Second US aircraft carrier to support Israel as China warns Israeli actions beyond ‘self-defence’
The US has dramatically increased its military support for Israel as China warns Israel it has gone too far. Follow the updates. Warning: Graphic
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The United States is sending a second aircraft carrier strike group to the eastern Mediterranean “to deter hostile actions against Israel or any efforts toward widening this war following Hamas’s attack,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said Saturday.
The USS Eisenhower and its affiliated warships will join another carrier group already deployed to the region in the wake of the attack on Israel a week ago and Israel’s ongoing response.
The deployment signals Washington’s “ironclad commitment to Israel’s security and our resolve to deter any state or non-state actor seeking to escalate this war,” Mr Austin said in a statement.
A week of deadly Israeli salvos was sparked by a Hamas raid which saw fighters break through the heavily fortified border between the Gaza Strip and Israel and gun down, stab and burn to death more than 1,300 people.
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In Gaza, health officials said Israel’s response had killed more than 2,200 people. As on the Israeli side, most of them were civilians.
The United States has sent munitions to Israel and warned other countries not to escalate the conflict.
The same day as the announcement of the second carrier deployment, President Joe Biden underscored US support for efforts to protect civilians amid the Israeli siege and bombardment of Gaza in a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“President Biden affirmed his support for all efforts to protect civilians,” the White House said in a statement about the call, which did not specifically mention the enclave.
Biden also spoke Saturday with Palestinian Authority leader Mahmud Abbas for the first time since hostilities broke out, condemning “Hamas’ brutal attack on Israel.”
It comes as Israel’s actions in Gaza have gone “beyond the scope of self-defence” and the Israeli government must “cease its collective punishment of the people of Gaza”, China’s foreign minister Wang Yi said.
Wang, who made the comments on a call to his Saudi Arabian counterpart Prince Faisal bin Farhan on Saturday, said “all parties should not take any action to escalate the situation and should return to the negotiating table as soon as possible,” according to a foreign ministry readout.
CHOPPER SHOT DOWN
This is reportedly the moment Hamas militants shoot down an Israeli military helicopter. The footage, while its authenticity cannot be verified, was being circulated by the Palestinian press. The Israel Defence Force had conceded last week one of its helicopters was downed in the early moments of the conflict when militants crossed into Israel.
Meanwhile, The Israel Defence Force confirmed it had taken out an underground Hamas tunnel in Gaza and several militants in its latest strike, drone footage of which it released Sunday.
The relentless air strikes have focused on Jabalya, Zaytun, al-Furqan and Beit Hanoun areas where Hamas had been firing mortars. An IDF combat helicopter also identified a building with “several terrorists and eliminated them”.
It released dramatic footage of the latest strikes through X, formerly known as Twitter.
WHO WARNS OF ‘DEATH SENTENCE’
The World Health Organisation said forcing thousands of hospital patients to evacuate to already overflowing hospitals in the southern Gaza Strip could be “tantamount to a death sentence”.
Israel has warned Palestinians to evacuate northern Gaza ahead of an expected ground offensive against Hamas, one week after the deadliest attack in Israel’s history.
“WHO strongly condemns Israel’s repeated orders for the evacuation of 22 hospitals treating more than 2,000 inpatients in northern Gaza,” the UN health agency said in a statement.
“The forced evacuation of patients and health workers will further worsen the current humanitarian and public health catastrophe.”
Moving 2,000 patients to southern Gaza, “where health facilities are already running at maximum capacity and unable to absorb a dramatic rise in the number patients, could be tantamount to a death sentence,” the WHO said.
The organisation said the lives of many critically ill and fragile patients now “hang in the balance” - with people in intensive care or relying on life support, newborns in incubators, patients undergoing haemodialysis and women with pregnancy complications.
They and others “all face imminent deterioration of their condition or death if they are forced to move and are cut off from life-saving medical attention while being evacuated”, the WHO said.
Israel pummelled northern Gaza with fresh air strikes on Saturday before an expected ground.
In Gaza, health officials said more than 2,200 people had been killed. As on the Israeli side, most of them were civilians.
