IDF gunfire kills 30 Palestinians waiting for aid, Gaza defence ministry says, as US special envoy due to visit Israel
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the Middle East crisis.
Israeli gunfire killed at least 30 Palestinians waiting for humanitarian aid in northern Gaza on Wednesday, according to the Hamas-run civil defence agency.
Gaza civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that “at least 30” people were killed and 300 wounded.
The Israeli military said it had no knowledge of casualties in the incident north of Gaza City, as the United Nations said that pauses in Israel’s offensive against Hamas were not enough to help the population through a deepening hunger crisis.
The UN humanitarian agency, OCHA, said that four days into Israel’s “tactical pauses”, people were still dying from hunger and malnutrition, alongside casualties among those seeking aid.
Mohammed Abu Salmiya, director of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, said his facility had received 35 bodies from the shooting, which reportedly struck about three kilometres (two miles) southwest of the Zikim crossing point for aid trucks entering Gaza.
Amid deadlocked talks on a ceasefire, US special envoy Steve Witkoff is scheduled to visit Israel on Thursday.
Witkoff has been involved in indirect ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas. The discussions broke down last week when Israel and the US recalled their delegations from Doha.
A US official told reporters that Witkoff “will meet with officials to discuss next steps in addressing the situation in Gaza.”
His visit comes as Canada followed France and the UK when it announced plans to recognise a Palestinian state at the UN General Assembly in September.
Key events
Here are some images coming to us over the wires.
Talks on two-state solution ‘must begin now’, German foreign minister says
Germany’s foreign minister Johann Wadephul said on Thursday talks on a two-state solution “must begin now”, warning Berlin would respond to “unilateral steps”, Reuters reports.
“A negotiated two-state solution remains the only path that can offer people on both sides a life in peace, security, and dignity,” he said in a statement issued shortly before his trip on Thursday to Israel and the Palestinian territories.
“For Germany, the recognition of a Palestinian state comes more at the end of that process. But such a process must begin now.”
AFP reports that Wadephul said that the recent UN conference on a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – boycotted by the US and Israel – showed that “Israel is finding itself increasingly in the minority”.
Reuters has reported on the desperate situation in Gaza.
In a makeshift tent on a Gazan beach, three-month-old Muntaha’s grandmother grinds up chickpeas into the tiniest granules she can to form a paste to feed the infant, knowing it will cause her to cry in pain, in a desperate race to keep the baby from starving.
“If the baby could speak, she would scream at us, asking what we are putting into her stomach,” her aunt, Abir Hamouda said.
Muntaha grimaced and squirmed as her grandmother fed her the paste with a syringe.
Muntaha’s family is one of many in Gaza facing dire choices to try to feed babies, especially those below the age of six months who cannot process solid food.
Infant formula is scarce after a plummet in aid access to Gaza. Many women cannot breastfeed due to malnourishment, while other babies are separated from their mothers due to displacement, injury or, in Muntaha’s case, death.
Her family says the baby’s mother was hit by a bullet while pregnant, gave birth prematurely while unconscious in intensive care, and died a few weeks later. The director of the Shifa Hospital described such a case in a Facebook post on April 27, four days after Muntaha was born.
“I am terrified about the fate of the baby,” said her grandmother, Nemah Hamouda. “We named her after her mother…hoping she can survive and live long, but we are so afraid, we hear children and adults die every day of hunger.”
Muntaha now weighs about 3.5 kilograms, her family said, barely more than half of what a full-term baby her age would normally weigh. She suffers stomach problems like vomiting and diarrhoea after feeding.
Health officials, aid workers and Gazan families told Reuters many families are feeding infants herbs and tea boiled in water, or grinding up bread or sesame.
Humanitarian agencies also reported cases of parents boiling leaves in water, eating animal feed and grinding sand into flour.
Syrian foreign minister says he wants Russia ‘by our side’
Syrian foreign minister Asaad al-Shaibani said his country wants Russia “by our side” and called for “mutual respect” between the two nations following the overthrow of Syria’s previous Moscow-backed government last year, AFP reports.
“The current period is full of various challenges and threats, but it is also an opportunity to build a united and strong Syria. And, of course, we are interested in having Russia by our side on this path,” he told his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov during a visit to Moscow, according to a Russian translation of his comments.
