200 people evacuated from Gaza's Indonesian Hospital, after 12 killed in Israeli attack

This blog is now wrapping up. Thanks to all for following along. The New Arab will be back at 7am with more live coverage from Gaza. 

Al Jazeera's West Bank correspondent is reporting that Israeli media is saying that Israel has essentially given the green light for a deal that would see the exchange of women and children who are held inside the Gaza Strip for a five-day pause in the fighting.

Additionally, as per Hamas’s request, we would see women and minors being held in Israeli prisons released.

None of this has been officially confirmed by any of the parties involved. 

Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh has told Reuters that the Palestinian group is close to reaching a truce agreement with Israel and that they have delivered their response to Qatar.

Qatar has been mediating between Hamas, Israel and the US around the release of Israeli hostages. Earlier we reported that Hamas' main demands were the release of at least 100 Palestinian prisoners and a 3-day truce, though this cannot be confirmed. 

Several relatives of the Israelis being held hostage by Hamas in the Gaza Strip walked out of a meeting with members of the war cabinet on Monday evening, according to Haaretz.

The families expressed their disappointment when they were told that the goals of freeing the hostages and toppling Hamas are equally important.

Udi Goren, whose cousin, 42-year-old Tal Chaimi, is among the hostages, told Channel 12 news that the purpose of the meeting was for ministers to explain Israel’s goals in the war.

“A few days ago, we met with just Gantz and Eisenkot,” Goren said. “They told us unequivocally that the overriding goal of the war was to secure the hostages’ release and now we are being told, in answer to a very concrete question, that the other members of the war cabinet say that there are two equally important goals.”

The Palestinian news agency Wafa is reporting that 17 people, including women and children, were among those killed in an Israeli strike on Nuseirat refugee camp that took place after midnight.

Wafa also reported several injuries in the strike on the camp, located in central Gaza.

Al Jazeera is reporting that 3 Palestinians have been killed after Israeli forces struck a residential building in Jabalia. 

The building has been reduced to rubble, from which the dead bodies were pulled and where many people are still trapped under.

Mohammed Al-Haddad, a photojournalist, the scene at the Nasser hospital in Khan Younis, where medical staff treated patients evacuated from the Indonesian Hospital arrived on Monday, many of them suffering from serious injuries.

“[They] passed through roads full of body parts and destruction for more than 12 hours,” al-Haddad wrote. “Their bodies exhausted, and their spirits tired.

 

 

 

 

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According to various reports in the media and on social media, Israeli forces are storming Hebron in the occupied West Bank. 

🔴 The Israeli Occupation forces storm the city of Hebron, West Bank pic.twitter.com/UxQBP7dJTy

— Suribelle 🚩 (@Syribelle) November 20, 2023

Since the beginning of the war on Gaza, the West Bank has seen a massive wave of Israeli violence, in the form of both Israeli military raids and settler attacks, leading to the deaths of over 200 Palestinians. 2023 was already the deadliest year for Palestinians in the West Bank since the Second Intifada, with 250 people killed by Israeli military forces. 

The Palestinian news agency, Wafa, reported that the journalist Ayat Khadura was killed after her home in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip was bombarded by Israeli forces.

Khadura is the second Palestinian journalist killed in Gaza in the last 24 hours.

Israel has been accused of deliberately targeting journalists in Gaza. 

There are a little more than 1,200 Americans, legal permanent residents and family members still in Gaza and at least six U.S. citizens have been killed since Israel began its war on Gaza, the U.S. State Department said on Monday.

State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told a briefing that around 800 Americans, legal permanent residents and family members had left Gaza via the Rafah crossing to Egypt and "there are a little over 1,200 left."

Six Americans have died since October 7, he said, comprised of five Israeli troops - four killed in Gaza and one killed in northern Israel - and a national police border officer.

You can read more about Americans who fight for Israel here:

The charity Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) said that after 6 weeks of Israel's siege on Gaza, food is running out rapidly and over 1 million Palestinian children will go to bed hungry. 

After six weeks of Israel’s siege, food in Gaza is rapidly running out. There are severe shortages of fuel and clean water for cooking. We must stand together to protect Gaza’s children, who will go to bed tonight hungry.

