Closing summary
It’s approaching 5.30am in Gaza City and Tel Aviv and we’ll shut this blog shortly. Our live coverage will resume later in the day. Here’s an overview of the latest developments. And you can see all our Israel-Gaza war coverage here. Thank you for reading.
The United Nations general assembly overwhelmingly voted to demand an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza. The ceasefire resolution passed with 153 members voting in favour, 10 voting against and 23 abstaining. The US, Israel and eight other countries – including Austria, Guatemala and Liberia – voted against the resolution.
The US looked increasingly isolated on the world stage after the UN ceasefire vote, which highlighted the stiffening consensus around the world for the need to stop Israel’s relentless assault on Gaza. In contrast, the previous UN resolution calling for a “humanitarian truce” on 27 October attracted 120 votes in favour and 14 against, with 45 abstentions.
Joe Biden said Israel was starting to “lose support” from the international community due to its indiscriminate bombing in Gaza. The US president added that Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu needed to change his hardline government.
Israeli tank shelling on Tuesday was focused on the centre of Khan Younis, southern Gaza’s main city, residents said. Israeli airstrikes there killed 11 Palestinians, including two children, health officials said. Further south in Rafah, bordering Egypt, strikes killed 22 people including children, officials said.
Israeli forces killed six Palestinians in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin on Tuesday, Palestinian health officials said. Five were killed in an Israeli operation in the morning, the health ministry said, while a sixth died later. The Israeli military said it carried out an operation in Jenin targeting an explosives-manufacturing facility on Tuesday and uncovered “explosive devices planted under roads to attack the security forces”.
A senior official from Yemen’s Houthis has warned cargo ships in the Red Sea to avoid travelling towards Israel and the occupied territories, after the Iran-aligned group claimed an attack on a commercial tanker earlier in the day.
US president Joe Biden declined to directly answer a question on reports that Israel was pumping seawater into Hamas’s tunnel complex in Gaza, referring only to assertions that there were no hostages in the areas targeted. Citing unnamed US officials, the Wall Street Journal has reported that Israel recently began pumping seawater into the tunnels in a process that would likely take weeks. Responding in Washington to a question about the reports, Biden said on Tuesday: “With regard to the flooding of the tunnels. I’m not at lib – well, there [are] assertions being made that ... there’s no hostages in any of these tunnels. But I don’t know that for a fact.”
Biden will be speaking to the families of Americans who were taken hostage by Hamas on 7 October, his first in-person meeting with families, Reuters reported, citing a White House official. It is unclear how many families will be present for the Wednesday meeting and how many will be in person versus on video conference.
Palestinians who have been injured during the war in Gaza are facing potentially fatal delays both in getting treatment within the territory as well as in being evacuated abroad, caused by Israeli bureaucracy and military checkpoints, the UN and aid organisations say. The delays come amid a claim by the UN World Health Organisation that Palestinian ambulance staff involved in a recent high-risk evacuation were detained at gunpoint, stripped and beaten by Israeli soldiers.
Updated
The Israeli military says it carried out an operation in Jenin targeting an explosives-manufacturing facility on Tuesday.
It said the operation in the West Bank city uncovered “explosive devices planted under roads to attack the security forces”, who subsequently seized weapons, ammunition and more explosives.
The comments, reported by Agence France-Presse, came as Palestinian health officials said Israeli forces killed six Palestinians in Jenin on Tuesday.
An Israeli military statement said of its operation:
The forces identified and dismantled a ready-to-use explosives manufacturing facility and located underground tunnel shafts and an observation control room.
This morning, IDF [Israel Defence Force] drones identified a terrorist cell hurling explosive devices and firing at the forces. The IAF [air force] targeted the threat and killed a number of the terrorists.
The military said “dozens” of arrests were made and operations were ongoing.
Israeli military kills six in Jenin, Palestinian officials say
Israeli forces killed six Palestinians in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin on Tuesday, Palestinian health officials said.
Five people were killed in an Israeli operation in the morning, the health ministry said, while the sixth was a man who was shot in the thigh and later died after Israeli forces allegedly prevented him from reaching hospital in time, Agence France-Presse reports.
The ministry added that a 13-year-old boy having a separate medical emergency also died after being prevented from reaching treatment.
Earlier reports put Tuesday’s death toll at four.
An AFP photographer saw Israeli military vehicles entering Jenin refugee camp on Tuesday and a drone flying above.
Israeli forces “continue to storm Jenin camp and ambulance crews are prevented from entering to deal with medical cases without prior coordination”, the Palestinian Red Crescent said on Tuesday morning.
Updated
The US will always insist on the need to protect journalists reporting from Gaza during the Israel-Hamas conflict, US secretary of state Antony Blinken has said in a letter to Agence France-Presse.
The news agency and other international media groups had written to Blinken in late October urging his help in protecting journalists on the ground in Gaza after several were killed since the outbreak of fighting.
AFP reports Blinken wrote back:
The United States has and will continue to underscore with Israel, and with all countries, that journalists must be protected from harm.
We stand unequivocally for the protection of journalists during armed conflict and mourn those who have been killed or injured.
Since the Israel-Hamas war began on 11 October, at least 63 journalists and media workers – 56 Palestinian, four Israeli and three Lebanese – have been killed, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
AFP and the other media groups also urged Blinken’s help in evacuating their employees from Gaza as Israeli bombards the territory in response for Hamas’s attack.
Updated
A senior official from Yemen’s Houthis has warned cargo ships in the Red Sea to avoid travelling toward Israel and the occupied territories, after the Iran-aligned group claimed an attack on a commercial tanker earlier in the day.
Mohamed Ali al-Houthi, the head of Yemen’s Houthi supreme revolutionary committee, said ships should avoid heading towards Israel and that any that passed Yemen should keep radios turned on and quickly respond to Houthi attempts at communication.
Al-Houthi also warned cargo ships against “falsifying their identity” or raising flags different from the country belonging to cargo shipowner.
In solidarity with Palestinians under attack from Israel in Gaza, the Houthis are using their control of Yemen’s western seaboard, including ports such as Hodeidah, to mount attacks on what it regards as shipping linked to Israel.
On Tuesday, the Houthis said they hit a Norwegian commercial tanker with a missile, in their latest protest.
The full report is here:
Updated
Biden responds to reports Israel pumping seawater into Gaza tunnels
US president Joe Biden declined to directly answer a question on reports that Israel was pumping seawater into Hamas’s tunnel complex in Gaza, referring only to assertions that there were no hostages in the areas targeted, Reuters reports.
Citing unnamed US officials, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) has reported that Israel recently began pumping seawater into Hamas’s vast labyrinth of tunnels underneath the territory, in a process that would likely take weeks.
US ABC News later published a similar report and said the flooding appeared limited as Israel evaluated the strategy’s effectiveness.
Israel’s military said it was looking into the reports, while a defence ministry spokesperson declined to comment.
Responding in Washington to a question about the reports, Biden said on Tuesday:
With regard to the flooding of the tunnels. I’m not at lib – well, there [are] assertions being made that ... there’s no hostages in any of these tunnels. But I don’t know that for a fact.
Biden added:
I do know that, though, every civilian death is an absolute tragedy, and Israel has stated its intent, as I said, to match its words ... with actions.
The WSJ, citing Biden administration officials, has said the flooding could help destroy the tunnels, where Israel believes Hamas is hiding hostages, fighters and munitions.
Other officials expressed concerns the seawater could endanger Gaza’s supply of fresh water, it said.
Updated
Australia’s foreign minister says the country supported the UN resolution calling for a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza out of concern for civilians in the besieged enclave, in a rare split with close ally the US.
Penny Wong told a news conference in Adelaide after the UN resolution passed:
Australia has consistently affirmed Israel’s right to defend itself. And in doing so, we have said as Israel must respect international humanitarian law, civilians and civilian infrastructure, including hospitals must be protected.
The resolution we have supported is consistent with the position we have previously outlined on these issues.
Reuters also reports that Australia, New Zealand and Canada – which along with the US and the UK make up the intelligence alliance known as the Five Eyes – released a joint statement on Tuesday backing the ceasefire.
After dire warnings by UN officials over a deepening humanitarian crisis in Gaza, the 193-member UN general assembly passed a resolution on Tuesday calling for a ceasefire, with 153 countries including Australia voting in favour and 23 abstaining.
Ten countries voted against, including the US and Israel, which say a ceasefire only benefits Hamas.
Updated
The US was looking increasingly isolated on the world stage after the resounding vote at the UN general assembly calling for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza.
Cheers and clapping echoed around the general assembly chamber in New York as the emergency vote was announced on Tuesday. A thumping 153 member states out of the 193 total membership backed the resolution, with only 10 including the US, Israel and Austria voting against, and 23 – including the UK and Germany – abstaining.
The Palestinians had been hoping for an emphatic result as a demonstration of the unequivocal global desire for an end to Israel’s bombardment of Gaza – and they got it. By contrast, the previous UN resolution calling for a “humanitarian truce” on 27 October attracted 120 votes in favour, 14 against, with 45 abstentions.
