Israel Hamas war updates: Israel cuts funds as forces encircle Gaza with ‘full force’
Israel will return those working in Gaza to their Palestinian territory, as its troops surrounded the city and warned Hamas soldiers would go home “in black bags”. Warning: Graphic
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Israel will return those working in Gaza to their besieged Palestinian territory, the government said, almost four weeks after it began striking Hamas targets there in response to a deadly cross-border attack.
“Israel is severing all contact with Gaza. There will be no more Palestinian workers from Gaza,” the Israeli security cabinet announced in a statement late Thursday.
“Those workers from Gaza who were in Israel on the day of the outbreak of the war will be returned to Gaza,” it added, without specifying how many people would be sent back.
Before the Israel-Hamas conflict started, Israel had issued work permits to some 18,500 Gazans, according to COGAT, the Israeli defence body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs.
The Israeli security cabinet has also announced it would cut funds for Gaza from all money transfers made out to the Palestinian Authority.
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ISRAEL SURROUNDS GAZA CITY
Israel’s military says its forces have surrounded Gaza City in the Hamas-run Palestinian territory as they pressed their assault against the Islamist group.
The Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, warned Israel that its invading soldiers would go home “in black bags”.
Spokesman Abu Obeida said: “Gaza will be the curse of history for Israel.”
The Hamas warning came after Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari said troops had completely surrounded Gaza City after days of expanding ground operations.
“Israeli soldiers have completed the encirclement of the city of Gaza, the centre of the Hamas terror organisation,” Hagari told journalists.
“The concept of a ceasefire is not currently on the table at all,” he added.
Amid growing fears of the conflict spreading, Israel and Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon exchanged fire after a salvo of rockets slammed into a northern Israel town.
The White House said US President Joe Biden was calling for humanitarian pauses in the conflict that would involve a “temporary, localised” cessation of hostilities, well short of a general ceasefire.
Leaving on a new Middle East tour, Biden’s Secretary of State Antony Blinken said “we are determined to deter any escalation” in the Israel-Hamas war.
“We will be talking about concrete steps that can and should be taken to minimise harm to men, women and children in Gaza,” he told reporters.
The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza says 9061 people have been killed since the war started, including 3760 children.
BLINKEN ARRIVES IN ISRAEL AS HAMAS COMMANDER KILLED
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken has arrived in Tel Aviv to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the country’s president Isaac Herzog.
Mr Blinken will then travel to Jordan where he will hear from several Arab leaders directly.
As he left Washington, Mr Blinken said he intended to discuss steps to minimise harm to civilians in Gaza.
However, the White House said any potential pauses in fighting should be temporary and localised and insisted Israel should not be stopped from defending itself.
The Israel Defense Forces says it has killed the commander of Hamas’s Sabra-Tel al-Hawa battalion, Mustafa Dalloul, in an overnight airstrike in the Gaza Strip.
According to the IDF, Dalloul “took a key role in the management of the fighting against IDF forces in the Gaza Strip.”
LEBANON ‘DOESN’T NEED WAR’ WITH ISRAEL: FRANCE
French Defence Minister Sebastien Lecornu said that Lebanon “doesn’t need a war” with Israel and warned against a regional escalation.
Lebanon’s southern border has seen near daily exchanges of fire, mainly between Israel and Hamas ally Hezbollah since Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel.
“Lebanon doesn’t need a war, that’s the least we can say,” Lecornu said during a visit to French peacekeepers in the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL).
Such a war “could have major escalatory effects on the whole region,” he added.
The cross-border exchanges have left 66 dead on the Lebanese side - 48 of them Hezbollah fighters but also including seven civilians, one of them a Reuters journalist, according to an AFP tally.
On the Israeli side, nine people have died - eight soldiers and one civilian, the army says.
On Saturday, a UN peacekeeper was wounded by shelling, the mission’s spokesman said, hours after reporting a hit on its headquarters.
UNIFIL acts as a buffer between Lebanon and Israel, which remain technically at war, and counts around 10,000 peacekeepers, some 700 of them French.
ISRAEL SETS UP ‘HAMAS MASSACRE’ WEBSITE
Israel has set up a “Hamas Massacre”, which features graphic photos and videos of Hamas’ October 7 terror attack, vowing to “document the horrors of that day”.
The attacks began when Hamas gunmen descended upon the Nova music festival near Kibbutz Re’im on motorised paragliders and in pick-up trucks, massacring around 260 revellers and capturing hostages.
The website features chilling photos of people enjoying a music festival the day before, alongside gruesome footage and images of dead bodies.
Pictures of the brutal Kibbutz Be’eri attack that saw more than 100 of its 1100 community members tortured and slaughtered are also included, as well as photographs of bedrooms drenched with blood.
“Viewer discretion advised: some of you may have seen clips and images of the horrific war crimes committed by Hamas on October 7th. A new website archives all of this footage,” Israel posted on its X – formerly known as Twitter – account.
“We know it’s difficult to watch, but it is even more heart wrenching for the victims and the families of these heinous crimes. Please RT this and help us make sure that the world knows what happened.”