Please take action and demand a #CeasefireNOW. pic.twitter.com/GNDDfg2w1P

— Medical Aid for Palestinians (@MedicalAidPal) November 20, 2023

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Monday that the establishment of a Palestinian state would be the best way of ensuring Israel’s security.

Borrell held a video conference with foreign ministers from the EU’s 27 member states after touring the Middle East for talks on Israel’s war on Gaza.

The EU’s chief diplomat said that he had drawn “a fundamental political conclusion” from his discussions across the Middle East and North Africa.

“I think that the best guarantee for Israel’s security is the creation of a Palestinian state,” Borrell stated in a written summary of the meeting.

Borrell adopted a similar stance to US President Joe Bide and said Israel should not occupy Gaza after the current conflict ends and that control of the territory should be handed over to the Palestinian Authority. 

The Spanish diplomat also stopped short of calling for a full ceasefire, despite the deaths of over 13,300 Palestinians, including 5,600 children.

“The UN Security Council resolution calling for immediate humanitarian pauses is a big step forward, but we must ensure its rapid implementation,” he said.

The New York Review of Books has published an open letter by Holocaust scholars who expressed their “dismay and disappointment at political leaders and notable public figures invoking Holocaust memory to explain the current crisis in Gaza and Israel”.

They noted recent comments from Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who compared Hamas to Nazis, as well as US President Joe Biden, who said the Palestinian group had “engaged in barbarism that is as consequential as the Holocaust”.

“It is understandable why many in the Jewish community recall the Holocaust and earlier pogroms when trying to comprehend what happened on October 7,” said the open letter’s signatories, which included professors in Canada, the US, the UK, Germany and Israel.

However, appealing to the memory of the Holocaust obscures our understanding of the antisemitism Jews face today, and dangerously misrepresents the causes of violence in Israel-Palestine,” they said, adding that the Israeli occupation and blockade of Gaza are among those root causes.

Israeli leaders and others are using the Holocaust framing to portray Israel’s collective punishment of Gaza as a battle for civilization in the face of barbarism, thereby promoting racist narratives about Palestinians,” the scholars wrote.

There is no military solution in Israel-Palestine, and deploying a Holocaust narrative in which an ‘evil’ must be vanquished by force will only perpetuate an oppressive state of affairs that has already lasted far too long."

A group of U.S. President Joe Biden's fellow Democrats urged him on Monday to encourage Israel to take immediate steps - including reopening a major border crossing - to help provide humanitarian aid for innocent civilians in Gaza.

"Eliminating the threat posed by Hamas and protecting civilians are not mutually exclusive aims. Indeed, International Humanitarian Law requires that civilians be protected during armed conflict," a group of Democratic senators wrote in a letter to Biden.

The letter was led by Senators Tammy Baldwin, Tim Kaine and Chris Van Hollen, and signed by at least eight other Senate Democrats. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The lawmakers sent the letter as Biden's administration said it was nearing a deal to free some of the 240 hostages held in Gaza.

The crisis has divided Congress, prompting to date only about three dozen Democratic members to back calls for a ceasefire, which Israel rejects as something that let Hamas regroup.

Monday's letter did not call for a ceasefire, but did note the dire humanitarian situation, including working toward the sustained delivery of water, food, fuel and other basic necessities, including by reopening the Kerem Shalom border crossing between Israel and Gaza, protection of civilians and civilian sites and ensuring civilians' access to medical attention.

"We are concerned that increased and prolonged suffering in Gaza is not only intolerable for Palestinian civilians there but will also negatively impact the security of Israeli civilians by exacerbating existing tensions and eroding regional alliances," the lawmakers wrote.

U.N. aid chief Martin Griffiths last week implored Israel to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza via the Kerem Shalom crossing. 

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has said that the death toll of media workers lost during Israel's war on Gaza stands at 50 - 45 Palestinians, 4 Israelis and 1 Lebanese. 

11 have been injured, with 3 missing and 18 arrested. 

The CPJ report that the most recent media worker to be killed was

Alaa Taher Al-Hassanat, a Palestinian journalist and presenter at AlMajedat Media Network. She was killed, along with multiple members of her family, in an Israeli airstrike that hit her house in the Gaza Strip.
 

