International

Israeli missile strike kills three sons, four grandchildren of Hamas political leader

Published

3 weeks ago

April 11, 2024

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh

Israeli missile strike kills three sons, four grandchildren of Hamas political leader

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh’s three sons and three grandchildren were murdered in an Israeli airstrike on a Gaza refugee camp, according to the Hamas-affiliated news agency Shehab.

Haniyeh told Al Jazeera that his children were targeted while visiting relatives for Eid at the Shati refugee camp in northern Gaza.

The Hamas president condemned what he called Israel’s savagery, but he emphasized that Palestinian leaders will not back down if their families and homes are harmed.

“There is no doubt that this criminal enemy is driven by the spirit of revenge and the spirit of murder and bloodshed, and it does not observe any standards or laws,” Haniyeh said, adding that 60 members of his family have been killed since the start of the war.

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“We’ve seen it violate everything on the land of Gaza. There is a war of ethnic cleansing and genocide. There is mass displacement.”

Also, Gaza’s media office confirmed that Haniyeh’s children and grandchildren were killed by Israeli fighter jets when a “civilian vehicle” was targeted on the first day of Eid el-Fitr.

Several of his children and grandchildren were riding in the vehicle, it said.

“We strongly condemn Israel’s ongoing attacks against our Palestinian people,” the office said, adding that at least 125 bodies of slain Palestinians arrived at various hospitals in the past 24 hours alone.

“We hold the US administration, the international community responsible, and the Israeli occupation responsible for these massacres and crimes that are still taking place in this ongoing genocide,” it added.

Israeli missile strike kills three sons, four grandchildren of Hamas political leader

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International

UN warns Israel assault on Gaza’s Rafah on ‘immediate horizon’

Published

2 hours ago

May 1, 2024

Trends Admin

United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres

UN warns Israel assault on Gaza’s Rafah on ‘immediate horizon’

UNITED NATIONS, April 30 (Reuters) – The United Nations on Tuesday warned that an Israeli assault on Rafah in the Gaza Strip was “on the immediate horizon” and that “incremental” progress by Israel on aid access to the enclave could not be used to prepare for or justify an operation.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appealed for states with influence over Israel “to do everything in their power” to prevent an Israeli assault on Rafah in southern Gaza, where more than 1.2 million displaced Gaza Palestinians are sheltering.

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed on Tuesday to go ahead with a long-promised assault, whatever the response by Hamas to latest proposals for a halt to fighting in the nearly seven-month-long war and a return of Israeli hostages.

“The world has been appealing to the Israeli authorities for weeks to spare Rafah, but a ground operation there is on the immediate horizon,” said U.N. aid chief Martin Griffiths in a statement. “The simplest truth is that a ground operation in Rafah will be nothing short of a tragedy beyond words.”

Israel pledged nearly a month ago to improve aid access to the enclave of 2.3 million people after U.S. President Joe Biden demanded steps to alleviate the humanitarian crisis, saying the U.S. could place conditions on support if Israel did not act.

Guterres told reporters that there had been “incremental progress” toward averting “an entirely preventable, human-made famine” in northern Gaza, but much more was urgently needed.

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“These improvements in bringing more aid into Gaza cannot be used to prepare for or justify a full-blown military assault on Rafah,” Griffiths said.

Guterres specifically called on Israel to follow through on its promise to open two crossings to the north.

“A major obstacle to distributing aid across Gaza is the lack of security for humanitarians and the people we serve. Humanitarian convoys, facilities and personnel, and the people in need must not be targets,” Guterres told reporters.

NO ALTERNATIVE TO LAND

A U.N.-backed report in March said famine was imminent and likely by May in northern Gaza, and could spread across the enclave by July. Guterres said the most vulnerable in the north “are already dying of hunger and disease.”

When asked what leverage the U.S. could use over its ally Israel to boost aid access and avert a Rafah assault, Guterres said: “It is very important to put all possible pressure in order to avoid what would be an absolutely devastating tragedy.”

