Gaza: At least 16 killed amid freezing weather, Israeli attacks

The expansion of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank is at its highest level since at least 2017, when the United Nations began tracking such data, according to a report by the United Nations secretary-general on Friday.

In 2025, "plans for nearly 47,390 housing units were advanced, approved, or tendered, compared with some 26,170 in 2024," the report said.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned what he called the "relentless" expansion in a statement accompanying the report, saying it "continues to fuel tensions, impede access by Palestinians to their land and threaten the viability of a fully independent, democratic, contiguous and sovereign Palestinian State."

Gaza's civil defence agency on Friday said at least 16 people had died in the last 24 hours, including three children who died from exposure to the cold, as a winter storm batters the territory.

Heavy rain from Storm Byron has flooded tents and temporary shelters across the Gaza Strip since late Wednesday, compounding the suffering of the territory's residents, nearly all of whom were displaced during more than two years of war.

Gaza's civil defence agency told AFP three children had died from exposure to the cold -- two in Gaza City and one in Khan Yunis in the south.

Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City confirmed the deaths of Hadeel al-Masri, aged nine, and Taim al-Khawaja, who it said was just several months old.

Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis on Thursday said eight-month-old Rahaf Abu Jazar had died in the nearby tented encampment of Al-Mawasi due to the cold.

With most of Gaza's buildings destroyed or damaged, thousands of tents and makeshift shelters now line areas cleared of rubble.

Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said six people died when a house collapsed in the Bir al-Naja area of the northern Gaza Strip.

Two bodies were recovered from the rubble of a home in the Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood of Gaza City, he added.

Five others died when walls collapsed in multiple separate incidents, Bassal said.

In a statement, the civil defence said its teams had responded to calls from "13 houses that collapsed due to heavy rains and strong winds, mostly in Gaza City and the north".

The United States Central Command will host a conference in Doha on December 16 with partner nations to plan the International Stabilization Force for Gaza, two US officials told Reuters on Friday.

More than 25 countries are expected to send representatives to the conference, which will include sessions on the command structure and other issues related to the Gaza force, the officials said.

US intelligence officials temporarily suspended sharing some key information with Israel during the Biden administration over concerns about its conduct of the war in Gaza, according to six people familiar with the matter.

In the second half of 2024, the US cut off a live video feed from a US drone over Gaza, which was being used by the Israeli government in its hunt for captives and Hamas fighters. The suspension lasted for at least a few days, said five of the sources.

The US also restricted how Israel could use certain intelligence in its pursuit of high-value military targets in Gaza, said two of the sources, who declined to specify when this decision was taken.

Nearly 795,000 Palestinians are at risk from Storm Byron, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) warned amid heavy rainfall, worsening conditions for the already-suffering and displaced population.

IOM said itself that the shelter items it has provided for those displaced "cannot withstand the flooding".

IOM director Amy Pope also said that unimpeded deliveries of shelter supplies and other aid are necessary to respond to the crisis.

Israeli settlers opened fire at Palestinian youths on Friday evening in Khirbet Ibziq, north of Tubas, according to a local official, cited by the Palestinian Wafa news agency.

Head of Ibziq Village Council Abdul Majeed Khdeirat said that a group of settlers chased after the youths and fired live ammunition at them. No injuries were reported.

Khirbet Ibziq has been subjected to escalating attacks and violations by settlers and Israeli occupation forces in recent months.

Israeli authorities say they will "confiscate and demolish" the homes of Palestinian Malik al-Jaber Salem n the village of Bazariya, near Nablus.

Salem was allegedly the culprit behind a July 2025 attack at the Gush Etzion Junction, a settlement area in the southern occupied West Bank.

International troops could be deployed in the Gaza Strip as early as next month to form a U.N.-authorized stabilization force, two US officials told Reuters, but it remains unclear how Palestinian militants Hamas will be disarmed.

The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the International Stabilization Force (ISF) would not fight Hamas. They said lots of countries had expressed interest in contributing and U.S. officials are currently working out the size of the ISF, composition, housing, training and rules of engagement.

An American two-star general is being considered to lead the ISF but no decisions have been made, the officials said.

Deployment of the force is a key part of the next phase of U.S. President Donald Trump's Gaza peace plan. Under the first phase, a fragile ceasefire in the two-year war began on October 10 and Hamas has released hostages and Israel has freed detained Palestinians.

"There is a lot of quiet planning that's going on behind the scenes right now for phase two of the peace deal," White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Thursday. "We want to ensure an enduring and lasting peace."

Israel has reportedly approved the establishment and regulation of 19 new settlements in the occupied West Bank.

This includes two settlements in the northern West Bank that were dismantled during the so-called disengagement in 2005.

Head of the Wall and Colonization Resistance Commission, Minister Muayyad Shaaban, said that the approval of the settlements "marks yet another step in the race to erase Palestinian geography in favour of the colonial settlement project".

Shaaban called the decision "a dangerous escalation that exposes the true intentions of the occupation government to entrench a system of annexation, apartheid, and the complete Judaisation of Palestinian land".

