Israeli ceasefire talks delegation returning from Qatar
An Israeli delegation that was in Doha at the weekend for talks on the next phase of the Gaza ceasefire is now returning from the Qatari capital, Benjamin Netanyahu’s spokesperson has said, without providing further details.
It comes a day after US President Donald Trump said he was losing patience with the ceasefire deal after seeing footage of Hamas release Israeli hostages over the weekend, whose appearance he compared to Holocaust survivors.
“They look like Holocaust survivors. They were in horrible condition. They were emaciated,” Trump told reporters. “I don’t know how much longer we can take that … at some point we’re going to lose our patience.”
“I know we have a deal … they dribble in and keep dribbling in … but they are in really bad shape,” Trump said of the Israeli hostages.
Little progress has been made on negotiating the second phase of the three part ceasefire deal, which is designed to extend the truce and to secure the release of more Israeli hostages held by Hamas.
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Palestinian groups monitoring arrests of Palestinians by Israeli forces in the Israeli-occupied West Bank report that about 580 people were detained by Israeli forces during the month of January, including about 60 children and 17 women.
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Here are images of the protest outside the court where Mahmoud Muna and his nephew Ahmed Muna were due to appear, having been held overnight on charges of “violating public order” after an Israeli security forces raid on bookshops in occupied East Jerusalem.
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Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid has said he is “against transfer and expulsion by force” of the Palestinian population from the Gaza Strip.
Lapid was being asked to respond to last week’s announcement by Donald Trump that the US will “take over” Gaza and “own it”, effectively endorsing the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians while standing alongside Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington.
The Times of Israel reports that Lapid said he did not believe that Trump’s proposal meant the forced removal of anybody, but that people who wished to leave the Palestinian territory would be able to do so.
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Israeli ceasefire talks delegation returning from Qatar
An Israeli delegation that was in Doha at the weekend for talks on the next phase of the Gaza ceasefire is now returning from the Qatari capital, Benjamin Netanyahu’s spokesperson has said, without providing further details.
It comes a day after US President Donald Trump said he was losing patience with the ceasefire deal after seeing footage of Hamas release Israeli hostages over the weekend, whose appearance he compared to Holocaust survivors.
“They look like Holocaust survivors. They were in horrible condition. They were emaciated,” Trump told reporters. “I don’t know how much longer we can take that … at some point we’re going to lose our patience.”
“I know we have a deal … they dribble in and keep dribbling in … but they are in really bad shape,” Trump said of the Israeli hostages.
Little progress has been made on negotiating the second phase of the three part ceasefire deal, which is designed to extend the truce and to secure the release of more Israeli hostages held by Hamas.
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The Israeli military has deployed more armoured vehicles, machinery and bulldozers to Jenin and the Far’a camp, which is located in a rural area 17 kilometres northeast of Nablus in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, according to Al Jazeera.
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Israeli military’s deadly raid on West Bank city of Jenin continues
The IDF’s raid on the West Bank city of Jenin, which has killed at least 25 Palestinian people, according to officials, is on its 21st consecutive day. The Israeli military says its aim is to rout out what it has described as militants.
Jenin’s refugee camp, one of 19 across the West Bank built in the aftermath of Israel’s creation in 1948 to house displaced Palestinians, is a centre of armed Palestinian resistance to the Israeli occupation.
The UN has expressed concern that the ceasefire in Gaza could be endangered by Israel’s military actions in the occupied West Bank, which have involved what the UN human rights spokesperson labelled “unnecessary or disproportionate use of force”.
Jenin’s assistant governor Mansour Al-Saadi said yesterday that Israeli forces have completely destroyed the Jenin camp, and displaced about 20,000 people from inside it.
The following is from a report from the Palestinian news agency, Wafa. We have not yet been able to independently verify this information:
The occupation soldiers opened fire on the journalists present in the Jenin camp, detained a group of them, interrogated them, confiscated their phones, and prevented them from returning to the camp.
The occupation continues to demolish and burn the homes of citizens in the camp, amid intensive flying of drones.
Israeli military vehicles continue to besiege Jenin governmental hospital after bulldozing its entrance and the main street leading to it.
For the 21st consecutive day, the hospital departments are suffering from a severe shortage of potable water, while the necessary hospital departments are operating at their minimum capacity due to the occupation’s aggression that makes it difficult for patients to reach it.
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Israeli police have raided the best-known Palestinian-owned bookshop in Jerusalem and detained its two owners after using Google translate to examine the shop’s stock.
Rights groups called for the men’s immediate release, describing the arrests on Sunday as part of a broader campaign of harassment of Palestinian intellectuals.
Mahmoud Muna and his nephew Ahmed Muna were held overnight on charges of “violating public order” after the Educational Bookstore shops were ransacked. Images on social media showed piles of books swept on to the floor, and a selection of others that had been confiscated.
They were due to appear in court in Jerusalem on Monday morning. A crowd of demonstrators gathered outside in support. “No to censorship, No to book bans,” read one placard.
