Summary
Hello and thank you for reading the Guardian’s continuing coverage of the crisis in the Middle East.
Here is a quick roundup of some of the key developments from today:
At least 24,285 Palestinians have been killed and 61,154 have been wounded in Israeli strikes on Gaza since 7 October, the health ministry in the territory said in a statement on Tuesday. In the past 24 hours, 158 Palestinians were killed and 320 wounded, the ministry added.
Iran destroyed two bases of Baluchi militant group Jaish al-Adl in Pakistan by launching missiles on Tuesday, Iranian state media reported. According to Reuters, the group has previously mounted attacks on Iranian security forces in the border area with Pakistan.
Arab countries are not keen to get involved in the rebuilding of Gaza if the Palestinian enclave will be “levelled” again in a few years, US secretary of state Antony Blinken said on Tuesday, adding that the Palestinian statehood question needed to be addressed.
Aid agencies have begun suspending vital operations in Yemen after the recent US and UK strikes on Houthi targets, amid warnings that further military intervention risks deepening one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
The EU has sanctioned the Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar and added him to the group’s terrorist list. As a result, Sinouar is subject to the freezing of his funds and other financial assets in EU member states. The sanctions also prohibit EU operators from making funds or economic resources available to him.
US Central Command said in a statement on Tuesday that it had seized Iranian advanced conventional weapons bound for Yemen’s Houthis on 11 January. It was the first seizure of “lethal Iranian-supplied advanced conventional weapons” to the Houthis since Houthi attacks against merchant ships began in November, the statement added.
The Iraqi Kurdish prime minister, Masrour Barzani, has accused Iran of killing innocent civilians in its strikes on the capital of the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region.
A number of European states, “concerned” Arab countries and the United States are working on a concept for a unified Palestinian government that could attract reconstruction funds, Norway’s foreign minister said in an interview in Davos. Specific countries were not named.
Turkey said it had destroyed 23 targets in overnight airstrikes on Kurdish militants in northern Iraq and Syria, a further escalation of conflict south of its border.
Requiring Israel to agree to a time-bound, mandatory path to a two-state solution is key to future stability in Israel and the Palestinian territories, Qatar’s prime minister said on Tuesday during the World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Davos.
France has accused Iran of violating Iraq’s sovereignty after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards claimed to have struck a purported Israeli “spy headquarters” in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region, Reuters reported.
Iraq condemned on Tuesday Iran’scondemned Iran’s “aggression” on Erbil that led to civilian casualties in residential areas, according to a statement by the country’s foreign ministry, after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they attacked Israel’s “spy headquarters” in Iraq’s Kurdistan region.
The Israeli military said on Tuesday its troops killed dozens of Palestinian militants around the town of Beit Lahia in northern Gaza and also uncovered about 100 rocket launchers. “During IDF activity in the area of Beit Lahia, the troops located approximately 100 rocket set-installations and 60 ready-to-use rockets. The troops killed dozens of terrorists during the activity,” it said.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have also claimed an attack in Syria. The group said it had fired a number of ballistic missiles at “terrorist operations” in the country – including Islamic State targets – and destroyed them. A US defence official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the US tracked the missiles, which hit in northern Iraq and northern Syria, and initial indications were that the strikes were “reckless and imprecise”.
A few days ago, in a wood-panelled courtroom in The Hague, men and women in robes and wigs argued over whether what is happening in Gaza is the deliberate destruction of a people. In Today in Focus, Michael Safi asks, is it genocide? The accuser was South Africa, a state that emerged just decades ago from a suffocating regime of apartheid. The accused was Israel, a nation established in the wake of the most notorious genocide in history.
Aid officials in Gaza believe that pockets of famine already exist in the territory, with parents sacrificing remaining food for their children, an apple costing $8 and fuel for cooking almost impossible to find, the Guardian’s Jason Burke reported. UN agencies have said that Gaza urgently needs more humanitarian assistance as Palestinian authorities reported that the death toll in the territory during the Israeli offensive there had risen to more than 24,000.
Egyptian authorities reportedly thwarted a drug smuggling attempt on the Egyptian-Israeli border on Monday. Two security sources told the Reuters news agency that there was an exchange of gunfire close to a crossing where aid deliveries for Gaza were being inspected. During the incident, six drug smugglers were arrested, the sources said.
