UN calls Israeli settler attack in West Bank ‘horrific’
Echoing widespread condemnation internationally and within Israel of the attack reportedly by Israeli settlers on the village of Jit on Thursday which left a Palestinian man dead and about a dozen injured, Office of the United Nations high commissioner for Human Rights spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani described the incident as “horrific”.
She noted that the killing “was not an isolated attack”, in reference to years of violence directed at Palestinian communities by Israeli settlers, maintaining that it was “the direct consequence” of Israel’s policy of occupation.
“We have been reporting for the past years about settlers attacking Palestinian communities in their land in the West Bank with impunity and this really is the crux of the matter, the impunity that the perpetrators of such actions have been enjoying,” Shamdasani said.
“Clearly this needs to stop and key to this will be accountability for the perpetrators,” the OHCHR spokesperson said.
Key events
Latest Gaza ceasefire proposal ‘closes gaps’ to allow for rapid implementation
A joint statement from Egypt, Qatar and the United States said that the U.S. presented on Friday a Gaza ceasefire proposal that closes the remaining gaps in a manner that allows for the rapid implementation of the agreement and is consistent with the principles set out by President Joe Biden on May 31.
The statement came out after negotiators met in Doha on Thursday and Friday in the latest round of ceasefire talks.
Images show the aftermath of violence by settlers who rioted in the village of Jit on Thursday night, near the city of Nablus in the northern West Bank, killing one Palestinian and badly injuring others, according to Palestinian health officials.
Residents interviewed by The Associated Press said at least a hundred masked settlers entered the village, shot live ammunition, burned homes and cars and damaged water tankers.
Footage online showed fire ravaging the small village, which Palestinian residents said was left without military assistance for two hours.
The U.N. special rapporteur on torture on Friday condemned what she called a “particularly gruesome” case of the alleged sexual abuse of a Palestinian prisoner by Israeli soldiers and said the perpetrators of such crimes must be held accountable.
“There are no circumstances in which sexual torture or sexualised inhuman and degrading treatment can be justified,” Special Rapporteur Alice Jill Edwards said in a statement.
On Tuesday, the Israeli military said prosecutors have requested that soldiers accused of abusing a Palestinian detainee be placed under house arrest.
Israeli media reports said the soldiers have been accused of sexually abusing a member of an elite Hamas unit at the Sde Teiman detention facility in the Negev desert in southern Israel.
“This alleged sexual torture involving multiple offenders is particularly gruesome,” Edwards said, adding that Israeli authorities had informed her that several soldiers suspected of involvement were under investigation. All alleged crimes must be investigated and those responsible held accountable by civilian courts, she said.
Commenting on Israel’s new order to civillians to evacuate areas previously designated humanitarian zones, the UNRWA, the main U.N. agency in Gaza, said people “remain trapped in an endless nightmare of death and destruction on a staggering scale”.
Earlier, Israel’s military said it had hit an area in Khan Younis from where rockets were fired towards the community of Kissufim on Thursday, finding weapons including shoulder-fired missiles and explosives.
The latest evacuation warnings came as negotiators in Doha were due to meet for a second day of talks aimed at reaching a deal to halt the fighting in Gaza and bring Israeli and foreign hostages home.
Israeli leaders on Friday have also condemned the attack in what is a rare move.
The settler riot in the village of Jit, near the city of Nablus in the northern West Bank, killed one Palestinian and badly injured others late Thursday, Palestinian health officials said.
Residents interviewed by The Associated Press news agency said at least a hundred masked settlers entered the village, shot live ammunition at Palestinians, burned homes and cars and damaged water tankers.
The video below shows flames engulfing the small village, which residents said was left to defend itself without military help for two hours.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he took the riots “seriously” and that Israelis who carried out criminal acts would be prosecuted. He issued what appeared to be a call for settlers to stand down.
“Those who fight terrorism are the IDF and the security forces, and no one else,” he said, using an acronym for the Israeli military.
President Isaac Herzog also condemned the attack, as did Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who said the settlers had “attacked innocent people.” He added they did not “represent the values” of settler communities.
UN calls Israeli settler attack in West Bank ‘horrific’
Echoing widespread condemnation internationally and within Israel of the attack reportedly by Israeli settlers on the village of Jit on Thursday which left a Palestinian man dead and about a dozen injured, Office of the United Nations high commissioner for Human Rights spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani described the incident as “horrific”.
