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

[Saif]

Israeli airstrike kills nine people in north Gaza town, medics say, amid ceasefire disputes

At least nine Palestinians were killed, including three local journalists, and others wounded on Saturday in an Israeli airstrike on Gaza's northern Beit Lahiya town, Gaza's health ministry said, as Hamas' leaders hold Gaza ceasefire talks with mediators in Cairo. Several were critically injured a

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Israeli airstrike kills nine people in north Gaza town, medics say, amid ceasefire disputes
REUTERS
Published :
Mar 15, 2025 21:56
Updated :
Mar 15, 2025 21:56

Northern Gaza Strip March 15, 2025. Photo : REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa

At least nine Palestinians were killed, including three local journalists, and others wounded on Saturday in an Israeli airstrike on Gaza's northern Beit Lahiya town, Gaza's health ministry said, as Hamas' leaders hold Gaza ceasefire talks with mediators in Cairo.

Several were critically injured as the strike hit a car, with casualties inside and outside the vehicle, health officials told Reuters.

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Witnesses and fellow journalists said the people in the car were on a mission for a charity called Al-Khair Foundation in Beit Lahiya, and they were accompanied by journalists and photographers when the strike hit them. At least three local journalists were among the dead, according to Palestinian media.

The Israeli military said in a statement that it had struck two individuals that it identified as "terrorists" operating a drone that it said posed a threat to forces in Beit Lahiya.

The military later struck several other suspects who it said had collected the drone equipment and entered a vehicle.

The military did not say how it had determined that the individuals it had struck were "terrorists" or provide detail on the threat that the drone had posed to its soldiers.

The incident underscores the fragility of the January 19 ceasefire agreement that halted large-scale fighting in the Gaza Strip. Palestinian health officials say dozens of people have been killed by Israeli fire despite the truce.

Salama Marouf, the head of the Hamas-run Gaza government media office, denied the army's allegations.

"The team was made of civilians and worked in an area near a shelter on a mission sponsored by a charity. They didn't exist in a prohibited area and didn't pose any danger of any kind to the occupation army," Marouf said in a statement.

The Palestinian militant group accused Israel in a statement of attempting to renege on the ceasefire agreement, putting the number of Palestinians killed since January 19 at 150.

It urged mediators to compel Israel to move ahead with the implementation of the phased ceasefire deal, blaming Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the current impasse.

Responding to some of the incidents reported by Gaza medics, the Israeli military says its forces have intervened to thwart threats by "terrorists" approaching its forces or planting bombs on the ground near where forces operate.

Since a temporary first phase of the ceasefire expired on March 2, Israel has rejected opening the second phase of talks, which would require it to negotiate over a permanent end to the war, the main demand of Hamas.

The incident coincided with a visit by Hamas' exiled Gaza chief, Khalil Al-Hayya, to Cairo for further ceasefire talks aimed at resolving disputes with Israel that could risk a resumption of fighting in the enclave.

On Friday, Hamas said it had agreed to free an American-Israeli dual national if Israel begins the next phase of ceasefire talks towards a permanent end to the war, an offer Israel dismissed as "psychological warfare."

Hamas said it had made the offer to release New Jersey native Edan Alexander, a 21-year-old soldier in the Israeli army, after receiving a proposal from mediators for negotiations on the second phase of a ceasefire deal.

Israel says it wants to extend the ceasefire's temporary first phase, a proposal backed by U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff. Hamas says it will resume freeing hostages only under the second phase.

The war began when Hamas carried out a cross-border raid into southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people and capturing 251 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.