A US state department spokesperson has said that an Iranian attack near Iraq’s northern city of Erbil on Monday “undermine Iraq’s stability.” “We oppose Iran’s reckless missile strikes,” Matthew Miller said, adding that the US supported “the Government of Iraq and the Kurdistan Regional Government’s efforts to meet the aspirations of the Iraqi people.”
Come back tomorrow for more of our live coverage.
Updated
Iran destroyed two bases of Baluchi militant group Jaish al-Adl in Pakistan by launching missiles on Tuesday, Iranian state media reported.
According to Reuters, the group has previously mounted attacks on Iranian security forces in the border area with Pakistan.
Updated
US oil corporation Chevron has made no “fundamental changes” to its shipping routes as the Iran-allied Houthi militia threatens to expand its attacks in the Red Sea to include US ships, CEO Mike Wirth told Bloomberg TV on Tuesday.
The company is working with naval authorities in the US and Middle East to move its cargoes through the region, Wirth said during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
The Houthi militia threats come in response to American and British strikes on its sites in Yemen, Reuters reports.
Yemen’s Houthi movement targeted on Tuesday the Zografia ship that was heading to Israel with naval missiles which resulted in a “direct hit”, the group’s military spokesperson Yahya Sarea said in a statement.
According to Reuters, the Malta-flagged, Greek-owned bulk carrier sustained material damage but no injuries after it was hit in the Red Sea near the Yemeni port of Saleef, a security firm and two Greek shipping ministry sources said.
Updated
The chief executive of Norway’s $1.5tn sovereign wealth fund, the world’s largest, told Reuters on Tuesday the fund’s return on investments would probably be “slow” in 2024 due to high interest rates, persistent inflation and geopolitical risk.
Arab countries are not keen to get involved in the rebuilding of Gaza if the Palestinian enclave will be “levelled” again in a few years, US secretary of state Antony Blinken said on Tuesday, adding that the Palestinian statehood question needed to be addressed.
In an interview in Davos, Blinken told CNBC:
You have to resolve the Palestinian question.
Arab countries are saying this: They’re saying, look, we’re not going to get into the business, for example, of rebuilding Gaza only to have it levelled again in a year or five years and then be asked to rebuild it again.
The EU imposed sanctions on Tuesday on Yahya Sinwar, the political leader of Hamas in Gaza, over the Palestinian militant group’s attack on Israel last October.
The decision by the European Council, which considers Hamas a terrorist organisation, makes Sinwar subject to an asset freeze in the 27-nation bloc and bars EU citizens from conducting financial transactions with him, Reuters reports.
In a statement, the EU executive said:
The Council decided today to add one individual to the EU terrorist list.
This decision comes as part of the EU’s response to the threat posed by Hamas and its brutal and indiscriminate terrorist attacks in Israel on 7 October 2023.
Israeli foreign minister Israel Katz welcomed what he said was a “just and moral decision” by the EU.
On X, Katz said:
This decision is also a result of our diplomatic efforts to strangle the resources of the Hamas, to delegitimise them and prohibit all support to them.
We will continue to eradicate the root of evil, in Gaza and wherever it raises its head.
Taher Al-Nono, media adviser to Qatar-based Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh, accused the EU of bias and called for an end to what he said was its “double-standard policy”.
“These are ridiculous and silly sanctions, because everyone knows that Yahya Al-Sinwar has no assents or money, neither in Palestine nor outside it,” he told Reuters.
“Such a decision has no value against Hamas, but the idea of imposing sanctions on the leaders of resistance and Hamas, which is resisting the (Israeli) occupation, as granted by international law, shows bias to the occupation.”
The EU member states have given initial backing to create a naval mission to protect ships from attacks by Iran-backed Houthi rebels in the Red Sea, European diplomats said on Tuesday.
The diplomats said the aim was to establish the mission by 19 February at the latest, with it becoming operational quickly afterwards, and that it would work in coordination with other like-minded partners in the region as part of efforts to stop disruptions to the key trading route, according to Reuters.
