Israeli troops capture around 100 Hamas militants in north Gaza hospital, military says

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza accused Israeli forces of storming the last functioning hospital in the territory's north in a raid it said left two children dead, while the military said it was unaware of live fire or strikes in the area. (File/AFP)
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Updated 28 October 2024
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Israeli troops capture around 100 Hamas militants in north Gaza hospital, military says

  • Gaza health officials have denied any militant presence at the hospital
  • Medical staffers refused to evacuate the hospital or leave their patients unattended

JERUSALEM: Israeli soldiers captured around 100 suspected Hamas militants during a raid in Kamal Adwan hospital in northern Gaza, the military said on Monday.
Gaza health officials and Hamas have denied any militant presence at the hospital, which Israeli forces stormed on Friday and left on Saturday.
“The soldiers apprehended approximately 100 terrorists from the compound, including terrorists who attempted to escape during the evacuation of civilians. Inside the hospital, they found weapons, terror funds, and intelligence documents,” the military said.
Gaza’s health ministry said the troops had detained dozens of male medical staffers and damaged the hospital, which had already been struggling to operate with heavy Israeli raids in the area.
“A few of the fully identified terrorists disguised themselves as medical staff so we didn’t have any alternative but to check the medical staff as well,” a military official told journalists in an online briefing.
Footage circulated by Gaza’s health ministry on Saturday — which Reuters could not immediately verify — showed damage to several buildings after the Israeli forces withdrew.
The military official said that troops had caused limited damage to the hospital when entering it and that soldiers also had to destroy what he described as “dual use” equipment, like oxygen tanks, which if detonated could have harmed anyone at the complex.
Medical staffers refused to evacuate the hospital or leave their patients unattended. Hundreds of displaced Palestinians had also been sheltering there.
“They evacuated all those who were sheltering here...They separated men from women and made two queues, it was very humiliating for our men since they took them without clothes and nothing to cover with,” said Mayssoun Alian, a hospital nurse.
The military official said that suspected Hamas men arrested were stripped to check them for weapons. “After checking them we supplied them with clothes,” he said.
Gaza medics said at least two children had died inside the intensive care unit after Israeli fire hit the generators and oxygen station in the facility on Friday.
The military said civilians at the hospital were kept safe, despite heavy fighting near the complex. Fuel, medical equipment and blood units had been provided to the hospital and electricity and oxygen supply had been ensured, it said.


Turkiye man kills seven before taking his own life

Updated 25 November 2024
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Turkiye man kills seven before taking his own life

Istanbul: A 33-year-old Turkish man shot dead seven people in Istanbul on Sunday, including his parents, his wife and his 10-year-old son, before taking his own life, the authorities reported on Monday.
The man, who was found dead in his car shortly after the shooting, is also accused of wounding two other family members, one of them seriously, the Istanbul governor’s office said in a statement.
The authorities, who had put the death toll at four on Sunday evening, announced on Monday the discovery near a lake on Istanbul’s European shore of the bodies of the killer’s wife and son, as well as the lifeless body of his mother-in-law.
According to the Small Arms Survey (SAS), a Swiss research program, over 13.2 million firearms are in circulation in Turkiye, most of them illegally, for a population of around 85 million.


2 Palestinians killed in Israeli raid in West Bank: PA

Updated 25 November 2024
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2 Palestinians killed in Israeli raid in West Bank: PA

  • The official Palestinian news agency Wafa said Israeli forces entered the village on Sunday night

Yabad: The Palestinian Authority said two Palestinians, including a teenage boy, were killed during an Israeli raid in the occupied West Bank village of Yabad.
The official Palestinian news agency Wafa said Israeli forces entered the village on Sunday night, leading to clashes during which soldiers shot dead two Palestinians.
The two dead were identified by the Palestinian health ministry as Muhammad Rabie Hamarsheh, 13, and Ahmad Mahmud Zaid, 20.
“Overnight, during an IDF (Israeli army) counterterrorism activity in the area of Yabad, two terrorists hurled explosives at IDF soldiers. The soldiers responded with fire and hits were identified,” an Israeli military source told AFP.
Last week, the Israeli army launched several raids in the West Bank city of Jenin, killing nine people, most of them Palestinian militants.
Violence in the West Bank has soared since the war in Gaza erupted on October 7 last year after Hamas’s attack on Israel.
Israeli troops or settlers have killed at least 777 Palestinians in the West Bank since the start of the Gaza war, according to the Ramallah-based health ministry.
Palestinian attacks on Israelis have also killed at least 24 people in the West Bank in the same period, according to Israeli official figures.
Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967.


