USAID officials said Wednesday that just 1,000 of the 7,000 tonnes of aid shipped from Cyprus to Gaza had been distributed, blaming looting and security problems.

    Gaza’s humanitarian crisis is intense, said US doctors and nurses returning from the territory, who reported patients in the few remaining hospitals were dying in large numbers.

    Israeli tanks seen in central Gaza, gunfire heard
    Israeli tanks seen in central Gaza, gunfire heard

    One of the volunteer medics, former US army combat surgeon Adam Hamawy, said he had worked in many war-torn and natural disaster-hit countries in the past 30 years.

    “But the level of civilian casualties that I experienced was beyond anything I’d seen before,” the 54-year-old told AFP.

    “Most of our patients were children under the age of 14,” he said. “This has nothing to do with your political views.”

  • Israeli military spokesman admits Hamas can’t be destroyed, enraging Netanyahu

    Israeli military spokesman admits Hamas can’t be destroyed, enraging Netanyahu

    Israeli military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari has acknowledged that the Palestinian resistance organization Hamas is an ideology that cannot be defeated. The statement has exposed the rift between the country’s political and military leadership, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has consistently claimed that only the destruction of Hamas can bring an end to the war on Gaza.

    In an interview with CBS News, the spokesman of the Israeli army, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, said that anyone who thinks that we will eliminate Hamas is mistaken. “Hamas is an idea, Hamas is a party. It’s rooted in the hearts of the people – whoever thinks we can eliminate Hamas is wrong,” Hagari was seen saying.

    The statement of Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari is being taken as proof of a conflict between the Israeli army and the government, an example of which is the replacement of the Israeli war cabinet with a reduced kitchen cabinet.

    However, Netanyahu’s office strongly denied the statement of the spokesman of the Israeli army and reiterated his determination to eliminate Hamas completely.

    Al Jazeera’s Hamdah Salhut reported that Netanyahu’s office was “fuming” at Hagari’s remarks.

    “This just gives you an idea of what Benjamin Netanyahu’s policies are in this war, and the army on the ground saying it is actually not realistic,” she stressed.

    On the other hand, the Israeli military said that the statement of Admiral Daniel Hagari is being taken out of context, and he has clearly declared the elimination of Hamas as the ideology of the Israeli army, which we are determined to achieve.

    Hagari’s comments, the statement said, “referred to the destruction of Hamas as an ideology and an idea, and this was said by him very clearly and explicitly,” the military statement added. “Any other claim is taking things out of context.”

    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly said that it is impossible to end the war without eliminating Hamas, but even though the Zionist forces have martyred nearly 40,000 Palestinians in the ongoing genocide since October 7, they have failed to eliminate Hamas.

  • Israel PM Netanyahu says Rafah strike a ‘tragic accident’

    Israel PM Netanyahu says Rafah strike a ‘tragic accident’

    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that a deadly strike that hit a displacement camp in Gaza’s Rafah was a “tragic accident” that his government was investigating.

    “In Rafah, we evacuated a million uninvolved residents and, despite our best efforts, a tragic accident happened yesterday,” Netanyahu told parliament.

    He added that “we are investigating the case and will draw the conclusions” after Gaza’s health ministry reported 45 dead as the strike late Sunday sparked a fire that tore through a tent city for displaced Gazans.

    The ministry in the Gaza Strip also said that 249 people were wounded.

    Israel faced a wave of international condemnation on Monday over the Rafah strike, including from across the region as well from the European Union, France, and the United Nations.

    The Israeli military said it had launched a probe into the strike which it said was carried out based on “precise intelligence information” about two Hamas militants who it said were killed.

    It also said “the strike did not occur in the humanitarian area in Al-Mawasi, to which the IDF (army) has encouraged civilians to evacuate” since the ground operation began in Rafah.

    Netanyahu struck a defiant tone in his Knesset address while being heckled by relatives of hostages held in Gaza, and vowed to keep up the battle to destroy Hamas.

    “There is no substitute for absolute victory” in Gaza, he told the chamber.

    Netanyahu denounced pressure, both internal and external, that he said his government has faced since the war in Gaza began.

    “They pressured us then,” said Netanyahu, before listing calls to refrain from military operations which Israel carried out anyway.

    “Don’t enter Gaza. We entered! Do not enter Shifa! We entered! Do not enter Khan Yunis! We entered! Do not enter Rafah! We entered!” he said.

