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Gaza's economy has plummeted by more than 80%, going from about $670 million in the third quarter to just $90 million in the fourth, according to the World Bank.
The Israeli army has withdrawn from the Al Naser medical complex after seven days of siege and has positioned itself in the vicinity of the hospital, where it continues to prevent access to and exit from it, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health, controlled by Hamas. .
Three Palestinians have opened fire on civilians on a highway near the Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim - near Jerusalem - in the occupied West Bank, killing one person and wounding eight others, according to Israeli emergency services.
The police have killed the three attackers.
The Israeli air force has attacked Hezbollah targets in different parts of southern Lebanon, after having detected several projectiles launched from those places towards Israel.
In Gaza, Israeli bombings on Rafah, the southernmost city of the enclave, have destroyed several houses and a mosque in recent hours.
The attacks have been so intense that residents have described the night as one of the worst yet.
00:50
One Israeli killed and eight others wounded in shooting attack near West Bank settlement
Israeli officials carry a body this Thursday after the shooting near an Israeli settlement in the West Bank.Photo: REUTERS
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The country
Yemen's Houthis claim several attacks, including on the Israeli tourist city of Eilat
Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthis have claimed responsibility for the attack on a British cargo ship and the drone assault on an American destroyer, and have attacked the Israeli port and tourist city of Eilat with ballistic missiles and drones.
The Israeli army later stated that its defenses had “detected a long-range ballistic target launched from the southeast into the airspace of the State of Israel.” “The systems followed the trajectory of the missile,” the army said, adding that the target was intercepted “outside the borders of the state of Israel.”
The statement from a representative of this militia on social network Israel's military operations in the Gaza Strip.
Houthi militants have launched repeated drone and missile attacks in the Red Sea, the Bab al-Mandab Strait and the Gulf of Aden since November in support of the Palestinians, as the war between Israel and Hamas and the death toll in Gaza reaches almost 30,000.
Eilat, a resort city on the Red Sea, has been the target of launches by the Houthis.
“Operations in the Red and Arabian Seas, the Strait of Bab al-Mandab and the Gulf of Aden continue, are intensified and are effective,” Abdul Malik al-Huti added in a televised speech, without giving more details about the weapons. submarines.
(Reuters)
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 21:37
The country
Gaza's economy shrank more than 80% in the fourth quarter, according to the World Bank
Gaza's economy has plummeted by more than 80%, going from about $670 million in the third quarter to just $90 million in the fourth, according to the World Bank.
Israel's war against Gaza has had a "catastrophic" impact on the territory's infrastructure, the institution stated in a statement in which it also offered preliminary estimates from the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics.
“Since the start of the conflict, the Palestinian economy has experienced one of the biggest shocks recorded in recent economic history,” he adds.
Poverty was already high in Gaza before the conflict, with more than half of households relying on aid as their main source of income.
Today, almost all Gazans live in poverty and face severe food insecurity.
Poverty levels are also increasing in the West Bank, due to a marked economic slowdown and limited fiscal capacity, which affects the effectiveness of social protection programs.
Overall, poverty levels in the Palestinian territories by the end of 2023 are expected to exceed those of 2020, during the height of Covid-related restrictions.
“Almost all Gazans will live in poverty, at least in the short term,” the statement concludes.
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 21:15
The country
The US holds “constructive” meetings in Egypt and Israel in view of a ceasefire
The United States envoy for the Middle East, Brett McGurk, has held “constructive” meetings in Egypt and Israel, White House National Security spokesman John Kirby reported this Thursday.
He added that Washington remains fully committed to doing everything possible to reach an agreement on the hostages in exchange for a prolonged pause.
In a virtual briefing with reporters, Kirby did not confirm an Axios report that CIA Director Bill Burns was meeting in Paris with Qatari, Egyptian and Israeli officials.
“I can't confirm specific reports about Paris, but I can absolutely assure you that talks are ongoing,” Kirby said.
(Reuters)
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 20:45
The country
What has happened in the last few hours
This is the latest news on the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza at 8:30 p.m. this Thursday, February 22.
Borrell emphasizes that “Israel cannot have veto power” over the creation of a Palestinian state.
The head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, emphasized in Rio before a group of journalists that “Israel cannot have veto power” over the creation of a Palestinian State.