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said he will discuss with Netanyahu on Wednesday measures that Israel still needs to take to increase the flow of aid into Gaza.

“I strongly encourage the government of Israel and the Hamas leadership to reach now an agreement,” Guterres said. “Without that, I fear the war, with all its consequences both in Gaza and across the region, will worsen exponentially.”

The U.N. is in talks with the U.S. about a floating pier it is constructing to allow maritime aid deliveries to Gaza from Cyprus. Guterres said: “We welcome aid delivery by air and sea, but there is no alternative to the massive use of land routes.”

Israel’s Deputy U.N. Ambassador Jonathan Miller said last week that Israel continued “to elevate and step up” its aid support and that there had been substantial results with a “dramatic increase” in the volume of aid over the past several months.

Israel is retaliating against Hamas in Gaza over an Oct. 7 surprise attack on southern Israel led by the militant group.

Israel says about 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 people were taken hostage in the assault. Gaza health authorities say Israel has killed more than 34,000 people in its offensive in Hamas-run Gaza since then.

UN warns Israel assault on Gaza’s Rafah on ‘immediate horizon’

Reuters

International

Gaza: Israeli PM Netanyahu says Rafah attack will happen despite deal

Published

2 hours ago

May 1, 2024

Trends Admin

Benjamin Netanyahu

Gaza: Israeli PM Netanyahu says Rafah attack will happen despite deal

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Israel will launch an invasion of the southern Gaza city of Rafah regardless of truce talks with Hamas.

It comes amid ongoing attempts to try to reach an agreement for a ceasefire and hostage releases.

But at a meeting of hostages’ relatives, Mr Netanyahu said he would invade “with or without” a deal.

His comments follow renewed warnings by the US against a Rafah invasion unless civilians were properly protected.

In a phone call with Mr Netanyahu on Sunday, US President Joe Biden “reiterated his clear position” on Rafah, a White House statement said. Mr Biden has previously described an invasion of Rafah as a “red line”.

On Tuesday, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said an assault on Rafah would be an “unbearable escalation”, appealing for “all those with influence over Israel to do everything in their power to prevent it”.

More than half of Gaza’s 2.5m population is in Rafah, having fled there to escape fighting in other parts of the territory. Conditions in the overcrowded city are dire, and displaced people there have spoken of a lack of food, water and medication.

The West Bank-based Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Monday that an invasion of Rafah would be the “biggest catastrophe in the Palestinian people’s history”.

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Israeli sources told the Reuters news agency on Monday that plans to attack Rafah would be shelved in favour of a “sustained period of calm” if a ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israeli was reached.

Days earlier, Israel’s Foreign Minister Israel Katz told Israeli Channel 12 television that “if there will be a deal, we will suspend the [Rafah] operation”.

But on Tuesday Mr Netanyahu insisted that the war would continue until Israel had achieved all of its objectives in Rafah.

“The idea that we will halt the war before achieving all of its goals is out of the question,” he said.

“We will enter Rafah and we will eliminate the Hamas battalions there with or without a deal, in order to achieve the total victory,” according to a statement issued by Mr Netanyahu’s office.

It said the families urged the prime minister and his national security adviser, Tzachi Hanegbi, to continue the war and ignore mounting international pressure. Many hostage families however have publicly demonstrated for the government to agree to a deal to return their loved ones at any cost.

About 130 hostages from among 253 kidnapped by Hamas during its unprecedented attack on Israel on 7 October remain unaccounted for. At least 34 of them are presumed dead. The rest have been released or rescued.

Indirect talks have been at an impasse for weeks, although the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, said on Monday that he hoped Hamas would accept what he has called Israel’s “extraordinarily generous offer” for a truce.

Meanwhile the head of the UN’s refugee organisation has warned that the looming invasion was causing people in Rafah to live in a state of “constant traumatic stress disorder”.

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“People have not yet been asked to evacuate from Rafah, but there is a sense that if there is no deal this week that could happen,” Philippe Lazzarini told reporters.

“My colleagues on the ground are describing constant state of trauma among the people.”

