World
China sends its youngest-ever crew to space as it seeks to put astronauts on moon before 2030
China launched its youngest-ever crew for its orbiting space station on Thursday as it seeks to put astronauts on the moon before 2030.
The Shenzhou 17 spacecraft lifted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on the edge of the Gobi Desert in northwestern China atop a Long March 2-F rocket at 11:14 a.m. (0314 GMT)
According to the China Manned Space Agency, the average age of the three-member crew is the youngest since the launch of the space station construction mission, state broadcaster CCTV earlier reported. Their average age is 38, state media China Daily said.
Read: Humanitarian crisis deepens in Myanmar: UN expert
Beijing is pursuing plans to place astronauts on the moon before the end of the decade amid a rivalry with the U.S. for reaching new milestones in outer space. This reflects the competition for influence between the world's two largest economies in the technology, military and diplomatic fields.
The trio — Tang Hongbo, Tang Shengjie and Jiang Xinlin — will replace a crew that has been on the station for six months. Tang is a veteran who led a 2021 space mission for three months.
The new crew will conduct experiments in space medicine, space technology and other areas during their mission and will help install and maintain the equipment inside and outside the station, the agency said.
On Wednesday, the agency also announced plans to send a new telescope to probe deep into the universe. CCTV said the telescope would enable surveys and mapping of the sky, but no timeframe was given for the installation.
Read: India conducts space flight test ahead of planned mission to take astronauts into space in 2025
China has researched the movement of stars and planets for thousands of years while in modern times, it has pushed to become a leader in space exploration and science.
It built its own space station after it was excluded from the International Space Station, largely due to U.S. concerns over the control of the program by the People’s Liberation Army, the military branch of the ruling Communist Party.
China’s first manned space mission in 2003 made it the third country after the former Soviet Union and the U.S. to put a person into space using its own resources.
American spending, supply chains and capabilities are believed to give it a significant edge over China, at least for now. China has broken out in some areas, however, bringing samples back from the lunar surface for the first time in decades and landing a rover on the less explored far side of the moon.
The U.S., meanwhile, aims to put astronauts back on the lunar surface by the end of 2025 as part of a renewed commitment to crewed missions, aided by private sector players such as SpaceX and Blue Origin.
Read: Chinese President Xi announces major steps to support high-quality Belt and Road cooperation
In addition to their lunar programs, the two countries have also separately landed rovers on Mars, and China plans to follow the U.S. in landing a spacecraft on an asteroid.
At least 16 dead in Maine shooting and dozens injured: Law enforcement officials
A man opened fire at a bowling alley and a bar in Lewiston, Maine, on Wednesday night, killing at least 16 people and engulfing the state's second-largest city in chaos. The suspect remained at large as authorities ordered residents and business owners to stay inside and off the streets.
Two law enforcement officials told The Associated Press dozens of people also had been wounded. The officials were not authorized to publicly discuss details of the ongoing investigation and spoke to AP on condition of anonymity.
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Lewiston Police said in an earlier Facebook post that they were dealing with an active shooter incident at Schemengees Bar and Grille and Sparetime Recreation, a bowling alley about 4 miles (6,4 kilometers) away. The Androscoggin County Sheriff’s Office released two photos of the suspect on its Facebook page that showed a gunman walking into an establishment with a weapon raised to his shoulder.
“Please stay off the roads to allow emergency responders access to the hospitals,” police said.
On its website, Central Maine Medical Center said staff were “reacting to a mass casualty, mass shooter event” and were coordinating with area hospitals to take in patients. A woman who answered the phone in the emergency department said no further information could be released and that the hospital itself was on lockdown.
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Melinda Small, the owner of Legends Sports Bar and Grill, said her staff immediately locked their doors and moved all 25 customers and employees away from the doors after a customer reported hearing about the shooting at the bowling alley less than a quarter-mile away around 7 p.m. Soon, the police flooded the roadway and a police officer eventually escorted everyone out of the building four at a time. Everyone in the bar is safe.
“I am honestly in a state of shock. I am blessed that my team responded quickly and everyone is safe,” Small told The Associated Press. “But the same time, my heart is broken for this area and for what everyone is dealing with. I just feel numb.”
The alert for Lewiston was made shortly after 8 p.m. as the sheriff's office reported that law enforcement agencies were investigating “two active shooter events.” Officials issued an update around 10 p.m. for what they described as a manhunt.
Gunman kills 3 people in twin Rotterdam shootings
"Avoid the area until authorities give the all-clear,” the statement said. “Seek alternative routes to circumvent the area and any disruptions. If already operating in the affected region, adhere to all instructions issued by local officials, including the shelter-in-place order.”
“We are encouraging all businesses to lock down and or close while we investigate,” the sheriff's office reported.
