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

[Saif]

Germany shifts tone on Israel over 'incomprehensible' Gaza carnage

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz delivered his most severe rebuke of Israel to date on Tuesday, criticising massive air strikes on Gaza as no longer justified by the need to fight Hamas and "no longer comprehensible". The message, delivered from a press conference in Finland, reflects a broader sh

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Germany shifts tone on Israel over 'incomprehensible' Gaza carnage

REUTERS
Published :
May 27, 2025 17:56
Updated :
May 27, 2025 17:56

A general view shows destruction in North Gaza, as seen from Israel, May 27, 2025. Photo : REUTERS/Amir Cohen TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz delivered his most severe rebuke of Israel to date on Tuesday, criticising massive air strikes on Gaza as no longer justified by the need to fight Hamas and "no longer comprehensible".

The message, delivered from a press conference in Finland, reflects a broader shift in public opinion but also a greater willingness from top-ranking German politicians to criticise Israel's conduct since the October 7, 2023 attacks by Hamas.

There was similar criticism from Merz's foreign minister Johann Wadephul and calls among his junior coalition partner, the Social Democrats, to halt arms exports to Israel or else risk German complicity in war crimes.

While not a complete rupture, the shift in tone is significant in a country whose leadership follows a policy of special responsibility for Israel, known as the Staatsraeson, due to the legacy of the Nazi Holocaust.

Germany, along with the United States, has been one of Israel's staunchest supporters, but Merz's words come as the European Union is reviewing its Israel policy and Britain, France and Canada also threatened "concrete actions" over Gaza.

"The massive military strikes by the Israelis in the Gaza Strip no longer reveal any logic to me. How they serve the goal of confronting terror. ... In this respect, I view this very, very critically," Merz said in Turku, Finland.

"I am also not among those who said it first ... But it seemed and seems to me that the time has come when I must say publicly, (that) what is currently happening is no longer comprehensible."

The comments are particularly striking given that Merz won elections in February promising to host Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on German soil in defiance of an arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Merz also has hanging in the chancellery a picture of Zikim beach, where Hamas fighters arrived on boats during their rampage in 2023 that killed around 1,200 people.

The Chancellor plans to speak to Netanyahu this week, as attacks on Gaza killed dozens in recent days and its population of 2 million is at risk of famine. He did not reply to a question about German weapons exports to Israel, and a government official told a briefing that this was a matter for a security council presided over by Merz.

Israel's ambassador to Berlin, Ron Prosor, acknowledged German concerns on Tuesday but made no commitments.

"When Friedrich Merz raises this criticism of Israel, we listen very carefully because he is a friend,” Prosor told the ZDF broadcaster.

PRESSURE FROM BELOW?

Merz's comments come on top of a groundswell of opposition to Israel's actions. A survey by Civey, published in the Tagesspiegel newspaper this week, showed 51 per cent of Germans opposed weapons exports to Israel.

More broadly, while 60 per cent of Israelis have a positive or very positive opinion of Germany, only 36 per cent of people in Germany view Israel positively, and 38 per cent view it negatively, a survey by the Bertelsmann Foundation found in May.

This represents a notable change from the last survey in 2021, when 46 per cent of Germans had a positive opinion of Israel. Only a quarter of Germans recognise a special responsibility towards the state of Israel, while 64 per cent of Israelis believe Germany has a special obligation.

In another striking rebuke of Israel, Germany’s commissioner for antisemitism Felix Klein this week called for a discussion about Berlin’s stance on Israel, saying German support after the Holocaust could not justify everything Israel was doing.

Israeli historian Moshe Zimmermann said popular opinion in Germany towards Israel has reacted the same way as in other countries.

"The difference is in the political elites - the political elite is still under the influence of the lessons of WWII in a very one-dimensional way: 'Jews were our victims during WWII, so we have to take sides with the Jews wherever they are and whatever they do,'" he said.

"You can feel it in the reaction of the new foreign minister, Wadephul, and indirectly the fact that Merz didn't repeat his promise to invite Netanyahu. This is an unprecedented situation where the pressure from below is forcing the political class to reconsider."​

 

[Saif]

Palestinians wary as US-backed aid group begins operations in Gaza

Palestinians voiced wariness on Tuesday toward a US-backed foundation set to bring aid to Gaza amid signs of famine, with Hamas warnings about biometric screening procedures keeping many away from distribution points. The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation said it began operations on Monday, but there w

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Palestinians wary as US-backed aid group begins operations in Gaza

REUTERS
Published :
May 27, 2025 19:22
Updated :
May 27, 2025 19:22

Trucks transport aid as Gaza Humanitarian Foundation said it has commenced operations to begin distribution of aid, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, May 26, 2025. Photo : Gaza Humanitarian Foundation/Handout via REUTERS/Files

Palestinians voiced wariness on Tuesday toward a US-backed foundation set to bring aid to Gaza amid signs of famine, with Hamas warnings about biometric screening procedures keeping many away from distribution points.

The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation said it began operations on Monday, but there was little indication of Palestinians turning up at distribution centres in southern Gaza even after almost three months of Israel blockading the enclave.

Palestinians said there was no known visits to new sites of distribution on Monday, but on Tuesday dozens headed to one of them established in Rafah to get some aid despite the warnings, at least three witnesses told Reuters.

Others stayed away.

"As much as I want to go because I am hungry and my children are hungry, I am afraid," said Abu Ahmed, 55, a father of seven. "I am so scared because they said the company belongs to Israel and is a mercenary, and also because the resistance (Hamas) said not to go," he said in a message on the chat app WhatsApp.

Israel says the Switzerland-based GHF is a U.S.-backed initiative and that its forces will not be involved in the distribution points where food will be handed out.

But its endorsement of the plan, which resembles Israeli schemes floated previously, and its closeness with the US has led many to question the neutrality of the foundation, including its own former chief, who resigned unexpectedly on Sunday.

The United Nations and other international aid groups have boycotted the foundation, which they say undermines the principle that humanitarian aid should be distributed independently of the parties to a conflict, based on need.

"Humanitarian assistance must not be politicised or militarised," said Christian Cardon, chief spokesperson of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Israel, at war with Gaza's dominant Hamas militant group since October 2023, imposed the blockade in early March accusing Hamas of stealing supplies and using them to entrench its position. Hamas has denied such accusations.

Israeli officials said one of the advantages of the new aid system is the opportunity to screen recipients to exclude anyone found to be connected with Hamas.

Humanitarian groups briefed on the foundation's plans say anyone accessing aid will have to submit to facial recognition technology that many Palestinians fear will end up in Israeli hands to be used to track and potentially target them.

Details of exactly how the system will operate have not been made public.

Israel makes extensive use of facial recognition and other forms of biometric identification in the occupied West Bank and has been reported by Israeli and international media to be using such techniques in Gaza as well.

BEGGING FOR BREAD

Hamas, which has in recent months faced protests by many Palestinians who want the devastating war to end, has also warned residents against accessing GHF sites, saying Israel was using the company to collect intelligence information.

"Do not go to Rafah ...Do not fall into the trap...Do not risk your lives. Your homes are your fortress. Staying in your neighbourhoods is survival, and awareness is your protection," a statement published by the Hamas-linked Home Front said.

"These schemes will be broken by the steadfastness of a people who do not know defeat," it added.

The launch of the new system came days after Israel eased its blockade, allowing a trickle of aid trucks from international agencies into Gaza last week, including World Food Programme vehicles bringing flour to local bakeries.

But the amount of aid that has entered the densely populated coastal enclave has been only a small fraction of the 500-600 trucks that UN agencies estimate are needed every day.

"Before the war, my fridge used to be full of meat, chicken, dairy, soft drinks, everything, and now I am begging for a loaf of bread," Abu Ahmed told Reuters via a chat app.

As a small aid flow has resumed, Israeli forces - now in control of large parts of Gaza - have kept up attacks on various targets around the enclave, killing 3,901 Palestinians since a two-month-old ceasefire collapsed in mid-March, according to the Gaza health ministry.

