Latest news with #MohammedalMughayyir
Observer
5 days ago
- Politics
- Observer
US eyes new truce talks as 44 Gazans killed
GAZA CITY: US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff has presented a new proposal for a 60-day ceasefire in the Gaza Strip that includes the release of 10 captives, according to media. As per the new draft plan, the captives are to be released in two groups within a week, several outlets reported. Palestinian group Hamas would also have to hand over the bodies of 18 captives still held in Gaza. The bodies of 180 Palestinians would also be handed over. In return, 125 Palestinians sentenced to life imprisonment and 1,111 Gaza residents who have been detained in Israeli jails since October 7, 2023 will be freed. The two-month truce is set to facilitate negotiations between Israel and Hamas on an end to the almost 20-month-long conflict, according to the reports. If Israel and Hamas manage to come to an agreement, the remaining captives are due to be released under the latest proposal. The proposal also stipulates that aid distribution in the Gaza Strip will once again be handled by the United Nations and international aid organisations. Meanwhile, at least 44 people were killed in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip on Thursday, rescuers said, a day after a World Food Programme warehouse in the centre of the territory was looted by desperate Palestinians. After a more than two-month blockade, aid has finally begun to trickle back into Gaza, but the humanitarian situation remains dire after 18 months of devastating war. Food security experts say starvation is looming for one in five people. Gaza civil defence official Mohammed al Mughayyir said "44 people have been killed in Israeli raids", including 23 in a strike on home in Al Bureij.
Observer
10-05-2025
- Politics
- Observer
15 killed in Israeli attacks
GAZA CITY: Gaza's civil defence agency said on Saturday that 15 people were killed in Israeli attacks across the Palestinian territory including five in one strike in Gaza City. "Fifteen people have been killed in Israeli air strikes on Gaza since dawn," civil defence official Mohammed al Mughayyir said. Five people were killed in an air strike on a tent in Gaza City at dawn he said. Elsewhere in the territory, where Israel's army resumed its offensive in March following a two-month truce, four people were killed in an Israeli bombardment in Deir al Balah in the central Gaza Strip. One child was killed in gunfire by the Israeli navy on the coast of Rafah, in the south of Gaza, Mughayyir added. AFP images showed mourners alongside bodies wrapped in white shrouds, which relatives said belonged to a single family killed in the Gaza City strike. "Three children, their mother and her husband were sleeping inside a tent and were bombed by an (Israeli) occupation aircraft," family member Omar Abu al Kass said. The strikes came "without warning and without having done anything wrong," added Abu al Kass, who said he was the children's maternal grandfather. The Israeli army did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the strike. The new German foreign minister, Johann Wadephul, who was due to visit Israel, called for "serious discussions for a ceasefire" in Gaza, where the humanitarian situation "is now unbearable". Wadephul is scheduled to meet with his Israeli counterpart, Gideon Saar, on Sunday, followed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The war in Gaza was triggered by Hamas's October 2023 attack, which killed 1,218 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures. Israeli retaliatory war has killed at least 52,810 people in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory's health ministry, which the United Nations considers reliable. — AFP
Observer
02-05-2025
- Politics
- Observer
Israeli air strike kills 29, including children
GAZA: Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli strikes killed at least 29 people on Friday in the Palestinian territory, devastated by war and under a total Israeli aid blockade for two months. Israel resumed its military campaign in the Gaza Strip on March 18 after the collapse of a ceasefire that had largely halted the fighting. Nine people were killed when an Israeli air strike hit a home in Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza, civil defence official Mohammed al Mughayyir said. Another six people were killed in a separate strike targeting the Al Masri family home in the northern city of Beit Lahia, he added. In Gaza City, a strike on a community kitchen claimed the lives of six more, the civil defence agency reported. Elsewhere across the Gaza Strip, at least eight additional fatalities were reported in similar attacks, the agency said. Since Israel resumed its campaign in Gaza, at least 2,326 people have been killed, bringing the overall death toll since the war broke out to 52,418, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory. The United Nations has repeatedly warned of the humanitarian catastrophe on the ground, with famine again looming. On Friday, the International Committee of the Red Cross warned that the humanitarian response in Gaza was on the "verge of total collapse". "This situation must not — and cannot — be allowed to escalate further," Pascal Hundt, ICRC Deputy Director of Operations said in a statement. A youth draped in a blanket looks on as people look for survivors in the rubble of a building hit in an Israeli strike in the Bureij camp for Palestinian refugees in the central Gaza Strip on Friday. — AFP Meanwhile, Reuters said that a ship bound for Gaza carrying humanitarian aid and activists was bombed by drones in international waters off Malta early on Friday, its organisers said, alleging that Israel was to blame. The Israeli foreign ministry did not respond to a request for comment on the allegation by the Freedom Flotilla Coalition, an international non-governmental group. The Maltese government said the vessel and its crew were secured in the early hours of the morning after a nearby tug assisted with firefighting operations. Türkiye's foreign ministry said Turkish nationals were on board at the time of the incident and it was working with Maltese authorities to transfer them to a safe location. "We condemn in the strongest terms this attack on a civilian ship," it said, noting that there were "allegations that the ship was targeted by Israeli drones". "All necessary efforts will be made to reveal the details of the attack as soon as possible and to bring the perpetrators to justice," it said. Swedish activist Greta Thunberg said she was in Malta and had been supposed to board the ship as part of the Freedom Flotilla's planned action in support of Gaza, which is under blockade and bombardment by Israel. BREAK THE BLOCKADE A spokeswoman for the NGO, Caoimhe Butterly, said the attack took place as the ship was preparing for activists to board from another vessel. A transfer