A spokesperson for Maine Department of Public Safety urged residents to stay in their homes with their doors locked.
“Law enforcement is currently investigating at two locations right now," Shannon Moss said. "Again please stay off the streets and allow law enforcement to diffuse the situation.”
Gov. Janet Mills released a statement echoing those instructions. She said she has been briefed on the situation and will remain in close contact with public safety officials. The White House said President Joe Biden also had been briefed.
Lewiston, about 35 miles (56 kilometers) north of Portland, emerged as a major center for African immigration into Maine. The Somali population, which numbers in the thousands, has changed the demographics of the once overwhelmingly white mill city into one of the most diverse in northern New England.
Ange Amores, a spokesperson for the city of Lewiston, said city officials are not commenting on the shooting. Amores said Maine State Police were planning to hold a news conference, likely at city hall, to update the public on Wednesday night.
Maine Sen. Angus King, an independent, said he was “deeply sad for the city of Lewiston and all those worried about their family, friends and neighbors” and was monitoring the situation. King’s office said the senator would be headed directly home to Maine once the Senate’s final vote is held Thursday afternoon.
Death toll of Palestinians from Israeli airstrikes on Gaza approximates 5,800: Hamas-run Health Ministry
The death toll of Palestinians from Israeli airstrikes on the Gaza Strip has risen to 5,791, the Hamas-run Health Ministry said on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, 16,297 Palestinians were wounded in the coastal enclave, the ministry said in a statement.
Read: Israel vows again to destroy Hamas, rejecting calls for a cease-fire in Gaza at a major UN meeting
The Israeli airstrikes were triggered by a large-scale Hamas attack on Israeli military targets and towns on Oct. 7, which has so far killed at least 1,400 people in Israel.
Read: Hamas frees two Israeli women as US advises delaying ground war to allow talks on captives
Leader of Lebanon's Hezbollah holds talks with senior Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad figures
The leader of Lebanon’s Hezbollah group held talks on Wednesday with senior Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad figures in a key meeting of three top anti-Israel militant groups amid the war raging in Gaza.
A brief statement following the meeting said that Hezbollah's leader Hassan Nasrallah agreed with Hamas' Saleh al-Arouri and Islamic Jihad's leader Ziad al-Nakhleh on the next steps that the three — along with other Iran-backed militants — should take at this “sensitive stage."
Read: Israel vows again to destroy Hamas, rejecting calls for a cease-fire in Gaza at a major UN meeting
Their goal, according to the statement that was carried on Hezbollah-run and Lebanese state media, was to achieve “a real victory for the resistance in Gaza and Palestine” and halt Israel's "treacherous and brutal aggression against our oppressed and steadfast people in Gaza and the West Bank”.
No other details were provided. The discussions in Beirut came as the war between Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that rules the Gaza Strip, is now in its third week. The fighting, triggered by Hamas' deadly incursion into Israel on Oct. 7 that killed more than 1,400 people in Israel, has killed more than 5,700 Palestinians in Gaza.
As the Gaza death toll spirals, tensions have also been rising along the tense Lebanon-Israel border, where Hezbollah members have been exchanging fire with Israeli troops since the day after Hamas' rampage into Israel.
Read: Israeli airstrikes surge in Gaza, killing dozens at a time in destroyed homes, witnesses say
For now, those exchanges remain limited to a handful of border towns and Hezbollah and Israeli military positions on both sides. Lebanese army soldiers and United Nations peacekeeping forces have deployed in large numbers.
Dozens of Hezbollah fighters have been killed in the clashes so far, the group says, while the Israeli military has also announced some deaths among its ranks.
Nasrallah has yet to publicly speak about the war in Gaza and clashes along the Lebanon-Israel border. However, other Hezbollah top officials have warned Israel against its planned ground invasion into the besieged territory.
Israeli officials have said they would retaliate aggressively in case of a cross-border attack by Hezbollah from Lebanon.
Read: 40 years after bombing that killed Americans in Beirut, US troops again deploy east of Mediterranean
“We will cripple it with a force it cannot even imagine, and the consequences for it and the Lebanese state (will be) devastating," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said while visiting Israeli troops along the border with Lebanon on Sunday.
Lebanon's cash-strapped caretaker government, along regional and international figures, has been scrambling to keep the country out of the war.
Hezbollah and Israel fought a monthlong war in 2006 that ended in a tense stalemate. Israel sees Iran-backed Hezbollah as its most serious threat, estimating it has some 150,000 rockets and missiles aimed at Israel.
Israel vows again to destroy Hamas, rejecting calls for a cease-fire in Gaza at a major UN meeting
Israel vowed again to destroy Hamas, rejecting calls for a cease-fire from the U.N. chief, the Palestinians and many countries at a high-level U.N. meeting on Tuesday and declaring that the war in Gaza is not only its war but “the war of the free world.”
