Live: At least 137 people killed by Israel recovered from rubble in Rafah

Good morning, Middle East Eye readers,

Despite the announcement of a ceasefire deal set to take effect on 19 January, Israel's bombardment of Gaza has intensified. Here are the latest updates on Israel's war on Gaza:

• Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has confirmed that a ceasefire agreement has been reached with Hamas, but relentless Israeli assaults on Gaza continue.

• A security cabinet meeting will be held today to vote on the deal, but The Times of Israel reports that a second full cabinet session is scheduled for Saturday night, meaning the agreement may only be ratified after a mandatory 24-hour grace period, delaying its implementation until late Sunday.

• Despite the ceasefire announcement, Israeli air strikes and shelling persist. An attack on a home in Khan Younis, southern Gaza, has killed at least five people.

• Israeli forces also bombed makeshift tents housing displaced Palestinians in the Nuseirat refugee camp, killing at least one person and injuring others.

Our liveblog will shortly be closing until tomorrow morning. 

Here are the day's key developments:

- Israel carried out heavy air raids in the early hours of Friday morning local time in Jabalia, in northern Gaza, as well as in Gaza City, where there is an as-yet undetermined number of casualties. Nearly one hundred Palestinians were killed in the previous 24 hours. 

- At his final press conference on Thursday as secretary of state, Antony Blinken told reporters he wished the Gaza ceasefire deal could have been secured sooner but made no mention of how the incoming Trump administration pushed Israel in a way that President Joe Biden chose not to, or was unable to. He said he still expects the ceasefire to begin Sunday, even as the Israeli security cabinet is yet to vote on it. Asked by a reporter if the US takes Israel's potential violations of international law seriously, Blinken responded that Israel can investigate itself because it is a democracy. 

- Israel's far-right Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir said on Thursday that he is going to resign from government if the Gaza ceasefire deal is approved by the security cabinet. He called on Netanyahu to scuttle the agreement, saying it would deal a blow to everything Israel has achieved in Gaza.

- Meanwhile opposition leader Yair Lapid said on Thursday he is ready to prop up Netanyahu's government. "I say to Benjamin Netanyahu, don't be afraid or intimidated, you will get every safety net you need to make the hostage deal. This is more important than any disagreement we've ever had," Lapid said in a post on X. 

- In video remarks on Thursday, Abdul Malik al-Houthi, who leads the armed group in Yemen, said there would be further attacks on Israel if it does not abide by the ceasefire agreement in Gaza, which goes into effect on Sunday. He also credited the "success" of the Houthis' naval blockade in the Red Sea, saying it led to "true victory" against Israel.

- Rome's chief Jewish rabbi on Thursday sharply criticised Pope Francis over the pontiff's recent ramping up of criticism against Israel's war on Gaza, in an unusually forceful speech during an annual Catholic-Jewish dialogue event. Francis, the rabbi said, has unfairly focused his attention on Israel compared to other ongoing world conflicts, including those in Sudan, Yemen, Syria, and Ethiopia.

Before anything else happened, Maryam al-Muqayad says male Israeli troops told her to take off her clothes.

Then, the soldiers took the 13-year-old Palestinian girl, dragged her by her hair and made her kneel down. When they had stopped abusing her, they forced her to leave northern Gaza, her home, and make her way south.

She was not alone.

Dozens of Palestinian women and girls reported similar sexual abuses committed against them by Israeli forces during the storming of Kamal Adwan hospital in the north of the wartorn coastal enclave last month. 

The incursion was preceded by nearly three months of a blockade preventing the entry of aid, medicine and food, as well as heavy bombardment in the hospital’s complex and vicinity.

Read more: Dozens of women report being sexually assaulted during the Kamal Adwan hospital raid last month

Al Jazeera's correspondent in Gaza is reporting Israeli air raids in the early hours of Friday morning local time on Jabalia, in northern Gaza, as well as in Gaza City, where there is an as-yet undetermined number of casualties. 

Several journalists who are outspoken critics of US support for Israel loudly lambasted US Secretary of State Antony Blinken over the war on Gaza on Thursday, repeatedly interrupting his final press conference as he sought to defend his handling of the 15-month-old war.

Israel's assault on Gaza is likely to define the foreign policy legacy of the outgoing Biden administration, despite a deal reached with Palestinian group Hamas on Wednesday on a ceasefire in exchange for the release of hostages.