The G-20 insists on this idea after 99 of the 120 deputies of the Israeli Parliament rejected on Wednesday that the world recognize a Palestinian State outside of a negotiation between the parties in conflict.
United Airlines will resume its direct flights to Israel in March.
After a detailed safety analysis, United Airlines has announced that it will resume flights from the United States to Israel starting in March.
United thus becomes the first major US airline to resume operations to Israel following the Hamas terrorist attack on October 7 and the subsequent war in Gaza.
The decision comes after a number of European airlines made similar announcements recently, including Lufthansa, Air France and Poland's LOT.
The Israeli Army withdraws from Al Naser hospital.
The Israeli army has withdrawn from the Al Naser medical complex after seven days of siege and has positioned itself in the vicinity of the hospital, where it continues to prevent access to and exit from it, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health, controlled by Hamas. .
“The staff and patients of the Nasser medical complex find themselves without water for drinking or personal hygiene, without food, without electricity, without oxygen and without therapeutic tools,” the Ministry states.
The UN calls for protection of security forces in the Strip.
The UN humanitarian coordinator for the Palestinian Territories, Jamie McGoldrick, has assured that looting and anarchy reign in Gaza when it comes to distributing humanitarian aid to the civilian population because, he has stated, the security forces in charge of guaranteeing the arrival aid to the south and, above all, to the north of the Palestinian enclave are often the target of Israeli fire.
Security Council holds briefing on Gaza.
Although no vote or discussion is planned on the temporary ceasefire resolution proposal being prepared by the United States, the members of the Council will analyze the humanitarian situation on the ground, in addition to expressing, once again, their concern about the announced ground offensive. Israeli on Rafah.
Israel responds to Hezbollah's missile launch.
The Israeli air force has attacked Hezbollah targets – considered the most important paramilitary organization in the Middle East – in Maroun el Ras, Kfarkela and Khiam, different points in southern Lebanon, after having detected several projectile launches from those places towards Israel.
Iran urges UN Court to offer Palestinians hope that justice will prevail.
The legal consequences of the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories have been analyzed since Monday by the United Nations International Court of Justice (ICJ), at the request of the General Assembly.
Among the 52 countries that have asked to intervene before their judges is Iran, and its representative, Raza Najafi, deputy foreign minister, urged the court this Thursday to offer the Palestinians “the hope that justice will prevail.”
Iran maintains that “the inaction of the UN Security Council” is one of the “main causes of the prolonged occupation of Palestine.”
Israel will test the day-after scenario in Gaza with “humanitarian pockets.”
Israel is seeking Palestinians not affiliated with Hamas to manage civil affairs in areas of the Gaza Strip designed as testing grounds for the enclave's post-war administration, an Israeli official said Thursday.
Israeli bombings on Rafah destroy several houses and a mosque.
The attacks have been so intense that residents have described the night to Reuters as one of the worst so far.
The Gazans have recovered at least seven bodies that they have put in bags and left on the cobblestones outside a morgue in this city bordering Egypt, where more than half of the 2.3 million inhabitants of the Palestinian enclave are crowded. after fleeing the north, mostly in tents.
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 20:30
María Antonia Sánchez-VallejoNew York (UNITED STATES)
Doctors Without Borders denounces the failure of the Security Council and calls for the unconditional protection of hospitals in the Strip
The intervention of the Secretary General of the NGO Doctors Without Borders (MSF) before the Security Council, this Thursday, has put his finger on the sore spot of the blockade of the highest UN body, in charge of ensuring world peace and security, which This week saw a draft resolution for a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza fail for the third time due to the veto of one of its permanent members, the United States.
"Meeting after meeting, resolution after resolution, this body has failed to effectively address this conflict," Christopher Lockyear said at the monthly Gaza briefing.
"We have seen members of this Council deliberate and delay decisions while civilians died. This death, destruction and forced displacement are the result of military and political decisions that blatantly disregard the lives of civilians. These decisions could have been - and still are They can be very different."
Lockyear also called for the unconditional protection of medical facilities, health personnel and patients, listing the attacks that have been targeted, both beneficiaries and the teams of the NGO he directs.
“Our patients suffer catastrophic injuries, amputations, crushed limbs and severe burns,” explained the manager. “They need sophisticated care.
They need long and intensive rehabilitation.
Doctors cannot treat these injuries on a battlefield or in the ashes of destroyed hospitals.
