[🇧🇩] Israel and Hamas war in Gaza-----Can Bangladesh be a peace broker?

[Saif]

Israel fire near aid centre in Gaza kills 31

The Gaza civil defence agency said Israeli forces opened fire on people waiting to enter a US-backed food distribution centre on Wednesday, killing 31 and wounding ‘about 200’...

www.newagebd.net

Israel fire near aid centre in Gaza kills 31
Agence France-Presse . Gaza City 12 June, 2025, 01:07

The Gaza civil defence agency said Israeli forces opened fire on people waiting to enter a US-backed food distribution centre on Wednesday, killing 31 and wounding ‘about 200’.

‘We transported at least 31 martyrs and about 200 wounded as a result of Israeli tank and drone fire on thousands of citizens on their way to receive food from the American aid centre,’ civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said.

Restrictions imposed on media in the Gaza Strip and the difficulties of access on the ground mean AFP is not able to independently verify the death tolls announced by the civil defence agency.

Bassal said thousands of Palestinians had been gathering since 2:00am (2300 GMT Tuesday) in the hope of reaching the US and Israeli-backed food distribution centre.

‘Israeli tanks fired several times, then at around 5:30am intensified their fire, coinciding with heavy fire from drones targeting civilians,’ he said.

Mohammad Abu Salima, head of Gaza City’s Al-Shifa hospital, said it had received the bodies of 24 people killed while waiting to enter the aid centre and was treating 96 who had been wounded.

Al-Awda hospital, in Nuseirat camp in central Gaza, said in a statement that it had received seven bodies and was treating 112 people who had been wounded in the same incident.

There have been a series of deadly shootings since the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation first opened aid distribution points in the Palestinian territory on May 27, as Israel faced mounting international condemnation over the humanitarian conditions.

Israel recently allowed some deliveries to resume after barring them for more than two months and began working with the newly formed, US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.

But UN agencies and other aid organisations have criticised the GHF and the United Nations refuses to work with it, citing concerns over its practices and neutrality.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said on Tuesday that ‘Israeli military operations have intensified in recent days, with mass casualties reported’.

The Hamas attack that triggered the war in October 2023 resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official figures.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza says at least 54,981 people, the majority of them civilians, have been killed in the territory since the start of the war. The United Nations considers the figures reliable.

Out of 251 people taken hostage during the Hamas attack, 54 are still held in Gaza including 32 the Israeli military says are dead.​

 

[Saif]

Israeli ‘starvation’ of Gaza a ‘war crime’

Israel’s refusal to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza and its targeting of aid distribution points is causing civilians to starve which constitutes a war crime, Sweden’s foreign minister said Thursday.

www.newagebd.net

Israeli ‘starvation’ of Gaza a ‘war crime’
Agence France-Presse . Stockholm 12 June, 2025, 22:30

Women cry as they mourn the death of a loved one killed during overnight Israeli bombardment on Thursday, at Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, amid the on-going war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas group. | AFP photo

Israel’s refusal to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza and its targeting of aid distribution points is causing civilians to starve which constitutes a war crime, Sweden’s foreign minister said Thursday.

In early June, UN human rights chief Volker Turk said deadly attacks on civilians around aid distribution sites in the Gaza Strip constituted ‘a war crime’, while several rights groups including Amnesty International have accused Israel of genocide.

Israel has vehemently rejected that term.

‘To use starvation of civilians as a method of war is a war crime. Life-saving humanitarian help must never be politicised or militarised,’ Maria Malmer Stenergard said at a press conference.

‘There are strong indications right now that Israel is not living up to its commitments under international humanitarian law,’ she said.

‘It is crucial that food, water and medicine swiftly reach the civilian population, many of whom are women and children living under wholly inhumane conditions,’ she said.

Sweden announced in December 2024 it was halting funding to the UN’s Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA after Israel banned the organisation, accusing it of providing cover for Hamas militants.

