According to witness testimony, information from medics, and media reports, Israeli forces “buried people alive in the hospital yard”.
A terrifying massacre and unspeakable scenes. What the Israeli occupation did inside Kamal Adwan Hospital is a horrific crime against citizens and medical staff.
Dozens of displaced, sick and wounded people were buried alive. The occupation [Israeli] bulldozers trampled the tents of the displaced people in the hospital yard and brutally crushed them.
View a short but disturbing video of the scene here. A full report, currently available only in Arabic, is here. We will bring the English version when it is available.
Israeli military says 90 arrested at Kamal Adwan Hospital: The arrests were made after the Israeli military besieged Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza for at least six days. Israel’s military released videos of weapons it claimed were found at the medical complex. It said the arms are proof Hamas used the hospital to launch attacks. Israel has repeatedly accused Hamas of using hospitals as “human shields”, a claim repeatedly rejected.
Earlier, the Palestinian health minister called for an investigation into reports that wounded Palestinians, patients and displaced people were crushed by Israeli bulldozers in the yard of Kamal Adwan.
RECOMMENDED VIEWING: UN warns of ‘domicide’ in Gaza: Houses and infrastructure destroyed
A deadly day for Gaza’s journalists
Israeli drone kills beloved Al Jazeera photojournalist Samer Abudaqa: Al Jazeera correspondent Wael Dahdouh, who was injured along with Abudaqa in the Israeli attack, says the network’s crew was documenting civil defense rescuers on a mission to evacuate a family after its home was bombed.
“We captured the devastating destruction and reached places that had not been reached by any camera lens since the Israeli ground operation started,” Dahdouh said from his hospital bed.
As the Al Jazeera journalists were heading back on foot because the areas were not accessible by car, Dahdouh said “something big” happened that knocked him to the ground.
After the explosion, Dahdouh said he pressed on his wounds and walked out of the area to get help, but by the time he reached an ambulance, medics said they could not return to the site of the attack because it was too dangerous.
Subsequent efforts to coordinate a safe passage to send rescuers for Abudaqa were delayed, Dahdouh said, adding that one ambulance that tried to reach the cameraman came under fire.
Rescuers reached him finally after over 5 hours, but by then he had succumbed to his wounds. Abudaqa was the father of 4.
RECOMMENDED VIEWING: Wael Dahdouh recounts Israeli attack that killed Abudaqa
Palestinian journalist Ramy Budair and 3 Gazan rescue workers were also killed in the Israeli attack on Khan Younis: The Palestinian New Press agency says they were “directly targeted.”
Targeting journalists is a war crime.
Jodie Ginsberg, the president of the Committee to Protect Journalists, says the Gaza war is “the deadliest conflicts for journalists” that the media watchdog has documented in the past 30 years.
Jeremy Scahill, journalist and co-founder of US news outlet The Intercept, said in a tweet,
Israel does not want any journalists they cannot control and censor to witness their mass killing campaign in Gaza, so they are systematically killing the Palestinian journalists who are the eyes and ears of the world, reporting from this Israeli-enforced killing cage.
US says killing of journalist Abudaqa is a ‘heavy loss’, no indication Israel targets journalists: White House national security spokesman John Kirby has expressed Washington’s “deepest sympathies and condolences” for the killing of the Al Jazeera journalist.
“We know it’s a heavy loss indeed…Journalists need to be able to have the freedom to cover conflicts around the world … It’s never acceptable to deliberately target them.”
Although Israel has killed dozens of media workers in Gaza, Kirby said the US does not have “any indications that they are deliberately targeting journalists”. Kirby previously said that the US is not drawing any red lines for Israel as it supplies its ally with weapons and bombs in a conflict that UN experts have said poses a “risk of genocide” to Palestinians.
Abudaqa’s coworker, Wael Dahdouh, was also injured in the attack. Dahdouh’s wife, son, daughter and grandson were killed in an attack in October.
RECOMMENDED READING: The newsroom has become a battleground in Israel’s war on Gaza
Israeli forces attack/kill Gazan Christians
Christian mother and daughter killed in church: The Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem has condemned the killing of a Christian mother and daughter, allegedly shot dead “in cold blood” on Saturday by an Israeli military sniper while they were inside the Holy Family Parish in Gaza.
A statement released by the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem confirmed that an Israeli sniper murdered two Christian women inside the Holy Family Parish where the majority of Christian families have taken refuge since the start of the war.