The vote highlighted the stiffening consensus around the world for the need for a stop to Israel’s relentless assault on Gaza.
See the full report here:
Updated
Further south of Khan Younis in Rafah, which borders Egypt, health officials said an Israeli airstrike on houses overnight killed 22 people, including children. Civil emergency workers were searching for more victims under the rubble.
Residents said the shelling of Rafah, where the Israeli army this month ordered people to head for their safety, was some of the heaviest in days, Reuters reports.
Abu Khalil, 40, a father of six, said:
At night we can’t sleep because of the bombing, and in the morning, we tour the streets looking for food for the children. There is no food.
The UN World Food Programme says half of Gaza’s population is starving.
“There’s no electricity, no fuel, no water, no medicine,” resident Mohammed Obaid said as he inspected debris in Rafah.
The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry said diseases and illnesses including diarrhoea, food poisoning, meningitis, respiratory infections, chickenpox and scabies were spreading.
Updated
In Khan Younis, the main city in southern Gaza, residents are saying Israeli tank shelling is now focused on the city centre.
One said on Tuesday that tanks were operating in the street where the house of Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’s leader in Gaza, is located.
Reuters also reports that after nightfall, Israeli airstrikes on Khan Younis killed 11 Palestinians, including two children, health officials said.
An older Palestinian, Tawfik Abu Breika, said earlier that his residential block in the city was hit without warning by an Israeli airstrike that brought down several buildings and caused casualties.
As neighbours sifted through rubble, he said:
The world’s conscience is dead, no humanity or any kind of morals. This is the third month that we are facing death and destruction.
Updated
Hamas has welcomed the UN vote demanding an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza, Reuters has snapped.
The Palestinian militant group also urged the international community to pressure Israel to abide by the decision.
The UN general assembly resolution for a ceasefire passed with 153 members voting in favour, 10 voting against and 23 abstaining.
This is Adam Fulton picking up our live coverage as it just passes 1.10am in Gaza City and Tel Aviv. Stay with us for all the latest developments
Updated
Summary
It is currently 1.00am in Gaza.
Here’s a summary of what happened today:
The UN general assembly overwhelmingly voted to demand an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza. The resolution for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire passed with 153 members voting in favor, 10 voting against, and 23 abstaining.
The United States, Israel and eight other countries voted against the ceasefire resolution. Other countries that voted against included Austria, Guatemala and Liberia.
Canada, Australia and New Zealand issued a joint statement to support efforts towards a sustainable ceasefire in Palestine.
Joe Biden said that Israel is starting to “lose support” from the international community due to its indiscriminate bombing that has killed thousands of Palestinian civilians. The US president added that Benjamin Netanyahu needed to change his hardline government.
Biden will be speaking to the families of Americans who were taken hostage by Hamas on 7 October, his first in-person meeting with families, Reuters reported, citing a White House official. It is unclear how many families will be present for the Wednesday meeting and how many will be in person versus on video conference.
Palestinians who have been injured during the war in Gaza are facing potentially fatal delays both in getting treatment within the coastal strip as well as in being evacuated abroad, caused by Israeli bureaucracy and military checkpoints, the UN and aid organisations say. The delays come amid a claim by the World Health Organization (WHO) that Palestinian ambulance staff involved in a recent high-risk evacuation were detained at gunpoint, stripped and beaten by Israeli soldiers.
Thank you for reading. My colleague in Australia will be handling future updates.
Updated
UNRWA has confirmed that one of its schools in northern Gaza was blown up. In a post on Twitter/X, Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner general of UNRWA said: “Saw videos of an @UNRWA school in northern #Gaza blown up. It is outrageous. All public facilities, including hospitals & @UN schools are protected under international law.”
Saw videos of an @UNRWA school in northern #Gaza blown up. It is outrageous. All public facilities, including hospitals & @UN schools are protected under international law. Parties to this brutal war have the coordinates of all our facilities in Gaza.
— Philippe Lazzarini (@UNLazzarini) December 12, 2023
Footage has been circulating online of the school in question and shows it being detonated as Israel Defense Forces troops appear to cheer nearby.
My middle school @UNRWA in Beit Hanoun, northern Gaza Strip blown apart by demolition explosives. pic.twitter.com/1AEeXwsLvd
— Loay (@AstroLoay) December 12, 2023
Updated
Joe Biden, in a press conference with Volodymyr Zelenskiy, reiterated US support for Israel, citing the “brutality” of the Hamas attack on 7 October.
But, in line with more Israel-critical comments he made earlier today, he added: “We have made it clear to the Israelis that the safety of innocent Palestinians is still of great concern.”
The US president called every civilian death a “tragedy”.
Updated
Here is a breakdown of the UN resolution vote by country.
Political scientist Ian Bremmer compared the results of the ceasefire resolution to the UN vote in February that called for an end too the war in Ukraine.
unga vote calling for an end to war in ukraine, feb 2023:
— ian bremmer (@ianbremmer) December 12, 2023
in favor: 141
against: 7
abstentions: 32
today’s vote for ceasefire in gaza
in favor: 153
against: 10
abstentions: 23 pic.twitter.com/QUQmmt5L6w
The latest vote from the UN general assembly shows growing support for a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza.
Thirty-two more countries voted in favor of a ceasefire compared to 27 October vote.
While 14 countries voted against a ceasefire in October, only 10 voted against the resolution today.
From Margaret Besheer, Voice of America United Nations correspondent:
In breaking down the numbers, international support has grown for a #Gaza humanitarian #ceasefire -- with 32 more countries supporting a CF than on Oct 27. 22 countries that abstained previously took a position (or didn't show up) today. 14 voted no on 10/27, only 10 today.
— Margaret Besheer (@mbesheer) December 12, 2023
Updated
As the UN gathered to vote on the humanitarian ceasefire resolution, pro-Palestine protestors continued outside the general assembly meeting in New York.
Protestors have now blocked off all traffic on 1st Avenue as they protest in front of the UN during the emergency General Assembly meeting pic.twitter.com/457E6WbVwT
— katie smith (@probablyreadit) December 12, 2023
Updated
UN general assembly votes to demand Gaza ceasefire
The UN general assembly overwhelmingly voted to demand an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza.
The resolution for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire passed with 153 members voting in favor, 10 voting against, and 23 abstaining.
The countries that voted against included:
The United States
Austria
Israel
Paraguay
The United Kingdom voted to abstain.
Updated
The US’s amendment has also failed, as it did not obtain the necessary two-thirds majority.
Eighty-four members voted in favor, 62 voted against. Twenty-five members abstained.
The amendment would condemn the 7 October attack and the kidnapping of hostages.
Updated
Austria’s amendment has failed, as it did not obtain the required two-thirds majority.
The amendment called for clarification that hostages are being held by “Hamas and other groups”.
Eighty-nine UN members voted in favor, while 61 voted against.
Twenty members abstained.
Updated
Munir Akram, the UN representative of Pakistan, have said they will not support either amendment introduced by the US and Austria, calling Israel’s attacks on Palestine “one-sided slaughter”.
Akram called out Israel’s treatment of Palestinian people as having a role in the attacks on 7 October:
“When you deny people freedom and dignity…they become very angry, and they do to others what they do to them”- Munir Akram, Permanent Representative of Pakistan to the UN pic.twitter.com/Y5aGaT9t1y
— UN News (@UN_News_Centre) December 12, 2023
Akram also called out arguments from the US and others that Israel should be allowed to act in self-defense.
“Is this any kind of legitimate self defense when you can kill 18,00 civilians with impunity and enjoy the protection of [the] security council against action?” he said.
Updated
The US has also introduced an amendment that would condemn the 7 October attack and the kidnapping of hostages.
From J Alex Tarquinio, correspondent for Foreign Policy:
The @USUN mission to the UN proposes an amendment condemning the heinous terrorist attack by Hamas on October 7 and the taking of hostages. pic.twitter.com/gBVbMHr6pX
— J. Alex Tarquinio (@alextarquinio) December 12, 2023
Updated
Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the US representative for the UN, has said they support the amendment brought by Austria, but called a ceasefire “dangerous”.
“We support affirming that Israel, like every single country on Earth, has the rights and the responsibility to defend itself from terrorism,” Greenfield said.
“So long as Hamas remains driven by its murderous ideology, any ceasefire right now would be temporary at its best, and dangerous at its worst,” she added.
Updated
The UN representative for Austria introduced an amendment on the ceasefire resolution.
The amendment asks to signify that hostages are being held by “Hamas and other groups”.
From J Alex Tarquinio, correspondent for Foreign Policy:
The @AustriaUN mission to the UN proposes this language clarifying the hostages are held by "Hamas and other groups." pic.twitter.com/04ZByPFgFA
— J. Alex Tarquinio (@alextarquinio) December 12, 2023
The Austrian representative said it supports the amendment as the current resolution falls short and doesn’t name Hamas or ensure Israel has the right to defend itself.
Updated
Mahmoud warned that a failure to pass the resolution would legitimize genocide as a tool for war and lead to a war in the Middle Eastern region.
“This will unfortunately mean that genocide will be used as a tool for war, completely disregarding international law,” Mahmoud said.