“They took every book that had the Palestinian flag on it,” one of the men’s brothers told the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. He shared an image of books that had been seized by police and later returned.
They included the artist Banksy’s Wall and Piece and Gaza in Crisis by the US academic Noam Chomsky and the Israeli scholar Ilan Pappé, and Love Wins by the Canadian film-maker and photographer Afzal Huda.
You can read the full story by my colleagues, Emma Graham-Harrison and Quique Kierszenbaum, here:
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Iranian president says Trump is aiming to bring his country ’to its knees’
We have some more comments from Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, who has been speaking to a crowd in Tehran as the country marked the 46th anniversary of the 1979 Islamic revolution (see post at 09.22 for more details).
“Trump says, ’we want to talk’, and… (then) he signs in a memorandum all the conspiracies to bring our revolution to its knees,” Pezeshkian told the crowd, referring to the US president’s reinstatement of sanctions against Tehran earlier this month.
Trump last week signed a national security presidential memorandum to enforce his restored maximum pressure on Iran policy, which Tehran maintains has failed. The memorandum instructs the US Treasury and state department to implement a campaign aimed at “driving Iran’s oil exports to zero” and is meant to block the country from achieving a nuclear weapon.
“We are not looking for war,” Pezeshkian said earlier today, adding that Iran “will never bow to foreigners”. Saying the US sought to weaken Iran by sowing “division”, Pezeshkian added: “If we join hands, we are capable of resolving all the country’s problems.” . Iran denies seeking atomic bombs.
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Updated at 10.45 GMT
Gaza Hamas chief says Trump’s plan for the territory is ‘doomed’
Hamas’ Gaza chief Khalil al-Hayya said on Monday that Donald Trump’s plans for the Gaza Strip were “doomed” (see post at 9.50 for more details on the proposal, which has been condemned as one for ethnical cleansing).
“We will bring them down as we brought down the projects before them,” he said during a commemoration of the 46th anniversary of the Iranian revolution in Tehran.
Hamas, which has been the sole ruler in the Gaza Strip since 2007, has previously said Trump’s plan would “put oil on the fire” in the region.
Hamas has adamantly insisted it wants to remain in Gaza while Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has agreed with Trump’s Gaza takeover proposal, has vowed to destroy the Palestinian militant group and never allow it to again rule the territory.
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Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has been giving his regular media briefing with journalists. He was asked about Donald Trump’s plans to take over the Gaza Strip, move Palestinians to neighbouring countries – such as Egypt and Jordan – and redevelop the territory for occupation by “the world’s people”, effectively endorsing the ethnic cleansing of the people of Gaza.
Trump said on Sunday he was committed to buying and owning Gaza, but could allow sections of the devastated territory to be rebuilt by other states in the Middle East.
Asked whether the US President’s plan was acceptable for Moscow, Peskov told a conference call:
It’s worth waiting for some details here if we’re talking about a coherent plan of action. We are talking about almost 1.2 million Palestinians who live there, and this is probably the main issue.
These are the people who were promised a two-state solution to the Middle East problem by the relevant security council resolutions, and so on and so forth. There are a lot of questions like that. We don’t know the details yet, so we have to be patient.
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Tens of thousands of Iranians marked the anniversary of the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, the first such rally since Donald Trump returned to office last month and restarted his “maximum pressure” campaign targeting Tehran.
The annual commemoration of the end of the rule of the American-backed Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and the creation of Iran’s Shiite theocracy comes this year as deep uncertainty lingers across the country.
Iran faces crushing sanctions wrecking its economy and the threat of more coming from Trump, even as the US president suggests he wants to reach a deal with Tehran over its rapidly advancing nuclear program.
“If the US were sincere about negotiations, why did they sanction us?” Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said earlier today.
Trump has said he wants a “verified nuclear peace agreement” with Iran and that it was essential that the country did not have a nuclear weapon. As the Guardian’s diplomatic editor, Patrick Wintour, notes in this story, the Republican president seems willing to hold talks with Iran to try to replace the nuclear deal signed in 2015 (but from which he pulled the US out in 2018, despite European opposition).
As its 2015 nuclear deal with major powers has eroded over the years, Iran expanded and accelerated its nuclear programme, reducing the time it would need to build a nuclear bomb if it chose to, though it denies wanting to.
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Updated at 10.02 GMT
The freed Israeli hostage Eli Sharabi did not know his wife and two teenage daughters were killed in the 7 October attack until after his release, his British family have confirmed.
An Israeli soldier broke the news about what had happened to his wife, Lianne, who grew up near Bristol, and their two British-Israeli children Noiya, 16, and Yahel, 13, after Sharabi and two other hostages were released by Hamas in exchange for 183 Palestinian prisoners on Saturday.
Sharabi had spent 491 days in captivity unaware that, after armed men entered his home and shot the family dog, they locked Lianne and the children in their safe room and set it on fire, Lianne’s parents told the BBC. Their bodies were later found “all cuddled together”.
Sharabi’s brother, Yossi, was also taken hostage on 7 October. He died early last year when the Israeli army bombed a building in Gaza near where he was being held.