As of November 20, in the #Israel-#Gaza war, CPJ has documented:
- 50 journalists and media workers dead: 45 Palestinian, 4 Israeli, and 1 Lebanese
- 11 journalists injured
- 3 journalists missing
- 18 journalists arrested
- Multiple assaults, threats, cyberattacks, censorship,…

— Committee to Protect Journalists (@pressfreedom) November 20, 2023

The parliament in Saskatchewan was cleared as a result of a protest calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. 

A video shared on social media showed legislators leaving their seats amid chants of, “Ceasefire now!”

“We expect our government, provincially and federally, to represent us and we do not support genocide,” Valerie Zink, one of the protest organisers, told the Regina Leader-Post newspaper ahead of the action.

Canadian PM Justin Trudeau continues to oppose a ceasefire. 

The moment the Saskatchewan legislature was cleared this afternoon as calls for "Ceasefire now" rained down on MLAs. pic.twitter.com/M3JX0JpdQz

— Alexander Quon (@AlexanderQuon) November 20, 2023

The Red Cross said Monday that its president had travelled to Qatar to meet with Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh "to advance humanitarian issues related to the armed conflict in Israel and Gaza".

"President Mirjana Spoljaric met with (Ismail) Haniyeh, Chair of Hamas' Political Bureau, and separately with authorities of the state of Qatar," the International Committee of the Red Cross said in a statement.

The Geneva-based organisation stressed that it was continuing "to appeal for the urgent protection of all victims in the conflict, and for the alleviation of the catastrophic humanitarian situation in the Gaza strip".

"ICRC staff in Gaza have been delivering life-saving assistance, and an ICRC surgical team continues to perform operations," it said, adding that it was "calling for sustained, safe humanitarian access so it can increase its work".

Gaza's health ministry said on Monday that 200 patients were evacuated from the Indonesian hospital with the help of the Red Cross just hours after it was hit by a deadly Israeli strike, killing 12 people.

"200 patients were evacuated from the Indonesian hospital with the help of the ICRC," health ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra told AFP, saying another 100 would be taken out overnight to another facility in the southern town of Khan Younis.

The United States on Monday denounced the seizure of a cargo ship in the Red Sea by Yemen's Houthi movement as a violation of international law and demanded the immediate release of the vessel and its crew.

"The Houthi seizure of the motor vessel Galaxy Leader in the Red Sea is a flagrant violation of international law," State Department spokeman Matthew Miller told a briefing.

"We demand the immediate release of the ship and its crew and we will consult with our allies and U.N. partners as to appropriate next steps."

Leaders from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iran and the United Arab Emirates will on Tuesday attend a virtual summit of the  BRICS group of nations hosted by South Africa.

All 3 countries are due to join BRICS in January 2024.

The BRICS -- Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa -- are a group of major emerging economies seeking to reshape the US and Western-led global order.

Tuesday's "Extraordinary Joint Meeting on the Middle East Situation in Gaza" will be hosted by South African President Cyril Ramaphosa in the hope of drawing up a common response to the more than six-week conflict.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres will also participate, the South African presidency said in a statement.

It added that all five BRICS heads of state will join the virtual summit, after which a joint statement with particular reference to Gaza is expected.

Read the full report here.

Israel's war cabinet discussed its willingness to advance negotiations over the release of hostages held in Gaza, and wants to send a message to Qatar that it is ready to make a deal happen, according to a report by the Israeli media outlet Channel 12.

Doha is mediating between Israel and Hamas. 

The Channel 12 report says Israel wants to progress in principle, on a deal for the release of 50-plus children and women.

It quotes a senior Israeli diplomatic source saying: “There will be difficult days ahead ... The deal is not something that can be finalized from today to tomorrow; freeing the hostages will take several days.”

Hamas' main demands are believed to be the release of 100 male and female prisoners and a five-day pause in the fighting, according to the report.  

The United States believes a deal to release hostages held by Hamas amid the conflict with Israel is getting closer, White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said on Monday.

Kirby told reporters that Washington is “hopeful” a deal can be reached, but nothing is finalised.

"There’s still work to be done and nothing is done until it’s all done, so we’re going to keep working on this," he added.

He also said the US is calling for international law to be respected in Gaza, and for the increase of the flow of humanitarian aid into the besieged Palestinian territory.

The US continues to oppose a ceasefire. 

(Reuters contributed to this report)

Relatives of some of the 240 hostages held by Hamas in Gaza urged far-right Israeli lawmakers on Monday not to pursue proposed capital punishment for captured Palestinian militants, saying that even talk of doing so might endanger the lives of their captured loved ones.

Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has called for the death penalty, which is dormant on Israel's law books.

Some of the relatives of the people held captive by Hamas in Gaza worry the publicity around the capital punishment debate could invite reprisals even as hopes of a deal to free some of them is growing.

"It would mean playing along with their mind games. And in return we would get pictures of our loves ones murdered, ended, with the State of Israel being blamed for it," Yarden Gonen, whose sister Romi is among the hostages, told Ben-Gvir and his party colleagues during a parliamentary panel.

"Don't pursue this until after they are back here," she said. "Don't put my sister's blood on your hands."

Read the full report here. 

A member the political bureau of the Houthi group, Hazam Al-Assad, told The New Arab's sister publication Al-Araby Al-Jadeed's podcast that the decision by the group to seize the Israeli ship in the Red Sea was "the decision of the Yemeni people", amid speculation the group was directed by their allies Iran. 

"The talk about Iran is a scapegoat from the beginning, and it is always used in this context," Al-Assad said.

"There is joint coordination within the framework of the axis of resistance, but the response was a purely Yemeni decision," he added.

Al-Assad also said that the seizure of the Israeli vessel by the Houthis is "just the first of our upcoming naval operations, whether we are targeting Israeli naval ships and warships or commercial vessels", while he was keen to point out that such moves against Israel had no bearing on ongoing peace talks with Saudi Arabia. 

The spokesman for Hamas’ military wing the Qassam Brigades says the group believes the Israeli military fired at its own forces in Gaza, “thinking that some had been captured," according to Al Jazeera.

Israel has previously used a controversial policy known as the "Hannibal directive", which states that the Israeli military must prevent the capture of its own forces at any cost, as attested to by former Israeli soldiers. 

In a prerecorded message, Hamas spokesman Abu Obaida also claimed that fighting is ongoing between Palestinian fighters and Israel across multiple locations in Gaza, and that in the last 3 days Qassam fighters destroyed 60 Israeli military vehicles, including 10 personnel carriers. 

President Joe Biden's energy security adviser Amos Hochstein was traveling to Israel on Monday to discuss issues related to the northern border with Lebanon, including how to stop the war in Gaza from spreading, a U.S. official said.

"This trip builds on Hochstein's visit to Beirut earlier this month where he made clear the United States does not want to see conflict in Gaza escalating and expanding into Lebanon," the official said.

Bordering on insecurity: What's at stake in Lebanon-Israel border negotiations? https://t.co/3V8Cmtlh4X

— The New Arab (@The_NewArab) October 6, 2023

"While in Israel, Hochstein will emphasise that restoring calm along Israel's northern border is of utmost importance to the United States and it should be a top priority for both Israel and Lebanon."

Hochstein helped to finalise a maritime demarcation deal last year between Israel and Lebanon, bringing a measure of accommodation between the enemy states as they eyed offshore energy exploration.

Turkey will not allow the issue of Israel's nuclear weapons to be dropped from the global agenda, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday, while attributing European support for Israel to what he called "the shame of the Holocaust".

Speaking after a cabinet meeting, Erdogan said the West was trying to "vindicate" what he said were Israel's war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza, adding Western countries had a "fraternity of lies" with Israel which he called "shameful".

"The shame of the Holocaust has literally taken European leaders hostage," he said. "We, as Turkey, will not allow the issue of Israel's nuclear to be forgotten," Erdogan added.

Will Turkey-Israel ties reach breaking point amid Gaza war? 👇 https://t.co/tr1u8GR95u

— The New Arab (@The_NewArab) November 20, 2023

Israel has recalled for consultations its ambassador to South Africa following the "latest statements from South Africa," Israel's Foreign Ministry said on Monday.

South Africa's ruling African National Congress (ANC) party on Thursday had said it would support a parliamentary motion calling for the Israeli embassy in South Africa to be closed.

South Africa, which is highly critical of Israel's bombardment of Gaza, has recalled its diplomats from Israel.

Yemen's Houthis released video footage on Monday showing armed men dropping from a helicopter and seizing a cargo ship in the southern Red Sea.

The footage was released by the movement's TV channel Al Masirah a day after the ship was hijacked by the Iran-backed group, who said the ship was linked to Israel.