Israelis released from captivity in Gaza reconvened in their border village on Tuesday to hold a solemn first-birthday ceremony for the infant of a family still held hostage.
Kfir Bibas was eight months old when Hamas stormed their kibbutz Nir Oz on 7 October, and became the youngest of about 240 people taken back to the Gaza Strip as captives, Reuters reports.
Hamas has said that Kfir, his four-year-old brother Ariel and their mother, Shiri, were killed in the Israeli offensive that ensued, while their father, Yarden, survived.
But in the absence of Israeli corroboration, relatives and friends back home have refused to let hope die for the whole family’s safe recovery.
Kfir would turn one on Thursday, at which point he would have spent a third of his life as a hostage.
Updated
Aid agencies have begun suspending vital operations in Yemen after the recent US and UK strikes on Houthi targets, amid warnings that further military intervention risks deepening one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
A coalition of 23 aid organisations operating within the Gulf state issued a joint statement on Tuesday, warning that military escalation will further compromise their ability to deliver critical services while worsening living conditions for millions of people in Yemen.
Tuesday’s statement, released shortly after reports that another cargo ship had been struck by a missile off the coast of Yemen, read: “Following the US/UK strikes, some humanitarian organisations have been forced to suspend operations over safety and security concerns, while others assess their ability to operate.”
Their intervention came days after airstrikes on targets inside Yemen by the US and UK after attacks by the Iran-backed Houthi militia group on ships passing through the Red Sea. The Houthis said those attacks were an effort to put pressure on Israel to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza and that an Israeli ceasefire would immediately lead to the free flow of ships.
Updated
Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister said on Tuesday that the kingdom could recognise Israel if the Palestinian issue was resolved, Reuters reports.
Asked at a panel at the World Economic Forum in Davos whether Saudi Arabia could take this step as part of a wider agreement after a resolution of the Palestinian conflict, Prince Faisal bin Farhan said “certainly”.
Updated
EU sanctions Hamas leader and adds him to terrorist list
The EU has sanctioned the Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar and added him to the group’s terrorist list.
As a result, Sinouar is subject to the freezing of his funds and other financial assets in EU member states. The sanctions also prohibit EU operators from making funds or economic resources available to him.
In a statement, the Council of the EU said: “The council decided today to add one individual to the EU terrorist list. This decision comes as part of EU’s response to the threat posed by Hamas and its brutal and indiscriminate terrorist attacks in Israel on 7 October 2023.
“These sanctions are effective as of today.
“The individual designated today is Yahya Sinwar, the political leader of Hamas. Following his listing, Yahya Sinwar is subject to the freezing of his funds and other financial assets in EU member states. It is also prohibited for EU operators to make funds and economic resources available to him.”
Updated
Afternoon summary
The Israeli military said on Tuesday its troops killed dozens of Palestinian militants around the town of Beit Lahia in northern Gaza and also uncovered about 100 rocket launchers. “During IDF activity in the area of Beit Lahia, the troops located approximately 100 rocket set-installations and 60 ready-to-use rockets. The troops killed dozens of terrorists during the activity,” it said.
The Iraqi Kurdish prime minister, Masrour Barzani, has accused Iran of killing innocent civilians in its strikes on the capital of the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards earlier said they attacked an Israeli spy centre in the region. Speaking on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos after the attack, Barzani said the Iranian allegations were baseless and added that now was not the time for US forces to withdraw from the country.
Iraq on Tuesday condemned Iran’s “aggression” on Erbil that led to civilian casualties in residential areas, according to a statement by the country’s foreign ministry, after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they attacked Israel’s “spy headquarters” in Iraq’s Kurdistan region. The Iraqi government said it would take all legal measures against what it described as a violation of Iraq’s sovereignty and the security of its people, including filing a complaint at the United Nations security council.
Iraq has recalled its ambassador from Tehran to discuss the recent Iranian attack on the city of Erbil, according to the country’s foreign ministry. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they attacked the “spy headquarters” of Israel in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region late on Monday.
A US state department spokesperson has said that an Iranian attack near Iraq’s northern city of Erbil on Monday “undermined Iraq’s stability”. “We oppose Iran’s reckless missile strikes,” Matthew Miller said, adding that the US supported “the government of Iraq and the Kurdistan regional government’s efforts to meet the aspirations of the Iraqi people”.