She noted that the killing “was not an isolated attack”, in reference to years of violence directed at Palestinian communities by Israeli settlers, maintaining that it was “the direct consequence” of Israel’s policy of occupation.
“We have been reporting for the past years about settlers attacking Palestinian communities in their land in the West Bank with impunity and this really is the crux of the matter, the impunity that the perpetrators of such actions have been enjoying,” Shamdasani said.
“Clearly this needs to stop and key to this will be accountability for the perpetrators,” the OHCHR spokesperson said.
Seyed Hossein Mousavian
The situation in the Middle East has now deteriorated so far that the US could be dragged into a regional war. The Israeli assassination of Ismail Haniyeh, after the top Hamas leader had travelled to attend the inauguration of Iran’s new president, has sparked fears of retaliation.
Seyed Hossein Mousavian – a Middle East security and nuclear policy specialist at Princeton University and a former head of Iran’s national security foreign relations committee – argues the flagging Israeli leader has every reason to involve the US in a regional conflict, but this would be a huge mistake for Tehran.
Read his analysis here:
The British and French Foreign Ministers also strongly condemned attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank.
British foreign minister David Lammy said at the joint conference: “The scenes overnight, of the burning and the torching of buildings, of the Molotov cocktails thrown at cars, of the widespread rampage and chasing of people from their homes, is abhorrent, and I condemn it in the strongest of terms.”
French Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne said on Friday that he condemned the attack on a Palestinian village.
“We condemn this situation,” said Sejourne, speaking alongside his British counterpart Lammy at a news conference in Jerusalem, Israel.
UK foreign secretary says Israeli ministers hope ‘we are on the cusp of a deal’
Foreign Secretary David Lammy and French Foreign Minister Stéphane Séjourné, in a joint statement after meeting their Israeli counterparts, said they had been told they hope they are “on the cusp of a deal” to bring the conflict to an end.
Lammy said: “The reports out of Qatar suggests the first day of hostage talks has gone well and it has been important to listen to ministers here in Israel and hear too from them that they hope we are on the cusp of a deal.
“As we head now to 315 days of war the time for a deal – for those hostages to be returned, for aid to get in, in the quantities that are necessary in Gaza, and for the fighting to stop – is now.
“Of course that is the message that we have jointly underlined to ministers today, both in Israel and in the occupied territories.”
We are awaiting a joint statement from Foreign Secretary David Lammy, French Foreign Minister Stéphane Séjourné and Israel’s Foreign Minister Israel Katz and Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer.
The ministers have held a joint meeting as efforts to draw the conflict to a peaceful conclusion intensify.
People in Khan Younis and Deir al-Balah areas of Gaza ordered by IDF to leave
In our post at 9.14 BST we reported on orders by the Israeli army for people in northern Khan Younis and eastern Deir al-Balah to evacuate the area.
We now have more details on the order and the former humanitarian zones affected. They included al-Qarara, Muwasi, al-Galaa, Hamd City, and al-Nasr.
The IDF said it had asked people to evacuate by rolling out flyers, SMS messages, phone calls, Arabic broadcasts, and recorded voice messages.
“Due to significant acts of terrorism, the exploitation of the Humanitarian Area for terrorist activities, and the firing of rockets and mortars toward the State of Israel in the north of Khan Yunis, remaining in this area has become dangerous. Therefore, at this time the Humanitarian Area will be adjusted,” the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said on social media, as reported by the Associated Press news agency.
More now on those ceasefire talks taking place for the second day in Qatar today.
Hamas is not thought to be directly taking part, with diplomats from Qatar and Egypt engaged on their behalf.
Israel’s foreign minister is also set to meet with his counterparts from the UK and France to discuss preventing a escalation of the Middle East conflict.
Mediators have spent months trying to hammer out a three-phase plan in which Hamas would release scores of hostages captured in the 7 October attack in exchange for a lasting ceasefire, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza and the release of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel.
Full details below from The Guardian’s Jerusalem correspondent Bethan McKernan
Egypt’s foreign minister said Friday that an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip is needed to stop an escalation that could push the region into a wider war.
Badr Abdelaty’s comments in Beirut came as officials from Egypt, Qatar, Israel and the U.S. are holding talks in the Qatari capital of Doha in an attempt to end the war in Gaza.
“We confirm the importance of stopping the escalation and that the region does not slide to a comprehensive regional war,” Abdelaty told reporters after meeting with Lebanese Parliament speaker Nabih Berri, a key ally of Hezbollah.
