Israel-Hamas war Highlights: Five soldiers killed in northern Gaza strip, says Israeli army

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Thursday military operations in Gaza's southern city of Rafah were crucial in the fight against Palestinian militants."The battle in Rafah is critical... it is a fight that decides many things in this campaign," he said. (AFP)

The House was set Thursday to deliver a rebuke to President Joe Biden for pausing a shipment of bombs to Israel, voting on legislation that would seek to force the weapons transfer as Republicans worked to highlight Democratic divisions over the Israel-Hamas war.Seeking to discourage Israel from its offensive on the crowded southern Gaza city of Rafah, the Biden administration this month put on hold a weapons shipment of 3,500 bombs — some as large as 2,000 pounds — that are capable of killing hundreds in populated areas. Republicans were outraged, accusing Biden of abandoning the closest U.S. ally in the Middle East.Debate over the bill, rushed to the House floor by GOP leadership this week, showed Washington's deeply fractured outlook on the Israel-Hamas war. The White House and Democratic leadership have scrambled to rally support from a House caucus that ranges from moderates frustrated that the president would allow any daylight between the U.S. and Israel to progressives outraged that he is still sending any weapons at all. (AP)

The United Nations' top court on Thursday opened two days of hearings into a request from South Africa to press Israel to halt its military operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where more than half of Gaza's population has sought shelter. It is the fourth time South Africa has asked the International Court of Justice for emergency measures since the nation launched proceedings alleging that Israel's military action in its war with Hamas in Gaza amounts to genocide.

South Africa asked the top UN court on Thursday to order a halt to the Rafah offensive as part of its case in The Hague accusing Israel of genocide in the Gaza Strip, saying the Palestinian people faced "ongoing annihilation".The hearings at the International Court of Justice, also known as the World Court, come after South Africa last week asked for additional emergency measures to protect Rafah, a southern Gaza city where more than a million Palestinians have been sheltering.It also asked the court to order Israel to allow unimpeded access to Gaza for UN officials, organisations providing humanitarian aid, and journalists and investigators. It added that Israel has so far ignored and violated earlier court orders. (Reuters)

Israel's Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said Thursday that more troops would "enter Rafah" as military operations intensify in Gaza's far-southern city.The operation in Rafah "will continue as additional forces will enter" the area, Gallant said, adding that "several tunnels in the area have been destroyed by our troops... this activity will intensify"."Hundreds of [terror] targets have already been struck, and our forces are manoeuvring in the area," he said in a ministry statement. (AFP)

A judge decided Wednesday that a Southern California college professor will stand trial for involuntary manslaughter and battery in the death of a Jewish counter-protester during demonstrations over the Israel-Hamas war last year. Superior Court Judge Ryan Wright judge declared after a two-day preliminary hearing that there's enough evidence to try Loay Abdelfattah Alnaji, according to the Ventura County District Attorney's Office.

Israel's tanks pushed into the heart of Jabalia in northern Gaza on Thursday, facing anti-tank rockets and mortar bombs from militants concentrated there, while in the south, its forces pounded Rafah without advancing, Palestinian residents and militants said.The slow progress of Israel's offensive, more than seven months after it was prompted by Hamas' deadly cross-border raid, highlighted the difficulty of achieving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's aim of eradicating the militant group. (Reuters)

ebanese state-run media reported Thursday an overnight Israeli air raid on eastern Lebanon, where Hezbollah holds sway, hours after the Iran-backed armed group launched an attack deep into Israeli territory.Israel and Hamas ally Hezbollah have exchanged near-daily fire following the Palestinian group's October 7 attack on southern Israel that sparked the war in Gaza, now in its eighth month.Lebanon's official National News Agency said that "the outskirts of the eastern Lebanon mountain range, at midnight (2100 GMT Wednesday), was subjected to five enemy raids."

The US military finished installing a floating pier for the Gaza Strip on Thursday, with officials poised to begin ferrying badly needed humanitarian aid into the enclave besieged over seven months of intense fighting in the Israel-Hamas war.The final, overnight construction sets up a complicated delivery process more than two months after U.S. President Joe Biden ordered it to help Palestinians facing starvation as food and other supplies fail to make it in as Israel recently seized the key Rafah border crossing in its push on that southern city on the Egyptian border.

The Israeli military said Thursday that friendly fire had killed five soldiers the previous day in the northern Gaza Strip, where intense fighting in the Israel-Hamas war has resumed in recent days.Asked to confirm media reports that the five fatalities announced earlier in an official statement were caused by Israeli fire, according to a military spokesperson .

The United States aims to have a floating pier in place off the Gaza Strip coast in the coming days to boost aid deliveries, but Washington is facing the same challenges that have beset the United Nations and relief groups for months when it comes to distributing assistance to the war-torn enclave.These include working in a war zone to stave off a looming famine and a dire shortage of fuel for aid trucks. The United Nations also has yet to finalize its involvement in the distribution of aid once it comes off the pier.

