Live: Lawyers present genocide risk case against Israel at ICJ

The Israeli army has announced that its 36th Division has gained full control of the "Morag Axis" in the southern Gaza Strip and has "encircled" Rafah. 

The area consists mainly of agricultural land between Khan Younis and Rafah, stretching from east to west across the Gaza Strip.

It includes parts of what the Israeli military had previously designated as a "humanitarian zone" - an area where internally displaced Palestinians had been told to seek refuge.

The area had not been identified as an "axis" or a "corridor" before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's announcement.

The name "Morag" that he used refers to an illegal Israeli settlement that was established in the region between 1972 and 2005.

Good morning Middle East Eye readers,

Here are some of the latest updates from Israel’s war on Gaza:

• Israel continues its bombardment across the besieged enclave, killing at least two and injuring several others, including children and women.

• Qatar's Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a statement condemning Israel's decision to shut down six schools affiliated with the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa), calling it a "new crime in the ongoing series of Israeli crimes in the occupied Palestinian territories".

• Unrwa has warned of a deepening humanitarian crisis in Gaza, stressing a lack of basic supplies. “Gaza inches closer towards very, very deep hunger,” said Juliette Touma, director of communications at the agency.

• A UN investigation has revealed that only Palestinian women and children were killed in at least 36 Israeli strikes in the besieged enclave between 18 March and 9 April.

• Over 400,000 people in Gaza have now been displaced in just a little more than three weeks, according to Olga Cherevk from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (Ocha). She told Al Jazeera that “absolutely zero supplies have come in in over 40 days”, with a critical lack of medical and trauma supplies.

Israeli forces stormed Burqa village northwest of Nablus in the West Bank, Al Jazeera reported on Friday. 

At least 20 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza since dawn according to medical sources, Al Jazeera reported on Friday.

 In Khan Younis, southern Gaza, at least 10 people were killed, including seven children in an Israeli strike.

In the enclave’s south, one Palestinian was killed and four others were wounded following the bombing of a group of civilians in Rafah.

A Jewish leader who did not wish to be identified, spoke outside the Louisiana detention centre where Mahmoud Khali is being detained and said, “Let us not forget that abducting people, isolating them from their families and silencing their voices is the hallmark of oppression" reported The Guardian on Friday. "Even pharaohs fell when they defied justice,” he added.

Other faith leaders also spoke out. A campus minister, who identified herself as Liv, detailed the story of Jesus Christ being born in Palestine and then killed by “state-sanctioned violence”.

Meanwhile, Reverand Sarah Greene, a Unitarian Universalist community minister, said: “What we will continue to do for as long as it takes, we’ll circle around for release, for the end of genocide, for the end of colonisation, for a free Palestine, for the release of all political prisoners. We will not stop until every inch, I’m so serious, every inch of our imagination, of how free we could be, is realised.”

Nour Abdalla, Mahmoud Khalil’s wife, released a statement on an immigration judge's ruling on Friday that her husband can be deported. She said, “Today’s decision feels like a devastating blow to our family. No person should be deemed ‘removable’ from their home for speaking out against the killing of Palestinian families, doctors and journalists.

"Today, in court, the government reiterated the same baseless, racist claims about my husband that we have heard time and again in attempts to smear those calling for an end to Israel’s brutal genocide in Gaza. My husband is a political prisoner who is being deprived of his rights because he believes Palestinians deserve equal dignity and freedom. There is nothing the government can say about my husband that can silence this truth.

"This ruling is an indictment of our country’s immigration system and does not reflect truth, justice of the will of the American people. In less than a month, Mahmoud and I will welcome our first child. Until we are reunited, I will not stop advocating for my husband’s safe return home.”

Permanent legal resident Mahmoud Khalil can be deported from the US, a judge has ruled following a hearing on Friday. 

The judge said that a State Department memo on Palestinian activist’s beliefs was enough evidence to remove him from the US.

In his memo, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that Khalil’s “beliefs and associations” were not in foreign policy interests and were sufficient evidence to remove a green card holder from the United States. The memo, which is the main piece of evidence submitted by the government, made no allegations of criminal conduct against Khalil.

The judge gave Khalil's lawyers a deadline of 23 April to file applications for relief to stop his deportation. Failure to do so would mean he would be sent to Syria or Algeria.

Khalil's support team, who spoke at a press conference outside a Louisiana detention center, said, “Today an immigration judge ruled that Mahmoud can be removed from this country," reported The Guardian. "A decision as unjust as it is alarming. Despite the government’s failure to prove that Mahmoud broke any law, the court has decided that lawful permanent residents can have their status revoked for pro-Palestine advocacy. This is a blatant violation of the First Amendment and a dangerous precedent for anyone who believes in free speech and political expression.

