By Abdul Adil
(AA, Al Jazeera, Wafa, NNA, The Muslim News):
GAZA
At least 70 more Palestinians were killed in indiscriminate Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip, bringing the overall death toll since October 2023 to 46,006, the Health Ministry in the enclave said on Thursday.
A ministry statement added that some 109,378 others were injured in the ongoing assault.
“Israeli forces killed 70 people and injured 104 others in three massacres of families in the last 24 hours,” the ministry said.
“Many people are still trapped under the rubble and on the roads as rescuers are unable to reach them,” it added.
Meanwhile, at least three Palestinians were killed and 25 others injured on Thursday in an Israeli airstrike on a school sheltering thousands of displaced people in the Jabalia area of northern Gaza.
According to the Civil Defense Service, the deceased included a child and a woman.
At least 13 Palestinians were killed in fresh Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, medics said.
A medical source said eight people lost their lives when Israeli warplanes hit a home in the Jabalia Nazla area in the northern Gaza Strip.
A father and his three sons were also killed in another strike targeting a home in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, another source added.
Another Palestinian died of injuries from an Israeli strike in the central city of Deir al-Balah, the source added.
Witnesses also reported an Israeli drone strike on a tent inside a school sheltering displaced civilians in Nuseirat, but no injuries were reported.
Several Israeli airstrikes were reported in several areas across northern Gaza, including the Al-Saftawi and Karama neighborhoods in Gaza City, but no information was yet available about fatalities.
The Israeli army also continued its systematic blowing-up operations of homes and residential buildings in Jabalia and Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza and in Gaza City’s southeastern neighborhood of Zeitoun, witnesses said.
Artillery shelling was reported in eastern Khan Younis and Rafah’s western Al-Mawasi area in southern Gaza, but there were no reports yet of injuries.
Several Palestinians were killed and others injured in separate Israeli military airstrikes across Gaza City, according to local medical sources.
The airstrikes targeted civilians near the Barbari Station at the Jalaa and Sahaba junction in Gaza, resulting in multiple civilians killed and several others injured, many of which are reported to be in critical condition.
Additionally, 43-year-old Samah al-Madhoun from Jabalia, a town in northern Gaza, succumbed to her wounds after being severely wounded in an Israeli airstrike on displacement tents in the Khan Younis area several days ago. She joined her children, Lina, Dima, and Bara, who had also been killed in the same attack.
Meanwhile, Israeli occupation forces set fire to dozens of homes in northern Gaza, triggering extensive fires in various regions. The affected areas include Tal al-Zaatar, the Abu Eita junction, Behtimi Street, the Nassar junction, Abu Qamar Station, the remains of the Al-Alami neighborhood, the area around the Gaza Electric Company, and Razan Towers.
WEST BANK
The Israeli army detained 15 more Palestinians in military raids in the occupied West Bank, prisoners’ affairs groups said on Thursday.
The Detainees and Ex-Detainees Commission and the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society said in a joint statement that the detention operations were concentrated in the cities of Bethlehem, Qalqilya, Hebron, Ramallah, Jerusalem, accompanied by widespread raids and abuse, assaults and threats against detainees and their families, in addition to vandalism and destruction of citizens’ homes.
According to the statement, Israeli forces held and interrogated 50 Palestinian residents in Hebron before releasing them.
“The arrest campaigns came amid a massive aggression launched by the (Israeli) occupation against our people in retaliation that falls under the crime of collective punishment,” the statement said.
The new arrests brought the number of Palestinians detained by the Israeli army in the West Bank since October 2023 to over 14,300, including those who were released after being arrested, according to Palestinian figures.
The figure does not include those arrested from the Gaza Strip, whose numbers are estimated to be in the thousands.
The Israeli army continued its incursion in the West Bank city of Tulkarem for the second consecutive day on Thursday amid destruction of infrastructure, witnesses said.
Israeli forces besieged the Nur Shams refugee camp in the city and staged house-to-house searches in the area, they added.
Witnesses said the Israeli army deployed additional forces in the camp with military bulldozers destroying infrastructure in the Nur Shams and Tulkarem refugee camps in the city.
At least one house was blown up by Israeli army forces amid reports of clashes with armed Palestinians in the Tulkarem camp.
The Israeli raid “is a new crime to be added to the Israeli list of crimes committed by Israel to spread chaos and destruction,” Tulkarem Governor Abdullah Kamil said.
He said the assault aims to drain the Palestinian Authority’s resources by destroying the infrastructure, markets, and public and private properties.
The Israeli occupation forces withdrew two days after the aggression on the city of Tulkarm and its two camps, causing widespread destruction to the infrastructure and Palestinians’ property.
WAFA correspondent said that the occupation forces blew up the house of the detainee Mahmoud Mutie Sleit in al-Madares neighborhood in Tulkarm camp. He was detained after being injured early last year.
She added that the Israeli bulldozers continued throughout last night to bulldoze and destroy the infrastructure in the streets of the camp, including water, electricity and internet networks, specifically in its center and its northern side, which is located in the neighborhoods of “schools, services, Balawneh, Hanoun Square, Abu al-Foul, al-Akasha and the Muqata’a”, which led to their interruption in large parts of it.
The occupation soldiers raided dozens of homes in the aforementioned neighborhoods, amid acts of violence, searches and abuse of citizens, detaining them in one room and subjecting them to field investigation, and turning a number of them into military barracks and sniper locations, while other groups were expelled from their homes.
Meanwhile, the occupation forces stormed Nour Shams camp east of the city, and pushed more of their vehicles and bulldozers into the camp, where they began destroying the infrastructure and citizens’ property along Nablus Street adjacent to its entrances, the vicinity of the Martyr Saif Abu Labda roundabout, the entrance to Manshiya neighborhood and the center of the camp.
