CHICAGO: All 14-year-old Siwar Almadhoun wanted to do was play basketball. Her 9-year-old brother, Omar, dreamed of being a soccer star.
Their dreams died with them in the early hours of Friday, Nov. 24 when, as they slept, Israeli forces dropped a massive bomb on their home in Beit Lahia, in the Gaza Strip.
Their parents, Majed, 41, and Safa, 38, were also killed in the indiscriminate Israeli slaughter, along with siblings Reman, 18, who had just started college, and 7-year-old Ali, said Hani Almadhoun, Majed’s brother. He is an American citizen who works for the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East office in Washington D.C., where he supervises charitable fundraising efforts to help needy families.
Only two of his brother’s children, daughters Roa and Salam, survived the carnage. They are married and live with their families in Rafah.
“Siwar, the basketball player, a 14-year-old girl, she loved basketball,” Almadhoun, 42, told Arab News as he struggled to speak through the grief. “The salt of this earth. A very sweet girl. She was killed. She did nothing. She was asleep, just like her family.
“And half of her mom, only one half, was recovered. Reman was recovered. Ali was recovered … their cat was buried and killed next to them. They adopted a cat named Lucky. A very unfortunate name. They liked to call her Cici. She was killed between the two kids because they loved to play with her so much.
“The only body that was found immediately was Omar. He flew through the window into the street 20 meters away. They went to bury him. They went to find Majed, and my mom knew her son was there. She was grieving and then, on top of that, (there were) no ambulances, no bulldozers were able to come to remove this rubble.”
The bodies of some of the occupants of the five-story apartment building the Almadhoun family owned were thrown from the building when it was destroyed but they could not be immediately recovered because of Israeli sniper fire and the missile strikes that continued to pound the civilian neighborhood.
Almadhoun said his father and mother spent three days searching for the remains of Majed, Safa and their grandchildren.
“They kept digging through the rubble of their destroyed homes but they could find nothing,” he said. “As they searched the area they recovered two and a half bodies that had been thrown by the explosion and were found in a destroyed home next door.
“(My mother) was desperate. She is heart-broken. Nobody is coming to the rescue. I have had meetings as high as the White House, the State Department and all these guys, and I can’t get safety to my family. It broke me.
“We all love our moms and dads. But she is just a lady whose son is buried and she can’t even have a minute with him. She can’t even take a picture with him because his face is swollen.”
Almadhoun said the search continues for Siwar’s body but his family’s efforts are hampered by the communications blackout imposed during the conflict by Israel, which has had total control of the Gaza Strip since 1967.
“There is heartbreak. There is sorrow,” he said. In response to suggestions that his relatives might have somehow had a connection with Hamas or were being used as human shields, he added: “This is personal … I know my family. There is no way that you could build a case against Majed, my brother.
“Majed loved his mom, honored his parents. He was very generous to help neighbors in need. We don’t know why they were killed.”
Almadhoun’s father owned a small grocery store a three-minute walk from the family home. Majed leased space for a kitchenware store in Sheikh Radwan, a 10 minute ride from Beit Lahia. Both shops have also been destroyed.
“All their savings were lost. My family is homeless,” Almadhoun said. “Remember the refugees from 1948.”
The massacre of his family, and the thousands of other civilians killed since the Israeli bombings and invasion began, are difficult to comprehend given their scale, he added.
According to official estimates, more than 14,000 Palestinians have been killed during the Israeli assaults and invasion, nearly 10,000 of whom were civilians with no connection to Hamas.
The attacks are not only partly funded by US taxpayers through US support for Israel, but the Israelis are using American-made weapons including massive 2,000-pound bombs capable of flattening an apartment building in a single strike.
Almadhoun said his brother and sister-in-law had been grieving the loss of 12 members of the latter’s family who were wiped out several weeks ago during the early stages of the Israeli onslaught.
They were killed by an attack in the Atwan area, a few miles south of Beit Lahia, Almadhoun said. The dead included Safa’s father and mother, five of her siblings and five of their young children.
“They lived in the Atwan area of northern Gaza,” he said. “The good volunteers in the family went and dug out the bodies. It was so horrific a scene, and a genocide
at their home, that they would not let Safa see her family because of the brutality: the body parts, the known pieces, the plastic bags.
