Gaza Unrest
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David Teeger removed as South Africa captain for U-19 World Cup for pro-Israeli comments
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Gaza hospital director says fuel is running out, patients at risk of death
Iyad Abu Zaher, the director of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir el-Balah, has warned that medical services at the hospital will soon cease due to a lack of fuel, Al Jazeera reports.
“The World Health Organisation told us that the fuel will enter the hospital at noon on Thursday, January 11,” Abu Zaher said in a statement quoted by the AJ. “The fuel has not yet arrived.”
He warned that children and patients are at risk of death if the electric generators stop completely.
UN says Israel blocking efforts to help people in north Gaza
The UN humanitarian office said Israeli authorities were blocking its efforts to help people who had stayed in the north.
“We have systematic refusal from the Israeli side of our effort to get there,” said Andrea De Domenico, Head of Office for the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
“In particular, they have been very systematic to not allowing us to support hospitals, which is something that is reaching a level of inhumanity that, for me, is beyond comprehension,” he said.
Israel says it does not block aid and blames holdups on what it says are poor logistics by the UN and other aid agencies. Aid officials say Gazans are on the verge of starvation and suffering from diseases brought on by a lack of fresh water and sanitation due to widespread bombing.
Number of journalist killed rises to 117: Gaza media office
The death toll of Palestinian journalists in the Gaza Strip has increased as a result of the ongoing Israeli aggression against the territory since October 7, Al Jazeera reports.
“The number of journalists killed has risen to 117 since the start of the genocidal war on Gaza after the death of two fellow journalists, Fouad Abu Khammash and Muhammad Al-Thalathini,” the government media office in Gaza said in a statement.
The Israeli army “has been deliberately targeting Palestinian journalists since the beginning of the war, to prevent the reporting of the crimes it commits in Gaza,” it added.
Erdogan accuses US Britain of trying to turn Red Sea into 'sea of blood'
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan on Friday slammed the US and British strikes on Houthi targets in Yemen as a disproportionate use of force and accused the two countries of trying to turn the Red Sea into a "sea of blood".
Turkey, a NATO member, has strongly criticised Israel for its war in Gaza aimed at wiping out Palestinian.
Turkiye providing documents for genocide hearings against Israel: Erdogan
Turkiye is providing documents for a case brought by South Africa against Israel at the UN’s top court on a charge of committing genocide against Palestinian civilians, President Tayyip Erdogan said, Reuters reports.
Speaking to reporters in Istanbul, Erdogan said that Turkiye will continue to provide documents, mostly visuals, on Israel’s attacks on Gaza.
“I believe that Israel will be convicted there. We believe in the justice of the International Court of Justice,” Erdogan said.
EU to debate sending naval mission to Red Sea
EU countries will next week discuss a plan to set up a naval mission to help protect Red Sea shipping following attacks from Yemen’s Houthi rebels, diplomats said.
The proposal — in the pipeline in Brussels for several weeks — was mooted before US and British forces struck rebel-held Yemen.
Any EU effort would seek to complement a US-led coalition, which includes numerous countries from the bloc, already operating in the vital shipping route.
The exact details of the size and scope of any EU mission remain to be hammered out and European diplomats said a first discussion would take place in Brussels on Tuesday.
At least 330 killed while sheltering in UNRWA facilities
The UNRWA has reported that at least 330 people have been killed while sheltering in its facilities in the besieged Gaza Strip.
It said there have been 230 instances of its premises and people sheltering inside coming under attack since the start of the war, with 66 different installations directly hit.
The organisation has said from about 2.3 million people living in the Strip, at least 1.4 million Palestinians are sheltering in its facilities, with another half a million staying in areas close to them.
Shaw says Israel’s decision-makers sought to abide by law
In considering South Africa’s claims that Israel is perpetrating genocide, it must consider the conduct and directives of its leaders, Shaw said, adding that possible violations by individual soldiers do not necessarily reflect state policy.