The WHO said health workers in northern Gaza were now facing an “agonising choice” between abandoning critically ill patients, putting their own lives at risk by remaining on site, or endangering their patients’ lives while trying to transport them to southern hospitals “that have no capacity to receive them.
“Overwhelmingly, care givers have chosen to stay behind and honour their oaths as health professionals to ‘do no harm’,” the WHO said.
“Health workers should never have to make such impossible choices.”
IRAN’S WARNING TO ISRAEL
Iran’s mission to the United Nations said “if Israel’s war crimes and genocide are not halted immediately, the situation could spiral out of control and ricochet far-reaching consequences”.
In a post on X, the mission wrote that if that happens, “the responsibility lies with the UN, the Security Council and the states steering the Council toward a dead end”.
‘NEXT STAGE IS COMING’
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has given another warning that his country’s war efforts are ramping up, declaring “the next stage is coming”.
Mr Netanyahu made that statement to troops on the front line on Saturday afternoon, local time.
In a video shared to social media, Mr Netanyahu could be seen shaking hands with Israeli soldiers and saying: You ready for the next stage? The next stage is coming”.
No further details were provided but the troops could be seen nodding.
×¢× ×”×œ×•×—×ž×™× ×©×œ× ×• בעוטף ×¢×–×”, בקו החזית. ×›×•×œ× ×• ×ž×•×›× ×™×.
— Benjamin Netanyahu - ×‘× ×™×ž×™×Ÿ × ×ª× ×™×”×• (@netanyahu) October 14, 2023
(צילו×: ×בי ×וחיון, לע״מ) pic.twitter.com/TiGzHcWhPK
On Saturday evening the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it was preparing to conduct a massive offensive against Hamas, including coordinated attacks from land, air and sea.
“IDF battalions and soldiers are deployed throughout the country and are ready to elevate their readiness for the upcoming stages of the war, with a strong emphasis on significant ground operations,” IDF said in a statement.
The Israeli military has mobilised 300,000 reservists for what could be an unprecedented offensive against Gaza.
Israel’s National Security Council head Tzachi Hanegbi said the goal is to remove Hamas from military and political control over the Gaza Strip.
Mr Hanegbi said that in a recent cabinet meeting, the government approved a plan to “destroy” Hamas, as stated by the prime minister and defense minister.
It comes after the city of Sderot in southern Israel was placed under red alert after Hamas fired rockets on the city.
In a post on Telegram on Saturday, local time, Hamas said it had fired “rockets at the occupied city of Sderot.”
According to CNN journalists in Sderot, Israel’s Iron Dome air defense system was working to intercept the rockets.
Earlier on Saturday, the six-hour window issued by the Israeli military ordering Palestinians to complete evacuation from Gaza City to the southern part of the strip expired at 4 p.m. local time (midnight, AEST) on Saturday.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) told residents to move towards the Gaza Valley, in a message posted on X, formerly Twitter.
The ultimatum from the Israeli military came a day after it told 1.1 million people living in northern Gaza to evacuate their homes.
The IDF has inundated the border with military amid a relentless onslaught in retaliation to the historic assault by the militant group Hamas on October 7.
On Saturday, CNN authenticated five videos from the scene of a large explosion along an evacuation route for civilians south of Gaza City. The videos show many dead bodies, including children, amid a scene of major destruction.
The Hamas media office told CNN that Israeli military airstrikes killed 70 and injured 200 evacuees in Gaza, hitting those fleeing in three locations: Salah Al-Din street, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin street, and near Wadi Gaza, Hamas said.
Earlier, the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza confirmed that “large numbers” of dead and injured people, including women and children, arrived at Al-Shifa’ Hospital after they were shelled on their way from northern Gaza to the south.
Separately, Hamas said that another nine hostages taken a week ago, including four foreigners, had been killed by Israeli bombing.
Israel continues airstrikes on Gaza, which have killed more than 1900 Palestinians, and it is expected the IDF will launch a major ground invasion of Gaza in order to wipe out Hamas.
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HAMAS ACCUSES ISRAEL OF ‘WAR CRIMES’
Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh has accused Israel of committing war crimes and preventing humanitarian aid from entering the Gaza Strip, as Israel pounded the blockaded territory with air strikes.