"Criminal! Why aren't you in The Hague," shouted Sam Husseini, an independent journalist and longtime critic of Washington's approach to the world. The Hague is where the International Criminal Court is located.

The unusually confrontational scene at the State Department briefing room only ended when security personnel forcibly picked up Husseini and carried him out of the room as he continued to heckle Blinken.

"Why did you keep the bombs flowing when we had a deal in May?" Max Blumenthal, editor of the Grayzone, an outlet that strongly criticizes many aspects of US foreign policy, called out to Blinken before being escorted out.

Blinken, who leaves office on Monday when the administration of President-elect Donald Trump takes over, calmly asked for quiet while he delivered his remarks, and later took questions from reporters.

He has been frequently heckled at appearances in Washington since Israel's war on Gaza began. Demonstrators camped outside his Virginia home for months and repeatedly threw red paint - resembling blood - on cars carrying Blinken and his family.

Reporting by Reuters

The non-governmental global development group ActionAid announced on Thursday that one of its staff members has been killed by Israel at a hospital in Gaza.

"ActionAid is devastated to learn that Fatin Shaqoura-Salha, the Chief of Nursing Staff at Al-Awda hospital in Nuseirat, run by ActionAid’s partner Al-Awda, has been killed in Gaza, along with her family," a press release by the organisation said.

"Fatin, her husband and their children were killed when their home was struck by the Israeli military on Wednesday, while ceasefire negotiations were underway and just hours before a deal was confirmed," the statement said.

"This heartbreaking loss is yet another example of the Israeli military’s disregard for civilians and its disturbing pattern of attacks on hospitals and healthworkers, more than 1000 of whom have been killed since October 7. It comes as Israeli military attacks intensify across Gaza despite a ceasefire deal having been reached: at least 80 people have been killed since the announcement [on Wednesday] evening, according to Gaza’s civil defence."

With the threat of Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir's resignation if Israel's security cabinet approves the Gaza ceasefire deal, opposition leader Yair Lapid said on Thursday he is ready to prop up Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government.

"I say to Benjamin Netanyahu, don't be afraid or intimidated, you will get every safety net you need to make the hostage deal. This is more important than any disagreement we've ever had," Lapid said in a post on X. 

אני אומר לבנימין נתניהו, אל תרא ואל תחת, תקבל כל רשת בטחון שתזדקק לה כדי לעשות את עסקת החטופים. זה חשוב יותר מכל חילוקי הדיעות שהיו בינינו אי פעם

— יאיר לפיד - Yair Lapid (@yairlapid) January 16, 2025

Israel's far-right Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir said on Thursday that he is going to resign from government if the Gaza ceasefire deal is approved by the security cabinet.

He called on Netanyahu to scuttle the agreement, saying it would deal a blow to everything Israel has achieved in Gaza.

It would also seal the fate of the captives held by armed groups in Gaza who are not being released as part of the prisoner swap, Ben Gvir said. 

The swap, he added, would "release hundreds of terrorist killers" from Israel. 

"We are prepared to pay a heavy price to free our kidnapped, but what is on the table is heavier than we can bear," Ben Gvir said. 

Rome's chief Jewish rabbi on Thursday sharply criticised Pope Francis over the pontiff's recent ramping up of criticism against Israel's military campaign in Gaza, in an unusually forceful speech during an annual Catholic-Jewish dialogue event.

Francis, the rabbi said, has unfairly focused his attention on Israel compared to other ongoing world conflicts, including those in Sudan, Yemen, Syria, and Ethiopia.

Rabbi Riccardo Di Segni has been the spiritual leader of Rome's Jewish community since 2001.

"Selective indignation … weakens the pope's strength," said Di Segni. 

"A pope cannot divide the world into children and stepchildren and must denounce the sufferings of all," he said. "This is exactly what the Pope does not do."

Reporting by Reuters

An Israeli diplomatic source has told the Times of Israel that the final details of a ceasefire and prisoner swap deal have not, in fact, been finalised.

The source said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is "adamant on finalising all the details of the agreement before he brings it to the approval of the cabinet and the government" and added that Israel has forced Hamas to back down on its demands that Israel withdraws from the Philadelphi Corridor.  

Hamas has not confirmed such a move. 

