UN says over 50 Gaza aid workers abused in Israeli detention as Gaza medic freed

At a Memorial Day event, President Isaac Herzog urged that state security services remain free from political disputes, as tensions between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and outgoing Shin Bet director Ronen Bar continue to stir controversy in Israeli politics.

"At this pure national moment, I call: Remove the [Israeli military] from political disputes," Herzog said.

"Place the Shin Bet, the Mossad, the police and all security services above all disputes."

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed on Tuesday to achieve victory in the Gaza war and secure the return of hostages still held there.

"In the name of the fallen, and for their sake, we will continue to pursue the mission of victory -- including the return of all our hostages", Netanyahu said in a statement marking Memorial Day.

Israel released 10 detainees in the Gaza Strip on Tuesday - Wafa reports.

The agency says the detainees were transferred to the Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah after being freed via the Kissufim checkpoint.

Among the freed are Asaad al-Nasasra, who was detained on 23 March after Israeli forces killed 15 aid workers.

Many civilians were killed on Tuesday after Israeli airstrikes targeted the Jabalia and Nuseirat refugee camps in the Gaza Strip.

Wafa reports that four were killed after Israeli strikes targeted a factory east of Jabalia town in northern Gaza. One body was recovered, but emergency crews were unable to retrieve the other three after Israeli drones fired at them.

At the same time, two Gazans, including a child, were killed in an Israeli airstrike on the Ain Jalut towers in Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.

Israel's government said on Tuesday that it had cancelled a decision to fire domestic security chief Ronen Bar, a day after he announced he would step down following weeks of tension with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

"The government has decided to revoke its decision of March 20, 2025" to sack Bar, it said in a document submitted to the Supreme Court, a copy of which was obtained by AFP.

The government's move to fire Bar, head of the Shin Bet security agency, had been frozen by the top court and triggered mass protests.

Aid group ActionAid has revealed that food prices are skyrocketing in the Gaza Strip as Israel imposed a total blockade of life-saving supplies from entering the Gaza Strip.

The aid group says that in Deir Al Balah, a bag of flour costs $300, but the price goes higher to $500 in the north.

“Most people are now surviving on a single meal per day, predominantly consisting of pasta, rice or canned food," ActionAid said in its statement.

Gaza's Ministry of Education and Higher Education revealed that Israel's war has killed 14,784 students and injured 24,766 since October 2023.

The Ministry says that over 14,649 students in Gaza have been killed and 135 have been killed in the occupied West Bank. A further 724 students have been detained.

The Ministry also added that teachers and administrative staff have been killed across the occupied territories.

The UN rights chief called on countries to halt a "humanitarian catastrophe" in Gaza, where a total Israeli blockade on aid is pushing towards a collapse of critical life-saving support in the Palestinian territory.

"There must be concerted international efforts to stop this humanitarian catastrophe from reaching a new unseen level," Volker Turk said in a statement that added that "Israel appears to be inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza conditions of life increasingly incompatible with their continued existence as a group in Gaza".

It took five hours of queuing at a community kitchen in Gaza's Nuseirat district for displaced grandmother Um Mohammad Al-Talalqa to get one meal to feed her hungry children and grandchildren.

But finding food may be about to get even tougher: Gaza's community kitchens -- lifelines for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians after 18 months of war -- may soon have no more meals to provide.

Multiple aid groups told Reuters that dozens of local community kitchens risk closing down, potentially within days, unless aid is allowed into Gaza, removing the last consistent source of meals for most of the 2.3 million population.

France's foreign ministry accused Israel's embassy of "unacceptable" behaviour on Tuesday after it banned two French groups, including elected officials, from visiting Israel and alleged the groups were linked to a terrorist organisation.

In a statement on Monday, Israel's embassy said it would not allow any individual or delegation associated with the Decentralised Cooperation Network for Palestine or the France-Palestine Solidarity Association (AFPS) to enter the country because they were linked to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. The PFLP is designated a terrorist group by the United States and the European Union.

France's foreign ministry said the decision by Israel to revoke the travel authorisations for the two delegations, which included elected French officials, was regrettable, counterproductive, and damaging to Franco-Israeli relations.

"The public accusations by the Israeli Embassy in France alleging links between these associations and terrorist organisations are unacceptable," the foreign ministry said.

It called on Israel to reverse its decision.

(Reuters)

The Palestine Red Crescent Society said Israel released from detention on Tuesday a medic held since a deadly attack on ambulances in southern Gaza on 23 March.

