Israel’s war on Gaza updates: Deadly combat rages as Rafah assault looms

This live page is now closed.

For the latest updates on the Israel-Gaza war, please follow along on our new page, here.

For more context on the conflict, read more about Norway, Spain and Ireland’s decision to recognise Palestinian statehood here.

Or click to learn more about what effect ICC arrest warrants would have on Israel here.

We will be closing this live page soon. Here’s a look at today’s biggest updates.

• Ireland, Norway and Spain said they formally recognise Palestinian statehood, in a major move cheered by Palestinian officials.
• Israel and several key allies, including the US, swiftly condemned the announcement, with Israel recalling its ambassadors to the three countries and summoning their envoys.
• Aid deliveries remain suspended in Rafah as Israel continues its operation in the southern city, from which 800,000 Palestinians have been displaced in recent weeks.
• The head of the World Health Organization has said all medical staff have reportedly been evacuated from the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, making the facility no longer operable. The al-Awda Hospital was also under Israeli siege, according to the UN.

WHO chief Tedros Ghebreyesus has said the hospital in the northern town of Beit Lahiya is “no longer functioning”.

The update comes after Israeli forces launched artillery attacks on the facility and a missile struck the hospital’s emergency department.

“Access to health care across Gaza is further shrinking. Many hospitals lack fuel and medicines due to the continued closure of the Rafah crossing,” Tedros wrote on X.

Update from Kamal Adwan hospital in northern #Gaza: reportedly all patients and health staff have been evacuated and the hospital is no longer functioning. Some patients went home, while the majority were referred to Al-Ahli Hospital. Al-Ahli referred stable patients to Al Helou…

— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) May 22, 2024

Earlier this week, International Criminal Court’s prosecutor Karim Khan applied for arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Minister of Defence Yoav Gallant, along with three leaders of Hamas.

The move sent shockwaves around the world.

Watch Al Jazeera’s Virginia Pietromarchi explain the decision – and what it could mean after seven months of war.

Al Jazeera is reporting from outside Israel because it has been banned by the Israeli government

These protests have continued non-stop, almost every day now, by not just the families of those still held captive but also people calling for the government to be dissolved and for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to resign.

Many blame him – as well as the military and some war cabinet members – for the disastrous day for them on October 7. We have seen protests in Tel Aviv and at the military headquarters. There have been some scuffles with police officers and an attempt to block a highway – something we’ve been seeing a lot.

This comes about as a war cabinet meeting takes place now where they’re supposed to be reviving discussions on how to move forward with ceasefire talks that have come to a complete stalemate.

Speaking to Al Jazeera, Slovenia’s ambassador to the UN, Samuel Zbogar, may soon join other European countries in formally recognising a Palestinian state.

He said the country’s foreign minister has travelled “very extensively” in the Middle East, and the government will finalise its internal discussions by June 13.

“We want to create a momentum which was created this morning by three countries. [We] want to continue that momentum and in that way to help stabilise the situation on the ground, as well as creating momentum for a two-state solution, which is now somehow on the shelf,” he told Al Jazeera from UN headquarters in New York.

The Israeli public broadcaster Kan reports that the military confirmed a soldier uploaded a video of himself throwing a Quran into a fire in Gaza.

The soldier posted the footage on Instagram.

The military said it opened an investigation, telling the broadcaster the incident is “not consistent” with its values.

The Palestinian Wafa news agency reports that Israeli troops entered the town west of Hebron. Israeli forces set up a military checkpoint in the southern entrance of the town, it said.

Israeli raids in the occupied West Bank have surged in the wake of October 7 with more than 500 Palestinians killed in violence by Israeli soldiers and settlers of illegal settlements.

Most recently, 11 Palestinians were killed during an operation in the Jenin refugee camp.

Speaking to reporters, Foreign Minister Luis Gilberto Murillo says the Latin American country’s President Gustavo Petro has ordered the opening of an embassy in Ramallah.

The move comes weeks after Petro, Colombia’s first leftist leader, cut diplomatic ties with Israel over the war in Gaza.

“President Petro has given the order that we open the Colombian embassy in Ramallah, the representation of Colombia in Ramallah, that is the next step we are going to take,” Murillo said.

Petro has heavily criticised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and requested to join South Africa’s case accusing Israel of genocide at the International Court of Justice.

For Palestinians, May 15 marks the anniversary of the “Nakba” – Arabic for “catastrophe” – when hundreds of thousands were forced from their homes.

Israel’s war on Gaza since October 7 has been called the “second Nakba” by many Palestinians forced to flee their homes.

Bisan Owda from AJ+ spoke with three survivors from the first Nakba who shared firsthand accounts of their struggles in 1948 – and today.