Israel’s Foreign Minister Eli Cohen also dismissed calls for “proportionality” in the country’s response to Hamas’ surprise attacks on Israel on Oct. 7 that killed 1,400 people and has since led to more than 5,700 Palestinian deaths in Gaza according to its Health Ministry.
“Tell me, what is a proportionate response for killing of babies, for rape (of) women and burn them, for beheading a child?” Cohen asked. “How can you agree to a cease-fire with someone who swore to kill and destroy your own existence?”
Read: Israeli airstrikes surge in Gaza, killing dozens at a time in destroyed homes, witnesses say
He told the U.N. Security Council that the proportionate response to the Oct. 7 massacre is “a total destruction to the last one of the Hamas,” calling the extremist group “the new Nazis.” He stressed: “It is not only Israel’s right to destroy Hamas. It’s our duty.”
Cohen called the Oct. 7 attacks “a wake-up call for the entire free world” against extremism, and he urged “the civilized world to stand united behind Israel to defeat Hamas.”
And he warned that today it is Israel, and tomorrow Hamas and the attackers “will be at everyone’s doorstep,” starting with the West.
Cohen also accused Qatar of financing Hamas and said the fate of the more than 200 hostages taken from Israel, some of whose families came to the U.N. meeting, was in the hands of its emir.
Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki demanded an end to the Israeli attacks.
Read: 40 years after bombing that killed Americans in Beirut, US troops again deploy east of Mediterranean
“We are here today to stop the killing, to stop … the ongoing massacres being deliberately and systematically and savagely perpetrated by Israel, the occupying power, against the Palestinian civilian population," he said. “Over 2 million Palestinians are on a survival mission every day, every night.”
Under international law, he said “it is our collective human duty to stop them.”
Al-Maliki warned that more attacks and killings and weapons and alliances won’t make Israel safer: “Only peace will.”
“For those actively engaged to avoid an even greater humanitarian catastrophe and regional spillover, it must be clear that this can only be achieved by putting an immediate end to the Israeli war launched against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip,” he said. “Stop the bloodshed.”
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres opened the monthly meeting on the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict — which has turned into a major event with ministers from the war’s key parties and a dozen other countries flying to New York — warning that “the situation in the Middle East is growing more dire by the hour.”
As the council met, a barrage of Israeli airstrikes across the Gaza Strip crushed multiple residential buildings and buried families under rubble. Nearly 90 countries were on the speakers list including about 30 foreign ministers and deputy ministers, many echoing calls for a cease-fire and halt to attacks on Palestinian civilians.
The U.N. chief said the risk of the Gaza war spreading through the region is increasing as societies splinter and tensions threaten to boil over. He called for an immediate humanitarian cease-fire to deliver desperately needed food, water, medicine and fuel. He also appealed “to all to pull back from the brink before the violence claims even more lives and spreads even farther.”
Guterres stressed that the rules of war must be obeyed.
He said the grievances of the Palestinian people cannot justify “the horrifying and unprecedented Oct. 7 acts of terror” by Hamas in Israel and demanded the immediate release of all hostages.
Read: Hamas frees two Israeli women as US advises delaying ground war to allow talks on captives
But Guterres also stressed that “those appalling attacks cannot justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”
He expressed deep concern at “the clear violations of international humanitarian law,” calling Israel’s constant bombardment of Gaza and the level of destruction and civilian casualties “alarming.”
Protecting civilians “is paramount in any armed conflict,” he said.
Without naming Hamas, the U.N. chief stressed that “protecting civilians can never mean using them as human shields.”
Guterres also criticized Israel without naming it, saying “protecting civilians does not mean ordering more than one million people to evacuate to the south, where there is no shelter, no food, no water, no medicine and no fuel, and then continuing to bomb the south itself.”
Cohen, in his address to the council, criticized the secretary-general’s remarks. After being told by a reporter at a stakeout later that the secretary-general stood by his statement, the Israeli minister said: “There is no cause for this, and shame on him.”
Israel’s U.N. Ambassador Gilad Erdan went further, taking issue especially with Guterres’ statement that it’s important to recognize that “the attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum.”
He accused the secretary-general of having lost “all morality and impartiality” and called for his resignation.
By contrast, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, speaking for Israel's closest ally, thanked the U.N. chief “for your leadership in this incredibly challenging time, particularly in getting humanitarian aid to civilians in Gaza.”
He stressed Israel's right to defend itself “against terrorism” but also called for protection of Palestinian civilians saying: “We know Hamas does not represent the Palestinian people and Palestinian civilians are not to blame for the carnage committed by Hamas.”
He said “Israel must take all possible precautions to avoid harm to civilians” and “humanitarian pauses” must be considered to get aid flowing into Gaza and enable civilians “to get out of harm’s way.”
