Channel 12 reported, citing sources, that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approved, during a meeting of the Israeli Security and Political Cabinet (the cabinet), the resumption of humanitarian aid deliveries to the Gaza Strip.

According to the same Hebrew sources, Netanyahu rejected Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir's request to bring the aid to a vote within the cabinet, affirming that he would proceed with the decision without the need for collective approval.

The Hebrew channel indicated that aid will reach all areas of the Gaza Strip, without exception.

In the same context, Axios reported, citing Israeli government officials, that the cabinet has decided to immediately resume the transfer of humanitarian aid to Gaza. They explained that this aid will be delivered via several international organizations until the new aid mechanism, scheduled to be launched on May 24, begins operating.

Ben-Gvir commented on this with an extreme tone: "Netanyahu made a grave mistake by deciding to allow humanitarian aid into the country while he lacked a majority."

The US Embassy in Libya denied on Sunday a report that the US government is working on a plan to transfer Palestinians from the Gaza Strip to Libya.

According to NBC News, the administration of US President Donald Trump is attempting to bribe one of the warring parties in Libya to accept one million Palestinians that Israel is trying to deport from Gaza. Libya became a failed state after the US-led regime-change war against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. According to NBC News, several US officials confirmed that the Trump administration was in negotiations with one of the rival Libyan governments. The report explains: "In exchange for resettling the Palestinians, the administration would likely release billions of dollars in funds that the United States had frozen more than a decade ago."

The NBC News report did not specify whether the United States was speaking with the Tripoli-based government led by Abdul Hamid Dbeibah or the eastern government led by Khalifa Haftar. Libya has been in a state of civil war since US-backed jihadist rebels overthrew and killed Gaddafi in 2011.

Fighting has erupted in areas surrounding Tripoli in recent weeks. Both Libyan governments are accused of committing gross human rights violations, and the US State Department advises Americans not to travel to Libya "due to crime, terrorism, unexploded landmines, civil unrest, kidnapping, and armed conflict."

This report comes as Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump have discussed proposals for the mass displacement of Palestinians in recent days. On Friday, the US president said, "I have very good ideas about Gaza: to make it a free zone. Let the United States get involved, and just make it a free zone."

He added, "I would be proud if the United States owned the Strip, took it over, made it a free zone, and we allowed some good things to happen. Put people in safe houses, and Hamas would have to be dealt with."

Trump floated a similar proposal earlier in his administration. At the time, he said Palestinians would be evacuated from the Gaza Strip and sent to live in refugee cities in third countries.

Speaking about the war in Gaza earlier this week, Netanyahu said Israel was prepared to force about a million Palestinians to leave Gaza, but was still looking for a country willing to accept the refugees. “But there is one problem: We need countries to take them in,” he continued. “That’s what we are working on now. If you give them a way out, I tell you, more than 50 percent will leave, in my opinion, much more.” He also told the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee: “We are destroying more and more homes, and Gazans have nowhere to return to. The only inevitable result is that Gazans will want to emigrate outside the Gaza Strip.”

Since Israel launched its brutal war on Gaza, Israel and Washington have reached out to a number of countries to accept Palestinians forcibly displaced from Gaza by Israel. Many of these countries are facing numerous internal problems or active civil wars, such as Somalia, Sudan, Congo, Chad, and Syria.

NBC News reported that talks between Washington and Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa regarding the acceptance of Palestinians displaced from Gaza are still ongoing.

On Thursday, Trump met with the new Syrian leader, Abu Mohammed al-Julani, now known as Ahmed al-Sharaa. Al-Julani is a veteran of al-Qaeda in Iraq and founded al-Qaeda's Syrian branch. Since taking power, al-Julani's government has been implicated in mass killings of Syrian minority groups.

The official Israeli Broadcasting Authority claimed on Sunday evening that Tel Aviv had proposed a 60-day ceasefire in the Gaza Strip in exchange for Hamas releasing half of the remaining Israeli prisoners.

The Broadcasting Authority quoted unnamed Israeli sources familiar with the negotiations as saying, "The negotiating delegation presented a new proposal yesterday (Saturday) during the ongoing negotiations in the Qatari capital, Doha."

It added that the proposal "includes Hamas releasing half of the living (Israeli) prisoners in Gaza, in exchange for a 60-day ceasefire."

Tel Aviv estimates that there are 58 Israeli prisoners in Gaza, 20 of whom are still alive. Meanwhile, more than 10,100 Palestinians are languishing in its prisons, suffering torture, starvation, and medical neglect, many of whom have died, according to Palestinian and Israeli human rights and media reports.

The proposal also includes discussing the future of the war during the truce, and negotiating the disarmament of Palestinian factions and the deportation of their leaders—two demands Tel Aviv is adamant about, according to the sources.

On more than one occasion, Hamas has affirmed its refusal to disarm as long as Israel continues to occupy Palestinian territories.

As of 18:50 GMT, neither Hamas nor the Qatari mediation had commented on the claims made by the Israeli Broadcasting Authority.

With American support, Israel has been committing genocidal crimes in Gaza since October 7, 2023, leaving more than 174,000 Palestinians dead and wounded, most of them children and women, and more than 11,000 missing, in addition to hundreds of thousands displaced.

Many cities and capitals around the world witnessed mass demonstrations on Sunday, denouncing the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip.

Thousands participated in demonstrations held in Malmö, Sweden; Lodi, Italy; The Hague, Netherlands; and Amsterdam, in support of the Palestinian people, demanding a ceasefire, and the entry of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip.

The demonstrators raised Palestinian flags and banners condemning the crimes committed by the Israeli occupation against our people.

Participants called for an end to double standards and the need to hold the occupation accountable for its massacres against the Palestinian people, especially children. They also condemned the genocide in the Gaza Strip.

The bishops of the Church of Norway called for an end to the violence in Gaza and a halt to the humanitarian violations against Palestinians, expressing their deep concern over the destruction, mass displacement, and deteriorating living conditions resulting from the Israeli aggression.

A statement issued by the Norwegian Bishops' Conference in recent days criticized the undermining of international law and warned of genocide in Gaza, considering what is happening to represent a moral collapse alongside a humanitarian collapse.

The statement called for an immediate ceasefire, the release of prisoners, relief for Gaza, and an end to violence in the West Bank. They also called on the Norwegian government and the international community to exert political and economic pressure on Israel, including sanctions, to halt what they see as its policy of ethnic cleansing against Palestinians.

Voice of the Churches

In statements to Al Jazeera Net, the President of the Norwegian Bishops' Conference, Olav Vikse, emphasized that the significance of the statement issued by the Norwegian bishops stems from its call to address the Gaza tragedy from a moral perspective. He pointed out that the statement's positive resonance among churches and the Palestinian people is evidence of the need for increased moral support for the Palestinians.

Fakes explained that Western churches, particularly in Scandinavia, have begun issuing similar statements of solidarity with Gaza, expressing his hope that this voice will extend to include churches in Europe and North America. He emphasized the need to escalate this shared moral stance at a critical time when the world is witnessing deafening silence.

The President of the Norwegian Bishops' Conference emphasized that Western churches and religious institutions also have a moral influence on policymakers. Decision-makers in democratic countries often turn to the Church's positions, especially when it comes to issues that touch on human values and human rights.

Regarding the possibility of imposing European sanctions on Israel, Fakes explained that this matter depends on the will of political leaders. However, there are indications that discussions on this issue are ongoing in international forums.