Israeli soldiers operating in northern Gaza eliminated dozens of terrorists in encounters and airstrikes as Hamas tries to regroup in the Zeitoun area, the Israel Defense Forces said on Wednesday.The IDF said ground forces destroyed Hamas infrastructure, including a weapons workshop located near a school. Large numbers of weapons, including AK-47s, grenades, explosives and magazines, machines for producing rocket launchers as well as unspecified "intelligence management assets" were also uncovered.

Israeli PM Netanyahu says any move to establish an alternative to Hamas as the government of Gaza requires the group's elimination

The European Union urges Israel to end its military operation in Gaza's Rafah "immediately", warning that a failure to do so would undermine ties with the bloc."Should Israel continue its military operation in Rafah, it would inevitably put a heavy strain on the EU's relationship with Israel," said the statement issued in the EU's name by its foreign policy chief Josep Borrell. (AFP)

Ni'ma Ali Imad is desperate to get her wounded son Mohammed out of Gaza for the medical treatment that doctors say they cannot provide in the Palestinian enclave.

Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah group said it launched dozens of rockets at north Israel military positions Wednesday in retaliation for the killing of a member Israel said was a field commander.Israel and Hamas ally Hezbollah have exchanged near-daily fire following the Palestinian group's October 7 attack on southern Israel that sparked the war in Gaza.Hezbollah fighters on Wednesday attacked "the Meron base with dozens of Katyusha rockets, heavy rockets and artillery shells" as well as targeting a barrack with "heavy rockets," the group said.The attacks were "part of the response to the assassination carried out by the Israeli enemy in the south" the previous day, it said.Israel's army said sirens sounded in Meron on Wednesday without providing further details. (AFP)

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday his government unanimously rejected the U.N. decision to promote the recognition of a Palestinian state, his office said."We will not let them establish a terror state from which they can attack us even more," Netanyahu said. "Nobody will prevent us, Israel, from exercising our basic right to defend ourselves - not the U.N. General Assembly and not any other entity." (Reuters)

The Israeli army released drone footage showing armed men standing next to UN marked vehicles at a United Nations compound in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, and called on the UN to investigate.An IDF statement said that on Saturday, troops had identified fighters in the central logistics compound of the UN Palestinian relief agency UNRWA east of Rafah, where the Israli military has been operating for more than a week.An UNRWA spokesperson said the agency was examining the footage and would share information once it became available.Reuters located the footage by matching nearby buildings, poles, railings, tanks on a roof and greenery to satellite and file images, but was not able to verify the date it was filmed or the identity of the armed men.UNRWA has been the target of fierce criticism by Israel, which accuses the agency of cooperating with the Islamist movement Hamas in Gaza and has called for it to be disbanded. The agency, set up to help Palestinian refugees displaced during the war that broke out around the time of the creation of the state of Israel in 1948, strongly denies the accusations.Israeli military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said the army had forwarded the footage to "senior members of the international community" and called on the UN to investigate the connection between UNRWA logistics centres and what he described as "Hamas operatives" near their vehicles.

Palestinians across the Middle East on Wednesday are marking the anniversary of their mass expulsion from what is now Israel with protests and other events across the region at a time of mounting concern over the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.The Nakba, Arabic for “catastrophe,” refers to the 700,000 Palestinians who fled or were driven out of what is now Israel before and during the war surrounding its creation in 1948.More than twice that number have been displaced within Gaza since the start of the latest war, which was triggered by Hamas' Oct. 7 attack into Israel. U.N. agencies say 550,000 people, nearly a quarter of Gaza's 2.3 million people, have been newly displaced in just the last week, as Israeli forces have pushed into the southern city of Rafah and reinvaded parts of northern Gaza.

The United Nations has launched an investigation into an unidentified strike on a UN car in Rafah on Monday that killed its first international staff in Gaza since Oct. 7, a spokesperson for the UN Secretary General said.The staff member, a retired Indian Army officer named Waibhav Anil Kale, was working with the UN Department of Safety and Security and was on route to the European Hospital in Rafah along with a colleague, who was also injured in the attack.Israel has been moving deeper into Rafah in southern Gaza, where more than a million people had sought shelter, and its forces pounded the enclave's north on Tuesday in some of the fiercest attacks in months.Israel's international allies and aid groups have repeatedly warned against a ground incursion into Rafah, where many Palestinians fled, and Israel says four Hamas battalions are holed up. Israel says it must root out the remaining fighters.

Colonel Waibhav Anil Kale (Retd), killed in Gaza while serving as an observer with UN department of safety and security, played a crucial role in fending off the 2016 terror attack on Pathankot airbase, his close friend, Lt Col Hange SD (Retd), told TOI on Tuesday.Hange, who was then commanding a tank transport unit, said, "Kale, an alumnus of NDA in Pune, was commanding Indian Army's 11 J&K Rifles battalion when the Pathankot attack took place. He and his unit played a crucial role in that operation.""He was a jovial person. His demise is a big loss for me and my family as we stayed in the same building in Mumbai," Hange added.An officer told TOI, "Kale was from 'November' squadron of 97th course at the academy & passed out from NDA in 1999. He was commissioned into the Indian Army in 2000 after passing out from IMA."