France has accused Iran of violating Iraq’s sovereignty after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards claimed to have struck a purported Israeli “spy headquarters” in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region, Reuters reported. “Such acts represent blatant, unacceptable and worrying violations of Iraq’s sovereignty and an attack on its stability and security, as well as that of Kurdistan within it,” France’s foreign ministry said.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have also claimed an attack in Syria. The group said it had fired ballistic missiles at “terrorist operations” in the country – including Islamic State targets – and destroyed them. A US defence official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the US tracked the missiles, which landed in northern Iraq and northern Syria, and initial indications were that the strikes were “reckless and imprecise”.
Jordan’s foreign minister, Ayman Safadi, said on Tuesday Israel was placing many obstacles to the entry of aid into Gaza that were worsening the plight of Palestinians. In remarks during a press conference with his Australian counterpart, Safadi said these hurdles meant only 10% of the total needs of more than 2 million people in Gaza under siege were being covered.
Turkey said it had destroyed 23 targets in overnight airstrikes on Kurdish militants in northern Iraq and Syria, a further escalation of conflict south of its border. The attacks were the latest by Turkey since nine Turkish soldiers were killed in clashes with Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) militants in northern Iraq on Friday, Reuters reported.
US Central Command said in a statement on Tuesday that it had seized Iranian advanced conventional weapons bound for Yemen’s Houthis on 11 January. It was the first seizure of “lethal Iranian-supplied advanced conventional weapons” to the Houthis since Houthi attacks against merchant ships began in November, the statement added.
The Israeli military said on Tuesday that its special forces had carried out a strike in the area of Ayta ash Shab in Lebanon. “IDF special forces struck in order to remove a threat in the area of Ayta ash Shab in Lebanon,” the military said. It did not say what kind of forces had struck nor where specifically they had operated.
Requiring Israel to agree to a time-bound, mandatory path to a two-state solution was key to future stability in Israel and the Palestinian territories, Qatar’s prime minister said on Tuesday during the World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Davos. Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said the Palestinians had to be the ones to decide if the Hamas movement running Gaza would continue to play a political role in the future, Reuters reported.
At least 24,285 Palestinians have been killed and 61,154 have been wounded in Israeli strikes on Gaza since 7 October, the health ministry in the territory said on Tuesday. In the past 24 hours, 158 Palestinians were killed and 320 wounded, the ministry added.
A number of European states, “concerned” Arab countries and the United States were working on a concept for a unified Palestinian government that could attract reconstruction funds, Norway’s foreign minister said in an interview in Davos. “A number of countries are working with us ... trying to build a broad unity government,” Espen Barth Eide said, without naming the specific countries, Reuters reported. Norway was of the view that a unified Palestinian territory should be run by the Palestinian Authority, but “prefacing everything, it has to be what the Palestinians want”, he added.
Egyptian authorities reportedly thwarted a drug smuggling attempt on the Egyptian-Israeli border on Monday. Two security sources told the Reuters news agency that there was an exchange of gunfire close to a crossing where aid deliveries for Gaza were being inspected. During the incident, six drug smugglers were arrested, the sources said.
Aid officials in Gaza believe that pockets of famine already exist in the territory, with parents sacrificing remaining food for their children, an apple costing $8 and fuel for cooking almost impossible to find. UN agencies have said that Gaza urgently needs more humanitarian assistance as Palestinian authorities reported that the death toll in the territory during the Israeli offensive there had risen to more than 24,000. The World Food Programme, Unicef and the World Health Organization said in a joint statement that new entry routes needed to be opened to Gaza, more trucks needed to be allowed in each day, and aid workers and those seeking aid needed to be allowed to move around safely.
Updated
A Palestinian shop owner said Israeli troops used him as a human shield to protect themselves during a raid on the town of Dura in the occupied West Bank, Reuters reports.
Mobile phone footage showed Baha Abu Ras being marched up a street by a soldier who guided him from behind with one hand and kept a rifle resting on his shoulder with the other. Two Israeli soldiers advanced carefully behind them, their rifles raised.