“This will lead the region to a full-fledged war and it will jeopardize the creditability of this international organization,” he said.
Updated
Osama Mahmoud Abdelkhalek Mahmoud, UN representative for Egypt, is speaking about the wide spread support for the resolution amid other UN members, despite the US’s veto.
“This is a sign of the international community is well aware of the seriousness of the current situation and its tragic repercussions on national peace and security,” he said.
The UN general assembly president, Dennis Francis, wrapped his remarks with a final plea:
“In the name of humanity, I ask you all once again: Stop this violence, now.”
Updated
UN general assembly debating resolution for immediate ceasefire
The UN general assembly is currently meeting on a resolution for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.
Dennis Francis, president of the UN general assembly, is currently speaking, calling the violence a “humanitarian catastrophe”.
“Civilians should never undergo the level of suffering we are currently witnessing,” Francis said.
“Again, I ask, how many more thousands of lives must be lost before we do something? No more time is left. The carnage must stop,” Francis added.
Updated
The Israeli army said on Tuesday that it had recovered the bodied of two hostages taken by Hamas during a military operation in Gaza, AFP reported.
From AFP:
The army had previously confirmed that one of the hostages, soldier Ziv Dado, was killed on the day of the attack, but Israel considers those still held by Hamas to be hostages regardless of whether they are dead or alive.
The other hostage, Eden Zecharya, was taken by Hamas from the Supernova music festival near the Reim kibbutz.
Before the bodies of Dado and Zecharya were recovered, Israel said it believed 137 hostages were still in Hamas captivity.
A statement from the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, which has helped to coordinate relatives’ outreach efforts, said that Zecharya “was kidnapped while injured in the upper half of her body”, and that her boyfriend was murdered during the attack.
Updated
Israel said on Tuesday that 19 people who are still being held hostage are dead in absentia, also announcing that it had recovered the bodies of two hostages, Reuters reported.
Of the 19 people include a Tanzanian national, said Israel’s press office. Tanzania has said that two of its citizens were among those taken hostage in October.
Some 240 people were taken hostage by Hamas on 7 October, with 135 people still in captivity.
Updated
The Israeli military has reportedly begun pumping seawater into Gaza’s tunnel system, with some critics warning that such a move could hurt Gaza’s freshwater supply, the Wall Street Journal reports.
The Israeli military has said such tunnels are where Hamas is hiding fighters, hostages, and weapons, the Journal reported. The process of destroying the tunnels by pumping in seawater could take weeks.
Israel’s military did not immediately provide comment on the report to Reuters.
The Guardian’s Ed Pilkington also discussed how Biden’s latest comments could signal a crack in his support for Israel.
Biden’s warning for Netanyahu suggested that a crack could be opening up in his previously solid support for Israel over its punishing response to the 7 October attack by Hamas that killed 1,200 people, mainly civilians. Two months of military operations inside Gaza have left more than 18,000 Palestinians killed, according to the health ministry, and an estimated 50,000 with injuries.
The Biden administration has come under increasing strain over its stance on the Israeli assault, both from the court of public opinion and from inside his own Democratic party. A recent CBS News poll found that only 20% of Americans think his approach is more likely to lead to a peaceful resolution of the conflict, while 38% of Democrats – substantially up from 28% last month – felt that Biden has shown too much support for Israel.
Read the full article here.
Updated
Here’s more information on comments Biden made at a fundraising event, where he said Israel is starting to lose support from the international community, from CNN.
Speaking to Democratic donors in Washington, Biden said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had a “tough decision to make.”
“This is the most conservative government in Israel’s history,” Biden said, adding that the Israeli government “doesn’t want a two-state solution.”
Biden said Israel was beginning to lose support around the world, and argued Netanyahu “has to strengthen and change” the Israeli government to find an eventual long-term solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The remarks – delivered at an off-camera fundraiser, a venue in which the president has been more freewheeling than his usual White House appearances – amounted to some of Biden’s most candid to date when it comes to his view of the ongoing war…
Read the full article here.
Canada, Australia and New Zealand issue joint statement calling for efforts towards a ceasefire
Canada, Australia and New Zealand support efforts towards a sustainable ceasefire in Palestine, according to a joint statement released from the prime ministers of all three governments, Reuters reported.
“The recent pause in hostilities allowed for the release of more than 100 hostages and supported an increase in humanitarian access to affected civilians … We want to see this pause resumed and support urgent international efforts towards a sustainable ceasefire,” read the statement.
“We are alarmed at the diminishing safe space for civilians in Gaza. The price of defeating Hamas cannot be the continuous suffering of all Palestinian civilians,” read the statement, further.
The prime ministers added that a ceasefire must also include Hamas releasing all hostages and to “stop using Palestinian civilians as human shields”, the statement read.
This latest statement comes after the US vetoed a UN security council resolution calling for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, a move that garnered criticism from several world leaders.
Updated
Biden says Israel 'starting to lose support' of international community over Gaza bombing
Biden also said that Israel is starting to “lose support” from the international community due to its indiscriminate bombing that has killed thousands of Palestinian civilians.
“They’re starting to lose that support,” Biden said during a Tuesday campaign event.
Biden added that Netanyahu needs to change his hardline government.
Biden’s comments come as Netanyahu thanked the US for its support on Tuesday, but noted that the US and Israel have had disagreements about “the day after Hamas, said Israel’s prime minister on X.
Updated
US president Joe Biden will be speaking to the families of Americans who were taken hostage by Hamas on 7 October, his first in-person meeting with families, Reuters reported, citing a White House official.
It is unclear how many families will be present for the Wednesday meeting and how many will be in person versus on video conference.
Biden has previously met with families before, but either virtually or on the phone.
On Tuesday, Biden said the US commitment to Israel is “unshakable”. “We’re not going to stop until every hostage is returned home,” Biden said to donors in Washington DC on Tuesday.
The World Health Organization’s eastern Mediterranean regional office has said that four people are still being detained after being deployed on a WHO-led mission to move patients from al-Shifa Hospital.
A member with Palestine’s health ministry and three people with Palestine Red Crescent Society were all detained on 22 November while on the WHO-led mission.
WHO’s eastern Mediterranean regional office posted about their detention on a post to X, formerly known as Twitter.
On 22 November, six people from the Ministry of Health and PRCS were detained during a WHO-led mission to move patients from Al-Shifa Hospital. Four people–three from the Ministry of Health and one [Palestine Red Crescent Society] staff—are still in detention, more than three weeks later.
There is no information on their wellbeing or whereabouts. This is unacceptable. WHO, along with their family, colleagues and loved ones, is deeply concerned about their wellbeing. We reiterate our call for their legal and human rights to be respected.
Updated
Children react following an Israeli air strike on Palestinian houses, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photograph: Reuters
Palestinians check the destruction following Israeli bombardment in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip. Photograph: Mohammed Abed/AFP/Getty Images
One patient died after treatment was delayed due to Israeli military checkpoints, WHO has confirmed.
Additionally the WHO has blamed the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) for lengthy delays at checkpoints in allowing wounded people to pass. It cited the case of a patient who died in an emergency convoy en route to a Gaza City hospital, during repeated and lengthy Israeli checks in which a health worker was detained and beaten.
The organisation also provided several details of medics being detained, harassed, beaten, or stripped by Israeli soldiers while trying to access treatment for injured Palestinians.
On Tuesday, he provided further details about the high-risk mission, saying on X that the WHO was “deeply concerned about prolonged checks and detention of health workers that put lives of already fragile patients at risk”.
“Due to the hold-up, one patient died en route, given the grave nature of their wounds and the delay in accessing treatment,” he said.
A statement further described the incidents.
“On the way north, the UN convoy was inspected at the Wadi Gaza checkpoint, and ambulance crew members had to leave the vehicles for identification. Two Palestinian Red Crescent [PRCS] staff were detained for over an hour, further delaying the mission.
“WHO staff saw one of them being made to kneel at gunpoint and then taken out of sight, where he was reportedly harassed, beaten, stripped and searched.
“As the mission entered Gaza City, the aid truck carrying the medical supplies and one of the ambulances were hit by bullets.
Read the full article here.
Updated
Aid organisations working in Gaza say that injured Palestinians face potentially fatal delays with accessing treatment due to Israeli military checkpoints and other bureaucracy.
The Guardian’s Peter Beaumont reports:
Palestinians who have been injured during the war in Gaza are facing potentially fatal delays both in getting treatment within the coastal strip as well as in being evacuated abroad, caused by Israeli bureaucracy and military checkpoints, the UN and aid organisations say.
The delays come amid a claim by the World Health Organization (WHO) that Palestinian ambulance staff involved in a recent high-risk evacuation were detained at gunpoint, stripped and beaten by Israeli soldiers.
With estimates that 50,000 Palestinians have suffered injuries in the two months of Israeli military operations launched after Hamas’s attack on Israel on 7 October, Physicians for Human Rights Israel (an Israeli NGO) said on Tuesday that only 400 Palestinians had been evacuated abroad, despite a number of countries being willing to receive the wounded …
Read the rest of the article here.