Boycott Israel

For his part, Secretary-General of the Palestinian Christian Initiative, Rifaat Kassis, said that the Church of Norway's call for sanctions was not a surprise initiative, but rather the culmination of ongoing Palestinian demands, from the Kairos Movement and Palestinian Christian institutions.

In statements to Al Jazeera Net, Qassis indicated that these church calls aim to push Israel to abide by international law. He emphasized that economic boycotts and divestments are peaceful and effective means, asserting that without such pressure, Israeli violations against Palestinians will not cease.

Qassis (who is also the Secretary General of the Kairos Palestine Movement and its International Coalition) added that churches possess significant moral and ethical power even if they do not have the power to directly influence politics, as accumulated principled positions make a difference over time.

The Secretary-General of the Palestinian Christian Initiative called on churches to believe in their ability to effect real change, and to stand with the oppressed and amplify the voice of justice in the face of the occupation and ongoing violations.

Israeli settlers began establishing a new settlement outpost east of the West Bank city of Ramallah, while occupation forces continued their tight siege of the town of Bruqin, west of Salfit, for the fifth day following an operation that resulted in the death of a settler.

The Al-Baidar Organization for the Defense of Bedouin Rights and Villages Targeted by Israel said in a statement that "settlers began establishing a new settlement outpost this Sunday morning amidst the homes of residents in the Maghayer al-Deir Bedouin community located east of the town of Deir Dibwan, east of Ramallah."

The organization explained that the region is witnessing repeated attacks targeting residents and their property, exacerbating the suffering of the population and threatening their stability.

She added, "These measures are part of a series of violations perpetrated by the occupation forces and settlers against Bedouin communities in the West Bank."

Last February, Palestinian farms on the outskirts of the town of Deir Dibwan were subjected to settler attacks, resulting in the theft of approximately 1,000 goats.

Siege of Burqin

Meanwhile, occupation forces continue their siege of the town of Bruqin, with heavy deployment throughout the town's neighborhoods and strict restrictions on civilian movement. The forces are reportedly searching for the perpetrator of the shooting attack that occurred last Wednesday, which killed a female settler and wounded others.

Local sources told Al Jazeera that occupation forces seized a number of homes and turned them into field interrogation centers for residents. They also carried out extensive house searches and vandalized their contents in retaliation since the siege began.

In parallel with the genocidal war in Gaza, the Israeli occupation army and settlers have escalated their attacks in the West Bank, including occupied Jerusalem, resulting in the deaths of at least 967 Palestinians, the injury of approximately 7,000, and the arrest of more than 17,000, according to reports from Palestinian organizations.

US President Donald Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, said the president is determined to resolve the conflict with Iran diplomatically and through dialogue, stressing that Trump has sent all necessary signals, including direct messages to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

Witkoff told ABC News that the United States has a clear red line regarding nuclear enrichment, adding, "We cannot allow even 1 percent enrichment because enrichment gives us the capability to build a nuclear weapon, and we will not allow a bomb to reach here."

Witkoff emphasized that any potential agreement must be built on this foundation, saying, "From our perspective, everything starts with an agreement that does not include enrichment. We cannot accept that at all."

However, Witkoff expressed US hope for progress.

He continued, "Apart from that, there are many ways we can achieve our goals in these negotiations. We believe we will hold a meeting this week in Europe, and we hope that this will lead to some real positive results. That is our current position."

Witkoff said that the United States will not allow a humanitarian disaster to occur in the Gaza Strip under Trump.

"The question now, in my opinion, is: How do we logistically get all these trucks into Gaza? How do we set up aid distribution stations? Mobile kitchens will be sent into Gaza, and there are trucks loaded with flour waiting at the border. The Israeli authorities have indicated that they will begin allowing more of these trucks into Gaza," Witkoff added.

Aid organizations have warned that the Gaza Strip is on the brink of a humanitarian disaster, with Israel halting all aid from entering since March 2.

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) warned on Sunday that the situation in the Gaza Strip has deteriorated significantly over the past two months due to the Israeli blockade and the prevention of humanitarian aid from entering.

UNICEF said in a post on its Twitter account that children in Gaza have been facing relentless Israeli bombardment and deprived of essential goods, services, and life-saving care since the beginning of the war of extermination on the Strip.

UNICEF stressed the need to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza and resume the ceasefire immediately.

She stressed that "the situation in the Gaza Strip has deteriorated significantly over the past two months due to the blockade imposed on it and the prevention of the entry of humanitarian aid."

Since March 2, Israel has closed all crossings into Gaza, preventing the passage of any humanitarian aid. This has plunged the Strip into a state of famine, despite the backlog of aid trucks at its borders.

The Israeli occupation army announced on Sunday the launch of a large-scale ground operation in the north and south of the Gaza Strip, as part of what it called "Operation Gideon."

The army said in a statement that "regular and reserve forces began a large-scale ground operation across the northern and southern Gaza Strip over the past day." The army explained that the air force launched an opening strike last week targeting more than 670 Hamas targets across the Strip, with the aim of "disrupting enemy preparations" and supporting the ground operation, it claimed.

The statement added that the raids targeted "weapons depots, terrorist elements, underground tunnels, and anti-tank missile launch sites," noting that the air force continues to provide support to ground forces operating inside the Gaza Strip, they claimed.

Meanwhile, medical sources in Gaza announced the deaths of 103 Palestinians, the majority of whom were women and children, as a result of a series of violent raids launched by the occupation forces on various areas of the Gaza Strip since dawn on Sunday.

Sources reported that 40 people were killed in airstrikes targeting displaced persons' tents in the Al-Mawasi area, west of Khan Yunis, while 45 other Palestinians were killed in airstrikes targeting Gaza City and areas in the northern Gaza Strip.

Politically, Reuters quoted a senior Israeli official as saying that there has been little progress in talks aimed at ending the war in Gaza.

This comes after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office announced that the Israeli negotiating delegation in Doha, under his direction, is working to exhaust all possible avenues to reach a deal with Hamas.

According to the statement, the options on the table include the proposal presented by US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, or an agreement to end the war that includes the release of all detainees, the exile of Hamas leaders, and the movement's disarmament.

News analysis

On Iran, Gaza, Syria, and Yemen, US President Donald Trump is moving forward with his Middle East policies without Israel, rewriting decades of foreign policy, The New York Times reported on Sunday. When President Trump shook hands with the new Syrian leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, and promised to lift sanctions on Syria at the Saudi royal palace last week, it was a clear indication of how the president’s Middle East diplomacy has all but marginalized Israel.

Trump described Ahmed al-Sharaa, who had previous ties to al-Qaeda and was known as Abu Mohammed al-Julani, as "a tough guy with a tough past." Trump added that he ended sanctions, many of which were imposed on the former Syrian government, "to give it a chance at greatness."

In doing so, Trump effectively ignored the views of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose government describes al-Sharaa as a "jihadist." The Israeli military has bombed Syria hundreds of times since last December, when rebels led by al-Sharaa ousted President Bashar al-Assad from power. In recent decades, under US presidents of both parties, Israel has enjoyed a largely special place at the center of US foreign policy in the region. Netanyahu, who has been in power for most of the past two decades, has consistently been a key player in Middle East debate, even to the point of irritating his American counterparts at times.

It is noteworthy that there is no indication that the United States is abandoning its historical ties with Israel, or that it will cease its military and economic support for it. During his flight on Air Force One from Riyadh to Doha, Trump dismissed concerns about marginalizing Israel. He told reporters who raised the issue of the estrangement between the United States and Israel, "No, not at all. It's a good thing for Israel to have a relationship like I have with these countries, the countries of the Middle East, almost all of them."

