Summary
It is 4:34am on Tuesday in Gaza and Tel Aviv and this blog is now closing. You can read the full report of our coverage for more. But here is a summary of the latest developments:
A UN official has warned on Monday that “an even more hellish scenario” looms in Gaza in which humanitarian aid simply grinds to a halt. Agence France-Presse has reported that “The conditions required to deliver aid to the people of Gaza do not exist,” said Lynn Hastings, UN humanitarian coordinator for the Palestinian territories. Since the end of a seven-day truce, Israeli forces have pushed into southern Gaza, “forcing tens of thousands … into increasingly compressed spaces, desperate to find food, water, shelter and safety,” Hastings said. “Nowhere is safe in Gaza and there is nowhere left to go.”
Israel’s military expanded ground operations deeper into southern Gaza, with dozens of Israeli tanks, armoured personnel carriers and bulldozers entering the Gaza Strip near Khan Younis. Witnesses said Israeli military vehicles were on the southern section of the main north-to-south road in Gaza, “firing bullets and tank shells at cars and people trying to move through the area”. Israeli military issued fresh orders to Palestinians in about 20 areas of central Gaza to move farther south, posting maps online.
The Israeli army has denied telling the World Health Organization to empty an aid warehouse in southern Gaza within 24 hours before ground operations in the area render it unusable. The Israeli defence ministry body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs, COGAT said on X “The truth is that we didn’t ask you to evacuate the warehouses and we also made it clear (and in writing) to the relevant UN representatives”. WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus wrote on X on Monday: “Today, WHO received notification from the Israel Defense Forces that we should remove our supplies from our medical warehouse in southern Gaza within 24 hours, as ground operations will put it beyond use… We appeal to Israel to withdraw the order, and take every possible measure to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure, including hospitals and humanitarian facilities,” he wrote.
The White House said Hamas broke an agreement to release more women hostages, and its refusal to do so was the cause of the collapse of the week-long truce with Israel on Friday. In a briefing at the White House on Monday afternoon, US national security advisor Jake Sullivan said “it is that refusal by Hamas that has caused the end of the hostage agreement, and therefore the end of the pause in hostilities”. He it was “too soon” to judge if Israel provided enough notice, or done enough to inform Palestinian civilians where it would be safe as it moved into southern Gaza, but said the US warned Israel civilians must be protected.
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Israel has assembled a large system of pumps that may be used to flood tunnels used by Hamas under the Gaza Strip in a bid to drive out fighters.
The paper is citing US officials as the source, but says the plan could threaten Gaza’s water supply.
The Wall Street Journal also said an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) official declined to comment on the flooding plan but was quoted as saying: “The IDF is operating to dismantle Hamas’s terror capabilities in various ways, using different military and technological tools.”
The Israeli army has denied telling the World Health Organization to empty an aid warehouse in southern Gaza within 24 hours before ground operations in the area render it unusable.
The Israeli defence ministry body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs, COGAT said on X “The truth is that we didn’t ask you to evacuate the warehouses and we also made it clear (and in writing) to the relevant UN representatives”
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus wrote on X on Monday: “Today, WHO received notification from the Israel Defense Forces that we should remove our supplies from our medical warehouse in southern Gaza within 24 hours, as ground operations will put it beyond use”.
“We appeal to Israel to withdraw the order, and take every possible measure to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure, including hospitals and humanitarian facilities,” he wrote.
At a press conference earlier on Monday, the WHO regional director for the eastern Mediterranean, Ahmed al-Mandhari, said the intensification of military ground operations in southern Gaza risked depriving thousands of people of health care, Agence France-Presse reports.
“We saw what happened in the north of Gaza. This cannot serve as a model for the south,” he said.
Israeli authorities are investigating claims by US researchers that some investors may have known in advance about the Hamas plan to attack Israel on 7 October and used that information to earn millions of dollars by short-selling Israeli shares.
Research by law professors Robert Jackson Jr from New York University and Joshua Mitts of Columbia University found significant short-selling of shares leading up to the attacks that triggered the war.
Read our piece here for more:
The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) says on X and Telegram that it has fired on Hezbollah in Lebanon with “IAF fighter jets”. It says it is in response to a strike by Hezbollah from Lebanon to Israel on Monday.
מטוסי קרב של חיל האוויר תקפו לפני זמן קצר עמדות שיגור, תשתית טרור ומבנה צבאי של ארגון הטרור חיזבאללה בשטח לבנון בתגובה לשיגורים לעבר שטח מדינת ישראל אמש >> pic.twitter.com/CRNNzo3kb1
— צבא ההגנה לישראל (@idfonline) December 5, 2023
Unicef Spokesperson James Elder has posted a video on X a couple of hours ago about children being injured and praised the commitment of the health staff. According to the video, he’s in Nasser hospital in the Gaza Strip. Elder says in the video:
We keep saying it’s a war zone, this is again what it looks like
Somehow, amid the never-ending attacks in Khan Yonis #Gaza the health workers just keep responding. Though as one told me: "we are torn, whilst we are here, we know our families may be bombed without us". pic.twitter.com/JnJJiReBNT
— James Elder (@1james_elder) December 4, 2023
Israel’s military has renewed calls for mass evacuations from the southern town of Khan Younis, according to Associated Press.
Israeli warplanes are reported to have heavily bombarded an area around Khan Younis in southern Gaza on Monday.
The expanded assault posed a choice for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians – either stay in the path of Israeli forces or flee within the confines of southern Gaza with no guarantee of safety.
Aid workers have warned that the mass movement would worsen the already dire humanitarian catastrophe in the territory.
“Another wave of displacement is underway, and the humanitarian situation worsens by the hour,” the Gaza chief of the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, Thomas White, said in a post on X.
Thomas White also described the scene yesterday:
Another wave of displacement is underway, and the humanitarian situation worsens by the hour.
— Thomas White (@TomWhiteGaza) December 4, 2023
The roads leading South towards Rafah are clogged with cars and donkey carts packed with people and their meagre possessions.
Australia’s deputy prime minister says the country remains a safe place for Jewish people, despite Israel issuing travel warnings for its citizens looking to visit.
Israel has upgraded travel warnings to multiple countries, including Australia, after a rise in antisemitism stemming from the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, Australian Associated Press is reporting.
Travel warnings to Australia have been raised to level 2, which urges Israeli citizens to take additional precautions while visiting.
Richard Marles has urged greater social cohesion in Australia after the conflict. He told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation:
It’s really important that all of us, in what is a very difficult time globally, are looking after each other…
It is very important that as people legitimately express their views about what’s happening in the world, this is done in a peaceful manner … many in the Jewish community are finding this to be a very difficult time.
A UN official has warned on Monday that “an even more hellish scenario” looms in Gaza in which humanitarian aid simply grinds to a halt.
Agence France-Presse is reporting:
“The conditions required to deliver aid to the people of Gaza do not exist,” said Lynn Hastings, UN humanitarian coordinator for the Palestinian territories.
Since the end of a seven-day truce, Israeli forces have pushed into southern Gaza, “forcing tens of thousands … into increasingly compressed spaces, desperate to find food, water, shelter and safety,” Hastings said.
“Nowhere is safe in Gaza and there is nowhere left to go.”
“If possible, an even more hellish scenario is about to unfold, one in which humanitarian operations may not be able to respond,” Hastings said in a statement.
Hastings, a Canadian, rejected the idea of “safe zones” urged upon Israel by the US government where people are still unable to move about freely.
“These zones cannot be safe nor humanitarian when unilaterally declared,” she said.
“What we see today,” Hastings added, “are shelters with no capacity, a health system on its knees, a lack of clean drinking water, no proper sanitation and poor nutrition for people already mentally and physically exhausted: a textbook formula for epidemics and a public health disaster.”
Further complicating aid deliveries, two major roads in Gaza have been declared off-limits to UN teams and trucks, Hastings said.
Hastings has her base in Jerusalem but Israel last week informed the UN that it would not renew her visa, accusing her of not being “impartial.”
Reged Ahmad here, taking over from Richard Luscombe.
Updated
Summary
It’s 1am on Tuesday in Gaza and Tel Aviv. Here is a summary of the latest developments in the Israel-Hamas conflict as it nears the two-month mark:
Israel’s military expanded ground operations deeper into southern Gaza, with dozens of Israeli tanks, armoured personnel carriers and bulldozers entering the Gaza Strip near Khan Younis. Witnesses said Israeli military vehicles were on the southern section of the main north-to-south road in Gaza, “firing bullets and tank shells at cars and people trying to move through the area”. Israeli military issued fresh orders to Palestinians in about 20 areas of central Gaza to move farther south, posting maps online.
The White House said Hamas broke an agreement to release more women hostages, and its refusal to do so was the cause of the collapse of the week-long truce with Israel on Friday. In a briefing at the White House on Monday afternoon, US national security advisor Jake Sullivan said “it is that refusal by Hamas that has caused the end of the hostage agreement, and therefore the end of the pause in hostilities”. He it was “too soon” to judge if Israel provided enough notice, or done enough to inform Palestinian civilians where it would be safe as it moved into southern Gaza, but said the US warned Israel civilians must be protected.
