Israel’s war on Gaza updates: Netanyahu rejects end of war deal

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We will soon be closing this live page. Here’s a recap of the main developments:

• The Palestinian death toll in Gaza has reached a grim milestone, surpassing 25,000, the enclave’s Health Ministry says.
• Heavy clashes between Israeli forces and Palestinian fighters continue in Khan Younis, with fighting and Israeli bombing nearing the city’s Nasser Hospital.
• An Israeli attack killed two people in a southern Lebanese village; Hezbollah says it responded by firing rockets at an Israeli town.
• Netanyahu said he rejected a Hamas offer to free captives held in Gaza and end the war, while also reasserting his opposition to the establishment of a Palestinian state.
• The US military said it is assessing the damage after a rocket attack against one of its bases in Iraq.
• Hamas released a report on the events of October 7, saying the attack was a “natural response” to Israeli abuses and the push to liquidate the Palestinian cause.

The raid on the Shweikeh area, where one man was earlier reported to have been shot, now appears to have ended.

Four Palestinians who had been detained were released.

The family members erected tents in front of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s private home in West Jerusalem as part of an ongoing effort to force the Israeli government to accept a deal to bring home captives from Gaza, even if it means ending the war.

A spokesperson for the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, quoted by the Times of Israel, said that protesters would stay in their tents until “the prime minister agrees to a deal to return the hostages”.

A poster displayed prominently at the sit-in reads: “We love our children more than we hate Hamas”.

Earlier on Sunday, Netanyahu rejected any talk of a deal that would see the return of the captives in exchange for an end to the war without the defeat of Hamas.

The man was injured, according to the Wafa news agency, after being shot as Israeli forces continue their near-nightly raids on the occupied West Bank.

The incident took place in the Shweikeh neighbourhood.

Verified footage posted by local platforms shows Israeli forces firing smoke grenades during the rai on Shweikeh.

Other Israeli raids on Sunday night have taken place in the town of Sebastia, in the Nablus Governorate, and the al-Arroub refugee camp, north of Hebron.

The Israeli attack on the Lebanese village of Kafra earlier targeted a top Hezbollah commander, the AFP news agency has reported.

The air attack, which hit a car near a Lebanese army checkpoint, “killed a member of Hezbollah’s protection team”, a Lebanese security official told AFP, adding that the senior commander he was protecting “escaped death”.

Hezbollah said one of its fighters was killed today, which Lebanese media outlets have linked to the Kafra incident. Lebanon’s National News Agency later reported that a civilian woman succumbed to her wounds from the Israeli attack, bringing the death toll to two.

As the occupied West Bank roils with near-daily Israeli raids, settler attacks and killings of Palestinians, an overlooked impact of the violence is starting to take its toll.

The past few months, Muhanad Nairoukh, the manager of one of the three biggest aluminium factories in the occupied West Bank, tells Al Jazeera, have been the worst for production and profits in a long time.

Life in the occupied West Bank is becoming more dangerous and complicated for the people living there and alongside that, industry has crawled to a near halt as a result of Israeli actions, making it impossible to have “business as usual”.

Read more here.

The Florida governor has been a staunch supporter of Israel, even by the normally pro-Israel standards of mainstream US politicians. In the last presidential debate, DeSantis expressed openness to backing the ethnic cleansing of Gaza.

“If they make the calculation that to avert a second Holocaust, they need to do that – I think some of these Palestinian Arabs – Saudi Arabia should take some, Egypt should take some,” he said.

DeSantis also banned a Palestinian student organisation from state universities in Florida. Moreover, he has said that the occupied West Bank is not occupied.

“Judea and Samaria are not occupied territory,” DeSantis said in July, referring to the West Bank by a Biblical name used by Israel. He added that Israelis have “the strongest claim of right” to the Palestinian territory.

With DeSantis out of the presidential race, former President Donald Trump and former ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley are the only candidates left in the Republican contest.

Haley’s UN tenure was defined by her hawkish Israel advocacy. As president, Trump pushed Washington policy further in favour of Israel, including by moving the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

Mohammed Abdulsalam says the Yemeni group is targeting ships linked to Israel to pressure the country to end its “criminal and fascist aggression” against the Gaza Strip.

Abdulsalam accused the administration of US President Joe Biden, which has been pushing to separate the attacks from the war on Gaza, of trying to blatantly “mislead” the world.

“America itself must stop escaping responsibility by creating crises that no one needs and end the aggression against Gaza,” he wrote in a social media post.

He added that Yemen will defend itself against violations of its sovereignty, referring to US-led attacks against the Houthis.

Labour Party legislator Richard Burgon has also called on the United Kingdom’s government to push for a UN Security Council ceasefire resolution.

“25,000 dead in Gaza. The Israeli PM making it clear he’s against any two-state solution,” Burgon wrote in a social media post. “Yet all we get from our Government is empty words. Enough is enough.”

25,000 dead in Gaza.

The Israeli PM making it clear he's against any two-state solution.

Yet all we get from our Government is empty words.

Enough is enough.

It needs to act. Starting by bringing a UN Security Council motion for a ceasefire and by ending arms sales to Israel.

— Richard Burgon MP (@RichardBurgon) January 21, 2024

Some of those injured in the latest Israeli attacks on Khan Younis have arrived at the city’s Nasser Hospital, where doctors have said they are struggling to deal with the continuous influx of patients amid continuous Israeli attacks.

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A post shared by Amr Tabash (@amr.tabash)

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) says the UN should investigate reports that Israeli troops have looted archeological artefacts in Gaza.

“The ongoing genocide by the far-right Israeli government in Gaza is targeting all aspects of Palestinian culture and heritage,” CAIR’s Director Nihad Awad said in a statement.

“We urge the United Nations to investigate this latest war crime of cultural theft and for the Biden administration to open its eyes to the harm its blind support for this genocide and ethnic cleansing is doing to our nation’s humanity, core values and interests worldwide.”

Large explosions can be seen in the distance of footage captured by a local journalist, Amr Tabash, in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis. The footage has been verified by Al Jazeera’s Sanad fact-checking unit.

Khan Younis has been the focus of recent Israeli attacks, despite the large number of Palestinians who have fled to the area from northern Gaza.

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A post shared by Amr Tabash (@amr.tabash)

Lebanon’s National News Agency reports the heavy presence of Israeli aircraft over Mount Lebanon and Dahiyeh, the south Beirut suburb where Hezbollah’s leadership is thought to be based.

An Israeli attack killed Hamas leader Saleh al-Arouri in Dahiyeh early in January.

Hundreds of people have marched in the centre of the Belgian capital Brussels, calling for a ceasefire in Gaza and an end to Israel’s attacks on the Palestinian enclave.

“The point [of the protest] is to insist on the fact that there is no military solution to this conflict, which has led to far too many deaths, and which has created an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe,” said Gregory Mauze, the spokesperson for the Belgo-Palestinian Association.

“Now is the time for Belgium and the European Union to say that not only must this war end and there must be a ceasefire, but also we must take action to force Israel to end its murderous offensive, which is directed not against Hamas, but against the whole of the Palestinian people.”