Shaw pointed to several statements by Israeli army commanders and ministers calling for the army to focus on military targets and to minimise civilian casualties.
However, several Israeli leaders, including the defence minister in its war cabinet, have also issued statements seeming to urge unrestrained violence in Gaza.
A reminder of what Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said in October: “We will eliminate everything… Gaza won’t return to what it was before.”
Jordan warns that Israel ‘driving region towards greater conflict’: Report
Jordan’s foreign minister Ayman Safadi issued a strongly worded statement for Israel and its allies, warning that Israel is “driving the entire region towards greater conflict” and must be contained.
He told the official Petra news agency that Tel Aviv is “attempting to open new fronts and draw the West into them in order to extend the Israeli prime minister’s political career and carry out the radical racist agenda of radical ministers in the Israeli government”.
Safadi cautioned that the international community is at a crossroads and needs to choose whether to make efforts to stop the war or “allow the Israeli prime minister and the ministers of radicalism, hatred and racism in his government to drag the region into a regional conflict that could endanger global peace and security”.
Sri Lanka calls for ‘immediate ceasefire’ in Gaza
Sri Lanka has called for an “immediate ceasefire” in the Gaza Strip and a commitment to achieving a two-state solution.
President Ranil Wickremesinghe said the following at a meeting with ambassadors from 10 unnamed Middle Eastern nations, according to a statement from his office:
The call for an immediate ceasefire reflects the South Asian nation’s commitment to seeing the humanitarian plight of Palestinians in Gaza resolved.
The two-state solution “could not be achieved with a single state”.
Israeli settlers need to be “removed” from the occupied West Bank, which needs to be run by a “functional Palestinian Government”.
“Terrorist” attacks by Hamas on October 7 should not serve as justification for bombing Gaza.
Russia says Yemen strikes violate international law
Russia has said the US and UK strikes on Yemen violate international law and wrongly take advantage of the UN Security Council resolution that had demanded the Houthis stop their attacks on shipping lanes.
“The US air strikes on Yemen are another example of the Anglo-Saxons’ perversion of UN Security Council resolutions,” Maria Zakharova, Russia’s foreign ministry spokeswoman, said.
Zakharova said the strikes showed a “complete disregard for international law” and were “escalating the situation in the region”.
UK says Yemen strikes were ‘act of self-defence’
The British armed forces minister, James Heappey, has said the UK’s overnight military strikes on targets in Yemen were justified.
“Our action and the action of the Americans last night was in self-defence in order to defend against further attacks on our warships as they go about their legal and reasonable business,” he told Times Radio.
Earlier, the UK defence secretary Grant Shapps had said the “threat to innocent lives and global trade” had become so great that London felt it was its “duty” to safeguard ships and freedom of navigation.
Palestinians pay tribute to medics killed during Gaza rescue mission
The Palestinian Red Crescent has released footage from a funeral ceremony for four of its members killed in a strike on their ambulance on Wednesday.
Attendees can be seen paying tribute to the slain medics, whose vehicle was “deliberately targeted” by an Israeli strike near Deir el-Balah as they sought to rescue injured Palestinians there, according to the aid group.
At least 30 bodies taken to Khan Younis hospitals
The bodies of 30 people killed in the latest wave of Israeli strikes in Gaza have been brought to hospitals in Khan Younis, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa.
The reported toll comes as Israeli artillery fire continues to hit residences in the southern city.
UN says Israeli denials of access ‘paralysing’ Gaza aid
The latest report by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) says the organisation’s aid efforts are affected by Israel’s denials of access.
In the first 11 days of the year, only five out of 24 planned aid deliveries of food, medicines, water and other lifesaving supplies to the north of Wadi Gaza proceeded.
“Humanitarian partners were forced to cancel or delay missions in two instances due to excessive delays at Israeli checkpoints or because the agreed routes were unpassable,” it said, adding that only two of the five missions that were allowed in were able to fully deliver their aid.
