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October 7, 2023: Israel begins bombarding Gaza in retaliation to Hamas attacks
Israel resumes massive attacks on March 18, killing over 400 in a day — two months after ceasefire ending 15 months of relentless attacks began
Future governance of Gaza remains unclear as Trump suggests US takeover but Arab countries propose alternative plan, which UK, others back
Hamas and Israel exchange 25 hostages, bodies and 1,700 detainees in seven swaps
Over 50,000 Palestinians, 400 Israeli soldiers dead; nearly all of Gaza displaced
Multi-billion dollar challenges ahead to reconstruct decimated enclave
In its latest death toll update, the Gaza Ministry of Health says that in addition to the 44 deaths, there have been 145 injuries in the past 24 hours, Al Jazeera reports.
“There are still a number of victims under the rubble and on the streets, and ambulance and civil defence crews cannot reach them”, it said.
“The death toll from the Israeli aggression has risen to 51,201 martyrs and 116,869 wounded since October 7, 2023”, it said, adding that since Israel resumed new offensive on March 18, 1,827 people have been killed and 4,828 injured.
Pope Francis has reiterated his call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza in an Easter Sunday message read aloud by an aide as the pontiff, still recovering from pneumonia, looked on during a brief appearance on the main balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica, Reuters reports.
The 88-year-old pope, limiting his workload on doctors’ orders, did not preside over the Vatican’s Mass for Easter but appeared at the end of the event for a twice-yearly blessing and message known as the ‘Urbi et Orbi’ (to the city and the world).
In the Easter message, the pontiff said the situation in Gaza was “dramatic and deplorable”. The pope also called on Hamas to release its remaining hostages and condemned what he said was a “worrisome” trend of antisemitism in the world.
“I express my closeness to the sufferings … of all the Israeli people and the Palestinian people,” said the message. “I appeal to the warring parties: call a ceasefire, release the hostages and come to the aid of a starving people that aspires to a future of peace,” it said.
The Wafa news agency reports that Israeli forces launched a drone attack on farmers in the southern town of Abasan, near Khan Younis, killing at least two people and wounding several more.
Israeli forces also carried out air raids on Gaza City, targeting a group of civilians in Zeitoun neighbourhood and killing at least two people.
A separate Israeli attack on Gaza City’s Shujayea neighbourhood killed at least two more people.
Wafa also provided more details on the person killed in al-Mawasi. It identified the victim as 23-year-old Waseem Abu Mousa.
The renewed attacks come as Netanyahu ordered the Israeli military to intensify the war on Gaza.
Medical sources say Israeli attacks since the early hours of this morning have killed at least 19 people, Al Jazeera reports.
These include at least five people killed in Gaza City’s Tuffah neighbourhood and two others killed in Khan Younis’s al-Manara neighbourhood.
Qatar’s chief negotiator has voiced frustration over talks for a truce in Gaza in an interview with AFP, a month after Israel resumed its strikes on the Palestinian territory and another round of negotiations ended without a deal.
“We’re definitely frustrated by the slowness, sometimes, of the process in the negotiation. This is an urgent matter. There are lives at stake here if this military operation continues day by day,” Mohammed Al-Khulaifi said on Friday.
“We’ve been working continuously in the last days to try to bring the parties together and revive the agreement that has been endorsed by the two sides,” the Qatari minister of state said.
“And we will remain committed to this, in spite of the difficulties,” he added.
“Critiques without any context, such as the ones that we keep hearing from Netanyahu himself, are often just noise,” he added.
Al-Khulaifi rejected recent remarks from Netanyahu to the US-based evangelical Christian channel Daystar that Qatar had promoted “anti-Americanism and anti-Zionism” on US college campuses.
Israeli soldiers have forcibly removed a Palestinian family from their home in the town of Turmus Aya in the occupied West Bank and converted the property into a military outpost, Al Jazeera reports, citing the Wafa news agency.
The Palestinian news agency, citing local sources, said the move comes just three days after Israeli forces created a new outpost on land belonging to the town located in the Ramallah and el-Bireh governorates.
The Hind Rajab Foundation (HRF) has urged the US Department of Justice and Homeland Security Investigations to arrest and prosecute Israeli soldier Yuval Shatel for “war crimes” committed in the Gaza Strip, Al Jazeera reports.
The HRF said the soldier, who was last seen in the southern state of Texas, served as a sergeant in the Givati Brigade of the Israeli military.
During his deployment in Gaza, he “allegedly took part in the deliberate destruction of civilian homes, schools, and places of worship—acts prohibited by both U.S. and international law”, it said.
