Israeli airstrikes in Gaza kill four as search for captives' bodies resumes

An Israeli strike killed a Lebanese man in the south of the country on Sunday, according to the Lebanese health ministry and the country's main news agency.

The Israeli military did not immediately respond to an AFP query, but has previously said it reserves to right to strike militant targets in Lebanon it deems a threat.

The ministry said the strike hit a car in the town of al-Mansouri, south of Tyre and just over 10 kilometres (six miles) from the Israeli border, and "resulted in the martyrdom of a citizen".

A report from Lebanon's National News Agency identified the deceased as Mohammed Shoueikh and said he was a school principal in al-Mansouri.

In November last year, Lebanon and Israel agreed a ceasefire to end more than a year of fighting between Israel and the Hezbollah militia, which broke out after the start of the Gaza war.

Under the deal, Israel was to withdraw its forces from south Lebanon, but it has kept them at five areas it deems strategic.

It has also carried out regular strikes on targets in Lebanon, arguing it is hitting Hezbollah sites and operatives.

Al Jazeera reports that Palestinian resistance factions are urging Algeria – a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council – to reject a proposal to deploy stabilisation forces in Gaza.

The Security Council is expected to vote tomorrow on a draft that would authorise roughly 20,000 foreign troops, empowered to use force, to secure Gaza’s borders, train Palestinian police and demilitarise armed groups.

In their statement, the factions described the effort as “a new attempt to impose another form of occupation on our land and people, and to legitimise foreign trusteeship”.

“We direct a sincere and fraternal appeal to the Algerian Republic, government and people, to continue adhering to its principled positions supporting Palestine, and its steadfast rejection of any projects targeting Gaza’s identity and our people’s right to self-determination,” the statement added.

Al-Jazeera also cites the PFLP’s Maher al-Tahir as warning that the plan’s danger “lies in turning the Gaza Strip into an area outside Palestinian governance” through a transitional phase that “may last for years, which poses a significant danger and keeps the Gaza Strip under a new occupation.

Three Palestinians - including two boys - were wounded in Israeli gunfire in Al-Fara'a refugee camp, south of Tubas, on Sunday evening, according to Palestinian news agency WAFA.

Israeli foreign minister Gideon Sa'ar has said that the government should have no role in selecting who will investigate the failures that led to the Hamas-led attacks on 7 October 2023.

Israeli media reported earlier today on plans to allow cabinet ministers to appoint the panel, rather than set up an independent commission led by the Supreme Court.

The Israeli government has announced plans to set up an inquiry to examine the failures that led to the 7 October attacks in 2023.

The inquiry will see Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu nominate a panel to handle the investigation, rather than an independent state commission of inquiry led by the Supreme Court, according to Israeli media. 

The decision has drawn criticism from opposition figures, including Yair Lapid who accused the government of "doing everything it can to escape the truth and evade responsibility".

Israeli NGO the Movement for Quality Government in Israel described the inquiry as a "Cover-up Committee".

"This is a transparent attempt to evade a real investigation of the greatest failure in the history of the state," it wrote on social media.

Israeli forces shot and killed a Palestinian man in Gaza City on Sunday afternoon, a medical source has told Al Jazeera.

The attack took place in the suburb of Tuffah behind the so-called yellow line which demarcates territory occupied by Israeli forces.

The Lebanese army has condemned Israel's targeting of UN peacekeepers in south Lebanon earlier today, calling it a "dangerous escalation".

"The Israeli enemy insists on its violations of Lebanese sovereignty, causing destabilisation in Lebanon and hindering the completion of the army's deployment in the south," it said in a statement carried by Lebanon's National News Agency.

The UN peacekeeping force (UNIFIL) said its forces had come under fire from an Israeli tank on Sunday.

The Israeli military insisted it had not deliberately targeted them and blamed "poor weather conditions".

The Israeli military has claimed that it did not intentionally fire on UN peacekeepers stationed in south Lebanon earlier today, blaming "poor weather conditions".

UNIFIL said earlier today that its forces had been targeted by an Israeli tank and machine gun fire, calling it a "serious violation" of the UN resolution that ended the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah.

Nobody was killed or injured in the attack.

The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) said Sunday that Israeli soldiers had shot at its peacekeepers from a tank near an army position in the country's south.

UNIFIL has been working with the Lebanese army to consolidate a truce between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah reached last November.

"This morning, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) fired on UNIFIL peacekeepers from a Merkava tank from near a position Israel has established in Lebanese territory," the peacekeepers said in a statement, adding heavy machine gun rounds hit about five metres from their personnel.

The force said the peacekeepers were able to "leave safely thirty minutes later" after the tank withdrew inside the Israeli position.

UNIFIL said the shooting "represents a serious violation of UN Security Council resolution 1701", which ended a 2006 conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, and also formed the basis of last November's truce.