In all, more than 54,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel's air and ground war, launched following a cross-border Hamas-led attack on October 7, 2023 that killed some 1,200 people and saw 251 taken hostage into Gaza.​

 

[Saif]

UN in dark over Gaza aid group deliveries

The United Nations said on Tuesday it had no information on whether the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a US-backed aid group, had actually delivered any supplies inside the war-ravaged Palestinian territory...

www.newagebd.net

UN in dark over Gaza aid group deliveries
Agence France-Presse . Geneva 27 May, 2025, 23:07

AFP file photo

The United Nations said on Tuesday it had no information on whether the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a US-backed aid group, had actually delivered any supplies inside the war-ravaged Palestinian territory.

The little-known group, which has stirred controversy since surfacing in early May, announced on Monday it had begun distributing truckloads of food in the Gaza Strip.

But officials from the UN humanitarian agency OCHA, and UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, said they were unaware whether any aid had actually been distributed.

The UN and international aid agencies have said they will not cooperate with the GHF, amid accusations it is working with Israel without any Palestinian involvement.

‘It is a distraction from what is actually needed, which is a reopening of all the crossings in to Gaza; a secure environment within Gaza; and faster facilitation of permissions and final approvals of all the emergency supplies that we have just outside the border that need to get in,’ OCHA spokesman Jens Laerke told a press briefing in Geneva.

UNRWA spokeswoman Juliette Touma told journalists aid to Gaza was still ‘very, very far’ from what was needed: a minimum of 500 to 600 trucks per day loaded with food, medical aid, fuel, water and other basic supplies, she said, speaking via video-link from Amman.

Israel, which recently stepped up its offensive against militant group Hamas, drew international condemnation after implementing a blockade on March 2 that has sparked severe food and medical shortages.

Humanitarian aid has begun trickling back into Gaza in recent days after Israel lifted the 11-week blockade.

Touma said no UNRWA supplies had gone in since March 2, while Laerke said he had no information on how many UN trucks had passed through the Kerem Shalom crossing in the last 24 hours, partly because Israel does not allow them to have a fixed presence there.

UN officials have raised concerns the GHF could be used to ‘weaponise’ aid by restricting who is eligible to receive it.

On Sunday, GHF executive director Jake Wood quit, saying it was impossible to do his job in line with humanitarian principles.

Hours later, GHF’s board accused ‘those who benefit from the status quo’ of attacking the group.

On Monday, GHF added: ‘It is clear that Hamas is threatened by this new operating model, and will do everything in its power to see it fail.’

The UN’s World Health Organisation has also confirmed it will not be working with the GHF.​

 

[Saif]

https://thefinancialexpress.com.bd/world/asia/netanyahu-says-hamas-gaza-chief-mohammed-sinwar-has-been-eliminated

Netanyahu says Hamas Gaza chief Mohammed Sinwar has been eliminated

REUTERS
Published :
May 28, 2025 20:36
Updated :
May 28, 2025 20:36

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday that Israel had eliminated Hamas Gaza chief Mohammad Sinwar, one of its most wanted targets and the younger brother of the deceased group's leader, Yahya Sinwar.

Mohammad Sinwar had been the target of an Israeli strike on a hospital in southern Gaza earlier this month and Netanyahu said on May 21 that it was likely he had been killed.

"We eliminated Mohammad Deif, (Ismail) Haniyeh, Yahya Sinwar and Mohammed Sinwar," Netanyahu said, confirming the death to the Israeli parliament, known as the Knesset.

"In the last two days we have been in a dramatic turn towards a complete defeat of Hamas," he said, adding that Israel was also "taking control of food distribution", a reference to a new aid distribution system in Gaza managed by a U.S.-backed group.

Hamas has yet to confirm his death Sinwar's death.

Sinwar was elevated to the top ranks of the Palestinian militant group last year after Israel killed his brother Yahya in combat.

Yahya Sinwar masterminded the October 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the war, now in its 20th month, and was later named the overall leader of the group after Israel killed his predecessor Ismail Haniyeh in Iran.​

 

[Saif]

Israel's Gaza aid model is 'distraction from atrocities', UNRWA chief says

The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees said on Wednesday Israel's model for providing aid to Gaza was wasteful and a "distraction from atrocities", criticising a chaotic distribution by a US-backed foundation this week. On Tuesday, thousands of Palestinians rushed an aid distribution s

thefinancialexpress.com.bd

Israel's Gaza aid model is 'distraction from atrocities', UNRWA chief says

REUTERS
Published :
May 28, 2025 21:09
Updated :
May 28, 2025 21:09

Philippe Lazzarini, head of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, speaks during a meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba (not pictured), at the prime minister's office in Tokyo, Japan May 27, 2025. Photo : KAZUHIRO NOGI/Pool via REUTERS/Files

The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees said on Wednesday Israel's model for providing aid to Gaza was wasteful and a "distraction from atrocities", criticising a chaotic distribution by a US-backed foundation this week.

On Tuesday, thousands of Palestinians rushed an aid distribution site set up in the Israeli-held southern Gaza city of Rafah operated by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), with desperation for food overcoming wariness about biometric and other checks Israel said it would employ.

"The model of aid distribution proposed by Israel does not align with core humanitarian principles," UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini told reporters at the Japan National Press Club in Tokyo.

"We have seen yesterday the shocking images of hungry people pushing against fences, desperate for food. It was chaotic, undignified and unsafe," Lazzarini said.

"I believe it is a waste of resources and a distraction from atrocities," he added, referring to civilian deaths during Israel's air and ground war in the small coastal enclave.

Israel says its military operations target only Hamas-led militants and accuses them of using civilians for cover, which they deny.

As a trickle of aid has resumed, Israeli forces - now in control of wide areas of Gaza - have kept up their offensive, killing 3,901 Palestinians since a short ceasefire collapsed in mid-March, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

The GHF, backed by Israel and its close ally, the United States, said it had distributed about 8,000 food boxes, equivalent to 462,000 meals, since Israel eased an 11-week-old blockade of the war-shattered Palestinian enclave last week.

The United Nations and other international aid groups have boycotted the foundation, which they say undermines the principle that humanitarian aid should be distributed independently of the parties to a conflict, based on need.

US State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce dismissed criticism of the aid program as "complaints about style".

Israel says one advantage of the new aid system is the opportunity to screen recipients at designated sites to exclude anyone found to be connected with Hamas. Israel, at war with Hamas since October 2023, accuses Hamas of stealing supplies and using them to entrench its position. Hamas denies this.​

 

[Saif]

Palestinians in Gaza 'deserve more than survival,' says UN envoy

Palestinians living in Gaza "deserve more than survival," the United Nations envoy for the Middle East told the Security Council on Wednesday, as Israel's war there enters its 600th day. Israel stepped up its military offensive in Gaza, ignited by an attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas...

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Palestinians in Gaza 'deserve more than survival,' says UN envoy
AFP United Nations, United States
Published: 28 May 2025, 22: 39

Palestinians attempt to collect water at a camp for displaced people in Gaza City, on 20 May 2025, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Hamas AFP

Palestinians living in Gaza "deserve more than survival," the United Nations envoy for the Middle East told the Security Council on Wednesday, as Israel's war there enters its 600th day.

Israel stepped up its military offensive in Gaza, ignited by an attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas on 7 October 2023, earlier this month, while mediators push for a ceasefire that remains elusive.

The issue of aid has come sharply into focus amid a hunger crisis after Israel imposed a full blockade on Gaza for over two months, before allowing supplies in at a trickle last week.

"Since the resumption of hostilities in Gaza, the already horrific existence of civilians has only sunk further into the abyss. This is manmade," Sigrid Kaag, the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, told the Council.

"Death is their companion," she continued. "It's not life, it's not hope. The people of Gaza deserve more than survival. They deserve a future."

The aid that is now coming in "is comparable to a lifeboat after the ship has sunk," she said.

Kaag warned that there could be no "sustainable peace" in the Middle East without a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, adding that the West Bank also is on a "dangerous trajectory."

And she called for collective action to revive a two-state solution, saying that a high-level international conference in June presents a "critical opportunity."

"It must launch a concrete path towards ending the occupation and realizing the two-state solution," she said.

When speaking of people in Gaza, "the words empathy, solidarity and support have lost their meaning," Kaag said.

"We should not become accustomed to the number of people killed or injured. These are daughters, mothers, and young children whose lives have been shattered. All have a name, all had a future, all had dreams and aspirations."

