Gaza Unrest
Live Reporting
EU discusses possible role monitoring Gaza border crossing
The European Union is studying whether it could play a role in monitoring the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt after Israel’s bombardment ends, officials said according to AFP.
“We received demarches from different parties including Israel whether we could study the possibility to reopen it (the EU mission),” a high-ranking EU official said.
The official said EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell would likely get a green light from European ministers meeting in Brussels on Monday to draw up options for a potential redeployment of an EU mission.
“Obviously this would not be in the current circumstances, not in war circumstances. We are talking about the future,” the official said.
Israeli PM to consult ministers after ICJ order to halt Rafah op
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said he would consult senior ministers by phone after the UN’s top court ordered Israel to immediately halt its military operation in the Gaza city of Rafah, AFP reports.
Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich responded to the ruling on X, formerly Twitter, saying “history will judge those who stand today alongside the Nazis of Hamas Daesh,” referring to the Islamic State group.
Strikes continue in Gaza, as UN court orders Israel to halt Rafah assault
Israeli forces stepped up military strikes on Gaza on Friday, residents and medics said, with planes bombing targets in the southern city of Rafah even as the UN's top court ordered Israel to halt its offensive there.
Heavy fighting was also reported in Jabalia, in the north, where Israel's military said it had recovered the bodies of three hostages killed during the Hamas-led attacks on Oct. 7 that triggered the war.
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Reaction to World Court's order for Israel
Israel was ordered by the World Court on Friday to halt its military assault on the city of Rafah in Gaza.
Here are some reactions:
PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY
The Palestinian Authority welcomed the ruling by the U.N.'s International Court of Justice.
"The presidency welcomes the decision issued by the International Court of Justice, which represents an international consensus on the demand to stop the all-out war onGaza,"
ICJ orders Israel to submit compliance report in one month
The International Court of Justice has ordered Israel to report to the court within one month its progress in applying measures ordered by the institution today.
ICJ ‘not convinced’ Israeli steps for Gazans’ safety ‘sufficient’ to address risks of offensive
Nawaf Salam, the head of the International Court of Justice, has said it “is not convinced that evacuation efforts […] that Israel affirms to have undertaken to enhance the security of civilians in Gaza strip […] are sufficient to alleviate the immense risks to which the Palestinian population is exposed as a result of the military offence in Rafah.”
Pakistan praises international recognition for Palestine
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs welcomed the announcement by Ireland, Spain and Norway on recognising the state of Palestine, adding that it served as another milestone in the “decades-long quest of the people of Palestine for their inalienable right to self-determination”.
During a weekly press briefing, the foreign office said that the Gaza “genocide” and the dire humanitarian situation there have underlined the urgency of moving towards the establishment of an independent and sovereign Palestinian state.
“Palestine is now recognised by an overwhelming majority […] Time has therefore come to accord full membership to the State of Palestine at the United Nations […] We reiterate our call to the UN Security Council to positively respond to this growing international sentiment,” the foreign office said.
‘There’s nothing left for us’
Rafah, once the heart of Gaza, has now been largely deserted, says Raed Abed, a displaced Palestinians who came back to the city in hopes of finding drinking water.
“I was shocked when I arrived in Rafah. I found no one. I didn’t even find cats or dogs,” Abed told Al Jazeera. “There’s no market or shops. Every single thing is closed. You can’t even buy a bottle of water to drink.”
He added: “Rafah used to be the best place in Gaza. It’s where everyone and everything coming into the strip used to gather, but now it’s just too much suffering.
“There is nothing left for us. It’s ongoing suffering that doesn’t stop.”
Israeli military says it found bodies of three captives
The Israeli military says the bodies of three captives it claimed were taken to Gaza in the October 7 attack were recovered during an overnight mission in Jabalia.
The military named the captives as Orion Hernandez, 30, Hanan Yablonka, 42, and Michel Nisenbaum, 59.
It added that the captives were all taken from Israel’s Mefalsim Intersection to Gaza.
UN Security Council to vote on resolution decrying attacks on UN and aid workers
The UNSC is scheduled to vote on a resolution that strongly condemns attacks on humanitarian workers and UN personnel.
The resolution also demands that all combatants protect them in accordance with international law, without singling out any conflict.
The Switzerland-sponsored resolution expresses grave concern at the growing number of attacks and threats against UN and humanitarian personnel and the disregard for and violations of international humanitarian law by combatants.
