Wednesday, December 31, 2025
type here...
Home Blog Page 1063

Israel confirms pumping seawater to flood Gaza tunnels

By
IFP Media Wire
-
Gaza War Hamas Tunnel

”Before it floods tunnels, the army carries out ‘professional and comprehensive’ preemptive checks, including an analysis of the soil and water system in the area, to ensure groundwater is not contaminated,” Israeli’s public broadcaster reported, quoting an army statement.

”Tunnels have been flooded only in locations suitable for this method, without impairing the use of groundwater,” it added.

It marks the first official Israeli confirmation of what foreign media outlets had previously reported regarding the military’s use of water to flood tunnels in Gaza, according to Haaretz.

At the end of last year, Israel installed a system of pumps in the northern Gaza Strip to flood the tunnels with seawater as a part of an operation called Sea of Atlantis, according to US newspaper The Wall Street Journal.

Israel launched a deadly offensive on the Gaza Strip on Oct. 7, killing at least 26,751 Palestinians and injuring 65,636. Nearly 1,200 Israelis are believed to have been killed in the Hamas attack.

The Israeli offensive has left 85% of Gaza’s population internally displaced amid acute shortages of food, clean water and medicine, while 60% of the enclave’s infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.

The Israeli military has been “astonished” by the size and quality of the tunnels Hamas has built under the besieged enclave, according to a report.

The tunnel network was originally estimated to include 250 miles (400 km) of underground passages and bunkers. Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has since revised these estimates to 350-450 miles (560-725 km) or more.

Two officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said there were close to 5,700 separate shafts leading into the tunnels under Gaza. None of the numbers could be independently verified, however.

It could take “years” to disable the tunnels, one Israeli official told the New York Times newspaper. They need to be mapped, checked for Israeli captives, and “made irreparable”, he stated, acknowledging that the recent attempts to destroy the tunnels by flooding them with seawater “have failed”.

According to another official, Israel is using a “triangle” model to locate the tunnels, which assumes they will be found under any hospital, school or mosque in Gaza.

The Israeli military has underestimated the “extent and importance” of the tunnels to Hamas, which the daily described as an “intelligence failure”.

One soldier, who spoke with the daily on condition of anonymity, said that he took had taken part in destroying about 50 tunnels in Beit Hanoun, in the northeast of Gaza. All of them were rigged with bombs and other explosives, wired to be activated remotely.

EU says opposes Ukraine truce, calls for more weapons for Kiev, further sanctions on Moscow

By
IFP Media Wire
-
The European Union

In an op-ed for France’s L’Obs magazine on Tuesday, Borrell urged EU leaders to reject “the temptations of conciliation” with Russia.

“These ideas were wrong in 2022, and they remain wrong today,” he wrote, arguing that “we must not let them shape our policy towards Ukraine.”

It is unclear which calls for peace Borrell was referring to. In the EU, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has persistently called for a negotiated settlement, arguing that Kiev’s forces cannot win a military victory against their Russian opponents, and that the EU’s sanctions on Moscow hurt EU economies more than they hurt Russia’s.

Borrell, on the other hand, claimed that sanctions have “weakened Russia’s war machine”, despite admitting in a speech one day earlier that they have largely failed to achieve their goals.

“Instead of seeking compromise, we should remember the lessons we have learned since 2022 and redouble our efforts,” Borrell continued.

“We must shift the paradigm from supporting Ukraine for ‘as long as it takes’ to committing to doing ‘whatever it takes’ for Ukraine to win,” he declared, calling for Ukraine to be given “long range missiles and other advanced weapons systems”, including more air-defense batteries.

Ukraine’s demand for arms and ammunition can only be met if there is “a renaissance of the European defense industry”, Borrell wrote.

While Borrell boasted that defense spending across the EU has risen by 40% since 2014, this increase has not been matched by a corresponding increase in arms production. EU member states committed last March to the joint supply of a million artillery shells to Ukraine by March 2024, for example, but only a third of that number has been delivered, and German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius told reporters in November that “the one million target will not be reached”.

Defense contractors across Europe are wary of increasing production without being offered iron-clad contracts from governments, Politico reported last summer. Without such contracts, these firms would be risking a loss if demand for their weapons were to fall in the coming years.

