Philippe Lazzarini says staff report shortages of water, food and medical care with bodies left under rubble or on roads after three weeks of bombardments

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LIVE Updated 18m ago

• 18m agoFour children among 18 killed after Israeli strike near Beirut hospital, ministry says
• 1h agoFBI investigating leak of documents alleging Israel's plans to attack Iran
• 2h agoNo UK arms exports that could 'violate humanitarian law' are now going to the IDF - minister
• 2h agoAt least 45 people killed by Israeli forces in Gaza since this morning - report
• 3h agoBenjamin Netanyahu holds talks with Antony Blinken in Jerusalem
• 3h agoHezbollah claims responsibility for drone attack targeting Netanyahu's home last week
• 3h agoSummary of the day so far...
• 5h agoThe smell of death is everywhere in northern Gaza after 'non-stop Israeli bombardments', Unrwa chief says
• 6h agoDeath toll in Gaza reaches 42,718, says health ministry
• 6h agoAirlines that have suspended flights as Middle East tensions rise
• 7h agoOfficials raise death toll to 13 killed in Israel airstrike near Beirut hospital
• 8h agoUS secretary of state lands in Tel Aviv for talks with Israeli leaders
• 9h agoAir raid sirens sound in Tel Aviv after Hezbollah claims to have targeted Israeli city
• 9h agoOpening summary

Tom Ambrose (now); Yohannes Lowe and Philip Wen (earlier)Tue 22 Oct 2024 15.39 BSTShareThe Guardian’s expert news coverage is funded by people like you, not a billionaire owner. Will you help us keep our independent journalism free and open to all today?Support usShow key events onlyFrom 5h ago11.25 BST

The smell of death is everywhere in northern Gaza after 'non-stop Israeli bombardments', Unrwa chief says

Philippe Lazzarini, the commissioner general of the UN relief agency for Palestinians, Unrwa, has described the toll of three weeks of “non-stop” Israeli bombardments on northern Gaza.

He said his staff are reporting shortages of water, food and medical care, with the “smell of death” everywhere across the territory because dead bodies are being left under rubble or lying on the roads.

“Missions to clear the bodies or provide humanitarian assistance are denied. In northern Gaza, people are just waiting to die. They feel deserted, hopeless and alone. They live from one hour to the next, fearing death at every second,” Lazzarini said in a post on X.

He called for an “immediate truce” even if just for a few hours to enable Palestinian families to flee safely without being killed by Israeli bombardments. “This is the bare minimum to save the lives of civilians who have nothing to do with this conflict,” Lazzarini said.

Unrwa provides education, health and aid to millions of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, the occupied West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon, with the agency acting as the backbone of aid operations in Gaza since last October.

Sweeping evacuation orders for the estimated 400,000 people still living in the northern third of the territory, the blockage of aid and food deliveries and the targeting of civilian infrastructure have led to accusations that Israel is committing the war crime of seeking to forcibly displace the remaining population.

ShareUpdated at 11.39 BST18m ago15.39 BST

Four children among 18 killed after Israeli strike near Beirut hospital, ministry says

At least 18 people were killed, including four children, and 60 were wounded in an Israeli strike on Monday near Beirut’s main government hospital, the health ministry said on Tuesday.

Israeli jets hit a Hezbollah target close to the Rafik Hariri university hospital in Beirut but did not target the hospital and it was not affected by the strike, the Israeli military said on Tuesday.

However, the director of the hospital said that due to the Israeli attack, nearby debris, probably from heavy ammunition, had caused damage to the medical facility, Reuters reported.

While there were no casualties among the staff, efforts to rescue people in front of the hospital were ongoing, the director, Jihad Saadeh, added.

Share36m ago15.21 BST

Israel is unlikely to make a “significant move” against Tehran but could instead mount a symbolic limited attack, Revolutionary Guards cultural and social commander Mohammad Ali Jafari said on Tuesday, according to the Iranian Student News Network.

Israel is widely thought to be planning retaliation for a missile barrage launched by Iran on 1 October.

“Israel is too small to be able to attack Iran, although it may carry out a desperate, limited, and small attack to say it has retaliated, but it will definitely not carry out an offensive [strike] similar to ours,” said Jafari, the former commander in chief of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards.

He added that Iran’s response would depend on the intensity of Israel’s retaliation, and that if Israel ended up carrying out a significant attack, Iran would respond with a higher-intensity offensive against Israel.

Share1h ago14.47 BST

Israeli police said they had arrested seven Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem who planned to assassinate an Israeli scientist and a city mayor on orders from Iran, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.

In a statement, the police said:

The Shin Bet and the Central Investigations Unit of the Jerusalem district police arrested seven residents from the Beit Safafa neighbourhood in Jerusalem.

These individuals, under Iranian direction, planned to assassinate a senior Israeli scientist and a mayor of a major Israeli city.

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The conflict in the Middle East continues to destroy countless lives. The scenes since 7 October from Gaza and Israel have haunted millions around the world and the crisis is being felt with an increasing intensity in Lebanon and the West Bank. 

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1h ago14.30 BST

FBI investigating leak of documents alleging Israel's plans to attack Iran

The FBI is investigating the leak of a pair of highly classified intelligence documents describing Israel’s preparations for a retaliatory strike on Iran, the Washington Post reports.

“The FBI is investigating the alleged leak of classified documents and working closely with our partners in the Department of Defense and Intelligence Community,” the FBI said in a statement. “As this is an ongoing investigation, we have no further comment.”