“Israeli atrocities amount to war crimes,” he said in a letter addressed to United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres that was posted on the Palestinian group’s website.
Mr Haniyeh also condemned the “barbaric Israeli siege imposed” on the Palestinian territory, charging that “the Israeli occupation is banning entry of humanitarian aid and medical supplies to the Gaza Strip”.
He urged Mr Guterres to pressure Israel into letting humanitarian aid enter into Gaza.
It comes as Palestinian Health Minister Dr. Mai Al-Kaila blamed Israel for killing 28 health care workers and damaging medical centres in a statement on Saturday.
The minister also said Al-Durrah Children’s Hospital was evacuated on Friday after being targeted with internationally prohibited white phosphorus bombs, and Beit Hanoun Hospital has also ceased operations due to Israeli bombardment, according to CNN.
MORE THAN 700 PALESTINIAN CHILDREN KILLED: REPORTS
More than 700 children have been killed in Gaza and another 2450 have been injured since last Saturday, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund.
“According to the latest reports by local health authorities and media, at least 2,215 Palestinians were reportedly killed, including over 700 children, and more than 8,714 people wounded, including more than 2,450 children,” UNICEF spokeswoman Sara Al Hattab told CNN on Saturday.
The latest figures are an escalation of what was previously reported.
“The killing of children must stop,” UNICEF spokesperson James Elder said. “The images and stories are clear: children with horrendous burns, mortar wounds, and lost limbs. And hospitals are utterly overwhelmed to treat them.”
Mr Elder joined calls from the international community saying, “Israeli children being held hostage in Gaza must be safely and immediately reunited with their families and loved ones.”
GAZA STRIP RUNNING OUT OF WATER, TWO MILLION AT RISK
The United Nations has warned that the clean water supply for the two million people in Gaza is running dangerously low, and also warned of increasing risks of waterborne diseases.
“It has become a matter of life and death. It is a must; fuel needs to be delivered now into Gaza to make water available for 2 million people,” Commissioner-General of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) Phillippe Lazzarini said in a statement on Saturday.
Mr Lazzarini emphasised the effects of the blockade on Gaza, which has received no fresh humanitarian aid for one week now.
“Clean water is running out in the Gaza Strip, after its water plant and public water networks stopped working. People are now forced to use dirty water from wells, increasing risks of waterborne diseases. Gaza has also been under an electricity blackout since 11 October, impacting the water supply,” the statement said.
“Only in the past 12 hours, hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced. The exodus continues as people move to the southern parts of the Gaza Strip. Nearly 1 million people have been displaced in one week alone,” the statement said.
“We need to truck fuel into Gaza now. Fuel is the only way for people to have safe drinking water. If not, people will start dying of severe dehydration, among them young children, the elderly and women. Water is now the last remaining lifeline,” Mr Lazzarini added. “I appeal for the siege on humanitarian assistance to be lifted now.”
SITUATION IN GAZA ‘UNTENABLE’
The UN’s under-secretary general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, Martin Griffiths, has warned that the humanitarian situation in Gaza is “fast becoming untenable.”
It’s been a dreadful week. Humanity must prevail. pic.twitter.com/vQUMy2jK1q
— Martin Griffiths (@UNReliefChief) October 14, 2023
In a statement issued on Saturday, Mr Griffiths said: “In Gaza, families have been bombed while inching their way south along congested, damaged roads, following an evacuation order that left hundreds of thousands of people scrambling for safety but with nowhere to go.
Nearly 2,000 people have been killed and many more have been injured. There is no power, no water and no fuel. Food supplies are running dangerously low. Hospitals, overwhelmed with patients, are running out of medicine…
Even wars have rules, and these rules must be upheld, at all times, and by all sides. Civilians and civilian infrastructure, including humanitarian workers and assets, must be protected.
Civilians must be allowed to leave for safer areas. And whether they move or stay, constant care must be taken to spare them.”
50,000 PRO-PALESTINIANS MARCH IN LONDON
Police have lined the streets in London, Manchester, Edinburgh and Liverpool as up to 50,000 demonstrators estimated in London alone were warned to avoid the Israel Embassy at Kensington High Street, and to not take any actions that would risk arrest.