‘NO INCOME, NO LIFE’: JERUSALEM’S OLD CITY SUFFERS
The once bustling streets of Jerusalem’s Old City have fallen eerily quiet, with the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas keeping away tourists and their much-needed cash.
“There is no tourism industry any more,” said Marwan Attieh, 48, a third-generation tour guide and souvenir shop owner.
“We have families, we have children … (There is) no business, no income, no revenue, no life. How can you spend money, if you don’t have money?”
The walled Old City in annexed east Jerusalem is home to some of the holiest sites for Christians, Jews and Muslims and has drawn pilgrims and travellers for centuries.
Yet Jerusalem’s lucrative tourism sector has all but collapsed since October 7.
ALBO‘S ‘DIRE’ WARNING
Anthony Albanese has warned of “dire” consequences if Israel’s war against Hamas explodes into a regional conflict.
Speaking at the Australian-Melbourne Institute Economic and Social Outlook conference on Thursday, the prime minister said the civilian death toll in Gaza is causing “enormous concern” around the world.
“Israel has a right to defend itself but how it defends itself matters as well,” Mr Albanese said, The Australian reports.
“It must comply with international law and the rules of war (and) do all that it can to ensure that innocent civilians are not paying the price of Hamas’ atrocities.
“I think that the civilian toll is quite rightly causing an enormous concern around the world.”
HAMAS ‘BAKED BABIES TO DEATH’
An Israeli emergency worker claims Hamas baked babies to death in an oven.
In a video testimony, Asher Moskowitz claimed he saw the remains of a baby who had been baked to death in an oven by the terrorists at Kibbutz Kfar Aza on October 7.
“They took the baby and put it in a kitchen oven,” Mr Moskowitz, a member of the United Hatzalah first responder group, said as he recalled the assessment made by staff.
“The body hardened and, unfortunately, appeared to have also swollen.
“And really, the heating element of the oven was on the body itself.”
Here's the second half of Asher Moskowitz's video testimony. pic.twitter.com/o5ely6hORu
— Ben Sales (@BenjaminSales) November 1, 2023
AUSSIE EVACUEES COMING HOME
Foreign Minister Penny Wong has shared photos of consular staff meeting Australian citizens evacuated from Gaza via the Rafah crossing in Egypt.
She said “Travel arrangements are being made for them to get home, free of charge.”
Overnight 20 Australians, plus two family members and a permanent resident were able to cross the border at Rafah.
— Senator Penny Wong (@SenatorWong) November 2, 2023
They are being supported by our consular staff in Egypt. Travel arrangements are being made for them to get home, free of charge. pic.twitter.com/XNfpV7GxUt
Ms Wong also backed calls for a humanitarian pause in the war.
“We continue to press for the remaining Australians and their family members to be able to cross. And we are calling for humanitarian pauses on hostilities, so humanitarian supplies of food, water, medicine and fuel can reach people in desperate need,” she said on X, formerly Twitter.
ISRAEL STRIKE NEAR UN SCHOOL
The Hamas-run health ministry says 27 people were killed in an Israeli strike near a UN school in the camp. AFP was unable to independently verify the toll.
Meanwhile Gaza’s Hamas government says that 195 people had been killed in two days of Israeli strikes on Jabalia refugee camp, the biggest in the Palestinian territory.
It said officials “have recorded 195 martyrs, 120 missing under the rubble, and 777 wounded” at the camp on Tuesday and Wednesday.
BLINKEN HEADED TO ISRAEL
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said he would seek “concrete measures” from Israel to minimise harm to Gaza civilians as he headed on his second crisis trip to the Middle East since the October 7 attacks by Hamas triggered the current war.
President Joe Biden has promised full support and ramped-up military aid to Israel for its retaliatory strikes in Gaza, but in a visible shift of tone has also voiced empathy for Palestinian suffering which has stoked anger in parts of the world.
“We will be talking about concrete steps that can and should be taken to minimise harm to men, women and children in Gaza,” Mr Blinken said as he flew out of Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington.
“This is something that the United States is committed to,” he said, a day before his latest meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
WEST BANK BLOODSHED
Unrest has increased in the occupied West Bank in tandem with the war in Gaza, with three Palestinians killed by Israeli fire on Thursday local time and an Israeli killed in a Palestinian shooting attack, according to first responders.
Two Palestinians were shot dead during an Israeli raid in El-Bireh near the city of Ramallah, while a third was killed in the northern town of Qalqilya, the Palestinian health ministry said.
Around 130 Palestinians have been killed in clashes with troops or Jewish settlers since October 7, according to the ministry.
The Israeli victim died when his car came under fire near Einav settlement in the northwest of the territory.
ISRAELI TROOPS ‘CIRCLING’ GAZA
Israel’s military says it has surrounded Gaza City and is “deepening” its operations there.
“Our soldiers have been operating in Gaza City for the past few days, surrounding it from several directions, deepening the operation,” IDF chief Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi said in a TV interview on Thursday local time.
“Our forces are in very significant areas of Gaza City.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised his military.
