Israel's Gaza invasion - Day 746

The emergency committee of Gaza City’s Holy Family Church has said that it will remain at the compound to support priests, nuns and civilians sheltering there, even as Israel prepares to occupy the city, Anadolu Agency reports.

In a statement, the committee said its decision follows a joint declaration by the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem and the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem warning of an impending Israeli offensive and ongoing evacuation orders in Gaza City.

“Since the first day of the war, the committee has worked tirelessly to serve the displaced inside the church and the community outside it,” the Holy Family Church’s statement said.

“We renew our commitment to stand with the Church, hand in hand with the priests and nuns, for the common good of the community.”

Two Microsoft employees have been fired after taking part in a sit-in at the office of the company’s president to protest the firm’s ties to Israel, Reuters reports.

A Microsoft spokesperson said the workers were terminated following “serious breaches of company policies and our code of conduct” stemming from “the break-in at the executive offices.”

Anna Hattle and Riki Fameli received voicemails informing them that they were fired, the protest group No Azure for Apartheid said in a statement.

They were among seven protesters who were arrested earlier this week after occupying the office of company President Brad Smith. The other five were former Microsoft workers and people outside the company.

“We are here because Microsoft continues to provide Israel with the tools it needs to commit genocide while gaslighting and misdirecting its own workers about this reality,” Hattle said in a statement.

No Azure for Apartheid, whose name references Microsoft’s Azure software, has demanded that the company cut its ties to Israel and pay reparations to Palestinians.

President Donald Trump presided over a policy meeting on the situation in Gaza with input from former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and former Trump Middle East envoy Jared Kushner, a senior White House official says, Reuters reports.

Trump, top White House officials, Blair and Kushner discussed the hostage crisis, plans to escalate food aid deliveries, plans following the end of the offensive and more, the official told Reuters.

The official described the session as “simply a policy meeting,” the type frequently held by Trump and his team.

A joint statement from 14 of the 15 members of the UN Security Council has called for Israel to stop further expansion of its military operation in Gaza, Al Jazeera reports.

The statement, which was not signed by the US, also backed the IPC global hunger monitoring system that confirmed a famine in Gaza and said the famine in Gaza was a man-made crisis.

It also warned that the use of starvation as a weapon of war is banned under international law.

The joint statement also called for an immediate and unconditional permanent Gaza ceasefire, the release of captives held in the enclave and demanded Israel immediately and unconditionally lift all restrictions on aid delivery into Gaza.

The German city of Frankfurt has banned a protest demanding an end to the Gaza conflict, Al Jazeera reports.

United4Gaza, the group behind the protest planned for Saturday, says it will go to court to overturn the ban and fight “until the last breath for our fundamental right to freedom of assembly”.

Authorities in Frankfurt banned the march as a “potentially anti-Semitic gathering”. The city’s mayor, Mike Josef, from the left-wing Social Democratic Party, supported the ban.

Pro-Palestinian campaigners in Germany accuse the country’s authorities of taking a hard line against criticism of Israel and limiting pro-Palestinian speech.

Israeli Culture Minister Miki Zohar has applauded the government’s move to set up more illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank, saying he hopes they continue to multiply — with US support — across the territory, Al Jazeera reports.

“Settlements are a guiding light for us; we are expanding and strengthening them,” Zohar said in comments carried by Israel’s Arutz Sheva media.

Ongoing settlement projects in the occupied West Bank are a “significant achievement”, he said, adding, “perhaps soon we will do the same in Gaza”.

However, “no less important than settlements is the task of sovereignty,” he stressed, apparently referring to Israeli annexation of Palestinian territory. “Once we implement sovereignty, we can say we have accomplished something real.”

Zohar said he believes Trump is “supportive” of such plans and that “the goal is to advance this with the Americans so that we have their backing.”

Israel’s UN Ambassador Danny Danon has said that there will be more information in the coming days on a strike on Nasser hospital in Gaza on Monday, which killed at least 20 people, including five journalists, Reuters reports.

