- A family of 10 has been reported killed in an Israeli attack on a Khan Younis home this morning after medical sources said at least 32 people were killed in Israeli strikes across Gaza on Thursday.
- Houthi-affiliated media reports that US strikes on Ras Isa port in Yemen’s Hodeidah governorate have killed at least 58 people and wounded another 126.
- A group of 12 aid agencies say Gaza is “one of the worst humanitarian failures of our generation”.
- Gaza’s Health Ministry says at least 51,065 Palestinians have been confirmed dead and 116,505 wounded in Israel’s war on Gaza since it began 18 months ago.
- The Gaza 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.
‘Never felt truly safe’: Palestinian woman describes displacement
Summer Aljamal, a Palestinian woman who works with Medical Aid for Palestinians, and her family have spent nearly a year displaced from their home in Rafah.
“Throughout that time, my family and I have had to move multiple times,” she said in a video shared by the organisation. “We were never able to settle, never able to feel truly safe.”
She described returning to Rafah during the short-lived ceasefire in Gaza, which ended on March 18, and seeing that her home was “seriously damaged but somehow still standing”.
“Today, we live with the unbearable uncertainty of not knowing what’s next. We do not know if we will ever be able to go back, or if the place we once called home will still be there.”
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Let’s get you up to speed with the latest developments:
A spokesperson for Yemen’s Health Ministry says at least 74 people have been killed and 171 wounded in the US strikes on Ras Isa port in Yemen’s Hodeidah governorate.
Medical sources told Al Jazeera that at least 50 people have been killed by Israeli attacks since dawn.
Houthi spokesperson says the group fired a ballistic missile at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport earlier today.
UNRWA estimates that nearly 420,000 people have been displaced since the ceasefire in Gaza was broken by Israel.
Hamas’s chief negotiator has called for immediate pressure on Israel to end the six-week blockade that has deepened a hunger crisis in the battered enclave.
Protests in New York over Trump’s policies against universities
Many of the protesters who rallied this week in the US city have called for the release of Mahmoud Khalil, the former Columbia University student who was detained last month over his pro-Palestine activism.
The Trump administration is trying to deport Khalil under a rarely used provision of an immigration law, which gives the secretary of state the power to remove any non-citizen whose presence in the US is deemed to have “adverse foreign policy consequences”.
Rights advocates say the US government is cracking down on free speech and pro-Palestine activism under the guise of fighting anti-Semitism.
Hezbollah pledges to retain arms until Israel ceases hostilities in southern Lebanon
A Hezbollah official says the group categorically refuses to discuss handing over its weapons to Lebanon’s army unless Israel withdraws completely from the south and stops its “aggression”.
“It is not a question of disarming,” Wafiq Safa said in an interview with Hezbollah’s Al Nur radio station. “What the president [Joseph Aoun] said in his inauguration speech is a defensive strategy.”
A ceasefire agreement in November ended more than a year of hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, sparked by the war in Gaza, that included two months of open warfare.
Safa said Hezbollah had conveyed its position to Aoun, who on Tuesday said he sought “to make 2025 the year of restricting arms to the state” alone.
“Wouldn’t it be logical for Israel to first withdraw, then release the prisoners, then cease its aggression … and then we discuss a defensive strategy?” he asked in the interview.
Israel’s defence minister says focus is on Iran’s nuclear capability and Gaza
Israel’s Defence Minister Israel Katz says he is focused on “preventing nuclear weapons from Iran and winning the war [on Gaza]”.
Houthis say they fired missile at Israeli airport
Houthi spokesperson Yahya Saree says the group fired a ballistic missile at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport earlier today.
He added that the group also shot down a US drone that was carrying out “hostile acts” around the Sanaa governorate.
Earlier, we reported that Israeli authorities said a ballistic missile had been fired from Yemen and that the country’s air defences had intercepted the missile. No casualties were reported.
Psychological toll of war showing on the Palestinians’ faces
The prolonged and systematic Israeli policy of siege and blockade of the entire Gaza Strip has led to severe repercussions at the humanitarian level.
Gaza’s hospitals are operating beyond capacity. In light of chronic shortages of medical supplies, the situation is now unprecedented.
The situation is very difficult for every single person here in Gaza – you have 200,000 Palestinians suffering from chronic diseases in very desperate need of essential medicines.