'Why didn't I die?'

The UN Security Council also heard the harrowing testimony of an American surgeon on Wednesday, a few weeks after his return from Gaza.

"I am here because I have witnessed what is happening in Gaza with my own eyes, especially to children, and I cannot pretend not to have seen it. You too, cannot claim ignorance," said Dr Feroze Sidhwa.

The medical system in Gaza has not failed, he said. "It has been systematically dismantled through a sustained military campaign that has willfully violated international humanitarian law."

Children are "supposed to be protected," he said, but "in Gaza, those protections are simply gone."

"Most of my patients were pre-teen children, their bodies shattered by explosions and torn by flying metal. Many died. Those who lived often awoke to find their entire families gone," he said.

"According to the War Child Alliance, nearly half of Gaza's children are suicidal," he said.

"They ask, why didn't I die with my sister, my mother, my father? Not out of extremism, but out of unbearable grief. I wonder if any member of this Council has ever met a five-year-old child who no longer wants to live."
The Israeli ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, blamed Hamas for the situation in Gaza.

"There is suffering in Gaza, but the blame is on the shoulders of Hamas ... so they will continue to be suffering until Hamas will understand that they will not stay in Gaza," he told reporters.​

 

[Saif]

Netanyahu says Israel accepts Witkoff's new Gaza truce proposal, media report

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has told families of hostages held in Gaza that Israel has accepted a new ceasefire proposal presented by US President Donald Trump's Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, Israeli media reported on Thursday. Palestinian militant group Hamas said earlier that it had rec

thefinancialexpress.com.bd

Netanyahu says Israel accepts Witkoff's new Gaza truce proposal, media report

REUTERS
Published :
May 29, 2025 21:36
Updated :
May 29, 2025 21:37

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a press conference, in Jerusalem, May 21, 2025. Photo : REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun/Pool/ Files

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has told families of hostages held in Gaza that Israel has accepted a new ceasefire proposal presented by US President Donald Trump's Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, Israeli media reported on Thursday.

Palestinian militant group Hamas said earlier that it had received the new proposal from mediators and was studying it.​

 

[Saif]

Gaza aid system under pressure as thousands seek food

After a slow and chaotic start to the new US-backed aid system in Gaza, thousands of Palestinians have been arriving at distribution points, seeking desperately needed food despite scenes of disorder and fears of violence. The two hubs run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a private group

thefinancialexpress.com.bd

Gaza aid system under pressure as thousands seek food

REUTERS
Published :
May 29, 2025 20:12
Updated :
May 29, 2025 20:12

Palestinians walk next to a donkey-drawn cart loaded with aid supplies which they received from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, near an area of Gaza known as the Netzarim corridor, May 29, 2025. Photo : REUTERS/Ramadan Abed

After a slow and chaotic start to the new US-backed aid system in Gaza, thousands of Palestinians have been arriving at distribution points, seeking desperately needed food despite scenes of disorder and fears of violence.

The two hubs run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a private group sponsored by the United States and endorsed by Israel, have been running since Tuesday, but the launch was marred by tumultuous scenes when thousands rushed the fences and forced private contractors providing security to retreat.

An Israeli military official told Reuters that the GHF was now operating four aid distribution sites, three in the Rafah area in the south and one in the Netzarim area in central Gaza.

GHF did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on whether it was now distributing aid in Netzarim.

The new system has been heavily criticised by the United Nations and other aid groups as an inadequate and flawed response to the humanitarian crisis left by Israel's 11-week blockade on aid entering Gaza.

Wessam Khader, a 25-year-old father of a three-year-old boy, said he had gone to a site near Rafah, despite widespread suspicions of the new system among Palestinians and warnings from militant group Hamas to stay away.

He said he had gone every day since Tuesday but only obtained a 3 kg (6.6 pounds) package containing flour, canned sardines, salt, noodles, biscuits and jam on the first day.

"I was driven by the hunger, for several weeks we had no flour, we had nothing in the tent," he told Reuters by telephone from Rafah. "My son wakes every day asking for something to eat and I can't give him."

When he arrived with his father and brother, there were thousands there already and no sign of the identification process that Israeli officials had said would be in place to screen out anyone considered to have links to Hamas.

"I didn't see anything, no one asked for me for anything, and if there was an electronic gate or screening I think it collapsed under the feet of the crowds," he said. The gates, the wire fences were all brought down and even plastic pipes, metal boards and fencing material was carried off.

"People were hungry and they took everything at the site," he said.

Earlier this week, GHP said it had anticipated such reactions from a "distressed population".

For Palestinians in northern Gaza, cut off from the distribution points in the south even that remains out of reach.

"We see videos about the aid, and people getting some, but they keep saying no trucks can enter north where we live," said Ghada Zaki, a 52-year-old mother of seven in Gaza City, told Reuters via chat app.

AIR STRIKES

Israel imposed the blockade at the beginning of March, saying supplies were being stolen by Hamas and used to entrench its control over Gaza. Hamas denies stealing aid and says it has protected aid trucks from looters.

Even as thousands made their way to the distribution site, Israeli jets continued to pound areas of Gaza, killing at least 45 people on Thursday, including 23 people in a strike that hit several houses in the Bureij camp in the central Gaza Strip, Palestinian medical workers said.

The Israeli military said it hit dozens of targets in Gaza overnight, including what it said were weapons storage dumps, sniper positions and tunnels.

Speculation around a possible ceasefire agreement grew after US President Donald Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff said the White House was preparing a draft document that could provide the basis for an agreement.

However, it was unclear what changes to previous proposals were being considered that might overcome the deep differences between Hamas and Israel that have stymied previous attempts to restore a ceasefire deal that broke down in March after only two months.

Israel has insisted that Hamas disarm completely and be dismantled as a military and governing force and that all of the 58 hostages still held in Gaza must come back before it will agree to end the war.

Hamas has rejected the demand to give up its weapons and says Israel must commit to ending the war for a deal to work.

Israel has come under increasing international pressure, with many European countries that have normally been reluctant to criticise Israel openly demanding an end to the war and a major humanitarian relief effort.

Israel launched its campaign in Gaza in response to the devastating attack on communities in southern Israel on Oct 7, 2023, that killed some 1,200 people and saw 251 taken hostage into Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.

The campaign has killed more than 54,000 Palestinians and left the enclave in ruins, forcing most of its population to move multiple times, Gaza health officials say.​

 

[Saif]

Israel announces creation of 22 settlements in West Bank

Israel announced on Thursday the creation of 22 new settlements in the occupied West Bank

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Israel announces creation of 22 settlements in West Bank

AFP Jerusalem
Published: 29 May 2025, 14: 58

Israeli security forces take cover behind riot shields next to a destroyed car and burning tires during clashes with Palestinian demonstrators following a protest against the expropriation of Palestinian land by Israel in the village of Kfar Qaddum in the occupied West Bank near the Jewish settlement of Kedumim, on 23 September 2022. AFP

Israel announced on Thursday the creation of 22 new settlements in the occupied West Bank, risking further strain on relations with the international community already taxed by the war in Gaza.

Israeli settlements in the West Bank are regularly condemned by the United Nations as illegal under international law, and are seen as one of the main obstacles to a lasting peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

The decision to establish more, taken by the country's security cabinet, announced by far-right finance minister Bezalel Smotrich, himself a settler, and Defence Minister Israel Katz, who is in charge of managing the communities.

"We have made a historic decision for the development of settlements: 22 new communities in Judea and Samaria, renewing settlement in the north of Samaria, and reinforcing the eastern axis of the State of Israel," Smotrich said on X, using the Israeli term for the West Bank, which it has occupied since 1967.

"Next step: sovereignty!" he added.

Katz said the initiative "changes the face of the region and shapes the future of settlement for years to come".

In a statement on Telegram, the right-wing Likud party of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the move a "once-in-a-generation decision", saying the initiative had been led by Smotrich and Katz.

"The decision also includes the establishment of four communities along the eastern border with Jordan, as part of strengthening Israel's eastern backbone, national security and strategic grip on the area," it said.

The party published a map showing the 22 sites spread across the territory.

