Gaza: Israeli strikes kill another journalist amid increased shelling

TNA’s live coverage of the latest from the war on Gaza concludes for today. Join us again at 0800 GMT for updates from the besieged Palestinian enclave.

Members of the US Congress Suzanne Bonamici and Don Beyer have criticised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's rejection of a Palestinian state and reiterating his postwar stance. 

“I condemn the remarks of Prime Minister Netanyahu and the rhetoric of Israel’s far-right government leaders who want to deny Palestinians the right to a state," Bonamaci said.

“Prime Minister Netanyahu’s position as stated here is antithetical to American interests, the long-term security of Israel, the wellbeing of Palestinians, and hopes for peace in the region. I urge the administration to forcefully reject this," Beyer said in a separate comment.

Earlier during a nationally broadcast news conference, Netanyahu rejected the establishment of a Palestinian state- pledging instead for Israel to continue launching attacks in Gaza until there is a “decisive victory over Hamas." 

Protesters in Tel Aviv have blocked a Tel Aviv highway near the Defence Ministry to call on the government to do more about the captives' release.

Demonstrators were also filmed spelling out the number ‘136’ in flames on the road.

Israeli news publication Haaretz reported that Israeli police forces have since arrested seven people, including the family members of captives held in Gaza who also attended the demonstration.

The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, who facilitated the protest, issued a statement that they aim to heighten the protest, in order to pressure the government into taking action for the return of their family members. 

#TelAviv tonight: Protesters blocking major highway with fire demanding that the @Netanyahu govt strikes a deal to bring about the release of all 136 hostages held by Hamas. pic.twitter.com/QXiqrZLyUn

— Yonatan Touval (@Yonatan_Touval) January 18, 2024

Palestinian health officials said Israeli troops killed a man Thursday on the second day of an operation in the Tulkarem area, a day after violence in the occupied West Bank killed 10.

Unrest in the West Bank has surged alongside the Israel's war in the Gaza Strip.

The latest death followed the deaths of five people in the Tulkarem refugee camp on Wednesday in an air strike which the Israeli military said targeted "terrorists".

A 27-year-old man was shot dead in Nur Shams camp on the edge of Tulkarem on Thursday, the Palestinian Red Crescent and the health ministry said.

Local official Rami Elyan said the man killed was a civilian not involved in fighting between Israeli forces and Palestinian militants.

Palestinian news agency Wafa have reported Israeli forces raiding west Bethlehem's villages of Nahalin and Husan.

According to the outlet, multiple attacked four young men, fired tear gas and forcibly made store owners to close their shops in Husan, according to a local official who spoke to Wafa.

In Nahalin, Israeli forces conducted searches in several homes and halted any movement in the village, Wafa reported.

Yemen's Houthi group have issued a statement that “naval missiles” have been fired at US ship, the Chem Ranger, and have achieved direct hits.

This comes after the UK Maritime Trade Operations group said that they were alerted of a security incident around 85 nautical miles off the coast of Yemen.

“The Yemeni Armed Forces confirm that a retaliation to the American and British attacks is inevitable, and that any new aggression will not go unpunished,” The Houthis’ statement read.

The US has also carried out more strikes on Houthi targets inside Yemen earlier, despite President Joe Biden sharing his doubt on whether such retaliation has been effective. 

Stuart Seldowitz, the former Obama administration official who was under arrest for hate crime and aggravated harassment against a New York based halal food cart vendor, has walked away with a deal that would drop the charges against him if he accepts an anti-bias counselling programme.

Muslim rights groups have since condemned the deal, who called the announcement a "slap in the face” to the victims.

Afaf Nasher, the director of the New York chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, has since issued a statement to denounce the latest move.

“Seldowitz’s vile verbal abuse and harassment targeting an innocent street vendor were caught on video for all to see,” Nasher said.

“The sweetheart deal he received from the Manhattan DA’s office is a shameful affront of our justice system and wholly unfitting of his actions.”

Seldowitz caught controversy last year after film of him making anti-Islamic and genocidal threats against 24 year old Egyptian street vendor Mohammed Hussein for over a two-week period went viral.

Seldowitz also threatened Hussein's family in Egypt, saying that he could arrange for his father to be arrested by the mukhbarat secret police and tortured in a specific way.

