Middle East latest: Hezbollah's acting leader says the group is focused on hurting Israel
Hezbollah’s acting leader declared Tuesday that the Lebanese militant group is focused on “hurting the enemy” by targeting Haifa and other parts of Israel, including Tel Aviv.
Sheikh Naim Kassem, Hezbollah’s deputy chief, vowed in a televised speech to “defeat our enemies and drive them out of our lands.” It was his third appearance since Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli airstrike in a southern suburb of Beirut.
The United Nations human rights office meanwhile called for an independent probe into an Israeli airstrike that hit an apartment block in Aito in northern Lebanon, killing at least 22 people, including 12 women and two children.
Israeli strikes continued in the southern Gaza Strip, killing at least 15 people overnight, including six children and two women, Palestinian medical officials said Tuesday. In northern Gaza, where Israel has been waging an air and ground campaign in Jabaliya for more than a week, residents said families were still trapped in their homes and shelters.
It’s been more than a year since Hamas-led militants blew holes in Israel’s security fence and stormed in, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting another 250. Israel’s offensive in Gaza has killed over 42,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities, who do not say how many were fighters but say women and children make up more than half of the fatalities. The war has destroyed large areas of Gaza and displaced about 90% of its population of 2.3 million people.
In solidarity with Hamas, Lebanese militant group Hezbollah has exchanged cross-border fire with Israel almost daily for the past year. Israel has escalated its campaign against the group in recent weeks.
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UNITED NATIONS — Yemen risks being dragged further into the military escalation in the Middle East, the U.N. special envoy for the Arab world’s poorest nation says.
Hans Grundberg also told the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday that repeated attacks on international shipping by the Houthi rebels who control most of the country’s north “have significantly increased the risk of an environment disaster” in the Red Sea.
Both Grundberg and acting U.N. humanitarian chief Joyce Msuya urged the Iranian-backed Houthis to halt their attacks on shipping and release dozens of U.N. personnel, staff of non-governmental organizations and diplomatic missions, and members of civil society. Most have been detained since June.
Days after the June detentions, the Houthis said they had arrested members of what they called an “American-Israeli spy network,” an allegation vehemently denied by the U.N. and others.
Msuya called the Houthis’ recent referral of a significant number of those detained for “criminal prosecution” unacceptable.
She warned that despite escalating needs, the issue continues to "significantly hinder our ability to provide lifesaving humanitarian assistance in Yemen.”
The number of Yemenis without enough to eat soared to "unprecedented levels” in August, she said.
BEIRUT — Several villages in southern Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley are witnessing intensified airstrikes.
According to the state-run National News Agency, an Israeli airstrike on Qana in Tyre province on Tuesday killed at least one person and wounded 30, with many believed to be trapped under the rubble.
In the same province, incessant airstrikes targeted villages including Al-Qasimiyah, Ain Baal, Aita al-Jabal, Majdalzon, and Al-Mansouri, according to the agency.
The Lebanese Health Ministry says an Israeli strike on Riyak in the Bekaa Valley killed five people, including three children, and wounded 16.
UNITED NATIONS — The United Nations humanitarian office is warning that the situation is “catastrophic” in northern Gaza, where only three hospitals are operating and Israeli military operations have intensified.
U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said Tuesday that the escalation in the north is “severely compromising people’s access to means of survival.” He said the U.N.’s health partners report that the three hospitals “have dire shortages of fuel, of blood, of trauma items and medications.”
With military action continuing outside, he said, about 285 patients remain in Kamal Adwan Hospital, Al-Adwa Hospital and the Indonesian Hospital.
Dujarric said the U.N. World Health Organization warned that Kamal Adwan hospital “remains overwhelmed, receiving between 50 and 70 new injured patients each day.”
With dwindling food stocks, he said the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs known as OCHA said available food supplies are still being delivered, including more than 110,000 meals in Gaza City every day.
However, “there is barely any food left to distribute, and most bakeries will be forced to shut down again in just days without any additional fuel,” the U.N. spokesperson said.
In the first two weeks of October, OCHA reported that just one of its 54 efforts to get to the north was facilitated by Israeli authorities, Dujarric said.
He said 85% of the requests were denied, “with the rest impeded or canceled due to various logistical or security reasons.”
UNITED NATIONS — United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is warning again that attacks on U.N. peacekeepers in southern Lebanon violate international law and may constitute a war crime.
U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric delivered the warning Tuesday. He told reporters that not only have five UNIFIL peacekeepers been wounded in southern Lebanon but U.N. premises “have been impacted on at least 20 occasions since Oct. 1,” when Israel launched its ground offensive.
