“Suleiman lost his football career, and football lost Suleiman.” The family of Palestinian football icon Suleiman al-Obaid mourn his loss after he was killed in an Israeli air strike while waiting for humanitarian aid in Gaza.
Published On 14 Aug 202514 Aug 2025
“This reality definitively buries the idea of a Palestinian state.” Far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich announced a plan to effectively split the occupied West Bank in half, approving thousands of new Jewish settler homes between occupied East Jerusalem and the Maale Adumim settlement.
Published On 14 Aug 202514 Aug 2025
The humanitarian tragedy unfolding in the Gaza Strip must not be perceived merely as a conflict confined to a narrow strip of land; rather, it should be regarded as a deepening humanitarian catastrophe that wounds the collective conscience of humanity with each passing day. Israel’s months-long bombardments have targeted women, children, and the elderly, rendering cities uninhabitable. Homes, hospitals, schools, and places of worship have been reduced to rubble; essential services such as food, water, healthcare, and electricity have collapsed. Hunger, thirst, and the threat of epidemic disease are propelling Gaza towards a total humanitarian collapse. To date, more than 61,000 Palestinians — the majority of them women and children — have been killed in Israeli attacks. This picture is not only the mark of war, but also a stark testament to a systematic policy of annihilation.
In the face of such a dire picture, the world’s silence or its feeble responses only deepen the suffering and pave the way for the continuation of oppression. The West’s double standards — rushing to act in other crises while adopting an ambivalent approach to Gaza — undermine the credibility of an international order purportedly founded upon principles and rules. It is a fact that had the swift and comprehensive sensitivity shown towards the crisis in Ukraine also been displayed in the face of the atrocities in Gaza, the landscape we confront today would be entirely different. Israel’s ability to act without the slightest sanction has accelerated the erosion of international law and human rights norms. The crisis in Gaza stands before us as a litmus test of whether the international community is willing and able to uphold the most fundamental human values.
From the outset, Turkiye has demonstrated a resolute, consistent, and principled stance to end the atrocities and the worsening humanitarian disaster in Gaza. Our Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency (AFAD), the Turkish Red Crescent, and our civil society organisations are working actively on the ground, and despite all obstacles, food, medicines, and medical supplies are being delivered to the region with the support of brotherly nations in the vicinity. Wounded Gazans are being evacuated and treated in Turkiye. These relief efforts not only address urgent needs, but also proclaim to the world that the people of Gaza are not alone. On the diplomatic front, our calls for a ceasefire continue within the United Nations and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, and our mediation efforts between Palestinian groups are ongoing.
At the NATO Summit held in The Hague on June 25, I underlined that the fragile ceasefire must be transformed into a lasting peace, warning that “Gaza has no time to lose.” I have openly defined Israel’s attacks and policy of collective punishment — in flagrant disregard for international law — as genocide. We are working closely, particularly with Qatar, on humanitarian access, ceasefire negotiations, and reconstruction. We value Qatar’s leading role in facilitating humanitarian aid and in advancing diplomatic initiatives aimed at bringing the massacre to an end.
The violence in Gaza threatens not only the Palestinian people but also the stability of the entire region. Tensions between Israel and Iran heighten the risk of a broader conflict, with the potential to disrupt the security balance from the Eastern Mediterranean to the Gulf. The deepening of the crisis poses serious threats in the form of new waves of displacement, increased radicalisation, and risks to energy security. The Gaza question is, therefore, not solely a humanitarian crisis, but also a matter of strategic importance for global security and peace.
The path to a solution is, in essence, clear. An immediate ceasefire must be declared, and all attacks must be halted unconditionally. Humanitarian corridors must be opened to ensure the unimpeded delivery of food, water, and medical aid, and international mechanisms must be established to protect civilians. Turkiye stands ready to serve as an actor in shaping this process. War crimes and human rights violations must be investigated before the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice; perpetrators must be held to account before the law. Sustainable resources must be secured for aid organisations — particularly the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) — which are being strangled by Israeli pressure.
The reconstruction of Gaza must not be confined to rebuilding destroyed structures; it must evolve into a comprehensive process that safeguards the rights to education, healthcare, infrastructure, economic development, and political representation. This process should be conducted with the direct participation of the local population and under the oversight of the United Nations and regional organisations. The foundation of lasting peace lies in the recognition of an independent and sovereign State of Palestine with its territorial integrity safeguarded. A two-state solution is the sole key to peace and stability in the region.
The events in Gaza once again demonstrate that war also targets those who pursue truth. In recent months, numerous journalists have been murdered simply for doing their duty, striving to bring the reality of conflict zones to the world. The losses suffered by Al Jazeera, in particular, rank among the most brutal assaults on press freedom and the right to information. The death of courageous individuals who strive to bring the truth to the world and to lift the veil of lies and propaganda that shrouds war is a profound loss for us all. Their memory will remain a symbol of the pursuit of justice. I extend my condolences to the families of the deceased, to their colleagues, and to the entire media community.
