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

[Saif]

Israeli strikes kill 43 including children at a water distribution point

Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli air strikes on Sunday killed more than 40 Palestinians, including children at a water distribution point

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Israeli strikes kill 43 including children at a water distribution point
AFP Gaza, Palestine
Published: 14 Jul 2025, 09: 38

Two Palestinians stand on the roof of a building as smoke billows following Israeli strikes on Jabalia, in the northern Gaza Strip on July 13, 2025.

Delegations from Israel and the Palestinian militant Hamas group have now spent a week trying to agree on a temporary truce to halt 21 months of devastating fighting in the Gaza Strip. AFP

Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli air strikes on Sunday killed more than 40 Palestinians, including children at a water distribution point, as talks for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas stalled.

Delegations from Israel and the Palestinian militant group have now spent a week trying to agree on a temporary truce to halt 21 months of devastating fighting in the Gaza Strip.

On the ground, civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said eight children were among the 10 victims of a drone strike at a water point.

Israel's military blamed it on a "technical error" when targeting a militant in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, adding "the munition fell dozens of meters from the target".

Washington is Israel's top ally and Donald Trump has been pushing for a ceasefire, with the US president saying Sunday he was hopeful of a deal.

But there was no immediate sign an end to the fighting was near. Strikes across the Palestinian territory on Sunday killed at least 43 people, including 11 at a Gaza City market, Bassal said.

In Nuseirat, resident Khaled Rayyan told AFP he was woken by the sound of two large explosions.

"Our neighbour and his children were under the rubble" of a house hit, he said.

Another resident, Mahmud al-Shami, called on the negotiators to secure a ceasefire deal.

"What happened to us has never happened in the entire history of humanity," he said. "Enough."

Targets

The Israeli military, which has recently intensified operations across Gaza, said that in the past 24 hours the air force "struck more than 150 terror targets".

It released aerial footage of what it said were fighter jet strikes attacking Hamas targets around Beit Hanoun, in northern Gaza, showing explosions on the ground and thick smoke in the sky.

Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify tolls and details provided by the civil defence agency and other parties.

The war was sparked by Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which led to 1,219 deaths, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Of the 251 people taken hostage by militants that day, 49 are still held in Gaza, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead.

Hamas-run Gaza's health ministry says that at least 58,026 Palestinians, most of them civilians, have been killed in Israel's retaliatory campaign. The United Nations considers those figures reliable.

UN agencies on Saturday warned that fuel shortages had reached "critical levels", threatening to worsen conditions for Gaza's more than two million people.

"Only 150,000 litres of fuel have been allowed in over the past few days -- an amount that covers less than one day's needs," the head of the Palestinian NGOs Network in Gaza, Amjad Shawa, told AFP on Sunday. "We require 275,000 litres of fuel per day to meet basic needs."

Forced displacement fears

Talks in the Qatari capital Doha to seal a 60-day ceasefire and hostage release were in the balance on Saturday after Israel and Hamas accused each other of trying to block a deal.

Despite the deadlock, Trump said "hopefully we're going to get that straightened out over the next week", speaking to reporters Sunday as he echoed similarly optimistic comments he made 4 July.

Hamas wants the complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, but a Palestinian source with knowledge of the talks said Israel had presented plans to maintain troops in more than 40 percent of the territory.

The source said Israel wanted to force hundreds of thousands of Palestinians into the south of Gaza "in preparation for forcibly displacing them to Egypt or other countries".

A senior Israeli official said Israel had demonstrated an openness "to flexibility in the negotiations, while Hamas remains intransigent, clinging to positions that prevent the mediators from advancing an agreement".

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he is prepared to enter talks for a more lasting end to hostilities once a temporary truce is agreed, but only if Hamas disarms.

Netanyahu on Sunday evening faced renewed pressure to secure the release of all hostages when protesters beamed images of captives onto buildings near his Jerusalem office.

"The absolute majority want a deal even (at the cost of) ending the fighting," Yotam Cohen, whose brother Nimrod is still being held, told AFP.​

 

[Saif]

Deadlocked Gaza truce talks limp on, US hopes for deal

Stuttering Gaza ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas entered a second week on Monday, with US president Donald Trump still hopeful of a breakthrough and as more than 20 people were killed on the ground.