Israel's subsequent assault on Gaza has killed more than 48,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health officials, and reduced much of the territory to rubble and led to accusations of genocide and war crimes that Israel denies.​

 

[Saif]

'A terrible beauty is born' in Gaza and West Bank

Pre-occupation Palestine had, to use Anglo-American poet WH Auden's words, "marble well-governed cities" full of "vines and olive trees." But Israel and its allies have turned it into "an artificial wilderness"

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'A terrible beauty is born' in Gaza and West Bank

Pre-occupation Palestine had, to use Anglo-American poet WH Auden's words, "marble well-governed cities" full of "vines and olive trees." But Israel and its allies have turned it into "an artificial wilderness"

PHOTO: COLLECTED

The Easter Rising of 1916 against British rule in Ireland has both political and literary significance. It marked one of the foundational moments in European history that led to the liberation of the Irish state six years later. WB Yeats's famous poem "Easter 1916" gives the rebellion a literary expression that transcends political and geographical boundaries.

Through the uprising, the Irish rebels took the British coloniser as well as the people of Ireland by surprise. It was planned so furtively that even a close observer of Irish politics like Yeats was unaware of what was going on among the rebels. They sought to free their country from centuries-old British colonial rule.

Yeats thought that the Easter uprising was premature, and its unpredictability and suddenness initially shocked him. Later he surmounted his shock and reservations about the revolt and composed the poem to commemorate the heroism and sacrifice of the rebels.

In the Easter armed rebellion, about 1600 members of the paramilitary group Irish Volunteers (now known as the Irish Republican Army or IRA) in addition to 200 fighters of the more radical organisation the Irish Citizen Army took control of several key points in Dublin on Monday, 24 April, 1916. The General Post Office (GPO) in the city was the epicentre of the insurrection.

Initially the British colonial government was unprepared and suffered casualties, but later it deployed additional soldiers eventually totalling about 20,000 against roughly 2000 Irish freedom fighters. On the whole, the British response to the uprising was brutal, cruel and ruthless. By Friday, April 28, 1916, the armed struggle was crushed and the fighting ended the next day. Nearly 500 people including civilians, rebels, British troops, and police officers were killed. Within a couple of weeks, the British government put to death 15 of the key rebel leaders by firing squad.

The steadfastness and determination of the rebel leaders and the manner in which they were killed galvanised retrospective support for the uprising and garnered public sympathy for them. Like many others, Yeats was ambivalent about the Easter rising and had mixed emotions about its leaders. But the rebels' commitment to the cause of Irish liberation and their resolute conviction that the country they loved needed their support changed Yeats's perception of them.

The steadfastness and determination of the rebel leaders and the manner in which they were killed galvanised retrospective support for the uprising and garnered public sympathy for them. Like many others, Yeats was ambivalent about the Easter rising and had mixed emotions about its leaders.

In "Easter 1916", Yeats repeats the phrase "a terrible beauty is born" to refer to what the rebels did for their country and the cost that they paid. The inhuman savagery of the British was terrible, but the selflessness and bravery that the Irish revolutionaries demonstrated were most beautiful.

Yeats's elegant oxymoron of "a terrible beauty" can be extended to the situation in Palestine. Most people passionate about the cause of Palestine had conflicting feelings when on October 7, 2023, a group of Palestinians launched a surprise attack on apartheid Israel, their long-term oppressor. Global sympathy was divided, and Israel received comforting words from many world leaders.

However, Israel's indiscriminate killings of Palestinians in Gaza and continued settler terrorism in the West Bank, and finally over a yearlong livestreamed genocide in Gaza shifted public sympathy in favour of the victims of Israel's aggression. People of the world have watched the unspeakably sickening cruelty of Israel and its backers and undoubtedly horrifying devastation that the Zionist genocide has left in Gaza.

Pre-occupation Palestine had, to use Anglo-American poet WH Auden's words, "marble well-governed cities" full of "vines and olive trees." But Israel and its allies have turned it into "an artificial wilderness." Gaza is now:

"A plain without a feature, bare and brown,

No blade of grass, no sign of neighborhood,

Nothing to eat and nowhere to sit down."

During this time and previously, Palestine has been a battleground between some of the most powerful nations and some of the poorest and most vulnerable people on earth. Again to borrow Auden's words, against their oppressors, defenceless Palestinians

"could not hope for help and no help came:

What their foes liked to do was done."

