Hamas releases two more hostages, US demands rest be freed

An Israeli woman touches photos of Israelis missing and held captive in Gaza, displayed on a wall in Tel Aviv, on Saturday, Oct. 21, 2023. (AP)
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Updated 24 October 2023
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Hamas releases two more hostages, US demands rest be freed

  • Their release comes days after two other women — American citizens — were freed

RAFAH: Two elderly Hamas hostages were airlifted to an Israeli hospital to be reunited with family Tuesday, as the United States demanded Palestinian militants release 200 other captives before Gaza cease-fire talks are considered.

Hamas militants stormed into Israel from the Gaza Strip on October 7, and killed at least 1,400 people, mostly civilians who were shot or burnt to death on the first day of the raid, according to Israeli officials.

Israel says around 1,500 Hamas fighters were killed in clashes before its army regained control of the area under attack.

The militants also took 222 people hostage, among them elderly people and young children, according to the Israeli authorities’ latest count. The hostages also include dozens of foreigners.

More than 5,000 Palestinians, mainly civilians, have been killed across the Gaza Strip in relentless Israeli bombardments in retaliation for the attacks by the Palestinian Islamist militant group, according to the latest toll from the Hamas health ministry in Gaza.

Early on Tuesday, an AFP journalist saw a military helicopter bring freed hostages Nurit Cooper, aged 79, and Yocheved Lifshitz, aged 85, to a medical center in Tel Aviv.

Their release comes days after two other women — American citizens — were freed.

The office of Israel’s prime minister said Cooper and Lifshitz would receive medical treatment and be reunited with family.

The women were wheeled into the facility on a stretcher and wheelchair, as relatives gathered nearby.

Hamas released Cooper and Lifshitz on Monday citing “compelling humanitarian” reasons, after mediation by Qatar and Egypt.

Lifshitz recounted being bundled onto the back of a motorbike and stolen away to Gaza.

“They loaded me on a motorcycle sideways so I wouldn’t fall, with one terrorist holding me from the front and the other from behind,” she told local media.

“They crossed the border fence into the Gaza Strip, and at first they held me in the town of Abesan, which is near Be’eri. After that, I don’t know where I was taken.”

In response to the worst attack in its 75-year history, Israel launched operation “Swords of Iron” — blockading Gaza and firing a near-continuous barrage of strikes against targets in the enclave to “erase Hamas.”

While Israel’s military has claimed success in “eliminating high-ranking commanders” and destroying Hamas infrastructure, humanitarian groups have warned that Palestinian civilians are paying too steep a price for the campaign.

AFP has not been able to independently verify the Hamas-run health ministry’s death toll, but the scale of the destruction is clear.

Thousands of buildings have been levelled and more than a million people are believed to have been displaced in the besieged territory.

Gaza City resident Ayman Abu Shamalah was among the tens of thousands who heeded an Israeli warning to flee to south Gaza.

Despite the move, he told AFP that his pregnant wife, their three-year-old son and nine-year-old daughter were killed in an Israeli air strike on Rafah in southern Gaza.

“They put my son’s shattered body in a blue bag,” he said, sobbing.

Across Gaza, water, food and other basic supplies are running out. Only a trickle of aid is being allowed to cross into Gaza from Egypt.

A few dozen trucks carrying food, medicine and water have entered Gaza since a US-brokered deal entered into operation on Saturday.

The United Nations estimates about 100 trucks are needed every day.

UN rights chief Volker Turk on Monday called for an “immediate humanitarian cease-fire” to relieve the suffering and allow the delivery of aid.

But that suggestion was immediately slapped down by US President Joe Biden, who said any discussions about a cease-fire could only take place if Hamas frees all the hostages.

“We should have those hostages released and then we can talk,” Biden said when asked if he would support a “hostages-for-cease-fire” deal.

Facing mounting public pressure, Israel has shown little sign of slowing its offensive.

On Monday the Israeli military said it had hit “over 320 military targets” overnight, some of the most intense bombing of the war to date.

A 19-year-old Israeli soldier was killed and three others wounded during a ground operation “to dismantle terror infrastructure... and locate missing persons and bodies.”

But the timing of a promised full-scale ground offensive remains unclear.

“We are well prepared for the ground operations in the south,” Herzi Halevi, the chief of general staff of the Israel Defense Forces told troops.

“The Southern Command has quality operational plans. There are tactical, operative and strategic considerations that have provided additional time,” he said.

Chief among those considerations may be the labyrinth of tunnels and strong points that Hamas is believed to have developed to thwart any Israeli invasion.

