Israeli troops kill 4 Palestinians in West Bank refugee camp — ministry

Palestinians check a burnt car in the village of Al-Fara in the occupied West Bank following an earlier Israeli raid on Dec. 8, 2023. (AFP)
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Updated 18 December 2023
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Israeli troops kill 4 Palestinians in West Bank refugee camp — ministry

  • 301 Palestinians have now been killed by Israeli forces or settlers in the West Bank since the war in Gaza erupted
  • Violence in the West Bank, occupied by Israel since 1967, has flared since the outbreak of the war in Gaza

AL-FARA REFUGEE CAMP, Palestinian Territories: Israeli forces shot dead four Palestinians in a West Bank refugee camp Monday, the Palestinian health ministry said, taking the toll in the occupied territory to over 300 during the Gaza war.
Mohammad Samir Milhem, 17, his brother Hikmat, 24, and Yazan Khatib, 20, were shot in the head by Israeli troops in the Al-Fara camp near Tubas, the ministry said. Rashed Habib Al-Aydi, 17, was shot in the chest.
Health officials say 301 Palestinians have now been killed by Israeli forces or settlers in the West Bank since the war in Gaza erupted with the attack by Hamas on October 7.
The Israeli army did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Earlier this month Israeli forces shot dead at least six Palestinians including a 14-year-old boy in a raid on the refugee camp, the health ministry said. The army confirmed at that time it had conducted a “counter-terrorism” operation.
In a separate incident on Monday, a 27-year-old woman was wounded in “a shooting toward a car” north of Ramallah, the Magen David Adom emergency medical services said.
She had been traveling with a man and one-month-old baby, who were not injured, near the Ateret settlement and was taken to hospital “in a moderate condition.”
Violence in the West Bank, occupied by Israel since 1967, has flared since the outbreak of the war in Gaza.
The deadliest ever Gaza war began with unprecedented attacks by Hamas on October 7, when the group killed 1,139 people, mostly civilians, and abducted around 250, according to an AFP tally based on updated Israeli figures.
The health ministry in the Hamas-run territory says Israel’s retaliatory assault in Gaza has killed more than 18,800 people, mostly women and children.


Gaza rescuers say 3 aid workers killed in Israel strike

Updated 35 min 41 sec ago
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Gaza rescuers say 3 aid workers killed in Israel strike

  • The agency said the aid workers killed were Palestinian employees of World Central Kitchen
  • The US aid group did not immediately respond to AFP requests for comment

GAZA: Gaza’s civil defense agency said three aid workers were killed in an Israeli air strike in the Hamas-run territory on Saturday but the Israeli army said it killed a “terrorist.”
The agency said the aid workers killed were Palestinian employees of World Central Kitchen. The US aid group did not immediately respond to AFP requests for comment.
The Israeli army said it had “struck a vehicle with a terrorist that took part in the murderous October 7 massacre,” referring to militant group Hamas’s unprecedented attack on Israel last year.
“The claim that the terrorist was simultaneously a WCK worker is being examined,” it added in a statement.
Civil defense agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said the bodies of “at least five dead were transported (to hospital), including (those of) the three employees of World Central Kitchen.”
“All three men worked for WCK and they were hit while driving in a WCK jeep in Khan Yunis,” Bassal said, adding that the vehicle had been “marked with its logo clearly visible.”
The Israeli army insisted its strike in the main southern city hit “a civilian unmarked vehicle and its movement on the route was not coordinated for transporting of aid.”
In April, an Israeli air strike killed seven WCK staff — an Australian, three Britons, a North American, a Palestinian and a Pole.
Israel said it had been targeting a “Hamas gunman” in that strike but the military admitted a series of “grave mistakes” and violations of its own rules of engagement.
The October 2023 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,207 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory military offensive has killed 44,382 people in Gaza, according to figures from the territory’s health ministry which the United Nations considers reliable.


Several wounded in two Israeli strikes in south Lebanon, health ministry says

Updated 47 min 56 sec ago
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Several wounded in two Israeli strikes in south Lebanon, health ministry says

  • Later on Saturday, another person was injured in a separate Israeli strike on Al Bisariya
  • The Israeli military said it had attacked a Hezbollah facility

CAIRO: An Israeli strike on a car wounded three people, including a seven-year-old child, on Saturday in the south Lebanon village of Majdal Zoun, the Lebanese Health Ministry said in a statement.
Later on Saturday, another person was injured in a separate Israeli strike on Al Bisariya, which lies near the southern Lebanese city of Sidon, the ministry said.
The Israeli military said it had attacked a Hezbollah facility in Sidon that housed rocket launchers for the armed group.
It added that it had also hit a vehicle in southern Lebanon loaded with rocket-propelled grenades, ammunition and military equipment as part of its actions against ceasefire violations.
A truce came into effect on Wednesday, but both sides have accused each other of breaching a ceasefire that aims to halt over a year of fighting.


