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- Authorities in Gaza say Israel’s “starvation policy” has killed at least 326 Palestinians since March 2, as the UN warns that 14,000 babies are at risk of dying within 48 hours.
- The UN also says no aid has been distributed in Gaza, a day after Israel allowed limited humanitarian deliveries to resume.
- The UK suspends free trade talks with Israel, while the EU says it will review a pact governing its political and economic ties with Israel over the “catastrophic” situation in Gaza.
- Israel’s war on Gaza has killed at least 53,573 Palestinians and wounded 121,688, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. The Government Media Office updated the death toll to more than 61,700, saying thousands of people missing under the rubble are presumed dead.
- An estimated 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, 2023, and more than 200 were taken captive.
Three killed in another Israeli attack on south Gaza
Israel’s relentless attacks on Khan Younis continue.
Our correspondents on the ground are reporting that an Israeli attack on the Maen area has killed at least three people.
This comes after Israeli forces launched more than 20 raids on houses in the eastern and southern neighbourhoods of the city.
At least four people were reported killed in Khan Younis earlier, while another four were killed in the nearby town of Abasan al-Kabira.
Israeli attack kills four in southern Gaza
Our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic are reporting that four people have been killed and several others wounded in an Israeli air attack on a house in the town of Abasan al-Kabira in Khan Younis.
UN experts slam Israeli attacks on schools in Gaza, East Jerusalem
A group of 22 human rights experts have denounced Israel’s deadly assault on a UNRWA-run school-turned-shelter in the Gaza Strip on May 7, as well as its forcible closure of all six schools run by the agency in occupied East Jerusalem on May 8.
The experts said, “Attacks on schools are an assault on children.”
They are “also an assault on the right to safe education and a blatant violation of international law, all the more in the context of an unlawful occupation,” the experts added.
The attack on the UNRWA-run school in Gaza involved two strikes on a building that was sheltering 2,000 displaced Palestinians. At least 30 civilians, including women and children, were killed.
In the attacks on occupied East Jerusalem, heavily armed Israeli forces stormed three UNRWA schools in the Shu’fat refugee camp while classes were in session, violently evicting more than 550 Palestinian children, some as young as six, from their classrooms, the experts said. “By the end of the day, all six UNRWA schools in East Jerusalem had been evacuated,” they said.
“Israel has no authority to carry out these actions, when the International Court of Justice has determined that Israel is under an obligation to dismantle its occupation.”
Israeli soldier killed in southern Gaza
The Israeli military says the 20-year-old sergeant in the 51st Infantry Division “fell in battle in the southern Gaza Strip”.
According to figures published by the military, at least 858 soldiers have been killed since the Hamas-led attacks of October 7, 2023.
Israeli opposition leader criticises killing ‘children as a hobby’
Yair Golan calls a news conference to address outrage over comments he made in an interview in which he accused the Israeli government of killing “babies as a hobby”.
Mixed reaction in the West Bank as UK sanctions Israeli settlers
We’ve been speaking to Palestinians in the occupied West Bank on the UK’s decision to impose sanctions against Israeli settlers in the territory, as well as its move to suspend trade talks with Israel over its war on Gaza.
“This is a serious and tangible change in the British position. We hope that this would be the start of more steps towards imposing sanctions on the state of Israel,” one man told Al Jazeera on video.
“We are already witnessing changes worldwide: in the Netherlands, Norway and others. We hope that these positions gain momentum worldwide and lead towards a boycott of Israel as a protest from its genocide and occupation,” he added.
Another man said that the UK helped create Israel, “so it won’t abandon it in one day”.
“We haven’t seen serious actions by the UK despite all the massacres. We feel that we’ve been left alone by our own people: the Arabs. So I am not holding my breath that the UK will help us.”
A third person said the decision is for “media consumption”.
“But they need to stop the war. The Arabs also: They need to threaten military action. Otherwise, it’s all talk. We feel abandoned,” he added.
Australia urged to impose sanctions on Ben-Gvir, Smotrich
The Australian Centre for International Justice (ACIJ) is calling on the Australian government to impose sanctions on the far-right Israeli cabinet ministers, Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich.
Rawan Arraf, ACIJ’s executive director, said that a recent joint statement from Canada, France and the UK shows that “it’s not too late” for Australia “to take concrete actions” over Israeli human rights violations, including through sanctions and an arms embargo.
