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Tag: Live updates: Israel-Hamas war

  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Gaza ceasefire and hostage deal, Al-Mawasi attack

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Gaza ceasefire and hostage deal, Al-Mawasi attack

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    In a new statement, Hamas said it “has shown the necessary positivity in all stages of negotiations” in order to reach a “comprehensive and acceptable agreement based on the just demands of our people.”

    Hamas said those demands include a permanent ceasefire, a complete withdrawal from Gaza, the “return of the displaced, reconstruction, and the conclusion of a serious deal for the exchange of prisoners.”

    Hamas said while it has “expressed its positive position” to what was included in US President Joe Biden’s speech on May 31, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has “continued to confirm their commitment to the genocide war, attacking the proposal put forth by President Biden” that is in contradiction to the claim that Israel has agreed to what was in the Biden speech.

    Hamas said while US Secretary of State Antony Blinken “continues to talk about Israel’s agreement to the latest proposal, we have not heard any Israeli official speak about this agreement.”

    Hamas called on Blinken and the Biden administration to put pressure on the Israeli government that Hamas said “is determined to complete its mission,” and which Hamas says is “in flagrant violation of all international laws and treaties.”

    In the statement, Hamas also said it rejects statements by Blinken that attempt to absolve Israel “of its crimes against innocent children, women, and elderly.”

    Hamas said this is in line with American policy that is complicit in the brutal war “against our Palestinian people, allowing the occupation to continue its crimes under full American political and military cover.”

    Earlier Wednesday, Blinken questioned whether Hamas is “proceeding in good faith” amid the ceasefire negotiations, saying Hamas had proposed a number of changes in their response to the latest deal, which “go beyond positions they had previously taken.”

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Benny Gantz threatens to leave Netanyahu war cabinet

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Benny Gantz threatens to leave Netanyahu war cabinet

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    Today marks the self-imposed deadline for key Israeli war cabinet member Benny Gantz to leave the country’s emergency government if Israel has not laid out a new plan for the war in Gaza. Follow for live updates.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah invasion looms, Arab League summit in Bahrain

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah invasion looms, Arab League summit in Bahrain

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    Israeli delegation members sit at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) as part of an ongoing case South Africa filed at the ICJ in December last year accusing Israel of violating the Genocide Convention during its offensive against Palestinians in Gaza, in The Hague, Netherlands, on May 17. Yves Herman/Reuters

    At the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on Friday, Israel responded to a public emergency hearing called for by South Africa, accusing Israel of violating the 1946 Genocide Convention by dismissing its claims.

    “This case, even by its very name… suggests an inversion of reality… and the obscene exploitation of the most sacred convention… calling something a genocide again and again doesn’t make it genocide. Repeating a lie does not make it true,” Israel’s Deputy Attorney General for International Law Gilad Noam said in his opening remarks.

    Noam said the picture South Africa has been painting over the last five months is “completely divorced from the facts and circumstances.” He spoke of the “difficult and tragic armed conflict” Israel is engaged in, asking the court to “respect the predicament” it is in.

    “Armed conflict is not synonymous to genocide,” he said.

    He said that Israel was surprised by South Africa’s emergency hearing notification and requested a postponement to ensure adequate representation. However, the court denied this request.

    South Africa told the ICJ on Thursday that Rafah is the last refuge for civilians in Gaza. In response, Noam stated that while civilians have been evacuated to Rafah, it is also a “focal point for ongoing terrorist activity.” 

    South Africa told the court on Thursday that “if Rafah falls, so too does Gaza,” to which Israel said the opposite is true.

    He accused South Africa of “exploiting the court and its authority” with its “baseless claims” and “evidence that does not exist,” saying “not every media report represents facts.”

    Remember: As in previous hearings at the ICJ, Israel insisted it is acting in accordance with international law in Gaza.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah invasion looms as Israel battles Hamas in the north

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah invasion looms as Israel battles Hamas in the north

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    Smoke rises after an Israeli airstrike on the Jabalia refugee camp in Gaza, on May 15. Mostafa Alkharouf/Anadolu/Getty Images

    The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) says that the operation in Rafah remains limited in scope, while it continues operating in two other parts of Gaza.

    IDF International spokesman, Nadav Shoshani, told CNN during a briefing Thursday that the operation in the eastern part of the southern Gaza city, which began ten days ago, remained “limited in space and in targets.”

    “We’re operating in specific places according to our intelligence, and where we know Hamas are hiding,” Shoshani said.

