RT News - November 1st, 2023 LATE

Numbers update. At least 400 more civilians killed and wounded since yesterday, official count unknown, but at least 8,500 confirmed killed and 21,000 confirmed wounded. Day 26

Show more

Updates "as they happened" below video report trans.

Video contains disturbing images

The IDF has bombed the Jabalia refugee camp in north Gaza for the second time in 24 hours. The people left are completely devastated. Mansour Shouman reports from the scene. "a complete massacre". The Israel government continues to tell lies, including to the Israelis.

Eyad Al-Bosum (Gaza Interior Ministry spokesman) gives official comment, saying the occupiers (Israel) used 6 US made megabombs, each weighing 1 ton of explosives. 400 dead. White phosphorus has been used. 3 churches have been aerial bomb-destroyed.

The IDF reported that HAMAS militants were hiding in the Jabalia refugee camp. Maria Finoshina reports. 11,000 targets have been hit in Gaza. A HAMAS commander has allegedly been killed.

Senator Lindsey Graham alikened HAMAS to the Japanese and Germany "taking over the world" in WW2

Bolivia has broke diplomatic ties with Israel citing the barbaric nature of the Jabalia camp massacre. Arab countries have also condemned Israel's atrocities and so has Chile and Columbia. Bolivia's deputy FM Freddy Mamani spoke exclusively to RT

The Iranian Jewish Community leader held a conference in Tehran and has said "not in Jewish people's name" and has stated full support for Gaza. Yusef Jalali reports

The West Bank has also come under fire. Mohammed Najib reports as citizens protest in solidarity with Gaza.

Yemeni Houti spokesman reported that Yemen has sent a ballistic missile and drones at Israel strategic targets as the conflict expands past the Palestine/Israel borders. He said they will continue "until the aggression stops." Yasin Eken reports. The USA Pentagaon spokesman Pat Ryder said they will deploy more troops to the region. Ryder blames Iran for the escalations !

Peter spoke with Seyed Mohammad Maradi (University Prof of Tehran) about the expansion.

Egypt has been allowed to open the Rafah humanitarian route from it's borders into Gaza, according to reports.
=
In Donetsk, two Russian soldiers have been arrested for shooting nine civilians. Roman Kosarev reports on the developing story.
=========

UPDATES "as they happened" today

01 November 2023

16:57 GMT
Jordan has recalled its ambassador to Israel, its foreign minister Ayman Safadi has confirmed. In a statement, Safadi said the diplomatic measure was being taken “as an expression of Jordan’s position rejecting and condemning the Israeli war raging in Gaza.”

Safadi also stated that Israel’s ambassador to Jordan, who is not presently in the Middle Eastern country according to the statement, is not currently welcome to return.

Safadi added that the Israeli ambassador would be permitted back only “upon Israel ceasing its war in Gaza, halting the humanitarian disaster, and refraining from actions that deny Palestinians their basic rights, including access to food, water, and medicine, as well as as a secure and stable life on their national soil.”

15:57 GMT
The IDF has said 15 of its soldiers have been killed in ongoing operations in Gaza since Tuesday, revising upwards figures reported earlier today.

It brings the number of Israeli troops to have died in the renewed conflict to 330, the Anadolu news agency said.

14:31 GMT

UN Under-Secretary-General Martin Griffiths has described the recent Israeli airstrikes on the Jabalia refugee camp, in which “scores of civilians were killed,” as the “latest atrocity to befall the people of Gaza.” The fighting in the Palestinian enclave “has entered an even more terrifying phase, with increasingly dreadful humanitarian consequences,” the official, who is charge of the UN’s relief work, warned in a statement.

Griffiths called upon both Israel and Hamas “to respect their obligations under international humanitarian law” and spare civilians as they conduct their military operations. He also urged the international community to accelerate efforts to resolve the crisis. “The world seems unable, or unwilling, to act. This cannot go on. We need a step change,” he demanded.

