Middle East crisis live: Gaza is ‘dying’, aid group chief tells Paris conference on Lebanon | Israel

Key events

Hamas official says it is ready to stop fighting is Israel accepts Gaza ceasefire deal

A senior Hamas official has said the group had told Egyptian officials it was ready to stop fighting in Gaza if Israel committed to a ceasefire deal.

As we reported earlier, a delegation of Hamas leaders met with an Egyptian security delegation in Cairo on Thursday as part of efforts to resume the Gaza ceasefire negotiations, Egyptian state media reported.

The Hamas official told AFP that the group’s delegation discussed “ideas and proposals” related to a ceasefire deal with Egyptian officials in Cairo on Thursday. The official added:

Hamas has expressed readiness to stop the fighting, but Israel must commit to a ceasefire, withdraw from the Gaza Strip, allow the return of displaced people, agree to a serious prisoner exchange deal and allow the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza.

Share

Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, “welcomes Egypt’s readiness” to advance a deal for the release of hostages held in Gaza, his office posted to X.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu welcomes Egypt’s readiness to advance a deal for the release of the hostages.

— Prime Minister of Israel (@IsraeliPM) October 24, 2024

Share

Updated at 15.04 EDT

As we reported earlier, Israeli and US negotiators are scheduled to meet in Doha this weekend to try to restart talks toward a deal for a ceasefire and the release of hostages in Gaza.

An Egyptian security delegation met with a delegation of Hamas leaders in Cairo as part of efforts to resume the Gaza ceasefire negotiations, Egyptian state media reported on Thursday.

A Hamas delegation, headed by chief negotiator and deputy Hamas Gaza chief Khalil al-Hayya, arrived in Cairo to meet with Egypt’s head of general intelligence agency, Hassan Mahmoud Rashad, Hamas-run al-Aqsa TV reported.

Share

Updated at 15.03 EDT

Russia’s president Vladimir Putin met with the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, at the Brics summit in Russia on Thursday.

Putin, in televised comments, told Abbas:

We are strongly for a quick end to the bloodshed (in Gaza).

At a news conference at the summit, Putin said Russia is “not interested” in escalating conflict in the Middle East. He said:

We are very concerned about what is happening in the region. Russia is not interested in the conflict getting worse. We will not gain anything from this strategically, we will only see additional problems.

Share

Updated at 14.44 EDT

Israel’s top general has said there was a possibility for a “sharp conclusion” to the conflict with Hezbollah.

Lt Gen Herzi Halevi, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) chief of staff, said in a video statement on Wednesday:

In the north, there’s a possibility of reaching a sharp conclusion. We thoroughly dismantled Hezbollah’s senior chain of command.

Share

Updated at 14.22 EDT

Funerals were held on Thursday for the victims of a deadly attack on the headquarters of the Turkish national aerospace company near Ankara.

Five people were killed and 22 others wounded in the explosion and assault at the Tusaş headquarters on Wednesday afternoon.

Turkey’s interior minister, Ali Yerlikaya, said investigators had confirmed that both attackers were members of the militant Kurdistan Workers’ party, or PKK.

The PKK has been fighting for autonomy in south-east Turkey in a conflict that has killed tens of thousands of people since the 1980s. It is considered a terrorist group by Turkey and the country’s western allies.

In response, Turkey launched airstrikes against suspected Kurdish militant targets in Syria and Iraq. The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said on Thursday that Turkish airstrikes had killed 12 civilians in north-east Syria.

Share

Updated at 14.14 EDT

Gaza is ‘dying’, aid group chief tells Lebanon conference in Paris

Gaza is “dying”, the vice-president of aid group Doctors of the World has warned, as he called for immediate cessation of hostilities.

Jean-François Corty, speaking at an international conference for Lebanon in Paris on Thursday, welcomed the mobilization of aid for Lebanon but lamented the lack of concrete efforts to pressure the warring parties to stop the fighting in Lebanon and Gaza, AP reported.

“There was no mention of any potential constraints on the parties involved in the conflict, particularly the Israeli government,” Corty said, adding:

I also reminded them that whilst we are mobilizing for Lebanon, Gaza is dying today. Thousands of people are being eliminated … in the north of Gaza, and it seems that the international community no longer considers the Gazans to be our fellow human beings.

Share

Updated at 15.00 EDT

Footage shows large crowds gathering outside a bakery in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip as people try to secure bread.

The prices of basic food items have become unaffordable for many Palestinians amid Israel’s restrictions on produce entering Gaza.

Reuters’ analysis of official Israeli data shows that the flow of goods into the Palestinian territory is at its lowest level since the start of the war.

