6 h. ago Middle East crisis live: Israel has turned Gaza into a ‘mass grave’, top UN court hears

ICJ holding hearing about Israel’s obligation to facilitate aid to Gaza and the West Bank amid the outlawing of UnrwaTehran has accused Benjamin Netanyahu of trying to dictate US policy in negotiations after the Israeli prime minister repeated calls for Iran’s entire nuclear infrastructure to be dismantled.The US and Iran have so far held three rounds of indirect talks, mediated by Oman, aimed at sealing a deal that would block Tehran from acquiring a nuclear weapon but also lift crippling economic sanctions imposed by Washington.Israel’s fantasy that it can dictate what Iran may or may not do is so detached from reality that it hardly merits a response. What is striking, however, is how brazenly Netanyahu is now dictating what President Trump can and cannot do in his diplomacy with Iran Continue reading...

Events

7 d. ago Israeli military admits 'professional failures' after 15 Palestinian medics killed in Gaza

An Israeli probe found that 15 aid workers were killed as a result of an ‘operational misunderstanding’

Events

7 d. ago Israeli military finds 'professional failures' after 15 Palestinian medics killed in Gaza

An Israeli probe found that 15 aid workers were killed as a result of an ‘operational misunderstanding’

Events

7 d. ago Israel sacks deputy commander after it admits 'professional failures' over the killings of 15 Gaza aid workers by IDF troops

An Israeli investigation into the killings of 15 Palestinian medics last month in Gaza by Israeli forces said Sunday it found a chain of 'professional failures'

Events

2 w. ago IDF unit involved in killing of Palestinian paramedics led by general with ‘contempt for human life’

Golani troops were under command of reservist Armoured 14th Brigade, part of division led by Brig Gen Yehuda VachThe Israel Defense Forces (IDF) unit involved in the killings of 15 Palestinian paramedics and rescue workers in the Gaza Strip last month was under the command of a brigade led by a notorious Israeli general previously accused by some of his own troops of having “contempt for human life”.The IDF has confirmed that troops from Golani, one of the army’s five infantry brigades, opened fire on two convoys of ambulances in Rafah on 23 March and dug a mass grave to cover the bodies of those killed until the corpses could be retrieved by a UN team six days later. It has disputed allegations from two witnesses who exhumed the bodies and newly released postmortem results that found several of those killed had close-range gunshot wounds to the head and chest and were discovered with their hands or legs tied. Continue reading...

Events

2 w. ago IDF unit involved in Gaza paramedics’ killing was under command of brigade led by notorious Israeli general

Golani troops were under command of reservist Armoured 14th Brigade, part of division led by Brig Gen Yehuda VachThe Israel Defense Forces (IDF) unit involved in the killings of 15 Palestinian paramedics and rescue workers in the Gaza Strip last month was under the command of a brigade led by a notorious Israeli general previously accused by some of his own troops of having “contempt for human life”.The IDF has confirmed that troops from Golani, one of the army’s five infantry brigades, opened fire on two convoys of ambulances in Rafah on 23 March and dug a mass grave to cover the bodies of those killed until the corpses could be retrieved by a UN team six days later. It has disputed allegations from two witnesses who exhumed the bodies and newly released postmortem results that found several of those killed had close-range gunshot wounds to the head and chest and were discovered with their hands or legs tied. Continue reading...

Events

2 w. ago How a phone footage exposed a massacre of Gaza paramedics – podcast

Israeli forces killed 15 Palestinian paramedics and civil defence workers in southern Gaza on 23 March. Bethan McKernan reports on the emerging evidence of what happenedIsraeli forces shot dead 15 Palestinian paramedics and civil defence workers on 23 March and buried them in a mass grave in the Tel al-Sultan district of Rafah.The Israeli military claimed their vehicles had been “advancing suspiciously” and without headlights or flashing emergency lights. Continue reading...

