Palestinians fight for their lives and their stolen lands

[Anthea]

Former UN Chief DEMOLISHES October 7 Lies

What REALLY Happened

Chris Gunness is the former chief spokesman for UNRWA and founder of the Myanmar Accountability Project ► https://the-world-is-watching.org/our...

Must watch video:

https://youtu.be/9pVbqwnmSuM?feature=shared

[Anthea]

Palestinian mother Islam Qudeih shows her severely malnourished, shirtless, 2-year-old daughter, Shamm, to journalists at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Aug. 9, 2025

4,400 scientists worldwide demand
immediate end to Gaza genocide

Nobel laureates and top scientists condemn Gaza’s siege, denouncing famine, collapsed healthcare, and the systematic destruction of civilian life

More than 4,400 scientists from 87 countries have issued a joint appeal urging an immediate halt to the man-made humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.

The signatories, among them 14 Nobel Prize winners, five Fields Medalists, 21 Breakthrough Prize recipients, 34 Dirac Prize winners, four Wolf Prize laureates, and two Abel and Turing Prize holders, warned that “nothing in this historical record” can “justify” the devastation inflicted on Gaza’s civilian population.

The statement, dated August 21, 2025, also included the names of 85 Israeli scientists, among them David Harel, president of the Israeli Academy of Sciences and Humanities. Signatories span the globe, with Italy contributing the highest number (921), followed by Spain (449), the United States (429), France (326), Brazil (267), the United Kingdom (247), Switzerland (138), Japan (112), and the Netherlands (104). India accounted for 310 signatories, the fifth-highest number worldwide.

Act immediately to end this human-made humanitarian crisis

Signed in their personal capacities, the scientists denounced the “artificial shortage of food… leading to a famine-like situation,” the “enforced denial of medical facilities,” the “absence of even a modicum of education for children,” and the “systematic annihilation of civil infrastructure (including universities).” The statement underscored a pervasive “disregard for the rights, well-being, and life of the civilian population of Gaza.”

The scientists also decried the killing of “tens of thousands of innocent lives” in Gaza, including nearly 1,000 infants under the age of one

The signatories stressed that “nothing in this historical record” can “justify” the horrors endured by Palestinians in Gaza. They urged the Israeli government to “act immediately to end this human-made humanitarian crisis” and called on governments and international institutions worldwide to “exert all available means so there is a halt to this tragedy.”

UNICEF warns ‘the unthinkable’ is already unfolding in Gaza City

The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warned on Thursday that a catastrophe is already underway in Gaza City as "Israel" intensifies its aggression, with food and medicine running out and functioning hospitals being targetede.

Tess Ingram, UNICEF’s Communications Manager for the Middle East and North Africa, described the city as “a place where childhood cannot survive” after spending nine days on the ground. “The unthinkable is not looming. It is already here,” she told reporters in New York.

Out of 92 UNICEF-supported nutrition centers, only 44 remain operational, leaving thousands of malnourished children without treatment. Hospitals are collapsing under strain: just 11 are partly functioning, with only five neonatal units. 40 incubators are serving nearly double their capacity, keeping as many as 80 newborns alive on fragile power supplies and dwindling medicines.

Ingram recounted meeting families displaced multiple times, mothers who lost children to hunger, and young patients with bodies “shredded by shrapnel.” Famine, she said, was “everywhere I looked in Gaza City.”

She highlighted the case of a mother, Nesma, whose two-year-old daughter recently died from malnutrition after aid blockages cut off treatment. Her surviving child is “barely hanging on.”

UNICEF has reportedly provided emergency food for more than 3,000 children, along with support for infants, pregnant women, and access to safe drinking water. But the agency warns that far more is needed and is seeking $716 million this year to respond to the crisis.

“The cost of inaction will be measured in the lives of children buried in rubble, wasted by hunger and silenced before they even had a chance to speak,” Ingram stressed, urging "Israel" to allow greater aid access, and for states with influence to press for an end to the war.

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/pol ... nd-to-gaza

[Anthea]

The Voice of Hind Rajab received
record standing ovation at Venice

Kaouther Ben Hania’s Gaza film "The Voice of Hind Rajab" has seen a record 23-minute standing ovation at Venice but was soon hit by a hate campaign targeting its producers

A powerful new film on Gaza received 23 minutes of applause at its Venice Film Festival premiere, but within hours became the target of a coordinated hate campaign, director Kaouther Ben Hania revealed Friday.

Her film, “The Voice of Hind Rajab,” tells the harrowing story of a five-year-old Palestinian girl killed by Israeli fire in January 2024. It is now a strong contender for the Golden Lion, the festival’s top prize.

Hate campaign after acclaim

Speaking to AFP, the French-Tunisian director said her producers, including Hollywood stars Brad Pitt and Joaquin Phoenix, who served as executive producers, received “thousands and thousands” of identical, intimidating emails after the screening.

“The same message, sent over and over, was super intimidating,” Ben Hania said.

A child’s last moments

The film is based on real recordings of Hind Rajab’s desperate calls to the Red Crescent as her family tried to flee Gaza. The audio, shared with the director by Hind’s mother, is paired with actors portraying emergency workers overwhelmed by the chaos as "Israeli" tanks closed in.