The World Health Organization (WHO) issued a statement expressing “grave concern” about the resumption of hostilities and bombardment of southern Gaza, and warned “nowhere is safe” for civilians in Gaza. The WHO said it was appealing to Israel for protection of the health system from further attacks and degradation of its capacity, and feared a repeat of the collapse of hospitals and other essential services in the north.
A Hamas rocket fired during the 7 October attacks struck an Israeli military base where many of the country’s nuclear-capable missiles are believed to have been stored, the New York Times said in a report. None of the missiles were struck, although the attack on the Sdot Micha base in central Israel set a fire that “approached missile storage facilities and other sensitive weaponry”, according to the newspaper’s visual analysis.
Hamas engaged in years of planning, drawing up detailed maps with the help of spies inside Israel ahead of the 7 October attack, the country’s military concluded after examining vast quantities of phones, notebooks and documents seized from gunmen on the battlefield and in Gaza. Fighters also carried guides to hostage-taking and Arabic-to-Hebrew phrasebooks, one of which included the line “put your hands up and spread your legs”. The document was included in a cache of material that was released on Monday by the Israel Defense Forces’ Amshat military intelligence unit.
Matthew Miller, a US state department spokesperson, said Hamas continued to hold female Israeli hostages because it did not want them to reveal what they experienced in captivity. Hamas fighters committed widespread “gender-based atrocities and sexual violence” during the 7 October attacks according to Israeli police who say they have evidence of more than 1,500 incidents. “The fact [Hamas] continue to hold women hostages, the fact that they continue to hold children hostages … and the reason this pause fell apart, is they don’t want those women to be able to talk about what happened to them during their time in custody,” Miller told a media briefing.
Gaza’s health ministry issued new casualty figures, saying that 15,899 Palestinians have been killed by Israel’s military campaign in the Gaza Strip since 7 October. The ministry, which is part of the Hamas-led government in the Gaza Strip, says that 70% of those who have been killed are women and children. It does not distinguish in the figures between civilians and combatants. The number of deaths is likely under-counted, as the collapse of the health system in Gaza has made it difficult for statistics to be gathered, and there are more than 6,000 Palestinians considered missing within the territory.
The head of the International Committee of the Red Cross described the suffering in Gaza as “intolerable” while visiting the territory. Mirjana Spoljaric Egger said: “The level of human suffering is intolerable. It is unacceptable that civilians have no safe place to go in Gaza.”
Telecoms company PalTel said that Gaza is facing a communications blackout, with all telecom services (landline, cellular and internet) in Gaza City and north Gaza Strip lost due to the disconnection of main elements of the network.
Israel’s military has again said it has fired into Lebanon at the site of launches it claimed were directed into Israel. It said “a number of launches from Lebanon” had occurred, and that they had fallen in open areas, with no casualties as a result. Earlier on Monday it said that three soldiers had been “slightly injured” by fire from Lebanon at an Israeli military site.
Six hostages from Thailand kidnapped and held for weeks in the Gaza Strip by Hamas arrived back in the kingdom on Monday. Israel believes that Hamas still holds about 137 people hostage in Gaza.
At least 60 Palestinians were arrested in the occupied West Bank overnight, Al Jazeera reported, with Israeli forces carrying out raids in the cities of Qalqilya, Jericho, Jenin and Tulkarem. At least 30 armoured vehicles were deployed in Jenin following a dawn raid, the broadcaster reported.
Updated
WHO: 'Nowhere is safe in Gaza'
The World Health Organization (WHO) has issued a statement expressing its “grave concern” about the resumption of hostilities between Hamas and Israel in Gaza, the bombardment of southern Gaza, and warns that “nowhere is safe” for civilians.
WHO appeals for protection of the health system from further attacks and degradation of its capacity
— World Health Organization (WHO) (@WHO) December 4, 2023
Once again, nowhere is safe in #Gaza.
WHO is gravely concerned about the resumption of hostilities, including heavy bombardment in Gaza, and reiterates its appeal to Israel to… pic.twitter.com/b7EZ1gfddZ
In its message posted to X, formerly Twitter, on Monday afternoon, the organization said it was appealing for protection of the health system from further attacks and degradation of its capacity:
WHO is gravely concerned about the resumption of hostilities, including heavy bombardment in Gaza, and reiterates its appeal to Israel to take every possible measure to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, as per the laws of war.
We have seen what happened in northern Gaza. This cannot be the blueprint for the south. Gaza cannot afford to lose another hospital as health needs continue to soar.
As more civilians in southern Gaza receive immediate evacuation orders and are forced to move, more people are being concentrated into smaller areas, while the remaining hospitals in those areas run without sufficient fuel, medicines, food, water, or protection of health workers.
Read the WHO’s full statement here.
Report: Hamas 7 October rocket struck suspected Israeli nuclear base
A Hamas rocket fired during the 7 October attacks struck an Israeli military base where many of the country’s nuclear-capable missiles are believed to have been stored, the New York Times said in a report published Monday.
None of the missiles were struck, although the attack on the Sdot Micha base in central Israel set a fire that “approached missile storage facilities and other sensitive weaponry”, according to the newspaper’s visual analysis.
A rocket most likely fired by Hamas on Oct. 7 struck an Israeli military base believed to house many of the country’s nuclear-capable missiles, a visual analysis by The New York Times found. https://t.co/kxQ1J2eIx3
— The New York Times (@nytimes) December 4, 2023
Israel, which has always maintained a policy of ambiguity over its nuclear arsenal, probably has about 25 to 50 nuclear-capable Jericho missile launchers at the base, Hans Kristensen, director of the Federation of American Scientists’ nuclear information project, told the Times.
The missiles are equipped to carry nuclear warheads, according to experts and declassified US government documents, the newspaper said, although Kristensen noted the warheads were “most likely” kept in a separate location away from the base and not under threat during the attack.
The Times said the strike on Sdot Micha was the first known instance of Hamas hitting a site suspected of containing Israeli nuclear weaponry, although there is no evidence the group knew anything of its target other than it being a military facility.
Here is a selection of images sent to us over the news wires on Monday, relating to the almost two-months-old Israel-Gaza conflict.
Updated
A group of Israeli former hostages released by Hamas during the recent pause in hostilities has written to ask the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to ask it provide medical assistance and to visit relatives still being held in Gaza.
The eight said in their letter that they had endured “harsh conditions” while being held and asked the Red Cross to help secure the immediate release of those still in captivity, and to verify the health status of the captives, according to Reuters.
The Red Cross has not commented on the letter, the news agency said, but has previously called for agreements to allow its teams to check on hostages and deliver medication.
The former hostages said their Hamas captors subjected them to “lack of medical treatment for illnesses and injuries with culpable neglect, severe food shortage and unsanitary living conditions”.
“Some of the hostages undergo psychological and physical abuse,” the letter added, along with a request for the group to meet Mirjana Spoljaric Egger, the ICRC president.
Updated
British national killed fighting for IDF
A 19-year-old British national has been killed while fighting for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in Gaza.
Binyamin Needham was one of two soldiers killed during an operation in the north of the territory on Sunday, according to a statement released by the IDF.
Needham, the youngest of five siblings, was born in England and emigrated with his family to Israel at the age of eight, Haaretz reported. The newspaper said he was from the town of Zichron Yaakov.
Needham is thought to be the second British national to have been killed serving with the IDF during or after the 7 October attacks. The first was 20-year-old Nathanel Young.
Read the full story here:
Updated
At least five Palestinians killed in West Bank, Gaza health ministry says
At least five Palestinians were killed on Monday by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank, a statement from the Palestinian health ministry said, reported by Reuters.
Two of the dead were named as Anas Al Faroukh, 23, and Mohamed Al Faroukh, 22, from Sair, who both died from wounds sustained from Israeli gunfire, the statement said.
Earlier Monday, the health ministry said another Palestinian man was killed at the Qalandia refugee camp. At least 22 other Palestinians were injured by bullets in clashes with Israeli forces at the camp, the Palestinian Red Crescent said.
And two Palestinians in a car were killed and two others detained during a raid in the city of Qalqilya, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.
An military spokesperson said the Israel Defense Forces had engaged in “counter-terrorism activity” in the region and would release details later.
Updated
Hamas said on Monday that claims of rape and sexual violence by Palestinian militants during the 7 October attacks on Israel were “unfounded lies”, AFP reports.
UN Women condemned last week what it said was widespread “gender-based atrocities and sexual violence during those attacks”.
Israeli police say they have collecting evidence of more than 1,500 incidents of sexual violence by militants who had stormed Israeli communities and army bases, ranging from alleged gang rapes to post-mortem mutilation, AFP said.
We reiterate that all women, Israeli women, Palestinian women, as all others, are entitled to a life lived in safety and free from violence.
