Analysis

Palestinian Authority pursuing West Bank terrorists to impress Trump, analysts say

Semi-autonomous body wishes to show US president-elect it is capable of governing a post-war Gaza; 11 people killed in last month’s clashes between PA forces and terror  groups

By AFP and ToI Staff

1 January 2025

A Palestinian Authority security officer clutches his gun amid a major raid against members of terror groups in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank, December 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)

The Palestinian Authority is determined to score a win against terrorists in the West Bank ahead of US-President elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, aiming to demonstrate its ability to control post-war Gaza, analysts told AFP.

The security forces of the PA, which exercises limited control over the West Bank, have been engaged in deadly clashes with gunmen since early December. The arrests of several terrorists triggered the skirmishes.

The PA forces are fighting members of the Jenin Battalion group, most of whom are affiliated with either Palestinian Islamic Jihad or Hamas, whose October 7, 2023 attack on Israel triggered war in the Gaza Strip.

The massacre saw terrorists invade Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping 251.

Hamas, which has been in power in Gaza since 2007 when it ousted the PA in a bloody coup, is the main political rival of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah party that dominates the PA.

Eleven people — including PA security personnel, terrorists and civilians —have been killed in the violence in Jenin refugee camp, a stronghold of armed groups in the northern West Bank and a frequent target of Israeli military raids.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas listens while then-US President Donald Trump makes a statement for the press before a meeting at the Palace Hotel during the 72nd United Nations General Assembly on September 20, 2017, in New York. (AFP/Brendan Smialowski)

“What is happening in Jenin is a crucial test for the Palestinian Authority, which is trying to assert its control and impose security in the region,” political analyst Khalil Shahin said.

An official with the Ramallah-based PA, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the operation in Jenin, said that Abbas “categorically rejects any mediation… and insists these militants surrender themselves and their weapons.”

Anwar Rajab, a spokesman for the PA’s security forces, said, “There will be no tolerance for this rogue group that operates outside the law.”

The intra-Palestinian clashes erupted amid a major raid by PA forces on the Jenin camp, which came after the December 5 arrest of a Jenin Battalion commander on charges of possessing weapons and illicit funds.

Armed Palestinian factions in Jenin and elsewhere portray themselves as a more effective resistance to Israel than the PA, which coordinates security matters with Israel.

Palestinian Authority security forces gather at the site of a protest against clashes with terror groups in the northern West Bank city of Jenin on December 16, 2024. (Jaafar Ashtiyeh/AFP)

Analysts say that in Jenin, the PA is trying to prove it can control the violence and demonstrate that it could bring stability to Gaza once the war is over.

Shahin said the PA was trying to “weather the storm” of the Gaza war, Israeli offensives and regional upheavals before Trump takes office in January.
‘Illusions’

“The PA hopes that, after Trump sees its ability to control Jenin, he will support it in governing Gaza after the war, unlike President Joe Biden,” Shahin said.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, however, has ruled out any role for the PA or Hamas in governing Gaza after the war ends.

During Trump’s first term, US relations with the PA rapidly deteriorated over what the Palestinians viewed as a series of moves to sideline them.

Trump broke with most of the world by moving the US embassy to Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. He also suspended aid to Palestinians and his “deal of the century” to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would have seen Israel annex 30 percent of the West Bank.

Hani al-Masri, director of the Palestinian Center for Policy Research and Strategic Studies, said the timing of the Jenin raid appeared to strategically coincide with the lead-up to Trump’s return to the White House, as well as the possibility of reaching a ceasefire in Gaza after nearly 15 months of war.

In an analysis piece for his institute, Masri warned against the “illusions” of trying to appease Trump or believing he would take a different approach in his second term.

The PA “believes it will be acceptable to the new Trump (presidency) if it lowers” its demands or opposition, Masri said.

Palestinian Authority security officers launch smoke grenades during clashes with Palestinians in the West Bank city of Jenin, December 16, 2024. (Nasser Ishtayeh/ Flash90)

While Hamas and Islamic Jihad accuse the PA of effectively serving Israeli interests, many fear a more intense outbreak of intra-Palestinian violence, against the backdrop of the ongoing war in Gaza and a surge in Israeli military raids and settler attacks in the West Bank.

Videos have circulated showing alleged abuses by Palestinian security forces, further increasing tensions between the rival camps of the PA and Hamas.

Hamas has condemned “grave violations” by the PA’s forces, while Fatah has denounced those who “legitimize chaos and anarchy.”

Palestinian Authority takes Al Jazeera off air after coverage of Jenin clashes


The Palestinian Authority on Wednesday suspended Al Jazeera broadcasts across the Palestinian territories, accusing the Qatar-based channel of “interference” in Palestine’s internal affairs. The suspension order came after Al Jazeera covered clashes between Palestinian security forces and resistance fighters in Jenin in the West Bank.


Issued on: 01/01/2025 - 
FRANCE24
By: NEWS WIRES

Pictures of slain al-Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh hang on the facade of the building housing the television station's office in Ramallah in the occupied West Bank after Israel issued a 45-day closure order on September 22, 2024. © Jaafar Ashtiyeh, AFP

The Palestinian Authority on Wednesday ordered the suspension of broadcasts by the Qatar-based Al Jazeera across the Palestinian territories, accusing the network of airing "inciting content", official media reported.

"The specialised ministerial committee, comprising the ministries of culture, interior and communications, has decided to suspend broadcasts and freeze all activities of Al Jazeera satellite channel and its office in Palestine," the official Wafa news agency said.