According to the newspaper, Trump's five-day tour of the Middle East last week highlighted a new dynamic, one in which Israel—and Netanyahu in particular—have become an afterthought. In Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates, Trump sought to negotiate "peace agreements" with Iran and Yemen, and struck trillions of dollars in trade deals with wealthy Gulf states. He also did not stop in Israel.

The newspaper quotes Itamar Rabinovich, the former Israeli ambassador to the United States, as saying: "The general feeling is that attention is shifting, particularly toward the Gulf states, where the money is."

Rabinovich added that Trump appears to have lost much interest in working with Netanyahu to stop the war in Gaza, because he feels there is no point. Netanyahu is sticking to his position and won't back down. Hamas isn't backing down. It seems like a dead end with no hope.

While Netanyahu's spokesman, Omar Dostari, denied any serious rift in relations between the two countries, citing Netanyahu's two visits to the White House in recent months and Trump's recent comment that we're "on the same side on every issue," referring to the Israeli prime minister, the shift in diplomatic fortunes has been hard to miss over the past few weeks, as Trump has taken action on one issue after another—without involving Netanyahu.

It's worth noting that earlier this month, Trump surprised many in Israel with his sudden announcement of a ceasefire with the Houthis in Yemen, even as the group continued to fire rockets at Israel, and days after Israel failed to intercept a missile that struck Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv, disrupting flights for weeks.

The Trump administration also succeeded in securing the release of Idan Alexander, the last surviving American hostage in Gaza, without Israel's knowledge or intervention.

Nadav Strauschler, a former advisor to Netanyahu, stated that the Israeli prime minister still has a strong relationship with Trump, but it is different from the one he had with previous US presidents.

"With Biden, Netanyahu can postpone (US) decisions," he said. "But with Trump, once that happens, decisions are made above Netanyahu's head. This is a change that worries many in Israel."

Throughout his visit to the Middle East, Trump reiterated his desire to reach an agreement with Iran that would avoid the need to use military force against its nuclear facilities. In Qatar last Thursday, he said the United States was in "very serious negotiations with Iran for long-term peace," adding that it would be "great" if they reached an agreement.

This is also the opposite of what Netanyahu wants, as he has been urging the Trump administration to support, or even participate in, military strikes against Iran. So far, Trump has taken the opposite approach, although he has repeatedly held out the possibility of launching large-scale strikes if negotiations fail.

"Iran is the heart of the story, more than anything else," Struckler told the newspaper. "Netanyahu's legacy is at stake."

The decision to engage with Iran is no different from Trump's decision to lift sanctions on Syria. There are deep suspicions in Israel that the new Sharaa government will transform into another extremist force hostile to Israel. Israeli officials say the strikes aim to destroy the weapons of the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, who was ousted by Sharaa, and limit its presence near Israel's northern border.

In contrast, Trump's announcement of sanctions is an endorsement of Shara'a's promises to be different, and will provide him with a much-needed economic lifeline.

Overall, the US president's actions represent a stunning shift, even from Trump's first term, when he visited Israel during his first foreign trip. One of his first official decisions on that trip was to announce that the United States was moving its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, in a symbolic show of solidarity with Netanyahu alongside him.

This shift shook the Israelis.

Reports in Israeli newspapers and international headlines were deeply alarming: “Trump bypasses Israel, but it’s silent”; “Trump’s snub: What Netanyahu’s declining global power means for his fortunes at home”; “White House shows Netanyahu fatigue”; “Trump’s Middle East trip leaves Netanyahu watching from afar” and so on.

On this point, a former US official told a correspondent for Al-Quds newspaper that, at the present time, it appears as though Trump will continue his "cold" approach to his relationship with Netanyahu, even as his aides insist that his relationship with the Israeli prime minister remains strong. It also appears as though the US president no longer treats Israel as an indispensable state in the Middle East or the sole democracy in a sea of tyranny.

But, according to the former official, who requested anonymity for privacy reasons, "It is unlikely that the United States will change its relationship with Israel. This is a very strong, historical relationship, rooted from the founding of Israel until today, despite the change of American presidents and Israeli leaders."

He added: "Israel and America are a cohesive unit economically, militarily, intelligence-wise, culturally, and heritage-wise, and the United States is Israel's largest supporter. The previous administration (Democratic President Joe Biden's administration) supported Israel with more than $22 billion over 15 months, gave it the green light to brutally and continuously bomb Gaza, and prevented the world from condemning Israel in international forums. The Trump administration has continued the same approach, and even worse. In Gaza, it allowed Israel and Netanyahu to violate the ceasefire (on March 18), and allowed Israel to impose a complete blockade on the Gaza Strip, despite widespread international opposition."

“Trump’s electoral base is completely supportive of Israel,” the former official said. “Every official in the US government is completely supportive of Israel, from Vice President J.D. Vance, to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, to Secretary of Defense Ben Hegseth, to CIA Director John Ratcliffe, to his Middle East negotiator, Steve Witkoff, and to Trump’s ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, who fully embraces the Israeli position.”

The Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, said that the Israeli occupation army committed a new massacre against Palestinian journalists. This came after a simultaneous bombardment at dawn on Sunday targeted the homes and tents of five journalists in the Gaza Strip, killing them and their family members, including children.

The movement clarified in a statement that the journalists killed in this bombing were: Aziz al-Hajjar, Nour Qandil, Abdul Rahman al-Abadlah, Khaled Abu Saif, and Ahmed al-Zinati, noting that they were deliberately targeted as part of a systematic policy to suppress the voice of truth and silence the Palestinian media.

Hamas affirmed that this attack is part of a long series of crimes committed by the occupation forces against journalists in Gaza, considering that the continued killing of media professionals protected under international law demonstrates the extent of the occupation government's disregard for UN conventions and international legitimacy.

The movement called on international press and media organizations, as well as journalists around the world, to stand in solidarity with their colleagues in Gaza and work to expose the ongoing violations and attempts to obscure the facts. It noted that the number of journalists martyred since the start of the aggression on Gaza has reached 220.

Israeli occupation forces stormed the town of Al-Khader, south of Bethlehem, on Sunday evening.

According to local sources, occupation forces stormed Al-Khader, took up positions in the "Bab Al-Gate" area, and conducted a foot patrol on Jerusalem-Hebron Road, without any reported raids or arrests.

Occupation forces also took up positions near Al-Yamama Hospital, set up a military checkpoint, stopped a vehicle, searched it, and checked the passengers' IDs.

Today, Sunday, the Israeli occupation authorities forced a Jerusalemite citizen to demolish a residential building in the Shuafat camp, north of occupied Jerusalem.

Local sources reported that the occupation forces forced Khalil Abu Mayala to demolish a five-apartment building under construction in Shuafat refugee camp, claiming it lacked a permit.

The sources reported that an Israeli police force was present in the vicinity of the building to monitor the demolition operations.

Nearly ten Israeli soldiers who participated in the war on the Gaza Strip reported that "the Israeli army is systematically demolishing residential and public buildings in the Gaza Strip, as well as buildings on agricultural land. This demolition has become an integral part of the army's modus operandi, and in many cases, it has been a goal in itself and the army's central mission," according to a report published by the "Local Conversation" website.

One soldier said, "I guarded four or five bulldozers. On the two days I guarded the bulldozers, they demolished 60 homes a day. They would demolish a one- or two-story home in an hour."

A three- or four-story building takes a little longer. The official mission was to open a logistical hub for the invasion, but in reality, bulldozers simply demolished the houses. The southeastern part of Rafah is completely destroyed. The horizon is flat. There is no city.