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Deadlocked Gaza truce talks limp on, US hopes for deal
Agence France-Presse . Jerusalem 15 July, 2025, 00:14

Children queue with pots to receive meals from a charity kitchen in Gaza City on Monday. | AFP photo

Stuttering Gaza ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas entered a second week on Monday, with US president Donald Trump still hopeful of a breakthrough and as more than 20 people were killed on the ground.

The indirect negotiations in the Qatari capital, Doha, appeared deadlocked at the weekend after both sides blamed the other for blocking a deal for a 60-day ceasefire and the release of hostages.

In Gaza, the Palestinian territory’s civil defence agency said at least 22 people were killed in the latest Israeli strikes on Monday in and around Gaza City, and Khan Yunis in the south.

One strike on a tent in Khan Yunis on Sunday killed the parents and three brothers of a young Gazan boy, who only survived as he was outside getting water, the boy’s uncle said.

Belal al-Adlouni called for revenge for ‘every drop of blood’ saying it ‘will not be forgotten and will not die with the passage of time, nor with displacement or with death’.

AFP reporters in southern Israel meanwhile saw large plumes of smoke in northern Gaza, where the military said fighter jets had pounded Hamas targets over the weekend.

Trump, who met Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington last week, is keen to secure a truce in the 21-month war, which was sparked by Hamas’s deadly October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

‘Gaza — we are talking and hopefully we’re going to get that straightened out over the next week,’ he told reporters late on Sunday, echoing similarly optimistic comments he made on July 4.

A Palestinian source with knowledge of the talks said on Saturday that Hamas rejected Israeli proposals to keep troops in over 40 per cent of Gaza and plans to move Palestinians into an enclave on the border with Egypt.

In response, a senior Israeli political official accused Hamas of inflexibility and trying to deliberately scupper the talks by ‘clinging to positions that prevent the mediators from advancing an agreement’.

Israel’s foreign minister Gideon Saar and the Palestinian minister of state for foreign affairs Varsen Aghabekian Shahin headed to Brussels on Monday for talks between the EU and its Mediterranean neighbours.

But the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority denied media reports that any meeting between the two was on the agenda.

In Israel, Netanyahu has said he would be ready to enter talks for a more lasting ceasefire when a deal for a temporary truce is agreed and only when Hamas lays down its weapons.

But he is under pressure to quickly wrap up the war, with military casualties mounting and with public frustration both at the continued captivity of the hostages and a perceived lack of progress in the conflict.

Politically, his fragile governing coalition is holding, for now, but Netanyahu is seen as beholden to a minority of far-right ministers in prolonging an increasingly unpopular conflict.

He also faces a backlash over the feasibility and ethics of a plan to build a so-called ‘humanitarian city’ from scratch in southern Gaza to house displaced Palestinians if and when a ceasefire takes hold.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees has described the proposed facility as a ‘concentration camp’ and Israel’s own security establishment is reported to be unhappy at the plan.

Israeli media said the costs were discussed at a security cabinet meeting at the prime minister’s office on Sunday night, just hours before his latest court appearance in a long-running corruption trial on Monday.

Hamas’s attacks on Israel in 2023 resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

A total of 251 hostages were taken that day, of which 49 are still being held, including 27 that the Israeli military says are dead.

Israel’s military reprisals have killed 58,026 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.​

 

[Saif]

UN says 875 Palestinians have been killed near Gaza aid sites

The U.N. rights office said on Tuesday it had recorded at least 875 killings within the past six weeks at aid points in Gaza run by the U.S.- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation and convoys run by other relief groups, including the United Nations. The majority of those killed were in t

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UN says 875 Palestinians have been killed near Gaza aid sites

REUTERS
Published :
Jul 15, 2025 16:46
Updated :
Jul 15, 2025 16:46

A general view shows destruction in North Gaza, as seen from Israel, May 27, 2025. Photo : REUTERS/Amir Cohen/Files

The U.N. rights office said on Tuesday it had recorded at least 875 killings within the past six weeks at aid points in Gaza run by the U.S.- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation and convoys run by other relief groups, including the United Nations.

The majority of those killed were in the vicinity of Gaza Humanitarian Foundation sites, while the remaining 201 were killed on the routes of other aid convoys.

The GHF uses private U.S. security and logistics companies to get supplies into Gaza, largely bypassing a U.N.-led system that Israel alleges has let Hamas-led militants loot aid shipments intended for civilians. Hamas denies the allegation.

The GHF, which began distributing food packages in Gaza in late May after Israel lifted an 11-week aid blockade, previously told Reuters that such incidents have not occurred on its sites and accused the U.N. of misinformation, which it denies.