— UN Women (@UN_Women) December 2, 2023
👉Read our full statement: https://t.co/gbvae3l8kl pic.twitter.com/b0LZutlJmI
Hamas, in its statement released Monday, said the allegations were part of “Zionist campaigns which promote unfounded lies and allegations to demonise the Palestinian resistance”.
Updated
Here’s our latest dispatch from The Guardian’s Harriet Sherwood and Jason Burke in Jerusalem about the extension of Israel’s ground assault in southern Gaza on Monday, and the country’s belief its mission in northern Gaza is “almost complete”.
Israeli tanks, armoured personnel carriers and bulldozers have entered the southern part of the Gaza Strip near Khan Younis, as an Israeli commander claimed the army had almost completed its mission in the north.
Israeli military vehicles were on the southern section of the main north-to-south road in Gaza, “firing bullets and tank shells at cars and people trying to move through the area”, a witness, Moaz Mohammed, told the AFP news agency.
The reports came soon after the Israeli military issued fresh orders to Palestinians in about 20 areas of central Gaza to move farther south, posting maps online for people to access via smartphones.
The move was criticised by a leading human rights organisation. Sari Bashi of Human Rights Watch, said Israel was asking people “who don’t have electricity or the internet to somehow scan a barcode to see where they’re supposed to go”.
Despite the Israeli instruction, there was heavy bombing in the south of Gaza overnight and early on Monday.
Read the full story:
The White House said it was “too soon” to pass judgment about whether Israel had provided enough notice, or done enough to inform Palestinian civilians where it would be safe to shelter, before launching an assault in south Gaza.
Instead, national security advisor Jake Sullivan noted at his afternoon press briefing that Israel had identified a specific area that it said it would target, and that the US was having an “ongoing conversation” to ensure civilians were protected:
What I can’t judge is how many of the people in that area as of right now have received that communication, because I’m not on the ground. What we have indicated to the Israelis is they need to use every means and tool that they have available, to be sure that when they actually move in, in force into an area in the south, that they do so with some confidence that people have actually gotten safe passage out of that area.
That’s an ongoing conversation we have with them. From our perspective, one of the key lessons from the north was to ensure that as you commence a ground operation, you have got to give civilians the time and capacity and real opportunity to leave.
They have every right to go after the Hamas terrorists who committed this brutal massacre on October 7, and who continue to fire rockets just in the last hours at civilian areas in Israel, but they also have a responsibility to try to protect civilians.
They have indicated that there are areas where there will be ‘no-strike’ zones. And in those zones we expect Israel to follow through on not striking.
Updated
White House: Hamas refusing to release more female hostages to blame for truce collapse
The week-long truce that saw the release of dozens of hostages back to Israel collapsed because Hamas refused to release any more women, the White House said on Monday.
Jake Sullivan, the US national security advisor, has just been briefing reporters about the truce falling apart on Friday, after two extensions. He said the Biden administration “will not rest” until all of the estimated 137 hostages, including nine Americans, held by Hamas are free.
But he said Hamas’s insistence on continuing to detain women meant a pathway to a new truce was not immediately apparent:
Right now, Hamas is refusing to release civilian women who should have been part of the agreement. And it is that refusal by Hamas that has caused the end of the hostage agreement, and therefore the end of the pause in hostilities.
Sullivan said he had been engaged over the weekend in “intensive phone calls with partners in Israel, Egypt, Qatar and other nations”, and he and Joe Biden had met with families of some Americans still being held:
I can tell you it has not gotten any easier. What these families are going through is gut wrenching. It’s heart wrenching, and it’s unimaginable, unthinkable for any of us.
We continue to do everything in our power under the president’s leadership and guidance, with his direct involvement and participation, to try to bring all of these Americans home as well as all of the hostages.
Updated
US official suggests Hamas wants to stop female hostages talking about captivity amid reports of sexual abuse
Matthew Miller, the state department spokesperson, was also asked at the briefing about reports that female hostages were sexually abused while being held captive by Hamas.
Miller said Hamas continued to hold female Israeli hostages because it does not want them to reveal what they experienced in captivity:
The fact that they continue to hold women hostages, the fact that they continue to hold children hostages… and the reason this pause fell apart, is they don’t want those women to be able to talk about what happened to them during their time in custody,.
There is very little that I would put beyond Hamas when it comes to its treatment of civilians, and particularly its treatment of women.
State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller suggests “one of the reasons [Hamas doesn’t] want to turn women over that they’ve been holding hostage — and the reason this pause fell apart — is they don’t want those women to talk about what happened to them.” pic.twitter.com/GOlM3PHgVR
— The Recount (@therecount) December 4, 2023
Updated
The US is asking Israel to allow more fuel into Gaza after the country, reluctantly it seems, lifted a post-truce blockade in place before the weekend.
State department spokesperson Matthew Miller briefed reporters on the situation at a recently concluded press conference:
The Israeli government was not early on Friday allowing fuel to go in. We had some very frank conversations with them about the need for fuel to come in and saw some fuel going in Friday.
We saw additional fuel go in Saturday, but it’s at the level of fuel that we were at before the pause began. We’ve made clear we want to see it back up not just to the level of fuel that went in during the pause, but actually higher.
Last week, Ismail Al-Thawabta, director of government media office in Gaza, said “the wheel of life has stopped turning”, referring to a collapse in the health system and other essential services because of a scarcity of fuel.
He said 1,000 trucks of fuel were needed daily to sustain basic life-supporting functions.
Hello, it’s Richard Luscombe in the US taking over from my colleague Gloria Oladipo. I’ll be here to guide though the next few hours of developments in the Israel-Hamas conflict.
The United Nations secretary general António Guterres urged Israel to “avoid further action that would exacerbate the already catastrophic humanitarian situation in Gaza and to spare civilians from more suffering”, a UN spokesperson said on Monday.
“The secretary general reiterates the need for unimpeded and sustained humanitarian aid flow to meet the needs of the people throughout the Strip. For people ordered to evacuate, there is nowhere safe to go and very little to survive on,” UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said.
Updated
US: too early to say if Israel heeding calls to protect civilians
The US state department has said that it’s too early to assess if Israel is heeding US calls to protect civilians during their airstrikes in Gaza, Reuters reports.
State department spokesperson Matthew Miller that Israel’s targeted evacuations amid airstrikes are an improvement compared to earlier attempts to evacuate an entire city during bombardment.
But displaced Palestinians have said that Israeli officials are attempting to evacuate them to places that are currently under fire.
Airstrikes in Gaza’s southern regions has killed and injured dozens of Palestinians, according to media on the ground.
At least 15,000 Palestinians have been killed since 7 October, the territory’s health ministry reports.
Updated
Israel investigating reports that some US investors knew of 7 October attack in advance
Israel is investigating reports from US researchers that some investors knew of the 7 October attack on Israel before hand and used the information for profit, Reuters reports.
From Reuters:
Research by law professors Robert Jackson Jr from New York University and Joshua Mitts of Columbia University found significant short-selling of shares leading up to the attacks, which triggered a war nearly two months old.
“Days before the attack, traders appeared to anticipate the events to come,” they wrote, citing short interest in the MSCI Israel Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) that “suddenly, and significantly, spiked” on Oct. 2 based on data from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA).
“And just before the attack, short selling of Israeli securities on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE) increased dramatically,” they wrote in their 66-page report.
The Israel Securities Authority told Reuters it was aware of the allegations and was conducting an investigation.
Read the full article here.
Updated
Qatar has expedited its pledge to provide the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine refugees with 65.7m qatari ralis (£14.3m) over the next two years, according to a press release on social media.
In a letter posted to X, the Qatar government said it fufilled the pledged sum ahead of schedule “in order to support the brotherly Palestinian people and [provide] all forms of support to them”.
Qatar Fulfils It's Pledge to Support UNRWA with QR 65.7 Million for Two Years#MOFAQatar pic.twitter.com/LREsYydqq9
— Ministry of Foreign Affairs - Qatar (@MofaQatar_EN) December 4, 2023
Updated
John Bolton, the former Republican US national security adviser, has proposed to the UK’s foreign affairs select committee that the Gaza Strip be split into two territories, with Gaza north of the Wadi Gaza River valley administered by Israel and an area to the south run by Egypt.
Bolton added that he would abolish the UN relief works agency, UNRWA, which he said had “developed an institutional culture of sustaining the refugee status of Palestinians”.
His proposal would involve large numbers of Palestinians leaving Gaza permanently. Bolton said his it would mean Palestinians were no longer stuck in the eternal hell of Gaza, a place he described as a terrorist state.
Bolton said it was clear that the refugees from Gaza would not be able to be resettled in Israel, since that was not consistent with Israel’s security needs. He added that Israel had made it clear it was not even going to provide work visas. As a result, he said, they should be resettled in third countries.
“This is not forcible population removal but doing what we did after world war two – we find other countries that will accept refugees and give them asylum. They have to be put in places where they are part of a functioning economy. Otherwise they do not have the dignity of providing for themselves,” he said.
