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Posts tagged ‘cease-fire’

Iran Orders Direct Strike on Israel


Wednesday, 31 July 2024 04:22 PM EDT

Read more at https://www.newsmax.com/world/globaltalk/iran-ismail-haniyeh-assassinated/2024/07/31/id/1174622/

Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has ordered Iran to strike Israel directly in retaliation for the killing in Tehran of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, sources told The New York Times. Haniyeh was assassinated in the Iranian capital Tehran early on Wednesday morning, an attack that drew threats of revenge on Israel and fueled further concern that the conflict in Gaza was turning into a wider Middle East war.

The Palestinian Islamist militant group and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards confirmed Haniyeh’s death. The Guards said it took place hours after he attended a swearing-in ceremony for Iran’s new president. Although the strike on Haniyeh was widely assumed to have been carried out by Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government made no claim of responsibility and said it would make no comment on the killing.

Haniyeh was killed by a missile that hit him “directly” in a state guesthouse where he was staying, Khalil Al-Hayya, a senior Hamas official, told a news conference in Tehran, quoting witnesses who were with Haniyeh. “Now we are waiting for the full investigation from the (Iranian) brothers,” Al-Hayya said. Haniyeh, normally based in Qatar, had been the face of Hamas’ international diplomacy as the war set off by the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7 has raged in Gaza. He had been taking part in internationally-brokered indirect talks on reaching a cease-fire in the Palestinian enclave.

The assassination occurred less than 24 hours after Israel claimed to have killed Hezbollah’s most senior military commander in the Lebanese capital Beirut in retaliation for a deadly rocket strike in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Two Lebanese security sources said on Wednesday that the body of Hezbollah operations chief Fuad Shukr had been found in the rubble of a building hit by an Israeli airstrike in Beirut’s southern suburbs.

Netanyahu made no mention of Haniyeh’s killing in a televised statement on Wednesday evening but said Israel had delivered crushing blows to Iran’s proxies of late, including Hamas and Hezbollah, and would respond forcefully to any attack.

“Citizens of Israel, challenging days lie ahead. Since the strike in Beirut there are threats sounding from all directions. We are prepared for any scenario, and we will stand united and determined against any threat. Israel will exact a heavy price for any aggression against us from any arena,” he said.

The latest events appear to set back chances of any imminent cease-fire agreement in the nearly 10-month-old war in Gaza between Israel and the Iran-backed Hamas. Hamas’ armed wing said in a statement Haniyeh’s killing would “take the battle to new dimensions and have major repercussions.” Vowing to retaliate, Iran declared three days of national mourning and said the U.S. bore responsibility because of its support for Israel.

ISRAEL INVITES ‘HARSH PUNISHMENT,’ KHAMENEI SAYS

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Israel had provided the grounds for “harsh punishment for itself” and it was Tehran’s duty to avenge Haniyeh’s death. Iranian forces have already made strikes directly on Israel earlier in the Gaza war.

Israeli government spokesperson David Mencer told a briefing with journalists that Israel was committed to Gaza cease-fire negotiations and securing the release of Israeli hostages held by Palestinian militants in Gaza. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, at an event in Singapore, sidestepped a question on Haniyeh’s killing, saying a cease-fire deal in Gaza was key to avoiding wider regional escalation. He told Channel News Asia that the U.S. had neither been aware of nor involved in the killing.

Qatar, which has been brokering talks aimed at halting the fighting in Gaza along with Egypt, condemned Haniyeh’s killing as a dangerous escalation of the conflict.

“Political assassinations and continued targeting of civilians in Gaza while talks continue leads us to ask, how can mediation succeed when one party assassinates the negotiator on other side?” Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said on X.

Egypt said Haniyeh’s assassination showed a lack of political will on Israel’s part to calm tensions.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas condemned the killing and Palestinian factions in the Israeli-occupied West Bank called for a strike and mass demonstrations.