Israeli government and its allies have killed tens of thousands of Palestinians children, men and women, demolished their houses, destroyed their schools, colleges, and universities, turned their hospitals to rubble, killed doctors who treated them, butchered journalists who told the world about their ordeals, murdered teachers who taught their children and assassinated aid workers who stood by them in their difficulty. Israel and its allies perpetrated all the above and many other atrocities against Palestinians to break their will to resist. But the genociders have been defeated by Palestinians' willpower, strong resolve and formidable opposition to foreign occupation.

Without any support from the rest of the world, vulnerable Palestinians stood up to powerful nations that have continued providing arms and ammunition and diplomatic support to Israel, especially, Gazans have remained steadfast and resilient in the face of barbarity and evil that epitomise the behaviour of their oppressors.

Despite military superiority, Israel and its Euro-American allies have not been able to break the courage of Palestinians and their urge for resistance. Against the sadistic and bellicose behaviour of the Israeli administration and its sophisticated weaponry, Palestinians are armed with an enormous dose of courage and spurred by love for their land.

The land that has been littered with blood and dead bodies of Palestinians bears a strong testimony that it belongs to those who are ready to die for it and not to those who have come to destroy it. Every injured Palestinian child and bereaved parent declare in unison that Palestinians will continue to live and die in their land and their source of strength is not modern, hi-tech weapons but truth and moral rectitude.

Most Palestinians who live in Gaza and the West Bank have their roots in cities in what is now Israel. They or their ancestors were uprooted from their homes when the Zionist state was established. Even before the post-October 7, 2023 genocide, Gazans were already living in a condition that commentators regarded as Israel's open-air prison or the world's largest concentration camp. By making life in Gaza increasingly unbearable in pre-during-and post-genocide periods, Israel and its backers seek to ramp up their ethnic cleansing project. Thus, Palestine's "casual comedy" is still in play.

Every time we open the newspaper or turn on the news channel, we see scores of Palestinians are butchered or buried in their homes which Israeli bombings have turned into mountains of rubble. Using Yeats's words, we tend to ask:

"O when may it suffice?"

Palestinian homes that now look like demolition sites were once inhabited by men and women along with their old parents and young children. Their homes were bombed while they were inside them. We now see only the rubble, debris and ruins of destroyed buildings. But how was the experience of those who were living there with their families during the horrifying moments of the bombings?

We are required to raise the level of our psychological adaptability even to imagine the frightening sounds, fallen pieces of concrete, and dust in the midst of which Palestinians regularly die or survive with significant bodily impairments and other devastating outcomes. When houses are bombed and reduced to heaps of debris, how do their occupants and people around feel?

The patience and resilience of Palestinians in the midst of genocide and decades-long human rights violations tell us about the beauty of their "hearts" which have been "enchanted to a stone" of single-minded devotion to Palestinian liberation. This resonates with what Yeats said about the freedom-loving Irish:

"Too long a sacrifice

Can make a stone of the heart."

By daring to stay put in the face of death and destruction, for decades Palestinians have been affirming their love for their land and confronting injustice with dignity and resilience. Conversely, the ugliness and hypocrisy stored in the hearts of their oppressors are exposed out there for all to see.

While the global conscience is continuously challenged by Israeli aggression, inhumanity and intolerance, as in 1916 Dublin, "a terrible beauty is born" in present-day Gaza and the West Bank.