Sources reported that Israeli occupation forces, besieging the neighborhood, have been targeting anyone moving within the church compound. The invading Israeli military, which has been imposing a siege around the area for several days, has demanded over 600 displaced individuals trapped inside the church compound to evacuate the premises, the sources added.
Israel bombs convent for the disabled: In addition, rockets fired from an Israeli tank on Saturday morning severely damaged the Convent of the Sisters of Mother Theresa, home to 54 people with disabilities, leaving them “displaced and without access to the respirators some of them need to survive”.
Israeli forces also bombed the Young Men’s Christian Association in Gaza: Israeli forces bombed the Young Men’s Christian Association in Gaza on Saturday, where hundreds of Palestinians were sheltering. Further air strikes targeted residential buildings in the surrounding areas. According to the chairman of the Euro-Med Monitor, dozens are reported to be dead or wounded.
RECOMMENDED READING: Gazans say they fear a fate worse than bombs: permanent exile
More from Gaza
Israel’s Gaza ‘detention pit’ revealed, sparking fears about Palestinian prisoners’ safety: A shocking image emerged this week showing the Israeli army detaining hundreds of Palestinians in what appeared to be an open-air pit in northern Gaza, possibly breaking the Geneva Convention on the treatment of prisoners of war.
The image was originally posted in the “Reporters’ chat” section on Channel 12’s website by Nir Dvori, the channel’s security and army correspondent.
The caption read “Detention of prisoners in Gaza” and the image showed hundreds of men, dressed in similar dark clothes, kept in a large berm made of red dirt.
A small group of detainees, some shirtless, are standing in front of an LED illuminator positioned on a stand, usually used for photography. In the background, a group of Israeli soldiers gather near a vehicle.
Sharing images of prisoners of war, particularly when they are held in degrading or humiliating conditions, is a contravention of the Geneva Convention. (Read the full story here.)
IDF accidentally shoots and kills three Israelis held hostage in Gaza: Israeli soldiers shot and killed three Israeli hostages in northern Gaza after misidentifying them as threats, the Israel Defense Forces said. “During combat in Shejaiya, the IDF mistakenly identified three Israeli hostages as a threat. As a result, the troops fired toward them and they were killed,” IDF spokesman Daniel Hagari said in a news briefing on Friday.
“During searches and checks in the area in which the incident occurred, a suspicion arose over the identities of the deceased,” Hagari added. “Their bodies were transferred to Israeli territory for examination, after which it was confirmed that they were three Israeli hostages.”
Israeli soldiers ‘failed to follow rules of engagement’: Three captives who were mistakenly shot dead in northern Gaza “were killed because the troops did not follow the army’s rules of engagement”, the Israeli army says. Here are the main finding from its preliminary investigation:
- Three shirtless figures were spotted holding a long stick with a white cloth attached by a soldier
- The soldier felt threatened and opened fire
- Two were hit and fell. The third managed to escape to a nearby building
- The soldier reported this to his commanding officer
- The commander arrived at the scene, while an army squad followed the third captive in the building
- As the soldiers approached the building, they heard a plea for help in Hebrew
- The Israeli captive hiding inside the building came out before running inside again
- The soldiers said they believed that it was a Hamas member trying to pull them into a trap. They entered the building and killed the captive.
The Israeli military apparently tried to cover up the nature of their killing at first, as evidenced in this Ha’aretz headline: IDF Rescues Three Bodies of Hamas-slain Israeli Hostages From Gaza, Including Two Soldiers. The article included the statement, “The army did not provide information about the circumstances of the death of the three hostages.”
The Israeli rights group B’Tselem says it is prohibited by international humanitarian law, and basic moral principles, “to shoot people who yielded and carry a white flag, regardless [of] whether they’re combatants or not, regardless of their nationality and religion.”
WATCH: Aftermath of a deadly Israeli attack in Khan Younis: A Palestinian journalist has shared footage of the aftermath of Israeli strikes that destroyed houses in al-Manara neighborhood in Khan Younis, southern Gaza. Reports are emerging that dozens of people have been killed and injured.
6 Gaza cemeteries destroyed by Israel: The Israeli military occupation forces have damaged or completely destroyed at least six cemeteries in the northern Gaza Strip during their recent ground invasion advancements. According to an analysis conducted by The New York Times using satellite imagery and video footage, Israeli forces demolished part of the Tunisian cemetery to establish a temporary military position in the Shuja’iyya neighborhood in Gaza.