The GHF did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the latest UN figures.

“The data we have is based on our own information gathering through various reliable sources, including medical human rights and humanitarian organizations,” Thameen Al-Kheetan, a spokesperson for the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, told reporters in Geneva.

The United Nations has called the GHF aid model “inherently unsafe” and a violation of humanitarian impartiality standards.

The GHF said on Friday it had delivered more than 70 million meals to Gaza Palestinians in five weeks, and that other humanitarian groups had “nearly all of their aid looted” by Hamas or criminal gangs.

The Israeli army previously told Reuters in a statement that it was reviewing recent mass casualties and that it had sought to minimise friction between Palestinians and the Israel Defence Forces by installing fences and signs and opening additional routes.

The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has previously cited instances of violent pillaging of aid, and the U.N. World Food Programme said last week that most trucks carrying food assistance into Gaza had been intercepted by “hungry civilian communities”.​

 

[Saif]

Crush at Gaza aid site kills at least 20, GHF blames armed agitators

19 people were trampled and one fatally stabbed during the crush at one of its centres in Khan Younis in southern Gaza.

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Crush at Gaza aid site kills at least 20, GHF blames armed agitators
Reuters Cairo/Jerusalem
Published: 16 Jul 2025, 21: 10

People carry a body as they mourn Palestinians who were killed in an incident on Wednesday while seeking aid in Khan Younis, at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on 16 July, 2025. Reuters

At least 20 Palestinians were killed on Wednesday at an aid distribution site run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in what the US-backed group said was a crowd surge instigated by armed agitators.

The GHF, which is supported by Israel, said 19 people were trampled and one fatally stabbed during the crush at one of its centres in Khan Younis in southern Gaza.

"We have credible reason to believe that elements within the crowd – armed and affiliated with Hamas – deliberately fomented the unrest," GHF said in a statement.

Hamas rejected the GHF allegation as "false and misleading", saying GHF guards and Israeli soldiers sprayed people with pepper gas and opened fire.

GHF said Hamas' account was "blatantly false".

"At no point was tear gas deployed, nor were shots fired into the crowd. Limited use of pepper spray was deployed, only to safeguard additional loss of life," GHF said in a written response to Reuters via e-mail.

"Today’s incident is part of a larger pattern of Hamas trying to undermine and ultimately end GHF. It is no coincidence that this incident occurred during ceasefire negotiations, where Hamas continues to demand that GHF cease operations."

Witnesses told Reuters that guards at the site sprayed pepper gas at them after they had locked the gates to the centre, trapping them between the gates and the outer wire-fence.

“People kept gathering and pressuring each other; when people pushed each other...those who couldn’t stand fell under the people and were crushed," said eyewitness Mahmoud Fojo, 21, who was hurt in the stampede.

"Some people started jumping over the netted fence and got wounded. We were injured, and God saved us. We were under the people and we said the Shahada (death prayers). We thought we were dying, finished," he added.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli army on Hamas and eyewitness accounts.

Palestinian health officials told Reuters that 21 people had died of suffocation at the site. One medic said lots of people had been crammed into a small space and had been crushed.

On Tuesday, the UN rights office in Geneva said it had recorded at least 875 killings, opens new tab within the past six weeks in the vicinity of aid sites and food convoys in Gaza - the majority of them close to GHF distribution points.

Most of those deaths were caused by gunfire that locals have blamed on the Israeli military. The military has acknowledged that Palestinian civilians were harmed near aid distribution centres, saying that Israeli forces had been issued new instructions with "lessons learned".

The GHF uses private US security and logistics companies to get supplies into Gaza, largely bypassing a U.N.-led system that Israel alleges has let Hamas-led militants loot aid shipments intended for civilians. Hamas denies the accusation.

The UN has called the GHF’s model unsafe and a breach of humanitarian impartiality standards - an allegation GHF has denied.

Amjad Al-Shawa, director of the Palestinian NGOs Network, accused the GHF on Wednesday of gross mismanagement.

"People who flock in their thousands (to GHF sites) are hungry and exhausted, and they get squeezed into narrow places, amid shortages of aid and the absence of organization and discipline by the GHF," he told Reuters.

The war in Gaza, triggered in October 2023 by a deadly Hamas attack on Israel, has displaced almost all of the territory's population and led to widespread hunger and privation.

