Humanitarian crisis worsens in Gaza as Israel-Hamas war rages
By Chris Lau, CNN
Published 12:00 AM ET, Fri December 29, 2023
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4 min ago
Gaza desperation grows as thousands of civilians surround aid convoy for food. Here's the latest
From CNN staff
Palestinians swarm a relief aid convoy at a United Nations center in the Al-Zeitoun neighborhood of northern Gaza on Thursday. CNN
Thousands of desperate civilians surrounded a relief convoy in northern Gaza, seeking food amid an acute hunger crisis.
Almost all of Gaza's 2.2 million residents are facing acute hunger, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization warned earlier this week.
Meanwhile, the Israeli military has urged more residents to evacuate parts of central Gaza as it presses on with its offensive against Hamas.
Twenty-one people were killed, and dozens injured after an apparent Israeli airstrike hit a residential building in Rafah, a director at the hospital receiving the bodies told CNN over the phone on Thursday. A medical source at Al-Kuwaiti Hospital said 12 children and four women were among the dead.
Hostage probe: Israel’s military “failed in its mission” to rescue three hostages mistakenly killed by its troops in Gaza earlier this month, its chief of the general staff said Thursday, as the military published the findings of its investigation. Israeli military chief Herzi Halevi said the shootings “could have been prevented” but he determined there was “no malice in the event, and the soldiers carried out the right action to the best of their understanding of the event at that moment.”
Deadliest year for West Bank children: More than 80 children have been killed in the past 12 weeks in the occupied West Bank, amid intensified military activities, according to the UN Children's Fund. That's "more than double the number of children killed in all of 2022, amid increased military and law enforcement operations. More than 576 have been injured and others have reportedly been detained." UNICEF said in a report Thursday.
Hundreds leave Gaza: Fifteen US citizens were among 748 foreign nationals who left the strip for Egypt via the Rafah crossing on Thursday, according to an Egyptian official. Heading in the opposite direction, 103 trucks entered Gaza through Rafah Thursday, including 80 aid trucks — four of which carried cooking gas — and 23 trucks carrying commercial goods, the official said.
Camp plan: The Palestine Red Crescent Society said it is working with the Egyptian Red Crescent to establish the "first organized camp" for displaced people in Gaza's southern city of Khan Younis, where tens of thousands of Palestinians are crowded in makeshift camps.
Houthi sanctions: The US Treasury Department on Thursday imposed sanctions on one individual and three entities "responsible for facilitating the flow of Iranian financial assistance to Houthi forces and their destabilizing activities." The new sanctions were imposed in the wake of a series of Houthi attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.
17 min ago
Israeli forces "failed" in rescue mission of 3 hostages who were accidentally killed, report says
From CNN's Michael Rios
Israel’s military “failed in its mission” to rescue three hostages mistakenly killed by its troops in Gaza earlier this month, its chief of the general staff said Thursday, as the military published the findings of its investigation.
Israeli military chief Herzi Halevi said the shootings “could have been prevented” but he determined there was “no malice in the event, and the soldiers carried out the right action to the best of their understanding of the event at that moment.”
The findings concluded that Israeli command ranks had information that hostages were present in the area, and “even took actions to prevent strikes on locations suspected of having hostages,” the report read.
But the investigation also concluded the Israeli forces in the field had “insufficient awareness” of the possibility that hostages would approach them or that the troops would encounter hostages in operations not specifically aimed at freeing them.
Yotam Haim, Alon Shimriz and Samer Talalka were kidnapped by Hamas militants during their attack on Israel on October 7. The three men were killed during an IDF operation around the Gaza City neighborhood of Shejaiya on December 15.
That day, according to the findings, an Israeli soldier fired toward three hostages “identified as threats,” killing two of them. The third hostage fled, and the battalion commander gave an order to hold fire to identify the third person.