From the outset of the conflict in Ukraine, Borrell has consistently portrayed Russia as the party that was uninterested in peace. Even in March 2022, as Russia offered Ukraine peace terms which former Ukrainian officials now concede were generous, the EU diplomat claimed that Moscow “doesn’t want to sit and negotiate anything: what it wants is to occupy the ground”.

Moscow insists that it has not ruled out a negotiated end to the conflict, but maintains that peace will only be reached when the goals of its military operation in Ukraine are achieved, either by military or diplomatic means.

Biden says has decided how to respond to deadly raid on Jordan-based US forces

By
IFP Media Wire
-
Joe Biden

Asked by reporters whether he has decided how to respond, Biden said, “Yes”, but declined to provide further details.

Biden had warned in a statement Sunday that the US will respond in a “time and manner of our choosing” as he weighs how to deter future attacks without escalating the conflict.

Biden stressed Tuesday as he prepared to depart for a fundraising swing in south Florida that he holds Iran responsible for the attack.

“I do hold them responsible in the sense that they’re supplying the weapons to the people who did it,” he added.

He reiterated that he is hoping to deter a broader conflict in the region, stating, “I don’t think we need a wider war in the Middle East. That’s not what I’m looking for.”

US officials said on Monday that the American response was likely to be more powerful than previous US strikes in Iraq and Syria against Iranian interests, but they have suggested it is unlikely the US will strike within Iran.

Tehran on Monday once again stressed that regional resistance groups do not take orders from Iran, nor does the Islamic Republic have a role in their decisions to carry out retaliatory operations in defense of Palestine.

“Iran is not involved in the resistance groups’ decisions about how to support the Palestinian people or defend themselves and the people of their countries in the face of any aggression and occupation,” Foreign Ministry Spokesman Nasser Kanaani stated.

He cautioned that leveling baseless accusations against Iran is a projection and a conspiracy by those who see their interests in dragging the US feet in a new conflict in the region to cover up their own problems.

“Iran monitors the developments in the region with readiness and vigilance and the responsibility for the consequences of provocative accusations against Iran rests with the perpetrators of such baseless claims,” he added.

Islamic Jihad chief sets conditions for release of Israeli hostages

By
IFP Media Wire
-
Israel Hostages

Al-Nakhaleh said on Tuesday that the group, a major resistance movement in Gaza, would not engage in any deal that ignores the four main conditions set by the group for a truce with the Israeli regime.

He added the four conditions are a comprehensive ceasefire in Gaza, the withdrawal of the occupation forces from the territory, a guarantee for reconstruction and a clear political solution that ensures the rights of the Palestinian people.

His statement came in response to media reports about initiatives undertaken by the US government to secure the release of Israeli captives as part of indirect ceasefire negotiations between the Gazans and the Israeli regime.

Israel faces growing international pressure to end the aggression on Gaza that has killed nearly 27,000 people over the past four months.

Israel started the war on Gaza in early October after a brief but decisive operation against Israeli settlers and military forces by Hamas, the largest resistance group in the territory.

The regime secured the release of some of the captives in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners during a weeklong truce that came to an end on December 1.

However, tens of captives are still held by Hamas and the Islamic Jihad while an unknown number have been killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza in recent weeks.

Iran summons UK ambassador over “baseless accusations”

By
IFP Editorial Staff
-
Iranian Foreign Ministry

On Monday, the US and the UK imposed sanctions on a network of people they claim targeted “Iranian opposition activists” under Iran’s orders.

During a meeting with the British envoy, the Director General of Western Europe Affairs Department of Iran’s Foreign Ministry declared the British sanctions illegal under false pretenses.

The Iranian official called the accusations of the British authorities baseless and strongly condemned them.

He considered the British government’s ongoing efforts to create a negative atmosphere against Tehran as another instance of non-constructive and destructive actions towards the Islamic Republic of Iran. He stated that such efforts are doomed to failure.

“This is a bitter historical irony: a country that is the founder and supporter of organized terrorist groups, drug trafficking, and criminal gangs, is simultaneously engaging in throwing accusations against the Islamic Republic of Iran and its loyal and honest forces, who are on the front line fighting against organized crime,” the Iranian diplomat further added.

The British ambassador stated that he would convey the situation to London.

