Israel forms emergency government and war cabinet
Israel formed an emergency government and war management cabinet, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and National Unity Party leader Benny Gantz jointly announced today.
Gantz, a former defense minister, will join Netanyahu and current defense minister Yoav Gallant in a “war management cabinet,” the joint Netanyahu-Gantz statement said.
The government will not pass any laws or make any decisions that do not concern the conduct of the war, the announcement said.
That implies that the controversial judicial overhaul will not move forward while the emergency government is in place.
There has been no indication that opposition leader Yair Lapid and his Yesh Atid party are joining the government.
Gaza death toll rises to 1,055, Palestinian health ministry says
Bodies of Palestinians killed in Israeli airstrikes lie outside the Shifa Hospital, waiting to be buried after funeral prayers in Gaza City, Gaza, on October 11.
At least 1,055 people have been killed in Gaza since Israel began airstrikes on the Palestinian enclave Saturday in response to Hamas' attacks, the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza said Wednesday.
A further 5,184 people have been injured, the ministry said.
Israeli official says Iran effectively "gave green light" to Hamas attacks despite initial US intel
A man walks with mattresses in Gaza's Jabalia refugee camp on Wednesday.
A senior Israeli official says Iran was aware of the operation and effectively “gave the green light” to Hamas attacks that killed more than 1,200 Israelis at the weekend, despite US intelligence suggesting senior Iranian government officials were caught by surprise by Saturday’s bloody attack on Israel by Hamas.
The official, who has been briefed on Israeli intelligence, told CNN Wednesday that Iran, which has provided longstanding funding and training to Hamas militants, may not have known about the exact timing of the raids from Gaza, but was certainly “aware of the Hamas operation before it happened.”
On the threat from the Hezbollah militia, the Israeli official told CNN that the Iranian-backed group was currently “allowing” Palestinian factions to attack Israel from Hezbollah-controlled territory.
Amid concerns of the US being drawn into a Mideast conflict, the official told CNN that “Israel does not expect the United States to fight for us,” saying that a US aircraft carrier group newly positioned off the Israeli coast would help provide “long-range coverage” in the event of a broader regional conflict.
Israeli official says the government cannot confirm babies were beheaded in Hamas attack
Bodies of Palestinians killed in Israeli airstrikes wait outside at the Nasser Hospital to be buried after a funeral prayer in Khan Yunis, Gaza, on October 12.
The Israeli government has not confirmed the specific claim that Hamas attackers cut off the heads of babies during their shock attack on Saturday, an Israeli official told CNN, contradicting a previous public statement by the Prime Minister's office.
"There have been cases of Hamas militants carrying out beheadings and other ISIS-style atrocities. However, we cannot confirm if the victims were men or women, soldiers or civilians, adults or children," the official said.
The explosive allegations that children had been decapitated at the kibbutz of Kfar Aza emerged Tuesday in Israeli media. Israel Defense Forces (IDF) later described the scene as a "massacre" in a statement to CNN. Women, children toddlers and the elderly were "brutally butchered in an ISIS way of action," the IDF said.
Tal Heinrich, a spokeswoman for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said on Wednesday that babies and toddlers had been found with their "heads decapitated" in Kfar Aza.
An IDF spokesman later in the day said that terrorists had carried out decapitations.
"We know that there were dead babies. There is evidence that there was decapitation. I don't know how to verify numbers or how they were killed," IDF spokesman Maj. Nir Dinar said.
Israeli military shells southern Lebanon in response to explosion at security fence
Smoke billows after an Israeli strike on the Lebanese village of Alma Ach-Chaab on October 13.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have taken action in response to an explosion at a security fence near the community of Hanita at the Lebanese-Israeli border, IDF said in a statement.
The IDF is responding with artillery fire toward Lebanese territory, it said. Israeli forces have also activated an alert warning of a possible infiltration by terrorists into the community. Israeli soldiers are currently searching the area.
Military officials said the blast at the fence caused "light damage."