Updated
A senior Palestinian official said that Netanyahu’s recent statement equating Oslo Accords with what happened on 7 October confirms that Israel’s war is against all Palestinians, in a post to X, formally known as Twitter, Reuters reported.
The post was made by Hussein al-Sheikh, secretary general of the executive committee of the PLO.
Al-Sheikh’s remarks were in response to Benjamin Netanyahu’s comments on Tuesday that the Oslo accords led to as many Israelis being killed as the attacks on 7 October did.
On X, Al-Sheikh wrote:
Netanyahu’s statement, which equates the Oslo accords with what happened on 7 October, confirms that his war is against all Palestinians, and we say to Netanyahu that Oslo died under the tracks of his tanks that are sweeping through all our cities, villages and camps from Jenin to Rafah.
Netanyahu's statement, which equates the Oslo Accords with what happened on October 7th, confirms that his war is against all Palestinians, and we say to Netanyahu that Oslo died under the tracks of his tanks that are sweeping through all our cities, villages and camps from Jenin… https://t.co/0oFicbR60e
— حسين الشيخ Hussein AlSheikh (@HusseinSheikhpl) December 12, 2023
Updated
The UN has previously warned that Palestinians could starve as Israel escalates its military operations in the territory, specifically in the southern region where many Palestinians have moved to take refuge.
Last month, the UN said that Palestinians faced the “immediate possibility” of starvation as aid shipments were halted amid fuel shortages and delivery trucks were unable to coordinate shipments due to internet blackouts.
Updated
The Palestinian foreign minister has accused Israel of intentionally starving Palestinians as a “weapon of war”, during a UN meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, Reuters reported.
Palestinian foreign minister, Riyad al-Maliki, made the remarks while speaking at a UN event to mark the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
He said:
As we speak, at least 1 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, half of them children, are starving, not because of a natural disaster or because of lack of generous assistance waiting at the border …
No, they are starving because of Israel’s deliberate use of starvation as a weapon of war against the people it occupied …
Al-Maliki added that the protection of Palestinians has been an “utter international failure”.
Rather than insisting on respecting the Palestinian people’s basic right to eat and drink water, we are living through this dystopian reality that excludes Palestinians from the basic, most basic rights afforded to all human beings.
Updated
Summary of the day so far …
It is 5pm in Gaza City and in Tel Aviv. Here are the latest headlines …
Israel has continued its bombing of Gaza as fierce fighting raged on Tuesday, with Hamas saying clashes had taken place in central Gaza and witnesses reporting deadly Israeli strikes in the south of the territory.
Palestinians who have been injured during the war in Gaza are facing potentially fatal delays both in getting treatment within the coastal strip as well as in being evacuated abroad, caused by Israeli bureaucracy and military checkpoints, the UN and aid organisations say. The delays come amid a claim by the World Health Organization (WHO) that Palestinian ambulance staff involved in a recent high-risk evacuation were detained at gunpoint, stripped and beaten by Israeli soldiers. An estimated 50,000 Palestinians have suffered injuries in the two months of Israeli military operations launched after Hamas’s attack on Israel on 7 October. 18,412 people have been killed according to the Palestinian health ministry.
The UN general assembly is due to vote Tuesday on a non-binding resolution demanding “an immediate humanitarian ceasefire” in Gaza – a call that the security council has so far failed to make after the US vetoed a draft resolution. The UK abstained on the vote. All other 13 members of the security council backed the ceasefire call.
The number of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin on Tuesday has risen to four, the Palestinian health ministry reported. The Israeli military has confirmed that it fired from drones, killing an unspecified number of Palestinians it said had been spotted hurling explosive devices and firing at its forces.
Israel’s defence minister Yoav Gallant, has said Israel had “no intention” of staying permanently in Gaza after the completion of its military campaign to eliminate Hamas. The country was open to discuss alternatives about who will control the territory as long as it is not a group hostile to Israel, he said.
A spokesperson for the government of Cyprus says a team of technical experts from Israel is visiting the island nation to inspect infrastructure and facilities that will be used to ship humanitarian aid across the Mediterranean to Gaza, once conditions on the ground allow for it.
The US has warned Houthi rebels that the peace plan for Yemen that was negotiated with Saudi Arabia and handed to the UN peace envoy will fail if attacks on merchant shipping off the coast of Yemen continue. Houthis earlier said that they had carried out a military operation against a Norwegian commercial tanker in the Red Sea.
Four human rights groups have written to the UK government calling for a halt to UK arms sales to Israel in response to the war in Gaza.
Here are some of the latest images sent to us from Israel and Gaza over the news wires.
A spokesperson for the government of Cyprus says a team of technical experts from Israel is visiting the island nation to inspect infrastructure and facilities that will be used to ship large quantities of humanitarian aid across the Mediterranean to Gaza, once conditions on the ground allow for it.
AP reports spokesperson Constantinos Letymbiotis said the Israeli team’s visit Tuesday follows two earlier trips that Cypriot technical experts made to Israel to brief authorities there about the Cypriot initiative.
Letymbiotis repeated that many countries have already expressed their willingness to contribute both in materiel or any other technical assistance required to deliver the aid, using shallow-draft vessels able to reach the shoreline.
An initial shipment is already in storage at Larnaca port, from where ships will set sail for Gaza which is 242 miles (390 kilometers) away.
It’s understood that officials from Israel and elsewhere will be on hand to monitor as Cypriot customs agents inspect the aid to ensure that nothing is shipped to Gaza that could be weaponised by Hamas to use against Israel.
Attacks on commercial vessels by Yemen’s Houthis are a strategic threat to global shipping routes and seaborne traffic to Israel although there has been no direct impact on port activity, Israel’s Port of Ashdod said on Tuesday.
“We emphasise that we are doing everything in order to act fully and to maintain open gateways to Israel despite the challenges of the war,” Reuters reports the port said in a statement.
Ashdod in the south and Haifa in the north are the country’s biggest ports.
The smaller port of Ashkelon, which is the closest to Gaza, has shut for the moment due to the war.
In a separate development, the Strinda chemical tanker that was attacked off the coast of Yemen [See 7.25 GMT] had been tentatively nominated by charterers for a cargo out of the Israeli port of Ashdod in January of 2024.
Updated
The Israeli military has confirmed that it fired from drones, killing an unspecified number of Palestinians it said had been spotted hurling explosive devices and firing at its forces on Tuesday.
Its troops were operating “to expose explosive devices planted under roads to attack the security forces”. They found weapons, ammunition and explosive devices, dismantled a bombmaking facility and located tunnels and an observation control room, the military said in a statement.
Four Palestinians were killed on Tuesday in a drone strike during an Israeli raid on the occupied West Bank city of Jenin and its refugee camp, the Palestinian health ministry and the Palestinian official news agency WAFA said.
One other person was injured in the attack on Al-Sibat neighbourhood in the city of Jenin, WAFA reported.
Jenin’s hospital director told the agency the Palestinians were directly targeted.
Israeli forces are encircling three hospitals in the area, WAFA added.
Reuters has spoken to some of the growing number of children orphaned by the Gaza war.
Reuters reports:
Playing with dolls on a Gaza hospital bed where she sits with her leg in a plaster cast and scars on her face, 10-year-old Razan Shabat does not know that her mother, father and siblings were killed in the strike that wounded her.
The little girl is one of a growing number of children in Gaza who have lost both parents, and in some cases their entire families, in the war between Israel and Hamas, and who are being cared for by distant relatives, friends or even strangers.
Rajaa al-Jarou, who is married to an uncle of Razan and is now caring for the girl at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza, said:
This girl doesn’t know that she lost her family, and we’re responsible for her now.
Razan’s face lit up with a big smile as she played with two pink rag dolls, cooing at them as a mother would with a baby.
Her smile disappeared when she was asked what she was missing the most in hospital.
Suddenly sad and serious, she said:
I miss my family. I miss seeing them.
I had an operation on my leg, it was broken. And as you can see in my forehead there’s a wound, and I had four operations in my skull, but thank God, I’m good and thank God, I’m getting better.
Younis al-Ajla, a doctor involved in caring for Razan, said she and many other children had been brought to the hospital alone.
James Elder, chief spokesperson for Unicef, the UN agency for children, said it was hard to determine how many Gaza children were now orphans due to the sheer number of people being killed and the desperate conditions on the ground.
He said:
There are so, so many children who have lost both parents, but worse than that, they’ve lost entire families.
I’ve met children, usually in hospitals because they’d been injured when their home was hit, they lost their mother and their father and grandparents, aunts and uncles, siblings, everyone.
When a child is the last surviving family member, then you have a real problem.
Updated
18,412 people killed in Gaza, health ministry reports
18,412 people have been killed and 50,100 injured in Israeli strikes on Gaza since 7 October, the Palestinian health ministry has reported in its daily tally.
Fashion brand Zara has said it regretted the “misunderstanding” over an ad campaign featuring statues wrapped in white that triggered calls for a boycott by some pro-Palestinian activists, and it had removed the images.
People left tens of thousands of complaints about the campaign on Zara’s Instagram account, saying the images resembled photos of corpses in white shrouds in Gaza.