“My brother Majed, her husband, went and collected the bodies and buried them. There was no proper burial because we know that Gaza is running out of spaces for graves and cemeteries are overflowing with dead bodies.”
The Almadhouns originally came from Ashkelon, which was in the Gaza District of Palestine before it was captured by Israel in 1948. The family fled Gaza to find work in the UAE, which is where Hani was born. But they returned to Beit Lahia to open their businesses there.
Almadhoun said the last time he saw his brother and his family was during a visit to Gaza in August this year. His parents and other surviving relatives are still in northern Gaza but cannot easily be reached.
“My dad is trying to be strong, trying to be normal,” he said. “I know he is not doing well but he is trying to be strong for everybody else. My mom cries and when she cries, I cry. I can’t take it. It is a lot.”
6 members of American UN aid worker’s family killed by Israeli attack in Gaza
https://arab.news/57us3
6 members of American UN aid worker’s family killed by Israeli attack in Gaza
- Hani Almadhoun says his brother, sister-in-law and 4 of their children died when a massive bomb reduced their home to rubble
- 12 members of his sister-in-law’s family, including 5 children, were killed by an airstrike during the early stages of the conflict in Gaza
Israeli military confirms hostage killed alongside father in Gaza
The Israeli military has said it suspected Hamza and Youssef were killed in one of its strikes
JERUSALEM: Israel confirmed on Friday that the remains of a hostage found killed in Gaza were of Hamza Ziyadne, the son of deceased hostage Youssef Ziyadne, whose body was found beside him in an underground tunnel near the southern city of Rafah.
Israeli forces continued on Friday to pound Gaza, with Palestinian medics saying at least 15 people had been killed, including a journalist for Cairo-based Al-Ghad TV who had been covering an incident at Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.
There was no immediate comment on the latest fighting from Israeli’s military, which earlier announced it had concluded forensic tests to identify Hamza Ziyadne, an Israeli Bedouin taken hostage by Hamas-led fighters alongside his father and two of his siblings.
It said earlier this week that the body of Hamza’s father Youssef had been recovered close to those of armed guards from Islamist group Hamas or another Palestinian militant group and there were indications that Hamza may also have been killed.
There was no immediate comment from Hamas although the group’s armed wing told Qatar’s Al-Jazeera news network that most of the hostages in northern Gaza were now considered missing because of intense Israeli strikes there.
The left-leaning Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported that the Israeli military has said it suspected Hamza and Youssef were killed in one of its strikes, given their bodies were found next to those of dead militants. A military spokesperson said this week that Youssef Ziyadne had not died recently.
The military declined to comment on the cause of the hostages’ deaths.
EFFORTS TO END FIGHTING
Mediators Qatar, the United States and Egypt are making new efforts to reach a deal to halt the fighting in Gaza and free the remaining hostages before President-elect Donald Trump takes office on Jan. 20.
The Hostages and Missing Family Forum, which represents most of the families, renewed its call on the Israeli government to conclude a deal with Hamas and bring back the hostages, saying Youssef and Hamza Ziyadne could have been saved through an earlier agreement.
The negotiations have been at an impasse for a year over two key issues. Hamas has said it will only free its remaining hostages if Israel agrees to end the war and withdraw all its troops from Gaza. Israel says it will not end the war until Hamas is dismantled and all hostages are free.
Israeli defense minister Israel Katz on Friday instructed the military to present a plan for the “total defeat” of Hamas in Gaza if it does not release the hostages before Trump’s inauguration. It was not clear how such a plan would differ from existing Israeli military plans.
“We must not be dragged into a war of attrition against Hamas in Gaza, while the hostages remain in the tunnels, putting their lives at risk and suffering severely,” he told senior commanders, according to a defense ministry statement.
Israel launched its assault on the Gaza Strip after Hamas fighters stormed across its borders in October 2023, killing 1,200 people and taking more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
Since then, more than 46,000 people have been killed in Gaza, according to Palestinian health officials, with much of the enclave laid waste and most of its people — displaced multiple times — facing acute shortages of food and medicine due to Israel’s actions, humanitarian agencies say.