“I didn’t make this film to keep people comfortable in their seats,” Ben Hania said. “After hearing about Hind’s death, I felt anger, despair, but also the need to ask, ‘What can I do?’”

Cast members said at a press conference they considered it their “duty” to make the film.

The film has drawn strong reviews, with The Guardian praising Ben Hania for tackling “one of the most relevant issues of our time and thrusting it under our noses.”

Critics highlighted the emotional power of the audio recordings, though some raised ethical questions about their use.

The movie will be released in Tunisia later this month and has been chosen as the country’s entry for the 2026 Academy Awards. It is also set to travel the international festival circuit, with screenings in Toronto, London, San Sebastian, and Busan.

Ben Hania said the global visibility of the film is crucial. “For a film like this, it allows enormous visibility. And I want the film to be seen everywhere in the world.”

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/Arts&Culture/gaza-film-at-venice-faces-hate-campaign-after-record-standin

[Anthea]

Israel Orders Gaza City Evacuations

The Israeli army on Saturday issued evacuation orders for parts of Gaza City and struck high-rise buildings, urging Palestinians to flee south as it pressed ahead with preparations for a major offensive in the densely populated city of nearly one million people

Aid groups warned that a large-scale evacuation would worsen the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza City, where the world’s leading hunger watchdog has declared famine as a result of Israel’s restrictions on food entry into the territory. Many families, already displaced multiple times during the nearly two-year war, said they have no safe place left to go. Some Palestinians, weakened by hunger, said they are unable to uproot themselves again.

Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee said on social media platform X that the makeshift encampment of Muwasi and parts of Khan Younis had been designated as humanitarian zones. The army shared a map showing the area, which includes the district surrounding Nasser Hospital — a facility struck last week in an Israeli attack that killed 22 people, among them five journalists, including Associated Press contributor Mariam Dagga.

Adraee said Palestinians would be allowed to drive south to Khan Younis and Muwasi along a designated road without being searched. The military pledged to provide field hospitals, food, and water pipelines in the newly designated zone.

But aid groups raised alarm over dire conditions in Muwasi and Khan Younis, where months of bombardment have destroyed civilian infrastructure. The United Nations said its staff would remain in Gaza City to deliver aid to residents trapped in the assault, stressing that Palestinians who evacuate must be allowed to return voluntarily when circumstances permit.

Exhausted residents voiced despair at the new orders. “Nowhere is safe across the strip,” said Gaza City resident Ayman Abo Saif, noting that overcrowding in the south has driven rents to more than $7 per day for a 25-square-meter space.

On Saturday, Israel also issued evacuation warnings for two Gaza City high-rises before striking one of them, claiming Hamas operated inside or nearby. Hamas has not commented on the allegations. Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz posted a video of the tower collapsing in a massive cloud of smoke with the caption: “We continue.”

The latest strike followed Friday’s demolition of another Gaza City high-rise

Israel’s intensifying campaign comes after it announced plans last month to seize full control of Gaza City in a bid to weaken Hamas.

Earlier this week, the army said it had already captured 40% of the city.

https://www.basnews.com/en/babat/893929

[Anthea]

64,368 slaughtered in 701 days

The Ministry of Health in Gaza reports over 64,300 martyrs and 162,000 wounded as the Israeli occupation continues its genocide with intensified bombardment on Gaza City

According to the latest figures released Sunday by the Ministry of Health in Gaza, 11,911 people have been martyred and 50,735 wounded since the occupation resumed its genocidal war on March 18.

In the past 24 hours alone, hospitals received 87 martyrs, including 4 whose bodies were recovered from under the rubble, as well as 409 wounded.

In the same 24-hour period, hospitals recorded 31 martyrs and 132 wounded among those attempting to access humanitarian aid. This raises the total number of people killed in aid massacres to 2,416 martyrs and more than 17,709 wounded.

The famine in Gaza continues to claim more lives, with hospitals reporting the deaths of 5 people, including 3 children, within the past day. This brings the total number of starvation-related deaths to 387 martyrs, including 138 children.

Intensified bombardment on Gaza City

Since dawn, at least 42 people have been martyred in renewed attacks, with Gaza City bearing the brunt of Israeli aggression.

In addition, Israeli warplanes struck a displaced persons’ tent near al-Wafaa Hospital in the Sarayah area, killing two people and injuring others.

In central Gaza City, one woman was martyred and several others were wounded when a house near Fahmi al-Jarjawi School in the al-Daraj neighborhood was bombed. Additional strikes targeted homes near al-Yarmouk Market and Musa Bin Nusair School.

The occupation also hit a house near al-Aybaki Mosque, while artillery shelling pounded the al-Tuffah neighborhood east of the city.

In northern Gaza City, warplanes bombed al-Tawhid and al-Sunnah Mosque near al-Nafaq Street.
Airstrikes in central and southern Gaza

In the central Gaza Strip, one woman was martyred and several others were injured when the Old Town Mosque minaret in Deir al-Balah was targeted. Another strike hit northeast of Nuseirat camp.

The bombardment extended southward, where one person was martyred and others wounded in a strike on the mills area, north of Khan Younis.

