Israel’s war on Gaza updates: ‘Humanity must prevail,’ says UN official

As the war enters its 12th month, here is the news on the latest Israeli attacks across Gaza.

To learn more about the demands of the family of the US activist killed in the West Bank, go here.

And follow along with all our coverage of Israel’s war on Gaza, here.

This live page will soon be closed. Here’s a quick look at the latest news:

• At least 31 Palestinians have been killed – including children and women – in the Gaza Strip on Saturday as Israel’s military relentlessly bombed northern, central and southern areas.
• An estimated 500,000 people hit the streets of Tel Aviv with 250,000 others around the country in what appears to be the largest mass demonstration demanding the government secure the release of captives in Gaza.
• Prime Minister Najib Mikati denounced Israel’s deadly attack on firefighters, saying that “this new aggression against Lebanon is a blatant violation of international laws … and human values”.
• Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says Islamic countries should form an alliance against what he called “the growing threat of expansionism” from Israel.
• Palestinian photographer Mahmud Hams won the prestigious Visa d’Or News prize for his coverage of Israel’s devastating war on Gaza.

Miko Peled, from the Palestine House of Freedom, says that the large protests in Israel will not have a tangible effect on the war on Gaza because the fundamental demand to stop the mass killing of Palestinians is absent.

“It’s a group within Israeli society that doesn’t like Netanyahu’s policies and has been trying to push him away but his majority in the Knesset is solid, his support from the right is solid, and really, if these protesters were serious about releasing the hostages, they would focus on ending the mass killing of Palestinians,” he said.

“Since there’s no real concern being expressed for the fate and safety and security of Palestinians who are being butchered by the tens of thousands in Gaza and the West Bank. I don’t believe these protests are serious.

“It’s absurd to ask the perpetrator of a genocide for a ceasefire. The asks are the wrong asks. The premise for the negotiations is the wrong premise. There has to be an absolute clear demand to end the killing of Palestinians. Nothing short of that is going to bring about any change,” Peled told Al Jazeera.

Prime Minister Najib Mikati demanded an urgent meeting with Western ambassadors after a deadly Israeli attack on Civil Defence personnel in southern Lebanon.

“Based on the principle that the Israeli enemy disregards international laws and norms, I have called for an urgent meeting with Western ambassadors and representatives of international organizations at the government palace on Monday,” he said in a statement.

The aim of the meeting is “to hold everyone accountable for stopping the ongoing Israeli aggression against Lebanon and to pressure the Israeli enemy, which ignores any law and continues to fuel its crimes against Lebanon and the Lebanese people”.

Earlier, three paramedics were killed and two others wounded in the attack, which hit a fire truck in southern Lebanon.

Tens of thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters gathered in London, reacting to UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy’s recent announcement to suspend 30 of 350 licences for arms exports to Israel.

However, for many people, the move falls far short. Many recall how, in 1982, then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher imposed a full arms embargo on Israel during the Lebanon war – a measure they feel should be replicated.

Alon Pinkas, a former Israeli diplomat, says he doesn’t believe the Netanyahu government plans to annex the entire West Bank during its latest military incursion because of the sticky issue of governance over the large Palestinian population.

But, he said, it’s clear the Israeli government is attempting to sideline the Palestinian Authority.

“This government is intent on weakening the Palestinian Authority. A few months ago – even though everyone stopped talking about it – there was a plan for post-war Gaza with the Palestinian Authority extending its governance from the West Bank,” Pinkas told Al Jazeera.

“With this [West Bank] operation, Israel is weakening the Palestinian Authority to the point where there’s not going to be anyone to negotiate with. And that is the grand plan that the government has.”

The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), a Gaza-based NGO, condemned an Israeli attack on the apartment of its administrative assistant Ihab Marwan Kamal Faisal.

The attack in northern Gaza City brought the building down on top residents, injuring Faisal, his wife and their two daughters. It killed two of his brother-in-laws, PCHR said.

Faisal lost two of his brothers during the war in October 2023 in a previous Israeli attack on a shelter for displaced people in the Nuseirat refugee camp.

“[Israeli forces] continue to target the remaining homes where civilians and displaced people have sought refuge, destroying them on top of their residents,” PCHR said.

🚨The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) strongly condemns the ongoing Israeli genocidal campaign against the #Gaza Strip and the airstrike on the apartment of our colleague, Ihab Marwan Kamal Faisal, PCHR’s administrative assistant, destroying it on top of its residents.… pic.twitter.com/Yw78SskCYB

— Palestinian Centre for Human Rights – PCHR (@pchrgaza) September 7, 2024

Earlier, we reported that at least eight people were killed and 20 wounded in an Israeli air attack on the Halimah al-Saadiyah School, which sheltered war-displaced Palestinians, in northern Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp.

More details have now emerged.

“The two missiles targeted a tent, not even a concrete building or a tunnel,” said witness Ahmed Abd Abbo. “We came down among all the people killed and were scared, including a woman preparing milk for her child.”