    The operation was aimed at locating tunnel shafts operated by Hamas and had recovered “ammunition of many types,” including anti-tank missiles. He said “more than 100 terrorists” had been killed.

    While a broader offensive has been long expected in Rafah, Israel is battling elsewhere in Gaza to prevent Hamas regrouping.

    Shoshani said operations were continuing in Jabalya, in northern Gaza, and in Zeitoun, in central Gaza.

    He said the deaths of five Israeli soldiers on Wednesday night in Jabalya – in Israeli tank fire – came amid fighting in a “dense, very complicated area.”

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah invasion looms, Gaza aid crisis worsens

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah invasion looms, Gaza aid crisis worsens

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    A damaged United Nations vehicle is seen in front of a hospital after a UN employee was killed in an attack on a vehicle in Gaza, according to Israeli media. Ali Jadallah/Anadolu/Getty Images

    The US has assessed that Israel has amassed enough troops on the edge of Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah to launch a full-scale incursion in the coming days, but senior American officials are unsure if a decision to carry out the offensive has been made, two senior administration officials told CNN.

    The White House believes an Israeli ground offensive in Rafah would be a mistake and is “urgently” working toward a ceasefire, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said Monday.

    The Biden administration is urging Israel to connect their military operations to a “clear” end game for the war, Sullivan told reporters. And, a top State Department official said the US and Israel are “struggling over what the theory of victory is” for Israel in Gaza, and that the US does not believe that the kind of total victory Israel says it is fighting for against Hamas is “likely or possible.”

    Here are the major developments:

    Unclear military strategy: The Israeli military has renewed its fighting in northern Gaza where it previously claimed to have dismantled Hamas’ command structure. But it now says the Palestinian militant group is trying to “reassemble” in the area, raising doubts about whether Israel’s goal to eradicate the group in the enclave is realistic and renewing questions about its long-term military strategy.

    Hamas treated in Turkey: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that “more than 1,000 Hamas members are currently under treatment” in Turkish hospitals. He said he does not see Hamas as a “terrorist organization” but as a “resistance organization.”

    Death toll unchanged: The United Nations has clarified the war’s death toll in Gaza, tallied by the enclave’s Health Ministry, remains unchanged at over 35,000, after its casualties report caused confusion.

    Aid ransacked: Israeli activists opposed to helping Palestinians in Gaza intercepted and ransacked an aid shipment. Video from a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank shows at least two trucks ransacked. Other footage showed activists blocking the path of the trucks, throwing packages on the ground and stomping on boxes. It’s unclear whether the aid was coming from Jordan or the Palestinian Authority.

    United Nations staffer killed and wounded: At least one UN aid worker was killed and another wounded after a vehicle marked as belonging to the agency was attacked in Rafah, according to a UN secretary-general spokesperson, who did not assign blame to either Israel or Hamas for the attack.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah invasion looms, new Gaza aid crossing opens

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah invasion looms, new Gaza aid crossing opens

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    Intense shelling and gunfire have continued in much of the Jabalya refugee camp in northern Gaza after Israeli forces began a ground operation there on Saturday.

    Videos from the area uploaded Sunday and Monday show civilians streaming out of the area against a background of constant drone flights, automatic gunfire, and explosions. Panicked families carrying whatever they can are seen leaving a UN school in the refugee camp amid heavy explosions.

    In one video showing the rooftops of Jabalya, the sound of heavy gunfire is constant.

    Communications from much of Gaza have been sporadic in the last few days. But CNN footage from Jabalya filmed early Monday showed terrified and exhausted families trying to leave the area. One child is seen carrying another child. There are also people being pushed in wheelchairs.

    One child said there were Israeli tanks behind the schools. “They are coming for us, we are going to the other schools.”

    An unidentified man also said that tanks were close to the schools, where thousands have taken shelter.

    “They are bombarding the area and randomly shooting everyone. Those people are running away, they were in the schools, hoping they were safe. Where will they go now?”

    Fares Afarna, director of ambulance services in northern Gaza, told the Al Jazeera network Monday that “ambulances are having a hard time to evacuate the dead and injured in the north.”

    He alleged that “more than once our ambulances have been targeted by Israeli occupation forces…”

    Afarna said that since the Israeli operation began on Saturday, ambulance crews had evacuated more than 50 wounded and 20 bodies. He told Al Jazeera that only two hospitals (Kamal Adwan and Al-Awada) were operating “and that’s where we are evacuating the dead and injured to and to some medical field points in the area.”

