[IMPORTANT] Hamas launches foot assault against settlements.

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There is no evidence they are not being targeted because they are journalists.

“The Israeli forces have killed nearly 50 journalists in 45 days in the Gaza Strip, including 11 in the course of their work. This is one of the deadliest tolls in a century. International journalists are banned from entering Gaza. Reporters there have no safe refuge and no way of leaving. They are being killed one after another. Since 7 October, the Palestinian territory has been subjected to a veritable eradication of journalism. We urge the international community to intervene to protect the journalists there, to open the Rafah border crossing, and to enable international reporters to go in.”

The Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA) documented 17 violations of media freedom in the Gaza Strip by Israeli forces during 2022, largely during the August conflict. The offices of eight media organizations were partially destroyed by air strikes.

Hmmm....

Sixty three reporters died in the fifteen years of the Vietnam war (1960 to 1975).

But thats almost equaled by the fifty some who have died in the six weeks of the Gaza War.


But if these reporters were roving the streets of Gaza to keeps tabs on the scene they could well all be collatoral damage. Not targeted on purpose.

Most sources say that Israel has dropped 6000 tons of "weapons" on the Gaza strip containing about 4000 tons of explosive. Four thousand tons of TNT is about one third of the power of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. All in just six weeks.

So thats a lot of indiscriminent TNT going off in a very small place.

Assuming the current ceasefire leads to more hostage swaps and all Israeli and foreign hostages returned, then every Israeli will need to dip into their pockets and help rebuild Gaza. Compensation should be paid to victims of the bombing.

Israel will then need to build better defenses as HAMAS will likely try again to incite violence.

At the end of September 2023, the Israel Prison Service (IPS) was holding 146 Palestinian minors in detention or in prison on what it defined “security” grounds. At that time, the IPS was also holding 34 Palestinian minors for being in Israel illegally.

At the end of 2020, the IPS adopted a new policy and stopped providing B'Tselem with the requested figures. Instead, it has since published some data on the IPS website every three months. The first year this occurred (July 2020 through September 2021), the figures published were partial and therefore are not included here.

In addition, at times, some Palestinians are briefly held in military facilities. The figures from the military are received with a significant time delay and provide no details regarding inmates’ legal standing.

According to PCATI, children, mostly 14 to 17 years old, have been violently arrested by the security forces using such means as beatings, kicking, verbal abuse, humiliation and threats, and apparently have been interrogated illegally. During their detention, the minors were held with adult criminals and were exposed to rape, sexual harassment, theft, threats and constant physical and psychological violence.

According to the same source, the children are reportedly subjected to sleep deprivation spanning, continuous and long interrogation, painful manacling of the hands and feet, pouring of freezing cold water on the detainee and preventing him from changing his clothing for a long period of time, covering the head with a sack, shooting the detainee with small plastic bullets from point blank range, placing weights on the detainee's shoulders for an extended period of time, dunking his head in ice water, humiliation and threats.

According to Defence for Children International – Palestine Section (DCI – PS) , torture and ill treatment mainly occur during interrogation. Generally, once the child leaves interrogation, the treatment improves, although there are frequent cases of ill treatment occurring beyond the interrogation phase. To DCI – PS’ knowledge, no investigation has been opened so far on these cases.

According to DCI – PS, some of the children who were submitted to such treatment have problems reintegrating after their release. Some of them have difficulty finding and maintaining employment, difficulty returning to school, often resulting in school dropouts, and psychosocial disorders related to the prison experience.

Approximately 185 children are still detained by the Israeli military authorities.

While the case of Palestinian teen activist Ahed Tamimi has conjured significant international media attention, her case is not unique. According to Israel Prison Service (IPS) statistics published by Israeli anti-occupation organization B’Tselem, Israel is holding over 300 Palestinian minors in prison. Just like Tamini, an alarming proportion of those minors are being held in detention until the end of legal proceedings, without having been convicted.

Children tried in military courts

Israel is the only country in the world that automatically prosecutes children in military courts that lack fundamental fair rights and guarantees.

The systematic ill treatment and torture of Palestinian children has been widely documented in recent years, with Amnesty International finding that Israeli forces had “tortured and otherwise ill-treated Palestinian detainees, including children, particularly during arrest and interrogation”, with methods including “beating with batons, slapping, throttling, prolonged shackling, stress positions, sleep deprivation and threats.”

