NITZANA: Even as the threat of famine stalks the war-ravaged Gaza Strip, Israeli protesters have gathered repeatedly to stop desperately needed aid from getting into the Palestinian territory.
“You might say it’s not acceptable to block food and water going in,” said one protester, David Rudman, at the Nitzana border post between Israel and Egypt.
“But, given the situation we’re in, it’s acceptable,” he argued as the Gaza war, siege and hostage crisis have continued into a fifth month.
The latest protest on Sunday came as Hamas threatened to suspend talks to free hostages unless more aid gets in.
Despite those threats, just over 100 people gathered at Nitzana, where the Egyptian Sinai meets Israel’s Negev desert, with some saying they were hoping to pile pressure on in a bid to free the captives.
Rudman, 35, drove three hours from Jerusalem to prevent food, fuel and medicine from getting into Gaza, which Israel has been shelling since Hamas’s October 7 attack.
Undeterred by concrete blocks across the road and armed soldiers on patrol, the protesters reached the terminal where aid from Egypt is checked before the trucks continue toward Gaza.
As a result, trucks waiting on the Egyptian side were unable to cross into Israel.
“Our aim is to get the hostages back,” said Rudman.
“There hasn’t been any progress for weeks, and you’re going to see more and more people coming here,” he predicted.
The war began with Hamas’s attack that resulted in about 1,160 deaths in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official Israeli figures.
Israel’s retaliatory campaign in Gaza has killed more than 29,000 people, mostly women and children, according to the territory’s health ministry.
Some 300,000 people remain in northern Gaza, where increasingly desperate conditions have forced some to grind bird feed for flour.
A first truce at the end of November saw the release of 108 hostages out of the more than 250 kidnapped by Hamas on October 7. Israel says 130 captives are still in Gaza but 30 may be dead.
“One of my best friends is a hostage in Gaza,” said Rudman, without naming the captive. “We hope he’s still alive in Gaza but we don’t know for sure.
“It makes no sense at all. On the one hand we give them water, medicine and food but on the other we don’t even have a list” of who is being held and their condition.
Families of the hostages have taken to the streets every week to push the Israeli government to accept a deal for their release.
This weekend said they would block the terminal at Nitzana or one further north at Kerem Shalom.
But at Nitzana on Sunday only one member of the hostages’ families turned up and refused to talk, out of fear of reprisals for those being held.
A survey for Israel’s Channel 12 television at the end of January suggested 72 percent of Israelis believed Gaza should not receive any aid while hostages are still being held.
The UN says the protests at Nitzana and Kerem Shalom are blocking trucks from going into Gaza, hitting dwindling stocks.
The Palestinian Red Crescent Society on Sunday evening said 123 trucks made it into Gaza via Kerem Shalom, but none had passed through Nitzana because of the protest.
Nili Naouri, head of the far-right group “Israel is Forever,” said that “it’s completely immoral to force Israel to send humanitarian convoys of trucks to people that support Hamas, who are holding our people hostage, and are collaborating with the enemy.”
On Sunday, members of the organization turned up to block aid, calling it “unhumanitarian.”
“Hamas aren’t going to gladly free our hostages if we allow aid trucks in for the civilian population of Gaza,” said Naouri.
Her solution is simple: “Let Gazans leave Gaza” if they want help from the international community.
Hamas, she charged, diverts aid for its own ends.
Some 1.4 million Palestinians have been sheltering in Rafah in the far south of Gaza, many having been displaced several times in a bid to find safety since the start of the war.
With neighboring Egypt repeatedly rejecting the mass displacement of Palestinians, they have nowhere to go as Israel’s planned ground offensive of Rafah looms.
But David Ickowicz, 39, a regular at the aid blockades, is convinced that his “civil disobedience” serves a purpose.
“Hamas’s leaders live in the tunnels. But to live underground and breathe oxygen you need electricity produced by fuel,” he reasoned.
“Cut off fuel supplies and we’ll get them out of the tunnels.”
Israeli protesters block aid convoys bound for Gaza
https://arab.news/8zyts
Israeli protesters block aid convoys bound for Gaza
- Protesters reached the terminal where aid from Egypt is checked before the trucks continue toward Gaza
- As a result, trucks waiting on the Egyptian side were unable to cross into Israel
Jordan’s king says Israel’s resumption of Gaza attacks a ‘dangerous step’
“Israel’s resumption of attacks on Gaza is an extremely dangerous step that adds further devastation to an already dire humanitarian situation,” he said, standing next to French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris.
Gaza health ministry says one dead among foreign UN staff injured in Israeli strike
GAZA: The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said that a foreign UN worker was killed and five others seriously injured Wednesday by an Israeli strike on their headquarters.
A statement from the health ministry said there was “one death and five severe injuries among foreign staff working for UN institutions... due to the bombing of their headquarters by the occupation in the central governorate a short while ago,” adding they had been taken to the Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital. AFP has not been able to confirm the information with the UN.
Hamas says open to talks as Israel keeps up Gaza strikes
- Hamas is open to talks on getting the ceasefire back on track but will not renegotiate the agreement that took effect on January 19
- Negotiations have stalled over how to proceed with a ceasefire whose first phase expired in early March
GAZA CITY: Hamas said it remained open to negotiations while calling for pressure on Israel Wednesday to implement a Gaza truce after its deadliest bombing since the fragile ceasefire began in January.
Israel carried out fresh air strikes on Gaza on Wednesday, killing 13 people according to the territory’s civil defense agency, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday’s raids were “only the beginning.”
