Live: Arab and Muslim countries urge Israel to allow 'permanent' shelter into Gaza as weather worsens

US President Donald Trump has welcomed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to his Mar-a-Lago estate as talks between the two leaders get under way.

Trump told reporters he wants to push towards a ceasefire agreement in Gaza “as quickly as we can”, as international pressure mounts over Israel’s war on the enclave.

However, the US president again echoed Israel’s long-standing demands, insisting that “there has to be a disarmament” of Palestinian groups resisiting the Israeli occupation.

He added: “[That’s] one of the things we’ll talk about, certainly, but there has to be a disarming of Hamas.”

Israeli occupation forces shot and wounded a young Palestinian man in Qalqilya in the occupied West Bank on Monday evening, Wafa reported.

Sources told Wafa that Israeli gunfire resulted in wounding the man’s foot with shrapnel while he was near the apartheid wall in the northern part of the city. Paramedics transferred him to hospital, where doctors described his condition as stable.

Elsewhere, settlers injured a child and an elderly man during an attack east of Bethlehem on Monday evening.

Security sources said a group of settlers raided the Khala’il al-Luz area, assaulted homes and violently beat 80-year-old Ibrahim Ahmed Hassan Abayat, leaving him with serious bruising to his shoulder and back. The same attack injured 14-year-old Mustafa Abu Jalghif, who suffered fractures to his limbs.

Residents say settler violence has escalated across eastern Bethlehem governorate in recent months, particularly in Khala’il al-Luz. The area has faced repeated assaults, home raids and efforts to impose control by force, carried out under the protection of Israeli occupation forces.

Communities near colonial outposts east of Bethlehem also report ongoing night raids, restrictions on access to farmland and attacks on farmers and shepherds. These measures have deepened fear and instability, hitting elderly people and children hardest.

Data from the Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission shows that Israeli forces and settlers carried out 2,144 attacks in November alone. The occupation army accounted for 1,523 incidents, while settlers carried out 621, with the highest numbers recorded in Ramallah and al-Bireh, Hebron, Bethlehem and Nablus.

Hamas's military wing, the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, introduced a new spokesman on Monday and confirmed the death of his predecessor in an Israeli strike on Gaza City in August.

In a prerecorded speech aired on Arab media, the new spokesman revealed that his predecessor, known by the nom de guerre Abu Obeida, was actually Huthaifa Samir al-Kahlout.

The new spokesperson, whose identity is unknown, is also taking on the same nom de guerre.

This was the first time Hamas officially confirmed Kahlout's identity, after he had served as the Qassam Brigades spokesman and head of its military unit for two decades without ever revealing his face.

“We mourn the great leader Huthaifa Samir al-Kahlout, Abu Ibrahim, the head of al-Qassam’s media apparatus, who passed away after two decades of frustrating the enemies and uplifting the hearts of the believers,” said the new Abu Obeida.

Read more: Abu Obeida: Hamas reveals new military spokesman after predecessor's death

The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has held talks with the United States’ top diplomat ahead of his planned meeting with President Donald Trump.

Posting on X, Netanyahu described his meeting with Secretary of State Marco Rubio as “great”.

Rubio has played a limited role in the Gaza ceasefire negotiations, which President Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, has led.

Israeli occupation forces raided the town of Sinjil, north of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank on Monday evening, local sources told Wafa.

Witnesses reported that troops moved into areas on the town’s outskirts and fired flares into the air, triggering fear and panic among residents.

The same sources said Israeli forces sealed off entrances to Sinjil, erected military checkpoints and stopped passing vehicles. Soldiers checked residents’ identity documents but made no arrests during the operation, according to local reports.

Severe winter weather in Gaza has killed at least 25 people since the start of December, including six children, as powerful low-pressure systems batter the besieged enclave.

Civil defence and rescue teams report that Gaza had not experienced such intense weather before December, with successive depressions bringing heavy rain, strong winds and biting cold.

They say the storms triggered the complete collapse of 18 residential buildings that Israeli bombardment had previously damaged. More than 110 other homes suffered “serious” partial collapses, leaving thousands of people living inside or nearby at immediate risk.

