Israel's War on Gaza Live: Israel pounds Rafah in overnight strikes

After Palestinian doctor Ghassan Abu Sittah announced on X that he was stopped at an airport in Germany and prevented from entering the country and attending a conference on Palestine, reports have emerged that Germany police have disrupted that conference and stopped the live stream.

A video feed of the conference shows police arriving on scene, shortly before the video cuts out.

The lack of clean water combined with rising temperatures is increasing the spread of waterborne diseases in the Gaza Strip, the UN has warned.

"It is becoming very hot there," Jamie McGoldrick, United Nations humanitarian coordinator in Gaza, told reporters via video link from Jerusalem.

"People are getting much less water than they need, and as a result, there have been waterborne diseases due to lack of safe and clean water and the disruption of the sanitation systems."

"We have to find a way in the months ahead of how we can have a better supply of water into the areas where people are currently crowded at the moment."

The EU has sanctioned the armed wings of Hamas and Islamic Jihad over their use of sexual violence during the 7 October attack in southern Israel.

Hamas's Qassam Brigades and special forces Nukhba Force as well as PIJ’s al-Quds Brigades are now subject to an asset freeze and a travel ban to the EU, alongside a ban on providing funds directly or indirectly to them, the bloc said on Friday.

An activist has been arrested in Berlin for holding up a "Jews Against Genocide" banner outside a Palestine conference.

The man, reportedly a German member of Jewish Voice for Peace, had held the banner outside the Palestine Congress event, which was also set to featured Palestinian doctor Ghassan Abu Sittah before he was denied entry to the country.

"Outside our Palestine Congress in Berlin, a German Jewish member of Jewish Voice for Peace has been arrested, for holding up a sign reading 'Jews against Genocide', by German police for... anti-semitism," tweeted Yanis Varoufakis, another speaker at the event.

Ghassan Abu Sittah, a British-Palestinian doctor who has become known for his work in Gaza, has been detained at an airport in Germany while he was attempting to enter the country.

According to Al Jazeera, German authorities prevented his entry while he was en route to speak at the Palestine Congress conference in Berlin.

A cameraman for Turkish state TV channel TRT was badly wounded in an Israeli strike in Gaza on Friday, the channel said.

"The vehicle of a team from TRT Arabi (TRT's Arabic-language channel) that was preparing to broadcast from the Nuseirat camp... was targeted by an Israeli army strike," the broadcaster said.

"Sami Shahada, a freelance cameraman, was badly wounded."

TRT's chief Zahid Sobaci said Shahada had "lost a foot and is currently in surgery."

The UK could be complicit in Israeli war crimes through its continued sale of arms to the country, Oxfam has warned.

“It is illegal, immoral and inconsistent for the UK to continue to sell arms to Israel, when it is clear that UK-made weapons and components are being used in serious violation of international humanitarian law – and after it imposed restrictions in previous escalations of violence when the scale of death and destruction had been lower,” Aleema Shivji, Oxfam’s chief impact officer, said on Friday.

“The people of Gaza are facing unprecedented levels of bloodshed, schools and hospitals are being deliberately targeted and starvation is being used as a weapon of war - what more suffering must they endure for the UK government to act?”

Students of world politics have long understood that when it comes to the strategic interests of leading states, international law is marginalised unless it is useful in waging a propaganda war against adversaries. 

Indeed, the United Nations was designed in ways that recognised this feature of international political life. Otherwise, giving the winners of World War II a right of veto would make no sense. 

Such an exemption from international law was also evident at the war crimes trials held in Nuremberg and Tokyo after World War II, at which only the crimes of the losers were scrutinised for legal accountability, and obvious crimes of the victors - such as the indiscriminate bombing of Dresden and the atomic bomb attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki - were not prosecuted. 

To this day, for understandable reasons, many in Japan believe the use of weapons of mass destruction against the civilian population of these two cities constituted genocide.

At the same time, the victorious democracies after 1945 seemed genuinely committed to building a world order that was stable, protective of human rights, and respectful of the sovereign rights of weaker states. Of course, the Cold War interfered with such idealistic plans, paralysed the UN in peace and security settings, and downplayed adherence to international law to a significant degree. 

Opinion by Richard Falk.

READ MORE: Western powers never believed in a rules-based order

Reporters in Gaza say that several journalists, including some TRT Arabic staff, were injured in an Israeli attack on the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.

A cloud has been hanging over Iran for 11 days.

The Israeli bombing of Iran’s consulate in Damascus which killed a senior general and six other officers has Iranians fearing the Gaza war may be making its way to their shores.

In a speech to mark Eid al-Fitr, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei stressed that embassies and consulates are considered sovereign territory. An attack on them is tantamount to an attack on Iran itself, he declared.

"The Zionist regime has made a grave mistake and must be punished - and will be punished," he said.

Though some Iranian officials have echoed those sentiments, there has been no further confirmation that retaliation is planned or what it would look like.

Reporting by Middle East Eye's correspondent in Tehran.

READ MORE: The threat of war with Israel hangs over Iran as retaliatory strike looms

Israel has so far in 2024 declared a record amount of the occupied West Bank as state-owned land, a move that could see a rapid expansion in settlement construction.

According to data obtained by NGO Kerem Navot, 2,743 acres in the West Bank have been declared state-owned land, with the biggest bloc consisting of nearly 2,000 acres in the Jordan Valley.

A further 650 acres were designated state property near Abu Dis, as well as 42 acres near the Herodion National Park.

The previous record was in 1999, when just 1,285 acres were designated, according to data from the Peace Now NGO.

The data showed that between 2018 to 2023 the Civil Administration, which runs Israeli civilian affairs in the West Bank, also remapped approximately 24,000 dunams (5,900 acres) of state-owned land.

READ MORE: Israel declares record amount of occupied West Bank as state-owned land in 2024

The Israeli commander responsible for an attack on foreign aid workers in Gaza had advocated for a total blockade on aid entering the besieged Palestinian territory, according to a report by a British media outlet.

An article by the Telegraph said Nochi Mandel, the chief of staff of the Nahal Infantry Brigade, was a signatory to an open letter published in January, which called on Israel’s government to deprive Gaza of all aid.

Mandel, who lives in an illegal settlement in the occupied West Bank, was one of 130 officers who signed the letter, the newspaper reported.

On 1 April, the Israeli army launched a series of drone strikes on a convoy of cars belonging to World Central Kitchen (WCK), an aid group working with western backers to feed Gaza’s besieged population.

The attack killed seven people, including a Palestinian and citizens from Poland, Australia, and the United Kingdom, as well as a dual Canadian-American national.

READ MORE: Israeli commander behind aid worker killings had demanded ‘siege’ of Gaza

France warned its citizens on Friday to "imperatively refrain from travel in the coming days to Iran, Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinian territories", the foreign minister's entourage told the AFP.

Russia made a similar move yesterday, saying they "strongly recommend that Russian citizens refrain from travelling to the region, especially to Israel, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories, except in cases of extreme necessity."

These moves come as the region anticipates Iran's promised retaliatory attack against Israel, after the latter reportedly conducted a deadly strike on the Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria, killing top Iranian commanders.

The World Health Organisation said that there are currently 9,000 patients in the Gaza Strip in need of treatment outside of the Palestinian enclave, as Israel's bombing, ground invasion and blockade crippled the medical sector.

Pan-Arab channel Al Mayadeen said one of its vehicles got targeted by Israeli fire in Adaysseh, south Lebanon on Friday.

No injuries were reported from the attack.