Sunday, June 30, 2024

Assange’s Freedom Is Also Ours: To Tell the Truth

After 12 years – including five years of solitary confinement at Belmarsh Prison in London – Julian Assange is free. God bless America! He wasn’t extradited to the U.S. to stand trial, where he faced a sentence of 170 years in prison for violating the so-called Espionage Act.

Instead, he took a plea deal with the U.S. government, pleading guilty to one count of violating that act – you know, threatening America’s freedom – for which he had paid by his time already served. He was officially pronounced free at a U.S. federal court in Saipan, capital of the Northern Mariana Islands (a U.S. territory), after which he flew home to his wife and two children in Australia.

My emotional relief at his escape from the clutches of this government far outweighs my feelings about the broader implications of the guilty plea, which has justifiably stirred concern and controversy. The government got its little triumph: a “legal” acknowledgment of its right to keep monstrous secrets about what it does and punish any unauthorized spilling of the beans as “espionage.”

“He’s basically pleading guilty to things that journalists do all the time and need to do,” according to Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, quoted by the New York Times.

And Matt Taibbi said the decision “will remain a sword over the heads of anyone reporting on national security issues. Governments have no right to keep war crimes secret, but Assange’s 62-month stay in prison is starting to look like a template for Western prosecutions of such leaks.”

While such concerns are no doubt worrisome, I don’t think the legal system is a mechanism for seriously addressing them. Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, was hardly an equal in this hellish controversy. He was in the legal crosshairs of the most powerful country on the planet, which he had had the nerve to defy, by publishing an enormous amount of “classified” – that is to say hidden – data, given to him by government-employed whistleblowers.

This is called journalism, no matter that part of the U.S. case against Assange was that he doesn’t count as a real journalist. Mainstream, corporate journalists know how to behave themselves, I guess. They’re far more likely to “respect” the do-not-cross lines the government establishes.

As I wrote in 2010, at the beginning of the WikiLeaks controversy:

“In a time of endless war, when democracy is an orchestrated charade and citizen engagement is less welcome in the corridors of power than it has ever been, when the traditional checks and balances of government are in unchallenged collusion with one another, when the media act not as watchdogs of democracy but guard dogs of the interests and clichés of the status quo, we have WikiLeaks, disrupting the game of national security, ringing its bell, changing the rules.”

As long as “national security” includes the waging of war, honest – a.k.a., real – journalism will be a nuisance to those in charge, because it includes actual reportage, not simply press-releases and public-relations blather. In the real world, war equals murder. War is not an abstract game of strategy and tactics. War itself is a “war crime” – especially when it’s waged not to gain freedom from an oppressor but to maintain control over the oppressed.

WikiLeaks releases were outrageous acts of espionage – from a war-waging government’s point of view – because the data was raw, real and unsanitized. They included 90,000 classified documents on the US war in Afghanistan and nearly 400,000 secret files on the Iraq war, which… uh, bled beyond the official propaganda and, among other things, showed that civilian deaths in the two wars were, according to Al-Jazeera, “much higher than the numbers being reported.”

In addition, WikiLeaks released data that, as Al-Jazeera noted, “unearthed how the Geneva Conventions were being violated routinely in the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba. The documents, dating from 2002 to 2008 showed the abuse of 800 prisoners, some of them as young as 14.”

And then, of course, there was the infamous “collateral murder” video, which showed a U.S. helicopter firing at people on a street in Baghdad, killing seven of them, including a Reuters journalist, and wounding a number of others, including two children, who were sitting in a van that had pulled up to aid the wounded people in the street. And all this happened as helicopter crew members snickered about the deaths. This was the United States in full view, waging its “war on terror” by unleashing terror at the level only a superpower could commit.

