Germany to resume working with Unrwa after UN report found Israel yet to supply evidence to back terror claims
The German government plans to resume cooperation with the UN agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) in Gaza, Reuters reports its foreign and development ministries said in a joint statement on Wednesday.
The decision follows an investigation by the former French foreign minister Catherine Colonna into whether significant numbers of Unrwa employees have Hamas or Islamic Jihad ties. The review of the agency’s neutrality on Monday concluded Israel had yet to back up its accusations.
The German ministries urged UNRWA to swiftly implement the report’s recommendations, including strengthening its internal audit function and improving external oversight of project management.
“In support of these reforms, the German government will soon continue its cooperation with Unrwa in Gaza, as Australia, Canada, Sweden and Japan, among others, have already done,” said the ministries in the statement.
Israeli foreign ministry spokesperson Oren Marmorstein on Monday accused more than 2,135 Unrwa workers of being members of Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad. He claimed the Colonna review of Unrwa was insufficient and an “effort to avoid the problem.”
The US, which was formerly Unrwa’s largest donor, has ruled out resuming funding until March 2025 at the earliest.
Key events
Israel’s military has issued a statement to say it is “currently striking Hezbollah terror targets in southern Lebanon.”
More details soon …
Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani has criticised US authorities for its clampdown on students protesting against Israel’s actions in Gaza.
The Islamic Republic News agency (IRNA) quotes him saying:
News reports related to the widespread suppression and arrest of students from American universities by the police in this country because of their support for the Palestinian people are a violent breach of the right to vote, freedom of expression, and human rights, causing concern among public opinion worldwide.
It is necessary for the US government, while adhering to its human rights obligations, to guarantee the freedom of expression and assembly of university students and professors and to respect their legal demands and rights.
Police arrested about 150 protesters at pro-Palestinian demonstrations at Yale and New York University on Monday night, while Columbia University announced that classes would be taught remotely for the rest of the semester, as anger boiled over after more than 100 arrests there last week. Hundreds of Jewish anti-war demonstrators have also been arrested during a Passover seder that doubled as a protest in New York.
A report by Amnesty International late in 2023 said that Iran had arrested more than 19,000 people, and at least 500 protesters have been killed when protests spread across the country after the death in custody of a 22-year-old Kurdish woman, Mahsa Amini, in September 2022 following her detention for allegedly breaking the country’s dress code.
In the UK, MPs on the business and trade committee are holding a one-off session on arms exports to Israel, six months after the war in Gaza began. You can watch it here …
The Israeli military has said it is deploying two reserve brigades for missions in the Gaza Strip.
Associated Press reports that in a statement, the Israeli military said the brigades would be involved in “defensive and tactical missions” in Gaza, without elaborating.
The military said the brigades had previously been operating along Israel’s northern border, where Hezbollah and Israeli forces have been repeatedly exchanging fire since 7 October.
Israel’s defence ministry has bought 40,000 tents, each with the capacity for 10 to 12 people, for Palestinians relocated from Rafah, Israeli government sources have told Reuters.
Government sources told the news agency prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s war cabinet planned to meet in the coming two weeks to authorise civilian evacuations – expected to take around a month – as the first stage of the Rafah sweep.
Israel claims Rafah is home to four intact Hamas combat battalions which have been reinforced by thousands of retreating fighters.
Israel’s defence ministry declined to make an official comment. Netanyahu’s office also had no immediate official comment.
An Israeli government minister has said he would rather vote for Donald Trump than Joe Biden in the forthcoming US presidential election.
Speaking to Israel’s public broadcaster Kan, Amichai Chikli, who is the diaspora affairs minister and a member of Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party, said Biden is “subject to very heavy pressure that influences him, and causes real damage to relations” between the US and Israel.
Haaretz reports that Chikli noted Biden’s current policy is not allowing Israel to operate as it would like in Rafah.
“I don’t think the US, under his leadership, radiates power, and this is something that hurts the state of Israel,” Chikli is quoted as saying.