Israel, however, says the seized ship was British-owned and Japanese-operated.

مشاهد للعملية العسكرية النوعية للقوات البحرية اليمنية على السفينة الإسرائيلية والسيطرة عليها واقتيادها إلى الساحل اليمني ..#طوفان_الأقصى #البحر_الأحمر #باب_المندب #سيد_القول_والفعل #لستم_وحدكم #المسيرة pic.twitter.com/RgHlzXeANx

— قناة المسيرة (@TvAlmasirah) November 20, 2023

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, who was reelected to the post last week, will travel to Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories on Thursday, his office said in a statement on Monday.

Sanchez will travel alongside his Belgian counterpart Alexander de Croo, representing the current and upcoming rotating presidencies of the Council of the European Union, respectively.

Both leaders are set to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's President Isaac Herzog and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, the statement added.

U.S. President Joe Biden said on Monday he believes a deal is near to secure the release of some of the hostages being held by Hamas in Gaza, telling reporters "I believe so" when asked at the White House about a possible agreement.

Reuters reported last week that Qatari mediators had been seeking a deal between Israel and Hamas to exchange 50 hostages in return for a three-day ceasefire that would help boost emergency aid shipments to Gaza civilians, citing an official briefed on the talks.

Despite ongoing fighting, Israel's ambassador to the United States, Michael Herzog, told ABC News on Sunday that Israel was hopeful a significant number of hostages could be released by Hamas "in coming days."

The World Health Organization said Wednesday that 1.7 million people in the Gaza Strip - more than half of the enclave's population - has been displaced by Israel's bombardment.

An Israeli drone attack destroyed a house in the Lebanese border village of Aitaroun Wednesday evening.

Videos shared on social media showed flames and smoke billowing from the scene of the drone strike.

#عـاجل: غارة إسرائيلية طالت أطراف بلدة الطيبة واخرى استهدفت منزلاً في بلدة عيترون جنوب لبنان pic.twitter.com/CrgLWKwPwS

— عاصمة الشتات (@3asmat_alshatat) November 20, 2023

Gaza's health ministry said the death toll from Israel's bombardment has surpassed 13,300 people, including 5,600 children.

The government's media office said 55 hospitals were now out of service.

A large salvo of rockets was fired at Tel Aviv Wednesday evening, in response to ongoing Israeli bombardment of Gaza, Hamas' armed wing said.

According to Alaraby TV, Israeli paramedics were searching for any casualties following the rocket attack.

Videos shared online showed some of the rockets being intercepted by the Israeli Iron Dome, as sirens blasted throughout the city.

Hamas resume rocket fire 🔥 on Tel Aviv tonight : pic.twitter.com/l34cZ0bLbp

— Nagi N. Najjar (@NagiNajjar) November 20, 2023

Israel's repression of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank has escalated significantly post-October 7.

It is crucial to mention that Israel isn't only targeting Palestinians on both sides of the Green Line but is also persecuting Jewish Israeli citizens opposing the war or even calling for a ceasefire. 

Read the full article here.

The organisation Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) - or Doctors Without Borders - said its clinic in Gaza City came under fire on Monday

"This morning, the MSF clinic in Gaza City came under fire. Our colleagues saw that a wall was torn down and part of the building was engulfed by fire as heavy fighting took place all around it. An Israeli tank was seen in the street," it said in a statement, posted on X.

Four MSF cars burned down. A fifth car, parked across the street, was broken in two pieces as if crushed by a heavy-duty vehicle or a tank. All the cars and the clinic were clearly identified with the MSF logo.

— MSF International (@MSF) November 20, 2023

The destroyed cars are the same ones that were used in the aborted evacuation of our staff and their relatives on 18 November, resulting in the killing of one family member. The cars were the only means of transport our staff and their families had to facilitate their evacuation.

— MSF International (@MSF) November 20, 2023

The house of a Lebanese lawmaker was hit by Israeli shelling in the border village of Mays al-Jabal, which has been frequently targeted in the cross-border clashes between Israel and Hezbollah.

Videos shared online showed the house of Qabalan Qabalan - from Speaker Nabih Berri's parliamentary bloc - heavily damaged from the shelling.