Share

Updated at 13.29 EDT

Summary of the day so far

It has gone 8pm in Gaza, Tel Aviv and Beirut. This blog will shortly be handed over to the US team. Here is a summary of the day’s news so far:

At least 17 people, including children, have reportedly been killed by an Israeli strike on a school sheltering displaced Palestinians in the Nuseirat refugee camp. Al Jazeera reported that more than one missile was used in the area, which was close to the local market, and that the injured were being taken to two nearby hospitals. Jordan’s foreign ministry condemned the strike, calling it “a heinous crime that is added to the war crimes committed by Israel”.

Israel’s military posted to Telegram to claim that a strike on a school sheltering displaced Palestinians in the Nuseirat refugee camp in Gaza was targeting what it described as “Hamas terrorists who were operating inside a command and control centre in the area”, accusing Hamas of the “systemic abuse of civilian infrastructure in violation of international law”.

An Israeli delegation will travel to Doha on Sunday, a spokesperson for prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday. The head of Israel’s the Mossad will meet the head of the CIA and the Qatari prime minister in Doha, according to Netanyahu’s office.

The US state department said that secretary of state Antony Blinken “discussed renewed efforts to secure the release of the hostages and end the war in Gaza” with Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani. Blinken added that he anticipates negotiators will get together in the coming days for discussions on a ceasefire deal. He also said that the US was open to “different options” to ending the Gaza war.

World powers raised $1bn to ease the humanitarian crisis in Lebanon and support its army at a conference in Paris on Thursday, with France’s foreign minister urging Israel to heed the message to cease fire and focus on diplomacy. On Thursday, 70 government delegations and 15 international organisations met in Paris to help Lebanon.

Emmanuel Macron launched the one-day international conference on Lebanon on Thursday, announcing €100bn of French humanitarian aid and warning the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, that “civilisation is not best defended by sowing barbarism ourselves”. The twin aims of the French president’s Paris conference are to alleviate the humanitarian suffering in Lebanon and to strengthen Lebanese state institutions including the official army.

Blinken on Thursday announced an additional $135m in US aid for Palestinians, bringing the US total to $1.2bn since the 7 October 2023. “Today, we’re announcing an additional $135m in humanitarian assistance, water sanitation, internal health for the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, as well as in the region,” Blinken said in Qatar.

The US, Qatar and Egypt continue their efforts to reach a ceasefire in Gaza and release Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners, Qatar’s prime minister said on Thursday. “This painful period in the region should come to an end,” said Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, who is also the foreign minister, after meeting with the US secretary of state in Doha.

Gaza’s civil defence agency said on Thursday that more than 770 people have been killed in the north of the territory since Israel launched an assault aimed at preventing Hamas from regrouping there. “Since the start of the military operation in northern Gaza more than 770 people have been killed,” said Mahmud Bassal, spokesperson for the territory’s civil defence agency, adding that the toll could rise as there were people buried under the rubble.

Qatar’s prime minister has said that Israeli accusations that six Al Jazeera journalists based in Gaza have links to terror groups cannot be taken “at face value”. He told the gathered media that “we have never seen the journalists being treated the way they have been treated in Gaza unfortunately,” adding that “what we have learnt” since the war began is “we cannot take those accusations of Israel at face value”. Israel’s military named six specific journalists it accused of being members of Hamas or Islamic Jihad. Al Jazeera has forcefully denied Israel’s allegations, calling the accusations “a blatant attempt” to silence its coverage.

The European Union will give the Lebanese army €20m (£16.6m / $21.6m) this year and €40m (£33.3 / $43.1m) next year, the EU’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell told reporters on Thursday during a conference held in Paris aimed to raise humanitarian aid for Lebanon.

Gaza’s civil defence agency said on Thursday that it could no longer provide first responder services in the north of the territory, accusing Israeli forces of threatening to “bomb and kill” its crews.

Emmanuel Macron has called for an end to fighting in Lebanon, criticising Israel’s incursion into the south of the country, and calling on Hezbollah to stop its operations.

At the Paris event, Lebanon’s caretaker prime minister Najib Mikati has said his country still supports the 21-day ceasefire proposal on the table that was brokered by the US and France. He said the Lebanese army could deploy more troops in the south to support any ceasefire agreement, but needed international resources to bolster their capability.

Mikati also said on Thursday that only the state should carry weapons. “Lebanese authorities must deploy over (all) Lebanese territory and weapons should be carried only by the state and the Lebanese army,” Mikati said on the sidelines of a Lebanon aid conference in Paris, without explicitly calling for the disarmament of Hezbollah, the only group that did not lay down its arms after the end of the Lebanese civil war.

