Gaza Live: Israeli air strike takes out 25 members of same family

Attacks on health care are becoming the “new normal” of conflicts in Afghanistan, Gaza, Haiti, Lebanon, Myanmar, Sudan, Ukraine, and elsewhere, World Health Organisation (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

"Over the past three years, we have seen an increase in the frequency, scale and impact on attacks in healthcare," Tedros said.

The WHO has confirmed more than 1,200 attacks on healthcare across multiple countries only in 2024.

Attacks on health care are becoming the “new normal” of conflict.

This year alone, @WHO has verified more than 1200 attacks in Afghanistan, Gaza, Haiti, Lebanon, Myanmar, Sudan, Ukraine, and elsewhere.

These attacks kill and maim. pic.twitter.com/9IRKoO2PrA

— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) December 5, 2024

Good morning Middle East Eye readers, 

Here are the latest updates from the Israeli war on Gaza, the occupied West Bank and Lebanon:

• Gaza now has the highest number of child amputees per capita anywhere in the world, according to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees latest assessment

• Another volunteer member of the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS), Alaa al-Derawi, has been killed in Gaza, the organisation said. In October, the PRCS said that 34 staff members had been killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza since October 2023

• Israel continued its assault on Gaza overnight, attacking Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya and carrying out an air strike on the Rafei school in northern Jabalia. The strike killed two people, according to Gaza-based Al-Aqsa TV.

• Israeli fighter jets also hit the Jousiya crossing on the Syria-Lebanon border, Lebanese news sources reported.

Good evening Middle East Eye readers. On Thursday, the international community reacted to the landmark report by human rights group Amnesty International, which labelled Israel's actions in Gaza as genocide.

The report, the first of its kind from a major western rights group, was rebuked by the US, with the State Department calling it unfounded. Israel dismissed the report as “entirely false”.

But the label has already been used by numerous countries, particularly in the developing world.

Recently, at the Gulf Cooperation Council summit, the leaders of the summit referred to Israel's war in Gaza as a genocide.

Meanwhile, the ongoing rebel advances in Syria against President Bashar al-Assad's forces are having major consequences for the geopolitics of the Middle East, including for the Israeli war on Gaza.

Hezbollah's chief Naim Qassem said in an address on Thursday that the movement stands with Syria's Assad. He said the opposition's recent military operations that took Aleppo and now Hama are the workings of Israel and the US.

Israel said it was monitoring the situation. Hamas, which previously supported the Syrian revolution against Assad before restoring ties with the Syrian leader in 2022, has yet to make a statement.

Here's what else you need to know about Thursday's events in the Israeli war on Gaza:

• At least five people were wounded in an Israeli strike on the town of Aitaroun, located in southern Lebanon, despite Israel agreeing to the ceasefire with Hezbollah last month.

• Hamas' armed wing, the Qassam Brigades, said they were able to target a group of 50 Israeli soldiers using a "television" bomb in the Tal al-Hawa neighbourhood in north Gaza.

• Two Palestinian sisters, Lian Nasser and Lian Kayed, were released after spending eight months in Israeli administrative detention.

• Palestinian prisoner Alaa Marwan Hamza al-Mahlawi died in Israeli detention, after being in Israeli prison since 21 December 2023.

• Hamas said it has agreed to the proposal submitted by Egypt regarding the formation of the Community Support Committee to manage Gaza through inclusive national mechanisms.

• Gaza’s civil defence has declared that 13 out of 22 firefighting and rescue vehicles stopped working south of the enclave due to fuel shortage.

• The health ministry in Gaza said that the death toll there has now reached at least 44,580 Palestinians.

A Johannesburg-based civic freedom monitor has pinpointed the Palestinian cause as the reason behind 10 percent of all global repression of free speech in 2024. 

The civil society alliance Civicus, which monitors the state of civic freedom globally, said the violations it documented either took place in occupied Palestinian territories or were “perpetrated against those expressing solidarity with Palestine” elsewhere, according to its 2024 report. 

“The lack of open civic space is rooted in a number of issues,” the report says.

Major conflicts, it explains, such as Israel’s war on Gaza, "have affected millions of people and their livelihoods and created the conditions for state and non-state sources to implement authoritarian policies”.

The report says that this is most notable in the Middle East and North Africa (Mena), which “continues to be home to some of the most repressive governments in the world”.

Read the full story by clicking below.

Ten percent of all civic repression worldwide related to Palestine, study finds

The Palestinian Prisoners' Club announced on Thursday that 42-year-old Alaa Marwan Hamza al-Mahlawi died in Israeli detention, according to a report by the Palestinian news outlet Wafa.

According to the report, Mahlawi was imprisoned on 21 December 2023 and was married with four children. The report did not say what caused Mahlawi's death, but his family noted that he did not have any serious health conditions before being detained.

He was being held in the Negev prison in southern Israel.

