You are here

Home

Region

Region section

Israeli offensive on Rafah would be 'unbearable escalation' — UN chief

May 01,2024 - Last updated at May 01,2024

Children stand behind barbed-wire along a slope near a camp housing displaced Palestinians in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on Tuesday (AFP photo)

UNITED NATIONS, United States (AFP) — United Nations chief Antonio Guterres on Tuesday urged Israel not to invade southern Gaza's Rafah city, after the Israeli prime minister said an offensive would go forward regardless of a pending hostage deal with Hamas.

With the war roiling the region, international outrage mounting over the human toll, and mediators ramping up diplomatic efforts to ease the crisis and reach a truce, Guterres implored Israel not to go ahead with its operation.

"A military assault on Rafah would be an unbearable escalation, killing thousands more civilians and forcing hundreds of thousands to flee," the secretary-general told reporters.

Such an operation "would have a devastating impact on Palestinians in Gaza, with serious repercussions on the occupied West Bank and across the wider region", he added.

“All members of the Security Council, and many other governments, have clearly expressed their opposition to such an operation. I appeal for all those with influence over Israel to do everything in their power to prevent it.”

The latest Guterres warning follows prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s promise that the Israeli army will launch a ground offensive on the Gaza Strip’s far-southern city of Rafah “with or without” a truce deal being agreed with Hamas.

Rafah has become a refuge for some 1.5 million Palestinians who have fled Israel’s bombardments that have ravaged the territory since the start of the war on October 7, when Hamas launched a deadly and unprecedented attack on Israel.

But Netanyahu has pledged to destroy Hamas, and he said the Israeli army stopping the war “before achieving all of its goals is out of the question”.

“We will enter Rafah and we will eliminate the Hamas battalions there with or without a deal,” he told families of hostages still being held in Gaza, his office said.

Guterres implored Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas to reach a truce “now”, and reiterated his call for Israel to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza, including through the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, or UNRWA.

“Without that, I fear the war, with all its consequences both in Gaza and across the region, will worsen exponentially,” he said.

The secretary-general also expressed alarm on Tuesday over reports of mass graves discovered at Gaza’s two main hospitals, along with allegations those buried there were unlawfully killed.

“It is imperative that independent international investigators with forensic expertise are allowed the immediate access to the sites of these mass graves to establish the precise circumstances under which the Palestinians lost their lives and were buried or reburied,” he said.

Meanwhile, the president of Cyprus said Tuesday that US forces were expected to complete a floating pier on Gaza’s coast later this week, allowing more aid deliveries into the besieged Palestinian territory.

The Mediterranean island nation hopes to be a hub for a “maritime corridor” to ship relief goods to the 2.4 million people of Gaza, who have been under Israeli bombardment and siege since Hamas launched its October 7 attack.

Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides told reporters the United States had informed his government that the floating dock would be ready by Thursday, roughly in line with earlier US timelines.

US President Joe Biden first announced the plan for the temporary pier on March 7. The Pentagon declared construction had started on April 25 and said it was expected to begin operating in early May.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who has pledged EU involvement in the aid project, was on Thursday due to visit Cyprus, from where aid vessels have previously made the almost 400-kilometre voyage to Gaza.

Christodoulides said “all necessary preparations are being made” by Cyprus “in cooperation with the United States, the European Union and the United Arab Emirates, for the dispatch of humanitarian aid, once the green light is given by the United States”.

US says five Israeli units committed abuse before Hamas attack

By - Apr 30,2024 - Last updated at Apr 30,2024

WASHINGTON — The United States found five Israeli units committed "individual incidents of gross violations of human rights" against Palestinians in the West Bank before the Hamas attack in October, the State Department said on Monday.

Four of the units have taken remedial measures, State Department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel told reporters, with consultations ongoing over the fifth unit.