“Publicly posted videos from Shatel’s own Instagram account show him detonating an apartment block in Khan Younis and celebrating its destruction. Other footage shows him involved in the demolition of the Tiberias Primary School and the Hassan al-Banna Mosque—both protected civilian structures with no military use,” it said.
The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has warned about the worsening humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip, stating that nearly two million people — most of whom are displaced—are currently living without any source of income, and are completely reliant on humanitarian aid to meet their basic food needs, Wafa reports.
In a series of statements released over the past few hours, the WFP raised alarm over an increasing danger to hundreds of thousands of Gaza’s population. The programme expressed grave concern over the sharp decline in food stocks, warning that the region is on the brink of a potential humanitarian catastrophe.
The WFP emphasised that this critical situation is compounded by Israel’s ongoing closure of the border crossings, which is preventing the delivery of vital food supplies to the besieged enclave. According to the agency, Gaza urgently needs an uninterrupted and continuous flow of food to avoid a complete collapse of food security in the region.
“Al-Mawasi was among the areas targeted by the latest Israeli strikes, which have killed more than 50 people on Saturday,” Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary reports from Deir el-Balah, Gaza.
“What we need to know about al-Mawasi is that it is considered an international humanitarian zone. It is also a zone where Palestinians have been ordered by Israeli forces to evacuate.
“Al-Mawasi is a very big evacuation area with barely any humanitarian facilities. Many people who fled Rafah and Khan Younis in the south are also squeezed into al-Mawasi camp,” she said.
“Since the Israeli war resumed on March 18, there have been continuing strikes on tents in the camp. We also have to take note that al-Mawasi is not the only camp being targeted,” Khoudary said.
“UNRWA schools and other shelters are also being targeted.”
The Israeli military says Hamas fighters have killed a 35-year-old Israeli soldier and wounded five others in the north of the Gaza Strip on Saturday, Al Jazeera reports.
The Times of Israel said the tracker in the Northern Brigade was the first to be killed in the enclave since Israel resumed its attacks on Gaza on March 18.
It added that three of the five wounded were in serious condition.
The father of a US-Israeli hostage held in Gaza said on Saturday he remains hopeful his 21-year-old son was still alive after Hamas said it could not account for his status, Reuters reports.
Adi Alexander, whose son Edan was serving in the Israeli army when he was captured on October 7, 2023, called on the United States to engage in direct talks to free the remaining hostages dead and alive abducted during the deadly attack launched by Hamas two years ago in southern Israel.
“I think we should engage back with them directly and see what can be done in regards to my son, four American dead hostages and everybody else,” the father said in an interview on Saturday.
“It seems like the negotiations are stalled, everything is stuck and we are kind of back to a year ago,” he added. “It’s really concerning.”
Hamas recently released an undated video, purportedly of Edan.
His father Adi said, “He looked very scary to us – just a horrible, horrible video.”
Ilana Gritzewsky has told demonstrators in Tel Aviv that Netanyahu’s government is choosing “to turn its back” on the remaining Israelis held by Hamas in Gaza, “instead of stopping everything and bringing them home”, Al Jazeera reports.
“How can this be? How can a state founded in the wake of the Holocaust forget its sons and daughters who are being held in holocaust conditions?” she asked.
Gritzewsky and her partner, Matan Zangauker, were taken by Hamas from their home in Kibbutz Nir Oz during the October 7, 2023, assault. She was among those released during a weeklong Gaza truce in November, while Zangauker remains in captivity.
She also recalled that during her captivity, she was hurt “physically, emotionally, psychologically, sexually — until I reached the depth of fear and humiliation”.
Mahmoud Basal has told AFP that the toll could climb.
“Fifty-four people have been killed in Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip since dawn… and the number is likely to rise as the bombing continues until this moment,” he said.
Al Jazeera Arabic reports that the bodies were recovered from a residential building west of the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.
Several others were also wounded.
The attack comes after a day of bombings that killed at least 52 people across Gaza.
The far-right finance minister has hailed Netanyahu’s pledge to continue the war on Gaza.
“Netanyahu’s statement that the war must end in victory means that the style of warfare must be changed and the approach must be to occupy the entire Gaza,” Bezalel Smotrich said in a statement on X.
“We must not be afraid of establishing military administration in Gaza if necessary and destroying Hamas to ensure that Gaza does not pose a threat to our country. This is the way to ensure security and this is the way to return the kidnapped quickly,” he added.
The UN’s humanitarian agency (OCHA) says Israel’s military has designated some 69 percent of Gaza’s land area as “no-go” zones or displacement zones.