"But this decision should not pacify you; it should embolden and encourage you. Those who know Mahmoud know him for his fierce commitment to justice and his refusal to back down from even the steepest of challenges. It is Mahmoud’s fighting spirit that we must embrace in the following days. While his deportation would devastate his wife and their soon-to-be-born child, it would also intimidate all who dare to speak for Palestinian liberation. We must not give in to this chilling effect.”

Khalil, who played a prominent role in the Columbia University student protests over the past year, was detained in early March by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in his apartment building in New York City.

Khalil has been held at an ICE prison facility in Jena, Louisiana, for the past month, where his lawyers believe the Trump administration finds judges more favourable to the US government. 

The Trump administration submitted evidence on Wednesday, published by the Associated Press, where Rubio insisted that Khalil's "presence or activities would compromise a compelling US foreign policy interest".

Qatari Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said that Israel's use of "starvation and aid as weapons is a crime that violates all human values," Al Jazeera reported on Friday.

Israeli Air Force Commander Tomer Bar warned reservists who signed a public letter calling for an end to the war in Gaza that they would no longer be permitted to serve in the military, as reported by Yedioth Ahronoth on Friday.

In a Passover holiday letter sent to Air Force personnel, Bar wrote that Israel had marked 18 months since the start of what he described as a "justified, long, complex and demanding" war. He criticised the letter, saying it “expresses a lack of trust and damages unity within the corps”.

“There is no place for such publications during wartime,” Bar said. “Active reservists who signed the letter will not be able to continue serving in the IDF.”

Almost 1,000 Israeli Air Force reservists and retirees signed the letter, published in Israeli media on Thursday, demanding the immediate return of the captives in Gaza, even at the cost of ending the fighting. “The continuation of the war doesn’t contribute to any of the declared objectives, and will lead to the death of hostages, (Israel Defense Forces) soldiers, and of innocents,” the authors wrote.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said that a Palestinian was injured by Israeli military gunfire in the town of Beita, south of Nablus, in the West Bank, Al Jazeera reported on Friday.

One person was killed and 10 were wounded after an Israeli drone bombed a tent of displaced people in Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Yunis, in southern Gaza Strip, Al Jazeera reported on Friday.

At least 40 out of 70 people killed in Gaza are children, say volunteer American doctors, according to a report by Haaretz on Friday.

Dr Feroze Sidhwa and Dr Mark Perlmutter are medics who volunteered in Gaza both this year and last. The two men were volunteering at different hospitals in the Gaza Strip when Israel violated the ceasefire on 18 March. 

Dr Sidhwa, who was stationed at Nasser Hospital, said that there was a special area where children are allowed to die quietly in the presence of their families, which is known as the "dead children's area". It is also for children whose survival would require resources the hospital does not have.

Dr Perlmutter, who volunteered at the Shuhada al-Aqsa Hospital, said that American hospitals would be "paralyzed" by the situation he saw in Gaza. He said that many wounded people needed amputations and he saw people with "an open head wound exposing their brains" or "tourniquets on all four limbs".

Both doctors said that - similar to previous visits to Gaza - many of the dead and wounded are children. "Of 70 people every hour," Perlmutter said, "40 are going to be children."

Spain's public broadcaster said on Friday it has called for a "debate" over Israel's participation in this year's Eurovision Song Contest in Switzerland due to "concerns" over the situation in war-torn Gaza.

RTVE has sent a letter to the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), which manages the event, "requesting a debate on the participation of Israeli public television (KAN)" in the contest, the Spanish public broadcaster said in a statement.

Talk of normalisation between Lebanon and Israel has been non-stop in recent days. The flurry of speculation reached a crescendo late last month, when the US special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, declared that normalisation was “a real possibility”.

Several Lebanese politicians joined the chorus. MP Paula Yacoubian, a self-declared reformist, described normalisation as a “taboo” that needs to be broken. Pro-Saudi MP Walid Baarini, whose constituency in the Akkar region is pro-Palestinian, announced that normalisation may enable Lebanon to wrest back territory that Israel has occupied during the current war and restore stability.

Recycled claims were also peddled about the alleged economic benefits of “peace” with Israel, and Lebanon’s need to catch up with other Arab countries that have crossed that bridge. 

Belated assurances by Lebanon’s newly-elected president, Joseph Aoun, and appointed prime minister, Nawaf Salam, that normalisation was not on the table put the brakes on this feverish campaign. Faced with public pressure, Baarini backtracked.

READ MORE: Can the US push Lebanon to normalise with Israel?

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday lashed out at Israel for a pre-dawn air strike that officials in Gaza said killed 10 members of the same family.

"Just this morning, 10 people, including seven children, from the same family were martyred in Khan Younis. If this is not barbarism, I ask you, what is it?" Erdogan told a diplomacy forum in the southern province of Antalya.