The United Nations and countries around the world condemned the high civilian death toll in the renewed strikes, which have killed more than 400 people, according to Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.
Hamas is open to talks on getting the ceasefire back on track but will not renegotiate the agreement that took effect on January 19, an official from the militant group said.
“Hamas has not closed the door on negotiations but we insist there is no need for new agreements,” Taher Al-Nunu told AFP.
“We have no conditions, but we demand that the occupation be compelled to immediately halt its aggression and war of extermination, and begin the second phase of negotiations.”
Negotiations have stalled over how to proceed with a ceasefire whose first phase expired in early March, with Israel and Hamas disagreeing on whether to move to a new phase intended to bring the war to an end.
Instead, Israel and the United States have sought to change the terms of the deal by extending stage one.
That would delay the start of phase two, which was meant to establish a lasting ceasefire and an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and was swiftly rejected by Hamas, which demanded full implementation of the original deal.
“There is no need for new agreements in light of the existing agreement signed by all parties,” Nunu said.
Israel and the United States have portrayed Hamas’s rejection of an extended stage one as a refusal to release more Israeli hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.
Netanyahu’s office said he ordered the renewed strikes on Gaza after “Hamas’s repeated refusal to release our hostages.”
In a televised address late Tuesday, the premier said: “From now on, negotiations will take place only under fire... Military pressure is essential for the release of additional hostages.
“Hamas has already felt the strength of our arm in the past 24 hours. And I want to promise you — and them — this is only the beginning.”
The White House said Israel consulted US President Donald Trump’s administration before launching the strikes, while Israel said the return to fighting was “fully coordinated” with Washington.
The intense Israeli bombardment sent a stream of new casualties to the few hospitals still functioning in Gaza and triggered fears of a return to full-blown war after two months of relative calm.
The roads were once again filled with Palestinian civilians on the move as families responded to evacuation warnings from the Israeli army.
“Today I felt that Gaza is a real hell,” said Jihan Nahhal, a 43-year-old from Gaza City, adding some of her relatives were wounded or killed in the strikes.
“Suddenly there were huge explosions, as if it were the first day of the war.”
The Gaza health ministry said the bodies of 413 people had been received by hospitals, adding people were still under the rubble.
A spokeswoman for the UN children’s agency UNICEF said medical facilities that “have already been decimated” by the war were now “overwhelmed.”
Governments in the Middle East, Europe and beyond called for the renewed hostilities to end.
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said Israel’s raids on Gaza “are shattering the tangible hopes of so many Israelis and Palestinians of an end to suffering on all sides.”
European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said she told her Israeli counterpart Gideon Saar that the new strikes on Gaza were “unacceptable.”
Both Egypt and Qatar, which brokered the Gaza ceasefire alongside the United States, condemned Israel’s resort to military action.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi said the strikes were part of “deliberate efforts to make the Gaza Strip uninhabitable and force the Palestinians into displacement.”
Trump has floated a proposal to move Palestinians out of Gaza, an idea rejected by Palestinians and governments in the region and beyond, but embraced by some Israeli politicians.
Israel’s resumption of military operations in Gaza, after it already halted all humanitarian aid deliveries to Gaza this month, drew an immediate political dividend for Netanyahu.
The far-right Otzma Yehudit party, which quit his ruling coalition in January in protest at the Gaza ceasefire, rejoined its ranks with its firebrand leader Itamar Ben Gvir again becoming national security minister.
The war began with Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which resulted in 1,218 deaths, mostly civilians, according to Israeli figures.
Israel’s retaliation in Gaza has killed at least 48,577 people, also mostly civilians, according to figures from the territory’s health ministry.
Of the 251 hostages seized during the attack, 58 are still in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.
Trump meets UAE national security adviser, discusses strategic partnership prospects
- Sheikh Tahnoon is on an official visit to the US where he will meet with senior US administration officials and business leaders
DUBAI: UAE National Security Adviser Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al-Nahyan met with US President Donald Trump at the White House on Wednesday in the presence of senior US officials.
“Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed and the US President discussed opportunities to strengthen the long-term strategic partnership between the UAE and the US and explored ways to enhance it to serve their shared interests,” the state run WAM news agency reported.
Sheikh Tahnoon is on an official visit to the US where he will meet with senior US administration officials and business leaders.
During his meeting with Trump, Tahnoon affirmed the UAE’s commitment to strengthening economic ties with the US by expanding partnerships.
Sheikh Tahnoon also met with US National Security Adviser Michael Waltz and discussed ways to advance bilateral relations and the latest developments on matters of mutual interest.
Iraq makes rare seizure of ship suspected of fuel smuggling in Gulf
BAGHDAD: Iraqi naval forces have seized an unidentified ship in Iraqi territorial waters in the Gulf suspected of smuggling fuel, the naval forces said in a statement.
Fuel smuggling is common in Gulf waters, where heavily subsidised fuel from some countries is sold on the black market to buyers across the region, though it is relatively rare for Iraqi authorities to seize ships.
A naval patrol boat intercepted the ship on Tuesday after receiving intelligence about suspected illegal activity, according to the navy statement issued late on Tuesday.
The navy said an Iranian captain, eight Indian nationals, and two Iraqi crew members were onboard the ship.
The navy released a picture of the ship, in which no name was visible. It gave no further details about the vessel.
The ship was towed to Umm Qasr naval base for further investigation, and the crew has been handed over to the local police, the navy said.
