GAZA: Israel declared its determination Wednesday to press on with its Gaza war “with or without international support,” after it came under mounting pressure even from key backer the United States.
Now in its third month, the war was launched after the unprecedented October 7 attacks on Israel by Palestinian militant group Hamas that officials say killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians.
It has left Gaza in ruins, killing more than 18,600 people, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, and causing “unparallelled” damage to roads, schools and hospitals.
The day after the UN General Assembly overwhelmingly backed a non-binding resolution for a ceasefire, more strikes hit Gaza and battles raged, especially in Gaza City, the biggest urban center, and Khan Yunis and Rafah in the south, AFP correspondents said.
Cold wintery rains lashed the territory, where the UN estimates 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.4 million population have been displaced, living in makeshift tents as vital supplies of food, drinking water, medicines and fuel run low.
Camped with thousands in the grounds of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital in central Gaza, Ameen Edwan said his family was unable to sleep.
“Rainwater seeped in. We couldn’t sleep. We tried to find nylon covers but couldn’t find any, so we resorted to stones and sand” to keep the rain out, he said.
The United Nations warned the spread of diseases — including meningitis, jaundice, impetigo, chickenpox and upper respiratory tract infections — had intensified.
The World Health Organization said 107 trucks carrying humanitarian aid had entered the besieged territory from Egypt, well below the daily average of 500 before October 7.
Air raid sirens wailed in Sderot and other southern Israeli communities near Gaza as Palestinian militants fired rockets, most of which were intercepted.
Israel’s military said sirens sounded in Ashdod city north of Gaza and in the Lakhish area. Social media footage showed a large fragment of an intercepted rocket had hit a supermarket.
The army said an air strike had hit a militant cell in Gaza City’s Shejaiya district “that was en route to launch rockets toward Israel.”
In Khan Yunis, a family mourned father of seven Fayez Al-Taramsi, killed in a strike.
“How are we going to live after him?” one of his daughters said, crying and clutching his bloodied shirt. “He brought us to life.”
In the October 7 attack — the deadliest in Israel’s 75-year history — Hamas also seized around 240 hostages.
Determined to destroy Hamas and bring the hostages home, Israel began a devastating aerial and ground offensive.
It has lost 115 soldiers, including 10 in northern Gaza on Tuesday, its deadliest day since the ground assault began on October 27.
The UN General Assembly passed a resolution Tuesday demanding a ceasefire, backed by 153 of 193 nations — surpassing the 140 or so that have routinely condemned Russia for invading Ukraine.
While Washington voted against, the resolution was supported by allies Australia, Canada and New Zealand, who, in a rare joint statement, said they were “alarmed at the diminishing safe space for civilians in Gaza.”
US President Joe Biden told a campaign event Israel had “most of the world supporting it” immediately after October 7, but “they’re starting to lose that support by the indiscriminate bombing that takes place.”
Biden, who toned down his comments later, on Wednesday met with families of American hostages from those the militants seized.
Despite the criticism from its main ally, Israel vowed to pursue its war.
“Israel will continue the war against Hamas with or without international support,” said Foreign Minister Eli Cohen.
“A ceasefire at the current stage is a gift to the terrorist organization Hamas, and will allow it to return and threaten the residents of Israel,” Cohen told a visiting diplomat, quoted by his ministry.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later said Israel would persevere.
“We will continue until the end. There is no question at all. I say this in light of great pain, but also in light of international pressure. Nothing will stop us. We are going until the end, until victory, nothing less than that,” he said in a video statement.
Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, will travel to Israel on Thursday to meet Netanyahu, who has said there is “disagreement” with Washington over how a post-conflict Gaza would be governed.
Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh on Wednesday said that any plan for post-war Gaza that does not involve the Palestinian militant group “or the resistance factions is a delusion.”
Tuesday’s UN vote came as Philippe Lazzarini, head of its Palestinian refugee agency, said Gazans were “running out of time and options.”