13:55 GMT

The IDF has published a clip showing its Merkava main battle tanks and soldiers in action inside Gaza, as well as airstrikes on Hamas targets in the Palestinian enclave. In another post on X (formerly Twitter), it cited one of the commanders of the troops, who said the Israeli “attacks are of the strength that the Hamas terrorist organization hasn’t yet encountered.” He also said the expansion of the IDF’s ground operation was taking place simultaneously with the bombardment of Gaza by the Israeli Air Force and navy. https://twitter.com/idfonline/status/1719694458197828068

13:38 GMT

Hamas fighters have destroyed four Israeli military vehicles using 105mm ‘Al-Yassin’ anti-tank shells in the Beit Hanoun area in northern Gaza, the Palestinian armed group has claimed on Telegram. It did not specify if the vehicles were tanks, APCs, or some other hardware.

Israel has so far confirmed the deaths of 13 of its troops in the fighting inside Gaza this week. The IDF also said that “numerous” Hamas gunmen have been killed as a result of the operation.

12:36 GMT

The number of people killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7 has risen to 8,796, with 22,219 others wounded, the Health Ministry in the besieged Palestinian enclave has said. More than 3,640 children are among those killed in the bombardment, it added. According to the ministry, there are 2,030 reports of people missing under the rubble of destroyed buildings, including 1,120 children.

11:34 GMT

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has called on Muslim states to cease oil and food exports to Israel over the IDF’s attacks on Gaza, Press TV has reported. “What Muslim states must insist on is the immediate cessation of [Israeli] crimes in Gaza… and stop the export of oil and other commodities to the Zionist regime,” Khamenei said during a meeting with students in Tehran. “The entire Muslim world must be mobilized” against Israel, ceasing any economic cooperation with the country and using international forums to draw attention to the Israeli actions in Gaza, he said.

10:55 GMT

Hamas political bureau member Ghazi Hamad has claimed that Israel is not concerned about “the safety of the prisoners in Gaza, regardless of their nationalities,” accusing it of “indiscriminate bombings” of the Palestinian enclave. “We confirmed our readiness to release foreign prisoners, but Israel is obstructing that,” Hamad told Al Jazeera.

Hamas said earlier that five hostages, including three foreigners, were killed in an IDF strike on the Jabalia refugee camp in Gaza on Tuesday. The group claimed last week that some 50 captives have lost their lives due to the Israeli bombardment since October 7. According to IDF estimations, Hamas took around 240 people hostage during its surprise attack on Israel more than three weeks ago.

09:53 GMT

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has expressed condolences to the families of 12 IDF soldiers, officially confirmed as killed during the fighting with Hamas inside Gaza this week. “We are all with you in your time of great sorrow,” he said in a statement published on social media.

“We are in a difficult war. It will be a long war. We have important achievements in it, but also painful losses… Our soldiers fell in an unjust war, the war for our home. I promise you citizens of Israel: we will complete the job. We will continue until victory,” the prime minister pledged.

08:57 GMT

The Rafah crossing into Egypt has opened from Gaza’s side for the first time since the start of the escalation between Israel and Hamas on October 7, Al Jazeera has reported. The Qatari broadcaster’s live footage from the scene shows dozens of people and vehicles, including ambulances, moving through the gates into Egyptian territory.

The authorities in Cairo earlier allowed the evacuation of 81 critically injured Palestinians – and hundreds of foreigners or Palestinians with dual nationality – through the Rafah crossing, Al Jazeera said. The foreign nationals were notified by their embassies through the Red Cross that they could leave the besieged Palestinian enclave, it added. https://twitter.com/AJEnglish/status/1719635426334347629

08:29 GMT

The decision by Bolivia to cut ties with Israel over its attacks on Gaza is “a surrender to terrorism and to the Ayatollah’s regime in Iran,” Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Lior Haiat has said in a statement on X (formerly Twitter).

By making this move, the government in La Paz “is aligning itself with the Hamas terrorist organization,” Haiat claimed. “Israel condemns Bolivia’s support of terrorism and its submission to the Iranian regime, which attest to the values the government of Bolivia represents,” he added.

According to the spokesman, relations between Israel and Bolivia “have been devoid of content” since the socialist government of President Luis Arce came to power in the Latin American country in 2020.

08:07 GMT

The IDF has said it sent additional missile boats to the Red Sea on Tuesday, following several missile and drone attacks on Israel from Yemen. The deployment was made “in accordance with the assessment of the situation, and as part of the increased defense efforts in the area,” the Israeli military said in a post on X (formerly Twitter). It also published a video clip of Israeli warships operating in the Red Sea.

