- The military wing of Hamas said contact has been lost with the group guarding US-Israeli soldier Edan Alexander after Israel launched a “direct bombardment” on the area where the captive was being held.
- Medical sources tell Al Jazeera that at least 23 people have been killed in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip since dawn on Tuesday, and reports of more attacks and casualties continue.
- Gaza’s Health Ministry says at least 51,000 Palestinians are confirmed dead and 116,343 wounded in Israel’s war on Gaza since it began 18 months ago.
- The Government Media Office updated its death toll to more than 61,700, saying thousands of people missing under the rubble are presumed dead. At least 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attacks and more than 200 were taken captive.
Israel plans longer-term presence in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria
As we’ve been reporting, Israeli officials have suggested they plan to maintain a longer-term military presence in areas it has seized in the Gaza Strip, as well as in Lebanon and Syria.
Israel Katz, the country’s defence minister, said in a statement earlier today that “unlike in the past, the [Israeli military] is not evacuating areas that have been cleared and seized”.
He said Israeli forces “will remain in the security zones as a buffer between the enemy and [Israeli] communities in any temporary or permanent situation in Gaza – as in Lebanon and Syria”.
In recent weeks, the Israeli army has taken over large swathes of Gaza, which, under international law, is considered occupied by Israel. Israeli-controlled “security zones” exist between the south and north of the enclave, as well as between the southern cities of Rafah and Khan Younis.
Meanwhile, Israel has refused to withdraw from some areas in Lebanon following a ceasefire with Hezbollah, with Katz saying the country will “remain in a buffer zone in Lebanon at five observation posts”.
It also seized a buffer zone in southern Syria after the December overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad.
Hamas ‘studying’ Israeli ceasefire proposal, demand to disarm a ‘red line’
Hamas says it’s reviewing an Israeli proposal—relayed by Egypt—for a potential ceasefire in Gaza and will respond ‘as soon as possible.’
The new plan reportedly includes a 45-day temporary ceasefire and the entry of food and shelter in exchange for the release of half of the captives remaining in Gaza in the first week.
No humanitarian aid will enter Gaza: Israeli defence minister
“Israel’s policy is clear and no humanitarian aid will be allowed into Gaza,” Israel Katz said in statement on X.
Preventing humanitarian aid from entering the Strip “is one of the main pressure tools that stops Hamas from using this means against the population,” Katz said.
“In the current reality, no one is going to allow any humanitarian aid into Gaza, and no preparations are being made to allow any aid of this kind,” he said.
Israeli authorities have blocked all aid from entering Gaza for over a month worsening the already catastrophic humanitarian situation in Gaza.
Earlier today, charity Doctors Without Borders, or MSF, denounced the “full siege” of Gaza which has depleted food, fuel and medical stocks.
Israeli drone strike targets car in southern Lebanon
Israeli drone strike targeted a car in Wadi al-Hujayr, in southern Lebanon.
There were no immediate reports of casualties.
The Israeli army earlier acknowledged it launched an attack on southern Lebanon on Tuesday night, claiming the attack was targeting Hezbollah.
These latest attacks come after the office of the UN Human Rights Office said on Tuesday that Israeli forces have killed at least 71 civilians in Lebanon since the beginning of a ceasefire with Hezbollah in November.
Israeli defense minister says troops will remain in Gaza ‘security zones’ indefinitely
“Unlike in the past, the [Israeli military] is not evacuating areas that have been cleared and seized,” Israel Katz said in a statement.
Israeli forces “will remain in the security zones as a buffer between the enemy and (Israeli) communities in any temporary or permanent situation in Gaza – as in Lebanon and Syria.”
Israeli forces have taken over large areas of Gaza in recent weeks in a renewed campaign to pressure Hamas to release the remaining captives after Israel ended their ceasefire last month.
Israel has also refused to withdraw from some areas in Lebanon following a ceasefire with the Hezbollah last year, and it seized a buffer zone in southern Syria after the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad.
Gaza, a ‘mass grave’ for Palestinians and those helping them: MSF
Palestinian lives are being systematically destroyed as Israel’s continued bombardment of the Gaza Strip shows a “blatant disregard” for the safety of humanitarian workers, Doctors Without Borders, or MSF, has warned.
“Gaza has been turned into a mass grave of Palestinians and those coming to their assistance. We are witnessing in real time the destruction and forced displacement of the entire population in Gaza,” said Amande Bazerolle, MSF’s emergency coordinator in the enclave.