In Israel, the mood was buoyant as Israelis welcomed what they saw as a major achievement in the war against Hamas. Residents in besieged Gaza feared Haniyeh’s death would prolong the fighting that has devastated the enclave.

“This news is scary. We feel that he was like a father to us,” said Gaza resident Hachem Al-Saati.

MESHAAL IS LIKELY SUCCESSOR TO HANIYEH

Haniyeh’s most likely successor is Khaled Meshaal, his deputy-in-exile who lives in Qatar, analysts and Hamas officials said. Under Meshaal, Hamas emerged as an ever more important player in the Middle East conflict due to his charisma, popularity and regional standing, analysts said. Meshaal narrowly survived an attempt on his life in Jordan ordered by Netanyahu in 1997.

Appointed to the top Hamas job in 2017, Haniyeh moved between Turkey and Qatar’s capital Doha, escaping the travel curbs of the blockaded Gaza Strip and enabling him to act as a negotiator in the truce talks or to talk to Hamas’ ally Iran. Three of his sons were killed in an Israeli airstrike in April.

His deputy Saleh Al-Arouri was killed in January by Israel, leaving Yehya Al-Sinwar, the Hamas chief in Gaza and the architect of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, and Zaher Jabarin, the head of the group in the West Bank, in place but in hiding.

That assault by Hamas-led fighters killed about 1,200 people in southern Israeli communities and some 250 people were taken to Gaza as hostages, Israeli tallies say.

In response, Israel launched a ground and air offensive in the coastal enclave that has killed more than 39,400 people, according to Gaza health officials, and left more than 2 million facing a humanitarian crisis.

No end appears to be in sight for Israel’s campaign there as the cease-fire talks falter.

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IDF Striking Hamas Positions in Rafah After Cease-Fire Talks Appear to Falter Anew


By Newsmax Wires    |   Monday, 06 May 2024 03:26 PM EDT

Read more at https://www.newsmax.com/world/globaltalk/hamas-terrorists-israel/2024/05/06/id/1163647/

Israeli Defvense Forces reported on Monday that they’ve begun attacks against Hamas targets in Rafah, Gaza Strip, after the latest round of talks on a proposed cease-fire took a turn unsatisfactory to Israeli leadership. The news came after Hamas announced it had accepted an Egyptian-Qatari proposal for a cease-fire to halt the seven-month-long war with Israel in Gaza, hours after Israel ordered about 100,000 Palestinians to begin evacuating from the southern city of Rafah, signaling that a long-promised ground invasion there could be imminent.

Israel’s military spokesperson said Monday that all proposals regarding negotiations to free hostages in Gaza are examined seriously, and that in parallel it continues to operate in the Hamas-ruled territory.

“We examine every answer and response in the most seriously manner and are exhausting every possibility regarding negotiations and returning the hostages,” Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said when asked during a media briefing whether Hamas saying it accepted a cease-fire proposal would impact a planned offensive in the Gaza city of Rafah.

“In parallel, we are still operating in the Gaza Strip and will continue to do so.”

An Israeli official says Hamas approved a “softened” Egyptian proposal that was not acceptable and not approved by Israel, which apparently keeping up airstrikes on the Rafah hideouts of Hamas terrorists, as covered live by Newsmax.

Newsmax’s John Huddy is on the ground in Israel as the sound of strikes rang in the air, reportedly from nearby Rafah.

“This would appear to be a ruse intended to make Israel look like the side refusing a deal,” said the Israeli official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Israel’s Channel 12 quotes Israeli officials saying Israel’s negotiating team has just received Hamas’ response from the mediators. The report says Israel is now carefully evaluating the Hamas response and will issue orderly comments later this evening.

It says the Israeli officials are already saying “this is not the same proposal” for a deal that Israel and Egypt agreed upon 10 days ago, and that served as the basis for the indirect negotiations since then.

“All kinds of clauses” have been inserted, according to the TV report.

These new clauses, among other issues, relate to the cardinal questions of if, how and when the war would end, and what kind of guarantees are being offered to that effect.