The United States and Britain announced a new round of sanctions against Hamas over the October 7 attack, targeting “key officials who perpetuate Hamas’s violent agenda.”
Gaza’s hospital system is in ruins, and Hamas authorities said vaccines for children had run out, warning of “catastrophic health repercussions.”
The World Bank in a new analysis warned that “the loss of life, speed and extent of damages... are unparallelled.”
The Hamas-controlled health ministry said Israeli forces opened fire on wards of Kamal Adwan hospital in north Gaza, raising fears for the safety of 12 children in paediatric care.
The army has yet to comment, but Israel has repeatedly accused Hamas of using hospitals, schools, mosques and vast tunnel systems beneath them as military bases — claims the group has denied.
Fears of the conflict broadening continued, with daily exchanges of fire along Israel’s border with Lebanon, where Hezbollah is based, and other Iran-backed groups targeting US and allied forces in Iraq and Syria.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog warned Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels had “crossed a red line,” after repeatedly launching missiles and drones toward Israel and cargo ships in the Red Sea.
Israel to pursue Gaza war ‘with or without international support’
https://arab.news/5tk2z
Israel to pursue Gaza war ‘with or without international support’
- Israeli attacks have left Gaza in ruins, killing more than 18,600 people, mostly women and children
- Benjamin Netanyahu: ‘Nothing will stop us. We are going until the end, until victory, nothing less than that’
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
- 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.
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.”
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.”
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.
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.
“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.
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.
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.
Germany pushing for EU to relax sanctions on Syria, sources say
- This requires an unanimous EU decision
- Germany’s foreign ministry declined to comment
BERLIN: Germany is leading European Union discussions on easing sanctions imposed on the Syrian government of toppled President Bashar Assad and aiding the country’s population, foreign ministry sources said on Tuesday.
“We are actively discussing ways to provide sanctions relief to the Syrian people in certain sectors,” one of the sources said. This requires an unanimous EU decision.
Germany’s foreign ministry declined to comment.
A lightning rebel offensive overthrew Assad on Dec. 8 and Islamist rebels Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), which led the advance, set up a caretaker government.
The US on Monday issued a six-month sanctions exemption for transactions with some government bodies to ease the flow of humanitarian assistance, address Syria’s power shortages and allow personal remittances.
The EU, United States, Britain and other governments imposed tough sanctions on Syria after Assad’s crackdown on pro-democracy protests in 2011 spiraled into civil war.
HTS has renounced its ties with Al Qaeda but is still designated a terrorist entity by the United Nations and US
German officials first circulated thoughts on easing sanctions on Syria in documents sent to Brussels before Christmas.
The FT first reported on Tuesday that the documents outline how the EU could gradually ease restrictions on Damascus in return for progress on social issues, including safeguarding minority and women’s rights and upholding commitments to ensuring non-proliferation of weapons.
The FT, citing an unnamed source familiar with the EU discussions, added that, like Washington, the bloc could make any easing of sanctions temporary to ensure that it could be reversed if necessary.
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock on Friday traveled to Syria for a one-day trip with her French counterpart on behalf of the EU and met with HTS leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa.
Baerbock said during her visit that all Syrian groups including women and Kurds must be involved in the country’s transition if Damascus wants European support.
Algeria slams French ‘interference’ over jailing of writer
- The Algerian foreign ministry said Macron “unduly and falsely” presented Sansal’s detention “as a matter of freedom of expression, which it isn’t in the eyes of the law of a sovereign and independent state”
ALGIERS: Algeria accused France on Tuesday of “unacceptable and blatant interference” after President Emmanuel Macron said Algiers was “dishonoring itself” by keeping French-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal behind bars on national security charges.
Sansal, a literary figure who has been critical of the Algerian authorities, was arrested at Algiers airport in November and has been kept in custody despite calls from Paris for his release.