Metropolitan Police deployed more than 1000 officers to patrol London during the march, as UK PM Rishi Sunak pledged his government’s support to British Jews.
ISRAEL ADMITS INTELLIGENCE ‘MISTAKES’ IN FAILING TO PREDICT ATTACKS
A senior Israeli official admitted on Saturday “mistakes” in intelligence assessments ahead of the brutal Hamas attack last weekend that took Israel by surprise.
“It’s my mistake, and it reflects the mistakes of all those making (intelligence) assessments,” National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi told a press briefing when asked about his recent remarks predicting no Hamas aggression.
“We really believed that Hamas learned the lesson from” its last major war with Israel in 2021, Mr Hanegbi said
US EMBASSY IN ISRAEL AUTHORISES DIPLOMATS, WORKERS TO LEAVE
The US State Department has authorised the evacuation of family members of diplomats and non-essential workers from Israel amid the conflict with Gaza, but says the embassy remains open, according to the Times of Israel.
“The Department of State has no higher priority than the safety and security of U.S. citizens overseas, including US government personnel serving abroad,” says an embassy spokesperson.
“The Embassy remains open. We remain diplomatically engaged at the highest levels and that will continue,” the spokesperson adds.
LEBANON SAYS ISRAEL BEHIND ROCKET FIRE THAT KILLED JOURNALIST
Israel was behind cross-border rocket fire that killed a Reuters journalist and wounded others from AFP, Reuters and Al Jazeera, the Lebanese army said on Saturday.
“The Israeli enemy fired a rocket shell that hit a civilian car belonging to a media team, leading to the death of Issam Abdallah,” a Reuters journalist, and wounding several others on Friday, it said in a statement.
GAZA CITY RESIDENTS TOLD ‘NOT TO DELAY’ LEAVING
The Israeli military said Gaza City residents must not delay their departure before a military offensive starts as roads out of the northern part of the territory were again jammed with people leaving on Saturday.
Military spokesman Richard Hecht said there is a “window” for safe passage to south Gaza between 10.00 am and 4.00 pm.
Without saying how many days the window would remain, he said: “We know this is going to take time but we recommend people not to delay”.
The Israel Defence Force (IDF) opened two routes for residents of Gaza City to escape south – giving them a six hour window to relocate before an expected massive ground assault.
“In recent days, we have appealed to you to leave Gaza City to the south of Wadi Gaza in order to preserve your safety,” IDF spokesman Avichay Adraee posted on social media.
“I would like to inform you that the IDF will allow movement on the indicated streets without any harm between the hours of 10:00-16:00. For your safety, take advantage of the short time to move south - from Beit Hanoun to Khan Yunis.”
“If you care about yourself and your loved ones, go south as instructed,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
“Rest assured that Hamas leaders have taken care of themselves and are taking cover from strikes in the region”.
He said residents of the beach, sand, and west of Olive will also be allowed to move on Daldul and Al-Sana Streets towards Salah Al-Din and Al-Bahr Streets.
HAMAS LEADER ALI QADI KILLED: IDF REVEALED
The Israeli Defence Force and intelligence service Shin Bet have revealed they have killed Hamas militant forces leader Ali Qadi that led the bloody terror attacks on the Israeli communities near Gaza last Saturday.
כלי טיס של צה"ל, ×‘×”×›×•×•× ×” ×ž×•×“×™×¢×™× ×™×ª של שב"×› ו×מ"ן, חיסלו ×ת עלי ק×צ'×™, מפקד בכוח ×”× ×—'בה של ×רגון הטרור חמ×ס, שהוביל מתקפת טרור ביישובי עוטף ×¢×–×” בסוף השבוע ×”×חרון. ×‘×©× ×ª 2005 עלי × ×¢×¦×¨ בעקבות חטיפה ורצח של ישר××œ×™× ×•×”×•×—×–×¨ כחלק מעסקת גלעד שליט. pic.twitter.com/aclnoXpGz5
— דובר צה״ל ×“× ×™×ל הגרי - Daniel Hagari (@IDFSpokesperson) October 14, 2023
Kachi had been arrested in 2005 and accused of killing and murdering Israelis but was released as part of a deal to free Gilad Shalit, an IDF soldier taken hostage in 2006 and held for five years until October 2011 as part of a prisoner exchange deal.