    “I don’t give up and I won’t give up! I stand up to pressures from home and abroad.”

    Israel’s genocide in Gaza has caused the death of 36,050 Palestinians.

    © Agence France-Presse

  • Israel army says retrieved bodies of three Gaza hostages

    Israel army says retrieved bodies of three Gaza hostages

    The Israeli military said Friday its forces had retrieved the bodies of three hostages in an overnight operation in the northern Gaza Strip’s Jabalia.

    The bodies of Israeli hostage Chanan Yablonka, Brazilian-Israeli Michel Nisenbaum and French-Mexican Orion Hernandez Radoux “were rescued overnight” and their families were notified after forensic identification, the military said in a statement.

    Both Yablonka, 42, and Hernandez Radoux, 32, were abducted from a music festival when Hamas militants stormed southern Israel from Gaza on October 7, triggering the ongoing war.

    Nisenbaum, a 59-year-old resident of the Israeli town of Sderot near Gaza, was last contacted on his way to an army base on the border to pick up his granddaughter on the day of the attack.

    Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, under increasing domestic pressure to secure the release of remaining hostages, said in a statement Friday that “together with the Israeli people, my wife Sara and I bow our heads in deep sorrow and embrace the grieving families in their difficult time”.

  • Austria to resume aid to UN agency for Palestinians

    Austria to resume aid to UN agency for Palestinians

    Austria said on Saturday that it will restore its funding to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees after suspending it over allegations that staff were involved with the Hamas.

    Israel alleged in January that some United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) employees may have participated in the Hamas attacks on Oct. 7 that triggered the genocide in the Gaza Strip.

    In the weeks that followed, numerous donor states, including Austria, suspended or paused some $450 million in funding.

    Many, including Germany, Sweden, Canada and Japan, had since resumed funding, while others have continued to hold out.

    “After analysing the action plan in detail” submitted by UNRWA “to improve the functioning of the organization,” Austria has decided to “release the funds,” its Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

    A total of 3.4 million euros ($3.7 million) in funds have been budgeted for 2024, and the first payment is expected to be made in the summer, the statement said. 

    An UNRWA staff member checks a burned area at a school housing displaced Palestinians that was hit during the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip on May 17, 2024. (Credit: AFP)

    “Some of the Austrian funds will be used in the future to improve internal control mechanisms at UNRWA,” it added.

    Austria said it will “closely monitor” the implementation of the action plan with other international partners, noting that “a lot of trust had been squandered.”

    The Alpine country said it has substantially increased support for the suffering Palestinian population in Gaza and the region since Oct. 7, making 32 million euros ($34.8 million) in humanitarian aid available to other international aid organizations.

    Israel’s has massacred at least 35,303 people, mostly civilians, according to data provided by the health ministry in the Gaza territory.

  • Ireland to recognise Palestinian statehood ‘this month’: minister

    Ireland to recognise Palestinian statehood ‘this month’: minister

    Ireland is certain to recognise Palestinian statehood by the end of May, the country’s foreign minister said Wednesday, without specifying a date.

    “We will be recognising the state of Palestine before the end of the month,” Micheal Martin, who is also Ireland’s deputy prime minister, told the Newstalk radio station.

    In March the leaders of Spain, Ireland, Slovakia and Malta said in a joint statement that they stand ready to recognise Palestinian statehood.

    Ireland has long said it has no objection in principle to officially recognising the Palestinian state if it could help the peace process in the Middle East.

    But Israeli genocide against Palestinians in Gaza has given the issue new impetus.

    Last week EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Spain, Ireland and Slovenia planned to symbolically recognise a Palestinian state on May 21, with others potentially following suit.

    But Ireland’s Martin shied Wednesday from pinpointing a date.

    “The specific date is still fluid because we’re still in discussions with some countries in respect of a joint recognition of a Palestinian state,” said Martin.

    “It will become clear in the next few days as to the specific date but it certainly will be before the end of this month.

    “I will look forward to consultations today with some foreign ministers in respect of the final specific detail of this.”

    Last month during a visit to Dublin by Spanish premier Pedro Sanchez, Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris said the countries would coordinate the move together.

    “When we move forward, we would like to do so with as many others as possible to lend weight to the decision and to send the strongest message,” said Harris.

    Israeli genocide in Gaza has killed more than 35,000 people in the besieged strip, mostly women and children, according to the territory’s health ministry.