The Israeli military claims it demolishes buildings housing Hamas fighters or Hamas infrastructure that pose a threat to Israeli forces. However, since the beginning of last year, "The Hottest Place in Hell," a left-wing Israeli website, has reported that the army is carrying out "a systematic and complete demolition of all buildings close to the fence and within a kilometer of the Strip, without intelligence or field soldiers identifying them as terrorist sites, with the aim of creating a buffer zone."

The report noted that an analysis of satellite images conducted last week showed that the Israeli military controls 129 square kilometers, or 35% of the Gaza Strip's area, which it describes as a "buffer zone." The military thus describes the area between the "Morag axis" and the border with Egypt, where the city of Rafah is located, or "practically located."

The report quoted a soldier who participated in the war as saying, "There was no justification for demolishing buildings, as they do not threaten Israel. This is not related to defending military sites." While the Israeli army claims that the goal of the demolitions is to prevent Hamas forces from being present in the buildings, "many soldiers understood that what they were actually doing was 'leveling buildings to the ground,' in order to ensure that 'the return of residents to these areas will not happen.' These things were sometimes said explicitly by officers, and at other times they were understood from the atmosphere as a result of direct statements made by Israeli politicians."

The report noted that the Israeli army does not advance into areas where residents remain, and that it is the bombing that leads to the massive number of martyrs, while "the systematic demolition of buildings in cities is paving the way for ethnic cleansing in the Strip, which in Israeli political parlance today is described as 'the realization of Trump's vision.'"

Israeli Defense Minister Yisrael Katz said after the war resumed last March that "the evacuation of residents from combat zones will soon begin again, and Israel will act with a force you have never seen before. Accept the American president's advice. Return the kidnapped soldiers and expel Hamas, and other options will open up for you, including leaving for other parts of the world for those who wish to do so. The alternative is total demolition and destruction."

"We are demolishing more homes, and there is nowhere for them to return to," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said during a meeting of the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee last week. "The only desired outcome will be for Gazans to want to emigrate. Our main problem is which countries will receive them."

The report quoted a former Israeli security official as saying, "I received reports from field officers about operations that were not operationally necessary: demolishing homes, forcing tens or hundreds of thousands of residents to leave. They said that D9 forces were operating that were not under their command."

The officers told me, 'This makes us war criminals.' Demolishing a building because a terrorist is hiding in it is legal, but I received information that forces entered and systematically demolished buildings in Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahiya. I don't know what percentage of these were non-operational demolitions, but there were a lot of them."

"These are two war crimes," human rights lawyer Michael Sfard explained. "Destruction of property not for military necessity constitutes a war crime, and there is a specific, more serious war crime of widespread destruction of property without military justification. There is a broad debate among legal experts, human rights activists, and academia about whether 'domination'—the destruction of an area used for human habitation—should be considered a crime against humanity. Crimes against humanity are widespread attacks on a civilian population," he was quoted as saying in the report.

It seems we're trying to forget and not remember our past lives and memories. For fear of falling back into the past, the pain of losing a son, and the destruction of homes and memories, we may be doing this intentionally. This morning, my daughter Yaffa reminded me that Eid al-Adha is just around the corner, in just a few days.

Time is full of blood, death and destruction, and cold and ridiculous talk on the media and satellite channels. Who bears the moral and national responsibility for what remains of lives, memories, property and possessions?

Darkness reigns and I no longer have words to describe the feeling of horror. The images and scenes burn the human soul. Hearts no longer beat. The statements from Hamas officials, and the refusal to accept a partial solution to stop the genocide, could have been better than what was.

99 martyrs since midnight until Sunday morning. The bloody nights of the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, the mass killing in tents and hospitals, the destruction of what remains of buildings, the suffering of hunger and thirst. Corpses are lying in the streets, fear is driving people to flee, the inability to bury them and flee to escape death. There is a severe shortage of available shrouds, to bury the bodies of the martyrs with dignity.

Hamas believes it has achieved success through its engagement with the US administration and the promises it received following the release of Israeli-American prisoner Idan Alexander, and that it possesses the solution and security. It also believes it possesses the power to protect Gaza and prevent the Israeli occupation from reoccupying the entire Gaza Strip.

The Israeli military operation continues even before Trump's departure, while mass famine deepens in the Gaza Strip, with hundreds of Palestinians killed in recent days as a result of Israeli airstrikes and displacement.

While Israeli public opinion is largely indifferent to the lives of Israeli prisoners and unmoved by the war's catastrophic consequences for the suffering of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, the ground operation is expanding, and the severe restrictions and blockade on the entry of humanitarian aid are being imposed.

Netanyahu refuses to reach a prisoner exchange agreement and rescue the kidnapped Israelis. If Netanyahu decides to accede to Trump's demands and stop the war, the ruling right-wing coalition, which is pushing for the continuation of the war, the occupation of the Gaza Strip, and settlement expansion there, will bring down the government.

It seems that Hamas, as well as the international community, did not hear the remarks of MK Zvi Sukkot (Religious Zionism) on Channel 12 that "everyone is already accustomed to the fact that it is possible to kill a hundred residents of Gaza in one night of war, and this does not matter to anyone."

This is what is actually happening these days, and it demonstrates that the massacres taking place represent terrifying trends in the Israeli government's policy.

Hamas is still relying on US President Donald Trump's intervention to halt the war, hoping he will continue to pay attention to events in Gaza. Trump said Saturday morning that he is not bothered by Netanyahu's actions, describing him as "an angry man who has been in a difficult situation" since October 7.

Trump speaks to the media daily, but the problem lies in sorting the real information from the multiple, sometimes contradictory, statements, and trying to assess his intentions, knowing that they may change from one day to the next.

Trump also said, "We're watching Gaza and we're going to take care of it. There are a lot of people starving." His Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, also spoke by phone with Netanyahu last Thursday and said the administration was "concerned about the suffering in Gaza." Rubio's words may also indicate the seriousness of the situation in the Strip. But for now, the Trump administration has shown little interest in the issue.

Conflicting reports emerged on Saturday regarding the resumption of negotiations between the two sides in Qatar, mediated by Qatar, amid the ongoing genocide and Israeli military operation in the background.

Hamas still expects Trump to decide to intervene, as if he were the awaited messiah. The world and Arab leaders who gathered in Baghdad nearly 20 months later expressed their concern about the ongoing genocide and suffering afflicting the Palestinians, and their concern is worthless. Hamas can withdraw the pretexts and assume responsibility, given the ongoing war of deception, lies, destruction, and devastation.

The newspaper reported that the Israeli army refuses to disclose the number of soldiers who committed suicide this year.

Source: An-Nahar

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported on Sunday, citing sources, that 35 Israeli soldiers have committed suicide since the beginning of the war on Gaza (in October 2023) until the end of 2024.

The newspaper said that the Israeli army refuses to disclose the number of soldiers who committed suicide this year.

It noted that the Israeli army has buried many soldiers who committed suicide since the beginning of the war without military funerals or public announcements.

Haaretz reported that the number of soldiers receiving treatment for mental illnesses since the beginning of the war exceeds 9,000.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office confirmed on Sunday that the negotiating team is working in Doha to exploit any opportunity to reach a deal in accordance with Witkoff's proposal.

Netanyahu's office said in a brief statement, "The contacts are addressing Witkoff's proposal and a comprehensive proposal to end the war, including the exile of Hamas leaders and the disarmament of the Gaza Strip."

In recent months, the Israeli army has called up hundreds of soldiers from the reserve, including those suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and those with permanent mental disabilities, to serve again in the escalating war on the Gaza Strip. This comes amid a "severe manpower crisis" and warnings of "serious repercussions," according to a report in Haaretz on Sunday.

