Here’s how things stand on Monday, March 18, 2024:
Fighting and humanitarian crisis
- Israeli forces stormed Gaza’s al-Shifa Hospital, with a military spokesman claiming Hamas fighters have regrouped inside the medical facility. Gaza’s Ministry of Health said the raid on the hospital – Israel’s fourth since October – has resulted in deaths and injuries.
- According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, some 30,000 people – including displaced civilians, wounded patients and medical staff – are trapped inside the hospital amid Israel’s onslaught.
- Separately, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has pledged to go ahead with a ground assault on Rafah in Gaza after German Chancellor Olaf Scholz warned against it.
- In Gaza, 19 aid trucks arrived safely in Jabalia as the first convoys to travel from the south to the north of the Gaza Strip without incident in four months bring desperately needed aid.
- Israel’s air and ground campaign since October has killed more than 31,600 people, Gaza health authorities said. It has also driven most of the population from their homes, and brought people to the brink of famine, aid agencies added.
Diplomacy and regional tensions
- The Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a coalition of pro-Iran armed groups, has said it launched a drone attack at an Israeli airbase in the occupied Golan Heights.
- Meanwhile, the Jordanian army has announced detecting suspicious aerial movements from an unknown source along the border with Syria, according to the Reuters news agency.
- German Chancellor Olaf Scholz warned Israel’s Netanyahu on Sunday against his plans for a ground offensive in Rafah, while EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen echoed his sentiments during a visit to Cairo.
Violence in the occupied West Bank
- The Wafa news agency is reporting that Israeli forces detained at least 25 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank on Sunday, including a woman from Gaza, a child and former prisoners.
- The woman from Gaza has cancer and was arrested as she was heading to Jerusalem to complete her treatment, the agency said, citing a joint statement from the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society and the Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees.