Md Mahmudul Hasan is Professor, Department of English Language and Literature, International Islamic University Malaysia.​

 

[Saif]

Israeli strikes kill 14 people in Gaza over past day, Palestinian medics say

Israeli military strikes have killed at least 14 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip over the past 24 hours, the enclave's Health Ministry said on Sunday, as Arab and US mediators work to shore up a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Palestinian officials say dozens of people have been killed

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Israeli strikes kill 14 people in Gaza over past day, Palestinian medics say
REUTERS
Published :
Mar 16, 2025 18:49
Updated :
Mar 16, 2025 18:49

Mourners react next to the bodies of Palestinians killed in an Israeli strike, in the northern Gaza Strip March 15, 2025. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa Photo : Mourners react next to the bodies of Palestinians killed in an Israeli strike, in the northern Gaza Strip March 15, 2025. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa

Israeli military strikes have killed at least 14 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip over the past 24 hours, the enclave's Health Ministry said on Sunday, as Arab and US mediators work to shore up a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.

Palestinian officials say dozens of people have been killed by Israeli fire despite the January 19 truce that halted large-scale fighting in Gaza.

Israel's military has said its forces have intervened to thwart threats by "terrorists" approaching its troops or planting bombs since the ceasefire took effect.

Gaza's Health Ministry said most of the latest deaths took place on Saturday when an Israeli airstrike killed nine Palestinians including four journalists in the town of Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip.

The Israeli military said six men that it had identified as members of the armed wings of Hamas and the allied Islamic Jihad militant group had been killed in the strike. It said some of the militants had operated "under the cover of journalists".

Salama Marouf, the head of the Hamas-run Gaza government media office, said the military's statement about the incident included the names of people who were not present.

It was based on inaccurate social media reports "without even bothering to verify the facts", Marouf said.

At least four more Palestinians were killed in separate Israeli strikes on Saturday, the Gaza health officials said.

An Israeli drone had fired a missile at a group of Palestinians in the town of Juhr Eldeek in central Gaza on Sunday, killing a 62-year-old man and wounding several others, the medics said. Several others were hurt when an Israeli drone fired a missile towards a group of people in Rafah, they added.

The Israeli military said it was not familiar with the reported drone strikes.

US President Donald Trump on Saturday launched military strikes against Yemen’s Houthis over the group’s attacks against Red Sea shipping.

CEASEFIRE TALKS

Persistent bloodshed in Gaza underscores the fragility of the three-stage ceasefire agreement mediated by Qatar, Egypt, and the United States, which have stepped in to hammer out a deal between Israel and Hamas over how to proceed.

Israel wants to extend the ceasefire's first phase, a proposal backed by US envoy Steve Witkoff. Hamas says it will resume freeing hostages only under the second phase that was due to begin on March 2.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said on Saturday negotiators had been instructed to be ready to continue talks based on the mediators' response to a US proposal for the release of 11 living hostages and half of the dead captives.

Hamas on Friday said it had agreed to release American-Israeli soldier Edan Alexander and four bodies of the hostages if Israel agreed to begin talks immediately on implementing the second phase of the agreement. Israel responded by accusing Hamas of waging "psychological warfare" on the families of hostages.

The war began when Hamas carried out a cross-border raid into southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people and capturing 251 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.

Israel's subsequent assault on Gaza has killed more than 48,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health officials, reduced much of the territory to rubble, and led to accusations of genocide and war crimes that Israel denies.​

 

[Saif]

US says Hamas bears 'total responsibility' for Gaza deaths

"Every death would have and could have been avoided had Hamas accepted the 'bridge' proposal that SE Witkoff offered last Wednesday," says a State Department spokesperson

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US says Hamas bears 'total responsibility' for Gaza deaths

People sit as Palestinians make their way to flee their homes, after the Israeli army issued evacuation orders for a number of neighborhoods, following heavy Israeli strikes, in the northern Gaza Strip March 18, 2025. Photo: Reuters/Mahmoud Issa

The United States said Tuesday that Hamas bore full blame for Israel's massive deadly airstrikes, saying the militants could have accepted a ceasefire extension proposal by US special envoy Steve Witkoff.

"Hamas bears total responsibility for the war, and for the resumption of hostilities," a State Department spokesperson said.

"Every death would have and could have been avoided had Hamas accepted the 'bridge' proposal that SE Witkoff offered last Wednesday."