The report stated that at least two reserve soldiers committed suicide in recent months after being called back to duty despite having previously been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, bringing the number of suicides among regular and reserve soldiers to 35 since October 7, 2023, including 21 soldiers since the beginning of 2024.

The newspaper noted that the army does not have an updated and comprehensive database on the psychological conditions of soldiers previously recognized as having mental health disabilities, including soldiers currently being treated in the Ministry of Defense's rehabilitation department. Although the ministry has transferred partial lists to the army, they lack accurate clinical information, making monitoring cases extremely difficult.

Recruitment despite warnings

One example cited in the report is the suicide of a 25-year-old reserve soldier who served in Khan Yunis as part of an armored unit. He was called up again in March 2024 despite previous suicide attempts and being registered as mentally ill with the ministry. Despite being informed of the deterioration of his condition, he was not referred to any specialized authority and committed suicide with his weapon in his home hours after requesting his discharge.

An army source told the newspaper that hundreds, perhaps thousands, of reserve soldiers suffer from varying degrees of psychological trauma, some of whom are recognized as permanently injured with disabilities exceeding 50%. The source emphasized that some of these soldiers were called up through volunteer advertisements on social media.

"egg-cracking" doctrine

According to the report, leaders in the Human Resources Division opposed initiatives to subject recruits to psychological assessments before their call-up, fearing it would "open Pandora's Box" and lead to a collapse in combat readiness. One officer was quoted as saying, "We need as many rifles as possible. We'll deal with the consequences later. You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs."

The report noted that some soldiers attempted to excuse themselves from service due to their condition, but their requests were rejected. One of them, a 29-year-old man with a persistent mental health condition, received a summons despite having received official recognition of his disability.

Lack of follow-up and high suicide

The newspaper explained that the army places the responsibility of reporting mental health conditions on the soldier himself, although many are unaware of this obligation. According to psychological experts, some sufferers prefer not to disclose their problems for fear of exclusion or shame.

Israeli psychiatrists say that returning wounded soldiers to the battlefield exposes them to increased risks, both in terms of deteriorating psychological state and increased risk of suicide. The newspaper reported that ten soldiers committed suicide after being discharged from service, but these were not included in the army's statistics.

In response, the Israeli military said it "invests significant resources in psychological follow-up" and that "every soldier must report any change in their health condition," but did not deny the difficulty of monitoring cases under the current circumstances.

For its part, the Ministry of Defense indicated that the Rehabilitation Department is monitoring more than 17,000 casualties from the ongoing Gaza war, including more than 9,000 psychologically injured. It stated that dealing with these patients is a "national mission" and noted that cooperation is ongoing with various agencies to address the challenges.

The Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip announced today, Sunday, that 67 dead (including 5 recovered dead) and 361 injuries arrived at Gaza Strip hospitals in the past 24 hours.

The ministry said in its daily statement, "The initial toll of those who have arrived at hospitals since dawn today is 96 dead and more than 140 wounded as a result of the occupation's massacres against citizens in the Gaza Strip."

It pointed out that a number of victims are still under the rubble and on the streets, and that ambulance and civil defense crews are unable to reach them.

The Ministry of Health confirmed that the death toll from the Israeli aggression has risen to 53,339 dead and 121,034 injuries since October 7, 2023.

The death toll and injuries since March 18, 2025 has reached (3,193 dead, 8,993 injuries).

Settlers seized a sheep pen in preparation for the establishment of a pastoral outpost between the towns of Deir Dibwan and Mikhmas, east of Ramallah.

Local sources reported that a group of settlers seized a sheep pen belonging to a family from the Arab al-Malihat tribe in the Maghayer al-Deir area, located between the towns of Deir Dibwan and Mikhmas, and began erecting a tent and metal fence around it.

Sources reported that the settlers brought a group of livestock to the enclosure, indicating their intention to transform it into a colonial pastoral outpost.

International newspapers published a report revealing details of an Israeli plan to divide the Gaza Strip into three areas separated by four Israeli-controlled military zones.

This move is part of a long-term strategy aimed at gaining complete control over the Gaza Strip, while the siege and starvation continue as a means of pressuring the Palestinians.

According to a Sunday Times report, the Israeli army plans to seize control of four main areas extending from the northern Gaza Strip to Gaza City, passing through the Netzarim Corridor and the Morag axis, and reaching Rafah in the south.

According to the plan, Gaza's population will be divided into three separate zones, with strict restrictions on movement. Citizens will only be allowed to travel between these zones with security permits, along with strict inspection procedures for goods.

The report indicates that the evacuation of the areas to be controlled by Israel will take approximately three weeks and will include the construction of military infrastructure to separate civilian areas and reinforce the presence of Israeli forces within the Strip.

The leaked map also reveals that approximately 12 locations within civilian areas will be designated for the distribution of humanitarian aid, as part of US envoy Steve Witkoff's plan, which includes expanding the number of "safe distribution sites" to assist the population in Gaza.

These developments come at a time when the Gaza Strip is suffering from a severe humanitarian crisis amid intense bombardment by the Israeli army, while international mediators seek to reach a ceasefire.

In this context, reports emerged that Hamas had agreed to release half of the hostages in exchange for a two-month truce, a claim officially denied by Israel.

For its part, the Spanish newspaper El Pais described what is happening in Gaza as "potential genocide," calling on the international community to take urgent action to halt this escalation. It argued that the rhetoric surrounding Israeli crimes must be more forceful, commensurate with the scale of Palestinian suffering.

The Times reported on a map leaked by diplomats showing that the Israeli military proposes forcing civilians in Gaza to remain in three tightly controlled sectors, separated by four occupied territories.

According to the newspaper, this map will remain in place unless a ceasefire agreement is reached in the coming days. The plan indicates that civilians will be prohibited from moving between these sectors without authorization, and security measures, including identity verification, will be implemented.

At a time when international pressure is mounting to avoid a large-scale military operation in Gaza, Yedioth Ahronoth asserted that the current escalation is diminishing the chances of reaching a peaceful settlement, noting that the international community is seeking to pressure for a ceasefire.

The Washington Times highlighted the Arab League summit in Baghdad, where Arab leaders called for an end to the war and pledged to help rebuild Gaza once military operations ended. Meanwhile, the US president's recent tour failed to yield any tangible results in a ceasefire.

Overall, this report reflects the continued Israeli escalation in the Gaza Strip, amid intense diplomatic efforts to reach a compromise that would prevent the conflict from escalating and alleviate the humanitarian crisis facing the Palestinian population.

For the fourth consecutive day, Israeli occupation forces continue to storm the towns of Kafr ad-Dik and Burqin, west of Salfit.

Local sources reported that the occupation forces imposed a curfew on the town of Kafr ad-Dik, preventing citizens from entering or leaving the town until further notice.

This coincides with the bulldozing of hundreds of dunams of land between the towns of Bruqin and Kafr ad-Dik, with the aim of constructing colonial roads and plazas for settlers.

 May 15, 2025 – Ramallah, Palestine

Arab Palestinian Investment Company (APIC) disclosed its financial results for the first quarter of 2025. APIC Chairman and CEO Tarek Aggad announced that the company recorded total revenues of USD 292.5 million, reflecting an 18.7% growth compared to the same period last year. Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) reached USD 12.3 million, and the company achieved an operating profit of USD 10 million. However, APIC reported a net loss of USD 1.34 million in the first quarter of 2025, compared to a net profit of USD 1.22 million for the same period of 2024. 