My colleagues Richard Luscombe and Dan Sabbagh have the below detail on the leaked documents (included in this story):

The documents are attributed to the US Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency. They are written in a style similar to documents previously leaked from the Pentagon, using classifications familiar to the national security community.

The first document has the title “Israel: air force continues preparations for strike on Iran and conducts a second large-force employment exercise” and the second “Israel: defense forces continue key munitions preparations and covert UAV activity almost certainly for a strike on Iran”. Both are dated 16 October and were first leaked a day later.

Share2h ago14.19 BST

No UK arms exports that could 'violate humanitarian law' are now going to the IDF - minister

Patrick Wintour

Patrick Wintour is diplomatic editor for the Guardian

Anneliese Dodds, the British Foreign Office minister, said no UK arms exports are now going to the Israel Defense Forces as she sought to clarify the significance of the UK government decision in September to suspend only 30 of the 300 arms exports licences to Israel.

Speaking in the Commons, she also described the amount of aid reaching Gaza in October as unacceptable, and likely to be the lowest amount for a single month since the conflict began. But she did not set out any specific measures apart from diplomatic pressure to ensure a change.

In what the minister saw as a clarification, she told MPs:

Following the 2 September decision there are currently no extant UK export licences for items to Israel that we assess might be used to commit or facilitate serious violations of UK humanitarian law.

She said the only one exception is UK supplied components for F35s joint strike fighter program.

She added that “most licences for exports to Israel are absolutely not for the Israel Defense Forces and I am pleased to put that on the record”.

She added later there had been misconceptions about the arms exports that have not been suspended.

At the time of the September statement, the Foreign Office said:

There are a number of export licences which we have assessed are not for military use in the current conflict in Gaza and therefore do not require suspension.

These include items that are not being used by the IDF in the current conflict (such as trainer aircraft or other naval equipment), and other, non-military items. Export licences cover a range of products including things such as food-testing chemicals, telecoms and data equipment.

The Foreign Office has so far refused to publish a list of the suspended and non suspended arms export licences, or their customers.

ShareUpdated at 14.21 BST2h ago14.02 BST

At least 45 people killed by Israeli forces in Gaza since this morning - report

Medical sources have told Al Jazeera that at least 45 people have been killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza since the morning, of which 37 were killed in the northern part of the Strip, where there is a renewed three-week-old Israeli offensive.

Philippe Lazzarini, the head of Unrwa, the UN’s Palestinian refugee agency, said the humanitarian situation had reached a dire point and called for an “immediate truce” to allow civilians to flee elsewhere.

“In northern Gaza, people are just waiting to die. They feel deserted, hopeless and alone,” he said in a statement on X. “I am calling for an immediate truce, even if for a few hours, to enable safe humanitarian passage for families who wish to leave the area & reach safer places.”

Share2h ago13.45 BST

The Lebanese Red Cross said three paramedics have been injured in an airstrike on south Lebanon while on a rescue mission coordinated with UN peacekeepers.

Four ambulance teams were dispatched to the southern city of Nabatieh in coordination with Unifil after a strike there, the Lebanese Red Cross said, adding that “the site was bombed again and three … volunteers were injured and are being transported to hospital”.

Share2h ago13.28 BST

Israel’s army on Tuesday called on residents of a southern Beirut suburb to evacuate ahead of operations targeting what it claims to be Hezbollah’s facilities in the area.

“For your safety and the safety of your family, you must evacuate these buildings and the surrounding ones immediately and move at least 500 meters (yards) away,” the army’s Arabic-language spokesperson Avichay Adraee wrote on X alongside a map showing two specific buildings to be targeted.

Updated at 13.37 BST

Benjamin Netanyahu holds talks with Antony Blinken in Jerusalem

Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu held talks with Antony Blinken in Jerusalem on Tuesday, after the US secretary of state arrived in the country to push for an end to the war in Gaza.

“Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is currently meeting in his office in Jerusalem with US secretary of state Antony Blinken”, the Israeli leader’s office said in a statement.

Updated at 13.42 BST

A Hezbollah spokesperson has acknowledged that some of the militant group’s fighters were captured by the Israeli army without giving numbers, adding that Israel “bears responsibility” for their lives.

“On the issue of captives currently held by the enemy, I say: I know that the enemy is not committed to the ethics of war and international conventions but it bears the responsibility of preserving the lives of the captives,” spokesperson Mohammed Afif told reporters, calling on the International Committee of the Red Cross to ascertain their safety.

Updated at 13.38 BST

Israeli jets hit a Hezbollah target close to the Rafik Hariri university hospital in Beirut late on Monday but did not target the hospital and it was not affected by the strike, the Israeli military said on Tuesday.

During a press conference on Tuesday, the director of the hospital, Jihad Saadeh, said Beirut’s main government medical facility had sustained damage due to an Israeli attack nearby.

“We were subject to an attack yesterday. Whether it was targeted or not, we don’t know, but Israel has no red lines,” Saadeh said.

He said debris, likely from heavy ammunition, damaged the hospital’s solar panels and front facade and shattered its windows. While there were no casualties among the staff, efforts to rescue people in front of the hospital were ongoing.

“We won’t evacuate the hospital following the targeting of hospitals in Dahiyeh – we are the only one left,” Saadeh said.

Updated at 14.02 BST

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