It was a reference to ideas from Witkoff, a friend of President Donald Trump, to ease Israel and Hamas toward extending a ceasefire.

Israel said it had no choice but to resume fighting to free remaining hostages seized on October 7, 2023. The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said that more than 400 people died.

"Hamas is delaying the compelling deal in front of us and forcing Palestinians to suffer the consequences," the State Department spokesperson said.

National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes said earlier: "Hamas could have released hostages to extend the ceasefire but instead chose refusal and war."

The Trump administration has staunchly backed Israel, whose resumed military operations drew condemnation from most world capitals which reacted.​

 

[Saif]

Gazans plunged back into chaos with resumption of Israeli strikes

'There are bodies and limbs on the ground, and the wounded cannot find any doctor to treat them,' a displaced victim says

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Gazans plunged back into chaos with resumption of Israeli strikes

Palestinians flee the area after Israeli bombardment in central Gaza City. Photo: AFP

Mourners cried over the bodies of their loved ones with drones buzzing overhead early on Tuesday, as a wave of Israeli strikes plunged Gazans back into chaos.

"They opened the fire of hell again on Gaza," said Ramez al-Amarin, 25, a displaced Palestinian who lives in a tent in the southeast of Gaza City.

"There are bodies and limbs on the ground, and the wounded cannot find any doctor to treat them," he added.

Amarin said he transported several of his neighbours' children to hospital but there were no beds for them.

Outside the Al-Ahli hospital, which was already functioning at reduced capacity due to Israel blocking the entry of humanitarian aid to the territory, dozens of bodies had been lined up.

The bare feet of the dead protruded from under some of the shrouds, while relatives sat alongside them and held their heads in their hands and cried.

Amarin said he didn't "expect the war to return because (US President Donald) Trump said he doesn't want wars".

Overnight, Israel unleashed its most intense strikes on the Gaza Strip since a fragile ceasefire commenced on January 19, with the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory reporting more than 400 people killed.

Israel has vowed to continue fighting in Gaza until all hostages held in the Palestinian territory are returned, with Prime Minister Netanyahu's office saying the operation was ordered after Hamas's "repeated refusal to release our hostages".

Hamas accused Netanyahu of deciding to "resume war" after an impasse in truce negotiations and warned that a return to fighting could be a "death sentence" for the hostages that Palestinian militants are still holding alive in Gaza.

The initial phase of the ceasefire took effect in January, largely halting more than 15 months of fighting which devastated the Gaza Strip.

The war, sparked by Palestinian militant group Hamas's October 7, 2023, attack on Israel, has displaced almost the entire population of Gaza and triggered widespread hunger while destroying or damaging more than 69 percent of the territory's buildings according to the United Nations.

'Real hell'

Israel announced in early March that it was blocking all aid into the strip and a week later cut off electricity supplying the territory's main water desalination plant.

Gaza's civil defence agency has for weeks said that it lacks the supplies to provide first aid to the territory's population of some 2.4 million people.

"There is bombing everywhere, today I felt that Gaza is a real hell," said Jihan Nahhal, 43, a mother living in northwest Gaza City, adding that some of her relatives were wounded or killed in the strikes.

Nahhal said she heard Israeli air force planes flying overhead as she prepared her pre-dawn meal -- the bombardment came with Muslims celebrating the holy month of Ramadan in which they fast during daylight hours.

"Suddenly there were huge explosions, as if it were the first day of the war," she said.

"Everywhere there was screaming and fires raging, and most of them were children."

"It is a real war of extermination," she added, condemning Israel.

In Beit Hanoun, a northern town close to the Israeli border, residents began to flee with bags and blankets piled on their heads, even before the army urged them to evacuate on Tuesday morning.

In Gaza City, residents left a school that had been turned into a shelter for the displaced.

Some scoured through the rubble of buildings destroyed in the strikes in search of casualties.

Families in Deir el-Balah inspected the damage to their homes, as a woman held a shaken-looking young boy in her arms.