'Heritage of our ancestors'

Two of the settlements, Homesh and Sa-Nur are particularly symbolic. Located in the north of the West Bank, they are actually re-settlements, having been evacuated in 2005 as part of Israel's disengagement from Gaza, promoted by then-prime minister Ariel Sharon.

Current Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government, formed in December 2022 with the support of far-right and ultra-Orthodox parties, is the most right-wing in Israel's history.

Human rights groups and anti-settlement NGOs say a slide towards at least de facto annexation of the occupied West Bank has gathered pace, particularly since the start of the Gaza war, triggered by Hamas's October 2023 attack on Israel.

"The Israeli government no longer pretends otherwise: the annexation of the occupied territories and expansion of settlements is its central goal," the Peace Now group said in a statement, adding the move "will dramatically reshape the West Bank and further entrench the occupation".

In his announcement, Smotrich offered a preemptive defence of the move, saying: "We have not taken a foreign land, but the heritage of our ancestors."

Some European governments have moved to sanction individual settlers, as did the United States under former president Joe Biden, though those measures were lifted by current President Donald Trump.

Thursday's announcement comes ahead of an international conference to be led by France and Saudi Arabia at UN headquarters in New York next month, which is meant to resurrect the idea of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Supporters of the blueprint, which was the basis of successive rounds of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, say the prospects for a viable, contiguous Palestinian state alongside Israel are being undermined by the proliferation of settlements.

The announcement also comes after US envoy Steve Witkoff said Wednesday he had "very good feelings" about the prospects for a Gaza ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, adding that he expected to send out a new proposal imminently.​

 

[Saif]

44 killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza

At least 44 people were killed in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip on Thursday, rescuers said, a day after a World Food Programme warehouse in the centre of the territory was looted by desperate Palestinians.

www.newagebd.net

44 killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza
Food warehouse looted
Agence France-Presse . Gaza City 30 May, 2025, 01:23

At least 44 people were killed in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip on Thursday, rescuers said, a day after a World Food Programme warehouse in the centre of the territory was looted by desperate Palestinians.

After a more than two-month blockade, aid has finally begun to trickle back into Gaza, but the humanitarian situation remains dire after 18 months of devastating war. Food security experts say starvation is looming for one in five people.

The Israeli military has also recently stepped up its offensive in the territory in what it says is a renewed push to destroy Hamas, whose October 7, 2023 attack triggered the war.

Gaza civil defence official Mohammad al-Mughayyir said ‘44 people have been killed in Israeli raids’, including 23 in a strike on home in Al-Bureij.

‘Two people were killed and several injured by Israeli forces’ gunfire this morning near the American aid centre in the Morag axis, southern Gaza Strip,’ he added.

The centre, run by the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, is part of a new system for distributing aid that Israel says is meant to keep supplies out of the hands of Hamas, but which has drawn criticism from the United Nations and the European Union.

‘What is happening to us is degrading. The crowding is humiliating us,’ said Gazan Sobhi Areef, who visited a GHF centre on Thursday.

‘We go there and risk our lives just to get a bag of flour to feed our children.’

The Israeli military said it was looking into the reported deaths in Al-Bureij and near the aid centre.

Separately, it said in a statement that its forces had struck ‘dozens of terror targets throughout the Gaza Strip’ over the past day.

In a telephone call Thursday with EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, Jordanian foreign minister Ayman Safadi said Israel’s ‘systematic starvation tactics have crossed all moral and legal boundaries’.

On Wednesday, thousands of desperate Palestinians stormed a World Food Programme warehouse in central Gaza, with Israel and the UN trading blame over the deepening hunger crisis.

AFP footage showed crowds of Palestinians breaking into the WFP facility in Deir al-Balah and taking bags of emergency food supplies as gunshots rang out.

‘Hordes of hungry people broke into WFP’s Al-Ghafari warehouse in Deir Al-Balah, central Gaza, in search of food supplies that were pre-positioned for distribution,’ the UN agency said in a statement.

The issue of aid has come sharply into focus amid starvation fears and intense criticism of the GHF, which has bypassed the longstanding UN-led system in the territory.

Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations Danny Danon told the Security Council that aid was entering Gaza by truck — under limited authorisation by Israel at the Kerem Shalom crossing — and accused the UN of ‘trying to block’ GHF’s work through ‘threats, intimidation and retaliation against NGOs that choose to participate’.

The UN has said it is doing its utmost to facilitate distribution of the limited assistance allowed by Israel’s authorities

The world body said 47 people were wounded Tuesday when crowds of Palestinians rushed a GHF site. A Palestinian medical source reported at least one death.

GHF, however, alleged in a statement that there had been ‘several inaccuracies’ circulating about its operations, adding ‘there are many parties who wish to see GHF fail’.

But 60-year-old Abu Fawzi Faroukh, who visited a GHF centre Thursday, said the situation there was ‘so chaotic’.

‘The young men are the ones who have received aid first, yesterday and today, because they are young and can carry loads, but the old people and women cannot enter due to the crowding,’ he said.

Negotiations on a ceasefire, meanwhile, have continued, with US envoy Steve Witkoff expressing optimism and saying he expected to propose a plan soon.

But Gazans remained pessimistic.

‘Six hundred days have passed and nothing has changed. Death continues, and Israeli bombing does not stop,’ said Bassam Daloul, 40.

The Gaza war was sparked by Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel that killed 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Out of 251 hostages seized during the attack, 57 remain in Gaza including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said Thursday that at least 3,986 people had been killed in the territory since Israel ended the ceasefire on March 18, taking the war’s overall toll to 54,249, mostly civilians.​

 

[Saif]

German minister says future arms deliveries to Israel depend on Gaza situation

Germany will decide whether or not to approve new weapons shipments to Israel based on an assessment of the humanitarian situation in Gaza, Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said in an interview published on Friday. Wadephul questioned whether Israel's actions in its war with Palestinian militant g

thefinancialexpress.com.bd

German minister says future arms deliveries to Israel depend on Gaza situation

REUTERS
Published :
May 30, 2025 21:45
Updated :
May 30, 2025 21:45

German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul attends a press conference in Lisbon, Portugal, May 26, 2025. Photo : REUTERS/Pedro Rocha/Files

Germany will decide whether or not to approve new weapons shipments to Israel based on an assessment of the humanitarian situation in Gaza, Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said in an interview published on Friday.

Wadephul questioned whether Israel's actions in its war with Palestinian militant group Hamas in Gaza were in line with international law.

"We are examining this and, if necessary, we will authorise further arms deliveries based on this examination," he said in an interview with Sueddeutsche Zeitung.

The comments build on a shifting tone from Berlin and mounting international criticism of Israel in recent days as the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza after an Israeli aid blockade and mounting civilian deaths test German support.

Wadephul said it was important that Israel can defend itself given the threats it faces, including from Houthi militants, Hezbollah and Iran.

"For me, there is no question that we have a special responsibility to stand by Israel's side," he said, reiterating the principle of "Staatsraeson" which underpins German support for Israel in atonement for the Holocaust of World War Two.

"On the other hand, of course, this does not mean that a government can do whatever it wants," he said.

Three months into the war, South Africa filed a case to the International Court of Justice accusing Israel of committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has dismissed the accusations as outrageous.

Israel's aid blockade of Gaza, which began after the breakdown of a ceasefire in early March, has also been contested at the World Court. Half a million people in the Gaza Strip face starvation, a global hunger monitor said in mid-May.

Netanyahu has dismissed charges that Israel was deliberately causing starvation in Gaza by imposing the 11-week blockade that was relaxed last week after mounting pressure from close allies.

On Tuesday, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said airstrikes on Gaza were no longer justified by the need to fight Hamas, whose October 7, 2023 assault on Israel killed some 1,200 people, according to Israeli tallies, and triggered the war.