Showing snippets of truth about the war on terror is Julian Assange’s crime: his act of espionage. And I get the government’s point of view. Assange put war itself into the forefront of collective human awareness – as a hideous reality, not a political abstraction. What he did bears striking similarity to what Emmett Till’s mother did. She exposed the raw horror of Southern racism by insisting that her son, a 14-year-old boy who was beaten and drowned by Mississippi racists for allegedly speaking to a white woman, have a public funeral with an open casket, so the whole world could see what had been done to him. This was in 1955. Not long afterward, the Civil Rights Movement was fully underway.

Human evolution isn’t a legal issue, decided by the courts. It involves humanity facing and transcending its own dark side, which can be a messy and chaotic process. This is the nature of truth.

Robert Koehler (koehlercw@gmail.com), syndicated by PeaceVoice, is a Chicago award-winning journalist and editor. He is the author of Courage Grows Strong at the Wound, and his newly released album of recorded poetry and art work, Soul Fragments.


Julian Assange is finally free – but it is far from the end of the story

Nimo Omer
THE GUARDIAN
Tue, 25 June 2024 


WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange arrives at a United States District Court in Saipan, Northern Mariana Islands, US.Photograph: Kim Hong-Ji/Reuters


After 12 years of confinement, seven in the Ecuadorian embassy and five in a high-security prison in south London, Julian Assange has been freed. The WikiLeaks founder, who faced 18 charges for helping and encouraging Chelsea Manning to leak military files, has pleaded guilty to one criminal count of conspiring to obtain and disclose classified US national defence, as part of a plea deal struck with the US justice department. Assange was sentenced by Judge Ramona V Manglona to time served on the island of Saipan in the Northern Mariana Islands and is now on a flight back to Australia. The US ambassador to Australia, Caroline Kennedy, said his return “brings this longstanding and difficult case to a close”. Assange’s wife said she is “elated” at the news of her husbands’ release.

It is the latest twist in the story of Assange, who spent years leaking documents that exposed government and military secrets, as well as less obvious targets like the actor Wesley Snipes, the Church of Scientology and the Church of the Latter-day Saints.

For today’s newsletter I spoke with writer and journalist Duncan Campbell about the final chapter of his legal drama.

In depth: ‘It’s good news for Assange … but not particularly good news for journalism’

Julian Assange, who was an expert hacker by the age of 16, has always had a bit of a rebel streak. In the late 80s he was accused of stealing half a million Australian dollars from Citibank.

But it was the website WikiLeaks that brought him to international attention. Major news outlets including the Guardian published leaks about Guantanamo Bay and classified Pentagon documents in collaboration with Assange. And in 2010 (when the picture above was taken) WikiLeaks published a video titled “Collateral Murder”, showing two US helicopter gunships in Iraq shooting Iraqi Reuters journalists. That devastating footage was followed by the publication of hundreds of thousands of documents, many in collaboration with numerous mainstream media outlets from the wars in Afghanistan, the war in Iraq, and Democratic party operatives in the run up to the 2016 election.

What followed were claims of dealings with Russian intelligence services, allegations of sexual assault in Sweden – which were ultimately dropped – and relentless calls for his imprisonment and even execution by US politicians. For years, prosecutors in America grappled with how to get a hold of Assange and prosecute him – the impulse to squash Assange became so strong that in 2017 senior CIA officials reportedly discussed plans to kidnap or assassinate him.

Journalists, human rights groups and press freedom organisations have been criticising the US for years, arguing that the pursuit of Assange represents a huge assault on freedom of expression. Amnesty International said prosecution could have a chilling effect on journalists who might self-censor for fear of punishment.

***

Years of pursuit

In 2010, the Swedish authorities put out an arrest warrant for Assange over separate allegations of rape and molestation – Assange has always denied the allegations. To avoid extradition, Assange requested political asylum at the Ecuadorian embassy in 2012, stating his fear that he would be sent to the US through Sweden, where he could face a lifetime in prison or death. His claim was granted and specific diplomatic laws protected him from arrest in the UK, as long as he stayed inside the building, which is where he remained for seven years. During this time he was visited by a host of celebrities – Lady Gaga, John Cusack and Pamela Anderson among them. He was also visited by Nigel Farage, in secret, on a number of occasions.

