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Israeli Troops Recover Slain Gaza Hostage, Egypt to Host New Truce Talks
A man cycles past posters with pictures of hostages kidnapped in the deadly October 7 attack on Israel by the Palestinian Islamist terror group Hamas from Gaza, as the conflict between Israel and Hamas continues, in Tel Aviv, Israel, April 6, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Hannah McKay
Israel said on Saturday its special forces had recovered the body of a hostage killed while being held captive in Gaza, as the Palestinian enclave’s dominant Islamist terrorist group Hamas said it would take part in a new round of ceasefire talks in Cairo.
Almost six months into the war, Israel has faced protests at home demanding a deal to free the dwindling number of live hostages from Hamas’ Oct. 7 cross-border rampage. Western countries, meanwhile, have voiced outrage over what they see as an unacceptably high Palestinian civilian toll and the accompanying humanitarian crisis.
The body of Elad Katzir, a 47-year-old Israeli farmer, was unearthed by commandos in southern Khan Younis overnight, the military said. He had been killed by his Palestinian Islamic Jihad captors and buried there in mid-January, it said, citing intelligence information about which it declined to elaborate.
Islamic Jihad, an ally of Hamas, had no immediate comment.
Katzir was among 253 people dragged into Gaza by Hamas-led gunmen who killed some 1,200 others in southern Israel, according to official tallies, sparking an offensive that medics in the enclave say has killed more than 33,000 Palestinians.
His father Avraham was killed in their kibbutz, Nir Oz, and his mother Hanna was also taken hostage but freed in November under a truce.
Qatari and Egyptian mediators have been trying to secure another deal that might return some of the 129 remaining hostages in a longer ceasefire in Gaza.
Hamas on Saturday said its fighters targeted three Israeli tanks in Khan Younis with missiles, inflicting casualties. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military, though it said earlier that troops had engaged with gunmen in the area.
TALKS
The World Health Organization said its team had managed to reach Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, where Israeli special forces conducted a two-week raid against suspected militants, leaving a wasteland of destroyed buildings.
The team saw at least five dead bodies at the complex, most of which had suffered extensive destruction. “Even restoring minimal functionality in the short term seems implausible,” said a statement from WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
Al-Shifa, the Gaza Strip’s biggest hospital before the war, was one of the few healthcare facilities that had been partially operational in the north of enclave before the raid.
Angered by an Israeli air strike that killed aid workers in Gaza, U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday urged an “immediate ceasefire” and for Israel to boost humanitarian relief measures.
Israel approved the reopening of the Erez crossing into northern Gaza and the temporary use of its Ashdod port following the U.S. criticism, measures welcomed on Saturday by U.N. aid coordinator Jamie McGoldrick.
Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid told N12’s Meet the Press on Saturday that he was traveling to Washington where he will meet U.S. officials next week. The Biden administration did not immediately respond to a request for comment about whether senior officials will meet Lapid.
Hamas said it would send a delegation to Cairo on Sunday for a new round of mediated talks. Israel was undecided on whether to attend, an Israeli official said, citing concern that the event would be “more political theatre than actual progress”.
Hamas wants any deal to bring about an end to the war and withdrawal of Israeli forces. Israel has said that, after any truce, it would topple Hamas, which is sworn to its destruction.
A rally in Jerusalem calling on leaders to secure a hostage release was set to take place on Sunday, which marks six months since the Oct. 7 attack, and anti-government protesters in Tel Aviv on Saturday called for an election.
In a Jan. 8 video posted by Islamic Jihad online, Katzir said: “I was close to dying more than once. It’s a miracle I’m still alive… I want to tell my family that I love them very much and I miss them very much.”
Based on various sources of information, Israel has declared at least 35 hostages as dead in Gaza captivity. Palestinian factions have said some were killed in Israeli strikes. While confirming this in several cases, Israel says that, in others, hostages whose bodies were recovered bore signs of execution.
The post Israeli Troops Recover Slain Gaza Hostage, Egypt to Host New Truce Talks first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels
View of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib / Flash90.
i24 News – Sweden will no longer fund the U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) and will instead provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza via other channels, the Scandinavian country said on Friday.
The decision comes on the heels of multiple revelations regarding the agency’s employees’ involvement in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.
Sweden’s decision was in response to the Israeli ban, as it will make channeling aid via the agency more difficult, the country’s aid minister, Benjamin Dousa, said.
“Large parts of UNRWA’s operations in Gaza are either going to be severely weakened or completely impossible,” Dousa said. “For the government, the most important thing is that support gets through.”
The Palestinian embassy in Stockholm said in a statement: “We reject the idea of finding alternatives to UNRWA, which has a special mandate to provide services to Palestinian refugees.”
Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel thanked Dousa for a meeting they had this week and for Sweden’s decision to drop its support for UNRWA.
“There are worthy and viable alternatives for humanitarian aid, and I appreciate the willingness to listen and adopt a different approach,” she said.
The post Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Pope Calls Gaza Airstrikes ‘Cruelty’ After Israeli Minister’s Criticism
Pope Francis waves after delivering his traditional Christmas Day Urbi et Orbi speech to the city and the world from the main balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, December 25, 2021. Photo: REUTERS/Yara Nardi
Pope Francis on Saturday again condemned Israeli airstrikes in Gaza, a day after an Israeli government minister publicly denounced the pontiff for suggesting the global community should study whether the military offensive there constitutes a genocide of the Palestinian people.
Francis opened his annual Christmas address to the Catholic cardinals who lead the Vatican’s various departments with what appeared to be a reference to Israeli airstrikes on Friday that killed at least 25 Palestinians in Gaza.
“Yesterday, children were bombed,” said the pope. “This is cruelty. This is not war. I wanted to say this because it touches the heart.”
The pope, as leader of the 1.4-billion-member Roman Catholic Church, is usually careful about taking sides in conflicts, but he has recently been more outspoken about Israel’s military campaign against Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.
In book excerpts published last month, the pontiff said some international experts said that “what is happening in Gaza has the characteristics of a genocide.”
Israeli Minister of Diaspora Affairs Amichai Chikli sharply criticized those comments in an unusual open letter published by Italian newspaper Il Foglio on Friday. Chikli said the pope’s remarks amounted to a “trivialization” of the term genocide.
Francis also said on Saturday that the Catholic bishop of Jerusalem, known as a patriarch, had tried to enter the Gaza Strip on Friday to visit Catholics there, but was denied entry.
The patriarch’s office told Reuters it was not able to comment on the pope’s remarks about the patriarch being denied entry.
Israeli officials were not immediately reachable for comment on Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath, and the Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The post Pope Calls Gaza Airstrikes ‘Cruelty’ After Israeli Minister’s Criticism first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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IDF Pledges to Implement Lessons from Failure to Intercept Houthi Missile
Iranian-backed Yemeni terrorist leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi. Photo: Screenshot
i24 News – The Israeli military said on Saturday that while the investigation into the failure to intercept the missile that hit Tel Aviv early in the morning was still ongoing, some lessons were already being implemented. The ballistic missile, fired by Yemen’s Houthi jihadists, landed at a playground in a residential area, leading to 16 people sustaining injuries from glass shards.
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson said that “some of the conclusions have already been implemented, in regards of both interception and early warning.”
The spokesperson added that “no further details regarding aerial defense activities and the alert system can be disclosed due to operational security considerations.”
The Houthis have repeatedly fired drones and missiles towards Israel in what they describe as “acts of solidarity” with Palestinians in Gaza.
The post IDF Pledges to Implement Lessons from Failure to Intercept Houthi Missile first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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