(AFP and TNA staff)

Israeli officials say the 153 Palestinians who unexpectedly landed in South Africa were allowed to leave Gaza only after a third country agreed to receive them, though they did not name the state.

The passengers were held on their plane for 12 hours in Johannesburg due to missing Israeli exit stamps, before being allowed in with NGO support.

South African authorities say 130 entered the country and 23 travelled onward. COGAT says it facilitates Gaza departures only when foreign countries request them and claims more than 40,000 residents have left since 2023.

South Africa has questioned the circumstances of the flights.

Winter rain has flooded Gaza's Mawasi camp, soaking flimsy tents and leaving families struggling to keep their shelters standing. Aid groups warn that supplies are nowhere near enough as hundreds of thousands face cold, wind and collapsing infrastructure.

Read the full story here.

Hospitals in Gaza received the bodies of 17 Palestinians over the past 24 hours, 15 of whom were recovered from the rubble, according to the local health ministry.

The overall death toll since 7 October 2023 is now at 69,483, while 170,706 others have been injured.

Washington's current approach toward Tehran does not indicate any readiness for "equal and fair negotiations", Iran's foreign minister said on Sunday, after US President Donald Trump hinted last week at potential discussions.

Following Israel's attack on Iran in June, which was joined by U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, attempts at renewing dialogue on Tehran's nuclear programme have failed.

The United States, its European allies and Israel accuse Tehran of using its nuclear programme as a veil for efforts to develop the capability to produce weapons. Iran says its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes only.

Tehran and Washington underwent five rounds of indirect nuclear talks prior to the 12-days-war, but faced obstacles such as the issue of domestic uranium enrichment, which the U.S. wants Iran to forego.

"The US cannot expect to gain what it couldn't in war through negotiations," Abbas Araghchi said during a Tehran conference named "international law under assault."

"Iran will always be prepared to engage in diplomacy, but not negotiations meant for dictation," he added.

(Reuters and TNA staff)

Iran’s foreign minister on Sunday said that Tehran is no longer enriching uranium at any site in the country.

Answering a question from an Associated Press journalist visiting Iran, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi offered the most direct response yet from the Iranian government regarding its nuclear program following Israel and the United States' bombing its enrichment sites in June.

“There is no undeclared nuclear enrichment in Iran. All of our facilities are under the safeguards and monitoring” of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Araghchi said. “There is no enrichment right now because our enrichment facilities have been attacked.”

(Associated Press)

Several Israeli ministers on Sunday doubled down on their opposition to a Palestinian state after a US-led statement declared that the Trump peace plan would provide a roadmap to a future state.

"Israel’s policy is clear: There will be no Palestinian state," Israel's far-right defence minister Israel Katz wrote on X.

Gaza will be "demilitarised down to the last tunnel", he said, insisting that Israeli forces would continue to occupy the territory, as well as Mount Hermon in Syria.

Meanwhile, Israel's foreign minister Gideon Sa'ar wrote on social media that "Israel will not agree to the establishment of a Palestinian terror state".

Renowned legal scholar Richard Falk was detained by Canadian border agents in Toronto on Thursday while on his way to participate in a conference on Israeli human rights violations.

Falk, a retired Princeton University professor and former UN rapporteur on human rights in occupied Palestine, said he was held and interrogated for four hours after he entered the country for the Palestine Tribunal on Canadian Responsibility in Ottawa.

The event was organised to document examples of "Canada's complicity in the genocide and dispossession of Palestinians, including over the last two years in Gaza," and took place on 14-15 November.

Falk said that border agents detained him and his wife at Toronto airport to assess whether they were a "national security threat" to the country.

A Palestinian worker was injured in Israeli gunfire on Sunday in the town of Al-Ram, north of Jerusalem in the occupied West Bank, according to Palestinian news agency WAFA.

The Red Crescent said it had transported a 26-year-old man to hospital after he was shot by Israeli troops.

Israeli bombing in Khan Younis has killed at least three Palestinians, Al Jazeera is reporting, citing a source at Nasser hospital.

Israeli forces struck multiple areas of Gaza earlier this morning in violation of the ceasefire, including Rafah, Gaza City and Khan Younis.

Israeli forces shot and killed a young Palestinian man after storming a refugee camp near Nablus in the occupied West Bank on Saturday evening, the Red Crescent told Al Jazeera.

Another young Palestinian man was reportedly also wounded during the raid, which occurred at the Old Askar camp east of Nablus.

Hamas is expected to resume the search for deceased captives in Gaza today, according to Israeli public broadcaster Kan.

The group has paused search operations over the past 48 hours due to the heavy rains that hit the territory on Friday.

Israeli forces have reportedly launched several attacks across the Gaza Strip on Sunday morning in violation of the ceasefire.

Al Jazeera reported this morning that helicopter gunships attacked Rafah in the south, an area which is inside Israel-occupied Gaza.

Airstrikes were also reported in eastern Khan Younis and the Zeitoun suburb of Gaza City.

No casualties were immediately reported.