Israel-Hamas war updates | U.S. sends second aircraft to boost Israel’s military as death toll in Gaza rises over 2,200

At least 300 Palestinians were killed, mostly children and women, while 800 others were injured in the Gaza Strip on Saturday, according to the health ministry in the coastal enclave, according to Reuters.

U.S. President Joe Biden on Saturday spoke with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, urging the leaders to allow humanitarian aid to the region and affirmed his support for efforts to protect civilians.

The weekend calls in Washington came ahead of Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s announcement that the U.S. was moving up a second carrier strike group in support of Israel. - AP

Russia has asked the United Nations Security Council to vote Monday on a draft resolution on the Israel-Hamas conflict that calls for a humanitarian ceasefire and condemns violence against civilians and all acts of terrorism.

Russia’s Deputy U.N. Ambassador Dmitry Polyanskiy said on Saturday no changes had been made to the text since it was given to the 15-member body on Friday and that he expected the vote to be scheduled for 3 p.m. EDT (1900 GMT) on Monday. - Reuters

The United States is sending a second aircraft carrier strike group to the eastern Mediterranean “to deter hostile actions against Israel or any efforts toward widening this war following Hamas’s attack,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said Saturday.

The USS Eisenhower and its affiliated warships will join another carrier group already deployed to the region in the wake of a Hamas attack on Israel a week ago and Israel’s ongoing response. - AFP

Israel has launched an air strike against Syria’s Aleppo Airport late on Saturday that put it out of service, the Syrian defence ministry said.

“The Israeli enemy carried out an air attack from the direction of the Mediterranean Sea, west of Latakia, targeting Aleppo International Airport, which led to material damage to the airport and it being out of service,” the ministry added. - Reuters

The Palestinian Hamas group said three of its fighters from Lebanon were killed on Saturday in an Israeli air strike after they detonated a section of the Israel-Lebanon border fence, crossed over and clashed with Israeli troops.

Israel’s military said earlier its aircraft had struck a group of people who it believed had intended to launch anti-tank missiles towards Israel. - Reuters

France on Saturday urged the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militia to stay out of the conflict between Israel and Hamas, expressing concern at the situation on the Lebanon-Israel border.

Hezbollah and Lebanon must “exercise restraint to avoid opening a second front in the region”, of which “the first victim will be Lebanon”, the French presidency said in a statement Saturday. - AFP

Iran warned on Saturday that if Israel’s “war crimes and genocide” are not halted immediately, “the situation could spiral out of control & ricochet far-reaching consequences,” Tehran’s mission to the United Nations in New York posted on X.

“If the Israeli apartheid’s war crimes & genocide are not halted immediately, the situation could spiral out of control & ricochet far-reaching consequences — the responsibility of which lies with the UN, the Security Council & the states steering the Council toward a dead end,” the post read. - Reuters

An Israeli airstrike targeted the airport of Syria’s government-held city of Aleppo, a war monitor said, days after a similar strike hit Aleppo and Damascus airports.

“An Israeli air strike coming from the direction of the sea struck Aleppo airport,” Rami Abdel Rahman, who heads the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told AFP.

A special flight carrying 274 Indian nationals wanting to leave Israel amidst the Israel-Hamas conflict left for home on Saturday, the second in a day and fourth since the launch of ‘Operation Ajay’.

The Indian Embassy in Tel Aviv earlier earlier announced that two special flights will operate from Ben Gurion airport on Saturday. The first flight left around 5.40 pm local time. The second flight with 274 Indian nationals took off at 11.45 pm local time. - PTI

Israel’s military said on Friday it had identified shooting from Syria that set off sirens in two towns in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, and that its artillery was striking the origin of the shooting in Syria. - Reuters

European Council chief Charles Michel called a video-summit of EU leaders for next week to discuss the Israel-Hamas war, as the conflict entered its second week Saturday.

“It is of utmost importance that the European Council, in line with the Treaties and our values, sets our common position and establishes a clear unified course of action that reflects the complexity of the unfolding situation,” he said in a statement. He set the meeting for Tuesday 5:30 pm. - AFP

The U.S. government on Saturday advised its citizens in Gaza to move south toward the Rafah border crossing with Egypt to be ready for its possible reopening amid the humanitarian crisis in the coastal enclave after a Hamas attack in Israel drew Israeli military retaliation.