Our NY chapter's ED Afaf Nasher: "Seldowitz’s abuse & harassment targeting an innocent street vendor were caught on video for all to see. The sweetheart deal he received from the Manhattan DA’s office is a shameful affront to our justice system."https://t.co/oQu04UhisB

— CAIR National (@CAIRNational) January 18, 2024

Palestinian state news agency, Wafa, has reported Israeli forces having killed Palestinians in Gaza.

According to sources who spoke to Wafa, at least two Palestinians were killed by Israeli shelling on a residential building in Gaza City, as Israeli forces have besieged a Tal al-Hawa based school where displaced Palestinians have sought shelter.

Meanwhile, in Khan Younis, four bodies have been brought into the European Hospital following an Israeli attack.

British maritime security firm Ambrey said on Thursday that a Marshall Islands-flagged, US-owned tanker reported four unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) approached and circled the vessel, approximately 87 miles southeast of Yemen's Mukalla.

"One of the UAVs reportedly fell into the water. No damage or injuries were reported. The tanker was not impacted and continued its voyage," Ambrey said in an advisory note.

There is "no way" to solve Israel's long-term security challenges in the region and the short-term challenges of rebuilding Gaza without the establishment of a Palestinian state, U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said on Thursday.

Speaking at a news briefing, Miller said Israel has an opportunity right now as countries in the region are ready to provide security assurances to Israel.

"But there is no way to solve their long-term challenges to provide lasting security and there is no way to solve the short-term challenges of rebuilding Gaza and establishing governance in Gaza and providing security for Gaza without the establishment of a Palestinian state."

Defence systems shot down an armed drone on Thursday over Erbil airport in northern Iraq, where US and other international forces are stationed, security sources said.

But Iraqi Kurdistan's counter-terrorism service denied the incident and said in a statement no drone was shut down.

Two security sources confirmed that an armed drone was intercepted and shot down at around 7:10 pm local time and a blast was heard near the airport.

Three suspected traffickers were killed on the Egypt-Israel border Thursday as they attempted to smuggle across 300 kilogrammes of assorted narcotics, Egyptian army spokesman Gharib Abdel Hafez said.

It was the second deadly clash on the border this week between the security forces and suspected drug traffickers.

On Tuesday, one suspected smuggler was killed and six arrested south of the Al-Awja (Nitzana) crossing, where humanitarian aid is inspected by Israeli personnel before being delivered to Gaza.

An Israeli army spokesman said troops opened fire on "approximately 20 suspects, including several that were armed", heading towards southern Israel from Egyptian territory.

The Egyptian army said that foiled smuggling attempt involved 147 kilogrammes of drugs.

The two countries, which signed a peace treaty in 1979, share a mostly calm border, with anti-smuggling operations causing occasional exchanges of fire.

The United States launched additional strikes on Thursday targeting two Houthi anti-ship missiles that were being prepared to fire into the Red Sea and deemed "an imminent threat" to shipping and US Navy vessels in the region, the US military said.

"US Central Command forces conducted strikes on two Houthi anti-ship missiles that were aimed into the Southern Red Sea and were prepared to launch," US Central Command said in a statement.

White House national security spokesman John Kirby, during a briefing aboard Air Force One, said the latest strikes were similar to those Wednesday taking aim at Houthi missiles that were prepared to fire in the southern Red Sea.

Biden separately told reporters earlier on Thursday that air strikes would continue even if they may not be halting the Houthi attacks.

"Are they stopping the Houthis? No. Are they gonna continue? Yes," Biden said before boarding Air Force One to leave the White House.

Israeli news outlet The Times of Israel reported Israeli far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir providing advice which run counter to the rules engagement of both the Israeli army and police.

Previous incidents have seen Israeli forces have shot unarmed people which have also included Israeli hostages held in Gaza.

“You have complete backing from me. When your life is in danger or see a terrorist – even if he does not endanger you – shoot. I have your back,” Ben-Gvir told army officers during a visit to the occupied West Bank.

Ben-Gvir’s office later issued a statement that said he had informed Border Guards to shoot “armed terrorists”.

Mexico and Chile have requested the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigative potential crimes in Gaza, by emphasising “growing worry” about increasing violence and suspected human rights violations against Palestinians since October 7.

Mexico’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs also specifically pointed out violence “against civilian targets”.

 An estimated 320 journalists around the world were imprisoned because of their work toward the end of 2023, according to a report issued Thursday by the Committee to Protect Journalists, which called it a disturbing attempt to smother independent voices.

That's the second-highest number of jailed journalists since the committee began its annual census in 1992. It's down from 367 in 2022, due primarily to the release of many in Iran, either on bail or as they await sentencing, the committee said.

