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Israel is escalating its bombardment of targets in the Gaza Strip ahead of an expected ground invasion against Hamas militants. The war is rapidly raising the death toll in Gaza, and the U.S. fears the fighting could spark a wider conflict in the region.
Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been running out of food, water and medicine since Israel sealed off the territory following the Hamas attack on Israeli towns on Oct. 7. The aid convoys allowed into Gaza so far have carried a fraction of what’s needed, and the U.N. said distribution will have to stop if there’s no fuel for the trucks.
The war, in its 18th day Tuesday, is the deadliest of five Gaza wars for both sides. The Hamas-run Health Ministry said at least 5,087 Palestinians have been killed and 15,270 wounded. In the occupied West Bank, 96 Palestinians have been killed and 1,650 wounded in violence and Israeli raids since Oct. 7.
More than 1,400 people in Israel have been killed, mostly civilians who died in the initial Hamas rampage. In addition, 222 people including foreigners were believed captured by Hamas during the incursion and taken into Gaza, Israel’s military has said. Four of those have been released.
Currently:
1. The U.S. Department of Defense is assisting Israel in its war planning by sending military advisers
2. 40 years after bombing that killed Americans in Beirut, US troops again deploy east of Mediterranean
3. The war is giving Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system its toughest challenge yet
4. Release of more hostages gives some hope to families of others abducted in the attack on Israel
5. Find more of AP’s coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war
Here’s what’s happening in the latest Israel-Hamas war:
FRANCE’S MACRON SAYS ‘FIGHT MUST BE WITHOUT MERCY, BUT NOT WITHOUT RULES’
JERUSALEM — French President Emmanuel Macron, speaking after meeting Israel’s prime minister on Tuesday, proposed a coalition to fight terror groups in the region “that threaten all of us.”
He compared the proposal to the international coalition fighting the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria. He was referring to the Iranian-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon, Iran itself and the Houtis in Yemen, among others, saying they must not take the risk of opening a new front.
Macron, on a two-day visit to the region, met with families of hostages held captive in the Gaza Strip by Hamas, and said “we will neglect nothing” to obtain freedom for French citizens. Nine French citizens are being held or have disappeared. Macron said he would visit Ramallah later Tuesday and several regional leaders on Wednesday. He did not identify them.
Standing at the side of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Macron stressed Israel’s right to defend itself in its war with Hamas.
“The fight must be without mercy, but not without rules” because democracies “respect the rules of war,” Macron said, adding that for example democracies don’t target civilians. His statement appeared to be a message to Israel, which has been criticized by some for attacks that have killed Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip. He called for access to aid for Gaza and for electricity to be supplied to Gaza hospitals — not for making war.
Netanyahu said it is Hamas that is responsible for civilian casualties, but that “we will do every effort to avoid them.” He added, “It could be a long war.”
“Hamas must be destroyed,” Netanyahu said, calling it a condition for ending the war.
Macron said any peace “cannot be durable” without restarting a “decisive” political process with Palestinians. But he said, “Hamas does not (represent) the Palestinian cause.”
US ISSUES WARNING TO SHIPS IN THE RED SEA
JERUSALEM — The U.S. is issuing a new warning to ships traveling through the Red Sea after a drone and missile attack launched from Yemen during the Israel-Hamas war.
The U.S. Maritime Administration warning on Tuesday urged vessels to “exercise caution when transiting this region.”
The U.S. Navy says it shot down missiles and drones believed to have been launched by Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in recent days amid wider tensions across the Middle East over the war.
HEZBOLLAH-ALLIED POLITICIAN SAYS LEBANON WON’T INITIATE A WAR WITH ISRAEL
BEIRUT — A prominent Lebanese Christian politician allied with Hezbollah said Tuesday that Lebanon would not initiate a war with Israel but would defend itself if attacked.
The comments by Gebran Bassil, head of the Free Patriotic Movement of former President Michel Aoun, came as sporadic clashes continue on the Lebanese border with Israel between Hezbollah and armed Palestinian groups in Lebanon on one side and Israeli forces on the other.
“No one can drag us into war unless the Israeli enemy attacks us, and then we will be forced to defend ourselves,” Bassil said after a meeting with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, another Hezbollah ally. Bassil also spoke by phone to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah on Monday. “All the Lebanese agree that they do not want war, but that does not mean that we should allow ourselves to be attacked without a response.”
There has been widespread speculation as to whether and under what circumstances Hezbollah and its arsenal of an estimated 150,000 rockets and missiles would fully enter the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. The ongoing clashes on the border and anxieties about a wider conflict have internally displaced 19,646 people in Lebanon, according to the International Organization for Migration.
RELEASED HOSTAGE SAYS SHE WAS BEATEN WITH STICKS WHEN KIDNAPPED
TEL AVIV — Yocheved Lifshitz, an 85-year-old woman released by Hamas, told reporters Tuesday that the militants beat her with sticks, bruising her ribs and making it hard to breathe, as they kidnapped her during their attack on towns in southern Israel on Oct. 7.
They drove her into Gaza, then forced her to walk several kilometers (miles) on wet ground to reach a network of tunnels that looked like a spider web, she said. Lifshitz is one of only four hostages to be released — and the first to speak publicly — of the more than 220 believed held by Hamas.
She said the people assigned to guard her “told us they are people who believe in the Quran and wouldn’t hurt us.”
Lifshitz, whose husband remains a hostage, said that after she and four other people were taken into a room, they were treated well, conditions were clean, and they received medical care, including medication. They ate one meal a day of cheese and cucumber, she said, adding that her captors ate the same.