"The decision also includes temporarily freezing the work of all journalists, employees, crews and affiliated channels until their legal status is rectified due to Al Jazeera's violations of the laws and regulations in force in Palestine," the report said.

"This decision comes in response to Al Jazeera's insistence on broadcasting inciting content and reports characterised by misinformation, incitement, sedition and interference in Palestinian internal affairs," it added.

An Al Jazeera employee contacted by AFP confirmed that the network's office in Ramallah had received a suspension order on Wednesday.

Tensions between the network and the Fatah movement of Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas have risen in recent weeks due to the channel's coverage of clashes between Palestinian security forces and resistance fighters in Jenin.

The Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority's decision comes more than three months after Israeli forces raided the network's office in Ramallah.

The network is already banned from broadcasting from Israel amid a long-running feud with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's government, which has only worsened during the ongoing war in Gaza.

(AFP)

Israel carries out wave of arrests in West Bank as violence reaches record levels in 2024

Hundreds of settlers stormed Al-Aqsa complex on Wednesday in the latest in a series of Israeli provocations at the religious site over the past week.

The New Arab Staff
01 January, 2025


Israeli forces carried out waves of arrests in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday as the UN's humanitarian agency (OCHA) announced Israeli settler violence in the West Bank and East Jerusalem reached the highest levels on record in 2024.

According to the Palestinian Wafa news agency, Israeli forces arrested at least 22 Palestinians in a series of raids in various parts of the occupied West Bank.

Local sources said that eight people were detained in the Hebron area and nine were arrested in towns close to Salfit in the north of the territory. Another five were taken in a raid in a town near Tubas.

There has been a sharp rise in the number of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons since 7 October 2023, with the number of detainees almost doubling to 11,000 as of June 2024, according to data collected by Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem.

Settler violence

This comes as OCHA recorded around 1,400 separate incidents of settler violence—equal to almost four per day—over the past 12 months, which is the highest number since the agency began keeping records almost 20 years ago.

The agency includes all recorded incidents of physical attacks, arson, raids on Palestinian communities and destruction of agriculture in its data.

Data shows 2024 also saw the second-highest number of Palestinian deaths in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

More than 480 Palestinians—91 of them children—were killed over the 12-month period, most of them by Israeli forces, OCHA said.

Settler violence was responsible for 12 percent of the 4,700 Palestinians who were internally displaced in the West Bank this year.

Separately, a local rights group has reported that the Israeli military and illegal settlers conducted almost 3,000 attacks against Palestinian Bedouin communities in the occupied West Bank last year.

The Al-Baidar Organisation for the Defence of Bedouin said on Wednesday that 67 Bedouin communities have been driven from their land by Jewish colonists over the past 12 months.

"These attacks are part of an ethnic cleansing policy pursued by the occupation authorities to empty the Palestinian lands of their legitimate owners and make them live in a permanent state of threat and displacement," the rights group said in a statement.

Hundreds of Israeli settlers storm Al-Aqsa

Meanwhile, hundreds of Israeli settlers stormed the Al-Aqsa complex in Jerusalem on Wednesday in what was the latest in a series of Israeli provocations at the religious site over the past week.

Palestinian news agency Wafa reported that around 630 Israelis forcibly entered the compound under the protection of the police in violation of an increasingly fragile status quo that prohibits non-Muslims from praying at the site.

This came as an official at the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf revealed that Israeli officials had allowed more than 53,600 Israelis to storm the compound during 2024, the highest number since police began allowing Jews entrance to the site more than 20 years ago.

Over the past week, far-right Israeli ministers performed prayers in the area, triggering international condemnation.

Extremist national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and the hard-right Likud communications minister Shlomo Karhi both made provocative appearances at Al-Aqsa to mark the Jewish holiday of Hannukah, and prayed for the Israeli military’s success in its brutal war on Gaza.

The Al-Aqsa Mosque is the third holiest site in Islam and for years has been a flashpoint for tensions between Palestinians and Israelis.

Under a decades-old arrangement, only Muslims are permitted to pray at the site but since the formation of Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-right government in 2022 Israel has been undermining the sensitive status quo with increasing regularity.

'Real holocaust': Palestinian Bedouins face 3000 Israeli attacks in 2024

At least 835 Palestinians have since been killed and more than 6,700 wounded by Israeli army fire in the occupied territory, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.


The Israeli violations “were meant to forcibly expel the Palestinians from their areas, in a mass displacement process. / Photo: AA

The Israeli army and illegal settlers launched 2,977 attacks against Palestinian Bedouin communities in the occupied West Bank in 2024, a local rights group has said.

In a statement on Wednesday., the al-Baidar Organisation for the Defence of Bedouin said that 67 Bedouin communities comprising 340 families were displaced by the Israeli authorities in 2024.

The Israeli violations “were meant to forcibly expel the Palestinians from their areas, in a mass displacement process aimed at creating a population vacuum for the benefit of settlement,” it added.

The rights group termed attacks on the Bedouin communities as a "real holocaust," saying that the assaults varied between violence and persecution.

“These violations reflect an organized policy aimed at emptying the Palestinian lands of their indigenous inhabitants and replacing them with Israeli settlers," the statement added.

“These attacks are part of an ethnic cleansing policy pursued by the occupation authorities to empty the Palestinian lands of their legitimate owners, and make them live in a permanent state of threat and displacement."