The cause of Palestine and Gaza transcends borders; it is a common test for humanity. We must never forget the heavy price borne by human dignity when the world turned a blind eye to the tragedies of Bosnia and Rwanda. For this reason, Turkiye’s unwavering stance on Gaza is both a moral obligation and a strategic necessity. Together with all actors who believe in humanitarian diplomacy, foremost among them Qatar, we will continue our efforts towards a lasting, just, and honourable peace. We hold the view that achieving peace is not beyond reach, but rather an essential goal that has been awaited for far too long. We are committed to making every effort to achieve peace and will persist in our endeavours.
History is bearing witness to those who took action and to those who turned away from the cruelty in Gaza. Gaza has no time to lose; the international community must heed the voice of the global conscience and act. The future of humanity will be shaped by the courage of the steps we take today.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
Rizik ran on. Next to him was a young man who spoke to Al Jazeera later, requesting anonymity for his safety.
He said Rizik fell while jumping over a stone wall, hurting his legs, but that when they saw two boys who needed help, Rizik joined the young man in carrying them to safety.
But then Rizik and his friend found themselves surrounded by settlers.
They ran, but just as he dove for cover in the bushes, the friend saw a settler shoot Rizik in the chest.
“The settlers started shouting: ‘Yes! I got you!’” he recalled, describing how several settlers gathered around Rizik as he lay on the ground.
At about the time of the shooting, Rizik had called his family, but the family told others the call lasted only seconds, with no response from Rizik, although they heard shouts in Hebrew in the background.
Rizik’s friend ran for his life down the side of the mountain, heading east.
At 3:18pm, he sent a panicked voice message to local WhatsApp groups, begging for help: “Someone’s been martyred!” he beseeched.
[Audio]: Witness to Muhammad Rizik al-Shalabi’s shooting, believing he’s been killed and sending a voice message calling for help.
Later reconstructions estimated that Rizik may have still been alive at the time, but he was dead by the time search parties were able to access the area to look for him.
Meanwhile, Saif and others were running for their lives further south, headed towards Ain al-Sarara.
As family members confirmed to Al Jazeera, one of those young men was caught along the way and tied up by a gang of about nine settlers.
Witnesses say the settlers repeatedly smashed the young man in the knee with their weapons, then dragged him, tied up, into a car and shot bullets all around him.
Then they threw him to the ground over and over, until the young man was begging them to kill him.
“They said: ‘I’m not going to kill you,’” a friend recalled on TikTok. “‘I’m going to chop off your arms and your legs and throw you on the side of the road like a dog.’”
According to Sinjil activist Ayed Ghafari, among the settlers was Yahariv Mangory, reportedly the leader of the outpost builders in al-Baten, who was carrying an M16 rifle.
Mangory later identified himself in an interview with Israel’s Channel 14 as the “owner” of the al-Baten outposts.
Saif and the others had managed to go up a hill, but at about 3:30pm, they were met by a group of settlers coming downhill and attacked them from above, according to Ghafari, who spoke with the young men.
The settlers were pelting the young men with rocks, with occasional bullets zooming past them as they made their way down the hill.
A settler hit Saif square in the back with a rock, toppling him. He was instantly surrounded by a group of settlers who beat him with clubs and sticks all over, according to witnesses.
Dazed, Saif staggered to his feet after the settlers stopped beating him, heading south down the hill until he came across a big oak tree where a young Palestinian man was hiding.
Battered, he sank to the ground there for the next two and a half hours as the young man tried to reach out to people from Mazraa, asking for help.
Saif was vomiting and struggling to breathe, his condition worsening by the minute.
That was when Muhammad caught word that his big brother was in trouble.
At least 23 people, including 10 seeking aid, have been killed on Thursday in Israeli attacks across Gaza, according to Palestinian health authorities, as four more people died from malnutrition amid a growing starvation crisis in the besieged territory.
Hospital sources told Al Jazeera that 10 people seeking aid were among 12 people killed by Israeli forces near Rafah in southern Gaza.
One person was killed and several others were wounded in an Israeli attack near an aid distribution site, the sources said.
Eight people were killed in an Israeli air strike on a residential home in Gaza City in northern Gaza, medical sources said.
Two other people were killed in an Israeli attack on the city’s Tuffah neighbourhood, hospital sources told Al Jazeera.
The killings come as Israel escalates its attacks on Gaza City, the largest city in the enclave, after the country’s security cabinet approved plans for the military to seize the city, an operation that could forcibly displace hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to concentration zones in southern Gaza.
The plan has received international condemnation from the United Nations and even dissent from within Israel’s own military.
Al Jazeera correspondents reported on Thursday that large swaths of northern Gaza have been turned into “lifeless wastelands” amid the Israeli escalation.
Palestinians in Gaza City have spoken of their fears of further displacement, following an Israeli forced evacuation order to areas further south, ahead of the proposed occupation.
Walaa Sobh said she had already been displaced during the war from the northern city of Beit Lahiya to Gaza City, and was unable to move again.
“We’re afraid to move anywhere else, because we have nowhere to go, no income – and I am a widow,” she told Al Jazeera.
“If they want to force us out, then at least find us a place, give us tents, especially for the widows, the children, and the sick. You’re not only displacing one or two people; you’re displacing millions who have nowhere to stay.”
Another woman, Umm Sajed Hamdan, said she would refuse to follow the order.
“I am a mother of five and the wife of a detainee. I cannot escape with my children from one place to another,” Hamdan told Al Jazeera. “I would rather face death here in Gaza City than go to al-Mawasi.”
Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst Marwan Bishara said Israel’s plans to occupy Gaza City are a serious cause for concern.
“It’s a terrible escalation, really,” said Bishara.
“[Netanyahu] really intends to reoccupy Gaza … send the military in and just take it on again.”
As Israel continues to escalate attacks on Gaza City, Mossad spy chief David Barnea is visiting Qatar in an effort to revive talks over a Gaza ceasefire, two Israeli officials told the Reuters news agency on Thursday.
The visit follows a reported expression of positivity from Hamas officials to restart ceasefire negotiations during a meeting with Egypt’s intelligence chief in Cairo earlier this week.
Earlier on Thursday, Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel said that a non-Israeli, peaceful civilian administration for Gaza was among the Israeli government’s five key principles for ending the war.
The other principles include the release of captives still held in Gaza, the surrender of weapons by Hamas, the full demilitarisation of Gaza, and Israel retaining overriding security control, he said.
Meanwhile, more than 100 aid groups on Thursday accused Israel of obstructing life-saving aid from entering Gaza, resulting in vast quantities of relief supplies remaining stranded in warehouses across Jordan and Egypt as more Palestinians starve.
“Despite claims by Israeli authorities that there is no limit on humanitarian aid entering Gaza, most major international NGOs [nongovernmental organisations] have been unable to deliver a single truck of life-saving supplies since 2 March,” the groups said.
There is aid sitting all around the boundary between Israel and Gaza that is not being allowed in, Natasha Davies, a nursing activity manager with Doctors Without Borders (MSF), told Al Jazeera.
“We’ve had a couple of trucks in [to Gaza], but really, it’s just a drop in the ocean … We run primarily a trauma surgical hospital, so every single patient has a wound of some sort that needs fixing with supplies that we are intermittently receiving,” Davies said by videolink from Gaza’s southern city of Khan Younis.
“It’s just a humanitarian catastrophe. There are these GHF sites, which are slaughter masquerading as aid, which create mass casualty incidents, which create more injuries for us to treat with limited resources,” she said.
The total number of aid seekers killed since May 27, when Israel introduced a new aid distribution mechanism through the US-based GHF, has reached 1,881, with more than 13,863 injured, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
The total count of hunger-related deaths is now 239, including 106 children, the ministry records.
Israel’s war on Gaza has killed at least 61,776 people and wounded 154,906. An estimated 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the October 7, 2023, attacks, and more than 200 were taken captive.
The Israeli cabinet’s decision to escalate its war on Gaza, disregarding the humanitarian crises it has caused there already, appears to have angered as many in Israel as in the international community, though not necessarily for the same reasons.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had to backtrack on his idea of seizing all of Gaza after pushback from a military widely regarded as being exhausted.
Under the new “plan”, Israel will seize Gaza City and, according to an anonymous Israeli official talking to the Associated Press, Gaza’s “central camps” as well as al-Mawasi in the south.
Defending his new idea on Sunday, Netanyahu told journalists that Israel had “no choice” but to “finish the job and complete the defeat of Hamas”.
Israel has spent 22 months killing 61,722 people and destroying nearly all of Gaza, ostensibly for that very purpose.
Many in Israel, including the families of the remaining captives held in Gaza, object to the escalation. So why is Netanyahu doing it, and how has this landed in Israel? Here’s what we know.
It’s not clear.
Many in the international community, from the European Union to the United Nations, have condemned the idea. Even many of Israel’s formerly stalwart allies, like Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, have condemned it.
In Israel, many suspect Netanyahu’s move aims to shore up his support among the far-right elements that his coalition needs to stay in power, and to drag out a war he feels his political survival depends on.
Not as many as he’d hoped.
While hard-right ministers like ultra-nationalist Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir still support Netanyahu’s coalition, their loyalty seems conditional.
Both had been among a cohort of hard-right politicians who had objected to the suggestion that humanitarian aid be allowed into the enclave in May, following worldwide outrage over starvation there, before falling into line with government policy and Smotrich even diverting extra funds for aid earlier this month.
Both ministers, and their sizeable constituencies, want a full Israeli seizure of all of Gaza, the “razing” of Gaza City, and what they describe as the “voluntary” migration of Gaza’s population, once the territory has been rendered uninhabitable.
On Saturday, Smotrich released a video criticising Netanyahu’s plans to limit the invasion to Gaza City, saying he had “lost faith” in Netanyahu’s leadership. He later clarified that he would remain in government nonetheless.
No.
Israeli media reports that Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir and several senior Israeli officers oppose the plan.
According to leaked reports, Zamir told Netanyahu he was creating a “trap” that would further erode the army and endanger the lives of the remaining captives.
Earlier in the same week, more than 600 former Israeli security officials wrote to US President Donald Trump to implore him to use his influence over Netanyahu to bring the war to a close.
“Everything that could be achieved by force has been achieved. The hostages cannot wait any longer,” the Commanders for Israel’s Security (CIS) group said in a post on X, where it shared the letter.
No.
Tens of thousands of people, including many of the captives’ families, have taken to the streets to protest against the decision to escalate the war.
In mid-July, a poll carried out by the Israeli Democracy Institute found 74 percent of Israelis supported a negotiated end to the war that would see the return of the roughly 50 captives remaining in Gaza.