Blinken told the council all countries are determined to prevent the conflict from spreading, saying a broader conflict “would be devastating, not only for Palestinians and Israelis but for people across the region and indeed around the world.”
He warned Iran — which supports Hamas, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen — that while the U.S. doesn't seek a conflict, it will respond “swiftly and decisively” to any attack on U.S. personnel by its forces or its proxies anywhere in the world.
Iran’s U.N. Ambassador Amir Iravani later accused Blinken of “wrongly” attempting to blame Iran for the Hamas attack, rejecting his “groundless allegations” and saying the Islamic Republic is committed to regional peace and security, and supports the call for an immediate cease-fire.
He echoed secretary-general Guterres’ statement that the Oct. 7 attack didn’t happen in a vacuum and claimed the U.S.’ “unwavering support” for Israel and its rapid provision of military and logistical support “made the U.S. complicit in the brutal massacre of innocent Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip.”
Iravani also claimed that Israel, as an occupying power, has no right to self-defense in Gaza under the U.N. Charter. But he said the Charter does recognize the right to self-determination and self-defense for the Palestinian people, which Iran supports, “including resistance groups like Hamas, in the struggle against Israeli occupation.”
The United States is pushing for adoption of a resolution that would condemn the Hamas attacks in Israel and violence against civilians, and reaffirm Israel’s right to self-defense. There were some expectations that it might be voted on Tuesday, but diplomats said it was still being negotiated.
Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia told the council Moscow rejects the U.S. draft and is demanding an immediate ceasefire. The U.S. draft does not mention a cease-fire and Nebenzia said Russia is putting forward its own new proposed resolution.
Read: At least 60% of Gaza's population displaced due to Israeli attacks: UN
Jordan's Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi, speaking on behalf of the 22-memeber Arab Group at the United Nations, accused Israel of waging a war that is killing innocent civilians and “razing Gaza to the ground” in violation of international law “without any deterrent.”
“And the Security Council didn't even call for a cease-fire,” he said, urging the U.N. body charged with maintaining international peace and security to adopt a resolution to stop the war, condemn the killing of civilians on both sides, and prevent the starvation of Palestinians and their collective punishment.
“The Security Council must take a clear stance to reassure two billion Arabs and Muslims that international law will be applied,” Safadi said.
Israeli airstrikes surge in Gaza, killing dozens at a time in destroyed homes, witnesses say
Israel escalated airstrikes across the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, crushing families in the rubble of residential buildings, as health officials said hundreds of Palestinians were killed in the past day and medical facilities were shut down because of bomb damage and lack of power.
The soaring death toll from the bombardment is unprecedented in the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It augurs an even greater loss of life in Gaza once Israeli forces backed by tanks and artillery launch an expected ground offensive aimed at crushing Hamas militants.
Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been running out of food, water and medicine since Israel sealed off the territory following the devastating Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on towns in southern Israel.
Israeli airstrikes in Gaza killed more than 700 people in the past day
The Gaza Health Ministry, which is run by Hamas, said Israeli airstrikes killed at least 704 people over the past day, mostly women and children. The Associated Press could not independently verify the death tolls cited by Hamas, which says it tallies figures from hospital directors.
In Washington, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters that the U.S. also could not verify that one-day death toll.
“The Ministry of Health is run by Hamas, and I think that all needs to be factored into anything that they put out publicly.”
Syria, Lebanon call for immediate stop to deadly Israel-Hamas conflict
Israel said Tuesday it had launched 400 airstrikes over the past day, killing Hamas commanders, hitting militants as they prepared to fire rockets into Israel and striking command centers and a Hamas tunnel shaft. Israel reported 320 strikes the day before.
Hamas is sworn to Israel’s destruction.
Israel, for it's part, has vowed repeatedly since the massacre to crush Hamas.
On Tuesday, Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen told the U.N. Security Council that the proportionate response to the Oct. 7 attack is “a total destruction to the last one” of the militants. “It is not only Israel’s right to destroy Hamas. It’s our duty,” he said.
The Israeli military said it thwarted an assault by a group of Hamas underwater divers who tried to infiltrate Israel on a beach just north of Gaza. They were attacked by air, naval and ground forces.
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Across central and south Gaza, where Israel told civilians to take shelter, there were multiple scenes of rescuers pulling the dead and wounded out of large piles of rubble from collapsed buildings. Graphic photos and video shot by the AP showed rescuers unearthing bodies of children from multiple ruins.
A father knelt on the floor of the Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir Al-Balah next to the bodies of three dead children cocooned in bloodied sheets. Later at the nearby morgue, workers prayed over 24 dead wrapped in body bags, several of them the size of small children.
Buildings that collapsed on residents killed dozens at a time in several cases, witnesses said. Two families lost a total 47 members in a leveled home in Rafah, the Health Ministry said.