GOP lawmakers grill university presidents over campus protests
A Republican-controlled congressional committee held the latest in a series of hearings on campus protests that were staged in solidarity with Gaza at universities across the US.
The hearings focused on accusations rather than fact-finding. Republicans accused universities of being hotbeds of anti-Semitism, frequently cutting off college presidents as they tried to explain their actions regarding campus protests.
Democrats argued the hearing was politically motivated, aimed at scoring points with right-wing voters. The war in Gaza, with more than 35,000 people killed by Israeli forces, was scarcely mentioned.
Israel to stop Spanish consulate from providing services to Palestinians
Israel’s minister of foreign affairs, Israel Katz, said he has decided to “sever the connection” between Spain’s representation in Israel and Palestinians following Spain’s recognition of Palestinian statehood this week.
Katz said the move, which will also see the Spanish consulate in Jerusalem prohibited from providing services to Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, also came in response to comments made by Spain’s deputy PM Yolanda Diaz who had said she wanted to “liberate Palestine from the river to the sea”.
Israeli jets target homes in northern Gaza, killing 7
Israeli jets have struck several homes in northern Gaza, killing at least seven people, reports the Palestinian news agency Wafa.
One house was hit in al-Fakhoura neighbourhood near the Jabalia refugee camp, killing at least five people and wounding several others. Another was struck in the Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood, north of Gaza City, killing two members of the family sheltering there, the report added.
Dozens more were wounded when Israeli jets hit two apartments nearby – one just north of Gaza City and the other in Gaza City’s Daraj neighbourhood.
The report added that Israeli artillery shelling also targeted other neighbourhoods within Gaza City, including Zeitoun, Tal al-Hawa, ar-Remal al-Janoubi, Sabra and Sheikh Ijlin.
ICJ verdict today on Gaza ceasefire request
The ICJ will issue its verdict today on South Africa’s plea for it to order an end to Israel’s offensive on Rafah.
The request is part of a broader genocide case brought by South Africa against Israel. After that case opened in December 2023, the court ruled Israel must do everything it can to prevent “genocidal acts”, but stopped short of ordering a ceasefire in Gaza.
South Africa, in its latest petition, said Israel’s ongoing invasion of Rafah, the last refuge for displaced Palestinians, has changed the situation on the ground and merits new emergency orders.
Israel argued the request should be dismissed, saying it has the right to continue fighting Hamas.
The ICJ’s judges could agree to South Africa’s request today, reject it out of hand or even issue a completely separate set of orders.
Whatever ruling the court makes today will apply only to potential emergency orders – or provisional measures. It could take it years to make a ruling on the overall case, which will determine whether or not Israel is committing genocide.
US comedian Dave Chappelle calls out Israel’s ‘genocide’ in Gaza at UAE show
Chappelle’s reference to the “genocide” striking the Gaza Strip received loud cheers and applause during his performance in the capital of the United Arab Emirates, The Associated Press reports.
Even before coming on stage, the full crowd of thousands on Thursday night at Abu Dhabi’s Etihad Arena cheered as DJ Trauma, who accompanied Chappelle on the trip, played the song “My Blood is Palestinian” by the Palestinian singer Mohammed Assaf.
About halfway through his set, Chappelle said the Gaza Strip faces a “genocide”. He also said that making Jews safer in America amid rising cases of anti-Semitism would make them realise they do not need Israel as an ultimate protector.
When touching on the upcoming US presidential election, Chappelle’s mention of President Joe Biden – Israel’s staunched supporter in its war on Gaza – drew widespread boos throughout the arena.
Hundreds of Harvard students walk out of commencement, chant ‘Free, free Palestine’
Hundreds of students in graduation robes walked out of the Harvard commencement chanting “Free, free Palestine”, a day after the school announced that 13 students who participated in a Gaza solidarity encampment would not graduate alongside their classmates.
To cheers and applause, student commencement speaker Shruthi Kumar went off script from her speech to blast the university, saying that “freedom of speech” and “expressions of solidarity” had been made “punishable” by Harvard.
“I am deeply disappointed by the intolerance for freedom of speech and their right to civil disobedience on campus,” Kumar said. “The students have spoken. The faculty have spoken. Harvard, do you hear us?”