Zara said the campaign, which also featured mannequins with missing limbs, had been conceived in July and photographed in September, before the conflict erupted in October, and was meant to show unfinished sculptures in a sculptor’s studio.
“Unfortunately, some customers felt offended by these images, which have now been removed, and saw in them something far from what was intended when they were created,” Reuters reports Zara said in an Instagram post.
“Zara regrets that misunderstanding and we reaffirm our deep respect towards everyone,” Zara said.
Updated
The US has warned Houthi rebels that the peace plan for Yemen that was negotiated with Saudi Arabia and handed to the UN peace envoy will fail if attacks on merchant shipping off the coast of Yemen continue, the Guardian’s diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour writes.
The French defence ministry said on Tuesday that the French frigate Languedoc intercepted and destroyed a drone that was threatening the Norwegian oil tanker Strinda in a complex aerial attack originating from Yemen on Monday evening.
The attack caused a fire onboard the tanker, which was sailing under the Norwegian flag, the ministry said.
The Houthis claimed responsibility for the attack on the ship, which was travelling from Malaysia to India. No casualties have been reported.
It is believed two missiles were fired, one from Hodeidah port and another from Huban, east of Taiz.
In solidarity with Palestinians under attack from Israel in Gaza, the Houthis are using their control of Yemen’s western seaboard including ports such as Hodeidah to mount attacks on what it regards as shipping linked to Israel.
The US is hurriedly trying to organise a larger maritime protection force based out of Bahrain to prevent the world’s busiest shipping lanes becoming blocked, and thus crippling the world economy.
AFP reports that Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry has said that Israeli forces were raiding Kamal Adwan hospital in the north of the Gaza Strip.
“Israeli occupation forces are storming Kamal Adwan hospital after besieging and bombing it for days,” ministry spokesperson Ashraf al-Qudra said, accusing troops of rounding up men in the hospital courtyard, including medical staff.
Israel’s army did not immediately comment.
On Telegram, al-Qudra said “We call on the United Nations, the World Health Organization and the International Committee of the Red Cross to act immediately to save the lives of those in the hospital.”
Hani Mahmoud, reporting for Al Jazeera from Rafah, had this account of the incident, saying:
Tanks pushed deeper at the gates and the entire facility is under heavy bombardment. There are confirmed reports from a source on the ground that some of the medical staff inside the hospital were shot and killed inside the hospital. Loudspeakers are being used to call anyone aged above 15 to come out of the building with their hands in the air.
Journalists have been able to speak to the relatives of Palestinian children who have been killed overnight by Israeli airstrikes in the south of Gaza.
Associated Press spoke to Islam Harb, who said his three children were among those killed overnight. He said he had been sharing the family home with nine displaced people when an Israeli airstrike flattened four residential buildings in Rafah.
“My twin girls, Maria and Joud, were martyred, and my little son, Ammar, also martyred,” he said.
The Guardian has seen images of Harb mourning, cradling the dead bodies of his children.
Reuters spoke to Um Zeyad al-Dbari. Her grandson Idres al-Dbari had been living in a tent in Rafah, southern Gaza, with his displaced family when he and his mother, Wafaa were killed by an Israeli airstrike overnight. Wrapped in a white shroud and a light blue blanket with dots, Idres had been born during the war a month ago.
“The boy was born early in the war, early, he was born a little over a month ago,” she said, her voice high-pitched from weeping.
Idres’s body was placed on top of that of his mother, whose shroud was inscribed with the words “The martyr Wafaa al-Dbari”, and the date of her death, 12 December.
Updated
NGOs call for UK government to intervene and halt arms sales to Israel
Dan Sabbagh is the Guardian’s defence and security editor.
Four human rights groups have written to UK foreign secretary, David Cameron, trade secretary, Kemi Badenoch, and development minister, Andrew Mitchell, calling for the government to halt UK arms sales to Israel in response to the war in Gaza, ahead of a Westminster Hall debate in London on the topic at 2.30pm GMT.
The groups – Amnesty International, Campaign Against Arms Trade, Human Rights Watch, War on Want – say there is “a clear and overriding risk” that “UK-licensed military equipment could be used to commit or facilitate a serious violation of international law, including unlawful attacks that may amount to war crimes.”
In the correspondence, they argue that Israeli forces have carried out “unlawful and apparently unlawful attacks” on medical facilities, residential buildings, water and electricity networks, schools and refugee facilities for displaced people – and accuse Israel of blocking humanitarian aid from reaching civilians on the strip.
British arms export licensing criteria states that the UK should not grant an export licence where there is a clear risk that weapons might be used in serious violations of international humanitarian law, a clause that has been used in the past to contest (but not ultimately halt) arms sales to Saudi Arabia.
British manufacturers have supplied at least £474m worth of arms since 2015, and provide 15% of the components in the F-35 fighter, used to bomb targets in Gaza – and a further 25 were put on order with prime contractor Lockheed Martin in July. But a minister said on 28 November that the UK has not approved any arms sales since the Israel-Gaza war began on 7 October.
Israel says its intense bombing campaign in Gaza is justified because Hamas fighters operate from or very close to civilian areas in the crowded strip that is home to 2.3 million people.
Updated
Summary of the day so far …
It is 1.30pm in Gaza City and in Tel Aviv. Here are the headlines …
Israel has continued its bombing of Gaza as fierce fighting raged on Tuesday, with Hamas saying clashes had taken place in central Gaza and witnesses reporting deadly Israeli strikes in the south of the territory. The Palestinian news agency Wafa reports that 20 civilians were killed, and dozens more were injured, when Israel bombed a number of homes in Rafah, in the south of the Gaza Strip.
A World Health Organization (WHO) official said on Tuesday that only 11, or less than a third, of Gaza’s hospitals remain partially functional and pleaded for them to remain intact. “In just 66 days the health system has gone from 36 functional hospitals to 11 partially functional hospitals – one in the north and 10 in the south,” Richard Peeperkorn said, adding: “We cannot afford to lose any healthcare facilities or hospitals. We hope, we plea that this will not happen.”
The WHO has also issued a strong statement in which it accuses Israel of delaying a vital medical mission, and making Palestinian medical staff kneel at gunpoint, while detaining them and preventing them doing their jobs. A member of Palestine Red Crescent Society staff claims to have been harassed, beaten, threatened, stripped and blindfolded by Israeli forces, then left to walk towards the south with his hands still tied behind his back, and without clothes or shoes.
Benjamin Netanyahu has been criticised by opposition politicians for reported comments in which Israel’s prime minister appeared to claim that the Oslo accords had claimed as many Israeli lives as the 7 October Hamas attack, but over a longer period of time. Opposition leader Yair Lapid said Netanyahu was conducting “a wicked political campaign during wartime”.
The UN general assembly is due to vote Tuesday on a non-binding resolution demanding “an immediate humanitarian ceasefire” in Gaza – a call that the security council has so far failed to make after the US vetoed a draft resolution. The UK abstained on the vote. All other 13 members of the security council backed the ceasefire call.
Haaretz reports that the IDF has said that since the start of the ground operation in Gaza, 13 Israeli soldiers have been killed in friendly fire incidents. On Monday, the Israeli military issued figures saying that 104 members of its forces had been killed in Gaza since the ground operation began, with 582 injured. It gave its total number of casualties since 7 October as 433 soldiers killed, and 1,645 wounded.
The number of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin on Tuesday has risen to four, the Palestinian health ministry reported.
Yemen’s Houthis said that they carried out a military operation against a Norwegian commercial tanker in the Red Sea.
Israel said it will open two additional checkpoints examining relief supplies before dispatching them to the Palestinian territory through the Rafah gateway. No new direct crossings will be opened, Israel stressed on Monday, but the Nitzana and Kerem Shalom crossings will be used to carry out checks before sending the trucks through Rafah, Agence France-Presse reports.
Israel’s defence minister, Yoav Gallant, also said Israel had “no intention” of staying permanently in Gaza after the completion of its military campaign to eliminate Hamas. The country was open to discuss alternatives about who will control the territory as long as it is not a group hostile to Israel, he said, and would consider an agreement with Hezbollah in Lebanon if security guarantees were received.
Updated
Al Jazeera reports that in the last hour there has been a further airstrike on Rafah in the south of the Gaza Strip, one of the areas Israel’s military had ordered Palestinians to move to for safety. At least 20 people were killed there earlier, according to reports by Palestinian media.
There are also reports of an Israeli military buildup outside the occupied West Bank city of Jenin. More than 270 Palestinians are believed to have been killed in the occupied West Bank by Israel since 7 October.
And within the last 20 minutes, warning sirens have sounded near the Gaza Strip in southern Israel due to the threat of incoming rockets.
The IDF has also issued a statement in the last five minutes to say that “a suspicious aerial target” crossed into Israeli airspace from Lebanon in the north. Israel’s military says “the incident has concluded” after it launched several interceptors.
Updated
WHO: Gaza only has 11 partially functioning hospitals remaining out of 36
A World Health Organization (WHO) official said on Tuesday that only 11, or less than a third, of Gaza’s hospitals remain partially functional and pleaded for them to remain intact.
