World
US believes Hamas, Israel can break Gaza ceasefire impasse; Israeli forces cut Rafah aid route
The U.S. said negotiations on a Gaza ceasefire should be able to close the gaps between Israel and Hamas while Israeli forces seized the main border crossing in Rafah on Tuesday, closing a vital route for aid, Reuters reported.
Hamas official Osama Hamdan, speaking to reporters in Beirut, warned that if Israel's military aggression continued in Rafah, there would be no truce agreement.
The Palestinian militant group accused Israel of undermining ceasefire efforts in the seven-month-long war that has laid waste to Gaza and left hundreds of thousands of its people homeless and hungry.
The truce comments came as Israel invaded Rafah, a southern Gazan city where more than one million displaced Palestinian civilians have sought shelter from Israel's offensive throughout the tiny territory.
White House spokesperson John Kirby said Hamas offered amendments on Monday to an Israeli proposal aimed at ending the impasse. The deal text, as amended, suggests the remaining gaps can "absolutely be closed," he said. He declined to specify what those were.
Israel on Monday said a three-phase proposal that Hamas approved was unacceptable.
Kirby said mediators from Qatar and Egypt along with U.S. and Israeli officials were gathering in Cairo. Hamas separately said its delegation was in Cairo as well.
OFFENSIVE
Israel's seizure of the Rafah crossing came despite weeks of calls that the U.S., other nations and international bodies hoped would deter a big offensive in the Rafah area - which Israel says is Hamas fighters' last stronghold, read the report.
Israeli army footage showed tanks rolling through the Rafah crossing complex between Gaza and Egypt, and the Israeli flag raised on the Gaza side.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said seizing the crossing was a "very significant step" toward Israel's stated aim of destroying Hamas's military capabilities.
Residents reported heavy tank shelling on Tuesday evening in some areas of eastern Rafah. A Rafah municipal building caught fire after Israeli shelling, residents and Hamas media said. Medics said one Palestinian was killed and several wounded in the building while an Israeli strike also killed two Palestinians on a motorcycle.
Health officials said Abu Yousef Al-Najar, the main hospital in Rafah, closed on Tuesday after heavy bombardment nearby led medical staff and around 200 patients to flee, Reuters reported.
"They have gone crazy. Tanks are firing shells and smoke bombs cover the skies," said Emad Joudat, 55, a Gaza City resident displaced in Rafah.
"I am now seriously thinking of heading north, maybe to the central Gaza area. If they move further into Rafah, it will be the mother of massacres," he told Reuters via a chat app.
Many of those in Rafah were previously displaced from other parts of Gaza following Israel's orders to evacuate from there.
Families have been crammed into tented camps and makeshift shelters, suffering from shortages of food, water, medicine and other essentials.
The U.N. and other international aid agencies said the closing of the two crossings into southern Gaza - Rafah and Israeli-controlled Kerem Shalom - had virtually cut the enclave off from outside aid and very few stores were available inside.
Red Crescent sources in Egypt said shipments had completely halted. "These crossings are a lifeline... They need to be reopened without any delay," Philippe Lazzarini, head of U.N. aid agency UNRWA, said on X.
Separately, Jordan said Israeli settlers attacked a humanitarian convoy on its way to a crossing in northern Gaza.
The White House said it had been told the Kerem Shalom crossing would re-open on Wednesday and fuel deliveries through Rafah would resume then too.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appealed to Israel and Hamas to spare no effort to get a truce deal. "Make no mistake – a full-scale assault on Rafah would be a human catastrophe," Guterres said.
'PANIC AND DESPAIR'
Israel's military said it was conducting a limited operation in Rafah to kill fighters and dismantle infrastructure used by Hamas, which runs Gaza. It told civilians to go to what it calls an "expanded humanitarian zone" some 20 km (12 miles) away.
In Geneva, U.N. humanitarian office spokesperson Jens Laerke said "panic and despair" were gripping the people in Rafah.
