israeli warcrimes in Gaza reports 2024:

April week4 part2 -- April week 4 --  April week 3 2024 --  April - March, 2024

 When one hurts or kills a women
one hurts or kills hummanity and is an antrocitie.
Gino d'Artali
and: My mother (1931-1997) always said to me <Mi figlio, non esistono notizie <vecchie> perche puoi imparare qualcosa da qualsiasi notizia.> Translated: <My son, there is no such thing as so called 'old' news because you can learn something from any news.>
Gianna d'Artali.

israeli warcrimes in Gaza reports 2024:
with special thanks to citizen-reporter 'Biba' (Algeria)

Sky News - April 22, 2024
<<Major General Aharon Haliva: Israeli intelligence chief quits IDF over 7 October attack
Major General Haliva, who has served 38 years in the IDF, said: <I will carry the horrible pain of the war with me forever.>
The Israeli military intelligence chief has resigned after failures that led to the deadly 7 October Hamas attack on Israel. Major General Aharon Haliva was one of several senior commanders who said they failed to predict and prevent the most devastating attack in the country's history.
He is the first senior figure to quit the IDF since the assault.
In his resignation letter, he said the intelligence division under his command <did not live up to the task we were entrusted with>. Major General Haliva, who has served 38 years in the IDF, added: <I carry that black day with me ever since, day after day, night after night. I will carry the horrible pain of the war with me forever.> Lower-level intelligence officials reportedly had information that Hamas was hatching a plan to launch an attack, but Israel did not foresee the group's surprise attack when militants stormed the Gaza border and rampaged through Israeli communities, military bases and a music festival.>>
Source:
https://news.sky.com/story/major-general-aharon-haliva-israeli-intelligence-chief-quits-idf-over-7-october-attack-13120904

Sky News - April 22, 2024 - by Alex Crawford - Special correspondent @AlexCrawfordSky
<<Trail of destruction in Lebanon's 'ghost towns' - as daily explosions fuel fears of escalating war. Village after village, town after town have been left like ghost towns, with those homes still standing now emptied of residents. We saw multiple houses and buildings flattened, craters in roads and acres of farmland left burned and unusable. The UN Special Coordinator for Lebanon has told Sky News the dangers in the region have not gone away and called for calm, wisdom and de-escalation as a matter of urgency. Joanna Wronecka spoke from her office in Beirut about her worries and appealed for restraint from all those involved. <I'm very concerned,> she said. <Because we need just a small miscalculation and the situation can escalate even more.> She was referring to the spike in cross-border firing between the Israeli military and the Lebanese Hezbollah fighters who've been trading attacks with growing intensity since 7 October. It's resulted in around 100,000 Lebanese fleeing their homes along the border and around 80,000 being forced to leave their communities on the Israeli side. We saw a trail of destruction as we joined a UN peacekeepers patrol in south Lebanon. Village after village, town after town have been left like ghost towns, with those homes still standing now emptied of residents. We saw multiple houses and buildings flattened, craters in roads and acres of farmland left burned and unusable. In Alma Shaab town, a few hardy folk have opted to stay despite the dangers. <It's dangerous to stay here,> Nader Eid said. <But we have to. We have to survive and we have to keep our home safe... and to keep Alma safe.>
Middle East violence 'will not stop until Gaza war ends'
Situation in northern Israel 'untenable'
Are Israel and Lebanon heading for war?
Exchange of fire is regular and often
Walking past crushed buildings which were once people's homes, Lieutenant Colonel Bruno Vio from the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) says the exchange of fire and attacks is regular and often. <For sure, it's daily,> he says. <Every day we can count some different kind of activity and in different numbers.> The UN mission in the country, only weeks ago, marked its 46th anniversary but used it to call for all involved to lay down their weapons and talk peace. Before the Hamas attack inside Israel on 7 October, the border area was judged to have enjoyed a relative period of calm and stability but that all changed with the events across the border. Since then Hezbollah fighters and Israeli troops have been exchanging more and more serious fire, violating the terms of an earlier agreement contained in the UN Resolution 1701. That agreement preserved what's known as the Blue Line - an official demarcation area on disputed territory between Lebanon and Israel. All sides agreed this would be a demilitarised zone with no militia or military engagement in this area. But Israeli forces continue to strike inside Lebanon at locations they say are being used by Hezbollah to mount attacks inside Israel. Hezbollah argues they are mounting strikes in support of the Palestinians under Israeli bombardment in Gaza, as well as distracting IDF troops on a separate additional front. There are many suspicions among the Lebanese that the Israeli attacks are an attempt to snatch territory from them. Whatever the motivations, the daily explosions have fuelled concerns across the region over the potential for the war to escalate hugely, drawing in multiple militias in multiple countries.
'Lebanon is in a very sensitive place'
Ms Wronecka says: <One mistake, one miscalculation can make a difference and put this region in a completely new situation. And taking Lebanon's geopolitical position into account, Lebanon is in a very sensitive place. <So we deploy every day, every moment to speak about responsibility and restraint.> Lebanon is home to around 250,000 Palestinian refugees, among them an 85-year-old man called Abu Jamal. He fled to safety in Lebanon more than seven decades ago during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. The hugely traumatic event became known as the Nakba (catastrophe in Arabic) and saw more than half the Palestinian population displaced and dispossessed with many never returning to their homes.