    CNN is reaching out to the Israeli military for a response to the allegation that ambulances are being targeted.

    “Following calls to the civilian population to temporarily evacuate from the area of Jabalya to shelters in western Gaza City, IDF troops began an operation overnight based on intelligence information regarding attempts by Hamas to reassemble its terrorist infrastructure and operatives in the area,” the military said.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war

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    Hundreds of thousands of people have fled Rafah after the Israel Defense Forces ordered evacuations ahead of a ground offensive. Follow live updates.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, looming Rafah invasion, Israel Eurovision participation

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, looming Rafah invasion, Israel Eurovision participation

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    Displaced Palestinians arrive in a truck carrying their belongings to set up shelter in a tent camp after returning to Khan Yunis in southern Gaza on May 9. AFP/Getty Images

    In its most recent ceasefire counterproposal on Monday, Hamas demanded Israel agree upfront to an initial 12-week pause in fighting rather than six weeks, creating a major obstacle in the negotiations, three sources familiar with the deliberations tell CNN. 

    Israeli officials are staunchly opposed to agreeing to the longer request, as they believe it would be no different than agreeing to an effective end to the war.

    One senior Biden administration official said Israel has made clear that it wants to reserve the right to dismantle the four remaining Hamas battalions in Rafah.

    “Need to maintain flexibility to continue the war to do that,” the official said, adding that Israel couldn’t do that if the first six-week ceasefire period simply flowed into the second phase, when a “sustained calm” is supposed to be restored in Gaza, according to the Hamas proposal.

    At an earlier point in the talks, Hamas agreed to engage in negotiations during the first six weeks of a pause in fighting — talks that would require that the parties reach terms before the second phase of the truce, of another six weeks, could go into effect, sources said. They described Hamas’ new demand as a clear reversal.

    Israeli officials privately recognize that a months-long ceasefire would make it difficult to restart the war and send Israeli troops back into Gaza, effectively ending the war.

    Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is loathe to make such an explicit commitment upfront, with several of his right-wing governing partners having threatened to collapse his government if the war ends without a major ground offensive in Rafah and the dismantlement of Hamas. 

    Israel is also taking issue with committing to 12 weeks of pause in fighting upfront before any of the hostages are released, said an Israeli source familiar with the talks. Sources said the wording in the agreement of how phase one of the truce would transition to phase two would be key to securing Israel’s agreement.  

    Hamas’ request appears to be confirmed in a document obtained by CNN, which states: 

    “All measures in this [first] stage, including the temporary cessation of mutual military operations, relief and shelter, and the withdrawal of forces, etc., will continue in the second stage until a sustainable calm is declared.”

    The senior Biden administration official added that the change in Hamas’ position may be due to its negotiators being out of sync with the group’s ultimate decision maker, Yahya Sinwar, who is believed to be underground in Gaza.

    CNN reported Thursday that there is now a pause in the ceasefire talks while Israel’s military operation in Rafah is taking place, according to US officials. 

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, looming Rafah invasion, Gaza devastation

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, looming Rafah invasion, Gaza devastation

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    A displaced Palestinian girl holds a child as she walks at a tent camp on a rainy day in Rafah, Gaza on May 6. Mohammed Salem/Reuters

    Rafah is “hanging on the edge of a precipice” and those left in the southern Gazan city, including 600,000 children, are the most vulnerable and living in “shocking” conditions, according to an official with the United Nations Children’s Fund in Rafah.

    “(They are) living in a very difficult conditions under tents, makeshift tarpaulins, under shocking sanitary conditions because there’s no effective sewage system here,” Hamish Young, UNICEF’s senior emergency coordinator for Gaza, told CNN on Thursday.
    “The level of acute watery diarrhea, which… can kill children quite easily, is now 20 times higher than what it was this time last year.”

    Young said that malnutrition rates in Rafah are increasing, and children are “in real trouble” after the closure of one of the main hospitals in the city “greatly reduced the ability for children to reach medical services.”

    World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Wednesday that hospitals in southern Gaza only have three days of fuel left, “which means services may soon come to a halt.”

    “It’s two days of fuel now,” said Young.

    “We’re rationing the fuel already for hospitals, scaling down operations as we can. When that fuel runs out, life support systems in hospitals stop.”

    If the generators stop running, patients on ventilators and children relying on incubators are at extreme risk, he said.

    “People on ventilators, I don’t know what happens to them when the ventilator stops running. Children in incubators, little tiny babies, often it’s two and three jammed into one incubator because we haven’t been able to bring enough in,” Young said.

