Israel-Palestine live: Unicef says over 13,000 children killed in Gaza

A faulty air drop of aid in Gaza City has killed at least two people, according to Palestinian reports.

Videos captured by local journalists showed over a dozen packages dropped from a plane falling at a great speed near the al-Fayrouz Towers area. 

Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said Friday it was "deeply concerned" about a staff member detained by Israeli soldiers after being forced to flee Nasser hospital in Khan Younis last month. 

"We call on them to treat him with dignity and ensure his wellbeing," the NGO said after receiving confirmation form Israeli authorities he was in their custody. 

The UK will join the US in constructing a maritime corridor on the Mediterranean Sea to deliver aid to Gaza, British Foreign Secretary David Cameron said. 

In a post on social media platform X, Cameron renewed calls for Israel to "allow more trucks into Gaza as the fastest way to get aid to those who need it".

An Israeli tank crew killed a Reuters reporter in Lebanon in October by firing two shells at a clearly identified group of journalists and then "likely" opened fire on them with a heavy machine gun in an attack that lasted 1 minute and 45 seconds, according to a report into the incident published on Thursday.

The report by the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research (TNO) - which was contracted by Reuters to analyse evidence from the 13 October attack that killed visuals journalist Issam Abdallah - found that a tank 1.34 km away in Israel fired two 120 mm rounds at the reporters.

The first shell killed Abdallah, 37, and severely wounded Agence France-Presse (AFP) photographer Christina Assi, 28.

A Reuters investigation in December covered TNO's preliminary finding that a tank in Israel had fired at the journalists. In its final report on Thursday, the institute revealed that audio picked up by an Al Jazeera video camera at the scene showed the reporters also came under fire from 0.50 calibre rounds of the type used by the Browning machine guns that can be mounted on Israel's Merkava tanks.

"It is considered a likely scenario that a Merkava tank, after firing two tank rounds, also used its machine gun against the location of the journalists," TNO's report said. "The latter cannot be concluded with certainty as the direction and exact distance of (the machine gun) fire could not be established."

Reuters could not independently determine if the Israeli tank crew knew it was firing on journalists, nor whether it also shot at them with a machine gun and, if so, why.

Neither of the two surviving Reuters reporters or another AFP journalist at the scene remembered the machine gun fire. All said they were in shock at the time.

Reporting by Reuters

Israel is to be allowed to compete in the Eurovision song contest after changing a lyrics in its entry that referenced the 7 October killings by Hamas.

Eden Golan is set to sing for Israel at the competition in Sweden, but her original song October Rain was prohibited over its political content, which is officially banned by the competition.

The original lyrics to the song, according to Kan, including lines such as "There’s no air left to breathe" and "They were all good children, each one of them."

Kan had initially said it would not change the lyrics, but agreed to do so after a request by Israeli President Isaac Herzog. 

Israel's entry in Eurovision while the attack on Gaza is ongoing has been criticised by pro-Palestinian campaigners, who pointed to Russia's exclusion from the competition as a result of its invasion of Ukraine.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said she expected a maritime aid corridor to start operating between Cyprus and Gaza over this weekend, taking desperately-needed aid to besieged Palestinians.

Von der Leyen said a pilot test run of food aid collected by a charity group and supported by the United Arab Emirates could be leaving Cyprus as early as Friday from the port of Larnaca in Cyprus.

Reporting by Reuters

The United Nations human rights office said on Friday that an Israeli offensive in Gaza's border town of Rafah could not be allowed to happen because it would cause massive loss of life.

"Should Israel launch its threatened military offensive into Rafah, where 1.5 million people have been displaced in deplorable, subhuman conditions, any ground assault on Rafah would incur massive loss of life and would heighten the risk of further atrocity crimes," said Jeremy Laurence, spokesperson for the UN Human Rights Office spokesperson.

"This must not be allowed to happen."

Reporting by Reuters

Delivering humanitarian supplies to Gaza by airdrops or sea cannot sufficiently "substitute" land deliveries, the UN aid coordinator for the Palestinian territory said Thursday after a closed-door Security Council meeting.

Sigrid Kaag said her message to the UN Security Council was that the international community must "flood the market in Gaza with humanitarian goods" and "re-energise the private sector" so more commercial goods can enter to meet civilians' needs.

"The diversification of the supply routes via land" this remains the optimal solution," she said.

