Category World News

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A senior United Nations official has warned the UN Security Council (UNSC) that Israel’s plan to seize Gaza City risked “another calamity” in the Gaza Strip with far-reaching consequences, as five more people in Gaza reportedly died from starvation – bringing the overall toll to 217, including 100 children.

UN Assistant Secretary-General for Europe, Central Asia and the Americas Miroslav Jenca on Sunday told an emergency weekend meeting that if implemented, the plan could result in the displacement of all civilians from Gaza City by October 7, 2025, affecting some 800,000 people, many of them already previously displaced.

This “will likely trigger another calamity in Gaza, reverberating across the region and causing further forced displacement, killings and destruction, compounding the unbearable suffering of the population,” Jenca said.

Palestinian UN Ambassador Riyad Mansour told the UNSC that Israel was aiming for “the destruction of the Palestinian people through forced transfer and massacres to facilitate its annexation of our land”.

“What will force Israel to change course is our ability to transform justified condemnation into just actions … History will judge us all,” he said.

Foreign powers, including some of Israel’s allies, have slammed Israel’s plan. The United Kingdom, a close ally of Israel which nonetheless pushed for an emergency meeting on the crisis, warned the Israeli plan risked prolonging the conflict.

“It will only deepen the suffering of Palestinian civilians in Gaza. This is not a path to resolution. It is a path to more bloodshed,” the British Deputy Ambassador to the UN James Kariuki said.

France’s Deputy Permanent UN Representative Jay Dharmadhikari condemned “in the strongest possible terms” the plan, which he said would have “dramatic humanitarian consequences” for civilians already “living in horrifying conditions”.

“The images of children dying of hunger or civilians being targeted as they tried to find food are unbearable,” Dharmadhikari said, urging Israel to comply with international humanitarian law.

The UK, Denmark, France, Greece and  Slovenia issued a joint statement asking Israel “to urgently reverse this decision and not to implement” the plan, saying it violates international law.

In a separate statement, the foreign ministers of Spain, Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, Norway, Portugal and Slovenia warned that Israel seizing Gaza City would be “a major obstacle to implementing the two-state solution, the only path towards a comprehensive, just and lasting peace”.

Israel to ‘finish the job’ in Gaza

Despite the international backlash and rumours of dissent from Israeli military top brass, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has remained defiant over the plan to seize Gaza’s largest urban centre, which was approved by Israel’s security cabinet on Friday.

“The timeline that we set for the action is fairly quickly,” Netanyahu told a news conference in Jerusalem on Sunday. “I don’t want to talk about exact timetables, but we’re talking in terms of a fairly short timetable because we want to bring the war to an end.”

He said Israel had “no choice but to finish the job and complete the defeat of Hamas”, given the group’s refusal to lay down its arms. Hamas said it would not disarm unless an independent Palestinian state was established.

Netanyahu said the military had been given the green light to “dismantle” what he described as two remaining Hamas strongholds: Gaza City in the north and al-Mawasi further to the south.

“This is the best way to end the war and the best way to end it speedily,” he said. “We will do so by first enabling the civilian population to safely leave the combat areas to designated safe zones.”

While the prime minister stressed that these “safe zones” would be given “ample food, water, and medical care”, guards at the controversial Israel- and United States-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), purportedly established to deliver aid to the starving Palestinian population, have routinely opened fire on the aid seekers, killing dozens at a time.

Asked about the growing criticism targeting his cabinet’s decision, Netanyahu said the country was prepared to fight alone. “We will win the war, with or without the support of others,” he said.

The United States, a veto-wielding permanent member of the UNSC, has so far shielded its staunch ally from any practical measures of UN censure. Netanyahu said he had not yet spoken with US President Donald Trump since Israel’s cabinet approved the expanded war plan, but intended to do so soon.

‘Unacceptable catastrophe’

The director of the coordination division at the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that the “unacceptable catastrophe” unfolding in Gaza must be brought to an end as he addressed the UN Security Council via videolink on Sunday.

Ramesh Rajasingham expressed concern over “the prolonged conflict, the reports of atrocities and further human toll that is likely to unfold following the government of Israel’s decision to expand military operations in Gaza”.

Israel has blocked all but a trickle of aid from entering Gaza for months and has prevented UN workers from accessing and distributing lifesaving assistance. “The UN has a plan and the systems in place to respond. We’ve said this before, and we will say it again and again: Let us work,” Rajasingham said.