Hamas, the report noted, had been toughening its demands in recent days, and demanding  the war end during the first, 40-day phase of the deal, rather than in the second or third phases.

Israel, for its part, has repeatedly rejected ending the war as part of a hostage deal at all, instead insisting it will resume fighting once the deal is implemented, in accordance with its twin war goals: returning the hostages and destroying Hamas’s military and governance capacities.

Earlier, Hamas said in a brief statement that its chief, Ismail Haniyeh, had informed Qatari and Egyptian mediators that the group accepted their cease-fire proposal. The statement gave no details of the accord.

There has been no successful agreement on a cease-fire in Gaza since a week-long pause in the fighting in November. The Hamas announcement of an agreement came hours after Israel ordered the evacuation of parts of Rafah, the city on Gaza’s southern edge that has served as the last sanctuary for around half of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents.

In recent days, Egyptian and Hamas officials have said the cease-fire would take place in a series of stages during which Hamas would release hostages it is holding in exchange for Israeli troop pullbacks from Gaza.

It is not clear whether the deal will meet Hamas’ key demand of bringing about an end to the war and complete Israeli withdrawal.

Hamas said in a statement Haniyeh had delivered the news in a phone call with Qatar’s prime minister and Egypt’s intelligence minister. After the release of the statement, Palestinians erupted in cheers in the sprawling tent camps around Rafah, hoping the deal meant an Israeli attack had been averted.

Israel’s closest allies, including the United States, have repeatedly said Israel should not attack Rafah. The looming operation has raised global alarm over the fate of around 1.4 million Palestinians sheltering there.

Aid agencies have warned that an offensive will worsen Gaza’s humanitarian catastrophe and bring a surge of more civilian deaths in an Israeli campaign that in nearly seven months has killed 34,000 people and devastated the territory.

President Joe Biden spoke Monday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and reiterated U.S. concerns about an invasion of Rafah. Biden said that a cease-fire with Hamas is the best way to protect the lives of Israeli hostages held in Gaza, a National Security Council spokesperson said on condition of anonymity to discuss the call before an official White House statement was released.

Hamas and key mediator Qatar said that invading Rafah will derail efforts by international mediators to broker a cease-fire. Days earlier, Hamas had been discussing a U.S.-backed proposal that reportedly raised the possibility of an end to the war and a pullout of Israeli troops in return for the release of all hostages held by the group. Israeli officials have rejected that trade-off, vowing to continue their campaign until Hamas is destroyed.

Netanyahu said Monday that seizing Rafah, which Israel says is the last significant Hamas stronghold in Gaza, was vital to ensuring the terrorists can’t rebuild their military capabilities and repeat the Oct. 7 attack on Israel that triggered the war.

Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, an army spokesman, said about 100,000 people were being ordered to move from parts of Rafah to a nearby Israel-declared humanitarian zone called Muwasi, a makeshift camp on the coast. He said that Israel has expanded the size of the zone and that it included tents, food, water and field hospitals.

It wasn’t immediately clear, however, if that material was already in place to accommodate the new arrivals.

Around 450,000 displaced Palestinians already are sheltering in Muwasi. The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, said it has been providing them with aid. But conditions are squalid, with few bathrooms or sanitation facilities in the largely rural area, forcing families to dig private latrines.

After the evacuation order announcement Monday, Palestinians in Rafah wrestled with having to uproot their extended families once again for an unknown fate, exhausted after months living in sprawling tent camps or crammed into schools or other shelters in and around the city. Few who spoke to The Associated Press wanted to risk staying.

Mohammed Jindiyah said that at the beginning of the war, he had tried to hold out in his home in northern Gaza after Israel ordered an evacuation there in October. He ended up suffering through heavy bombardment before fleeing to Rafah. He is complying with the order this time but was unsure now whether to move to Muwasi or another town in central Gaza.

“We are 12 families, and we don’t know where to go. There is no safe area in Gaza,” he said.