Abu Jamal
'I pray to see my country before I die'
Mr Jamal sees many parallels between what's happening now in Gaza and what he fears may happen in parts of Lebanon too. He was eight when he left his family home - a day he remembers with searing clarity. He has a large key which he says was the key to his family's front door, now part of Israel. He said: <My dad told me that it would be one or two months and we'd go back home - and we've been here in Lebanon for 76 years. This is the key to our home. I'm still hanging it in my bedroom. I pray to God we return back to our country Palestine. I pray I see my country and our land before I die.>
Reporting with cameraman Jake Britton, specialist producer Chris Cunningham and Lebanon producer Jihad Jineid.>>
Source and video:
https://news.sky.com/story/trail-of-destruction-in-lebanons-ghost-towns-as-daily-explosions-fuel-fears-of-escalating-war-13120463

France 24 - April 22, 2024
<<About 200 bodies recovered from mass grave in Nasser hospital complex, says Gaza official
Gaza's Civil Defence agency said Monday that health workers had uncovered around 200 bodies over the past three days of people killed and buried by Israeli forces at a hospital in Khan Yunis. Palestinians react after the body of a relative was found buried by Israeli forces in the Nasser Hospital compound in Khan Younis, on April 21, 2024. The Israeli military did not offer an immediate comment. <Our civil defence crews are still recovering bodies from inside Nasser Medical Complex, and since Saturday bodies of nearly 200 martyrs have been retrieved,> Mahmud Bassal, spokesman for Gaza's Civil Defence, told AFP. Bassal said several of the recovered bodies had decomposed. <There is difficulty in the process of identifying them but civil defence efforts are ongoing,> he said. Ismail al-Thawabta, head of the Hamas government media office in the Palestinian territory, gave a higher figure of 283 bodies found at the hospital. <We discovered mass graves inside Nasser Medical Complex> of people killed by <the occupation (Israeli) army>, Thawabta told AFP. Muhammad al-Mughayyir, a senior official at the civil defence agency, also confirmed the discovery of corpses at the facility and said the work to retrieve the remaining bodies would continue until Thursday.
(AFP)>>
Source and video:
https://www.france24.com/en/middle-east/20240422-scores-bodies-found-in-mass-graves-unearthed-at-hospital-in-gaza-khan-younis

Sky News - April 22, 2024 - by Dominic Waghorn - International affairs editor @DominicWaghorn
<<Baby saved from womb of mother killed in Israeli strike
Doctors told the Sky News team in Gaza how they saved the life of an unborn baby even as her mother was dying from head injuries. Palestinians in Rafah are reeling from a series of devastating Israeli airstrikes that have killed 22 people - including 18 children. The last 48 hours, horrific even by Gaza's standards, are an indicator of what may follow in any Israeli Rafah offensive. Doctors told the Sky News team in Gaza how they saved the life of an unborn baby even as her mother was dying from head injuries.
.....
<We tried to rescue the patient,> Dr Ahmad Fawzi said. <We realised that she was pregnant. We had to do an emergency caesarean to save the baby. Thanks to God, we managed to save the baby.> The little girl lies in an incubator. She has no name but there is tape attached to her hand with writing that says: <The baby of the martyr Sabreen al Sakani.> The baby's mother Sabreen, her father Shoukri, and three-year-old sister Malak all died in the Israeli airstrike. Her uncle says he will care for her now. Israel's military says it <struck several military targets of the terrorist organisations in Gaza including military compounds, launch posts and armed terrorists>. Also in Rafah, another airstrike killed 17 children and two women all from the same extended family, say Palestinians. There were heartbreaking scenes at the hospital as relatives mourned the children being placed in body bags. A relative, Umm Kareem, told how the children were killed as they slept in their beds, saying: <These children were sleeping. What did they do? What was their fault? Pregnant women at home, sleeping children, the husband's aunt is 80 years old. What did this woman do? Did she fire missiles? We complain about our concerns to God.> The strikes, all in Rafah, have provoked unusually sharp criticism of Israel by the UK government. Lord Ahmad, foreign minister for the Middle East, tweeted that he was <appalled by the Israeli strike, on a residential apartment in the densely populated Rafah in Gaza, which resulted in more children being killed>. <We must stop this fighting immediately and bring an end to this conflict,> he added. But there is no end in sight. Quite the opposite.>>
Read more and watch videos here:
https://news.sky.com/story/baby-saved-from-womb-of-mother-killed-in-israeli-strike-13120661