Among them were 60 percent who had previously voted for the prime minister’s coalition.
Loudly.
Groups representing the families of the captives and those of Israeli soldiers killed in Gaza are calling for a general strike on August 17.
Many in Israel’s vital tech industry, as well as universities and local authorities, have responded positively.
“The goal”, one of the groups organising the action explained, is “to save the lives of the hostages and soldiers, and prevent further families from joining the bereaved”.
They almost universally oppose it.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid – who has backed the government through much of its war on Gaza – declared the latest escalation a “disaster that will lead to many more disasters”.
Another opposition figure, Benny Gantz, who served in the government throughout some of its fiercest attacks upon Gaza during the early stages of the war, also condemned the escalation. In a post on X, Gantz characterised the escalation as a “political failure that wastes the tremendous achievements of the [Israeli army]”.
מה כן לעשות כדי להחזיר את החטופים ולנצח?
אני רואה שוב את המחדל המדיני שמבזבז את ההישגים האדירים של צה”ל.
שוב מחכים.
שוב מנהלים משא ומתן בשלבים.
בלי שום יצירתיות.אפשר אחרת:
קודם כל להודיע – בתמורה להשבת החטופים נהיה מוכנים להפסקת אש קבועה – עד החטוף האחרון.
כל עוד זה לא מתקבל:…— בני גנץ – Benny Gantz (@gantzbe) August 8, 2025
A poll by the Israeli Democracy Institute in July showed that, despite widespread coverage, a majority of Israelis described themselves as “not at all troubled” by “reports of famine and suffering among the Palestinian population in Gaza”.
An estimated 227 people have died of starvation as a result of the Israeli siege on Gaza that began in March. A total of 103 of them have been children.
Israel’s far-right finance minister has approved plans for thousands of illegal homes in the occupied West Bank — saying it ‘buries the idea of a Palestinian state’. Bezalel Smotrich announced 3,401 illegal housing units will be built in the controversial E1 settlement project.
Published On 14 Aug 202514 Aug 2025
The far-right minister said he will approve 3,000 new homes in the controversial E1 area project, hailing it as ‘Zionism at its best’.
Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has announced he will approve thousands of housing units in a highly controversial and long-delayed illegal settlement project in the occupied West Bank, saying the move “buries the idea of a Palestinian state”.
In a statement on Wednesday, Smotrich announced his intention to approve tenders to build more than 3,000 homes in the E1 area settlement project that would connect Jerusalem and the existing Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim, located several kilometres to the east.
“Approval of construction plans in E1 buries the idea of a Palestinian state and continues the many steps we are taking on the ground as part of the de facto sovereignty plan that we began implementing with the establishment of the government,” he said.
Smotrich, who is also a minister in Israel’s Ministry of Defence with broad responsibility for approving settlements in the occupied West Bank, hailed the project as “Zionism at its best”.
“After decades of international pressure and freezes, we are breaking conventions and connecting Maale Adumim to Jerusalem,” Smotrich added.
Israel Gantz, chairman of the Yesha Council – an umbrella organisation of illegal settlements in the West Bank – and head of the Binyamin Regional Council, also praised the “tremendous and historic achievement for the settlement movement”, according to Israel National News.
Gantz said it was a “true revolution in strengthening the settlement enterprise”, the outlet said.
Development of the E1 settlement – which is illegal under international law – has been frozen for decades.
Observers believe that its location will hinder the realisation of a future Palestinian state.
The planned settlement would effectively divide the occupied West Bank into northern and southern regions, preventing the establishment of a contiguous Palestinian territory connecting occupied East Jerusalem to major cities such as Bethlehem and Ramallah.
Israel postponed the plan in 2022 following US pressure. But in recent months, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right government has approved road-widening projects in the area and begun restricting Palestinian access.
Maale Adumim mayor Guy Yifrach praised the new settlement, saying it will “connect Maale Adumim to Jerusalem and serve as a Zionist response of settlement and nation-building”.
“The Palestinians aimed to establish a stranglehold through illegal construction – this project will thwart that effort,” he said, according to Israel National News.
On Wednesday, Israeli anti-settlement watchdog Peace Now said a total of 4,030 new housing units had been approved in the occupied West Bank.
Some 730 are west of the existing Israeli settlement of Ariel, while 3,300 had been approved in a new Maale Adumim neighbourhood that will connect it “with the industrial zone to its east”.
“The 3,300 housing units in Maale Adumim represent an increase of about 33 percent in the settlement’s housing stock – an enormous expansion for a settlement whose population has been stagnant at around 38,000 for the past decade,” it said.
It added that the Maale Adumim extension raised “serious questions about the need for the E1 plan”.
Mass outcry from aid groups as Israel continues to block millions of dollars in aid supplies to starving Palestinians.
More than 100 aid groups have accused Israel of obstructing life-saving aid from entering Gaza, resulting in vast quantities of relief supplies remaining stranded in warehouses across Jordan and Egypt as more Palestinians starve.
Aid trucks have massed on Gaza’s borders amid Israel’s blockade of the famine-stricken territory, and new rules are being used by Israel to deny the entry of food, medicine, water and temporary shelters, the groups said in a joint statement released on Thursday.