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/hea ... de-in-gaza

[Anthea]

Banksy targets UK crackdown on
protests with new High Court mural

Banksy has painted a mural on London's High Court showing a judge striking a protester, widely seen as a critique of Britain's ban on Palestine Action and the mass arrests of its supporters

British street artist Banksy has unveiled a new mural on London's High Court, showing a judge striking down a demonstrator, in what appears to be a response to the mass arrests of activists linked to Palestine Action.

The image, shared on Banksy's Instagram on Monday, portrays a judge in a traditional wig bringing down a gavel on a protester holding a blood-marked placard. The figure on the ground appears to have been subdued by the blow.

The piece follows the detention of almost 900 people during a London rally on Saturday opposing the government's ban on Palestine Action. Authorities have carried out hundreds of other arrests of the group's supporters in recent weeks.

Britain outlawed Palestine Action in July, designating it as a terrorist group. The move came after members broke into a Royal Air Force base and damaged aircraft following reports of the RAF providing logistical and surveillance assistance to Israeli forces. Under the law, it is now a criminal offense to support or belong to the organization

The decision has triggered widespread criticism, with opponents warning that the right to protest is increasingly under threat. Observers argue the country's legal and political systems are being used to stifle peaceful dissent.

Although Banksy rarely explains his work, his past projects have often addressed Palestinian struggles, including murals on the West Bank barrier near Beit Lahham.

The mural's location, the Royal Courts of Justice, is a Grade One-listed site, giving it the highest level of heritage protection. By Monday, barriers had already been placed around the artwork to safeguard it.

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/Art ... gh-court-m

[Anthea]

Bombing 50 high-rises in Gaza City

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu boasted Monday that his army destroyed 50 high-rise residential buildings in Gaza City in two days, vowing further demolitions and forced displacement

“In the past two days, 50 of these towers have fallen. The air force brought them down,” Netanyahu said in a video statement.

“Now all of this is just an introduction, just a prelude, to the main intense operation — a ground maneuver of our forces, who are now organizing and gathering in Gaza City.”

Netanyahu pledged to proceed with forced displacement plans. “This is just the prelude to the main powerful operation, so I tell Gaza residents: you have been warned, get out of there.”

The Palestinian resistance group Hamas denounced Netanyahu’s boasting as “one of the ugliest forms of sadism and criminality” in full view of the world.

On Friday, the Israeli army began to bomb multi-story buildings sheltering hundreds of displaced civilians in Gaza City, as Tel Aviv pressed ahead with a plan to occupy the entire city

Israel has killed more than 64,500 Palestinians in a brutal offensive in Gaza since October 2023. The military campaign has devastated the enclave and pushed the entire population into famine.

Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.

https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/is ... ys/3681860

[Anthea]

The West Bank is on
the verge of catastrophe

The Israelis will not allow for 3.3 million Palestinians to live in what the regime considers “Israel’s biblical heartlands”; they seek “Greater Israel” with as few Palestinians there as possible

The Israeli regime seeks to collapse the notion of the so-called “two-state solution” once and for all, as part of its broader final solution to the Palestinian question. In order to do this, even the Palestinian Authority will have to fall, and with it will come a new series of horrors for the occupied West Bank.

Since October 7, 2023, the Zionist entity has waged a regional campaign that its Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has branded the “seven-front war”. The publicly stated goal of this regional war is to achieve “total victory”. While many analysts continue to cover the Gaza war as a separate issue from the other fronts, this is a misreading of the realities we are seeing on the ground.

When looking at how the West Bank factors into the ongoing regional war, it would make no sense to view it outside of its proper context. To begin with, the October 7 operation was used as a pretext for the acceleration of the most extreme goals sought after by the Zionist entity.

The Israelis had suffered their greatest ever military blow, shattering their power projection model and shaking the very foundations of Zionism's core pillars. In reaction to this, the supremacist entity decided to go all out in every conceivable way, although this came quicker on some fronts than others.

Specifically looking at the occupied West Bank, the Israelis did not waste any time in deploying a large number of soldiers to the territory and began immediately placing countless new movable checkpoints, dirt mounds, cement barriers, and gates to isolate villages from one another, ensuring the further fragmentation of an already divided territory.

In conjunction with this, Israeli settlers were armed with a seemingly unlimited supply of light weapons and encouraged to begin carrying out pogroms against villages and collections of communities, with the aim of ethnic cleansing

This was fully backed by the Israeli military, which had even begun creating settler-controlled units the year prior, including the infamous “Desert Frontier”, which sought to legitimize settler extremist militias that had once been deemed terrorists by the Zionist entity itself.

Then came the imposition of curfews, lockdowns targeting specific areas, and road closures that would leave West Bank Palestinians stranded. Military raids also increased, as did the murder rate against Palestinian civilians, which reached levels not witnessed since the Second Intifada.

The Israelis committed countless on-the-ground raids and airstrikes, focused primarily in the northern West Bank, where young Palestinian fighters had formed groups since 2021 to confront the occupying entity’s raids on their refugee camps and villages.

Following these frequent attacks, which often resulted in civilian massacres along with the killing of fighters, in August of 2024, the Zionist regime announced “Operation Summer Camps”, aimed at destroying the armed resistance in the northern West Bank. The operation ultimately failed to inflict a defeat on the resistance groups, taking its largest toll on the civilian populations living in the Nur al-Shams and Jenin refugee camps.