A strike on a four-story building in Khan Younis killed at least 32 people, including 13 members of the Saqallah family, said Ammar al-Butta, a relative who survived the airstrike. He said there were about 100 people sheltering in the building, including many who had evacuated from Gaza City.
“We thought that our area would be safe,” he said.
Another strike destroyed a bustling marketplace in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, witnesses said. AP photos showed the floor of a vegetable shop covered with blood.
In Gaza City, at least 19 people were killed when an airstrike hit the house of the Bahloul family, according to survivors, who said dozens more people remained buried. The legs of a dead woman and another person, both still half buried, dangled out of the wreckage where workers dug through the dirt, concrete and rebar.
The Health Ministry says more than 5,700 Palestinians have been killed in the war, including some 2,300 minors. The figure includes the disputed toll from an explosion at a hospital last week.
The fighting has killed more than 1,400 people in Israel — mostly civilians slain during the initial Hamas attack, according to the Israeli government.
As the death toll in Gaza spirals, and fuel supplies dwindle, the number of facilities able to deal with casualties is shrinking. More than half of primary health care facilities, and roughly 1 of every 3 hospitals, have stopped functioning, the World Health Organization said.
Overwhelmed hospital staff struggled to triage cases as constant waves of wounded were brought in. The Health Ministry said many wounded are laid on the ground without even simple medical intervention and others wait for days for surgeries because there are so many critical cases.
While Israel has allowed a small number of trucks filled with aid to enter, it has barred deliveries of fuel to Gaza to keep it out of Hamas' hands. The U.N. said its operation distributing aid will halt Wednesday evening if it does not receive fuel.
To make room for the dead, cemeteries have been forced to excavate and reuse old plots. Families have dug trenches to bury multiple bodies at a time.
“Bodies pour in by the hundreds every day. We use every empty inch in the cemeteries,” said Abdel Rahman Mohamed, a volunteer who helps transfer bodies to Khan Younis’ main cemetery.
Israel says it does not target civilians and that Hamas militants are using them as cover for their attacks. Palestinian militants have fired over 7,000 rockets at Israel since the start of the war, according to Israel, and Hamas said it fired a fresh barrage on Tuesday.
On Monday, Hamas released two elderly Israeli women who were among the roughly 220 people Israel says were taken hostage during the Oct. 7 attack and forced into Gaza.
Appearing weak in a wheelchair and speaking softly, 85-year-old Yocheved Lifshitz told reporters Tuesday that the militants beat her with sticks, bruising her ribs and making it hard to breathe as they kidnapped her. They drove her into Gaza, then forced her to walk several kilometers (miles) on wet ground to reach a network of tunnels that looked like a spider web, she said.
Once there, she said, she was treated well, fed and given medical care.
Lifshitz and 79-year-old Nurit Cooper were freed days after an American woman and her teenage daughter were released.
The Israeli military dropped leaflets in Gaza asking Palestinians to reveal information on the hostages’ whereabouts. In exchange, the military promised a reward and protection for the informant’s home.
Iranian-backed fighters around the region are warning of possible escalation, including the targeting of U.S. forces deployed in the Mideast, if a ground offensive is launched. Israel and Hezbollah have traded fire almost daily across the Israel-Lebanon border.
Humanitarian crisis deepens in Myanmar: UN expert
A growing trend of coordinated action by member states, including sanctions targeting key financial institutions and jet fuel, is offering the hope of a more effective path forward to weaken a military junta that is driving Myanmar deeper into a human rights and humanitarian crisis.
This was relayed by Tom Andrews, UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, in remarks to the General Assembly’s third committee in New York.
“The junta continues to attack the people of Myanmar with the relentless bombing of villages, hospitals, schools, and camps for internally displaced persons. But non-Myanmar nationals are also being victimised by transnational criminal enterprises, including scam operations that are flourishing on the border," said Andrews.
“Now is the time for UN Member States to strengthen and coordinate actions that weaken the junta,” Andrews said. “A world beset by conflagrations of mass violence must not lose sight of the runaway fire of brutality and human rights violations that is burning in Myanmar, threatening the lives of millions and eroding regional stability,” he said.
In his report to the UN General Assembly, Andrews highlighted the junta’s attacks against civilians, including reports of mass killings, beheadings, torture, sexual and gender-based violence, forced labour, and the use of human shields by junta forces.
Massive humanitarian needs have been exacerbated by the junta’s deliberate obstruction of the delivery of lifesaving aid, according to the report. Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh have endured drastic cuts in food rations even as they face the threat of coercive repatriation back into the hands of the same military forces whose genocidal attacks forced them over the border.
“Junta leaders would like the world to believe that only they can restore peace and stability in Myanmar. The opposite is true. The junta is an agent of chaos and violence, creating a vacuum of governance in the country that is increasingly impacting Myanmar’s neighbours and the international community,” Andrews said.