Sahar Abu Nahel, who fled to Rafah with 20 family members including her children and grandchildren, wiped tears from her cheeks, despairing at a new move.

“I have no money or anything. I am seriously tired, as are the children,” she said. “Maybe it’s more honorable for us to die. We are being humiliated.”

Israeli military leaflets were dropped with maps detailing a number of eastern neighborhoods of Rafah to evacuate, warning that an attack was imminent and anyone who stays “puts themselves and their family members in danger.” Text messages and radio broadcasts repeated the message.

UNRWA won’t evacuate from Rafah so it can continue to provide aid to those who stay behind, said Scott Anderson, the agency’s director in Gaza.

“We will provide aid to people wherever they choose to be,” he told the AP.

The U.N. says an attack on Rafah could disrupt the distribution of aid keeping Palestinians alive across Gaza. The Rafah crossing into Egypt, a main entry point for aid to Gaza, lies in the evacuation zone. The crossing remained open Monday after the Israeli order.

Jan Egeland, secretary-general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, condemned the “forced, unlawful” evacuation order and the idea that people should go to Muwasi.

“The area is already overstretched and devoid of vital services,” Egeland said. He said that an Israeli assault could lead to “the deadliest phase of this war.”

Israel’s bombardment and ground offensives in Gaza have killed more than 34,700 Palestinians, around two-thirds of them children and women, according to pro-Hamas Gaza health officials. The tally doesn’t distinguish between civilians and combatants. More than 80% of the population of 2.3 million have been driven from their homes, and hundreds of thousands in the north are on the brink of famine, according to the U.N.

Tensions escalated Sunday when Hamas fired rockets at Israeli troops positioned on the border with Gaza near Israel’s main crossing for delivering humanitarian aid, killing four soldiers. Israel shuttered the crossing — but Shoshani said it wouldn’t affect how much aid enters Gaza as others are working.

Meanwhile, Israeli airstrikes on Rafah killed 22 people, including children and two infants, according to a hospital.

The war was sparked by the unprecedented Oct. 7 raid into southern Israel in which Hamas and other terrorists killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted around 250 hostages. After exchanges during a November cease-fire, Hamas is believed to still hold about 100 Israelis captive as well the bodies of around 30 others.

The mediators over the cease-fire — the United States, Egypt and Qatar — had appeared to scramble to salvage a cease-fire deal they had been trying to push through the past week. Egypt said it was in touch with all sides Monday to “prevent the situation from … getting out of control.”

CIA Director William Burns, who had been in Cairo for talks on the deal, headed to meet the prime minister of Qatar, an official familiar with the matter said. It wasn’t clear whether a subsequent trip to Israel that had been planned would happen. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the closed-door negotiations.

In a fiery speech Sunday evening marking Israel’s Holocaust memorial day, Netanyahu rejected international pressure to halt the war, saying that “if Israel is forced to stand alone, Israel will stand alone.”

On Monday, Netanyahu accused Hamas of “torpedoing” a deal by not budging from its demand for an end to the war and a complete Israeli troop withdrawal in return for the hostages’ release, which he called “extreme.”

Information from The Associated Press, Reuters, and Newsmax’s Eric Mack contributed to this report.

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Israeli Officials Puzzled by Biden’s Optimism on Cease-Fire Deal


By Jewish News Syndicate Staff    |   Tuesday, 27 February 2024 07:43 AM EST

Senior Israeli officials said on Tuesday that they were unaware of any basis for U.S. President Joe Biden’s remarks on Monday that a hostage-for-cease-fire agreement in Gaza is imminent. During an unannounced visit to Van Leeuwen Ice Cream in Manhattan, near Rockefeller Plaza, Biden was asked about when a cease-fire in Gaza might start.

“I hope by the end of the weekend,” Biden said, per the pool report.

“My national security adviser tells me that we’re close. We’re close. We’re not done yet,” Biden said. “My hope is by next Monday, we’ll have a cease-fire.”

Ynet quoted the senior Israeli officials as saying on Tuesday morning that they do not understand “what the American president’s optimism is based on.”