Washington worked with Egypt, Israel and Qatar to try to open the Rafah crossing for limited hours on Saturday afternoon to allow Palestinian-Americans to leave, a senior State Department official told reporters travelling with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken. - Reuters

Saudi Arabia has suspended talks on potentially normalising ties with Israel, a source told AFP on Saturday, as the war raged between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

“Saudi Arabia has decided to pause discussion on possible normalisation and has informed US officials,” a source familiar with the discussions told AFP.

The Israeli military said for the first time Saturday that the bodies of some hostages abducted by Hamas militants had been found during operations inside Gaza this week.

“We have found and located some bodies in the perimeter in the Gaza Strip of Israelis that were abducted,” a military spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner, told a briefing. - AFP

Israeli families with members held captive by Hamas for a week in Gaza demanded that the International Committee of the Red Cross facilitate an arrangement Saturday enabling the transfer of medicines to their loved ones.

“We expect that tonight, by midnight (2100 GMT), there will be an agreement to transfer medicine to the missing people and hostages,” said Ronen Tzur, who heads the Hostages and Missing Families Forum. - AFP

Israel’s chief military spokesman says that Israeli military is going to strike Gaza City “very soon.” In a nationally broadcast address Saturday night, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari issued a new appeal to residents to move to the southern Gaza Strip.

“We are going to broadly attack Gaza City very soon,” he said. He accused Hamas of trying to use civilians as human shields. - AP

The third batch of 197 Indian nationals wanting to leave Israel amidst the Israel-Hamas conflict left for home on a special flight on Saturday. The special flights are part of ‘Operation Ajay’ launched on October 12 to facilitate the return of those Indian nationals who wish to return home following the brazen attacks on Israeli towns by Hamas militants from Gaza on October 7.

“#OperationAjay moves forward. 197 more passengers are coming back to India,” External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar posted on X.

- PTI

A senior Israeli official admitted Saturday “mistakes” in intelligence assessments ahead of a brutal Hamas attack last weekend that took the country by surprise.

“It’s my mistake, and it reflects the mistakes of all those making (intelligence) assessments,” National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi told a press briefing when asked about his recent remarks predicting no Hamas aggression.

- AFP

Palestinians struggled Saturday to flee from areas of Gaza targeted by the Israeli military while grappling with a growing water and medical supply shortage ahead of an expected land offensive a week after Hamas’ bloody, wide-ranging attack into Israel.

Israel renewed calls on social media and in leaflets dropped from the air for Gaza residents to move south, while Hamas urged people to stay in their homes. The U.N. and aid groups have said such a rapid exodus would cause untold human suffering, especially for hospitalized patients, older adults and others unable to relocate.

- AP

The Israeli military says it has prepared a “coordinated” offensive in the Gaza Strip involving air, ground and naval forces.

In a statement on its website Saturday night, the army said it is “preparing to implement a wide range of offensive operative plans.” Israel has ordered roughly half of Gaza’s population to evacuate their homes ahead of an expected ground offensive in response to a brutal cross-border Hamas attack.

Israel has not said when the offensive will begin.

- AP

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s national security adviser said on Saturday that Israel received no concrete warning, including from Egypt, of the October 7 onslaught by Hamas from Gaza.

The chief of Israel’s Shin Bet domestic security service was summoned for an unusual 4 a.m. briefing that day - 2.5 hours before the attack began - on new intelligence information but this did not warrant mobilisation, Tzachi Hanegbi told reporters.

- Reuters

Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, said in a televised speech that Palestinians will not leave Gaza or the West Bank and migrate to Egypt. “Our decision is to remain in our land,” Haniyeh added, while addressing Egypt in that part of the speech.

- Reuters

Two Lebanese civilians were killed in Israeli shelling of the southern village of Shebaa on Saturday, Mayor Mohammad Harb told AFP, as border tensions rise over Israel’s war with Hamas.

- AFP

The humanitarian situation in Gaza, already critical, is now “fast becoming untenable,” U.N. aid chief Martin Griffiths said in a statement on Saturday.

There is no power, water or fuel in Gaza, and food is running dangerously low, Mr. Griffiths said, urging all countries with influence to use it to ensure respect for the rules of war, and avoid further escalation.

- Reuters

Saudi Arabia has suspended talks on potentially normalising ties with Israel, a source told AFP amid the war raging between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

“Saudi Arabia has decided to pause discussion on possible normalisation and has informed U.S. officials,” a source said.

- AFP

Turkey stands with Egypt in rejecting the exile of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip in the face of Israel’s war with the Hamas militant group, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said alongside his counterpart in Cairo.