The source also said that details of which Palestinian prisoners will be released from Israeli detention centres are yet to be worked out. 

“This insistence seems to be bearing fruit, but until things are fully agreed upon, Netanyahu will not convene the cabinet and the government,” the source told the Times of Israel. 

In video remarks on Thursday, Abdul Malik al-Houthi, who leads the armed group in Yemen, said there would be further attacks on Israel if it does not abide by the ceasefire agreement in Gaza, which goes into effect on Sunday. 

He also credited the "success" of the Houthis' naval blockade in the Red Sea, saying it led to "true victory" against Israel.

📍عاجل| #السيد_القائد: عملياتنا البحرية وصلت لنتيجة حاسمة وانتصار حقيقي..#Gaza#سيد_القول_والفعل #غزة_تنتصر #اليمن
#Yemen #ليلة_الجمعة #صنعاء #فلسطينhttps://t.co/kOSt55Nitp. 👈🏻 الـــــــــمزيد pic.twitter.com/KMk6qmDZHu

— محور همدان بن زيد (@BnMhwer) January 16, 2025

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Thursday was asked if he regrets not being firmer on red lines as Israel carried out its war on Gaza, to which he responded that Israelis are "traumatised" and that containing the fighting to Gaza and not letting it spread across the region was a success for the Biden administration. 

"[The] policies that, in the case of Gaza, were basically supported by an overwhelming majority of Israelis after the trauma of October 7, this is a traumatised society, just as Palestinian society is getting traumatised by everything that's followed October 7," he said.

"If you don't understand that, or don't factor that in, it's really challenging to make progress," he added, not sidestepping the argument that Palestinians also have the right to defend themselves according to international law.

"We are now in a place where we're finally making good on [the president's] priorities... one of them is to avoid a broader war with more countries coming in. And at various moments, throughout these last 15 months, we've been right on the edge of having that wider reward, and because of American diplomacy, because of American deterrence, because of America's ability to mobilise others... we marshalled other countries to come to Israel's defence," Blinken told reporters. 

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Thursday that he is confident a Gaza ceasefire agreed by Israel and Hamas will begin on Sunday as expected, despite a last-minute glitch.

Blinken, in his last news conference as the US top diplomat, said he had been speaking to US negotiator Brett McGurk and Qatari officials on Thursday morning to resolve the issue.

"It's not exactly surprising that in a process and negotiation that has been this challenging and this fraught, you may get a loose end," he said. "We're tying up that loose end as we speak."

Reporting by Reuters 

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Thursday that he has received strong indications that Saudi Arabia is willing to normalise relations with Israel, particularly now that a ceasefire deal has been signed by Israel and Hamas.

"You all know we were all planning to go to Saudi Arabia and Israel because we'd made so much progress on the normalisation, on October 10 [2023], which, of course, didn't happen, to do two things: to try to help finalise agreements that were necessary to get to normalisation, and as part of that, to find a clear way forward, a pathway to a Palestinian state, vital to Saudi Arabia, very important to us as well, even with everything that's happened since October 7," Blinken told reporters at his final press conference.

"I believe strongly, including from my many conversations with leaders in the region, whether it's in Israel and Saudi Arabia or beyond that, the desire to pursue integration, the desire to bring countries together, remains strong, remains powerful, and can be a driving force for finally resolving some of these other questions, including the Palestinian question," he said. 

Asked by a reporter at his final press conference on Thursday if the US takes Israel's potential violations of international law seriously, Secretary of State Antony Blinken responded that Israel can investigate itself because it is a democracy.

"In Gaza, we face the challenging situation in trying to make final determinations, because uniquely in Gaza, besides having a population that's been trapped there... you have an enemy that embeds itself in and among civilians, houses, hospitals, mosques, schools," Blinken said of Hamas - a talking point that has in large parts been debunked as Israeli raids on Gaza's hospitals uncovered little to no evidence. 

"Getting a clear picture and a clear understanding of whether any one incident in that context constitutes a violation of international law in one way or another is incredibly complicated, especially in real-time," he added. 

"So we continue to gather the information, we continue to assess it. If we have any conclusions that we can draw over time remains, we will. I also point out that in Israel itself, there are hundreds of cases that are being investigated. They have a process, they have procedures, they have rule of law, and we also look to them to carry out that process, to carry out the rule of law themselves. That's the hallmark of any democracy," he said.