Civilians did not have enough time to prepare for evacuation and no safe route to travel, he said. The roads are "littered with unexploded ordnance, massive bombs lying in the street. It's not safe," he said.
Critics of the Gaza war have urged U.S. President Joe Biden to pressure Israel to change course. The U.S., Israeli's closest ally and main weapons supplier, has delayed some arms shipments to Israel for two weeks, according to four sources on Tuesday.
The White House and Pentagon declined comment, but this would be the first such delay since the Biden administration offered its full support to Israel after Hamas' Oct. 7 attack, read the report.
Israel's offensive has killed 34,789 Palestinians, most of them civilians, in the conflict, the Gaza Health Ministry said.
The war began when Hamas militants attacked Israel on Oct. 7, killing about 1,200 people and abducting about 250 others, of whom 133 are believed to remain in captivity in Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.
Any truce would be the first pause in fighting since a week-long ceasefire in November during which Hamas freed around half of the hostages and Israel released 240 Palestinians it was holding in its jails.
Since then, all efforts to reach a new truce have foundered over Hamas' refusal to free more hostages without a promise of a permanent end to the conflict, and Israel's insistence that it would discuss only a temporary pause.
World
ICC issues arrest warrants for Israel’s Netanyahu, Gallant and Hamas leader
Judges at the International Criminal Court have issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defence chief, as well as a Hamas leader, Ibrahim Al-Masri, for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity, Reuters reported on Thursday afternoon.
The move comes after the ICC prosecutor Karim Khan announced on May 20, that he was seeking arrest warrants for alleged crimes connected to the Oct.7, 2023 attacks on Israel by Hamas and the Israeli military response in Gaza.
The ICC said Israel's acceptance of the court's jurisdiction was not required.
Israel has rejected the jurisdiction of the Hague-based court and denies war crimes in Gaza.
Israel has said it killed Al-Masri, also known as Mohammed Deif, in an airstrike but Hamas has neither confirmed nor denied this.
World
US vetoes UN Security Council resolution on Gaza ceasefire
The United States on Wednesday vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution for a ceasefire in Gaza, drawing criticism of the Biden administration for once again blocking international action aimed at halting Israel's war with Hamas.
The 15-member council voted on a resolution put forward by 10 non-permanent members that called for an "immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire" in the 13-month conflict and separately demanded the release of hostages, Reuters reported.
Only the U.S. voted against, using its veto as a permanent council member to block the resolution.
Robert Wood, deputy U.S. ambassador to the U.N., said Washington had made clear it would only support a resolution that explicitly calls for the immediate release of hostages as part of a ceasefire.
"A durable end to the war must come with the release of the hostages. These two urgent goals are inextricably linked. This resolution abandoned that necessity, and for that reason, the United States could not support it," he said.
Wood said the U.S. had sought compromise, but the text of the proposed resolution would have sent a "dangerous message" to Hamas that "there's no need to come back to the negotiating table."
Israel's campaign in Gaza has killed nearly 44,000 people and displaced nearly all the enclave's population at least once. It was launched in response to an attack by Hamas-led fighters who killed 1,200 people and captured more than 250 hostages in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Members roundly criticized the U.S. for blocking the resolution put forward by the council's 10 elected members: Algeria, Ecuador, Guyana, Japan, Malta, Mozambique, South Korea, Sierra Leone, Slovenia and Switzerland.
"It is deeply regretted that due to the use of the veto this council has once again failed to uphold its responsibility to maintain international peace and security," Malta's U.N. Ambassador Vanessa Frazier said after the vote failed, adding that the text of the resolution "was by no means a maximalist one."
"It represented the bare minimum of what is needed to begin to address the desperate situation on the ground," she said.
Food security experts have warned that famine is imminent among Gaza's 2.3 million people.
U.S. President Joe Biden, who leaves office on Jan. 20, has offered Israel strong diplomatic backing and continued to provide arms for the war, while trying unsuccessfully to broker a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas that would see hostages released in exchange for Palestinians held by Israel.