Over the past few years, the Israeli military has conducted regular raids in the occupied West Bank, which have escalated with the beginning of the war on Gaza on Oct. 7, 2023.

Illegal Israeli settlers have violently attacked Palestinians.

The escalation follows a landmark opinion in July by the International Court of Justice that declared Israel's decades-long occupation of Palestinian land “illegal” and demanded the evacuation of all existing settlements in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Over 1,000 Palestinian infants killed by Israeli forces since October 7, 2023

January 1, 2025
DAYS OF PALESTINE

DaysofPal- Gaza’s Government Media Office (GMO) has reported alarming figures highlighting the devastating toll on children in the ongoing conflict.

According to Ismail Al-Thawabta, the director of the GMO, Israeli occupation forces have killed 1,091 Palestinian infants in Gaza since October 7, 2023. Among these victims are 238 newborns who lost their lives during the ongoing genocidal war.

In a press statement issued on Tuesday, Al-Thawabta condemned the targeted killings of infants, labeling them as “clear war crimes.” He called on the international community to urgently launch investigations and hold those responsible accountable.

The conflict’s impact on civilians, especially children, is further highlighted by a UN High Commissioner for Human Rights report, which revealed that women and children constitute nearly 70% of those killed in the Israeli aggression on Gaza since October 2023.

The findings, based on a detailed analysis of a representative sample of victims, emphasized that the systematic targeting of civilians in Gaza amounts to war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The first day of 2025 brought further sorrow to Gaza. Medical sources reported that 29 Palestinians, including children, were killed on Wednesday in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip. Among the casualties were a woman and child who died when an Israeli drone struck a home in the Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza. Several others were injured in the attack.

The ongoing violence has compounded an already dire humanitarian crisis. On Monday, local health authorities confirmed that at least seven people, including six babies, froze to death due to the winter cold amid the Israeli blockade. This chilling statistic underscores the devastating impact of the conflict and the blockade on Gaza’s most vulnerable populations.

UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini has warned that children in Gaza are freezing to death due to the cold weather and severe lack of shelter.

“Gaza babies are freezing to death due to cold weather and a lack of shelter,” Lazzarini wrote in a post on X (formerly Twitter). He further criticized the blockade that has prevented essential winter supplies, including blankets and mattresses, from reaching those in need.

“Blankets, mattresses, and other winter supplies have been stuck in the region for months waiting for approval to get into Gaza,” he said, calling for an immediate cease-fire and the flow of much-needed basic supplies.

The UN official’s warning follows reports from Gaza’s Health Ministry Director-General Munir Al-Barsh, who revealed that three Palestinian children died in makeshift displacement camps over the past week due to freezing temperatures.

The conflict has also taken a heavy toll on Gaza’s healthcare system. By the end of June 2024, more than 500 medical professionals had been killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health. This loss of medical personnel, combined with attacks on hospitals and limited access to medical supplies, has severely compromised the ability to provide care to the injured and vulnerable.

More than 45,550 people have since been killed, mostly women and children, and over 108,300 others injured, according to local health authorities.

Shortlink for this post: https://daysofpalestine.ps/?p=59752

Over 1,500 tents housing displaced Gazans

 inundated by rainwater

January 1, 2025

 MEMO

Palestinians taking shelter in tent camps are battling harsh weather conditions as heavy rainfall has flooded their tents on December 31, 2024. [Dawoud Abo Alkas – Anadolu Agency]


Heavy rains have inundated over 1,542 tents housing displaced civilians in the Gaza Strip in the past two days amid Israel’s genocidal war on the enclave, the Civil Defense Service said on Wednesday, Anadolu reports.

“Hundreds of tents were flooded with rainwater at a level exceeding 30 centimeters,” the agency said in a statement.

“Many people were reported to be shivering from the cold as their belongings were damaged by the rainwater,” it added.

The service said torrential rains have swept away 497 tents in Gaza City, 210 in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, 170 in Rafah and 665 in Khan Younis in southern Gaza.

READ: 7 killed as cold weather hits Gaza

The Gaza Strip has been hit by a cold wave and torrential rains since Sunday, bringing more misery to the territory’s 2.3 million population.

Local health authorities said Monday that at least seven people, including six babies, froze to death due to the winter cold in the enclave.

The Israeli army has continued a genocidal war on Gaza that has killed over 45,500 victims, mostly women and children, since a Hamas attack on Oct. 7, 2023, reducing the enclave to rubble.

In November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.

Outspoken mother of hostage barred from Knesset over ‘unacceptable behavior’

Einav Zangauker says MKs ‘afraid to hear’ about hostages’ plight; MK Rothman aborts committee meeting in spat with parents of Oct. 7 victims

By ToI Staff

Times of Israel 

Today

Einav Zangauker, mother of Matan Zangauker who is being held hostage by Hamas in Gaza, sits on the street near the Begin Gate at the Defense Ministry headquarters in Tel Aviv, June 1, 2024. 

(Paulina Patimer / Pro-Democracy Protest Movement)


Einav Zangauker, the mother of hostage Matan Zangauker and a prominent voice in the fight to secure a deal for the release of those held captive in the Gaza Strip was prevented from entering the Knesset Wednesday due to “serious violations of order.”

The Knesset Spokesperson’s Office said Zangauker has, “despite her repeated promises, continued to seriously violate order.”