“In just 66 days the health system has gone from 36 functional hospitals to 11 partially functional hospitals – one in the north and 10 in the south,” Reuters reports Richard Peeperkorn, WHO representative for the Palestinian Territory, told a UN press briefing by videolink from Gaza.
“We cannot afford to lose any healthcare facilities or hospitals,” he said. “We hope, we plea that this will not happen.”
Earlier, WHO issued a statement strongly critical of Israel, accusing it of detaining and mistreating medical staff during an urgent mission inside Gaza. [See 9.10 GMT]
Updated
Haaretz reports that the IDF has said that since the start of the ground operation in Gaza 13 Israeli soldiers have been killed in friendly fire incidents.
Yesterday the Israeli military issued figures saying that 104 members of its forces had been killed in Gaza since the ground operation began, with 582 injured.
It gave its total number of casualties since 7 October as 433 soldiers killed, and 1,645 wounded.
Updated
Here is a little more from that World Health Organization statement earlier, which accused Israel of detaining and mistreating medical staff within the Gaza Strip while they were carrying out an urgent medical mission. [See 9.10 GMT]
The WHO statement went on to call for a ceasefire, and remained highly critical of Israel and the conditions it has caused to develop inside the Gaza Strip.
It wrote:
Obstructing ambulances and attacks on humanitarian and health workers are unconscionable. Healthcare, including ambulances, are protected under international law. They must be respected and protected in all circumstances.
The difficulties faced by this mission illustrate the shrinking space for humanitarian actors to provide aid within Gaza, even though access is desperately needed to alleviate the catastrophic humanitarian situation.
WHO and partners remain firmly committed to staying in Gaza and assisting the population. But as hostilities increase across Gaza, aid falls short of needs, the humanitarian support system is on the verge of falling apart.
The only viable solution is a sustained ceasefire, so WHO and partners can work safely and unhindered to strengthen a deteriorating health system, replenish critical supplies of fuel, medicines, and other essential aid, and prevent disease, hunger, and further suffering in the Gaza Strip.
The statement also described deteriorating healthcare conditions for Palestinians within the territory, stating:
WHO staff described Al-Ahli Hospital as in a state of “utter chaos and a humanitarian disaster zone.” It is extremely congested with many displaced people and over 200 patients, while it only has enough resources to support 40 beds – half of its original bed capacity. The building has sustained substantial damage because of the hostilities.
Doctors said the situation is “beyond control” as they face shortages of fuel, oxygen, and essential medical supplies, as well as a lack of food and water for patients and themselves. Health staff capacity is minimal, nursing care is extremely limited, and the hospital is relying heavily on volunteers.
They are treating many serious cases in the hospital’s corridors, on the floor, in the hospital chapel, and even in the street.
Updated
Tass reports that after a conversation between foreign ministers Sergei Lavrov and Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, the Russian foreign ministry has said Moscow expressed concern about the humanitarian situation in Gaza during a call with Iran.
In a statement, the ministry said:
Special attention was paid to the current situation in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict zone. Mutual concern was expressed about its ongoing escalation and the deterioration of the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip. The importance of an immediate ceasefire and providing urgent assistance to the affected civilian population, as well as mobilizing the authority of the UN for these purposes, was emphasised.
In recent days, the US vetoed a UN security council motion calling for a ceasefire, and, speaking directly to Vladimir Putin, Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, criticised Russia’s “dangerous” cooperation with Iran.
Updated
WHO accuses Israel of detaining medical staff carrying out urgent missions in Gaza
The World Health Organization has issued a strong statement in which it accuses Israel of delaying a vital medical mission, and making Palestinian medical staff kneel at gunpoint, while detaining them and preventing them doing their jobs.
It writes:
On 9 December 2023, a WHO team … completed a high-risk mission to Al-Ahli hospital in Gaza City to deliver medical supplies, assess the situation in the hospital, and transfer critically injured patients to a hospital in the south.
On the way north, the UN convoy was inspected at the Wadi Gaza checkpoint, and ambulance crew members had to leave the vehicles for identification. Two PRCS staff were detained for over an hour, further delaying the mission. WHO staff saw one of them being made to kneel at gunpoint and then taken out of sight, where he was reportedly harassed, beaten, stripped and searched.
As the mission entered Gaza City, the aid truck carrying the medical supplies and one of the ambulances were hit by bullets.
On the way back towards southern Gaza, with the patients from Al-Ahli hospital on board, the convoy was again stopped at the Wadi Gaza checkpoint, where PRCS staff and most of the patients had to leave the ambulances for security checks. Critical patients remaining in the ambulances were searched by armed soldiers.
One of the same two PRCS staff temporarily detained earlier on the way in was taken for interrogation a second time. The mission made numerous attempts to coordinate his release, but eventually – after more than two and a half hours – had to make the difficult decision to leave the highly dangerous area and proceed, for the safety and wellbeing of the patients and humanitarian workers. Palestine Red Crescent Society reported afterwards that during the transfer process one of the injured patients died as a result of his untreated wounds.
The PRCS staff member was released later that night after joint UN efforts. Yesterday, the WHO team met him, as well as his father, supervisor, and colleagues. He said he was harassed, beaten, threatened, stripped and blindfolded. His hands were tied behind his back and he was treated in a degrading and humiliating manner. Once released, he was left to walk towards the south with his hands still tied behind his back, and without clothes or shoes.
Updated
There has been political pushback in Israel after reported comments by Benjamin Netanyahu that the Oslo accords led to as many Israelis being killed as the attacks on 7 October did, it just happened over a more prolonged period of time.
It has been reported that at a foreign affairs and defence committee meeting, Netanyahu described the Oslo accords as “the original sin”.
Likud Knesset member Danny Danon is reported to have responded by saying “there is no place to compare, both because we are in the middle of a war, and because the events of that black Saturday happened in a number of hours, a number of killed and wounded that Israel has never seen since its founding”.
The opposition leader, Yair Lapid, has been highly critical of Netanyahu on social media, saying:
The State of Israel is at war. We are all going from one funeral to the next, from shiva to shiva. The soldiers are fighting heroically. The heart breaks anew every morning in front of the pictures of those killed.
It is impossible to understand the level of disconnect and cynicism of the prime minister, who is conducting a wicked political campaign during wartime whose entire purpose is to absolve himself of responsibility, to accuse others, and to create hatred. The nation deserves alternative leadership.
Some observers believe that Netanyahu will be politically vulnerable after the war ends, as attention will turn to how the events of 7 October were allowed to happen under his watch.
Israel’s military has already said there were failures of intelligence gathering in the run-up to the surprise Hamas attack inside Israel which killed at least 1,200 people, and during which an estimated 240 people were seized and taken to Gaza as hostages.
The Oslo accords established the Palestinian National Authority, granting limited self-governance over patches of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Further negotiations were planned at the time.
Some prominent Palestinians regarded the accords as a form of surrender while rightwing Israelis opposed giving up settlements or territory. The political charge against Oslo was led by the future prime ministers Ariel Sharon and Netanyahu himself.
Updated
The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday said he was concerned about the prolonged checks of health convoys in the Gaza Strip and the detention of health workers there.
Reuters reports that in a post on social media, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said a WHO-led mission to Al-Ahli hospital in Gaza on Saturday was stopped twice at a checkpoint on the way to north Gaza and on the way back, and that some staff of the Palestine Red Crescent Society were detained on both occasions.
“We are deeply concerned about prolonged checks and detention of health workers that put lives of already fragile patients at risk,” Tedros said.
Updated
Here are some of the latest images sent to us over the news wires from Gaza and Israel.
Updated
The number of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin on Tuesday has risen to four, the Palestinian health ministry has reported.
AFP reports the ministry did not provide further details on the fatalities, while the Palestinian Red Crescent Society said they were killed in a drone strike.
About 270 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire and settler attacks in the West Bank, Palestinian officials say, as violence has escalated in the territory since the outbreak of the war on 7 October.
An AFP photographer saw Israeli military vehicles entering Jenin refugee camp on Tuesday and a drone flying above.
Israeli forces “continue to storm Jenin camp and ambulance crews are prevented from entering to deal with medical cases without prior coordination”, the Red Crescent said in a statement.
There was no immediate comment on the killings from the Israeli military, which has occupied the West Bank since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
Updated
The Palestinian news agency Wafa reports that 20 civilians were killed, and dozens more were injured, when Israel bombed a number of homes in Rafah, in the south of the Gaza Strip, on Tuesday. The Wafa correspondent there said that there were still missing people under the rubble.
The claims have not been independently verified.
Updated
Yemen’s Houthis have said that they carried out a military operation against a Norwegian commercial tanker.
The group targeted the tanker with a rocket after the crew refused to respond to warnings, Reuters reports Houthi military spokesperson Yehia Sareea said in a televised statement.
He added that the group had managed to obstruct the passage of several ships in recent days, acting in support of the Palestinians.
He vowed that the Houthis would continue blocking all ships heading to Israeli ports until Israel allows the entry of food and medical aid into the Gaza Strip.
