Palestinian medical officials say Israeli airstrikes have killed at least 28 people in the Gaza Strip, including seven children and a woman, hours after the U.N. General Assembly overwhelmingly approved a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.
One of the strikes overnight and into Thursday flattened a house in the built-up Nuseirat refugee camp, according to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the nearby city of Deir al-Balah, where the casualties were taken.
Two other strikes killed 15 men who were part of local committees established to secure aid convoys. The committees were set up by displaced Palestinians in coordination with the Hamas-run Interior Ministry.
On Wednesday, the U.N. General Assembly approved resolutions demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and expressing support for the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees that Israel has moved to ban. General Assembly resolutions are not legally binding, although they reflect world opinion.
The war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting around 250 people. Some 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, at least a third of whom are believed to be dead.
Israel’s offensive has killed over 44,800 Palestinians in Gaza, more than half of them women and children, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not say how many were combatants. The Israeli military says it has killed over 17,000 militants, without providing evidence.
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US Secretary of State Blinken visits Mideast after Assad's ouster in Syria
AQABA, Jordan — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has arrived in Jordan on his 12th visit to the Mideast since the Israel-Hamas war erupted last year and his first since the weekend ouster of Syrian President Bashar Assad that has sparked new fears of instability in a region wracked by three conflicts despite a ceasefire agreement in Lebanon.
Blinken was meeting in Aqaba with Jordan’s King Abdullah II and Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi on Thursday before traveling to Turkey for talks with Turkish officials on Friday. The meetings will focus largely on Syria but also touch on long-elusive hopes for a deal to end the fighting in Gaza that has devastated the Palestinian territory since October 2023.
Blinken is the latest senior U.S. official to visit the Middle East in the five days since Assad was deposed as the Biden administration navigates more volatility in the region in its last few weeks in office and as President-elect Donald Trump has said the U.S. should stay out of the Syrian conflict.
Other include national security adviser Jake Sullivan and a top military commander who traveled there as the U.S. and Israel have launched airstrikes to prevent the Islamic State militant group from reconstituting and prevent materiel and suspected chemical weapons stocks from falling into militant hands.
Blinken “will discuss the need for the transition process and new government in Syria to respect the rights of minorities, facilitate the flow of humanitarian assistance, prevent Syria from being used as a base of terrorism or posing a threat to its neighbors, and ensure that chemical weapons stockpiles are secured and safely destroyed,” the State Department said.
The U.S. would be willing to recognize and fully support a new Syrian government that met those criteria.
U.S. officials say they are not actively reviewing the foreign terrorist organization designation of the main Syrian rebel group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, known as HTS, which was once an al-Qaida affiliate, but stressed they are not barred from speaking to its members.
Netanyahu says Israeli forces will remain in Syrian buffer zone until border security is guaranteed
JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says Israeli forces will remain in a Syrian buffer zone until a new force on the other side of the border can guarantee security.
After the overthrow of Syrian President Bashar Assad, Israeli forces pushed into a buffer zone that had been established after the 1973 Mideast war. The military says it has seized additional strategic points nearby.
Netanyahu’s office said in a statement Thursday that Assad’s overthrow by jihadi rebels created a vacuum on the border.
“Israel will not permit jihadi groups to fill that vacuum and threaten Israeli communities on the Golan Heights with October 7th style attacks,” it said, referring to Hamas’ 2023 attack out of Gaza, which ignited the war there.
“That is why Israeli forces entered the buffer zone and took control of strategic sites near Israel’s border.”
The statement added that “this deployment is temporary until a force that is committed to the 1974 agreement can be established and security on our border can be guaranteed.”
The buffer zone is adjacent to the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Mideast war and later annexed. The international community, except for the United States, views the Golan as occupied Syrian territory.
Attacker who fatally shot boy on a bus in the West Bank turns himself in, military says
JERUSALEM — Israel’s military said Thursday that the attacker who fatally shot a 12-year-old Israeli boy in the occupied West Bank overnight turned himself in to authorities.
The attacker opened fire on a bus near the Israeli settlement of Beitar Illit, critically wounding the boy, who hospital authorities pronounced dead in the early morning. Three others were wounded in the attack, paramedics said.
The shooting took place just outside Jerusalem in an area near major Israeli settlements.
Indonesia evacuates 37 citizens from Syria
JAKARTA, Indonesia — The Indonesian government has evacuated 37 citizens from Syria following the fall of the Bashar al-Assad government, officials said Thursday.
The evacuees were taken by land from Damascus to Beirut, where they boarded three commercial flights to Jakarta, said Judha Nugraha, director of citizen protection at the Foreign Affairs Ministry.
The Indonesian Embassy in Damascus said all 1,162 Indonesian citizens in Syria were safe.
Indonesian Ambassador to Syria Wajid Fauzi said the situation in Syria has gradually returned to normal.
“I can say that 98% of people’s lives are back to normal, shops are open, public transportation has started running,” Fauzi said, adding that most Indonesian nationals living in Syria had chosen to stay.
Israeli airstrikes kill at least 28 people, including 7 children, Palestinian medical officials say
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Palestinian medical officials say Israeli airstrikes have killed at least 28 people in the Gaza Strip, including seven children and a woman.
One of the strikes overnight and into Thursday flattened a house in the built-up Nuseirat refugee camp, according to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the nearby city of Deir al-Balah, where the casualties were taken.
An Associated Press reporter saw the bodies at the hospital’s morgue.
Two other strikes killed 15 men who were part of local committees established to secure aid convoys. The committees were set up by displaced Palestinians in coordination with the Hamas-run Interior Ministry.
The Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis received the bodies and an Associated Press reporter counted them. The hospital said eight were killed in a strike near the southern border town of Rafah and seven others in a strike 30 minutes later near Khan Younis.
The war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting around 250 people. Some 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, at least a third of whom are believed to be dead.
Israel’s offensive has killed over 44,800 Palestinians in Gaza, more than half of them women and children, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not say how many were combatants. The Israeli military says it has killed over 17,000 militants, without providing evidence.
The fighting has plunged Gaza into a severe humanitarian crisis, with experts warning of famine.
Israel says it allows enough aid to enter and blames U.N. agencies for not distributing it. The U.N. says Israeli restrictions, and the breakdown of law and order after Israel repeatedly targeted the Hamas-run police force, make it extremely difficult to operate in the territory.
UN General Assembly demands ceasefire in Gaza and backs UN agency helping Palestinian refugees
UNITED NATIONS — The U.N. General Assembly overwhelmingly approved resolutions Wednesday demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and backing the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees that Israel has moved to ban.
The votes in the 193-nation world body were 158-9 with 13 abstentions to demand a ceasefire now and 159-9 with 11 abstentions to support the agency known as UNRWA.
The votes culminated two days of speeches overwhelmingly calling for an end to the 14-month war between Israel and the militant Hamas group.
General Assembly resolutions are not legally binding, though they reflect world opinion. There are no vetoes in the assembly.
Israel and its close ally, the United States, were in a tiny minority speaking and voting against the resolutions.