“She prevented the proper conduct of committee discussions; she attempted to throw a glass bottle at a guest; and if that were not enough, in the presence of the chief of Knesset security, she threatened that she would stab a guest if she had a knife,” the statement said. “This is unacceptable behavior that cannot be allowed.”
Keep Watching

The statement noted that many “conversations” had been held with Zangauker to enable her continued visits, in which she was asked to promise not to engage in such activity, “but regrettably they were repeated again and again.”

Zangauker was notified the night before about the situation, the statement said.

It was unclear if Zanguaker has been barred permanently.

Einav Zangauker, the mother of hostage Matan Zangauker, speaks during a Knesset committee hearing on December 16, 2024. (Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

In response, Zangauker said the government is “trying to silence the families of the hostages.”

“How is it logical that my son was kidnapped on the watch of 120 Knesset members, and I don’t have the right to visit them in the building?” she said, according to Kan news.

“The Knesset is afraid to hear what is happening to the kidnapped men and women while they transfer funds and trade jobs between themselves,” she said.

The hostages were abducted from Israel on October 7, 2023, when the Palestinian terror group Hamas led a devastating attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians. Of the 251 hostages taken to Gaza that day, 96 remain in captivity, many of them no longer alive.

Talks via mediators to secure a hostage release deal with Hamas that would include a ceasefire have so far failed, and the most recent effort has also appeared to hit a wall.

Two weeks ago, Zangauker attended the Knesset Committee for Strengthening and Developing the Negev and Galilee, where she lambasted lawmaker Ze’ev Elkin, a minister in the Finance Ministry, and threatened to “take the law into her own hands” if her son does not return alive from captivity.

Earlier this month, Hamas released a propaganda video showing the first sign of life from Matan, 14 months after he was kidnapped from his home in Kibbutz Nir Oz alongside his girlfriend, Ilana Gritzewsky, who was released in late November 2023 as part of a weeklong truce deal.

In the likely coerced propaganda video, Matan said he and his fellow captives “die 1,000 deaths every day” and that he has seen how active his mother has been in working to bring him home.


MK Simcha Rotman, chair of the Constitution, Law and Justice Committee leads a committee meeting in the Knesset in Jerusalem on December 24, 2024. 

(Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, the main NGO representing families of hostages, said in a statement that it condemns the ban on Zangauker from the Knesset as “harming the basic right of the families of hostages to make their voices heard in the place where fateful decisions are made.”

Meanwhile, Religious Zionism MK Simcha Rothman, the chairman of the Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee, aborted a meeting of the panel Wednesday because family members of those killed in the Hamas attack who spoke at the meeting went on beyond their allotted time.

The families were from the October Council, a group demanding a state commission of inquiry into the failures that led to the October 7 massacres. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has so far refused to set up such a committee.

Rafi Ben Shitrit, whose soldier son Alroy Ben Shitrit died in battle at the Nahal Oz military post, told Rothman as he left the room that he should “be ashamed.”

“You have no patience. Two minutes. My son didn’t even have two minutes to get ready” to battle the invading terrorists, he said to Rothman, whose party opposes a hostage release deal if it requires ending the war.

A video shared on social media showed the moment when Rothman stormed out of the meeting.


רפי בן שטרית ממועצת אוקטובר, אבא של אלרועי שנפל בקרב על מוצב נחל עוז ליו"ר ועדת חוקה רוטמן שמוציא את הדיון להפסקה כי המשפחות דורשות לדבר:
תתבייש לך, אני איבדתי את הבן היחיד שלי, אין לו סבלנות, שתי דקות, לבן שלי לא היו אפילו שתי דקות להתארגן לשים עליו שכפץ וקסדה pic.twitter.com/UhPvYbbkmK

— Noa Shpigel (@NoaShpigel) January 1, 2025

Rothman later said in a statement that families “receive time to make their remarks heard at Knesset committee deliberations, in a manner that enables upholding the Knesset work.”

He said he allowed the families to continue a bit beyond their allowed time “but to my regret” was then forced to cancel the meeting. Rothman claimed that another MK had brought the families to the meeting along with media “in order to ruin the meeting and not let it be held.”

When Netanyahu’s own hitmen came gunning for him

The PM placed Itamar Ben Gvir and Yitzhak Goldknopf at the heart of his government, and has indulged their reckless activities for two years. They rewarded him with an act of spectacular ruthlessness, showing utter contempt for his health

Op-ed: Day 453
By David Horovitz
TOI Times of Israel 

Today,

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (center) interacts with National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir (right) in the Knesset on December 31, 2024. Netanyahu left the hospital less than two days after prostate surgery to vote on a budget law that Ben Gvir tried in vain to defeat. (Chaim Goldberg / Flash 90)


To be clear, this was not only a political hit — a bid to expedite the termination of Netanyahu’s career. No, it was also a callous act of actual life-endangerment, ruthlessly orchestrated by a pair of his own ostensible colleagues.

The prime minister is 75 years old. He has a chronic heart condition. Seventeen months ago, in July 2023, he told his then-defense minister Yoav Gallant, as they sat side by side in the Knesset plenum hours after Netanyahu had been discharged from Tel Aviv’s Sheba Medical Center with a newly fitted pacemaker, that he’d have died if he hadn’t got to the hospital within minutes after experiencing heart irregularities the week before.

On Sunday, Netanyahu underwent routine but major surgery at Jerusalem’s Hadassah Medical Center to have his prostate removed. He was kept there for observation on Sunday night and Monday night, and was expected to remain for at least another day or two, with several weeks of recovery at home after that. He didn’t even have his wife at his bedside.