A satellite image captured on Sunday reveals Israeli armored vehicles and defensive structures on ground that previously housed intact graves, despite international law considering the destruction of religious locations as possible war crimes.
The Israeli military has not provided explanations to The New York Times regarding the demolition of the cemetery or any measures taken to safeguard religious sites in Gaza.
Qatar: Discussions on new truce ongoing: The Qatar Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced on Saturday that they have confirmed that diplomatic efforts are ongoing to reach a new truce in Gaza. The statement read,
Qatar affirmed its ongoing diplomatic efforts to renew the humanitarian pause, and expressed hope for building upon the progress made to accomplish a comprehensive and sustainable agreement that would end the war, stop the bloodshed of our Palestinian brethren, and lead to serious negotiations and the launch of a political process that yields a comprehensive, permanent and just peace in accordance with international resolutions and the Arab Peace Initiative.
West Bank and Jerusalem
Palestinian prisoner affairs chief tells ICRC conditions in Israeli prisons are “cruel and unprecedented”: Qadura Fares, head of the Palestinian Authority’s Commission for Detainees’ Affairs, told ICRC President Mirjana Spoljaric that Palestinians held in Israeli jails are experiencing “cruel and unprecedented” treatment.In a meeting with Spoljaric, Fares urged her to take action and end what he described as a “new phase” of attacks against detainees since October 7.
Israeli authorities have banned prisoners from going outside and confiscated their belongings, including kitchen equipment, appliances, and clothes, he said. They have also reduced the quantity of food usually given to prisoners. Prisoners also have been “tortured” and beaten, with many sustaining injuries and broken bones and often are deprived of medical attention. At least six Palestinians have died in custody, Fares said.
Woman with cancer among 16 Palestinians detained by Israel in West Bank: A woman ill with cancer was among 16 Palestinians the Israeli occupation forces detained today in the occupied West Bank, raising the total detained since the launch of the Israeli war on October 7 to 4520, according to prisoners’ groups.
She was arrested apparently because she is from Gaza even though she has been living in the West Bank for the last three years, according to her husband, who was with her when she was arrested. The soldiers would not let her even take her medicine with her, he said.
RECOMMENDED READING: Palestinians detained in Israeli prisons are hostages, too
Two Israeli police officers suspended for beating photojournalist: Israeli police have suspended from “operational activity” two officers who brutally assaulted a photojournalist working for Turkey’s Anadolu Agency. Mustafa Alkharouf was covering Friday prayers near the al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem when two Israel Border Police officers attacked him. The journalist had to be hospitalized.
The suspension will be effective until “details of the incident were examined.” Watch the incident (TW disturbing)”
(NOTE: There was reportedly also an incident of Israeli forces shooting multiple Gazans at point blank range earlier this week.)
Israeli military’s ‘execution’ killings of two Palestinian civilians prompts investigation: Israel on Friday said it was opening a military police investigation into the killing of two Palestinians in the West Bank after an Israeli human rights group posted videos that appeared to show Israeli troops killing the men — one who was incapacitated and the second unarmed — during a military raid in a West Bank refugee camp.
The B’Tselem human rights group accused the army of carrying out a pair of “illegal executions.”
Israel rarely prosecutes such cases, and human rights groups say soldiers rarely receive serious punishments even if wrongdoing is found.
UN documents Israeli settler violence, displacement of Palestinians in occupied West Bank: Violence by Israeli settlers since October 7 has displaced at least 189 families in the occupied West Bank; among the 1,257 Palestinians forced from their homes, 582 are children.
During the same period, the demolition of Palestinian homes by Israeli authorities left another 338 people, including 182 children, without a place to reside, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in its latest report on Gaza and the occupied Palestinian territories.
Adding to that, 88 people were left homeless in the occupied West Bank by punitive demolitions of Palestinian homes by Israel’s military since October 7, the UN said.
“Other operations” by Israel’s military since October 7 also destroyed a further 42 Palestinian homes leaving 269 people, including 121 children, displaced, it added.
The UN Human Rights Committee “in 2014, concluded that punitive demolitions are a form of collective punishment and as such are illegal under international law”, the report notes.
US and elsewhere
Worldwide outrage at Israel’s aggression: According to the Armed Conflict Location and Events Data Project, a nongovernmental organization specializing in conflict data collection, from October 7 to November 24, at least 7,283 pro-Palestine protests took place in more than 118 countries and territories. Another 845 events were pro-Israel – about 10%.