Our surgeons are running out of gauze.
"They use it once, squeeze out the blood, wash it, sterilize it and reuse it for the next patient."
This Tuesday, the same day that the United States vetoed for the third time a binding humanitarian ceasefire resolution, the wife and daughter-in-law of an MSF worker were killed and six other people were injured by the attack of an Israeli tank, which fired against a clearly identified shelter where MSF staff were staying in a neighborhood of Khan Yunis, according to the NGO.
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 20:15
Naiara Galarraga Gortázar
G-20
Borrell emphasizes that “Israel cannot have veto power” over the creation of a Palestinian State
Naiara Galarraga Gortázar
The Gaza war, with its nearly 30,000 deaths, has resurrected the two-state solution as the preferred formula for ending hostilities and resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
A formula that has aroused “virtual unanimity” among the G-20 foreign ministers, meeting in Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), as “the only possible solution,” the host, the Foreign Minister, declared this Thursday after the closing. Mauro Vieira.
The head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, emphasized in Rio before a group of journalists that “Israel cannot have veto power” over the creation of a Palestinian State.
The G-20 insists on this idea after 99 of the 120 deputies of the Israeli Parliament rejected on Wednesday that the world recognize a Palestinian State outside of a negotiation between the parties in conflict.
Read the full news here
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 19:50
María Antonia Sánchez-Vallejo
United Airlines will resume direct flights to Israel in March
After a detailed safety analysis, United Airlines has announced that it will resume flights from the United States to Israel starting in March.
United thus becomes the first major US airline to resume operations to Israel following the Hamas terrorist attack on October 7 and the subsequent war in Gaza.
United's decision to resume flights to Tel Aviv comes after a number of European airlines recently made similar announcements, including Lufthansa, Air France and Poland's LOT.
None of the other major US airlines that until October operated flights to Israel, Delta and American Airlines, have yet resumed operations.
Delta could do so partially in spring.
The resumption of United flights to Tel Aviv is currently limited to the airports in New York and Newark (New Jersey), which operates as the Big Apple's third airfield.
Flights available before the conflict from San Francisco, Washington and Chicago will be evaluated starting in the fall, the company has announced.
"United conducted a detailed safety analysis in making this decision, including working closely with safety experts and government officials in the United States and Israel. We also worked closely with the Air Line Pilots Association and the Association of Flight Attendants. to develop protocols to ensure they are safe," the airline said in a statement.
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 19:31
The country
The Gaza Ministry of Health assures that the Israeli army has withdrawn from Al Naser hospital and the siege continues in the surrounding area
The Israeli army has withdrawn from the Al Naser medical complex after seven days of siege and has positioned itself in the vicinity of the hospital, where it continues to prevent access to and exit from it, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health, controlled by Hamas. .
“The staff and patients of the Nasser medical complex find themselves without water for drinking or personal hygiene, without food, without electricity, without oxygen and without therapeutic tools,” the Ministry states.
“Medical teams were able to bury 13 bodies inside Al Nasser hospital of some of the patients who have died as a result of the generators and oxygen being cut off.
The wastewater floods all the grounds of the medical complex and the occupation still prevents the repair of the water tanks, the sewage network and the operation of the electrical generator in the medical complex," says the Ministry of Health in a statement.
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 19:46
The country
The UN calls for protecting security forces in the Strip to guarantee the arrival of humanitarian aid
The UN humanitarian coordinator for the Palestinian Territories, Jamie McGoldrick, has assured that looting and anarchy reign in Gaza when it comes to distributing humanitarian aid to the civilian population because, he has stated, the security forces in charge of guaranteeing the arrival aid to the south and, above all, to the north of the Palestinian enclave are often the target of Israeli fire.
McGoldrick, who has just visited the Strip, has stressed that the Israeli Army attacks police officers, who should protect humanitarian caravans.
"And that is what we are trying to do right now, get guarantees that [the police] can work without being the target of [Israeli] attacks," he noted.
"Given the conditions there (...) there has not been any significant supply of food to northern Gaza for two or three months," said the UN humanitarian coordinator, who announced in a press conference that he would be studying with the Israeli authorities the possibility of using a military crossing to serve some 300,000 people there.