But there are also fears about how Hamas’s allies around the Middle East would respond to a ground war.

The US-based Institute for the Study of War has reported an uptick in attacks on Israeli and US targets from Iranian-backed groups in Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen.

There are daily cross-border clashes between Israel and Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group.

At least 41 people have been killed in Lebanon, according to an AFP tally — mostly combatants but also at least four civilians, including a Reuters journalist.

And four people have been killed in Israel, including three soldiers and a civilian.

The pace of evacuations has increased on both sides of the border, with the UN saying nearly 20,000 people had fled villages in south Lebanon as the fighting rages.

Israel has also ordered the evacuation of thousands of people from a string of communities near its northern border.

But not everyone has left, with some such as 62-year-old peach farmer Moshe Dadoush, refusing to go.

“I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t afraid. But I have to stay here,” he told AFP.

“I wouldn’t leave for one simple reason: it’s here where I grew up. I have nowhere else to go but this country.”


Some Syria sanctions ‘could be lifted quickly’: French top diplomat

Updated 9 sec ago
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Some Syria sanctions ‘could be lifted quickly’: French top diplomat

PARIS: Some sanctions against Syria “could be lifted quickly” following last month’s fall of Bashar Assad, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said on Wednesday.
“There are sanctions targeting Bashar Assad and the executioners of his regime, there is clearly no intention to lift these sanctions. Then there are others which currently hinder access to humanitarian aid, which prevent the country’s recovery and these could be lifted quickly,” Barrot told France Inter radio station.


Lebanon to extradite son of late Muslim cleric Al-Qaradawi to UAE, PM’s office says

Updated 08 January 2025
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Lebanon to extradite son of late Muslim cleric Al-Qaradawi to UAE, PM’s office says

  • The UAE and Egypt have both filed requests for his extradition

CAIRO: Lebanon is set to extradite the son of late senior Muslim cleric Youssef Al-Qaradawi to the United Arab Emirates after the country’s caretaker cabinet approved the move on Tuesday, the Lebanese prime minister’s office said.
Abdul Rahman Al-Qaradawi, an Egyptian-Turkish poet, was detained in Lebanon on Dec. 28 after returning from Syria, according to his lawyer Mohammad Sablouh and human rights group Amnesty International.
Youssef was stopped by Lebanese authorities on the basis of an Egyptian court ruling against him that dates back to 2016.
The arrest was made based on an Interpol notice issued by the Arab Interior Ministers Council based on the 2016 court ruling to imprison Youssef for three years on charges of spreading false news.
The UAE and Egypt have both filed requests for his extradition.
Qaradawi’s lawyer said he would file an urgent appeal to block his extradition on Wednesday morning but feared his client might be flown out of the country before then.


UN calls for $370m in new humanitarian aid for Lebanon

Imran Riza, UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator, attends an interview with Reuters in Beirut, Lebanon October 3, 2024.
Updated 08 January 2025
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UN calls for $370m in new humanitarian aid for Lebanon

  • Following nearly a year of exchanges of cross-border fire initiated by Hezbollah over the war in Gaza, Israel in September stepped up its bombing campaign and later sent troops into Lebanon

UNITED NATIONS, United States: The United Nations joined the Lebanese government on Tuesday to appeal for an additional $371.4 million in humanitarian aid for people displaced by the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah.
The extension builds on an initial aid appeal for $426 million launched in October, as all-out war flared between the two sides and sent hundreds of thousands in Lebanon fleeing their homes.
That appeal raised approximately $250 million, according to the UN.
Following nearly a year of exchanges of cross-border fire initiated by Hezbollah over the war in Gaza, Israel in September stepped up its bombing campaign and later sent troops into Lebanon.
After two months of warring, in which Hezbollah’s influential chief Hassan Nasrallah and multiple other leaders were killed, a ceasefire deal was reached that went into effect in late November.
“While the cessation of hostilities offers hope, over 125,000 people remain displaced, and hundreds of thousands more face immense challenges rebuilding their lives,” Imran Riza, the UN humanitarian coordinator in Lebanon, said in a statement Tuesday.
The additional funding “is urgently required to sustain life-saving efforts and prevent further deterioration of an already dire situation,” he added.
The appeal is primarily aimed to assist an estimated one million Lebanese, Syrian and Palestinian refugees affected by the conflict, funding a three-month period of emergency efforts through March 2025.
Since the ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon began on November 27, more than 800,000 displaced people in Lebanon have been able to return home, according to UN figures.
 