The impact on displaced families has been devastating. Officials say around 90 percent of tents used as temporary shelters were torn apart or flooded across the strip, forcing thousands of families into the open.

Many lost what little they had left, including “clothes, blankets and mattresses”, deepening an already dire humanitarian crisis as winter conditions worsen.

A group called Justice for the Hunger Strikers has reportedly targeted the Labour Party headquarters in London by smashing its windows and spraying red paint. 

This follows a series of direct action strikes seemingly inspired by the tactics of the now-proscribed organisation Palestine Action, including recent attacks on Labour offices in Newcastle and Aspen Insurance in London, which provides employment liability to Israeli weapons manufacturer Elbit Systems. Greta Thunberg was arrested at a protest outside the latter site on Wednesday. 

Today marks the 57th day that Palestine Action prisoner Heba Muraisi has refused food in protest against her treatment, the proscription of Palestine Action and the Labour government's complicity in Israel's genocide in Gaza.

Pro-Palestine activists are protesting outside of New Hall prison in Wakefield, northern England, where Palestine Action-linked prisoner Heba Muraisi is currently on hunger strike.

Demonstrators are demanding that Muraisi be moved back to HMP Bronzefield, where she was originally placed before being relocated over 100 miles away from her support network, isolating her from friends and family, whom she has not seen for many months.

Muraisi is now on day 57 of her hunger strike and is losing the ability to form sentences and make conversation, according to a statement released by Prisoners for Palestine on her behalf.

The statement said: "Heba still stands strong but she is well into the danger zone, is losing the ability to speak and think clearly. She needs to be near her family right now."

In a statement released on Monday, Palestine Action prisoner Heba Muraisi, who is currently on the 57th day of her hunger strike in a UK prison, said she is losing her ability to think clearly and form sentences.  

In a statement released by Prisoners for Palestine, she said she is growing "weaker as each day passes" and "I can no longer lie on my side as it hurts my face". 

Muraisi is one of four remaining prisoners still on hunger strike. Two other activists had to pause their strike after being admitted to hospital due to deteriorating health. 

They are protesting against their treatment, the proscription of Palestine Action, and British complicity in Israel's genocide in Gaza. 

Eight Palestine Action prisoners have been accused of offences involving break-ins and criminal damage at a weapons factory run by Israeli-owned Elbit Systems UK and an RAF base in Brize Norton, prior to the direct action group's proscription. 

They have been awaiting trial since 2024, but will not expect to go before a judge prior to May next year at the earliest. 

Muraisi was transfered from Brozefield to HMP New Hall in October, 100 miles away from friends and family, in what the statement released by Prisoners for Palestine described as "clearly a vindictive act ... to separate her from other hunger strikers to wear down her will to resist." She hasn't seen her family in more than four months, according to the statement. 

Another inmate refusing food, Teuta Hoxha, being held in HMP Peterborough, has said she is unable to stand without blacking out and "virtually bedridden" due to worstening health from the strike.

7amleh, the Arab Center for the Advancement of Social Media, has released a new report titled "The Impact of the Gaza Blockade and the Destruction of Telecommunications Infrastrucutre on the Digital Economy Amidst Genocide".

The report documents how the systematic destruction of telecommunications and power infrastructure since October 2023, on top of the already long-standing Israeli blockade, has pushed Gaza's digital economy into devastating "collapse".

Findings show that the impact has been catastrophic for thousands of young freelancers, remote workers and digital entrepreneurs reliant on the digital space for income, education, information and global connection.

Daily collapses in connectivity and frequent blackouts have undermined people's work and communication, which "erodes their ability to build sustainable livelihoods", said Mohammed Alshurafa, author of the report.

"Ultimately, supporting Gaza’s digital workers is not merely an act of aid but an act of justice that affirms their right to connect, create, and contribute to a global digital future on equal terms," the report said.

The report's key recommendations are aligned with 7amleh's #ReconnectGaza campaign, which calls for the international community to assist with "restoring and rebuilding telecommunications and power infrastructure with resilient, sustainable systems that guarantee reliable connectivity even during crises".

It calls for ensuring long-term sustainability of digital infrastruture as well as providing immediate relief for the collapsing economy. 

Protests erupted in the breakaway Somali region of Somaliland on Sunday following Israel's announcement that it would formally recognise the territory as an independent state.