  • Joe Biden finally threatens Israel with cutting arms supply

    Joe Biden finally threatens Israel with cutting arms supply

    US President Joe Biden has given his most severe warning yet after Israel shelled Rafah on Thursday, warning that he will stop arms supplies if IDF continue ahead with a ground offensive into the city.

    “If they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used… to deal with the cities,” Biden said. “We’re not gonna supply the weapons and the artillery shells that have been used.”

    “Civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence of those bombs,” Biden said. “It’s just wrong.”

    In response, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations has expressed disappointment at Biden’s threat.

    “This is a difficult and very disappointing statement to hear from a president to whom we have been grateful since the beginning of the war,” Gilad Erdan told Israeli public broadcaster Kan radio, in Israel’s first reaction to Biden’s warning.

  • Pro-Palestinian student protests spread in Switzerland

    Pro-Palestinian student protests spread in Switzerland

    Pro-Palestinian protests on Tuesday spread to three universities across Switzerland — inspired by similar student demonstrations that began in the United States.

    For weeks, students around the world have been calling for their universities to cut ties with Israeli institutions over the war in Gaza.

    Students at the University of Lausanne (UNIL) were the first to mobilise in Switzerland, with several hundred occupying a hall Thursday evening to demand an end to partnerships with Israeli universities.

    UNIL responded in a statement that it “considers that there is no reason to cease these relations”. Protesters and the rector will meet later Tuesday.

    On Tuesday, the movement spread to the prestigious EPFL university in Lausanne, where a group of students occupied the university’s hall, an AFP photographer observed.

    The students are demanding “an academic boycott” of Israeli institutions and “an end to censorship at EPFL”, and called on other universities to join in.

    Tens of students protested in the entrance hall of the ETH Zurich shortly before midday on Tuesday, shouting “Free Palestine” and rolling a poster onto the floor that said “no Tech for Genocide” before being removed by police, according to news agency Keystone-ATS.

    In Geneva, the Palestine Student Coordination – University of Geneva (CEP-UnigGe) took over a hall at the university with sofas, chairs and tables around midday, the Swiss agency reported.

    Numerous Palestinian flags and banners were hung on all floors of the building. An assembly is scheduled for Tuesday.

    In a letter to the university’s rector, the group called for “an immediate end to links between the University of Geneva and Israeli universities” and called on the rectorate to encourage the admission of Palestinian students.

    Students across Europe have launched pro-Palestinian protests on campuses in Ireland, France, The Netherlands, Belgium and Germany.

  • Israel shows no sign of accepting ceasefire

    Israel shows no sign of accepting ceasefire

    The ceasefire. The one that Palestinians still in Rafah were waiting for. Hamas had agreed to the ceasefire terms but Israel has once again, delayed any possibility of peace in the region.

    Israel’s unapologetic dissent comes despite global pressure calling for an end to the seven-month genocide of Palestinians which has now killed more than 34,000 people.

    As per the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the three-phase ceasefire is in ‘contradiction with Israel’s demands’ and a delegation will reportedly be sent to Cairo for talks.

    On the other hand, according to sources from Al Jazeera, Hamas claims that Netanyahu deliberately undermined the recent discussions while reports in the Israeli media of Hamas accepting a deal is also being discredited, deeming it as a “ruse designed to make Israel look like they had sabotaged the deal”.

    Ironically, at the same time, Israeli military has invaded the Rafah crossing.

    “By deciding to close the Rafah and Kerem Shalom [Karem Abu Salem] border crossing, Israel is leading the region toward a disaster and continues its policy of starvation and persecution of [Palestinians],” said Hamas.

    Hamas has also called for “international intervention” to prompt Israel into accepting the ceasefire.

    Previously, Hamas deputy leader Khalil al-Hayya confirmed to Al Jazeera that US President Biden personally committed to the implementation of the ceasefire deal.

    He told the Qatari news network that Egyptian and Qatari mediators had told Hamas that the United States president was committed to making sure that the agreement was enforced.

    However, there hasn’t been confirmation of this from the American side.

    The US confirmed that work was being done ‘right now’ to ensure peace. State Department spokesperson Miller didn’t give a timeframe for how long the details of the ceasefire would take but he said that the CIA director is “literally working on this right now”.

    “It’s something that is a top priority for everyone in this administration from the president on down,” Miller said.

    “Everyone is focused on this. Everyone is trying to get a deal over the line.”