The Times of Israel is liveblogging Tuesday’s events as they unfold.
Italy fans protest Israel during soccer match in Hungary
A group of about 50 Italy fans clad in all black turned their backs in apparent protest during Israel’s national anthem before a Nations League match in neutral Hungary, the Associated Press reports.
The Italy fans also held up an Italian flag with the word, “Liberta” (Freedom) on it. There were black slashes on other banners put up by the ”ultra” supporters.
The same group of Italy supporters who turned their backs during the anthem also chanted against Italian anti-fascist activist Ilaria Salis during the first half, Italian daily Corriere della Sera reports. Salis. recently elected to the European Parliament for the Italian Green and Left Alliance, was freed from house arrest in Budapest in June after facing charges for allegedly assaulting far-right demonstrators.
Italy is slated to host Israel in Udine on October 14, although Udine’s city council has not endorsed the match and a pro-Palestinian protest has been scheduled for the same day in the northern city.
Israel lost the match 2-1.
Directors still dealing with legal issues as ‘damning’ ‘Bibi Files’ premiers
At a Q and A session following a screening of The Bibi Files in Toronto, featuring new footage of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s graft grillings, directors Alex Gibney and Alexis Bloom both note outstanding legal issues with the film that is keeping it unfinished and unable to be seen in Israel.
Gibney tells the audience that some of the material in the film had previously been leaked and “discussed” in the Israeli press, but what’s new is the footage. Due to laws aimed at protecting privacy rights, he says, showing the film is illegal in Israel.
“It does threaten the freedom of the source, if the source were ever to be found out,” he says of the person who leaked him the footage.
Bloom says an actor was used to portray one person in the film because of legal issues with putting footage of the person on screen.
“There’s a lot of legal issues involved in making a film like this, and there are legal issues that we can’t specify here involving the person who had to be portrayed by an actor,” she says, adding that she is still hoping to remove the actor and use the actual person.
The Bibi Files: Well that’s the last place I wanted to see Fantastic Mr. Fox.
Not sure if there’s any new bombshells in the leaked interrogation footage — and the movie is mostly that footage. Picks up in urgency once it gets to Netanyahu’s actions after the charges. #TIFF24
— Reuben Baron @ #TIFF24 (@AndalusianDoge) September 10, 2024
According to accounts on social media, during the session, Bloom was heckled by a member of the crowd who was unhappy with the film’s subject and other comments critical of the war in Hamas.
Jason Gorber, a Canadian film critic, says the movie links the corruption probe into Netanyahu to the Hamas massacre of October 7 (which he initially misstates as September 6, perhaps in homage to Netanyahu.)
“Very well constructed, balanced, and clear eyed, with real pain and anger given space to be heard,” he tweets.
THE BIBI FILES – Compelling doc with plenty of Israeli forces from world of politics, media and Netanyahu's inner circle, as well as leaked testamony seen for first time, amifies the coruption case, ties it directly to both quid pro quo and the coddling of Hamas that led to Oct…
— Jason Gorber (@filmfest_ca) September 10, 2024
Another local critic, Radheyon Simonpillai, calls the movie “Damning. Infuriating. Necessary. But also so incredibly made.”
Hamas denies its fighters were in targeted tent camp
The Hamas terror group claims in a statement that its operatives were not in the al-Mawasi humanitarian zone near Khan Younis when it was hit by Israeli fighter jets.
Israel says it a targeted a Hamas command and control center embedded in the tent camp, while taking multiple steps to minimize harm to civilians.
“The occupation’s allegations of the presence of resistance fighters are a blatant lie,” Hamas says in a statement on Telegram.
The group has repeatedly denied embedding within civilian populations, despite evidence to the contrary.
Dozens reported killed in Israeli strike on Gaza tent camp
An official in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip says at least 40 people were killed and 60 injured in an Israeli strike on a humanitarian zone in southern Gaza where the military said Hamas was operating a command and control center.
The official says the number represents those who were found and transferred to hospitals, with civil defense officials indicating more people may be missing beneath the wreckage.
A spokesperson for Hamas’s civil defense unit quoted by the Hamas-linked Shehab news agency claims entire families were swallowed under mountains of sand in the strike, which left massive holes in the ground, though rescuers lack the equipment to dig them out.
Videos show Gazans desperately clawing at mounds of sand in the darkness as they try to reach the dead and injured.
بالفيديو | استمرار عملية البحث عن الشهداء والمفقودين بالأيادي في مكان #مجزرة_المواصي غرب #خانيونس pic.twitter.com/8gmiXNniA4
— قناة المنار (@TVManar1) September 10, 2024
Hotly anticipated ‘Bibi Files’ debuts in Toronto after Netanyahu fails to block screening
The Toronto International Film Festival is beginning its highly anticipated debut screening of “The Bibi Files,” an unfinished film featuring never-before-seen footage of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu being questioned by police between 2016 and 2018.
The screening comes after the Jerusalem District Court rejected a request by the premier to block the screening of the film earlier in the day. Netanyahu had argued that journalist Raviv Drucker, one of the film’s producers, was set to publish footage from a police interrogation without permission from the court — a crime that carries up to a year in prison in Israel.