‘Hellfire’ and chaos in Rafah tests Biden’s opposition to displacement: Biden’s public pledge to oppose the forced displacement of Palestinians from the besieged enclave is looking increasingly tenuous amid a humanitarian crisis brewing in Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city.
Stark warnings that social order is breaking down in southern Gaza, with the potential to send hundreds of thousands of desperate Palestinians across the border to Egypt, is testing one of US President Joe Biden’s clearest red lines on Israel’s offensive, current and former US officials told Middle East Eye.
“We seem to be on the glide path to displacement by desperation,” William Usher, a former senior Middle East analyst at the CIA, told MEE. “That would be an embarrassment for the Biden administration, which is clearly growing more frustrated with Israel”…
“You put everything together and it’s not haphazard or accidental. It’s impossible not to draw the conclusion that Israel’s ultimate goal is to force people over the border,” Khaled Elgindy, director of the Middle East Insitute’s program on Israeli-Palestinian affairs, told MEE.
Senator Bernie Sanders introduces resolution to investigate indiscriminate bombing of Gaza: The measure would compel the State Department to produce a report within 30 days about Israel’s human rights practices.
“The scale of the suffering in Gaza is unimaginable – it will be remembered among some of the darkest chapters of our modern history,” Sanders said in a statement.
Protesters denounce US Senate majority leader Schumer for Israel support: Dozens of demonstrators took part in the protest in front of the office of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer in New York. The demonstrators chanted “Schumer! Schumer! You can’t hide. You’re supporting genocide,” as they waved Palestinian flags. Schumer has been vocal in his support for Israel during the war on Gaza.
Health Ministry, food security updates from Gaza
Israel says US will pay for upgraded Rafah crossing to enable delivery of more humanitarian aid: Israel has agreed to temporarily allow aid to enter Gaza through the Karem Abu Salem (Kerem Shalom) crossing in addition to the Rafah crossing from Egypt. This comes after pressure from the US to allow more food, water, and fuel into Gaza.
Prime Minister Netanyahu’s office stated, “The United States has committed to pay for the upgrade of the Rafah crossing as soon as possible to enable the transfer of humanitarian aid only via Rafah after passing Israeli security screening.”
Early in the conflict, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant ordered a “complete siege” of the Gaza Strip: “There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed…We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly,” so Israel would consider the opening of a second crossing a major concession.
The Israeli prime minister’s office says the opening of the Karem Abu Salem crossing will allow Israel to permit the entry of 200 trucks of aid per day, agreed upon in a temporary ceasefire deal brokered and implemented last month – well below the daily average of 500 truckloads (including fuel and private sector goods) that entered every working day prior to 7 October.
Supplies haven’t arrived at al-Awda Hospital for 67 days: Manager of the al-Awda Hospital, Ahmed Muhanna, says basic and essential medical supplies have yet to reach the facility in northern Gaza. Muhanna said no medical aid has reached al-Awda Hospital in 67 days, saying there was no oxygen available at the facility, adding,
Israeli tanks are around the hospital … while one tank closed the entrance…They targeted two floors of the hospital from the outside, destroying the surgical wards. We are looking for support from international societies, especially the Red Crescent and the World Health Organization.
Palestinian Health Ministry officials in Gaza have just shared these updates:
- Israeli forces are targeting anyone who moves in Kamal Adwan and al-Awda hospitals
- The southern part of Kamal Adwan Hospital has been completely destroyed and 12 newborns are still in incubators inside the hospital
- Medical staff at al-Awda Hospital have refused an Israeli order to evacuate
- Ambulances carrying the wounded out of Kamal Adwan Hospital have been targeted
- Israel attacked al-Sahaba center, the only maternity care center operational in Gaza, on Friday
Significant deterioration of food security in south Gaza: Severe hunger levels were reported in 44 percent of households. This is compared to 24 percent in a previous assessment conducted between November 27-30 by the World Food Program. Other food security news:
- The food security situation in the northern governorates of Gaza is believed to be significantly worse, the UN agency said.
- According to the World Food Program (WFP) there have been alarming trends in the food security situation in southern Gaza: 44 per cent of assessed households are now facing very severe hunger. This is an increase from the 24 per cent recorded in the previous assessment undertaken during the humanitarian pause (24-30 November).
- On 15 December, as of 22:00, 115 trucks carrying humanitarian supplies and four tankers of fuel have entered the Gaza Strip. This is well below the daily average of 500 truckloads that entered every working day prior to 7 October.
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