West faces ‘reckoning’ over Middle East radicalization: UK spy chief

Updated 30 November 2024
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West faces ‘reckoning’ over Middle East radicalization: UK spy chief

  • MI6 head Richard Moore cites ‘terrible loss of innocent life’
  • ‘In 37 years in the intelligence profession, I’ve never seen the world in a more dangerous state’

LONDON: The West has “yet to have a full reckoning with the radicalizing impact of the fighting, the terrible loss of innocent life in the Middle East and the horrors of Oct. 7,” the head of Britain’s foreign intelligence service MI6 has warned.

Richard Moore made the comments in a speech delivered to the British Embassy in Paris, and was joined by his French counterpart Nicolas Lerner.

Moore said: “In 37 years in the intelligence profession, I’ve never seen the world in a more dangerous state. And the impact on Europe, our shared European home, could hardly be more serious.”

Daesh is expanding its reach and staging deadly attacks in Iran and Russia despite suffering significant territorial setbacks, he added, warning that “the menace of terrorism has not gone away.”

In October last year, Ken McCallum, the head of Britain’s domestic intelligence service MI5, said his agency was monitoring for increased terror risks in the UK due to the Gaza war. More than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza in over a year of fighting.

In Lebanon, a 60-day truce agreed this week between Hezbollah and Israel brought an end to a conflict that has killed thousands of Lebanese civilians.


Israel military strikes kill 32 Palestinians in Gaza, medics say

Updated 30 November 2024
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Israel military strikes kill 32 Palestinians in Gaza, medics say

  • Among the 32 killed, at least seven died in an Israeli strike on a house in central Gaza City

The Israeli military said it killed a Palestinian it accused of involvement in Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel in a vehicle strike in Gaza, and is investigating claims that the individual was an employee of aid group World Central Kitchen.
At least 32 Palestinians were killed in Israeli military strikes across Gaza overnight and into Saturday, with most casualties reported in northern areas, medics told Reuters.
Later on Saturday medics said seven people were killed when an Israeli air strike targeted a vehicle near a gathering of Palestinians receiving aid in the southern area of Khan Younis south of the enclave.
According to residents and a Hamas source, the vehicle targeted near a crowd receiving flour belonged to security personnel responsible for overseeing the delivery of aid shipments into Gaza.
Among the 32 killed, at least seven died in an Israeli strike on a house in central Gaza City, according to a statement from the Gaza Civil Defense and the official Palestinian news agency WAFA early on Saturday.
The Gaza Civil Defense also reported that one of its officers was killed in attacks in northern Gaza’s Jabalia, bringing the total number of civil defense workers killed since October 7, 2023, to 88.
Earlier on Saturday, WAFA reported that three employees of the World Central Kitchen, a US-based, non-governmental humanitarian agency, were killed when a civilian vehicle was targeted in Khan Younis, southern Gaza.
The World Central Kitchen has not yet commented on the incident.


Syria’s military ‘temporarily’ withdraws from Aleppo to prepare for counteroffensive

Updated 25 min 33 sec ago
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Syria’s military ‘temporarily’ withdraws from Aleppo to prepare for counteroffensive

  • Syrian military confirms militants enter Aleppo, says dozens of soldiers killed

AMMAN: The Syrian military said on Saturday that dozens of its troops had been killed during a militant attack in northwestern Syria and that militants had managed to enter large parts of Aleppo city, forcing the army to redeploy.

The Syrian military statement was the first public acknowledgement by the army that insurgents led by the Islamist Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham had entered the government-held city of Aleppo in a surprise attack that began earlier this week.

“The large numbers of terrorists and the multiplicity of battlefronts prompted our armed forces to carry out a redeployment operation aimed at strengthening the defense lines in order to absorb the attack, preserve the lives of civilians and soldiers, and prepare for a counterattack,” the army said.

The insurgent attack marks the most significant challenge in years to President Bashar Assad, jolting the frontlines of the Syrian civil war that have largely been frozen since 2020.

The Syrian military statement said that the insurgents had not been able to establish fixed positions in Aleppo city due to the army’s continued bombardment of their positions.

Two Syrian military sources said earlier that Russian and Syrian warplanes targeted insurgents in an Aleppo suburb on Saturday. Russia deployed its air force to Syria in 2015 to aid Assad in the Syrian civil war, which began in 2011.

The insurgent force began its surprise offensive earlier this week, sweeping through government-held towns and reaching Aleppo nearly a decade after government forces backed by Russia and Iran drove militants from the city.

Speaking on Friday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Moscow regarded the militant attack as a violation of Syria’s sovereignty. “We are in favor of the Syrian authorities bringing order to the area and restoring constitutional order as soon as possible,” he said.