Medical facilities are not exempt from attacks and evacuation orders by Israeli forces. MSF teams have had to leave many facilities, while others continue operating with staff and patients trapped inside, unable to leave safely for hours at a time, a statement from the charity reads.
Operating inside Gaza has become extremely challenging, and according to the group:
The lack of fuel replenishment across the Strip will lead to the suspension of activities as hospitals rely on generators for electricity to keep critical patients alive and conduct lifesaving operations.
MSF reported strikes from both Hamas and the Israeli army near its field hospital in Deir el-Balah, central Gaza.
Israeli forces also carried out strikes near the compounds of Al-Aqsa and Nasser hospitals.
Since March 18, MSF said it has not been able to return to the Indonesian hospital in northern Gaza where the charity’s teams were set to begin paediatric care.
MSF mobile clinics in north Gaza were suspended, and in the south, teams have been unable to return to the Shaboura clinic in Rafah.
The full siege on Gaza has depleted food, fuel and medical stocks. MSF is especially facing shortages in medications for pain management and chronic illnesses, antibiotics and critical surgical materials.
‘Incredibly unpopular’ Netanyahu poised to prolong Gaza war
The Israeli prime minister’s calculations remain as they were throughout his war, as the fighting and killing drag on at his behest in Gaza, says Dan Perry, Israeli affairs analyst and former regional editor of The Associated Press news agency in the Middle East.
“Netanyahu has clearly decided that he can’t let his government fall, which it probably would if he ends the war, even in exchange for the hostages,” Perry told Al Jazeera from Tel Aviv.
Top UK barrister: Israel is carrying out ‘destruction of humanity’ in Gaza
Ten British citizens, including dual nationals, who have served in the Israeli army are being accused of war crimes in Gaza.
They are suspected of acts such as “murder, extermination, attacking civilians, and deportation or forcible transfer of population”, according to the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights and the UK-based Public Interest Law Centre, which submitted a 240-page report to the Metropolitan Police’s War Crimes Unit last week.
Michael Mansfield, 83, a leading barrister who has worked on several high-profile cases throughout his career and is dubbed “the king” of human rights work, was among those who handed over the dossier that took a team of lawyers and researchers in the UK and The Hague six months to compile.
Dozens of other lawyers, researchers and human rights practitioners have signed a letter of support, urging the Met’s war crimes team to investigate the complaints.
Death toll in Israeli attack in northern Gaza rises to 10
We reported earlier that an Israeli attack killed at least three people in a residential home in an area east of Gaza City.
We are now getting reports that the death toll has risen to 10. The bodies have been retrieved from under the rubble of the Hassouna family’s home.
At least 13 others were critically injured in the attack.
Israeli soldiers arrest journalist in West Bank raid
Israeli forces have arrested journalist Ibrahim Abu Safiyeh after raiding his home in Beit Sira village near Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, Wafa reports.
We’ll bring you more soon.
UNRWA chief thanks EU for ‘standing by’ Palestinian refugees with funding
UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini has expressed thanks to the European Union for its continued funding of the UN agency that supports Palestinian refugees.
Lazzarini, who has fought back against months of attacks on UNRWA by Israel that caused donors to halt funding, thanked the EU for “standing by Palestinian refugees”.
“In these immensely challenging times when millions of people rely on our services, the European Commission support is truly indispensable,” Lazzarini wrote said in a post on social media.
Israel’s unfounded accusations that a handful of UNRWA staff took part in the October 7, 2023, attacks on Israel led to almost 20 countries suspending funding to the organisation. Several have since restored their funds following independent reviews, which proved there was no substance to Israel’s claims.
Israeli forces have killed more than 280 UNRWA staff in Gaza since the start of the war, and the Israeli parliament recently passed legislation outlawing the UN agency’s operations in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory.
With amputations soaring, Gaza lab makes prosthetics from recycled materials
Thousands of Palestinians have lost one or more of their limbs in Israeli attacks since October 2023, leading to surging demand for prosthetics.
But Hossny Muhna, from Gaza’s Artificial Laboratory, says the “sharp surge in limb loss” as well as Israel’s blockade have led to “severe shortages of prosthetic devices and essential materials”.
To try to meet demand, technicians at the lab have been turning to recycled materials pulled from the rubble.