Israeli accusations against UNRWA distraction from ongoing onslaught in Gaza: WHO

By
IFP Media Wire
-
WHO

“The discussion right now is much of a distraction of what is going on every day, every hour, every minute in Gaza,” WHO spokesperson Christian Lindmeier told a UN press briefing in Geneva.

“It’s a distraction from close to 27,000 deaths as of now, out of which 70% are women and children.”

Lindmeier was referring to recent allegations by Tel Aviv that some of UNRWA’s staff were involved in the cross-border attack on Israel by Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7.

Arguing that while these claims should be investigated, he stated they currently serve as a “distraction” from measures preventing an entire nation’s access to food, water, shelter and electricity.

They also distract from the “continuous shelling” of Palestinians in Gaza, even in designated safe areas, as well as from attacks on “shelters, schools, hospitals”, he added.

“It’s a distraction. And as important as this discussion (on allegations) is, let’s not forget what the real issues are on the ground,” he urged.

At least 12 countries — Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Canada, Finland, Australia, UK, Netherlands, US, France, Austria, and Japan — have suspended funding for UNRWA, which was established in 1949 to help Palestinian refugees across the Middle East.

UNRWA announced it terminated contracts with several employees following the Israeli allegations.

Israel launched a deadly offensive on the Gaza Strip following a cross-border attack by Hamas on Oct. 7, killing at least 26,637 Palestinians and injuring 65,387. Nearly 1,200 Israelis are believed to have been killed in the Hamas attack.

The Israeli offensive has left 85% of Gaza’s population internally displaced amid acute shortages of food, clean water, and medicine, while 60% of the enclave’s infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.

Israel hit squad dressed as doctor, nurse assassinates three in West Bank hospital: PA

By
IFP Media Wire
-
West Bank Hospital

The killings were carried out by undercover operatives while the men were sleeping at the Ibn Sina Hospital, according to statements issued by the Palestinian Ministry of Health and the Israeli army on Tuesday.

“This morning three young men were martyred by the bullets of the occupation [Israeli] forces who stormed the Ibn Sina Hospital in Jenin and shot them,” the Health Ministry in Ramallah said.

The Israeli army claimed its troops had “neutralised” the men, who were hiding in the hospital and belonged to a Hamas “terrorist cell”.

“A gun was found on a wanted person, which was confiscated by the forces,” the army statement added.

It reported that one of the men “had recently been involved in promoting significant terrorist activity and was hiding” in the hospital.

Hospital director Naji Nazzal told the AFP news agency that “a group of Israeli forces entered the facility undercover and assassinated the men”. They used weapons fitted with silencers, he added.

The official Palestinian news agency Wafa named the three men as Muhammad Jalamnah, Muhammad Ayman Ghazawi and Basel Ayman Ghazawi.

Security camera footage circulated online appeared to show about a dozen undercover personnel, including three in women’s clothing and two dressed as medical staff, pacing through a corridor of the hospital with assault rifles.

Hamas said in a statement that the Israeli army’s “crimes will not go unanswered”, adding that the killings are a “continuation of the occupation’s ongoing crimes against our people from Gaza to Jenin”.

The statement noted that one of the men was injured and in bed when he was killed.

Of the three men, Hamas confirmed one was one of its members, and another was with the Jenin Battalion. The third was also a Palestinian fighter.

Violent clashes were reported in the area surrounding the hospital.

The funeral ceremony of the three men was under way at noon, as crowds passed through the streets of Jenin in preparation for performing funeral prayers for them to be buried later in the cemetery in the Jenin refugee camp. Palestinian media outlets published scenes from the funeral.

Since the beginning of Israel’s war on Gaza, Israeli forces have carried out raids and arrests in the West Bank on a daily basis.

Hundreds of people have been killed and arrested since Hamas’s October 7 attacks on Israel, in which about 1,140 people were killed and some 250 taken captive.

Approximately 100 of the captives were returned to Israel under a truce deal last November in exchange for the release of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.

Ex-Pakistan PM Imran Khan, top aide get 10-year jail term for leaking state secrets

By
IFP Media Wire
-
Imran Khan

The special court set up in a prison in Rawalpindi on Tuesday announced the sentence in the so-called cypher case, which pertains to a diplomatic cable that Khan claims proves his allegation that his removal from power in 2022 was a conspiracy.