By September 9, 2024, the Palestinian Authority (PA) had reached a deal with the Israeli military that would see its forces work alongside the occupying army to root out the Palestinian resistance forces. In early December, the PA’s security forces then launched their “Operation Protect The Homeland”, where they arrested Palestinian Resistance fighters, killed civilians, and removed IEDs planted in Jenin that were set to target Israeli military jeeps.

By January, amid a failure of the PA to uproot the resistance from Jenin alone, the Israeli military launched a renewed military effort alongside the PA that would lead to the mass displacement of tens of thousands of civilians. The Israeli forces launched airstrikes, carried out assassinations, desecrated mosques, blew up homes, and imposed siege warfare on both the Jenin and Nur al-Shams refugee camps.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian Authority was further demonized and delegitimized by the incoming Trump administration in the United States, after failing to prove its effectiveness at combating the Palestinian resistance alone.

A steep economic decline has also plagued the West Bank since October 7, 2023, plunging hundreds of thousands into poverty, as the Israeli settlers and military continue to construct new settlements and uproot olive trees and have ethnically cleansed over 30 communities and villages, while imposing a regime of all-out intimidation across the territory

The results have proven catastrophic; the Zionist regime is taking over more of the Ibrahimi Mosque in al-Khalil, entering Area A of the West Bank at will despite it being technically under PA control, while refusing to release tax revenue back to the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah.

Although the Palestinian Authority has repeatedly sought to combat resistance, runs security coordination for the Israeli occupying entity, frequently blames the genocide in Gaza on Hamas, and attempts to follow the rules laid out by its US, EU, and UK sponsors, it is now being totally delegitimized and pushed to the brink of collapse.

The PA is the perfect example of what happens when you lay down your arms, denounce resistance, and cooperate with the Israelis in search of a so-called “peace agreement”. The Zionists only take this as a weakness and continue to pursue their agendas, except that there is no substantial resistance now to protect the people.

With Western nations like Canada, France, Belgium, Australia, and the UK all declaring they will recognize the State of Palestine, the Israelis have reacted by pursuing a policy that completely eliminates the Palestinian Authority and its global standing. The E1 settlement project is one step; imposing annexation is another, yet perhaps the biggest factor here may be the Israeli refusal to release the necessary funds that the PA needs to keep afloat.

Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump notably banned the Palestinian Authority’s officials from travelling to the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York this month, while his own officials openly talk about the West Bank as “Judea and Samaria”; the Israeli settler name for the occupied territory.

Another major issue is the ongoing Israeli-manufactured water crisis in the occupied West Bank, making it so that some residents of Ramallah only get water access at home twice per week, causing them to go to public areas to fill up on supplies.

The Israeli settlers have exacerbated this crisis by destroying and poisoning water wells and pipes. It is of note that Palestinians are not permitted to drill for water without specific permits, and the West Bank’s natural basin has long been hijacked by the Israelis, who supply their West Bank settlements with all the water they need

So far, the population of the West Bank has not risen up into an Intifada either, so the Israelis get away with whatever they choose. In addition to this, the armed resistance that was in its early phases in the north of the territory has been forced into hiding and is no longer active.

Unlike the Gaza Strip, which had built a sophisticated underground tunnel network and armed itself with every weapon it could create or smuggle in, the West Bank is all but defenseless. However, the West Bank does have one advantage over Gaza: there are settlements littered throughout it, and the population there is very close to the occupiers physically.

Whether the Israelis choose to suddenly collapse the Palestinian Authority, annex portions of the territory, and begin a mass ethnic cleansing campaign, or they simply seek to slowly achieve this goal over time, the people of the West Bank have one way to combat it: a mass popular uprising. This uprising also must involve frequent violent assaults on Israeli settlements and operations that cross over into the territories occupied in 1948.

Currently, many people in the West Bank, particularly those living in the major cities, have not shown such resolve and determination. Instead, they have been slowly ground down into the material distractions that the Israelis intended for them to occupy themselves with, using their loans and credit cards to purchase cars and handbags or live cafe lifestyles they cannot afford.

The biggest employers in the West Bank are the Palestinian Authority, Israeli businesses, and Western NGOs, while the loans that people take are often impossible for people to pay back. Therefore, they have become enslaved to the material system of occupation. This is why you only really see armed resistance coming from a handful of villages and refugee camps, where the people have nothing to distract themselves from the occupation they live under.

The West Bank is perhaps one of the most sophisticated and ruthless social engineering testing grounds in modern history. In order for the people to break free, they will have to fight. This uprising will bring about countless horrors, some similar to what we have seen in Gaza, but the alternative is simply losing everything without a fight. Perhaps fewer people will die in such a short period, but the result of doing nothing will unfortunately be the loss of their homeland. The path of resistance is the only way that victory and liberation are even possible.

The Israelis will not allow for 3.3 million Palestinians to live in what the regime considers “Israel’s biblical heartlands”; they seek “Greater Israel” with as few Palestinians there as possible. There is no “two-state solution”, no “peace deals”, no “security agreements”, only an agenda to completely destroy the Palestinian people and implement the genocidal regime’s final Solution. Although the situation appears bleak, the people are still strong and will undoubtedly resist.

https://english.almayadeen.net/articles ... atastrophe

[Anthea]

Gaza Death Toll

Dutch Protesters Line Up 18000 Pairs Of Shoes To Honour Killed Palestinian Children

Thousands of children’s shoes were lined up in Almere, Netherlands representing the 17,400+ Palestinian children killed by Israel.