Events

2 w. ago How phone footage exposed a massacre of Gaza paramedics – podcast

Israeli forces killed 15 Palestinian paramedics and civil defence workers in southern Gaza on 23 March. Bethan McKernan reports on the emerging evidence of what happenedIsraeli forces shot dead 15 Palestinian paramedics and civil defence workers on 23 March and buried them in a mass grave in the Tel al-Sultan district of Rafah.The Israeli military claimed their vehicles had been “advancing suspiciously” and without headlights or flashing emergency lights. Continue reading...

Events

2 w. ago France could recognise Palestinian state ‘in June’, says Emmanuel Macron – Middle East crisis live

President says ‘we must move towards recognition’ and process could start at UN conference on settling Israel-Palestine conflict in New York in JuneSuspected US airstrikes in Yemen overnight into Thursday killed at least three people, while the death toll in an earlier attack rose to 13 dead, the Iran-backed Houthi rebels said. The rebels meanwhile aired footage they said showed the debris left after shooting down yet another American MQ-9 Reaper drone, reports the Associated Press (AP). The 13 killed in strikes on Tuesday night around Hodeida’s al-Hawak district made it one of the deadliest single incidents in the ongoing US campaign, the rebels said.Another 15 people were injured. The Houthis described the majority of those killed as women and children, without providing a breakdown. The area is home to the city’s airport, which the rebels have used in the past to target shipping in the Red Sea. Since its start, the intense campaign of US airstrikes targeting the rebels over their...

Politics

2 w. ago Israeli strike on Gaza apartment building kills at least 23, officials say

An Israeli airstrike on a residential block in northern Gaza killed at least 23 people, health officials in the Palestinian territory say

Events

2 w. ago Gaza rescue workers say 20 people killed in Israeli strike on residential block – Middle East crisis live

Gaza’s civil defence agency says the strike resulted in ‘20 martyrs and more than 40 injured’The Gaza health ministry said on Wednesday that at least 1,482 Palestinians have been killed since Israel resumed intense strikes on the Gaza Strip on 18 March, taking the overall death toll since the start of the war to 50,846.Hamas’s October 2023 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an Agence France-Presse (AFP) tally based on Israeli official figures. Continue reading...

Events

2 w. ago Gaza has become ‘a killing field’ due to Israel blocking aid, says UN secretary general – Middle East crisis live

António Guterres says ‘more than a month has passed without aid into Gaza’ as Israeli officials say there is ‘no shortage’ of aidAs calls for Lebanon’s Hezbollah to disarm gain momentum, a senior Hezbollah official told Reuters the group is ready to hold talks with the Lebanese president about its weapons if Israel withdraws from south Lebanon and stops its strikes.US-backed president Joseph Aoun, who vowed when he took office in January to establish a state monopoly on the control of arms, intends to open talks with Hezbollah over its arsenal soon, three Lebanese political sources told Reuters. Continue reading...

Events

3 w. ago Middle East crisis live: Israeli attack on tents housing journalists in Gaza kills at least two, say Palestinian medics

Airstrikes hit media tent outside Nasser hospital in Khan Younis, say medics, injuring nine othersAs we mentioned in the opening summary, ten Britons have been accused of committing war crimes while fighting for Israel in Gaza. Here is some more of the story, written by the Guardian’s legal affairs correspondent Haroon Siddique:Michael Mansfield KC is one of a group of lawyers who will on Monday hand in a 240-page dossier to Scotland Yard’s war crimes unit alleging targeted killing of civilians and aid workers, including by sniper fire, and indiscriminate attacks on civilian areas, including hospitals.The report, which has been prepared by a team of UK lawyers and researchers in The Hague, also accuses suspects of coordinated attacks on protected sites including historic monuments and religious sites, and forced transfer and displacement of civilians. Continue reading...