Arab, international support for Lebanon pours in as Aoun set to form government
- Bukhari expressed “Saudi Arabia’s satisfaction with Lebanon’s successful presidential election”
- Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides visited Beirut to congratulate Aoun, marking the first visit by a foreign head of state to Lebanon following the election
BEIRUT: Joseph Aoun’s first day as president of Lebanon was marked by strong Arab and international support.
Parliamentary consultations to name a new prime minister will take place next week.
Imran Riza, UN humanitarian coordinator in Lebanon, announced the allocation of $30 million from the Lebanon Humanitarian Fund to address urgent humanitarian needs caused by the recent escalation of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah.
Lebanon’s Dar Al-Fatwa relayed remarks from the Saudi ambassador to Lebanon, Walid Bukhari, during his meeting with Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdel Latif Derian.
Bukhari expressed “Saudi Arabia’s satisfaction with Lebanon’s successful presidential election, achieved through Lebanese unity that inspires hope.”
He described the accomplishment as a significant step toward Lebanon’s renaissance, reconstruction, security, and stability, as well as the initiation of reforms and restoring Arab and international confidence.
Dar Al-Fatwa also reported that Bukhari admired “President Joseph Aoun’s inaugural speech, which was a reflection of his national responsibility.”
On Friday, Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides visited Beirut to congratulate Aoun, marking the first visit by a foreign head of state to Lebanon following the election.
Aoun also received a congratulatory message from Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, expressing “the Iranian government’s readiness to continue strengthening bilateral cooperation in all areas.”
Pezeshkian said he hoped the presidential elections would lead to political stability, economic growth, peace, and security for the people of Lebanon. He added that reinforcing stability and unity would thwart Israel’s ambitions in Lebanon’s territory.
Aoun’s initial meetings included a session with Prime Minister Najib Mikati, who, along with Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib, is set to visit Syria on Saturday. This marks the first official Lebanese visit to Damascus since the fall of Bashar Assad.
Aoun asked Mikati to “continue managing caretaker duties until a new government is formed.”
Mikati said after the meeting that during the two years and two months since the end of former President Michel Aoun’s term, his government held 60 Cabinet sessions and issued more than 1,211 decisions and more than 3,700 decrees.
“We managed to navigate this phase and maintain the continuity of the state, particularly through its backbone — the army — under the leadership of Gen. Joseph Aoun and through our cooperation with him.”
Mikati explained that the discussion with the president focused on “the existing challenges and the content of the inaugural address, in which Aoun outlined the directions for any new government to implement the speech’s content through the necessary constitutional steps.”
Mikati said: “We talked about the situation in the south and the necessity for a swift and full Israeli withdrawal, reestablishing stability in the south and halting Israeli violations.”
He said the next government must be able to reflect the direction outlined by the president. “We are embarking on a new phase that requires everyone’s cooperation to exert serious efforts to save the nation. The broad outlines set by the president are very important and the leadership of this country has the will to act. Many of these objectives can be achieved quickly through an active government.”
Regarding Aoun’s insistence in his speech on “the state having a monopoly on bearing weapons,” Mikati said: “Do we expect the president of the country to say that weapons are legal for everyone? Do we expect a new government to say that weapons are legal for all citizens? Today, we are entering a new phase that starts from southern Lebanon, specifically south of the Litani River, to withdraw arms and ensure that the state will be present across all Lebanese territory, with stability beginning from the south.”
Aoun’s inaugural address on Thursday was widely welcomed in Lebanon, and across the Arab and international states. Leaders of political parties and economic bodies expressed support for the speech and its implementation.
Sami Gemayel, head of the Lebanese Kataeb Party, said: “His address is unprecedented in the past three decades, as all presidents came during the Syrian guardianship or when Hezbollah controlled decisions and no president was allowed to speak about the interest of his country.”
Gemayel pledged to “defend the speech, which fully represents us, and to stand by the president to realize his national project.”
A few hours after the election of the president, Israeli reconnaissance planes resumed violations of Lebanese airspace, starting from the south and reaching Beirut and its southern suburb, extending to Hermel on the border with Syria.
Meanwhile, Israeli forces continued their incursions into southern Lebanon, destroying border villages.