An Israeli group representing families of Gaza hostages called on Netanyahu and Hamas to secure an agreement for the release of captives, after new truce talks were announced on Thursday. “We demand the Israeli prime minister grant the negotiating team full authority to secure this deal. Time is running out for the hostages,” said the Hostages and Missing Families Forum.

France’s foreign minister Jean-Noël Barrot has said a joint proposal made by France and the US remains the basis for any potential ceasefire in Lebanon, adding that the full implementation of UN resolution 1701 was still the goal of diplomatic efforts. Speaking to the media in Paris, Reuters reports Barrot also called for Lebanon to end a two-year power vacuum and elect a new president.

Hezbollah claimed to have destroyed at least one Israeli tank in direct clashes in southern Lebanon. Israel’s military has not yet commented on the claim.

Israel’s military reported that 95 rockets had been launched at Israel from inside southern Lebanon on Thursday. Israeli media reported that five people had been injured so far on Thursday by shrapnel in locations across the north of the country.

Israel’s army radio reported that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) located two explosive devices in a cistern near the illegal Israeli settlement of Avni Hefetz, which is near Tulkarm in the occupied West Bank. It reported that the devices were destroyed and there were no casualties.

Two people were killed in an Israeli strike on a vehicle on the main road from Beirut to the east of Lebanon in what has been described as an apparent targeted assassination.

Four people have been killed by an Israeli airstrike “which targeted a facility housing displaced people in the al-Maghazi refugee camp”, reported the Palestinian news agency Wafa on Thursday. Medical sources told Wafa that at least four people were killed at the Al-Maghazi Services Club.

Israel’s Arabic language military spokesperson Avichay Adraee issued a statement in which he claimed that Hezbollah was “using ambulances to transport terrorists and weapons” and said that Israel would target vehicles “regardless of its type”. Without providing evidence of the claim, Adraee said Israel “calls on medical teams to avoid dealing with Hezbollah elements and not to cooperate with them”.

Israel’s military has claimed that during its operations inside southern Lebanon it has “discovered an underground hideout” which Hezbollah was using for a planned attack inside Israel.

Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency services reported on Thursday that an 84-year-old man had been “lightly wounded by shrapnel” in northern Israel.

Iran’s president Masoud Pezeshkian has told China’s Xi Jinping at the Brics summit in Kazan that Israel is the main threat to peace in the region, and that Tehran would give a firm and decisive response to any act of aggression against it. Russia’s president Vladimir Putin at the summit described the Middle East as being on the bring of all-out war.

Turkey has launched airstrikes against suspected Kurdish militant targets in Syria and Iraq after blaming the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) for a deadly attack on the headquarters of the Turkish national aerospace company on Wednesday that killed five people. Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization said it had targeted numerous “strategic locations” used by the PKK, or by Syrian Kurdish militia affiliated with the militants, the Anadolu Agency reported.

Sri Lankan police arrested three men after a US intelligence warning of possible attacks against Israeli tourists visiting the island, the foreign minister said on Thursday. “We are questioning three local men,” Vijitha Herath told reporters in Colombo. “We are taking the US warning seriously and have increased security.”

Share

Updated at 13.15 EDT

Turkey has launched airstrikes against suspected Kurdish militant targets in Syria and Iraq after blaming the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) for a deadly attack on the headquarters of the Turkish national aerospace company on Wednesday that killed five people.

Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization said it had targeted numerous “strategic locations” used by the PKK, or by Syrian Kurdish militia affiliated with the militants, the Anadolu Agency reported.

There was no immediate statement from the PKK on the attack or the Turkish airstrikes.

The targets included military, intelligence, energy and infrastructure facilities and ammunition depots, the report said. A security official said armed drones were used in Thursday’s strikes.

The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said on Thursday that Turkish airstrikes killed 12 civilians in north-east Syria.

“Over the past hours … a new wave of (Turkish) attacks on northern and eastern Syria” killed 12 civilians, including two children, and wounded 25 others, a statement from the US-backed SDF said.

“In addition to populated areas, Turkish warplanes and UAVs (drones) targeted bakeries, power stations, oil facilities and (Kurdish) Internal Security Force checkpoints,” added the statement, which also reported Turkish shelling.

On Wednesday, Turkey’s air force carried out strikes against similar targets in northern Syria and northern Iraq, hours after Turkish government officials blamed the PKK for the deadly attack at the headquarters of the aerospace and defence company Tusaş near Ankara.

Share

An Israeli group representing families of Gaza hostages called on prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas to secure an agreement for the release of captives, after new truce talks were announced on Thursday, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).

“We demand the Israeli prime minister grant the negotiating team full authority to secure this deal. Time is running out for the hostages,” said the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, adding:

We urgently call on world leaders to exert maximum pressure on Hamas to accept this deal and end a humanitarian catastrophe that has already claimed too many innocent live”.

