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Category: War

Weeks before Oct. 7, IDF said to have been warned of Hamas plan to take 250 hostages

Weeks before Oct. 7, IDF said to have been warned of Hamas plan to take 250 hostages

The Times of Israel reports: A document put together by the IDF’s Gaza Division less than three weeks before October 7 warned that Hamas was training for a large-scale invasion of Israel during which hostages would be taken en masse, according to an Israeli television report Monday. Chillingly, the September 19 document by Military Intelligence’s Unit 8200 — which was ignored — estimated the target number of hostages at 200-250, according to the Kan public broadcaster, citing unnamed security sources….

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Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières: Gaza before October 7th

Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières: Gaza before October 7th

📽️ Watch the documentary “Gaza before 7 October”, which captures the resilience of healthcare workers in Gaza, before the war erupted in October 2023, and the unfathomable loss and devastation that followed.https://t.co/PEzJvxAWuz — MSF International (@MSF) June 17, 2024 Most of the footage in this documentary was filmed in May 2023, some five months before the war that has now engulfed Gaza. The purpose of the original documentary project was to explore the impact of Israel’s blockade on Gaza, which…

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UNICEF decries Israel’s ‘war on children’ as starvation and deaths mount in Gaza

UNICEF decries Israel’s ‘war on children’ as starvation and deaths mount in Gaza

  The Israeli military on Sunday announced a daily “tactical pause” in its attacks on Rafah to allow humanitarian relief to enter the Gaza Strip, after systematically blocking aid from reaching Palestinians in Gaza since October 7. While a full ceasefire is still vital, “any pause in the bombing is good news for children,” says UNICEF spokesperson James Elder, speaking to Democracy Now! from Rafah. “The physical and psychological exhaustion they face is almost impossible to capture,” he says, characterizing…

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Israel’s descent

Israel’s descent

Adam Shatz writes: When Ariel Sharon​ withdrew more than eight thousand Jewish settlers from the Gaza Strip in 2005, his principal aim was to consolidate Israel’s colonisation of the West Bank, where the settler population immediately began to increase. But ‘disengagement’ had another purpose: to enable Israel’s air force to bomb Gaza at will, something they could not do when Israeli settlers lived there. The Palestinians of the West Bank have been, it seems, gruesomely lucky. They are encircled by…

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In Israel’s new air war in the West Bank, nearly half the dead are children

In Israel’s new air war in the West Bank, nearly half the dead are children

The Intercept reports: Around 9.30 PM in late February, a white Mazda pulled up near a game cafe in the Jenin refugee camp on the northern edge of the West Bank, where a crowd of boys and young men often gathered to socialize. As the car stopped, a few people walked by on the narrow street. Two motorbikes weaved past in different directions. “Everything was fine at the time,” according to an eyewitness sitting nearby in the camp’s main square….

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Israeli politician invokes Hitler in call to expel Gaza’s ‘Islamo-Nazi’ population

Israeli politician invokes Hitler in call to expel Gaza’s ‘Islamo-Nazi’ population

Middle East Eye reports: Israeli politician and former Likud lawmaker Moshe Feiglin invoked Adolf Hitler when urging in a TV interview the expulsion of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, whom he described as “Islamo-Nazis”. In a panel discussion on Channel 12, Feiglin called for resettlement in Gaza and argued Israel should transform the Palestinian territory into a “Hebrew Gaza”. “We are not guests in our country, this is our country, all of it,” he said in the video shared on…

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Russia overtook U.S. as biggest LNG supplier to Europe in May

Russia overtook U.S. as biggest LNG supplier to Europe in May

First Post reports: While Russia continues to navigate through the host of sanctions imposed by Ukraine and Western allies, Europe’s gas imports from Russia overtook supplies from the US. This was the first time Russia overtook the US to be the biggest gas supplier in Europe in almost two years. The reversal which took place in May indicates the difficulty of reducing Europe’s dependence on gas from Russia, with several eastern European countries still relying on imports from their neighbour….

