The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants on Thursday for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defense minister and Hamas officials, accusing them of war crimes and crimes against humanity. The announcement came as health officials in the Gaza Strip said the death toll from the 13-month-old war between Israel and Hamas has surpassed 44,000.
Netanyahu condemned the arrest warrant against him, saying Israel “rejects with disgust the absurd and false actions.” In a statement released by his office, he said: “There is nothing more just than the war that Israel has been waging in Gaza.”
On Thursday, the Health Ministry in Gaza said 44,056 people have been killed and 104,268 wounded since the start of the war. It has said the real toll is higher because thousands of bodies are buried under rubble or in areas that medics cannot access.
The Gaza Health Ministry does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its count, but it has said that more than half of the fatalities are women and children. The Israeli military says it has killed over 17,000 militants, without providing evidence.
Israel launched its war against Hamas after Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting another 250. Around 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, at least a third of whom are believed to be dead. Most of the rest were released during a cease-fire last year.
The Israeli offensive has caused heavy destruction across wide areas of the coastal territory and displaced 90% of Gaza's population of 2.3 million people.
Israel has also launched airstrikes against Lebanon after the Hezbollah militant group began firing rockets, drones and missiles into Israel the day after Hamas' attack last October. A full-blown war erupted in September after nearly a year of lower-level conflict.
More than 3,500 people have been killed in Lebanon, according to the country’s Health Ministry, and over 1 million people have been displaced. It is not known how many of those killed were Hezbollah fighters and how many were civilians.
On the Israeli side, Hezbollah’s aerial attacks have killed more than 70 people and driven some 60,000 from their homes.
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Israeli president says arrest warrants signal “dark day for justice”
Israel’s mostly ceremonial president, Isaac Herzog, called the International Criminal Court's arrest warrants against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “a dark day for justice. A dark day for humanity.”
In a post on X, he said the international court “has chosen the side of terror and evil over democracy and freedom, and turned the very system of justice into a human shield for Hamas’ crimes against humanity."
Benny Gantz, a retired general and political rival to Netanyahu, also condemned the decision, saying it showed “moral blindness” and was a “shameful stain of historic proportion that will never be forgotten.”
Hamas welcomes warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant
Hamas has welcomed the decision by the International Criminal Court to issue warrants against Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister Yoav Gallant, calling it an “important and historic precedent” after what it said was decades of injustice at the hands of a “fascist occupation.”
The statement did not refer to the warrants issued for the militant group’s own leaders.
Hamas called on all nations to “cooperate with the court in bringing the Zionist war criminals, Netanyahu and Gallant, to justice, and to work immediately to stop the crimes of genocide against innocent civilians in the Gaza Strip.”
Bakeries reopen in central Gaza after flour shortages
DEIR AL-BALAH, The Gaza Strip — Bakeries have reopened in the central Gaza Strip after being closed for several days because of flour shortages.
The shortages appear to have been linked to the looting of nearly 100 truckloads of aid by armed men in southern Gaza last weekend.
Associated Press footage showed a crowd of hundreds pushing and shouting outside a bakery in the central city of Deir al-Balah on Thursday. The day before the reopening, the price of a bag of 15 loaves of pita bread had climbed above $13.
“In my house, there is not a morsel of bread, and the children are hungry,” said Sultan Abu Sultan, who was displaced from northern Gaza during the war.
The amount of aid entering Gaza plunged in October as Israel launched a major offensive in the isolated north, where experts say famine may be underway.
Hunger is widespread across the territory, even in central Gaza where aid groups have more access. Humanitarian organizations say Israeli restrictions, ongoing fighting and the breakdown of law and order make it difficult to deliver assistance.
Israel’s offensive, launched after Hamas’ October 2023 attack, has displaced around 90% of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million people. Hundreds of thousands are crammed into tent camps with little in the way of public services and are reliant on international food aid.
Cyprus says EU must no longer stand by as an observer to the MidEast
The president of Cyprus says the European Union must play a bigger role in the Middle East as it can no longer stand by as an observer.
President Nikos Christodoulides said the 27-member bloc needs to establish closer ties with countries that bolster regional stability like Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf states.
“The conflict in the Middle East is taking place on the EU’s doorstep, in an area of vital interest to the bloc’s interests, where any escalation or regional spillover will have significant consequences on its security and stability,” Christodoulides told an Economist conference in the Cypriot capital.
Christodoulides said EU member Cyprus for years has tried to get this message across to Brussels. The island nation earlier this year was the staging ground for a maritime corridor delivering some 20,000 tons of humanitarian aid to Gaza.
The EU is wracked by members’ divisions over how peace should come about in the Middle East
International Criminal Court issues arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Hamas officials
The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants on Thursday for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defense minister and Hamas officials, accusing them of war crimes and crimes against humanity over the war in Gaza and the October 2023 attacks that triggered Israel’s offensive in the Palestinian territory.
The decision turns Netanyahu and the others into internationally wanted suspects and is likely to further isolate them and complicate efforts to negotiate a cease-fire to end the 13-month conflict.
But its practical implications could be limited since Israel and its major ally, the United States, are not members of the court and several of the Hamas officials have been subsequently killed in the conflict.
Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders have previously condemned ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan’s request for the warrants as disgraceful and antisemitic. U.S. President Joe Biden also blasted the prosecutor and expressed support for Israel’s right to defend itself against Hamas. Hamas also slammed the request.
Death toll in Gaza surpasses 44,000, local officials say
The death toll in the Gaza Strip from the 13-month-old war between Israel and Hamas has surpassed 44,000, local health officials said Thursday.
The Gaza Health Ministry does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its count, but it has said that more than half of the fatalities are women and children. The Israeli military says it has killed over 17,000 militants, without providing evidence.
The Health Ministry said 44,056 people have been killed and 104,268 wounded since the start of the war. It has said the real toll is higher because thousands of bodies are buried under rubble or in areas that medics cannot access.
The war began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting another 250. Around 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, at least a third of whom are believed to be dead. Most of the rest were released during a cease-fire last year.
Around 90% of Gaza's population of 2.3 million people have been displaced, often multiple times, and hundreds of thousands are living in squalid tent camps with little food, water or basic services.
Israel says it tries to avoid harming civilians and blames their deaths on Hamas because the militants operate in residential areas, where they have built tunnels, rocket launchers and other military infrastructure.
Rocket from Lebanon kills 1, wounds 2 others in northern Israel
A rocket fired from Lebanon killed a man and wounded two others in northern Israel on Thursday, according to the Magen David Adom rescue service.
The service said paramedics found the body of the man in his 30s near a playground in the town of Nahariya, near the border with Lebanon, after a rocket attack on Thursday.
Israel meanwhile struck targets in southern Lebanon and several buildings south of Beirut, the Lebanese capital, after warning people to evacuate.