Palestinians are forced to cut down on the number of daily meals. They are not eating very nutritious foods, only canned goods and vegetables that they can afford. Prices of those have skyrocketed.
We can see the very psychological toll of the city on the faces of everyone here, people are walking very exhausted, traumatised. They are thinking about the dark future that awaits them.
People are not just dying here from bombardment, but they have started to die from malnutrition, and many of them feel psychologically broken due to their inability to provide meals for their children.
Death toll in Gaza today rises to 50
Medical sources told Al Jazeera that at least 50 people have now been killed by Israeli attacks since dawn.
More than half of the casualties were in Gaza City and northern Gaza, but deadly attacks have occurred throughout the Palestinian enclave, including in Khan Younis and Rafah in the south.
Iran’s FM spokesman condemns ‘most heinous war crimes’
Esmaeil Baghaei has condemned the killing of Palestinian children in Gaza in what he described as Israel’s “relentless brutal bombardment” and “cruel starvation”.
“These are not only morally outrageous; they are the most heinous acts of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide under international law,” Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman said in a post on X.
“The Israeli regime, its enablers & apologists, must be held accountable.”
UNRWA says it is running 115 shelters in Gaza housing more than 90,000 people
In a post on X, the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) stated that it estimates “nearly 420,000 people have been displaced yet again since the breakdown of the ceasefire.”
Settlements are a ‘major obstacle’ to peace: British consulate in Jerusalem
The consulate has posted a thread on X in which it says diplomats from a number of countries, including Belgium, France, Spain and Germany, have shown “support with Palestinian community members” after settler attacks in the occupied West Bank.
“The attacks included demolitions of donor-funded shelters and other structures”, the consulate said, as it called on Israel to “uphold its obligations under the 4th Geneva Convention, including the prohibition of forcible transfer and destruction of homes and property”.
“We also reaffirm our opposition to settlements, which are illegal under international law, and a major obstacle to the achievement of the two-State solution and to a just, lasting and comprehensive peace”, it said.
Gaza’s civil defence warns vehicles are running out of fuel
The fuel shortage could force the agency – which carries out emergency and rescue services in Gaza – to halt operations “within the next few days”, it said in a post on Telegram.
“We call for pressure on the Israeli occupation authorities to allow the entry of sufficient quantities of fuel,” said the civil defence.
Israel has not allowed any fuel, or food or medicine for that matter, into the Gaza Strip since early March. A top Israeli official said earlier this week that it will continue to blockade Gaza as a means to force Hamas to release the remaining Israeli captives.
More strikes heard near Gaza City’s Zeitoun
Gaza’s civil defence has warned that in the coming days, their firetrucks are going to stop moving because of fuel shortages.
What does this mean? It means people who are trapped under rubble are going to have to wait a long time under piles of concrete for any help.
Meanwhile, strikes continue. Just in the past few minutes, strikes could be heard in the eastern part of Gaza City, particularly in the direction of Zeitoun neighbourhood, where there are initial reports of tents being targeted.
Israeli settler attacks continue in the occupied West Bank
aIsraeli settlers have attacked Palestinians on their land in the town of Biddya, in the Salfit governorate in the occupied West Bank, according to Al Jazeera Arabic.
The Palestine Red Crescent said that a Palestinian was injured in the attack.
Local sources also told our colleagues that dozens of settlers stormed Jabal al-Urma, a hill in the town of Beita in the Nablus governorate under the protection of the Israeli army.
Settlers are Israeli citizens who live illegally on private Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Death toll rises following US strikes on Yemeni port, Houthi media says
Houth-affiliated media outlet Al Masirah TV now says that 58 people have been killed in the US strikes on Ras Isa port in Yemen’s Hodeidah governorate, which we have been reporting on.
Al Masirah TV also said that 126 people have been wounded in the strikes.
Hamas condemns deadly US attack in Yemen
Hamas has condemned the US missile attack on Yemen’s Ras Isa port, which killed at least 38 people and injured more than 100, calling it a “full-fledged war crime”.
“The US aggression against the Yemeni people is an extension of the war of extermination being waged against our Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip,” said the Palestinian group in a post on Telegram. “Hamas expresses its full solidarity with the brotherly Yemeni people.”
Hamas also denounced “international silence” over the “blatant aggression” in Yemen, whose people it said are “paying the price” for supporting Palestinians in Israel’s genocide.
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