France 24 - April 22, 2024 - By: NEWS WIRES
<<Rockets fired from northern Iraq target US-led coalition base in Syria
Rockets were fired late Sunday from northern Iraq at a military base in Syria housing a US-led coalition, according to Iraqi security forces. In response, the Iraqi forces launched a major search operation in northern Nineveh province and found the vehicle used in the attack, they said in a statement. It is the first major attack against the coalition forces in several weeks. It comes days after Israel reportedly responded to an Iranian attack with a drone strike on the Islamic republic, amid tensions fuelled by the Gaza war. The statement from the Iraqi security forces accused <outlaw elements of having targeted a base of the international coalition with rockets in the heart of Syrian territory>, at around 9:50 pm (1850 GMT). The security forces burned the vehicle involved in the attack, the statement added. Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor, said several rockets had been fired <from Iraqi territory at the Kharab al-Jir base> in northeast Syria, where US forces are stationed. He accused the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a loose alliance of Iran-backed groups, of staging the attack. The group has claimed most of the attacks on US forces carried between mid-October and early February. Following a series of rocket attacks and drone strikes by pro-Iran armed factions against US soldiers deployed in the Middle East over the winter, there had been several weeks of calm.
Rising regional tension
The Islamic Resistance in Iraq has said it is acting in solidarity with Palestinians and out of anger at US support for Israel in the Gaza war. A January 28 drone attack killed three US soldiers in the Jordanian desert on the Syrian border. In response, the US military struck dozens of targets in Syria and Iraq, aiming for pro-Iran forces, and drawing criticism from the governments of both countries. The United States has around 2,500 soldiers stationed in Iraq and nearly 900 across the border in Syria as part of an international coalition created in 2014 to fight the Islamic State group (IS).
Sunday night's rocket attack came against the background of increasing tension in the region, with a flare-up between Iran and Israel. Early on Saturday, an explosion at an Iraqi military base killed one person and wounded eight others. Security forces said the blast hit the Kalsu military base in Babylon province south of Baghdad, where regular army, police and members of Iraq's Popular Mobilisation Forces, or Hashed al-Shaabi, are stationed. CENTCOM, the US military command in the region, denied involvement in a strike there. The Israeli army refused to comment.
(AFP)>>
Source:
https://www.france24.com/en/middle-east/20240422-rockets-fired-northern-iraq-hit-us-led-coalition-base-syria

France 24 - April 22, 2024 - Video by: Kethevane GORJESTANI
<<What is the IDF's Netzah Yehuda battalion and why might the US sanction it?
The United States appears close to sanctioning an Israeli military unit known as the Netzah Yehuda battalion over alleged human rights violations in the West Bank, a move the Israeli prime minister angrily denounced as <the height of absurdity.> France 24's Kethevane Gorjestani takes a look at why the US might sanction the unit and what the consequences could be.>>
Watch the video here:
https://www.france24.com/en/video/20240422-what-is-the-idf-s-netzah-yehuda-battalion-and-why-might-the-us-sanction-it