“Despite claims by Israeli authorities that there is no limit on humanitarian aid entering Gaza, most major international NGOs [nongovernmental organisations] have been unable to deliver a single truck of life-saving supplies since 2 March,” the groups said.
“Instead of clearing the growing backlog of goods, Israeli authorities have rejected requests from dozens of NGOs to bring in life-saving goods, citing that these organisations are ‘not authorised to deliver aid’,” the groups, which include Doctors Without Borders (known by their French acronym, MSF) and Oxfam, said.
Relief organisations that have worked in Gaza for decades are now told by Israel that they are not “authorised” to deliver aid due to new “registration rules”, which include so-called “security” vetting.
Hospitals in Gaza are now without basic supplies as a result, and children, the elderly and those with disabilities are “dying from hunger and preventable illnesses”, the statement continued.
Bushra Khalidi, Oxfam policy lead, said her organisation has more than $2.5m worth of humanitarian aid supplies that “have been rejected from entering Gaza by Israel”.
MSF’s emergency coordinator in Gaza, Aitor Zabalgogeazkoa, said the restrictions on aid are part of Israel’s militarised distribution of relief supplies, spearheaded by the notorious GHF.
“The militarised food distribution scheme has weaponised starvation and curated suffering. Distributions at GHF sites have resulted in extreme levels of violence and killings, primarily of young Palestinian men, but also of women and children, who have gone to the sites in the hope of receiving food,” Zabalgogeazkoa said.
At least 859 Palestinians have been killed attempting to access aid supplies around GHF distribution sites since May.
The more than 100 relief organisations that signed the statement have called for pressure to be exerted on Israel to end its “weaponisation of aid”, for Israel to end its “bureaucratic obstruction” and for unconditional delivery of life-saving humanitarian aid to Gaza.
Israel’s Diaspora Minister Amichai Chikli, who had a role in the new rules imposed on aid groups, told the AFP news agency that registration of humanitarian groups could be rejected if Israeli authorities deem that its activities deny the democratic character of Israel or ” promote delegitimisation campaigns”, such as the movement to boycott Israel over its war on Gaza.
The joint outcry by aid groups comes as Israeli forces launch a new operation to take over Gaza City, which will displace more than a million people and force them to move south to concentration zones.
Israel’s operation to occupy Gaza City has triggered international outrage, with the United Nations and world leaders warning of devastating humanitarian consequences for the war-shattered territory.
Protests and vigils have taken place around the world in support of Palestinians suffering in Gaza and to pay tribute to the four Al Jazeera journalists and two freelancers killed by Israel in the besieged enclave in a deliberate targeted assassination on Sunday.
Journalists, students, activists and members of civil society – notably in Cape Town, South Africa; Manila, the Philippines; and London, the United Kingdom – held the protests on Wednesday to call on their governments to put pressure on Israel to allow international media into Gaza and bring an end to Israel’s genocidal war there.
Late on Sunday, Al Jazeera correspondents Anas al-Sharif and Mohammed Qreiqeh, along with cameramen Ibrahim Zaher and Mohammed Noufal, were killed in an Israeli strike that had targeted their media tent located by al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.
Al-Sharif had been one of Gaza’s most recognisable faces for his constant reporting of the reality on the ground since Israel’s war on Gaza began following the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attacks on southern Israel.
Israel’s war on Gaza has killed at least 61,722 people and wounded 154,525. An estimated 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the October 7, 2023, attacks in southern Israel, and more than 200 were taken captive.
Nearly 270 Palestinian journalists and media workers have been killed by Israel since the war began.
Members of civil society and journalists gathered at St George’s Cathedral in Cape Town on Wednesday to express their anger at al-Sharif’s murder, sporting placards with one reading “your voice was louder than their bombs”.
The location is significant, said Al Jazeera’s Fahmida Miller, reporting from Cape Town, as “it’s been an important signal against oppression here in South Africa, especially during the decades of apartheid”.
The people gathered here “have condemned what Israel has done”, Miller said.
“They want the entry of international journalists into Gaza in addition to the work being done by Palestinian journalists,” she said. “People here are angry.”
Journalist Zubeida Jaffer told Miller, “I was one of the journalists who were targeted, you know those media that documented apartheid, so this really resonates with me.”
Miller said, “The South African government has previously condemned the killing of journalists in Gaza, specifically in 2022 when Shireen Abu Akleh was killed. The South African government had said it was a violation of international law.”
Abu Akleh was a Palestinian-American journalist who worked as a reporter for 25 years for Al Jazeera, before she was killed by Israeli forces while covering a raid on the Jenin refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
In December 2023, South Africa brought a case before the International Court of Justice, accusing Israel of committing genocide in the Gaza Strip.
Reporters belonging to the UK branches of the National Union of Journalists paid their respects on Wednesday to the slain Al Jazeera workers outside the prime minister’s residence at Number 10 Downing Street, said Al Jazeera’s Jonah Hull, reporting from London.
The reporters, holding placards bearing the names of journalists killed since Israel’s war on Gaza began, read out the names of each journalist that appeared on their placard and “symbolically, recited Islamic funeral prayers” for those killed on Sunday, said Hull.
Those present “have really condemned the British government … talking about its complicity in what is going on in Gaza, for not doing more and speaking out more,” said Hull.