The Biden administration on Tuesday has informed key lawmakers of its decision to dispatch a fresh package exceeding $1 billion in arms and ammunition to Israel, according to three congressional aides.This is the first arms shipment announcement to Israel since it halted another transfer of 3,500 bombs earlier this month. The administration clarified that it paused the earlier transfer to prevent Israel from utilizing the bombs during its escalating offensive in the densely populated southern Gaza city of Rafah.The congressional aides, speaking anonymously, disclosed that the package includes approximately $700 million earmarked for tank ammunition, $500 million for tactical vehicles, and $60 million for mortar rounds. The timing of the arms shipment remains uncertain. Israel is currently seven months into its conflict with Hamas in Gaza.

At least two people were killed by an Israeli airstrike targeting a car in southern Lebanon's Tyre, the state news agency reported on Tuesday. (Reuters)

Israeli tanks pushed deeper into eastern Rafah on Tuesday, reaching some residential districts of the southern border city where more than a million people had been sheltering and stoking fears of further civilian casualties.Israel's international allies and aid groups have repeatedly warned against a ground incursion into refugee-packed Rafah, where Israel says four Hamas battalions are holed up.The World Court, also known as the International Court of Justice (ICJ), said it would hold hearings on Thursday and Friday to discuss a request by South Africa seeking new emergency measures over the Rafah incursion, which Qatar says has stalled efforts to reach a ceasefire.South Africa's demand is part of a case it brought against Israel accusing it of violating the genocide convention in Gaza, and which Israel has called baseless. Israel will provide its views on the latest petition on Friday, the ICJ said.

Thousands of people took part Tuesday in an annual march through the ruins of villages that Palestinians were expelled from during the 1948 war that led to Israel's creation.Wrapped in keffiyeh scarves and waving Palestinian flags, men and women rallied through the abandoned villages of Al-Kassayer and Al-Husha -- many holding signs with the names of dozens of other demolished villages their families were displaced from."Your Independence Day is our catastrophe," reads the rallying slogan for the protest that took place as Israelis celebrated the 76th anniversary of the proclamation of the State of Israel.

On Israel's 76th Independence Day, victory feels far away for many agonising over the fate of dozens of hostages still held in the war-ravaged Gaza Strip."On one side we're still here, my daughters are still here, my family's still here, and Israel is still here," said Lishay Lavi Miran, from the Nir Oz kibbutz community, less than a kilometre (0.62 miles) from the Gaza border."But it's not really independence because... Omri is over there," added the 39-year-old, referring to her husband who was kidnapped and taken to the Palestinian territory on October 7 alongside about 250 other hostages.

India supported granting full membership to Palestine at the UN and emphasised that lasting peace in the conflict-affected region can only be achieved through a two-state solution. India voted in favour of a draft UN General Assembly resolution last week that said Palestine is qualified and should be admitted as a full member of the United Nations and recommended that the Security Council "reconsider' the matter "favourably'.

The U.N.'s International Court of Justice will hold hearings on Thursday and Friday to discuss new emergency measures sought by South Africa over Israel's attacks on Rafah during the war in Gaza, the tribunal said Monday.The hearings on May 16 and 17 will deal with South Africa's request to the court to order more emergency measures against Israel over its attacks on Rafah, the tribunal added, part of an ongoing case which accuses Israel of acts of genocide against Palestinians.

Israel's military offensive in the Gaza Strip has killed at least 35,173 Palestinians and wounded 79,061 since Oct. 7, the Palestinian enclave's health ministry said on Tuesday.There have been 82 Palestinians killed and 234 injured in the past 24 hours, the ministry statement added.

Israel's military operation in Rafah has set truce negotiations with Hamas "backward", mediator Qatar said on Tuesday, adding that talks have reached "almost a stalemate"."Especially in the past few weeks, we have seen some momentum building but unfortunately things didn't move in the right direction and right now we are on a status of almost a stalemate," Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani told the Qatar Economic Forum."Of course, what happened with Rafah has set us backward."

The Israeli military said on Tuesday that a vehicle carrying UN staff that was hit in Rafah in southern Gaza was in an "active combat zone" at the time.The United Nations said that a UN security services member was killed in an attack on a vehicle in Gaza on Monday, marking the first death of a UN international employee in the Palestinian territory since the war began more than seven months ago.Another United Nations Department of Safety and Security (DSS) staff member was wounded in the attack, a spokesman for UN chief Antonio Guterres said, adding that the two had been travelling to the European Hospital in Rafah when their vehicle was hit.

Talks over a ceasefire in Gaza have reached a stalemate as Israel's operation in Rafah has sent things backwards, Qatar's Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani said on Tuesday at an economic forum in Doha.Sheikh Mohammed, whose country has mediated heavily between Palestinian Islamist group Hamas and Israel throughout the 7-month conflict, said Qatar will continue its role.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees said Tuesday that nearly 450,000 people have been displaced from Rafah since Israel began issuing evacuation orders for the south Gaza city eight days ago."UNRWA estimates that nearly 450,000 people have been forcibly displaced from Rafah since May 6," the agency said on X, formerly Twitter, without specifying where they fled to.