McGoldrick has also explained that the trucks are also "assaulted" by organized groups in the security zone between the Israeli Kerem Shalom crossing, north of the enclave, and at the gate that directly accesses the streets of Rafah, to the south of the Strip, where humanitarian cargo is unloaded and loaded onto new trucks.
Once the convoy enters the streets of Rafah, these groups try again to block it to steal all the products.
According to McGoldrick, among the assailants there are also people desperate for the situation in Rafah, a place where 1.4 million people are taking refuge in "extreme conditions" and which is being attacked by the Israeli army.
"The majority of people live in miserable tents, without drinking water, without access to healthcare, without access to what is normally considered a minimum standard of living, with serious problems of food insecurity," he detailed.
(Efe)
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 18:01
María Antonia Sánchez-VallejoNew York
Security Council holds briefing on Gaza
The UN Security Council is holding an open briefing this Thursday, followed by closed-door consultations, on the situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian issue.
The special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, Tor Wennesland, and Chris Lockyear, international secretary of the NGO Doctors Without Borders (MsF), are scheduled to speak.
The United Nations Deputy Secretary General for Security, Gilles Michaud, is expected to intervene in the closed-door consultations.
Although no vote or discussion is planned on the temporary ceasefire resolution proposal being prepared by the United States, the members of the Council will analyze the humanitarian situation on the ground, in addition to expressing, once again, their concern about the announced ground offensive. Israeli on Rafah.
The session occurs two days after a resolution proposal for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, presented by Algeria, was vetoed by the United States.
Wennesland is expected to provide an update on the situation in the Strip, as well as the latest developments in the West Bank and the region.
On his recent visit to Gaza (on the 19th), Wenneslan spoke with displaced families and held meetings with UN staff and NGOs working to provide humanitarian aid.
In this regard, the spokesman for the Secretary General, Stéphane Dujarric, recalled that "the UN needs the necessary tools to act on the ground, including the need for Israel to allow the entry of items critical to UN operations and improve coordination." to prevent incidents in the distribution of aid.
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 16:26
The country
Israel responds to Hezbollah's missile launch with attacks on southern Lebanon
In recent hours, the Israeli air force has attacked Hezbollah targets – considered the most important paramilitary organization in the Middle East – in Maroun el Ras, Kfarkela and Khiam, different points in southern Lebanon, after having detected several projectiles launched from those places towards Israel.
“In the last few hours, numerous launches have been identified crossing from Lebanon towards the areas of Kiryat Shmona and Yuval, in northern Israel.
The Israel Defense Forces attacked the source of the fire,” said a military statement.
Fighter jets have bombed a military complex of the Lebanese Shiite militia in Maroun el Ras;
“terrorist infrastructure” in Kfarkela and Khiam, while a tank fired to “eliminate a threat” in the Jebbayn area, also in southern Lebanon, according to the army.
Hezbollah has so far claimed responsibility for four attacks towards Israel, with rockets and “appropriate weapons”, towards the Israeli towns of Yuval and Kiryat Shmona;
as well as the disputed territory known as Cheba Farms, all in the occupied Golan Heights.
A mother and her daughter were killed yesterday by an Israeli bombing in their home in Majdal Zoun, in southern Lebanon, while the Lebanese group claimed responsibility for at least 12 attacks towards northern Israel.
Since October 8, the day after the outbreak of war between Israel and the Islamist group Hamas - which controls Gaza - Hezbollah and the Israeli army have been engaged in an intense exchange of fire.
The border between Israel and Lebanon is experiencing its highest peak of tension since 2006 with an intense exchange of fire for more than four months that has claimed the lives of at least 290 people, most on the Lebanese side and in the ranks of Hezbollah. which has confirmed some 206 casualties, some of them in Syria.
In Israel, 19 people have died on the northern border (13 soldiers and six civilians);
while on the other side of the border some 271 people have died, including some 32 members of Palestinian militias, one soldier and 32 civilians - among them ten minors and three journalists - in addition to Hezbollah militiamen.
(Efe)
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 14:16
Isabel FerrerThe Hague
Iran urges UN court to offer Palestinians hope that justice will prevail
The legal consequences of the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories have been analyzed since Monday by the United Nations International Court of Justice (ICJ), at the request of the General Assembly.
Among the 52 countries that have asked to intervene before their judges is Iran, and its representative, Raza Najafi, deputy foreign minister, urged the court this Thursday to offer the Palestinians “the hope that justice will prevail.”