Also Tuesday, U.N. peacekeeping chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix met with Israel’s Ambassador Danny Danon.
Danon said Hezbollah militants “find shelter behind UNIFIL positions,” and even though there are regular contacts between UNIFIL and the Israeli military, “Israel still insists that the U.N. peacekeeping forces temporarily withdraw from their positions.”
Lacroix told the U.N. Security Council on Monday that Guterres said UNIFIL peacekeepers would remain where they are, even though Israel asked them to move five kilometers (3 miles) north.
Dujarric expressed deep concern at the impact of the continued strikes on civilians on both sides of the U.N.-drawn boundary between Lebanon and Israel, but especially in Lebanon.
He said Guterres condemns the loss of civilian lives in an Israeli airstrike on Aito in northern Lebanon that killed at least 22 people. The U.N. human rights office has called for an independent investigation into that airstrike.
“All actors must uphold obligations under international law, including International humanitarian law, and do their utmost to protect civilians,” Dujarric said.
WASHINGTON — The Biden administration has warned Israel that it must increase the amount of humanitarian aid it allows into Gaza within the next 30 days or risk losing access to U.S. weapons funding.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin warned their Israeli counterparts in a letter dated Sunday that the changes must occur. The letter, which restates U.S. policy toward humanitarian aid and arms transfers, was sent amid deteriorating conditions in northern Gaza.
State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said Tuesday that a similar letter Blinken sent to Israeli officials in April lead to more humanitarian assistance getting to the Palestinian territory. But that didn’t last.
Miller says the leaders wanted to make clear to Israel that it must bring assistance back up from “very, very low levels.”
For Israel to continue qualifying for foreign military financing, the aid getting into Gaza must increase to at least 350 trucks a day, Israel must institute additional humanitarian pauses and provide increased security for humanitarian sites, Austin and Blinken said in their letter. They said Israel had 30 days to respond to the requirements.
An Israeli official confirmed a letter was delivered but did not discuss the contents. That official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss a diplomatic matter, confirmed the U.S. has raised “humanitarian concerns” and is putting pressure on Israel to speed up the flow of aid into Gaza.
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Associated Press writers Tara Copp, Matthew Lee and Lolita C. Baldor in Washington, and Josef Federman in Jerusalem, contributed to this report.
BEIRUT — Lebanon’s crisis response unit says 41 people were killed and 124 wounded in the past 24 hours, raising the total toll over the past year of conflict between Israel and Hezbollah to 2,350 killed and 10,906 wounded.
The Lebanese Health Ministry said Tuesday that the crisis response unit report also recorded 146 airstrikes and incidents of shelling in the past day, most in southern Lebanon, the southern suburbs of Beirut and the Bekaa Valley.
Some 1,067 centers — including educational complexes, vocational institutes, universities, and other institutions — are sheltering 188,652 people, including 41,894 families, displaced by the Israeli offensive in Lebanon, the report said.
Among these shelters, 881 have now reached capacity. The fighting in Lebanon has driven 1.2 million people from their homes, including more than 400,000 children, according to a top official with the U.N. children’s agency.
The Lebanese Ministry of Education reported that 77% of public schools are out of service, either because they are being used as shelters or they are in areas directly affected by the war.
Displaced people continue to flow from Lebanon into Syria, even after an Israeli strike took out a major border crossing last week. Between Sept. 23 and Oct. 15, Lebanese General Security recorded 329,386 Syrian citizens and 126,842 Lebanese citizens crossing into Syria, the report said.
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden's administration believes it has won assurances from Israel that it will not hit Iranian nuclear or oil sites as it considers retaliating to Iran’s missile barrage earlier this month, two U.S. officials say.
The administration also believes that sending a U.S. Terminal High Altitude Area Defense battery to Israel and roughly 100 soldiers to operate it has eased some of Israel’s concerns about more Iranian strikes and general security issues.
The Pentagon announced Sunday that the THAAD deployment was to help bolster Israel’s air defenses following Iran’s ballistic missile attacks on Israel in April and October, saying it was authorized at Biden's direction.
However, the U.S. officials who spoke Tuesday on condition of anonymity to discuss private diplomatic discussions, cautioned that the assurance is not iron-clad and that circumstances could change. The officials also noted that Israel’s track record on fulfilling assurances in the past is mixed and has often reflected domestic Israeli politics that have upended Washington’s expectations.
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Associated Press writer Matthew Lee contributed.
DAMASCUS, Syria — A shelter near Damascus established to house Syrians displaced by the country’s civil war is now housing more than 300 Lebanese families who fled the escalating war between Israel and Hezbollah in their country.