“In Gaza, space for people is shrinking by the day,” the agency said in a post on X.
“Vast areas have been taken over. Hundreds of thousands are being pushed into renewed displacement,” it said.
Attempts by aid organisations to reach the affected people have also been denied, it added.
Hospitals across Gaza are struggling to treat newborns and young children due to a severe shortage of medical equipment, Al Jazeera reports citing Unicef.
“Humanitarian aid must be allowed to enter Gaza again,” it said in a post on X, adding that the ceasefire in Gaza must be reinstated. “The survival of children depends on it.”
The Israeli military announced that a soldier was killed in the fighting in Gaza, the first Israeli fatality since a ceasefire with Hamas collapsed in mid-March, AFP reports.
The military said Sergeant Major Ghaleb Sliman Al-Nasasra, 35, fell during combat in northern Gaza, adding that three others were also wounded.
Two of the wounded were female soldiers, the military said.
Nearly 140,000 Israelis have signed petitions to demand the return of captives and end the conflict, as pressure grows on Netanyahu following a week of letters from sections of the military, the intelligence agency and academics calling for the captives to be prioritised, Al Jazeera reports.
While Netanyahu threatened to dismiss soldiers who spoke out against the offensive last week, more active and former military personnel are joining the initiative.
According to the latest data from the movement, which is coordinated through the website Restored Israel, the majority of signatories, 127,255, are civilians, and 11,179 are military figures.
Several key former military leaders have also signed the petitions, including former prime minister and chief of general staff Ehud Barak, former chief of staff Dan Halutz, and former military intelligence chief Amos Malka.
Israeli forces are shooting inside the Nur Shams refugee camp, which has been subjected to a military campaign for weeks, sources tell Al Jazeera, adding that an explosion has been heard inside the camp, located east of Tulkarem in the occupied West Bank.
The latest attack comes after at least eight Palestinians were arrested by Israeli forces in the Fawwar refugee camp, south of Hebron, according to the Wafa news agency.
At the same time, settler attacks have been reported in the Palestinian communities of Khirbet ad-Dir in the northern Jordan Valley and the Bedouin village of Ras Ein al-Auja, north of Jericho.
Al Jazeera has spoken to Palestinian Christian pastor and theologian, Reverend Munther Isaac, who lamented the fact that this is the second year in which Christians in the occupied West Bank “mark Easter in the shadow of the genocide unfolding in Gaza”.
“There is clearly an atmosphere of frustration and anger, even fear, that characterises our celebrations this year,” he said. “It’s really hard to fathom the idea that we’re still saying the same things about the need for a ceasefire, for this genocide to stop.”
However, he said there is also a sense of “defiance and resilience, whether it’s the faithful in Gaza insisting on holding prayers despite the risk, or the faithful here (in occupied East Jerusalem), who are celebrating in prayer, defiance and hope”.
He added that it is the duty of people to speak up, adding, “I think the silence of many people of faith around the world, including many church leaders … is too loud.”
The head of Turkish intelligence has held discussions with a Hamas delegation to look at options to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza amidst the ongoing crisis triggered by the Israeli blockade, Al Jazeera reports.
Anadolu news agency reported that National Intelligence Organisation chief Ibrahim Kalin met Muhammad Darwish, the head of Hamas’s Shura Council, and his delegation.
The pair also reviewed the current state of initiatives aimed at halting Israel’s offensive on Gaza and achieving a permanent, comprehensive ceasefire.
Medical sources in Gaza have told Al Jazeera that at least 52 people have been killed in Israeli attacks across the enclave today.
In the latest attack, Israel opened fire on Palestinians in Beit Hanoon in the north of the Gaza Strip, killing one person and wounding others.
Palestinian news outlet Al-Aqsa TV is reporting that one Palestinian was killed and two were wounded by an Israeli air strike targeting a shelter for displaced people in Al-Mawasi area, west of Khan Younis, Al Jazeera reports.
A spokesperson for Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s military wing, says the fate of the Israeli-American captive, Edan Alexander, is unknown after they found the body of the guard looking after the captive, Al Jazeera reports.
“We are trying to protect all prisoners and preserve their lives despite the brutality of the aggression. The lives of prisoners are in danger due to the criminal bombing operations carried out by the enemy army,” Abu Obeida said.
He added that Israeli forces “lie” that Hamas are treating the captives inhumanely and “fabricate false testimonies” from former captives to cover up Israel’s continued attacks on Gaza that hinder the safety of Israelis being held in the enclave.
