Aid groups have collected humanitarian aid carried by about 90 trucks, out of a total of nearly 200 that have entered Gaza since Israel began allowing limited goods in earlier this week, the United Nations said Thursday.
Under international pressure, Israel stopped blocking all food, medicine, fuel and other material after nearly three months. However, many supplies have been sitting on the Gaza side of the Kerem Shalom crossing with Israel.
Jens Laerke, spokesperson for the U.N. Humanitarian agency OCHA, said Thursday the trucks that entered carried medicine, wheat flour and nutrition supplies. Aid groups faced significant challenges distributing the aid because of insecurity, the risk of looting and coordination issues with Israeli authorities, Laerke added.
Also Thursday, international leaders were reacting to the shooting of two Israeli Embassy staff members in Washington, D.C., the previous day. The attack was seen by officials in Israel and the U.S. as the latest in a growing wave of antisemitism as Israel ramps up its offensive in the Gaza Strip.
Here’s the latest:
Israeli tank fire heavily damages a hospital in northern Gaza, Palestinian health officials say
Israeli tanks fired on Al-Awda Hospital in the Tel al-Zaatar area of northern Gaza on Thursday, igniting fires and causing extensive damage to the facility, according to hospital officials.
Hospital director Mohamed Salha told The Associated Press about the “horror” that ensued overnight as Israeli forces bombed the third floor and used quadcopters, tanks, and drones to shoot at the hospital’s fuel tanks and units storing medication.
There were no immediate details about fatalities.
Israeli forces also targeted the hospital’s water tanks and set fire to outpatient clinics, according to Raafat Ali al-Majdalawi, director of the Al-Awda Health and Community Association.
Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, an Israeli military spokesperson, said there were no planned Israeli military strikes at the Al-Awda hospital and the military is checking where the explosion came from.
Al-Awda was one of the only two surviving medical facilities in north Gaza. The Indonesian Hospital was also encircled and came under fire this week. Some people among the 130 hospital staff and volunteers were injured, he said, but didn’t provide specific figures.
Video taken by Salha shows a damaged hospital building, with one room on an upper floor left exposed after its walls were blown away. Thick black smoke billows from the rubble and wreckage within the hospital complex, where fires spread through some parts.
Salha said that Gaza’s emergency service, the Civil Defense agency, spent three hours trying to contain the fires and failed.
As soldiers killed his colleagues, a Palestinian medic survived by pleading in Hebrew “Don’t shoot! I’m Israeli”
According to the head of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, the medic Asaad al-Nsasrah has not spoken with the media since Israeli soldiers killed 15 emergency responders in southern Gaza on March 23.
Words in Hebrew could be heard in the final moments of a video of the killings that was subsequently found and made public.
“The soldiers were so close to have a dialogue with somebody. And that somebody was Assad,” said Younis al-Khatib, the Red Crescent chief. “What Assad said in Hebrew: ‘Don’t shoot. I am Israeli.’ And soldiers got a bit confused.”
The Israeli military declined to comment.
“You know why he said that? His mother is Israeli. Assad’s mother is Israeli — Palestinian Arab Israeli from Bir Saba,” al-Khatib said, referring to the Arabic name for the city of Beersheba in southern Israel.
Al-Khatib spoke on Thursday to reporters in Geneva at the headquarters of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
Israeli troops bulldozed over the bodies along with their mangled vehicles, burying them in a mass grave, according to the U.N. The surviving medic was detained by Israel for over a month and released back to Gaza.
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Food insecurity and malnutrition are driving up pregnancy complications in Gaza, the UN says
Health facilities in Gaza have reported that over 12% of pregnancies resulted in miscarriages during the first four months of this year, said Nestor Owomunhangi, representative of the United Nations Population Fund, told The Associated Press on Thursday. In the same period, there were 10% premature births and low-birth weight recorded, he said.
There are over 50,000 pregnant women in Gaza, he said.
Only a ceasefire would allow aid groups to deliver lifesaving supplies and material into Gaza at a scale that prevents further deterioration in malnutrition and starvation, Owomunhangi said.
During his visit to Gaza earlier this month, desperation was palpable, hunger and malnutrition visible everywhere, he said. “The worst has already arrived in Gaza.”
After aid started trickling into Gaza Thursday, Owamunhangi said: ” By the time it gets to the weakest of the weakest, that will be days.”