Summary of events so far
It’s 9:01am in Gaza and Tel Aviv. Here are some of the latest developments:
The UN general assembly is due to vote Tuesday on a non-binding resolution demanding “an immediate humanitarian ceasefire” in Gaza – a call that the paralysed security council has so far failed to make.
Israel has continued its bombing of Gaza as fierce fighting raged on Tuesday, with Hamas saying clashes had taken place in central Gaza and witnesses reporting deadly Israeli strikes in the south of the territory. Agence France-Press reports that strikes on Monday targeted Gaza’s main southern city of Khan Yunis, now the centre of the fighting, as well as Rafah, a city on the border with Egypt where tens of thousands of people are seeking shelter.
Israel said it will open two additional checkpoints to examining relief supplies before dispatching them to the Palestinian territory through the Rafah gateway. No new direct crossings will be opened, Israel stressed on Monday, but the Nitzana and Kerem Shalom crossings will be used to carry out checks before sending the trucks through Rafah, Agence France-Presse reports.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (Ocha) has highlighted in its daily update the spread of infectious diseases in Gaza as the war continues. “Due to the overcrowding and poor sanitary conditions at UNRWA shelters in the south, there have been significant increases in some communicable diseases and conditions such as diarrhoea, acute respiratory infections, skin infections and hygiene-related conditions like lice.”
A land-based cruise missile launched from Houthi-controlled Yemen has struck a commercial tanker vessel, causing a fire and damage but no casualties, two US defence officials have told Reuters. The Iran-aligned Houthis have waded into the Israel-Gaza conflict – which has spread around the Middle East since the war erupted on 7 October, attacking vessels in vital shipping lanes and firing drones and missiles at Israel itself.
The US president, Joe Biden, hosted a Hanukkah reception at the White House on Monday night, vowing to continue to stand with Israel in its war with Hamas while saying that a “surge of antisemitism” around the globe is “sickening”. Reuters is reporting that in his speech, Biden alluded to the complex relationship he has with the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, suggesting Netanyahu is in a “tough spot” and that the two have had their share of disagreements over the years and at present.
Israel’s defence minister, Yoav Gallan, on Monday said the next phase of the war in Gaza would be lower-intensity fighting against “pockets of resistance” and would require Israeli troops to maintain their freedom of operation, according to the Associated Press. “That’s a sign the next phase has begun,” he said. He’s pushed back against international calls to wrap up the country’s military offensive in the Gaza Strip, saying the current phase of the operation against the Hamas militant group will “take time”. In a briefing with the Associated Press, Gallant refused to commit to any firm deadlines, but he signalled that the current phase, characterised by heavy ground fighting backed up by air power, could stretch on for weeks and that further military activity could continue for months.
The White House said it was “concerned” over reports that Israel’s military is using white phosphorus bombs against target in Lebanon. At a morning briefing, John Kirby, strategic communications coordinator for the national security council, said use of the highly incendiary substance could legally be used for a smokescreen to conceal military operations, but that the US would seek clarification from Israel about how stocks were being used.
Israel’s defence minister Yoav Gallant gave a fleeting and noncommittal answer when asked at his Monday briefing about reports the country was using white phosphorus in military attacks. The Israel Defense Forces operate “according to international law”, he said.
Gallant also said Israel had “no intention” of staying permanently in Gaza after the completion of its military campaign to eliminate Hamas. The country was open to discuss alternatives about who will control the territory as long as it is not a group hostile to Israel, he said, and would consider an agreement with Hezbollah in Lebanon if security guarantees were received.
European leaders Leo Varadkar of Ireland, Pedro Sánchez of Spain, Robert Abela of Malta and Alexander De Croo of Belgium, wrote to the EU president, Charles Michel, calling for a discussion about a Gaza ceasefire at the union summit on 14 and 15 December. US network CNN said the letter expressed “alarm” over the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza and questions Israel’s military campaign and its effect on the civilian population.
The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry updated casualties since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on 7 October, stating that 18,205 Palestinians have been killed, and 49,645 injured. The reported death toll has risen by more than 500 in the two days from Saturday, when it stood at 17,700, the ministry said.
Qatar has spoken with Israel to gauge interest in talks about a possible new pause in the fighting in Gaza, according to a journalist for Axios. The report directly contradicts the position of diplomats at the annual Doha Forum conference in Qatar, who have said they are not expecting any reopening of Gaza ceasefire talks for some weeks.
Updated
On the same night US president Joe Biden hosted a Hanukah reception at the White House, a protest took place outside by Jewish organisations calling for a ceasefire.
Here are some of the images from the event:
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (Ocha) has also highlighted in its daily update the spread of infectious diseases in Gaza as the war continues:
Due to the overcrowding and poor sanitary conditions at UNRWA shelters in the south, there have been significant increases in some communicable diseases and conditions such as diarrhoea, acute respiratory infections, skin infections and hygiene-related conditions like lice.
On average, UNRWA shelters located in the middle and southern areas are currently sheltering nine times the number of IDPs [internally displaced persons] as was planned for.
Updated
Reports are coming in from the Reuters news agency that three Palestinians were killed on Tuesday during an Israeli raid on the occupied West Bank city of Jenin – that’s according to the Palestinian health ministry.
An Israeli drone attack killed the three Palestinians and injured others, medical sources say, adding that the Israeli raid included the city of Jenin and its refugee camp.
We don’t have any more information at this stage, but we’ll keep across developments as they come to hand.
Updated
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (Ocha) has released its daily update overnight.
Here is what they have to say about the fighting taking place:
Between the afternoons of 10 and 11 December, 208 Palestinians were killed and another 416 were injured, according to the [Hamas run] Ministry of Health (MoH) in Gaza. Heavy Israeli bombardments from air, land, and sea across Gaza continued, especially in the central part, including Al Maghazi and An Nuseirat Refugee Camps, as well as in parts of northern Gaza. Meanwhile, intense ground operations and fighting between Israeli forces and Palestinian armed groups continued, especially in Khan Younis, Jabalya, and the northern parts of Gaza Strip. Additionally, air strikes have reportedly targeted residential homes in the western and central parts of Rafah, areas designated as safe for displaced Palestinians by the Israeli army. The firing of rockets by Palestinian armed groups into Israel also continued.
The update also notes the difficulties with aid distribution and mentions a one-off high risk mission to a hospital:
Limited aid distributions are taking place in Rafah governorate. In the rest of the Gaza Strip, aid distribution has largely stopped over the past few days, due to the intensity of hostilities and restrictions of movement along the main roads, except for limited fuel deliveries to key service providers and a one-off high-risk mission on 9 December to Al Ahli hospital.
Ocha says the fighting is making aid deliveries difficult and notes a shortage of trucks in Gaza too:
On 11 December, as of 22:00, 100 trucks carrying humanitarian supplies entered Gaza from Egypt, the same volume recorded on most days since the resumption of hostilities on 1 December. This is well below the daily average of 500 truckloads (including fuel) that entered every working day prior to 7 October. The ability of the UN to receive incoming aid has been significantly impaired over the past few days by several factors. These include a shortage of trucks within Gaza; the continuing lack of fuel; telecommunications blackouts; and the increasing number of staff who were unable to travel to the Rafah crossing due to the intensity of hostilities.
US president Joe Biden hosted a Hanukkah reception at the White House on Monday night, vowing to continue to stand with Israel in its war with Hamas while saying that a “surge of antisemitism” around the globe “is sickening.”
Nearly 800 guests filled the East Room, Associated Press reports. A menorah is lit nightly during the eight-day Jewish festival, which this year is being celebrated from 7 December until Friday.
Reuters is reporting that in his speech, Joe Biden alluded to the complex relationship he has with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, suggesting Netanyahu is in a “tough spot” and that the two have had their share of disagreements over the years and at present.
Biden recalled his decades-long relationship with Netanyahu and noted he made an inscription on an old photograph of the two men, using a nickname for the Israeli leader. “I wrote on the top of it, ‘Bibi I love you but I don’t agree with a damn thing you had to say.’”
“It’s about the same today,” Biden said, to scattered applause from the largely Jewish audience, reports Reuters. Biden added “I’ve had my differences with some Israeli leadership.”
He did not elaborate on what differences between the two men remained, though in recent weeks they have included issues spanning the current war against Hamas and treatment of Palestinians.
Updated
For a sum up of the latest events in the last 24 hours, you can see our full report:
Heavy fighting was reported across Gaza late into the evening on Monday, as Israel’s defence minister pushed back against international calls to wrap up the country’s military offensive in the territory, saying the current phase of the operation against Hamas would “take time”.
Yoav Gallant told the Associated Press the current phase of the conflict, characterised by heavy ground fighting backed up by air power, could stretch on for weeks and that further military activity could continue for months.
Read the rest of our report here:
More on that anti-ship cruise missile launched from Houthi-controlled Yemen hitting a commercial tanker vessel.