Footage shows various pairs of children's shoes displayed while some were stuffed with plush toys. A protester can also be seen reading out the names of victims of the conflict in Gaza. The demonstration followed intensified outrage over Israel's military operations in Gaza, where over 53,000 Palestinians have reportedly been killed since March

Link to Video:

https://youtu.be/cV-8kEWSB8Y?feature=shared

[Anthea]

Mass displacement order for Gaza City

Amnesty International denounces Israel’s mass displacement order for all of Gaza City, calling it part of a broader genocidal campaign against Palestinians

Amnesty International has condemned the mass displacement order issued by the Israeli military on September 9, against the entirety of Gaza City, calling it "unlawful", "inhumane", and "indicative of genocidal intent." The order comes as "Israel" escalates its military assault on the city, further endangering the lives of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians already enduring extreme conditions.

The evacuation order mirrors the October 13, 2023, directive for all of North Gaza, which led to the forced displacement of hundreds of thousands. Since then, many residents have been trapped in a cycle of repeated evacuations, homelessness, and insecurity under siege conditions.
Mounting civilian suffering amid forced evacuation

The impact of this new order has been immediate and devastating. Many families report being unable to flee due to financial constraints or lack of transport. Others are too sick, injured, or vulnerable to evacuate without assistance. The designated evacuation zones remain overcrowded, unsanitary, and unsafe.

Amnesty International has collected first-hand testimonies that highlight the impossible choices Palestinians are being forced to make:

A healthcare worker treating malnourished children described the agony of choosing between continuing care and fleeing bombardment, while another woman said her son carried her due to her disabilities. "Where do we go? We have no money, no transport, and nowhere to sleep.”

A grandmother caring for her injured granddaughter, orphaned in an airstrike, expressed feeling "tired of reliving this nightmare."

Deliberate campaign to destroy Palestinian life

In a scathing condemnation, Heba Morayef, Amnesty's Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa, described Israel’s actions in Gaza as part of a deliberate and systematic effort to destroy Palestinian life.

She described it as "cruel, unlawful," and furthering of genocidal conditions that Israel is inflicting.

According to Morayef, the mass displacement of Gaza City’s besieged population marks a "inhuman repeat" of past atrocities and reflects Israel’s deliberate campaign to physically destroy Palestinians, enabled by continued international military and diplomatic support.

“Deplorably, companies and investors continue to profit from Israel’s genocide. States and companies that continue to arm Israel risk complicity in genocide. All those with influence over Israel must press for an immediate end to Israel’s genocidal campaign and full humanitarian access to Gaza’s civilians.”

Violation of international law, genocidal conditions

Amnesty International reiterated that forcibly displacing Palestinians within the Gaza Strip or deporting them constitutes a grave breach of international humanitarian law and may amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity. The human rights group pointed to the combination of forced displacement, destruction of civilian infrastructure, denial of humanitarian access, and ongoing siege as evidence of deliberate conditions designed to bring about the destruction of the Palestinian population in Gaza.

"Israel’s" continued defiance of International Court of Justice (ICJ) orders, including those mandating protection and provision of aid to civilians, reinforces Amnesty’s claim that the intent behind such policies is genocidal in nature.

Amnesty urged the international community to:

Pressure "Israel" to immediately rescind the evacuation order;

Ensure full humanitarian access to all areas of the Gaza Strip;

Halt all arms sales, military aid, and diplomatic support that could contribute to further atrocities;

Hold corporations and governments accountable for any complicity in war crimes or genocide.

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/mass-displacement-order-for-gaza-city--unlawful----inhumane

[Anthea]

Israel drops incendiary and
explosive bombs on Gaza City

In their home in Gaza City, Raed Sharaf* sits with his family in total darkness. Their shattered windows are draped with dark blankets to shield them from the gaze of Israeli drones

As night falls, the Palestinian family counts down the hours until dawn, hoping to survive another round of relentless Israeli bombardment. But just before sunrise, the familiar buzz of an Israeli quadcopter breaks the silence.

It hovers above their building, drops a payload on the roof, then moves on to neighbouring homes. Minutes of silence are then shattered by a series of explosions that rock the area.

“The blast left a hole in our ceiling and damaged most of the upper floor,” Sharaf told Middle East Eye. “Our neighbours’ homes were hit the same way, bombs dropped and detonated simultaneously.”

According to Sharaf, the tactic is increasingly used in neighbourhoods where residents refuse to obey Israeli expulsion orders.

“They drop dozens of explosive boxes onto residential buildings and then remotely detonate them.”

Since the genocide in Gaza began in October 2023, Israeli quadcopters - small unmanned aerial vehicles with four rotors - have played a central role in the military assault.

Initially used for surveillance, the drones are now being deployed to fire live rounds, ignite fires with incendiary bombs, and scatter shrapnel-filled explosives over densely populated areas

Operated remotely, these drones allow Israeli forces to strike targets continuously, without risking soldiers on the ground. For civilians, they represent a constant and deadly threat.

The army gave evacuation orders for our area a few days ago, but we have nowhere to go,” Sharaf, who lives in the Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood, said.