More than 54,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel's air and ground campaign, according to Gaza health authorities.​

 

[Saif]

Gaza and the collapse of Western morality

Humans sit at the top of the food chain and kill animals for food. But even in killing, there are moral boundaries. Animals are not starved for weeks or subjected to unnecessary suffering before being killed. Yet in Gaza today, such basic mercy is not extended to people. Around two million human be

thefinancialexpress.com.bd

Gaza and the collapse of Western morality

SYED MUHAMMED SHOWAIB
Published :
May 31, 2025 00:10
Updated :
May 31, 2025 00:10

Humans sit at the top of the food chain and kill animals for food. But even in killing, there are moral boundaries. Animals are not starved for weeks or subjected to unnecessary suffering before being killed. Yet in Gaza today, such basic mercy is not extended to people. Around two million human beings living there are enduring a level of cruelty that would be deemed unacceptable even in a slaughterhouse. For three months, Israel has systematically denied food, water and basic supplies to Gaza's civilian population, weaponising hunger in what constitutes a clear crime against humanity. The deprivation has been so extreme that on May 20, the UN warned that 14,000 infants could die within 48 hours if aid did not reach them. Even the US president Donald Trump, a staunch ally of Israel, was compelled to acknowledge the severity of the crisis. Under mounting international pressure, Israel finally allowed a small amount of food into Gaza which aid workers described as a drop in the ocean compared to the overwhelming need.

Beyond the deliberate starvation of civilians, since October 8, 2023, Israel has waged an unrelenting campaign of bombardment and military violence in Gaza. Israeli forces have killed civilians on a massive scale, with the official death toll exceeding 62,000 and thousands more remaining buried under rubble, presumed dead. This is beyond tragic. This is madness. No sane country, no professional army, kills innocent civilians as a matter of routine, shoots babies in the head and chest with sniper rifles, executes people waving white flags, or bombs hospitals with impunity. Yet in Gaza, these horrors occur daily.

The people there have nowhere to flee. Borders are sealed, the sea patrolled by warships, and even so-called safe zones are bombed. Schools have turned into overcrowded shelters where strangers share bare floors. Food is gone, clean water non-existent, and the constant roar of explosions never stops.

The language of Israel's own leadership makes the intention of their campaign abundantly clear. Just last week, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said, "We are there to conquer, cleanse and remain. We are disassembling Gaza into piles of rubble." He even boasted, "We're doing something that no one's done in the world before. Yes, the Gazans will have to leave."

What is perhaps most tragic is that these atrocities are unfolding in full view of the world. Many Western countries continue to provide the weapons, funding and diplomatic backing that enable the violence. For instance, according to Israel's Defence Ministry, since October 8, 2023, the US has delivered more than 90,000 tons of military aid in Israel via 800 transport planes and 140 ships which include armoured vehicles, munitions and protective gear. European governments like Germany and France banned demonstrations in support of Palestinians, along with Palestinian flag and symbols. In this atmosphere, even appeals for Israel to adhere to basic humanitarian norms are often denounced as antisemitic.

This is a moral unravelling of the Western civilisation which has long claimed to champion human rights. A civilisation that watches the weaponisation of starvation and does nothing has forfeited any claim to ethical leadership and is inching closer to collapse. The only meaningful challenge to the moral failure of the West has come from the US university campuses, where students and faculty have protested to call out the ongoing genocide. But their resistance has come at a cost. For speaking out against Israeli atrocities, these institutions have faced punitive measures including withdrawal of federal funding, research contracts, grants, and even the right to enrol foreign students.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has taken a historic step by seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former IDF chief Yoav Gallant on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. In the wake of these developments, many around the world who once sympathised with the historical suffering of the Jewish people are now turning away in disillusionment. Attempts to dismiss criticism as antisemitism are losing their power. The façade is cracking, and a growing number now recognise the devastation of Gaza as a deliberate campaign to destroy a people.

Defenders of Israel often frame the onslaught in Gaza as a justified response to Hamas' October 7 assault which killed 1,200 Israelis. But this narrative deliberately ignores the context. The October 7 attack did not occur in isolation. It was the explosion of a pressure cooker sealed shut for decades. It followed 75 years of displacement, 56 years of military occupation and 17 years of a suffocating blockade on Gaza. Since 2007, two million Palestinians have been trapped in what Human Rights Watch called an "open-air prison." Their borders are guarded by snipers, their fishermen fired upon at sea, and even food imports are monitored with strict limits, down to calorie count. October 7 emerged from this despair. As historian Norman Finkelstein notes, the Hamas' attack on Israel is akin to a slave revolt against colonial masters.

Had Israel limited its response to targeting Hamas within the bounds of international law, the world might have viewed it as a harsh but legitimate military operation. But what is happening goes far beyond that. It is the wholesale slaughter of a captive population, most of whom had no part in the initial attack. When even infants are stripped of innocence and treated as legitimate targets, no justification can stand. No matter how loudly this campaign of extermination in Gaza is defended by voices in Western media and political circles, it perfectly fits the definition of genocide and ethnic cleansing under international law.

Perhaps one day this nightmare will end. When it does and the dust finally settles, the world will have to confront hard and uncomfortable truths. Accountability must extend to every journalist, politician, propagandist and online voice who enabled, excused, financed or shielded these atrocities. None should be allowed to escape the judgment of history. This reckoning will be essential, not merely as justice for the victims, but as the only way to reclaim collective humanity.

​

 

[Saif]

Unilever’s Ben & Jerry’s calls war in Gaza a ‘genocide’

The independent board of Ben & Jerry's said the conflict in Gaza is a genocide, escalating a bitter feud between the ice cream maker and its longtime London-based corporate parent, Unilever. "Ben & Jerry's believes in human rights and advocates for peace, and we join with those around the world wh

thefinancialexpress.com.bd

Unilever’s Ben & Jerry’s calls war in Gaza a ‘genocide’

REUTERS
Published :
May 30, 2025 20:56
Updated :
May 30, 2025 20:56

The independent board of Ben & Jerry's said the conflict in Gaza is a genocide, escalating a bitter feud between the ice cream maker and its longtime London-based corporate parent, Unilever.

"Ben & Jerry's believes in human rights and advocates for peace, and we join with those around the world who denounce the genocide in Gaza," the board said in a statement viewed by Reuters. "We stand with all who raise their voices against genocide in Gaza - from petition-signers to street marchers to those risking arrest."

Unilever and Ben & Jerry's have been at odds since at least 2021 when the Chubby Hubby ice cream maker said it would stop selling in the Israel-occupied West Bank. Ben & Jerry's sued its owner last year over its alleged attempts to silence it on Gaza and criticise US President Donald Trump. Its statement on Gaza is unusual for a major US brand.

A Unilever spokesperson said that the comments reflect the views of the independent social mission board of Ben & Jerry's, and they do not speak for anyone other than themselves.

"We call for peace in the region and for relief for all those whose lives have been impacted," the spokesperson said.

Unilever asked a US judge to dismiss Ben & Jerry's lawsuit. The company is also in the process of separating out its ice cream business, including Vermont-based Ben & Jerry's, to an independent company this summer.

Ben & Jerry's has said its year 2000 merger agreement with Unilever gave its independent board "primary responsibility" to pursue the company's social mission. The crux of the dispute between Ben & Jerry’s and Unilever is how much leeway the board actually has.​

 

[Saif]

Israel’s settlement plan in occupied West Bank draws criticism

Katz said the initiative “changes the face of the region and shapes the future of settlement for years to come”.

en.prothomalo.com

Israel’s settlement plan in occupied West Bank draws criticism
AFP Jerusalem
Published: 30 May 2025, 14: 09

A Palestinian demonstrator reacts to a sound grenade fired by Israeli forces during a protest against Jewish settlements and Israel's planned annexation of parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank, in the Palestinian town of Asira ash-Shamaliya, 17 July 2020. Reuters

Israel announced Thursday the creation of 22 new settlements in the occupied West Bank, drawing sharp condemnation from Britain, Jordan and others already at odds with the country over its Gaza war.

London called the move a “deliberate obstacle” to Palestinian statehood, while UN chief Antonio Guterres’ spokesman said it pushed efforts towards a two-state solution “in the wrong direction”.

Israeli settlements in the West Bank are regularly condemned by the United Nations as illegal under international law and are seen as a major obstacle to lasting peace.

The decision, taken by Israel’s security cabinet, was announced by far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, himself a settler, and Defence Minister Israel Katz, who oversees the communities.

“We have made a historic decision for the development of settlements: 22 new communities in Judea and Samaria, renewing settlement in the north of Samaria, and reinforcing the eastern axis of the State of Israel,” Smotrich said on X, using the Israeli terms for the southern and northern West Bank, which it has occupied since 1967.

“Next step: sovereignty!” he added.