Health ministry in Gaza says war death toll at 34,488

Hamas delegation due in Egypt for Gaza truce talks

By - Apr 30,2024 - Last updated at Apr 30,2024

A woman and children react following Israeli bombardment in Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip on Monday, amid the ongoing Israeli aggression (AFP photo)

PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES — The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said on Monday that at least 34,488 people have been killed in the Palestinian territory during almost seven months of war between Hamas and Israel.

The tally includes at least 34 deaths in the past 24 hours, a ministry statement said, adding that 77,643 people have been wounded in the Gaza Strip since the war broke out when Hamas fighters attacked Israel on October 7.

A Hamas delegation was due Monday in Egypt, where it will respond to Israel's latest proposal for a long-sought truce in Gaza and hostage release after almost seven months of war.

Egypt, Qatar and the United States have been trying to mediate an agreement between Hamas and Israel for months, but a flurry of diplomacy in recent days appeared to suggest a new push towards halting the fighting.

 

 Talks “are taking place in Cairo today”, said Al Qahera News, which is linked to Egyptian intelligence services, though it was not immediately clear whether the Hamas delegation had already arrived.

A senior Hamas official said on Sunday that the Palestinian group had no “major issues” with the most recent truce plan.

“The atmosphere is positive unless there are new Israeli obstacles,” the official told AFP, requesting anonymity to discuss the negotiations.

A source with knowledge of the talks told AFP that Qatari mediators were also taking part in the negotiations in Cairo.

While Israel has pledged to pursue Hamas battalions in Rafah despite mounting global concern for Palestinian civilians sheltering in the southern Gaza Strip city, Foreign Minister Israel Katz said the government may “suspend” the invasion if an agreement is reached.

A Hamas source close to the negotiations had told AFP the group is keen for an agreement that “guarantees a permanent ceasefire, the free return of displaced people, an acceptable deal for [prisoner-hostage] exchange and an end to the siege” in Gaza.

In Israel, protesters have demanded that the government secure the freedom of the 129 hostages estimated to remain in Gaza since being seized by the fighters on October 7, including 34 the military says are dead.

The war has brought besieged Gaza to the brink of famine, UN and humanitarian officials say, reduced much of the territory to rubble and raised fears of broader conflict.

British Foreign Secretary David Cameron said on Monday that

Hamas has been offered a 40-day ceasefire and the release of “potentially thousands” of Palestinian prisoners in return for freeing Israeli hostages. 

The Palestinian militant group has been given “a very generous offer of sustained 40 days ceasefire, the release of potentially thousands of Palestinian prisoners, in return for the release of these hostages”, Cameron told a World Economic Forum meeting in Riyadh.

“I hope Hamas do take this deal and frankly, all the pressure in the world and all the eyes of the world should be on them today saying take that deal,” Cameron said, adding the proposal would lead to a “stop in the fighting that we all want to see so badly”.

The UK foreign minister said that for a “political horizon for a two-state solution”, with an independent Palestine co-existing with Israel, the “people responsible for October 7, the Hamas leadership, would have to leave Gaza and you’ve got to dismantle the terrorist infrastructure in Gaza”.

“You’ve got to see a political future for the Palestinian people, but you’ve also crucially got to see security for Israel and those two things have to go together,” he added.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken also told the World Economic Forum meeting that diplomacy has halted regional escalation since the start of the Israel-Hamas war, including after unprecedented open clashes between Iran and Israel earlier this month.

“We did come very close to an escalation or spread of the conflict, and I think because of very focused, very determined efforts, we’ve been able to avoid it,” Blinken told a World Economic Forum meeting in Riyadh.

Host Saudi warns of economic fallout from Gaza war at global summit

Palestinian president says US 'only country capable' of preventing Israel's invasion of Rafah

By - Apr 29,2024 - Last updated at Apr 29,2024

Palestinian children stand in a camp for displaced people in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip by the border with Egypt on Sunday, amid the ongoing Israeli war against the coastal enclave (AFP photo)

RIYADH — Saudi Arabia on Sunday called for regional "stability", warning of the effects of the ongoing Israeli war on Gaza on global economic sentiment at the start of a summit attended by a host of Gaza mediators.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Palestinian leaders and high-ranking officials from other countries trying to broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas are on the guest list for the summit in Riyadh, capital of the world's biggest crude oil exporter.