While condemning the actions of Member States that supply the junta with arms and provide other forms of material or diplomatic support, Andrews praised positive actions taken by governments to deprive the junta of weapons, money, and legitimacy.
“Sanctions targeting aviation fuel and key financial institutions relied on by the junta are potent measures that could help alleviate the suffering of the people of Myanmar and push the country back towards the path to democracy,” the Special Rapporteur said.
“Some of Myanmar’s neighbours have boycotted diplomatic and defence summits attended by junta officials and denounced the junta’s plans to hold fraudulent elections,” Andrews said.
“The international community must build on the momentum created by these positive developments through a working coalition of states that are committed to human rights and engaging in coordinated actions that add up to a powerful whole,” he said. “The people of Myanmar deserve no less.”
Israeli airstrikes in Gaza killed more than 700 people in the past day
Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip had killed more than 700 people in the past day, the Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza said Tuesday.
That represented a massive increase in the death toll amid widening Israeli bombing attacks in the territory.
Israel has been attacking Gaza since Hamas militants attacked southern Israeli towns on Oct. 7.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
Israel escalated its bombardment of targets in the Gaza Strip, the military said Tuesday, ahead of an expected ground invasion against Hamas militants that the U.S. fears could spark a wider conflict in the region, including attacks on American troops.
The stepped-up attacks, and the rapidly rising death toll of thousands killed in Gaza, came as Hamas released two elderly Israeli women who were among the hundreds of hostages it captured during its devastating Oct. 7 attack on towns in southern Israel.
French President Emmanuel Macron arrived in Tel Aviv on Tuesday, meeting with the families of French citizens who were killed or held hostage before heading to talks with top Israeli officials. He told them that he came “to express our support and solidarity and share your pain” as well as to assure Israel it is “not left alone in the war against terrorism.”
Read: Syria, Lebanon call for immediate stop to deadly Israel-Hamas conflict
In a joint news conference with Macron, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would make every effort to fight the war quickly, “but it could be a long war.”
Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been running out of food, water and medicine since Israel sealed off the territory following the attack. A third small aid convoy entered Gaza on Monday carrying only a tiny fraction of the supplies aid groups say is necessary.
Tamira Alrifai, spokesperson for the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, said the 54 trucks that entered Gaza over the last several days was a “trickle” compared to the 500 trucks a day that entered before the war. She said U.N. negotiators were “very, very far away” from getting an agreement to send the sustained aid into Gaza that is needed.
With Israel still barring the entry of fuel, the U.N. said aid distribution would soon grind to a halt when it can no longer fuel trucks inside Gaza. Hospitals overwhelmed by the wounded are struggling to keep generators running to power lifesaving medical equipment and incubators for premature babies.
On Tuesday, Israel said it had launched 400 airstrikes over the past day, killing Hamas commanders, hitting militants as they were preparing to launch rockets into Israel and striking command centers and a Hamas tunnel shaft. The previous day, Israel reported 320 strikes. The Palestinian official news agency, WAFA, said many of the airstrikes hit residential buildings, some of them in southern Gaza where Israel had told civilians to take shelter.
An overnight strike hit a four-story residential building in the southern city of Khan Younis, killing at least 32 people and wounding scores of others, according to survivors.
Read: Pro-Palestinian activists occupy international court entry, demanding action against Israeli leader
The fatalities included 13 from the Saqallah family, said Ammar al-Butta, a relative who survived the airstrike. He said there were about 100 people there, including many who had come from Gaza City, which Israel has ordered civilians to evacuate.
“They were sheltering at our home because we thought that our area would be safe. But apparently there is no safe place in Gaza,” he said.
Fifteen members of another family were among at least 33 Palestinians buried Monday in a shallow, sandy mass grave at a Gaza hospital after being killed in Israeli airstrikes.
Israel says it does not target civilians and that Hamas militants are using them as cover for their attacks. Palestinian militants have fired over 7,000 rockets at Israel since the start of the war, Israel said, and Hamas said it fired a new barrage Tuesday morning.
“We continue to attack forcefully in Gaza City and its environs, where Hamas is building up its terrorist infrastructure, where Hamas is arraying its troops," said Israeli military spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari. He again told Palestinians to head south “for your personal safety.”
The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees said six of its staff were killed in bombings, bringing to 35 the death toll of its workers since the war started.
The war has killed more than 5,000 Palestinians, including some 2,000 minors and around 1,100 women, the Hamas-run Health Ministry said. That includes the disputed toll from an explosion at a hospital last week. The toll has climbed rapidly in recent days, with the ministry reporting 436 additional deaths in just the last 24 hours.
Read: Israel plans to step up attacks on the Gaza Strip
The fighting has killed more than 1,400 people in Israel — mostly civilians slain during the initial Hamas attack.