The Government Media Office in Gaza said only 1,210 aid trucks have entered Gaza over the past 14 days. Officials said this represents just 14 percent of the territory’s minimum actual needs of 8,400 trucks.

Netanyahu acknowledged there have been issues of “deprivation” in Gaza, but denied that Israel has a “starvation policy”. Human Rights Watch, among other international organisations, has repeatedly called Israel’s use of starvation of civilians as a weapon of war a “war crime”.

Ahmad Alhendawi, Save the Children International’s director for the Middle East, North Africa and Eastern Europe, told Al Jazeera that his team on the ground was seeing an “exponential increase” in the number of malnutrition cases, with effects that can “span generations”.

Police in London on Saturday arrested 522 people who were protesting against the United Kingdom’s recent decision to ban the group Palestine Action, a tally thought to include the highest-ever recorded at a single protest in the British capital.

The Metropolitan Police on Sunday updated its previous arrest tally of 466 and said that all but one of the 522 arrests took place at a protest in central London’s Parliament Square and were for displaying placards backing Palestine Action.

The other arrest for the same offence took place at nearby Russell Square as thousands rallied at a Palestine Coalition march demonstrating against Israel’s war in Gaza, which has killed at least 61,430 people and wounded 153, 213.

The Met made 10 further arrests on Saturday, including six for assaults on officers, though none were seriously injured, it added on Sunday.

The protests were the latest in a series of rallies denouncing the British government’s ban of Palestine Action under the Terrorism Act 2000 on July 5, days after the group took responsibility for a break-in at an air force base in southern England that caused an estimated 7 million pounds ($9.4m) of damage to two aircraft.

The group said its activists were responding to the UK’s indirect military support for Israel amid the war in Gaza.

Huda Ammori, cofounder of Palestine Action, said ahead of Saturday’s protests that they would “go down in our country’s history as a momentous act of collective defiance of an unprecedented attack on our fundamental freedoms”.

The force said the average age of those arrested on Saturday was 54, with six teenagers, 97 aged in their 70s, and 15 octogenarians.

A roughly equal number of men and women were detained.

In a statement following the latest mass arrests, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper defended the government’s decision, insisting: “UK national security and public safety must always be our top priority”.

“The assessments are very clear – this is not a non-violent organisation,” she added.

But critics, including the United Nations and groups such as Amnesty International and Greenpeace, have condemned the government’s proscription as legal overreach and a threat to free speech.

“If this was happening in another country, the UK government would be voicing grave concerns about freedom of speech and human rights,” Greenpeace UK’s co-executive director Areeba Hamid said on Saturday.

She added the government had “now sunk low enough to turn the Met into thought police, direct action into terrorism”.

Police across the UK have made scores of similar arrests since July 5, when being a member of Palestine Action or supporting the group became a criminal offence punishable by up to 14 years in prison.

Police announced this week that the first three people had been charged in the English and Welsh criminal justice system with such backing following their arrests at a July 5 demonstration.

In its update on Sunday, the Met revealed a further 26 case files following other arrests on that day are due to be submitted to prosecutors “imminently” and that more would follow related to later protests.

It believes that 30 of those held on Saturday had been arrested at previous recent Palestine Action protests.

Eighteen people remained in custody by Sunday lunchtime, but were set to be released on bail within hours, the Met added.

It noted officers from its counterterrorism command will now “work to put together the case files required to secure charges against those arrested as part of this operation”.

Protesters call for release of Israeli captives

Meanwhile, demonstrators calling for the release of Israeli captives held in Gaza marched in central London on Sunday.

The protesters, who planned to march to Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s residence in Downing Street for a rally, include Noga Guttman, a cousin of 24-year-old captive Evyatar David, who featured in a video that enraged Israelis when it was released by Hamas last week. The video showed an emaciated David saying he was digging his own grave inside a tunnel in Gaza.

In the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel, which triggered Israel’s war on Gaza, more than 200 people were taken captive. Some 50 of the captives still have not been released. Twenty are thought to be alive.

Israel last week announced its intention to seize Gaza City as part of a plan to end the war and bring the captives home. Family members and many international leaders have condemned the plan, saying it would lead to more bloodshed and endanger the captives.

“We are united in one clear and urgent demand: the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages,” Stop the Hate, a coalition of groups organising the march, said in a statement.

Lebanon’s government has announced a timeline for Hezbollah’s disarmament, saying the military would set out a plan to bring all weapons under state authority before the end of 2025.

