US special envoy Witkoff visits food distribution centre in Gaza
International experts warned this week that a 'worst-case scenario of famine' is playing out in Gaza.
Israel's near 22-month military offensive against Hamas has shattered security in the territory of some 2.0 million Palestinians and made it nearly impossible to safely deliver food to starving people.
Envoy Steve Witkoff and the US Ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, toured a Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) distribution site in Rafah, Gaza's southernmost city, which has been almost completely destroyed and is now a largely depopulated Israeli military zone.
Steve Witkoff, centre, and Mike Huckabee, centre left, visiting a food distribution site in Gaza City (David Azaguri/US Embassy Jerusalem via AP)
Hundreds of people have been killed by Israeli fire while heading to such aid sites since May, according to witnesses, health officials and the UN human rights office.
Israel and GHF say they have only fired warning shots and that the toll has been exaggerated.
In a report issued on Friday, the New York-based Human Rights Watch said GHF was at the heart of a 'flawed, militarised aid distribution system that has turned aid distributions into regular bloodbaths.'
Mr Witkoff posted on X that he had spent more than five hours inside Gaza in order to gain 'a clear understanding of the humanitarian situation and help craft a plan to deliver food and medical aid to the people of Gaza'.
Humanitarian aid is airdropped to Palestinians over Khan Younis, in the Gaza Strip (Abdel Kareem Hana/AP)
Chapin Fay, a spokesperson for GHF, said the visit reflected Mr Trump's understanding of the stakes and that 'feeding civilians, not Hamas, must be the priority'.
The group said it has delivered over 100 million meals since it began operations in May.
All four of the group's sites established in May are in zones controlled by the Israeli military and have become flashpoints of desperation, with starving people scrambling for scarce aid.
More 1,000 people have been killed by Israeli fire since May while seeking aid in the territory, most near the GHF sites but also near United Nations aid convoys, the UN human rights office said last month.
The Israeli military says it has only fired warning shots at people who approach its forces, and GHF says its armed contractors have only used pepper spray or fired warning shots to prevent deadly crowding.
Officials at Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza said on Friday they received the bodies of 13 people who were killed while trying to get aid, including near the site that US officials visited.
GHF denied anyone was killed at their sites on Friday and said most recent shootings had occurred near UN aid convoys.
Mr Witkoff's visit comes a week after US officials walked away from ceasefire talks in Qatar, blaming Hamas and pledging to seek other ways to rescue Israeli hostages and make Gaza safe.
Mr Trump wrote on social media that the fastest way to end the crisis would be for Hamas to surrender and release hostages.
The war was triggered when Hamas-led militants killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, on October 7 2023 and abducted 251 others.
They still hold 50 hostages, including about 20 believed to be alive. Most of the others have been released in ceasefires or other deals.
Israel's retaliatory offensive has killed more than 60,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza's health ministry.
Its count does not distinguish between militants and civilians. The ministry operates under the Hamas government. The UN and other international organisations see it as the most reliable source of data on casualties.