Abu Ras said he had been taken from his mobile phone shop on Monday in Dura, near the city of Hebron, after Israeli soldiers searched the premises during a raid in which Palestinian officials said two Palestinians were shot dead.
“He [the first soldier] told me that he will use me as a human shield, that young people shouldn’t hurl stones,” Abu Ras told Reuters. “‘You will walk in front of me.’ That’s what happened and he took me toward the centre of the town.”
Asked about the incident, the Israeli military had no immediate comment. It said in an earlier statement that troops in Dura had used live fire to disperse about 100 people who had thrown stones and fired bombs at them.
Updated
Updated
US Central Command said in a statement on Tuesday that it had seized Iranian advanced conventional weapons bound for Yemen’s Houthis on 11 January.
It was the first seizure of “lethal Iranian-supplied advanced conventional weapons” to the Houthis since Houthi attacks against merchant ships began in November, the statement added.
Kurdish PM says Iran is attacking civilians
The Iraqi Kurdish prime minister, Masrour Barzani, has accused Iran of killing innocent civilians in its strikes on the capital of the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards earlier said they attacked an Israeli spy centre in the region.
Speaking on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos after the attack, Barzani said the Iranian allegations were baseless and added that now was not the time for US forces to withdraw from the country.
Updated
A number of European states, “concerned” Arab countries and the United States are working on a concept for a unified Palestinian government that could attract reconstruction funds, Norway’s foreign minister said in an interview in Davos.
“A number of countries are working with us ... trying to build a broad unity government,” Espen Barth Eide said, without naming the specific countries, Reuters reported.
Norway was of the view that a unified Palestinian territory should be run by the Palestinian Authority, but “prefacing everything, it has to be what the Palestinians want”, he added.
Norway served as a facilitator in the 1992-93 talks between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) that led to the Oslo accords in 1993.
The Palestinian Authority, set up under that agreement, exercises limited self-rule in the West Bank and held talks with Israel on a Palestinian state before they collapsed in 2014. Islamist Hamas has ruled in Gaza since 2007 and is sworn to Israel’s destruction.
Since the Oslo talks, Norway has chaired a donor group coordinating international assistance to the Palestinian territories, the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee (AHLC), and worked with others to try to revive a diplomatic channel between Israel and the Palestinians.
Barth Eide said work on a two-state solution was becoming urgent as the conflict was spreading in the region, but that only the US and the Israeli people could influence Israel’s position.
“What we can do is work on Palestinian unity, and think about models with interested countries,” he said.
Updated
Iraq has recalled its ambassador from Tehran to discuss the recent Iranian attack on the city of Erbil, according to a statement by the country’s foreign ministry.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they attacked the “spy headquarters” of Israel in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region late on Monday.
Jordan’s foreign minister, Ayman Safadi, said on Tuesday Israel was placing many obstacles to the entry of aid into Gaza that were worsening the plight of Palestinians.
In remarks during a press conference with his Australian counterpart, Safadi said these hurdles meant only 10% of the total needs of more than 2 million people in Gaza under siege were being covered.
Updated
Turkey said it had destroyed 23 targets in overnight air strikes on Kurdish militants in northern Iraq and Syria, a further escalation of conflict south of its border.
The attacks were the latest by Turkey since nine Turkish soldiers were killed in clashes with Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) militants in northern Iraq on Friday, Reuters reported.
The new strikes were on targets in northern Syria and the Metina, Gara, Hakurk and Qandil regions of northern Iraq, the defence ministry said late on Monday.
“Twenty-three targets were destroyed, including caves, shelters, tunnels, ammunition warehouses, supply materials and facilities used by the terrorist organisation,” it said in a statement accompanied by a photo of Turkish warplanes.
It said many militants had been “neutralised”, a term commonly used to be mean killed.
Updated
Requiring Israel to agree to a time-bound, mandatory path to a two-state solution is key to future stability in Israel and the Palestinian territories, Qatar’s prime minister said on Tuesday during the World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Davos.
Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said the Palestinians must be the ones to decide if the Hamas movement that runs Gaza will continue to play a political role in the future, Reuters reported.
Updated
At least 24,285 Palestinians have been killed and 61,154 have been wounded in Israeli strikes on Gaza since 7 October, the health ministry in the territory said in a statement on Tuesday.