At least 12 buildings  have collapsed due to Storm Byron in Gaza, amid heavy rains and strong winds.

Earlier this morning, five people were killed after a building collapsed in Beit Lahia, while similar incidents have also been reported.

The buildings have been previously shelled amid Israel's military onslaught.

Israeli forces arrested a Palestinian woman from the town of Deir Samet, near Hebron, on Friday.

Sources told Palestinian media that Israeli forces, accompanied by several military vehicles, stormed the town of Deir Samet, west of Hebron, raided the home of recently released prisoner Atef al-Awawdeh, searched it, and ransacked its contents before arresting his wife.

The Palestinian Prisoners' Media Office said the woman was arrested in order to force her husband to turn himself in.

The death toll from Storm Byron in Gaza has increased to 12, the enclave's health ministry said on Friday.

"The Gaza Strip has witnessed dangerous developments, including: 12 casualties, including martyrs and missing people, as a result of the storm’s impact and the collapse of bombed buildings across all governorates of the Gaza Strip," the statement read.

Ireland’s planned curbs on trade with Israeli settlements will be limited strictly to goods, a minister told Reuters, offering the first clear signal on the scope of the contested legislation and rejecting accusations that the country is "antisemitic".

Ireland has been preparing a law to curb trade with settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, facing pressure at home to widen the scope of the ban from goods to services, while Israel and the United States want the bill scrapped.

Ireland has been one of the European Union's most outspoken critics of Israel's assault in Gaza, which authorities in the Palestinian enclave say has killed more than 70,000 people.

But Thomas Byrne, Ireland's Minister of State for European Affairs and Defence, told Reuters that the bill is limited to the import of goods and that it would not become law this year.

"It's an extremely limited measure, which would prohibit imports of goods from illegally-occupied territories," he said in an interview. "Similar measures have already been brought in in a number of European countries."

Byrne's comments give insight into Dublin's thinking as Ireland seeks to deflect pressure, including from US companies based in the country, to soften its criticism of Israel. Ireland's bill is expected to help shape how other European nations launch similar curbs on trade with Israeli settlements.

Hundreds of thousands of displaced Gazans face flooding of their tents and shelters by heavy rains, and materials for shelters and sandbags are not being allowed to enter the enclave, the UN International Organization for Migration said on Friday.

Torrential rain swept across the Gaza Strip on Thursday, flooding hundreds of tents sheltering families displaced by two years of war, and leading to the death of a baby girl due to exposure, local health officials said.

Nearly 795,000 displaced people are at heightened risk of potentially dangerous flooding in low-lying, rubble-filled areas where families are living in unsafe shelters, the IOM said. Insufficient drainage and waste management also heightened the risk of disease outbreak, the UN agency added.

Materials to help reinforce shelters such as timber and plywood, as well as sandbags and water pumps to help with flooding have been delayed from entering Gaza due to ongoing access restrictions, the IOM said.

Israel says it is meeting its obligations and accuses agencies of inefficiency and failing to prevent theft by Hamas, which the group denies. COGAT, the Israeli military arm that oversees humanitarian matters, was not immediately available for comment.

Supplies already dispatched to Gaza, including waterproof tents, thermal blankets and tarpaulins, were not able to withstand the flooding, the IOM added.

"After this storm made landfall yesterday, families are trying to protect their children with whatever they have," IOM Director General Amy Pope said.

Israeli forces assaulted the family of Palestinian man Abdel Baset Abu Aliya early on Friday during a raid on Al-Mughayyir village, east of Ramallah.

The Palestinian Wafa agency said that an infantry unit of the Israeli army stormed Abu Aliya’s home, physically attacking all members of his family and causing damage to the house’s contents.

Israeli forces have carried out raids in south Syria's Quneitra province, the Syrian official agency SANA said on Friday, in the army's continuation of its incursions in the country following the fall of Bashar al-Assad.

The agency indicated that the Israeli incursion took place "starting from the Adnaniyah point towards the villages of Umm al-Adham and Ruwayhina, passing through the villages of Rasm al-Halabi, al-Mushayrifah, and Umm Batinah".

Israeli incursions into southern Syria have become almost daily occurrences recently, accompanied by arrests and the establishment of checkpoints, leading to escalating public anger.

The Israeli army has reportedly carried out an airstrike on a Hezbollah facility in southern Lebanon early on Friday.

The site reportedly belonged to the group's Radwan Forces.

At least five people have been killed on Friday morning in Gaza's Beit Lahia following the collapse of a building, Al Jazeera reported.

Other people were injured in the incident.

The building's collapse was reportedly caused by the bad weather conditions in the Palestinian enclave, currently impacted by Storm Byron.

Israeli forces wounded two Palestinians early on Friday morning during a raid on Al-Am’ari refugee camp, in Ramallah, according to local sources cited the Palestinian Wafa agency.

The sources said that the Israeli military stormed the camp and opened fire on residents, resulting in two young men being shot in the hand and shoulder. The injured were transferred to the Palestine Medical Complex for treatment.