Palestinians mourn the loss of loved ones in Israeli attacks in Khan Younis, Gaza on October 6, 2024. (Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu via Getty Images)
The Israeli military announced a “new phase” of the war in Gaza while conducting its most severe airstrikes so far in Beirut.
Israeli forces stepped up attacks in both the Gaza Strip and Lebanon overnight and into Sunday.
Israeli forces bombed a mosque and a school-turned-shelter in Gaza, killing 26 and injuring dozens more, according to the Palestinian health ministry; the Israeli military described the two sites as Hamas “command and control centers” but provided no evidence.
The Israeli military also on Sunday announced a “new phase” of the war in Gaza, issuing new evacuation orders that cover most of the northern part of the enclave, The New York Timesreported. The military said it would send more soldiers and weapons to Gaza to “destroy terrorist infrastructures and undermine Hamas’ capabilities until all the war’s goals are achieved.”
Al Jazeera‘s Moath al-Kahlout reported that “the situation here in northern Gaza is deteriorating as the Israeli army intensifies its bombing.” He said that children, women, and journalists were among the victims.
“An entire family was killed by the Israeli army in the overnight attacks,” he added.
Meanwhile, Israel conducted the “most severe” airstrikes so far on Beirut, “pounding” the city overnight, according toThe Guardian. The strikes were in southern Beirut and its suburban outskirts, which are seen as a Hezbollah stronghold and have been heavily targeted by Israeli forces for the past two weeks.
Al Jazeera journalist Ali Hashem, reporting from Beirut, described a “massive air strike” on Sunday near the city’s international airport—an area that Israel has been bombarding for days. He said that daytime strikes are particularly harrowing.
“During the nights there are warnings,” Hashem reported. “During the days there are no warnings.”
Hashem said that emergency services have been prevented from getting into the suburban area where many of the strikes are taking place.
The Lebanese health ministry said Sunday that 23 people were killed and 93 injured in Israeli strikes on Saturday.
The Israeli military continues to advance its ground incursion in southern Lebanon. On Sunday, it ordered people in 25 villages to evacuate immediately, “signaling it’s expanding its ground offensive,” Al Jazeera reported
Filippo Grandi, the United Nations’ high commissioner for refugees, visited Beirut on Sunday and called for a cease-fire—saying it was “desperately needed”—and international humanitarian aid.
Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, Beirut, Lebanon, October 3, 2024
HEZBOLLAH agreed to a ceasefire hours before its leader Hassan Nasrallah was assassinated in an Israel air strike on Beirut, Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib said today
The sensational claim came during an interview with Christiane Amanpour on US broadcaster CNN.
Mr Habib said that Mr Nasrallah’s agreement to the ceasefire had been communicated to both the US and French governments.
He confirmed that they had told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who reportedly welcomed the initiative.
The Lebanese prime minister also said he had heard that US special envoy for the Middle East Moss Hochstein was in the process of being dispatched to Lebanon to negotiate a temporary ceasefire before the assassination took place.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer delivers a statement on the situation in the Middle East from 10 Downing Street, London, October 1, 2024
THE Labour government has ordered 100 spy flights over Gaza to aid Israeli intelligence, an investigation by Declassified UK revealed today.
The intelligence-gathering flights began in December under the previous government.
Eleven flights took place in Labour’s first week in power, and during Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s first full month in office in August, the Royal Air Force (RAF) flew 42 flights over Gaza.
Declassified UK found that the flights were departing from Britain’s air base in Cyprus.
The flights may have gathered up to 500 hours of footage of Gaza, Declassified UK said, though it is unclear exactly where the British intelligence is going and what it comprises.
Zionist Keir Starmer is quoted “I support Zionism without qualification.” He’s asked whether that means that he supports Zionism under all circumstances, whatever Zionists do.UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy says that UK is suspeding 30 of 350 arms licences to Israel. He also confirms the UK government’s support for Israel’s Gaza genocide.Vote For Genocide Vote Labour.
Zionist Keir Starmer is quoted “I support Zionism without qualification.” He’s asked whether that means that he supports Zionism under all circumstances, whatever Zionists do.
Razan Arafat Barbah, a 14-year-old Palestinian girl who lost both of her legs in an Israeli attack on her home in Rafah in southern Gaza, is treated at Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis on October 1, 2024. (Photo: Hani Alshaer/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“A cease-fire must be imposed on the warring parties by withholding military support for Israel and supporting an international arms embargo on Israel and all Palestinian armed groups.”
Nearly 100 U.S. healthcare providers who have volunteered in the Gaza Strip over the past year sent President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris a Wednesday letter detailing “the massive human toll from Israel’s attack” and urging the administration to “end this madness now!”