In its daily report, the UN Office of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) says cases of diarrhoea, respiratory infections and jaundice syndrome surged in the wake of Israel’s attacks on Rafah in the south of Gaza.

Since May 6, 800,000 people have been displaced from the city, according to the agency, with another 100,000 displaced from the north of Gaza. Meanwhile, a suspension of aid deliveries in Rafah announced on Tuesday continues.

In northern Gaza, Kamal Adwan Hospital remains non-functional and al-Awda Hospital is under siege, it said.

The death toll from the Israeli raid on the occupied West Bank city of Jenin has risen to 11, the Palestinian health ministry says.

Among those killed are four children, two 15-year-olds and two 16-year-olds. Israeli forces, the ministry added, wounded at least 25 during the raid that began on Tuesday morning.

The official Palestinian news agency Wafa and medical charity Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres, or MSF) reported that surgeon Usaeed Jabareen, from the Jenin government hospital, was among those killed.

A schoolteacher and a student are also among the dead, Wafa said, quoting hospital director Wissam Bakr.

Israeli forces have killed 517 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank since October 7, the ministry said.

In video obtained by Al Jazeera, a doctor recalls being displaced from the al-Awda Hospital in the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, which Israeli troops besieged four days ago.

“We were inside the hospital and did not think about leaving it and leaving the wounded and sick, but we were surprised four days ago that the Israeli army surrounded the hospital and prevented movement to and from it, and we congregated inside the corridors of the hospital to preserve the lives of patients,” one unidentified doctor said in the footage.

“The Israeli army forced us today at three o’clock in the afternoon to leave the hospital, and a number of patients and two doctors, including the director of the hospital, and some assistants remained. But all medical staff, men and women, were asked by the Israeli army to flee to areas west of Gaza City,” he added.

“We are now looking to save the medical staff who continued to stay in the hospital and have not left since last October 7.”

The Lebanon-based armed group has said it attacked seven sites along the border with artillery, including military posts in al-Sadh, Avivim, as-Summaqa, Jal al-Allam and Beit Hillel.

The Israeli military said its warplanes attacked three Hezbollah sites in southern Lebanon, including Aita al-Shaab and Marvin.

It said an explosive unmanned aerial device landed in Beit Hillel with no injuries.

The party has said that the Canadian government’s response to the International Criminal Court prosecutor filing applications for arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, Israeli Defence Minister Gallant, and three Hamas officials, “falls woefully short of the steady defence of international rule of law and justice Canadians expect our country to espouse as a founding member of the ICC”.

“The government must at once stop playing into the false narrative of moral equivalence. In front of the law, everyone is and must remain equal. The parties are not measured against one another but against the law,” the party said in a statement.

“From now on, it is crucial that the government refrains from declarations and actions that might negatively interfere with the work of the ICC and ICJ and commits itself publicly to respecting and enforcing their decisions, whichever they may be.”

The Green Party of Canada welcomes the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) Prosecutor applications for arrest warrants for war crimes and crimes against humanity in relation to the situation in the State of Palestine against three Hamas commanders and two Israeli officials,… pic.twitter.com/3n2LzdnfUi

— Jonathan Pedneault (@j_pedneault) May 22, 2024

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) welcomed the recognition of the state of Palestine by Norway, Ireland and Spain, and called on the US government to stop blocking its full UN membership.

“The full entry of the state of Palestine into the community of nations is long overdue and should not be subject to the veto of our government or that of the far-right, openly racist and genocidal Israeli government,” said Nihad Awad, CAIR’s national executive director.

“All major Israeli leaders have made it very clear that they will never willingly accept a Palestinian state, or even recognise Palestinian humanity. It is now time for all nations, including our own, to recognise the state of Palestine.”

Federal laws that would penalise international bodies for recognising Palestine must be rejected and repealed, CAIR added.

Speaking on the state-affiliated Al-Qahera News TV, the head of Egypt’s State Information Service (SIS) Diaa Rashwan condemned what he described as efforts by some parties to blame Egyptian mediators for delays in any breakthrough in ceasefire talks.

Such allegations, Rashwan said, will only further complicate the situation. He accused those making the claims of doing so to avoid making decisive decisions in the negotiations. The statements come after Qatari mediators faced similar criticism of their role, which they firmly rejected.

The Egyptian statement came in response to a CNN report in which three anonymous sources said Egypt’s intelligence officials had quietly changed the terms in a possible deal sent to Hamas for review.

The sources said the terms presented to Hamas were different than what the US and Qatar were aware of and what Israel had agreed to. The round of negotiations eventually broke down after the changes were discovered, according to CNN.