The Gaza war along with conflicts in Ukraine and elsewhere put "a lot of pressure" on the economic "mood", Saudi Finance Minister Mohammed Al Jadaan said at one of the first panel discussions of the two-day World Economic Forum (WEF) special meeting.

"I think cool-headed countries and leaders and people need to prevail," Jadaan said. "The region needs stability."

The war in Gaza, which has sent regional tensions soaring, began with an unprecedented surprise attack on southern Israel by Palestinian fighter group Hamas on October 7.

The attack resulted in the deaths of about 1,170 people, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

Vowing to destroy Hamas, Israel's retaliatory offensive has killed at least 34,454 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry.

Speaking in Riyadh, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said the United States "is the only country capable" of preventing Israel's long-feared invasion of Rafah city in southern Gaza.

“We appeal to the United States of America to ask Israel to stop the Rafah operation,” Abbas said, warning it would harm and displace civilians, and be “the biggest disaster in the history of the Palestinian people”.

Saudi planning minister Faisal Al Ibrahim told a press conference on Saturday, previewing the summit, that the world is “walking a tightrope right now, trying to balance security and prosperity”.

“We meet at a moment when one misjudgement or one miscalculation or one miscommunication will further exacerbate our challenges.”

WEF President Borge Brende said there was “some new momentum now in the talks around the hostages, and also for... a possible way out of the impasse we are faced with in Gaza”.

However, there will be no Israeli participation at the summit.

“This is more an opportunity to have structured discussions” with “the key players” including mediators Qatar and Egypt, he said.

“There will be discussions, of course, on the ongoing humanitarian situation in Gaza” as well as on Iran, which backs Hamas and Lebanon’s Hizbollah group, he added.

The US State Department said Blinken will “discuss ongoing efforts to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza that secures the release of hostages”.

Hamas said on Saturday it was studying the latest Israeli counterproposal regarding a potential ceasefire in Gaza, a day after media reports said a delegation from mediator Egypt arrived in Israel in a bid to jump-start stalled negotiations.

France's top diplomat in Lebanon in push for calm with Israel

By - Apr 29,2024 - Last updated at Apr 29,2024

BEIRUT — France's top diplomat on Sunday urged calm in Lebanon during his second visit to the country since cross-border tensions with Israel flared on the back of the war in Gaza.

Israel and Lebanon's Iran-backed Hizbollah group have exchanged near-daily fire since Hamas's unprecedented surprise attack on southern Israel on October 7 sparked the war in Gaza.

Fighting has intensified in recent weeks, with Israel striking deeper into Lebanese territory, while Hezbollah has stepped up its missile and drone attacks on military positions in northern Israel.

France has for months sought to de-escalate the cross-border tensions, presenting to both Lebanon and Israel an initiative in January seeking to end hostilities.

During a visit to the headquarters of the United Nations' peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon (UNIFIL), French Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne reiterated that Paris has been making proposals to "avoid war in Lebanon".

"I will head to Beirut to meet political authorities to... make proposals," he added. "Our responsibility is to mitigate escalation, and that is also our role in UNIFIL. We have 700 soldiers here."

A French diplomatic source told AFP that the volume of cross-border attacks had doubled since April 13.

Sejourne is set to meet Lebanese officials on Sunday afternoon ahead of holding a press conference.

In March, Beirut submitted its response to the French initiative, which was based on a UN resolution barring the presence of any forces other than the Lebanese military and UNIFIL in south Lebanon.

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati, who heads a caretaker government with reduced powers, on Friday suggested that Paris was reviewing its proposal and would submit a new one to Beirut.