Swedish international development minister Benjamin Dousa told Thursday’s press conference that Stockholm was now channelling aid through other UN organisations, and was ‘the fifth-biggest donor in the world ... (and) the second-largest donor in the EU to the humanitarian aid response in Gaza’.

The country’s humanitarian aid to Gaza since the start of the war in October 2023 currently amounts to more than 1 billion kronor ($105 million), while funding earmarked for Gaza for 2025 totals 800 million kronor, he said.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian Authority said internet and fixed-line communication services were down in Gaza on Thursday following an attack on the territory’s last fibre optic cable it blamed on Israel.

‘All internet and fixed-line communication services in the Gaza Strip have been cut following the targeting of the last remaining main fibre optic line in Gaza,’ the PA’s telecommunications ministry said in a statement, accusing Israel of attempting to cut Gaza off from the world.

‘The southern and central Gaza Strip have now joined Gaza City and the northern part of the Strip in experiencing complete isolation for the second consecutive day,’ the ministry said in a statement.

It added that its maintenance and repair teams had been unable to safely access the sites where damage occurred to the fibre optic cable.

‘The Israeli occupation continues to prevent technical teams from repairing the cables that were cut yesterday’, it said, adding that Israeli authorities had prevented repairs to other telecommunication lines in Gaza ‘for weeks and months’.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said the communication lines were ‘directly targeted by occupation fores’.

It said the internet outage was hindering its emergency services by impeding communication with first responder teams in the field.

‘The emergency operations room is also struggling to coordinate with other organisations to respond to humanitarian cases.’

Maysa Monayer, spokeswoman for the Palestinian communication ministry, told AFP that ‘mobile calls are still available with very limited capacity’ in Gaza for the time being.

Now in its 21st month, the war in Gaza has caused massive damage to infrastructure across the Palestinian territory, including water mains, power lines and roads.​

 

[Saif]

Israeli fire kills 22 in Gaza

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli fire killed 22 people across the Palestinian territory on Thursday, including 16 who were waiting to collect aid.

www.newagebd.net

Israeli fire kills 22 in Gaza
Agence France-Presse . Gaza City 13 June, 2025, 00:45

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli fire killed 22 people across the Palestinian territory on Thursday, including 16 who were waiting to collect aid.

The distribution of food and basic supplies in the war-ravaged Gaza Strip has become increasingly fraught and perilous, exacerbating the territory’s deep hunger crisis.

Civil defence official Mohammed al-Mughayyir said that the Al-Awda Hospital received 10 dead and around 200 wounded, including women and children, ‘after Israeli drones dropped multiple bombs on gatherings of civilians near an aid distribution point around the Netzarim checkpoint in central Gaza’.

He said that Gaza City’s Al-Shifa Hospital received six dead following Israeli attacks on aid queues near Netzarim and in the Al-Sudaniya area in northwestern Gaza.

The Israeli army said it was looking into the reports when asked for comment by AFP.

Restrictions imposed on media in the Gaza Strip and the difficulties of access on the ground mean AFP is not able to independently verify the death tolls announced by the civil defence agency.

Mughayyir said another six people were killed in Israeli attacks across Gaza.

The US- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation accused Palestinian militant group Hamas of attacking aid workers en route to a distribution centre on Wednesday, saying at least five people were killed.

GHF said a bus carrying its staff to a distribution site near the southern city of Khan Yunis was ‘brutally attacked by Hamas’ around 10:00pm (1900 GMT).

In an email to AFP, the group added that all five of the people killed were Palestinian aid workers for GHF.

In a post on X, Israel’s foreign ministry accused Hamas of ‘weaponising suffering in Gaza — denying food, targeting lifesavers and forsaking its own people’.