Bolton, who acted as national security adviser to Donald Trump, warned that if the current population was allowed to stay in Gaza they would be in an “Orwellian situation where there is no future and the Palestinian people will become victims once again”.
He described his plan as an interim solution and claimed it was legal since there was an unresolved mandate for Gaza dating to the League of Nations, and the previous responsibility of the British had not been clearly handed to anyone else.
Bolton’s plan is based on the presumption that Gaza and the West Bank will not form a state as part of a wider two-state solution. His proposal echoes proposals circulating in the Israeli government.
Washington has ruled out such a proposal but as Gaza becomes slowly uninhabitable due to Israeli bombardment, the US could reluctantly change its policy to seek homes for Palestinians away from Gaza.
Updated
Here’s more information from the Guardian’s Archie Bland about US officials continue to warn Israel about protecting Palestinian life as Israel continues its offensive in Gaza.
Israel arguably has a higher tolerance for international condemnation of its actions than almost any other country,” [Guardian’s Dan Sabbagh in Jerusalem] said. The only country with the leverage to seriously affect its actions is the United States. And in the last few days, US public statements have taken on a new tone.
On Thursday, US secretary of state Antony Blinken was reported to have told Israel’s war cabinet that it may only have weeks to complete its plan to defeat Hamas in Gaza. In a press conference, he said that he had “underscored the imperative – for the United States – that the massive loss of civilian life and displacement of the scale that we saw in northern Gaza not be repeated in the south.” That warning was echoed by US vice-president Kamala Harris and defence secretary Lloyd Austin over the weekend.
Updated
At least 50 people were reportedly killed in an Israeli airstrike that hit a school where displaced people were sheltering, Reuters reported, citing WAFA, the official Palestinian news agency.
The reported air strike hit the Daraj neighborhood in northwest Gaza.
A spokesperson from the Israeli military told Reuters they were looking into the reported attack. Reuters was unable to independently verify the report.
The latest attack comes as leaders across the globe are calling out Israel’s killing of Palestinian civilians as it increases offensives across the Gaza territory.
Joe Biden told Israel aid must be linked to assurances to reduce Gaza casualties
Democratic US lawmakers have told US president Joe Biden that continued aid to Israel must be met with assurances to reduce casualties in Gaza, the Associated Press reported.
US senator Bernie Sanders along with other Democratic senators said they are done “asking nicely” for Israel to limit civilian deaths as Israel continues its airstrike attacks on Gaza.
It is unlikely that US lawmakers will vote down wartime aid to Israel, but pressure is building amid lawmakers, especially as US public support for Israel decreases.
Over 15,000 Palestinians have died since 7 October, the territory’s health ministry reports.
Updated
At least 300 people have been killed in Gaza, as Israeli airstrike attacks continue to target the territory since the humanitarian pause ended on 1 December, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) reports.
The UN humanitarian agency also reported that aid access has been completely blocked in northern Gaza and that Israeli air raids have escalated in Gaza’s southern regions.
More than 300 people have been killed since the resumption of hostilities in #Gaza, @UNOCHA reports. Aid access to the north is now entirely blocked amid escalating bombing raids in the south.https://t.co/ynQnjF2rZW
— UN News (@UN_News_Centre) December 4, 2023
Summary of the day so far …
It has just gone 5pm in Gaza City and in Tel Aviv. Here are the latest headlines …
Dozens of Israeli tanks have entered the southern part of the Gaza Strip near Khan Younis on Monday, witnesses have told AFP. Armoured personnel carriers and bulldozers were also seen. Moaz Mohammed, 34, said Israeli tanks were on the southern part of Salah al-Din road. “They are holding Salah al-Din road on both sides and are now cutting it between Deir al-Balah and Khan Younis, firing bullets and tank shells at cars and people trying to move through the area,” he said.
Israel’s military has issued a situational update, in which it claims that “ground troops are continuing to operate in the Gaza Strip in parallel to Israeli air force strikes on approximately 200 Hamas terror targets”. Local reporters have described “a very deadly and bloody night for the Palestinians” with many believed killed.
In videos posted on X, Unicef spokesperson James Elder reported “another intense evening of attacks here in Khan Younis” late on Sunday. It was the “worst bombardment of the war right now in southern Gaza”, he said. “I feel like I am running out of ways to describe the horrors hitting children here,” he said. “I feel like I’m almost failing in my ability to convey the endless killing of children here.”
Gaza’s health ministry has issued new casualty figures, saying that 15,899 Palestinians have been killed by Israel’s military campaign in the Gaza Strip since 7 October. The ministry, which is part of the Hamas-led government in the Gaza Strip, says that 70% of those who have been killed are women and children. It does not distinguish in the figures between civilians and combatants. The number of deaths is likely under-counted, as the collapse of the health system in Gaza has made it difficult for statistics to be gathered, and there are more than 6,000 Palestinians considered missing within the territory.
The head of the International Committee of the Red Cross has described the suffering in Gaza as “intolerable” while visiting the territory. Mirjana Spoljaric Egger said: “The level of human suffering is intolerable. It is unacceptable that civilians have no safe place to go in Gaza.”
Telecoms company PalTel has said that Gaza is facing a communications blackout, with all telecom services (landline, cellular and internet) in Gaza City and north Gaza Strip lost due to the disconnection of main elements of the network.
Israel’s military has again said it has fired into Lebanon at the site of launches it claimed were directed into Israel. It said “a number of launches from Lebanon” had occurred, and that they had fallen in open areas, with no casualties as a result. Earlier on Monday it said that three soldiers had been “slightly injured” by fire from Lebanon at an Israeli military site.
Six hostages from Thailand kidnapped and held for weeks in the Gaza Strip by Hamas will arrive back in the kingdom on Monday. Israel believes that Hamas still holds about 137 people hostage in Gaza.
At least 60 Palestinians were arrested in the occupied West Bank overnight, Al Jazeera reported, with Israeli forces carrying out raids in the cities of Qalqilya, Jericho, Jenin and Tulkarem. At least 30 armoured vehicles were deployed in Jenin following a dawn raid, the broadcaster reported.
Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has said that Benjamin Netanyahu will eventually be tried as a war criminal over Israel’s ongoing offensive in Gaza.
A court hearing in the Netherlands challenging the export of fighter jet parts to Israel that could be used in attacks on Gaza has begun.
Netanyahu has invited Argentina’s president-elect Javier Milei to Israel, and thanked him for his stated intention to move the Argentinian embassy to Jerusalem.
Updated
Benjamin Netanyahu has invited the Argentinian president-elect, Javier Milei, to Israel, and thanked him for his stated intention to move the Argentinian embassy to Jerusalem.
Reuters reported that Netanyahu’s office said the Israeli prime minister congratulated Milei on his election victory, thanked him for his support during the war, and “thanked the president-elect for his intention to move the Argentina embassy to Jerusalem, and invited him to visit in Israel.”
Updated
Here are some of the latest images sent to us from Gaza and Israel over the news wires.
The UK’s government has condemned attacks on shipping in the Red Sea, claimed by Yemen’s Houthi group.
In London, the prime minister’s official spokesperson said: “We condemn the attack on commercial shipping in the Red Sea by Houthi militants.
“As we’ve previously said, Iran has long provided political and military support to Houthi militants and it bears responsibility for the actions of its proxies and partners.
“These waters are vital routes for global trade and incidents like these show the importance of the Royal Navy’s presence in the region.”
PA Media reports that a UK Type 45 destroyer HMS Diamond was heading to the region to bolster the Royal Navy presence there.
The US military said on Sunday that three commercial vessels had come under attack in international waters, as Yemen’s Houthi group claimed drone and missile attacks on two Israeli vessels in the area.
Updated
Israel’s military has issued a statement to say it is ‘fighting in close-quarters with Hamas terrorists’ inside the Gaza Strip.
It said its Kfir brigade was operating inside the Palestinian territory for the first time, and quoted its brigade commander Col Yaniv Barot saying:
The Kfir brigade has been training for this moment. I am proud to lead the brigade in its first-ever operation. I am confident that we will accomplish every task as to date in the war. The brigade has located and destroyed more than 30 shafts until now in cooperation with other units. The cooperation with the air force is close and is very significant for operational success.
Updated
Gaza health ministry: 15,899 killed by Israeli attacks since 7 October
Gaza’s health ministry has issued new casualty figures, saying that 15,899 Palestinians have been killed by Israel’s military campaign in the Gaza Strip since 7 October.
The ministry, which is part of the Hamas-led government in the Gaza Strip, says that 70% of those who have been killed are women and children. It does not distinguish in the figures between civilians and combatants.
The number of deaths is likely under-counted, as the collapse of the health system in Gaza has made it difficult for statistics to be gathered, and there are more than 6,000 Palestinians considered missing within the territory.
Israel launched the attacks after the 7 October surprise attack by Hamas inside Israel which killed at least 1,200 people and left more than 5,000 injured. Israel believes that Hamas is still holding over 130 people hostage inside Gaza who were seized from Israel on 7 October.