France 24 - April 22, 2024
<<Israel carries out new air strikes on Gaza after military intelligence chief resigns
Israel's military intelligence chief has resigned after taking responsibility for failures leading to the Hamas attack on October 7, the military said on Monday, as Israel carried out more shelling in war-battered Gaza. Read our blog to see how the day's events unfolded.
10:43pm: Pro-Palestinian protests sweep US college campuses following mass arrests at Columbia. Columbia canceled in-person classes, dozens of protesters were arrested at Yale and the gates to Harvard Yard were closed to the public on Monday as some of the most prestigious US universities sought to diffuse campus tensions over Israel's war with Hamas. The various actions followed the arrest last week of more than 100 pro-Palestinian demonstrators who had camped out on Columbia's green, as schools struggle with where to draw the line between allowing free expression while maintaining a safe and inclusive campus. In addition to the demonstrations at the Ivy League schools, pro-Palestinian encampments have sprouted up on other campuses, including the University of Michigan, New York University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The protests have pitted students against one another, with pro-Palestinian students demanding that their schools condemn Israel's assault on Gaza and divest from companies that sell weapons to Israel. Some Jewish students, meanwhile, say much of the criticism of Israel has veered into anti-Semitism and made them feel unsafe, and point out that Hamas is still holding hostages taken during the group's October 7 attack.
9:14pm: Hamas has 'moved goal post' on hostage talks, says State Department
Palestinian militant group Hamas has <moved the goal post> and changed its demands in the hostage negotiations with Israel mediated by Egypt and Qatar, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said on Monday. Speaking at a daily press briefing, Miller said the United States would continue to push for an agreement that would see hostages taken on October 7 released and a pause in fighting in Gaza. Separately, Miller said the United States had received a report by former French foreign minister Catherine Colonna into the UN aid agency for Palestinians, UNRWA, and is reviewing it.
9:06pm: Gaza official says about 200 bodies exhumed at hospital since Saturday
Gaza's Civil Defence agency said Monday that health workers had uncovered around 200 bodies over the past three days of people killed and buried by Israeli forces at a hospital in Khan Younis. When asked for comment, the Israeli military said: <We will come back to you on the matter.> Mahmud Bassal, spokesman for Gaza's Civil Defence, told AFP that <civil defence crews are still recovering bodies from inside Nasser Medical Complex, and since Saturday bodies of nearly 200 martyrs have been retrieved>. Bassal said several of the recovered bodies had decomposed.
<There is difficulty in the process of identifying them but civil defence efforts are ongoing,> he said.
9:03pm: Hezbollah fires dozens of rockets into northern Israel, drawing retaliatory strikes.
Hezbollah fired dozens of rockets into northern Israel on Monday, drawing retaliatory strikes. The Israeli military said 35 projectiles were launched at one of its bases, striking the sources of the rocket fire, without causing any casualties. Hezbollah said its attack was in response to recent Israeli strikes on towns and villages in southern Lebanon. The two sides have traded fire on a near-daily basis along the border since the start of the war in Gaza. Hezbollah says it is acting in solidarity with the Palestinian Hamas militant group, which triggered the war with its October 7 attack into southern Israel. The low-intensity fighting has repeatedly threatened to boil over as Israel has targeted senior Hezbollah militants in recent months.
8:51pm: Drone and rocket attacks targeted US forces in Iraq, US officials say
US forces in Iraq and Syria faced two separate rocket and explosive drone attacks in less than 24 hours, Iraqi security sources and US officials told Reuters on Monday, in the first such incidents reported after a near three-month pause. Two drones were shot down near Ain al-Asad air base that hosts US troops in the western Iraqi province of Anbar out of an abundance of caution, a US official said. That followed five rockets fired from northern Iraq toward US forces at a base in Rumalyn in remote northeastern Syria on Sunday, according to US and Iraqi officials. There were no reports of casualties or significant damage from the attacks.
8:42pm: Blinken says US looking into alleged Israeli human rights abuses in Gaza
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday said that the United States is looking into allegations of human rights abuses by Israel in its operations against Hamas in Gaza. Unveiling the State Department's annual human rights report, Blinken denied the United States has a double standard when it comes to Israel and human rights. <Do we have a double standard? The answer is no,> Blinken told reporters. <In general, as we're looking at human rights and the condition of human rights around the world, we apply the same standard to everyone. That doesn't change whether the country is an adversary, a competitor, a friend or an ally,> he said. <When it comes to allegations of incidents or whether it's violations of international humanitarian law, rights abuses...we have processes within the department that are looking at that incidents that have been raised. Those processes are ongoing,> Blinken said.
6:39pm: Review of UN agency helping Palestinian refugees found Israel did not express concern about staff
An independent review of the neutrality of the UN agency helping Palestinian refugees found that Israel never expressed concern about anyone on the staff lists it has received annually since 2011. The review was carried out after Israel alleged that a dozen employees of the agency known as UNRWA had participated in Hamas' October 7 attacks. The review found that <Israel has yet to provide supporting evidence> for a recent claim that UNRWA employs more than 400 <terrorists.> In a wide-ranging 48-page report released Monday, the independent panel said UNRWA has <robust> procedures to uphold the UN principle of neutrality, but it cited serious gaps in implementation, including staff publicly expressing political views, textbooks with <problematic content> and staff unions disrupting operations. From 2017 to 2022, the report said the annual number of allegations of neutrality being breached at UNRWA ranged from 7 to 55. But between January 2022 and February 2024 UN investigators received 151 allegations, most related to social media posts <made public by external sources,> it said. In a key section on the neutrality of staff, the panel, which was led by former French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna, said UNRWA shares lists of staff with host countries for its 32,000 staff, including about 13,000 in Gaza. But it said Israeli officials never expressed concern and informed panel members it did not consider the list <a screening or vetting process> but rather a procedure to register diplomats.
5:36pm: Columbia cancels in-person classes as demonstrations sprout on US campuses to protest Israel war
Columbia University canceled in-person classes on Monday and new demonstrations broke out on other U.S. college campuses as tensions continue to grow over Israel's war in Gaza. Police arrested several dozen protesters at Yale University on Monday morning after officials at the New Haven, Connecticut, school said they defied warnings over the weekend to leave. And following arrests last week at Columbia, pro-Palestinian demonstrators set up encampments on other campuses around the country, including at the University of Michigan, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of North Carolina. The developments came hours before the Monday evening start of the Jewish holiday of Passover.
4:42pm: Gaza health system 'completely obliterated', says UN expert
Israel's war in Gaza has from the start been a <war on the right to health> and has <obliterated> the Palestinian territory's health system, a UN expert said on Monday. Tlaleng Mofokeng, the United Nations special rapporteur on the right to health, accused Israel of treating human rights as an <a la carte menu>. Just days into the war that has been raging in Gaza since Hamas's unprecedented attacks inside Israel on October 7, <the medical infrastructure was irreparably damaged>, she told reporters in Geneva. Amid the unrelenting Israeli bombardment of Gaza, healthcare providers had for months been working under dire conditions with very limited access to medical supplies, she said. <This has been a war on the right to health from the beginning,> said Mofokeng, who is an independent expert appointed by the UN Human Rights Council but who does not speak on behalf of the United Nations.>>
Read more here:
https://www.france24.com/en/middle-east/20240422-%F0%9F%94%B4-live-netanyahu-vows-to-reject-any-us-sanctions-on-army-battalions