Alexis Bloom at the work-in-progress cut of THE BIBI FILES – just announced there's an actor standing in for some of the scenes pending legal resolution #tiff24 pic.twitter.com/NVQY1xLOTo
— Jason Gorber (@filmfest_ca) September 9, 2024
Outside the theater earlier, about a dozen pro-Israel protesters demonstrated against Netanyahu and for a deal to free hostages held in Gaza.
למה, למה, למה שמאלנים לא יודעים להפגין? כאילו, אי אפשר להתאמץ קצת? אוף איתכם.#bibifiles#thebibifiles pic.twitter.com/KlHPFp7kPy
— Guy A. Levanon (@GuyALevanon) September 9, 2024
According to reports in Hebrew media, a Telegram group in Israel that had promised to leak the film was joined by thousands of Israelis, including a number of senior politicians from within Netanyahu’s government, but a manager of the group says now the footage is not being published due to legal issues.
Among those in the crowd are a number of Israeli journalists.
Looking forward to seeing the Bibi files. I am sure it's not a romantic comedy pic.twitter.com/DVmPb6ZBFx
— כהנא מוטי???? ???????? Moti Kahana (@motikahana) September 9, 2024
According to Variety magazine, the recordings of the corruption investigation were leaked to renowned director Alex Gibney last year and feature interviews with Netanyahu, his wife Sara and his son Yair, along with friends, associates and household staff.
Netanyahu was ultimately charged with fraud and breach of trust in three separate cases filed in 2019, and with bribery in one of them. The proceedings are ongoing and likely to take years to wrap up, especially given delays after the first trial was suspended along with all other non-urgent cases due to Hamas’s shock October 7 incursion and the ensuing war in Gaza.
Netanyahu denies any wrongdoing in the cases against him and claims that the charges were fabricated in a witch hunt led by the police and state prosecution, and facilitated by a weak attorney general.
At least 14 reported killed in Israeli strike targeting Hamas war room
Gazan authorities claim at least 14 people have been killed in an Israeli airstrike on a tent encampment in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, without indicating if they are civilians or Hamas operatives.
Residents and medics say the Al-Mawasi humanitarian zone was struck by at least four missiles, leaving craters as deep as nine meters (30 feet). Gaza’s Hamas-run civil emergency service says at least 20 tents caught on fire.
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Another huge massacre in Al_Mawasi in Khan Yunis — an area designated by Israel as a “safe zone” for the internally displaced Palestinians.
Reports of a large number of civilians killed & injured when Israel bombed over 20 tents, where many families were asleep.… pic.twitter.com/AKNW0yk33e— Hala Jaber (@HalaJaber) September 9, 2024
“Our teams are still moving out martyrs and wounded from the targeted area. It looks like a new Israeli massacre,” a Gaza civil emergency official says.
Israel says it struck Hamas terrorists in a command and control center embedded inside the humanitarian zone.
IDF says it bombed Hamas command center hiding in Gaza humanitarian zone
The Israel Defense Forces says fighter jets struck a Hamas command and control center operating clandestinely within an Israeli-designated humanitarian zone in southern Gaza.
According to the military, terrorists based in the command center in Khan Younis “advanced and deployed terror plots against IDF troops and Israeli civilians.”
The army says it took “several steps ahead of the attack to minimize the chances of harming civilians,” including by using precision munitions and intelligence information.
Authorities in the Hamas-run Strip claim several dead and wounded in the attack, according to reports out of Gaza. Officials claim rescue teams are hampered by large craters blasted into the ground where tents sheltering displaced Gazans previously stood.
شاهد .. محاولة انتشال الشـ.ـهداء والجرحى من مكان مجزرة المواصي غرب خانيونس pic.twitter.com/wugSGlJ3c6
— المركز الفلسطيني للإعلام (@PalinfoAr) September 9, 2024
The IDF accuses Hamas of repeatedly using Gaza’s civilian population and civil infrastructure, including humanitarian areas, as cover for “terror activities.”
UNRWA head says polio campaign may be paused after IDF detained convoy
The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees says a convoy of United Nations vehicles and staff detained by Israel in northern Gaza on Monday has been released and are back at a UN facility.
UNRWA chief Phillip Lazzarini says the convoy was carrying Gazans and foreign staff who were en route to Gaza City and northern Gaza to roll out a polio vaccination campaign when they were detained.
“The convoy was stopped at gun point just after the Wadi Gaza checkpoint with threats to detain UN staff. Heavy damage was caused by bulldozers to the UN armoured vehicles,” Lazzarini says on X. “All staff & convoy are now released & back safely in the UN base.”
The Israeli military said earlier it detained the convoy after receiving intelligence indicating that “Palestinian suspects” had snuck aboard the convoy. It had disputed claims that the convoy was carrying polio vaccines.
Lazarini says he is unsure if the vaccination campaign will resume in northern Gaza on Tuesday.
This significant incident is the latest in a series of violations against UN staff including shootings at convoys & arrests by the Israeli Armed Forces at checkpoints despite prior notification,” Lazzarini complains.