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AS IT HAPPENED
Blinken arrives in Saudi Arabia as Riyadh pledges $40 million for UNRWA
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken touched down in Jeddah Wednesday to bolster new efforts to secure a ceasefire in Gaza and ramp up aid deliveries there. His visit comes as Saudi Arabia announced its donation of $40 million to UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees. Read our blog to see how the day’s events unfolded.
Issued on: 20/03/2024 – 02:22
Modified: 20/03/2024 – 18:04
2 min
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken walks as he arrives in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, March 20, 2024.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrives in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia on March 20, 2024. © Evelyn Hockstein, Reuters
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FRANCE 24
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This blog is no longer being updated. For more coverage of the Israel-Hamas war, please click here.
Summary:
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is touring this Middle East this week as part of efforts to secure a ceasefire in Gaza and increase humanitarian aid deliveries to the enclave.
A Senior Hamas official, Osama Hamdan, said in a Beirut press conference on Wednesday that Israel’s response to the group’s latest Gaza ceasefire proposal was negative after mediators handed it over.
Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday he was still determined to carry out a Rafah ground offensive despite the misgivings expressed by US President Joe Biden.
In an interview with FRANCE 24, the executive director of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) sounded the alarm about the situation facing children caught in the war in Gaza.
At least 31,923 Palestinians have been killed and 74,096 wounded since Israel started its offensive on Gaza,Israel, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run enclave. Around 1,140 people were killed in the Hamas-led October 7 attacks and 250 people taken hostage, according to Israeli figures, with 132 still missing.
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Last Update:
11 hours ago
11 hours ago
Dozens of former US officials urge Biden to take harder line with Israel
Nearly 70 former US officials, diplomats and military officers on Wednesday urged President Joe Biden to warn Israel of serious consequences if it denies civil rights and basic necessities to Palestinians and expands settlement activity in the occupied West Bank.
“The United States must be willing to take concrete action to oppose” such practices, the group said in an open letter to Biden, “including restrictions on provision of (US) assistance (to Israel) consistent with US law and policy.”
Among the signatories were more than a dozen former ambassadors, as well as other retired State Department officials and former Pentagon, intelligence and White House officials, including Anthony Lake, a national security adviser to former President Bill Clinton.
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13 hours ago
A ‘double-forked operation’ for Blinken in the Middle East
As US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken begins his sixth trip to the Middle East, he will try to secure a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas, said Fraser Jackson, FRANCE 24’s correspondent in Washington, DC. In exchange for that ceasefire, there would be a release of hostages and more aid getting into the Gaza Strip.
Yet it is a “double-forked operation” for Blinken as he looks to dissuade the Israeli government from going forward with a southern defensive into the southern Gazan town of Rafah, added Jackson. Click on the video report for more.
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15 hours ago
Probe finds flaws in UN Palestinian refugee agency
A preliminary investigation into UNRWA, the embattled United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, has found “critical areas” which need to be addressed, a United Nations spokesperson said Wednesday.
UNRWA was swept into controversy in January when Israel accused 12 of its 30,000 employees of being involved in the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, which led to the deaths of around 1,160 people — mostly civilians — according to an AFP count based on official Israeli figures.
The UN immediately fired the implicated staff members and launched an internal investigation to assess the agency’s neutrality, led by former French foreign minister Catherine Colonna.
An interim report found that “UNRWA has in place a significant number of mechanisms and procedures to ensure compliance with the Humanitarian Principle of neutrality,” said UN spokesperson Florencia Soto Nino.
But investigators, who presented their findings to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday, have “also identified critical areas that still need to be addressed”.
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15 hours ago
Netanyahu tells US Republicans Gaza war will continue, days after Schumer speech
Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu told US Republican senators on Wednesday that Israel will continue its efforts to defeat Palestinian militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip, senators told reporters after he addressed a party lunch.
“He’s going to do what he said he’s going to do. He’s going to finish it,” Senator Jim Risch said.
The conservative Israeli leader spoke to Republicans via videolink nearly a week after the Senate’s Democratic majority leader, Chuck Schumer, gave a speech in the Senate harshly criticising Netanyahu as an obstacle to peace and urging new elections in Israel.