But on Tuesday afternoon, Netanyahu left his recovery room — a reinforced area, on a basement floor of the hospital, where he had been placed to ensure he would be protected from further Houthi missile or Hezbollah drone attack — and had himself driven to the Knesset, personal physician in tow.

He made the journey, against the advice of the doctors, because his minister of national security, Itamar Ben Gvir, had joined forces with his minister of housing, Yitzhak Goldknopf, to try to block what is known as the “Trapped Profits” law — legislation that closes tax loopholes in the 2024 budget — and the pair thought they had the votes to do so. Still, Netanyahu’s cause was not entirely lost, and there was a chance that the prime minister’s own vote might prove crucial in rescuing the bill before its year-end deadline.

Goldknopf, the leader of the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism Party, has for months been threatening Netanyahu and vowing to quit the coalition as he battles to enshrine in law the decades-long aberration by which the vast majority of ultra-Orthodox males do no military or other national service — a cardinal issue for their political leadership.

Even though the Supreme Court has ruled this institutionalized draft-dodging illegal, even though the IDF is desperately short of soldiers, even though vast numbers of reservists have spent hundreds of days fighting on multiple fronts since Hamas’s October 7, 2023, invasion and slaughter, and even though Netanyahu has been desperately trying to find a legislative means to appease Goldknopf and the coalition’s other ultra-Orthodox extortionists, the UTJ leader had instructed party MKs to vote against the Trapped Profits bill — to underline to Netanyahu that he could and would paralyze the government until he gets his way.

Ben Gvir’s pretext for voting against the coalition was neither cardinal nor particularly credible. He was purportedly digging in his heels because he claims to have been allocated insufficient funding for Israel’s police force, which he oversees at Netanyahu’s pleasure despite his multiple criminal indictments and convictions for racism and incitement to terrorism. But Ben Gvir has also of late threatened the coalition and voted against legislation in order to protest his exclusion from a key ministerial decision-making forum and to advance his demand for the sacking of the attorney general.

He wears a suit, runs a ministry, and has a personal (dangerous) driver. But he remains a hoodlum.

MK Itamar Ben Gvir brandishing a handgun during clashes in East Jerusalem on October 13, 2022. (Screen capture: Twitter; used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)

Much analysis of Tuesday’s proceedings at the Knesset has focused on Netanyahu’s indomitable fighting skills. He had apparently spent several hours before the vote making calls from his hospital bunker to try to defuse the revolt, with some success. But the political arithmetic was still not dependably in his favor.

His arrival in the Knesset plenum, however, made all the difference. He was greeted by his loyalists like a political messiah risen from beneath the surgeon’s knife. One after another, they approached to inquire about his health. So determined were they to offer their good wishes that they delayed him when, in between innumerable procedural votes, he tried to leave the chamber, visibly discomfited, for some medically ordered rest.

Three hours after he had returned, his political resurrection was completed — you really couldn’t make this up — with the legislation passing by 59 votes to 58: The prime minister had persuaded one of Ben Gvir’s MKs to vote for the law, and two of Goldknopf’s to abstain, but it was Netanyahu’s own vote that proved decisive.

The prime minister, even laid low by urgent surgery, had not merely outsmarted the younger, ultra-energetic Ben Gvir, but had weakened Ben Gvir and Goldknopf’s grip on their own parties and potentially deterred future such political ploys.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (center) enters the Knesset plenum on December 31, 2024, for a budgetary vote. His doctor Tzvi Berkovitz is at right. (Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

What has been less remarked upon is the sheer heartlessness of Ben Gvir and Goldknopf’s failed insurrection. They challenged the prime minister who gave them their jobs, contemptuously pressuring and stressing him when what he needed most was rest and recuperation.

Despicably, they would not even allow him a minor grace that would have done their cause no harm: They could have agreed to spare him the wearying schlep from the hospital by offsetting his vote against that of one of their MKs — a routine political act when an MK is unavoidably indisposed, that does not affect the final voting tally. They displayed similar viciousness to Likud MK Boaz Bismuth, by also refusing to offset Bismuth’s vote, thus compelling the bereaved legislator to leave the shiva (mourning) for his own mother.

Likud MK Boaz Bismuth, center, greets other lawmakers after arriving at the Knesset from sitting shiva following the death of his mother, on December 31, 2024. His shirt is torn in line with Jewish mourning customs. (Knesset spokesperson)

Israel has a habit of considering its prime ministers to be somehow invincible, exempt from the laws of mortality — a misconception frequently promulgated by the prime ministers themselves.

In 1995, at the height of the bitter national divide over the Oslo Accords with the PLO, Yitzhak Rabin brushed off the notion that somebody would try to harm him; somebody did, fatally.

Ariel Sharon suffered from obesity, high blood pressure and high cholesterol. He had a minor stroke in mid-December 2005, and defied doctors’ warnings by returning to work soon afterward, amid a kind of national nonchalant admiration; plainly, Sharon was built of special material. He was not. Barely two weeks later, he suffered a major stroke and fell into a coma from which he never emerged. He died in January 2014.

Prime minister Ariel Sharon greets the public on being released from Hadassah Medical Center after his first, minor stroke, on December 20, 2005. Alongside him is then hospital director Shlomo Mor-Yosef. (Nati Shohat/Flash90)

Benjamin Netanyahu is an extraordinary figure — Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, invariably five steps ahead of his political rivals, repeatedly hauling himself back from the political abyss, currently retaining power even after presiding over the worst disaster in modern Israeli history, and entirely capable of defying all polling predictions that show he has no chance of winning the next elections, whenever they may be.