“Our research shows how entrenched authoritarianism is globally, with governments emboldened to stamp out critical reporting and prevent public accountability,” said Jodie Ginsberg, the committee's chief executive officer.

Israel is tied with Iran for sixth place, the country's highest ranking ever on CPJ's annual list. Each of the 17 that were held in Israel at the time of the census were Palestinians arrested in the occupied West Bank since the start of the war on Gaza, the report said.

More than a third of the journalists in jail according to the CPJ's December 1, 2023, census were in China, Myanmar and Belarus, the report said.

Hezbollah has denounced the move by the US labelling the Houthis a "terrorist group" saying that the "US is the sponsor of Zionist [Israeli] terrorism and criminal aggression against Gaza."

"This decision will not discourage the determination of the great Yemeni people and their effective and influential role to lift the siege of Gaza; it will embolden their persistence in continuing this honourable conduct to end the Zionist genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza," the group said.

The Israeli army has targeted several locations in southern Lebanon, as its war in Gaza escalates across the region.

Israel and the Islamist group Hezbollah have exchanging tit-for-tat attacks across their shared border for over three months, when the war in the enclave broke out.

Israel bombs several locations in southern Lebanon. pic.twitter.com/4QjMsd0clW

— Quds News Network (@QudsNen) January 18, 2024

President Joe Biden said Thursday that US and British military strikes against Yemen's Houthis would continue, because the Iran-backed rebels were still attacking shipping in the Red Sea.

"When you say 'working, are they stopping the Houthi?' No. Are they going to continue? Yes," Biden told reporters at the White House when asked if the strikes were working.

Saudi Arabia is unable to pursue talks about a landmark deal to recognise Israel until there is a ceasefire in Gaza, the kingdom's ambassador to the United States said Thursday.

"I think the most important thing to realise is the kingdom has not put normalisation at the heart of its policy. It's put peace and prosperity at the heart of its policy," Princess Reema bint Bandar al-Saud told a panel at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

"The kingdom has been quite clear. While there is violence on the ground and the killing persists, we cannot talk about the next day."

Saudi Arabia, home to Islam's holiest sites, has never recognised Israel and did not join the 2020 US-brokered Abraham Accords that saw its Gulf neighbours Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates as well as Morocco establish formal ties with Israel.

US President Joe Biden's administration has pushed hard for Saudi Arabia to take the same step.

Under de facto ruler Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, son of the ageing King Salman, Riyadh had laid out conditions for normalisation, including security guarantees from Washington and help developing a civilian nuclear programme.

Turkish first division club Basaksekir on Thursday sent Israeli midfielder Eden Karzev on loan to Maccabi Tel Aviv following a probe into his repost of a social media message calling for the release of hostages held by Hamas militants.

The Istanbul side launched disciplinary proceedings against Karzev earlier this week after the defensive midfielder shared a message reading: "Bring Them Home Now".

The probe came the same day Israeli footballer Sagiv Jehezkel was briefly detained and charged with incitement to hatred for displaying a message about the Gaza war after scoring a goal for Antalyaspor.

Jehezkel left Turkey after being formally charged in an Istanbul court on Monday.

Basaksekir took Karzev on loan from Israeli outfit Maccabi Tel Aviv last year.

"The player was fined in accordance with the club's disciplinary instructions, and it was deemed appropriate for the football player to continue his career abroad," Basaksekir said in a statement.

The deputy leader of Yemen's presidential council said Thursday that its military forces need foreign assistance to launch a ground operation that would back US and UK air strikes against Houthi rebels.

Aidarus al-Zubaidi, vice president of the Presidential Leadership Council based in the southern city of Aden, told AFP the aerial barrage alone was not enough to deter Houthi attacks on merchant ships in the Red Sea.

"An international and regional alliance is necessary to secure international navigation in the Red Sea," Zubaidi said in an interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

Zubaidi heads the secessionist Southern Transitional Council, which wants to split the country back in two, reversing its 1990 unification.

He said a Saudi-led military intervention launched in support of the government in 2015, which has also involved air strikes, had been "insufficient" to deter the Huthis.

"Ground forces must be supported on the ground, and these forces belong to the legitimate government," he said.

"These forces are the ones who can achieve a victory on the ground, because strong strikes without ground operations are useless."

Birzeit University has condemned the destruction of the Al-Israa University in southern Gaza, calling it a crime and a part of Israel's onslaught of the territory.