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Irish Times
an hour ago
- Irish Times
‘They think this is their hope to overcome this miserable situation': Teaching students online in Gaza
A picture of a trench lined with sandbags is on the screen. Physics teacher Ayda Elsayed Ahmed (55) uses it to illustrate Newton's laws of motion – explaining the 'directions and the spaces', how 'force' can become 'less'. This example was already on the Palestinian physics curriculum long before the bombardment of Gaza , she says, but understanding it has perhaps taken on a new form of urgency for her students, trapped inside the blockaded enclave for close to two years now; desperate to learn, but also to survive. Before the Hamas-led attacks of October 7th, 2023, more than 625,000 students in Gaza and 22,000 teachers attended 815 schools in 564 buildings across the enclave, according to the Global Education Cluster, which comprises of representatives from many international NGOs and is steered by Unicef and Save the Children. In June this year, a UN Human Rights Council commission of inquiry found that Israel had 'used air strikes, burning and controlled demolitions to damage and destroy more than 90 per cent of the school and university buildings in Gaza, creating conditions where education for children, including adolescents, and the livelihood of teachers have been made impossible". READ MORE It said attacks on educational facilities had been war crimes, which included the killing of civilians sheltering in schools, and that 'Israeli soldiers recorded and distributed videos in which they mock Palestinians and Palestinian education, before destroying schools and universities'. This was 'indicative of the Israeli security forces' intent to destroy these facilities to curtail Palestinians' access to education in the long-term'. More than 658,000 children in Gaza have had no schooling for 20 months, the commission said. Israel says Hamas operates in civilian areas, with Binyamin Netanyahu's office last week saying Hamas 'openly uses civilians as human shields' and 'uses schools and kindergartens to store weapons'. [ Sally Hayden: Stranded fathers describe anguish over children in Gaza Opens in new window ] An ever-growing number of international lawyers and experts call what is happening in Gaza a genocide. More than 60,000 people have already been killed there, according to Gazan health authorities, including about 18,500 children. While ensuring access to education may seem secondary compared to mass killing, Palestinian teachers say Gazan students remain desperate to learn. In April 2024, a UN Human Rights Council panel of experts also said it may be 'reasonable to ask if there is an intentional effort to comprehensively destroy the Palestinian education system [in Gaza], an action known as 'scholasticide',' adding 'when schools are destroyed, so too are hopes and dreams'. Ayda Elsayed Ahmed (55) teaches physics to students inside Gaza and those displaced abroad. Photograph: Sally Hayden 'I have a responsibility to support them' Ahmed was first contacted by Gazan students through social media early last year. The physics teacher of 25 years is based in the city of Dura, in the occupied West Bank. She added the students to a WhatsApp group, saying she was willing to give them physics courses online. 'I was really affected by what's happening in Gaza. Some of my students contacted me and told me sad stories about their lives. They showed me their destroyed houses, and so I was emotionally affected and I started giving them psychological support before I started teaching them. I have a responsibility to support them, to help them to pass these miserable conditions,' she says, sitting on a sofa in her family home. Gaza is about 44km (27 miles) west of Ahmed's house, but the enclave is under a complete blockade. As she speaks, the sound of a warplane rumbles above followed by a distant explosion – they can sometimes hear the bombing of Gaza from the West Bank, Ahmed says. Most of her original students were Gazans displaced abroad: usually in Egypt, but also Russia, Norway and Germany. 'I searched for students who needed help and gave them my number,' Ahmed says. She held three online intensive courses – in June, August and December 2024 – managing to finish the whole of the final year physics course in a month, with multiple sessions a day reaching up to 100 students, she says. [ Sally Hayden: From a viewing platform in Israel, observers watch Gaza's destruction Opens in new window ] They attended classes through Microsoft Teams, took tests through Google Forms and watched as Ahmed used a virtual physics lab to carry out experiments. Some later passed formal exams in Egypt, while others are at least better prepared for whenever they get the chance. In January 2025, Ahmed joined about 25 West Bank-based teachers involved in a more official programme offering 'virtual schools' for Gazan students, supported by the Palestinian education ministry in Ramallah. She says teachers inside Gaza have made impressive efforts to teach classes in tents, but 'it's crowded, a lot of noise, [the students] can't hear anything and they don't understand things'. She calls for those teachers to get more financial support and materials such as tablets, pens and paper. Through the virtual school, Ahmed taught 480 students in Gaza online. She received a stipend from the Palestinian Authority for some of that period, but said she would take part either way. 