It has not been possible for journalists to independently verify the casualty figures being issued during the conflict.
Updated
PalTel: all telecom services cut in Gaza City and north Gaza Strip
There are reports that communications have been cut in northern Gaza.
Telecomms company PalTel posted to its Facebook page:
We regret to announce that all telecom services (landline, cellular and internet) in Gaza City and north Gaza Strip have been lost due to the disconnection of main elements of our network in light of the ongoing aggression. Our technical teams are working relentlessly by all available means to restore the services.
Updated
In Rafah, Reuters reports that a bombing at one site overnight had torn a crater the size of a basketball court out of the earth. A dead toddler’s bare feet and black trousers poked out from under a pile of rubble. Men struggled with their bare hands to move a chunk of the concrete that had crushed the child.
Later they wept as they marched through the ruins carrying the body in a bundle and that of another small child body wrapped in a blanket.
“We were asleep and safe, they told us it was a safe area, Rafah and all,” said Salah al-Arja, owner of one of the houses destroyed at the site.
“There were children, women and martyrs,” he said. “They tell you it is a safe area, but there is no safe area in all of the Gaza Strip, it is all lies and manipulations.”
In Khan Younis, many of those taking flight on Monday were already displaced from other areas. Abu Mohammed told Reuters it was now the third time he had been forced to flee since abandoning his home in Gaza City in the north.
“Why did they eject us from our homes if they planned to kill us here?” he said.
At a home in Khan Younis that was struck overnight, flames licked the collapsed masonry and grey smoke billowed out from the rubble. Next door, Nesrine Abdelmoty stood amid damaged furniture in the rented room where she lives with her divorced daughter and two-year-old baby.
“We were sleeping at 5am when we felt things collapse, everything went upside down,” she told Reuters. “They told (people) to move from the north to Khan Younis, since the south is safer. And now, they’ve bombed Khan Younis. Even Khan Younis is not safe now, and even if we move to Rafah, Rafah is not safe as well. Where do they want us to go?”
Updated
Here are some of the latest images sent to us over the news wires from Gaza and Israel.
The Palestinian ambassador to the UN in Geneva Ibrahim Khraishi has said that an emergency World Health Organization (WHO) board meeting would focus mostly on Gaza but also cover attacks on the health sector in the West Bank.
“We want to empower the WHO and call for the Israeli side not to target the medical sector. We want to allow for fresh medical supplies,” he told Reuters, saying that his diplomatic mission was drafting a motion to be reviewed by the 34-member board.
WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has convened the extraordinary session of its executive board for 10 December after receiving a request from 14 members of the board.
Earlier, health ministry spokesperson in Gaza, Ashraf al-Qudra, told Al Jazeera that “the Israeli occupation is deliberately bombing hospitals in Gaza to put them out of service.”
He accused Israel of creating a “circle of death” for medical workers, and said that only nine of Gaza’s 35 hospitals are still operational.
The Palestine Red Crescent Society has announced the overnight death of one of its workers, killed by an Israeli strike.
Head of ICRC: level of human suffering in Gaza is 'intolerable'
The head of the International Committee of the Red Cross has described the suffering in Gaza as “intolerable” while visiting the territory.
Mirjana Spoljaric Egger said:
The level of human suffering is intolerable. It is unacceptable that civilians have no safe place to go in Gaza, and with a military siege in place there is also no adequate humanitarian response currently possible.
The last week provided a small degree of humanitarian respite, a positive glimpse of humanity that raised hopes around the world that a path to reduced suffering could now be found.
As a neutral actor, the ICRC stands ready to support further humanitarian agreements that reduce suffering and heartbreak.
This map shows the latest extent of damage known to have taken place in the Gaza Strip since Israel began its bombardment following the 7 October Hamas attack inside southern Israel.
Israel has caused extensive damage to built-up areas south of the Gaza River, where it initially instructed Palestinian residents to flee to in order to avoid fighting.
Hamas has claimed that it has carried out a “missile barrage” aimed at the Israeli city of Ashkelon. There are no reports of any casualties.
Summary of the day so far …
It is 2pm in Gaza City and in Tel Aviv. Here are the latest headlines …
Israel’s military has issued a situational update, in which it claims that “ground troops are continuing to operate in the Gaza Strip in parallel to Israeli air force strikes on approximately 200 Hamas terror targets”. Local reporters have described “a very deadly and bloody night for the Palestinians” with many believed killed.
In videos posted on X, Unicef spokesman James Elder reported “another intense evening of attacks here in Khan Younis” late Sunday. It was the “worst bombardment of the war right now in southern Gaza”, he said. “I feel like I am running out of ways to describe the horrors hitting children here,” he said. “I feel like I’m almost failing in my ability to convey the endless killing of children here.”
Dozens of Israeli tanks have entered the southern part of the Gaza Strip near Khan Younis on Monday, witnesses have told AFP. Armoured personnel carriers and bulldozers were also seen. Moaz Mohammed, 34, said Israeli tanks were on the southern part of Salah al-Din road. “They are holding Salah al-Din road on both sides and are now cutting it between Deir al-Balah and Khan Younis, firing bullets and tank shells at cars and people trying to move through the area,” he said.
Israel’s military has denied claims that it is attempting to permanently remove Palestinians from the Gaza Strip. Spokesperson Jonathan Conricus said “We are not trying to displace anyone, we are not trying to move anybody from anywhere permanently.” Israel’s military has issued a grid map of Gaza and is insisting residents evacuate to areas it specifies. Rohan Talbot, advocacy director at the charity Medical Aid for Palestinians, has described the Israeli move as “akin to a macabre game of Battleships in which terrified civilians will be left guessing which square will save their life.”
In its latest estimate, the UN’s OCHA said about 1.8 million people in Gaza, roughly 75% of the population, had been displaced, many to overcrowded and unsanitary shelters. The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza has said that more than 15,000 Palestinians have been killed since 7 October, with more than 6,000 people missing.
Israel’s military has again said it has fired into Lebanon at the site of launches it claimed were directed into Israel. It said “a number of launches from Lebanon” had occurred, and that they had fallen in open areas, with no casualties as a result. Earlier on Monday it said that three soldiers had been “slightly injured” by fire from Lebanon at an Israeli military site.
Six hostages from Thailand kidnapped and held for weeks in the Gaza Strip by Hamas will arrive back in the kingdom on Monday. Israel believes that Hamas still holds 137 people hostage in Gaza.
Haaretz is reporting that a meeting between families of those being held hostage in Gaza and Israel’s war cabinet is being scheduled as a result of the families’ threat to escalate their protests. Earlier on Monday at a press conference some of the families of those held in Gaza threatened to stage a permanent sit-in at Israel’s army headquarters, telling the government: “Your indifference towards us is a disgrace.”
At least 60 Palestinians were arrested in the occupied West Bank overnight, Al Jazeera reported, with Israeli forces carrying out raids in the cities of Qalqilya, Jericho, Jenin and Tulkarem. At least 30 armoured vehicles were deployed in Jenin following a dawn raid, the broadcaster reported.
Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said that Benjamin Netanyahu will eventually be tried as a war criminal over Israel’s ongoing offensive in the Gaza Strip.
A court hearing in the Netherlands challenging the export of fighter jet parts to Israel that could be used in attacks on Gaza has begun.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in the West Bank have lost their jobs or had their salaries frozen after the Israeli authorities cancelled their work permits and imposed severe restrictions on crossings after the 7 October attacks. Approximately 182,000 Gaza residents who work in Israel and the settlements had their employment terminated, initial estimates by the International Labour Organization (ILO) suggest.
Updated
Israel must not only instruct Gazans to move to safety but also make this possible, a spokesperson for the German foreign ministry said on Monday, amid concerns that Israel’s ground camapaign against Hamas could expand into Gaza’s refugee-crowded south, which Israel has been repeatedly bombarding from the air.
It is important that Israel avoids civilian casualties and adheres to humanitarian law, Reuters reports the spokesperson telling the media in Berlin, adding that the German government was conveying this message in its talks with Israeli partners.
The Israel Defense Forces released a map on Friday dividing Gaza up into hundreds of numbered small districts. It has begun to ask civilians to evacuate from specific areas before, it says, military operations start.
It has been sharply condemned by humanitarian organisations for the piecemeal evacuation plan, which they say leaves Palestinians with fewer and fewer places to flee to, while Gaza’s infrastructure is at breaking point.
Updated
Dozens of Israeli tanks enter southern part of Gaza Strip, witnesses say
Dozens of Israeli tanks have entered the southern part of the Gaza Strip near Khan Younis on Monday, witnesses have told AFP. Armoured personnel carriers and bulldozers were also seen.
Amin Abu Hawli, 59, said the Israeli vehicles were “two kilometres (1.2 miles) inside” the Palestinian territory in the village of Al-Qarara near Khan Younis.
Moaz Mohammed, 34, said Israeli tanks were on the southern part of Salah al-Din road which runs from the north to the south of the strip.