"The occupation forces have just released medic Asaad al-Nsasrah, who was detained on March 23, 2025, while performing his humanitarian duty during the massacre of medical teams in the Tal al-Sultan area of Rafah Governorate", the PRCS said in a statement.

The PRCS said weeks after the incident that Nsasrah was in Israeli custody after being "forcibly abducted" when Israeli soldiers had opened fire on the ambulances.

An Israeli military investigation released this month "found no evidence to support claims of execution" or "indiscriminate fire" by its troops, but admitted to operational failures and said it was firing a field commander.

Israeli attacks across Gaza have killed at least 50 Palestinians in the past 24 hours, the health ministry said in a statement. 

Many bodies are still trapped under the rubble, and an additional 113 people have been wounded in the same period, the statement added. 

Since Israel shattered the ceasefire agreement with Hamas on 18 March, at least 2,273 Palestinians have been killed. 

At least 13 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza.

At least two were killed in separate attacks in Shujayea and two more in Beit Hanoon - Al Jazeera reports.

This includes the civilians who were killed south of the Gaza strip in Khan Younis.

Israeli forces took health units and confiscated a private vehicle north of the Jordan Valley - Wafa reports.

The head of the village council reported that the forces seized health units belonging to several families.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, on Tuesday said more than 50 of its staff in Gaza were abused and used as human shields while in Israeli military detention.

"Since the start of the war in October 2023, over 50 UNRWA staff among them teachers, doctors, social workers, have been detained and abused," UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini wrote on X.

"They have been treated in the most shocking & inhumane way. They reported being beaten + used as human shields."

Lazzarini cited the testimony of one of the staff members who had been detained by the Israeli military before being released.

"I wished for death to end this nightmare I was living through," the staff member was quoted as saying.

"Received this awful testimony from a colleague who was rounded up in Gaza, tortured while in Israeli detention and finally released," they added

“I wished for death to end the nightmare I was living through”.

Received this awful testimony from a colleague who was rounded up in #Gaza tortured while in Israeli detention and finally released.

For @UNRWA staff humanitarian duty is met with brutality.
Since the start of…

— Philippe Lazzarini (@UNLazzarini) April 29, 2025

Israeli forces detained at least 22 Palestinians across the occupied West Bank since Monday evening - Wafa reports. This comes as the Israeli army continues its detention campaign and investigations.

Detainees include four women, three of whom were released, a journalist and former detainees.

At least six Palestinians have been killed since Tuesday as Israel continues to target the Mawasi area in Khan Younis.

Wafa reports four civilians were killed after Israeli strikes targeted a tent sheltering the displaced, while another civilian succumbed to his injuries.

Thirty others have been injured.

Israeli forces detained Ali Samoudi, a correspondent for Al-Quds newspaper, on Tuesday after raiding his home in the Al-Zahraa neighbourhood of Jenin.

Amnesty International on Tuesday accused Israel of committing a "live-streamed genocide" against Palestinians in Gaza by forcibly displacing most of the population and deliberately creating a humanitarian catastrophe.

In its annual report, Amnesty charged that Israel had acted with "specific intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza, thus committing genocide".

Switzerland's youth fencing team apologised on Monday, two days after sparking a diplomatic row by refusing to face the Israeli flag at the European championships in Estonia.

Following its defeat against Israel in the final of the under-23 championships in Tallinn on Saturday, the four-man Swiss team did not join the Israelis and the third-placed Italians in turning towards the flags during the playing of the winner's national anthem.

The four teammates, Ian Hauri, Theo Brochard, Jonathan Fuhrimann and Sven Vineis, issued a joint apology on Instagram after drawing ire in Israel and Switzerland alike for politicising the sporting event.

"We wish to explain our actions and express our regret," they said in their message, stressing that their action did not reflect "any contempt for Israel".

The leader of Lebanon's Hezbollah group called on the government Monday to work harder to end Israel's attacks in the country, a day after an Israeli airstrike hit a suburb of Beirut.

Naim Kassem said in a televised speech that Hezbollah implemented the ceasefire deal that ended the 14-month Israel-Hezbollah war in late November. But despite that, Israel is continuing with near-daily airstrikes.

"The resistance complied 100% with the (ceasefire) deal and I tell state officials that it's your duty to guarantee protection," Kassem said, adding that Lebanese officials should contact sponsors of the ceasefire so that they pressure Israel to cease its attacks.

"Put pressure on America and make it understand that Lebanon cannot rise if the aggression doesn't stop," Kassem said, pointing to Lebanese officials. He added that the US has interests in Lebanon and "stability achieves these interests".