Katz said the initiative “changes the face of the region and shapes the future of settlement for years to come”.

Not all of the 22 settlements are new. Some are existing outposts, while others are neighbourhoods of settlements that will become independent communities, according to the left-wing Israeli NGO Peace Now.

Hamas accused Israel of “accelerating steps to Judaize Palestinian land within a clear annexation project”.

“This is a blatant defiance of the international will and a grave violation of international law and United Nations resolutions,” Gaza’s Islamist rulers said.

Britain’s minister for the Middle East, Hamish Falconer, said the plan imperils “the two-state solution” and does not protect Israel.

Jordan called the decision illegal and said it “undermines prospects for peace by entrenching the occupation”.

“We stand against any and all” expansion of the settlements, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said, repeating calls for Israel to halt such activity, which he said blocks peace and economic development.

On Telegram, the right-wing Likud party of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the move a “once-in-a-generation decision” and said it “includes the establishment of four communities along the eastern border with Jordan, as part of strengthening Israel’s eastern backbone”.

A map posted by the party showed the 22 sites scattered across the territory.

‘Heritage of our ancestors’

Two of the settlements, Homesh and Sa-Nur, are particularly symbolic.

Located in the north of the West Bank, they are resettlements, having been evacuated in 2005 as part of Israel’s disengagement from Gaza, promoted by then prime minister Ariel Sharon.

Netanyahu’s government, formed in December 2022 with the support of far-right and ultra-Orthodox parties, is the most right-wing in Israel’s history.

Human rights groups and anti-settlement NGOs say a slide towards at least de facto annexation of the occupied West Bank has gathered pace, particularly since the start of the Gaza war triggered by Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel.

“The Israeli government no longer pretends otherwise: the annexation of the occupied territories and expansion of settlements is its central goal,” Peace Now said in a statement.

In his announcement, Smotrich offered a pre-emptive defence of the move, saying: “We have not taken a foreign land, but the heritage of our ancestors.”

Some European governments have moved to sanction individual settlers, as did the United States under former president Joe Biden—though those measures were lifted under Donald Trump.

The announcement comes ahead of an international conference led by France and Saudi Arabia at the United Nations next month aimed at reviving the two-state solution.​

 

[Saif]

UN warns all of Gaza at risk of famine

The UN warned Friday that the entire population of Gaza was at risk of famine, as an Israeli far-right minister urged the use of ‘full force’ against Hamas.

www.newagebd.net

UN warns all of Gaza at risk of famine
Agence France-Presse . Jerusalem 31 May, 2025, 00:18

Children collect items as Palestinians check the site of an overnight Israeli strike, in Jabalia in the central Gaza Strip, on Friday, amid the war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. | AFP photo

The UN warned Friday that the entire population of Gaza was at risk of famine, as an Israeli far-right minister urged the use of ‘full force’ against Hamas.

Negotiations to end nearly 20 months of war have so far failed to achieve a breakthrough, with Israel resuming operations in Gaza in March following a short-lived truce.

Israel recently intensified its offensive in what it says is a renewed push to destroy Hamas, drawing global condemnation over the dire humanitarian conditions in Gaza.

Recent AFPTV footage has shown chaotic scenes as large crowds of Palestinians desperate for food rushed to a limited number of aid distribution centres to pick up supplies.

‘Gaza is the hungriest place on earth,’ Jens Laerke, a spokesman for the UN humanitarian agency OCHA, said on Friday.

‘It’s the only defined area — a country or defined territory within a country — where you have the entire population at risk of famine. One hundred per cent of the population at risk of famine.’

Laerke said 900 UN aid trucks had been authorised by Israel to enter so far, but only 600 had been offloaded on the Gaza side of the border, and an even smaller number had been picked up there due to security considerations.

Laerke described the ‘limited number of truckloads’ as ‘drip-feeding food’.

Adding to the international pressure, French president Emmanuel Macron said Friday that European countries should ‘harden the collective position’ against Israel if it did not respond appropriately to the humanitarian situation in Gaza.

Action was needed ‘in the next few hours and days’, he added.

The White House announced Thursday that Israel had ‘signed off’ on a new ceasefire proposal submitted to Hamas, but the Palestinian militant group said the deal failed to satisfy its demands, while stopping short of rejecting it outright.

Far-right national security minister Itamar Ben Gvir, addressing prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a Telegram post Friday, said that ‘after Hamas rejected the deal proposal again — there are no more excuses’.

‘The confusion, the shuffling and the weakness must end,’ he added. ‘It is time to go in with full force, without blinking, to destroy, and kill Hamas to the last one.’

Gaza’s civil defence agency said that at least 22 people had been killed in Israeli attacks on Friday, including seven in a strike targeting a family home in Jabalia in the north.

Palestinians sobbed over the bodies of their loved ones at Gaza City’s Al Shifa Hospital following the strike, AFPTV footage showed.

‘These were civilians and were sleeping at their homes. The house was destroyed due to the indiscriminate bombardment,’ said neighbour Mahmud al-Ghaf, describing ‘children in pieces’.

‘Stop the war!’ said Mahmud Nasr, who lost relatives. ‘We do not want anything from you, just stop the war.’

The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the Jabalia strike, but said separately that the air force had ‘struck dozens of targets throughout the Gaza Strip’ over the past day.

The White House said on Thursday that president Donald Trump and US envoy Steve Witkoff had ‘submitted a ceasefire proposal to Hamas that Israel backed’.

Israel has not confirmed that it approved the new proposal.

Hamas sources said last week that the group had accepted a US-backed deal, but on Thursday political bureau member Bassem Naim said the new version meant ‘the continuation of killing and famine and does not meet any of our people’s demands, foremost among them halting the war’.Political party merchandise

‘Nonetheless, the movement’s leadership is studying the response to the proposal with full national responsibility,’ he added.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt added that discussions were ‘continuing’ with the militants.

Naim on Friday reiterated that a review was on-going, while a source close to Hamas said one of the group’s main concerns was the lack of American guarantees that talks towards a permanent ceasefire would continue.

According to two sources close to the negotiations, the new proposal involves a 60-day truce, potentially extendable to 70 days, and the release of five living hostages and nine bodies in exchange for Palestinian prisoners during the first week, followed by a second exchange the next week.

Of the 251 hostages seized during Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack that triggered the war, 57 remain in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.

As of Thursday, the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said at least 3,986 people had been killed in the territory since Israel resumed major operations on March 18, taking the war’s overall toll to 54,249, mostly civilians.

Hamas’s attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.​

 

[Saif]

New US-backed truce proposal does not meet demands: Hamas

The White House said Thursday Israel had ‘signed off’ on a new Gaza ceasefire proposal submitted to Hamas, but the Palestinian group said the deal failed to satisfy its demands.

www.newagebd.net

New US-backed truce proposal does not meet demands: Hamas
Agence France-Presse . Gaza City 31 May, 2025, 01:11

The White House said Thursday Israel had ‘signed off’ on a new Gaza ceasefire proposal submitted to Hamas, but the Palestinian group said the deal failed to satisfy its demands.

Negotiations to end more than 19 months of war have so far failed to achieve a breakthrough, with Israel resuming operations in Gaza in March after a brief truce.

The White House said president Donald Trump and US envoy Steve Witkoff had ‘submitted a ceasefire proposal to Hamas that Israel backed’.

‘Israel signed off on this proposal before it was sent to Hamas,’ press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, adding discussions were ‘continuing’ with the militants.

Israel has not confirmed that it approved the new proposal.

Hamas sources said last week the group had accepted a US-backed deal, but on Thursday political bureau member Bassem Naim said the new version meant ‘the continuation of killing and famine and does not meet any of our people’s demands, foremost among them halting the war’.Political party merchandise

‘Nonetheless, the movement’s leadership is studying the response to the proposal with full national responsibility,’ he added.

A source close to the group said the new version ‘is considered a retreat’ from the previous one, which ‘included an American commitment regarding permanent ceasefire negotiations’.

According to two sources close to the negotiations, the new proposal involves a 60-day truce, potentially extendable to 70 days, and the release of 10 living hostages and nine bodies in exchange for Palestinian prisoners during the first week.

The humanitarian situation in Gaza remains dire despite aid beginning to trickle back into the territory after a more than two-month Israeli blockade.