 


Qatar and Turkiye dispatch two power ships to generate electricity for Syria

Updated 08 January 2025
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Qatar and Turkiye dispatch two power ships to generate electricity for Syria

  • The vessels, which have power plants installed, are expected to increase the amount of electricity generated in the country by about 50 percent
  • Syria’s energy infrastructure was badly damaged during the decade-long civil war, with most areas receiving power for only two or three hours a day

LONDON: Qatar and Turkiye sent two power-generating ships to Syria on Tuesday to help address the energy crisis in the country caused by insufficient electricity supplies.

Khaled Abu Di, the director of Syria’s Public Establishment for Transmission and Distribution of Electricity, said the floating power plants are capable of generating a total of 800 megawatts a day, which would increase the amount of electricity generated in the country by about 50 percent, state news agency SANA reported.

Syria’s energy infrastructure was badly damaged during more than a decade of civil war in the country that culminated in the fall of the ruling Assad regime in December. The deterioration resulted in severe power shortages, with many areas receiving electricity for only two or three hours a day.

Abu Di said efforts are underway to secure transmission lines to deliver the electricity generated by the ships. He added that his team is also working to repair dozens of damaged conversion plants and connection lines to get the national grid up and running again.


How Israeli law permitting child detention imperils the rights of Palestinian minors

Updated 08 January 2025
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How Israeli law permitting child detention imperils the rights of Palestinian minors

  • Under legislation passed in November by the Knesset, Israeli authorities are permitted to imprison Palestinians under the age of 14
  • Rights monitors say Israel has detained some 460 children since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack triggered the Gaza war

DUBAI: Frightened, alone, and often injured during arrest, Palestinian children routinely find themselves vulnerable to abuses and deprived of basic rights after they are taken into Israeli custody, according to human rights monitors.

Under legislation passed in November by the Knesset, Israeli authorities are now permitted to detain Palestinians under the age of 14 — a measure that rights groups claim is motivated by revenge rather than security needs.

The bill, proposed by a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party and approved by 53-33 votes, allows judges to sentence minors between the ages of 12 and 14 to prison terms if convicted of terrorist murder, manslaughter, or attempted murder.

Palestinians clash with Israeli security forces during a raid at the Balata camp for Palestinian refugees, east of Nablus in the occupied West Bank on November 23, 2023. (AFP)

According to the law, which was passed as a temporary measure lasting for five years, convicted minors can be held in closed facilities until they turn 14, after which they can be transferred to regular prisons.

An identical law, which was passed in 2016 following a series of attacks carried out by teenagers and other minors, expired in 2020.

According to the Palestinian Commission for Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs, Israel imprisoned more than 460 children between the months of October 2023 and January 2024.

INNUMBERS

460

Children imprisoned by Israel between October 2023 and January 2024, according to the Palestinian Commission for Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs.

16

Israeli courts have long defined the term ‘Palestinian child’ as a person under the age of 16, rather than the internationally recognized age of 18.

The Israeli parliament also passed a law in November that allows for the deportation of the family members of those convicted of attacks on Israeli citizens.

Furthermore, it allows for the deportation of the family members of those who had advance knowledge and either failed to report the matter to the police or “expressed support or identification with an act of terrorism.”

Under legislation passed in November by the Knesset, Israeli authorities are now permitted to imprison Palestinians under the age of 14. (AFP file/Getty Images)

Relatives of those who published “praise, sympathy or encouragement for an act of terrorism or a terrorist organization” can also be deported.

“This is a historic and important day for all citizens of Israel,” Itamar Ben Gvir, Israel’s national security minister, said in a statement welcoming the bill, which he said “sends a clear message the State of Israel will not allow the families of the terrorists to continue enjoying life as if nothing had happened.

“From today onwards, every father, mother, child, brother, sister or spouse who identifies with and supports their family member who harmed the citizens of Israel will be deported.”

The abuse of Palestinian children in military detention was a child protection crisis before Oct. 7, and it has only become worse, says Jason Lee, Save the Children.

Both Israel’s Justice Ministry and the Attorney General’s Office raised concerns about the legislation, which stipulates that those being expelled would be sent to Gaza or other destinations for 7-15 years for citizens or 10-20 years for legal residents.

Some opposition members of the Knesset suggested at the time that the legislation is targeted specifically at Palestinian citizens of Israel, saying the law is unlikely to apply to Jewish Israelis convicted of terrorism offenses.

Israeli and Palestinian human rights organizations have branded both new laws unconstitutional.

Israeli policemen detain a Palestinian boy in the east Jerusalem Arab neighborhood of Issawiya on May 15, 2012, during protests to mark Nakba day. (AFP)

Hadeel Abu Salih, an attorney working for Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, sent a letter to the Israeli parliament claiming the legislation was motivated by revenge and retribution.