The US military’s central command, which oversees American forces in the Middle East, has said this in a statement posted on social media platform X:
There were no U.S. ships in the vicinity at the time of the attack, but the (U.S. Navy destroyer) USS MASON responded to the M/T STRINDA’s mayday call and is currently rendering assistance
CENTCOM Statement on missile attack in the Bab-el-Mandeb
— U.S. Central Command (@CENTCOM) December 12, 2023
At around 4 p.m. EST on December 11, the Motor Tanker STRINDA was attacked by what is assessed to have been an Anti-Ship Cruise Missile (ASCM) launched from a Houthi controlled area of Yemen while passing through the… pic.twitter.com/OJDoubAU2D
A land-based cruise missile launched from Houthi-controlled Yemen has struck a commercial tanker vessel, causing a fire and damage but no casualties, two US defence officials have told Reuters.
The attack on the tanker STRINDA took place about 111km (60 nautical miles) north of the Bab al-Mandab Strait at about 9pm GMT on Monday, one of officials said.
The US Navy destroyer USS Mason was there and provided aid, according to officials.
The chemical tanker is Norway flagged, and its Norwegian owner, Mowinckel Chemical Tankers, and manager Hansa Tankers could not be immediately reached for comment outside office hours.
The STRINDA had loaded vegetable oil and biofuels in Malaysia and was headed for Venice, Italy, according to data from ship tracking firm Kpler.
The Iran-aligned Houthis have waded into the Israel-Gaza conflict – which has spread around the Middle East since the war erupted on 7 October, attacking vessels in vital shipping lanes and firing drones and missiles at Israel itself.
On Saturday, the Houthis said they would target all ships heading to Israel, regardless of their nationality, and warned international shipping companies against dealing with Israeli ports.
It was not immediately clear whether the STRINDA had any ties to Israel.
The UN general assembly is due to vote Tuesday on a non-binding resolution demanding “an immediate humanitarian ceasefire” in Gaza – a call that the security council has so far failed to make.
The United States, one of only five permanent members of the Security Council, used its veto on Friday to halt a draft text calling for a ceasefire.
In a bid to build pressure, Arab countries called for the new special session of the general assembly after a visit to the Rafah border by more than a dozen security council ambassadors.
The draft text, seen by Agence France-Presse, largely reproduces the resolution blocked in the Council on Friday by the United States.
Associated Press reports that Palestinians are hoping the vote will demonstrate widespread global support for ending the Israel-Hamas war.
After the United States vetoed a resolution in the Security Council on Friday demanding a humanitarian ceasefire, Arab and Islamic nations called for an emergency session of the 193-member General Assembly on Tuesday afternoon to vote on a resolution making the same demand.
Unlike security council resolutions, general assembly resolutions are not legally binding. But as a UN spokesperson said Monday, the assembly’s messages “are also very important” and reflect world opinion. The Palestinian UN ambassador says he hopes for a high assembly vote.
Israel said it will open two additional checkpoints to examining relief supplies before dispatching them to the Palestinian territory through the Rafah gateway.
International aid organisations have struggled to get supplies to desperate Gazans under Israeli bombardment, with only the Rafah crossing in Egypt open.
No new direct crossings will be opened, Israel stressed on Monday, but the Nitzana and Kerem Shalom crossings will be used to carry out checks before sending the trucks through Rafah, Agence France-Presse reports.
“This is being done to improve the volume of security screenings of aid entering Gaza via the Rafah Crossing and will enable us to double the amount of humanitarian aid entering Gaza,” the army said on X (formerly Twitter).
The additional checkpoints will screen “trucks containing water, food, medical supplies and shelter equipment”, according to a joint statement from the Israeli army and COGAT, the defence ministry body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs.
It emphasised that “no supplies will be entering the Gaza Strip from Israel”, only via Egypt.
Israel has continued its bombing of Gaza as fierce fighting raged on Tuesday, with Hamas saying clashes had taken place in central Gaza and witnesses reporting deadly Israeli strikes in the south of the territory.
Agence France-Press reports that strikes on Monday targeted Gaza’s main southern city of Khan Yunis, now the centre of the fighting, as well as Rafah, a city on the border with Egypt where tens of thousands of people are seeking shelter.
Some of the heaviest close-quarters fighting in more than two months of conflict took place over the weekend, as the Israel Defense Forces tried to consolidate control of urban centres in northern Gaza and pursued Hamas leaders in the heart of the biggest city in the south, Khan Younis.
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said late on Monday that “Hamas is on the verge of dissolution – the IDF is taking over its last strongholds”.
Welcome and opening summary
Hello and welcome to our blog covering the Israel-Gaza war. It’s 5:47am in Gaza and Tel Aviv, my name is Reged Ahmad. I’ll be with you for the next while.
Fighting has continued on the ground in the Gaza Strip, accompanied by repeated aerial bombardments from Israel. Rockets have also been fired into Israel from Gaza, and from anti-Israeli forces in Lebanon.
More on that in a moment but first, here is a summary of the latest so far:
The UN general assembly is due to vote Tuesday on a non-binding resolution demanding “an immediate humanitarian ceasefire” in Gaza – a call that the paralysed Security Council has so far failed to make.
Israel’s defense minister Yoav Gallan on Monday said the next phase of the war in Gaza would be lower-intensity fighting against “pockets of resistance” and would require Israeli troops to maintain their freedom of operation, according to the Associated Press. “That’s a sign the next phase has begun,” he said. He’s pushed back against international calls to wrap up the country’s military offensive in the Gaza Strip, saying the current phase of the operation against the Hamas militant group will “take time.” In a briefing with the Associated Press, Gallant refused to commit to any firm deadlines, but he signaled that the current phase, characterised by heavy ground fighting backed up by air power, could stretch on for weeks and that further military activity could continue for months.
The White House said it is “concerned” over reports that Israel’s military is using white phosphorus bombs against target in Lebanon. At a morning briefing, John Kirby, strategic communications coordinator for the national security council, said use of the highly incendiary substance could legally be used for a smokescreen to conceal military operations, but that the US would seek clarification from Israel about how stocks were being used.
Israel’s defense minister Yoav Gallant gave a fleeting and noncommittal answer when asked at his Monday briefing about reports the country was using white phosphorus in military attacks. The Israeli Defense Forces operate “according to international law”, he said.
Gallant also said Israel had “no intention” of staying permanently in Gaza after the completion of its military campaign to eliminate Hamas. The country was open to discuss alternatives about who will control the territory as long as it is not a group hostile to Israel, he said, and would consider an agreement with Hezbollah in Lebanon if security guarantees were received.
Israel will open the Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza on Tuesday in an attempt to speed the security screening of humanitarian aid. A spokesperson for Cogat, the Israeli government department responsible for coordinating activities in the territories, said all aid will still enter via the Rafah crossing in Egypt, but the move to increase screening capacity will double the amount getting in.
European leaders Leo Varadkar of Ireland, Pedro Sanchez of Spain, Robert Abela of Malta and Alexander De Croo of Belgium, wrote to EU president Charles Michel calling for a discussion about a Gaza ceasefire at the union summit on 14 and 15 December. US network CNN said the letter expressed “alarm” over the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza and questions Israel’s military campaign and its effect on the civilian population.
The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry updated casualties since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on 7 October, stating that 18,205 Palestinians have been killed, and 49,645 injured. The reported death toll has risen by more than 500 in the two days from Saturday, when it stood at 17,700, the ministry said.
Qatar has spoken with Israel to gauge interest in talks about a possible new pause in the fighting in Gaza, according to a journalist for Axios. The report directly contradicts the position of diplomats at the annual Doha Forum conference in Qatar, who have said they are not expecting any reopening of Gaza ceasefire talks for some weeks.
At least 52 people were arrested in Washington DC on Monday at a protest calling for the US to push for a permanent ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Activists representing the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, Jewish Voice for Peace and other groups briefly protested in a Senate office building before police ended the demonstration and took dozens into custody.
Italy, France and Germany called on the European Union to impose ad hoc sanctions against Hamas and its supporters. “We express our full support for the … proposal to create an ad hoc sanctions regime against Hamas and its supporters,” they said in a letter to the EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell.
France is also considering imposing national sanctions on those involved in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, the French foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, has said.
Harvard University’s governing board faced mounting pressure on Monday to publicly declare support for, or oust the university president, according to a report by Reuters. It follows remarks she made last week at a congressional hearing on antisemitism.
UN security council ambassadors arrived in Egypt to visit the Rafah border crossing. An Egyptian foreign ministry official told the envoys during a briefing: “There is no justification to turning a blind eye to the pain and suffering inflicted on the Palestinian people in Gaza.”
Israel told the UN that it “must do better” at delivering aid to people in Gaza. The country said it was willing to double the number of inspections, but that “aid keeps waiting at the entrance of Rafah”. Since 7 October Israel has essentially blockaded Gaza, including at times cutting off telecommunications. The Rafah crossing with Egypt is the only entrance or exit to Gaza that has been open with any regularity, and Israel insists on inspecting all cargo being sent into the territory
Israel’s military said 104 members of its forces have been killed in Gaza since the ground operation began. In addition the IDF said 582 soldiers were injured inside the Gaza Strip. It gives its total casualties since 7 October as 433 soldiers killed, and 1,645 wounded.
Updated