Mr Netanyahu also denounced as “a scandal on a historical scale” recent reports, citing Israeli officials, that the International Criminal Court (ICC) at The Hague could be preparing to issue arrest warrants for Israeli government leaders and military commanders on charges related to the war.

“I want to make one thing clear: no decision, neither in The Hague nor anywhere else, will harm our determination to achieve all the goals of the war,” the prime minister said.

“Israel expects the leaders of the free world to come out strongly against this scandalous step, a step that will harm the self-defence capacity not only of the State of Israel, but of all democracies in the world.”

There has been no announcement from ICC Prosecutor Karim Kahn KC.

However, his office has been formally investigating alleged war crimes in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza Strip since June 2014, and Mr Khan has confirmed that the investigation will cover the 7 October attack and the ensuing war.

Israel has never ratified the Rome Statute, the ICC’s founding treaty, and Mr Netanyahu insisted that the ICC had “no authority” over the country. However, the ICC ruled in 2015 that it had jurisdiction because the Palestinians had ratified the treaty.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said on Monday that the US – which has also not ratified the Rome Statute – did not believe the court has jurisdiction and did not support the investigation.

Gaza: Israeli PM Netanyahu says Rafah attack will happen despite deal

BBC

International

Georgia rocked by clashes over ‘foreign agent’ bill

Published

2 hours ago

May 1, 2024

Trends Admin

Georgia rocked by clashes over ‘foreign agent’ bill

Riot police in Georgia have fired tear gas and water cannon to disperse crowds protesting against a bill seen by the opposition as targeting media freedoms.

Demonstrators threw eggs and bottles at the police outside the parliament in the capital, Tbilisi.

The crowds retreated, but clashes continued on the main Rustaveli Avenue late on Tuesday. A number of people were reportedly injured and detained.

On 17 April, MPs gave their initial backing to the “foreign agent” bill.

Under the bill proposed by the ruling Georgian Dream party, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and independent media that receive more than 20% of their funding from foreign donors would have to register as organisations “bearing the interests of a foreign power”.

They would also be monitored by Georgia’s justice ministry and could be forced to share sensitive information – or face hefty fines of up to 25,000 Georgian lari ($9,400; £7,500).

The passing of the bill in its first reading triggered a series of street protests.

On Tuesday, several protesters were injured during the clashes in Tbilisi, media reports say.

Georgia’s IPN news agency says that Levan Khabeishvili, chairman of the main opposition party United National Movement, was severely beaten and taken to hospital.

Reuters news agency says that eyewitnesses saw some police officers physically attack protesters.

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A number of protesters were reportedly detained.

The Georgian authorities have not publicly commented on the injury claims.

Opponents of the bill demand that the government scrap it, arguing that it is inspired by authoritarian legislation that neighbouring Russia uses to crush dissent.

They are also concerned that the bill could be used to crush critical voices ahead of the parliamentary elections later this year.

Parallels have been drawn with an authoritarian bill which came into force in Russia in 2012, and which the Russian government has since used to marginalise voices challenging the Kremlin – including prominent cultural figures, media organisations and civil society groups, reports the BBC’s South Caucasus correspondent, Rayhan Demytrie.

She says many are also worried that such a law will derail Georgia from its path towards the much-coveted status of EU membership which – according to a poll by the US National Democratic Institute – is supported by nearly 80% of Georgians.

Georgia was granted EU candidate status in December 2023, but now both Brussels and Washington have said the adoption of the foreign agents law would be detrimental to Georgia’s European ambitions.

A number of European leaders have warned the proposed bill is “incompatible” with European norms and values.

But the government of Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze is standing firm.

Mr Kobakhidze has accused NGOs of attempting to stage revolutions in Georgia twice, of promoting “gay propaganda” and of attacking the Georgian Orthodox Church.

The government insists the bill is about ensuring transparency and rejects the notion that it is against European values – or that Russia is behind the legislation.

On Monday, Georgian Dream organised its own rally in response to the protests. Bidzina Ivanishvili, the party’s billionaire founder, addressed the crowds, strongly criticising the West.