Closing summary
It’s turned 5.30am in Gaza City and Tel Aviv and we’ll shut this blog shortly – our live coverage will resume later today. Here’s a rundown on the latest developments. And you can see all our Israel-Gaza war coverage here. Thanks for reading.
Israel ordered residents out of the centre of Gaza’s main southern city, Khan Younis, as it pounded the length of the territory. Israel’s Arabic-language spokesperson posted a map on X (formerly Twitter) on Saturday highlighting six numbered blocks of Khan Younis that residents were told to evacuate “urgently”. They included parts of the city centre that had not been subject to such orders before. Israel issued similar warnings before storming eastern parts of the city and residents said they feared new evacuation orders heralded a further assault.
The Israeli military says five of its soldiers have died in the war. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) named the five in a post on X and said four of them died in battle in southern Gaza and one succumbed to his wounds after fighting on 7 October.
A United Nations peacekeeping position in southern Lebanon was hit without causing casualties, the UN force said, adding it was seeking to verify the source of the fire. Lebanon’s national news agency reported that an “Israeli Merkava tank” targeted the UN interim force in Lebanon (Unifil) position near the border across from Metula in northern Israel on Saturday. An Israeli army spokeswoman said it : “did not aim at Unifil, we did not hit a Unifil position.”
The Biden administration has used an emergency authority to sell about 14,000 tank shells to Israel without congressional review. The state department on Friday used an Arms Export Control Act emergency declaration for the tank rounds, worth $106.5m, for immediate delivery to Israel, the Pentagon said in a statement.
The UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said it had only been able to distribute aid in a very small part of southern Gaza “because of the intensity of the fighting and the bombardment since the humanitarian pause stopped”. Its deputy executive director, Carl Skau, said earlier: “About half the population in Gaza are starving … The humanitarian operation is collapsing. With the chaos with this active fighting it’s not possible to do the work that is needed.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu applauded the US for vetoing a UN security council resolution which called for a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza, where more than 17,700 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces. In an address on Saturday, Netanyahu said: “I greatly appreciate the correct stance that the US has taken in the UN security council. Other countries need to understand that.”
Israeli fighter jets “completed an attack on Lebanese territory during which targets of the terrorist organisation Hezbollah was attacked”, the Israeli Defense Forces’ spokesperson tweeted on Saturday. Daniel Hagari added: “Among the targets that were attacked, a number of military positions from which launches were made into the territory of the country, military sites where the organisation’s terrorists operated and other terrorist infrastructures.”
The Gulf Cooperation Council is holding Israel legally responsible for killing thousands of Palestinians in Gaza. The GCC countries said on Saturday that they had renewed their condemnation of the Israeli aggression on the Gaza strip and were holding Israel legally responsible for ongoing attacks that resulted in the deaths of thousands of civilians in Gaza.
Israeli forces shot and killed a 17-year-old Palestinian boy in the West Bank town of Azzun, in Qalqilya, on Saturday, according to the Palestinian health ministry. The boy has been identified as Mahmoud Abu Haniya by the Palestinian news agency Wafa. Local reports say Haniya was caught up in gunfire by an Israeli military unit and was fatally shot in the back.
Scotland’s first minister has criticised the UK government for its abstention in the United Arab Emirates-led UN security council resolution that called for an humanitarian ceasefire on Friday. Humza Yousaf said in a tweet on Saturday: “How can you choose to be complicit in the killing of thousands of children? Shame on the UK Government & Keir Starmer’s Labour Party who refuse to back a #CeasefireNow.”
The Palestinian foreign ministry has reported that more than 130 Palestinian families have been forcibly displaced from Bedouin communities by Israeli forces and extremist Israeli settlers in the West Bank since 7 October. At least 260 Palestinians had been killed in the West Bank by such settlers since then, Palestinian health minister Mai al-Kaila said.
Updated
The UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) says 133 of its staff have been killed in Israeli bombardments during the war.
The agency posted on X:
Our staff in #Gaza take their children to work so they know they are safe, or can die together.
133 colleagues have been confirmed killed in bombardments, most with their families.
The situation of civilians in #Gaza is untenable, we are reaching a point of no return.
Our staff in #Gaza take their children to work so they know they are safe, or can die together.
— UNRWA (@UNRWA) December 9, 2023
133 @UNRWA colleagues have been confirmed killed in bombardments, most with their families.
The situation of civilians in #Gaza is untenable, we are reaching a point of no return. pic.twitter.com/IIu5nAcSrB
Updated