In the past 24 hours, 158 Palestinians were killed and 320 wounded, the ministry added.
Updated
France has accused Iran of violating Iraq’s sovereignty after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards claimed to have struck a purported Israeli “spy headquarters” in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region, Reuters reported.
“Such acts represent blatant, unacceptable and worrying violations of Iraq’s sovereignty and an attack on its stability and security, as well as that of Kurdistan within it,” France’s foreign ministry said in a statement.
“They contribute to the escalation of regional tensions and must stop.”
Updated
The Israeli military said on Tuesday that its special forces had carried out a strike in the area of Ayta ash Shab in Lebanon.
“IDF special forces struck in order to remove a threat in the area of Ayta ash Shab in Lebanon,” the military said.
It did not say what kind of forces had struck nor where specifically they had operated.
The military also said its aircraft struck an anti-tank missile launcher in southern Lebanon that belonged to the Iranian-backed group Hezbollah.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have also claimed an attack in Syria. The group said it had fired a number of ballistic missiles at “terrorist operations” in the country – including Islamic State targets – and destroyed them.
A US defence official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the US tracked the missiles, which hit in northern Iraq and northern Syria, and initial indications were that the strikes were “reckless and imprecise”.
The strikes in northern Syria came after IS claimed responsibility earlier this month for two suicide bombings targeting a commemoration for an Iranian general slain in a 2020 US drone strike. That attack killed at least 84 people and wounded an additional 284 at a ceremony honouring former Revolutionary Guard Gen Qassem Suleimani.
Updated
Iraq condemns Iran's 'aggression' after attack on Erbil
Iraq on Tuesday condemned Iran’s “aggression” on Erbil that led to civilian casualties in residential areas, according to a statement by the country’s foreign ministry, after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they attacked Israel’s “spy headquarters” in Iraq’s Kurdistan region.
The Iraqi government will take all legal measures against these actions that are considered a violation of Iraq’s sovereignty and the security of its people, including filing a complaint at the United Nations security council.
Updated
Israeli military claims to have killed dozens of Palestinian militants in northern Gaza
The Israeli military said on Tuesday its troops killed dozens of Palestinian militants around the town of Beit Lahia in northern Gaza and also uncovered about 100 rocket launchers.
“During IDF activity in the area of Beit Lahia, the troops located approximately 100 rocket set-installations and 60 ready-to-use rockets. The troops killed dozens of terrorists during the activity,” it said.
Updated
A few days ago, in a wood-panelled courtroom in The Hague, men and women in robes and wigs argued over whether what is happening in Gaza is the deliberate destruction of a people. In other words, is it genocide?
The accuser was South Africa, a state that emerged just decades ago from a suffocating regime of apartheid. The accused was Israel, a nation established in the wake of the most notorious genocide in history.
But just as heavy in that courtroom as the past was the symbolism of the present: a major African power holding to account one of the west’s closest allies.
The Guardian’s Chris McGreal spoke to Today in Focus about the case, explaining that it will probably take years. But an interim decision to order Israel to cease its military campaign in Gaza immediately could be only weeks away.
Updated
Egyptian authorities reportedly thwarted a drug smuggling attempt on the Egyptian-Israeli border on Monday.
Two security sources told the Reuters news agency that there was an exchange of gunfire close to a crossing where aid deliveries for Gaza were being inspected. During the incident, six drug smugglers were arrested, the sources said.
An Israeli official also said the suspects were most likely trying to smuggle drugs across the border from Egypt, which has been at peace with Israel for decades.
An Israeli army spokesperson said 20 “suspects”, including gunmen, approached the border before being fired at by soldiers operating in the area. Injuries were reported, he added.
The crossing is just over 40km south of Rafah, the main crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip. Israel and Egypt have maintained a blockade on the enclave since 2007, when Hamas took control there.
Since war broke out between Israel and Hamas on 7 October, Rafah has been the main entry and exit point for humanitarian supplies being sent into Gaza.
Here’s more on the comments from Israel’s defence minister, who has said that the intense military operation in southern Gaza is winding down:
Yoav Gallant told a news conference on Monday that an “intense manoeuvring stage” due to last around three months “will end soon” in southern Gaza.