He also, in an apparent reference to pro-Palestinian student protests at US university campuses, decried what he described as “‘Woke culture’, which divides the world into oppressors and oppressed. Israel and the white man are the oppressors, and the Palestinians are the most oppressed.”
The Biden administration has just passed a bill for $26.3bn in military aid for Israel and humanitarian relief for civilians in conflict zones, including Gaza. Local authorities have claimed that over 34,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel’s military action in Gaza since 7 October.
In its latest operational update on its activities inside the Gaza Strip, Israel has claimed to have struck “over 50 targets” and destroyed two rocket launch posts in southern Gaza. The claims have not been independently verified.
Germany to resume working with Unrwa after UN report found Israel yet to supply evidence to back terror claims
The German government plans to resume cooperation with the UN agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) in Gaza, Reuters reports its foreign and development ministries said in a joint statement on Wednesday.
The decision follows an investigation by the former French foreign minister Catherine Colonna into whether significant numbers of Unrwa employees have Hamas or Islamic Jihad ties. The review of the agency’s neutrality on Monday concluded Israel had yet to back up its accusations.
The German ministries urged UNRWA to swiftly implement the report’s recommendations, including strengthening its internal audit function and improving external oversight of project management.
“In support of these reforms, the German government will soon continue its cooperation with Unrwa in Gaza, as Australia, Canada, Sweden and Japan, among others, have already done,” said the ministries in the statement.
Israeli foreign ministry spokesperson Oren Marmorstein on Monday accused more than 2,135 Unrwa workers of being members of Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad. He claimed the Colonna review of Unrwa was insufficient and an “effort to avoid the problem.”
The US, which was formerly Unrwa’s largest donor, has ruled out resuming funding until March 2025 at the earliest.
Nina Lakhani
Hundreds of Jewish anti-war demonstrators have been arrested during a Passover seder that doubled as a protest in New York, as they shut down a major thoroughfare to pray for a ceasefire and urge the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, to end US military aid to Israel.
The 300 or so arrests took place on Tuesday night on the doorstep of Schumer’s Brooklyn residence, where thousands of mostly Jewish New Yorkers gathered for the seder, a ritual that marked the second night of the holiday celebrated as a festival of freedom by Jews worldwide.
The seder came just before the US Senate resoundingly passed a military package that includes $26bn for Israel.
The protesters called on Schumer – who is among a minority of Democrats to recently criticize the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu – to stop arming Israel’s military, which relies heavily on US weapons, jet fuel and other military equipment.
Read more of Nina Lakhani’s report here: ‘Not like other Passovers’: hundreds of Jewish demonstrators arrested after New York protest seder
Al Jazeera reports there is “‘continuous’ Israeli artillery shelling of Gaza’s northern Beit Lahiya, Beit Hanoon and Jabalia neighbourhoods” and that “Three members of a family in southern Gaza’s Rafah have been killed and four wounded after an Israeli military strike hit their home.”
Lauren Gambino in Washington and Joan E Greve report for the Guardian
The US Senate overnight voted resoundingly to approve $95bn in aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, as a bipartisan super-majority united to send the long-stalled package to Joe Biden’s desk for signature.
“Today the Senate sends a unified message to the entire world: America will always defend democracy in its hour of need,” said Chuck Schumer in a floor speech.
The legislation includes $26.3bn for Israel and humanitarian relief for civilians in conflict zones, including Gaza.
Israel’s foreign minister, Israel Katz, reacted to its portion of the funding, saying it sent a “strong message” to the country’s enemies.
In the UK, there has been an ongoing row about a short filmed clip of police responding to Gideon Falter, chief executive of the Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA), attempting to cross the road while a pro-Palestinian protest is taking place.
For our First Edition newsletter this morning, Archie Bland has spoken to Alan Finlayson, UEA professor of political theory, about what the clip, and its use online and by the wider media, tells us about protest politics in the digital age. You can read that here.