Sejourne’s trip — which will also see him stop in Riyadh for a summit on Gaza — coincides with a visit to Jerusalem by US envoy Amos Hochstein as Washington also pushes for de-escalation along the Israel-Lebanon border.

Hizbollah has repeatedly declared that only a ceasefire in Gaza will put an end to its attacks on Israel.

Since October 8 at least 385 people have been killed in Lebanon, including 254 Hizbollah fighters and dozens of civilians, according to an AFP tally.

Israel says 11 soldiers and nine civilians have been killed on its side of the border.

Tens of thousands of people have been displaced on both sides.

 

Hamas says studying new Israeli truce proposal as mediators seek to revive talks

By - Apr 28,2024 - Last updated at Apr 28,2024

This photo shows a camp for displaced Palestinians in Deir Al Balah, in the central Gaza Strip, on Saturday (AFP photo)

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Hamas said it was studying on Saturday the latest Israeli counterproposal regarding a potential ceasefire in Gaza, a day after a delegation from mediator Egypt reportedly arrived in Israel in a bid to jump-start stalled negotiations.

The signs of fresh truce talks came alongside ongoing Israeli preparations for a military push into Gaza's southern city of Rafah and as spillover from the war led to continued attacks across the region.

"Today, the Hamas movement received the official Zionist occupation response to the movement's position, which was delivered to the Egyptian and Qatari mediators on April 13," Khalil Al Hayya, deputy head of Hamas's political arm in Gaza, said in a brief statement early Saturday.

"The movement will study this proposal, and upon completion of its study, it will submit its response."

Hamas had previously insisted on a permanent ceasefire, something rejected by Israel.

Egypt, Qatar and the United States have been unsuccessfully trying to seal a new truce deal in Gaza ever since a one-week halt to the fighting in November saw 80 Israeli hostages exchanged for 240 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.

Several Israeli media outlets, citing unnamed officials, said Israel's war Cabinet had discussed a new plan for a truce and hostage release ahead of the Egyptian delegation's visit.

There has been "noticeable progress in bringing the views of the Egyptian and Israeli delegations closer", said Al Qahera News, which is linked to Egyptian state intelligence services.

The war in Gaza was also on the agenda for an international summit set to kick off in Saudi Arabia over the weekend.

The World Economic Forum special meeting, scheduled to begin in Riyadh on Sunday, will include a Gaza-focused session on Monday set to feature newly appointed Palestinian prime minister Mohammed Mustafa, Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly and Sigrid Kaag, the United Nations aid coordinator for the Gaza Strip.

“Discussions with European, American and regional counterparts on Gaza and the regional situation are planned in Riyadh,” a diplomatic source said on Friday.

‘Miracle’ baby dies

Witnesses in besieged Gaza reported fresh Israeli strikes overnight into Saturday around Rafah, the last urban centre Israeli ground forces have yet to enter.

Plans for an Israeli incursion into the city, which military leaders say is necessary to uproot Hamas battalions, have sparked opposition among the international community due to the presence of hundreds of thousands of displaced civilians seeking refuge there.

Senior Hamas official Ghazi Hamad told AFP on Thursday that such an operation “will undoubtedly threaten the negotiations” and show “that Israel is interested in continuing the war”.

The war began with the unprecedented Hamas sudden attack on October 7, which resulted in the deaths of about 1,170 people in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 34,356 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.

Israel estimates that 129 hostages are still being held by Hamas in Gaza, including 34 the military says are dead.

On Friday, missiles fired from an Israeli jet hit Gaza City, killing at least three people in the Rimal neighbourhood, an AFP reporter said.

“I was sitting selling cigarettes and suddenly a missile fell, shaking the whole area,” a witness who did not give his name told AFP, adding that the bodies of a man, a woman and a little girl were pulled from the rubble.

Meanwhile, a baby delivered from her dying mother’s womb in Rafah on the weekend has died, the girl’s uncle said. When she was born, doctors hailed her as a “miracle”.