“If Australia were to take its obligations seriously it would open criminal investigations into Smotrich’s alarming remarks on annihilating the Gaza Strip,” said Arraf.
“Sanctions are a bare minimum opportunity to deter and punish such severe violations,” she said.
Australia should also impose a “two-way arms embargo on Israel,” she added.
“Ongoing military trade and cooperation only serve to reinforce Israel’s unlawful occupation and empower its military apparatus.”
Death toll in Gaza rises
Our correspondents on the ground say Israeli forces have killed at least 17 people in Gaza since the early hours of this morning.
Four killed in Israeli attack on south Gaza
Our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic are reporting that an Israeli attack on the city of Khan Younis has killed at least four people.
We’ll bring you more soon.
Why is Israel expanding its war on Gaza?
As Israel expands its operations in Gaza, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are again being forced from their homes.
Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, has promised to seize all of the Strip, adding that the ultimate result of this will be the “forcible expulsion of Palestinians” from Gaza.
While partially lifting a blockade of the Strip that’s now in its third month, he said he’s doing so only to appease his supporters in the US.
So, what does this mean for the future of Gaza, and for the Palestinians suffering displacement, starvation
What’s the significance of EU’s push to review trade pact with Israel?
The EU has decided to review Article 2 of its trade agreement with Israel, which was signed in 2000.
This means that if Israel is found to have breached its human rights obligations, it will face sanctions. But for the time being, the EU is just trying to put further pressure on Israel, hoping that it will one day allow more aid into Gaza.
Kaja Kallas, the EU’s top diplomat, speaking to reporters after a meeting in Brussels, said that pressure is necessary to change the situation and that a strong majority of the bloc’s nations favour this review.
This decision is quite significant.
First of all, just a few months ago, there was no consensus here at the EU on the need to put pressure on Israel or to implement sanctions. But over the last few days, they’ve managed to build more momentum towards a new push and get this review of the trade agreement.
So, what’s next?
If, in the future, there is no progress and the EU feels the Israelis are weaponising aid to continue the carnage in Gaza, then it will convene once again and decide on its next step, which could be imposing sanctions.
This will still be a delicate task, because you still have key players like Germany saying that sanctions are off the table, but people do feel there is a new consensus building towards taking stronger action against Israel and that otherwise the EU will be blamed for betraying the Palestinian people.
Ms Rachel implores world leaders to save babies in Gaza
Children’s educator and YouTube star Ms Rachel has issued an emotional plea to world leaders, urging them to act on the UN’s warning that thousands of babies could die in Gaza within the next 48 hours if Israel’s blockade continues.
“You can’t be about to let 14,000 children starve,” she said in a post on Instagram.
“Whatever is keeping you from standing up for these kids, who don’t have food and medical care and who have had amputations without anaesthesia, whatever is keeping you from saying it, it’s not greater than your humanity,” she said.
Ms Rachel, whose educational videos have had more than 10 billion views on YouTube, has continued to speak out over the plight of children in Gaza, despite facing backlash from Israel’s supporters.
Her real name is Rachel Griffin Accurso.
Gaza is being ‘deliberately asphyxiated by Israeli forces’
Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym MSF, says Israel is allowing an insufficient amount of aid into Gaza as “a smokescreen to pretend” that its siege is over, while subjecting hospitals and clinics in the enclave to “intensive attacks”, and forcing them out of service.
“The Israeli authorities’ decision to allow a ridiculously inadequate amount of aid into Gaza after months of an air-tight siege signals their intention to avoid the accusation of starving people in Gaza, while in fact keeping them barely surviving,” said Pascale Coissard, MSF’s emergency coordinator in Khan Younis.
“This plan is a way to instrumentalise aid, making it a tool to further Israeli forces’ military objectives,” he said.
MSF said that at least 20 medical facilities in Gaza have been “damaged, or forced partially or completely out of service in the past week by advancing Israeli ground operations, intensified airstrikes, and widespread evacuation orders”.
It said its teams in Khan Younis reported hearing almost one Israeli strike per minute between 6am and 6.30am on May 19, including one that hit the Nasser Hospital. The strike was the third time that the hospital had been struck in two months, and it damaged medical stocks, it added.
Earlier, an MSF staff member in central Deir el-Balah told Al Jazeera that the group has yet to see any aid distributed from the first batch of nine trucks Israel cleared for entry on Monday.