While British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Monday “talked about his grave concern” about the killings of the Al Jazeera journalists, those present on Wednesday “want outright condemnation and nothing less”, said Hull.
“They also want the government to take firm steps to pressure the Israeli government to ensure the safety of journalists in Gaza, importantly to allow international journalists into Gaza to be able to work freely there and for an independent investigation to be carried out by … the International Criminal Court in order to provide justice and accountability for those involved.”
Last week, Starmer condemned Israel’s plans to take over Gaza City, saying they were “wrong” and “will only bring more bloodshed”. He has also announced that the UK will recognise a Palestinian state in September unless Israel meets certain conditions, including agreeing to a ceasefire in Gaza and reviving the prospect of a two-state solution.
Students, campus journalists and activists gathered at the University of the Philippines on Wednesday to express outrage at the killing of the Al Jazeera journalists.
They say “the attack … is a deliberate cover-up by Israel of its crimes against humanity” in the Gaza Strip, said Al Jazeera’s Barnaby Lo, reporting from Manila.
“They also describe the accusation that Anas al-Sharif, one of the most prominent voices reporting from within Gaza, is a member of Hamas is baseless,” said Lo, noting that protesters say “this is an age-old tactic used by governments who are bent on silencing the truth”.
“Any imperialist power … will choose a scapegoat to use as a pretext, however false it is,” campus journalist Karl Patrick Suyat told Lo.
These protesters also gathered to urge “the international community to ramp up pressure on Israel to stop its genocide, including for the Philippine government to cut its trade and defence ties with Israel”, said Lo.
The Philippines is the third-largest importer of Israeli weapons.
In June, the Philippines voted in favour of a United Nations General Assembly resolution demanding an immediate and lasting ceasefire in Gaza. This resolution also condemned Israel’s use of starvation as a weapon of war and called for Israel to lift its blockade on humanitarian aid in Gaza.
A Palestinian man in the occupied West Bank has been shot dead by an Israeli settler during a land-leveling operation in the village Duma. Al Jazeera’s Nida Ibrahim explains how the killing of 35-year-old Thamin Dawabsheh is part of a growing pattern.
Published On 13 Aug 202513 Aug 2025
Israeli forces ordered the Bedouin residents of Ein Ayoub to leave after declaring their village a ‘closed military zone’. Residents had faced weeks of settler attacks, arson, and drone flights over their homes, before soldiers gave them just minutes to leave.
Published On 13 Aug 202513 Aug 2025
The occupied West Bank town’s mayor says Thamin Khalil Reda Dawabsheh killed as Israeli settlers attacked Palestinians.
A Palestinian man in the occupied West Bank has been shot dead in an attack instigated by Israeli settlers, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry as cited by the Wafa news agency.
Thamin Khalil Reda Dawabsheh, 35, was shot Wednesday morning in the town of Duma, south of Nablus, by an Israeli off-duty soldier who was accompanying “an Israeli civilian” near Duma “during engineering works”, the Israeli army said.
Earlier Palestinian reports of the attack had stated that Dawabsheh was killed by an Israeli settler.
35-year-old Thameen Khalil Reda Dawabsheh succumbed to his wounds after being shot by colonists during an attack on the village. pic.twitter.com/cHfdUg4Unl
— WAFA News Agency – English (@WAFANewsEnglish) August 13, 2025
According to the mayor of Duma, Palestinians in the town were “startled” by an Israeli settler attack, said Al Jazeera’s Nida Ibrahim.
“The settlers started assaulting a 14-year-old, leading many Palestinian men to go and try to defend him,” Ibrahim said.
Later, more armed settlers arrived, and they started shooting at the Palestinians, resulting in the death of Dawabsheh, “whose only crime was being on his land”, she added.
Suleiman Dawabsheh, the head of the Duma village council, said that settlers attacked Palestinians and opened fire on them in the southern part of the village, amid land-levelling operations that have been taking place in the area for days, Palestinian news agency Wafa reported.
Ibrahim said that Thamin Dawabsheh’s killing is part of a pattern of increased Israeli settler violence against Palestinians that is often filmed on camera.
“Every day, we stumble upon more videos showing how Israeli settlers are attacking Palestinians – intimidating them, shooting them, killing them. And they are not being held accountable by the Israeli authorities,” said Ibrahim.
The statement published by the Israeli army claimed dozens of Palestinians were hurling rocks towards the Israeli civilian and soldier, and “in response, the soldier fired to remove the threat, and a hit was identified”.
Recently, 31-year-old Palestinian activist and English teacher Awdah Hathaleen was shot dead by an Israeli settler on July 28 in the village of Umm al-Kheir, south of Hebron.
Hathaleen was well known for his activism, including helping the creators of the Oscar-winning film No Other Land, which documents Israeli settler and soldier attacks on the Palestinian community of Masafer Yatta.
Israeli settlers, protected by the Israeli military, are often armed and fire at will against Palestinians who try to stop them. They attack residents and burn property with impunity, rarely if ever facing legal consequences.
The Israeli military has also been intensifying its deadly raids, home demolitions and displacement campaigns in the West Bank.