Aita Al-Shaab was subjected to artillery shelling, with Israeli forces conducting explosions and intensive sweep operations inside the town.
Movements of Israeli forces’ vehicles were observed between Tallat Al-Hamames and the adjacent Metula settlement at the Khiam-Wazzani triangle.
Once again, Israeli tanks and infantry forces conducted incursions in the town of Taybeh and opened fire on the remaining houses.
On Friday, a Lebanese Army unit entered the town of Aitaroun in Bint Jbeil, accompanied by a bulldozer to clear a dirt barrier previously erected by the Israeli Army at the village entrance.
The Lebanese Army is awaiting a signal from a five-member committee, tasked with overseeing the implementation of the ceasefire resolution, to redeploy in positions at the Al-Qouzah-Debel-Aita Al-Shaab triangle following the Israeli withdrawal.
On Thursday Israel heavily bombed the border town of Aita Al-Shaab, causing tremors deep in southern regions.
Israel also carried out operations to detonate houses in Kafr Kila, Houla, and the vicinity of Wazzani, with the Israeli military claiming it had bombed “five large ammunition warehouses.”
Israeli forces still have 15 days left of the 60-day deadline to fully withdraw from the area following the incursion on Oct. 1.
On Friday, Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee renewed his warning to the residents of southern Lebanon via social media, advising them against “moving south to the line of villages from Mansouri in the west to Shebaa in the east until further notice. Anyone who moves south of this line is at risk.”
Civil defense personnel, in coordination with the army and UNIFIL, continue to search and survey the areas from which the Israeli army withdrew, looking for the bodies of Hezbollah fighters who were reportedly missing.
Stampede at central Damascus mosque kills four: health official
- Ghina, who was at the mosque to attend Friday prayers, said she saw “people carrying an elderly woman with blood dripping from her face“
- The Al-Watan newspaper said it happened during the distribution of free meals
DAMASCUS: A stampede at the landmark Umayyad Mosque in Syria’s capital on Friday killed four people, a Damascus health official told state media.
“Damascus Health Director Dr. Mohammed Akram Maatouq announced that the final toll from the unfortunate stampede that occurred today in the Great Umayyad Mosque and its surroundings is four dead and 16 injured,” a statement carried by state news agency SANA said.
Earlier, Damascus Governor Maher Marwan had told SANA that the deadly crush took place “during a civilian event at the mosque.”
A photographer who collaborates with AFP and was at the site of the stampede saw large crowds gathered near the mosque because free meals were being handed out.
Ghina, who was at the mosque to attend Friday prayers, said she saw “people carrying an elderly woman with blood dripping from her face,” adding that she appeared dead.
The Al-Watan newspaper said the stampede happened during the distribution of free meals by a social media personality.
A YouTuber called Chef Abu Omar, who has a restaurant in Istanbul, had earlier posted a video of preparations for the distribution of free meals at the Ummayyad Mosque.
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani had visited the mosque in the morning.
Israel strikes Yemen Houthis, warns it will ‘hunt’ leaders
- “A short while ago... fighter jets struck military targets belonging to the Houthi terrorist regime,” the Israeli military said
- It said it also struck military infrastructure in the ports of Hodeida and Ras Issa
JERUSALEM: Israel struck Houthi targets in Yemen on Friday, including a power station and coastal ports, in response to missile and drone launches, and warned it would hunt down the group’s leaders.
“A short while ago... fighter jets struck military targets belonging to the Houthi terrorist regime on the western coast and inland Yemen,” the Israeli military said in a statement.
It said the strikes were carried out in retaliation for Houthi missile and drone launches into Israel.
The statement said the targets included “military infrastructure sites in the Hizaz power station, which serves as a central source of energy” for the Houthis.
It said it also struck military infrastructure in the ports of Hodeida and Ras Issa.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in a statement after the strikes, said the Houthis were being punished for their repeated attacks on his country.
“As we promised, the Houthis are paying, and they will continue to pay, a heavy price for their aggression against us,” he said.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said Israel would “hunt down the leaders of the Houthi terror organization.”
“The Hodeida port is paralyzed, and the Ras Issa port is on fire — there will be no immunity for anyone,” he said in a video statement.