Total assets amounted to USD 905 million, marking a 7% increase to 2024’s year-end. Shareholder equity stood at USD 218.35 million, a15.7% increase to 2024’s year-end.

Aggad outlined the key factors behind the drop in the company’s net profit in the first quarter of 2025 compared to the same period last year. He emphasizedthat the ongoing devastating war on Gaza, the escalation of Israeli attacks in the West Bank, and the deep economic recession resulting from Israel’s withholding of Palestinian Authority funds—which has led to the PA’s inability to fully pay its employees or meet its financial obligations to the private sector—have significantly impacted the performance of APIC’s subsidiaries. Aggad added that the Palestinian Authority's direct and indirect debt to APIC subsidiaries reached around USD 114 million by the end of the first quarter of 2025.

Aggad went on to add that the continued classification of Turkey as a hyperinflationary country led to ongoing non-cash losses amounting to USD 1.85 million in Q1 2025 due to the application of International Accounting Standard No. 29. He also noted that inflation negatively impacted the operational performance of Polonez, Siniora’s subsidiary in Turkey.

About APIC

APIC is a public shareholding investment company listed on the Palestine Exchange (PEX: APIC). It holds diversified investments across the manufacturing, trade, distribution and service sectors in Palestine, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Iraq and Turkey through its group of subsidiaries: Siniora Food Industries Company; Unipal General Trading Company; Palestine Automobile Company; Medical Supplies and Services Company; National Aluminum and Profiles Company (NAPCO); Reema Hygienic Paper Company; Sky Advertising and  Promotion Company; Arab Leasing Company and Arab Palestinian Storage and Cooling Company, employing over 3,400 staff through its group of subsidiaries. For more information, visit https://apic.ps/

The Economist reported last week that since the war on Gaza began in October 2023, the death toll has been hotly contested, as counting the dead in any ongoing war is extremely difficult. But experts are still trying to track them, and new research suggests the reported numbers are far too low.

Accurate daily figures from Gaza are unusual, according to the magazine's report, which notes that such statistics have not been available from the Ukraine war, for example. However, during this war, as in previous ones, Gaza's health authorities released details of the number of Palestinian deaths.

The magazine notes, “Doubts about these figures are reasonable, as Hamas presumably has an incentive to inflate civilian casualties. However, when previous conflicts ended, Israeli and UN estimates of the death toll were roughly identical to those issued during the fighting. This war was more comprehensive and lasted longer than any previous one. Many institutions that count deaths, such as hospitals, were destroyed. As of May 5, the Gaza Health Ministry announced that 52,615 people had been killed in the war, without specifying the number of combatants killed as in previous wars. Israel estimated last January that about 20,000 of the dead were militants.”

The Gaza Ministry of Health uses two lists—one based on hospital information and the other from an online survey in which people reported deaths—along with other data, presumably related to those who died but were not identified, to compile the official totals. In a recent study published in The Lancet, researchers examined these two lists along with a third, compiled using details from social media obituaries (which only included deaths resulting from injuries caused by Israeli shelling and attacks by the Israeli military). All three lists included the names of those killed, typically their ages and gender. Some also included an ID number. Independent investigators confirmed that those on both ministry lists were likely dead.

The researchers ignored the ministry's official total. Instead, they examined the overlap between the three lists, using data from the start of the war until June 30, 2024. They used this information to estimate the number of people likely to have died and then compared it to the ministry's official total. If all 30-year-old men on one list also appeared on the other two, all these deaths might have been counted. But if the three lists had different names, each list could be completely incomplete.

The researchers found that the overlap was so small that the true death toll was likely 46% to 107% higher than the ministry's official total. If we assume that the rate has remained unchanged since last June (and did not decrease, as other statistical systems have done, for example, during a ceasefire) and apply it to the current count, this would indicate that between 77,000 and 109,000 Gazans were killed, equivalent to 4-5% of the Strip's pre-war population.

The magazine notes that there is still a huge amount of uncertainty, as the lists contain errors. Since the beginning of the war, the names of 3,952 people appeared on one of the two lists compiled by the Health Ministry, only to be subsequently deleted. Hamas fighters, most likely young, may be disproportionately absent from the lists (perhaps because the movement wanted to minimize its losses), so the death toll could be higher. An unknown number, perhaps in the thousands, also died due to lack of medical care. It will be difficult to determine the exact death toll in this war, even after it ends.

It's worth noting that the British medical journal The Lancet published a report in July 2024 stating that the actual death toll in Gaza due to the war could reach 186,000 or even more, representing approximately 8% of Gaza's population. The report then addressed how the war leads to indirect deaths due to a lack of medical care, food, shelter, and water.

Israeli security officials, both military and intelligence, reported Sunday that the Israeli military realizes it cannot free Israeli prisoners by expanding the war on Gaza. Because of the high cost associated with establishing military rule in the Strip, some within the military leadership doubt the feasibility of achieving Israel's second goal in the war, which is to defeat Hamas, Yedioth Ahronoth reported.

The newspaper added, "The Israeli army is caught in a trap. On one side, there is the public, which doesn't understand why and why the war has resumed, just as the army itself is having difficulty understanding what the army is doing and where it is headed with this move. On the other side, there are the families of the kidnapped soldiers, who believe there is danger in this move, not hope."

On the third side, the newspaper continued, "the political echelon, i.e. the prime minister and the defense minister, has suddenly become generous, giving unlimited credit to the army, which initiated and planned (the expansion of the war). All of this is so that (the political echelon) can hold it (the army) accountable when everything collapses. In the process, it adds to the plan, as if it came from the army, goals that are in stark contrast to the goals of the war and the laws of war, in words that create extremely grave risks for army officers."

The newspaper noted that "the army's most difficult trap may be its own. It has been fighting for a year and a half and has failed to defeat Hamas. Moreover, the army, under its new leadership, feels obligated to try to find a solution and do something, and has found itself in a creeping occupation of the Gaza Strip."

The newspaper quoted senior Israeli security sources as saying, "The army cannot retreat, because if it does, it will appear to its officers as if it has surrendered and given up the fight without achieving any of its objectives. It also cannot remain in the same place, because an army that remains in the same place facing terrorist nests will be targeted and will suffer casualties. Therefore, we are left with the only option, which is to advance."

According to the newspaper, "progressing forward will eventually lead Israel to occupy the entire Gaza Strip, and many, if not most, senior officers do not believe this is good for state security."

The General Staff's assessment, based on intelligence and analysis of operations conducted by the Air Force and the Military Operations Planning Brigade, according to the newspaper, is that "similar to similar steps in the West Bank, the army will have to remain there for years. In Gaza, there are many tunnels and fortifications. This requires complete control of the field, with massive forces, long axes for transporting logistical needs, and the need to replace forces with fresh ones. With the exhaustion that everyone sees in the reserve forces, it is not certain that this is something that can be advanced for a long time."

A senior security source stated, "The army believes that in the most optimistic scenario, we will eventually return to square one, where the political leadership will be forced to choose between occupying the Gaza Strip or the kidnapped soldiers."

According to the newspaper, an Israeli intelligence official reported that the army told the political echelon that "if you want to return the kidnapped soldiers alive, there is no alternative but to negotiate with Hamas and reach an agreement."

Since Sunday morning, the Israeli occupation army has been sending additional military reinforcements to Jenin refugee camp and its surroundings, as the aggression continues for the 118th consecutive day. Several neighborhoods in the city are witnessing daily deployment of infantry units.

This morning, Israeli occupation forces fired live ammunition intensively inside Jenin camp, expanding their bulldozing and destruction operations inside the camp with the aim of altering its features and structure, and continuing to prevent entry or access to it.