The Hamas terrorist group also weighed in on Biden’s comments, with a source telling Reuters that the statement was premature and did not align with the situation on the ground. “There are still big gaps that need to be bridged before there is a cease-fire,” he said.

A spokesman for the Qatari Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday that there has been no breakthrough in the negotiations that can be announced, while expressing that Doha is “optimistic” that a deal can be reached, even though Hamas and Israel don’t agree on any of the main issues. He added that Qatar has no intention of responding to Biden’s comments.

Reuters reported on Tuesday morning on the details of the proposal discussed at the Paris summit last weekend and submitted to Hamas for review. Citing a senior official privy to the details of the talks, the news agency reported that the proposal focuses on the first phase of the agreement, would last for 40 days and include the release of 10 Palestinian security prisoners for every Israeli hostage, which is seven more Palestinian terrorists freed per Israeli captive compared to the previous deal last November — 40 Israeli hostages in total for 400 Palestinian security prisoners in the first stage. Further, the Israeli captives include women, abductees aged 19 and under, adults aged 50 and over and sick captives.

Both sides will cease fire for 40 days and the IDF patrol flights over Gaza will stop for 8 hours a day. After the first phase, the IDF will gradually begin to withdraw its forces from dense areas of the Strip. Additionally, displaced Palestinians will gradually be allowed to return to the northern Gaza Strip, except for men of enlistment age for Hamas.

With regard to humanitarian aid, the proposal reportedly includes a commitment to bring in 500 aid trucks every day and to supply 200,000 tents and 60,000 trailers. Also, Gazans will be allowed to rehabilitate bakeries and hospitals.

According to The New York Times, the 40 captives to be released in the first phase in exchange for 15 Palestinian prisoners convicted of terror offenses would include five IDF soldiers and 35 civilians, including seven women who Israel believes should have been freed in the November deal. To release the seven women, Israel offered to release 21 Palestinian prisoners under the previous deal.Republished with permission from Jewish News Syndicate.

Read more: Israeli Officials Puzzled by Biden’s Optimism on Cease-Fire Deal | Newsmax.com

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Biden Calls Netanyahu ‘A**hole’


By Eric Mack    |   Monday, 12 February 2024 02:05 PM EST

Read more at https://www.newsmax.com/world/globaltalk/benjamin-netanyahu-joe-biden-israel/2024/02/12/id/1153226/

President Joe Biden’s political rhetoric aimed at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues, but it also is failing to move Israel on ceasing its war on Hamas in Gaza. Despite being an ally locked in war, Biden has been reportedly unkind to his Israeli counterpart, calling Netanyahu an “a**hole” behind closed doors — all while claiming publicly he close, sources told NBC News.

A week after reports saying Biden privately considers Netanyahu a “bad f**king guy,” sources say Netanyahu is “giving him hell.” Late last week, Biden denounced the Israeli war operations in Gaza as “over the top.”

Notably, there has been no reports of Biden cursing out Hamas terrorists or the world’s No. 1 state sponsor of terror Iran, anonymously or otherwise.

This all comes as the Biden administration continues to press a two-state solution, giving Gaza a Palestinian state after the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attacks on Israel, while Netanyahu has continued to press forward, vowing “total victory” over Hamas.

Netanyahu is Biden’s “primary obstacle” to keeping Israel from the prime minister’s secondary war objective of eradicating Hamas, officials told NBC.

But, since Israel’s war on Hamas began, Netanyahu has been steadfast in achieving three objectives:

  1. Return all of the 250 hostages taken by Hamas terrorists as human shields and leverage for a Palestinian state, as Israeli officials told Newsmax
  2. Eradicate the Hamas terrorist network and leadership, including worldwide
  3. Demilitarize and deradicalize the anti-Israeli Palestinian population in Gaza

Only after those three objectives are met can there be peace in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, according to Netanyahu, who is also called “Bibi.”

