Israeli strikes on Gaza continue amid polio vaccination campaign

The New Arab's live bog on Israel's war in Gaza has now ended, and will resume tomorrow at 09:00am. Thank you for following.

Around 189,000 children in Gaza have so far been vaccinated against polio, the White House said it estimated.

Hamas said it "affirms: its commitment to US President Joe Biden’s ceasefire proposal, its spokesperson said on Thursday.

Khalil al-Hayya went on to  accuse Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of continuing to "evade the obligation to reach a deal".

"The policy of military escalation and committing more massacres to release prisoners by force has proven to be a failure. The US administration must abandon its blind bias towards Israel if it wants to reach a deal and commit it to the agreements," he said.

He added that Hamas will not agree to a deal that does not stop the aggressions or gives "legitimacy to an Israeli presence in Gaza".

Hamas's lead negotiator on Thursday urged the United States to press Israel for a truce in Gaza, accusing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of evading a ceasefire in the Palestinian territory.

"If the US administration and its President (Joe) Biden really want to reach a ceasefire and complete a prisoner exchange deal, they must abandon their blind bias towards the Zionist occupation and exert real pressure on Netanyahu and his government," Qatar-based Khalil al-Hayya said, according to a Hamas statement.

A dual Lebanese-Belgian citizen accused by the United States of financing Lebanese armed group Hezbollah is expected to plead guilty in a criminal case charging him with sanctions evasion and money-laundering conspiracies.

Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn said in a court filing on Thursday that lawyers for Mohammad Bazzi told them he wishes to change his plea. Bazzi, 60, pleaded not guilty last year to three felony counts, including attempting to transact with a sanctioned terrorist organization.

Bazzi's lawyers did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The U.S. Treasury Department placed Bazzi on its sanctions list in 2018 over his alleged ties to Hezbollah, which Washington considers a terrorist organization.

Prosecutors said Bazzi covertly sold real estate he owned in Michigan and transferred the funds abroad, in violation of those sanctions.

The Israeli army is reportedly refusing to coordinate the entry of medical teams affiliated with the emergency polio vaccination campaign into some areas of Gaza, the Palestinian Health Ministry said on Thursday.

"We appeal to all concerned institutions and authorities to intervene urgently to ensure the success of the vaccination campaign by reaching all children wherever they are," the ministry said in a statement.

The health ministry in Gaza said Thursday that at least 40,878 people have been killed in the Israel-waged war on Gaza, now nearing its 12th month.

The toll includes 17 deaths in the previous 24 hours, according to ministry figures, which also list 94,454 people as wounded in the Gaza Strip since the war began.

German authorities are treating a shooting near Munich's Israeli consulate on Thursday as a "possible attack on an Israeli institution", said state interior minister Joachim Herrmann.

The gunman, who was shot dead by police after he had opened fire with a vintage rifle, was an 18-year-old Austrian man, added Munich police chief Thomas Hampel, speaking at a joint press conference.

The Commissioner-General for UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini has decried Israeli forces banning international media from freely entering the war-hit Gaza Strip, in a bid to report on the humanitarian crisis unfolding there, and the ongoing war.

Lazzarini also praised the bravery of Palestinian journalists in  Gaza who have gone on to report from the territory, despite constant Israeli threats to their safety.

"Palestinian journalists have my admiration," he wrote on X. "They continue to hold the torch despite far too many of them have been killed. They need the support of their colleagues."

Egypt's army chief of staff Lieutenant General Ahmed Fathy Khalifa made a surprise visit to the country's border with the Gaza Strip to inspect the security situation, state television reported on Thursday, citing the army's spokesperson.

The visit comes after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday that Israel would only agree to a permanent ceasefire in Gaza which guaranteed that the border area between southern Gaza and Egypt could never be used as a lifeline for Hamas.

The Philadelphi corridor, along the southern edge of the Gaza Strip bordering Egypt, has been one of the main obstacles to a deal to halt the fighting in Gaza and bring Israeli hostages home in exchange for Palestinian prisoners

Multiple casualties are being reported in the vicinity of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, following an Israeli airstrike targeting the area.

Israeli soldiers have stormed the West Bank's Tulkarem refugee camp again after briefly withdrawing earlier today.

Bulldozers and military vehicles in the outskirts of the camp were met with resistance by Palestinians, while fighting remains ongoing.

The Israeli army stormed al-Akasha neighbourhood in the camp and deployed snipers, accoridng to the Palestinian news agency Wafa. It also surrounded the Martyr Thabet Governmental Hospital and declared a curfew in the area of the Al-Shweika roundabout, forcing shops to close.

One person has been killed in an Israeli raid near the town of Kafra in southern Lebanon, Al Jazeera reported, citing the ministry of health.

