Hezbollah attacks Israeli military base; Israeli warplanes reign more death on Gaza and Lebanon – as it happened

Ahram Online , Tuesday 12 Nov 2024

In the face of the ongoing suffering of the Palestinian and Lebanese people amid Israel's wars in Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon, Ahram Online provides you with live updates of the most recent developments across the Middle East on Tuesday, 12 November, as they unfold.

Haifa
An Israeli soldier inspects the ground at the site where a rocket fired from Lebanon hit an area in Kiryat Ata a day earlier, in northern Israel's Haifa district. AFP

 

22:30 A top UN official on Tuesday condemned "daily cruelty" in Gaza, describing "acts reminiscent of the gravest international crimes."

"What distinction was made, and what precautions were taken, if more than 70 percent of civilian housing is either damaged or destroyed?" Joyce Msuya, interim chief of the OCHA humanitarian agency, told the Security Council.

"We are witnessing acts reminiscent of the gravest international crimes."

21:00 Josep Borrell said he “unequivocally condemn[s]” Smotrich’s call to “apply sovereignty” in the West Bank, describing it as a “clear step towards illegal annexation”.

As we previously reported, the far-right finance minister said he had ordered preparations for the annexation of the occupied West Bank in the hope that “2025 will be, with God’s help, the year of sovereignty in Judea and Samaria”.

19:30 Lebanese militant group Hezbollah said it launched a drone attack on a military base near the town of Nahariya in northern Israel on Tuesday.

The base lies inland from the Israeli coastal town, near which Israeli emergency services said two men were killed by rocket fire.

On the other hand, Israel's military said on Tuesday that it had dismantled most of Hezbollah's weapons and missile facilities, which it says are located under the southern Beirut suburb of Dahiyeh.

18:30 The humanitarian situation in northern Gaza is deteriorating to unprecedented levels, according to remarks reported by the Washington Post from the UN humanitarian coordinator for Palestinian territories, who described the conditions as "beyond imagination."

US State Department officials stated they would provide a detailed update on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza later on Tuesday. Humanitarian sources noted that no aid had reached northern Gaza from early October until at least mid-month, further exacerbating the dire conditions.

The United Nations has accused Israel of blocking the entry of closed aid trucks, asserting that these shipments posed no security threat. The blockade has compounded the already critical shortage of essential supplies, heightening international concern over the well-being of civilians in the conflict zone.

17:40  Hezbollah announced it launched a salvo of advanced rockets targeting Tel Nof Airbase, located south of Tel Aviv.

In northern Israel, sirens sounded in Doviv and other areas of the Upper Galilee amid warnings of a potential drone infiltration, according to Israel's Home Front Command.

Al Jazeera reported that the Iron Dome missile defense system was actively intercepting rockets fired from Lebanon over the Galilee region.

The Israeli ambulance service confirmed that two people were killed by a rocket strike in Nahariya, a coastal city in northern Israel.

Media reports from Israel Hayom noted that rescue and firefighting teams were still responding to multiple sites impacted by the rocket barrage.

The newspaper also reported that rockets had struck several locations in and around Nahariya.

Additionally, an Israeli ambulance service indicated that a woman sustained minor injuries from rocket fire in central Israel.


17:20 The Lebanese Health Ministry announced that the death toll from Israeli military operations has risen to 3,287, with 14,222 injured since the beginning of the conflict. 

17:10 The Israeli military has commenced the second phase of its ground operations in southern Lebanon, moving into new areas along the second line of villages, according to reports from Israeli public broadcaster and Maariv newspaper.

The expansion is led by the 36th Division, an armored division of the Israeli military refferd to as the Ga'ash (Rage) Division.

Amid the ground offensive, an Israeli airstrike targeted the city of Nabatieh in southern Lebanon for a second time, as reported by Al Jazeera correspondents. Surveillance drones were also observed flying over the central sector of southern Lebanon, indicating intensified military activity.

16:45 The Lebanese Health Ministry reported that five people were killed and two others injured in an Israeli airstrike on Baalshmay in the Mount Lebanon region.

In addition to the Baalshmay attack, Al Jazeera correspondents reported Israeli airstrikes targeting the southern Lebanese towns of Habboush and Al-Shaaytiyah.

16:20 Sirens blared across Tel Aviv and various towns in the Western Galilee on Monday.

The Israeli Home Front Command reported that alarms sounded in Nahariya, Shomera, and other areas in the region, warning of incoming rocket fire.

Hezbollah claimed responsibility for several rocket barrages, stating that it targeted an Israeli artillery position in Neveh Ziv and gatherings of Israeli forces in the settlements of Zar'it and Shomera.

According to Israel's Channel 12, one rocket struck a house in Shomera, but no injuries were reported.

16:00 The Gaza Health Ministry reported that the death toll from the ongoing Israeli military campaign has risen to 43,665, with 103,076 people injured since the conflict began on October 7, 2023. 

Most of those killed and injured are women and children. 

15:30 Egyptian ​Minister of Foreign Affairs Badr Abdelatty stressed to Sigrid Kaag, the UN's Chief Coordinator for Humanitarian Affairs and Reconstruction in Gaza, the necessity to bolster the humanitarian response to meet the escalating needs of Palestinians in Gaza, especially with the onset of winter and the worsening famine and disease caused by Israeli policies and actions.

In a meeting in Cairo, FM Abdelatty and Sigrid discussed how to address the catastrophic humanitarian crisis in Gaza and ensure the delivery of essential humanitarian aid to alleviate the suffering of Palestinian civilians, the ministry said in a statement.

Abdelatty stressed that the daily aid entering Gaza is inadequate to cope with the magnitude of the ongoing humanitarian disaster in the Strip.