This comes after months of pressure from the United States after Israel’s war on Lebanon killed more than 4,000 people and culminated in a ceasefire in November. Israel has continuously violated the ceasefire and still occupies five points in Lebanon.

Hezbollah’s arms have long been a contentious issue in Lebanon, and attempts to interfere in Hezbollah’s infrastructure or military capabilities have led to internal conflict.

However, Hezbollah took heavy losses in Israeli attacks last year, which diminished its status as Lebanon’s political and military hegemon.

As the issue of disarming Hezbollah heats up, here’s what you need to know about the government’s announcement on Tuesday and the situation in Lebanon:

What did Hezbollah say?

It doesn’t like the disarmament plan.

In fact, Hezbollah said it would treat the decision as though it didn’t exist.

“The government of Prime Minister Nawaf Salam committed a grave sin by taking a decision to strip Lebanon of its weapons to resist the Israeli enemy. … This decision fully serves Israel’s interest,” the group said in a statement.

Despite its flat-out rejection of the government’s decision, Hezbollah has yet to respond with force.

Under its late leader Hassan Nasrallah, the group threatened that any act taken against its arms could lead to civil war.

This time, Hezbollah has not taken military action, possibly a result of a change in its strategy or because of its weakened capacity after the war.

Rumours circulated during a cabinet session on Tuesday that Hezbollah supporters in black shirts were gathering along the highway in Khaldeh, just south of Beirut, but that turned out to be a restaurant celebrating reaching one million followers on Instagram.

Pro-Hezbollah protesters did briefly block the airport road in Beirut after the government’s decision, but little else has manifested despite heightened domestic concerns.

What about Iran, Hezbollah’s backer?

Iran voiced support for Hezbollah but said it has no role in shaping the group’s decisions or policy.

The comments came from Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who said the efforts to disarm Hezbollah wouldn’t work.

‏“This is not the first time they’ve tried to strip Hezbollah of its weapons,” Araghchi said. “The reason is clear: The power of resistance has proven itself in the field.”

Iran played a formative role in founding Hezbollah in 1982 during the heat of the Lebanese Civil War and has been the group’s main benefactor ever since.

But since Israel’s war on Lebanon, Iran’s ability to support Hezbollah has taken a major hit. The Lebanese government has blocked flights from Tehran, and the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in neighbouring Syria has blocked the land route used to transport funding and weapons.

How did Lebanon respond?

Iran’s comments angered some Lebanese officials.

Foreign Minister Youssef Raggi said Araghchi’s statement is “firmly rejected and condemned”.

“Such statements undermine Lebanon’s sovereignty, unity and stability and constitute an unacceptable interference in its internal matters and sovereign decisions,” Raggi said.

Is disarmament going to happen?

This remains to be seen.

Salam said after a follow-up cabinet meeting on Thursday that his ministers approved the “objectives” of a US proposal for “ensuring that the possession of weapons is restricted solely to the state”.

“The government is now expected to formally commit to disarming Hezbollah, a decision that could … ignite a political crisis,” Al Jazeera’s Beirut correspondent Zeina Khodr said.

Hezbollah has yet to respond forcefully, and anti-Hezbollah politicians have used increasingly bold rhetoric.

“If there is a cost to be able to centralise the weapons with the … Lebanese armed forces, [it may be] better like that,” Elias Hankash, a Lebanese MP with the anti-Hezbollah Kataeb party, said.

President Joseph Aoun and Salam will have to navigate US pressure and domestic support for disarming Hezbollah with opposition from the group and its supporters, who are reeling from Israel’s war.

The World Bank has said Lebanon needs $11bn for reconstruction and recovery, the vast majority of which is needed in southern Lebanon, the Bekaa Valley and Beirut’s suburbs, where most of Hezbollah’s support is based.

Have any Hezbollah members expressed discontent with disarmament?

Plenty of discontent has been expressed.

Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem rejected the idea, saying the group’s disarmament would make Lebanon vulnerable to attack and would serve only Israel.

Ali Mokdad, a Hezbollah MP, also dismissed the decision, calling it “ink on paper”. Another Hezbollah MP, Mohammad Raad, said the decision could never be implemented and compared Hezbollah giving up its weapons to “suicide”.

What are things like right now?

Tensions were heightened on Saturday when six Lebanese soldiers were killed while inspecting an alleged Hezbollah weapons site.

Hezbollah reportedly booby-trapped sites in southern Lebanon during the war in case invading Israeli soldiers came upon them.

Has Israel created a predicament it can’t escape with its zero-sum path for the Palestinians and regional overreach?