But he is, nonetheless, whisper it, human. And what Ben Gvir and Goldknopf put him through on Tuesday was reckless, dangerous and unforgivable.

Housing Minister Yitzhak Goldknopf (left) and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir speak in the Knesset on May 23, 2023 (Gil Cohen-Magen / AFP)

The irony is that Netanyahu indulges both of these political “leaders” — and still, after Tuesday’s antics, apparently dare not fire them — even as they recklessly endanger Israel every single day: Goldknopf, by insisting on the inequitable, anti-Zionist, nationally divisive, economically destructive, un-Jewish and unpatriotic exemption from national service of the ultra-Orthodox community. And Ben Gvir, by attempting to whip up anti-Israel hostility across the Muslim world with his hyped prayer visits to the Temple Mount, his enthusiastic partnership in the coalition’s abiding effort to neuter the judiciary and destroy the law enforcement bodies, and especially his ongoing attempt to transform the national police force into a violent, repressive militia.

It was Netanyahu, of course, who hired these national hitmen. This week, they came gunning for him.

ZIONIST ETHNIC CLEANSING

Gaza Population Down by 6% Since Start of War, Says Palestinian Statistics Bureau

The body of a victim of an Israeli army strike on a house in the Bureij refugee camp is carried for the funeral at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the central Gaza Strip town of Deir al-Balah Wednesday, Jan. 1, 2025. (AP)

1 January 2025

 AD ـ 02 Rajab 1446 AH

The population of Gaza has fallen 6% since the war with Israel began nearly 15 months ago as about 100,000 Palestinians left the enclave while more than 55,000 are presumed dead, according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS).

Around 45,500 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, have been killed since the war began but another 11,000 are missing, the bureau said, citing numbers from the Palestinian Health Ministry.

As such, the population of Gaza has declined by about 160,000 during the course of the war to 2.1 million, with more than a million or 47% of the total children under the age of 18, the PCBS said.

It added that Israel has "raged a brutal aggression against Gaza targeting all kinds of life there; humans, buildings and vital infrastructure... entire families were erased from the civil register. There are catastrophic human and material losses."

Israel's foreign ministry said the PCBS data was "fabricated, inflated, and manipulated in order to vilify Israel".

Israel has faced accusations of genocide in Gaza because of the scale of death and destruction.

The International Court of Justice (ICJ), the United Nations' highest legal body, ruled last January that Israel must prevent acts of genocide against Palestinians, while Pope Francis has suggested the global community should study whether Israel's Gaza campaign constitutes genocide.

Israel has repeatedly rejected accusations of genocide, saying it abides by international law and has a right to defend itself after the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, 2023 killed 1,200 Israelis and precipitated the current war.

The PCBS said some 22% of Gaza's population currently faces catastrophic levels of acute food insecurity, according to the criteria of the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, a global monitor.

Included in that 22% are some 3,500 children at risk of death due to malnutrition and lack of food, the bureau said.

Thousands abandon New Year’s celebrations around the world for Gaza rallies

Around 450,000 people in Istanbul rallied on New Year's eve, waving Palestinian flags, and demanding an end to Israel's atrocities in Gaza.

The New Arab Staff
01 January, 2025


Istanbul hosts massive rally for Gaza as 400 NGOs unite in solidarity with Palestinians [Getty]



Thousands of people around the world abandoned highly anticipated New Year’s celebrations to instead rally and shed light on the plight of Palestinians in Gaza amidst Israel’s ongoing war.

In Turkey’s Istanbul, media reports said over 450,000 people gathered at the cities Galata Bridge to express solidarity with Palestinians as Israel continued to bombard the Strip.

Those involved in the rally started marching at dawn despite the cold winter chill and waved Palestinian and Turkish flags.

The rally in Istanbul was organised by the National Will Platform, a coalition of 308 NGOs.

Many used the rally to call for immediate international action against Israel and for the aggression to stop.

According to local media, boats also supported the rally from the sea and human rights activists addressed crowds during the event.

Bilal Erdogan, one of the broad of trustees at the event, condemned Israel’s actions in Gaza and said, "all western values died in Gaza and the West".

Another NGO leader, Ibrahim Besinci, said "mothers’ eyes have no tears left, and fathers have no strength in their knees. Every square meter of Gaza has been watered with the blood of martyrs".

It comes as Israel’s war on the besieged enclave has killed at least 45,553 Palestinians and wounded over 108,379 others.

Similar rallies also took place in Sweden’s capital, where activists waved Palestinian flags and lit candles for those killed in the enclave.

Video footage shared online showed many braving the snow to chant for Palestinians to be freed from occupation and an end to the war.

In Norway, hundreds marched in Oslo’s town centre also waving Palestinian flags and chanting "free Palestine".

The rallies come as the UN and many rights organisations have raised alarm over the devastating humanitarian situation in the enclave.

Palestinians are facing dire conditions as temperatures drop and heavy rains flood tents for the displaced

Gaza’s civil defence said it had received hundreds of emergency calls to evacuate displaced people whose shelters were flooded by the rain.

  Jimmy Carter, the only US president who called out Israel for apartheid

The one-term president didn’t hold back while criticising Israeli settlers for occupying, confiscating and colonising Palestinian land.


