Israel-Gaza War: Israel was caught off-guard by Hamas last weekend as the group attacked its civilians.
US President Joe Biden will pay a solidarity visit to Israel on Wednesday following the Hamas attacks, said Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who also announced that Israel had agreed to work on civilian aid for Gaza.
Blinken spoke after meeting for nearly eight hours at the defence ministry with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the top US diplomat’s second visit since the October 7 attacks by Hamas.
Israel was caught off-guard by Hamas last weekend as the group attacked its civilians. Israel in response has also launched airstrikes on the Hamas-controlled Gaza stripped and stopped food and electricity supply to the region.
Here are the LIVE updates on Israel-Hamas War:
Get NDTV UpdatesTurn on notifications to receive alerts as this story develops.
US President Joe Biden said Tuesday he was “outraged and deeply saddened” by a deadly explosion at a Gaza hospital.
Biden had “directed my national security team to continue gathering information about what exactly happened,” he added in a statement.
Hamas has blamed Israel for the strike, while Israel says a rocket misfired by Islamic Jihad Palestinian militants was responsible.
The United Nations Security Council will now vote on Wednesday on a Brazilian-drafted resolution that calls for humanitarian pauses in the conflict between Israel and Palestinian militants Hamas to allow humanitarian aid access to the Gaza Strip.
The council is then expected to discuss – at the request of the United Arab Emirates and Russia – a Gaza hospital blast that killed hundreds of people on Tuesday, diplomats said.
Palestinian U.N. envoy Riyad Mansour blamed Israeli forces for the “massacre” at the hospital, calling for an immediate ceasefire. Israel’s U.N. Ambassador Gilad Erdan issued a statement accusing the Palestinian Islamic Jihad militant group of responsibility.
US President Joe Biden left the White House Tuesday for a trip to Israel and Jordan, hours after a strike on a Gaza hospital that killed at least 200 people and further raised Middle East tensions.
Biden’s motorcade left for Joint Base Andrews, from where he will fly to Tel Aviv to meet Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, followed by talks scheduled with the Palestinian, Jordanian and Egyptian leaders in Amman.
France on Tuesday “firmly” condemned a deadly strike on a Gaza hospital, blamed by Hamas on Israel, which it denied, 11 days into the war triggered by the militant group’s attack on Israeli soil.
“International humanitarian law is binding on all and must allow for the protection of civilian populations. Humanitarian access to the Gaza Strip must be opened without delay,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.
The Israeli army said Tuesday a strike which hit a Gaza hospital, killing at least 200 people according to Hamas officials, was a rocket misfired by Palestinian militants.
“An analysis of IDF (army) operational systems indicates that a barrage of rockets was fired by terrorists in Gaza, passing in close proximity to Ahli hospital in Gaza at the time it was hit,” the military said in a statement.
“Intelligence from multiple sources we have in our hands indicates that Islamic Jihad is responsible for the failed rocket launch which hit the hospital in Gaza,” the statement said, referring to another Gaza-based militant group which has claimed to be fighting Israel alongside Hamas.
Arab League chief Ahmed Aboul Gheit on Tuesday called for leaders to “stop this tragedy immediately” after strikes on a Gaza hospital sheltering displaced people killed at least 200 people.
“What diabolical mind intentionally bombards a hospital and its defenceless inhabitants?” he wrote on X, previously Twitter, vowing that “Arab mechanisms will document these war crimes and the criminals will not get away with their actions.”
The World Health Organization condemned a deadly strike Tuesday on a hospital in the Gaza Strip and demanded the immediate protection of civilians and health care in the Palestinian enclave.
“WHO strongly condemns the attack on Al Ahli Arab Hospital”, the UN health agency’s director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on the social media platform X, formerly Twitter.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday condemned the deadly Israeli strike on a hospital in Gaza as “the latest example devoid of the most basic human values”, in a message on social media.
“I invite all humanity to take action to stop this unprecedented brutality in Gaza,” Erdogan said on social media platform X, formerly Twitter.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is set to visit Israel this week, Sky News reported on Tuesday without citing sources.
Rishi Sunak’s office were not immediately available to comment on the report.
Israel has attacked around 5,000 Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip since Oct 7 and has cancelled a “large number” of other strikes in an effort to avoid Palestinian civilian casualties, a senior Israeli official said on Tuesday.
Briefing Reuters on condition of anonymity, the official did not elaborate on the number of strikes cancelled during a days-long bombardment of Gaza that has killed around 3,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities, saying only that every such operation is “approved at the highest level” of the Israeli military.
Eviatar Moshe Kipnis, an Italian-Israeli who had been missing since the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Islamist group Hamas has been confirmed dead, the Italian foreign minister said on Tuesday.
“I am close to his family, especially his two sons whom I met during my trip to Tel Aviv,” Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani wrote on social media X.