After the commander heard someone screaming “help” in Hebrew, he called on the person to come toward the soldiers; the hostage emerged from a building and moved toward the troops, the report said. Two soldiers didn’t hear the commander’s orders to hold fire “due to noise from a nearby tank” and fatally shot the third hostage, according to the investigation.
The probe also concluded that the "hostages were walking shirtless, and one of them was waving a white flag, standing at a point with limited visibility relative to the position of the soldier that fired the shot."
3 hr 31 min ago
Israel-Lebanon tensions grow as Hezbollah launches more attacks on northern Israel
From Charbel Mallo, Tamar Michaelis and Maija Ehlinger
Shelling along the Lebanon-Israel border continued Thursday, as Lebanese officials spent the day in meetings with counterparts from France and Britain about the growing conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, the powerful Iran-backed paramilitary group.
Hezbollah claimed it carried out simultaneous attacks around 4 p.m. local time (9 a.m. ET) — targeting multiple "barracks" across northern Israel.
The Israel Defense Forces told CNN that approximately 20 launches were detected on Thursday that were aimed at Kiryat Shmona, a northern Israeli municipality that has been the target of Hezbollah strikes over the past several days.
The municipality claimed two anti-tank missiles were fired at the town earlier in the day.
Hezbollah made six direct missile hits on Kiryat Shmona on Wednesday.
Diplomatic efforts: Lebanon's Prime Minister Najib Mikati met with British Foreign Secretary David Cameron in Beirut on Thursday and also spoke with French Foreign and European Affairs Minister Catherine Colonna on a call to discuss the growing clashes in southern Lebanon and northern Israel.
Mikati called for "maximum pressure to stop the Israeli attacks on southern Lebanon" during his meeting with Cameron, according to a social media post from the Lebanese government.
Cameron said in a post on X that an "escalation of the conflict in Gaza to Lebanon, the Red Sea or across the wider region, would add to the extremely high level of danger and insecurity in the world."
The fighting is among various incidents involving Iran and its proxies that have raised global concerns that Israel's war in Gaza could widen into a greater regional conflict.
Peacekeeper wounded: As the threat of greater violence between Hezbollah and Israel rises, evidence of the growing tensions on the ground in Lebanon is appearing.
The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNFIL) on Thursday called on Lebanese authorities to investigate after an attack on a patrol unit.
The UN peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon said the attack "by a group of young men" in the southern city of Taybeh left a peacekeeper wounded and a vehicle damaged, according to an X account run by UNIFIL.
3 hr 39 min ago
Desperate civilians in Gaza climb over trucks and swarm relief convoy for food, video shows
From journalist Khader Al Za'anoun and CNN’s Abeer Salman and Eyad Kourdi
Thousands of desperate civilians swarmed a relief aid convoy at a United Nations center in Gaza's northern Al-Zeitoun neighborhood, as seen in CNN video footage Thursday.
The video shows people climbing over two trucksdistributing aid just outside a center of the UN's agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) in a desperate attempt to take food.
An elderly man named Abu Hassan told CNN he came to get some flour, which he has had no access to for the past month, subsisting instead on "bits of rice".
"We are in desperate need of flour; it has been a month since the last time I had flour. We are living on some bits of rice, and it is not enough and causes health problems for us. We need them to give us only flour and water; all these aids aren't enough, not even for one refugee school," he said.
Earlier this week, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization expressed “deep concerns” over the rapidly worsening food security situation in Gaza, saying approximately 2.2 million residents are facing acute hunger.
3 hr 46 min ago
This has been the deadliest year for children in occupied West Bank, UNICEF report says
From CNN’s Kareem Khadder and Eyad Kourdi
More than 80 children have been killed in the past 12 weeks in the occupied West Bank, amid intensified military activities, according to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF).
That number is “more than double the number of children killed in all of 2022, amid increased military and law enforcement operations. More than 576 have been injured and others have reportedly been detained.” UNICEF said in a report issued Thursday.
Since the beginning of the year, the violence has claimed the lives of 124 Palestinian children and six Israeli children, UNICEF added.