In 2017, Sweden dropped its allegations stating that “at this point, all possibilities to conduct the investigation are exhausted”. Eventually Ecuador rescinded its asylum offer, paving the way for Assange to be arrested and sent to Belmarsh prison where he has been held ever since.

***

Why has he been released?

After so long avoiding extradition, his supporters and loved ones will no doubt be relieved at the end to this saga. It makes sense that he accepted the deal, Campbell says, “given the appalling conditions that he’s been held in, the fact that he has been deprived of seeing his two small children and wife for five years, often left in a cell for 23 hours a day. I think it’s shocking that the United States have insisted on that when he has not breached the Espionage Act.” His family have also said that his physical and mental health were deteriorating for a number of years.

For the US, and Joe Biden’s administration, it makes sense to wrap things up. In April Biden said that he was “considering” dropping the charges and extradition attempt against Assange, avoiding the complications and potential loss of a court case in the UK that could drag on through the most crucial part of the election race. Pursuing the charges against Assange was becoming damaging for Biden when a big part of his platform this campaign has been about providing a guard-rail against Donald Trump’s attacks on democracy and freedom of speech.

The quiet but forceful diplomatic pressure from Australia has also played a significant role in securing the release of Assange. Australian politicians have long expressed their opposition to the extradition charge and lobbied for a plea deal.

***

Press freedom

As noted by Trevor Timm, a plea deal is less troubling than a conviction and appeals court ruling, which could have created an official precedent that potentially binds other courts to rule against journalists in future cases. But he adds that it is certainly not the best case scenario for press freedom.

Campbell echoes this sentiment. “It’s good news for Assange and his family, but it’s not particularly good news for journalism as a whole,” he says. “It still means that the US believes that if a journalist, who is not American or in the United States, publishes damaging information about them they can issue an extradition order and seek to have people from different countries stand trial in America.”

The criminalisation of Assange’s conduct through a guilty plea of the Espionage Act before a potential Trump presidency is particularly troubling given that Trump has repeatedly suggested that he would use the courts to retaliate against the media. In his opinion piece, Campbell notes that all over the world, journalists are facing unprecedented threats to their safety.

“From Haiti to Hong Kong, from Russia to Saudi Arabia, journalists are faced with pressures similar to those placed on Assange. That specious argument that Assange was ‘not really a journalist’, and thus not worthy of media support can surely now be finally buried.” Assange may be free, and Campbell understands why he has accepted the deal after so long behind bars, but “the situation for journalists is not great right now and the decision to release Assange doesn’t make it much better”.

Kamala Harris scores poll boost to replace Joe Biden

Kamala Harris scores poll boost to replace Joe Biden

TEHRAN, Jun. 30 (MNA) – A new poll has found Vice President Kamala Harris is the top choice to replace President Joe Biden should he abandon his reelection campaign.

A new poll has found Vice President Kamala Harris is the top choice to replace President Joe Biden should he abandon his reelection campaign, News Week reported.

Biden's recent shaky debate performance has led some Democrats to consider whether he should be replaced on the ballot before November.

The Biden campaign has said the president is not dropping out. If he did, Harris, his vice president and running mate, would most likely join other top Democrats looking to replace him at the top of the ticket.

A Date for Progress flash poll, conducted on Friday, found Harris was the most popular choice to replace Biden. The poll surveyed 1,011 U.S. likely voters, including 387 Democratic likely voters, and has a margin of error of 3 percentage points.

Asked who should be picked if the Democratic Party holds a convention among party members to choose a replacement for Biden, 39 percent of Democrat respondents chose Harris.

The Biden campaign has been contacted for comment. Seth Schuster, a Biden campaign spokesman, previously told Newsweek: "Joe Biden is not dropping out."