It said the DNA test that confirmed the 65-year-old’s death was carried out by Israeli authorities.
At least six people have been killed in an Israeli air strike that hit a school run by the United Nations’ Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) in Gaza’s Al-Maghazi refugee camp, UNRWA posted on X social media platform.
🛑 At least 6 people were killed this afternoon when an @UNRWA school was hit in al-Maghazi refugee camp.
This is outrageous & it again shows a flagrant disregard for the lives of civilians.
No place is safe in📍#Gaza anymore, not even @UN facilities.
⬇️https://t.co/9yh38bCqvk– UNRWA (@UNRWA) October 17, 2023
“The world must stand united behind Israel to defeat Hamas,” Prime Minister Netanyahu said alongside visiting German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
“The savagery that we witnessed perpetrated by the Hamas murderers coming out of Gaza were the worst crimes committed against Jews since the Holocaust,” Mr Netanyahu said, referring to the extermination of more than six million Jews by the Nazis.
“There was a failure. We failed, the secret service failed. the Chief of staff of army and Intelligence failed. We were caught in a complete surprise. It was the exaggerated confidence and arrogance that caused. 80% Israeli people would love to see Benjamin Netanyahu go. Instead of building up negotiations and rapport with Palestinians, we downgraded them and uplifted Hamas. Netanyahu is responsible directly and personally for this. Like exchanging 1000 Hamas for 1 Israeli soldier. He is responsible for building up the capabilities of Hamas and he has to leave,” Ehud Olmert said.
Ehud Olmert On Israel-Saudi Talks-
The normalization was building and agreement of military assistance to US was building. One of the reasons of Hamas, which is a long arm of Iran, was to stop the talks. The growing cooperation of US-Saudi was important to stop Iran.
“We must make concentrated effort to try and remove Hamas from its position. This is an essential step to achieve peace but there will never be peace if Hamas is there,” said Israel ex PM Ehud Olmert to NDTV in an exclusive.
“I hope the war doesn’t expand, there have been some skirmishes. The reaction of Israel will be harsh if Hezbollah strikes. The US brought the USS Gerald R. Ford in order to warn Hezbollah and Iran to stay away,” Mr Olmert added.
Around 3,000 people have been killed in Israeli strikes on the Gaza Strip, the health ministry in the Hamas-run Palestinian territory said on Tuesday.
More than 12,500 others have been wounded since Israel started bombarding Gaza on October 7, in retaliation for Hamas attacks in Israel which killed more than 1,400 people.
Palestinian militant group Hamas said Tuesday one of the top leaders of its armed wing was killed in an Israeli strike in the Gaza Strip.
“Ayman Nofal, ‘Abu Ahmad’, a member of the general military council and commander of the central command in Al-Qassam Brigades, was killed” in an Israeli strike on the central Gaza Strip, Hamas said in a statement.
The US military has put 2,000 troops on deployment alert, the Pentagon said Tuesday, in response to the escalating conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin placed the personnel and a range of units “on a heightened state of readiness through a prepare to deploy order,” the Pentagon said in a statement, to be able “to respond quickly to the evolving security environment in the Middle East.”
French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday announced that he will visit Israel following the fatal terror attacks by Hamas terror group in Israel, reported The Jerusalem Post.
French President Macron has been a firm supporter of Israel since the Hamas group has launched a series of attacks on Israel since October 7, killing 1400 Israelis and abducting nearly 200 people to Gaza.
Intense talks are on to free hostages held by Hamas after its attack on Israel, French President Emmanuel Macron said Tuesday, after the mother of a French-Israeli captive begged world leaders to intervene.
“I want to be very cautious here… so as not to endanger the intense talks we are currently conducting,” Emmanuel Macron said. “But they are progressing and we are following these talks hour by hour.”
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Israel’s “genocide” of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip should stop “immediately”, state TV reported on Tuesday, a day before US President Joe Biden is due to visit Israel. Read here
Video journalist Issam Abdallah died in firing near the village of Alma al-Shaab in southern Lebanon on Friday.
“I am reiterating my call to the Israeli authorities, who have said they are investigating, to conduct a swift, thorough and transparent probe into what happened,” Reuters Editor-in-Chief Alessandra Galloni said.
“By transparent, I mean an investigation with clear evidence and explanation, and I also reiterate my call to the Israeli Defense Forces for clarity regarding the terms of engagement in this conflict,” she added.
Ravina Shamdasani, spokesperson for the UN human rights office, said Israel seemed to have made no effort to ensure the civilians temporarily evacuated in Gaza were provided with proper accommodation, as well as satisfactory conditions of hygiene, health, safety and nutrition.
“We are concerned that this order, combined with the imposition of a complete siege of Gaza, may not be considered as lawful temporary evacuation and would therefore amount to a forcible transfer of civilians in breach of international law,” she said.