But Rami Al Sheikh told AFP on Friday that his niece Ruh had “joined her family in the gardens of eternity”, after her mother was fatally wounded in an Israeli strike.

‘Hands off Rafah’

Opposition to an Israeli military operation in Rafah extended to university campuses across the United States, where hundreds of students have been arrested at pro-Palestinian protests.

“Stop the invasion! Hands off Rafah!” said a sign at a pro-Palestinian encampment at George Washington University in the US capital.

Israel’s military offensive has turned vast swathes of Gaza into rubble, creating 37 million tonnes of debris that will take years to clear away, according to the UN Mine Action Service.

The World Food Programme has warned that famine is “a real and dangerous threat” in Gaza.

The European Union said Friday it was giving an extra $73 million in aid to Palestinians in Gaza “in light of the continued deterioration of the severe humanitarian crisis”.

Three dead in Israeli strikes on south Lebanon — report

By - Apr 28,2024 - Last updated at Apr 28,2024

A house lies in ruins in the border area of Shebaa in southern Lebanon, following an Israeli strike on Saturday (AFP photo)

BEIRUT — Three people were killed Saturday in Israeli strikes on southern Lebanon, including two members of Hizbollah, the Iran-backed movement and official media said.

The border between Lebanon and Israel has seen near-daily exchanges of fire since the Israeli war on Gaza began nearly seven months ago.

Hizbollah has intensified its targeting of military sites in Israel since tensions soared between Israel and Iran over the bombing of Tehran's Damascus consulate on April 1, widely blamed on Israel.

In two separate statements, Hizbollah mourned the deaths of two fighters from the villages of Kafr Kila and Khiam.

It said they had been "martyred on the road to Jerusalem", the phrase it uses to refer to members killed by Israeli fire.

Lebanon's official National News Agency said "Israeli occupation aircraft carried out two raids today at dawn on the towns of Kafr Shuba and Shebaa", leading to the death of "citizen Qasim Asaad in the town of Kafr Shuba".

Multiple villages in southern Lebanon had been hit by Israeli strikes in recent hours, leaving damage to homes and property, NNA said.

Hizbollah said separately that it targeted "newly established positions of enemy soldiers" west of Shumira in northern Israel, the day after it targeted two military sites with dozens of Katyusha rockets in response to an Israeli strike on Friday.

Pro-Hamas Lebanese fighter group Jamaa Islamiya on Friday said that two of its senior commanders were killed in an Israeli strike in eastern Lebanon.

The Israeli army announced on Friday that its air force “aircraft struck and eliminated Mosab Khalaf in the area of Meidun in Lebanon”, describing him as a “senior terrorist in the Jamaa Islamiya terrorist organisation”.

Khalaf had “advanced a large number of terror attacks against Israel”, the army said.

US says downed Houthi anti-ship missile, four drones

By - Apr 26,2024 - Last updated at Apr 26,2024

DUBAI — US-led coalition forces shot down four drones and an anti-ship missile launched by Yemen's Houthi rebels, American authorities said on Thursday, as the Iran-backed group announced strikes against US and Israeli ships.

A Greek vessel deployed in the Gulf of Aden as part of an EU naval coalition also shot down a drone off Yemen's coast early on Thursday, the Greece general staff said in a statement.

The incidents follow a lull in attacks by the Houthis, who launched dozens of missile and drone strikes targeting shipping since November, saying they were acting in solidarity with Palestinians during the Hamas-Israel war.

Despite the drop in attacks in recent weeks, late on Wednesday the Houthis said they "are continuing to take further military actions against all hostile targets in the Red Sea, the Arabian Sea, and the Indian Ocean".

US Central Command (CENTCOM) said in a statement on X, formerly Twitter, that just before noon Yemen time (09:00 GMT) on Wednesday a coalition vessel "successfully engaged one anti-ship ballistic missile [ASBM]" launched from Houthi-controlled areas of the country.