Mr. Fidan said, the world must act to stop the conflict from spreading and to re-start peace talks centred on achieving a two-state solution for Israelis and Palestinians.

- Reuters

Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah group said it shelled Israeli positions in a contested border area on Saturday, as tensions rise over Israel’s war with Hezbollah’s Palestinian ally Hamas.

Hezbollah and other Palestinian factions in Lebanon have exchanged cross-border fire with Israel since Hamas’s surprise October 7 attack on Israel ignited a war that has killed more than 1,300 people in Israel.

- AFP

China’s top diplomat Wang Yi said that Washington should “play a constructive and responsible role” in the Israel-Gaza conflict, during a phone call with his U.S. counterpart Antony Blinken.

“The United States should practically play a constructive and responsible role, pushing the issue back on track for a political settlement as soon as possible,” Mr. Wang told Mr. Blinken, according to a readout published by the Chinese Foreign Ministry.

- AFP

Missiles were fired at an Israeli army post in southeastern Lebanon - a Reuters witness said on Saturday. The witness also reported heavy shelling from Israel and the sound of gunfire.

- Reuters

Hamas’ armed wing said that nine captives including four foreigners, were killed due to Israeli air strikes in Gaza over the past 24 hours. A statement from Al Qassam Brigades on its Telegram channel said the captives were killed “because of the Zionist bombardment on the areas they were staying in”.

- Reuters

Reuters videographer Issam Abdallah, killed in Israeli shelling of southern Lebanon, was laid to rest in his hometown Saturday in a funeral procession attended by hundreds of people. Draped in a Lebanese flag, Abdallah’s body was carried on a stretcher through the streets of his southern town of Khiam, from his family’s home to the local cemetery.

- AP

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken called on Saturday for protection for civilians in both the Gaza Strip and Israel as the Israeli military ordered half of the Palestinian territory’s population to evacuate in advance of an expected ground assault.

Mr. Blinken met his Saudi Arabian counterpart, Prince Faisal bin Farhan, in Riyadh as he began a third day of intense Middle East diplomacy aimed at preventing the Israel-Hamas war from expanding into a regional conflict and fuelling a humanitarian crisis.

- AP

Israel was behind cross-border rocket fire that killed a Reuters journalist and wounded others from AFP, Reuters and Al Jazeera, the Lebanese army said on Saturday.

“The Israeli enemy fired a rocket shell that hit a civilian car belonging to a media team, leading to the death of Issam Abdallah,” a Reuters journalist, and wounding several others on Friday, it said in a statement.

- AFP

After flying out more than 400 Indian nationals from Israel on two consecutive days, the Indian Embassy in Tel Aviv has announced two special flights on Saturday to further facilitate more Indians wanting to leave the country amidst the Israel-Hamas conflict.

- PTI

Egypt, Israel and the United States have agreed to allow foreigners residing in Gaza to pass through the Rafah border crossing into Egypt, under which Israel agreed to refrain from striking areas the foreigners would pass through on their way out of the Palestinian territory.

- ANI

Lebanon’s Foreign Ministry said it will submit a formal complaint to the U.N. Security Council over what it called “Israel’s deliberate killing” of Issam Abdullah, a Lebanese national and Reuters visuals journalist, state media reported on Saturday.

Abdullah was killed in southern Lebanon on Friday when missiles fired from the direction of Israel struck a group of journalists.

- Reuters

The Israeli military said that Gaza City residents must not delay their departure before an expected ground offensive starts, as people leaving the north of the territory again jammed roads south. Israel has designated two safe routes for more than one million residents of northern Gaza to leave for the south of the blockaded territory.

- AFP

Israeli troops are mobilising towards Gaza. Aerial patrolling is also being sent at the Gaza border. It was recently reported that Israeli soldiers, their tanks and munitions have been deployed near the Gaza border as they prepare for a full ground offensive against Hamas.

- ANI

New aid flights arrived on Saturday in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula where relief materials are being held until safe delivery into the nearby Gaza Strip can be secured, an official from the Red Crescent and an aid volunteer said.

Egypt says its side of the Rafah crossing that connects Sinai with the Gaza Strip remains open, though traffic has been halted for several days because of Israeli bombardments on the Palestinian side of the border.

A senior U.S. State Department official said the United States had been working with Egypt, Israel and Qatar to open the crossing on Saturday.