Violent attacks by Israeli settlers and soldiers in the occupied West Bank have surged since October 2023, in tandem with Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza, with the United Nations reporting that almost 650 Palestinians – including 121 children – have been killed in the territory by Israeli forces and settlers between January 1, 2024 and the start of July 2025.
A further 5,269 Palestinians were injured during that period, including 1,029 children.
Hundreds of Palestinians risked their lives to reach aid trucks as they arrived in northern Gaza. Amid volleys of gunfire, crowds of people climbed onto moving trucks to grab whatever food they could to feed their starving families. Al Jazeera’s Ibrahim Al Khalili was there.
Published On 13 Aug 202513 Aug 2025
Access to clean drinking water should be a right. Yet, for Palestinians in Gaza, it’s anything but. Israel has bombed what little water was keeping the taps running, and men, women and children are being killed by Israeli attacks at collection points. Aid groups say Israel is using water as a weapon of war.
Human rights groups have warned that expelling the population from Gaza would violate international law.
Israel is in discussions with South Sudan about forcibly relocating Palestinians from Gaza to the East African country, according to six people familiar with the matter who spoke to The Associated Press.
The proposal is part of an Israeli effort to displace Palestinians from Gaza – a move human rights groups warn would amount to forcible expulsion, ethnic cleansing, and would violate international law.
Critics of the transfer plan fear Palestinians would never be allowed to return to Gaza and that mass departure could pave the way for Israel to annex the enclave and re-establish Israeli settlements there, as called for by far-right ministers in the Israeli government.
South Sudan has struggled to recover from a civil war that broke out shortly after independence in 2011, killing nearly 400,000 people and leaving parts of the country facing famine. It already hosts a large refugee population from conflicts in neighbouring countries.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has previously said he wants to advance what he calls “voluntary migration” for much of Gaza’s population, a policy he has linked to previous statements of United States President Donald Trump.
“I think that the right thing to do, even according to the laws of war as I know them, is to allow the population to leave, and then you go in with all your might against the enemy who remains there,” Netanyahu said Tuesday in an interview with i24, an Israeli TV station. He did not make reference to South Sudan.
The AP reported that Israel and the US have floated similar proposals with Sudan, Somalia, and the breakaway region of Somaliland.
Egypt, which shares a border with Gaza, has strongly opposed any forced transfer of Palestinians out of the enclave, fearing a refugee influx into its territory.
South Sudanese civil society leader Edmund Yakani told the AP that the country “should not become a dumping ground for people … and it should not accept to take people as negotiating chips to improve relations”.
Joe Szlavik, founder of a US lobbying firm working with South Sudan, said he was briefed by South Sudanese officials on the talks.
According to Szlavik, the country wants the Trump administration to lift a travel ban and remove sanctions on some South Sudanese elites, suggesting the US could be involved in any agreement about the forcible displacement of Palestinians.
Peter Martell, a journalist and author of First Raise a Flag, said “cash-strapped South Sudan needs any ally, financial gain and diplomatic security it can get”.
The Trump administration has previously pressured several countries to accept deportations, and South Sudan has already taken in eight individuals removed from the US under the administration’s mass deportation policy.
Israel has silenced the voices of six journalists in Gaza, but the bombing across the city has not stopped.
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An American paediatrician who volunteered in the Gaza Strip says the injuries inflicted on Palestinian aid seekers at sites run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) suggest that Israeli forces there shot the men and boys deliberately, by targeting and maiming specific body parts on specific days.
Ahmed Yousaf made the comments to Al Jazeera from the Jordanian capital, Amman, on Tuesday, hours after returning from Gaza, where he had spent two and a half weeks working at Al-Aqsa Hospital in central Deir el-Balah and al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.
The doctor said he witnessed “mass casualty incidents” from Israeli shootings at the food distribution points run by the United States-backed GHF on an almost daily basis.
The boys and young men came in with very specific injuries, “almost like a daily pattern”, he said.
“Meaning on a given day, say Monday, we’d get 40,60 patients coming in at a given time, and they would all be shot in the legs, or in the pelvic area, or the groin on a given day, just kind of a similar pattern. And the next day, we would see upper body, chest, thoracic pattern, and then there were days we saw only head wounds, upper neck bullet wounds. And what it felt like, at least for me, the position that I went with, was that somebody behind the gun that day was going to choose the way they were either going to maim or decide to kill people,” he said.
“It was age indiscriminate.”
Yousaf’s comments are the latest by medical staff in Gaza that accuse Israeli forces and US contractors of targeted and indiscriminate violence at the GHF sites.
Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym MSF, said last week that the GHF-run food distributions in famine-stricken Gaza have become sites of “orchestrated killing and dehumanisation“, while Human Rights Watch said the shootings amount to serious violations of international law and war crimes.
On Tuesday alone, at least 19 aid seekers were killed at GHF sites in Gaza, while many more were wounded, according to medics and witnesses.
At least 1,838 Palestinians have been killed while seeking aid, and another 13,409 have been wounded since the GHF began its operations in late May, official figures show.
Israel and the GHF deny the killings.
Yousaf, the US paediatrician, said the victims at the sites were mainly boys and young men, as they are often the ones taking the risk to try to get food for their families, “given the dynamic of the risk associated with trying to carry a 5-pound [2.3kg] bag of flour, maybe kilometres, sometimes”.