    “Probably a large number will die when the fuel runs out.”

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah crossing, bombings, Gaza ceasefire deal

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah crossing, bombings, Gaza ceasefire deal

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    Hamas representative Osama Hamdan speaks during a news conference in Beirut, Lebanon, on May 7. Mohamed Azakir/Reuters

    A senior representative of Hamas says the proposed deal it agreed to includes the “withdrawal of the occupation from the Gaza Strip.”

    Osama Hamdan, a member of Hamas’ political bureau, told a news conference in Beirut that the proposed deal would secure “the main issues of the demands of our people and our resistance in stopping the aggression permanently, the withdrawal of the occupation from the entire Gaza Strip, the free return of the displaced, relief, reconstruction, ending the siege, and achieving a real and serious exchange deal.”

    Hamdan said the proposed deal’s three phases would be continuously implemented, claiming that Israel wanted “to complete one stage, in which it would achieve the release of its prisoners held by the resistance, and then resume its aggression against the Gaza Strip.”

    Referring to Egypt and Qatar, Hamdan said “the mediator brothers, if their proposal is approved…will have a role in completing all stages of the agreement, and putting pressure on the occupation to adhere to its provisions and implement them.”

    Israel has said there are significant gaps between what Hamas has agreed to and what was on the table in previous rounds of negotiations. In a statement Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Hamas proposal “was designed to torpedo the entry of our forces into Rafah. That did not happen.”

    Netanyahu said that “as the war cabinet unanimously determined, the Hamas proposal was very far from Israel’s core demands.”

    The White House said Tuesday that a close reading of Israel and Hamas’ separate negotiating positions on a hostage deal indicates the two sides should be able to strike an agreement.

    National security spokesman John Kirby’s comment was a fresh sign of optimism about the state of hostage talks after they appeared to stall Monday. CIA Director Bill Burns was in Cairo Tuesday for continued discussions.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah airstrikes, Gaza ceasefire deal

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah airstrikes, Gaza ceasefire deal

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    Smoke rises following an Israeli airstrike east of Rafah, on May 6. Ismael Abu Dayyah/AP

    Israel said the terms of a ceasefire proposal Hamas accepted on Monday remained “far from” meeting its demands and warned its military operations in Rafah would continue, even as it sent negotiators to talk to mediators.

    In a statement Monday, Hamas said the head of its political bureau, Ismail Haniyeh, told the Qatari prime minister and Egyptian intelligence minister that the militant group had accepted their proposals for a ceasefire and hostage deal.

    Palestinians celebrated that statement in the streets of Gaza, while in Tel Aviv, hostage families and their supporters implored Israel’s leaders to accept the deal.

    However, shortly afterwards, Israel said the terms Hamas had accepted were still far from meeting its “requirements,” and reiterated its commitment to an offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, saying its war cabinet had “unanimously decided” to continue with the operation “to exert military pressure on Hamas.” It did agree, though, to send a delegation to the mediators for further talks.

    Later on Monday evening, the Israel Defense Forces said it was “conducting targeted strikes against Hamas terror targets in eastern Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.” Video and images obtained by CNN showed multiple explosions in the Rafah area on Monday night.

    CNN political and global affairs analyst Barak Ravid said Israeli forces were going to take over the Palestinian side of the Rafah crossing in the next few hours, citing two sources with direct knowledge.

    The news comes just hours after Israel ordered Palestinians living in Rafah, a city in southern Gaza, to “evacuate immediately.”

    The order raised fears that Israel’s long-threatened assault on the city could be imminent. More than 1 million Palestinians have fled to Rafah, where Hamas is believed to have regrouped after Israel’s destruction of much of the north of Gaza.

    Read the full story.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, eastern Rafah evacuations

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, eastern Rafah evacuations

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    Children queue to receive food aid from a charity organization in Rafah, on May 3. Doaa Albaz/Anadolu/Getty Images

    The “necessary conditions for survival are absent” in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, as medical facilities have been stretched to the limit, according to a report from Medical NGO Medicins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders).

    The devastation in Rafah extends “far beyond those killed by Israeli bombardments and airstrikes”, saying that deaths as a result of the disruption to critical healthcare are “silent killings” that are “equally tragic.”

    It notes a “marked deterioration” in people’s health, with rising rates of “acute malnutrition”, medical facilities that are “inundated with patients and operating beyond their limits”, and the current medical response “rendered ineffective by the Israeli authorities’ siege”. 