Excessive use of force on minors

One prominent case that received widespread attention was that of Fawsi al-Junaidi. The image of him being dragged by more than 20 soldiers while blindfolded in Hebron went viral, eventually becoming an icon for Israel’s use of excessive force on Palestinians.

For Tamini, reports suggest that she has already encountered similar ill treatment while detained. According to Tamini’s lawyer, the teenager is said to have “faced long and aggressive interrogation sessions – sometimes during the night – and he interrogators have made threats against her family members.”

Or they could try something novel and stop electing war criminals to their government. Israel won't even stop stealing Palestinian land, I can't imagine them paying to rebuild when they haven't been allowing most construction materials into the area for quite some time due to them being usable for military purposes.

NPR's Ari Shapiro talks with Bader Al-Saif, a history professor at Kuwait University, about the role that Qatar is playing as a broker in the deadly conflict between Israel and Hamas.

ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: A four-day ceasefire between Israel and Hamas will begin tomorrow morning. If all goes according to plan, over those four days, Hamas will release 50 women and children held as hostages, and Israel will release 150 Palestinian women and minors held in Israeli jails. Humanitarian aid will also enter Gaza. Those details came today from the Foreign Ministry of Qatar. Majid Al Ansari is a ministry spokesman.

[...]

AL-SAIF: I think where Qatar stands to benefit the most among those different partners is that it hosts Hamas upon U.S. request that was made close to a decade ago.

SHAPIRO: It hosts them. They have an office in Qatar.

AL-SAIF: They have an office in Qatar. Qatar is playing the shuttle role between Hamas and its personnel and between the other interlocutors, whether it's the Americans, the Egyptians and the Israelis. And, mind you, even within Hamas, they're also having their different communications within them. That's not quite clear to everyone because a few days ago, there was a quiet pause in where the deal is because they couldn't reach the person of the military wing in Gaza from Hamas. And then when they heard back from him, they were able to move ahead because, if you remember, they needed the list of names of hostages. They wanted to verify that they're fine and alive and to compare it with the list that's going to be coming on the prisoners' side from Israel. So it's not a quite direct communication. It's multilayered, and it involves various steps. Central to all of this is the Qatari role.

SHAPIRO: Qatar has played a version of this role between Western powers and Iran, Yemen, Afghanistan. Do you think its role in this war, in this mediation has changed Qatar's position in Middle East diplomacy?

AL-SAIF: If there is any change, Ari, it's about them becoming a more prolific, credible mediator. This is not only about dealing with Middle East issues, which has been the case in this conflict. But as you've listed from the various cases and examples, it has stretched across to other conflicts. I think with time, they've been able to perfect their manual, if you may, their operations. And the logistics that comes with it will help, hopefully, strike a longer-term deal not only in Palestine and Israel but hopefully in other places. And it's quite interesting because Qatar, as you know, is one of the smallest countries in the region in terms of population size. But it's been able to play that outsized role basically due to its, A, ambition, B, its financial assets. It's one of the richest in the region. And third, it feels that it can provide something to contribute to the peace and security. You cannot have prosperity if there is a war in your backyard. So there is also some self-interest in all of this.

SHAPIRO: Whenever this war ends, be that days, weeks or months from now, do you think it will likely be thanks to talks through Qatar?

AL-SAIF: Qatar will very likely play a very key role in all of this. But let me tell you something. Without the U.S., we cannot expect much change to happen because they're the ones who hold leverage against Israel. My expectation is if they want this to be sustainable, they need to plan from now about the day after when it comes to peace negotiations. A two-state solution is a must. It has been delayed more than once. We cannot go back to a war in the region every few years because of this intractable conflict and disagreements and opinions. That's what needs to be done.

SHAPIRO: That's Bader Al-Saif, a professor of history at Kuwait University. Thank you very much.

All 13 Israeli hostages have been released, Israel Prime Minister's office says
Thai prime minister says he received confirmation of release of 12 Thai nationals held in Gaza

Thailand's Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin said he received confirmation of the release of 12 Thai nationals from Gaza.
"I have received confirmation from our national security team and ministry of foreign affairs that 12 Thai hostages have been released. Our RTE staffs are on their way to receive them," Thavisin said in a post on X, the social media platform formerly called Twitter.

RTE refers to Royal Thai Embassy.