Abdul-Nasser Khatib, the head of the shelter in Herjelleh, said Tuesday that Syria, which was already in the throes of an economic crisis, is struggling to meet the needs of the new arrivals.
He says the center doesn’t have enough drinking water, food, baby milk and clothes, and “we are in urgent need of the assistance of international organizations.”
A child playing with a make-believe train at the center chanted, “Toot toot, to Beirut,” a line from a popular song about Lebanon’s now-defunct railroad.
Nour Murad, a Lebanese citizen from the eastern city of Baalbek, says she fled a “disastrous” situation and has been in Syria for eight days.
“The destruction and blood were everywhere around us,” she said. “Displacement is nothing compared to those who have lost loved ones.” Murad said she plans to return to Lebanon “as soon as the situation calms down.”
Lebanese border authorities say more than 326,000 Syrians and more than 124,000 Lebanese citizens have crossed into Syria from Lebanon since Sept. 23, when Israel began widespread attacks in Lebanon.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The U.S. State Department has dismissed remarks by Iran’s foreign minister who said Tehran shut down an indirect communication route between the two countries in Oman.
Responding to a query from The Associated Press, the State Department said Tuesday: “We have direct and open lines of communication with Iran when it is in our interest.”
“There is no misunderstanding in our position,” the State Department said. “Thus, there is no need at the current time for indirect talks in Oman or anywhere else.”
On Monday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told Iranian state media in Muscat, Oman, that Iran has stopped indirect talks with the U.S. there.
Iran remains braced for a possible retaliatory strike by Israel to Iran’s Oct. 1 ballistic missile attack on Israel, its second direct attack on Israel amid the ongoing wars in the Middle East.
GENEVA — The U.N. human rights office is calling for an independent probe into an Israeli airstrike that hit an apartment block in northern Lebanon and left at least 22 people dead.
Jeremy Laurence, spokesperson for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights ( OHCHR ), says the agency has received reports that 12 women and two children were among those killed Monday in the airstrike on the village of Aito.
“With these factors in mind, we have real concerns with respect to … the laws of war and principles of distinction, proportion and proportionality,” he told reporters in Geneva Tuesday.
Laurence is calling for a “prompt, independent and thorough investigation into this incident.”
JERUSALEM — The Israeli Defense Ministry says it is speeding up development of new technologies to counter drone attacks like the Hezbollah strike this week that killed four soldiers.
Israel’s air defenses have performed well during a year of war against enemies across the region, particularly against rocket and missile attacks. But at times, they have struggled against drones, with uncrewed aerial vehicles responsible for several deadly attacks.
The Defense Ministry said it tested a number of technologies being developed by Israeli companies as part of an “expedited process” to find new solutions. It says it will analyze the results and select several technologies for further development with the aim of deploying them within months.
WASHINGTON — The United States and Canada have imposed sanctions on the Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, or “Samidoun,” a charity that allegedly fundraises for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine militant group.
The group operates in Gaza and the West Bank and has been a designated foreign terrorist organization since 1997.
Also designated is Khaled Barakat, a member of the group’s leadership.
Acting Undersecretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Bradley T. Smith said Tuesday that organizations like Samidoun “masquerade as charitable actors that claim to provide humanitarian support to those in need, yet in reality divert funds for much-needed assistance to support terrorist groups.”
The penalties aim to block them from using the U.S. financial system and bar American citizens from dealing with them.
BEIRUT — Hezbollah’s deputy chief and acting leader, Sheikh Naim Kassem, said in a televised speech Tuesday that the group is now focused on “hurting the enemy,” exemplified by targeting the Israeli city of Haifa and areas beyond it, including Tel Aviv.
The pre-recorded speech marked his third appearance since Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed by an Israeli airstrike in Beirut’s southern suburbs on Sept. 27.
“We will defeat our enemies and drive them out of our lands,” Kassem said. He accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of seeking a “new Middle East” aligned with Israeli and American interests.
He urged Hezbollah supporters to remain steadfast amid Israeli attacks. “Our hope for victory is limitless,” he said. “I give you good news that we are the ones who will hold the enemy’s reins and return it to the fold.”
Addressing Israelis, Kassem said only a cease-fire will allow residents of northern Israel to return to their homes. “We are not seeking a cease-fire because we are weak,” he said.
If Israel continues its bombardment and ground invasion in Lebanon, he said Hezbollah’s strikes will expand over a geographically wider area and “more than 2 million will be in danger.”
Israeli officials say the operation in Lebanon is intended to push back Hezbollah and allow displaced Israelis to return home.
Kassem linked the ongoing conflict in Lebanon to the broader struggle of the Palestinians, and to the ongoing war in Gaza.
