Israel is shoot mostly at Gaza…..
But also at Syria and Lebanon…..which could be a widing of the conflict….
And Egyptian strike was also made but Israel quickly apologized for it saying it was a mistake….
Israel wants people in North Gaza to move to Southern Gaza closer to Egypt’s border…..
The growing international consensus is that Isreal did NOT bomb the Gaza hospital….
Both parties have over 1,000 deaths/causalities..
Could there be a remote ‘silver lining ‘ for Israel and the Palestinians in this conflict?
(This linked piece towards the bottom…)
As Israeli forces massed along the border with Gaza on Sunday ahead of an expected ground invasion of the enclave, escalating clashes on Israel’s northern border with Lebanon along with strikes in Syria and in the Israeli-occupied West Bank intensified fears of a widening regional conflict.
The Israeli authorities said they were expanding a state-funded evacuation plan to move residents from an additional 14 Israeli villages near the border with Lebanon to safer areas. The move came as Israel’s military said Sunday it was contending with increasing attacks from Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militia that controls southern Lebanon, that have resulted in civilian and military casualties.
Amid concerns the conflict could spill over, the Pentagon said late Saturday that it was sending an antimissile battery and battalions of the Patriot ground-based air defense system to the Middle East following “recent escalations by Iran and its proxy forces.”
Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken said the Biden administration believes there is “a likelihood of escalation, escalation by Iranian proxies directed against our forces, directed against our personnel” in the days to come.
“We are taking steps to make sure that we can effectively defend our people,” he said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” program.
Violence also has been surging across the Israeli-occupied West Bank. The Israeli military carried out a rare airstrike there overnight against what it described as an underground “terror compound” beneath a mosque in the city of Jenin. Two people were killed, according to Palestinian health officials.
The Israeli military continued to pound Gaza with punishing airstrikes, as armed groups there fired rockets toward Israel on Sunday. Israeli officials said a man was injured in one attack that left rocket fragments in various locations around the city of Netivot, a few miles from the Gaza border.
While the timing of an Israeli ground invasion of Gaza remained unclear, senior Israeli commanders have increasingly been making public references to such preparations amid questions about when an operation might launch. The commanding officer of Israel’s ground forces, Maj. Gen. Tamir Yedai, has been meeting in recent days with soldiers training for “ground maneuvering,” according to a statement issued by Israel’s military on Sunday.
The Israeli military also reiterated its warning for civilians in Gaza to move to the southern part of the enclave as a humanitarian crisis spirals. But many people there said that doing so was not an option because of cost — and that it was no guarantee of safety.
Here are some other developments:
-
Aid groups and the United Nations continued to warn that the first shipment of aid that arrived in Gaza on Saturday — a convoy of 20 trucks carrying food, water and medicine — was just a fraction of what was needed. It was not immediately clear when or whether more aid would be allowed into the blockaded enclave.
-
Israel’s bombardment of Gaza continued “almost unabated,” while Palestinian armed groups continued with their “indiscriminate rocket firing” toward Israel, the United Nations said. The death toll in Gaza has increased to at least 4,385, while injuries number more than 13,500, according to the Hamas-run Ministry of Health in Gaza. On the Israeli side, the fatalities remained at 1,400 but injuries increased to almost 5,000, the U.N. said.
-
The Israeli military said one of its tanks accidentally hit an Egyptian post near the border crossing between the two countries at Kerem Shalom. The military expressed “sorrow” and said the episode was under investigation. Egypt’s military said there were minor injuries, but described the incident as an accident and noted Israel’s immediate apology. Kerem Shalom is a couple of miles from Egypt’s Rafah border crossing, from which a small convoy of aid trucks entered Gaza on Saturday.
-
Syria’s state-run news agency said the airports in Damascus and Aleppo were shut after an early-morning strike by Israel that killed one civilian worker in Damascus. The report could not be independently verified and Israel didn’t immediately comment. Israel has a policy of not commenting on possible operations in Syria…..
Update….
-
A second aid convoy comprising of 14 trucks has crossed the Rafah border crossing and entered Gaza on Sunday. Announcing the crossing, UN aid chief Martin Griffiths said: “Another small glimmer of hope for the millions of people in dire need of humanitarian aid. But they need more, much more.”
-
Pope Francis has once again urged for the end of the Israel-Hamas war, calling for humanitarian aid to delivered and for hostages to be released.Speaking at his Sunday prayer, Francis said: “War is always a defeat, it is a destruction of human fraternity. Brothers, stop! Stop!”
-
Thousands of people gathered in Berlin and London to oppose antisemitism and support Israel on Sunday. Earlier, German chancellor Olaf Scholz inaugurated a new synagogue in Dessau and said he was “outraged” by the rise in antisemitism since the war broke out on 7 October.
-
Thousands of people attended a rally in Paris in what is the first pro-Palestinian demonstration allowed by police since the 7 October Hamas attacks on Israel. Reuters reports around 15,000 people showed up at the Place de la Republique, according to police figures, to express their solidarity with Palestinians.
-
At least three Palestinians were killed on Sunday night in an Israeli air strike in Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, medics and witnesses told Reuters. Several others were wounded…..