Closing summary
It has just gone 5pm in Gaza and in Tel Aviv. We will be closing this blog soon, but you can stay up to date on the Guardian’s Middle East coverage here.
Here is a recap of the latest developments:
Ireland, Spain and Norway announced plans to formally recognise a Palestinian state on Wednesday, amid warnings from Israel that recognition will ‘fuel extremism and instability’.
Ireland’s prime minister Simon Harris said a two-state solution was the only credible path to peace and security for Israel, Palestine and their peoples. The recognition of statehood has particular resonance in Ireland given its history, Harris added. He also said that Ireland was unequivocal in fully recognising Israel and its right to exist “securely and in peace with its neighbours”, and he called for all hostages in Gaza to be immediately returned.
Harris added that he expected other countries to join Ireland, Spain and Norway in recognising a Palestinian state in the coming weeks: “In the lead up to today’s announcement, I’ve spoken with a number of other leaders and counterparts and I’m confident that further countries will join us in taking this important step in the coming weeks.”
Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, said his country would recognise the state of Palestine on 28 May, adding the two-state solution remained the only answer to the crisis in the Middle East.
Norwegian prime minister Jonas Gahr Støre said on Wednesday that the Scandinavian country will officially recognise a Palestinian state as of 28 May. “There cannot be peace in the Middle East if there is no recognition,” Gahr Støre said.
The Palestinian Authority and Hamas both welcomed on Wednesday the recognition of a Palestinian state by Ireland, Spain and Norway.
US president Joe Biden believes a Palestinian state should be achieved through negotiations, not unilateral recognition, the White House said on Wednesday after Ireland, Spain and Norway said they would recognise a Palestinian state this month.
Israel have “instructed for the immediate recall” of Israel’s ambassadors to Ireland and Norway for “consultations”. Israel’s foreign minister Israel Katz shared a post with the news on X on Wednesday, saying that it was “in light of these countries’ decisions to recognise a Palestinian state”. Katz said he was “sending a clear and unequivocal message to Ireland and Norway: Israel will not remain silent in the face of those undermining its sovereignty and endangering its security”.
Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan have praised the decision by Ireland, Norway and Spain to recognise a Palestinian state. “We welcome the decisions taken by friendly European countries today to recognise a Palestinian state,” Jordanian foreign minister Ayman Safadi told a joint press conference with his Hungarian counterpart in Amman.
France said on Wednesday that recognising a Palestinian state was not “taboo”, but Paris considers that now is not the right moment for it to do so. In a statement to AFP, French foreign minister Stéphane Séjourné, wrote: “Our position is clear: the recognition of a Palestinian state is not a taboo for France … France does not consider that the conditions have been present to date for this decision to have a real impact in this process.”
The Israeli military has approved permission for Israelis to return to three former West Bank settlements they had been banned from entering since an evacuation ordered in 2005, the defence ministry said on Wednesday. The three settlements, Sa-nur, Ganim and Kadim, are located near the Palestinian cities of Jenin and Nablus.
Israeli tanks advanced to the edge of a crowded district in the heart of Rafah on Wednesday during one of the most intense nights of bombardment of the southern Gaza city since Israel launched its offensive there this month. Residents and militants told Reuters that tanks had taken up new positions farther west than before along the southern border fence with Egypt. They said Israeli troops were now stationed on the edge of the Yibna neighbourhood at the centre of Rafah.
Heavy battles also rocked Gaza’s northern and central areas where Hamas forces have regrouped, and more Israeli airstrikes have hit Gaza City, Jabalia and Zeitun.
Ten people were killed in the central town of al-Zawaida during the night, according to the al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital. Additionaly, the Gaza civil defence agency said six bodies were recovered from the rubble of a family house in Jabalia.
The World Health Organization said northern Gaza’s last two functioning hospitals, al-Awda and Kamal Adwan, were besieged by Israeli forces, with more than 200 patients trapped inside.
Palestinian residents said Israeli drones were firing into the Yibna suburb and had opened fire overnight on fishing boats on the beach of Rafah causing some to catch fire. “Tanks made a limited push south-east, still limited but they have advanced under heavy fire all night,” a Palestinian in Rafah told Reuters, asking for his name to be withheld to protect his security.
At least 35,709 Palestinians have been killed and 79,990 injured in Israel’s military offensive on Gaza since 7 October, the Gaza health ministry said in a statement on Wednesday. The Hamas-run health ministry does not distinguish between combatants and non-combatants.
The Israeli military said it had killed a number of fighters in targeted operations in Khan Younis just north of Rafah, and in the northern Gaza Strip. The military said it had killed a person it identified as Ahmed Yasser Alkara and described as a key Hamas operative, along with two other militants, in a strike in Khan Younis. The statement also said five other militants were killed and had been operating from inside a school.
In the central Gaza Strip town of Zawayda, an Israeli airstrike killed seven people in one house, medics said.
On Gaza’s northern edge in Jabalia, the largest of Gaza’s eight historical refugee camps, Israeli forces pressed on with a ground offensive that has carried on in parallel with the Rafah assault for two weeks, reported Reuters.
Attacks on medics and health facilities in war zones increased in 2023 to the highest level since records began 11 years ago, a group of non-governmental organisations said on Wednesday. The Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition attributed 489 incidents in Gaza last year to Israeli forces, including medic deaths or injuries and strikes or raids on hospitals. No responsibility had been established in seven other cases, including the deaths of six Israeli military medics killed in fighting in separate incidents between October and December, and the bombing of the al-Ahli hospital on 17 October 2023, it said.
Iran’s supreme leader led prayers in Tehran on Wednesday at the funeral of the late president Ebrahim Raisi, as tens of thousands of mourners thronged streets at the funeral in Iran’s capital city, which will move to the cleric’s eastern home city of Mashhad for burial on Thursday.
The Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, and the prime minister and foreign minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani headed to Iran on Wednesday to attend the funeral of late Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi. Egyptian foreign minister Sameh Shoukry also headed to Tehran to participate in the funeral. “Shoukry’s visit is the first visit by the Egyptian foreign minister to Iran,” Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency said.
More than 40 high-ranking foreign delegations at the levels of head of state, foreign ministers, and heads of parliament were expected to take part at the commemoration ceremony in Tehran on Wednesday afternoon, Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency said. Iran-backed Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh and Lebanese militant group Hezbollah’s deputy chief Naim Qassem joined the funeral in Tehran.
China’s vice premier Zhang Guoqing will attend the memorial service for Raisi, the Chinese foreign ministry said on Wednesday.
The Iranian military said on Wednesday that it had used domestically produced drones to locate the helicopter of president Ebrahim Raisi after it crashed in the north-western mountains. The Iranian military said that a drone dispatched by Turkey had failed to locate the crash site “despite having night-vison equipment”.
A group of cross-party MPs and peers in the UK have urged the government “to do all it can to support the international criminal court” after the British prime minister Rishi Sunak called the ICC’s decision to seek arrest warrants for Israeli and Hamas leaders “deeply unhelpful”. In a letter to the foreign secretary, Lord David Cameron, 105 MPs and Lords from 11 parties said the government must take a clear stance against any attempts to intimidate an independent and impartial international court”.
Updated
Palestinian state should be realised through negotiations, White House says
US president Joe Biden believes a Palestinian state should be achieved through negotiations, not unilateral recognition, the White House said on Wednesday after Ireland, Spain and Norway said they would recognise a Palestinian state this month, reports Reuters.
“The president is a strong supporter of a two-state solution and has been throughout his career,” a spokesperson for the White House National Security Council said. “He believes a Palestinian state should be realised through direct negotiations between the parties, not through unilateral recognition.”
Updated