After blocking earlier resolutions on Gaza, Washington in March abstained from a vote that allowed a resolution to pass demanding an immediate ceasefire.
A senior U.S. official, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity ahead of Wednesday's vote, said Britain had put forward new language that the U.S. would have supported as a compromise, but that was rejected by the elected members.
Some members were more interested in bringing about a U.S. veto than compromising on the resolution, the official said, accusing U.S. adversaries Russia and China of encouraging those members.
'GREEN LIGHT'
France's ambassador Nicolas de Riviere said the resolution rejected by the U.S. "very firmly" required the release of hostages.
"France still has two hostages in Gaza, and we deeply regret that the Security Council was not able to formulate this demand," he said.
China's U.N. ambassador, Fu Cong, said each time the United States had exercised its veto to protect Israel, the number of people killed in Gaza had steadily risen.
"How many more people have to die before they wake up from their pretend slumber?" he asked.
"Insistence on setting a precondition for ceasefire is tantamount to giving the green light to continue the war and condoning the continued killing."
Israel's U.N. ambassador Danny Danon said ahead of the vote the text was not a resolution for peace but was "a resolution for appeasement" of Hamas.
"History will remember who stood with the hostages and who abandoned them," Danon said.
World
US imposes sanctions on senior Hamas officials
“Treasury remains committed to disrupting Hamas’s efforts to secure additional revenue and holding those who facilitate the group’s terrorist activities to account.”
The U.S. on Tuesday imposed sanctions on six senior Hamas officials, the U.S. Treasury Department said, further action against the Palestinian militant group as Washington has sought to achieve a ceasefire and the release of hostages in Gaza, Reuters reported.
The Treasury Department said in a statement the sanctions targeted the group's representatives abroad, a senior member of the Hamas military wing and those involved in supporting fundraising efforts for the group and weapons smuggling into Gaza.
"Hamas continues to rely on key officials who seemingly maintain legitimate, public-facing roles within the group, yet who facilitate their terrorist activities, represent their interests abroad, and coordinate the transfer of money and goods into Gaza," Treasury's Acting Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, Bradley Smith, said in the statement.
"Treasury remains committed to disrupting Hamas's efforts to secure additional revenue and holding those who facilitate the group’s terrorist activities to account."
Hamas condemned the sanctions in a statement that called on the U.S. administration to "review this criminal policy and stop its blind bias towards the terrorist occupation entity."
Among those targeted was Abd al-Rahman Ismail abd al-Rahman Ghanimat, a longtime member of Hamas's military wing who is now based in Turkey, the Treasury said, accusing him of being involved in multiple attempted and successful terrorist attacks, read the report.
Two other officials based in Turkey, a member based in Gaza who has participated in Hamas's engagements with Russia and a leader authorized to speak publicly on behalf of the group and who previously oversaw border crossings at Gaza were also among those targeted, according to the Treasury.
The statement by Hamas said: "The Treasury Department's lists are based on misleading and false statements and foundations aimed at distorting the image of the movement's leaders ... while ignoring the imposition of sanctions on the occupation leaders who commit the most heinous war crimes."
The U.S. on Monday warned Turkey against hosting Hamas leadership, saying Washington does not believe leaders of a terrorist organization should be living comfortably.
Asked about reports that some Hamas leaders had moved to Turkey from Qatar, U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller did not confirm the reports but said he was not in a position to dispute them. He said Washington will make clear to Turkey's government that there can be no more business as usual with Hamas, Reuters reported.
Hamas-led gunmen attacked Israel in October 2023, killing 1,200 people and taking more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
More than 43,500 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza over the past year, Palestinian health officials say, and Gaza has been reduced to a wasteland of wrecked buildings and piles of rubble, where more than two million Gazans are seeking shelter in makeshift tents and facing shortages of food and medicines.
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