Israel has been waging war on Gaza since the Hamas-led attack that killed over 1,100 people last year. During that time, the physicians, surgeons, nurse practitioners, nurses, and midwives who signed the letter have collectively spent 254 weeks volunteering in hospitals and clinics throughout the besieged enclave.
As of Wednesday, Israeli forces have killed at least 41,689 Palestinians in Gaza and injured another 96,625, according to local officials. Thousands more remain missing in the rubble of civilian infrastructure. Israel—which also launched a ground invasion of Lebanon this week—faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice.
“This letter and the appendix show probative evidence that the human toll in Gaza since October is far higher than is understood in the United States. It is likely that the death toll from this conflict is already greater than 118,908, an astonishing 5.4% of Gaza’s population,” the health workers wrote to Biden and Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee for the November election.
“Our government must act immediately to prevent an even worse catastrophe than what has already befallen the people of Gaza and Israel,” they argued. “A cease-fire must be imposed on the warring parties by withholding military support for Israel and supporting an international arms embargo on Israel and all Palestinian armed groups. We believe our government is obligated to do this, both under American law and international humanitarian law. We also believe it is the right thing to do.”
“Gaza was the first time I held a baby’s brains in my hand. The first of many.”
Even before the October 7, 2023 attack, the United States had given Israel billions of dollars in annual military aid. Throughout Israel’s assault on Gaza—and now Lebanon—the Biden administration has continued to provide weapons and diplomatic support.
The American medical volunteers’ new letter—published on a website that also features a July missive along with similar ones that Canadian and U.K. health workers sent to their governments—shares accounts from individual signatories. Dr. Thalia Pachiyannakis, an OB-GYN, said that “I saw so many stillbirths and maternal deaths that could have been easily prevented if the hospitals had been functioning normally.”
Those who survived birth faced a warzone where thousands of children have died. Last month, Gaza’s Ministry of Health released a 649-page document with names and ages of Palestinians killed in the past year—and the first 14 pages are babies.
“Every day I saw babies die,” said Asma Taha, pediatric nurse practitioner. “They had been born healthy. Their mothers were so malnourished that they could not breastfeed, and we lacked formula or clean water to feed them, so they starved.”
Israeli bombings in the past year have claimed thousands of lives. Dr. Mark Perlmutter, an orthopedic and hand surgeon, said that “Gaza was the first time I held a baby’s brains in my hand. The first of many.”
The letter to Biden and Harris states:
Children are universally considered innocents in armed conflict. However, every single signatory to this letter saw children in Gaza who suffered violence that must have been deliberately directed at them. Specifically, every one of us who worked in an emergency, intensive care, or surgical setting treated pre-teen children who were shot in the head or chest on a regular or even a daily basis. It is impossible that such widespread shooting of young children throughout Gaza, sustained over the course of an entire year is accidental or unknown to the highest Israeli civilian and military authorities.
President Biden and Vice President Harris, we wish you could see the nightmares that plague so many of us since we have returned: dreams of children maimed and mutilated by our weapons, and their inconsolable mothers begging us to save them. We wish you could hear the cries and screams our consciences will not let us forget. We cannot fathom why you continue arming the country that is deliberately killing these children en masse.
“I’ve never seen such horrific injuries, on such a massive scale, with so few resources,” said Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, a trauma and critical care surgeon and the letter’s organizer. “Our bombs are cutting down women and children by the thousands. Their mutilated bodies are a monument to cruelty.”
The letter notes that “Israel has destroyed more than half of Gaza’s healthcare resources and has killed nearly 1,000 Palestinian healthcare workers, more than 1 out of every 20 healthcare workers in Gaza. At the same time, healthcare needs have increased massively from the lethal combination of military violence, malnutrition, disease, and displacement.”
It also challenges Israeli forces’ attempts to justify attacking the enclave’s medical infrastructure, stressing that “not once did any of us see any type of Palestinian militant activity in any of Gaza’s hospitals or other healthcare facilities.”
“We urge you to see that Israel has systematically and deliberately devastated Gaza’s entire healthcare system, and that Israel has targeted our colleagues in Gaza for torture, disappearance, and murder,” the American volunteers wrote, describing Palestinian healthcare workers as “among the most traumatized people in Gaza, and perhaps in the entire world.”
While welcoming the administration’s efforts to negotiate an end to the fighting, they emphasized that “the United States can impose a cease-fire on the warring parties by simply stopping arms shipments to Israel, and announcing that we will participate in an international arms embargo on both Israel and all Palestinian armed groups.”
“President Biden and Vice President Harris, we are 99 American physicians and nurses who have witnessed crimes beyond comprehension,” they added. “Crimes that we cannot believe you wish to continue supporting. Please meet with us to discuss what we saw, and why we feel American policy in the Middle East must change immediately.”