     “This crisis is entirely man-made; what is being witnessed is a situation of deliberate deprivation,” MSF wrote in the report released on April 29.

    The current situation could result in “tens of thousands of non-trauma-related” deaths that could happen in the next six months, even in the event of a ceasefire, the report said.

    Malnutrition: Between January 2024 and the end of March 2024, MSF registered 216 cases of moderate and severe acute malnutrition in children under five at Al-Shaboura and Al-Mawasi primary healthcare centers in Rafah and 25 cases among pregnant women and new mothers.

    These figures represent only a small part of the larger reality, as they are based on screening of patients coming to the primary healthcare centers, while many people in Rafah do not have access to MSF’s services,” the report said. 

     “The more than one million Palestinian men, women and children who have risked everything to seek refuge in Rafah remain exposed to serious physical and mental harm, with no information about the future besides the confirmation of an imminent invasion of Rafah by the Israeli army,” it added. 

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, US funding for Israel, crisis in Gaza

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, US funding for Israel, crisis in Gaza

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    Pentagon Press Secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder speaks during a press briefing on April 23, 2024 at the Pentagon in Washington. Kevin Wolf/AP

    US military vessels are in the Mediterranean region and “standing by” and prepared to begin construction on the temporary pier off the coast of Gaza when given the order to do so, Pentagon spokesperson Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said Tuesday. 

    He also said the United States was “positioned to begin construction very soon, in the near future.”

    Officials are working through a checklist of processes and procedures, including security on the ground, coordination with partners supporting this effort and drawing up a timeline for implementation, Ryder said.

    Ryder has said the expectation is for the temporary pier to be operational by the end of April or early May, and said Tuesday the military is on track to meet that timeline. 

    The World Food Programme will support the distribution of aid from the pier following weeks of diplomatic wrangling, the organization said Saturday.

    The temporary pier, which will be several miles off Gaza’s coast, will receive military and civilian vessels, Ryder said. The aid brought by those vessels will then be transported by US military vessels to the causeway, where non-military trucks — driven by non-profit organization personnel — will take the aid and then distribute it into Gaza.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Netanyahu criticizes US sanctions plans, UNRWA review

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Netanyahu criticizes US sanctions plans, UNRWA review

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    A grave with nearly 300 bodies has been uncovered at a hospital in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, Gaza Civil Defense workers said, following the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the area earlier this month.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, West Bank violence, Iran tensions

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, West Bank violence, Iran tensions

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    Israeli troops stand guard near the scene of a shooting near Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank on April 21. Mussa Qawasma/Reuters

    Israeli soldiers shot and killed two Palestinians at Beit Einun Junction, near Hebron, in the occupied West Bank on Sunday, in what the military says was an attempted attack on soldiers.

    The Israel Defense Forces said that two men arrived at the junction, and one of them “attempted to stab IDF soldiers that were in the area, who responded with live fire and neutralized him.”

    Another man then “opened fire at the soldiers, who responded with live fire and neutralized him too,” the military said.

    The Palestinian Health Ministry in the West Bank named the two men as 19-year-old Muhammad Jabarin and 18-year-old Musa Jabarin.

    A video believed to be of the incident, which CNN cannot independently verify, shows one man ducking behind a large concrete block — often placed by the Israeli military at checkpoints and junctions to create barriers and block roads.

    The man does not appear to move from his location and it is not immediately clear in the video if he is holding anything in his hands. After about 30 seconds, gunfire is heard and the man falls to the ground.

    There was only one man in the video.

    Violence by Israeli settlers and troops in the occupied West Bank has surged during Israel’s war in Gaza. 

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Iran attack fears, Gaza aid crisis

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Iran attack fears, Gaza aid crisis

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    A Palestinian worker carries a bag of flour outside an aid distribution center in Gaza City on April 7. Mohammed Salem/Reuters

    The top US humanitarian official said Wednesday it is “credible” to assess that famine is already happening in parts of Gaza.

    Although US officials have been sounding the alarm about the imminent risk of famine in the enclave, United States Agency for International Development Administrator Samantha Power is the first official to publicly agree with an assessment that famine is already taking place.

    Power, speaking at a congressional hearing, was asked about an assessment from the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) and whether it “is plausible or likely that parts of Gaza, and particularly northern Gaza, are already experiencing famine.”

    “The methodology that the IPC used is one that we had our experts scrub,” Power said. “It’s one that’s relied upon in other settings and that is their assessment and we believe that assessment is credible.”

    “So there’s, famine is already occurring there?” the administrator was asked by Democratic Rep. Joaquin Castro.
    “That is – yes,” she replied.

