Mourners carry the body of a 40-year-old Palestinian man during his funeral procession who was killed in an attack by Israeli settlements near Bethlehem, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, on August 27. | Photo: Reuters
Israel said it killed three Hamas militants in an airstrike on the occupied West Bank on Friday (30 August 2024). large scale military operation It is now the third day, and the number has risen to at least 19.
Meanwhile, a top UN aid official questioned “what happened to our basic humanity” as the war in Gaza continues and humanitarian operations struggle to respond.
The United Nations has warned that the military operation launched by Israel in the West Bank on Wednesday (August 28, 2024) is “further escalating an already explosive situation” in the region and has pressured Israel to end it.
In the United States, Vice President Kamala Harris vowed that she would not change Washington’s policy of supplying arms to Israel if she is elected to the top job in November. But she stressed that it was time to “end this war”.
Israel has described its raids on towns and refugee camps in the northern West Bank as an “anti-terrorism” operation.
The army and the Palestinian Health Ministry said they had killed at least 19 Palestinians since Wednesday (August 28, 2024).
The army said it killed three Hamas militants in an airstrike near the northern city of Jenin on Friday (August 30, 2024).
Witnesses told media that a car was attacked in the town of Zababdeh, southeast of the city.
Israeli troops withdrew from other West Bank cities on Thursday (August 29, 2024), but fighting continued around Jenin, which has long been a hotbed of militant activity.
Loud explosions were reported from the city’s refugee camp and thick smoke was seen rising from the area.
Ban on vaccination
Israel has agreed to a “humanitarian pause” of at least three days in parts of Gaza, starting on Sunday (September 1, 2024), to facilitate a vaccination drive after the territory recorded its first case of polio in 25 years, the World Health Organisation said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the measures were “not a ceasefire” in the nearly 11-month-old war that began with Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack.
The army on the west coast said it had killed seven militants on Thursday (August 29, 2024), including five from the Tulkaram refugee camp.
One of the five militants was Muhammad Jaber, also known as Abu Shujaa, who the Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad said was its commander in the nearby Nur Shams refugee camp, a military statement said.
The Palestinian Prisoners’ Club advocacy group said at least 45 people had been detained in the West Bank since Wednesday (August 28, 2024). An Israeli military spokesman said “10 wanted individuals were arrested”.
‘Basic emotion of humanity’
In Gaza, the Israeli military said on Thursday (August 29, 2024) that it had killed “dozens” of militants in a day of fighting and attacks.
Two people were killed on Friday (August 30, 2024) in Israeli shelling at the Jabalia refugee camp, the Hamas-ruled territory’s civil defense agency said.
The United Nations on Monday (August 26, 2024) had to halt the movement of aid and relief workers within Gaza after Israel issued a new evacuation order for the Deir el-Balah area, which had become a hub for its workers.
“More than 88 percent of Gaza has been ordered to be evacuated at one point or another,” said Joyce Msuya, the acting head of the U.N. humanitarian office.
He said civilians were being forced to move into just 11 percent of the Gaza Strip, which was already one of the most densely populated areas in the world before the war.
“What we have seen over the past 11 months … calls into question the world’s commitment to the international legal system designed to prevent these tragedies,” Msuya said.
“It forces us to ask: What has happened to our basic sense of humanity?”