But Biden remains undaunted on Israel’s war objectives, instead facing pressure in the U.S. to get nearly $10 billion in funding for Gaza and far-left agitators calling for sanctions on Israel for its strikes against Hamas.

“He did say, ‘Bibi started off great, but he’s been a pain in my ass lately’ or ‘he’s been killing me lately’ — one of those things,” a source told NBC News. “He goes, ‘But, he’s doing a disservice … of late.'”

Biden’s inability to stop Israel has been a point of contention in private conversations with two-state advocates and campaign officials, sources told NBC.

“He just feels like this is enough,” one source said. “It has to stop.”

The rejection of the Israeli prime minister over political and policy differences could be construed as anti-Israel, so Biden administration officials have tried to tamp down talk of a personal rift.

“The president has been clear where he disagrees with Prime Minister Netanyahu, but this is a decadeslong relationship that is respectful in public and in private,” a National Security Council spokesman wrote in a statement, according to NBC News.

Eric Mack ✉

Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.

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Israel’s Netanyahu Rules Out Gaza Cease-fire


Friday, 03 November 2023 11:39 AM EDT

Read more at https://www.newsmax.com/world/globaltalk/israel-hamas-war/2023/11/03/id/1140884/

The United States urged Israel on Friday to ensure more humanitarian aid gets into Gaza and to do more to protect Palestinian civilians, as Israel’s prime minister said there would be no cease-fire in the nearly month-old war until Hamas releases hostages.

The leader of the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group stoked fears that the conflict could widen by promising more attacks along the Lebanon border.

Israeli troops tightened their encirclement of Gaza City, the focus of their campaign to crush the enclave’s ruling Hamas militants, who launched a brutal attack on Israeli communities that started the war.

But ever since that Oct. 7 assault, there have been concerns the conflict could ignite fighting on other fronts, and Israel and the Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah have repeatedly traded fire along the Lebanon border.

In his first public speech since the war began, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said his group had “entered the battle” with the past weeks’ unprecedented cross-border fighting. “We will not be limited to this,” he said, suggesting escalation was possible. Still, Nasrallah stopped short of announcing that Hezbollah is fully engaging in the war.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken, on his third trip to Israel since the war began, reiterated U.S. support for Israel in the war, saying it has the right to defend itself. But he said a “humanitarian pause” was needed to boost aid deliveries to Palestinian civilians amid growing alarm over the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

After meeting Blinken, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel “refuses a temporary cease-fire that doesn’t include a return of our hostages,” referring to some 240 people Hamas abducted during its attack. He said Israel was pressing ahead with its military offensive with “all of its power.”

Blinken said there had to be a substantial and immediate increase in humanitarian aid to Gaza, where “we need to do more to protect Palestinian civilians.” Without that, “there are no partners for peace,” he said, adding that it was critical to restore the path toward a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict.

Hezbollah, an ally of Hamas, attacked Israeli military positions in northern Israel with drones, mortar fire and suicide drones on Thursday. The Israeli military said it retaliated with warplanes and helicopter gunships, and spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said civilians were wounded in the Hezbollah attacks.

“We are in a high state of readiness in the north, in a very high state of alert, to respond to any event today and in coming days,” he said.

Blinken said the U.S., which has deployed aircraft carriers and other forces in the eastern Mediterranean, was committed to ensuring that no “second or third front” opens in the conflict, referring to Hezbollah.

In his speech, Nasrallah said his militia is not deterred by U.S. warnings, saying: “Your fleets in the Mediterranean … will not scare us.”

A war with Hezbollah would be devastating for both Israel and Lebanon. Hezbollah is much stronger than Hamas, with an arsenal of some 150,000 rockets and missiles, some believed to be precision-guided weapons capable of striking deep inside Israel.

Israel has promised to unleash vast destruction in Lebanon if all-out war erupts, accusing Hezbollah of hiding its military installation in the midst of residential areas. The two enemies fought an inconclusive monthlong war in 2006. Renewed fighting could also risk drawing Iran, which backs both Hamas and Hezbollah, into the conflict.