The Houthi government in Yemen said on Tuesday that attacks on Israel will continue until it stops its military operation against Hamas in Gaza. https://twitter.com/idfonline/status/1719608308737138817

07:51 GMT *** see post underneath ***
The US and Israel are discussing the possibility of American troops being deployed to Gaza as part of a multinational force after the IDF succeeds in eradicating Hamas, people familiar with the matter have told Bloomberg. This is one of three options currently being considered by the two countries, they claimed.

The second one is establishing a peacekeeping contingent modeled after the 13-nation Multinational Force and Observers (MFO), which had been set up as part of the 1979 Egypt-Israel peace treaty. Another solution could be to place Gaza under temporary UN oversight, the sources said.

The people stressed that the conversations are still at an early stage and “much could change.” Some US officials who spoke to Bloomberg described the aforementioned options as premature or unlikely.

07:28 GMT
Saudi Arabia has slammed Israel for its Tuesday airstrike on the Jabalia refugee camp in Gaza in which a Hamas commander and numerous Palestinian civilians were reportedly killed.

Riyadh “condemns in the strongest terms possible the inhumane targeting” of Gaza’s largest refugee camp, the Saudi Foreign Ministry said in a statement. “The Kingdom condemns and totally rejects the repeated targeting by the Israeli occupation forces of densely populated civilian areas, and its continuing violation of international law and international humanitarian law,” it added.

Such attacks keep happening because of “the international community’s failure” to put pressure on Israeli authorities to agree to an immediate ceasefire and a humanitarian truce in Gaza, the ministry stressed.

The local Interior Ministry said that the Israeli bombardment “destroyed the entire residential neighborhood” in Jabalia, leaving 400 Palestinians dead or wounded. According to data from Gaza’s Health Ministry, at least 50 civilians were killed and 150 others injured in the attack.

06:36 GMT
The Palestine Telecommunication Company (Paltel) has said that there is a “complete interruption” of communications and internet services with Gaza. The problems occurred due to “the international routes that were previously reconnected being cut off again,” the company explained in a post on X (formerly Twitter).

Israel is using Internet blackouts as a “warfare tactic to induce more pain on the population” of Gaza, Marwa Fatafta of the Access Now international human rights organization told Al Jazeera. The move is aimed to “cover potential war crimes as they started their ground invasion,” Fatafta claimed.

06:01 GMT
The IDF has published the names of another nine Israeli soldiers killed in the fighting with Hamas in northern Gaza on Tuesday. Two troops from the the 77th Battalion of the 7th Armored Brigade lost their lives after their armored vehicle was hit by a guided missile. Another four soldiers were wounded in the same incident, including one seriously, it said.

Seven servicemen from the Tzabar Battalion of the Givati Infantry Brigade were killed and two others seriously wounded when their tank drove on a mine, according to the Israeli military. Yesterday, the IDF announced the names of two troops killed in the fighting in the same area. https://twitter.com/idfonline/status/1719564955425415181

02:35 GMT
The US Senate confirmed Jack Lew as the country’s new ambassador to Israel on Tuesday. Lew served as treasury secretary under 44th President Barack Obama.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer described the procedure as “one of the most important and consequential nomination votes the Senate has taken in a long time.”

“We need to work together on strategy with Israel,” the senator said.

01:55 GMT
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke over the phone with Israeli President Isaac Herzog on Tuesday.

According to the White House, Blinken “reiterated US support for Israel’s right to defend itself against terrorism consistent with international humanitarian law and emphasized the need to take feasible precautions to minimize harm to civilians.”

Herzog earlier told the BBC that Israel was putting “a huge focus” on reducing civilian deaths in Gaza.

00:35 GMT
Chile and Colombia are recalling their ambassadors to Israel for “consultations,” citing the continuing Israeli strikes on Gaza.

Chilean President Gabriel Boric described Israel’s actions as “collective punishment of the civilian Palestinian population.”

“If Israel doesn’t stop the massacre of the Palestinian people, [our envoy] can’t remain there,” Colombian President Gustavo Petro wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

00:17 GMT
Lebanon accused Israel of using incendiary munitions during strikes on its territory. “I instructed the Lebanese mission to the UN to submit a new complaint to the Security Council to condemn Israel’s use of white phosphorus in repeated attacks on Lebanon,” Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib said on Tuesday, as cited by Arab News.