“Aircraft killed Ali Qadi, a company commander of the Hamas ‘Nukhba’ (elite) commando force,” an Israeli military statement said.
The IDF is expected to release more details later of how and where he was killed but follows the killing also in the past three days of the Hamas militant that led the air assault on Israel, Murad Abu Murad, and the unnamed Hamas militant behind the foiled naval assault.
A Hamas official said the Palestinian group had “no comment” concerning the Israeli claim about Qadi.
Israeli military earlier said a drone had killed a number of militants who tried to infiltrate from Lebanon, and a senior military commander of Hamas who headed the Islamist group’s aerial operations in Gaza City has been killed in Israeli air strikes.
Murad Abu Murad was killed over the past day when fighter jets struck an operational centre of Hamas from where the group carried out its “aerial activity”, the military said.
There was no immediate confirmation from Hamas about Murad.
DOZENS OF HOSTAGES KILLED
It comes as bodies of several Israelis have been found by the Israeli military after its forces entered the Gaza Strip.
The Israeli military said for the first time on Saturday that the bodies of some hostages abducted by Hamas militants had been found during operations inside Gaza this week.
“We have found and located some bodies in the perimeter in the Gaza Strip of Israelis that were abducted,” a military spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner, told a briefing.
A dozen hostages including foreign nationals kidnapped from Israel have also been killed as Hamas and Israeli Defence Forces exchange a barrage of artillery fire in embattled Gaza.
Hamas fighters are holding as many as 150 people hostage in locations across Gaza, following their raids on southern Israel on October 7.
Israeli families with members held captive by Hamas in Gaza for a week demanded an urgent arrangement on Saturday enabling the transfer of medicines to their loved ones.
Speaking at a briefing in Tel Aviv, Hagai Levine, chairman of the Israel Association of Public Health Physicians who was working with the families, said there were 150 captives with various medical conditions who needed “life-saving medicines immediately”.
SECOND AUSSIE MERCY FLIGHT CANCELLED
A Qantas mercy flight due to bring Australians stranded in Israel home on Sunday has been cancelled after government assessments deemed it currently too dangerous.
The second rescue flight from London to Ben Gurion Airport in the Israeli capital Tel Aviv was due out on Sunday and carry more than 200 Australian citizens from the escalating crisis.
But both Qantas internal assessments and those of DFAT deemed it currently too dangerous.
The move was likely affected by Hamas managing to fire its longest range rocket yet to north Israel beyond the airport.
The plight of Australians inside Gaza also hoping to escape the crisis remains unknown with DFAT confirming it was still in talks to get at least 19 people out via Egypt which is close to agreeing with Australian and US diplomatic appeals to open borders to foreigners to flee.
HEZBOLLAH READY TO JOIN HAMAS
It is the unholy alliance that threatens to descend the whole of the Middle East into bloody conflict.
Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah movement said on Saturday it would be “fully prepared” to join its Palestinian ally Hamas in the war against Israel when “the time comes for action”.
Hezbollah deputy chief Naim Qassem spoke as Hamas and Israel traded heavy fire for a seventh day, after hundreds of Hamas gunmen stormed across the border from Gaza into Israel on Saturday and killed more than 1,300 people, most of them civilians.
Israel has retaliated by bombarding Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip, killing at least 1,900 people, also mostly civilians and including more than 600 children, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
“We, as Hezbollah, are contributing to the confrontation and will (continue) to contribute to it within our vision and plan,” Qassem told a pro-Palestinian rally in Beirut’s southern suburbs.
“We are fully prepared, and when the time comes for action, we will take it,” he said.
The official, whose remarks coincided with a visit to Beirut by Iran’s foreign minister, rebuffed calls for Hezbollah to stay out of the war.
ISRAEL’S GROUND OFFENSIVE
The Israel Defence Force Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari confirmed its ground offensive had begun with limited mounted armoured raids into Gaza, targeting Hamas rocket crews.
But he confirmed the IDF had recovered the bodies of an unspecified number of hostages from the 150 kidnapped at gunpoint last Saturday and suspected of being held in basements and tunnels below Gaza.