“Those who managed to comply with the Israeli authorities’ order to evacuate are now trapped in the south of the Gaza Strip, with scant shelter, fast-depleting food supplies, little or no access to clean water, sanitation, medicine and other basic needs.”
Israel’s military is still looking into the killing of a Reuters journalist in Lebanon near the border with Israel, a spokesperson said on Tuesday.
“The Reuters event, we’re still looking into it. I’m looking at the footage and we’ll come out with an answer when we’re ready. A tragic event,” Lieutenant-Colonel Richard Hecht told a regular press briefing.
Issam Abdallah, a Reuters visual journalist, was killed on Friday when rocket fire hit a group of reporters who had been covering cross-border clashes between Israel and Lebanese Hezbollah fighters. Several other journalists were wounded.
The UN’s World Food Programme said the situation in the Gaza Strip was worsening by the minute with only four or five days of food stocks left in the shops.
“Inside the shops, the stocks are getting close to less than a few days, maybe four or five days of food stocks left,” WFP’s Middle East spokeswoman Abeer Etefa, told reporters in Geneva via video-link from Cairo.
The Israeli military is getting ready for the next phase of its campaign against the Gaza Strip but plans may not conform to widespread expectations of an imminent ground offensive, an army spokesperson said on Tuesday.
“We are preparing for the next stages of war. We haven’t said what they will be. Everybody’s talking about the ground offensive. It might be something different,” Lt Colonel Richard Hecht told a regular briefing with reporters.
The World Health Organization said on Tuesday it needs urgent access to Gaza to deliver aid and medical supplies, as the UN agency warned of a humanitarian crisis in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian enclave.
Speaking to media in a briefing, Dr Richard Brennan, regional emergency director of the WHO’s Eastern Mediterranean regional office, said the WHO was meeting with “decision-makers” on Tuesday to open access to Gaza as soon as possible.
Dr Richard Peeperkorn, WHO Representative in the occupied Palestinian territories, said 2,800 people have died and 11,000 injured in Gaza since Israeli air strikes started. About half of them were women and children.
The mother of French-Israeli woman Mia Shem, held hostage by Hamas militants in Gaza, urged world leaders Tuesday to free her daughter after the Islamists aired a video showing her in captivity.
“I ask world leaders that my daughter be returned to us in the state that she is today, as well as the other hostages,” Keren Shem told a press conference in Tel Aviv, a day after Hamas broadcast a video showing her daughter receiving treatment for an arm injury.
“I beg the world to return my baby to me,” said Shem after French President Emmanuel Macron demanded her immediate and unconditional release.
French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday condemned Hamas for airing a video of a Franco-Israeli woman the Islamist militant group has taken hostage and demanded her unconditional release.
“It is an ignominy to take innocent people hostage and put them on show in this odious way,” the Elysee presidential palace quoted Macron as saying.
It said Macron was aware of the video of Franco-Israeli Mia Shem and called for her “immediate and unconditional release”.
France was “working with its partners to free French hostages held by Hamas”, it added.
Trucks carrying aid for the Gaza Strip arrived on Tuesday at the only border crossing into the territory not controlled by Israel, a witness and Egyptian security sources said, after the U.S. said it was developing with Israel a plan for aid delivery.
Egypt says the Rafah crossing, a vital artery before the fighting and now a key route for desperately needed supplies into the Israeli-besieged Palestinian enclave, had not been officially closed but was made inoperable due to Israeli air strikes on the Gaza side.
On Monday, local media and Egyptian security sources said that Israel had struck the vicinity of the crossing in Gaza. Two of the sources said the aid deliveries were now waiting for the Gaza side of the border to open and for assurances of safe passage before entering the crossing.
Some 160 trucks left al-Arish in Egypt’s Sinai peninsula in the early hours of Tuesday, where hundreds of tonnes of aid has been awaiting an agreement on aid delivery, the witness told Reuters.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping may discuss the Israeli-Palestinian conflict during their meeting in Beijing this week, Russia’s RIA news agency quoted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying on Tuesday.
Israeli troops killed four militants attempting to infiltrate from Lebanon, the army said Tuesday, as tensions run high along the border between the two countries.
“A short while ago, IDF (Israeli army) observation troops spotted a terrorist squad attempting to infiltrate the security fence with Lebanon and plant an explosive device,” the army said in a statement. “Four terrorists were killed.”
Dozens of U.S. citizens from Israel arrived in Cyprus early Tuesday on the first evacuation boat organised by the United States amid the escalating crisis in the Middle East.
Some 159 people were on board the luxury liner Rhapsody of the Seas which left Haifa and sailed into Limassol port in Cyprus early Tuesday.
Cypriot government official Victor Papadopoulos told Cyprus state TV more evacuation vessels were expected to arrive over the next 12 hours.
Cyprus has been used as a transit hub for foreign governments to evacuate their civilians since just after the latest outbreak of violence on Oct. 7.