On Monday night, the two freed hostages, 85-year-old Yocheved Lifshitz and 79-year-old Nurit Cooper, were taken out of Gaza at the Rafah crossing into Egypt, where they were put into ambulances. The women, along with their husbands who were not released, were snatched from their homes in the kibbutz of Nir Oz.
Appearing weak in a wheelchair and speaking softly, Lifshitz told reporters Tuesday that the militants beat her with sticks, bruising her ribs and making it hard to breathe as they kidnapped her. They drove her into Gaza, then forced her to walk several kilometers (miles) on wet ground to reach a network of tunnels that looked like a spider web, she said.
Once there, though, her treatment improved, she said. The people assigned to guard her “told us they are people who believe in the Quran and wouldn’t hurt us.” Lifshitz, whose husband remains a hostage, said conditions were kept clean, she received medical care, including medication, and was given the same one meal a day of cheese and cucumber that her captors had.
The women were freed days after an American woman and her teenage daughter were released. Hamas and other militants in Gaza are believed to have taken roughly 220 people, including an unconfirmed number of foreigners and dual citizens.
On Monday, Hamas released a video showing the handover, with militants giving drinks and snacks to the dazed but composed women, and holding their hands as they are walked to Red Cross officials. Just before the video ends, Lifshitz reaches back to shake one militant’s hand.
Around the same time, Israel’s internal security service, Shin Bet, released a recording showing Hamas prisoners — most in clean prison uniforms, but one in a bloody T-shirt and at least one wincing in pain — sitting handcuffed in drab offices talking about the Oct. 7 attack. The men said they were under orders to kill young men, and kidnap women, children and the elderly, and that they’d been promised financial rewards.
The Associated Press could not independently verify either video, and both the hostages and the prisoners could have been acting under duress.
The Israeli military later dropped leaflets in Gaza asking Palestinians to reveal information on the hostages’ whereabouts. In exchange, the military promised a reward and protection for the informant’s home.
Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas. Iranian-backed fighters around the region are warning of possible escalation, including the targeting of U.S. forces deployed in the Mideast, if a ground offensive is launched.
The U.S. has told Iranian-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon and other groups not to join the fight. Israel and Hezbollah have traded fire almost daily across the Israel-Lebanon border, and Israeli warplanes have struck targets in Syria, Lebanon and the occupied West Bank in recent days.
National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said there has been an uptick in rocket and drone attacks by Iranian-backed militias on U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria, and the U.S. was “deeply concerned about the possibility for any significant escalation” in the coming days.
He said U.S. officials were having “active conversations” with Israeli counterparts about the potential ramifications of escalated military action.
The U.S. advised Israeli officials that delaying a ground offensive would give Washington more time to work with regional mediators on the release of more hostages, according to a U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to reveal sensitive negotiations.
Syria, Lebanon call for immediate stop to deadly Israel-Hamas conflict
Syria and Lebanon on Monday jointly condemned the Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip and called for an immediate stop to the deadly Israel-Hamas conflict.
Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad met with his visiting Lebanese counterpart Abdallah Bou Habib in the Syrian capital of Damascus, where they underscored the importance of continued consultation and strategic alignment to address the pressing common challenges, Syria's state news agency SANA reported.
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During the visit, both sides reiterated their unwavering commitment to addressing the plight of the Palestinian people, stressing unconditional and immediate delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza.
They vehemently rejected any attempts aimed at the displacement of the Palestinians or delegitimization of the Palestinian cause.
Moreover, they stressed the urgent need for the enforcement of related international resolutions to put an end to the Israeli occupation of Arab territories, while advocating for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.
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The discussion also delved into the Syrian refugee crisis in Lebanon, with both nations highlighting collaborative efforts to ensure the dignified and safe return of Syrian refugees to their homeland.
The two sides agreed to initiate subsequent coordination meetings to address important issues including the safe return of displaced individuals, border control, the exchange of convicts, and other matters of mutual concern.
40 years after bombing that killed Americans in Beirut, US troops again deploy east of Mediterranean
Forty years after one of the deadliest attacks against U.S. troops in the Middle East, some warn that Washington could be sliding toward a new conflict in the region.
On Oct. 23, 1983, a suicide bomber hit an American military barracks at Beirut International Airport, killing 241 U.S. service members, most of them Marines – still the deadliest attack on Marines since the World War II Battle of Iwo Jima. A near-simultaneous attack on French forces killed 58 paratroopers.
Washington blames the bombings on the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, a claim the Iranian-backed Hezbollah denies. The U.S. and French forces were in Beirut as part of a multinational force deployed amid Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon. The force oversaw the withdrawal of Palestinian fighters from Beirut and stayed afterward to help a Western-backed government at the time. The bombing prompted a U.S. withdrawal from Lebanon.