"It's easier, it's faster, it's cheaper, particularly if we know that we need to sustain humanitarian assistance to Gazans for a long period of time."

Reporting by AFP

Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories have expanded by a record amount and risk eliminating any practical possibly of a Palestinian state, the UN human rights chief said on Friday.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said that the growth of Israeli settlements amounted to the transfer by Israel of its own population, which he said was a war crime.

The US Biden administration said last month the settlements were "inconsistent" with international law after Israel announced new housing plans in the occupied West Bank.

"Settler violence and settlement-related violations have reached shocking new levels, and risk eliminating any practical possibility of establishing a viable Palestinian State," Turk said in a statement that accompanied the 16-page report.

The report, based on the UN's own monitoring as well as other sources, documented 24,300 new Israeli housing units in the occupied West Bank during a one-year period through to end-October 2023, which it said was the highest on record since monitoring began in 2017.

It also said there had been a dramatic increase in the intensity, severity and regularity of both Israeli settler and state violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, particularly since the deadly Hamas attacks on Israel in  October.

Reporting by Reuters

Israeli forces have killed an average of 63 Palestinian women in Gaza each day since 7 October, including 37 mothers, according to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa). 

"On #InternationalWomensDay, the women in #Gaza continue to endure the consequences of this brutal war," the agency said on social media platform X. 

Five members of the same family, Abu Slemah, were killed in air strikes on Rafah Friday morning. 

Israeli forces have killed 370 paramedics working for the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) since the start of the war in October, the humanitarian organisation told Al Arabi TV. 

Another 99 have been detained by invading troops operating inside the Gaza Strip, it added. 

Palestinian officials released the latest figures showing the devastating impact Israel's bombing campaign in Gaza has had on women, as the war enters its sixth month and the world marks International Women's Day. 

"Palestinian women, especially in the Gaza Strip, are exposed to the worst humanitarian catastrophe," Ashraf al-Qudra, the health ministry's spokesperson, said Thursday. 

"[They face] killing, displacement, arrest, miscarriage, epidemics and death from starvation as a result of the Israeli aggression."

According to the health ministry and the Gaza-based government media office, nearly 9,000 women have been killed in Israeli attacks in five months.

Another 2,100 are missing and presumed dead, while 23,000 have been wounded and over half a million are displaced. 

Dozens of women and girls have also been detained and face harsh conditions in Israeli custody, including sexual abuse, according to rights groups and media reports. 

The health ministry added that 5,000 women give birth monthly in Gaza under "harsh, unsafe and unhealthy" conditions caused by Israeli bombing and displacement. 

In total, there are 60,000 pregnant women in Gaza suffering from "malnutrition, dehydration and lack of medical care," it added. 

"This brutal [Israeli] war made 60,000 pregnant women live a harsh and extremely difficult life, during which they lacked the most basic health and medical care requirements," the government media office said. 

"Hundreds of women have lost their children, newborns, or foetuses as a result of [Israeli] bombing and fear."

US Central Command (CENTCOM) said it conducted strikes on Thursday in Yemen against four mobile Houthi anti-ship cruise missiles (ASCM) and one Houthi unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). 

CENTCOM said its forces shot down three UAVs launched toward the Gulf of Aden from areas controlled by the Houthis.

Reporting by Reuters

Good morning Middle East Eye readers, 

It's 7:56 am (5:56 GMT) in Palestine and Israel. Here are the latest developments on day 154 of Israel's war on Gaza: 

• President Joe Biden announced during his State of the Union Address that the US will build a temporary port to deliver Gaza aid, but questions remain unanswered about how long it will take and who will distribute the aid. 

• Biden also warned that aid cannot be used as a "bargaining chip" as dissent against his staunch support of Israel grows domestically ahead of the November presidential elections. 

• Meanwhile, in Gaza, Israeli bombing continued around the clock. Air strikes were reported in Deir al-Balah, Khan Younis and Rafah early on Friday, leaving at least 14 killed and others wounded. 

• CIA director, William Burns, reportedly travelled to Egypt and then Qatar as mediators continued to push for a ceasefire agreement. 

• On the eve of International Women's Day, the Palestinian health ministry released figures showing the impact the Israeli bombing has had on Palestinian women in Gaza. It said nearly 9,000 have been killed and condemned the "silence" by the international community over their plight.