Sky News - April 20, 2024
<<Middle East latest: No concern expressed from Israel about UNRWA employees since 2011, review finds
An independent report commissioned after Israel alleged 12 UNRWA employees took part in the Hamas attacks has found Israel had not expressed concerns about anyone on the agency staff lists it gets annually for more than a decade.
Pakistani PM praises Iran's 'strong stand on Palestine'
The prime minister of Pakistan has praised Iran's <strong stand on the issue of Palestine>. Shehbaz Sharif has welcomed Ebrahim Raisi, the president of Iran, to his country for a three-day visit. <Pakistan is also with the Palestinians,> Mr Sharif said. In televised remarks, Mr Raisi said the deaths caused by the Israeli military in Gaza were being committed with the support of the United States and other Western countries. Regarding international organisations - including the United Nations - he said: <They say they support human rights, but they proved that they are inefficient.>
Iran recently launched an unprecedented missile and drone attack against Israel - after an alleged Israeli strike in Syria that killed two Iranian generals. Pakistan is among countries that have no diplomatic relations with Israel because of the issue of Palestinian statehood.
Analysis: 'Unsustainable' for Netanyahu not to acknowledge blame for 7 October attacks
By Alistair Bunkall, Middle East correspondent
It's taken 199 days for the first senior Israeli to resign over the Hamas attacks on 7 October.
Major General Aharon Haliva, Israel's military intelligence chief, said that under his command, the division <did not live up to the task we were entrusted with>. The argument that has kept military heads in post - one made by generals, intelligence chiefs and even Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu - is that judgement should be suspended while the war against Hamas is being fought. There is cold logic in that, but almost seven months in, and with no conclusion in sight, judgement day is nearing and more Israelis are demanding accountability for the failure of their leaders.
General Haliva isn't the only IDF commander to express regret - he is the first to fall on his sword, though.
Others have hinted they will, when the time is right.
If they conclude that standing down is the honourable thing to do, then pressure will grow on Mr Netanyahu. He remains the one leader yet to acknowledge blame. It is unsustainable - although the prime minister's position is reasonably stable for now.
Tonight, Israelis are sitting down to a Jewish festival - Passover - with 132 people still being held hostage in Gaza and the defeat of Hamas looking increasingly unlikely. Major General Haliva's resignation will not bring Mr Netanyahu down, but it might be the first brick to come out of the wall.
EU foreign minsters propose new sanctions against Iran after direct attack on Israel
EU foreign ministers have agreed in principle to increase sanctions against Iran, the bloc's foreign policy chief Josep Borrell has said. It follows Iran's unprecedented missile and drone attack against Israel on 13 April. There are already multiple European Union sanctions programmes against Iran.
These are for proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, human rights abuses, and supplying drones to Russia. Several EU countries, however, have been calling for more sanctions regarding drones to cover missiles and transfers to proxy forces such as Hamas and Hezbollah. <We have reached a political agreement in order to enlarge and expand the existing drone (sanctions) regime in order to cover missiles and their potential ... transfer to Russia,> Mr Borrell told reporters following a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg.
Israel said that 99% of the objects launched towards it were shot down.
Analysis: Reckoning in Israel after massive intelligence and military failure
More resignations are possible after the head of Israeli military intelligence stood down earlier today, our international affairs editor Dominic Waghorn has said. Major General Aharon Haliva admitted he failed to foresee and prevent the Hamas attacks in Israel on 7 October. Asked whether there could be more resignations, Waghorn said: <I think so, potentially.> It is worth remembering that a <number of IDF commanders and intelligence chiefs have admitted responsibility and declared mea culpas in the wake of 7 October>, he added. Mr Haliva had written <quite a long resignation letter saying the burden of what he has to bear after 7 October is something that will live with him all his life>. Waghorn added that there is a <reckoning> as Israel tries to work out what happened on 7 October, which was a <massive intelligence and military failure>. <There will be a commission of inquiry and investigation,> Waghorn said. <It's the beginning of what will be a long and I think very painful process for Israel as it comes to terms with the failures that led to the worst loss of Jewish life since World War Two.>