"This is my grandson, he was rescued from under the rubble," said Um Abdullah Masmah.

Standing amid debris, her neighbour, Eyad Sabah, said he felt like he'd "gone back to square one, back to zero."

"This night reminded us of the return of war once again," he said.

"How long will this situation continue?"​

 

[Saif]

‘Desperate and scared’

Palestinians in Gaza were woken up by Israel unleashing a new wave of attacks on Gaza which killed at least 404 people and wounded 562.

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‘Desperate and scared’
Palestinians react as entire families wiped out in strikes

Palestinians in Gaza were woken up by Israel unleashing a new wave of attacks on Gaza which killed at least 404 people and wounded 562.

The attacks on Tuesday not only shattered a period of relative calm in Gaza during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan but also the fragile ceasefire deal Israel had with Hamas.

Palestinians who had returned to their damaged and destroyed homes after the ceasefire came into effect were also targeted by Israel's relentless bombing as entire families were wiped out in seconds.

"We were shocked late at night to see strikes and attacks on Gaza like in the early days of the war," Momen Qoreiqeh, who lost 26 members of his family in the attacks, told Al Jazeera.

"I was with my family and suddenly there was a huge attack on our residential block. The attack killed so many people from my family, some of them we still haven't recovered from under the rubble."

Ahmed Abu Rizq, a teacher, recounted the initial hours of the Israeli attacks, which added to the state of sheer horror and panic being witnessed at the hospitals.

"We woke up frightened, hearing Israeli strikes everywhere in Gaza. If you're now in one of Gaza's hospitals, you will see blood everywhere," said Abu Rizq, adding that he had seen families arriving at hospital with the "remains of their children" in their hands.

Reporting from Gaza City, Al Jazeera's Hani Mahmoud said that Israel's strikes had once again turned Gaza into a "killing box".

"Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City is overwhelmed with the number of mass casualties arriving," said Mahmoud. "We've seen entire families [killed] brought here, including a family of 26, with women, children and elderly. We've seen a mother here, crying over the bodies of her two daughters.

"Last night's attacks prove again that there is no safe place across Gaza. People had gone back to bombed homes and evacuation centres, thinking it was going to be safe due to the ceasefire, but that was not the case. They were killed inside these very places."

Muhammad Abu Salmiya, director of al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, told Al Jazeera that "every minute, a wounded person dies due to a lack of resources".

Reporting from Deir el-Balah in the centre of Gaza, Al Jazeera's Hind Khoudary said the Health Ministry was calling for urgent blood donations owing to "severe shortages" in supplies.

"Health facilities are also short on basic medical supplies they need to treat the wounded, like gauze and painkillers," she said.

Existing shortages in hospitals have been exacerbated by Israel's barring of aid trucks, which have not been allowed to enter the territory for more than two weeks.

"Doctors are saying that this is a very big challenge," said Khoudary. "In addition, there is a shortage of fuel that is putting all medical facilities at risk of collapse.

"The expectation here was people would at least spend the last days of Ramadan without any air strikes. There are a lot of people missing and trapped under the rubble. Palestinians are desperate and parents are scared."​

 

[Saif]

Why has Israel resumed large-scale strikes on Gaza?

Israel has resumed large-scale attacks in Gaza with a wave of airstrikes and artillery fire against targets throughout the devastated territory. More than 400 have been killed and hundreds more injured, according to Palestinian authorities.

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Why has Israel resumed large-scale strikes on Gaza?

Injured Palestinians mourn beside the body of a baby, who was killed in an Israeli strike, at the Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahia, in the northern Gaza Strip yesterday. Photo: AFP

Israel has resumed large-scale attacks in Gaza with a wave of airstrikes and artillery fire against targets throughout the devastated territory. More than 400 have been killed and hundreds more injured, according to Palestinian authorities.

The casualties include some high-ranking Hamas officials and many civilians, including women and children. Hospitals and civil defence teams say they have been overwhelmed.

