Live: Major clashes break out near Bethlehem after Israeli raid

Our live blog will shortly be closing until tomorrow morning.

Here are the day's key developments:

- At least one Palestinian was killed and several others are injured after part of a residential building collapsed in Gaza City during heavy rainfall, Gaza’s Civil Defence said.

- A senior Hamas representative said that fewer than one percent of all the Palestinians killed by Israel in Gaza since the ceasefire came into effect in October have been actual fighters.

- A Canadian delegation that includes six members of parliament was denied entry into the occupied West Bank by Israel on Tuesday, CBC News reported. 

- A second Palestinian teenager was shot dead by an Israeli settler in the town of Tuqu’, southeast of Bethlehem, in a 24-hour period, the Wafa news agency reported. The attack happened shortly after mourners dispersed following the funeral of another slain Palestinian teenager, Ammar Sabah, also 16.

- US President Donald Trump has added Palestinian Authority passport holders to his US travel ban, per an executive order signed on Tuesday.

- Around 9,300 Palestinians are currently held in Israeli custody, and of that figure, at least 350 children are currently imprisoned at Ofer and Megiddo prisons, the Palestinian Prisoners Society said. 

An executive order signed by President Donald Trump on Tuesday adds 20 countries to the previously listed 19 whose citizens cannot travel to the US. 

Among those newly listed is the Palestinian Authority, which effectively extends to all Palestinian passport holders.

"This administration's racist cruelty knows no limits, expanding their travel ban to include even more African and Muslim-majority countries, even Palestinians fleeing a genocide," Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian-American in Congress, said on X.

"Trump and Stephen Miller won't be satisfied until our country has the demographics of a Klan rally," she added, referring to Trump's chief immigration adviser and the white supremacist terror group, the Ku Klux Klan. 

A senior Hamas representative said on Tuesday that fewer than one percent of all the Palestinians killed by Israel in Gaza since the ceasefire came into effect in October have been actual fighters.

Ghazi Hamad said in video remarks that only 10 Palestinian fighters from across all factions are known to have been killed among the nearly 400 casualties since 10 October. 

Producing a map of the Israeli-controlled territory in Gaza, Hamad said Israel has been killing civilians well beyond Israel's "yellow line" boundaries on Gaza's eastern and southern borders. 

He added that the mediators - Qatar and Egypt - can attest to Hamas not having incurred a single ceasefire violation in that time.

Israel has also yet to produce any evidence to back up its allegations of Hamas' ceasefire violations, Hamad said.

In November, protestors in Bulgaria were mobilising to topple their government over corruption and a cost-of-living crisis. Meanwhile, in Abu Dhabi, one of the Balkan country's former foreign ministers was heralding “groundbreaking” talks on an economic deal between the European Union and the UAE.

The former Bulgarian diplomat and defence minister, Nickolay Mladenov, is now being eyed to serve as the top official in Gaza working on behalf of US President Donald Trump’s “Board of Peace”.

His name is circulating as an alternative to Tony Blair, the former UK prime minister, whose name drew such widespread condemnation that it forced the US and Israel to seek alternatives.

The contrast between the political paralysis in Mladenov’s home country and his life in the Gulf shows how he tried to carve out his own elite niche in the Middle East and earned high marks serving as United Nations envoy for Middle East peace.

Read more: Nickolay Mladenov: The Balkan diplomat who could be UAE's man in Gaza

Pro-Palestine campaigners have criticised British Health Secretary Wes Streeting for claiming that the protest chant "globalise the intifada" is linked to terrorism.

Streeting made the remarks in an interview with the BBC on Monday, the day after the antisemitic massacre that killed at least 15 people and wounded 40 on Bondi Beach in Australia.

Streeting said: "There will be a whole bunch of daft people in this country who've used those words online or used them in the streets, and watching the TV right now will be shouting, 'of course it doesn't mean terrorism against Jewish people'.

"I have to say to those people clearly and robustly, what on earth do you think globalise the intifada means?" he said.

"And can't people see the link between that kind of rhetoric and attacks on Jewish people as Jewish people?

Read more: Wes Streeting slammed for linking intifada chant to 'terrorist action'

A Canadian delegation that includes six members of parliament was denied entry into the occupied West Bank by Israel on Tuesday, CBC News reported. 

The travellers were reportedly asked to sign waivers deeming them potential safety threats if they entered the territory. They declined and were not allowed entry.

The Toronto Star cited Israeli concerns about the trip's funding. 

An Israeli official told the paper that because the funding can be traced back to Islamic Relief - a designated terror group in Israel - the delegation could not enter the occupied West Bank. 

Islamic Relief has not confirmed that it provides funding to Canadian Muslim Vote, which is the group that reportedly organised the trip. 

Islamic Relief is one of the foremost aid groups in North America, and carries out humanitarian work both domestically and internationally. 

Around 9,300 Palestinians are currently held in Israeli custody, Palestinian prisoner advocacy groups are reporting.

Of that figure, at least 350 children are currently imprisoned at Ofer and Megiddo prisons, according to the Palestinian Prisoners Society.

The group added that at least 3,500 of people detained in the occupied West Bank are held without charges or trial.

The Israeli military has said its forces targeted two Hezbollah fighters in southern Lebanon.

The first attack struck a fighter in the Taybeh area, according to a statement issued by the army.

Lebanon's National News Agency posted a photo of the aftermath of the smouldering remains of a vehicle which was travelling between Markaba and Aadaissah.

The Israeli army has yet to release details regarding the second attack.

