Middle East crisis live: 30 reported killed by Israeli airstrikes on Gaza as IDF orders more Palestinians to flee their homes | Israel-Gaza war
30 reported killed by Israeli airstrikes on Gaza as IDF orders more Palestinians to flee their homes
Israeli strikes across the Gaza Strip have now killed at least 30 Palestinians since Monday night, Palestinian media and medics said on Tuesday, as the IDF issued further evacuation orders for the besieged Palestinian territory.
Reuters reports that an airstrike damaged two houses in the town of Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza, and killed at least 20 people late on Monday, citing Palestinian official news agency WAFA and Hamas media.
Palestinian health officials said six people had also been killed in two separate Israeli airstrikes in Gaza City and Deir Al-Balah, while four other people were killed in the central Gazan town of Al-Zawayda around midnight. At least two children were among those reported dead.
Israeli planes have dropped leaflets over Beit Lahiya in the far north of the territory ordering residents who have not yet left their homes and shelters housing displaced families to leave the town.
“To all those who remained at homes and shelters, you are risking your lives. For your safety you have to head south,” said the leaflet, which was written in Arabic. UN agencies have said that almost all of Gaza’s 2.4 million people have been displaced at least once during the course of the war.
Al Jazeera, citing Gaza’s civil defence, reports that Israeli forces continue to disrupt humanitarian and medical services in northern Gaza for the 14th day in a row.
In a statement issued earlier, Israel’s military claimed that during its operations in the north of Gaza it has “eliminated dozens of terrorists during close-quarters encounters and aerial strikes and dismantled terrorist infrastructure sites.”
It has not been possible for journalists to independently verify the casualty figures being issued during the conflict.
Key events
This image, taken from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, shows smoke billowing over a village in Lebanon after an Israeli strike.
More than 100 patients including children suffering from trauma injuries and chronic diseases will be evacuated from Gaza on Wednesday, Reuters reports a World Health Organization (WHO) official said.
WHO representative for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Rik Peeperkorn, said that 12,000 people were awaiting transfer.
The transferred patients will exit Gaza into Israel via the Kerem Shalom crossing, then travel on to the UAE and Romania.
Foreign minister reiterates Iran’s right to defend itself from Israeli attacks
Iran’s Tasnim news agency has carried a read-out of a phone call between Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araqchi and his Egyptian counterpart Badr Abdelatty.
In the report, Araqchi is credited with saying that he believed Israel’s actions were “aimed at broadening the war to the entire region and disrupting peace, stability, and security of the region.”
Tasnim also reported:
[Araqchi] also reaffirmed that Iran has a right to respond to any violation of its security and territorial integrity in line with the principle of legitimate self-defence.
Iran and Israel have exchanged several direct state-to-state attacks during the course of the year, with Iran claiming to respond to Israeli assassinations of senior figures, and Israel saying it is responding to Iran’s strikes on its territory.
As my colleague Patrick Wintour noted:
The chain of responsibility, from Iran’s perspective, started with an Israeli bombing on 1 April on the Iranian consulate in Damascus that killed seven Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps officers. Iran responded with Operation True Promise 1 on 13 April, a highly signalled attack using drones and missiles.
Israel retaliated on 19 April, with limited airstrikes on an air defence radar close to a nuclear site in Iran.
Subsequently, the Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh was assassinated in Tehran on 31 July, and the Iranian-backed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed in Beirut on 27 September along with the IRGC deputy commander of operations, Abbas Nilforoushan.
This led to Iran’s response on 1 October, labelled Operation True Promise 2, in which about 200 ballistic missiles were fired at Israel.
Israel blames Iran for backing Hezbollah, which has had northern Israel under near constant rocket fire since the 7 October Hamas attack inside southern Israel in 2023. Tens of thousands of Israelis have been forced from their homes in the north of the country. Israel attacked on Iran on 26 October, with Tehran anticipated to respond again.
30 reported killed by Israeli airstrikes on Gaza as IDF orders more Palestinians to flee their homes
Israeli strikes across the Gaza Strip have now killed at least 30 Palestinians since Monday night, Palestinian media and medics said on Tuesday, as the IDF issued further evacuation orders for the besieged Palestinian territory.