Videos posted on social media showed protesters taking to the streets of Boroma, a town about 50km west of Somaliland's regional capital Hargeisa, where they chanted slogans against Israel and waved Palestinian flags.

"Free, Free Palestine," the large group of protesters could be heard chanting as onlookers cheered them on.

"We don't want separatists," others chanted.

Israel on Friday became the first country to formally recognise the self-declared republic as sovereign state, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saying Israel would seek immediate cooperation with Somaliland in the fields of agriculture, health, technology and the economy.

It was not immediately clear why Israel made the declaration or whether it was expecting something in return.

Earlier this year, news reports had said that Israel and the US had approached Somaliland, among others, about accepting Palestinians from Gaza as part of US President Donald Trump's plan at the time to forcibly resettle the territory's population.

Read more: Protests erupt in breakaway region of Somaliland after Israeli recognition

An Israeli soldier has been filmed forcing an elderly Palestinian man with an amputated leg to the ground and aiming a weapon at him in the occupied West Bank.

The man, Sheikh Saeed al-Amour, lost his leg in April after being shot by the security chief of a nearby illegal Israeli settlement in the southern Hebron Hills.

According to his testimony, al-Amour was detained by Israeli forces for several hours at an IDF base while handcuffed and blindfolded, before being released without charge on a roadside.

He says he was then forced to hobble hundreds of metres on crutches to reach his family’s vehicle.

The incident follows ongoing harassment by illegal Israeli settlers, including repeated trespass on his land, damage to his property, and mocking of his disability.

The incident is one of countless examples of systematic abuse by Israeli forces and illegal settlers against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, carried out with near total impunity.

An Israeli soldier has been filmed forcing an elderly Palestinian man with an amputated leg to the ground and aiming a weapon at him in the occupied West Bank.

The man, Sheikh Saeed al-Amour, lost his leg in April after being shot by the security chief of a nearby illegal… pic.twitter.com/BUhEkJfKHw

— Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) December 29, 2025

Three Palestinians were wounded on Monday in Israeli strikes on Gaza, which continued despite the ceasefire, Anadolu news agency reported, quoting medical sources. 

The report said that three people were wounded when Israeli strikes hit the western Jabalia refugee camp, which has already suffered extensive damage from previous bombardments.

Israeli attacks also targeted eastern Gaza City in northern Gaza, the Bureij refugee camp in the centre, and Rafah in the south.

Heavy rain and strong winds flooded and uprooted tents in the Gaza Strip on Monday, worsening already dire living conditions for Palestinians after two years of Israeli genocide. 

The Palestinian health ministry reported that two-month-old Arkan Firas Musleh died from the cold on Monday, as harsh winter conditions were exacerbated by Israel’s blockade on supplies of shelters.

Since the start of the rainy season earlier this month, at least three children have died from the cold, while 17 others have been killed by buildings collapsing due to storms and strong winds.

According to the Shelter Cluster, more than 42,000 tents and makeshift shelters were damaged between 10 and 17 December, affecting nearly a quarter of a million people in the besieged enclave.

Amro Akram, a resident of the Gaza Strip currently displaced in Khan Younis, described the harsh conditions.

Read more: Palestinians 'drowning' as rain and wind uproot more Gaza tents

Gaza health ministry said on Friday that three Palestinians have died as strong winds and heavy rain batters the region, and reported a further 17 deaths due to building collapses. 

"The death of the child Arkan Firas Musleh, aged two months, as a result of the extreme cold, thus raising the number of deaths as a result of the cold and the low-pressure system to three cases," the ministry said. 

"A citizen died as a result of a building collapse, bringing the number of victims who arrived at hospitals as a result of building collapses due to the weather depression to 17 cases," it added. 

During the same period, one Palestinian was reported killed, while three wounded people were received by hospitals in Gaza. 

Civil defence officials said that more than half a million Palestinians in Gaza face danger from the current storm, as their teams are unable to respond due to fuel shortages. 

Since the ceasefire on 10 October 2024, 414 Palestinians were reported killed, while 1,145 others were wounded.

The total number of Palestinians killed since the beginning of Israel's genocidal war in Gaza has reached 71,266.