The occupation forces fired live ammunition intensively, coinciding with the sounds of explosions heard around Nour Shams camp, which caused a power outage in the camp, Iktaba suburb, Salam neighborhood, and large parts of the city and its suburbs.
Yesterday evening, a woman, 36, was injured after the occupation army assaulted her by beating her in Al-Ghanem neighborhood in Tulkarm camp, while the young man Thaer Saleh Shraim, the brother of the slain Palestinian Mamoun Shraim, who was killed in November of last year, was detained from his home in Ezbet Al-Jarad east of the city.
Two Palestinian young men were injured today after being assaulted by Israeli occupation forces in the city of Hebron, south of the occupied West Bank.
According to local sources, the Israeli forces stationed at a military checkpoint leading to the Old City and the Ibrahimi Mosque stopped the two men as they were attempting to reach the mosque.
The soldiers took the young men inside the military checkpoint, where they were subjected to severe physical assault, resulting in injuries and bruises.
The two victims were later transported by the Palestinian Red Crescent medical teams to a local hospital for treatment.
Dozens of settlers Thursday stormed the courtyards of Al-Aqsa Mosque today under the protection of the Israeli occupation police.
Eyewitnesses reported that dozens of settlers stormed Al-Aqsa Mosque in successive groups from Al-Maghariba Gate, and performed Talmudic rituals in its courtyards.
The same sources added that the occupation police intensified their presence at the gates of Al-Aqsa Mosque and around the Old City, and obstructed the entry of Muslim worshipers into the mosque.
Since the start of the comprehensive Israeli aggression against Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, in October 2023, the occupation forces have tightened their measures at the gates of Al-Aqsa Mosque and the entrances to the Old City.
Settlers stormed the courtyards of Al-Aqsa Mosque 256 times during 2024.
LEBANON
The Israeli army’s drones on Thursday morning were spotted flying over several towns in southern Lebanon in a fresh violation of the fragile Israel-Lebanon cease-fire and on the day of an important parliamentary session that is scheduled to elect a president.
According to the official Lebanese National News Agency, the Israeli army drones have been flying over the Nabatieh district areas since early morning.
The Israeli fresh violation of cease-fire agreement came hours before the Lebanese Parliament is scheduled to convene for a special session to elect a long-awaited president which has been vacant for over two years.
After President Michel Aoun’s term ended on Oct. 31, 2022, Lebanon’s parliament failed to elect a new president during 12 sessions.
On Wednesday, the Lebanese broadcaster reported 19 Israeli violations to the cease-fire bringing the Israeli total cease-fire violations since Nov. 27 to over 400, including the deaths of 32 Lebanese people and the injury of 39 others.
YEMEN
In separate statements, the Israeli military said it intercepted two drones – one “launched from the east” and another “apparently launched from Yemen”.
The Houthis [Ansar Allah] have been launching drones and missiles at Israel in a campaign that they say aims to show support for Palestinians in Gaza.
The Yemeni Houthi group on Thursday reported six more US-UK raids on three provinces in the northern and western parts of the country.
The Houthi-run Al-Masirah TV said “an American-British aggression targeted with two raids the Jarban area of the Sanaa province, northern Yemen.”
It added that three US raids were carried out on the Harf Sufyan district in the Amran province and a sixth raid on the Alluheyah district in the Al-Hudaydah province, western Yemen.
The Houthi-run broadcaster did not provide further details of what the US-UK raids targeted.
On Wednesday, the Houthis also reported seven US-UK raids on Sanaa and Amran.
The escalation came after the Houthis said on Monday that they had attacked the US aircraft carrier USS Harry Truman in the northern Red Sea and claimed missile and drone attacks on targets in southern and central Israel.
The Israeli military says Yemen’s Houthis have fired 40 surface-to-surface missiles at Israel since the start of the war on Gaza, adding that all but three of the projectiles were intercepted.
The Houthis have also fired about 320 drones at Israeli territory with 100 intercepted, according to the Israeli military, which said two “effective hits” have been identified.
Israel and the US have repeatedly struck Houthi positions in Yemen throughout the war, but the Yemeni group’s attacks have continued.
SYRIA
The Israeli army claimed on Thursday to have destroyed Syrian army weapons found in the demilitarized zone in the occupied Golan Heights.
A military statement said Syrian weapons and military infrastructure were seized and destroyed in the demilitarized zone it seized last month.
The army claimed that it found an armored personnel carrier (APC) containing numerous weapons, anti-tank missiles, and explosive devices.
“All of the findings were either destroyed or confiscated to prevent them from falling into the hands of hostile elements that could harm the residents of the Golan Heights or IDF (army) troops,” the statement said.
The Israeli army launched massive airstrikes against Syrian military installations after anti-regime forces ousted the Bashar al-Assad regime last month, drawing widespread condemnation for violating Syria’s sovereignty.
Israel also declared the collapse of the 1974 Disengagement of Forces Agreement with Syria and deployed its military to the demilitarized zone in the Golan Heights, occupied by Israel since 1967.
[Photo: A view of damage caused by Israeli army tanks attacking civilian areas in four towns of Quneitra province in the Golan Heights, following the fall of the Baath regime in Syria on January 8, 2025. Early in the morning, Israeli tanks entered the towns of al-Asha, al-Hiran, Abu Gara, and Mazraat al-Hiran. The tanks damaged agricultural lands, electricity poles, and roads, and uprooted roadside trees. After causing destruction, the tanks withdrew from the area. Photojournalist: Melik Ebu Ubeyde/AA]