'We didn't join for money, we joined to help our students.' 'They are very thirsty for education, they think this is their hope to overcome this miserable situation.' Photograph: Sally Hayden Dr Salem Abu Musleh, the co-ordinator of the Palestine Astrophysics Programme, who now teaches in tents in Khan Younis, says in-person learning is still the best option for many. Nearly 80 per cent of Gazan students do not have access to stable internet from Palestinian providers, relying instead on weak, cheaper connections from service providers in tents, and must often travel long distances to get it, he says. Many are without a mobile phone, laptop or electricity – or have just one mobile phone per family. The internet regularly goes down. But virtual schools can be more 'comfortable' for those with that option, Ahmed says. 'I try to overcome the problem of when the internet is not available. I record my classes and I have a YouTube channel ... I have a special page on Facebook for the students of Gaza.' Starvation badly affects her students, with one in three Palestinians in Gaza going without food for days at a time, according to the UN. 'They are very, very, very hungry. My students told me while studying they [can't even get] a cup of tea with a spoon of sugar. [They ask] 'how can I study and do my homework without eating?' This is severe hunger they face, they're being pushed into starvation.' Some parents contact Ahmed too. 'A mother told me her daughter is a student, she can't go to where the charging point for mobiles is as she hasn't eaten for one week, she's so weak.' 'It was some kind of light through the darkness' Suheir Hussein Abu Arqub (55) – an English teacher in the West Bank for the past 24 years – began teaching virtual school in October last year, alongside her regular secondary school position in Dura. 'At first, the situation was hopeless and we were very sad for the students, we thought they lost their future ... but when the idea of virtual schools appeared it was some kind of light through the darkness. It was really an attempt to save what you can save,' she says. Suheir Hussein Abu Arqub started teaching online English classes for Gazan students in October last year. Photograph: Sally Hayden 'The idea is to keep the students in contact with schools, books, teachers and knowledge, education ... We don't want to lose hope. We want any kind of opportunity to give them light ... Certificates now are not important, what's important is to give them necessary knowledge that will help them in the future.' Arqub says she teaches as many as 1,700 students in Gaza across various groups, with up to 120 logging in for each class. 'Not all the students are able to connect ... because they have internet problems. Sometimes electricity is cut most of the day, some don't have mobiles or laptops ... In periods where there are massive bombing and destruction the number [joining classes] becomes much less.' She says students create WhatsApp groups to help each other and exchange homework. They have access to books online. But, even when in class, the horrors they are experiencing are impossible to forget. 'Displacement is a very hard situation for students, they say they keep all the time moving from place to place so this interrupts their continuous learning. Some lost close relatives. 'I have a student who talked to me, he lost his brother ... He said they were displaced and then when they returned to their house the house was damaged, but they don't have another place to live so they live in it and fear it will collapse on them.' During one lesson, she recalls, a student started screaming, saying his area was being bombed and he was going to move to a safer place. But he added: 'Please Miss, don't forget me'. Another student messaged from hospital, saying 'my father was killed and my mother was killed and I'm wounded in hospital but I want you to send me your homework and tell me what you did when I was away.' A student named Mohammed was killed, Arqub says. 'He did well on his exam ... When he died the students from the area where he lives [told] the principal ... I cried.' About 1,500 Gazan students sat high school matriculation exams – 'tawjihi' – on July 19th, according to Palestinian news agency Wafa. Those exams had been postponed since December 2023, and took place electronically, in organised venues or online from wherever those taking part could find an internet connection and charged device. Ahmed would like to see more students given the opportunity to sit their final exams but recognises that 'it depends on the security situation'. Writing on Al Jazeera's website this week, Ahmad Abushawish, a student still waiting to sit his, said the exams are not only a 'milestone', but also carry 'cultural and emotional weight' as a 'symbol of perseverance.' 'In a place where the occupation closes nearly every door, education is able to keep a few doors still open,' he wrote. Despite all of their challenges, Ahmed says she has never seen such dedicated students. 'I feel the students of Gaza deserve this because they insist on learning, they search for the knowledge ... They are very thirsty for education, they think this is their hope to overcome this miserable situation. They were very ambitious and hopeful in spite of all this.' Next, Ahmed says, her students are keen to join virtual universities 'to be connected with education forever. They're very clever, creative, they think outside the box. They deserve it'.