More than 1,500 students had petitioned, and nearly 500 staff and faculty had spoken out against sanctioning the student protesters, she said.
Those in the encampment had called for a ceasefire in Gaza and for Harvard to divest from companies that support the war.
Israeli rights group exposes violent settler ‘take over’ of Palestinian pastureland
B’Tselem, a leading Israeli human rights group, has released video footage documenting how Israeli settlers “take over” land belonging to Palestinian shepherds as “part of a state policy to drive out pastoral communities”.
The rights organisation said it had documented some 20 incidents where settlers and Israeli soldiers “drove Palestinian shepherds out of pastureland” in the occupied West Bank’s South Hebron Hills.
“The State of Israel is working to drive Palestinian pastoral communities out of their homes in the West Bank in order to take over their areas of habitation, including farmland and pastureland,” the rights organisation said.
Since the October 7 attack on Israel, settlers involved in “violent acts” of land expulsion are part of Israeli “territorial defence” units and have been issued military weapons and uniforms.
“This makes it impossible to distinguish when they are operating under military orders and when they are acting independently while in uniform,” B’Tselem said.
Children, women among more than 20 reported killed in latest Israeli attacks
Along with the recent bombing of an apartment that we reported had killed at least 10 people in the Shabiyah area of ?Gaza City, Israeli forces also killed at least 12 people and injured others during the bombing of an aid storage warehouse in Deir el-Balah in central Gaza.
Women and children were among those killed when Israeli aircraft and artillery targeted the warehouse, the Palestinian state news agency Wafa reports.
People were also killed in an overnight air strike on a house in the Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood in Gaza City, Wafa said.
Heavy gunfire from Israeli armoured vehicles stationed in the southern neighbourhoods of Gaza City was also reported.
Our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic have shared video footage of a large fire that was reported to have broken out in the Jabalia refugee camp area of northern Gaza following an Israeli bombardment overnight.
Since Israel’s Rafah operation, only 150 trucks of aid reached Gaza in two weeks
Sam Rose, planning director for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), has sounded the alarm about the dire aid situation in Gaza, saying there has been a significant decrease in humanitarian supplies entering the territory since Israel seized the Rafah crossing with Egypt two weeks ago.
“We’re going back to levels of aid that we were getting in October when the war first started,” Rose said, adding that the UN has received fewer than 150 trucks carrying aid since May 6.
With only a fraction of the usual aid reaching Gaza, UNRWA has had to suspend distribution due to insufficient supplies, Rose said.
Pentagon says aid from US-built Gaza pier reaching people, but still ‘a drop in the bucket’
A Pentagon spokesperson said the amount of food that has been distributed or is in the process of being distributed is 506 metric tonnes of food. That’s since this pier opened about a week ago today.
That is enough, according to the Pentagon, to feed ‘tens of thousands for a month’.
But, in the greater context of the need in Gaza, this is merely a drop in the bucket, and not nearly as much food as what once came over the land borders into Gaza – and, of course, at a time when the need and extreme hunger is only growing.
Since the pier opened, it started with almost no success in the first few days. There was so much insecurity in the distribution of the food that the World Food Programme halted its operations for two days.
Israel was asked to help more in assisting in the safe delivery of this food. Israel apparently responded and there are apparently alternate routes on land for these trucks once they’ve got the food from the pier to go to the storage warehouse.
And that apparently has been somewhat successful, because 27 trucks were able to deliver food to that warehouse.
That’s still not nearly the amount the Pentagon had envisioned. Ninety trucks, they said initially, and up to 150 trucks a day from this pier alone.
They say – hopefully, in the coming weeks – the number of trucks will vastly grow.
Israeli military bombs apartment in Gaza City, killing 10
The Israeli military has bombed an apartment complex in Gaza City, killing at least 10 people, the Wafa news agency reports.
Women and children were killed in the strike on the apartment, which belongs to the al-Ayoubi family and is located in the Shabiyah area of ??Gaza City, northern Gaza.
Israel launches deadly Gaza strikes, says ready for new truce talks
PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES (AFP) - Israel launched devastating air strikes on Gaza Thursday (May 23), while also expressing readiness to resume stalled talks on a truce and hostage release deal with Hamas to pause the war raging since Oct 7.
The Gaza Strip's civil defence agency said two pre-dawn air strikes had killed 26 people, including 15 children, in Gaza City.