Israel says hit Hezbollah command center in deadly weekend strike

Updated 25 November 2024
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Israel says hit Hezbollah command center in deadly weekend strike

  • The strike hit a residential building in the heart of Beirut before dawn Saturday
  • Since September 23, Israel has intensified its Lebanon air campaign

JERUSALEM: The Israeli army on Monday said it had struck a Hezbollah command center in the downtown Beirut neighborhood of Basta in a deadly air strike at the weekend.
“The IDF (Israeli military) struck a Hezbollah command center,” the army said regarding the strike that the Lebanese health ministry said killed 29 people and wounded 67 on Saturday.
The strike hit a residential building in the heart of Beirut before dawn Saturday, leaving a large crater, AFP journalists at the scene reported.
A senior Lebanese security source said that “a high-ranking Hezbollah officer was targeted” in the strike, without confirming whether or not the official had been killed.
Hezbollah official Amin Cherri said no leader of the Lebanese movement was targeted in Basta.
Since September 23, Israel has intensified its Lebanon air campaign, later sending in ground troops against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.
The war followed nearly a year of limited exchanges of fire initiated by Hezbollah in support of its ally Hamas after the Palestinian group’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which sparked the Gaza war.
The conflict has killed at least 3,754 people in Lebanon since October 2023, according to the health ministry, most of them since September this year.
On the Israeli side, authorities say at least 82 soldiers and 47 civilians have been killed.


HRW says Israel strike that killed 3 Lebanon journalists ‘apparent war crime’

Updated 25 November 2024
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HRW says Israel strike that killed 3 Lebanon journalists ‘apparent war crime’

BEIRUT: Human Rights Watch said on Monday an Israeli air strike that killed three journalists in Lebanon last month was an “apparent war crime” and used a bomb equipped with a US-made guidance kit.
The October 25 strike hit a tourism complex in the Druze-majority south Lebanon town of Hasbaya where more than a dozen journalists working for Lebanese and Arab media outlets were sleeping.
The Israeli army has said it targeted Hezbollah militants and that the strike was “under review.”
HRW said the strike, relatively far from the Israel-Hezbollah war’s main flashpoints, “was most likely a deliberate attack on civilians and an apparent war crime.”
“Information Human Rights Watch reviewed indicates that the Israeli military knew or should have known that journalists were staying in the area and in the targeted building,” the watchdog said in a statement.
HRW “found no evidence of fighting, military forces, or military activity in the immediate area at the time of the attack,” it added.
The strike killed cameraman Ghassan Najjar and broadcast engineer Mohammad Reda from pro-Iran, Beirut-based broadcaster Al-Mayadeen and video journalist Wissam Qassem from Hezbollah’s Al-Manar television.
The watchdog said it verified images of Najjar’s casket wrapped in a Hezbollah flag and buried in a cemetery alongside fighters from the militant group.
But a spokesperson for the militant group said he “had no involvement whatsoever in any military activities.”
HRW said the bomb dropped by Israeli forces was equipped with a United States-produced Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) guidance kit.
The JDAM is “affixed to air-dropped bombs and allows them to be guided to a target by using satellite coordinates,” the statement said.
It said remnants from the site were consistent with a JDAM kit “assembled and sold by the US company Boeing.”
One remnant “bore a numerical code identifying it as having been manufactured by Woodard, a US company that makes components for guidance systems on munitions,” it added.
The watchdog said it contacted Boeing and Woodard but received no response.
In October last year, Reuters journalist Issam Abdallah was killed by Israeli shellfire while he was covering southern Lebanon, and six other journalists were wounded, including AFP’s Dylan Collins and Christina Assi, who had to have her right leg amputated.
In November last year, Israeli bombardment killed Al-Mayadeen correspondent Farah Omar and cameraman Rabih Maamari, the channel said.
Lebanese rights groups have said five more journalists and photographers working for local media have been killed in Israeli strikes on the country’s south and Beirut’s southern suburbs.


Officials in Egypt say over a dozen people are missing after a tourist vessel sank in the Red Sea

Updated 38 min 36 sec ago
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Officials in Egypt say over a dozen people are missing after a tourist vessel sank in the Red Sea

CAIRO: Egypt's governor of the Red Sea region said Monday afternoon that authorities are searching for 17 people who went missing from a sinking vessel off Marsa Alam city.
Amr Hanafy said in a statement that rescuers saved 28 people from the boat, Sea Story, which was carrying 45 people, including 31 tourists of varying nationalities and 14 crew.

The tourists were on a multi-day diving trip when it went down near the coastal town of Marsa Alam, according to a statement by the Red Sea Governorate. 
Hanafi said some survivors were rescued using a helicopter and have been taken to medical care. Efforts to locate more survivors were ongoing in coordination with the Egyptian navy and army.
The governorate said a distress call was received at 5:30 a.m. (0330 GMT) and that the boat had departed from Porto Ghalib in Marsa Alam on Sunday, with plans to return to Hurghada Marina on Nov. 29.
The Red Sea is a popular diving destination renowned for its coral reefs and marine life, key to Egypt’s vital tourism industry.