Some context: There are rising fears of the Lebanon-based Shia militant faction Hezbollah entering the conflict, potentially opening a second front in the war. The IDF said Tuesday that it has added tens of thousands of additional troops to its northern border with Lebanon in anticipation of an attack by the Iran-backed group.
More than 700 Palestinian children reportedly killed in Gaza, UNICEF says
Black smoke rises after an Israeli airstrike in Gaza on Saturday.
More than 700 children have been killed in Gaza and another 2,450 have been injured since last Saturday, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund, citing local sources.
"According to the latest reports by local health authorities and media, at least 2,215 Palestinians were reportedly killed, including over 700 children, and more than 8,714 people wounded, including more than 2,450 children," UNICEF spokeswoman Sara Al Hattab told CNN on Saturday.
The Saturday figures are an update to UNICEF's Friday statement, which said “hundreds & hundreds of children have been killed and injured,” noting the number rises every hour.
"The killing of children must stop," UNICEF spokesperson James Elder said. "The images and stories are clear: children with horrendous burns, mortar wounds, and lost limbs. And hospitals are utterly overwhelmed to treat them."
Elder joined calls from the international community saying, “Israeli children being held hostage in Gaza must be safely and immediately reunited with their families and loved ones.”
At least 5 killed and 15 injured in Israeli airstrike in Rafah, Palestinian interior ministry says
Smoke billows after an Israeli air strike in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on October 16.
At least five people were killed and 15 others were injured in an Israeli airstrike that targeted a multi-story house in Rafah in the southern Gaza strip, the Palestinian interior ministry said Monday.
The ministry said the airstrike happened without prior warning from the Israel Defense Forces.
The IDF has not issued any comments about the strike.
Hundreds Killed in Israeli Strike on Gaza Hospital
Over 500 people are feared dead or injured after a strike on a hospital in Gaza City, the Hamas-run health ministry said. Hundreds are still under the rubble, it said. If confirmed, the attack would be by far the deadliest Israeli airstrike in five wars fought since 2008. Israel’s military said it did not have any details on the reported bombing.
The explosion occurred at a hospital in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian Authority. According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, the hospital was evacuating thousands of residents at the time. Many are still trapped under the rubble, it said.
The explosion is believed to have killed several hundred people, and Palestinian officials claimed that Israeli forces had bombed the hospital. In contrast, the Israeli side believes that rockets from the Islamic Jihad, an armed group in Gaza, were responsible for the blast, and that it was terrorist propaganda.
On the other hand, Islamic Jihad has denied the Israeli claim, saying in a written statement issued on October 18 that public facilities such as hospitals are never used for military purposes and dismissing the Israeli claim as a baseless lie.
The site of the blast at Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital is seen on Wednesday. Thank you. Here is how things stand tonight. We still don't know who is responsible.
Israel is using media and diplomatic channels to try to convince leaders of Arab countries that Tuesday’s blast at a Gaza hospital was caused by a misfiring jihadist missile, after even its regional allies rushed to blame it for the explosion.
Tuesday’s explosion, which killed hundreds, was blamed by Palestinian officials on an Israeli airstrike. Israel said it was caused by a failed rocket launch by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad militant group, which denied blame.
Arab state foreign ministries have issued individual statements condemning Israel for the explosion, including the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, which established ties with Israel in the Abraham Accords of 2020.
Morocco, another country that recognised Israel in 2020, also blamed it for the strike, as did Egypt, which became the first Arab country to normalise relations in 1979.
Saudi Arabia, which has ended talks on potential ties with Israel since the Israel-Hamas war flared, called the blast a “heinous crime committed by the Israeli occupation forces”.
The rapid apportioning of blame coincided with angry rallies across the region, with more planned on Wednesday after calls for a “day of rage”. With regional public opinion so inflamed, observers have cautioned that there is a low likelihood of statements being retracted regardless of whether conclusive evidence points to a failed rocket launch being to blame.
The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation also blamed Israel in a statement released after the 57-member bloc of Muslim-majority countries held an emergency meeting of foreign ministers, while Iran called for “an immediate and complete embargo” on Israel, including oil sanctions, “in addition to expelling Israeli ambassadors if relations with the Zionist regime have been established”.