“We cannot separate Lebanon from Palestine, or Palestine from the world,” he said.
JERUSALEM — A team of American troops supporting a missile defense system has arrived in Israel.
Pentagon press secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said in a statement that the team arrived in Israel on Monday. They’ll operate a Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense battery there to defend against ballistic missile attacks from Iran. Tehran has launched two missile attacks on Israel as the wars in Gaza and Lebanon rage.
“Over the coming days, additional U.S. military personnel and THAAD battery components will continue to arrive in Israel,” Ryder said. “The battery will be fully operational capable in the near future, but for operations security reasons we will not discuss timelines.”
Iran has warned U.S. troops would be in harm’s way if Iran launches another attack on Israel.
GENEVA — The U.N. health agency says more than 92,000 children aged under 10 in central Gaza received doses of novel oral polio vaccine as a second phase of a vaccination campaign got underway.
World Health Organization spokesperson Tarik Jasarevic told reporters Tuesday that the kick-off a day earlier to the second round of polio vaccinations was part of efforts to reach over 179,000 kids in central Gaza – and over 590,000 across the entire strip.
“What we have received from colleagues is that the vaccination went without major issues yesterday,” he told reporters at a regular U.N. briefing in Geneva. He expressed hopes that a “humanitarian pause” will be respected in north and south Gaza over the next six-to-eight days.
Jasarevic said 92,821 children aged under 10 received the vaccine on Monday, the first day of the new phase of the vaccination campaign.
“No one wants to see any child paralyzed (because of polio),” Jasarevic said. “But there are so many other problems that people in Gaza are facing, and we need sustained access.”
JERUSALEM — Israeli police say one officer was killed and four civilians were wounded in a shooting Tuesday on a highway in central Israel.
Police did not immediately provide the identity of the shooter, but police spokesperson Mirit Ben Mayor said that it was a militant attack.
Police said the attacker approached the highway and shot the officer before firing on civilians, wounding four. The attacker was then shot by a paramedic arriving on the scene, Israel’s rescue services said, without saying whether the attacker was killed.
The shooting occurred on a two-lane highway near the city of Yavne, just south of Tel Aviv.
Ohad Yehezkeli, a spokesperson for nearby Assuta Hospital, said the officer died on the way there and another civilian was being treated for moderate injuries. He said two more wounded people were being transported to the hospital.
Palestinians have carried out dozens of stabbing, shooting and car-ramming attacks against Israelis since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack triggered the war in Gaza.
Israel has ramped up military operations in the occupied West Bank, killing more than 750 Palestinians. Most have been killed during gunbattles with the army or violent protests, but the dead also include civilian bystanders.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — A general in Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard directly threatened the lives of Israelis during a funeral service in Tehran for a general slain alongside Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.
The comment from Gen. Ali Fadavi, a deputy commander in chief of the Guard, comes as Iran awaits a threatened retaliation by Israel over its Oct. 1 ballistic missile attack.
“That land is a small land. It’s not even as big as one of Iran’s small provinces,” Fadavi said. “If we will, we can obliterate all the Zionists.”
Iranian officials routinely refer to Israelis as “Zionists.”
The Guard’s leadership attended a funeral service for Gen. Abbas Nilforushan, who was killed alongside Nasrallah in an airstrike in Beirut. Guard leaders and others in Iran’s theocracy have threatened to destroy Israel in the past during the more than four decades since the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution.
JERUSALEM — Israeli police accused Hamas operatives in Turkey of directing a militant attack in August in Tel Aviv in which an explosive went off on a busy street, killing the attacker and wounding a bystander.
There was no immediate comment from Turkey. Relations between the two countries have plunged since the start of the war in Gaza.
Turkey has long provided political support for Hamas, including welcoming its top leaders on visits, but denies involvement in its military activities.
The bomb appeared to have gone off before it was planned to, and it was unclear if the attacker had planned to carry out a suicide bombing or plant the explosives. Both Hamas and the smaller Islamic Jihad militant group claimed the attack.
Police said Tuesday that they filed indictments against eight suspects. They said the attacker was a militant from Nablus, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, who had been directed by an operative in Turkey. They said one of the attack planners had traveled to Turkey several times for explosives training, and that a raid in Nablus uncovered more bombs and funds transferred from Turkey. The police did not provide evidence.
“The findings of this investigation clearly indicate the establishment of Hamas headquarters in Turkey and their extensive efforts abroad to incite violence and carry out bombings in Israel,” the police statement said.
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Palestinian first responders say they recovered 11 bodies, nearly all women and children, from a home destroyed in an airstrike in northern Gaza, where Israel has been waging an air and ground operation for over a week.