The court established under the Official Secrets Act found Khan guilty of misusing the confidential cable sent by a former Pakistani ambassador to the United States.

Khan has repeatedly denied the charge, saying the document contained evidence that his removal as prime minister was a plot hatched by his political opponents and the powerful military, with help from the US administration. Washington and the Pakistani army reject the accusation.

Khan was Pakistan’s premier from August 2018 to April 2022 when he lost a vote of confidence in the parliament. He has been in jail since August last year, facing trial in multiple cases.

The sentencing against the country’s main opposition leader comes about a week before the general elections, scheduled on February 8.

Syed Zulfiqar Bukhari, a spokesperson for Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, told Al Jazeera the PTI will challenge the court’s decision.

“This was pretty much a writing on the wall,” he said, adding that the trial was held in an “unlawful manner”.

“Our lawyers were not allowed to represent Imran Khan. They were not even allowed to cross-examine the witnesses. What was unfolding in the court was merely a charade and a sham.”

It is Khan’s second conviction in less than a year. In August, he was sentenced to three years in a corruption case, which barred him from contesting the national elections.

The vote follows a massive crackdown against the PTI, which saw dozens of its leaders quitting the party and thousands of its members and supporters jailed.

Recently, the party also lost its election symbol – a cricket bat – and had been forced to field its candidates as independents.

But Bukhari stated the verdict against Khan and Qureshi will only work in favour of the beleaguered party.

“With the sentence coming at a time when elections are less than 10 days away, it will only motivate our supporters and help them come out in droves. It looks like the authorities want to suppress the PTI and its voter base, but their acts will only drive us to vote in bigger numbers,” he told Al Jazeera.

US govt. employees to stage ‘Day of Fasting for Gaza’ to denounce Biden’s policies

By
IFP Media Wire
-
Gaza Rally

Feds United for Peace, representing employees from twenty-seven US government agencies and departments, said the “day of fasting for Gaza” aims to draw attention to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

Participating federal employees are set to show up to their offices dressed in black or wearing keffiyeh scarves or other symbols of Palestinian solidarity.

A federal employee speaking on behalf of the group cited a UN report that up to two million people in the territory are at risk of famine, saying the Day of Fasting is a response to Israel’s use of “starvation as a weapon of war by intentionally withholding food from entering Gaza.”

Feds United for Peace represents the departments of defense, homeland security, and state, and includes career public servants and political appointees, among others. The groups said they expect hundreds of government employees to participate.

The group also organized an office walkout in solidarity with Palestinians earlier in the month, which drew reactions in Washington, with national security officials from both parties criticizing their protests as insubordination.

“They deserve to be fired,” the House speaker, Mike Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, stated.

Feds United for Peace representatives say that their goal is to force a conversation in their offices, where many federal employees might support a ceasefire but fear retribution for speaking out, or are afraid to even casually discuss politics because doing so might hamper their efforts to work on policy effectively.

Israel unleashed a war in Gaza on October 7, killing more than 26,600 Palestinians, according to the latest count from the Gaza Health Ministry, with the majority women and children.

It also imposed a total blockade on the territory and restricted food, water, and fuel from entering. The blockade, the civic destruction, and the relentless bombardment of the Strip are pushing Gaza’s essential services and resources to the brink of collapse.

The United Nations has warned that a dire situation is unfolding in Gaza as half a million individuals are facing the threat of catastrophic hunger.

The people of Gaza account for a staggering 80 percent of the global population facing famine or catastrophic hunger, as reported by the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.

The Israeli genocidal war on Gaza also prompted other US government employees to organize against the war under other umbrellas as well. Staffers for Ceasefire, for instance, put on a vigil for Gaza outside the White House in December.

Last week, Staffers for Ceasefire published a statement in opposition to the efforts of senior White House officials to boost morale that has flagged as a result of opposition to the US’s support of Israel.

“While White House chief of staff Jeff Zients throws a morale-booster party for staff tonight, a child in Gaza is killed every 8 minutes,” Staffers for Ceasefire said in a statement, adding, “We are disgusted by this display of complete apathy towards the lives that have been taken in the region over the last three months.”

In early January, a senior political appointee from the education department, Tariq Habash, resigned in protest.

