Due to the decrease in the reserves of weapons and ammunition in the war with Hamas in Gaza and the threat of an armed conflict with the Lebanese formation Hezbollah, Israel turned to the import of weapons from India and Serbia, writes the French newspaper "Lezeko" (Les Echos).
The human rights organization Amnesty International (AI) today accused the Israeli authorities of detaining and torturing Palestinians from Gaza without the possibility of contact with family and lawyers.
AI interviewed 27 former Palestinian detainees, including a 14-year-old boy, who said they were held under Israeli law for up to four and a half months without charge, trial or access to lawyers and families.
Citing the Israeli human rights organization Hamoked, AI said that 1.402 Palestinians were held until July 1 this year under the law. This is the highest number since the beginning of the war, more than nine months ago, according to Hamokeda.
AI said the law allows the Israeli army to detain anyone suspected of involvement in hostilities or if it deems them to be a security threat, and that detention can be extended indefinitely without the presentation of evidence.
The organization said that all the former detainees who were interviewed said that they were tortured or subjected to other ill-treatment in custody.
Said Maruf, a 57-year-old pediatrician, said guards kept him blindfolded and handcuffed for 45 days in detention at the Sde Teiman military facility, starving him, and regularly beating him and forcing him to kneel.
One woman told AI that she was beaten and forced to watch the mock execution of her husband.
Amnesty called on Israel to guarantee all detainees, including those suspected of being part of armed groups, access to lawyers and monitoring groups such as the International Committee of the Red Cross.
The Secretary General, AI Agnes Kalamard, said that the law does not provide for this but enables torture.
Israel says it is holding the detainees legally and denies allegations of torture, and claims the detainees have "fundamental rights".
(Beta)
At least 38.848 Palestinians have been killed and 89.459 wounded in the Israeli military offensive on Gaza since October 7, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health, Reuters reports.
Italy has sent supplies of food and medical equipment for the population of Gaza on a humanitarian flight to Jordan, according to a statement, as part of Rome's "Food for Gaza" initiative to help civilians there, reports Reuters.
The aid includes over 60 tons of food, hygiene kits and sanitary equipment, as well as 150 tents. A flight from the southern city of Brindisi to Jordan's capital, Amman, from where the materials will be delivered to Gaza.
"With this operation, we give a tangible demonstration of the attention that the Italian government is paying to the humanitarian situation in the belt," said Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani.
He added that Italy is committed "to do everything possible to alleviate the suffering of the Palestinian population in Gaza."
In May, Italy announced that it would allocate 30 million euros in the "Food for Gaza" plan, as it continued financing the Palestinian humanitarian organization of the United Nations, UNRVA.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected calls for an urgent independent investigation into the security lapses that allowed the deadliest attack in his country's history, the one carried out by the Islamist movement Hamas on October 7 last year, which started the war in Gaza.
"First I want to defeat Hamas," Netanyahu told lawmakers, speaking before the Israeli parliament.
Israeli forces bombed historic Gaza Strip refugee camps in the center of the enclave and struck northern Gaza, killing at least 13 people, and tanks pushed deeper into Rafah in the south, health officials and residents said, Reuters reported.
An Israeli airstrike killed six people in the town of Zawayda in central Gaza, and two more people were killed in an attack on a house in the Bureij camp. An Israeli airstrike killed three people in a car in Deir al-Balah, a city packed with people displaced from other parts of Gaza, health officials said.
In the northern city of Gaza, medics said two Palestinians were killed in another airstrike.
Israel's military said in a statement that its forces killed two senior Islamic Jihad commanders in two airstrikes in Gaza, including one it said was involved in the Oct. 7 attack in southern Israel that triggered the Gaza war.
In Rafah, residents said Israeli tanks advanced deeper into the western side of the city and took up positions on top of a hill. The Israeli military said forces found several tunnels and killed several gunmen.
The armed wing of the militant group Hamas and its allies said they fired mortar bombs at Israeli forces in southwestern Rafah today.
More than a million people sought refuge in Rafah from the fighting to the north, but most have dispersed again since Israel launched an offensive in and around the city in May.
The fighting pushed the 60-bed Red Cross field hospital in Rafah to the brink of capacity, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said.
"Repeated mass casualty events resulting from relentless hostilities have brought our hospital - and all health facilities in southern Gaza - to the breaking point to treat those with life-threatening injuries," said William Schomburg, head of the ICRC sub-delegation in Gaza.
The Islamist group Jama'a Islamiya, close to the Palestinian Hamas, said on Thursday that one of its high-ranking commanders, Muhammad Hamed Jabbar, was killed in an Israeli attack on a vehicle in eastern Lebanon.