“Egypt is exerting all possible efforts, as you know, to stop the escalation and to work to reach as much as possible an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip,” Abdelaty said.
Israeli foreign minister says he expects allies to attack Iran if it strikes
Israeli foreign minister Israel Katz told his French and British counterparts Friday that his country expects support “in attacking” Iran if it strikes Israel.
“If Iran attacks, we expect the coalition to join Israel not only in defence but also in attacking significant targets in Iran,” Katz told his French and UK counterparts during their visit to Israel.
Undertakers are working like bricklayers in a Gaza cemetery, piling cinder blocks into tight rectangles, side by side, for freshly dug graves.
More than 10 months into the Gaza war, so many bodies are arriving at the cemetery in Deir el-Balah that the men, working in the hot sun, hardly have space to bury them, AFP reports.
“The cemetery is so full that we now dig graves on top of other graves, we’ve piled the dead in levels,” says Saadi Hassan Barakeh, leading his team of gravediggers.
Barakeh, 63, has been burying the dead for 28 years. In “all the wars in Gaza”, he says he has “never seen this”.
Bethan McKernan
A Palestinian herding community in the occupied West Bank’s Jordan valley has been forced to abandon their village after attacks and harassment from newly installed Israeli settlers.
Around 10 settlers set up a tent “outpost” on top of a hill about 150m away from Um Jamal, or Ain al Jamal, on Monday, according to residents. Outposts – such as tents and caravans – are used by ideological and violent Israeli settlers to encroach on Palestinian communities before more permanent building can take place. They are illegal under Israeli law, and all Israeli settlement building is illegal under international law.
The settlers have entered the village every day since, threatening the Palestinians to leave, throwing stones, attempting to steal sheep and calling the army to displace them. The community made a group decision to leave on Thursday. The women and children left on Thursday night, and on Friday the men of the village dismantled and salvaged what they could and put the sheep and other animals in flatbed trucks.
Um Jamal is in Area C, the 60% of the West Bank under Israeli civil and military control, where most settlements are built. Palestinians living in Area C are not allowed to build without permits, which are difficult to obtain, and as a result many of their homes are considered illegal by Israel. They are usually not connected to the water or electricity grid, and often subject to demolition orders.
Um Jamal is located on private Palestinian land and land owned by the Catholic church, according to 2017 comments from a lawyer representing the community. Nineteen Palestinian communities in the West Bank have been forced to abandon their homes since 7 October, the largest displacement since the occupation began in 1967.
עין אל ג׳מאל.
נכבה 2024.
גירוש כתוצאה מהטרדות ואיומים של מתנחלים מהמאחז החדש שסמוך לקהילה. pic.twitter.com/ymL1ObvC9Z— Yehuda Shaul (@YehudaShaul) August 16, 2024
When Vice President Kamala Harris flies to Chicago next week to accept her party’s nomination for the presidency, she will be met head-on with voters protesting one of her thorniest electoral issues: the Biden administration’s aid to Israel.
A coalition of some 200 social justice organizations is going forward with their plan to march at the Democratic National Convention on Monday. Pro-Palestinian activists resent Biden’s administration for funding Israel during its war against Hamas.
Harris has surged in opinion polls since Biden’s July 21 withdrawal from the race. Hatem Abudayyeh, spokesperson for the March on the DNC coalition, said dozens of coalition group leaders met after Biden ended his campaign and discussed if they should change tack if Harris became the nominee.
“There was absolute consensus,” he recalled. “She represents the policies of the administration and it’s full steam ahead.”
Concerns over a wider conflict in the Middle East have prompted international airlines to suspend flights to the region or to avoid affected air space.
Some of the airlines that have adjusted services to and from the region include Aegean Airlines. The Greek airline cancelled all flights to and from Beirut, Amman and Tel Aviv until August 19. Algerian airline Air Algerie has also temporarily suspended flights to and from Lebanon until further notice.
Latvia’s airBaltic cancelled all flights to and from Tel Aviv until August 18, while Indian flag carrier Air India suspended scheduled flights to and from Tel Aviv until further notice.
Air France-KLM cancelled all flights to and from Tel Aviv until Oct. 26, but resumed service between Paris and Beirut on August 15 after a two-week suspension. The Franco-Dutch group’s low-cost unit Transavia cancelled flights to and from Tel Aviv until March 31, 2025, and flights to Amman until November 3.