Shortly before he was handed over to the Red Cross on Saturday, Sharabi was escorted on to a stage by masked Hamas fighters, where he said: “I feel very, very happy today to return to my family and friends – to my wife and daughters. I truly hope to see them very soon.”
He appeared emaciated and is now being treated for severe malnutrition at a hospital in Tel Aviv.
You can read the full story by my colleague, Donna Ferguson, here:
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Updated at 08.56 GMT
Unrwa still operates in Gaza, West Bank and Jerusalem despite ban – report
Unrwa has provided education, health and other basic services to millions of Palestinian refugees across the region, including in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. The Israeli government has accused the UN agency of allowing Hamas militants to infiltrate its staff, an allegation the agency denies.
At the end of January, Israel formally banned Unrwa from operating on its territory but many operations are continuing, according to Hareetz. Here is an extract from its story published yesterday:
In contrast to concerns at Unrwa and among Palestinians, Israel has so far not taken any direct action aimed at preventing Unrwa operations in East Jerusalem. Schools in the Shoafat refugee camp and in other locations in the city, as well as Unrwa-run clinics, worked as usual last week, as did cleaning services provided by the agency at Shoafat. Officials in Unrwa say that they have not received any instructions from Israel to stop operating in East Jerusalem.
However, in the wake of these laws, the visas of 25 international employees who managed Unrwa operations in Jerusalem and the West Bank were revoked. These employees left Israel and are continuing to work from Jordan.
Local employees, who constitute the vast majority of the people working for Unrwa, continue to work as usual. The law is unclear with regard to whether Israeli banks and other organizations can continue maintaining their ties with Unrwa, but most employees are paid through Palestinian banks.
A few international employees still work in Gaza, and the agency continues to operate there on a large scale.
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Updated at 08.56 GMT
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (Unrwa) has said people living in makeshift tents in Gaza have been displaced due to “severe winter storms”.
In a post on X, Unrwa wrote:
Hundreds of families in Deir al-Balah and North Gaza have been affected, with hundreds of tents destroyed and several households displaced.
Unrwa is delivering tents, tarps, blankets and other essential supplies to thousands across Gaza struggling with the harsh conditions.
Despite the increase in aid deliveries coming into the strip because of the ceasefire, basic supplies such as warm clothing also are still not widely available, according to reports.
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Families returning to northern Gaza are ‘shocked by the scale of destruction’ there – Unicef
Welcome back to our live coverage of the latest news from the Middle East.
Displaced Palestinian families who have returned to northern Gaza since the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas came into effect last month have been “shocked” by the “complete scale of destruction” of their homes and neighbourhoods, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef).
Tess Ingram, a spokesperson for Unicef, said children in particular have been traumatised by Israel’s war on the territory, which has left many communities without adequate healthcare, sanitation, shelter and water.
Israel’s campaign of intense aerial bombing and mass demolitions levelled large swathes of Gaza, and left whole neighbourhoods barely habitable. Nine in 10 homes in the territory have been destroyed or damaged, UN figures show. Schools, hospitals, mosques, cemeteries, shops and offices have been repeatedly hit.
About 700,000 northern Gaza residents fled to southern areas at the start of the war in October 2023, when the Israeli military issued mass evacuation orders.
In a post on X on Sunday, Ingram, who has been speaking to Palestinian people returning to the northern part of the strip this week, said in a video:
The families that I’ve spoken to this week here in the north of Gaza have been shocked by what they have returned to.
They’ve been shocked by the complete scale of this destruction. Even after seeing photos and videos from the south, they hoped that their homes, their neighborhoods, their communities, maybe had been spared.
And as they come back here and realise that’s not the case the hope that they’ve been holding on to for 15 months crashes into a deep heaviness, and this is particularly traumatic for children, children who have endured so much already and are now coming back to communities without water and without health care, without the basics that they need to survive.
More people are returning to northern Gaza now as the Israeli military has completed its withdrawal from the Netzarim Corridor, that bisects the northern and southern halves of the Gaza Strip.
In other developments:
Egypt will host an Arab summit on 27 February to discuss what it said were “serious” developments for Palestinian people, according to the country’s foreign ministry. Egypt has rejected Donald Trump’s plans – condemned as ethnic cleansing – to move Palestinians out of their territories in Gaza and the occupied West Bank to neighbouring countries such as Egypt and Jordan.
Speaking on Sunday, the US President repeated his pledge to take control of the Gaza Strip. “I’m committed to buying and owning Gaza. As far as us rebuilding it, we may give it to other states in the Middle East to build sections of it. Other people may do it through our auspices. But we’re committed to owning it, taking it, and making sure that Hamas doesn’t move back. There’s nothing to move back into. The place is a demolition site. The remainder will be demolished,” he told reporters.
A spokesperson for Israeli prime minster Benjamin Netanyahu said that an Israeli delegation arrived in Qatar on Sunday for further ceasefire talks between Hamas and Israel. Reuters reports that indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas on the next stage of the ceasefire are set to begin this week.
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