Israel’s military has issued a statement on its official Telegram channel to say that yesterday it struck at multiple targets inside Lebanon.
It said the strikes were in response to a “number of launches [that] were identified crossing from Lebanese territory that fell in open areas in the area of Shomera.”
It claims its jets “struck terror infrastructure”, “a military compound” and “a Hezbollah observation post”.
The claims have not been independently verified.
US envoy says risk of famine in Gaza ‘very high’ despite some progress from Israel
David Satterfield, the US special envoy for humanitarian issues, has said the risk of famine in northern Gaza remains “very high” despite an increase in the amount of aid being admitted to the territory.
“Israel has taken significant steps in these last two and a half weeks,” Reuters reports Satterfield told the media. “There is still considerable work to be done. But progress has been made.”
The UN has long complained of obstacles to getting aid in and distributing it throughout Gaza in the six months since Israel began an aerial and ground offensive in the territory.
For its part, Israel has repeatedly insisted that more aid could get in, but that it wasn’t being supplied fast enough for Israel to check it. Israel inspects all shipments entering Gaza, and has a list of prohibited items which it considers might have a dual military and civilian use.
Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa), said that a peak number of over 300 trucks was absle to enter on Monday, still well short of the 500 that Unrwa says is the target.
Some good news for #Gaza
Yesterday, more than 310 trucks of aid entered.
This is the highest # since the war began on 7 October.
This shows that when there is a will there is a way.It needs now to be sustained & further increased.
Trucks should include both commercial and… pic.twitter.com/n0IsgH1VyK— Philippe Lazzarini (@UNLazzarini) April 23, 2024
Welcome and summary
Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s continuing coverage of the crisis in the Middle East.
The US special envoy for humanitarian issues has said Israel has taken significant steps in recent weeks on allowing aid into Gaza, but considerable work remained to be done as the risk of famine in the enclave is very high.
David Satterfield declined to say whether Washington was satisfied by Israel’s moves, weeks after US President Joe Biden demanded action to alleviate the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, saying conditions could be placed on support for Israel if it did not implement a series of “specific, concrete and measurable” steps.
The risk of famine throughout war-devastated Gaza, especially in the north, is “very high”, Satterfield said, calling for more to be done to get aid to those in need in that part of the tiny, densely populated Palestinian territory.
More on that in a moment, first here’s a summary of the day’s other main news.
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At Nasser hospital, southern Gaza’s main health facility, authorities are reported to have recovered a further 35 bodies in the past day from what they say is one of at least three mass graves found at the site, taking the total found there to 310 in the past week.
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UN rights chief Volker Turk said he was “horrified” by the destruction of the Nasser and al-Shifa medical facilities in Gaza and the reports of mass graves discovered there. Turk decried Israeli strikes on Gaza in recent days, which he said have killed mostly women and children. He also repeated a warning against a full-scale incursion on Rafah, the southernmost city in Gaza, where more than one million people are sheltering, saying this could lead to “further atrocity crimes”.
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Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah group said it had launched a drone attack against Israeli military bases north of the city of Acre, in its deepest strike into Israeli territory since Israel’s war in Gaza began in October. The Israeli military said it had no knowledge of any of its facilities being hit by Hezbollah, but had said earlier on Tuesday that it intercepted two “aerial targets” off Israel’s northern coast. Hezbollah said it acted in retaliation for an earlier Israeli attack killing one of its fighters.
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Qatar said there was no reason to end the presence of an office for Hamas in Doha while its mediation efforts continued amid Israel’s war in Gaza. It came after the US state department said Hamas “moved the goalpost” and changed its demands in negotiations with Israel. But it’s not clear what exactly has shifted in the details of the talks, which are being mediated by Egypt and Qatar.
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A Palestinian rights group’s legal challenge to try to stop British arms exports to Israel over allegations of breaches of international law in the war in Gaza will be heard in October at London’s high court, a judge ruled on Tuesday.