Israeli army road

Earlier on Wednesday, the Israeli military said it had finished paving a new road in southern Gaza separating several towns east of Khan Younis from the rest of the territory in an effort to disrupt Hamas operations.

Palestinians see the road, which extends Israeli control, as a way to put pressure on Hamas in ongoing ceasefire talks, which started on July 6 and are being brokered by Arab mediators Egypt and Qatar with the backing of the United States.

Palestinian sources close to the negotiations said a breakthrough had not yet been reached on any of the main issues.

Hamas said it rejected an Israeli demand to keep at least 40 per cent of Gaza under its control as part of any deal. Hamas also demanded the dismantlement of the GHF and the reinstatement of a UN-led aid delivery mechanism.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the war will end once Hamas is disarmed and removed from Gaza.

Gaza local health authorities said Israeli military strikes have killed at least 87 people across the enclave in the past 24 hours.

Israel's campaign in Gaza has killed more than 58,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities.

Almost 1,650 Israelis and foreign nationals have been killed as a result of the conflict, including 1,200 killed in the 7 October, 2023, Hamas attack, by Israeli tallies.​

 

[Saif]

Israeli strike on Gaza’s only Catholic church kills two

An Israeli strike on Gaza’s only Catholic church killed two people on Thursday, the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem said, as Israel said it ‘never targets’ religious sites and regretted any harm to civilians.

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Israeli strike on Gaza’s only Catholic church kills two
Agence France-Presse . Gaza City 18 July, 2025, 01:48

AFP photo

An Israeli strike on Gaza’s only Catholic church killed two people on Thursday, the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem said, as Israel said it ‘never targets’ religious sites and regretted any harm to civilians.

Pope Leo XIV said he was ‘deeply saddened’ by the attack, which came as Gaza’s civil defence agency reported that Israeli strikes across the Palestinian territory killed at least 20 people.

‘With deep sorrow the Latin Patriarchate can now confirm that two persons were killed as a result of an apparent strike by the Israeli army that hit the Holy Family Compound this morning,’ it said in a statement.

‘We pray for the rest of their souls and for the end of this barbaric war. Nothing can justify the targeting of innocent civilians.’ Gaza civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said ‘two citizens from the Christian community’ were killed in an Israeli strike on the church in Gaza City, with which the late Pope Francis kept regular contact through the war.

AFP photographs showed the wounded being treated in a tented area at Gaza City’s Al-Ahli Hospital, also known as the Baptist Hospital, with parish priest Father Gabriel Romanelli with a bandage around his lower leg. Some of the wounded arrived on stretchers, with one man wearing an oxygen mask.

The patriarchate, which has jurisdiction for Catholics in Israel, the Palestinian Territories, Jordan and Cyprus, condemned the strike and said it ‘destroyed large parts of the complex’.

‘Targeting a holy site currently sheltering approximately 600 displaced persons, the majority of whom are children and 54 with special needs, is a flagrant violation of human dignity and a blatant violation of the sanctity of life and the sanctity of religious sites, which are supposed to provide a safe haven in times of war,’ it said.

Israel expressed ‘deep sorrow’ over the damage and civilian casualties, adding that the military was investigating.

‘Israel never targets churches or religious sites and regrets any harm to a religious site or to uninvolved civilians,’ the foreign ministry said on X.

Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni said attacks on civilians in Gaza were ‘unacceptable’ while her foreign minister Antonio Tajani called the church attack ‘a serious act against a Christian place of worship’.

Out of the Gaza Strip’s population of more than two million, about 1,000 are Christians. Most of them are Orthodox but according to the Latin Patriarchate, there are about 135 Catholics in the territory.

Since the early days of the war which erupted in October 2023, members of the Catholic community have been sheltering at the Holy Family Compound in Gaza City, where some Orthodox Christians have also found refuge.

Pope Francis repeatedly called for an end to the war and in his final Easter message, a day before his death on April 21, he condemned the ‘deplorable humanitarian situation’ in the Palestinian territory.

Monsignor Pascal Gollnisch, the head of Catholic charity l’Oeuvre d’Orient, said the raid was ‘totally unacceptable’.

‘It is a place of worship. It is a Catholic church known for its peaceful attitude, for being a peacemaker. These are people who are at the service of the population,’ he said.

‘There was no strategic objective, there were no jihadists in this church. There were families, there were civilians. This is totally unacceptable and we condemn in the strongest possible terms this attitude on the part of Israel.’