An Israeli aircraft targeted an area near between the towns of Kafra and Siddiqin "severely damaging"  property in the area, local media reported.

It also reported artillery shelling on the Ras al-Dhahr area in Mays al-Jabal and an air raid in the outskirts of the town of Aita al-Shaab.

A young Palestinian man was injured on Thursday by Israeli gunfire in the village of Kafr Qud, west of Jenin.

Palestinian Red Crescent spokesman Ahmad Jibril said that the crews transferred a man injured by live bullets in the thigh area to the hospital.

Israeli forces have arrested several Palestinians across the West Bank on Thursday, as the Israeli army continued its violent raids of the occupied territory.

The arrests were carried out in and around Ramallah, the Aqabat Jabr refugee camp, Nablus, Hebron and Jenin areas.

Police in Munich said officers "fired shots at a suspicious person" on Thursday in an area near the Israeli Consulate and a museum on the city's Nazi-era history.

Police said on the social network X that the person was hit in the shooting, but didn't give further details. They said there was no evidence of any more suspects connected to the incident.

There was no immediate information on why the person was considered suspicious.

The incident took place in the Karolinenplatz area, near downtown Munich. 

German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said "the protection of Israeli institutions is of the highest priority after the shooting".

She described the shooting as "a serious incident" and said she was in contact with emergency services but did not want to speculate on further details. 

Hamas released a video late on Wednesday featuring two Israeli hostages whose bodies were later found by Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip.

Both of them blamed Israel for its offensive and warned that they could be killed during its strikes on the enclave.

One hostage, identified as Alexander Lobanov, accused the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of "failure… and continuing to fail in every attempt to release us alive".

The other hostage, Carmel Gat, said she was "pleading" to the government and Netanyahu to stop the bombardment, urging Israelis to continue their demonstrations to demand the release of the captives.

Hamas later issued a statement in which it said that there was no need for new ceasefire proposals, urging pressure on Netanyahu and his government to abide by what has been agreed upon.

Amnesty International on Thursday urged a war crimes probe into Israel razing homes and farms in eastern Gaza to expand a so-called buffer zone between it and the Palestinian territory.

"Using bulldozers and manually laid explosives, the Israeli military has unlawfully destroyed agricultural land and civilian buildings, razing entire neighbourhoods, including homes, schools and mosques," it said.

The London-based rights group said the levelling since the start of the war on October 7 "should be investigated as war crimes of wanton destruction and of collective punishment".

An Amnesty investigation, which examined satellite imagery and videos posted by Israeli soldiers between October and May, showed "newly cleared land along Gaza's eastern boundary, ranging from approximately 1 to 1.8 km (0.6 to 1.1 miles) wide", the group said.

The expanded buffer zone covers around 58 square kilometres (22 square miles), or about 16 percent of the Gaza Strip, it said.

More than 90 percent of buildings within that zone appeared to have been destroyed or severely damaged, it said.

More than half of the agricultural land in the area showed "a decline in health and intensity of crops due to the ongoing conflict", it added.

"Our analysis reveals a pattern along the eastern perimeter of Gaza that is consistent with the systematic destruction of the entire area," said Amnesty's Erika Guevara-Rosas.

"The homes were not destroyed as the result of intense fighting. Rather, the Israeli military deliberately razed the land after they had taken control of the area," she added.

Palestinian official media condemned on Thursday the Israeli detention of Palestine TV correspondent Ali Dar Ali after the Israeli occupation forces raided his home in the village of Burham, northwest of Ramallah.

The official media, according to Wafa, confirmed in a press release that the detention and abuse of journalists "will not deter the official media cadres from performing their duty towards Palestinian people and their just cause, and exposing the Israeli practices and crimes".

They said that Dar Ali's arrest comes as Israeli forces attempt to stifle Palestinian voices amid the war in Gaza and the West Bank raids over the months.

Dar Ali was among the five Palestinians taken into custody from the Ramallah and el-Bireh governorate.

Israeli occupation soldiers detain journalist Ali Dar Ali of the Palestine TV after raiding his home in the village of Burham, north of Ramallah. pic.twitter.com/xb6qpvX46z

— Quds News Network (@QudsNen) September 5, 2024

Palestinian medics reported Thursday that six people were killed in a strike targeting a car in the occupied West Bank area of Tubas, as the Israeli military said it carried out raids.

"Six killed and (one) seriously wounded in a strike (on) a car in Tubas," the Palestinian Ministry of Health and the Red Crescent reported on Thursday.

The Israeli military said its aircraft "conducted three targeted strikes on armed terrorists" in the Tubas area.

A large number of Israeli troops stormed the Fara'a refugee camp in Tubas governorate, where explosions were heard, eyewitnesses told AFP.