Israeli forces shell Gaza on war anniversary as Qatar says Trump plan will work

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US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington remains 'steadfast' in its support for Israel on the second anniversary of the 7 October 2023 attacks.

"The United States reaffirms its unwavering support for Israel’s right to exist, to defend itself, and to ensure the safety of its people," Rubio said.

"As the United States marks this tragic anniversary and honours the victims, we renew our resolve to prevent such evil from ever taking place again."

The top diplomat attended a vigil with fellow cabinet officials for the remaining captives held in Gaza.

The Government Media Office in Gaza said that Israeli forces have launched 230 air attacks on Gaza since Saturday, killing at least 118 people over a four-day period.

The dead included women and children, and 72 people in besieged Gaza City alone, where Israel has intensified a military campaign in recent months.

Swedish activist Greta Thunberg alleged on Tuesday that she and other detainees of the Gaza flotilla were subjected to torture in the Israeli prison they were held.

Thunberg told a news conference in Stockholm that she and others were "kidnapped and tortured" by the Israeli military.

She declined to elaborate, adding when pressed that she didn't get clean water and that other detainees were deprived of critical medication.

"Personally, I don't want to share what I was subjected to because I don't want it to make headlines and 'Greta has been tortured', because that's not the story here," she said, adding that what they were subjected to paled in comparison to what people in Gaza experienced daily.

Israel's foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment but has repeatedly denied mistreating the detainees.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, marking the second anniversary of Hamas's October 7 attack, vowed Tuesday to achieve all of the war's objectives in Gaza, beginning with securing the release of hostages.

"We are in fateful, decisive days. We will continue to act to achieve all the war's objectives: the return of all abductees, the elimination of Hamas's rule, and ensuring that Gaza will never again pose a threat to Israel," he said in a statement issued by his office.

As indirect negotiations between the Israeli government and Hamas began in Egypt since Monday in an effort to end the Gaza war, Netanyahu's reference to "the elimination of Hamas's rule" appears to mark a shift from his recent statements, in which he spoke of destroying the Palestinian Islamist movement as a goal.

Iran on Tuesday dismissed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's warnings over its missile programme as fabricated, after he alleged the Islamic republic was developing rockets capable of reaching US cities.

In an interview with US podcaster Ben Shapiro released on Monday, Netanyahu said: "Iran is developing now... intercontinental ballistic missiles for 8,000 kilometre range".

"What does that mean? They add another 3,000 kilometres and they've got under their guns... New York City in target, Washington, Boston, Miami, Mar-a-Lago", he said, referring to the Florida residence of US President Donald Trump.

Iran's foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, condemned the comments, saying Israel was trying to portray Iran's defensive capabilities as a threat.

"Israel is now attempting to turn our defensive power into a made-up threat," Araghchi wrote on X.

Hamas is demanding the release of high-profile Palestinian inmate Marwan Barghouti from an Israeli jail as part of ongoing negotiations on a hostage-prisoner exchange, Egyptian state-linked media reported Tuesday.

Al-Qahera News, which is close to Egypt's intelligence services, said talks had begun in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm El-Sheikh on the lists of Palestinian inmates to be freed by Israel under a potential ceasefire deal.

Barghouti, a leading member of the Palestinian Fatah party and imprisoned since 2002, is among several high-profile detainees whose release is being sought by Hamas.

Other names mentioned include Ahmad Saadat, Hassan Salameh and Abbas Al-Sayed.

Hamas's top negotiator Khalil El-Hayya said Tuesday during indirect talks with Israel in Egypt that the group "wants guarantees from (US) President Trump and the sponsor countries that the war will end once and for all".

"We do not trust the occupation, not even for a second," he told Egyptian state-linked media Al-Qahera News, referring to Israel.

"The Israeli occupation throughout history does not keep its promises, and we have experienced it twice in this war. Therefore, we want real guarantees," he continued, accusing Israel of violating two ceasefires in the current war.

Irish activists who returned to Dublin on Friday after being detained and expelled by Israel for trying to ship aid to Gaza said they were ready to have another go, despite alleging "mistreatment" in Israeli prison.

"There's another flotilla underway now and we'll be going back on another," activist Paddy O'Donovan told reporters at Dublin Airport after landing with four others who tried to break through Israel's blockade of Gaza.