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The United States is now deploying forces again in the region in connection to a war between Israel and its enemies.
The aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford has been positioned in the eastern Mediterranean along with other American warships – with a second carrier on the way – in what is widely seen as a message to Iran and Hezbollah not to open new fronts as Israel fights Hamas.
Longtime tensions between the U.S. and Iran have been hiked by the two-week-old war between Israel and Hamas, in which the Palestinian militant group's Oct. 7 surprise attack on southern Israeli towns brought devastating Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip.
The war risks spiraling into a wider regional conflict. The biggest worry is over the Lebanon-Israel border, where Israel and Hezbollah exchange fire on a daily basis.
But there are other spots where the U.S. could be dragged directly into the fight. There are roughly 2,500 U.S. troops in Iraq and around 900 others in eastern Syria, on missions against the Islamic State group. In both countries, Iran has militias loyal to it that already have opened fire on the Americans since the Gaza war erupted.
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A Hezbollah supporter who goes by the name of Haj Mohammed posted a video on Tiktok on Oct. 13 that drew a threatening parallel between the barracks bombing 40 years ago and present-day events.
"It seems that Uncle Joe did not tell the commanders of these warships and aircraft carriers about what happened on October 23, 1983," the man said, referring to President Joe Biden. Sitting in front of a poster of Jerusalem's Dome of the Rock, he wondered aloud whether U.S. troops will return home in coffins again.
Iran-backed groups have issued threats against the U.S. if it joins the war on the side of Israel.
Top Hezbollah official Hachem Safieddine said in a speech that there are tens of thousands of fighters around the region "whose fingers are on the trigger."
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The commander of a powerful Iranian-backed militia in Iraq posted a photo of himself on social media standing by the Lebanon-Israel border in an apparent show that his fighters are ready for war.
If the U.S. intervenes directly in the Israel-Hamas war, "then the American presence in the region becomes legitimate targets for resistance fighters whether in Iraq or elsewhere," the commander -- Abu Alaa al-Walae of Iraq's Kataib Sayyid al-Shuhada -- told Beirut-based Al-Mayadeen TV.
Since Wednesday, suicide drones and rockets have hit several bases housing U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria. The attacks were either claimed by or blamed on Iranian-backed militias.
A U.S. Navy warship on Thursday intercepted three missiles and several drones fired by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels from Yemen, potentially toward targets in Israel, the Pentagon said.
American forces could also come under attack if Israel launches a ground invasion of Gaza and appears about to destroy Hamas, as it has vowed to do.
Blinken, Austin say US is ready to respond if US personnel become targets of Israel-Hamas war
An official with one Iranian-backed group warned that if Israel tries to go all the way for a complete defeat of Hamas, Iranian allies can ignite a conflict throughout the Middle East. He said the volleys at U.S. forces were meant to send this message. The official spoke on condition that he and his group not be identified because he was not authorized to comment publicly.
Following a tour in the region where he met leaders of Hezbollah, Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Iran's foreign minister warned in mid-October that "pre-emptive action is possible" if Israel moves closer to a ground offensive and that Israel would suffer "a huge earthquake."
On Sunday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Washington expects the Israel-Hamas war to escalate through involvement by proxies of Iran, adding that the Biden administration is prepared to respond if American personnel or armed forces are targeted.
"This is not what we want, not what we're looking for. We don't want escalation," Blinken said. "We don't want to see our forces or our personnel come under fire. But if that happens, we're ready for it."
Austin said they see the "prospect of a significant escalation of attacks on our troops and our people throughout the region."
Biden repeatedly has used one word to warn Israel's enemies against trying to take advantage of the situation: "Don't."
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Iran leads the so-called "axis of resistance" that includes Tehran-backed factions from Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen, Afghanistan and Pakistan as well as Syria. Hezbollah, Lebanon's most powerful group, has tens of thousands of rockets and missiles as well as a drone arsenal that pose a serious threat if the group fully joins the war against Israel.
Still, many analysts say an all-out regional war that would risk dragging the U.S. and Iran into direct confrontation remains unlikely.
"Until this moment the two sides don't want a confrontation" and are communicating that to each other, said Iranian political analyst and political science professor Emad Abshenass about Tehran and Washington.
But "the situation could turn on its head" if Israel's army enters Gaza and seems likely defeat Hamas, Abshenass said.
In 1983, the barracks bombing was seen as a lesson in the danger for the U.S. from stepping in the middle of a conflict between Israel and one of its neighbors.
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Sam Heller of The Century Foundation said that, as in 1983, "I don't trust that the U.S. forces the Biden administration has sent to the region are enough to really intimidate and deter local actors."
"Iran and its allies are exposed in their own way," Heller said, but they have "very serious capabilities today that could be (used) against U.S. targets regionwide."