The Houthis, who control Sanaa, have fired missiles and drones toward Israel since war broke out in Gaza in October 2023.
They describe the attacks as acts of solidarity with Gazans.
The Iran-backed rebels have also targeted ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, prompting retaliatory strikes by the United States and, on occasion, Britain.
Israel has also struck Houthi targets in Yemen, including in the capital.
Since the Gaza war began, the Houthis have launched about 40 surface-to-surface missiles toward Israel, most of which were intercepted, the Israeli army says.
The military has also reported the launch of about 320 drones, with more than 100 intercepted by Israeli air defenses.
Gaza war death toll could be 40 percent higher, says study
- Researchers sought to assess the death toll from Israel’s air and ground campaign in Gaza between October 2023 and the end of June 2024
- They estimated 64,260 deaths due to traumatic injury during this period, about 41 percent higher than the official Palestinian Health Ministry count
LONDON: An official Palestinian tally of direct deaths in the Israel-Hamas war likely undercounted the number of casualties by around 40 percent in the first nine months of the war as the Gaza Strip’s health care infrastructure unraveled, according to a study published on Thursday.
The peer-reviewed statistical analysis published in The Lancet journal was conducted by academics at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Yale University and other institutions.
Using a statistical method called capture-recapture analysis, the researchers sought to assess the death toll from Israel’s air and ground campaign in Gaza between October 2023 and the end of June 2024.
They estimated 64,260 deaths due to traumatic injury during this period, about 41 percent higher than the official Palestinian Health Ministry count. The study said 59.1 percent were women, children and people over the age of 65. It did not provide an estimate of Palestinian combatants among the dead.
More than 46,000 people have been killed in the Gaza war, according to Palestinian health officials, from a pre-war population of around 2.1 million.
A senior Israeli official, commenting on the study, said Israel’s armed forces went to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties.
“No other army in the world has ever taken such wide-ranging measures,” the official said.
“These include providing advance warning to civilians to evacuate, safe zones and taking any and all measures to prevent harm to civilians. The figures provided in this report do not reflect the situation on the ground.”
The war began on Oct. 7 after Hamas gunmen stormed across the border with Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
The Lancet study said the Palestinian health ministry’s capacity for maintaining electronic death records had previously proven reliable, but deteriorated under Israel’s military campaign, which has included raids on hospitals and other health care facilities and disruptions to digital communications.
Israel accuses Hamas of using hospitals as cover for its operations, which the militant group denies.
STUDY METHOD EMPLOYED IN OTHER CONFLICTS
Anecdotal reports suggested that a significant number of dead remained buried in the rubble of destroyed buildings and were therefore not included in some tallies.
To better account for such gaps, the Lancet study employed a method used to evaluate deaths in other conflict zones, including Kosovo and Sudan.
Using data from at least two independent sources, researchers look for individuals who appear on multiple lists of those killed. Less overlap between lists suggests more deaths have gone unrecorded, information that can be used to estimate the full number of deaths.
For the Gaza study, researchers compared the official Palestinian Health Ministry death count, which in the first months of war was based entirely on bodies that arrived in hospitals but later came to include other methods; an online survey distributed by the health ministry to Palestinians inside and outside the Gaza Strip, who were asked to provide data on Palestinian ID numbers, names, age at death, sex, location of death, and reporting source; and obituaries posted on social media.
“Our research reveals a stark reality: the true scale of traumatic injury deaths in Gaza is higher than reported,” lead author Zeina Jamaluddine told Reuters.
Dr. Paul Spiegel, director of the Center for Humanitarian Health at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, told Reuters that the statistical methods deployed in the study provide a more complete estimate of the death toll in the war.
The study focused solely on deaths caused by traumatic injuries though, he said.
Deaths caused from indirect effects of conflict, such as disrupted health services and poor water and sanitation, often cause high excess deaths, said Spiegel, who co-authored a study last year that projected thousands of deaths due to the public health crisis spawned by the war.
The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) estimates that, on top of the official death toll, around another 11,000 Palestinians are missing and presumed dead.
In total, PCBS said, citing Palestinian Health Ministry numbers, the population of Gaza has fallen 6 percent since the start of the war, as about 100,000 Palestinians have also left the enclave.