Reuters

TRT/AA
39/12/2024

A peanut farmer from the US state of Georgia, President Carter is widely known in the Arab world for his commitment to peace in the Middle East long after leaving the White House. Photo: Reuters

Jimmy Carter – the one-term US president (1977-1981) who breathed his last on December 29 at age 100 – was the only American head of state who publicly confronted Israel for its crimes against Palestinians and identified it as an apartheid state.


“Israel’s continued control and colonisation of Palestinian land have been the primary obstacles to a comprehensive peace agreement in the Holy Land,” wrote Carter in his 2006 book Palestine: Peace, Not Apartheid – a deliberately provocative title that drew criticism from pro-Israel segments of US society.


His pro-Palestine stance stands in sharp contrast to the rock-solid pro-Israel policy of successive US administrations over the decades.


The outgoing Biden administration has firmly backed Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza – which has killed over 45,000 people, mostly women and children – by not only blocking UN Security Council ceasefire resolutions but also providing Israel with funds and weapons over the last 14 months.


Carter wrote that Israeli forces “deprived their unwilling subjects of basic human rights” in order to perpetuate their occupation of Gaza and the West Bank.


“No objective person could personally observe existing conditions in the [occupied] West Bank and dispute these statements.”


Carter, a peanut farmer from the US state of Georgia who served as the country’s 39th president, is widely recognised in the Arab world for his commitment to peace in the Middle East long after leaving the White House.


His most significant contribution to the Middle East peace process was the negotiation of the Camp David Accords in 1978. He mediated the negotiations between Egypt and Israel at the presidential retreat in Maryland, resulting in the 1979 Egypt-Israel Peace Treaty.


The agreement, which included provisions for Palestinian autonomy in the occupied West Bank and Gaza, marked the first time an Arab nation recognised Israel.


Tel Aviv “reconfirmed” in the Carter-mediated 1978 peace accords that Israeli borders must coincide with those prevailing from 1949 to 1967 and withdraw from the occupied territories.


Even after leaving the White House in 1981, Carter continued his efforts to bring peace to the Middle East through his think tank, The Carter Center. He advocated for a two-state solution while highlighting Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories in violation of international law.


Apartheid analogy


Carter’s use of the term “apartheid” for Israel ruffled more than a few feathers in the US and beyond.


His forceful comparison of South Africa’s historical system of racial segregation with Israel’s treatment of Palestinians invited the wrath of political leaders from even his own Democratic Party.


The main difference between the two apartheid systems, according to Carter, was the Israeli zeal for the acquisition of land.


“Utilising their political and military dominance, [Israelis] are imposing a system of partial withdrawal, encapsulation, and apartheid on the Muslim and Christian citizens of the occupied territories,” he wrote in his book.


“There has been a determined and remarkably effective effort to isolate settlers from Palestinians, so that a Jewish family can commute from Jerusalem to their highly subsidised home deep in the [occupied] West Bank on roads from which others are excluded, without ever coming in contact with any facet of Arab life.”


He describes how the Israeli separation barriers restrict Palestinian movement and access to resources, isolating communities and limiting economic opportunities.


“The wall and checkpoints create an unyielding barrier to any form of normal life for Palestinians,” he wrote while referring to the life of Palestinians around the Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank that Tel Aviv has used as an excuse to delay the establishment of a contiguous and viable Palestinian state.


About three million Palestinians live in the occupied West Bank under Israeli military rule, with the Palestinian Authority (PA), the Fatah-controlled government body, exercising limited control in population centres.


The presence of Israeli settlements and the accompanying infrastructure, such as settler-only roads and military checkpoints, restrict the movement of Palestinians, thus reducing employment opportunities and hindering trade and commerce.


“Palestinians are deprived of basic human rights, their land has been occupied, then confiscated, then colonised by the Israeli settlers,” he said.


Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin acknowledge applause during a Joint Session of Congress in which US President Carter announced the results of the Camp David Accords on September 18, 1978.

 Photo: Reuters


Engaging with Hamas


Unlike most Western leaders, Carter took the bold step of engaging with Hamas, the Palestinian group that gained control of Gaza after defeating the Fatah-backed Palestinian Authority in 2006.


Despite its designation as a terrorist organisation by the US and other countries, Carter argued that excluding Hamas from peace talks undermined prospects for a comprehensive resolution.


He observed that the people of Palestine had a “clear preference for Hamas candidates” even in historically strong Fatah communities during the 2006 elections, which his Carter Center monitored as an international observer.


He wrote that he was “surprised at the size of the Hamas victory” even though Israel imposed “the same rigid restraints” to minimise voting.


In 2008 and subsequent years, Carter met with Hamas leaders, underscoring his willingness to take political risks for the sake of peace.


In his dealings with Hamas, Carter told an interviewer in 2009, he found that Hamas demanded only one thing: Israel must open supply routes in the “enormous wall that surrounds Gaza” in order to let one and a half million people in the besieged enclave have sufficient food and water.


US role in perpetuation of violence


Carter reserved the harshest criticism for his fellow countrymen and -women for enabling Israel’s aggressions in Palestine.


He wrote that the condoning of illegal Israeli actions from a “submissive White House” and Congress has contributed to the perpetuation of violence in the Middle East.


Decisions by the Israeli government are “rarely questioned or condemned” in the US, he wrote, adding that most American citizens are unaware of the condition in the occupied Palestinian territories.


He held “powerful political, economic, and religious forces” responsible for the favourable public opinion of Israel in the US.


“If you had a candidate for Congress running either Democratic or Republican and they announced to the general public, ‘I’m going to take a balanced position between the Israelis and the Palestinians,’ they would never be elected. That’s an impossibility in our country,” Carter told an interviewer in 2006.