More than 9,200 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza so far, mostly women and minors, and more and than 23,000 people have been wounded, the Gaza Health Ministry said, without providing a breakdown between civilians and fighters.

More than 1,400 people have died on the Israeli side, mainly civilians killed during Hamas’ initial attack, when some 240 people were also taken hostage. Some 5,400 have also been injured.

Twenty-four Israeli soldiers have been killed in Gaza since the start of the ground operation. Since the start of the war, seven Israeli soldiers and a civilian have been killed in different incidents along Israel’s border with Lebanon.

As American officials have before, Blinken pledged unwavering support for Israel and its right to defend itself.

“We stand strongly for the proposition that Israel has not only the right but the obligation to defend itself, and to make sure that October 7 should never happen again,” said Blinken, who also plans to visit Amman, Jordan. It follows President Joe Biden’s suggestion for a humanitarian “pause” in the fighting. The aim would be to let in aid for Palestinians and let out more Palestinians who hold foreign passports and wounded.

Around 800 people left Gaza over the past two days — the first time people departed the besieged territory other than four hostages released by Hamas and another rescued by Israeli forces.

Blinken first held talks with Netanyahu behind closed doors before starting wider discussions with the leader and his War Cabinet and meeting with President Isaac Herzog.

More than 3,700 Palestinian children have been killed in 25 days of fighting, according to the Health Ministry in Hamas-run Gaza. Bombardment has driven more than half the territory’s 2.3 million people from their homes. Food, water and fuel are running low under Israel’s siege, and overwhelmed hospitals warn they are on the verge of collapse.

Israel has allowed more than 260 trucks carrying food and medicine into Gaza, but aid workers say it’s not nearly enough. Israeli authorities have refused to allow fuel in, saying Hamas is hoarding fuel for military use and would steal new supplies.

White House national security spokesman John Kirby said the U.S. was not advocating for a general cease-fire but a “temporary, localized” pause.

Israel has not openly responded to Biden’s suggestion. But Netanyahu, who has previously ruled out a cease-fire, said Thursday: “We are advancing. … Nothing will stop us.” He vowed to destroy Hamas rule in the Gaza Strip.

Israel and the U.S. seem to have no clear plan for what would come next if Hamas rule in Gaza is brought down — a key question on Blinken’s agenda during the visit, according to the State Department.

Meanwhile, military officials said Israeli forces have now completely encircled Gaza City, a densely packed cluster of neighborhoods that Israel says is the center of Hamas military infrastructure and includes a vast network of underground tunnels, bunkers and command centers.

Israeli forces are “fighting in a built-up, dense, complex area,” said the military’s chief of staff, Herzi Halevy.

Hagari, the military spokesperson, said Israeli forces were in “face to face” battles with militants, calling in airstrikes and shelling when needed. He said they were inflicting heavy losses on Hamas fighters and destroying their infrastructure with engineering equipment.

Hamas’ military wing said early Friday that its fighters battled Israeli troops in several areas in Gaza and claimed they killed four soldiers on the northern edge of the city of Beit Lahiya. It also claimed to have destroyed several tanks with locally made anti-tank rockets.

Neither the reports from Israel nor Hamas could be independently verified.

Casualties on both sides were expected to rise as Israeli troops advance toward the dense residential neighborhoods of Gaza City. Israel has warned residents to immediately evacuate the Shati refugee camp, which borders Gaza City’s center.

But hundreds of thousands of Palestinians remain in the path of fighting in northern Gaza, despite Israel’s repeated calls for them to flee. Many have crowded into U.N. facilities, hoping for safety.

Still, four U.N. schools-turned-shelter in northern Gaza and Bureij were hit in recent days, killing 24 people, according to Philippe Lazzarini, general-secretary of the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA.

In the occupied West Bank overnight, Israeli forces killed seven Palestinians in different places and arrested many more, according to the Israeli military and Palestinian health officials.

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