Abu Salih also said the legislation contradicts the principles of Israel’s Youth Law, which stresses rehabilitation over punitive measures for minors.

The Legal Center released a statement saying that “through these laws, Israel further entrenches its two-tiered legal system, with one set of laws for Jewish Israelis under criminal law and another, with inferior rights, for Palestinians under the pretext of counterterrorism.

An Israeli soldier controls a Palestinian boy during clashes between Israeli security forces and Palestinian protesters following a march against Palestinian land confiscation to expand the nearby Jewish Hallamish settlement on August 28, 2015 in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh near Ramallah. (AFP)

“By embedding apartheid-like policies into the law, the Knesset further institutionalized systematic oppression, in contravention of both international law and basic human and constitutional rights.”

Since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on southern Israel that triggered the Gaza war, Israeli forces have significantly increased the rate of arrests of Palestinian children, both in Gaza and the West Bank.

Between October and November 2023 alone, 254 minors were reportedly arrested by Israeli forces. Some of these detainees have since been released.

Israeli security forces scuffle with a Palestinian boy outside Damascus Gate in Jerusalem's old city during a demonstration on December 26, 2015. (AFP)

The bulk of the arrest operations appear to take place in towns, camps, and other areas with points of contact with Israeli checkpoints. Although the precise charges leveled against these minors are unknown, the most common offense is throwing stones.

In some cases, rights monitors say children under the age of 10 are taken in order to pressure their relatives to surrender themselves to Israeli authorities.

Palestinian children released from Israeli detention often describe traumatic experiences, recounting harsh measures enforced by guards and the prison administration, including allegations of physical and psychological torture during interrogation.

Nael al-Atrash, eleven-years-old, is blind folded and hand cuffed by Israeli soldiers who raided the neighborhood of Jabal al-Takruri in the West Bank town of Hebron 08 March 2006. (AFP)

Testimonies shared with Save the Children include severe beatings in the presence of their relatives, being shot at, having their legs restrained, and being blindfolded during transfers between detention centers.

Several claim that food and water were also withheld for long periods of time as a form of punishment. Some have even alleged sexual abuse. Monitors say minors are routinely denied their right to legal aid and at times the presence of a family member during their interrogations.

As a result of these abuses, minors are allegedly coerced into signing false confessions and into signing documents without understanding their content. Children are also rarely granted bail before standing trial.

The Palestinian Commission for Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoners Society have expressed concern about the ongoing detention of children and the alleged abuses.

Both say the behavior of Israeli prison administrations and conditions inside overcrowded facilities have become worse since the Oct. 7, 2023, attack.

Monitors say the detention centers holding minors do not meet the minimum humanitarian standards. A large number of detained children are reportedly sharing cells and are deprived of an education, medical assistance, and personal items such as books and clothing.

Israeli courts have long defined the term “Palestinian child” as a person under the age of 16, rather than the internationally recognized age of 18 as defined by the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Israeli authorities have previously denied the maltreatment of detainees.

Responding to separate claims by the UN in March last year about the alleged mistreatment of adults captured in Gaza, the Israel Defense Forces told the BBC: “The mistreatment of detainees during their time in detention or whilst under interrogation violates IDF values and contravenes IDF and is therefore absolutely prohibited.”

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur for Palestine, accused the international community of failing to address the detention of Palestinian children, saying minors in Israeli custody are “tormented often beyond the breaking point.”

On World Children’s Day, marked by the UN on Nov. 20, the Palestinian Commission for Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs released a statement saying that around 270 Palestinian children were being held in Israeli jails.

“The occupation continues to detain no less than 270 children, who are mainly held in Ofer and Megiddo prisons, in addition to camps established by the occupation army after the Gaza war,” the commission said.

“Systematic crimes are being committed by the prison administration against the jailed children, in addition to beatings, torture, and daily abuses.”

According to Palestinian rights monitors, more than 11,700 people from the West Bank have been detained since October 2023. This does not include those from the Gaza Strip, where the number of arrests is thought to be far higher.

Similarly, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Palestinian Authority urged the international community on World Children’s Day to pressure Israel to honor its commitments to global treaties, especially the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

It stressed the need to ensure Palestinian children are not excluded from international charters that call for special protections for children against violence and detention.

The ministry also condemned the law undertaken by the Knesset to detain children under the age of 14 years, calling it a dangerous escalation that further undermines Palestinian children’s rights.

Despite international and local human rights organizations calling for the abolition of the Knesset’s child detention laws, the Israeli government insists the law will remain in place for the next five years.