"It's all part of the Israeli occupation's goal to make Gaza uninhabitable; a continuation of the genocide being carried out in the Gaza Strip.

Birzeit University condemns the brutal assault and bombing of @Al-Israa University campus by the Israeli occupation south of #Gaza city, this occurred after seventy days of the occupation occupying the campus; turning it into their base, and military barracks for their forces pic.twitter.com/vot9s1z3tz

— Birzeit University (@BirzeitU) January 18, 2024

The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) says that since October 21, it has received 5,939 trucks from the Egyptian Red Crescent through the Rafah border crossing containing food, water, relief aid and medical supplies.

In the same time period, the organisation said it also received 88 ambulances.

The numbers represent just a fraction of what is needed to cover the immense needs of Gaza’s population, according to repeated statements by local and international aid groups and workers.

🚚 استلمت طواقم جمعية الهلال الأحمر الفلسطيني 5939 شاحنة من الهلال الأحمر المصري عبر معبر #رفح منذ تاريخ21/10/2023 وحتى تاريخ 18/1/2024. 📍تحتوي الشاحنات على طعام وماء ومساعدات إغاثية ومستلزمات طبية وأدوية.

بلغت إجمالي حصة الجمعية من الشاحنات 4001 شاحنة، فيما تم تسليم عدد 1938… pic.twitter.com/odeFu1rBOs

— PRCS (@PalestineRCS) January 18, 2024

The European Union will adopt sanctions Monday against Hamas, France said on Thursday.

Brussels will adopt "a regime of sanctions against Hamas", French foreign ministry spokesman Christophe Lemoine told reporters, adding that they would target "individuals and transfers of funds".

The punitive measures will target Hamas and some of its leaders involved in the unprecedented October 7 attacks against southern Israel that resulted in the death of about 1,140 people.

The European Parliament on Thursday called for a "permanent ceasefire" in Gaza - but on condition that all Israeli hostages are released immediately and Hamas dismantled.

Fighting has ravaged Gaza, killing at least 24,620 people since October 7.

The parliament called in a resolution "for a permanent ceasefire and to restart efforts towards a political solution provided that all hostages are immediately and unconditionally released and the terrorist organisation Hamas is dismantled".

The non-binding resolution was backed by 312 lawmakers, with 131 voting against and 72 abstaining.

The war in Gaza will hit economies across the Middle East if it is not resolved and the conflict urgently needs a non-military solution, Qatar's finance minister told Reuters.

"The solution is really to look for a permanent solution for the main issue in the Middle East which is the Palestinian problem. This cannot be fixed by military actions," Qatar's Finance Minister Ali Al Kuwari said in Davos.

"If you leave them long term unresolved, we will always go through cycles of violence, cycles of unrest, and which always will slow down the region," he said on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in the Swiss mountain resort.

Moroccan celebrations were subdued across the country following their impressive 3-0 victory against Tanzania on Wednesday in the African Cup of Nations, due to the ongoing war in Gaza.

Read more from The New Arab's North Africa correspondent Basma El Atti here.

Wael Fanouneh, the director of the Al-Quds Al-Yaoum (Jerusalem Today) channel was killed in an Israeli strike in central Gaza on Thursday.

At least nine journalists from the same channel have been killed amid Israel's war in  Gaza since October 7, where a significant number of journalists have been targeted and killed.

Another journalist killed

This time Wael Fanouneh, Director of Jerusalem Today TV, killed in an Israeli airstrike on central Gaza moments ago. pic.twitter.com/RzR0wClfxZ

— Rami Jarrah (@RamiJarrah) January 18, 2024

An incoming aerial threat over the Red Sea on Thursday prompted Israeli forces to sound sirens in the southern resort city of Eilat and launch an interceptor missile, the military said, adding that any danger had passed.

The military statement did not specify what had been launched at Eilat nor whether it had been successfully shot down. The city has previously been the target of long-range missile or drone attacks by Yemen's Iranian-aligned Houthis.

Medics said there was no word of any casualties in the incident, during which witnesses reported hearing a loud explosion and local TV showed smoke above the Gulf of Aqaba.

The Houthis, like several other Iranian-linked groups in the region, have been carrying out attacks on Israel in solidarity with Palestinian Hamas militants fighting a war with it in Gaza.

Russia on Thursday said the United States should stop strikes against Houthis in Yemen to aid a diplomatic resolution to a standoff over the rebel group's attacks on merchant vessels.