No concern expressed from Israel about UNRWA employees since 2011, review finds
Israel did not express concerns about anyone on the UNRWA staff lists it received annually since 2011, an independent review has found. The report was commissioned after Israel alleged that a dozen employees of the United Nations agency helping Palestinian refugees took part in the Hamas attacks in Israel on 7 October. A number of countries, including the UK, froze donations to UNRWA as a result. Some of those nations - and the EU - have since restored funding, but the UK has not. The 48-page report said UNRWA has <robust> procedures to uphold the UN's principle of neutrality.
However, it said there were serious gaps in implementation, including staff publicly expressing political views, textbooks with <problematic content>, and staff unions disrupting operations. The report, led by French former foreign minister Catherine Colonna, said that between 2017 and 2022, allegations of neutrality being breached at UNRWA ranged annually from 7 to 55. Between January 2022 and February 2024, UN investigators received 151 allegations - most of them related to social media posts <made public by external sources>, the report added. It said UNRWA shares lists of staff with host countries for its 32,000 staff, including about 13,000 in Gaza. It added that Israeli officials never expressed concerns and informed panel members they did not consider the list to be a <screening or vetting process>, but rather a procedure to register diplomats. The Israeli foreign ministry told the panel that until March 2024, staff lists did not include Palestinian identification numbers, the report said. Apparently based on those numbers, <Israel made public claims that a significant number of UNRWA employees are members of terrorist organizations>, the panel said.
It added: <However, Israel has yet to provide supporting evidence of this.>
US forces 'targeted in two attacks' in less than 24 hours
US forces in Iraq and Syria have been targeted in two separate rocket and drone attacks in less than 24 hours, Reuters news agency reports, citing security sources and US officials. At least one armed drone was launched at the Ain al Asad air base hosting US troops in the western Iraqi province of Anbar, a US official said. That attack followed five rockets fired from Iraq yesterday towards US forces at a base in Rumalyn, northeastern Syria, according to US and Iraqi officials. Referring to the rocket attack, Iraqi armed faction Kata'ib Hezbollah earlier denied it had resumed attacks on US forces after a three-month pause.
No casualties have been reported from the drone attacks.
On Saturday, a huge explosion at a military base in Iraq killed a member of an Iraqi security force that includes Iran-backed groups. The force's commander said it was an attack, while the army said it is investigating and there were no warplanes in the sky at the time.
The US denied involvement.
Israeli troops 're-enter Gazan city', forcing residents to flee again - report
Israeli troops have launched a surprise raid in the eastern part of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, Reuters is reporting. Israel pulled its troops out of southern Gaza earlier this month, but their apparent return has caused residents to flee once more, the news agency added. <They were too frightened,> 42-year-old Ahmed Rezik said from a school where he is sheltering in the western part of Khan Younis. <This morning many families who had left here in the past two weeks to go back home to Abassan came back,> he told Reuters via a messaging app. <They said tanks pushed in the eastern area of the town under heavy fire, and they had to run for their lives.> Meanwhile, Palestinian authorities said more bodies had been recovered from mass graves on the site of the city's main hospital, abandoned by Israeli troops (11.33 post). Further south, there are reports of fresh air strikes in Rafah, where more than half the enclave's 2.3 million people have sought shelter.
Source and watch: A 'horrific' 48 hours in Gaza:
https://news.sky.com/story/middle-east-latest-un-nuclear-watchdog-concerned-israel-could-target-iranian-nuclear-facilities-in-revenge-attack-12978800