Dozens of Palestinians have been killed while trying to reach GHF distribution points since they began operating in late May, according to Gaza’s civil defence agency.​

 

[Saif]

While the world marches for Gaza, the West remains silent

This silence is not accidental. It is carefully engineered

www.thedailystar.net

While the world marches for Gaza, the West remains silent

I've been trying to follow the Global March to Gaza for over a month now. The only glimpses I've found come from Al Jazeera, Turkey's Anadolu Ajansı, and a handful of Palestinian news portals.

But the march is happening -- right now -- and most of the Western world either doesn't seem to notice or is blatantly choosing not to. It's most likely the latter.

Across every inhabited continent, thousands are mobilising: marching, chanting, risking arrest, demanding justice for Gaza. Among them are doctors and teachers, imams and priests, students and elders -- united in historic solidarity.

And yet, if you turned on your television this morning, scrolled through your feed, or flipped through a newspaper, you'd barely know it was happening.

This silence is not accidental. It is carefully engineered.

Picture this: a convoy of nine buses carrying nearly a thousand activists, backed by unions, bar associations and rights groups, departing Tunis and crossing into Libya -- en route to Egypt's Rafah crossing. They're supported by Tunisian labour leaders and legal defenders, standing in defiance of a siege in what the UN calls "the hungriest place on Earth". Even yesterday, Swiss activists set out for Egypt.

Their goal is symbolic and profound: to break the blockade, deliver aid, bear witness to genocide, and pressure world leaders into action -- much like the Madleen crew, whose mission was intercepted just days ago.

The convoy is expected to arrive in Cairo today. From there, they plan to march through Sinai, traverse El Arish, and reach Rafah -- even while knowing Egypt may deny them entry and Israeli forces await at the border.

This is a truly global movement. Activists from 50 countries are converging in Cairo under banners like the Palestinian Youth Movement, Codepink, and Jewish Voice for Labour -- with support from 150 organisations across 31 nations. Hundreds more are joining from Algeria, Libya, Morocco and Mauritania. Some will come by land, others by sea.

On the Mediterranean, the aid ship Madleen, bound for Gaza with humanitarian supplies and carrying Greta Thunberg, a French MEP, a journalist and many more, was intercepted by Israeli forces in international waters. All passengers were detained -- some later deported, others imprisoned in Israel. The act drew international condemnation -- from France, Spain and Turkey.

The stakes could not be higher. Gaza has been under siege for more than 20 months. A genocidal war has killed over 54,900 Palestinians and injured more than 126,000. Aid distribution sites have become death zones -- Israeli forces have killed over 224 Palestinians gathering food since May 27 alone, wounding nearly 2,000. Schools lie in ruins, hospitals are bombed out, water is scarce. Hunger is weaponised. Gaza is collapsing.

And still, the Western media says almost nothing.

This diverse, global act of civilian resistance doesn't fit the dominant narrative where Palestine is framed as fringe insurgency, Israel as self-defence. To acknowledge thousands marching peacefully against genocide would dismantle that fiction. So, the silence holds -- no live feeds, no front pages, no analysis. Just vacuum. A sickening and deliberate vacuum.

In fact, over 100 BBC employees have allegedly accused the British broadcaster of pro-Israel bias in its coverage of the Gaza war. The claim was made in an open letter sent to BBC director Tim Davie and signed by more than 230 figures in the UK's media industry and other sectors, who said the public broadcaster has failed to provide "fair and accurate" coverage of the conflict.

The letter, first seen by The Independent, said the BBC must "recommit to fairness, accuracy and impartiality".

Behind that vacuum stands the United States -- the world's most powerful enabler of this violence. Washington sends $3.8 billion in unconditioned military aid to Israel each year. Its vetoes at the UN Security Council block ceasefires and investigations. Its diplomatic shield allows siege, bombing, displacement and starvation to continue with impunity.

Every bomb dropped, every sniper's bullet, every bulldozed home carries the imprint of American complicity.

And because the US sits at the centre of global media power, it shapes narratives at will. Palestinian suffering is erased. Israeli violence is sanitised. Headlines mimic government talking points, not witness testimony. What you see is not journalism; it's narrative warfare.