The Gaza Health Ministry’s ambulance service said the dead recovered Tuesday were all from the same family and included seven women and three children.
Fares Abu Hamza, head of the emergency service, said ambulances were only able to reach the area in the Jabaliya refugee camp around 12 hours after the airstrike late Monday. He said funeral prayers for the dead, which included a medic killed in Jabaliya, were held Tuesday in the courtyard of the Kamal Adwan Hospital.
First responders from the Civil Defense said its teams evacuated three families Tuesday who were stuck inside their homes in Jabaliya for several days because of heavy fighting.
Since the start of the war, the Israeli military has carried out several large operations in Jabaliya — a densely populated urban refugee camp dating back to the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s creation — only to return months later after saying militants had regrouped there. Israel launched a large operation there on Oct. 6.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The funeral of an Iranian Revolutionary Guard general killed alongside Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah drew the largest crowd of top leaders in the paramilitary organization together Tuesday for the first time since Tehran launched a ballistic missile attack on Israel.
The Guard’s leadership hasn’t been as visible in the two weeks since Iran’s Oct. 1 attack on Israel. The Guard is the main power behind Iran’s theocracy and oversees its arsenal of ballistic missiles — which would be crucial in any future attack on Israel.
At the funeral in Tehran for Gen. Abbas Nilforushan, the Guard’s chief commander, Gen. Hossein Salami, attended alongside President Masoud Pezeshkian and the head of the country’s judiciary. Other Guard generals also attended, including Gen. Esmail Qaani of the Guard’s expeditionary Quds Force, about whom rumors had circulated for days regarding his status after the strike that killed Nasrallah.
At least two prominent Guard generals were not on hand: Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, the commander of Guard’s aerospace division that oversees its missile program, and Gen. Ali Reza Tangsiri, commander of the Guard’s navy, did not attend.
Iran offered no explanation for their absence, though Israel has threatened to carry out a serious retaliatory strike against Iran.
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Israeli strikes in the southern Gaza Strip killed at least 15 people overnight, including six children and two women, Palestinian medical officials said Tuesday.
A strike early Tuesday hit a house in the southern town of Beni Suhaila, killing at least 10 people from one extended family, according to Nasser Hospital in nearby Khan Younis. The dead include three children and one woman, according to hospital records. An Associated Press camera operator at the hospital counted the bodies.
In the nearby town of Fakhari, a strike hit a house early Tuesday, killing five people, including three children and a woman, according to the European Hospital, where the casualties were taken.
The Israeli military rarely comments on individual strikes. It says it tries to avoid harming civilians and blames their deaths on Hamas, accusing the militants of sheltering in civilian areas.
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — In northern Gaza, where Israel has been waging an air and ground campaign in Jabaliya for more than a week, residents said families were still trapped in their homes and shelters Tuesday.
Adel al-Deqes said his relatives tried to move to another place in Jabaliya in the morning, but the military shelled them.
“We don’t know who died and who is still alive,” he said.
Ahmed Awda, another Jabaliya resident, said they heard “constant bombing and gunfire” overnight and Tuesday morning. He said the military destroyed many buildings in the eastern and northern parts of the camp, which dates back to the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s creation.
“They bombed many buildings; some of them empty buildings,” he said.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The head of the expeditionary arm of Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard has appeared in television footage aired Tuesday by Iranian state television.
Rumors circulated for weeks over Gen. Esmail Qaani’s status in the time since an Israeli airstrike that killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut in late September. But Qaani, the head of the Quds Force, was seen in a black bomber jacket, wiping away tears at an event early Tuesday morning at Tehran’s Mehrabad International Airport.
While Iranian state television did not acknowledge the rumors, it made a point to film Qaani for over a minute and later share the footage from the airport ceremony online.
Qaani was on hand for the repatriation to Iran of the body of Revolutionary Guard Gen. Abbas Nilforushan, 58, who was killed in the airstrike.
WELLINGTON, New Zealand — Australia’s government has imposed targeted financial sanctions and travel bans on five Iranians contributing to the country’s missile defense program, Foreign Minister Penny Wong said Tuesday.
Iran’s launch of at least 180 ballistic missiles against Israel on Oct. 1 was “a dangerous escalation that increased the risk of a wider regional war,” Wong said in a statement.
The fresh sanctions target two directors and a senior official in Iran’s Aerospace Industries Organization, the director of the Shahid Bagheri Industrial Group, and the commercial director of the Shahid Hemmat Industrial Group.
The decision brings to 200 the number of Iran-linked individuals and entities now sanctioned by Australia.
“Australia will continue to hold Iran to account for its reckless and destabilizing actions,” Wong said.
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