Author: Steven Sahiounie

Pedro Arrojo Agudo, the UN special rapporteur on water and sanitation, has warned that lack of access to clean drinking water in Gaza could have just as devastating a humanitarian toll as the bombing of civilians. “At present, people have no clean water for drinking, so they have a small quantity of salinised and contaminated water,” he told Al Jazeera. “That means – particularly for children – [that] we can expect, and I’m sure there are, thousands of [cases of diarrhea] and other diseases.” He added that Article 7 of the Rome Statute stipulates that “cutting off civilians from basic…

Thousands of Palestinian children, women, elderly have been killed, almost all of Gaza destroyed due to Israel’s attacks, says Turkish leader If Türkiye and Germany jointly achieve a humanitarian cease-fire in the ongoing Israeli war in Gaza, the region can be rescued from the ring of fire, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday. Speaking at the joint news conference with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Berlin, Erdogan said 13,000 Palestinians – including children, women and elderly people – have been killed so far in the war and almost all of Gaza has been destroyed due to Israel’s attacks…

Colonel Elad Goren, a representative of COGAT, Israel’s military agency that coordinates administration of the occupied Palestinian territories, promised that all UN requests for more aid into Gaza would be met. “We will increase the capacity of the humanitarian convoys and trucks as long as there is a need,” he said. “Every list that we get from the UN will be delivered. We will check it and it will enter Gaza, so it’s up to the UN to give us those lists,” he said. “And if there is a need for 400 trucks, tomorrow there will be 400 trucks. We…

President Mahmoud Abbas instructed the government to intensify its work and contact with international bodies in order to ensure the entry of medical and relief assistance to the besieged Gaza Strip. The president stressed the need to work with international bodies to compel Israel to bring aid into Gaza and allow the transfer of the wounded from the Strip to hospitals in the West Bank and Jerusalem for further treatment. Source: WAFA

Speaking from inside al-Shifa Medical Complex in Gaza City, Dr Munir al-Bursh, a general director at the Ministry of Health, accused Israeli forces of taking 18 unburied bodies from the courtyard of the hospital to an unknown location. Al-Bursh said that hospital staff had been forced to dig mass graves inside the walls of the complex because it had become too dangerous to venture outside the walls as Israeli forces approached. Eighty-two corpses were buried there, but once the Israelis entered the complex, it then became too dangerous to bury more of the dead. He added that Israeli forces were…

The Vatican told the Reuters news agency that Pope Francis will meet next Wednesday with a delegation of Palestinians with family members in Gaza and with the families of captives being held in the enclave. The meetings will be separate. “With these meetings, which are of an exclusively humanitarian character, Pope Francis wants to show his spiritual closeness to the sufferings of both,” Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said. Pope Francis had earlier called for an end to the fighting in Gaza and has appealed for more aid to be allowed in. Source: alJazeera

Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani discussed the situation in Gaza and the occupied Palestinian territories in a call with US President Joe Biden, the Qatari Emiri Diwan said. The pair discussed “strategic relations between the two countries” and ways strengthen them, it added. A separate readout from the White House said the US and Qatari leaders also “discussed the urgent need for all hostages held by Hamas to be released without further delay”, as well as efforts to get more aid into Gaza and Israel’s decision to resume some fuel deliveries. The diwan also said Sheikh Tamim held a…

Paltel says the service restoration in some areas of the Gaza Strip comes after “a limited quantity of fuel” was delivered by UNRWA to operate the company’s main generators. “Service continuity depends on receiving fuel supply regularly,” the telecommunications firm said. Source: AlJazeera

Pro-Palestine protests continue around the world since outbreak of Israeli war on Gaza Strip on Oct. 7 Scores of academics and university staff in Istanbul protested on Friday against the ongoing Israeli war on the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7. The protest took place in front of Istanbul University and was organized by the Academics and Authors Association of Islamic Countries, the Jihan al-Ummah Solidarity and Cooperation Association, and Egitim-Bir-Sen, a teachers’ union. The protesters wore their academic dresses and held banners that read “Israel is a killer” and “The West’s stance is double standard.” They also chanted slogans like…

Moscow’s close relationship with Iran, a Hamas ally, and its pro-Palestinian stance signal a shift in Russia’s Middle East policy. Russian President Vladimir Putin has been criticized for delaying his response to the resistance’s operation on October 7th, blaming the US for the failed policy in the Middle East. “I think that many will agree with me that this is a clear example of the failed policy in the Middle East of the United States, which tried to monopolize the settlement process,” Putin told Iraq’s prime minister. According to Reuters, Western observers believe that Putin is using the war on Gaza…