France 24 - April 21, 2024
<<Rafah offensive: Israel seeks to confront Hamas's last brigades, control border tunnels
Israel continues to carry out near-daily air raids on Rafah, where more than half of Gaza's population of 2.3 million has sought refuge from fighting elsewhere, vowing to expand its ground offensive to the city. "Israel still believes it needs to go into Rafah and confront Hamas's last four brigades there," ABC Correspondent Jordana Miller told FRANCE 24. Israel also seeks to control a corridor with many tunnels located on the border with Egypt which it believes is used by Hamas to acquire weapons, Miller said.>>
Watch the video here:
https://www.france24.com/en/video/20240421-en-nw-grab-q2-jordana-miller-from-08h-shpakova-anna

France 24 - April 21, 2024
<<Demonstrators gather outside US Capitol to protest Israel aid bill
Anti-war protesters gathered outside the American Capitol building on Saturday in a last-ditch effort to convince lawmakers to abandon sending more military aid to Israel. Despite their efforts, the US House of Representatives passed the bill which includes more than $26 billion to be spent on Israel and Palestinians with most of the money going to Israel.>>
Watch the video here:
https://www.france24.com/en/video/20240421-demonstrators-gather-outside-us-capitol-to-protest-israel-aid-bill

France 24 - April 21, 2024
<<Israeli forces kill more than 14 Palestinians in West Bank raid
The Palestinian Red Crescent rescue service said it has recovered a total of 14 bodies from an Israeli raid in the Nur Shams urban refugee camp in the West Bank that began late Thursday. At least 469 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli soldiers and settlers in the West Bank since the start of the war in Gaza, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. Most have been killed during Israeli military arrest raids, which often trigger gunbattles, or in violent protests.>>
Watch video here:
https://www.france24.com/en/video/20240421-israeli-forces-kill-more-than-14-palestinians-in-west-bank-raid

France 24 - April 21, 2024
<<US ‘risks complicity’ in approving military aid for Israel, Oxfam says
The US House of Representatives Saturday approved $13 billion in new Israeli military aid amid mounting global criticism over the death toll and dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza. “To continue arming Israel after an ICJ decision that finds that there is a possible risk of genocide and a United Nations Security Council resolution that calls for an immediate, sustained ceasefire ... from our opinion, risks complicity,” said Bushra Khalidi, West Bank policy lead for Oxfam.>>
Watch the video here:
https://www.france24.com/en/video/20240421-israeli-soldiers-share-videos-celebrating-gaza-destruction-online

France 24 - April 21, 2024
<<Israeli soldiers share 'abusive' videos mocking destruction of Gaza online
Since the start of the war in Gaza over six months ago, Israeli soldiers have filmed and posted hundreds of videos of destruction in Gaza online. In the videos, Palestinians are mocked, destruction is a celebration and launching artillery is an opportunity to have a laugh. The Israel Defence Forces said they have called their soldiers to order and have sanctioned some of them without saying how many.>>
Watch the video here:
https://www.france24.com/en/video/20240421-israeli-soldiers-share-videos-celebrating-gaza-destruction-online

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