ISRAELI AIR STRIKES ON HOMES KILL 28 PEOPLE IN RAFAH, INTERIOR MINISTRY SAYS
KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip — Israeli fighter jets pounded several homes overnight in the city of Rafah in southern Gaza, killing at least 28 people, according to the Hamas-run Interior Ministry. The ministry reported other airstrikes across the besieged territory which it said left dozens dead.
In Khan Younis, an Israeli airstrike hit a building in a refugee area late Tuesday morning, leaving many casualties. An Associated Press journalist saw ambulances bringing two dead and two wounded people from the strike.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said the airstrike in densely populated Khan Younis hit a house near its hospital, Al-Amal. It said the airstrike caused panic at the hospital and its shelter center, which houses 4,000 people who fled their homes in northern Gaza because of the bombardments.
Tens of thousands of Palestinians have moved to southern Gaza, including Rafah, which borders Egypt, after Israel told civilians to flee southward ahead of an expected ground invasion. However, Israel has continued its attacks across Gaza’s southern areas.
UN SAYS SOME AID TO GAZA NOT USABLE BECAUSE OF WATER, FUEL SHORTAGES
GENEVA — The U.N. aid agency for Palestinians, UNRWA, says some of the aid trucked into Gaza is “not very usable,” such as lentils and rice that require increasingly scarce fresh water and fuel to be cooked.
UNRWA spokesperson Tamira Alrifai said a total of 54 aid trucks have entered Gaza over the last several days, a “trickle” compared to the 500-odd truck deliveries, carrying both aid and commercial goods, a day in times of relative peace.
“My colleagues told me that in one of the shipments over the last couple of days, we received boxes of rice and lentils — donated very, very generously,” she said from Amman by video call to a U.N. briefing in Geneva. “But for people to cook lentils and rice, they need water and gas. And therefore, these kinds of supplies — while very generous and well-intended — are not very usable.”
Alrifai praised the “very spontaneous giving and donations” flown into Egypt for delivery to Gaza through the Rafah crossing, from various countries, “especially Arab countries.” She called for coordination with the Egyptian Red Crescent and “very, very clear guidance from the humanitarian groups that are on the ground.”
“Of course, everything is being closely coordinated with my U.N. colleagues and with U.N. agencies. But we will need to get better as a consortium of humanitarians in sending very explicit lists of what is most needed,” Alrifai said.
She said U.N. negotiators were “very, very far away” from getting the full ability to provide needed aid to Gaza.
QATAR’S RULING EMIR SAYS ISRAEL SHOULDN’T HAVE A ‘GREEN LIGHT’ TO KILL
JERUSALEM — The ruling emir of the small Middle East nation of Qatar, which hosts an office of Hamas and has served as an intermediary in hostage negotiations, said Tuesday that it “is untenable for Israel to be given an unconditional green light and free license to kill.”
The comments by Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani to Qatar’s consultative Shura Council come as negotiations continue to free more of the approximately 200 hostages Hamas has held since its Oct. 7 assault on Israel. About 1,400 people in Israel died in the assault, while the Hamas-run Health Ministry in the Gaza Strip says over 5,000 people have died in Israeli airstrikes since then.
“We are against attacks on innocent civilians, regardless of their nationality, by any party,” Sheikh Tamim said. “But we do not accept double standards, nor do we accept acting as if the Palestinian children’s lives are not worth to be reckoned with, as though they are faceless or nameless.”
He added: “We are saying enough is enough. It is untenable for Israel to be given an unconditional green light and free license to kill, nor it is tenable to continue ignoring the reality of occupation, siege and settlement. It should not be allowed in our time to use cutting off water and preventing medicine and food as weapons against an entire population.”
Sheikh Tamim renewed calls for a Palestinian state based on Israel’s 1967 borders, with east Jerusalem as its capital, something long called for by other Arab nations, including Saudi Arabia.
Qatar had a trade office for Israel from 1996 until 2000, but broke ties in 2009 over an Israel-Hamas war at the time. Under arrangements stemming from past cease-fire understandings with Israel, the gas-rich emirate of Qatar has paid the salaries of civil servants in the Gaza Strip, provided direct cash transfers to poor families and offered other kinds of humanitarian aid.
ISRAELI AIRSTRIKE HITS RESIDENTIAL BUILDING, KILLING 32 PEOPLE, SURVIVORS SAY
KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip — An overnight Israeli airstrike hit a 4-story residential building in the city of Khan Younis, killing at least 32 people and wounding scores of others, according to survivors.
The fatalities included 13 from the Saqallah family in the Qarraha area, east of Khan Younis, said Ammar al-Butta, a relative who survived the airstrike. He said about 100 people, including his family and many others, had sheltered there.
The victims were taken to Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis. An Associated Press video showed about a dozen bodies in white body bags lying on the ground outside the main gate of the hospital. One woman was weeping while another tried to console her.
“We were hosting our relatives from Gaza and the northern cities,” al-Butta said, speaking from the hospital. “They were sheltering at our home because we thought that our area would be safe. But apparently there is no safe place in Gaza.”
Osama al-Bashity, another relative, said they couldn’t recognize the dead. “We recognized them through the clothes they wore, who wore these trousers, or that T-shirt,” he said. “They turned into pieces.”
ISRAEL DELAYS START OF ACADEMIC YEAR
JERUSALEM — The start of the academic year at Israel’s universities and colleges has been delayed again, this time by nearly a month, suggesting the country is expecting extended fighting in the Gaza Strip.
The academic year initially had been scheduled to begin Oct. 19. After two previous delays, the Association of University Heads decided that studies won’t begin until Dec. 3, Israel Army Radio reported.
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