“The people would tell us they were sometimes at the site, or around the area, or they were trying to leave… and they were shot indiscriminately; it was like they were being sprayed. It seemed quite obvious to them and to us, from a pattern-recognition perspective, in terms of who came to the ER [emergency room], that on a given day, whoever was making the decision behind the trigger was choosing a very specific pattern of fire,” he said.
The doctor went on to describe all of Gaza as a “death trap”.
“It is a cage in which people are being marked for death. It almost feels like there is a quota for the number of people that need to be killed on a given day,” Yousaf said.
On the days that Palestinians stayed away from the GHF sites, because Israel allowed in more aid trucks, there would be more intense air attacks, he said.
“The last four days that we were there, when there was a bit more aid access via food trucks that were allowed in, the risk profile changed and them going to the food distribution sites wasn’t nearly worth the risk because there was some food elsewhere, we saw a significant uptick in bomb blasts on the streets, homes, vehicles. So the pattern of the MCIs – the mass casualty incidents – changed from bullet wounds, mostly boys and young men, to just indiscriminate bombings. We saw women and children, elderly, on the days the bombs come in,” he told Al Jazeera.
The doctor described the Israeli atrocities in Gaza as a “genocide”.
One clear aspect of this, he said, was Israel’s refusal to let him and his colleagues take in medical supplies or baby formula.
“When we were screened by the [Israeli military] at the border, the vast majority of us had things confiscated from our bags. Things like food and multivitamins and antibiotics and medical supplies, like stethoscopes, everything you can imagine, that we wished we could have to treat the people on the ground in Gaza,” he said.
“And this resulted in a situation in which, when those patients came in, in different stages of dying, screaming in pain for their mothers… we knew that in any other environment, we could have done something for them, but in the environment of Gaza, in the death trap that is Gaza completely, we were unable to give them the aid that they deserve, to provide the human dignity and humanity that they deserve.”
United Nations chief Antonio Guterres puts both countries ‘on notice’ over documented pattern of sexual violence.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has put Israel and Russia “on notice” that their armed forces and security personnel could be listed among parties “credibly suspected” of committing sexual violence in conflict zones.
The warning on Tuesday resulted from “significant concerns regarding patterns of certain forms of sexual violence that have been consistently documented by the United Nations”, Guterres wrote in a report seen by the Reuters news agency.
In his annual report to the UN Security Council on conflict-related sexual violence, Guterres said that Israel and Russia could be listed next year among the parties “credibly suspected of committing or being responsible for patterns of rape or other forms of sexual violence”.
In his warning to Israel, Guterres said he was “gravely concerned about credible information of violations by Israeli armed and security forces” against Palestinians in several prisons, a detention centre and a military base.
“Cases documented by the United Nations indicate patterns of sexual violence such as genital violence, prolonged forced nudity and repeated strip searches conducted in an abusive and degrading manner,” Guterres wrote.
Because Israel has denied access to UN monitors, it has been “challenging to make a definitive determination” about patterns, trends and the systematic use of sexual violence by its forces, he said, urging Israel’s government “to take the necessary measures to ensure immediate cessation of all acts of sexual violence, and make and implement specific time-bound commitments.”
The UN chief said these should include investigations of credible allegations, clear orders and codes of conduct for military and security forces that prohibit sexual violence, and unimpeded access for UN monitors.
In March, UN-backed human rights experts accused Israel of “the systematic use of sexual, reproductive and other gender-based violence”.
The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel said it documented a range of violations perpetrated against Palestinian women, men, girls and boys, and accused Israeli forces of rape and sexual violence against Palestinian detainees.
Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, dismissed the Secretary-General’s concerns as “baseless accusations” on Tuesday.
Danon, who circulated a letter he received from Guterres and his response to the UN chief, said the allegations “are steeped in biased publications”.
“The UN must focus on the shocking war crimes and sexual violence of Hamas and the release of all hostages,” the Israeli ambassador said.
Danon stressed that “Israel will not shy away from protecting its citizens and will continue to act in accordance with international law”.
In July 2024, the Israeli military said it had detained and was questioning nine soldiers over the alleged sexual abuse of a Palestinian detainee at the infamous Sde Teiman prison facility, which was set up to detain people arrested in Gaza.
Israeli media reported at the time that a Palestinian prisoner was taken to hospital after suffering severe injuries from what was an alleged gang rape by military guards at the prison.
In the case of Russia, Guterres wrote that he was “gravely concerned about credible information of violations by Russian armed and security forces and affiliated armed groups”, primarily against Ukrainian prisoners of war, in 50 official and 22 unofficial detention facilities in Ukraine and Russia.
“These cases comprised a significant number of documented incidents of genital violence, including electrocution, beatings and burns to the genitals, and forced stripping and prolonged nudity, used to humiliate and elicit confessions or information,” he said.
Russia’s mission to the UN in New York did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report.
Guterres said that Russian authorities have not engaged with his special envoy on the matter.
‘Thank you for dedicating your life to tell us the truth.’ Al Jazeera correspondents in Gaza, Hani Mahmoud, Hind Khoudary, Tareq Abu-Azoum, and Moath al-Kahlout, recorded these messages for their colleagues murdered by Israel.
Published On 12 Aug 202512 Aug 2025