The activists were greeted by cheers from around 100 supporters chanting pro-Palestinian slogans, and hugs from tearful family members.

Israel began intercepting vessels, part of Global Sumud Flotilla, last week, with police saying more than 470 people aboard the boats were arrested.

Comedian Tadhg Hickey told AFP of poor conditions while they were held in prison in Israel, including lack of access to medicine and clean drinking water -- claims that were echoed by other flotilla activists.

"To come face to face with the level of sadism and inhumanity that they display was really quite shocking to me," Hickey said about the prison conditions.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said on Tuesday that she and two of her ministers had been reported to the International Criminal Court for alleged complicity in genocide in connection with Israel's offensive in Gaza.

Speaking in an interview with state television company RAI, Meloni said Defence Minister Guido Crosetto and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani had been denounced, and "I think" also Roberto Cingolani, the head of defence group Leonardo

In other remarks, Meloni said she believed that US President Donald Trump had come to the conclusion that Russia was not interested in a peace deal with Ukraine.

Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani will attend the ongoing Gaza peace talks in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm El-Sheikh on Wednesday, the foreign ministry said.

Sheikh Mohammed's "participation in the meetings... comes at a critical stage of the talks, reaffirming the determination of the mediators to reach an agreement that would bring an end to the catastrophic war in the Gaza Strip," the ministry said Tuesday on X.

A Turkish delegation led by intelligence chief Ibrahim Kalin will participate in negotiations in Egypt on Wednesday aimed at ending the two-year Gaza war, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported Tuesday.

The agency, citing security sources, said that Kalin held talks with US, Egyptian, Qatari officials and representatives from Palestinian militant group Hamas ahead of the indirect talks with Israel.

US President Donald Trump said Tuesday there was a "real chance" of a Gaza peace deal, as Hamas and Israeli negotiators held indirect talks on the second anniversary of the 7 October attack.

"There's a real chance that we could do something," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office alongside Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, adding that US negotiators were also involved in the talks.

Swiss participants in the flotilla that tried to break through the Israeli maritime blockade on Gaza have faced "cruel, inhumane, and degrading treatment" in Israeli detention, their organisation said Tuesday.

The Waves of Freedom Switzerland organisation said Israel had conducted "illegal and shameful attacks on the humanitarian and peaceful flotillas", followed by "equally illegal arrests and detentions".

"It subjected our citizens to cruel, inhumane, and degrading treatment, as defined in the International Convention against Torture, both physically and psychologically," said the group, which goes by the acronym WOFA.

Mexico's Foreign Ministry stated that six Mexicans were also brought to Jordan, where they were met by the Mexican ambassador.

"They left Israel and began their return to Mexico," the ministry said.

Its President, Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo, had demanded the safe return of their nationals.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez condemned "terrorism in all its forms" on Tuesday on the second anniversary of the Hamas attack on Israel and urged an end to "the genocide" in Gaza.

"It is a day to reiterate our strong condemnation of terrorism in all its forms, to call for the immediate release of the Israeli [captives]," the Socialist leader wrote on X.

"And to demand that (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu stop the genocide of the Palestinian people and open a humanitarian corridor," he added.

Sanchez also reaffirmed that the two-state solution was the "only possible" way to end the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Sanchez has called for Israel to be barred from international sporting events in response to the country's offensive in Gaza, and recently approved a "total" arms embargo on Israel.

Israel has repeatedly denied permission to transfer incubators from an evacuated hospital in North Gaza, a UN children's agency official said on Tuesday, adding to the strain on overcrowded hospitals further south, where newborn babies are now sharing oxygen masks.

James Elder, UNICEF spokesperson, described mothers and babies lining the corridor floors of Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza, and said that premature babies were being forced to share oxygen masks and beds. Meanwhile, vital equipment is stranded in hospitals that have been shut in the north.

"We've been trying to recover incubators from a hospital that was evacuated in the north, and we've had four missions denied simply to get those incubators," he told Reuters by video link from Gaza, referring to supplies now stuck at the damaged Al-Rantissi Children's Hospital in Gaza City.