More than 21 months of war have created dire humanitarian conditions for Gaza’s population, displacing most residents at least once and triggering severe shortages of food and other essentials.

The war was triggered by a Hamas attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Israel’s retaliatory military offensive has killed at least 58,573 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.

Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defence agency and other parties.​

 

[Saif]

At least 32 killed by Israeli fire while seeking aid in Gaza, hospital says

At least 32 people were killed by Israeli fire while they were on their way to an aid distribution site in Gaza at dawn on Saturday, according to the Gaza Health Ministry and Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis. The Israeli military said it had fired warning shots at suspects who approached its troops

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At least 32 killed by Israeli fire while seeking aid in Gaza, hospital says

REUTERS
Published :
Jul 19, 2025 18:29
Updated :
Jul 19, 2025 18:29

Mourners react next to a body during the funeral of Palestinians killed in an early morning Israeli strike, according to medics, at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, July 19, 2025. Photo : REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa

At least 32 people were killed by Israeli fire while they were on their way to an aid distribution site in Gaza at dawn on Saturday, according to the Gaza Health Ministry and Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis.

The Israeli military said it had fired warning shots at suspects who approached its troops after they did not heed calls to stop, about a kilometre away from an aid distribution site that was not active at the time.

Gaza resident Mohammed al-Khalidi said he was in the group approaching the site and heard no warnings before the firing began. “We thought they came out to organise us so we can get aid, suddenly (I) saw the jeeps coming from one side, and the tanks from the other and started shooting at us,” he said.

The Gaza Humanitarian Fund, a US-backed group which runs the aid site, said there were no incidents or fatalities there on Saturday and that it has repeatedly warned people not to travel to its distribution points at dark.

“The reported IDF (Israel defence Forces) activity resulting in fatalities occurred hours before our sites opened and our understanding is most of the casualties occurred several kilometres away from the nearest GHF site,” it said.

The Israeli military said it was reviewing the incident.

DEATHS NEAR AID SITES

GHF uses private US security and logistics companies to get supplies into Gaza, largely bypassing a UN-led system that Israel alleges has let Hamas-led militants loot aid shipments intended for civilians. Hamas denies the accusation.

The UN has called the GHF’s model unsafe and a breach of humanitarian impartiality standards, which GHF denies.

On Tuesday, the UN rights office in Geneva said it had recorded at least 875 killings within the past six weeks in the vicinity of aid sites and food convoys in Gaza - the majority of them close to GHF distribution points.

Most of those deaths were caused by gunfire that locals have blamed on the Israeli military. The military has acknowledged that civilians were harmed, saying that Israeli forces had been issued new instructions with “lessons learned”.

Smoke billowed over the embattled southern Syrian city of Sweida on Friday, following nearly a week of bloodshed that has killed more than 300 people.

At least 18 more people were killed in other Israeli attacks across Gaza on Saturday, health officials said. The Israeli military said that it had struck militants’ weapon depots and sniping posts in a few locations in the enclave.

The war began when Hamas-led militants stormed into Israel on October 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people, mostly civilians and taking 251 hostages back to Gaza.

The Israeli military campaign against Hamas in Gaza has since killed around 58,000 Palestinians, most of them civilians according to health officials, displaced almost the entire population and plunged the enclave into a humanitarian crisis, leaving much of the territory in ruins.

Israel and Hamas are engaged in indirect talks in Qatar aimed at reaching a 60-day ceasefire though there has been no sign of any imminent breakthrough.​

 

[Saif]

Israel’s enduring pursuit of Palestinian disunity

ISRAEL is aggressively implementing plans to shape Palestine’s future and the broader region, sculpting its vision for the ‘day after’ its genocide in Gaza...

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Israel’s enduring pursuit of Palestinian disunity
Ramzy Baroud 20 July, 2025, 00:00

Counter Punch/Dylan Shaw

ISRAEL is aggressively implementing plans to shape Palestine’s future and the broader region, sculpting its vision for the ‘day after’ its genocide in Gaza.

The latest, bizarre iteration of this strategy proposes fragmenting the occupied West Bank into so-called ‘emirates,’ starting with the ‘emirate of Hebron.’

This unexpected twist in Israel’s protracted search for alternative Palestinian leadership first surfaced in the staunchly pro-Israeli US newspaper, the Wall Street Journal. It then quickly dominated all Israeli media.