Reuters reports that an airstrike damaged two houses in the town of Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza, and killed at least 20 people late on Monday, citing Palestinian official news agency WAFA and Hamas media.
Palestinian health officials said six people had also been killed in two separate Israeli airstrikes in Gaza City and Deir Al-Balah, while four other people were killed in the central Gazan town of Al-Zawayda around midnight. At least two children were among those reported dead.
Israeli planes have dropped leaflets over Beit Lahiya in the far north of the territory ordering residents who have not yet left their homes and shelters housing displaced families to leave the town.
“To all those who remained at homes and shelters, you are risking your lives. For your safety you have to head south,” said the leaflet, which was written in Arabic. UN agencies have said that almost all of Gaza’s 2.4 million people have been displaced at least once during the course of the war.
Al Jazeera, citing Gaza’s civil defence, reports that Israeli forces continue to disrupt humanitarian and medical services in northern Gaza for the 14th day in a row.
In a statement issued earlier, Israel’s military claimed that during its operations in the north of Gaza it has “eliminated dozens of terrorists during close-quarters encounters and aerial strikes and dismantled terrorist infrastructure sites.”
It has not been possible for journalists to independently verify the casualty figures being issued during the conflict.
Reuters has a quick snap, citing Interfax, that Russia is evacuating about 100 of its citizens from Beirut to Moscow on a special flight.
Israel’s army and the Shin Bet have announced that they have arrested what they described as over 60 members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Lebanon. In a statement they said senior figures were among those arrested.
Palestinian news agency Wafa reports that Israeli security forces have detained at least 15 people this morning in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
It takes, the agency says, the number of people detained by Israel in the 13 months since the 7 October attack to over 11,600.
Here are some images of the scenes of protest in Tel Aviv, where relatives and loved ones of Israelis still being held captive in Gaza by Hamas are calling on Benjamin Netanyahu’s Israeli government to do more to secure their release.
Al Jazeera reports that the death toll from an Israeli strike on tents housing displaced people in central Gaza has risen to six, and includes a six-year-old and a four-year-old child.
Lebanon’s Nation News Agency has reported that the Israeli army, which has been staging incursions inside the south of the country, “is booby-trapping and destroying entire neighbourhoods in cities and towns, such that more than 37 towns have been wiped out and their homes destroyed, and more than 40,000 housing units have been completely destroyed.”
The report suggests that Israeli forces are clearing an area 3km deep that runs from Naqoura on the coast to Khiam in the east.
At least four people killed by Israeli security forces in occupied West Bank
At least four people were killed on Tuesday during an Israeli military raid and airstrikes on the Israeli-occupied West Bank, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
Reuters reports the Palestinian ministry said two people had been killed in the city of Qabatiya and two others in the Tammoun area.
Palestinian news agency named one of those killed in Tammoun as Hani Bani Odeh, and said that the body of the second dead person there had been taken by Israeli forces.
Palestinian media sources report that Hezbollah claims to have targeted Israeli forces in the north of the country at Dovev, which is close to the UN-drawn blue line that separates Lebanon and Israel.
Earlier the Israeli military reported that warning sirens were sounding in the Upper Galilee area.
Israeli media reports that the Iranian-backed militia Islamic Resistance in Iraq has claimed to have launched three drones overnight that were aimed at Haifa.
A protest in Tel Aviv by relatives and friends of those still being held hostage in Gaza by Hamas has again blocked the southern Ayalon highway.
Haaretz quotes the protestors saying in a statement:
Netanyahu is sacrificing the lives of the 101 hostages in Gaza, who have been held there for nearly 400 days, and repeatedly endangering our security.
A government that conducts psychological warfare against its own people, while continuously forsaking them, has no mandate to continue a war. Only signing a hostage deal and ending the war in Gaza will bring everyone home.
Hamas seized about 250 hostages from Israel during the 7 October attack in 2023, of which about 100 are still believed to be held in Gaza. A significant number of them are believed to have been killed.
Lebanese media reports further fighting in the south of the country
The National News Agency in Lebanon has reported fighting in the south of the country, near Halta, Kfarchouba and Chebaa, all of which are close to the blue line that separates Israel and Lebanon.