MNA


Kamala Harris Is Top Choice To Replace Joe Biden


NEWSWEEK
Published Jun 30, 2024
By Khaleda Rahman
National Correspondent

Anew poll has found Vice President Kamala Harris is the top choice to replace President Joe Biden should he abandon his reelection campaign.

Biden's recent shaky debate performance has led some Democrats to consider whether he should be replaced on the ballot before November.


The Biden campaign has said the president is not dropping out. If he did, Harris, his vice president and running mate, would most likely join other top Democrats looking to replace him at the top of the ticket.

A Data for Progress flash poll, conducted on Friday, found Harris was the most popular choice to replace Biden. The poll surveyed 1,011 U.S. likely voters, including 387 Democratic likely voters, and has a margin of error of 3 percentage points.


Asked who should be picked if the Democratic Party holds a convention among party members to choose a replacement for Biden, 39 percent of Democrat respondents chose Harris.

The Biden campaign has been contacted for comment. Seth Schuster, a Biden campaign spokesman, previously told Newsweek: "Joe Biden is not dropping out."

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Vice President Kamala Harris on June 24, 2024, in College Park, Maryland. A new flash poll found Harris is the most popular possible option to replace President Joe Biden at the top of the Democratic... More KEVIN DIETSCH/GETTY IMAGES

California Governor Gavin Newsom was the second most popular option, with 18 percent of Democrats picking him as their choice to replace the incumbent.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg got 10 percent of the vote, Senator Cory Booker received 7 percent and Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer got 6 percent.

Senator Amy Klobuchar, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker, and Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro each garnered only 2 percent.

Another 6 percent said their choice would be someone not on the list, while 9 percent said they were not sure.

"The real problem with swapping out Biden is that Democrats will be venturing into the great unknown," Thomas Gift, an associate professor of political science and director of the Centre on U.S. Politics at University College London, told Newsweek.

"Although there may be an alternative with a larger potential upside, a Biden replacement is just as easy to take a beating in his or her favorability after being vetted on the national scene."

The Data for Progress poll found that only around half (51 percent) of Democrats and 35 percent of all likely voters think Biden should remain the Democratic presidential candidate.

A Morning Consult poll conducted after Thursday's debate also found that 47 percent of Democratic voters and 59 percent of independent voters think Biden should be replaced as the Democratic Party's presidential candidate.

Biden responded to critics at a rally in North Carolina on Friday.

"Folks, I don't walk as easy as I used to. I don't speak as smoothly as I used to. I don't debate as well as I used to. But I know what I do know: I know how to tell the truth. I know right from wrong. And I know how to do this job," he said. "I would not be running again if I didn't believe with all my heart and soul I can do this job."

Elaine Kamarck, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution think tank, a Democratic National Committee member, and author of the book Primary Politics about the presidential nominating process, told Reuters that there are several scenarios regarding how Biden could be replaced as the Democratic Party's presidential candidate.

Biden could decide to step aside before he is officially nominated at the convention in August, she said. He could also be challenged by others who try to win over the delegates he has accrued, or he could withdraw after the convention, leaving the DNC to elect someone to run against Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, in his place.

 

Turkish airport workers refuse to refuel El Al plane after emergency landing

Flight makes emergency landing in Antalya to get passenger medical attention, is forced to fly to Rhodes to refuel before heading to Tel Aviv


El Al airplanes on the tarmac at Israel's Ben-Gurion International Airport, October 4, 2022. (Moshe Shai/ Flash90/ File)
El Al airplanes on the tarmac at Israel's Ben-Gurion International Airport, October 4, 2022. (Moshe Shai/ Flash90/ File)

An El Al flight from Warsaw en route to Tel Aviv was not allowed to refuel after making an emergency landing in Antalya, Turkey, on Sunday to evacuate a passenger in need of medical attention.

Turkish workers at Antalya airport refused to refuel flight LY5102 before it could take off for Israel, El Al said in a statement.