Three killed, many wounded in Gaza City in Israeli bombing
Our correspondents are reporting that three people were killed and many wounded in an Israeli bombardment of a house in al-Sha’af in Gaza City’s Tuffah neighbourhood.
We will bring you more details as we receive them.
Israeli soldiers arrest 6 Palestinians in West Bank raid
Israeli forces raided Azzun in the Qalqilya governorate and arrested six men early on Wednesday morning, Wafa reports.
They also stormed Qalqilya city and searched many homes, with no arrests reported.
Israel claims senior Hamas fighter killed in coordinated attack
The Israeli military has claimed that a senior Hamas fighter was killed in a joint operation with the Shin Bet intelligence service.
In a post on social media, the military said the assistant to Hamas’s Gaza Brigade commander was killed a number of days ago in an attack in Gaza City.
The military said the victim – identified as Mahmoud Abu Hasira – was involved in an operation in July 2014 when Hamas fighters raided a fortified structure after infiltrating through a tunnel, killing five Israeli soldiers and wounding a sixth.
If you’re just joining us
Here’s what you need to know:
- Israeli attacks killed at least 11 people in Gaza City and three people in Jabalia in northern Gaza overnight.
- WHO Chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus decried an attack on the Kuwaiti field hospital in southern Gaza which killed one person and injured nine.
- Israel’s military said it shot down a drone attempting to smuggle weapons from Egypt into Israeli territory.
- Israeli forces shot a Palestinian youth at the Qalandiya checkpoint, located north of occupied East Jerusalem.
- Jordan’s Prime Minister Jafar Hassan met US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Washington, DC, and discussed Gaza and the West Bank.
Israeli helicopters, artillery attack southern Gaza homes, refugee camps
Palestinian media also report that Israeli attack helicopters are firing on Rafah city in the southern Gaza Strip, and the town of Abasan al-Kabira has also come under heavy Israeli artillery attack in nearby Khan Younis.
Artillery attacks have also been reported in the last hour on the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, as well as the Bureij camp.
We reported earlier that three people were killed in an attack on the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza earlier this morning, and six were killed overnight in an Israeli attack on the Hassouna family in the Tuffah neighbourhood of Gaza City.
We will bring you more on the overnight and early morning attacks on Gaza as more information emerges.
Israel admits another attack on Lebanon as UN reports 71 killed since ceasefire
The Israeli army has acknowledged it launched an attack on southern Lebanon on Tuesday night, claiming the attack was targeting Hezbollah.
In a post on X, the army accused Hezbollah of “cynically exploiting civilian infrastructure” and “using the residents of Lebanon as human shields”.
The latest attack comes after the office of the UN Human Rights Office said on Tuesday that Israeli forces have killed at least 71 civilians in Lebanon since the beginning of a ceasefire with Hezbollah in November.
More deadly Israeli attacks hit Gaza City
The Wafa news agency is reporting that Israeli forces have killed a Palestinian sheltering in a tent near Gaza City, in the north of the Gaza Strip.
Wafa is also reporting that an Israeli attack on an apartment near the as-Saraya intersection in the city centre killed two people.
As we reported earlier, Israeli forces also attacked the Yarmouk Stadium in Gaza City, where thousands of people are sheltering in tents, killing two people.
We’ll bring you more soon.
A recap of recent developments
- Israeli air strikes across Gaza have killed at least 23 Palestinians since early Tuesday as Israel’s total blockade maintained for more than seven weeks is starving the Palestinian enclave.
- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was accompanied by his defence minister and the army chief in a visit to besieged northern Gaza, where he promised that Hamas would receive “blow after blow”.
- The armed wing of Hamas said it has lost contact with the team guarding US-Israeli captive Edan Alexander after an Israeli air strike on their location.
- The UN said at least 71 civilians, including 14 women and nine children, have been killed by Israeli forces in Lebanon since the agreed-upon ceasefire with Hezbollah in November.
- The UK Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) reports that armed individuals on fast boats opened fire on a vessel some 100 nautical miles (185km) off the coast of the Yemeni city of Aden, but there were no casualties.
- Hundreds more Israeli settlers, backed by armed soldiers and far-right Knesset members, performed Talmudic rituals and celebrated Passover at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound for a third day.
- The Maldives announced it is banning all Israeli nationals from the luxury tourist archipelago, a decision Hamas welcomed as a “brave step”.
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You can find all our updates from Tuesday, April 15, here.