Lebanese Agriculture Minister Abbas Al Hajj Hassan claimed that 40,000 olive trees have been burned down in the southern part of the country.

Israel has carried out strikes on Lebanese territory in response to cross-border attacks by the pro-Palestinian group Hezbollah. The IDF denies using white phosphorus munitions.
====
=
========= = = = = 31 October 2023 ==

21:53 GMT
Bolivia’s government has cut diplomatic ties with Israel, demanding “an end to the attacks on the Gaza Strip which have so far claimed thousands of civilian lives and caused the forced displacement of Palestinians,” Maria Nela Prada, a minister in the presidential administration of Luis Arce, told reporters on Tuesday.

Arce had condemned the “war crimes being committed in Gaza” and expressed support for “international initiatives to guarantee humanitarian aid” in a post on social media on Monday after meeting with the Palestinian ambassador to his country.

Bolivia previously severed ties with Israel in 2009 under then-president Evo Morales, also in response to an invasion of Gaza that was widely condemned by the international community. Those ties were re-established in 2020 under the right-wing regime of Morales’ successor, Jeanine Anez.

21:47 GMT
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused Israel of crimes against humanity in Gaza and Western governments of enabling those crimes during a press conference on Tuesday.

“The Israeli administration, backed with unconditional support by Europe and America, has been committing crimes against humanity in front of the entire world for exactly 25 days,” Erdogan said. Condemning the killing of women and children and bombing of hospitals – including, on Monday, the Friendship Hospital gifted by Türkiye to Gaza – he argued that Israel, having forgotten it was a state accountable to international law, “must be stopped immediately.”

The Turkish leader has called for an immediate ceasefire and suggested an “International Peace Conference on Palestine-Israel” to work out the details of a lasting peace for the region. This would be guaranteed by a new security mechanism as the previous entities, including the UN Security Council, have failed to hold Israel accountable for its atrocities, Erdogan said.

20:05 GMT
The Israel Defense Forces claimed to have killed one of the Hamas leaders responsible for the militant group’s October 7 attack, Central Jabaliya Battalion commander Ibrahim Biari, along with 50 more “terrorists” in a devastating airstrike on the Jabaliya refugee camp Tuesday.

“The strike damaged Hamas’s command and control in the area, as well as its ability to direct military activity against IDF soldiers operating throughout the Gaza Strip,” the IDF said, adding that “underground terror infrastructure embedded beneath the buildings, used by the terrorists, also collapsed after the strike.”

At least 100 Palestinians were killed and over 150 wounded when Israel dropped six one-ton US-made bombs on a residential area of Jabaliya, one of the most densely-populated parts of Gaza - which is itself one of the most densely-populated places on Earth. The IDF did not mention the civilians killed in the attack.

19:39 GMT
Cyprus is working with European and Middle Eastern partners to set up a sea corridor for humanitarian aid deliveries to Gaza, a government official told the Times of Israel on Tuesday. The shipments would travel from Cyprus’ main port of Limassol to the Palestinian enclave during “humanitarian pauses” in the fighting.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly “wasn’t opposed” to the idea, which Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides first proposed last week, so long as Israel can vet the contents of every container before it leaves Limassol. The two men were scheduled to discuss the matter further on Tuesday.

18:26 GMT
Craig Mokhiber, the United Nations’ Human Rights Office director in New York, resigned on Tuesday to protest Israel’s war in Gaza, describing the UN’s mission in Palestine as a failure and Israel’s ongoing bombardment of the enclave as a “textbook case of genocide” in a letter to UN high commissioner for human rights Volker Turk.

Mokhiber claimed the UN had “surrendered to the power of the US” and the “Israeli lobby,” abandoning both its moral high ground and its duty to protect the vulnerable. It had instead allowed its most powerful member states to provide “political and diplomatic cover” as well as economic and military support for West Jerusalem’s “horrific assault” on the Palestinian people, he said.

Dismissing the “two-state solution” as a “total failure,” the human rights lawyer set out a ten-point plan aimed at creating a single democratic secular state. Following an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, the UN must deploy the same resources against Israeli “apartheid” that it used in South Africa, compensate Palestinians for their displacement during the Nakba and Naksa, and facilitate their return, Mokhiber explained.