“They are holding Salah al-Din road on both sides and are now cutting it between Deir al-Balah and Khan Younis, firing bullets and tank shells at cars and people trying to move through the area,” he said.
There have been reports of airstrikes on Khan Younis this morning.
About 1.8 million people in Gaza, roughly 75% of the population, have been displaced from their homes by Israel’s military action in the Gaza Strip, creating a humanitarian crisis. The Hamas-run health ministry says that more than 15,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since 7 October.
Updated
Haaretz is reporting that a meeting between families of those being held hostage in Gaza and Israel’s war cabinet is being scheduled as a result of the families’ threat to escalate their protests.
Earlier today at a press conference, Daniel Lifshitz, whose grandmother has been released but whose grandfather is still believed to be in Gaza, told the war cabinet:
We urge you to immediately return to the negotiating table, without delay and at any cost. Your indifference towards us is a disgrace. If you have no interest in representing us, we will turn to an international entity that agrees to do so. We will not beg you. If this does not happen, we will sit from 8pm this evening near the Kirya army headquarters and will not move from there.
A court hearing in the Netherlands challenging the export of fighter jet parts to Israel that could be used in attacks on Gaza has begun.
“The state must immediately stop its delivery of F-35 parts to Israel,” lawyer Liesbeth Zegveld told the court.
She said Dutch customs officials asked the government if it wanted to continue exports after the 7 October attacks by Hamas that triggered the Israel-Hamas war.
“The warning that the fighter jets can contribute to serious breaches of the laws of war does not, for the state outweigh its economic interests and diplomatic reputation,” Associated Press reports she said.
Government lawyer Reimer Veldhuis urged the court’s single judge to reject the injunction, saying that even if it were to uphold the rights lawyers’ legal arguments and ban exports, “the US would deliver these parts to Israel from another place”.
A decision is expected within two weeks.
Updated
Israel’s military has again said it has fired into Lebanon at the site of launches it claimed were directed into Israel. It said “a number of launches from Lebanon” had occurred, and that they had fallen in open areas, with no casualties as a result.
Earlier it said that three soldiers had been “slightly injured” by fire from Lebanon at an Israeli military site.
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said that Benjamin Netanyahu will eventually be tried as a war criminal over Israel’s ongoing offensive in the Gaza Strip.
Reuters reports that in a speech to a meeting of an Organisation of Islamic cooperation (OIC) committee in Istanbul, the Turkish president said that Gaza is Palestinian land and will always belong to the Palestinians, and again referred to Israel’s prime minister as “the butcher of Gaza”.
Quds News Networks quotes Erdoğan saying:
The butcher of Gaza, Netanyahu, admitted in front of the cameras that his expansionist goals are not limited to Ramallah and Gaza only. Therefore, defending Gaza and Palestine today means at the same time defending Jerusalem, Mecca, Medina, Damascus, Istanbul and other Islamic cities.
Hoda Abdel-Hamid reports from Hebron for Al Jazeera, saying that it was raided overnight by Israeli forces, adding that two Palestinians were killed in Qalqilya.
She writes for the network:
There are questions about the whereabouts of those Palestinians’ bodies, which authorities in Qalqilya said they could not recover. It is assumed that Israel is withholding the bodies. Israeli authorities are holding the bodies of 25 Palestinians killed in raids since 7 October.
During these raids, Israeli authorities have detained more than 3,500 people, bringing the total Palestinians in Israeli jails to more than 7,000. Bear in mind that majority of these people are held without charges.
The Palestine Red Crescent Society has posted to social media a tribute to one of its workers killed by Israel inside Gaza overnight.
It writes:
Martyr Osama Tayeh, 37 years old, was a First Responder with the PRCS in Jabalya, Gaza. He insisted to stay in the northern part, and on providing emergency medical assistance to those who suffered the war’s calamity.
Osama lost his life due to Israeli bombardment in the dawn hours, in front of his home at Al-Falouja. Our colleague Mohammad Abu Rukba who was with him at the house was also injured.
🚨 Martyr Osama Tayeh, 37 years old, was a First Responder with the PRCS in Jabalya, #Gaza. He insisted to stay in the northern part, and on providing emergency medical assistance to those who suffered the war’s calamity. #NotATarget#IHL #Humanrights pic.twitter.com/lAILO1Fu4q
— PRCS (@PalestineRCS) December 4, 2023
Here are some of the latest pictures sent to us from Rafah in the south of the Gaza Strip, showing the aftermath of an Israeli airstrike.
Israel’s military has denied that it is attempting to permanently remove Palestinians from the Gaza Strip. In its latest estimate, the UN’s OCHA said about 1.8 million people in Gaza, roughly 75 percent of the population, had been displaced, many to overcrowded and unsanitary shelters.
AFP reports that, speaking to the media on Monday, spokesperson Jonathan Conricus said:
We are not trying to displace anyone, we are not trying to move anybody from anywhere permanently. We have asked civilians to evacuate the battlefield and we have provided a designated humanitarian zone inside the Gaza Strip. We are perfectly aware that there is limited space and limited access and that is why it is so important to have the buy-in and support of international humanitarian organisations to help with the infrastructure.
Conricus also specifically said that Israel was not trying to force residents of Gaza to flee into Egypt, saying: “We have not tried to have any people evacuate there. Egypt has been very clear about where they stand: they do not want that.”
Israel has been effectively blockading aid agencies from bringing in as much humanitarian aid as they require, with only a limited number of trucks being permitted to pass through Egypt’s Rafah border crossing.
The Israeli military has been attempting to designate small “safe zones” within the Gaza Strip, and instruct people to move there.
However, some members of Israel’s government have suggested in public that Gaza’s population should leave the region. Earlier in November finance minister Bezalel Smotrich backed a call by two members of the Israeli parliament who wrote in a Wall Street Journal editorial that western countries should accept Gazan families who expressed a desire to relocate.
“I welcome the initiative of the voluntary emigration of Gaza Arabs to countries around the world,” Smotrich said in a statement. “This is the right humanitarian solution for the residents of Gaza and the entire region.”
Updated
Israel’s Arabic-language military spokesperson Avichay Adraee has posted to social media to say that Israel’s forces have been returning fire again over the UN-drawn blue line that divides Israel from Lebanon.
In a post, Adraee said:
During last night, several mortar shells were monitored from Lebanon towards a military site in the area of Shtula, where the attack resulted in three soldiers being slightly injured. Several mortar shells were also monitored a short while ago from Lebanon towards an IDF position in the area of Yiftah, where IDF forces responded by targeting the sources of fire.
Israel and anti-Israeli forces have regularly exchanged fire across the blue line since the Hamas attack in southern Israel on 7 October, although there was also an informal lull in the fighting in Israel’s north while the temporary truce was in place in Gaza.
Here are some of the latest images sent to us over the news wires from Khan Younis in the south of the Gaza Strip.
Israel claims to have struck 200 'terror targets' within Gaza Strip
Israel’s military has issued a situational update, in which it claims that “ground troops are continuing to operate in the Gaza Strip in parallel to Israeli air force strikes on approximately 200 Hamas terror targets”.
It writes:
IDF troops struck terror infrastructure located inside a school in Beit Hanoun, from which an attack on the troops was carried out. In the compound were two tunnel shafts, including a booby-trapped one, explosives, and additional weapons.
In addition, an IDF aircraft struck vehicles containing missiles, mortar shells, and weapons, thwarting an imminent attack against IDF soldiers. An additional IDF aircraft struck military infrastructure designated for ambushing the troops with anti-tank missiles.
IDF troops directed an aircraft to strike a cell of terrorists. Following this, a weapons storage facility from which the terrorists exited was struck as well.
Furthermore, overnight the Israeli Navy struck a number of Hamas terror targets, assisting with the reinforcement of ground troops. The Hamas terror targets included observation posts belonging to the Hamas naval forces and terrorist infrastructure at the Gaza harbor. The forces also struck with precise munitions Hamas military compounds.
The claims have not been independently verified.
The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza has issued casualty figures claiming that at least 15,523 Palestinians, including 6,600 children, have been killed by Israeli military action since 7 October, with a further 41,316 injured. It says that at least 6,800 people are missing.
Israel launched its military campaign against Hamas inside the densly populated Gaza Strip after the 7 October surprise Hamas attack inside Israel, which killed about 1,200 people and injured at least 5,600.
It has not been possible for journalists to independently verify casualty counts being issued during the conflict.
Updated
Hani Mahmoud has been reporting from Khan Younis in southern Gaza for Al Jazeera. In his latest dispatch, he describes last night as “a very deadly and bloody night for the Palestinians”.
He reports that at least 35 people have been killed and that “the worst of the attacks happened here in central Khan Younis”.
Reporting that a commercial centre was hit, he said:
The centre is located in an area that is supposed to be safe and where hundreds of people have sought refuge in the last two days since the end of the ceasefire. The centre was completely destroyed, burned beyond recognition.