Irish Examiner
4 hours ago
- Irish Examiner
If states can be shamed into action, Israel will be forced to change
Earlier this week, the renowned Israeli human rights organisation B'Tselem released Our Genocide, an analysis of Israeli policy towards Palestinians since October 7, 2023. The report finds that, since October 2023, the Israeli regime has been responsible for carrying out genocide against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip. The finding of genocide is based on two prior conclusions, supported by evidence gathered by the organisation: Mass crimes by Israel are being 'perpetrated systematically, as part of a coordinated attack aimed at annihilating all facets of life in the Gaza Strip'; The intent of Israel's political and military leadership is to 'irreversibly destroy Palestinian life'. The international community, B'Tselem argues, has not only failed to halt this genocide, but enabled it 'through statements affirming Israel's right to self-defense" or active support — including the shipment of weapons and ammunition' to Israel. The foundations for the genocide, the report states, have been laid through Israel's settler-colonial project, notably three of its fundamental elements: Apartheid, imposing separation, and ethnic cleansing; systematic and institutionalised violence against Palestinians, perpetrated with impunity; and the institutionalised dehumanisation of Palestinians, including through the framing of them as an existential threat. B'Tselem points to the Hamas attacks on October 7, 2023 — which it finds 'included many war crimes and likely also crimes against humanity' — as 'the catalyst for the ruling system to carry out genocide". The B'Tselem report is based on 20 months of research and documentation of human rights violations committed by Israel against Palestinians. It was released on the same day as an equally damning and clear report by a second Israeli organisation, Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, which has concluded the following: 'The destruction of life-sustaining systems, the cumulative patterns of destruction, the bodily and mental trauma inflicted, and the direct killing of civilians, when understood in light of the implemented policy and the public rhetoric, make clear that Israel's campaign in Gaza constitutes genocide under international law.' In publishing their reports, the Israeli organisations join a host of other internationally recognised human rights organisations — first and foremost Palestinian — in describing the slaughter being perpetrated by Israel in Gaza as genocide. On October 13, 2023, in light of the Israeli onslaught and statements by high-ranking Israeli politicians that followed the Hamas attacks of October 7 that year, Al-Haq, Al Mezan Centre for Human Rights, and the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights issued a statement calling on the international community to urgently intervene to protect the Palestinian people from a genocide by Israel. The Palestinian organisations warned that other states not only had an obligation under international law to intervene to prevent the potential genocide, but that they may be held responsible if they failed to take all measures within their power to do so. Since then, all three Palestinian organisations have continued to document the mass crimes being perpetrated by Israel. They have denounced its actions as amounting to genocide, and have called on all states do all within their power to bring it to an end. Their work, and that of other Palestinian human rights defenders, has reverberated around the world It has been reinforced by international human rights organisations and UN mechanisms. However, it has been cruelly, callously ignored and disregarded by many states which continue to defend Israel's actions, provide weapons and other equipment for its army, and allow the crimes to continue. The result: A famine engineered by Israel with international support; more than 60,000 Palestinians killed by Israel with international support, including more than 1,000 Palestinians killed trying to access humanitarian aid; cities completely destroyed, and millions displaced with international support; hospitals, schools, mosques, and churches bombed one by one by Israel with international support; more than 100,000 Palestinians injured by Israel with international support; and companies profiting from these crimes with international support. The atrocities go on. All the while Israeli cabinet ministers proclaim that Gaza will be entirely destroyed and cleared of all Palestinians in what B'Tselem calls 'the exact definition of genocide'. UN special rapporteur Mary Lawlor: 'International belief in a system of universal human rights has been eviscerated by the atrocities permitted to happen since October 7.' And what is the response by States? Crumbs dropped from the sky by former colonial powers and Middle Eastern states; an internal conclusion by the EU that there are 'indications' Israel is in breach of its human rights obligations, but no concrete measures to pressure it to abide by them; and the British government arguing in court that there is no evidence of genocide in Gaza. Where is the action? It is with the people in the streets, communities, associations, and organisations all around the world who are organising and protesting to demand an end to Israel's crimes, apartheid, and occupation — doing so despite being beaten by police, designated as terrorists, and smeared as antisemites. Action is with the Palestinian people among them and in Gaza and the West Bank, supporting one another despite the bombardments, massacres, displacement, and starvation. It is with Palestinian human rights defenders and their allies in Israel, such as B'Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, documenting these crimes and demanding justice. Recent days have shown what an increase in international pressure can do as aid trucks were finally permitted into Gaza by Israel, albeit on an extremely limited basis and while the killing continues. This is far too little, far too late for far too many, but it does demonstrate that if states can be shamed into action, Israel's behaviour will be forced to change International belief in a system of universal human rights has been eviscerated by the atrocities permitted to happen since October 7. In order to rescue the remnants of this system and resuscitate that which remains, the atrocities must stop, Israel must be held accountable, and the Palestinians must be guaranteed their full rights — including their right to self-determination. Mary Lawlor is the UN special rapporteur on human rights defenders
The Irish Sun
8 hours ago
- The Irish Sun
Trump's top US intelligence chief says she believes in aliens and vows to ‘share the truth' on UFOs
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