“We’re at the height of the battle,” Netanyahu said in a statement.
“We’ve had impressive successes and have passed the outskirts of Gaza City. We are advancing.”
Shortly after Hamas’s military wing, the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, said that Gaza would be a “curse” for Israel and that its invading soldiers would go home “in black bags”.
🔴A cruise missile launched from the southeast toward Israeli airspace was successfully intercepted by F-35i fighter jets.
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) November 2, 2023
🔴On the same day, the IAF’s Arrow Aerial Defense System intercepted a surface-to-surface missile in the Red Sea area. pic.twitter.com/jZn0wcqwUX
ISRAELI TROOPS IN AMBUSH
Fierce battles have continued to rage in the Gaza Strip, with Israeli troops fighting off an overnight Hamas ambush.
The Israeli army said ground forces and tanks clashed with Hamas terror cells in the northern Gaza Strip overnight, killing dozens of operatives, in what The Times of Israel reported was an intense and chaotic midnight battle that raged on for over three hours following an ambush targeting soldiers from Golani’s 13th Battalion.
In a statement, the IDF troops of the Golani Infantry Brigade had taken part in “prolonged battles” against Hamas terrorists who had fired missiles, set off explosive devices, and hurled grenades at the forces.
The Hamas gunmen tried to ambush the Israeli force at midnight, emerging from tunnels and attacking them with antitank missiles, mortars, and drones.
They tried to enter the armoured personnel carriers and take control of them. More than 20 Hamas terrorists were believed to have been killed and several managed to escape.
The IDF said it is using artificial intelligence to identify thousands of new targets belonging to the Palestinian terror group.
ISRAELIS TARGET HEZBOLLAH
Israel’s troops targeted Lebanon’s Hezbollah with a “broad assault” on Thursday, as the Iran-backed militant group said it had attacked 19 Israeli positions simultaneously.
The IDF said “warplanes and helicopters attacked in recent hours targets of the Hezbollah terror organisation in response to fire from Lebanese territory earlier today, together with attacks with artillery and tank fire”.
Earlier, a barrage of rockets wounded two people in the Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona near the Lebanese border, medics said.
The Lebanese section of Hamas’s armed wing said it had fired a dozen rockets at the town “in response to the occupation (Israeli) massacres against our people in Gaza”.
The cross-border fire comes ahead of the first public speech by Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah on Friday since the Israel-Hamas war began, amid fears the conflict could spill over.
MORE FOREIGNERS EVACUATED
More foreign passport holders and dual nationals crossed into Egypt on Thursday local time, the second day the Rafah crossing was opened to people seeking to flee Gaza.
Egyptian and Palestinian officials both said 400 foreigners and dual nationals were expected to cross, alongside between 60 to 100 sick and wounded.
Cairo said it would help evacuate “about 7,000” foreigners and dual nationals with passports issued by more than 60 countries.
More than 20,000 wounded people are still trapped in Gaza, according to Doctors Without Borders (MSF).
NETANYAHU’S DRAMATIC THREAT TO HAMAS
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to “continue until victory” over Hamas, whose brutal October 7 attack sparked the latest conflict, the deadliest in decades of unrest between the two sides.
His defence minister Yoav Gallant said Hamas had two options: to “die or to surrender unconditionally”.
The comments came as Hamas official Ghazi Hamad issued a chilling threat saying “we will repeat the October 7 attack time and again until Israel is annihilated”.
“We are victims, everything we do is justified. We must remove that country,” Hamad said in a televised interview from Beirut, Lebanon.
“We must teach Israel a lesson, and we will do it twice and three times. The Al-Aqsa Deluge [the name Hamas gave its October 7 onslaught] is just the first time, and there will be a second, a third, a fourth,”.
“Will we have to pay a price? Yes, and we are ready to pay it. We are called a nation of martyrs, and we are proud to sacrifice martyrs.”
But Lt Colonel Conricus retaliated, calling the threat “famous last words”.
AUSSIES WOMAN’S HORROR AMID GAZA ESCAPES
Australian woman Mona – she did not wish to give her surname – is an Australian citizen by marriage. She came to the border alone and was haunted by the thought of her family behind, trapped in Gaza.
“I’m not happy at all, because I’m leaving my other part, my brothers and sisters, my whole family is still here. I wish, God willing, they would all be in a safe place. The situation is terrible there, it’s very, very, bad.”
Mona said “there’s no food and no water”.” We have 17 kids in the family and there’s no food. The past two days, there was no water.”
“It’s very hard and dangerous to get food, you cannot imagine … I had to push myself hard to get myself a piece of bread that I don’t even want to eat.”
Retired Western Sydney teacher Abdullah Dahlan went to the Rafah crossing but did not pass after Egyptian officials refused entry for his Palestinian wife, who has an Australian visa.
“It’s a nightmare, worse than a nightmare. No food, no water, no fuel, no bread.”
Egypt has said it will help evacuate “about 7000” foreigners and dual nationals from the Gaza Strip, the foreign ministry said in a statement.
The statement did not offer specific details or a timeline for the Egyptian evacuation plan.
– with AFP
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