“We’re still looking into the details of that incident, and so that in the next few days we will have more information about that,” Danon told reporters. “Our goal is to fight terrorists, not journalists, not anyone who is not involved in terrorism.”

Joyce Msuya, UN assistant secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and deputy emergency relief coordinator, told the Security Council that “over half a million people currently face starvation, destitution and death” in Gaza, Al Jazeera reports.

“By the end of September, that number could exceed 640,000. Virtually no one in Gaza is untouched by hunger,” Msuya said.

She explained that the famine was the result of more than 22 months of “restricted and compromised” deliveries of desperately needed humanitarian aid, a weakened healthcare system, poor sanitation and hygiene, and a lack of adequate shelter.

Despite an uptick in trucks entering the enclave, Msuya said, much more was needed to feed Gaza’s people and all restrictions must be lifted.

Msuya called on the council to “immediately ensure” an end to the fighting in Gaza to stop the famine from spreading, release all captives and protect civilians and critical infrastructure.

Israel has called on the UN-backed hunger monitor, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification Initiative (IPC), to immediately retract a report which determined that famine was present in parts of Gaza, AFP reports.

“Israel demands that the IPC will retract immediately its fabricated report and publish a notice,” the director general of Israel’s foreign ministry, Eden Bar Tal, told a press conference.

He said Israel would share “evidence” of misconduct in preparing the report with IPC’s donors if the organisation fails to heed “within a short time”, calling it a “politicised” institute that is “working for an evil terror organisation”.

Dozens of Israeli soldiers have stormed the occupied West Bank city of Nablus with the Red Crescent reporting at least seven people wounded in the raid.

Contacted by AFP, the Israeli military confirmed that its forces were conducting an operation in the northern West Bank city, without specifying its purpose.

The raid began at around 3am (0000 GMT), residents said, with soldiers in armoured vehicles storming several neighbourhoods of Nablus’s old city, which has a population of around 30,000 people.

Nablus Governor Ghassan Daghlas told AFP that the “assault … is merely a show of force with no justification”.

One witness, who declined to give his name, reported that soldiers had expelled an elderly couple from their home.

Israeli troops “are storming and searching houses and shops inside the old city, while some houses have been turned into military posts”, said Ghassan Hamdan, head of the Palestinian Medical Relief organisation in Nablus.

Read more here.

The EU’s humanitarian chief Hadja Lahbib has urged the bloc to take tougher action over the war in Gaza as divisions among member states stall moves to punish Israel, AFP reports.

“We are at a turning point and now it’s time for the EU to act in a way that matches its international stature,” Lahbib, European Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management, told journalists.

“Now it’s time for the EU to find a collective voice on Gaza.”

“We cannot stand by and simply watch innocent civilians, aid workers, journalists being killed and starving to death,” Lahbib said.

“Saving lives takes the political courage to find a strong voice that reflects our values and principles.”

Lahbib said that the situation had improved “very, very partially” but that the aid getting into the territory remained a “drop in the ocean”.

“My role is to denounce and to say loudly what is happening there. This is a tragedy,” Lahbib said.

“We will be judged by history and by our grandchildren. That’s for sure.”

Israel will add two humanitarian aid distribution centres in the southern Gaza Strip to receive Palestinians it expects to relocate there when the military carries out its planned takeover of Gaza City, Reuters reports.

The Israeli military said in a statement that the work would be completed in the coming days, replacing the centre in the Tel al-Sultan neighbourhood and bringing the number of distribution centres to a total of five.

The Gaza health ministry has said 10 more people have died of malnutrition and starvation, raising deaths from such causes to 313 people, including 119 children.

At least 75 Palestinians, including 18 aid seekers, have been killed and 268 injured in Israeli attacks on Gaza in the past 24 hours, bringing the total death toll in Israel’s offensive on Gaza to 62,895, with 158,927 injured, Al Jazeera reports citing the enclave’s Health Ministry.

One body was also recovered from the rubble of previous Israeli attacks, the ministry said.