“The ability of humanitarian partners to respond to the extensive needs in the northern part of Gaza is being curtailed by recurring denials of access for aid deliverers and lack of coordinated safe access by the Israeli authorities. These denials and severe access constraints paralyse the ability of humanitarian partners to respond meaningfully, consistently and at-scale.”
Protest in New York over US bombing of Yemen
Anti-war protesters have rallied in New York to protest the US and UK attacks on Yemen.
Video clips shared on social media show the protesters gathering in Times Square holding placards calling for an end to Israel’s occupation of Palestine and for the US bombing of Yemen to stop.
The protesters chanted, “Hands off the Middle East”, “Hands off Yemen” and “Hands off Gaza”.
US military says Houthis ‘will be held accountable’ for Red Sea attacks
The US military’s Central Command (CENTCOM) said Yemen’s Houthi fighters “will be held accountable” for their “illegal and dangerous actions” against Red Sea shipping.
CENTCOM said that US and UK forces, with support from Australia, Canada, the Netherlands and Bahrain, “conducted joint strikes on Houthi targets to degrade their capability”.
Radar systems, air defence facilities, weapons storage and launch sites for drones and missiles were attacked, CENTCOM said.
“We hold the Houthi militants and their destabilizing Iranian sponsors responsible for the illegal, indiscriminate, and reckless attacks on international shipping that have impacted 55 nations so far, including endangering the lives of hundreds of mariners, including the United States,” CENTCOM Commander General Michael Erik Kurilla said.
The US military has been leading a maritime coalition of 12 countries to counter Houthi attacks on international shipping vessels in the Red Sea, which the Iran-backed group says have been carried out in protest of Israel’s war on Gaza. There have been 27 reported such attacks since October 17, according to CENTCOM.
On Wednesday, CENTCOM forces shot down 18 Houthi “one-way attack” aerial drones, two anti-ship cruise missiles and one anti-ship ballistic missile, preventing a “complex attack” that it said threatened dozens of vessels in international shipping lanes.
Palestinian fighters continue to ‘disrupt Israeli operations’ in northern Gaza: Monitors
The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) and the Critical Threats Project (CTP) said Palestinian fighters in the northern Gaza Strip “remain capable of disrupting Israeli operations” despite Israel’s recent claims to have “dismantled” Hamas resistance in the north of the territory.
The US-based defence think tanks also said that fighting continues to rage in southern Khan Younis where Palestinian fighters on Thursday targeted an Israeli military bulldozer and ground forces with anti-tank and anti-personnel improvised explosive devices.
According to the ISW and CTP, Hamas and other Palestinian groups held an “emergency national meeting”, which may signal that reopening talks with Israel is being considered.
Those attending the meeting emphasized their continued unity and responded to Israeli plans for post-war Gaza saying “the governance of the Gaza Strip is a Palestinian issue”, the monitors said.
One percent of Gaza’s child population killed
After nearly 100 days of war in Gaza, more than 10,000 children – or 1 percent of the total child population on the Strip – have been killed, according to a new report by Save The Children.
Children surviving the war are “enduring unspeakable horrors, including life-changing injuries, burns, disease, inadequate medical care, and losing their parents and other loved ones”, says the report.
Out of the thousands of injured children, at least 1,000 have lost one or both their legs, the report says. More than 10 children have lost at least one or both legs each day since the war began, with many of the amputations performed without anaesthesia.
“The numbers are not just staggering in the scale and scope, but the actual impact,” Jason Lee from the NGO told Al Jazeera. “These are not just numbers. Every single one of them is a child.”
Palestinians welcome, Israel's allies oppose South Africa's UN court case
THE HAGUE (Reuters) – South Africa accused Israel on Thursday of subjecting Palestinians to genocidal acts at the opening of hearings at the top UN court on a case the country brought against the Israeli military campaign in Gaza. Israel says the case is baseless.