at sea had been planned rather than the ship going to harbour, for bureaucratic reasons, she said. Thunberg said the attack had "caused an explosion and major damage to the vessel, which made it impossible to continue the mission". "I was part of the group who was supposed to board that boat today to continue the voyage towards Gaza, which is one of many attempts to open up a humanitarian corridor and to do our part to keep trying to break Israel's illegal siege on Gaza," she said in a Zoom interview. Thunberg and the Freedom Flotilla Coalition said there were 30 people on board, not 16 as the Maltese government said. The coalition said it had been organising a non-violent action under a media blackout in order to avoid any potential sabotage. The Gaza war started after Hamas-led fighters killed 1,200 people and took 251 hostages to Gaza in the October 7, 2023 attacks, according to Israeli tallies. Since then, Israel's offensive on the enclave killed more than 52,000, according to Palestinian health officials. Since March 2, Israel has completely cut off all supplies to the 2.3 million residents of the enclave and food stockpiled during a ceasefire at the start of the year has all but run out, according to international aid agencies. — Agencies
Observer
01-05-2025
- Politics
- Observer
29 dead in Gaza as Israel launches midnight strikes
Gaza's civil defence agency said on Thursday that Israeli bombardment killed at least 29 people since midnight in the war-ravaged territory, which has been under an Israeli aid blockade for nearly two months. Israel resumed its military campaign in the Gaza Strip on March 18, after a two-month truce collapsed over disagreements between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas, whose 2023 attack triggered the conflict. Civil defence official Mohammed al Mughayyir said the toll included eight people killed in an Israeli air strike on the Abu Sahlul family home in Khan Yunis refugee camp in the territory's south. Four people were killed in an air strike east of Shaaf in Gaza City's Al Tuffah neighbourhood, he added. At least 12 others were killed in seven separate attacks across the Palestinian territory, including one that hit a tent sheltering displaced people near the central city of Deir Al Balah, according to the agency. 'We came here and found all these houses destroyed, and children, women and young people all bombed to pieces,' said Ahmed Abu Zarqa following a deadly strike in Khan Yunis. 'This is no way to live. Enough, we're tired, enough! 'We don't know what to do with our lives anymore. We'd rather die than live this kind of life.' Images showed residents digging through rubble in search of bodies, which were carried away on stretchers under blankets. At Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis, rescuers rushed a screaming, wounded child out of an ambulance. The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said on Thursday that at least 2,326 people have been killed since Israel resumed strikes, bringing the overall death toll since the war broke out to 52,418. The attack on Israel on October 7, 2023 resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to official figures. Palestinians abducted 251 people, 58 of whom are still being held in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead. Israel says its renewed military campaign aims to force Hamas to free the remaining captives. Days before resuming its military campaign, Israel blocked all aid entering Gaza, with UN rights chief Volker Turk saying the territory was witnessing a 'humanitarian catastrophe'. 'Israel appears to be inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza conditions of life increasingly incompatible with their continued existence as a group in Gaza,' he said this week. A US official on Wednesday told the International Court of Justice there were 'serious concerns' about the impartiality of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA. ICJ judges are holding a week of hearings to help them formulate an advisory opinion on Israel's obligations towards UN agencies delivering aid to Palestinians in Gaza. Around 40 nations and organisations such as the League of Arab States are taking part in the hearings. — AFP
Observer
28-04-2025
- Politics
- Observer
Israeli strikes kill 40 in Gaza Strip
GAZA CITY: Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli strikes on Monday killed at least 40 people across the Palestinian territory, which has been under an Israeli aid blockade for more than 50 days. Israel resumed its military campaign in the Gaza Strip on March 18. A ceasefire agreement that had largely halted the fighting for two months before that collapsed over disagreements between Israel and Hamas. Civil defence official Mohammed al Mughayyir said that 40 people had been killed since dawn on Monday. They included eight people who were killed in an Israeli strike on the Abu Mahadi family home in Jabalia, in the north of the territory. "They were sleeping in their homes, feeling safe, when missiles hit... this scene makes the body shiver," said Abdul Majeed Abu Mahadi, 67, who added that his brother was killed in the attack. "If a person looked at this scene, they would have seen children, women and elderly men cut into pieces, it makes the heartache, but what can we do?" The civil defence agency reported that another 10 people were killed in an Israeli strike on the Al Ghamari family home in the Al Sudaniya area northwest of Gaza City. A strike on the Al Agha family home killed eight others in an area of Khan Yunis in the south, it added. Fourteen others were killed in four separate strikes across the territory, the civil defence said, including one that hit a tent sheltering displaced people in the Al Shafii camp, west of Khan Yunis. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military. The health ministry in Gaza said on Monday that at least 2,222 people have been killed since Israel resumed strikes, bringing the overall death toll since the war broke out to 52,314. Meanwhile, a top Palestinian official told the International Court of Justice that Israel was blocking humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza as a "weapon of war", at the start of a week of hearings at the UN's top court. Israel is not participating at the ICJ but hit back immediately, dismissing the hearings as "part of the systematic persecution and delegitimisation" of the country. The ICJ is hearing dozens of nations and organisations to draw up a so-called advisory opinion on Israel's humanitarian obligations to Palestinians, more than 50 days into its total blockage on aid entering war-ravaged Gaza. Top Palestinian official Ammar Hijazi told judges that "all UN-supported bakeries in Gaza have been forced to shut their doors". "Nine of every 10 Palestinians have no access to safe drinking water. Storage facilities of the UN and other international agencies are empty," added Hijazi. — Agencies