- Reuters

The Israeli military said Saturday that Gaza City residents must not delay their departure before a military offensive starts as roads out of the northern part of the territory were again jammed with people leaving.

Military spokesman Richard Hecht said there is a “window” for safe passage to south Gaza between 10.00 am and 4.00 pm. Without saying how many days the window would remain, Hecht told reporters: “We know this is going to take time but we recommend people not to delay.”

- AFP

Egypt, Israel and the United States have agreed to allow foreigners in Gaza to pass through the Rafah border crossing into Egypt, a senior Egyptian official says.

The official said Saturday that Israel has agreed to refrain from striking areas the foreigners would pass through on their way out of the besieged Palestinian territory. He said Qatar also was involved in the negotiations and the participants received also approval from the Palestinian militant groups, Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

A second official at the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing point said they received “instructions” to reopen it on Saturday afternoon for foreigners coming from Gaza.

- AP

Israeli strikes on the Gaza Strip since Hamas’s attack on southern Israel one week ago have killed at least 2,215 people, including 724 children, the Palestinian territory’s Hamas-controlled health ministry said Saturday.

Some 458 women were among those killed, the ministry said. It added that 8,714 people have also been wounded, after an earlier statement said at least 324 people were killed in the past 24 hours alone.

-AFP

The Israeli army said on Saturday it was aware of the incident in southern Lebanon in which a Reuters journalist was killed and that it was being investigated.

“We are aware of the incident with the Reuters journalist. We are looking into it. We already have visuals. We’re doing cross examination. It’s a tragic thing,” a military spokesperson told reporters.

Reuters video journalist Issam Abdallah was killed and six other journalists injured in southern Lebanon on Friday when missiles fired from the direction of Israel struck them, according to a Reuters videographer who was at the scene.

- Reuters

Egypt and Israel have agreed to let U.S. citizens leave the Gaza Strip through the Rafah crossing on Saturday as Israel carries out strikes against Hamas, a U.S. official said.

The two US partners agreed to keep the sole crossing from Gaza to Egypt open from 12:00 pm to 5:00 pm (0900-1400 GMT), said a U.S. official accompanying Secretary of State Antony Blinken on a regional tour, and adding that Qatar spoke with Hamas to encourage cooperation.

- AFP

Australia has cancelled two planned flights to repatriate citizens from Israel and the Palestinian territories due to the “highly challenging” situation, the foreign affairs department said on Saturday.

Repatriation flights scheduled for Saturday and Sunday will not depart as planned amid a “highly challenging and rapidly changing” situation, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) said in a statement on social media.

Australia continues to work with citizens in the area to help them return home and will communicate about future flights, DFAT added.

The first in the planned series of repatriation flights left on Friday local time, with over 200 Australians and their families arriving safely in London, according to SBS News.

- Reuters

Air India has extended the suspension of its scheduled flights to and from Tel Aviv till October 18, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and militant group Hamas.

The full service carrier, which normally operates five weekly scheduled flights to Tel Aviv, had earlier suspended the services till October 14.

An airline official on Saturday said the scheduled flights to and from Tel Aviv have now been suspended till October 18. The carrier will operate chartered flights to bring back Indians depending on the requirements, the official added. Normally, Air India operates five weekly flights to Tel Aviv from the national capital. The service is on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday. Under Operation Ajay launched by the government to bring Indians who wish to come back from Israel, the airline so far has operated two flights.

-PTI

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov may meet Hamas officials in Qatar next week and discuss a possible release of hostages seized by the militant group in its attack on Israel a week ago, Russian state news agency RIA reported on Saturday.

Bogdanov told RIA he was heading to Qatar and usually met with Hamas every time he was there.

“If they wish, we always maintain contact. Moreover, in this situation, this (meeting) is useful for resolving practical issues, including the release of hostages,” Bogdanov said.

- AFP

The Israeli army said Saturday it was “very sorry” for the death of a Reuters journalist killed when caught up in cross-border shelling along the frontier with Lebanon.

“We are very sorry for the journalist’s death,” military spokesman Richard Hecht told reporters when asked about the killing of the Reuters videographer on Friday. The Israeli military did not acknowledge responsibility, however. “We are looking into it,” Hecht said of the incident in which six other journalists, including two from AFP, were also injured.

- AFP

The ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict may lead to delays and complications in the India Middle East Europe Economic Corridor project, according to think tank Global Trade Research Initiative (GTRI).