The Egyptian FM also stressed that Israel’s continued military control over the Palestinian side of the Rafah crossing, along with its failure to fully open other crossings, has severely hindered the humanitarian access process.

He firmly rejected this position, describing it as a deliberate Israeli attempt to block the entry of aids, constituting a clear violation of international humanitarian law.

Moreover, Abdelatty expressed Egypt's commitment to continuing consultations with the UN official on implementing her mandate under UN Security Council Resolution 2720.

14:00 The Israeli military announced that 5,331 soldiers and officers have been injured since it launched its war on Gaza, which expanded to Lebanon, with 779 sustaining severe injuries. 

According to Haaretz, 24 Israeli soldiers have been killed since Israel launched its latest attack on the Jabalia refugee camp. 

The Israeli army announced on Tuesday that four of its soldiers were killed in battles in the northern Gaza Strip, bringing to 376 the number of Israeli soldiers killed since the start of its ground operation in the strip on 27 October 2023.

The army said in a statement: "The publication of the names of the four soldiers who fell in the fighting on Monday in the northern Gaza Strip has been approved."

The Israeli army revealed the names of its dead soldiers: Or Katz, Naveh Yair Asulin, Gary Laharoikema Zolat, and Ofer Eliyahu, all from the "Shimson" Battalion of the Kfir Brigade, in addition to a fifth officer from the "Lotar" unit who was killed on Sunday in northern Gaza.

Earlier, Israeli artillery shelled, in conjunction with air strikes, the northern Gaza Strip and the city of Beit Lahia, coinciding with heavy gunfire east of the Jabalia camp in the northern Gaza Strip.

The Palestinian Ministry of Health reported on Monday that 51 people were killed and 164 injured in Israeli strikes in the past 24 hours in the Gaza Strip.

It indicated that the death toll from Israeli genocidal war against Gaza has risen to 43,603 dead and 102,929 injured since 7 October  2023.


Palestinians displaced from shelters in Beit Hanoun cross the main Salaheddine road into Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on bicycles and donkey carts following Israeli army evacuation orders. AFP

13:50 Al Jazeera is reporting that at least six people have been killed and 10 seriously wounded in an Israeli airstrike on an overcrowded area near Al Noor mosque in the western part of Deir el-Balah city in central Gaza.

13:40 Egypt has strongly condemned the extremist statements made by Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, which called for the annexation of the occupied West Bank.

"These statements clearly violate international law, international humanitarian law, and all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions," the Egyptian foreign ministry said.

13:30 Hamas released a statement supporting the call on Monday by Arab and Islamic countries on the United Nations Security Council to mandate that Israel halt its aggression against Gaza and Lebanon.

Yesterday, Arab and Muslim leaders who met in an extraordinary summit in Riyadh issued a communique reiterating the need to end the Israeli wars in Gaza and Lebanon.

"The decisions taken by the summit require more effort to stop the Israeli aggression, lift the blockade on Gaza, and come to the rescue of the Palestinian people."

Hamas also urged the summit to immediately push for the freezing of Israel's membership in the United Nations and an embargo on the export of arms to Tel Aviv.

12:00 Ezzdin Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, announced the death of one of its vital military engineers, Tareq Ghanem Zidan, who was killed on Saturday in Tulkarm, in the northern West Bank.

The group stated that Zidan died in an Israeli-targeted assassination, calling it a “cowardly act” by the “criminal Zionist enemy.”

The statement highlighted his extensive involvement in “resistance, preparation, and defiance against the occupation,” marking his death as a significant loss for the group.

“With great pride and trust in the imminent victory from God, the Qassam Brigades bid farewell to their hero,” the statement said. The group vowed to continue the path of resistance and uphold the commitment to its martyrs and prisoners.

11:00 Lebanese media is reporting that two people have been killed and six wounded in an Israeli airstrike on Hermel in the northeast of the country near the border with Syria.

10:00 Israeli warplanes pounded Dahiya in southern Beirut with several strikes on Tuesday morning.


Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted a neighbourhood in Beirut’s southern suburbs on November 12, 2024. AFP

 

On the other side, a drone launched by Hezbollah from Lebanon against Nesher near Haifa hit its target in the morning hours after Israeli air defences failed to detect it.

09:00 Palestinian medical officials say on Tuesday two Israeli strikes in Gaza killed at least 14 people, including two children and a woman, most in an Israeli-declared "humanitarian zone."

One strike late Monday hit a makeshift cafeteria used by displaced people in Muwasi, the centre of the so-called humanitarian zone.

At least 11 people were killed, including two children, according to officials at Nasser Hospital, where the casualties were taken.

Video from the scene showed men pulling bloodied wounded from among tables and chairs set up in the sand in an enclosure made of corrugated metal sheets.


A girl cries as she's carried by a Palestinian woman mourning relatives killed in overnight Israeli strikes on the al-Mawasi cafeteria in southern Gaza's Khan Yunis, outside Nasser Hospital on November 12, 2024. AFP

 

The strike on the cafeteria in Mawasi came hours after the Israeli military announced an expansion of the zone, where it has told Palestinians evacuating from other parts of Gaza to take refuge. Hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians are sheltering in sprawling tent camps in and around Muwasi, a largely desolate area of dunes and agricultural fields with few facilities or services along the Mediterranean coast of southern Gaza.

Israel faces a deadline this week for the Biden administration’s ultimatum for it to allow more aid into Gaza or risk possible restrictions on US military funding.

Another strike early Tuesday hit a house in the urban Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, killing three people, including a woman, according to al-Awda Hospital, which received the casualties. The strike also wounded 11 others, it said.

The Israeli military had no immediate comment on either strike.

Israel’s 13-month-old war on Gaza has killed more than 43,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children. 

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