At a hospital Elder visited in the south, meanwhile, "in one of the paediatric rooms, there were three babies and three mums on a single bed, one source of oxygen, and the mothers would rotate the oxygen 20 minutes to each child," he said. "This is the level of desperation mums have now got to."

Brazil said Tuesday 13 of its citizens detained by Israel on a Gaza aid flotilla were on their way home.

The group, including lawmaker Luizianne Lins of the ruling Workers' Party, "were taken to the border with Jordan and released," Brasilia's Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

"After six days of illegal imprisonment in Israel, the 13 Brazilians of the Sumud Global Flotilla are finally free," Lins wrote on Instagram.

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on Monday demanded Israel ensure the safe return of Brazilian nationals and said it had violated international law by intercepting the flotilla in international waters.

The Vatican's top diplomat sharply criticised Israel's "ongoing massacre" in Gaza in comments published on Monday - one of the Catholic Church's strongest condemnations of Israel's war on Gaza

In an interview tied to the second anniversary of the Gaza War, Cardinal Pietro Parolin also called those attacks "inhuman and indefensible" and urged Hamas to free remaining hostages.

"Those who are attacked have a right to defend themselves, but even legitimate defence must respect the principle of proportionality," said Parolin, the Vatican secretary of state and one of Pope Leo's top deputies.

"The war waged by the Israeli army to eliminate Hamas militants disregards the fact that it is targeting a largely defenceless population, already pushed to the brink, in an area where buildings and homes are reduced to rubble," he said.

"It is ... clear that the international community is, unfortunately, powerless and that the countries truly capable of exerting influence have so far failed to act to stop the ongoing massacre," Parolin told the Vatican's media outlets.

Hamas said Tuesday that the 7 October attack on Israel, which according to Israeli officials resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, was a "historic response" to Israel's actions.

"We reaffirm that the Al-Aqsa Flood on October 7 was a historic response to attempts to eradicate the Palestinian cause," Fawzi Barhoum, a senior Hamas official, said in a televised speech.

Qatar's Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Tuesday that there were many details to be worked out regarding US President Donald Trump's 20-point plan for the Gaza Strip.

A US delegation led by presidential envoy Steve Witkoff will join talks aimed at a truce in Gaza and hostage and prisoner exchange on Wednesday, Egypt's Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty said.

In a joint press conference with his German counterpart, Abdelatty said Tuesday he and Johann Wadephul "had a long conversation with Steve Witkoff, who is expected in Egypt in the coming hours".

Israel has conducted two strikes on south Lebanon, killing two the military says are associated with Hezbollah, with one striking the towns of Deir Aames and another striking an excavator between Yater and Zinqin, according to the Times of Israel.

Lebanon's National News Agency said that an Israeli strike targeting a bulldozer in the town of Yater killed one. 

Hamas official Fawzi Barhoum said on Tuesday that the group's delegation now in talks in Egypt on a US plan to end the war in Gaza is seeking to overcome all obstacles to achieving a settlement.

As thousands gathered in southern Israel on Tuesday to commemorate victims on the second anniversary of Israeli attacks on the enclave, protesters in Indonesia rallied to condemn the war on Gaza.

More than 1,000 pro-Palestinian protesters marched to the US Embassy in Indonesia's capital of Jakarta to denounce Israel's blockade of Gaza and the detention of activists from the Global Sumud Flotilla that tried to break through the siege last week.

Chanting "Free free Palestine" and waving flags, demonstrators called for the activists' release and condemned two years of Israeli military action in Gaza.

Authorities in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim majority nation and one that has no formal ties with Israel, deployed over 1,000 police to secure the embassy.

Massive demonstrations in the #Indonesian capital 🇮🇩, Jakarta; Support for Gaza 🇵🇸#FreeGaza#SahabatPalestina_ID#ForeverPalestine pic.twitter.com/9USZDlo9HT

— ғᴏʀᴇᴠᴇʀ ᴘᴀʟᴇsᴛɪɴᴇ (@Pal_4ever__) October 28, 2023

Qatar's foreign ministry spokesman said on Tuesday that Israel should have ceased its war on Gaza already, in line with US President Donald Trump's peace plan.