It said while the conflict’s immediate consequences are confined to Israel and Gaza, its ripple effects throughout the Middle East cannot be underestimated.

GTRI said the conflict could derail the prospect of a historic peace deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia, a crucial linchpin in the India Middle East Europe Economic Corridor (IMEEC) framework.

- PTI

Palestinians scrambled to flee northern Gaza on Saturday after the Israeli military ordered nearly half the population to evacuate south and carried out limited ground forays ahead of an expected land offensive a week after Hamas’ bloody, wide-ranging attack into Israel.

The Israeli military, which has not commented on the strikes, posted a message in Arabic on social media saying Palestinians could travel along two main routes without being harmed from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. local time.

Thousands of people who fled their homes crammed into a U.N.-run school-turned-shelter in Deir al-Balah, a city south of the evacuation zone. Many slept outside on the ground without mattresses, or in chairs pulled from the classrooms.

- Reuters

Saudi Arabia has suspended talks on potentially normalising ties with Israel, a source told AFP on Saturday, amid the war raging between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

“Saudi Arabia has decided to pause discussion on possible normalisation and has informed US officials,” a source familiar with the discussions told AFP.

- AFP

A plane with medical supplies to support urgent health needs in Gaza has landed in Al Arish, Egypt, near the Rafah crossing, the chief of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Saturday in a post on messaging platform X.

“We’re ready to deploy the supplies as soon as humanitarian access through the crossing is established,” he said.

- Reuters

More than 1,300 buildings in the Gaza Strip have been destroyed, the United Nations said Saturday, after nearly a week of fierce bombardment by Israeli forces.

The UN’s humanitarian agency OCHA said “5,540 housing units” in those buildings were destroyed and nearly 3,750 more homes were so badly damaged they were uninhabitable.

- AFP

A Reuters journalist was killed on October 13 and six others from AFP, Reuters and Al Jazeera were wounded while working in southern Lebanon, in cross-border shelling.

The Israel-Lebanon border has seen a series of flare-ups since a bloody attack by the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas on Israel on October 7.

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Israeli forces on Saturday killed several “terrorists” trying to cross the border from Lebanon, a military spokesman said.

The military “identified a terrorist cell which attempted to infiltrate from Lebanon into Israeli territory,” the spokesman said, adding that a drone strike “targeted the terrorist cell and killed a number of the terrorists”.

- AFP

The Israel Air Forces has said that it has killed the head of Hamas’s Air Force Murad Abu Murad in the airstrike carried out overnight. The strike targeted a headquarters from which Hamas managed its aerial activity in the Gaza Strip.

The Israeli Air Force said that Murad Abu Murad “was largely responsible for directing terrorists during the massacre on Saturday.”

- ANI

As news of Palestinian militant group Hamas launching a deadly attack on Israel and Israel’s threat of retaliation began to filter across news networks and social media platforms, a wave of misinformation and fake videos rose alongside.

In a “tech-first” society, it is increasingly difficult to differentiate between authentic information and false claims or deliberately misleading video content. It is clear that numerous videos, social media posts and images purportedly about the Israel–Hamas conflict are deliberately misleading.

This problem highlights why the verification efforts of journalists reporting on conflicts are vital. And understanding how they work is important for ensuring the public can have confidence in what they read and see from media publishers.

The Digital News Report 2023 from the University of Oxford’s Reuters Institute, of which I am acting director, surveyed people from 46 countries about their news consumption habits. It found 56% said they were worried about identifying the difference between what is real and fake on the internet when it comes to news – up from 54% in 2022.

PTI

Israeli Army Arabic lanuage spokesperson on X: IDF will allow safe movement for Gazans on two main roads south in territory between 10 A.M. and 4 P.M.

Reuters

As the Israel-Hamas conflict enters the eighth day, Hamas has released a footage of Israeli children whom they claim they held hostage during the deadly attack on Southern Israel, reported The Jerusalem Post.

The Hamas group shared the video on their Telegram channel, with the caption, “Hamas fighters, showing compassion for children in the midst of the Kibbutz ‘Holit’ battles on day one of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.”

The Kibbutz Holit located in southern Israel, very close to the Gaza border, had witnessed horrific atrocities by the terrorist group Hamas during their October 7 attack on Israel.13 Israelis were killed during the attack on Kibbutz Holit, according to The Jerusalem Post.

According to Israeli media, the children seen in the video have not been identified yet and it is unclear if their parents were killed when the children were taken away.