"We should know more about their names and details, please stay tuned," Thavisin added.

A senior Israeli military intelligence officer dismissed a detailed warning predicting Hamas’s raid of October 7, calling it an “imaginary scenario”, said two people familiar with the discussions.

Sentries on Israel’s border with Gaza, many of them female soldiers who watch and analyse a constant feed of video and other data gathered near the electronic fence surrounding the enclave, sent a detailed report weeks before the attack to the highest-ranking intelligence officer in the southern command, both people said.

The report was sent using a secure communications system and contained specific warnings, including that Hamas was training to blow up border posts at several locations, enter Israeli territory and take over kibbutzim, the person with direct knowledge of the contents of the warning said.

Israel’s failure to prevent the attack, which the government says killed more than 1,200 people, is now seen as its largest intelligence failure since Egypt and Syria launched a surprise assault in 1973 on Yom Kippur, Judaism’s holiest day.

The lower-ranking soldiers also warned their analysis of several videos showed Hamas was rehearsing taking hostages, and that they felt an attack was imminent, the person said. The memo was triggered by the sighting of a high-ranking Hamas military commander overseeing the training, who was identified by the sentries against a database of faces and identities maintained by Unit 8200, a part of the Israeli intelligence corps.

“This is an imaginary scenario,” the high-ranking intelligence officer replied, according to a description of the communications shared with the Financial Times.

No action was taken, the person said. KAN, Israel’s public broadcaster, reported late on Thursday details of a similar warning sent by low-ranking soldiers to their seniors. KAN added that the warning included the possibility of an aircraft being downed, and of Hamas raising its flags over Israeli territory.

A second person familiar with the issue said the failure to take the report seriously had become an issue of discussion, verging on disciplinary action, within the intelligence community. This person had been told a similar description of the communications.

In response to a query from the FT, the Israel Defense Forces said its “commanders and soldiers were exclusively focused strictly” on their mission to defeat Hamas.

“Following the war, a thorough investigation will be conducted to clarify all details,” the IDF said.

The two people familiar with the communications told the FT that discussions within the intelligence community about the failure to act on the memo echoed those after the intelligence failures preceding the 1973 war.

Both said the warnings were dismissed not just because they came from lower-ranking soldiers, but because they ran up against the Israeli government’s confidence that it had contained Hamas through a punishing blockade, by bombing its military capabilities, and using aid and money as a mean to placate the Palestinian militant group.

An attack of that nature by Hamas would immediately trigger war with the Jewish state, which the Israeli intelligence community was convinced the militant group was seeking to avoid.

Hamas’s attack on October 7 largely followed the pattern predicted by the memo, including two specific kibbutzim that were attacked, and the use of rockets to distract the Israeli army from the ongoing intrusion.

Several female soldiers were killed in the attack and an unknown number abducted from their bases.

Israel’s subsequent aerial bombardment and invasion of Gaza has killed at least 13,000 people, many of them women and children, according to Palestinian health officials, reduced much of the blockaded enclave to rubble, and pushed nearly the entire 2.3mn population into the south, causing a severe humanitarian crisis.

A tentative deal for the release of 50 civilian hostages — women and children — held in Gaza in exchange for 150 Palestinian women and children held in Israeli jails is expected to begin on Friday, alongside a four-day ceasefire brokered by Qatar.

A total of 39 Palestinian detainees have been released from Israeli prisons in exchange for a group of hostages held by Hamas.

The deal - mediated by Qatar - includes a four-day pause in the fighting.

They are accused of a range of offences, from throwing stones to attempted murder. Some were convicted while others were awaiting trial.

The group of 24 women and 15 teenage boys was released across the Beituniya checkpoint in the occupied West Bank.

They will then be allowed to return home, according to Israel's prison service.

The detainees were chosen from a list of 300 women and minors compiled by Israel.

Less than a quarter of those on the list have been convicted - the vast majority are being held on remand while awaiting trial. Most of those listed are teenage boys - 40% of them under the age of 18. There is also one teenage girl and 32 women.........................................

Thirteen Israeli hostages were released by Hamas under the truce deal. It was confirmed on Friday that they had arrived back in Israel.

The Thai prime minister says that a group of Thai nationals held hostage by Hamas in Gaza were also released - separate from the Qatar-mediated truce deal..........................................

There are now thought to be more than 6,000 Palestinians held by Israel on security grounds