He asked for an explanation from Israel’s military as to why it would attack defenceless civilians. “Isn’t the siege, hunger and destruction we’ve experienced enough?”

Palestinian photographer Mahmud Hams has won the prestigious Visa d’Or News prize for his coverage of Israel’s devastating war on Gaza.

Hams, 44, has worked for France’s AFP news agency in the besieged Palestinian territory since 2003. He denounced the targeting of journalists during the conflict.

“I spent my childhood in Gaza and in 23 years of photojournalism, I have witnessed every war, every conflict there. But this war is unlike any other,” said Hams in a statement.

“Many journalists have been killed; others wounded. I’ve also lost friends and loved ones. We struggled to keep our families safe,” he said. “I hope the photos we take show the world that this war, and the suffering, must end.”

Eric Baradat, a deputy news director at AFP, paid tribute to Hams’s work.

“Mahmud and his colleagues, photographers and journalists from AFP in the Gaza Strip have carried out extraordinary work in every respect, considering the conditions in which they lived with their families and loved ones,” said Baradat.

“It is staggering and often unimaginable. Their testimony will be recorded in history.”

Yemen’s Houthi group said they shot down a US MQ-9 drone that was conducting hostile acts over the airspace of Marib governorate, the Iran-aligned group’s military spokesman Yahya Saree said.

We will share more details as we have them.

Since last November, the Houthis have been attacking Israel-linked ships in the Red Sea as an act of solidarity with Palestinians being killed in Gaza.

The Yemeni group also started attacking ships linked to the United States and United Kingdom after the two countries launched a military campaign in January to end the Houthis’ assaults on shipping lanes in the region.

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

This is in fact the largest protest in a single place in Israel’s history. Organisers say 500,000 are on the streets of Tel Aviv and 250,000 others are spread around the country, including West Jerusalem, Haifa, and Rishon LeZion.

This is a week of consecutive protests after the Israeli army announced it recovered the bodies of six captives in Gaza. That didn’t bode well with the Israeli public.

Families of captives are saying this is Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s fault, he has blood on his hands, and he’s the main impediment to why there hasn’t been a ceasefire deal yet.

The size of the demonstration just goes to show the level of frustration of family members, the Israeli public and the movement after 11 months of war.

Several Israeli settlers have stormed Khirbet Tuba in Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron, in the occupied West Bank.

Social media footage, verified by Al Jazeera’s fact-checking agency Sanad, showed verbal altercations between settlers and a Palestinian from Khirbet Tuba.

Israeli settler violence has intensified since the war on Gaza began.

This past week, the US imposed sanctions on an Israeli settler group over attacks against Palestinians in the occupied territory.

A general strike and massive protests have taken place in Tel Aviv this week after the bodies of six Israeli captives were found in a Gaza tunnel by Israeli forces.

Huge numbers of protesters are calling for Netanyahu to sign a deal to return the remaining captives.

What do these protests signify about the growing calls and pressure for a ceasefire agreement in Israel?

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati denounced Israel’s deadly attack on paramedics, saying “this new aggression against Lebanon is a blatant violation of international laws … and human values”.

The Amal Movement, a Hezbollah ally, said two of its members were among the dead. It said they were killed “while carrying out their humanitarian and national duty defending Lebanon and the south”.

A statement from Lebanese Health Minister Firass Abiad said that “due to [Israeli] aggression”, 27 emergency personnel and health workers have been killed and 94 others wounded since October.

Two hospitals and 21 health centres have been “targeted”, while 32 fire or ambulance vehicles have been “put out of service or partially damaged”. It urged an end to the “repeated and deliberate targeting of health workers and civilians”.

The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) condemned the recent actions of Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank, including the killing of 26-year-old Turkish-American activist Aysenur Ezgi Eygi.

Eygi was killed during a peaceful demonstration against Israeli settlement policies in Beita, south of Nablus. The OIC also denounced the shooting death of 13-year-old Bana Amjad Bakr during Israeli settler attacks on the village of Qarqout, south of Nablus.

The organisation said the incidents violated international laws and norms, and called for the formation of an independent international commission to investigate them.

The OIC also emphasised the need for the international community, especially the UN Security Council, to enforce its resolutions, including for a ceasefire in Gaza.

Israel has overseen a deadly and destructive 10-day military operation in the occupied West Bank.

As international law and global media have fallen short in holding the Israelis to account during 11 months of what many term to be genocide in Gaza, what hopes do the Palestinians have that outcomes will be any different in the West Bank?

Israeli air raids killed at least 31 people on Saturday as health workers wrapped up the second phase of an urgent polio vaccination campaign designed to prevent a large-scale outbreak.

Sources told A Jazeera that three women and two children were killed in Gaza’s central Nuseirat refugee camp because of Israeli shelling.

Separately, Gaza’s civil defence agency said an Israeli attack targeting a school-turned-shelter for displaced Palestinians killed at least eight people. Twenty people were wounded in the strike on the Amr Ibn al-Aas School in the Abu Iskandar area of the Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood in northern Gaza City.

Read more here.