ANI

In Israel’s call for the evacuation of half of Gaza’s population, many Palestinians fear a repeat of the most traumatic event in their tortured history, their mass exodus from what is now Israel during the 1948 war surrounding its creation.

Palestinians refer to it as the Nakba, or “catastrophe.” An estimated 700,000 Palestinians, a majority of the prewar population, fled or were expelled from what is now Israel in the months before and during the war, in which Jewish fighters fended off an attack by several Arab states.

The Palestinians packed their belongings, piling into cars, trucks and donkey carts. Many locked their doors and took their keys with them, expecting to return when the war ended.

Seventy-five years later, they have not been allowed back. Emptied towns were renamed, villages were demolished, homes reclaimed by forests in Israeli nature reserves.

Israel refused to allow the Palestinians to return, because it would threaten the Jewish majority within the country’s borders. So the refugees and their descendants, who now number nearly 6 million, settled in camps in the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria and Jordan. Those camps eventually grew into built-up neighborhoods.

AP

Listen in as an IDF Spokesperson provides a situational update as the war against Hamas continues.

A collection of articles from The Hindu explaining the ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict, and providing context on key players

Israel’s ultimatum that over one million people in northern Gaza should relocate within 24 hours is “extremely dangerous” and “simply not possible”, UN chief Antonio Guterres has said, asserting that “even wars have rules.” UN officials in Gaza on Thursday were informed by their liaison officers in the Israeli military that the entire population of northern Gaza, approximately 1.1 million, should relocate to the southern part within the next 24 hours.

The same order applied to all UN staff and those sheltered in UN facilities – including schools, health centres and clinics.

“Moving more than one million people across a densely populated warzone to a place with no food, water, or accommodation, when the entire territory is under siege, is extremely dangerous – and in some cases, simply not possible,” Guterres told reporters here on Friday.

The UN Secretary-General made those remarks before heading to a Security Council meeting on the situation in the Middle East.

PTI

An associate professor at the Tamil Nadu Agriculture University (TNAU), here, on a two-month training programme in Israel has been stranded in the conflict zone and she has sought help to return to Tamil Nadu, her husband, who is a HoD at the same varsity has said.

She has been spending sleepless nights at The Negev, a large desert region in southern Israel, as the region is in close proximity to Gaza, T Ramesh, an associate professor and Head of the Department, TNAU, said.

PTI

In Muslim communities across the world, worshippers gathered at mosques for their first Friday prayers since Hamas militants attacked Israel, igniting the latest Israel-Palestinian war. Some imams issued fiery calls of support for the Palestinians. Others bemoaned the loss of civilian lives on both sides and appealed for peace.

Prominent imams in France and Greece, in their Friday sermons, decried the violence that has wracked Israel and the Gaza Strip, and appealed for peace.

AP

Following the Israeli military’s order to evacuate all citizens from Gaza City, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged Israel to “reconsider” its warning, calling it “dangerous and deeply troubling,” according to The New York Times.

Guterres in an opinion article in The New York Times emphasized that such demand for a mass evacuation on extremely short notice could have devastating humanitarian consequences.

ANI

As of this time, the IDF has confirmed that over 120 civilians are being held captive in Gaza by the Hamas terrorist organisation.

In an unprecedented order to civilians in northern Gaza and Gaza City, the Israeli military gave Jamal — and 1.1 million other Palestinians — 24 hours to make up their minds. It was the sixth day of Israeli bombing prompted by Hamas’ brutal attack that killed more than 1,300 Israelis and stunned the country.

As the clock ticked on the ultimatum, hundreds of thousands of Israeli army reservists were massing near Gaza’s northern border. Israeli warplanes roared overhead, diving low to hurl bombs at homes and residential high-rises. Aid groups appealed to the international community to stop what they denounced as a possible war crime of forcible population transfer.

In understaffed and poorly supplied hospitals, Palestinian doctors said they felt they had no choice but to stay put. There was no way to evacuate Shifa, Gaza’s biggest hospital, its general director Mohammad Abu Selim said. Even though the hospital was in chaos — its electricity dwindling under an Israeli siege, its beds overwhelmed, its morgue overflowing — Abu Selim said there was simply no other safe place in Gaza to put 600 patients, many of them in serious condition from the attacks.