Jama' Islamia announced that its commander Muhammad Hamed Jabar was killed in a "heinous Zionist attack".
The official Lebanese News Agency (NNA) specified that he was killed in an attack by an "enemy drone" on his truck in the Beka Valley in eastern Lebanon, reports AFP.
Jama'ah Islamiyah, founded in 1960, is closely linked to Hamas - listed as a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union - with which it undertakes attacks on Israel.
Violence erupted on the Israeli-Lebanese border after the start of the war in the Gaza Strip, killing 512 people in Lebanon, most of them fighters, including nine from Jama'a Islamiyah and at least 104 civilians, according to AFP.
On the Israeli side, 17 soldiers and 13 civilians were killed.
(RSE)
Israeli ultra-right minister Itamar Ben-Gvir visited the most sensitive holy site in Jerusalem this morning, and that visit could undermine talks on a truce in the Gaza Strip, reports the Associated Press (AP).
Ben-Gvir, who is the minister of national security and one of the leaders of the Jewish settlers, said that he went to the Temple Mount to pray for the return of the hostages, but, as he assessed, without a "reckless agreement".
Ben-Gvir's visit threatens to derail talks aimed at establishing a ceasefire in the more than nine-month-old war between Israel and Hamas.
Israeli negotiators arrived in Cairo to resume talks on a ceasefire.
Ben-Gvir is pressuring Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not to bow to international pressure and continue the military campaign in Gaza.
The Temple Mount is a holy place for both Jews and Muslims, who call it the High Sanctuary - Haram al-Sharif, and Ben-Gvir's visit, although legal, can be understood as a provocation.
In addition, based on the status quo that has been in place for a long time, Jews can visit that place, but not pray there.
There were once ancient Jewish temples on the Temple Mount and it is the holiest in Judaism, and now there is the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the third most important in Islam.
Ben-Gvir visited the holy site ahead of Netanyahu's trip to the US where he will address Congress.
Previously, the minister was on the Temple Mount in May to protest against countries that unilaterally recognize Palestinian statehood.
Palestinians consider the mosque a national symbol, and Ben-Gvir visits the place where it is located during periods of tension.
This tension has often escalated into violence in the past.
(BETA)
The Israeli parliament (Knesset) voted early this morning on a resolution rejecting the establishment of a Palestinian state.
Proponents of the resolution were parties in the coalition of Israeli Prime Minister Israel Benjamin Netanyahu together with right-wing parties in the opposition, with the support of the center party of the former Chief of General Staff of Israel Benny Gantz, until recently a member of the War Cabinet.
MPs from Jair Lapid's center-left party walked out of the session to avoid supporting the resolution even though he spoke in favor of a two-state solution to the conflict with the Palestinians.
The only ones who did not support the resolution were deputies from the center-left Labor Party and two parties in which the majority are Israeli Arabs.
The resolution was adopted on the eve of Netanyahu's address at a joint session of the US Congress and a meeting with US President Joseph Biden at the White House.
That move could cause even more anger among members of the American Democratic Party towards the Government of Israel, which rejects a two-state solution to the conflict, Israeli media commented.
In February, the Knesset passed a resolution proposed by Netanyahu rejecting the establishment of a Palestinian state, but then referred to the unilateral creation of an independent Palestine at a time when foreign countries were reported to be considering recognizing it.
This morning, 68 MPs voted for the resolution, and nine were against, and it rejects the establishment of a Palestinian state, even as part of a negotiated agreement.
"The Knesset firmly opposes the creation of a Palestinian state west of Jordan. The establishment of a Palestinian state in the heart of the Land of Israel would represent an existential threat to the State of Israel and its citizens, would continue the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and destabilize the region," the document states. It added that after a short time Hamas would take over the Palestinian state and turn it into a "radical Islamic terrorist base" in cooperation with the Iran-led axis to eliminate Israel.
In addition, it is estimated that promoting the idea of a Palestinian state now would be a reward for terrorism and would only encourage Hamas and its supporters to see it as a victory thanks to the massacre of October 7, 2023.
Israeli lawmakers voted as Netanyahu's July 24 address to Congress is already raising concerns among many members of the Democratic Party, who have long supported Israel but are dismayed by his handling of military operations in Gaza. Netanyahu did not attend the vote.
In addition, things are complicated by Biden's unenviable political situation and increasingly frequent calls for him to give up his efforts to be re-elected president, and in addition, he has tested positive for covid-19 and must be in isolation.
The goal of the proposed resolution was to put pressure on Netanyahu because in the US he will likely face the opposite pressure from American officials on the hostage agreement that could include discussions on Palestinian sovereignty, Israeli media commented.
(BETA)
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