Food security experts say starvation is looming for one in five people.

Israel has also intensified its military offensive in what it says is a renewed push to destroy Hamas, whose October 7, 2023 attack triggered the war.

Gaza’s civil defence said 54 people were killed in Israeli attacks on Thursday, including 23 in a strike on a home in Al-Bureij, and two by Israeli gunfire near a US-backed aid centre in the Morag axis, in the south.

The centre, run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, is part of a new aid distribution system designed to keep supplies from Hamas. It has drawn criticism from the United Nations and the European Union.

‘What is happening to us is degrading,’ said Gazan Sobhi Areef, who visited a GHF centre on Thursday.

‘We go there and risk our lives just to get a bag of flour to feed our children.’

Israel’s military said it was not aware of the shooting near the aid centre. In Al-Bureij, it said it struck a ‘Hamas cell’ and was reviewing reports of civilian deaths.

In a phone call with EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, Jordanian foreign minister Ayman Safadi accused Israel of ‘systematic starvation tactics’ that had ‘crossed all moral and legal boundaries’.

The aid issue has come sharply into focus amid starvation fears and intense criticism of the GHF, which has bypassed the longstanding UN-led system in the territory.

Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, said aid trucks were entering via the Kerem Shalom crossing, and accused the UN of ‘trying to block’ GHF’s work.

The United Nations said it was doing its utmost to distribute the limited aid allowed in.

Gazans who went to GHF’s newly opened distribution centre in the central Netzarim corridor Thursday described a chaotic scene.

‘Some people caused a big commotion and stormed the aid distribution point because people are very hungry,’ Mohammed Abdel Aal, 29, said.

‘I ran, like everyone else, trying to get an aid box.’

He left empty-handed after forces at the facility ‘fired bullets and grenades at us, which forced us to retreat’.

A 17-year-old from Al-Bureij, who gave his name as Yousef, offered a similar account, saying in spite of the gunfire, ‘hunger is stronger than fear’.

Asked to comment, GHF said its ‘personnel encountered a tense and potentially dangerous crowd that refused to disperse’.

To ‘ensure the safety of civilians and staff, non-lethal deterrents were deployed — including smoke and warning shots into the ground’, it said.

Medical facilities in Gaza, meanwhile, have come under increasing strain and repeated attack.

Al-Awda Hospital said Israeli troops were ‘carrying out a forced evacuation of patients and medical staff’, adding it was ‘the only hospital that was still operating in the northern Gaza Strip’.

The Gaza war was sparked by Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel that killed 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Out of 251 hostages seized during the attack, 57 remain in Gaza including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said Thursday that at least 3,986 people had been killed in the territory since Israel ended the ceasefire on March 18, taking the war’s overall toll to 54,249, mostly civilians.

On Thursday, the military said an ‘employee of a contracting company that carries out engineering work’ was killed in northern Gaza.

Israel also intercepted a missile fired from Yemen Thursday in an attack claimed by the country’s Iran-backed Huthi rebels.​

 

[Saif]

Don’t let Israel forcefully deport Palestinians

Israel’s genocide in Gaza has now been going on for over 600 days.

www.thedailystar.net

Don’t let Israel forcefully deport Palestinians

Palestinians, displaced by the Israeli military offensive, shelter in a UNRWA school in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, on May 28, 2025. PHOTO: REUTERS

Israel's genocide in Gaza has now been going on for over 600 days. The Israeli government's larger vision is clear: erase the demography of Gaza and all of Occupied Palestine, and seize the geography. The intentions have been demonstrated by Israel through both actions and words. Its finance minister recently said the government was planning to "apply sovereignty" to the West Bank, Occupied Palestine in the near future, and within half a year, the population of Gaza would be "concentrated" in a "humanitarian zone," essentially a fenced-off piece of land in the destroyed Gaza Strip.

So the genocidal regime's plan goes like this: use evacuation orders and intense bombardment to trap Palestinians in Gaza in a concentration camp, then starve them there to a state of hopelessness so that they want to leave themselves. And then they will claim Palestine from Palestinians. We have seen this before during the Nakba in 1948 and the Six-Day War in 1967.

Israel's latest mission is executing an arrangement and threatening the people of Gaza—manipulating them into leaving on their own "will" through the shutdown Israeli border. Earlier in March, its Defence Minister Israel Katz released a video statement warning Palestinians in Gaza, "Take the advice of the US president. Return the hostages and eliminate Hamas, and other options will open for you—including going to other places in the world for those who wish. The alternative is complete destruction and devastation."

Two bordering nations, Egypt and Jordan, supporting Palestinian statehood, have rejected the proposition of "taking in" Palestinian refugees in order to support the establishment of Palestinian statehood. Following that, the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), the wing in Israel's defence ministry that is responsible for overseeing "civilian matters in Gaza," is now executing the heinous scheme to push out Palestinian Gazans through the Israeli border. In March, the security cabinet launched "Voluntary Emigration Bureau for Gaza residents interested in relocating to third countries" to facilitate this goal with COGAT, which blocked 3,000 trucks of humanitarian aid from entering Gaza through that same border for 11 weeks to starve the children in Gaza to death. The images of their skeletal bodies are being circulated all throughout social media as I write this.

Since the development of this "voluntary exit plan," the Palestinian citizens in Gaza—young, old, injured, and starving—have received messages from Israeli numbers, including law firms based in Tel Aviv, offering them paperwork to "safely" travel out of Gaza. News reports have revealed that Israeli agencies are persuading Gazans to give them "extensive assistance," to travel to Ramon Airport in Israel from where they are. In reality, they are being deported. Israel's Interior Minister Moshe Arbel said on April 7 that Palestinians had been deported to various destinations in at least 16 flights by then. The term "deportation" implies they will not be allowed to return, further cementing that the goal of this policy is to simply empty the Gaza Strip of Palestinians.

Israel's rationale for "voluntary exit" under the premise of "humanitarian assistance" also collapses under international law. As upheld by international tribunals, particularly the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, "It is impermissible to use forced displacement as a response to a disaster that one has created."

It has come to our knowledge that some entities—including in parts of the world that have demonstrated solidarity to Palestinians—are knowingly or unknowingly helping Israel expel Palestinians from Gaza under initiatives that appear humane on the surface. We must not fall into this trap after seeing with our own eyes what Israel has done to the Palestinians in Gaza over more than 600 days.

We must understand that "helping" Palestinians by hosting them as refugees forced out through the border of Israel undermines the Palestinian cause. I appeal to the people of conscience in Bangladesh as well as the decision-makers to not allow such heinous acts to take place under the pretext of protecting Palestinian lives in the Gaza Strip. Bangladesh should not be an alternative refuge for pushed-out, exploited citizens in Gaza under any circumstances. Israel's deceitful plan has also been criticised by UN officials who emphasise the Palestinians' right to live in their own land, and warn that forced migration is directly fostering Israel's vision to annihilate Gaza. It is imperative that the world realises that, especially the people of Bangladesh, who have set standards of humanity by unwaveringly standing beside Palestine throughout its history and shown historic solidarity for the Palestinians during Israel's genocide in Gaza.

Yousef SY Ramadan is the ambassador of Palestine to Bangladesh.​

 

[Saif]

Israeli attack near aid delivery point kills 31 in Gaza, truce talks falter

An Israeli attack near an aid distribution point run by a private US-based group killed at least 31 people in Gaza on Sunday, local health authorities said, as Hamas and Israel exchanged blame over a faltering effort to secure a ceasefire.

en.prothomalo.com

Israeli attack near aid delivery point kills 31 in Gaza, truce talks falter
Reuters Cairo, Gaza
Published: 01 Jun 2025, 17: 25

A paramedic carries a Palestinian man wounded in an Israeli strike, at Nasser Hospital, in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, 1 June, 2025. Reuters

An Israeli attack near an aid distribution point run by a private US-based group killed at least 31 people in Gaza on Sunday, local health authorities said, as Hamas and Israel exchanged blame over a faltering effort to secure a ceasefire.

The incident in Rafah in the south of the enclave was the latest in a series highlighting the volatile security situation complicating aid delivery to Gaza, following the easing of an almost three-month Israeli blockade last month.