Carter criticised the Trump administration in 2017 when it recognised Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and shifted the US embassy from Tel Aviv to the city that most countries consider part of the Palestinian territories.


He said the change to the status of East Jerusalem without the consent of the Palestinians “jeopardises any prospect for peace”.


“East Jerusalem is a lynchpin of Palestinian aspirations for a state of their own,” he said.

Israeli reveals secret operation in Syria's Masyaf



2025-01-01 10:02

Shafaq News/ On Wednesday, Israeli military censorship permitted the publication of details about a clandestine operation carried out by an elite Israeli unit deep within Syria, specifically targeting the "Scientific Studies and Research Center" in the Masyaf area.

According to the Israeli Broadcasting Authority, Israel claimed responsibility for the operation, stating that "commandos from the Shaldag Unit and the 669 Airborne Rescue and Evacuation Unit conducted a covert raid on the military research center in Masyaf in September. The mission aimed to destroy the site from close range."

Helicopters transported the forces that demolished the center, which reportedly manufactured advanced precision weapons for Iranians. The Israeli broadcaster revealed that the raid targeted the center and an underground missile production facility affiliated with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard (IRGC).

"The Israeli security apparatus had been aware of the center for over a decade. After monitoring the transfer of components for a precision missile project by Iranians to this center, Israel developed plans to execute ground raids."

Since the fall of Bashar al-Assad's regime in December 2024, the Israeli army has carried out multiple significant incursions into Syria, ostensibly as part of a broader strategy to prevent advanced weaponry from reaching factions and to maintain security along the Israeli-Syrian border, according to the Times of Israel.

One key operation, dubbed Operation Bashan Arrow, was launched following Al-Assad's fall. The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) targeted Syrian military capabilities across the country, executing over 350 airstrikes that obliterated approximately 70-80% of the former regime's strategic military assets, including long-range projectiles, Scud missiles, cruise missiles, and chemical weapons stockpiles.

Moreover, Israel invaded the buffer zone between Syria and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights on December 8, 2024, marking the first Israeli occupation of Syrian territory in over 50 years. This invasion was in direct response to the Syrian Army's abandonment of positions along the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) buffer area.

The IDF also conducted extensive naval and aerial strikes on Syrian military targets, including airbases, weapon depots, and production sites in Damascus, Homs, Tartus, Latakia, and Palmyra. Additionally, the Israeli Navy destroyed several Syrian naval vessels in the Minet el-Beida bay and Latakia port, as reported by the Times of Israel.

Ex-Israeli Defense Chief Yoav Gallant resigns from parliament

STILL WANTED BY THE ICC FOR CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY


Former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant resigned Wednesday from the Knesset, nearly two months after being fired by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for "substantial disagreements" over Israel's war against Hamas in Gaza. On Wednesday, Gallant reaffirmed his loyalty to Netanyahu's Likud party. File Photo by Atef Safadi/EPA-EFE



Jan. 1 (UPI) -- Former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant resigned from parliament Wednesday, nearly two months after being fired by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for "substantial disagreements" over Israel's ongoing war in Gaza.

Gallant announced his resignation Wednesday night from the Knesset in a national address.

"Shortly, I will inform the speaker of the Knesset of my decision to conclude my tenure as a member of the Knesset," Gallant said.

"After 45 years of public service -- 35 of them in the IDF and the rest in the Knesset -- this is just one station in a longer journey that is not yet complete," Gallant added. "Whether on the battlefield or public service, it's important to pause, reassess and aim for the necessary goals."

During his speech, Gallant reaffirmed his loyalty to Netanyahu's Likud party.

"The way of the Likud is my way," Gallant said. "I will continue to fight for the national, ideological and Zionist path of the Likud movement."

Netanyahu fired Gallant in November amid ongoing tensions over Israel's war in Gaza following the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas terror attacks that left 1,200 dead, more than 5,000 wounded and 250 held hostage.

Netanyahu claimed Gallant had opposed a number of his key military decisions, including positioning Israeli Defense Forces on the Philadelphia Corridor on the Gaza Strip's border with Egypt and demands to assassinate Hezbollah terror chief Hassan Nasrallah.

"Defense Minister Gallant and I had substantial disagreements on the management of the military campaign, disagreements which were accompanied by public statements and actions that contravened the decisions of the Cabinet and Security Cabinet," Netanyahu said in a statement released Nov. 5.

"What is even worse, they have reached the knowledge of the enemy; our enemies have taken great delight in these disagreements and have derived much benefit from them," Netanyahu added.

Gallant claimed he was fired over his insistence that no one in Israel should be exempt from army service.

"As the minister of defense in a difficult and protracted war, I understood that the issue of recruiting the Haredim is not only a social issue. This is first and foremost, a necessary security and military need."

"In order to significantly lighten the burden on reservists, it is our duty to make sure that all those who are eligible for service from the general public -- secular, religious and ultra-Orthodox -- are recruited," Gallant argued.

During Wednesday's speech, Gallant listed his accomplishments with IDF in Israel's war against Hamas.

"As minister of defense, I led the defense establishment throughout 13 months of war. I charted the way and determined the direction that allowed the State of Israel to reach a military defeat of its enemies in a war on seven fronts," Gallant claimed.

"The defense establishment under my leadership created the conditions to achieve all the war's urgent goals, including the ultimate return of the hostages."