    Power noted that the rate of malnutrition in northern Gaza before October 7 “was almost zero. And it is now one in three … kids.”

    Some background: An IPC analysis last month stated that all 2.2 million people in Gaza do not have enough food to eat, with half of the population on the brink of starvation and famine projected to arrive in the north “anytime between mid-March and May 2024.” It is unclear if this is the analysis cited in the hearing.

    Why this matters: The assessment is likely to fuel further calls for the Biden administration to put restrictions on its military aid to Israel. Top officials, including the US president himself, have told Israeli officials they must do more immediately to address the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza or risk changes in US policy.

    Read the full story.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Iran attack fears, Gaza Eid celebrations ruined

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Iran attack fears, Gaza Eid celebrations ruined

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    Iran’s foreign minister has spoken with his counterparts in Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and the UAE by phone, the Iranian foreign ministry said Wednesday.

    Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian spoke with each counterpart individually and stressed the importance of cooperation regarding the situation in Gaza, the ministry said.

    The phone calls come after US Middle East envoy Brett McGurk reportedly called the foreign ministers of Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and the UAE to ask them to send a message to Iran and urge it to lower tensions with Israel. Reuters reported that the officials conveyed the message, citing a source.

    Iran’s foreign minister also held a call with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, the Iranian foreign ministry said Thursday. The ministers discussed the war in Gaza, as well as “reactions and consequences” of the attack on Iran’s consulate in Syria. 

    Some context: The US and its allies have been bracing for a possible attack by Iran against Israeli and US assets in the Middle East in retaliation for a deadly strike last week on Iran’s consulate.

    The US and Iran continued to exchange messages this week, a US official told CNN on Wednesday, as the US remains on high alert for the potential retaliation. The official said that Iran has warned the US not to support Israel, and the US has warned Iran against an attack.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah offensive, Gaza during Eid al-Fitr

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah offensive, Gaza during Eid al-Fitr

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    An Israeli airstrike on a residential building in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza killed 14 people on Tuesday, according to Dr. Khalil Al-Dikran, the spokesperson of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital.

    He told CNN most of those killed were women and children, and 30 others were seriously injured. The information was also confirmed by the Civil Defense in Gaza.

    CNN has reached out to the Israeli military for comment.

    The attack happened on the last night before Eid al-Fitr, one of the most important holidays of the Islamic calendar, marking the end of Ramadan.

    In a video posted on social media, several children are seen being rushed into the hospital, where doctors inspect them on the floor — their bodies dusty and covered in blood. Another video shows the uncovered bodies of three dead children next to other bodies wrapped in blankets. 

    “Our hospital is very catastrophic as it’s on brink of collapse, our reception area is full of injured, and people are on floor, and we tried to do triage tents outside the hospital entrance, but that’s also full of injured people, and capacity is already beyond 100 percent capacity, as well as lack of all medical supplies and medicine and anesthetics”, the doctor told CNN.

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah invasion, ceasefire talks

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Rafah invasion, ceasefire talks

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    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations in Jerusalem, on February 18. Ronen Zvulun/Reuters

    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that a date for a ground offensive into Rafah has been set, according to a video posted on his official Telegram account.

    Netanyahu didn’t say what the date was.

    He also said that “entry into Rafah” was necessary for a “complete victory over Hamas.”

    Rafah, in the southernmost part of the besieged enclave, is where about 1.5 million Palestinians are estimated to be sheltering after fleeing fighting in the north.

    Earlier on Monday, Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir said that if Netanyahu abandoned plans for a ground offensive in Rafah, he may lose the support of the coalition that has kept him in power.

    The State Department later said Israel had not briefed the US on the date for the announced invasion of Rafah. 

    Matthew Miller, State Department spokesperson, reiterated that the US believes a ground offensive “would have an enormously harmful effect on … civilians, and that it would ultimately hurt Israel’s security.”

    “We have not yet seen them present a credible plan for dealing with the 1.4 million civilians who are in Rafah, some of whom have moved more than once, some of whom have moved more than twice,” said Miller at a press briefing.

    Miller said the US would be having “further conversations over the coming days, coming weeks” with Israeli officials about a potential Rafah operation “and how they could achieve it in a better way.”

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  • Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Khan Younis withdrawal, ceasefire talks

    Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Khan Younis withdrawal, ceasefire talks

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    Israel said it withdrew its forces from the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza. The military is “far from stopping” its operations in Gaza, its chief of staff said. Follow for live updates.

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