“We can’t afford to relocate or buy a makeshift tent, so we stayed. Many of our neighbours made the same choice, knowing that leaving means never returning.”

He added: “To force us out, the army has flattened buildings, bombed rooftops, and fired on people in the streets and even inside their homes.”

On Tuesday, the Israeli military issued sweeping expulsion orders for the entire northern Gaza Strip, including Gaza City, demanding over one million people move south to al-Mawasi Khan Younis.

Yet over the past month, such orders have become frequent across eastern, northern and southern parts of Gaza City - each followed by violent attacks that appear aimed at forcibly displacing residents.

Quadcopters have been key to these operations

“They want to drive us out by any means,” Sharaf said. “What they don’t destroy with missiles and explosive-laden robots, they set on fire with drones.”

“These drones come right into homes, dropping bombs inside apartments and courtyards. They don’t care if people are still inside. They say we’ve been warned, but they don’t care whether we have anywhere to go.”
Incendiary bombs

Alongside explosives, Israeli quadcopters have dropped dozens of incendiary bombs in recent weeks across Gaza, igniting fires in tents, homes, clinics, markets and vehicles.

“Israeli quadcopters are dropping incendiary bombs on our neighbourhood,” residents posted in online appeals.

Fares Afanah, head of Ambulance and Emergency Services in northern Gaza, confirmed the attacks extended to healthcare facilities.

“A few days ago, Israeli forces targeted Sheikh Radwan Clinic with incendiary bombs,” Afanah told MEE.

Genocide by remote control: Israel's explosive robots devastate Gaza

“One landed in the clinic yard and one on an ambulance. Emergency teams put out the fire before it destroyed the vehicle.”

He said other bombs struck civilian cars near the clinic and burned tents and stalls in the nearby market. “Despite this, our teams continue working from the clinic.”

Since the war began, Afanah said, Israeli drones have repeatedly targeted ambulances with incendiary bombs, wounding medical staff.

“When we were at Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, these drones came daily and dropped bombs in the hospital yard and on medical teams. They were routinely dropping bombs on the hospital’s yard and buildings,” he added.

In one incident on 23 November 2024, Israeli quadcopters dropped multiple bombs on the facility, injuring the hospital’s head, Dr Hossam Abu Safiya, who has since been kidnapped by Israeli forces.

“Now they’re using bombs packed with shrapnel, lethal on direct hit and capable of wounding over ten people at once.

“These are meant to kill, injure, and drive residents out,” Afanah said.

He also described larger quadcopters dropping barrels filled with over ten kilograms of explosives.

“They target rooftops and power panels. The destruction is massive. Countless civilians have been killed or wounded by these bombs, we can’t even keep count.”

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/isra ... -and-tents

[Anthea]

Humanity is absent, annihilation repeats

The same Israel that brandished Anne Frank's name to justify its existence, presenting itself as a refuge from Nazism, is the very one that reproduces Nazism upon a Palestinian child.

In every major war, thousands of lives are reduced to a cold statistic. But history is not preserved in numbers. The human memory is not concerned with quantity, but with quality; it seeks a story that clings to the soul. What embeds a tragedy in the conscience of humanity is not the death toll, but the story of a single child who gives a face and a voice to the pain.

In the 20th century, that face was etched in the features of Anne Frank, the Jewish girl who wrote her diary in a cramped Amsterdam hideout before being swallowed by a Nazi camp. In the 21st century, a similar echo reverberates from Gaza, where Hind Rajab's voice rang out over the phone: "I'm so scared... please come get me." No one came. She was martyred along with her family, but her voice became an eternal memory, defying oblivion.

The voice as a collective memory

Anne Frank left behind written words that became one of the most-read books in the world. Her testimony was private, written in complete secrecy and never intended for publication, which gave it a painful authenticity when it later emerged.

Hind Rajab left a trembling whimper, recorded by devices and broadcast on screens. Her testimony was public from the first moment, a plea launched directly into the public sphere, making all who heard it witnesses to the world's failure in real time.

Neither lived to see their second decade, and both became witnesses to annihilation. Anne penned her small dreams; Hind uttered her final fear. Between the paper and the air, the same truth is embodied: when childhood is slaughtered, nothing remains but a pure testimony that exposes the cruelty of the world.

From political silence to cultural explosion

Anne Frank was not saved. The world left her to face her fate, only to return later to build museums for her and turn her diary into plays and films.

Today, the scene repeats itself with Gaza: a silent, complicit world, while culture takes on the task of saying what politics has failed to say.

Hind Rajab's story has inspired documentaries and became a feature film by director Kaouther Ben Hania, which received a historic ovation in Venice. A foundation bearing her name was even established to prosecute war criminals.

Herein lies the role of art in immortalizing tragedy; it lifts it from its local, individual context and gives it a universal language that transcends geography and culture, transforming the child's story into a symbol for all of wounded humanity.

For art does not merely document a tragedy after the fact; it becomes an act of resistance itself. It screams when the mouth of politics is gagged and builds an archive for the future to ensure that the truth is not forged. Culture here is not a luxury; it is a weapon of memory and resistance.