“Many children report that fear has become a part of their daily life, with many scared even walking to school or playing outside due to the threat of shootings and other conflict-related violence,” the report said, calling for adherence to “obligations under international human rights law and to protect children from conflict-related violence and protect their most basic right simply to be alive.”
Thousands of desperate civilians surrounded a relief convoy in northern Gaza, seeking food amid an acute hunger crisis. Meanwhile, the Israeli military urged more residents to evacuate in central Gaza as it presses on with its offensive against Hamas.
Israel's army chief said troops failed in their mission to rescue three hostages mistakenly killed in Gaza as the military published its report into the incident.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is expected to travel to Israel next week to discuss next steps for the war, an Israeli official told CNN.Israel's military chief has said the war against Hamas is far from ending, despite diplomatic efforts.
Palestinians swarm a relief aid convoy at a United Nations center in the Al-Zeitoun neighborhood of northern Gaza on Thursday. CNN
Thousands of desperate civilians surrounded a relief convoy in northern Gaza, seeking food amid an acute hunger crisis.
Almost all of Gaza's 2.2 million residents are facing acute hunger, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization warned earlier this week.
Meanwhile, the Israeli military has urged more residents to evacuate parts of central Gaza as it presses on with its offensive against Hamas.
Twenty-one people were killed, and dozens injured after an apparent Israeli airstrike hit a residential building in Rafah, a director at the hospital receiving the bodies told CNN over the phone on Thursday. A medical source at Al-Kuwaiti Hospital said 12 children and four women were among the dead.
Hostage probe: Israel’s military “failed in its mission” to rescue three hostages mistakenly killed by its troops in Gaza earlier this month, its chief of the general staff said Thursday, as the military published the findings of its investigation. Israeli military chief Herzi Halevi said the shootings “could have been prevented” but he determined there was “no malice in the event, and the soldiers carried out the right action to the best of their understanding of the event at that moment.”
Deadliest year for West Bank children: More than 80 children have been killed in the past 12 weeks in the occupied West Bank, amid intensified military activities, according to the UN Children's Fund. That's "more than double the number of children killed in all of 2022, amid increased military and law enforcement operations. More than 576 have been injured and others have reportedly been detained." UNICEF said in a report Thursday.
Hundreds leave Gaza: Fifteen US citizens were among 748 foreign nationals who left the strip for Egypt via the Rafah crossing on Thursday, according to an Egyptian official. Heading in the opposite direction, 103 trucks entered Gaza through Rafah Thursday, including 80 aid trucks — four of which carried cooking gas — and 23 trucks carrying commercial goods, the official said.
Camp plan: The Palestine Red Crescent Society said it is working with the Egyptian Red Crescent to establish the "first organized camp" for displaced people in Gaza's southern city of Khan Younis, where tens of thousands of Palestinians are crowded in makeshift camps.
Houthi sanctions: The US Treasury Department on Thursday imposed sanctions on one individual and three entities "responsible for facilitating the flow of Iranian financial assistance to Houthi forces and their destabilizing activities." The new sanctions were imposed in the wake of a series of Houthi attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.
Israel’s military “failed in its mission” to rescue three hostages mistakenly killed by its troops in Gaza earlier this month, its chief of the general staff said Thursday, as the military published the findings of its investigation.
Israeli military chief Herzi Halevi said the shootings “could have been prevented” but he determined there was “no malice in the event, and the soldiers carried out the right action to the best of their understanding of the event at that moment.”
The findings concluded that Israeli command ranks had information that hostages were present in the area, and “even took actions to prevent strikes on locations suspected of having hostages,” the report read.
But the investigation also concluded the Israeli forces in the field had “insufficient awareness” of the possibility that hostages would approach them or that the troops would encounter hostages in operations not specifically aimed at freeing them.
Yotam Haim, Alon Shimriz and Samer Talalka were kidnapped by Hamas militants during their attack on Israel on October 7. The three men were killed during an IDF operation around the Gaza City neighborhood of Shejaiya on December 15.