17:31 GMT
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres repeated his demand for a ceasefire in Gaza in a statement on Tuesday, insisting humanitarian access be granted “to meet the urgent needs created by the catastrophe unfolding” in the Palestinian enclave.

Guterres urged restraint by both sides to avoid further escalation, calling on Hamas to release hostages and lamenting reports that two-thirds of those killed by Israeli airstrikes in Gaza have been women and children.

“International humanitarian law establishes clear rules that cannot be ignored,” the UN leader said, “It is not an a la carte menu and cannot be applied selectively.”

16:42 GMT
FBI director Christopher Wray warned that the threat of terrorism against the US had reached a “whole ‘nother level” following Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel, in testimony before the US Senate’s Homeland Security Committee on Tuesday.

Acknowledging in written remarks accompanying his testimony that there was no evidence Hamas itself had either the capacity or intention to attack the US directly, Wray explained that the militant group’s surprise strike against Israel was likely to “serve as an inspiration” for both foreign terrorist groups and domestic violent extremists looking to target Americans on US soil.

The FBI director predicted that both cyber and “kinetic” threats would grow with Israel’s war in Gaza, warning lawmakers that restricting the agency’s power to spy on American citizens under the controversial Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act may open the door to terrorist attacks in the future.
=
=
========================
*** ***
1 Nov, 2023 02:54

==== US could deploy ‘peacekeepers’ in Gaza – Bloomberg ====

Washington and its Israeli allies are reportedly discussing the potential deployment of an international force in the Palestinian enclave

US and Israeli officials are mulling an international peacekeeping force for Gaza should Israel successfully remove Hamas from power, Bloomberg has reported, suggesting that American troops could take part in the deployment.

As Israel escalates its ground assault, the two countries have been “exploring options” for the future of the Palestinian enclave, including several different peacekeeping arrangements, officials familiar with the discussions told the news agency on Tuesday.

“One option would grant temporary oversight to Gaza to countries from the region, backed by troops from the US, UK, Germany and France. Ideally, it would also include representation from Arab nations such as Saudi Arabia or the United Arab Emirates,” Bloomberg reported.

While the officials stressed that the conversations are still in an early stage, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken hinted at the issue in recent comments to lawmakers, suggesting Washington is deeply involved in the planning.

“We can’t have a reversion to the status quo with Hamas running Gaza. We also can’t have – and the Israelis start with this proposition themselves – Israel running or controlling Gaza,” he said at a Tuesday Senate hearing. “Between those shoals are a variety of possible permutations that we’re looking at very closely now, as are other countries.”

Though Blinken did not elaborate on those possibilities, officials told Bloomberg that they also include the creation of a peacekeeping force modelled on the 1979 peace treaty between Israel and Egypt, under which the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO) monitor areas of the Sinai Peninsula. The Israeli government believes that idea is “worthy of consideration,” one official said.

Under a third arrangement, the United Nations would be granted “temporary governance” of Gaza, although Israeli officials are reportedly less enthusiastic about the plan, viewing it as “impractical.”

In announcing Israel’s ground operation in the Palestinian enclave, Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said the country was seeking to “destroy Hamas” and create a new “security regime.” He emphasized that Israel must not be responsible for “day-to-day life in the Gaza Strip,” suggesting it would seek to hand off governance to a third party.

US President Joe Biden is hesitant to place “even a small contingent of American troops in harm’s way,” and is still far from a final decision, according to Bloomberg. Though the White House has discussed the need to establish a sovereign Palestinian state after the current conflict, exactly how to achieve that goal “has barely featured in discussions” among US officials.

The latest bout of violence in Gaza erupted following a Hamas terrorist attack on October 7, which killed some 1,400 Israelis, most of them civilians. The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) have carried out relentless airstrikes on the territory in the weeks since, leaving more than 8,000 dead, and have gradually stepped up a major ground attack, which officials say could go on for months.
https://www.rt.com/news/586319-us-israel-gaza-peacekeepers/
=======================

Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza is reportedly bombed by Israel for the second time. This follows a similar strike that killed and injured hundreds there yesterday. South American countries condemn Israel's attack on a Gaza refugee camp, and Bolivia severs diplomatic ties with Tel Aviv. An Iranian Jewish community leader slams Israel's leadership and calls on the country to stop its military operation in Gaza, adding that it does not represent all Jews.

Show less