In its report, the agency says “some heights are witnessing movements of enemy [Israeli] infantry forces and vehicles … these movements are being targeted by [Hezbollah] rocket salvos, while the forested areas remain exposed to artillery shelling and airstrikes from time to time.”
Yesterday the Israeli military said it was “conducting limited, localised, targeted raids based on precise intelligence in thicketed terrain along the border fence in southern Lebanon, where the Hezbollah terrorist organisation has established itself.”
The death toll in Lebanon since Israel stepped up its campaign and began launching significant airstrikes has reached over 3,000 according to Lebanese authorities.
Tens of thousands of Israelis have been forced to flee their homes in northern Israel by near constant rocket fire from inside Lebanon, which itself has seen over a million people displaced by Israeli attacks.
Israel’s military says that following an “hostile aircraft infiltration” warning in Masada in southern Israel near the Dead Sea, its air force intercepted a UAV that crossed into Israel from the east. It also claims to have intercepted a separate drone that crossed into Israel from Lebanon this morning.
At least 29 killed by Israeli strikes on Gaza including attacks on tents housing displaced people
At least 29 Palestinians were killed early on Tuesday by Israeli airstrikess on Gaza, including on tents housing displaced people. Casualties were recorded in Beit Lahiya, Deir Al-Balah and the town of Al-Zawayda, Reuters reports, citing Palestinian news agency Wafa.
According to Wafa, 20 people were killed in a heavy airstrike on a home in Beit Lahiya, located in the northern part of Gaza, two people were killed when a tent in central Deir al-Balah was hit and four people were killed and others injured in a similar attack on a tent in al-Zawayda.
It has not been possible for journalists to independently verify the casualty figures being issued during the conflict.
US steps up criticism of Israel over Gaza conditions amid threat of possible sanctions
Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of the conflict in the Middle East.
The Biden administration has stepped up criticism of Israel for not doing enough to improve humanitarian conditions in Gaza as a 30-day deadline for Israeli officials to meet certain requirements or face potential sanctions looms.
State department spokesperson Matthew Miller on Monday gave Israel a “fail” grade in terms of meeting the conditions laid out in a letter last month to senior Israeli officials by secretary of state Antony Blinken and defense secretary Lloyd Austin. He said there were still roughly nine days until the deadline expires, but that limited progress thus far has been insufficient.
“As of today, the situation has not significantly turned around,” Miller told reporters.
It comes as Israel formally notified the United Nations of its intention to ban the UN relief agency for Palestinian refugees, Unrwa, in a move the country’s allies and aid workers warn will deepen the humanitarian crisis in the Middle East.
Israeli airstrikes killed at least 16 Palestinians in Gaza on Monday and residents feared new air and ground attacks were aimed at emptying areas of civilians in the territory’s north.
In other developments:
More than 50 countries are urging the UN security council and general assembly to take immediate steps to halt arms sales or transfers to Israel, saying there are “reasonable grounds” to suspect the military materiel will be used in conflict-torn Gaza and the West Bank.
Israel claims to have killed two senior Hezbollah commanders in southern Lebanon in two separate strikes, as it continues its attacks on what it calls terrorist infrastructure. Lebanese authorities have put the death toll from Israeli airstrikes in the country at over 2,800.
Palestinian authorities in the Israeli-occupied West Bank have said that a massacre was narrowly avoided after an arson attack attributed to Israeli settlers on a building and about 20 cars in Al-Bireh, near to Ramallah. Witness said ten people poured liquid on the cars to torch them. Israeli security forces say they are investigating the incident.
The World Health Organization (WHO) says that 94,431 children under the age of 10 got a polio vaccine over the weekend, which represents 79% of the target in northern Gaza. At least 90% vaccination of a population is needed to stop the spread of the virus.
Leaks from Netanyahu’s office may have compromised a peace deal, an Israeli court found. A breakdown in peace negotiations may have been caused by leaked and falsified documents involving a close aide to the prime minister, an Israeli court has said. The leaking of the documents – to Britain’s Jewish Chronicle and Germany’s tabloid Bild – came at a crucial time for hostage negotiations.
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