That day, according to the findings, an Israeli soldier fired toward three hostages “identified as threats,” killing two of them. The third hostage fled, and the battalion commander gave an order to hold fire to identify the third person.
After the commander heard someone screaming “help” in Hebrew, he called on the person to come toward the soldiers; the hostage emerged from a building and moved toward the troops, the report said. Two soldiers didn’t hear the commander’s orders to hold fire “due to noise from a nearby tank” and fatally shot the third hostage, according to the investigation.
The probe also concluded that the "hostages were walking shirtless, and one of them was waving a white flag, standing at a point with limited visibility relative to the position of the soldier that fired the shot."
Shelling along the Lebanon-Israel border continued Thursday, as Lebanese officials spent the day in meetings with counterparts from France and Britain about the growing conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, the powerful Iran-backed paramilitary group.
Hezbollah claimed it carried out simultaneous attacks around 4 p.m. local time (9 a.m. ET) — targeting multiple "barracks" across northern Israel.
The Israel Defense Forces told CNN that approximately 20 launches were detected on Thursday that were aimed at Kiryat Shmona, a northern Israeli municipality that has been the target of Hezbollah strikes over the past several days.
The municipality claimed two anti-tank missiles were fired at the town earlier in the day.
Hezbollah made six direct missile hits on Kiryat Shmona on Wednesday.
Diplomatic efforts: Lebanon's Prime Minister Najib Mikati met with British Foreign Secretary David Cameron in Beirut on Thursday and also spoke with French Foreign and European Affairs Minister Catherine Colonna on a call to discuss the growing clashes in southern Lebanon and northern Israel.
Mikati called for "maximum pressure to stop the Israeli attacks on southern Lebanon" during his meeting with Cameron, according to a social media post from the Lebanese government.
Cameron said in a post on X that an "escalation of the conflict in Gaza to Lebanon, the Red Sea or across the wider region, would add to the extremely high level of danger and insecurity in the world."
The fighting is among various incidents involving Iran and its proxies that have raised global concerns that Israel's war in Gaza could widen into a greater regional conflict.
Peacekeeper wounded: As the threat of greater violence between Hezbollah and Israel rises, evidence of the growing tensions on the ground in Lebanon is appearing.
The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNFIL) on Thursday called on Lebanese authorities to investigate after an attack on a patrol unit.
The UN peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon said the attack "by a group of young men" in the southern city of Taybeh left a peacekeeper wounded and a vehicle damaged, according to an X account run by UNIFIL.
Thousands of desperate civilians swarmed a relief aid convoy at a United Nations center in Gaza's northern Al-Zeitoun neighborhood, as seen in CNN video footage Thursday.
The video shows people climbing over two trucksdistributing aid just outside a center of the UN's agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) in a desperate attempt to take food.
An elderly man named Abu Hassan told CNN he came to get some flour, which he has had no access to for the past month, subsisting instead on "bits of rice".
"We are in desperate need of flour; it has been a month since the last time I had flour. We are living on some bits of rice, and it is not enough and causes health problems for us. We need them to give us only flour and water; all these aids aren't enough, not even for one refugee school," he said.
Earlier this week, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization expressed “deep concerns” over the rapidly worsening food security situation in Gaza, saying approximately 2.2 million residents are facing acute hunger.
More than 80 children have been killed in the past 12 weeks in the occupied West Bank, amid intensified military activities, according to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF).
That number is “more than double the number of children killed in all of 2022, amid increased military and law enforcement operations. More than 576 have been injured and others have reportedly been detained.” UNICEF said in a report issued Thursday.
Since the beginning of the year, the violence has claimed the lives of 124 Palestinian children and six Israeli children, UNICEF added.
“Many children report that fear has become a part of their daily life, with many scared even walking to school or playing outside due to the threat of shootings and other conflict-related violence,” the report said, calling for adherence to “obligations under international human rights law and to protect children from conflict-related violence and protect their most basic right simply to be alive.”