AP

The special flight bringing back Indians, including those from Tamil Nadu, from Israel reached Delhi today morning. Tamil Nadu Government’s special representative for New Delhi, A.K.S. Vijayan, received them at the airport. The State Government has arranged flight tickets for passengers to Chennai and their hometowns. They will be provided food, and all other arrangements are made to send them on the next available flight, a release said.

Picture credits: TN DIPR

Israeli forces postpone the demand to evacuate Al Awda Hospital in Gaza Strip until 6am Israel time. The evacuation of patients remains complicated.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that his country will never forget and forgive the “horrific acts” perpetrated by its enemies. He asserted that Israel is pounding with “unprecedented forces” its enemies who have just begun to pay the price.

In his address after a security assessment at the Kirya in Tel Aviv, Netanyahu on Friday said, “We are all mobilized. We are all united. Stories of the heroic acts of our people in these dark days of pain and grief, of that cursed Saturday, will become an integral part of the history of Israel. We will never forget the horrific acts perpetrated by our enemies, and we will never forgive.”

ANI

The brutal attacks by Hamas last weekend is the most murderous assault on the Jews since the Holocaust in Europe, influential lawmakers told eminent Indian-Americans who have rallied behind Israel since the conflict began.

“The terrorist attacks in Israel committed by Hamas against Israeli civilians over the last week are the most sweeping, murderous assault on Jews that have taken place since the Holocaust in Europe,” Congressman Jamie Raskin told a group of Indian-Americans at an event organized by the Foundation for India and Indian Diaspora Studies (FIIDS).

PTI

Palestinian militant group Hamas, which attacked Israel last week taking more than 1,000 innocent lives, is worse than al-Qaeda, US President Joe Biden said Friday.

“The more we learned about the attack, the more horrifying it becomes. More than 1,000 innocent lives lost, including at least 27 Americans,” Biden said at the top of his remarks on Hydrogen Hubs in Philadelphia.

“These guys make -- they make al-Qaeda look pure. They’re pure evil. Like I said from the beginning, the United States, make no mistake about it, stands with Israel. The United States stands with Israel,” Biden said.

PTI

Russia proposed a draft resolution for the Security Council that calls for a humanitarian ceasefire and condemns violence against civilians and all acts of terrorism, according to a draft text seen by Reuters.

“Russia cannot accept the complete inaction and lack of any reaction on the part of the UNSC,” Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said after the meeting, adding that Russia was also ready to mediate between Israel and the Palestinians.

It was not immediately clear when or if Russia would put the draft resolution to a vote. The United States has traditionally shielded its ally Israel from any Security Council action. It holds a veto along with Britain, France, China or Russia.

Reuters

Israeli troops make foray into Gaza. Israel urgers mass evacuation of Gaza civilians. Palestinians in Gaza grapple with where to go, while hospitals struggle with patients.

AP

On the side of the United Nations Headquarters are the faces of those abducted at the hands of Hamas—making it known to the world the tragedy that Israelis and foreign nationals alike are grappling with.

More than 1 million Palestinians in northern Gaza faced an Israeli deadline on Saturday to flee south, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel had only just begun to retaliate for last week’s Hamas rampage across southern Israel.

U.S. President Joe Biden said consultations were under way with regional governments on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza as trapped Palestinians endured a power blackout and shortages of food and water amid fierce Israeli bombing.

Reuters

The Palestinian United Nations envoy appealed to U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Friday to do more to stop a “crime against humanity” by Israel, which has warned nearly half of the population of the Gaza Strip to relocate as it plans an assault.

“He has to do more. Whatever was done is not sufficient. We need all of us to do more to stop this crime against humanity,” Palestinian U.N. envoy Riyad Mansour told reporters before a meeting of Arab Group ambassadors at the United Nations.

Countries urged Israel on Friday to hold off attacking northern Gaza, where more than a million civilians largely defied Israel’s order to evacuate before it goes after Hamas militants who slaughtered Israeli civilians last weekend.

Over 1,350 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s bombing of Gaza in six days that followed a surprise attack by Hamas that left at least 1,200 Israelis dead on October 7. Israel has also mobilised some 300,000 military reservists and is moving troops and weaponry towards the Gaza border, preparing for an invasion. U.S. President Joe Biden has said responding to Hamas’s attack is Israel’s “duty”, throwing America’s full support behind Israel’s actions.

Israel’s military said early on Saturday it had struck a Hezbollah target in southern Lebanon in response to the “infiltration of unidentified aerial objects into Israel” and fire on an Israeli drone.

The military intercepted the objects and the fire on its drone, it said.

Reuters