"We await the outcomes of the negotiations in the coming days regarding the ceasefire. This question should be directed first to the Israeli occupation government. It was supposed to actually cease fire if the statements made by the prime minister there regarding adherence to the Trump plan were true," Majed al-Ansari told reporters in Doha.

Israeli defence companies have been barred from the upcoming Dubai Airshow after a "technical review", its organiser said on Tuesday, without providing further details, two years into the devastating Gaza war.

"The (Israeli) exhibitors that were previously coming won't be participating," said Tim Hawes, managing director of Informa Markets, which organises the show, on the sidelines of a press conference to announce details of the exhibition.

Australia's most populous state criticised a pro-Palestine group's plan to stage a protest event in Sydney on Tuesday.

The Stand for Palestine Australia group is planning a 'glory to our martyrs' event on Tuesday evening in Sydney's Bankstown suburb, drawing condemnation from Chris Minns, the Premier of the state of New South Wales, which includes Sydney.

"Terrible timing, shockingly insensitive," Minns told radio station 2GB. "We understand that there is concern about innocent Palestinian civilians in Gaza, but to do it ... on 7th, seems like they are glorifying the actions of these Hamas terrorists, and not the circumstance of those that are living in Gaza."

Palestinian activist lawyer Ramia Abdo Sultan, who is scheduled to speak at the event, said in a video on the group's Instagram account that Palestinians had been silenced and were not allowed to mourn or grieve their loved ones.

"Our own prime minister in Australia has decided to completely disregard the thousands of Palestinians that have died over the past two years," she said. Pro-Palestine protests have been happening in both Sydney and Melbourne almost every weekend, with some attended by thousands.

The United Nations chief on Tuesday demanded the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages held in Gaza, and an end to hostilities in the war-ravaged Palestinian territory, Israel and the region.

Speaking on the second anniversary of the Gaza War, Antonio Guterres decried a "humanitarian catastrophe on a scale that defies comprehension".

"I have said it time and again, and I am repeating it today with even greater urgency: Release the hostages, unconditionally and immediately," he said in a statement.

"End the suffering for all... Put an end to the hostilities in Gaza, Israel and the region now. Stop making civilians pay with their lives and their futures.

"After two years of trauma, we must choose hope. Now."

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer urged students to skip pro-Palestinian protests planned for the second anniversary on Tuesday of Hamas's October 7, 2023, attack in Israel, suggesting they were disrespectful.

Students from several London universities were due to walk out of classes at 2:00 pm (1300 GMT) before marching through the centre of the British capital.

Writing in the Times newspaper, Starmer alleged that regular pro-Palestinian protests have been used by some as a "despicable excuse to attack British Jews for something over which they have absolutely no responsibility".

He called that "a total loss of empathy and humanity".

Citing Tuesday's planned protests, Starmer wrote: "This is not who we are as a country.

"It's un-British to have so little respect for others. And that's before some of them decide to start chanting hatred towards Jewish people all over again."

Jordan's state news agency reported on Tuesday that 131 Gaza flotilla activists were deported from Israel to Jordan via the Allenby Bridge crossing.

Indirect talks in Egypt between Israel and Hamas have been "positive" so far, two sources close to the Palestinian groups' negotiating team told AFP on Tuesday, with discussions set to resume around midday.

"The talks were positive last night, with the first round lasting four hours," one of the sources said. "The indirect negotiations are scheduled to resume at midday," he added.

Another Palestinian source confirmed the talks would resume in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm El-Sheikh on Tuesday.

The Israeli army said it detected a projectile fired from Gaza on Tuesday.

"A projectile was identified crossing from the northern Gaza Strip into Israeli territory, and most likely fell in the area. So far, no injuries were reported," the Israeli army said in a statement adding that sirens had sounded in Netiv Haasara, on Gaza's northern border.

The United States, under the Biden and Trump administrations, has provided at least $21.7 billion in military assistance to Israel since the start of the Gaza war two years ago, according to a new academic study published Tuesday.

Another study, also published by the Costs of War project at Brown University’s Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, states that the US has spent roughly $10 billion more on security aid and operations in the broader Middle East over the past two years.

While the reports rely on open source material for most of their findings, they offer some of the most comprehensive accounts of US military aid to close ally Israel and the estimated costs of direct American military involvement in the Middle East.