“Local workers refused to refuel the company’s plane, even though it was a medical case,” it said, adding that the passenger was evacuated.

The plane then took off to Rhodes in Greece, where “it will refuel before taking off to Israel,” the airline said.

Turkish diplomatic sources confirmed the plane was allowed to make an emergency landing to evacuate a sick passenger.

“Fuel was to be provided to the plane due to humanitarian considerations, but as the relevant procedure was about to be completed, the captain decided to leave of his own accord,” a Turkish diplomatic source said.

Hebrew media reports said the Foreign Ministry had been assured by the Turkish authorities that the plane would be allowed to refuel, but in practice, it did not happen. Since the plane was burning fuel on the tarmac to keep air conditioning and other systems functioning, it was decided to take off for Rhodes, a 40-minute flight away, and refuel there, before even that short flight became impossible.

The plane was expected to land at Ben-Gurion Airport later Sunday.

Passengers were told that they were expected to spend several hours on the ground in Turkey, without permission to leave the plane, according to Hebrew media reports.

All direct flights between Israel and Turkey were canceled shortly after the war against the Hamas terror group broke out on October 7, when thousands of terrorists invaded southern Israel from the Gaza Strip, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has backed Hamas in the  war, in which Israel has sought to topple Hamas as Gaza’s de facto government, to secure the release of the hostages taken on October 7, and to prevent the Gaza Strip from posing a security threat to Israel going forward.

Erdogan hosted Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Istanbul in April, and in May, he said that more than 1,000 members of Hamas were being treated in Turkish hospitals.

In May, Turkey cut off all trade with Israel — a dramatic move for Israel’s fifth-largest source of imported goods, and one that was expected to result in price increases in Israel, at least in the short term.

AFP contributed to this report.






































Air India Express accused of unfair labor practices by union


The union now seeks labor commissioner's intervention

ByAkash Pandey

Jun 30, 2024

 

Illegal Israeli immigrants burn Palestinian crop 

Illegal Israeli settlers occupy an illegal outpost near the Israeli settlement of Kiryat Arba near the Palestinian city of Hebron in the West Bank in 2022, before Hamas's attack on October 7, 2023. File Photo by Abir Sultan/EPA-EFE
Illegal Israeli settlers occupy an illegal outpost near the Israeli settlement of Kiryat Arba near the Palestinian city of Hebron in the West Bank in 2022, before Hamas's attack on October 7, 2023. File Photo by Abir Sultan/EPA-EFE

June 30 (UPI) -- A group of illegal Israeli immigrants to Palestine have burned crops on land near the town of Asira al-Qibliya, south of Nablus, the head of the village council Hafez Saleh has said.

The issue of Israeli settlers in the West Bank is deemed illegal under international law, violating the Fourth Geneva Convention. These settlements lead to the displacement of Palestinian communities, the expropriation of land, and frequent conflicts.

The presence of settlers complicates peace efforts and contributes to a cycle of violence caused by the Israelis. The Israeli government's support for settlements exacerbates tensions and undermines the prospects for a two-state solution.

Israeli settlers set up a tent on Palestinian lands near the village of Artas, south of Bethlehem, on the way to establishing a colonial outpost, the Palestine News and Information Agency reported.

The settlers raised the Israeli flag after taking the land, Palestinian activist Hassan Brijiyeh told the official Palestinian news agency.

Earlier this month, Israel's Security Cabinet said it was considering proposals to "strengthen" its illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank where some 700,000 illegal Jewish immigrants live.

Ultimately, Israel said it had authorized five more West Bank outposts, violating international law. Foreign governments including Kuwait have now expressed outrage over Israel's expanded occupation.

Meanwhile, controversial Israeli politician Itamar Ben-Gvir, who lives in an illegal settlement, welcomed the arrest of 13 "Shebaim" who entered Israeli territory without permits.

"Zero tolerance!" said the minister.