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Israelis demand hostage deal in one of the biggest protests since October

Israelis demand hostage deal in one of the biggest protests since October

The National reports: Thousands of Israelis took to the streets of Tel Aviv on Saturday demanding a peace deal that would bring home hostages being held in Gaza. Pictures from Israeli broadcasters showed huge crowds lining Kaplan Street in one of the biggest demonstrations seen in the capital since October. Attendees held up signs and chanted slogans demanding the immediate resignation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. [Continue reading…] One more photo from the protest in Tel Aviv tonight. Yup, just…

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On the ground in Rafah: UNICEF reports ‘lethal’ lack of water, services

On the ground in Rafah: UNICEF reports ‘lethal’ lack of water, services

  UN News reports: Almost 3,000 malnourished children are at risk of dying before their families’ eyes in Gaza, where the eight-month-long war continues, according to the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) as spokesperson James Elder told UN News on Saturday about the situation on the ground in the besieged and bombarded enclave. Speaking from Gaza, Mr. Elder described a dire landscape, with a focus on child malnutrition and the devastating impact of the ongoing conflict amid growing concerns of famine….

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U.S. sanctions Israeli group for attacking Gaza aid convoys

U.S. sanctions Israeli group for attacking Gaza aid convoys

Al Jazeera reports: The United States has imposed sanctions on a “violent extremist” Israeli group for blocking and damaging humanitarian aid convoys to Gaza as the risk of famine increases in the besieged Palestinian territory. The administration of President Joe Biden on Friday targeted Tzav 9, a group whose stated aim is to prevent any assistance from entering Gaza. It accused the group of looting and setting fire to aid trucks. “The provision of humanitarian assistance is vital to preventing…

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Palestinians want liberation, not recognition

Palestinians want liberation, not recognition

Lana Tatour writes: Israel’s genocidal war against Gaza is one of the worst crises of modern times. Tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians are dead, and millions are homeless or displaced. The war in Gaza clearly calls for a new and different international response—a break from the past. Yet Western policymakers, including those in Washington, continue to push a sham peace process and a two-state solution that has long been a mirage. Western policies have only made the situation worse…

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U.S. Navy faces its most intense combat since World War II against Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels

U.S. Navy faces its most intense combat since World War II against Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels

The Associated Press reports: The U.S. Navy prepared for decades to potentially fight the Soviet Union, then later Russia and China, on the world’s waterways. But instead of a global power, the Navy finds itself locked in combat with a shadowy, Iran-backed rebel group based in Yemen. The U.S.-led campaign against the Houthi rebels, overshadowed by the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip, has turned into the most intense running sea battle the Navy has faced since World War II,…

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‘Unprecedented scale’ of violations against children in Gaza, West Bank and Israel, UN report says

‘Unprecedented scale’ of violations against children in Gaza, West Bank and Israel, UN report says

The Guardian reports: More grave violations against children were committed in Gaza, the West Bank and Israel than anywhere else in the world last year, according to a UN report due to be published this week. The report on children and armed conflict, which has been seen by the Guardian, verified more cases of war crimes against children in the occupied territories and Israel than anywhere else, including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Myanmar, Somalia, Nigeria and Sudan. “Israel and…

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How Israel’s war has created a neonatal nightmare in Gaza

How Israel’s war has created a neonatal nightmare in Gaza

The New Arab reports: Around 60,000 pregnant women in Gaza are living in fear of the fate of their unborn children as Israel’s genocidal war and its deliberately created famine spares no one. Yasmin Abdulrahman fled to southern Gaza in March just days after the death of her newborn baby, who lived only 11 days before succumbing to malnutrition. He had been born after four months of near-famine conditions across the Strip. Yasmin recalls that she spent over 30 hours…

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A majority of Iranians now favor possessing nuclear weapons. Their leaders take note

A majority of Iranians now favor possessing nuclear weapons. Their leaders take note

Peyman Asadzade writes: Iran is currently in a state of nuclear latency; it possesses the necessary materials to develop nuclear weapons should it decide to proceed. However, Iranian leaders have consistently stated that the country has no such intentions. Historically, public opinion polls since the mid-2000s have consistently demonstrated that while Iranians favored a peaceful nuclear program, a majority of them opposed developing nuclear weapons. A recent survey, however, suggests that Iranian citizens are growing more receptive to nuclear weapons….

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U.S. scrambling to prevent Israel-Hezbollah war amid Gaza ceasefire push

U.S. scrambling to prevent Israel-Hezbollah war amid Gaza ceasefire push

Barak Ravid reports: The Biden administration has grown extremely concerned that escalating violence between Israel and Hezbollah in recent days will deteriorate into an all-out war — and is scrambling to prevent it, according to U.S. officials. Why it matters: Amid the highly sensitive push to reach a ceasefire deal in Gaza, a full-blown war with the Lebanese militant group would dramatically exacerbate the regional crisis and draw the U.S. deeper into the conflict. Behind the scenes: The Biden administration has cautioned Israel in recent weeks against the…

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