At Biden’s 2024 re-election headquarters, campaigners have also anonymously signed petitions.

More than a thousand officials from the development agency USAid signed a letter in support of a ceasefire.

Government employees say that even though their substantive criticisms of the administration’s policy do not seem to be changing policy, the barrage of dissenting actions have reached the Oval Office.

Van Jackson, a political scientist who worked in the Pentagon during the Barack Obama administration, said the recent protests from US public servants were unprecedented.

“We are in uncharted territory, and no presidential administration in the past 40 years has been denounced by its own staff like this – not collectively, not so publicly, and not with this regularity,” Jackson wrote in his newsletter Un-Diplomatic.

Israel’s DM tells troops it could be months before the Gaza war is over

By
IFP Media Wire
-
Israel Army

“This is a long war, but in the end, we will break Hamas. We must keep going until we eliminate them as a governing system, and as a military organization capable of launching attacks against the state of Israel,” Yoav Gallant said.

Gallant described the conflict to the soldiers as an “hourglass” that has “flipped against” Hamas and is now in Israel’s favor.

The Israeli defense minister has on several occasions outlined Israel’s commitment to pursuing Hamas fighters in Gaza for as “long as necessary”.

The minister stressed that it will “take months, not a single day” to achieve Israel’s objectives despite his claim that Hamas’ capabilities have been significantly weakened.

“They don’t have ammunition, they don’t have reinforcements.”

In early January, Israel Defense Forces spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari stated Israel will continue to wage war in Gaza throughout 2024. The IDF spokesman’s prediction followed similar comments from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who warned that “many more months” of fighting still lay ahead.

A new report by US intelligence agencies has concluded that Palestinian group Hamas has lost 20-30 percent of its fighters after months of Israel’s war on the besieged Gaza Strip, meaning it is far from being destroyed.

The report says the agencies also found Hamas still has enough weaponry to continue striking Israeli forces and launch rockets into Israel “for months”.

It noted even though individual Hamas fighters may have to take on more tasks since they have lost comrades, they are far from being incapacitated and have changed their operational tactics to adjust.

The report also added Israeli officials estimate up to 16,000 Hamas fighters have been wounded and about half of those will not be returning to the battlefield. But US estimates puts that number between 10,500 and 11,700 fighters, many of whom could return.

The Israeli military has been “astonished” by the size and quality of the tunnels Hamas has built under the besieged enclave, according to a report.

The tunnel network was originally estimated to include 250 miles (400 km) of underground passages and bunkers. Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has since revised these estimates to 350-450 miles (560-725 km) or more.

Two officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said there were close to 5,700 separate shafts leading into the tunnels under Gaza. None of the numbers could be independently verified, however.

It could take “years” to disable the tunnels, one Israeli official told the New York Times newspaper. They need to be mapped, checked for Israeli captives, and “made irreparable”, he stated, acknowledging that the recent attempts to destroy the tunnels by flooding them with seawater “have failed”.

According to another official, Israel is using a “triangle” model to locate the tunnels, which assumes they will be found under any hospital, school or mosque in Gaza.

The Israeli military has underestimated the “extent and importance” of the tunnels to Hamas, which the daily described as an “intelligence failure”.

The IDF has not disclosed the number of soldiers killed and wounded in tunnel warfare. Officially, almost 190 soldiers have been killed and 240 or so seriously wounded in the fighting since the start of the ground campaign in Gaza.

One soldier, who spoke with the Times on condition of anonymity, said that he took had taken part in destroying about 50 tunnels in Beit Hanoun, in the northeast of Gaza. All of them were rigged with bombs and other explosives, wired to be activated remotely.

The Palestinian group Hamas, which maintains de facto control over Gaza, struck at nearby Israeli settlements on October 7, claiming the lives of approximately 1,200 Israelis. Another 250 were taken into the Palestinian enclave as captives. Israel responded by declaring war on Hamas and launching air and artillery strikes on Gaza, followed by ground troops in November.

Almost 26,600 Palestinians have been killed and another 65,000 wounded since early October, according to the Gaza health ministry.

1...1,0621,0631,064...5,133Page 1,063 of 5,133

© All Content by IFP News ( Iran Front Page ) is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

About Us

Popular Articles

Editor Picks