GENEVA: At least 28 on-duty medics have been killed in the past 24 hours in Lebanon, where Israel has launched airstrikes and sent troops to fight Hezbollah in an escalating conflict, the World Health Organization chief said on Thursday.
“Many (other) health workers are not reporting to duty and fled the areas where they work due to bombardments,” Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told an online press briefing, calling for stronger protections for health workers.
“This is severely limiting the provision of mass trauma management and continuity of health services,” he said.
The global health agency will not be able to deliver a large planned shipment of trauma and medical supplies to the country on Friday due to flight restrictions, he added.
WHO’s representative in Lebanon Dr. Abdinasir Abubakar told the briefing that all of the health care workers killed in the past day had been on duty, helping with the wounded.
A total of nearly 2,000 people have been killed, including 127 children, and 9,384 injured since the start of Israeli attacks on Lebanon over the last year, the country’s health ministry said.
“Hospitals have been already evacuated. I think what I can say for now is the capacity for mass casualty management exists, but it’s just a matter of time until the system actually reaches its limit,” said the WHO’s Abubakar.
Dozens of health workers killed in Lebanon over past day, WHO says
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Dozens of health workers killed in Lebanon over past day, WHO says
- “Many (other) health workers are not reporting to duty and fled the areas where they work due to bombardments,” Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said
- “This is severely limiting the provision of mass trauma management and continuity of health services”
‘Massive’ blast in south Iran port: state TV
- The toll from a “massive explosion” at Shahid Rajaee rose to 280 injured
- Footage on state TV showed thick columns of black smoke billowing from the port area
TEHRAN: Several containers exploded Saturday at a key Iranian port, authorities said, causing a major blast and fire, and leaving several people injured.
State media reported a “massive explosion” at Shahid Rajaee, the country’s largest commercial port located in Hormozgan province on Iran’s southern coast.
“The explosion occurred in a part of the Shahid Rajaee port dock, and we are extinguishing the fire,” state TV quoted Esmaeil Malekizadeh, a regional port official, as saying.
Shahid Rajaee, more than 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) south of the capital Tehran, is the most advanced container port in Iran, according to the official IRNA news agency.
It is located 23 kilometers west of Bandar Abbas, the Hormozgan provincial capital, and north of the Strait of Hormuz through which a fifth of world oil output passes.
Footage on state TV showed thick columns of black smoke billowing from the port area where many containers are located.
“Four rapid response teams were dispatched to the scene after the explosion,” Head of the Hormozgan Red Crescent Society, Mokhtar Salahshour, told state TV.
Mehrdad Hassanzadeh, head of the province’s crisis management authority, told state TV that “the cause of this incident was the explosion of several containers stored in the Shahid Rajaee Port wharf area.”
“We are currently evacuating and transporting the injured to nearby medical centers,” he added, without specifying the number of casualties.
Iran-US nuclear talks ‘may be extended’: Iranian state media
- A third round of nuclear talks between Iran and the United States “may be extended,” Iranian state media reported Saturday, as negotiators were meeting in Oman
MUSCAT: A third round of nuclear talks between Iran and the United States “may be extended,” Iranian state media reported Saturday, as negotiators were meeting in Oman.
“Given that the negotiations have entered technical and expert-level discussions and the examination of details, it can be anticipated that it may be extended if necessary,” the official IRNA news agency said.
Israel says intercepted missile launched from Yemen
- The Houthis, who control large parts of Yemen, have repeatedly fired missiles and drones at Israel since the war in Gaza
Israel’s military said Saturday it had intercepted a missile fired from Yemen, whose Houthi militants have launched attacks throughout the Gaza war, as well as a drone approaching “from the east.”
“Following the sirens that sounded recently in several areas in Israel, a missile that was launched from Yemen was intercepted” before “crossing into Israeli territory,” a military statement said.
In a later statement, it said a drone “that was on its way to Israeli territory from the east was intercepted” by the air force.
Yemen, large parts of which are under the control of the Iran-backed Houthis, is located to Israel’s southeast.