Claire Manera also said she is seeing “women and children who look like they haven’t eaten for weeks”, and that malnourished people are flooding into clinics for help.
Israeli soldiers disguised as civilians raid Gaza neighbourhood
Israeli forces, disguised as civilians, have raided a neighbourhood in Khan Younis.
They killed Palestinian fighter Ahmed Sarhan before taking his wife and young son. The raid unfolded as Israel escalated its assault on Gaza, where bombardment, a siege and starvation continue.
Death toll from Israel’s attacks on Tuesday rises
Medical sources say Israeli forces killed at least 98 Palestinians in Gaza on Tuesday.
Palestinians flee Israeli bombardment in northern Gaza
Israeli attack on north Gaza kills 12
We’ve been following an Israeli attack on a house in the town of Jabalia in northern Gaza.
Our correspondents on the ground say at least 12 people have been killed in that attack.
We’ll bring you more when we have it.
Columbia students highlight Mahmoud Khalil’s plight at graduation ceremony
The president of the student association of Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) has slammed the continued detention of activist Mahmoud Khalil during a speech at this year’s graduation ceremony.
“I cannot stand up here without acknowledging the absence of Mahmoud Khalil, whose unlawful detainment prevents him from walking across the stage today,” Felix Wang said.
Wang added that Columbia University had become known for its “capitulation”, its “silence” and the plight of Khalil, “a classmate who should be graduating with us today”.
Videos posted online show students cheering and applauding during Wang’s remarks.
Hours earlier, students booed the school’s acting president, Claire Shipman, at a separate graduation ceremony, and chanted “Free Mahmoud”.
Khalil, who was arrested on March 8 over his role in pro-Palestine protests on campus, remains at a detention facility in the state of Louisiana as he fights the Trump administration’s effort to deport him.
Israel pledges to continue war on Gaza until ‘total victory’
Israel’s Foreign Ministry released a statement on Tuesday in response to the measures taken by the UK to cancel trade talks with Israel and also impose sanctions on violent Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank.
Since Israel’s war on Gaza began on October 7, 2023, settler violence has largely increased against Palestinians, with little to no consequence, and these attacks were often carried out under the protection of Israeli forces.
But the Israeli Foreign Ministry is saying that they are going to continue fighting this war until there’s an “absolute victory”, a term that has been touted by the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, for more than a year and a half.
What was noticeably absent from this statement was the fact that all of this pushback the Israelis were getting was in response to the dire and catastrophic humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip, which has been caused by Israel’s war.
Netanyahu has said that he’s going to be allowing the basic and minimal amount of food into Gaza so that the army can continue on with their military operations, something Israeli allies say is wholly inadequate in their statements.
But despite all of the international pressure that the Israelis have been facing, they say that they are going to continue fighting this war.
One killed, several wounded in Israeli attacks on south Gaza
Our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic are reporting that at least one person has been killed in an Israeli air attack on a house in the Bani Suheila area of Khan Younis.
Several people were also wounded in an Israeli attack on a tent where displaced Palestinians were sleeping in the al-Mawasi area of Khan Younis. Another attack on the on the Nabhan family home in Jabalia, in northern Gaza, also wounded several people.
A recap of recent developments
- Israel’s military continues to pound Gaza, killing at least 87 Palestinians on Tuesday, as officials say at least 326 people have died of malnutrition and a lack of medicine since March 2.
- The United Nations says no aid has been distributed in Gaza, a day after Israel allowed limited humanitarian deliveries to resume, and warns that an estimated 14,000 babies are at risk of dying from starvation in the next 48 hours.
- The United Kingdom suspends free trade talks with Israel over the “monstrous” offensive in Gaza, and announces targeted sanctions against Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank.
- The European Union says it will review a pact governing its political and economic ties with Israel due to the “catastrophic” situation in Gaza.
- Israel’s army chief, Eyal Zamir, dismisses the mounting criticism and pledges to press on with the expanded offensive in Gaza.
- US Secretary of State Marco Rubio says Washington is not prepared to pressure Israel in the same way as the UK, France and Canada, which have threatened to take “concrete actions” if the human suffering in Gaza is not alleviated.
Welcome to our live coverage
Hello, and thank you for joining our live coverage of Israel’s war on Gaza, as well as its attacks on the occupied West Bank and the wider region.
Follow this page for round-the-clock updates and analysis on the latest developments.
You can read about the key events from Tuesday, May 20, here.
