Palestine

5 December 2023; MEMO: The Palestinian telecommunications company (PalTel), on Monday, said that all communication and internet services in the Gaza Strip have been completely cut off, Anadolu  Agency reports.

In a statement, the company said the telecom service was cut due to the disconnection of the main elements of the network in light of the ongoing Israeli shelling across Gaza.

6 December 2023; MEMO: The Izz Al-Din Al-Qassam Brigades announced yesterday that its fighters have targeted 25 Israeli military vehicles in various areas in the city of Khan Yunis in the besieged Gaza Strip, the Safa news agency reported.

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel said Tuesday that its troops had entered Gaza’s second-largest city as intensified bombardment sent streams of ambulances and cars racing to hospitals with wounded and dead Palestinians, including children, in a bloody new phase of the war.

RAMALLAH, Dec. 4 (Xinhua) -- Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas stressed on Monday that he rejects Israel's plans to "separate, occupy, cut off or isolate any part of the Gaza Strip," which is "an integral part of the Palestinian state," according to a statement by the official Palestinian News Agency (WAFA).

"It's necessary to immediately stop the aggression against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip, and spare civilians from the scourge of bombing and destruction carried out by Israel," Abbas said in a phone call with U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris.

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel renewed calls Monday for mass evacuations from the southern town of Khan Younis, where tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians have sought refuge in recent weeks, as the military widened its ground offensive and bombarded targets across the Gaza Strip.

RAMALLAH, Dec 2 (Reuters) - Palestinian human rights groups refused to meet the International Criminal Court prosecutor Karim Khan on Saturday, accusing him of favouring Israeli accusations of rights abuses over longstanding Palestinian charges.

Khan has been visiting Israel and the occupied West Bank following a request by a group representing families of victims of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Hamas gunmen, but he was also due to meet Palestinian officials in Ramallah.

GAZA, Dec 2 (Reuters) - U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris said too many innocent Palestinians had been killed in Gaza as Israeli war planes and artillery bombarded the enclave on Saturday following the collapse of a truce with Hamas militants.

Residents feared the barrages presaged an Israeli ground operation in the south of the Palestinian territory that would pen them into a shrinking area and possibly try to push them across into Egypt.

GAZA, Dec. 2 (Xinhua) -- The Israeli army is trying to expand its ground incursion in Khan Younis city in the southern Gaza Strip amid intense battles with Hamas militants in the area on Saturday, a Palestinian security source said.

"The clashes, which featured heavy gunfire and intermittent explosions, were monitored in more than one location on the eastern border of the city of Khan Younis," said the source who wished to remain anonymous.

KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel pounded targets in the crowded southern half of the Gaza Strip on Saturday and ordered more neighborhoods designated for attack to evacuate, driving up the death toll even as the United States and others urged it to do more to protect Gaza civilians a day after a truce collapsed.

RAFAH, Dec 1 (NNN-MENA) – A total of 2,781 trucks, loaded with humanitarian aid, have so far entered the Gaza Strip through the Rafah crossing, the only linking point between Egypt and the Palestinian enclave, Egypt’s State Information Service (SIS) said, yesterday.

Ayman Walash, manager of the SIS press centre for foreign media, said that, since the first relief convoy was allowed into Gaza on Oct 21, a total of 3,176 tonnes of medical materials, 1,308 tonnes of fuel, and 13,348 tonnes of food, had been sent to Gaza through the Rafah crossing, until Wednesday.