Share

Agence France-Presse (AFP) have published a part of the statement from Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office mentioned earlier (see 4.24pm BST)

“At the direction of prime minister (Benjamin) Netanyahu, the head of the Mossad, David Barnea, will leave on Sunday for a meeting in Doha with the head of the CIA, Bill Burns, and with the prime minister of Qatar,” said the statement, adding that “the parties will discuss the various options to restart the negotiations to release hostages from Hamas captivity following the latest developments”.

Share

Further to the news that an Israeli delegation will travel to Doha on Sunday (see 4.24pm BST), prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office has shared a bit more detail, reports Reuters.

The head of Israel’s the Mossad will meet the head of the CIA and the Qatari prime minister in Doha, according to Netanyahu’s office.

Share

Updated at 11.53 EDT

Israeli delegation to travel to Doha on Sunday, Israeli official says

An Israeli delegation will travel to Doha on Sunday, a spokesperson for prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday, reports Reuters.

The statement came after Qatar and Washington’s top diplomats said that negotiators will gather in Doha to try to restart talks toward a deal for a ceasefire and the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza.

The Netanyahu spokesperson gave no other details, according to Reuters.

Share

World powers raise $1bn for Lebanon at Paris conference

World powers raised $1bn to ease the humanitarian crisis in Lebanon and support its army at a conference in Paris on Thursday, with France’s foreign minister urging Israel to heed the message to cease fire and focus on diplomacy, reports Reuters.

On Thursday, 70 government delegations and 15 international organisations met in Paris to help Lebanon.

“The message (for Israel) is simple: Cease fire!” France’s soreign minister Jean-Noël Barrot told a news conference, reiterating that a Franco-American proposal for a temporary truce was still on the table, reports Reuters.

Barrot said more than $800m, including $300m from Washington, had been raised primarily to help up to one million displaced with food, healthcare and education.

A further $200m would go to the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF), deemed as the guarantor of internal stability, and also vital to implementing 2006 UN security council resolution 1701 that calls for southern Lebanon to be free of any troops or weapons other than those of the Lebanese state.

France has historical ties with Lebanon and has been working with Washington in trying to secure a ceasefire, although the two allies differ on approach regarding 1701, reports Reuters.

“The storm we are currently witnessing is unlike any other, because it carries the seeds of total destruction,” Lebanon’s caretaker prime minister Najib Mikati told delegates, pleading for more pressure to be put on Israel.

Opening the conference, French president Emmanuel Macron said there must not be a return to past cycles of violence. “More damage, more victims, more strikes will not enable the end of terrorism or ensure security for everyone,” he said.

Despite the repeated calls for a ceasefire, there was no sign on Thursday of the conflict abating. Three Lebanese soldiers were killed in an Israeli strike near the border, the Lebanese army said.

US secretary of state Antony Blinken skipped Paris and appeared to make little progress during a tour of the Middle East, a final push for peace before next month’s US election.

Share

Updated at 11.01 EDT

Macron warns Netanyahu against ‘sowing barbarism’ in remarks on Lebanon

Emmanuel Macron launched a one-day international conference on Lebanon on Thursday, announcing €100bn of French humanitarian aid and warning the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, that “civilisation is not best defended by sowing barbarism ourselves”.

He also vowed to help train 6,000 extra Lebanese official forces as he called for a ceasefire and an end to Israeli attacks on UN peacekeepers, for which he said there was no justification.

The twin aims of the French president’s Paris conference are to alleviate the humanitarian suffering in Lebanon and to strengthen Lebanese state institutions including the official army.

In his opening remarks Marcon also said it was a matter of bitter regret that Iran, backers of the Hezbollah group, had “engaged Hezbollah against Israel, while Lebanon’s higher interest required that it stay away from the Gaza war”.

France is hoping to raise €460m at the conference, more than the latest UN target of €400m.

In words directed at Netanyahu, with whom his relationship has deteriorated badly, he said:

We have been talking a lot in recent days about a war of civilisations or about civilisations that must be defended. I am not sure that we defend a civilisation by sowing barbarism ourselves.”

Netanyahu had said on Europe 1 radio on Wednesday:

It is a war of civilisations against barbarism; we are at the forefront of this war and France must support Israel.”

Macron argued:

I am sure of one thing, that the possibility of a civilisation is at stake in Lebanon, that is to say the possibility for women and men whose origins are different, whose religions are different, to share the same territory and to live for the same project.”

He added:

The war must end as soon as possible. There must be a ceasefire in Lebanon. More damage, more victims, more strikes will neither put an end to terrorism nor ensure the security of all.”

Share