In the eastern side of Khan Younis, the Israeli military has started to advance with tanks and armoured vehicles. A family stranded there was trying to evacuate when their three-story building was shelled by tanks and completely destroyed.
This is Martin Belam taking over the live blog in London. You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com
Updated
Israel has been declaring some of the missing as dead in captivity, a measure designed to grant anxious relatives some closure, Reuters reports. The news agency writes:
A three-person medical committee has been poring over videos from the 7 October rampage by Hamas-led Palestinian gunmen in southern Israel for signs of lethal injuries among those abducted, and cross-referencing with the testimony of hostages freed during a week-long Gaza truce that ended on Friday.
That can suffice to determine that a hostage has died, even if no doctor has formally pronounced this over his or her body, said Hagar Mizrahi, a health ministry official who heads the panel created in response to a crisis now in its third month.
“Designation of death is never an easy matter, and certainly not in the situation embroiling us,” she told Israel’s Kan radio. Her committee, she said, addresses “the desire of the families of loved ones abducted to Gaza to know as much as possible”.
Of 240 people kidnapped, 108 were freed by Hamas in return for the release by Israel of scores of Palestinian detainees as well as boosted humanitarian aid shipments to Gaza.
Since the truce, Israeli authorities have declared seven civilians and an army colonel as dead in captivity. Israel says 137 hostages remain in Gaza, their condition not always known.
This has not been confirmed by Hamas. It has previously said dozens of hostages were killed in Israeli airstrikes, has threatened to execute hostages itself and suggested that some hostages were in the hands of other armed Palestinian factions.
Hostages have been kept incommunicado despite Israel’s calls on the Red Cross to arrange visits and verify their wellbeing.
Mizrahi said she and her fellow panellists – a forensic pathologist and a physical trauma clinician – have been watching clips shot by the Hamas attackers themselves, mobile phone video by Palestinian spectators and CCTV footage of the hostage-taking “again and again, frame by frame”.
That has allowed them to map out life-threatening wounds and spot any cessation of breathing or other essential reflexes.
Additional considerations have been hostages’ rough handling by captors, the reduced chances of them getting adequate medical care in Gaza and accounts of deaths by former fellow hostages.
Updated
Six Thai hostages kidnapped and held for weeks in the Gaza Strip by Hamas will arrive back in the kingdom on Monday, officials have said according to Agence France-Presse. The news agency reports:
Tens of thousands of Thais were working in Israel, mostly in the agricultural sector, when Palestinian militants poured over the border on 7 October, killing 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping roughly 240, according to Israeli authorities.
At least 32 Thais were abducted by Hamas, with Bangkok’s foreign ministry and Thai Muslim groups working to negotiate their release.
On Monday, at about 2pm (0700 GMT), six are expected to land at the capital’s Suvarnabhumi airport following weeks in captivity.
Since their release, the group have been recuperating at a hospital in Israel as authorities made preparations to fly them home.
It follows the return of 17 citizens from Thailand at the end of November, during a temporary truce in which scores of people were released before it expired on 1 December.
A further nine Thais are still among the hostages taken by Palestinian militants during October’s cross-border raid into Israel, according to Bangkok’s foreign ministry.
Thirty-nine Thais have been killed and 19 wounded in the war, with the kingdom evacuating more than 8,500 of its people, according to Thailand’s foreign ministry.
Updated
Unicef spokesperson James Elder, in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, has described a “night of utterly relentless bombardments” in a voice note posted to X.
“I cannot stop thinking about the 1.8 million people here in the south,” he said. “I don’t think there was more than a five- or 10-minute period throughout the course of the night, and I really didn’t sleep, where something wasn’t flying overhead or the sky being lit up”.
Despite what has been assured, attacks in the south of #Gaza are every bit as vicious as what the north endured. Somehow, it's getting worse for children and mothers.
— James Elder (@1james_elder) December 4, 2023
Your voice matters. We must believe we can be a part of Stopping The War on Children ... Silence is complicity pic.twitter.com/1kYV18YMT3
Updated
A 21-year-old Israeli believed to have been kidnapped by Hamas and taken to Gaza on 7 October is dead, Israeli media have reported.
Yonatan Samarno was at the Nova music festival that was attacked in Hamas’s assault and was believed to have been shot, the Jerusalem Post reported. However, though the bodies of two of his friends were found afterwards, his was not with them.
Haaretz reported that he had fled to the nearby kibbutz Be’eri where he was shot and kidnapped.
It was not clear from either report whether his body had since been identified in Israel – many people were not immediately found or identified after the 7 October attack due to severe burns among other things – or whether he had died in Gaza while being held hostage.
Updated
A volunteer with the Palestinian Red Crescent has been killed in an Israeli strike on the al-Faluja neighbourhood north-east of Gaza City, the organisation has said on X.
Osama Tayeh was killed at his home, the Red Crescent said, while employee Muhammad Abu Rukba was injured in the attack.
🚨 PRCS volunteer Osama Tayeh was martyred, and employee Muhammad Abu Rukba was injured in the bombing of Al-Faluga at 5:30 AM while at the home of the late Osama Tayeh.#Gaza #IHl#HumanRights
— PRCS (@PalestineRCS) December 4, 2023
Updated
Almost 400,000 Palestinians have lost jobs due to war, ILO says
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in the West Bank have lost their jobs or had their salaries frozen after the Israeli authorities cancelled their work permits and imposed severe restrictions on crossings after the 7 October attacks.
Approximately 182,000 Gaza residents who work in Israel and the settlements had their employment terminated, initial estimates by the International Labour Organization (ILO) suggest, while about 24% of employment in the West Bank has also been lost – equivalent to 208,000 jobs – as a result of the Israel-Hamas war.
According to the ILO, a further 160,000 workers from the West Bank have either lost their jobs in Israel and the settlements, at least temporarily, or are at risk of losing them “as a result of restrictions imposed on Palestinians’ access to the Israeli labour market and the closures of crossings from the West Bank into Israel and the settlements”.
Hani Mousa, an assistant political science professor at Birzeit University in the West Bank, said this is part of “Israel’s collective punishment of Palestinians, which also extended to employees in the Palestinian Authority (PA), whose salaries were not paid because Israel did not transfer the money needed”.
Under interim peace accords, the Israeli finance minister has the final say in monthly money transfers made to the PA from taxes it collects on Palestinians’ behalf. The PA is then typically able to pay its employees, which it was not able to do in October, as Israel refused to make the full transfers.
Updated
At least 60 Palestinians were arrested in the occupied West Bank overnight, Al Jazeera reported, with Israeli forces carrying out raids in the cities of Qalqilya, Jericho, Jenin and Tulkarem.
At least 30 armoured vehicles were deployed in Jenin following a dawn raid, the broadcaster reported. Citing the Palestinian news agency Wafa, it said Israeli snipers were positioned on the roofs of homes and other buildings and a reconaissance plane flew overhead.
It also posted footage on Twitter of what it said was smoke rising in Jenin after Israeli troops were targeted with “explosive devices”.
Tensions have been escalating in the West Bank, with more than 200 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces and settlers since Hamas’ deadly assault on Israel on 7 October.
In one of the latest incidents, one Palestinian man was killed late Saturday after settlers attack two Palestinian villages.
Updated
Dutch court to hear legal challenge over export of fighter jet parts to Israel
The Netherlands faces a legal challenge on Monday over accusations that its role in the export of F-35 fighter jet parts to Israel makes it complicit in alleged war crimes in Gaza, Reuters reports. The news agency writes:
Three human rights organisations, including the Dutch arm of Oxfam, have brought the case at the district court in The Hague, stating the export of the fighter plane parts enables Israel to bomb the Gaza strip.
“Israel disregards the fundamental principles of the laws of war, such as distinguishing between civilian and military targets and the principle of proportionality,” in the bombing of the Gaza strip, the organisations said in their court filings.
Israel denies having carried out war crimes, saying its forces abide by international law while fighting Palestinian militants who operate in densely populated civilian areas.
The Netherlands is home to a regional warehouse which stores US-owned F-35 parts, which can be sent on to other F-35 partner countries such as Israel.
Several weeks after the 7 October Hamas attacks, the Dutch government allowed a shipment of reserve parts for Israeli F-35s, government documents show.
The Dutch defence ministry, which oversees the exports, would not comment on the court case, but in a letter to parliament last week said that, based on the current information, “it cannot be established that the F-35s are involved in grave violations of the humanitarian laws of war”.
More than 15,400 inhabitants of the Gaza strip have been killed as of Sunday, according to the Palestinian Bureau of Statistics, in nearly two months of warfare that broke out after the Hamas cross-border raid on southern Israel in which 1,200 Israelis were killed and more than 200 taken hostage.
The court case will start at 10 am CET (0900 GMT) and will hear the claimants’ case and a response by lawyers for the Dutch state. A ruling is expected in two weeks.
Khan Younis becomes focus of intense bombardments
Israel has continued to bombard Gaza overnight, with one target of the strikes reportedly in Khan Younis in the south, where many Palestinians fled in the early weeks of the war on Israel’s orders.