From yesterday's victim to today's executioner

The same Israel that brandished Anne Frank's name to justify its existence, presenting itself as a refuge from Nazism, is the very one that reproduces Nazism upon a Palestinian child. The paradox is stark and psychologically painful; the very tool Israel used to gain global sympathy, the image of the innocent victim, is the same image it crushes today with its military machine.

An entity founded on the image of the child victim has transformed into the killer of another child. Anne was a bridge for the world's sympathy toward Jews; Hind today reveals the true face of "Israel": A tormentor rather than a persecuted victim, recreating the very pain it claimed to exist to prevent.

Culture as a weapon of memory, resistance

Just as Anne Frank became a symbol for understanding the Nazism of the past, Hind Rajab is becoming a symbol for understanding the Zionism of the present. Art and literature do not change the outcomes of battles, but they change the consciousness of generations. They transform tragedy from a fleeting event into a long-term memory, resistant to erasure and forgetting.

An artwork strips the tragedy of its narrow specificity, making it the property of the global conscience. A person in Japan can mourn her just as a person in Brazil can, because it is no longer just the story of "Hind", but the story of "Childhood" in the face of brutality.

It is the same role played by Picasso's Guernica, which turned the bombing of a Spanish village into a timeless, universal cry against the barbarity of war, or Uncle Tom's Cabin, the novel that exposed the horrors of slavery to a public that had never lived them.

Art defeats politics

Herein lies the moral power of art. Politics, with the complex language of its interests, masters the art of justification, using cold terms like "national security" to strip its actions of their humanity. Art, however, takes the raw truth, like the plea of a dying child, and weaves from it an eternal testimony. It does not merely present the stark evidence of reality; it reshapes it into a vision that defies oblivion.

The film that places us in the heart of Hind's final moments transforms her voice from a piece of forensic evidence into a conscience that haunts the world

This is how art defeats the complexities of politics: by speaking to what is timeless within us, our shared humanity, and making it impossible to hide behind flimsy excuses. A single artistic moment can expose the falsehood of a thousand political statements, for it wagers on what is constant in the human spirit, while politics wagers on what is volatile in self-interest.

Conclusion: The unlearned lesson

If, decades later, Anne Frank became a global symbol for victims, Hind Rajab screams in our faces that the world has not learned. Childhood is still being annihilated, and international silence still repeats itself, as if the memory of the victim has been emptied of its meaning.

But Hind's voice, the films that documented her plea, and the lawsuits that bear her name all suggest that culture may precede politics in writing memory, and perhaps in redrawing the course of history. For when governments fail to deliver justice, a poem or a film may succeed in keeping the cause alive in the hearts of millions.

The world that wept for Anne Frank cannot afford to be silent before Hind Rajab. Otherwise, the victim who turned into an executioner will continue to repeat the annihilation with impunity, and the deferred lesson will keep knocking on the doors of a weary humanity.

https://english.almayadeen.net/articles ... nt--annihi

[Anthea]

Ex-IOF chief admits over
200,000 casualties in Gaza

Former Israeli occupation forces chief Herzi Halevi says over 200,000 Palestinians have been killed or injured in Gaza, admitting legal advice never limited Israeli operations

Former Israeli occupation forces Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi has acknowledged that more than 200,000 Palestinians have been killed or injured since the start of the war on Gaza, making him the first senior Israeli figure to cite a toll close to figures released by Gaza’s Health Ministry.

Speaking at a community meeting in the settlement of Ein HaBesor this week, Halevi said that “not once” during 17 months of operations did legal advisors restrict military actions in Gaza. The retired general led the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) from the outbreak of the war on 7 October 2023 until his resignation in March this year.

Halevi’s estimate, covering roughly 10% of Gaza’s 2.2 million residents, aligns with casualty data from Gaza’s Health Ministry, which lists 64,718 Palestinians killed and 163,859 wounded, though thousands remain unaccounted for under rubble. International humanitarian groups consider the ministry’s statistics broadly reliable, despite repeated Israeli claims that they amount to "Hamas propaganda".

'Israel' should've acted 'more forcefully'

Leaked Israeli intelligence from earlier in the war on Gaza suggested more than 80% of those killed were civilians.

“This isn’t a gentle war. We took the gloves off from the first minute,” Halevi told residents, arguing that the Israeli regime should have acted more forcefully in Gaza even before October 7's Operation al-Aqsa Flood. He added that while international law was “very important for the state of Israel,” military lawyers had never curbed operational decisions: “Not once has anyone restricted me … [they] will know how to defend this legally in the world.”

Israeli human rights lawyer Michael Sfard said Halevi’s remarks showed the IOF's legal advisors often function as “rubber stamps” rather than genuine constraints. His comments followed a Haaretz report that Halevi’s successor, Eyal Zamir, bypassed legal counsel urging delays to evacuation orders for about one million Gaza City residents before the beginning of the invasion of Gaza.

59 killed in one day

Al Mayadeen's correspondent confirmed on Friday that Israeli occupation forces killed 59 Palestinians during the day, including 42 in Gaza City and the northern areas of the Strip.

With this latest massacre, the toll of the ongoing Israeli genocide has reached 64,756 martyrs and 164,059 wounded and 52,018 injured

Earlier in the day, the Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, issued a statement denouncing "the horrific crime that targeted the home of the Sultan family north of Gaza City," describing it as "state terrorism and blatant war crimes."