"There are martyrs and injuries. Many injuries. It is a tragic situation in this place. I advise them that nobody goes to aid delivery points. Enough,” paramedic Abu Tareq said at Nasser Hospital in nearby Khan Younis city.

The local Palestinian Red Crescent, affiliated with the international Red Cross, said its medical teams had recovered the bodies of 23 Palestinians and treated another 23 injured near an aid collection site in Rafah. The US-based Gaza Humanitarian Foundation operates the aid distribution sites in Rafah.

The Red Crescent also reported that 14 more Palestinians were injured near a separate site in central Gaza. GHF also operates the aid distribution site in central Gaza.

Earlier, the Palestinian news agency WAFA and Hamas-affiliated media put the number of deaths at 30. Local health authorities said at least 31 bodies had so far arrived at Nasser Hospital.

Israel's military said in a statement it was looking into reports that Palestinians had been shot at an aid distribution site but that it was unaware of injuries caused by military fire. GHF denied anyone had been killed or injured near their site in Rafah and that all of its distribution had taken place without incident.

The US company accused Hamas of fabricating "fake reports".

Residents and medics said Israeli soldiers fired from the ground at a crane nearby that overlooks the area, and a tank opened fire at thousands of people who were en route to get aid from the site in Rafah. Reuters footage showed ambulance vehicles carrying injured people to Nasser Hospital.

The Hamas-run Gaza government media office said Israel has turned the distribution sites into "death traps" for people desperate to get some aid.

Smoke rises from Gaza after an explosion, near the Israel-Gaza border, as seen from Israel, 31 May, 2025. AFP

"We affirm to the world that what is taking place is a deliberate and malicious use of aid as a 'weapon of war', employed to exploit starving civilians and forcibly gather them at exposed killing zones, which are managed and monitored by the Israeli military," it said.

GHF is a US-based entity backed by the US and Israeli governments that provides humanitarian aid in Gaza, bypassing traditional relief groups. It began work in Gaza last month and has three sites from where thousands have collected aid.

GHF has been widely criticised by the international community and its executive director resigned in May, citing what he said was the entity’s lack of independence and neutrality. It is not clear who is funding the company.

Israeli officials have said that Palestinians collecting aid would be screened to exclude anyone linked to Hamas.

Ceasefire Talks Falter

Sunday's incident happened as Israel and Hamas traded blame for the faltering of a new Arab and US mediation bid to secure a temporary ceasefire and the release of Israeli hostages held in Gaza by Hamas, in exchange for Palestinians in Israeli jails.

Hamas said on Saturday it was seeking amendments to a US-backed ceasefire proposal, but President Donald Trump's envoy rejected the group's response as "totally unacceptable."

The Palestinian militant group said it was willing to release 10 living hostages and hand over the bodies of 18 dead in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons. But Hamas reiterated demands for an end to the war and withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, conditions Israel has rejected.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that his government had agreed to Witkoff's outline.

Israel began its offensive in Gaza in response to the Hamas-led attack on communities in southern Israel on 7 October, 2023, which killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, according to Israeli tallies, and saw 251 taken as hostages into Gaza.

Israel's campaign has devastated much of Gaza, killing over 54,000 Palestinians and destroying most buildings. Much of the population now live in shelters in makeshift camps. Gaza health officials report that most of the dead are civilians, though the number of militants killed remains unclear.​

 

[Saif]

‘All I think about is Gaza’

Away from home in Gaza, Palestinian pilgrim Mohammed Shehade said the rare chance he was given to perform hajj is overshadowed by fears for his family trapped in the war-battered territory.

www.thedailystar.net

‘All I think about is Gaza’
War weighs heavy on hajj pilgrims

Demonstrators lie on the ground covered with white sheets as they take part in a protest performance in support of the Palestinian people of Gaza, under the slogan “Stop genocide, Break with Israel now!” in the Spanish Basque city of San Sebastian, yesterday. PHOTO: AFP

Away from home in Gaza, Palestinian pilgrim Mohammed Shehade said the rare chance he was given to perform hajj is overshadowed by fears for his family trapped in the war-battered territory.

The 38-year-old engineer had been granted a permit to leave as he sought life-saving cancer treatment in Egypt, but Israeli authorities barred his family from accompanying him.

He said his departure from the Gaza Strip in February presented him with "the opportunity of a lifetime" to apply for the annual Muslim pilgrimage, which begins on Wednesday.

But even as he visited the holy sites in the Saudi city of Makkah, his heart was heavy with thoughts of his wife and four children stuck in Gaza under relentless bombardment.

"This is life's greatest suffering, to be far away from your family," Shehade told AFP on a roadside leading to Makkah's Grand Mosque.

He is among hundreds of Gazans set to perform Islam's holiest rites alongside more than a million worshippers from across the globe.

As pilgrims robed in white filed by, Shehade said he had been praying day and night for the Gaza war to end and to be reunited with his family.

"You could be in the best place in the world but if you are away from your family, you will never be happy," he said.

Leaving Gaza has become practically impossible for most inhabitants, but some like Shehade have been evacuated on medical grounds.

"Here I am preparing to perform hajj but there are things I can't speak about. If I do I will cry," he said as tears began to form in his eyes.

Shehade left Gaza during a truce, but Israel has since renewed its intense bombing campaign and blocked aid deliveries, with the United Nations warning of widespread famine.

"When I left I was caught between two fires," Shehade said of the choice to travel for an essential surgery and leave his family behind.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said yesterday that at least 4,149 people have been killed in the territory since Israel resumed its offensive on March 18, taking the war's overall deaths toll to 54,418, mostly civilians.​

 

[Saif]

Qatar, Egypt say will intensify efforts to resume Gaza truce talks

Netanyahu vowed on Monday to bring back all captives in Gaza, “living and dead” amid uncertainty in the hostage negotiations.

en.prothomalo.com

Qatar, Egypt say will intensify efforts to resume Gaza truce talks

AFP Doha
Published: 02 Jun 2025, 09: 31

A boy walks with a sack of salvaged items through debris at the site of Israeli bombardment on a residential block in Jalaa Street in Gaza City on 14 January, 2025 amid the ongoing war in the Palestinian territory between Israel and Hamas. AFP

Qatar and Egypt announced on Sunday plans to step up efforts for Gaza truce negotiations, as the Palestinian militant group Hamas said it was prepared to “immediately” hold a fresh round of talks.

“Qatar and Egypt, in coordination with the United States of America, affirm their intention to intensify efforts to overcome the obstacles facing the negotiations,” the two mediators said in a joint statement.

“The two countries are also striving to swiftly reach a 60-day temporary truce, which would pave the way for a permanent ceasefire agreement in the Gaza Strip,” the statement added.

Doha, Cairo and Washington have been engaged in months of back-and-forth mediation with Israel and Hamas but another round of negotiations aimed at ending 20 months of war in Gaza this week appeared to conclude once more without a breakthrough.

A two-month truce, in which dozens of hostages held by Hamas were released in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, collapsed in March, with Israel intensifying military operations in Gaza afterwards.

Following the statement by the Arab mediators, Hamas said it was ready “to immediately begin a round of indirect negotiations to reach an agreement on the points of contention”.

Hamas previously said it had responded positively—albeit with requested amendments—to the latest US-backed truce proposal on Saturday which would see 10 living hostages released form Gaza.

Militants took 251 hostages during the October 2023 Hamas attack on Israel which triggered the war, 57 of whom remain in Gaza including 34 who the Israeli military says are dead.

The United States envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, wrote on X that Hamas’s response was “totally unacceptable and only takes us backward”.

“Hamas should accept the framework proposal we put forward as the basis for proximity talks, which we can begin immediately this coming week,” the envoy said.

“That is the only way we can close a 60-day ceasefire deal in the coming days,” he added.

Netanyahu vowed on Monday to bring back all captives in Gaza, “living and dead” amid uncertainty in the hostage negotiations.

Israel has in recent weeks expanded its offensive in the Gaza Strip, drawing international condemnation as aid trickles in following a months-long blockade that has caused severe food and medical shortages.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza says at least 4,149 people have been killed in the territory since Israel resumed its offensive on 18 March, taking the war’s overall toll to 54,418, mostly civilians.

Hamas’s 2023 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.​