استهداف منزل النائب قبلان قبلان في ميس الجبل pic.twitter.com/0zxk63rXhl

— Al Jadeed News (@ALJADEEDNEWS) November 20, 2023

The head of the World Health Organisation said on Monday he was "appalled" by an attack on the Indonesian Hospital in Gaza that he said had killed 12 people, including patients, citing unspecified reports.

"Health workers and civilians should never have to be exposed to such horror, and especially while inside a hospital," Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on social media platform X.

.@WHO is appalled by an attack on the Indonesian Hospital in #Gaza, reportedly resulting in 12 deaths, including patients, and tens of injuries, including critical and life-threatening ones.

Health workers and civilians should never have to be exposed to such horror, and…

— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) November 20, 2023

Israel's far-right finance minister, who has so far been excluded from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's war cabinet, called on Monday for lawmakers taking a harder line towards Hamas to be included in decisions about the war.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and other hardline members of the broader cabinet have been excluded from much of the decision making, and were particularly critical of a decision last week to accede to a U.S. request to allow some fuel into Gaza for humanitarian reasons.

"I think this grave mistake necessitates the expansion of the war cabinet," said Smotrich, arguing that letting in fuel gave Hamas a lifeline during the war.

Netanyahu's office declined to comment.

Smotrich, in a statement, said the war cabinet should include "opinions that until today have not been heard," including from those with a record of calling for Hamas to be eliminated.

Israeli ships are a "legitimate target," Yemen's Houthi rebels warned on Monday, after their seizure of an Israel-linked cargo vessel opened a new dimension in the Gaza war.

"Israeli ships are legitimate targets for us anywhere...and we will not hesitate to take action," Major General Ali Al-Moshki, a Huthi military official, told the group's Al-Massirah TV station.

Analysts also said Houthi threats to shipping around the Bab al-Mandab Strait, a choke-point at the foot of the commercially vital Red Sea, were likely to rise.

Relatives of the more than 200 people held by Hamas in Gaza urged far-right Israeli lawmakers on Monday not to pursue proposed capital punishment for captured Palestinians who Israel says are militants, saying that even talk of doing so might endanger the hostages.

Israel's Justice Ministry said on November 7 that a task force was discussing how to try the Palestinians who had been detained and secure "punishments befitting the severity of the horrors committed" for those convicted.

Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has called for the death penalty, which is dormant on Israel's law books.

Some of the relatives of the people held captive by Hamas in Gaza worry the publicity around the capital punishment debate could invite reprisals even as hopes of a deal to free some of them is growing.

"It would mean playing along with their mind games. And in return we would get pictures of our loves ones murdered, ended, with the State of Israel and not them (Hamas) being blamed for it," Yarden Gonen, whose sister Romi is among the hostages, told Ben-Gvir and his party colleagues during a parliamentary panel.

"Don't pursue this until after they are back here," she said. "Don't put my sister's blood on your hands."

Chinese President Xi Jinping and French counterpart Emmanuel Macron discussed the Israel-Hamas war in a phone call on Monday, agreeing "to avoid a more serious humanitarian crisis", Beijing's state media reported.

"The two heads of state exchanged views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and both believe that the top priority is to avoid further deterioration of the situation between Palestine and Israel, especially to avoid a more serious humanitarian crisis," state broadcaster CCTV reported.

According to CCTV, Xi and Macron agreed to "continue to maintain communication on international and regional issues of common concern and contribute to maintaining world peace and stability".

"The 'two state solution' is the fundamental way to solve the recurrent conflict between Palestine and Israel," the state broadcaster added.

The African Union said Monday that Israel's response to Hamas's massive attack last month was "inexcusable," warning that civilian casualties would fuel further "extremism".

"The acts (of Hamas) are reprehensible... but the response is inexcusable," AU chairman Azali Assoumani told a press conference in Berlin.

"Imagine a child who has seen his mother, who has seen his father killed... it creates extremism," he said.

Examining the condemnation of Israeli policy across the African continent against the backdrop of a largely failed push by the US to cajole governments into taking sides in the Ukraine war 👇 https://t.co/E3rd7p2u8x

— The New Arab (@The_NewArab) November 20, 2023

The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Monday that three prematurely born babies from a bigger group evacuated into Egypt on Monday had been left behind in a hospital in southern Gaza to receive further treatment.

"The 28 babies have now safely arrived in Egypt. Three babies still remain at the Emarati Hospital and continue to receive treatment," a WHO spokesperson said in an emailed response to Reuters.