Israeli tanks have pushed into a new area on the edge of Gaza City overnight, destroying houses and prompting residents to flee, ahead of an expected meeting on the conflict to be chaired by US President Donald Trump, Reuters reports.

Tanks late on Tuesday entered into the Ebad-Alrahman neighbourhood on the northern edge of Gaza City and shelled houses, wounding several people and forcing many others, who had been taken by surprise, to move deeper into Gaza’s largest city, residents said.

“All of a sudden, we heard that the tanks pushed into Ebad-Alrahman, the sounds of explosions became louder, and louder, and we saw people escaping towards our area,” said Saad Abed, 60, a former construction worker.

“If no truce is reached, we will see the tanks outside our homes,” he told Reuters via a chat app from his house in Jala Street in Gaza City, around one kilometre from the Ebad-Alrahman neighbourhood.

Read more here.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has said in a speech that her government condemned the “unjustifiable” killing of journalists in Gaza, Reuters reports.

“It is an unacceptable attack on press freedom and on all those who courageously risk their lives to report on the tragedy of war,” she said during a political conference in the beach town of Rimini.

Meloni is one of the last Western leaders to condemn Monday’s strike, which has drawn wide international criticism. Israel has said the journalists were not the target of its Nasser Hospital strike.

Meloni also called on Israel to end its military occupation of Gaza, to allow aid into the Palestinian enclave and halt the expansion of settlements in the West Bank.

Oscar-winning Spanish director Pedro Almodovar has urged Madrid to cut all diplomatic and commercial ties with Israel over the conflict in Gaza, calling it a “genocide”, AFP reports.

The “All About My Mother” director called on Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez to convince other European leaders to do the same in a video posted on Instagram by his production company.

“I ask our government to sever diplomatic, commercial and all types of relations with the State of Israel as a sign of repulsion against the genocide it is committing against the people of Gaza before the eyes of the entire world,” he said.

At least 21 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks since dawn, Al Jazeera reports, citing medical sources.

Four aid seekers were among those killed.

Gaza’s Health Ministry has recorded 10 deaths “due to famine and malnutrition” over the past 24 hours, including two children, Al Jazeera reports.

This brings the total number of hunger-related deaths to 313 in the besieged enclave, including 119 children.

Discontent has been reported within the Israeli army’s Sayeret Givati unit after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed “deep regret” for a deadly strike on a hospital in southern Gaza that left 20 people dead, including five journalists, Anadolu Agency reports.

Channel 14 correspondent Hallel Bitton Rosen said he had “heard of significant anger in the Sayeret Givati unit over Netanyahu’s regret for the attack,” adding that troops “hope he apologises to the fighters instead.”

The outlet said Israeli soldiers confirmed the strike was approved and coordinated with the senior command.

Bosnia’s national museum has defended a decision to donate funds from the display of a precious Jewish manuscript to the people of Gaza, AFP reports.

It said ticket sales to see the Sarajevo Haggadah, one of the most precious religious manuscripts of the Middle Ages, would be donated to “support the people of Palestine who suffer systematic, calculated and cold-blooded terror, directly by the state of Israel”.

The move has drawn intense criticism from Jewish organisations, with some abroad accusing the museum of antisemitism.

But museum director Mirsad Sijaric, 55, stands by the decision and has said that he has received numerous messages of support from Jewish people around the world.

“Did we choose one of the sides? Yes, we chose one of the sides,” Sijaric told AFP.

Israeli forces have carried out a wave of overnight raids and arrests across the occupied West Bank, arresting at least five people, Al Jazeera reports, citing Wafa.

The Israeli army arrested five people in towns near Bethlehem after storming their relatives’ homes, the report said.

Pakistan has strongly condemned the deadly Israeli airstrikes on Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, Gaza, which claimed the lives of at least 21 individuals, including four journalists and a rescue worker, a statement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.

“This unconscionable and heinous attack on a medical facility, as well as the continued targeting of civilians and journalists, represents a grave violation of international human rights and humanitarian law, as well as freedom of the press,” said the statement.