Israel has also issued evacuation orders for parts of northern and central Gaza close to the perimeter, suggesting that some kind of attack involving troops on the ground is imminent. Hundreds, possibly thousands, of Palestinians in the territory who have only recently returned to their homes, often in ruins, are on the move again.

Why is it happening now?

The Israeli government has been threatening to launch an offensive for weeks. Israeli officials say targeting the Hamas leadership, which has re-emerged in recent weeks to again take control of Gaza, will bring about the release of more hostages. Many hostage families in Israel dispute this.

More practically, Israel now has capabilities it lacked six weeks ago. Ammunition stocks have been replenished – partly due to US deliveries – and new potential targets among Hamas' leaders identified. Planes and other equipment have been repaired. Troops have been rested.

What does this mean for the ceasefire?

The new offensive comes 16 days after the first of three phases of a ceasefire agreed in January ended. The three phases were supposed to lead to a definitive end to the war, a total Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and the release of all remaining Israeli hostages held by Hamas.

Indirect talks to prevent a return to violence have stalled. Israel has proposed extending the first phase of the ceasefire by 30 to 60 days to allow for the release of more hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners. Hamas has refused this.

What reasons are being cited for the new strikes?

Critics says Netanyahu never had any intention of moving to the second phase of the ceasefire, which would have meant Israeli forces withdrawing from Gaza, in effect leaving Hamas as its de facto ruler. Hamas has reasserted its control in recent weeks, humanitarian officials there say, with civilian officials returning to previous posts and the battered military wing finding thousands of new recruits.

A second reason cited is that Israel had the full backing of the Trump administration for renewed attacks against Hamas.

Then there are the domestic political factors. Netanyahu needs support from rightwing allies to win crucial votes in Israel's parliament in coming days and weeks, and to maintain his grip on power. These allies have fiercely opposed a permanent end to hostilities in Gaza, with one resigning from his ministerial post in protest at the January ceasefire. This vital support is now assured – at least in the short term.

Netanyahu is also on trial for corruption. If found guilty, he could face prison. On Tuesday, a court approved Netanyahu's request not to appear at a hearing on Tuesday "due to the renewal of the war", Israeli media reported.

What might happen next?

The grim reality is that the fragile two-month pause in hostilities between Israel and Hamas is now over. Israeli officials have made clear that the strikes are merely the beginning of a potentially much broader offensive that will continue until Hamas releases the 59 Israeli hostages still held in Gaza.

However, the move will not be welcomed by Egypt, which played a key role in the ceasefire negotiations, as well as Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

"The entire region is on the brink of something," said an al Jazeera correspondent, "Clearly, this humiliation of [Egyptian] President [Abdel Fattah] el-Sisi cannot go by with total impunity."​

 

[Saif]

Israeli strikes kill 413 in Gaza

Israel vowed on Tuesday to continue fighting in Gaza until all hostages are returned as it unleashed its most intense strikes since a ceasefire, with the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory reporting more than 400 people killed.

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Israeli strikes kill 413 in Gaza
Agence France-Presse . Gaza City 19 March, 2025, 00:04

Palestinian youths salvage items from the destroyed house of the Qrayqea family in the Shujaiya district in eastern Gaza City on Tuesday following Israeli strikes at dawn. | AFP photo

Israel vowed on Tuesday to continue fighting in Gaza until all hostages are returned as it unleashed its most intense strikes since a ceasefire, with the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory reporting more than 400 people killed.

Hamas accused Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu of deciding to ‘resume war’ after an impasse in truce negotiations, and warned that the return to fighting could be a ‘death sentence’ for hostages still alive in Gaza.

The strikes were by far the biggest and deadliest since a truce took effect in January. Hamas has not responded to the strikes so far.

Netanyahu warned Hamas this month of consequences it ‘cannot imagine’ if it does not free hostages still in Gaza, and Israeli media reported on plans aimed at ramping up pressure on Hamas dubbed the ‘Hell Plan’.