Asked about the babies' condition, he said: "All babies are fighting serious infections and continue needing health care."

Russian President Vladimir Putin will take part in a virtual summit of the BRICS group of nations on Tuesday to discuss the Gaza war, the Kremlin said.

The meeting will be chaired by South African President Cyril Ramaphosa in the hope of drawing up a common response to the more than six week conflict.

"On November 21, Russian President Vladimir Putin will participate in an extraordinary BRICS summit (via videoconference) to discuss the Palestinian-Israeli conflict," the Kremlin said, without providing further details.

Several people, including children, were reported killed on Monday after Israel struck a UN-run school in the Gaza Strip used a shelter for the displaced.

It is not yet clear how many people died from the attack on the school in Bureij.

Videos shared online showed bodies laid out in hospital grounds of victims from the strike, as well as wounded individuals.

Palestinian officials said a field hospital sent by Jordan entered the Gaza Strip Monday, the first since the war erupted on October 7.

"The hospital will be established in Khan Yunis, to receive the wounded and the sick, under catastrophic conditions which southern hospitals are experiencing, with the influx of hundreds of wounded each day and continued aggressive aerial and artillery strikes," said Mohammed Zaqout, director-general of Gaza hospitals.

سمو الأمير الحسين بن عبدالله الثاني ولي العهد يصل إلى مدينة العريش المصرية للإشراف على عملية تجهيز وإرسال المستشفى الميداني الأردني الخاص لجنوبي قطاع غزة وهو ثاني مستشفى أردني في غزة وسيكون موقعه في جنوب القطاع في مدينة خانيونس، وهو أول مستشفى ميداني يصل قطاع غزة خلال العدوان pic.twitter.com/BKTIaqGyPu

— حمزة (@hamzanga) November 20, 2023

There are around 30,000 wounded people across Gaza, according to the enclave's health ministry.

Aed Yaghi, head of medical aid in Gaza, said the field hospital will help ease the pressure on existing health services.

"The number of medical personnel is limited and there aren't (enough) ambulances," Yaghi told AFP.

The Jordanian field hospital reached Gaza accompanied by 17 personnel and 40 trucks of medical aid.

At least 25 rockets and mortar shells as well as drones were fired from south Lebanon at the Israeli border settlements of Qiryat Shmona and Margaliot.

It was not clear how many of the missiles were intercepted and whether there were any direct casualties in Israel.

Hezbollah said at least three of its drone targeted Israeli troops west of Qiryat Shmona.

Israel continued to shell south Lebanon border villages.

بالفيدو : إعتراض صواريخ فوق #كريات_شمونة قرب الحدود اللبنانية #عاجل pic.twitter.com/mKH863Unpi

— Voice of Lebanon 100.3 100.5 (@sawtlebnan) November 20, 2023

Video: Rockets intercepted over Qiryat Shmona near the Lebanese border

سقوط صواريخ اطلقت من لبنان على كريات شمونة 🇱🇧🇵🇸 pic.twitter.com/2OESwFvRkI

— مصدر مسؤول (@fouadkhreiss) November 20, 2023

Rockets fired from Lebanon land in Qiryat Shmona

Over a dozen people turned out to protest alongside Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) outside the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office in Lancaster House where a Global Food Security Summit is currently being held.

The protesters, holding empty plates reading 'Feed Gaza, Ceasefire Now,' are calling for an end to Israel’s siege and bombardment of the Gaza Strip, whilst highlighting the food insecurity that is currently being witnessed by Gaza’s population of 2.2 million people who lack regular access to food and water.

MAP CEO Melany Ward told The New Arab that the protest was to send a message to the participant of the summit, that the summit cannot "ignore the fact that 2.2 million people in Gaza are at risk of starvation because Israel is not allowing food in to them."

She added that the situation for civilians in besieged northern Gaza is of particular worry as "no food, no water, and no fuel has been allowed to get to them for the last two weeks," adding that "doctors report they’re starting to see signs of acute malnutrition among Children."

Indonesia's Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi on Monday condemned Israel's attack on the Indonesian Hospital in Gaza.

"The attack is a clear violation of international humanitarian laws. All countries, especially those that have close relations with Israel, must use all their influence and capabilities to urge Israel to stop its atrocities," she said in a statement.