Israel has repeatedly flouted its fragile ceasefire with Hezbollah, which was implemented over a year ago.

The Israeli army has said that its soldiers killed a Palestinian who "crossed the yellow line" and approached them "in a manner that posed an immediate threat".

Gaza's health ministry said that Israeli forces had killed two people in the last 24 hours.

A newborn baby has died of hypothermia in Gaza, while heavy rains have destroyed several already fragile structures in the Palestinian territory.

The health ministry in Gaza announced the death of Mohammed Khalil Abu al-Khair, a two-week-old boy who died due to a severe drop in his body temperature caused by the cold weather. 

The infant's family had brought him to the hospital's intensive care unit two days ago, but he died on Monday. 

Khair is one of 13 children who have died in recent days due to worsening weather conditions, as Storm Byron hits the Palestinian enclave. 

For over two years, Israel has severely restricted the provision of goods into Gaza, including winter clothes and shelters, with only limited supplies entering as part of international aid.

Read more: Gaza newborn dies of exposure while heavy rains cause buildings to collapse

At least one Palestinian was killed and several others are injured after part of a residential building collapses in Gaza City during heavy rainfall, Gaza’s Civil Defence says.

Civil defence crews recover the body from beneath the rubble of a partially collapsed home in the Shati refugee camp, while rescuers pull several wounded people from the debris.

Witnesses say strong winds and torrential rain have flooded or torn apart thousands of tents housing displaced families since Monday evening, leaving people exposed to the elements with nowhere safe to go.

The latest death comes as Gaza’s civilian infrastructure, devastated by years of Israeli bombardment, with damaged buildings increasingly at risk of collapse.

Aid workers warn that Israel’s destruction of homes, combined with its siege and restrictions on shelter materials, has turned winter storms into another deadly threat for Palestinians already living through a humanitarian catastrophe.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu drew precisely the wrong conclusion from Sunday’s terror attack at Bondi Beach - and western leaders and media are once again buying into his warped logic.

Predictably, Netanyahu aimed to exploit the attack - in which more than a dozen people were killed by two gunmen at a Hanukkah celebration in Sydney - to implicitly justify Israel’s slaughter and maiming of tens of thousands of children in Gaza over the past two years. 

Netanyahu said he had written to the Australian prime minister, Anthony Albanese, a few months earlier to blame him not only for supposedly failing to tackle antisemitism in his country, but for fuelling it by recognising Palestinian statehood. 

Quoting from the letter, he said: “Your call for a Palestinian state pours fuel on the antisemitic fire. It rewards Hamas terrorists. It emboldens those who menace Australian Jews and encourages the Jew hatred now stalking your streets.” 

Read more: Bondi Beach attack: How western allies are enabling Netanyahu's grotesque logic

A Palestinian teenager was shot dead by an Israeli settler in the town of Tuqu’, southeast of Bethlehem, in the latest lethal attack on civilians in the occupied West Bank, Wafa reported.

Local officials identify the victim as 16-year-old Muheeb Ahmed Jibril, who was killed on Tuesday by live fire from a settler.

Muhammad al-Badan, the mayor of Tuqu’, says the killing took place shortly after mourners dispersed following the funeral of another slain Palestinian teenager, Ammar Sabah, also 16.

Al-Badan says a small group of young men remained near the town’s northern entrance when a settler exited his vehicle and opened fire directly at them, killing Jibril.

He says Jibril’s killing marks the second death in Tuqu’ in less than 24 hours, as Israeli military operations and settler violence intensify across the area.

Rights groups have repeatedly accused Israel of enabling settler violence through impunity, as attacks on Palestinians across the occupied West Bank.

The Israeli army confirms that its forces shot and killed a Palestinian teenager in the occupied West Bank, after accusing him of throwing stones near Bethlehem. The Israeli claim could not be independently verified.

In a brief statement cited by The Times of Israel, the military claims a “riot” broke out in the area, alleging that Palestinians hurled stones at Israeli soldiers.

“The troops used riot dispersal means and then opened fire on a main instigator,” the army says, adding that “a hit was identified.”

The Palestinian Authority’s Ministry of Health names the victim as 16-year-old Ammar Yasser Muhammad Taamra, another child killed amid Israel’s routine use of lethal force against Palestinians in the occupied territory.

Images circulated by local media show Taamra’s family mourning over his body, as anger grows over Israel’s ongoing killings of Palestinian minors, often justified by vague or unverified military claims.

Rights groups have repeatedly accused Israel of excessive and unlawful use of force in the occupied West Bank, where soldiers routinely shoot Palestinians during raids, protests and confrontations with near-total impunity.

The Palestinian health ministry said on Tuesday that Israel’s war on Gaza has killed at least 70,667 people since 7 October 2023, with women and children making up the majority of the dead.

Health officials say Israeli attacks have also wounded 171,151 people, while many others remain trapped beneath rubble as ambulance and rescue crews struggle to reach devastated areas under continued bombardment.

In the past 24 hours alone, hospitals in Gaza receive the bodies of two Palestinians pulled from the debris, along with six wounded survivors. Medical sources say the true toll is likely higher, with entire neighbourhoods still inaccessible.

Since the ceasefire agreement announced on October 11, Israeli attacks have killed at least 393 Palestinians, injured 1,074 others, and led to the recovery of 634 bodies from under the rubble.

Health officials also report the death of a two-week-old infant, Muhammad Khalil Abu Al-Khair, who died after suffering severe hypothermia caused by extreme cold. He was admitted to intensive care two days earlier, but doctors were unable to save him.