Evidence of where the other hostages could possibly be had been gathered by the IDF in its brief incursion.
Hamas confirmed in the last 24 hours that 70 Palestinians in Gaza had been killed by artillery and air strikes but so too 13 of the hostages including foreigners, being held in five separate locations.
This is on top of the four it earlier claimed had been killed by Israeli air strikes.
The identity and nationalities of the apparent latest victims have yet to be revealed.
The IDF confirmed it had mobilised all forces in preparation for land assault. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a rare televised address after the beginning of the Sabbath said: “We are striking our enemies with unprecedented might. I emphasise that this is only the beginning.”
The UN confirmed tens of thousands of Gazan civilians had heeded Israeli warnings to flee the north of Gaza Strip or face likely death but more than 1 million citizens were struggling to move in the set 24-hour deadline.
Local video showed the main highway – the Salah al-Din Road – that stretches the full length of Gaza packed with vehicles laden with home goods as well as carts pulled by donkeys and people on foot.
But the struggle to flee was as much from the continued Israeli artillery shelling, blocked roads and widespread confusion as where exactly to go, as it was the Hamas militants’ demand Palestinians stay or face the prospect of permanently losing their land as they did in 1948 when war created Israel inside Palestine.
FOOTAGE OF HAMAS WITH KIDNAPPED ISRAELI KIDS
Hamas has released footage showing armed men playing with and holding what appears to be kidnapped Israeli children and babies.
The footage shows a number of men with their faces blurred wearing fatigues and tactical vests.
In one scene, a man rocks a baby in a crib, while a young boy no older than five, sits on his lap. An assault rifle can be seen on the table.
In another a man holds the baby in one arm and in another a gun while one man is seen tying the shoelaces of a toddler.
One of the terrorists in the video could be heard speaking in Arabic and asking a child to say “Bismillah” before he drinks water.
The footage was posted to a Hamas telegram channel according to the Jerusalem Post, although the identities of the children have not yet been confirmed.
The video is captioned, “Hamas fighters, showing compassion for children in the midst of the Kibbutz ‘Holet’ battles on day one of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.”
In the attack on Kibbutz Holit, 13 Israelis were murdered.
The children’s identities are unknown.
Israel has confirmed at least 1300 were killed following a surprise attack by Hamas a week ago, including the slaughter of 260 people at a music festival.
Meanwhile, Israel has pounded the Palestinian enclave with 6000 bombs in retaliation, as fears grow of a humanitarian crisis.
More than 2000 Gazans — including more than 600 children — have been killed so far in waves of missile strikes on the densely populated enclave.
At least 70 people, including women and children fleeing Gaza City, have been killed and 200 wounded in air strikes as several thousand residents were heading out of the northern Gaza strip.
UN officials warned that the movement of 1.1 million Palestinians would spark a “bone-chilling” humanitarian crisis and said the order is a crime against humanity.
UN chief Antonio Guterres appealed for the protection of basic human rights, stressing that “even wars have rules”.
“The situation in Gaza has reached a dangerous new low,” he said.
HAMAS TELLS PALESTINIANS TO STAY
Mosques had been broadcasting the message: “Hold on to your homes. Hold on to your land.”
The Hamas push for civilians to stay is suspected to be because it helps their impending urban warfare strategy with civilian human shields.
Hamas has also been telling Palestinians there was nowhere to go.
Egypt has shut its border in anticipation of a flood of Palestinian refugees and has told those already there to return to their homes.
“It is important that the (Palestinian) people remain steadfast and present on their land,” Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said
The chaos comes as the whole Middle East region threatens to descend into conflict with tensions high and widespread angry protests in support of the Palestinians, notably in Iran, Lebanon, Syria, Egypt and Iraq.
The Iran-backed Hezbollah has already warned it was “ready” to enter the conflict and has been making limited rocket attacks into Israel from southern Lebanon.
The United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Jordan and US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin called for the Arab world to stay out of the conflict as the first of two US naval aircraft carrier groups arrived in the eastern Mediterranean. A third British naval fleet was on its way to also act as a deterrent and detect any attempts to smuggle weapons into the war zone.
Other diplomats have been shuttling between Arab countries to also flag the risk of a devastating expanded war.
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