But silence cannot contain solidarity.

The people are marching -- they are acting how they can. And you can too, in your own way. Share livestreams; amplify images; write to political leaders and demand an end to arms transfers, call for ceasefire and UN investigations, insist on open humanitarian corridors; organise vigils, teach-ins, divestment campaigns, legal actions; support grassroots Palestinian media and aid organisations.

Don't ask, "How do I go to Gaza?" or "Can I adopt a Palestinian child?" Recognise your abilities, your logistics -- and direct your emotions through logic. We all have roles to play -- and every single act matters.

Because the choice is clear: in the face of genocide and silence, neutrality is not peace. It is violence. Standing by means siding with power. But going over your own head will also be of no help. Extend help within your means -- but extend it anyhow.

Make no mistake: this march, and every other act in support of the Palestinian people at this point in time, is not just mere protest.

All of this combined has now become a moral reckoning. This defines history.

When people touch the cables of silence, they spark cracks. When voices break through the cover-up, truth begins to seep.

If the world's media won't show the march, we must. If the powerful won't act, we must. If neutrality is not an option, then action becomes an obligation.

The march is underway. So is history.

We can walk with it or stay silent and be left behind. But history remembers voices, not voids.

Let them blackout the outlets. Let them scrub the headlines.

They cannot erase the footsteps. They cannot mute the movement.

The world is walking. And they -- nay, none of us -- will stop.​

 

[Saif]

Israeli fire kills 35 people in Gaza, many at aid site

The Gaza health ministry said on Saturday that at least 274 people have so far been killed, and more than 2,000 wounded.

en.prothomalo.com

Israeli fire kills 35 people in Gaza, many at aid site
Reuters Cairo
Published: 14 Jun 2025, 20: 13

Military vehicles manoeuvre in Gaza, as seen from the Israeli side of the border, 11 June, 2025. Reuters

Israeli fire and airstrikes killed at least 35 Palestinians across the Gaza Strip, most of them near an aid distribution site operated by the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, local health authorities said.

Medics at Al-Awda and Al-Aqsa Hospitals in central Gaza areas, where most of the casualties were moved to, said at least 15 people were killed as they tried to approach the GHF aid distribution site near the Netzarim corridor.

The rest were killed in separate attacks across the enclave, they added. There has been no immediate comment by the Israeli military or the GHF on Saturday's incidents.

The GHF began distributing food packages in Gaza at the end of May, overseeing a new model of aid distribution which the United Nations says is neither impartial nor neutral.

The Gaza health ministry said in a statement on Saturday that at least 274 people have so far been killed, and more than 2,000 wounded, near aid distribution sites since the GHF began operations in Gaza.

Hamas, which denies Israeli charges that it steals aid, accused Israel of "employing hunger as a weapon of war and turning aid distribution sites into traps of mass deaths of innocent civilians."

Later on Saturday, health officials at Shifa Hospital in Gaza said Israeli fire killed at least 12 Palestinians, who gathered to wait for aid trucks along the coastal road north of the strip, taking Saturday's death toll to at least 35.

The Israeli military ordered residents of Khan Younis and the nearby towns of Abassan and Bani Suhaila in the southern Gaza Strip to leave their homes and head west towards the so-called humanitarian zone, saying it would forcefully work against "terror organisations" in the area.

The war in Gaza erupted 20 months ago after Hamas-led militants raided Israel and took 251 hostages and killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, on 7 October, 2023, Israel's single deadliest day.

Israel's military campaign since has killed nearly 55,000 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to health authorities in Gaza, and flattened much of the densely populated strip, which is home to more than two million people. Most of the population is displaced, and malnutrition is widespread.

Despite efforts by the United States, Egypt, and Qatar to restore a ceasefire in Gaza, neither Israel nor Hamas has shown willingness to back down on core demands, with each side blaming the other for the failure to reach a deal.​