US lawmakers vote to censor Palestinian death toll in Gaza to cover Israel war crimes

June 30, 2024

Protesters gathered to demonstrate against Israel’s invasion of the Gaza Strip and the Biden Administration’s military support for Israel’s military offensive in Los Angeles, California on 02 March 2024
[David McNew/Getty Images]


Lawmakers in the United States this week voted to prevent the government from citing the death toll of Palestinians in Gaza killed by Israel, in the latest effort to directly censor facts and criticism of the occupation and its war crimes.

In a 269 – 144 vote in favour of the bipartisan amendment at the US House of Representatives, the move attempts to bar the State Department from using international affairs budget funds to cite figures and statistics published by Gaza’s Health Ministry, essentially censoring any mention of the number of Palestinians that Israel has killed in the besieged Strip since the beginning of its ongoing nine-month-long offensive.

Having overwhelmingly been voted in and being backed by 62 Democrats and 207 Republicans, the proposed amendment is now set to go to the Senate for consideration.

If passed, the US government will be forbidden from acknowledging that the Israeli occupation has killed at least 37,765 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and wounded 86,429 others so far. Those statistics by Gaza’s health ministry are also suspected of far underestimating the true number of deaths and injuries, primarily due to the fact that Israeli forces have significantly impacted the ministry’s capabilities to count such figures.

The vote has been condemned by many observers and critics who insist that it only aims to further censor facts relating to the scale of Israel’s war crimes in Gaza. One of those critics is Palestinian-American congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, who stated in a speech to the House ahead of the vote that since 1948, “there has been a coordinated effort, especially in this chamber, to dehumanise Palestinians and erase Palestinians from existence”.

She stressed that her “colleagues want to prohibit our own US officials from even citing the Palestinian death toll”, highlighting that fact that six children are killed in Gaza every hour. “But Palestinians are not just numbers. Behind these numbers are real people—mothers, fathers, sons, daughters who have had their lives stolen from them and their families torn apart, and we should not be trying to hide it”.

Tlaib condemned the “anti-Palestinian racism in this chamber”, emphasising that her fellow lawmakers “don’t even want to acknowledge that Palestinians exist at all. Not when they’re alive, and now, not even when they’re dead. It’s absolutely disgusting. This is genocide denial.”

WARMONGER
Israeli foreign minister says Iran is 'worthy of destruction'

Israel has said that Iran is worthy of destruction, after the Islamic Republic waned Israel it would retaliate if it attacked Hezbollah in Lebanon.


The New Arab Staff & Agencies
30 June, 2024

Israel Katz has threatened to destroy Iran, which is particularly ominous due to Tel Aviv's nuclear capability [Getty]


Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on Saturday that Iran's message of an "obliterating war" made it worthy of destruction.

⁠"A regime that threatens destruction deserves to be destroyed," Katz said in a post on X. He also said Israel will act with full force against Iran-backed Hezbollah if it does not stop firing at Israel from Lebanon and move away from the border.

Iran's UN mission said on Friday that if Israel embarks on a "full-scale military aggression" in Lebanon, "an obliterating war will ensue."

The Iranian mission also said in the post on X, formerly known as Twitter, that in such an event "all options, incl. the full involvement of all resistance fronts, are on the table."

Hezbollah has been exchanging fire with Israel since October, in parallel with the Gaza war. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said this week they prefer a diplomatic path to resolving the situation.


Though Katz is a member of Israel's security cabinet, war policy has largely been led by Netanyahu and a small circle of ministers that includes Gallant, who visited Washington this week for talks on Gaza and Lebanon.

Katz's comments come as Iran also on Saturday warned that "all Resistance Fronts", a grouping of Iran and its regional allies, would confront Israel if it attacks Lebanon.

The comment from Iran's mission to New York comes with fears of a wider regional war involving Israel and Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah movement. The two sides have engaged in near-daily exchanges of fire since the war in Gaza began.