Iran maintains that “the inaction of the UN Security Council” is one of the “main causes of the prolonged occupation of Palestine.”
Najafi recalled that the Palestinian population "tries to survive every day, and there is no food, water or schools for the children: only the threat of war."
Iran considers that “Israel's illegal regime” was established violently “with the forcible deportation of Palestinians from their land.”
For this reason, according to him, countries that support Israel have the obligation to “prevent genocide.”
The ICJ is the highest judicial body of the UN, and does not address the possibility of genocide in Gaza in this case.
Yes, it does so in another lawsuit, filed by South Africa, in which it has already demanded that the Government of Benjamin Netanyahu take measures to prevent the greatest crime.
Najafi concluded his intervention by wishing that justice prevails.
A commitment that should not be interpreted, he has stressed, “as a recognition of the state of Israel” by Iran.
Haydee Shiya, enviando legal de Irak, ha tomado luego la palabra haciendo un llamamiento a la comunidad internacional para “detener la máquina de matar al pueblo palestino”. Para ello, ha explicado, Israel debe cumplir con los tratados internacionales que ha firmado. La vulneración israelí de leyes y convenios ha sido recordada también por Irlanda. Rossa Fanning, su fiscal general, ha dicho que la larga ocupación de Palestina “no está justificada”, y que los palestinos son sometidos “a la violencia de los colonos israelíes, sin que las autoridades de Israel les defiendan”. Irlanda, ha terminado diciendo, apoya la solución de dos estados.
Jordania ha tomado también este jueves la palabra para recordar a los jueces el especial papel de su país en la custodia de Jerusalén como cuidad sagrada. “Debe ser una ciudad de paz”, ha afirmado Ahmad Ziadat, ministro jordano de Justicia. Su representante legal en estas audiencias es el jurista británico Michael Wood, y ha recordado que Naciones Unidas ha pedido “repetidas veces el establecimiento de un estado palestino y está a favor de la solución de los dos estados”. Ha dicho a su vez que Israel ha participado en actos “que constituyen crímenes contra la humanidad, y no los ha castigado”.
El próximo lunes 26 de febrero, último día de las sesiones, será el turno de España.
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 13:55
El País
Israel pondrá a prueba el escenario del día después en Gaza con “bolsillos humanitarios”
Israel está buscando palestinos que no estén afiliados a Hamás para gestionar los asuntos civiles en zonas de la franja de Gaza diseñadas como campos de pruebas para la administración del enclave en la posguerra, ha dicho un funcionario israelí este jueves.
Pero Hamás ha asegurado que el plan, que según el funcionario israelí también excluiría a cualquiera en la nómina de la Autoridad Palestina (AP) reconocida internacionalmente, significaría efectivamente una reocupación israelí de Gaza y está condenado al fracaso.
El funcionario israelí ha dicho que los “bolsillos humanitarios” planeados estarían en distritos de la Franja en los cuales Hamás ha sido expulsado, pero que su éxito final dependería de que Israel logre su objetivo de destruir a la facción islamista en el pequeño territorio costero.
“Estamos buscando a las personas adecuadas para que den un paso al frente”, ha dicho el funcionario a Reuters bajo condición de anonimato. “Pero está claro que esto llevará tiempo, ya que nadie se presentará si cree que Hamás les meterá una bala en la cabeza”. El plan, ha añadido el funcionario, “podrá lograrse una vez que Hamás sea destruido y no represente una amenaza para Israel o los habitantes de Gaza”.
Channel 12, the largest audience in Israel, reported that the Zeitoun neighborhood, located in the north of Gaza City, is a candidate for the implementation of the plan, according to which local merchants and civil society leaders would distribute humanitarian aid.
The Israeli military would provide peripheral security in Zeitoun, according to Channel 12 reporting, describing new troop incursions there this week as designed to eradicate the remnants of a Hamas garrison that was hit hard in the early stages of the war.
Asked about the plan, a senior Hamas official said such an idea would be tantamount to Israel reoccupying Gaza, from which it withdrew troops and settlers in 2005. Israel says it will have indefinite security control over Gaza after the war, but denies that this is a reoccupation.
“This project does not make sense, and is a sign of confusion and will never succeed,” said the official.
(Reuters)
ACT.22 FEB 2024 - 13:39