Events

3 w. ago Israeli military changes account of Gaza medics’ killing after video shows attack

Phone footage contradicts IDF claims vehicles were not using emergency lights when troops opened fireIsrael’s military has backtracked on its account of the killing of 15 Palestinian medics in Gaza last month after footage contradicted its claims that their vehicles did not have emergency signals on when Israeli troops opened fire. The military said initially it opened fire because the vehicles were “advancing suspiciously” on nearby troops without headlights or emergency signals. An Israeli military official, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with regulations late on Saturday, said that account was “mistaken”.The almost seven-minute video, which the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) said on Saturday was recovered from the phone of Rifat Radwan, one of the men killed, appears to have been filmed from inside a moving vehicle. It shows a red fire engine and clearly marked ambulances driving at night, using headlights and flashing emergency lights. Continue reading...

Events

3 w. ago Phone footage appears to contradict Israel's account in troops' killing of 15 Palestinian medics

A video on the phone of one of 15 Palestinian medics killed by Israeli forces in Gaza shows that their emergency vehicles had their lights and sirens flashing and their logos clearly visible when they came under a barrage of gunfire from troops lasting more than five minutes

Events

3 w. ago Israeli strikes kill at least 17 in Gaza as ground troops enter Palestinian territory's north

Israeli strikes have killed more than a dozen people in the Gaza Strip as Israel sent more ground troops into the Palestinian territory to ramp up its offensive against Hamas

Events

3 w. ago The Guardian view on Israel’s killing of paramedics: a new atrocity in an unending conflict | Editorial

Impunity over Palestinian deaths in Gaza will lead to further cases like this massacre of rescue and healthcare workersAfter 18 months of slaughter, it is still possible to be shocked by events in Gaza. More than 50,000 people have been killed, according to Palestinian health authorities. More are starving because Israel has cut off aid. The offensive is intensifying again – with 100 children killed or maimed each day since Israel resumed heavy strikes last month, the UN reports.Even so, Israel’s killing of 15 Palestinian paramedics and rescue workers is particularly chilling. Though they died on 23 March, it took days for Israel to grant access to the site, the UN said. Another man was last seen in Israeli custody. Two grounds for seeing this not only as tragic but as a war crime stand out. The first is that the UN says the men were shot “one by one”, and a forensic expert said that preliminary evidence “suggests they were executed, not from a distant range”, given the “specific an...

Events

3 w. ago ‘I heard them take their last breath’: survivor recounts Gaza paramedic killings

Munther Abed, 27, was in the first ambulance on the scene of an airstrike near Rafah when Israeli soldiers opened fire• Gaza paramedic killings: a visual timelineA survivor from a massacre of Palestinian paramedics and rescue workers in Gaza has said he saw Israeli troops open fire on a succession of Red Crescent ambulances and rescue vehicles and then use a bulldozer to bury the wreckage in a pit.Munther Abed, a 27-year-old Red Crescent volunteer, was in the back of the first ambulance to arrive on the scene of an airstrike in the Hashashin district of Rafah before dawn on 23 March, when it came under intense Israeli fire. His two Red Crescent colleagues sitting in the front were killed but he survived by throwing himself to the floor of the vehicle. Continue reading...

Events

3 w. ago Israel announces intention to seize large areas of Gaza Strip in major escalation

Defence minister Israel Katz says seized land ‘will be added to the state of Israel’s security areas’Middle East crisis – live updatesIsrael’s defence minister has said the country intends to “seize large areas” of the Gaza Strip amid a major expansion of aerial and ground operations in the besieged Palestinian territory.Israel Katz said in a statement on Wednesday that “troops will move to clear areas of terrorists and infrastructure, and seize extensive territory that will be added to the state of Israel’s security areas”. Continue reading...

Politics

3 w. ago Middle East crisis live: Israel issues evacuation order for parts of northern Gaza

IDF says residents should evacuate Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahiya and the neighbourhoods of Sheikh Zayed, al-Manshiya and Tal al-ZaatarThe IDF has issued a forced evacuation order to residents in parts of northern Gaza: Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahiya and the neighbourhoods of Sheikh Zayed, al-Manshiya and Tal al-Zaatar.Avichay Adraee, an Arabic language spokesperson for the Israeli army, said it is a “final” warning before the “raid”. Continue reading...

Politics