Other countries to Israel’s east include Iraq, where Tehran-aligned militants have claimed a number of attacks targeting Israel since the Gaza war began.
The Houthis have repeatedly launched missiles and drones at Israel since the war in Gaza broke out in October 2023 in what they say is a show of solidarity with the Palestinians.
The militants have also targeted ships they accuse of having ties to Israel as they travel on the Red Sea — a vital waterway for global trade.
They had temporarily paused their attacks during a recent two-month ceasefire in Gaza.
According to Israel’s army radio, the missile intercepted overnight was the 22nd fired by the Houthis since they had resumed their attacks as Israel renewed its Gaza offensive on March 18.
Since March 15, Israel’s key ally the United States has stepped up its attacks on the Houthis, targeting militants positions in Yemen with near-daily air strikes.
Gaza rescuers say Israeli strikes kill 17
- Witnesses reported an estimated 20 victims trapped beneath the rubble.
- Hamas says open to 5-year Gaza truce, one-time hostages release
GAZA: Gaza’s civil defense agency said Israeli strikes on Saturday killed at least 17 people across the territory, while more trapped under the rubble after a family home was hit.
Israel resumed its military campaign in the Gaza Strip on March 18, ending a two-month truce that had largely halted the fighting.
“Israeli air strikes in several areas killed 17 people since dawn,” civil defense official Mohammed Al-Mughayyir told AFP.
A strike on the house of Al-Khour family in Gaza City’s Sabra neighborhood killed 10 people, Mughayyir said, with witnesses reporting an estimated 20 victims trapped beneath the rubble.
Mahmud Bassal, spokesman for the civil defense agency, had earlier said that about 30 people were missing under the rubble.
Umm Walid Al-Khour, who survived the attack, said that “everyone was sleeping with their children” when the strike hit.
“The house collapsed on top of us,” she told AFP.
“Those who survived cried for help but nobody came... Most of the deceased were children.”
AFP footage showed rescuers searching under the rubble as a wounded man was pulled out from the debris.
Elsewhere in the city, three people were killed in Israeli shelling of a house in the Al-Shati refugee camp, Mughayyir said.
More strikes across the Gaza Strip killed four others.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.
Hamas says open to 5-year Gaza truce
Hamas is open to an agreement to end the war in Gaza that would see all hostages released and secure a five-year truce, an official said Saturday ahead of talks with mediators.
A Hamas delegation was in Cairo to discuss with Egyptian mediators ways out of the 18-month war, as on the ground rescuers said an Israeli strike on a family home in Gaza City killed at least 10 people and left more feared buried under the rubble.
The Hamas official, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, said the Palestinian militant group “is ready for an exchange of prisoners in a single batch and a truce for five years.”
The latest bid to seal a ceasefire follows an Israeli proposal which Hamas had rejected earlier this month as “partial,” calling instead for a “comprehensive” agreement to halt the war ignited by the group’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
The Israeli offer included a 45-day ceasefire in exchange for the return of 10 living hostages.
Hamas has consistently demanded that a truce deal must lead to an end to the war, a full Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and a surge in humanitarian aid into the besieged territory — where on Friday the United Nations warned food stocks were running out.
Israel, for its part, demands the return of all hostages seized in the 2023 attack, and Hamas’s disarmament, which the group has rejected as a “red line.”
More than a month into a renewed Israeli offensive in Gaza after a two-month truce, a Hamas official said earlier this week that its delegation in Cairo would discuss “new ideas” on a ceasefire.
Missile launched from Yemen into Israel intercepted, Israeli army says
CAIRO: The Israeli army said in the early hours of Saturday that a missile that was launched from Yemen was intercepted before crossing into Israeli territory.
Sirens sounded in a number of areas in Israel following the launch, the Israeli army added in a statement.
There was no immediate comment from Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis, who have been launching attacks against Israel as well as ships they perceive as affiliated to Israel, in what they say is to support the Palestinians in Gaza against the Israeli offensive on the enclave.