Sweden calls on EU to suspend trade pact with Israel
Swedish prime minister, Ulf Kristersson, urged the European Union to suspend the trade component of the bloc’s association agreement with Israel.
In a post on social media, he said:
The situation in Gaza is utterly deplorable, and Israel is not fulfilling its most basic obligations and agreed-upon commitments regarding humanitarian aid.
Sweden therefore demands that the EU, as soon as possible, freezes the trade component of the association agreement. Economic pressure on Israel must increase. The Israeli government must allow unrestricted humanitarian aid in Gaza.
At the same time, pressure on Hamas must increase so that the hostages are released immediately and unconditionally.
Sweden welcomes the fact that more countries in the Middle East are demanding that Hamas be disarmed and not have a role in the future governance of Gaza.
You can follow developments in Europe over on our Europe Live with Jakub Krupa here.
AFP is reporting more on Lebanese President Joseph Aoun’s speech (see earlier post).
In a speech to mark Army Day Aoun said Lebanon was at “a crucial stage that does not tolerate any sort of provocation from any side”.
“For the thousandth time, I assure you that my concern in having a (state) weapons monopoly comes from my concern to defend Lebanon’s sovereignty and borders, to liberate the occupied Lebanese territories and build a state that welcomes all its citizens”, he said, addressing Hezbollah’s supporters as an “essential pillar” of society.
Israeli media are reporting that US special envoy Steve Witkoff will visit US-Israeli-backed GHF aid sites in Gaza during his trip to Israel.
It comes as at least 30 people were killed waiting for aid in northern Gaza on Wednesday.
We have more from Lebanese President Joseph Aoun (see earlier post).
He said his country was determined to disarm Hezbollah, a day after the group’s chief said those demanding its disarmament were serving Israeli goals.
Beirut is demanding “the extension of the Lebanese state’s authority over all its territory, the removal of weapons from all armed groups including Hezbollah and their handover to the Lebanese army”, Aoun said in a speech to mark Army Day, AFP reports.
In The Guardian’s Today in Focus podcast Surgeon Nick Maynard describes the unfolding famine he witnessed during his volunteering in Gaza, while our chief Middle East correspondent, Emma Graham-Harrison, analyses whether the UK’s proposed recognition of Palestine will alleviate the suffering there.
You can listen to this here:
Lebanon’s President Joseph Aoun said on Thursday that Lebanese political parties need to seize the opportunity and hand over their weapons sooner rather than later, as Washington increases pressure on Hezbollah to give up its arms.
He added that the country would seek $1 billion annually for 10 years to support the army and security forces in Lebanon, Reuters reports.
Iran on Thursday described as “malicious” fresh US sanctions targeting a shipping empire controlled by the son of a top political advisor to Iran’s supreme leader, AFP reports.
Foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei called “the new US sanctions against Iran’s oil trade a malicious act aimed at undermining the economic development and welfare of the Iranian people”.
Here are some images coming to us over the wires.
IDF gunfire kills 30 Palestinians waiting for aid, Gaza defence ministry says, as US special envoy due to visit Israel
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the Middle East crisis.
Israeli gunfire killed at least 30 Palestinians waiting for humanitarian aid in northern Gaza on Wednesday, according to the Hamas-run civil defence agency.
Gaza civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that “at least 30” people were killed and 300 wounded.
The Israeli military said it had no knowledge of casualties in the incident north of Gaza City, as the United Nations said that pauses in Israel’s offensive against Hamas were not enough to help the population through a deepening hunger crisis.
The UN humanitarian agency, OCHA, said that four days into Israel’s “tactical pauses”, people were still dying from hunger and malnutrition, alongside casualties among those seeking aid.
Mohammed Abu Salmiya, director of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, said his facility had received 35 bodies from the shooting, which reportedly struck about three kilometres (two miles) southwest of the Zikim crossing point for aid trucks entering Gaza.
Amid deadlocked talks on a ceasefire, US special envoy Steve Witkoff is scheduled to visit Israel on Thursday.
Witkoff has been involved in indirect ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas. The discussions broke down last week when Israel and the US recalled their delegations from Doha.
A US official told reporters that Witkoff “will meet with officials to discuss next steps in addressing the situation in Gaza.”
His visit comes as Canada followed France and the UK when it announced plans to recognise a Palestinian state at the UN General Assembly in September.