Closing summary
Palestinian medics said Israeli airstrikes on Gaza killed at least 20 people overnight, including an airstrike on a tent encampment in the so-called humanitarian safe zone of al-Mawasi that killed eight people. Four people were reportedly killed in an Israeli attack on an area north of the al-Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip.
At least 45,317 Palestinian people have been killed and 107,713 injured in Israeli airstrikes on Gaza since 7 October 2023, the Gaza health ministry said. Of those, 58 Palestinians were killed and 86 injured in the latest 24-hour reporting period, the ministry said.
Only 12 out of the 34 trucks of food and water allowed to enter north Gaza over the last 10 weeks have managed to distribute aid to starving Palestinian civilians because of “deliberate delays and systematic obstructions” by the Israeli military, Oxfam said.
German foreign minister Annalena Baerbock warned that a war by Turkey against the Kurdish groups in Syria “must not happen”, saying that in the end this could empower “the IS terrorists”. “That would be a security threat for Syria, but also for Turkey and for us in Europe,” Baerbock told public broadcaster Deutschlandfunk.
Israel late last night reportedly ordered the closure and evacuation of one of the last hospitals still partly functioning in northern Gaza. The head of the Kamal Adwan hospital, Husam Abu Safiya, told Reuters that obeying the order to shut down was “next to impossible” because there were not enough ambulances to get patients out. An IDF spokesperson told the Washington Post forces had not conveyed any evacuation warnings to the hospital this weekend.
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A Palestinian officer has been killed during clashes with militants in the occupied West Bank, the security forces said. Here is a report from the Agence France-Presse news agency with more details:
Clashes between local militants and the security forces of the Palestinian Authority (PA) are uncommon, but Jenin and its adjacent refugee camp have experienced frequent gunfights for nearly two weeks, triggered by arrests earlier this month.
“The officer was killed after he was targeted by treacherous and cowardly gunfire from outlaws in the Jenin camp,” Anwar Rajab, spokesperson for the PA’s security force said in a statement.
Tensions in Jenin - also a frequent target of Israeli military raids - have escalated after Palestinian security forces arrested several activists and militants.
Palestinian rivals of the Fatah party, which dominates the PA, have condemned the arrests and accused the security forces of aiding Israel.
In addition to the two security personnel, three people have been killed since the clashes began on December 5: two civilians and a field commander of the Jenin armed battalion.
Jenin, in the northern West Bank, is a stronghold of armed Palestinian factions who view themselves as a more effective resistance to the Israeli occupation, in contrast to the PA which coordinates security matters with Israel.