With Mahlawi's death, the number of Palestinian prisoners who have died in Israeli detention since October 2023 has risen to 49. That number includes 30 prisoners from Gaza.

India will be guided by its "national interest" before reconsidering the transfer of weapons or arms sales to Israel, the country's external affairs minister has said, in yet another sign that Delhi is committed to providing diplomatic and military cover for Israel's genocide in Gaza.

On Thursday, several opposition politicians took the opportunity to use the Q&A session in parliament to probe India's external affairs minister, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, on India's policies, including its decision to abstain from several UN resolutions on Gaza, as well as to clarify its position on the International Criminal Court's (ICC) decision to issue warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.

Jaishankar said that India officially supports the two-state solution but if resolutions did not adequately condemn terrorism or the holding of hostages, in reference to the Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel on 7  October 2023, Delhi could not sign them.

“As a country that has suffered from terrorism, India cannot support resolutions that underplay such acts. Resolutions must be well-drafted, balanced, and reflect the entirety of the situation,” he said.  

The Indian government has been under scrutiny over the past several months with reports that Indian arms, ammunition and technology were making their way to Israel's army for potential use in operations in Gaza.  

In late November, MEE found that an AI weapons system used by Israeli ground forces in Gaza was co-produced by the Indian company, Adani Defense and Aerospace.

Read the full story by clicking below.

India doubles down on pro-Israel policy saying 'national interest' drives arms transfers

Two Palestinian women, Lian Nasser and Lian Kayed, were released after spending eight months in Israeli administrative detention, the Wafa news agency reported on Thursday.

The Palestinian Prisoners Club said that following the release, the number of Palestinian women currently detained by Israel in Damon prison is 89. That number includes four women from Gaza.

In a statement on Telegram on Thursday, Hamas's armed wing, al-Qassam Brigades, said they were able to target a group of 50 Israeli soldiers using a "television" bomb in the Tal al-Hawa neighbourhood in north Gaza.

Lebanon's state-run National News Agency reported on Thursday that at least five people were wounded in an Israeli strike on the town of Aitaroun, located in southern Lebanon.

Israel has continued to launch strikes in south Lebanon despite agreeing to a ceasefire last month.

The US State Department said on Thursday that it disagrees with Amnesty International's conclusion that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in its ongoing war on Gaza.

Spokesperson Vedant Patel said the conclusion was unfounded. Amnesty International is arguably the highest-profile rights group to conclude Israel's actions in Gaza meet the definition of genocidal acts as laid out under the Genocide Convention.

Tel Aviv University is running an “engineering war room” developing technology for the Israeli army including a live-streaming facility for a dog-mounted camera used by a canine unit linked to deadly attacks on Palestinian civilians in Gaza.

Details of the work are revealed in a video posted on social media by the university last week which described how it had opened a “war room” on campus to support hundreds of academics and students serving as reservists in the army.

The video noted that the highest proportion of serving soldiers had come from the faculty of engineering. It said that an “engineering war room” had also been established to “invent solutions for the challenges of our fighters on the front line”.

It goes on to describe how one of these innovations has enabled soldiers in the army's canine unit to live stream footage from the cameras worn by its dogs.

Read the full story by clicking below.

Tel Aviv University developed dog cameras for army unit linked to Gaza attacks

Here are some more points from Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem's address on Thursday:

• Qassem said that Hezbollah would “stand by Syria to thwart the goals of this aggression with our abilities”, referring to the government of Bashar al-Assad.

• He urged Arab and "brotherly" nations to provide aid relief funds to help rebuild the areas in Lebanon that were hit with Israeli bombardment. He said that while the Lebanese government would oversee reconstruction, Hezbollah would help where needed.

• Qassem said Hezbollah said Hezbollah has provided $57m in support to displaced families – money that came from Iran. There's still another $26m to be distributed.

The Israeli army said it is monitoring the recent events in Syria, where opposition fighters are continuing to make ground in an offensive directed at President Bashar al-Assad’s government.

The military issued a statement saying it “is monitoring the events and is preparing for any scenario, both offensive and defensive".

It added that Israel won't "allow a threat near the Syrian-Israeli border", likely referring to the area between Syria and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

The secretary general of Hezbollah said on Thursday that efforts to break apart Syria are being led by the US and Israel, who are backing the "Takfiri" groups on the ground that took over Aleppo. 

The term refers to Muslims who call out fellow Muslims as being apostates. 

Naim Qassem made the comments in a televised address in which he reiterated Hezbollah's backing for the Syrian government, a position the group has maintained for over a decade. 

Hezbollah's secretary general Naim Qassem expressed his gratitude on Thursday to the leadership of Iran and the allied factions in Iraq and Yemen for what he described as their solidarity and support as Lebanon came under attack from Israel.

Qassem is delivering a major televised speech on return and reconstruction efforts in Lebanon, including financial compensation for families ranging from $8,000 to $14,000. 

This comes eight days after a fragile ceasefire deal was reached between Israel and Lebanon.