The report details a letter from a person identified by the WSJ as ‘the leader of Hebron’s most influential clan.’ Addressed to Nir Barakat, Jerusalem’s former Israeli mayor, the letter from Sheikh Wadee’ al-Jaabari appeals for ‘cooperation with Israel’ in the name of ‘co-existence.’

This ‘co-existence,’ according to the ‘clan leader’, would materialize in the ‘Emirate of Hebron.’ This ‘emirate’ would ‘recognize the State of Israel as the nation state of the Jewish people,’ in exchange for reciprocal recognition of the ‘Emirate of Hebron as the Representative of the Arab residents in the Hebron District.’

The story may seem perplexing. This is because Palestinian discourse, regardless of geography or political affiliation, has never entertained such an absurd concept as united West Bank ‘emirates.’

Another element of absurdity is that Palestinian national identity and pride in their people’s unwavering resilience, especially in Gaza, are at an unprecedented apex. To float such clan-based alternatives to legitimate Palestinian leadership seems ill-conceived and is destined to fail.

Israel’s desperation is palpable. In Gaza, it cannot defeat Hamas and other Palestinian factions who have resisted the Israeli takeover of the Strip for 21 months. All attempts to engineer an alternative Palestinian leadership there have utterly collapsed.

This failure has compelled Israel to arm and fund a criminal gang that operated before October 7, 2023, in Gaza. This gang functions under the command of Yasser Abu Shabab.

The gang has been implicated in a litany of violent activities. These include hijacking humanitarian aid to perpetuate famine in Gaza and orchestrating violence associated with aid distribution, among other egregious crimes.

Like the clan leader of Hebron, the Abu Shabab criminal gang possesses no legitimacy and no public support among Palestinians. But why would Israel resort to such disreputable figures when the Palestinian Authority, already engaged in ‘security coordination’ with Israel in the West Bank, is ostensibly willing to comply?

The answer lies in the current Israeli extremist government’s adamant refusal to acknowledge Palestinians as a nation. Thus, even a collaborating Palestinian nationalist entity would be deemed problematic from an Israeli perspective.

While Benjamin Netanyahu’s government is not the first Israeli leadership to explore clan-based alternatives among Palestinians, the Israeli prime minister and his extremist allies are exceptionally determined to dismantle any Palestinian claim to nationhood. This was explicitly stated by extremist Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich. He famously declared in Paris, in March 2023, that a Palestinian nation is an ‘invention.’

Thus, despite the Palestinian Authority’s willingness to cooperate with Israel in controlling Gaza, Israel remains apprehensive. Empowering the PA as a nationalist model fundamentally contravenes Israel’s overarching objectives of denying the Palestinian people their very claim to nationhood and, consequently, statehood and sovereignty.

Though Israel has consistently failed to establish and sustain its own alternative Palestinian leadership, its repeated efforts have invariably proven disruptive and violent.

Prior to the Nakba of 1948, the Zionist movement, alongside British authorities colonizing Palestine, heavily invested in undermining the Arab Higher Committee, a nationalist body comprising several political parties. They achieved this by empowering collaborating clans, hoping to dilute the Palestinian nationalist movement.

When Israel occupied the remainder of historic Palestine in 1967, it reverted to the same divide-and-conquer tactics. For instance, it established a Palestinian police force directly commanded by Israeli military administrations, in addition to creating an underground network of collaborators.

Following the overwhelming victory of nationalist candidates in the 1976 elections in occupied Palestine, Israel responded by cracking down on PLO-affiliated politicians, arresting, deporting and assassinating some.

Two years later, in 1978, it launched its ‘Village Leagues’ project. It hand-picked compliant traditional figures, designating them as the legitimate representatives of Palestinians.

These individuals, armed, protected and financed by the Israeli occupation army, were positioned to represent their respective clans in Hebron, Bethlehem, Ramallah, Gaza and elsewhere.

Palestinians immediately denounced them as collaborators. They were widely boycotted and socially ostracized.

Eventually, it became evident that Israel had no alternative but to engage directly with the PLO. This culminated in the Oslo Accords in 1993 and the subsequent formation of the Palestinian Authority.

The fundamental problem, however, persisted: the Palestinian Authority’s insistence on a Palestinian state remains anathema to an Israel that has shifted dramatically to the right.

This explains Netanyahu’s government’s unwavering insistence that the PA has no role in Gaza in any ‘day after’ scenario. While the Palestinian Authority could serve Israel’s interest in containing the rebellious Strip, such a triumph would inevitably recenter the discussion of a Palestinian state — a concept repugnant to most Israelis.