Al Jazeera reported an “intense bombardment” of the east of the city in the early hours of Monday. Israeli raids and continuous artillery fire were also reported in the north of the territory, in the Gaza City neighbourhoods of Shejaiya and al-Tuffah.
Israel believes Hamas’ leadership is based in Khan Younis and has ordered people in and around certain areas of the city to evacuate.
Residents said the military dropped leaflets calling Khan Younis “a dangerous combat zone” and ordering them to move to the border city of Rafah or a coastal area in the south-west.
Halima Abdel-Rahman, a widow and mother of four, told the Associated Press she had stopped heeding such orders. She fled her home in October to an area outside Khan Younis, where she is staying with relatives.
“The occupation tells you to go to this area, then they bomb it,” she said by phone. “The reality is that no place is safe in Gaza. They kill people in the north. They kill people in the south.”
In videos posted on X, Unicef spokesman James Elder reported “another intense evening of attacks here in Khan Younis” late Sunday. It was the “worst bombardment of the war right now in southern Gaza”, he said.
“I feel like I am running out of ways to describe the horrors hitting children here,” he said. “I feel like I’m almost failing in my ability to convey the endless killing of children here”.
Another intense evening of attacks here in Khan Younis, in #Gaza pic.twitter.com/682rHFai4l
— James Elder (@1james_elder) December 3, 2023
Updated
Multiple streets in New Zealand’s capital city, Wellington, were cordoned off on Monday afternoon, following the discovery of two suspicious packages outside the Israeli and US embassies.
The police were notified of the packages just before 2pm. Wide cordons were erected around the embassies and surrounding central Wellington streets, while five nearby schools were placed in lockdown as a precaution.
The defence force explosive ordnance disposal team confirmed there was no risk to public safety just after 4pm and the cordons were removed.
The police have yet to confirm what the packages contained.
The Israeli embassy declined to comment on security matters. The US embassy has been contacted for comment.
Updated
Three Israeli soldiers were killed in Gaza on Sunday, the Haaretz newspaper reported citing the Israeli military (IDF).
The IDF named the soldiers as Sgt Maj (Res) Neriya Shaer, 36, from Yavne, Sgt 1st Class (Res) Ben Zussman, 22, from Jerusalem, and Sgt Binyamin Yehoshua Needham, 19, from Zichron Ya’akov.
Updated
US vice-president Kamala Harris reiterated US concerns that extremist settler violence in the West Bank could escalate tensions further in a phone call with Israeli president Isaac Herzog, the White House has said in a statement.
While emphasising “strong US support” for Israel’s right to self-defence, “the Vice-President reiterated the importance of planning for the day after the fighting ends in Gaza, and she underscored our commitment to a two-state solution,” the statement said.
Harris also spoke to Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas, telling him that “the Palestinian people must have a clear political horizon” and reiterating “US support for a unified West Bank and Gaza under a revitalized Palestinian Authority”.
The Palestinian Authority, which was booted out of Gaza by Hamas in 2006, has been touted by the west as the solution to a political vacuum in the territory after the war.
However many doubt its ability to govern Gaza due to its unpopularity among Palestinians and reputation for corruption. To read more about that, check out this analysis from our diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour.
Updated
Israel expands ground operations to 'all of Gaza Strip'
Israel continued with its intense bombing campaign across the north and south of Gaza for a third day since the end of the truce with Hamas, killing hundreds of Palestinians in a 24-hour period, according to local officials.
On Sunday night, the Israeli military also said it had expanded its ground operation to all of Gaza. “The IDF [Israel Defense Forces] continues to extend its ground operation against Hamas centres in all of the Gaza Strip,” spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari told reporters in Tel Aviv. “The forces are coming face-to-face with terrorists and killing them.”
The Jabaliya refugee camp in the north was among the targets. Heavy bombing was also reported in the southern city of Khan Younis, increasingly the focus of Israeli attacks, while its military demanded further evacuation of civilians from areas of the city, telling them to head south to Rafah or to the west.
On Sunday night there were reports of clashes between Hamas and Israeli troops a mile from the city.
Gaza residents had said earlier on Sunday they feared an Israeli ground offensive on the southern areas was imminent. Tanks had cut off the road between Khan Younis and Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza, in effect dividing the Gaza Strip into three.
Ismael al-Thawabteh, the director general of the government media office in Gaza, told Al Jazeera that more than 700 Palestinians had been killed in a 24-hour period to noon.
The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said later that 15,523 Palestinians had been killed since the start of the war, including 316 dead and 664 wounded “in the past hours”. Seventy per cent of the dead were women and children, it said.
Read our full report:
Updated
Opening summary
The Israeli military has said it is extending its ground operation against Hamas “in all of the Gaza Strip”, in the clearest indication yet that the ground offensive in the south has begun.
“The forces are coming face-to-face with terrorists and killing them,” spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari told reporters in Tel Aviv.
Hamas said its fighters clashed with Israeli troops about 2km from the southern city of Khan Younis, where many people had fled earlier in the conflict on Israeli orders.
Israel has now ordered civilians to evacuate some areas in and near the city and Palestinians said on Sunday they could hear tank fire and feared a new ground offensive was building.
The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said 316 people had been killed between Saturday afternoon and Sunday afternoon while 664 were wounded. In total 15,523 Palestinians have been killed since 7 October, with many more thought to be under the rubble of destroyed buildings.
Other key developments:
The Jabaliya refugee camp in the north of Gaza was among the sites reported hit from the air as were the cities of Khan Younis and Rafah in the south of Gaza. Israeli government spokesperson, Eylon Levy, said the military had struck more than 400 targets over the weekend “including extensive aerial attacks in the Khan Younis area” and had also killed Hamas militants and destroyed their infrastructure in Beit Lahiya in the north.
The UN humanitarian agency (OCHA) said that about 1.8 million people – roughly 75% of Gaza’s population – are internally displaced, up from a previous figure of 1.7 million. “However, obtaining an accurate count is challenging,” it said.
Hospitals in southern Gaza overflowed with dead and wounded, amid what Uncief spokesperson James Elder said was “the worst bombardment of the war right now in south Gaza” on Sunday evening. “I feel like I’m almost failing in my ability to convey the endless killing of children here,” Elder said in a video from Nasser hospital in Khan Younis.
Qatar is demanding an “immediate, comprehensive and impartial international investigation” into what its prime minister called Israeli crimes in Gaza, according to Al Jazeera. Sheikh Mohammed Bin Abdulrahman al-Thani also said Qatar would continue its efforts towards facilitating another truce and reaching a permanent ceasefire in the besieged enclave, Al Jazeera added.
Israel’s military (IDF) claimed to have found about 800 shafts leading to Hamas tunnels and bunkers since the IDF began its Gaza ground operation on 27 October. It said it had destroyed more than half of them.
The IDF also said it had killed Hamas commander Haitham Khuwajari in an airstrike. It said Khuwajari, the leader of the Shati battalion, was responsible for “numerous acts of terror” against Israel and under his command “Hamas terrorists carried out raids into Israeli territory on October 7th”.
The Israeli army reported 17 rocket salvos from Gaza into Israel on Sunday, adding that most were intercepted and there was only slight material damage. Israel said two of its soldiers had died in combat, the first since the week-long truce expired on Friday.
The prosecutor of the international criminal court (ICC) called on Israel to respect the international rules of war and said he was accelerating his investigation into violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. In a video address following a visit to Israel and Palestine, ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan added, “In Gaza, there is no justification for doctors to perform operations without light, for children to be operated upon without anaesthetics. Imagine the pain … I was crystal clear, that this is the time to comply with the law. If Israel doesn’t comply now, they shouldn’t complain later.”
Israeli settlers attacked two Palestinian villages in the occupied West Bank late on Saturday, killing one man and torching a car, Palestinian authorities said. The Palestinian ambulance service said a 38-year-old man in the town of Qarawat Bani Hassan, in the northern West Bank, was shot in the chest and died as residents confronted settlers and Israeli soldiers.
Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group said it had struck Israeli positions near the Lebanon-Israel border. Eight soldiers and three civilians were wounded by Hezbollah fire in the area of Beit Hillel, Israeli army radio reported. The IDF said its artillery struck sources of fire from Lebanon and its fighter jets struck other Hezbollah targets.
A US air strike killed five Iraqi militants near the northern city of Kirkuk as they prepared to launch explosive projectiles at US forces in the country, three Iraqi security sources told Reuters, identifying them as members of an Iran-backed militia. A US military official confirmed a “self-defense strike on an imminent threat” that targeted a drone staging site near Kirkuk on Sunday afternoon.
Three commercial vessels came under attack in international waters in the southern Red Sea, the US military said Sunday, as Yemen’s Houthi group claimed drone and missile attacks on two Israeli vessels in the area. The USS Carney, an American destroyer, responded to distress calls and provided assistance following missile and drone launches from Houthi-controlled territory, according to US Central Command.
Updated