Hamas urged the United Nations, the Arab League, and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation to assume their legal and moral responsibilities in halting Israeli atrocities.

Martyrs of livelihood

Palestinians in search of food aid continue to be targeted. Medical sources report 2,479 martyrs among aid-seekers and over 18,091 injured. In the past 24 hours alone, hospitals documented 14 martyrs and 143 wounded.

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/pol ... es-in-gaza

[Anthea]

Over one million in Gaza
face ethnic cleansing

The Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, has issued a grave warning, stating that over one million residents of Gaza City are currently facing ethnic cleansing and forced displacement under relentless Israeli bombardment

In a statement released on Saturday, Hamas said the level of brutality unleashed by the occupation has now surpassed that of Nazism. According to the movement, Israel continues to bomb residential towers, schools, and shelters with unprecedented ferocity.

In its statement, Hamas called on people around the world to "take to the streets and public squares" and showcase solidarity with Gaza until the ongoing genocide is stopped. It urged the international community, especially Arab and Islamic states, to act urgently to uphold humanitarian law.

The movement also held the US administration responsible for providing unconditional political cover to Israel, accusing Washington of shielding the leaders of what it termed a fascist occupation from accountability.

Over 10% of Gaza either dead or wounded

This follows revelations by former Israeli occupation forces Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, who admitted that more than 200,000 Palestinians have been killed or injured in Gaza. Halevi also disclosed that legal advisors never placed restrictions on military operations, stating, "not once has anyone restricted me."

In the past 24 hours alone, hospitals in Gaza have reported receiving 47 martyrs and 205 wounded. Dozens more remain buried under rubble or lie in the streets, unreachable due to the constant shelling and direct targeting of rescue teams.

The total death toll has now reached 64,803, with 164,264 wounded since October 7, 2023.

Israel has also turned famine and aid into weapons of war. Over 420 Palestinians, 145 of them children, were killed due to Israeli-manufactured famine. Another 2,484 Palestinians have been killed, and 18,117 wounded, while seeking humanitarian aid, further highlighting the genocidal policies being implemented.

Unprecedented destruction

The destruction in Gaza is staggering. The UN estimates that 92% of all residential buildings in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed. And only since August 6, Israel destroyed 1000+ buildings in Gaza City.

The occupation has also bombed 181 shelter and displacement centers. Recent massacres have targeted educational institutions such as the Al-Zaytoun School, where 22 Palestinians, including 13 children and six women, were martyred.

Other attacks include Kfar Qasim School in al-Shati refugee camp and the Al-Farabi School near al-Yarmouk Stadium.

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/pol ... alestinian

[Anthea]

Gaza children shot in head and chest

International doctors working in Gaza report a disturbing pattern of gunshot wounds in children, many fatal, raising concerns of deliberate targeting by snipers or drones

An international team of doctors working in Gaza has reported a deeply disturbing pattern of gunshot wounds among children, raising serious concerns about the possibility of deliberate targeting, according to an investigation published Saturday by the Dutch daily de Volkskrant and reported by Anadolu.

The newspaper spoke with 17 doctors and a nurse from the US, UK, Australia, Canada, and the Netherlands, all of whom had worked in six hospitals and four clinics in Gaza since October 2023, with many possessing long experience in crisis zones, such as Sudan, Afghanistan, and Ukraine.

Of the medical professionals interviewed, fifteen reported to de Volkskrant that they had treated a minimum of 114 children, all aged 15 or younger, each with a single gunshot wound to either the head or the chest, wounds which proved fatal for the majority of these children. These specific cases have been documented across 10 different medical facilities between late 2023 and mid-2025.

Four boys under 10 with identical head wounds in 48 hours

According to the report, one of the doctors, US trauma surgeon Feroze Sidhwa, recalled his first day at the European Hospital in Gaza in March 2024, an experience during which he encountered four boys all under the age of 10 who had been admitted with identical head wounds within 48 hours.

“How is it possible that here in this small hospital, within 48 hours, four children have come in who were shot in the head?” Sidhwa told the newspaper, noting that over the following 13 days, he encountered nine children with similar wounds.

Sidhwa later met a colleague who confirmed seeing the same injuries “almost every day” in another hospital, which led him to state, “That was the moment I decided: I have to find out what is happening here.”

Highly unlikely to be accidental

The doctors who were interviewed stressed that such injuries were highly unlikely to be accidental, a point which was supported by forensic experts consulted by the newspaper, who stated that the uniform pattern of the wounds suggested the use of aimed fire, potentially from snipers or drones.

This comes as Israel sustains its brutal war on Gaza, mercilessly killing dozens of Palestinians every day while forcibly displacing them from one warzone to the next.

Rising toll

According to the Gaza Ministry of Health, 68 martyrs and 346 new injuries arrived on Sunday at hospitals in the Gaza Strip in 24 hours.

This brings the total casualties from the Israeli aggression since October 7, 2023, as of September 14, 2025, to 64,871 martyrs and 164,610 injuries, with 12,321 martyrs and 52,569 injuries recorded since March 18, 2025.

Meanwhile, the number of aid seekers who were killed and whose bodies were received by hospitals in 24 hours has reached 10, with 18 injured, bringing the total number of Palestinians killed at aid distribution sites to 2,494, in addition to more than 18,135 injuries.

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/hea ... hot-in-hea