Qatar’s Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani is travelling to the United Kingdom and Russia on Tuesday as part of the Islamic-Arab summit committee’s efforts to secure a ceasefire in Gaza.

The Gulf state’s foreign ministry spokesperson Majed Al Ansari announced the tour on Sunday in remarks to Qatar News Agency (QNA), confirming it was part of agreements made at the November 11 Arab-Islamic summit.

Al Ansari said that the tour was "an implementation of the mandate decision issued by the extraordinary joint Islamic-Arab summit in Riyadh on 11 November to formulate international action to stop the war raging in Gaza", the QNA report said.

Lebanon's Hezbollah militant group fired heavy Burkan rockets at the Biranit military base in northern Israel, causing significant damage.

It's not clear if there were any casualties.

#Lebanon / #Palestine / #Israel 🇱🇧🇵🇸🇮🇱: #Hezbollah carried out an intense attack on Birnit Israeli military site in #Galilee near the Lebanese border.

The group allegedly used improvised 'Burkan' heavy rockets; which are mostly based on #Iran-made 🇮🇷 333mm 'Falagh-2' rockets. pic.twitter.com/GDbwrb5hrY

— War Noir (@war_noir) November 20, 2023

Twenty-nine premature babies arrived in Egypt on Monday, Egyptian media said, after they were evacuated from Gaza's largest hospital.

The infants were evacuated Sunday from the Al-Shifa hospital, which the World Health Organization has described as a "death zone" as Israel seeks to uncover what it says are Hamas bases in tunnels underneath the facility.

An initial 31 babies were reported evacuated from Al-Shifa to another Gaza clinic and it was not immediately clear why only 29 arrived in Egypt.

أُدخل 28 طفلاً خديجاً إلى #مصر عبر معبر رفح الحدودي مع قطاع غزة، اليوم الاثنين، بعد إجلائهم من #مجمّع_الشفاء_الطبي.

وأوضح أحد أفراد الأطقم الطبية الفلسطينية المشاركة في عملية نقل الأطفال، لقناة "القاهرة الإخبارية" أنّ 31 طفلاً كانوا قد نُقلوا من المستشفى، لكنّ ثلاثة منهم لقوا… pic.twitter.com/KINfG5mOUM

— العربي الجديد (@alaraby_ar) November 20, 2023

Iran on Monday dismissed as "invalid" Israel's accusations that Yemen's Houthi rebels were acting on Tehran's "guidance" when they seized a Red Sea ship owned by an Israeli businessman on Sunday.

"We have repeatedly announced that the resistance groups in the region represent their countries and make decisions and act based on the interests of their countries," said Iran's foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani.

He said the Israeli accusations were "invalid" and "projection meant to escape from the situation they are facing".

"The Zionist regime (Israel) cannot accept that it suffered a major defeat in Palestine and wants to find a justification for the defeat it suffered by accusing the Islamic Republic of Iran," Kanani added.

China’s top diplomat welcomed four Arab foreign ministers and the Indonesian one to Beijing on Monday, saying his country would work with “our brothers and sisters" in the Arab and Islamic world to try to end the war in Gaza as soon as possible.

The ministers from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, the Palestinian Authority and Indonesia chose to start a tour of world capitals in Beijing, a testament to both China's growing geopolitical influence and its longstanding support for the Palestinians.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told the foreign diplomats that their decision to start in Beijing shows their high level of trust in his nation.

More than 100 evacuees from Gaza are set to arrive in Turkey on Monday, including dozens of people who will receive medical treatment there, Turkey's health minister and foreign ministry spokesman said.

Sixty-one patients, accompanied by 49 relatives, arrived in Egypt from Gaza on Sunday evening and were scheduled to fly to Ankara on Monday after spending the night at Al Arish hospital, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said.

He said last week that Ankara wanted to bring as many of the nearly 1,000 cancer patients from Gaza to Turkey as possible. The first 27 patients arrived in Ankara last Thursday.

Keceli also said that if conditions on the ground permit, Turkey aimed to get around 100 more people out of Gaza on Monday.

Speaking in parliament, Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said Turkey's efforts to get its citizens out of Gaza were continuing.

"Until today, we have secured the exit from Gaza of 170 of our citizens and their relatives," he said, adding there would be further evacuations on Monday and Tuesday.