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France summons Israel’s ambassador to protest soldiers shooting near foreign diplomats in the West Bank
Israel’s ambassador to Paris was being summoned to the French Foreign Ministry on Thursday afternoon after Israeli soldiers fired warning shots at a delegation of diplomats the previous day.
The diplomats, including one from France, came under fire Wednesday while visiting Jenin, a city in the Israel-occupied West Bank. The Israeli military said the visit had been approved but the soldiers fired warning shots when the delegation deviated from an approved route.
French Foreign Ministry spokesman Christophe Lemoine said the shots put diplomats in danger and were “unjustifiable and unacceptable.” The Israeli ambassador was summoned “to explain himself about this extremely serious incident,” the French Foreign Ministry said.
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Bakery in Gaza resumes operations for the first time in over a month
The bakery, in the central Gaza Strip, was baking bread again Thursday after Israel eased its blockade to allow some aid into the Palestinian territory.
Vladimir Jovcev of the U.N.’s World Food Program said it was “definitely not enough, but we hope that the borders will remain open and we will be able to bring in more aid.”
Israel imposed a blockade on all imports, including food, medicine and shelter, at the beginning of March, shortly before ending a ceasefire with Hamas.
It announced an easing of the blockade this week and has allowed around 200 trucks to enter since Monday. But U.N. agencies say Israeli military restrictions and the breakdown of law and order in Gaza make it difficult to retrieve and distribute the aid. As a result, little of it has so far reached those in need. Around 600 trucks entered per day during the ceasefire.
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Japan protests to Israel over West Bank warning shots
Japan’s Foreign Ministry says it has made “a severe protest” to Israel over its military’s firing of warning shots at a diplomatic delegation including Japanese diplomats that was visiting a refugee camp in the Israel-occupied West Bank on Wednesday.
Vice-Minister for Foreign Affairs Takehiro Funakoshi summoned the Israeli Ambassador to Japan, Gilad Cohen, to request a full explanation and preventive measures. Fukakoshi told Gilad the incident was “deeply regrettable and should not have happened.”
Funakoshi also reiterated Japan’s strong concern over Israel’s attempted reoccupation of the Gaza Strip and the expansion of military operations, urging it to allow a full and immediate resumption of aid into Gaza, the foreign ministry said.
Funakoshi also offered his condolences on the killing of two Israeli embassy staff in Washington, stating that “terrorism is not tolerated anywhere in the world.”
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France boosts security around Jewish sites
The French government has instructed police and military officials to put “visible and dissuasive” security in place around Jewish sites after the killing of two Israeli Embassy staffers in Washington D.C.
The instructions were issued Thursday by Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau and published by his ministry. The minister said security should be reinforced around Jewish sites including synagogues, schools, shops, media and cultural events following Wednesday’s shooting.
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Macron reaches out to Israeli president after Washington shootings
French President Emmanuel Macron says he has reached out to his Israeli counterpart in the wake of the killings of two Israeli Embassy staffers in Washington, in what the French leader called “an anti-Semitic attack.”
“To President @Isaac_Herzog, I extended our thoughts to the families and loved ones of the victims,” Macron posted on X.
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Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels fire two missiles at Israel
The missiles were fired hours apart on Thursday, each time setting off nationwide air raid sirens.
The Israeli military said it intercepted both missiles, and there were no immediate reports of casualties or damage. An Associated Press reporter heard a loud explosion in central Israel that might have been caused by an interceptor.
Israeli police said they were searching the Jerusalem area for debris.
The Houthis have launched repeated missile attacks targeting Israel as well as international shipping in the Red Sea, portraying it as a response to Israel’s offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Most of the targeted ships had no relation to Israel or the conflict.
The United States halted a punishing bombing campaign against the Houthis earlier this month, saying the rebels had pledged to stop attacking ships. That agreement did not include attacks on Israel.
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France, EU condemn shooting outside Jewish museum in Washington
France’s foreign minister says the killing of two staff members of the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday “is an abhorrent act of antisemitic barbarity.”
In a post in English on X, the minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, said: “Nothing can justify such violence. My thoughts go to their loved ones, their colleagues, and the State of Israel.”
The European Union’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, said: “There is and should be no place in our societies for hatred, extremism, or antisemitism.”