The White House said Israel consulted US president Donald Trump’s administration before launching the wave of strikes, which the health ministry in Gaza said killed mostly women and children.

Netanyahu’s office said the operation was ordered after ‘Hamas’s repeated refusal to release our hostages, as well as its rejection of all of the proposals it has received from US Presidential Envoy Steve Witkoff and from the mediators’.

‘Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength,’ the statement said.

‘We will not stop fighting as long as the hostages are not returned home and all our war aims are not achieved,’ defence minister Israel Katz said.

Apart from the release of the remaining hostages, Israel’s other main war aim is to crush Hamas.

In a statement, Hamas said Israel had ‘decided to overturn the ceasefire agreement’.

‘Netanyahu’s decision to resume war is a decision to sacrifice the occupation’s prisoners and impose a death sentence on them,’ it said.

Hamas said the head of its government in Gaza, Essam al-Dalis, was among several officials killed in the strikes.

A Hamas official said the group was ‘working with mediators’ to stop the bombardment, while the movement blamed what it described as ‘unlimited’ US support for Israel for the deadly strikes.

In Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip, AFP footage showed people rushing stretchers with wounded people, including young children, to the Nasser Hospital. Bodies covered with white sheets were also taken to the hospital’s mortuary.

Mohammed Jarghoun, 36, was sleeping in a tent near his destroyed house in Khan Yunis when he was woken by huge blasts.

‘I thought they were dreams and nightmares, but I saw a fire in my relatives’ house. More than 20 martyrs and wounded, most of them children and women.’

Ramez Alammarin, 25, described carrying children to hospital southeast of Gaza City.

‘They unleashed the fire of hell again on Gaza,’ he said of Israel, adding that ‘bodies and limbs are on the ground, and the wounded cannot find any doctor to treat them.’

Families of Israeli hostages in Gaza pleaded with Netanyahu to ‘stop the killing and disappearance’ of their loved ones, and called for a protest in front of the premier’s residence.

Brokered by Qatar, Egypt and the United States, the initial phase of the ceasefire took effect on January 19, largely halting more than 15 months of fighting in Gaza triggered by Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

That first phase ended in early March, and the two sides have been unable to agree on the next steps.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said the bodies of 413 people had been received by Gaza hospitals.

‘A number of victims are still under the rubble and work is underway to recover them,’ it added.

Israel ordered all schools near the Gaza border to shut for fear of attack.

US envoy Witkoff told CNN on Sunday he had offered a ‘bridge proposal’ that would see five living hostages, including Israeli-American Edan Alexander, released in return for freeing a ‘substantial amount of Palestinian prisoners’ from Israel jails.

Hamas had said it was ready to free Alexander and the remains of four others.

Witkoff said Hamas had provided ‘an unacceptable response’ and that ‘the opportunity is closing fast’.

During the first phase of the truce, Hamas released 33 hostages, including eight deceased, and Israel freed around 1,800 Palestinian detainees.

Since then, Hamas has consistently demanded negotiations for the second phase.

Former US president Joe Biden had outlined a second phase which would involve the release of remaining living hostages, the withdrawal of all Israeli forces left in Gaza and the establishment of a lasting ceasefire.

Israel, however, seeks to extend the first phase until mid-April, insisting any transition to the second phase must include ‘the total demilitarisation’ of Gaza and the removal of Hamas.

The talks have been deadlocked, and Israel has cut aid and electricity to the territory.

Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack resulted in 1,218 deaths on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, while before the overnight strikes, Israel’s retaliatory response in Gaza had killed at least 48,577 people, also mostly civilians, according to figures from the two sides.

Of the 251 hostages seized during the attack, 58 are still held in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.

UN chief Antonio Guterres was ‘shocked’ by the renewed strikes, a spokeswoman said, while UN rights chief Volker Turk said he was ‘horrified’.

Both Russia and China warned against an escalation, while Egypt and Turkey condemned the violence.​