In its response, the Algerian foreign ministry said Macron’s comments “can only be rejected and condemned for they are blatant and unacceptable interference in an internal Algerian affair.”
Sansal’s arrest came amid growing tensions between France and Algeria over a range of issues.
“Algeria, which we love so much and with which we share so many children and so many stories, is dishonoring itself by preventing a seriously ill man from receiving treatment,” Macron said in a speech on Monday.
He described the 75-year-old, who acquired French citizenship last year, as a “freedom fighter.”
The Algerian foreign ministry said Macron “unduly and falsely” presented Sansal’s detention “as a matter of freedom of expression, which it isn’t in the eyes of the law of a sovereign and independent state.”
“It essentially stems from challenging the territorial integrity of the country, an offense punishable by Algerian law,” it added.
According to Paris newspaper Le Monde, Sansal’s arrest was linked to statements to a far-right French media outlet in which he repeated Morocco’s claim that its territory was truncated in favor of Algeria under French colonial rule.
In a speech in late December, Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune called him an “imposter” sent by France to make such claims.
Sansal is known for his strong stances against both authoritarianism and Islamism, as well as being a forthright campaigner on freedom of expression issues.
In 2015, he won the Grand Prix du Roman of the French Academy for his book “2084: The End of the World,” a dystopian novel set in an Islamist totalitarian world in the aftermath of a nuclear holocaust.
Algeria had already withdrawn its ambassador over the summer after the French government supported a Moroccan offer of autonomy for the disputed Western Sahara in place of the self-determination referendum stipulated by a 1991 UN Security Council resolution.
Orthodox Christians mark a somber Christmas in Gaza
- In the courtyard of the church, which was partially destroyed in an Israeli airstrike in October 2023, the destruction that has devastated much of Gaza is clear in the surrounding bombed-out buildings
GAZA CITY: Orthodox Christians marked a somber Christmas on Tuesday in the war-torn Gaza Strip, with worshippers saying there would be no gifts for children and no joy during this year’s holiday.
In the richly decorated Church of Saint Porphyrius in the heart of Gaza City, as fighting raged across the Palestinian territory, around a dozen members of the Orthodox Christian community gathered for the annual morning service.
Sitting in the wooden pews, older men and women joined Archbishop Alexios of Tiberias in lighting candles and praying for friends and family and for an end to the now 15-month-old war.
Around 1,100 Christians from various denominations remain in Gaza amid the fighting, sparked by militant Palestinian group Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel.
“Holidays are limited to prayers only, with no gifts for children, no joy or any signs of joy for children on this holiday,” Ramez Al-Suri told AFP.
“We hope and ask all countries to help bring a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.”
“We have been at war for 15 months and we in the Christian community always ask for peace and all our prayers are for love and peace for all and for the war to end as soon as possible,”
he said.
In the courtyard of the church, which was partially destroyed in an Israeli airstrike in October 2023, the destruction that has devastated much of Gaza is
clear in the surrounding bombed-out buildings.
Standing outside the church, Fuad Ayyad said “we wake up every minute to bombing, massacres, genocide or the martyrdom of a citizen.”
In the 2023 strike that hit the church, 18 Palestinian Christians were killed, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-run territory.
“Today we welcome the holiday with joy, but a diminished joy as Christians,” Ayyad said, adding, “sadness remains present and dominant within the Western and Eastern churches and within the Palestinian community whether Muslim or Christian.”
On Dec. 25, when the Catholic and other churches celebrated Christmas, Pope Francis called in his annual address for “arms to be silenced” around the world and appealed for peace in the Middle East, Ukraine and Sudan.
He also denounced the “extremely grave” humanitarian situation in Gaza.
The Hamas attack of October 7, 2023, resulted in the deaths of 1,208 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official Israeli data.
Since then, Israel’s military offensive has killed 45,885 people in Gaza, a majority of them civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry that the United Nations considers reliable.