"The most important thing now is to stop the aggression against Yemen, because the more the Americans and the British bomb, the less willing the Houthis are to talk," Lavrov told reporters in Moscow.

The Israeli military on Thursday sounded sirens in the southern port city of Eilat and a local radio station said an explosion had been heard as the result of the interception of an incoming aerial threat.

Eilat, on the Red Sea, has been the target of past long-distance launches by Iranian-aligned Yemeni Houthis, in solidarity with Palestinians impacted by Israel's war in Gaza.

Over 300 Palestinian sports clubs are calling for a ban on Israel's participation in the upcoming Olympic Games in Paris this summer.

Their statement is urging that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to "apply its principles and fulfil its obligations by banning Israel from the next Olympic Games to be held in Paris in July 2024, until it ends its grave violations of international law, particularly its system of apartheid and its ongoing genocide in Gaza."

The Palestinian plea for such a move comes as Russian athletes are banned from participation in the Games in the wake of the ongoing war in Ukraine, unless they compete as an Individual Neutral Athlete.

Palestinians are dying every day in Gaza’s overwhelmed remaining hospitals which can’t deal with the estimated 60,000 injured people and daily arrival of hundreds more hurt in Israeli’s military offensive, a UN health emergency expert said on Wednesday, while a doctor with the International Rescue Committee called the situation in Gaza's hospitals the most "extreme she had ever seen".

The two health professionals, who recently left Gaza after weeks working in hospitals there, described overwhelmed doctors trying to save the lives of thousands of wounded people amid collapsing hospitals that have turned into impromptu refugee camps.

The World Health Organization’s Sean Casey, who left Gaza recently after five weeks of trying to get more staff and supplies to the territory's 16 partially functioning hospitals, told a U. news conference that he saw "a really horrifying situation in the hospitals” as the health system collapsed day by day.

Al-Shifa Hospital, once Gaza’s leading hospital with 700 beds, has been reduced to treating only emergency trauma victims, and is filled with thousands of people who have fled their homes and are now living in operating rooms, corridors and stairs, he said.

"Literally five or six doctors or nurses" are seeing hundreds of patients a day, Casey said, most with life-threatening injuries, and there were "so many patients on the floor you could barely move without stepping on somebody’s hands or feet".

Israel should allow displaced Palestinians in Gaza to return to their homes, Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said on Thursday.

Speaking at a joint press conference with Turkey's Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan in Amman, Safadi also said it was essential to end the war in Gaza and avert an escalation of violence in the wider region.

"With regard to the current priorities, they are clear: ending the aggression in Gaza, letting in sufficient permanent humanitarian aid to all parts of the Strip, south and north, stopping the destruction, and working immediately for the return of displaced Gazans to their areas and homes," Safadi said.

American officials have reportedly ordered Israeli leaders to restore communications in the war-hit Gaza Strip after a weeklong blackout.

US news outlet Politico reports the Washington is concerned the ongoing cut of telecommunications that could render the humanitarian situation in Gaza’s even worse.

American officials have been "in touch with the government of Israel over this blackout and have urged them to turn telecoms back on", it quoted one unnamed White House official as saying.

"Absence of telecommunications deprives people from accessing life-saving information, while also undermining first responders and other humanitarian actors’ ability to operate and to do so safely," National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a statement.

The telecommunications blackout in Gaza has now entered the seventh consecutive day, in the longest interruption since the start of the war over three months ago.

Israel has cut off communications in the territory at least nine times since October 7.

The Israeli army have claimed they have killed around 60 Palestinian fighters in the Gaza Strip, the military said in a statement on Thursday summarising operations over the previous 24 hours.

Around 40 of the fighters were killed in the area of southern Khan Younis and several others in the northern Gaza Strip, including at a compound used by the Palestinian faction Islamic Jihad, the statement said. 

Israel killed a Palestinian man in the city of Tulkarm, the Palestinian health ministry confirmed on Thursday morning, following the second day of raids in the West Bank city.

The man was identified as 27-year-old Mohammed Faisal Dawas Abu Awwad, who was shot by live fire in the stomach.

The death toll since yesterday in Tulkarm has now risen to six.

Israeli forces today have detained at least 48 Palestinians across the West Bank in a wide-scale arrest campaign throughout Wednesday night and Thursday morning, according to the Palestinian Prisoner's Society (PPS), as cited by Wafa.

Among those detained are the mother of slain prisoner and ex-detainee.

The arrests were carried out in Hebron, Ramallah, Tulkarm and the village of Harmala.