The following are reactions to the proceedings that began at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague.
PALESTINIAN FOREIGN MINISTRY
"South Africa's case before the International Court of Justice... is a historic event in the process of the joint Palestinian and South African struggle in the face of the injustice and genocide.
Saudi Arabia calls for restraint after air strikes on Yemen
CAIRO (Reuters) – Saudi Arabia called for restraint and "avoiding escalation" in light of the air strikes launched by the United States and Britain against sites linked to the Houthi movement in Yemen, the kingdom's foreign ministry said on Friday.
Saudi Arabia, which has in recent months engaged in peace talks with Yemen's Houthis, was closely monitoring the situation with "great concern," the foreign ministry said in a statement.
"The kingdom emphasizes the importance of maintaining the security and stability of the Red Sea region, as the freedom of navigation in it is an international demand," the ministry added.
Australia says it provided personnel support for US, UK strikes in Yemen
SYDNEY (Reuters) - Australia provided personnel support to the US and UK in their strikes against Houthi military targets in Yemen, Defence Minister Richard Marles said on Friday.
"Australia's support of these actions came in the form of personnel in the operational headquarters," Marles told a news conference.
"Australia will continue to support any actions which assert the global rules-based order."
Also Read: US, Britain launch strikes against Houthis in Yemen over Red Sea attacks
The United States and Britain launched strikes from the air and sea against Houthi military targets in Yemen in response to the movement's attacks on ships in the Red Sea, a dramatic regional widening of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
Israel likely to argue self-defence, focus on October 7 at ICJ
As Israel prepares to contest allegations that it has committed genocide in Gaza at the International Court of Justice today, Canadian law professor Michael Lynk says that his “educated guess” is that it will show footage from the Hamas attack to argue that it is defending itself.
South African lawyers presented their case at The Hague yesterday arguing that Israel has committed acts of genocide in its war on Gaza.
US, Britain launch strikes against Houthis in Yemen over Red Sea attacks
WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States and Britain on Thursday (Jan 11) launched strikes against targets linked to the Houthi movement in Yemen, the first strikes against the Iran-backed group since it started targeting international shipping in the Red Sea late last year.
The strikes involved fighter jets and Tomahawk missiles, several US media said. US officials did not immediately confirm the reports when contacted by AFP.
US President Joe Biden said on Thursday that the strikes were conducted with support from Australia, Bahrain, Canada, and the Netherlands.
Russia calls for Security Council emergency session
A diplomatic source has told Al Jazeera that Russia has sent a message to UN Security Council members saying that it considers the use of force in Yemen to be a violation of the United Nations Charter.
The country has called for an emergency session of the Security Council to be held on Friday.
The US and UK initiated a bombing campaign against Houthi targets in Yemen earlier today in response to the Iran-backed group’s attacks on vessels in the Red Sea.
We will bring you more information on this story when we have it.
UK defence secretary: Yemen strikes are ‘necessary and ‘our duty’
Grant Shapps says that four Royal Air Force Typhoon jets conducted “precision strikes” on Houthi military targets in Yemen.
He wrote on X that “this action was not only necessary, it was our duty to protect vessels [and] freedom of navigation” in light of the great threat to “innocent lives and global trade” that Houthi attacks in the Red Sea presented.
Human Rights Watch says world must ensure Israel abides by any UN court ruling
GENEVA (Reuters) - The head of Human Rights Watch praised South Africa for bringing Israel's military campaign against Gaza to the top UN court and said the international community would be responsible for ensuring that Israel complies with any judicial decision.
South Africa demanded an emergency suspension of Israel's aerial and ground offensive in the Palestinian enclave, telling the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague that Israel was committing genocidal acts.
"South Africa is providing important leadership here. It's really using this important opportunity," Tirana Hassan, executive director of Human Rights Watch, told Reuters.
