Closing summary
It has gone 6pm in Gaza, Tel Aviv and Beirut, and 7pm in Sana’a. 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:
A Gaza-bound aid ship expected to make the maiden voyage along a new maritime corridor from Cyprus has yet to set sail because of logistical challenges. Government officials confirmed on Saturday that while a vessel belonging to the Spanish search and rescue group, Open Arms, had been loaded with food, water and other supplies, and was ready to depart the Mediterranean island, it was unlikely to leave before tomorrow.
A US charity said it was loading aid for Gaza on to a boat in Cyprus, the first shipment to the war-ravaged territory along a maritime corridor the European Commission hopes will open this weekend.“World Central Kitchen teams are in Cyprus loading pallets of humanitarian aid on to a boat headed to northern Gaza,” the charity said in a statement on Friday.
The Pentagon said on Friday that a US plan to establish a “temporary offshore maritime pier” in Gaza would take up to 60 days and would probably involve more than 1,000 US personnel.
Three Palestinian children died of dehydration and malnutrition at the northern al-Shifa hospital overnight, said the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry on Saturday. Its spokesperson Ashraf Al-Qidra said this raised to 23 the number of Palestinians who had died of similar causes in nearly 10 days.
The Israeli military said it conducted arrests, located weapons and killed more than 30 fighters in Khan Younis, including in the Hamad area, in central Gaza and in the area of Beit Hanoun in the north, according to a statement on Saturday summarising its operations in Gaza over the past day.
Gaza’s health ministry said on Saturday that at least 82 people were killed in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip in the last day. In Khan Younis, medics said at least 23 people were killed in military raids on homes and in Israeli shelling of a housing project in the Hamad area of the city. In the northern Gaza Strip, Israeli fire killed a Palestinian fisher along the beach, medics said.
Israel struck one of the largest residential towers in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on early Saturday. The 12-floor building, located about 500 metres from the border with Egypt, was damaged in the strike. Dozens of families were made homeless though no casualties were reported, according to residents. However, the Palestinian news agency Wafa reported that “scores of civilians sustained various injuries”.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed that it had struck one of the largest residential towers in Rafah overnight, saying it housed a “Hamas military asset”. The IDF said it had warned residents of the 12-floor Al-Masry Tower ahead of the strike, and said they all evacuated in time.
Canada and Sweden confirmed that they will restore funding for the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). According to CBC News, Canada’s international development minister Ahmed Hussen confirmed the move at a press conference on Friday, while the Swedish government announced on Saturday that it would resume suspended payments with a grant of 200m crowns ($20m/£16m).
“This brutal war has ruptured any sense of a shared humanity,” said Mirjana Spoljaric, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross on Saturday. According to Reuters, she called for an end of hostilities to allow for meaningful aid distribution in Gaza, for Hamas to release all hostages without conditions and for Israel to treat Palestinians in its custody humanely and to permit them to contact their families.
US president, Joe Biden said it was “looking tough” to secure a ceasefire in Gaza before the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which is expected to begin in the coming days.
An attack by Yemen’s Houthi rebels set off explosions ahead of a Singapore-flagged vessel in the Gulf of Aden, authorities said. The attack on Friday targeted the US bulk carrier Propel Fortune, which continued on its way, according to US Central Command (Centcom). “The missiles did not impact the vessel,” the US military said, adding that there were “no injuries or damages reported”. The Houthis said on Saturday they were behind the attack.
Houthi military spokesperson Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree claimed that along with targeting the Propel Fortune, the Houthi forces also launched 37 drones targeting US warships. The US military said on Saturday that the US and allied forces had shot down 15 one-way attack drones fired by the Houthis into the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. Centcom said the “large-scale” Houthi attack occurred before dawn into the Red Sea and adjacent Gulf of Aden.
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Saturday that Ankara “firmly backs” the Palestinian militant group Hamas. “No one can make us qualify Hamas as a terrorist organisation,” he said in a speech in Istanbul. “Turkey is a country that speaks openly with Hamas leaders and firmly backs them.”
Hundreds of thousands of Pro-Palestinian activists marched through London calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, during a National Day of Action for Palestine on Saturday. The demonstration, organised by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC), made its way from Hyde Park Corner to the US embassy in Nine Elms.
Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA’s commissioner-general told Swiss broadcaster RTS that the UN Palestinian refugee agency is at the “risk of death” after Israel alleged some of its staff took part in the 7 October Hamas attack. But, he said he was “cautiously optimistic” that “a number of donors will return” over the next few weeks and after an independent review of UNRWA is due to be published next month.
Egyptian president Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said the cost of rebuilding Gaza could exceed $90bn (£70bn). He made the comment during a speech marking Martyrs’ and Veterans’ Day in Egypt on Saturday.
Five people were killed and 10 injured in Gaza when they were hit by a pallet of aid parachuted into the territory as part of a humanitarian airdrop. Witnesses said the accident happened on Friday morning near the coastal refugee camp known as al-Shati, one of the most devastated parts of Gaza, after a parachute attached to the pallet failed to deploy properly.
A top US treasury official visiting Beirut this week pressed Lebanese authorities to prevent funds from being funneled to Hamas by way of Lebanon, officials told the Associated Press (AP).
The UN’s top aid official has renewed his call for a ceasefire in Gaza and outlined six priorities in the humanitarian response. In a social media post via the account of the UN office for the coordination of humanitarian affairs (Ocha) on Friday, Martin Griffiths, the UN emergency relief coordinator, listed six facts that “should keep us all awake at night” and six “things that would make a difference”.
Iran on Saturday denounced US tech company Meta’s decision to remove the Facebook and Instagram accounts of its supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, calling it a “violation of freedom of expression”. Meta’s move last month came as Khamenei increasingly voiced support for Palestinian militant group Hamas and denounced Israel amid the war between the two sides in the Gaza Strip.
The Iranian regime’s human rights violations during its brutal suppression of protests in 2022 amount to crimes against humanity, a UN fact-finding mission (FFM) said. Established by the UN human rights council in November 2022 – two months after the Woman, Life, Freedom protests swept the country in response to the death in custody of Mahsa Amini – the FFM released a report concluding the regime carried out widespread and sustained human rights violations against its own people, which broke international laws and specifically targeted women and girls.
Updated
A Gaza-bound aid ship expected to make the maiden voyage along a new maritime corridor from Cyprus has yet to set sail because of logistical challenges.
Government officials confirmed on Saturday that while a vessel belonging to the Spanish search and rescue group, Open Arms, had been loaded with food, water and other supplies, and was ready to depart the Mediterranean island, it was unlikely to leave before tomorrow.
“We are still waiting for the green light from Israel,” deputy government spokesperson Yiannis Antoniou told the Guardian. “And the weather will also play a role … the boat is going to move very slowly, it will take twice the time it would normally take, around 50 hours, to get there.”
Where “there” was also remains unclear. Although Israel’s foreign ministry has said shipments will be subject to inspection “according to Israeli standards,” who will distribute the assistance and what the destination of boats will be has still not been revealed because of security concerns.
“It is going to Gaza but at this stage we cannot say where it will offload,” Antoniou added, explaining that the mission is being seen as a test run by officials.
The island’s foreign minister Constantinos Kombos also made clear that while there was still optimism the operation would be activated “over the weekend” there were issues that had to be clarified.
Speaking to the Cyprus News agency, he said “speed should not affect efficiency, there has to be balance.”
“There are various issues and that’s why we say the window is this weekend [for the launch of the mission] as long as there isn’t an incident in Gaza, Israel or on the borders with Lebanon which could cause unrest and affect the operation, even the weather could cause problems.”
Updated