He said the stage was already being reached in northern Gaza, with Israel’s army confirming one of its four divisions in the territory has completed its withdrawal on Monday.
The army had stepped up operations and bombardments in the southern cities of Khan Yunis and Rafah in recent weeks after saying Hamas’s military structures in the north had been dismantled.
But Israel is facing heavy international pressure over Gaza’s humanitarian crisis and the growing number of civilian casualties, with the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry reporting 60 deaths in overnight bombardments Sunday into Monday.
Aid officials in Gaza believe that pockets of famine already exist in the territory, with parents sacrificing remaining food for their children, an apple costing $8 and fuel for cooking almost impossible to find.
UN agencies have said that Gaza urgently needs more humanitarian assistance as Palestinian authorities reported that the death toll in the territory during the Israeli offensive there had risen to more than 24,000.
The World Food Programme, Unicef and the World Health Organization said in a joint statement that new entry routes needed to be opened to Gaza, more trucks needed to be allowed in each day, and aid workers and those seeking aid needed to be allowed to move around safely.
The UN agencies did not directly blame Israel but said aid delivery was hindered by the opening of too few border crossings from Israel, a slow vetting process for trucks and goods going into Gaza, and continuing fighting.
Doctors in Gaza said that children, weakened by lack of food, had died from hypothermia and that several newborn babies with mothers who were undernourished had not survived for more than a few days.
“We don’t have the numbers but we can say that children are dying as a result of the humanitarian situation on the ground as well as due to the direct impact of the fighting,” said Tess Ingram, a spokesperson for the United Nations Children Fund, who is in Rafah.
US condemns Iranian attack in northern Iraq
A US state department spokesperson has said that an Iranian attack near Iraq’s northern city of Erbil on Monday “undermine Iraq’s stability.”
“We oppose Iran’s reckless missile strikes,” Matthew Miller said, adding that the US supported “the Government of Iraq and the Kurdistan Regional Government’s efforts to meet the aspirations of the Iraqi people.”
Iran claimed that Monday’s attacks targeted the “espionage headquarters” of Israel. At least four civilians were killed and six injured in the strikes, the Kurdistan government’s security council said in a statement, describing the attack as a “crime”.
Millionaire Kurdish businessman Peshraw Dizayee and several members of his family were among the dead, killed when at least one rocket crashed into their home, Iraqi security and medical sources said.
Additionally, one rocket had fallen on the house of a senior Kurdish intelligence official and another on a Kurdish intelligence centre, the security sources said.
No US facilities were affected by the missiles strikes, two US officials told the Reuters news agency earlier.
Welcome and summary
Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s continuing coverage of the crisis in the Middle East.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have claimed credit for an attack on Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region which left at least four people dead.
Iranian state media said that an Israeli spy base had been targeted, however those claims could not be verified.
We’ll have more on this shortly; first here’s a round-up of the day’s other major news.
Israel’s defence minister, Yoav Gallant, said today that the country’s intense military operation in southern Gaza was nearing its end. However, Gallant noted that Hamas would not agree to release any more hostages without continued military pressure. He accused the Islamist militant group of carrying out “psychological abuse”.
An anti-ship ballistic missile fired by Iran-backed Houthi militants struck a Marshall Islands-flagged, US-owned and operated container ship about 100 miles off the Gulf of Aden, the US military confirmed. The ship has reported no injuries or significant damage and is continuing its journey.
The strike on the Gibraltar Eagle marks a widening of the theatre of war and raises questions about whether the US-UK naval alliance off Yemen will have to mount a further series of strikes, or even consider liaising actively with ground troops from the UN recognised Presidential Leadership Council – the Saudi-UAE backed coalition government based in Aden.
Hamas released a video announcing the death of two Israeli hostages and claimed that they had beenn killed by Israeli airstrikes. The two men are believed to be Yossi Sharabi, 53, and Itay Svirsky, 38. Israel says 132 hostages are still being held by the Islamist militant group and that 25 have died in captivity. The IDF has denied that they were killed by an airstrike.
Two young French nationals were injured in Monday’s attack in Raanana, Israel, the French foreign ministry said in a statement, condemning the attack.