Such exchanges have escalated this month, alongside bellicose rhetoric from both sides. Israel's military said plans for a Lebanon offensive had been "approved and validated", prompting Hezbollah to respond that none of Israel would be spared in a full-blown conflict.



 India exports rockets, explosives to Israel amid Gaza war: Reports


An investigative report by AL Jazeera has revealed India’s involvement in the ongoing Israeli invasion on Gaza.

The report shows that India is exporting tonnes of rockets with explosive charges, propellants for cannons, rocket engines along with other military equipment to Israel.

The report also pointed out a video evidence which showed remains of a missile used to target a United Nations shelter at the Nuseirat refugee camp in Gaza in the first week of this month.

Amid the tangled parts, a label clearly read: “Made in India.”


Fighting Rages In Gaza City’s Shujaiya For Fourth Day

Heavy battles and bombardment hit Gaza City’s Shujaiya district for a fourth day on Sunday, months after the Israeli army declared Hamas’s command structure dismantled…

Gaza

By Daily Trust

Sun, 30 Jun 2024

Heavy battles and bombardment hit Gaza City’s Shujaiya district for a fourth day on Sunday, months after the Israeli army declared Hamas’s command structure dismantled in the northern area.

Tens of thousands of Palestinians have fled the devastated neighbourhood, where the army said it has fought Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants both “above and below ground” in tunnels.

The military said troops had “eliminated several terrorists, located weapons and conducted targeted raids on booby-trapped combat compounds” over the past 24 hours while the air force had “struck dozens” of the militants’ infrastructure sites.

It also reported clashes in central Gaza and the southern Rafah area, a week after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that the “intense phase” of the war raging since
 October 7 was nearing an end.

The United Nations humanitarian agency OCHA estimated that “60,000 to 80,000 people were displaced” from Shujaiya since new fighting broke out there on Thursday and the army issued evacuation orders.

Months of on-and-off talks towards a Gaza truce and hostage release deal have meanwhile made little progress, with Hamas saying Saturday there was “nothing new” in a revised plan presented by US mediators.

United States President Joe Biden late last month outlined what he called an Israeli plan for a six-week truce and exchange of some hostages for Palestinian prisoners held in Israel.

Washington last week presented “new language” for parts of the proposed deal, according to US news site Axios.

A Hamas official in Lebanon, Osama Hamdan, confirmed that the Islamist movement had received the latest proposal but said it presented “no real progress in the negotiations to stop the aggression”.

Hamdan labelled the proposals “a waste of time” that aimed to give “additional time for the occupation (Israel) to practise genocide”.

‘Everything is rubble’
The war started with Hamas’s October 7 attack on southern Israel which resulted in the deaths of 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.

The militants also seized 251 hostages, 116 of whom remain in Gaza although the army says 42 are dead.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 37,877 people, also mostly civilians, according to data from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.

Six more people were killed in an air strike at dawn targeting a family house in Rafah, said medics at Nasser Hospital where the bodies were taken.

Artillery shelling also struck southern areas of Rafah city, witnesses said.

United Nations and other relief agencies have voiced alarm over the dire humanitarian crisis and the threat of starvation the war and Israeli siege have brought for Gaza’s 2.4 million people.

“It’s really unbearable,” said Louise Wateridge from UNRWA, the UN agency supporting Palestinian refugees, speaking Friday after returning to the city of Khan Yunis.

“Everything is rubble,” she said. “And yet people are living there again… There’s no water there, there’s no sanitation, there’s no food. And now, people are living back in these buildings that are empty shells.”

In Israel, thousands of protesters again took to the streets of Tel Aviv on Saturday night, demanding greater efforts to return the remaining captives, and calling for early elections.


Former hostage Noa Argamani, 26, who was rescued in a special forces raid on June 8, said in a video address that “we can’t forget about the hostages who are still in Hamas captivity, and we must do everything possible to bring them back home”.