The missile was likely targeting the MV Yorktown, a US-flagged shipping vessel, CENTCOM said, adding there were no injuries or damage.

CENTCOM also said it had engaged and destroyed four drones launched by the Houthis shortly afterwards.

“It was determined that the ASBM and UAVs [drones] presented an imminent threat to US, coalition, and merchant vessels in the region,” CENTCOM said.

Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree on Wednesday said that the rebels attacked US and Israeli ships, including the MV Yorktown which he claimed was hit, without providing evidence.

The Houthi rebels said they “carried out a military operation targeting the American ship [MV Yorktown] in the Gulf of Aden, with a number of suitable naval missiles, and the hit was accurate”, Saree said.

The group also “targeted an American warship destroyer in the Gulf of Aden with a number of drones, and in another operation, targeted an Israeli ship the [MSC Veracruz] in the Indian Ocean, with a number of drones”, he added, saying the operations “achieved their objectives”.

The Houthi attacks have drawn reprisal strikes from the United States and Britain as well as the deployment of Western naval forces to counter strikes on ships plying the busy commercial routes.

The Greek frigate Hydra, deployed to the Gulf of Aden in February, fired on two drones off the coast of Yemen on Thursday, shooting down one, Greek authorities said.

The Houthis, who control much of Yemen’s Red Sea coast, are part of an “axis of resistance” of Iran allies and proxies targeting Israel in protest at its war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Israeli land grabs spike in West Bank during Gaza war

By - Apr 26,2024 - Last updated at Apr 26,2024

A general view taken on April 16, shows a mosque and cultivated fields outside the Palestinian village of Jiftlik in the occupied West Bank, north of Jericho by the Jordan River, where a military base (not pictured) is built on confiscated land from the village (AFP photo)

JIFTLIK, Palestinian Territories — As he fed his sheep costly fodder, Palestinian farmer Talib Edais looked wistfully at the hills where his herd had grazed for free until an Israeli decision last month.

"Do you see these troughs? We had to sell some sheep to feed the others. Within a year, we will not have any sheep left," the 65-year-old told AFP at his farm near the Jordan Valley village of Jiftlik in the occupied West Bank.

In March, Israeli authorities declared 8,000 dunams adjacent to Edais's home — an area including his sheep's grazing grounds — as state land, a move that often leads to restrictions on Palestinians' access.

Israel, which has occupied the West Bank since 1967 and established settlements that are deemed illegal under international law, has for decades seized land in the Palestinian territory.

But according to Israeli settlement watchdog Peace Now, this year has already broken a record for most land grabs, which in many cases lead to settlement expansion.

The advocacy group said that 10,971 dunams of West Bank land have been seized by Israel so far in 2024, as much of the world's attention has been focused on the devastating Hamas-Israel war in the Gaza Strip since October 7.

The previous yearly record, according to Peace Now, was 5,200 dunams seized in 1999.

Declaring an area as state land makes the Israeli government its owner, and technically should not affect farming or other uses until the lot is reallocated for development or handed over to private owners.

However, Peace Now found in 2018 that "99.76 per cent of state land allocated for any use in the occupied West Bank was allocated for the needs of Israeli settlements".

From the lot that Edais and 50 of his relatives have lived on since 1976, near the Jordanian border, the farmer can see the nearby settlement of Masua and an Israeli army base.

Before the Israeli seizure order had even taken effect, he said settlers captured his sheep, claiming the animals had entered an off-limits area.

To retrieve them, his family was made to pay 150,000 shekels (about $39,500) to the Jordan Valley Regional Council, an administrative body of about two dozen settlements including Masua.

Rights groups have decried the increasing use of similar tactics that encourage Palestinian displacement from lands coveted by settlers.

The Israeli defence ministry body responsible for Palestinian civil affairs, COGAT, and the office in charge of state lands, did not respond to repeated requests by AFP for comment.