Relief convoys which had been waiting in the Egyptian city of El Arish Tuesday headed towards the Rafah border crossing with the Palestinian enclave of Gaza, aid officials said.
“We have arrived at the terminal and are now waiting for the next step,” said Heba Rashed, who runs the aid group Mersal.
Hundreds more lorries were headed along the coast road for the 40 kilometre (25 mile) journey to Rafah, other aid officials said.
European Union leaders aim on Tuesday to settle on a united approach to the crisis triggered by the Hamas attack on Israel after days of confusion, infighting and mixed messaging.
In an emergency video conference at 1530 GMT, the European Council, which brings together the leaders of the EU’s 27 member countries, will also tackle potentially grave consequences for the continent arising from the crisis.
While the EU and its member governments all condemned the Hamas assault from Gaza, which killed some 1,300 Israelis, they diverged on other political statements and policy implications.
The disarray has exposed old divisions within the EU on the Middle East and underscored the severe limits of its influence in the region.
The Israel-Hamas war is set to overshadow the Frankfurt Book Fair this week after the postponement of a Palestinian author’s award ceremony sparked condemnation from top writers and the withdrawal of several Arab groups.
The world’s biggest publishing trade event begins Wednesday just over a week since Hamas launched the deadliest attack in Israel’s history, prompting Israel to respond with a relentless bombing campaign of the Gaza Strip.
Organisers swiftly denounced the Palestinian militants’ “barbaric” assault and rushed to reorganise the schedule, pledging Israeli voices would feature prominently.
Hundreds of Israeli high-tech experts have temporarily put their private sector jobs aside to help locate Israelis missing after last week’s attack by the Palestinian militant group Hamas.
Hamas gunmen evaded heavy Israeli security measures to escape the Gaza Strip and storm Israeli towns and kibbutzes, killing 1,300 people and taking almost 200 into captivity. In response, Israel has bombarded Gaza for days, killing more than 2,700 Palestinians while its troops prepare a ground assault.
Karine Nahon, one of the leaders of the initiative, said volunteers have been analysing footage – including videos posted online by Hamas – to help identify and locate the more than 1,000 people who are still unaccounted for. Any information gleaned is passed on to Israeli authorities.
Following days of confusing and sometimes contradictory messaging about the EU’s stance on the developing Israel-Hamas conflict, leaders of the bloc’s countries on Tuesday are to try to rally around a clear statement.
“We felt the need to bring some order,” one EU official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the issue more freely.
A videoconference of the leaders, taking place at 1530 GMT and chaired by European Council President Charles Michel, will seek to supersede initial steps taken by the European Commission and its chief, Ursula von der Leyen.
Von der Leyen, who has cultivated a profile as the “face” of the European Union, last Friday flew to Israel to tell its Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Europe backed Israel’s right to defend itself.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called on Monday for a humanitarian corridor to be opened into the Gaza Strip, saying urgent help was needed to address an increasingly dire situation in the besieged enclave of 2.3 million people.
Israel, reacting to an attack by Hamas last week that killed more than 1,300 people, has put Gaza under a total blockade and pounded the crowded Palestinian enclave with unprecedented air strikes.
Gaza authorities said Israel’s aerial bombardment has killed more than 2,800 people, around a quarter of them children, and left at least 10,000 others wounded.
The UN Security Council on Monday rejected a Russian resolution condemning spiraling violence in the Middle East, with delegates refusing to back a motion that did not single out Hamas for its surprise attack on Israel that left at least 1,400 people dead.
The council huddled as Israel readied for an expected ground assault on the Gaza Strip, after air and artillery strikes that officials say have killed at least 2,750 people.
It also came as the White House said President Joe Biden would visit Israel on Wednesday, in a visit that is designed to balance support for a key ally with calls for restraint in its operations in Gaza.
On Wednesday, I’ll travel to Israel to stand in solidarity in the face of Hamas’s brutal terrorist attack.
I’ll then travel to Jordan to address dire humanitarian needs, meet with leaders, and make clear that Hamas does not stand for Palestinians’ right to self-determination.
– President Biden (@POTUS) October 17, 2023
Around 500,000 Israelis have been evacuated and displaced in the 10 days since Hamas unleashed the bloodiest attack in the country’s history, the Israeli military said Tuesday.
“There are about half a million internally displaced Israelis at the time,” Jonathan Conricus, spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), said in an online briefing, adding that all communities around the Gaza Strip as well as more than 20 communities in the north had been evacuated.
The United States and Israel have agreed to work out ways to let international assistance come into the blockaded Gaza Strip, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said early Tuesday.
“At our request, the United States and Israel have agreed to develop a plan that will enable humanitarian aid from donor nations and multilateral organizations to reach civilians in Gaza,” Blinken said after nearly eight hours of overnight talks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