There is no doubt that neither the Abu Shabab gang nor the Hebron emirate will govern Palestinians, either in Gaza or the West Bank. Israel’s insistence on fabricating these alternatives, however, underscores its historic determination to deny Palestinians any sense of nationhood.

Israel’s persistent fantasies of control invariably fail. Despite their profound wounds, Palestinians are more unified than ever, their collective identity and nationhood hardened by relentless resistance and countless sacrifices.

CounterPunch.org, July 18. Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the editor of The Palestine Chronicle.​

 

[Saif]

Israeli fire kills 39 near two aid centres: Gaza civil defence

Gaza's civil defence agency said on Saturday that Israeli fire killed 39 people and wounded more than 100 near two aid centres, in the latest deaths of Palestinians seeking food.

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Israeli fire kills 39 near two aid centres: Gaza civil defence
AFP Gaza City
Published: 20 Jul 2025, 12: 24

Palestinians transport casualties of an Israeli strike on an apartment at the Nuseirat refugee camp, into Al-Awda hospital in the central Gaza Strip on 19 July, 2025. AFP

Gaza's civil defence agency said on Saturday that Israeli fire killed 39 people and wounded more than 100 near two aid centres, in the latest deaths of Palestinians seeking food.

Deaths of people waiting for handouts in huge crowds near food points in Gaza have become a regular occurrence, with the territory's authorities frequently blaming Israeli fire.

But the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which has replaced UN agencies as the main distributor of aid in the territory, has accused militant group Hamas of fomenting unrest and shooting at civilians.

Civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said the deaths happened near a site southwest of Khan Yunis and another centre northwest of Rafah, both in southern Gaza, attributing the fatalities to "Israeli gunfire".

One witness said he headed to the Al-Tina area of Khan Yunis before dawn with five of his relatives to try to get food when "Israeli soldiers" started shooting.

"My relatives and I were unable to get anything," Abdul Aziz Abed, 37, told AFP. "Every day I go there and all we get is bullets and exhaustion instead of food."

Three other witnesses also accused troops of opening fire.

'Warning shots

In response, the Israeli military said it "identified suspects who approached them during operational activity in the Rafah area, posing a threat to the troops".

Soldiers called for them to turn back and "after they did not comply, the troops fired warning shots", it said, adding that it was aware of the reports about casualties.

"The incident is under review. The shots were fired approximately one kilometre (more than half a mile) away from the aid distribution site at nighttime when it's not active," it said in a statement.

GHF said reports of deaths near its sites were "false".

"We have repeatedly warned aid-seekers not to travel to our sites overnight and early morning hours," it wrote on X.

An elderly woman holds out an empty pot at a food distribution point in the Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on 19 July, 2025. AFP

Elsewhere, the civil defence agency reported that an Israeli strike on a house near Nuseirat, in central Gaza, killed 12 people, the latest in a series of deadly bombardments.

Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify tolls and details provided by the civil defence agency and other parties.

The war in Gaza, sparked by militant group Hamas's deadly attack on Israel on 7 October, 2023, has created dire humanitarian conditions for the more than two million people who live in the coastal territory.

Most people have been displaced at least once by the fighting, and doctors and aid agencies say they were seeing the physical and mental health effects of 21 months of war, including more acute malnutrition.

The World Food Programme said nearly one in three people in Gaza were not eating for days at a stretch and "thousands" were "on the verge of catastrophic hunger".

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, on Saturday said it had enough food for all of Gaza for more than three months but it was stockpiled in warehouses and blocked from being delivered.

The free flow of aid into Gaza is a key demand of Hamas in indirect negotiations with Israel for a 60-day ceasefire in the war, alongside a full Israeli military withdrawal.

'Agitators'

After a more than two-month Israeli aid blockade, GHF took over the running of aid distribution in late May, despite criticism from the United Nations which previously coordinated handouts, that it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives.

GHF acknowledged for the first time that 20 people died at its Khan Yunis site on Wednesday but blamed "agitators in the crowd... armed and affiliated with Hamas" for creating "a chaotic and dangerous surge" and firing at aid-seekers.

The previous day, the UN said it had recorded 875 people killed in Gaza while trying to get food, including 674 "in the vicinity of GHF sites", since it began operating.

Hamas's 2023 attack on Israel led to the deaths of 1,219 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Israel's retaliatory military action has killed 58,765 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.​