Hamad Audi, a 55-year-old construction worker who lives in Jiftlik, told AFP that what had happened to Edais came as no surprise.

“The law is in the hands of the settlers, and the state [Israel]stands with them,” Audi said.

According to him, many houses in the village have been handed demolition notices by Israeli authorities and one already demolished.

In March, 206 dunams bordering Jiftlik were declared as a state-owned archaeological site and placed under the authority of the Jordan Valley settlement council.

The area — a rocky mound where a former British Mandate-era prison and an Ottoman-era building stand — is now inaccessible to Palestinians living right next to it.

Displacement fears 

Some 490,000 Israeli settlers live in the West Bank alongside three million Palestinians.

While settlements have consistently expanded under successive Israeli administrations, “in the last year we’ve seen a lot of developments”, said Yonatan Mizrahi, director of settlement watch for Peace Now.

Israel’s government, formed less than a year before the Gaza war broke out, includes extreme-right parties which support settlement expansion and politicians who call for the annexation of the West Bank.

To Audi, Palestinian life in the area is in danger.

“I expect that the population of the entire Jordan Valley area will be displaced,” he said.

According to Mizrahi, many Israelis believe that “the Jordan Valley should be in Israeli hands no matter what” due to its geographical location as a buffer zone between the West Bank and Jordan — with which Israel has signed a peace deal in 1994.

Palestinian communities in the Jordan Valley, many of them farm-based, “have very little power”, Mizarhi added.

Beyond land seizures, he said some of the recent government decisions concerning the West Bank include the expansion of the Jordan Valley Regional Council’s jurisdiction and increased funding for settlements.

And unauthorised settler outposts, which are technically illegal not only under international law but under Israeli law too, have increasingly been given official approval.

Edais, the herder, said he believes that Israel has used the Gaza war to accelerate its land grabs in the West Bank.

“They found... an excuse to expel people,” he said, “but here, there is no war! The war in Gaza is 200 kilometres away from us”.

Hizbollah denies Israel claim it killed half of commanders in south

By - Apr 26,2024 - Last updated at Apr 26,2024

Smoke plumes erupt during Israeli bombardment on the village of Alma Al Shaab in south Lebanon on Thursday amid ongoing cross-border tensions (AFP photo)

BEIRUT — Hizbollah denied on Thursday an Israeli claim that it had killed half of the Iran-backed Lebanese group's commanders in the south of the country, saying only a handful were slain.

The Lebanese group has been exchanging near-daily fire with the Israeli forces since the day after its Palestinian ally Hamas carried out an unprecedented surprise attack on Israel on October 7.

Israel's Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said on Wednesday that "half of Hizbollah's commanders in southern Lebanon have been eliminated" in the months of cross-border violence sparked by the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.

A Hizbollah source who spoke on condition of anonymity rejected the claim.

The source told AFP that the number of slain Hizbollah members who "hold a certain level of responsibility does not exceed the number of fingers on one hand".

The source said Gallant's claim was "untrue and baseless" and designed to "raise the morale of the collapsed [Israeli] army".

Israel has frequently claimed to have killed local Hizbollah commanders in targeted strikes, but the group has only confirmed a few were high-level members, referring to the rest as fighters in their statements.

Since October 8, the day after the Hamas attack on southern Israel, at least 380 people have been killed in Lebanon, including 252 Hizbollah fighters and dozens of civilians, according to an AFP tally.

Israel says 11 soldiers and eight civilians have been killed on its side of the border.

Tens of thousands of people have been displaced on both sides.

Both sides have stepped up attacks this week, with Hizbollah increasing rocket fire on military bases, while Gallant said in his latest remarks the army had carried out “offensive action” across southern Lebanon.

The Israeli military also said on Wednesday that it had struck 40 Hizbollah targets in Lebanon’s south.

Hizbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has said his group had some 100,000 “trained” and “armed” fighters, but analysts say this number is likely inflated.

Pages

Pages

PDF