“We reiterate our call on the international community to hold Israel accountable for such heinous crimes and to take concrete steps towards ending Israel’s impunity.”

Furthermore, the statement added that Pakistan also condemns in the “strongest possible terms the Israeli occupying forces’ incursion into the Syrian Arab Republic in contravention of international law and principles of the UN Charter”.

It said: “Pakistan expresses its full support for the sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity of Syria, and calls on the international community to prevent Israel from undermining the peace and stability of the entire region.”

US Secretary of State Rubio is going to meet Israeli FM Gideon Sa’ar in the US capital at 3:15pm today (12:15am PKT on Thursday), according to a State Department schedule, Al Jazeera reports.

It comes on the same day that US President Donald Trump is expected to chair a “large meeting” on the situation in Gaza, according to his envoy Steve Witkoff.

Medical sources at hospitals across Gaza say at least a dozen people have been killed in Israeli airstrikes since dawn, Al Jazeera reports.

Hamas has slammed an Israeli statement saying a strike on a Gaza hospital that killed several journalists was aimed at a camera operated by Hamas, calling the accusation “baseless,” AFP reports.

Israel “attempted to justify this crime by fabricating a false claim that it had targeted a ‘camera’ belonging to resistance elements — an allegation that is baseless, lacking any evidence, and merely aimed at evading legal and moral responsibility for a full-fledged massacre,” the group said in a statement.

US President Donald Trump will host a meeting today on plans for Gaza, his envoy Steve Witkoff has said, AFP reports.

“We’ve got a large meeting in the White House tomorrow, chaired by the president, and it’s a very comprehensive plan we’re putting together on the next day,” Witkoff said in a Fox News interview, without providing more details.

US envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, has said that the US expects Israel’s hostilities in Gaza to cease “by the end of the year,” Reuters reports.

In an interview on Fox News’ “Special Report with Bret Baier”, the US envoy said, “We think that we’re going to settle this one way or another, certainly before the end of this year.”

Witkoff said Israel was open to continuing discussions with Hamas. He added that Hamas has signalled it was open to a settlement.

President Emmanuel Macron has strongly rejected Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent criticism over rising antisemitism in France and warned the issue should not be “weaponised”, AFP reports.

“Accusations of inaction in the face of a scourge that we are fighting with everything in our power are unacceptable and are an offence to France as a whole,” Macron wrote to Netanyahu, in a letter published in several newspapers.

“The fight against antisemitism must not be weaponised and will not fuel any discord between Israel and France.”

The European Union has denounced as “completely unacceptable” the killing of at least 21 people, including journalists, medics, and rescue workers, in an Israeli strike on Nasser Hospital, Al Jazeera reports.

In a statement, the EU urged Israel to respect international humanitarian law, protect civilians and journalists, and carry out a credible investigation into the attack.

“There have been too many fatalities in this conflict,” the bloc said, expressing solidarity with the victims’ families, the press community, and people in Gaza who it said “continue to pay the highest price”.

The Israeli military has alleged that an initial inquiry into its strike on a Gaza hospital that killed five journalists determined that troops had identified a camera “positioned by Hamas” in the area to observe its forces, Reuters reports.

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen has said Denmark is not ruling out the possibility of recognising Palestinian statehood as long as it is democratic, AFP reports.

“We’re not saying no to recognising Palestine as a state,” she told reporters.

“We’re in favour of it. We have been for a long time. It’s what we want. But of course, we have to be sure that it will be a democratic state,” she added.

The Palestinian Red Crescent has said the Israeli army has raided the West Bank city of Ramallah, leaving 14 people wounded as troops fanned out across the city centre, AFP reports.

The Red Crescent said at least 14 people were wounded in the latest raid. Seven were hit by live rounds, while the rest were injured by rubber bullets or tear-gas inhalation.

It added that Israeli forces were “preventing our teams from reaching the injured in a besieged area”.