The occupation forces also continue to completely seal off Jenin camp and prevent access to it, while continuing to bulldoze and destroy it with the aim of altering its structure and features.

According to Jenin Municipality estimates, approximately 600 homes were completely demolished in the camp, while the rest were partially damaged and rendered uninhabitable. Meanwhile, the occupation forces continue to fire live ammunition intensively in the camp.

Extensive damage was caused to facilities, homes, and infrastructure in Jenin, especially in the eastern and Al-Hadaf neighborhoods.

In the morning hours, occupation forces arrested the freed prisoner, Yasmine Shaaban, from her home in the village of Al-Jalameh, north of Jenin.

Villages in Jenin Governorate are witnessing near-daily raids as the aggression against the city and camp continues. Daily military movements are being recorded in most of the governorate's villages, along with the constant presence of Israeli patrols and vehicles.

Yesterday, an elderly man was shot in the foot by the occupation forces at the entrance to Jenin camp, known as the Horse Roundabout, while a young man was later shot in the thigh by live ammunition.

Last night, Israeli occupation forces raided a number of towns and villages in the Jenin Governorate. An infantry force stormed the town of Araba, fired sound bombs, and detained and searched a citizen's vehicle. The raids were followed by raids on the towns of Ya'bad and Jalboun.

Families from the camp, along with hundreds of families from the city and its surrounding areas, remain forcibly displaced to this day. The Jenin Municipality reports that the number of displaced persons from the camp and the city has exceeded 22,000.

The economic situation in Jenin is further deteriorating, with massive commercial losses recorded as a result of the aggression. This has led to the closure of many shops and a decline in shopping traffic coming into the city from outside. Furthermore, bulldozing and destroying infrastructure and streets have also damaged a large number of shops, especially in the western neighborhoods, which are experiencing near-total economic paralysis. The aggression has caused losses initially estimated at more than $300 million.

Since the start of the assault on the city and camp on January 21, 40 people have been killed, along with dozens more injured and arrested.

A settler attempted to run over two brothers today, Sunday, at the entrance to Al-Baraka, south of Hebron.

Local sources said that a settler chased the brothers Sakher and Osama al-Dabbasah with his vehicle and attempted to run them over at the entrance to the al-Baraka area, east of Yatta, as they were trying to reach their workplace in the area. They managed to escape without injury.

It is noteworthy that a two-year-old girl was injured in the head the day before yesterday after being beaten on the head by a settler while she was returning home with her mother near the occupation checkpoint erected at the entrance to Shuhada Street in central Hebron.

By David Hearst

As with Vietnam, two factors will end this slaughter: the determination of Palestinians to stay on their land, and mounting public outrage in the West

In the latest episode of the TV game show, “The White House on Uber: How to pre-purchase a US President”, it appeared, fleetingly, as if the host was reading from the right script.

US President Donald Trump said in Saudi Arabia that liberal interventionism was a disaster. That’s true. He said you can’t break and remake nations. Post-Soviet Russia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Yemen are each testimony to that.

He stopped bombing Yemen and reversed decades of sanctions on Syria, blocking in the process two of Israel’s key routes to regional dominance: dividing Syria and starting a war with Iran.

I say fleetingly because – as Iran has been through this script many times before in negotiations over its nuclear programme – what a US president promises and what he delivers are two different things.

Not least of those to be blindsided by Trump’s announcement halting Syria sanctions were his own officials in the US Treasury. It turns out that the cessation of the multi-layered sanctions piled on Syria since the US first put the country on its list of state sponsors of terrorism in 1979 is not so easy, nor will it be rapid or comprehensive.

There is the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act, which requires Congress to overturn it, although Trump could suspend parts of it for national security reasons. The sanctions themselves, a mix of executive orders and statutes, could take months to unwind.

There is scope for more handbrake turns.

This particular episode of the show cost its sponsors, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar, staggering sums of money, more than $3 trillion and counting, which is high even by the standards of the Gulf.

Deadly mission

There was $600bn from Saudi Arabia, $1.2 trillion worth of deals with Qatar, a personal 747 for useas president, a tower for Trump’s son Eric in Dubai, and much more to come, including cryptocurrency deals with the Trump family firm World Liberty Financial.

The richest Arabs were competing with each other to lay tribute at the feet of Washington’s latest emperor.

While this orgiastic display of wealth was taking place in Riyadh and Doha, Israel was marking the anniversary of the 1948 Nakba by killing as many Palestinians as it could in Gaza.

Wednesday was one of the bloodiest days in Gazasince Israel’s unilateral abandonment of the ceasefire. Nearly 100 people were killed. Bunker-busting bombs were dropped near the European hospital in Khan Younis, a strike aimed at Muhammad Sinwar, the de facto leader of Hamas in Gaza. His death has not been confirmed.

Like the assassination of the late Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, Israel was targeting a key negotiator at a time when it was purporting to negotiate.

My sources tell me that just before Israel resumed its attacks on 18 March, the political leadership of Hamas abroad had accepted a deal with the Americans that would have led to more hostages being released in return for an extension of the ceasefire – but with no guarantee of an end to the war. But Sinwar rejected it, and accordingly, it did not go ahead.

If indeed Sinwar is dead, it will take time to re-establish secure communications within Hamas with one of several men who could now step into his shoes.

His attempted or actual killing is proof, if any more is needed, that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has no intention of bringing the remaining hostages home alive. A hostage deal needs Hamas forces to retain command and control. A guerrilla fight needs none.

Netanyahu’s mission in Gaza, which is to starve and bomb as many of the 2.1 million Palestinians out of the enclave as he can, has become so clear, so obvious, that not even the misnamed international community can now ignore it.

Tom Fletcher, the UN under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, told the Security Council: “For those killed and those whose voices are silenced: what more evidence do you need now? Will you act, decisively, to prevent genocide and to ensure respect for international humanitarian law?”

French President Emmanuel Macron called Israel’s policy in Gaza “shameful”. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez called Israel a “genocidal state” while speaking in parliament, noting that Madrid “does not do business” with such a country.

Massive betrayal

But not one public word of condemnation about Israel’s behaviour in Gaza was spoken to Trump from the lips of Mohammed bin Salman, the crown prince and de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, nor from UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed or Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al Thani.

The charade in the Gulf was a massive betrayal for Palestinians, but as they know only too well, Arab rulers have a track record of abandoning them.

In the past, they waited a few decent months or years after a military defeat to do so. It took a while after the 1967 war for Arab leaders to talk about a peaceful solution for the occupied West Bank and Gaza. Today, they are abandoning the true heroes of the Arab world as they are being starved and bombed to death.

Hamas and Hezbollah have both been severely weakened, although I question whether the blows they have received are terminal. But Hamas is still fighting on the ground, as the underreported Israeli military death toll in Gaza continues to show. No single guard has given up their hostage to save their own life.

The spirit of resistance in Gaza has not been defeated. In fact, the parallels with another historic defeat of colonial forces, the French and the Americans, have only grown stronger.

In one sense, there is no comparison between Gaza and the Vietnam War. The force Israel uses today in Gaza dwarfs that used by John F Kennedy, Lyndon B Johnson and Richard Nixon, the three US presidents whose terms were doomed by Vietnam.

In a span of eight years, the US dropped more than five million tonnes of bombs on Vietnam, making it the most bombed place on earth. By January of this year, Israel had dropped at least 100,000 tonnes of bombs on Gaza.

Put another way, the US dropped around 15 tonnes of explosives per square kilometre of Vietnam, while Israel has dropped 275 tonnes per square kilometre of Gaza – a figure that is higher by a factor of 18.

That being said, other points of comparison hit you between the eyes about a war that scars the US to this day and the current war in Gaza, which Netanyahu is set to deepen by attempting to reoccupy the territory permanently.

Crushing deja vu

The current generation of war watchers can only experience a crushing sense of deja vu when they watch the painstakingly complete account of the conflict in the new miniseries, Turning Point: The Vietnam War. The since-acknowledged futility of the US military campaign against the Viet Cong is mirrored and amplified by the Israeli military’s attempts to wipe Hamas off the map.

As US involvement in the Vietnam War expanded and Washington had to drop the pretence that more than 16,000 troops and pilots were “advising” the South Vietnamese Army, it became clear to both Washington and Saigon that they were going to have to push the Viet Cong out of the countryside and regain government control of around 12,000 hamlets.

Probably nothing turned villagers in South Vietnam against the US and their own government in Saigon faster than the “Strategic Hamlet Program” .

These were fortified settlements where villagers who had been turned out of their ancestral lands by US troops would be forced to resettle. In the jargon of the newsreel at the time, the villagers could start a new life purged of the communists.

As Thomas Bass, author of Vietnamerica: The War Comes Home, put it: “You have these entire regions that would be declared a zone that was open for attack.”

Closely allied to this was another assumption of the US “pacification” programme, the father of today’s counterinsurgency. This was born out of the problems US soldiers had in distinguishing civilians from combatants. The solution lay in treating any Vietnamese encountered in a declared “free-fire zone” as the enemy, and opening fire without referring up the chain of command.

One former US Marine said: “We were taught that all the Vietnamese were free to leave and all the Vietnamese that stayed were part of the infrastructure of the Viet Cong. You just hunt for people and you kill them, and you can kill them however you want.”

Commanders were expected to come back with a high body count. All of those killed, women and children included, were treated as dead communists: “I was told that if we killed 10 Vietnamese for every American, we would win,” another Vietnam vet said.

Villagers starved in their Viet-Cong-free encampments because they lost access to their paddy fields. The main aim, however, was not to feed them, but to clear the countryside. The result was that the villagers fled, and the Viet Cong came ever closer to the cities.

At one point, up to 70 percent of the villagers who volunteered to join the Viet Cong were women. Tran Thi Yen Ngoc from the National Liberation Front said: “They called us the Viet Cong, but we were the liberation army. We were all comrades and considered ourselves one family. When one person fell, five to seven others stepped forward.”

‘Terrible chaos’

There are two other similarities between today and 1968: the protests and vicious levels of repression on US campuses, and the extent to which the American and Israeli militaries felt they had to dehumanise their enemy before committing atrocities.

After the 1968 My Lai massacre, in which around 500 unarmed and innocent civilians were killed in the span of just a few hours, American commander General William Westmoreland said that life is cheap to the Vietnamese: “The Oriental doesn’t put the same high price on life as does a westerner.”

Israeli leaders go much further than Westmoreland did. They call Palestinians human animals.

Indeed, all this history from decades ago sounds eerily pertinent to the present day in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.

In an interview on 29 October 2023, only weeks into the war, Giora Eiland, a retired major general reserve, said Israel should not allow aid into the territory: “The fact that we are breaking down in the face of humanitarian aid to Gaza is a serious mistake … Gaza must be completely destroyed: terrible chaos, severe humanitarian crisis, cries to heaven.”

He later reasoned: “All of Gaza will starve, and when Gaza starves, then hundreds of thousands of Palestinians will be angry and annoyed. And hungry people, they are the ones who will bring about a coup against [Yahya] Sinwar, and that is the only thing that bothers him.”

Nothing of the sort happened, but Eiland’s reasoning became known as the Generals’ Plan, which was at first applied to northern Gaza, where 400,000 Palestinians remained. The plan to empty northern Gaza failed, as hundreds of thousands of people streamed backto their homes during the recent ceasefire, even though there was nothing left of them.

One-way ticket

But the tactic of starving and clearing has found new life in Israel’s current military operation, called “Gideon’s Chariots”. In what Netanyahu has repeatedly called the “final stage” of the war, the plan is to force more than two million Palestinians into a new “sterile area” around Rafah.

Palestinians will only be allowed entry after being checked by security forces. And it’s a one-way ticket: they would never be able to return to their homes, which would be completely demolished.

“The [Israeli army], in cooperation with the Shin Bet [Israel’s domestic security agency], will set up checkpoints on the main roads that will lead to the areas where the Gazan civilians will be housed in the Rafah area,” Ynet said.

Netanyahu said on Tuesday that he might accept a temporary ceasefire in Gaza, but would not commit to ending the war on the Palestinian enclave.

What Vietnam did for LBJ and Nixon, Gaza will do for Netanyahu and his successor as prime minister, probably Naftali Bennett. For Netanyahu is much more ill from cancer than he is publicly acknowledged to be, according to sources in Britain who see him regularly.

Two factors ended the Vietnam War, and with it more than a century of struggle to rid the country of a colonial master: the determination of the Vietnamese and public opinion in the US.

The same two factors will lead the Palestinian people to their own state: the determination of Palestinians to stay and die on their land, and public opinion in the West, which is already turning rapidly against Israel. Watch it carefully. It is seeping into the right and is firmly established on the left. Labelling legitimate criticism of the genocide as antisemitic won’t work anymore. That bolt has already been fired.

It is both in Palestine and in the hearts and minds of the West – from which the Zionist project grew, and on which it is so dependent – that this war is being fought. Israel may win each battle, as the Americans did in Vietnam, but it will lose the war.

Source: Middle East Eye

Zionist French Rabbi Delphine Horvilleur is facing death threats and intense backlash after criticizing Israeli ministers for justifying the starvation of civilians in Gaza.

Horvilleur, a leader of the Liberal Jewish Movement in Paris and editor of the Jewish magazine Tenou’a, wrote last week that “starving innocents or condemning children neither relieves pain nor avenges the dead.” Her comments targeted Israeli ministers who publicly defended blocking humanitarian aid to Gaza.

In her editorial, she wrote, “Without a future for the Palestinian people, there is no future for the Israeli people either.” Zionists swiftly responded with online abuse, including calls for her execution. Many threats were gender-based, claiming women shouldn’t speak or hold religious authority.

According to Haaretz, Horvilleur had been a prominent defender of Israel in French media, especially after the October 7 military operation. She said, “I’m too Zionist for some, not Zionist enough for others. I’m caught in the crossfire.”

She confirmed that French police are now monitoring her social media accounts due to the volume and severity of threats.

In a show of solidarity, 42 French intellectuals — both Jewish and non-Jewish — signed an op-ed in La Tribune du Dimanche. They denounced the Israeli government for eroding ‘democracy’, threatening detainees, expanding settlements, and preparing for the annexation of occupied territories.

However, Meir Ben Haim, French spokesperson for Israel’s Otzma Yehudit party, accused Horvilleur and her allies of “violating Jewish tradition.” He warned, “The price will be blood.”

The Ministry of Health in Gaza said on Sunday that the Israeli occupation has intensified its targeting and siege of the Indonesian Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip since dawn today.

The ministry added in a statement, "This prevents the wounded from reaching the hospital, as the northern Gaza Strip is being subjected to increasing massacres against civilians."

She noted that two patients were injured while trying to leave the hospital, noting that the occupation is intensifying its targeting to put the hospital out of service.

The Ministry of Health called on all relevant authorities to intervene urgently to provide protection for medical staff, patients, and the wounded inside the hospital.