Wednesday’s meeting underscored the politicisation of Washington’s Israel policy. Netanyahu has long been aligned with Republicans, who accused Schumer of seeking to “overthrow” the Israeli leader.
“We asked… him for an update and we got it on the war, on the release of the hostages and in the efforts to defeat Hamas. We told him Israel has every right to defend themselves and he said that’s exactly what they continue to do,” Senator John Barrasso said.
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16 hours ago
Palestine Football Association urges FIFA sanctions against Israel
The Palestine Football Association has called on football’s international governing body, FIFA, to sanction Israeli teams over the war in Gaza.
The PFA asked for its proposal, which it said six other member nations had endorsed, to be on the agenda at FIFA’s upcoming congress in May.
Israel’s football association on Wednesday responded to the petition by saying it had “always followed FIFA regulations and always will”.
The PFA’s statement, released on Tuesday, said “the loss of innocent lives, including no less than 99 footballers” and the “destruction of residential units… are clear violations of international laws”.
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16 hours ago
Arab foreign ministers to meet Blinken in Cairo on Thursday
Arab foreign ministers and a top Palestinian official will meet US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Cairo on Thursday as he pushes for a pause in fighting between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip during his latest tour of the region.
Blinken will meet foreign ministers from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan, as well as the Emirati international cooperation minister and the secretary-general of the Palestinian Liberation Organisation, according to an Egyptian foreign ministry note.
The note did not give details on the subject of the meeting, but Egyptian security sources said Arab nations would present plans for a political solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
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17 hours ago
Schumer declines Netanyahu request to speak to the Democratic Caucus, Punchbowl reports
US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer declined a request by Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to speak to the Senate Democratic Caucus, US online political news daily Punchbowl News reported on Wednesday.
Punchbowl reported that Schumer said these conversations should not happen “in a partisan manner”.
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17 hours ago
‘Beyond Gaza City, strikes and fighting continue throughout the Strip’
Gaza City is a ghost town. Israel continues its raids in and around the Al-Shifa Hospital, which it suspects to be a base for Hamas fighters. Beyond Gaza City, strikes and fighting continue throughout the Strip. Those wounded on a strike on the Nusseirat refugee camp were rushed to a hospital, after Hamas reported dozens killed. Click on this video report by Liza Kaminov and Bilal Tarabey for more.
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19 hours ago
Saudi Arabia announces $40 million donation to UNRWA
Saudi Arabia announced Wednesday it will donate $40 million to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, which has faced massive funding cuts and calls for its abolition spearheaded by Israel.
The King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre (KSrelief) said the funds would support UNRWA’s “humanitarian relief efforts in the Gaza Strip”, where the Israel-Hamas war has raged for more than five months.
“The funding will provide food for more than 250,000 people and tents for 20,000 families,” KSrelief said in a statement.
The UN agency, created in 1949, has come under heavy scrutiny after Israel accused about a dozen of its employees of involvement in the October 7 Hamas attack on southern Israel
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19 hours ago
Israel’s Netanyahu says Rafah operation ‘will take some time’
Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said that preparations were underway for the invasion of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip but that such an action “will take some time”.
In the statement, Netanyahu said that he will soon approve a plan for the evacuation of Palestinian civilians from fighting areas after having green-lit the military’s operational plans for Rafah.
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20 hours ago
Canada stops arms shipments to Israel
Canada has not approved new arms exports permits to Israel since January 8 and this freeze will continue until Ottawa can ensure the weapons are used properly, Foreign Minister Melanie Joly said on Wednesday. FRANCE 24’s Andrew Hilliar tells us more.
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20 hours ago
Hamas says Israeli response to its truce proposal was negative
A senior Hamas official said on Wednesday that Israel’s response to the group’s latest Gaza ceasefire proposal was negative after mediators handed it over.
“On Tuesday evening, our brothers, the mediators, informed us of the occupation’s position on the proposal … it is a negative response in general and does not respond to the demands .. In fact, it retracts the approvals it previously provided to the mediators,” Osama Hamdan told a press conference in Beirut.
He said Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and his government were responsible for the failure to negotiate a hostage release in exchange for Palestinian prisoners and stop the fighting in Gaza.
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20 hours ago
Blinken to visit Israel on Friday
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will visit Israel on Friday, a State Department spokesperson said as the top diplomat landed in Saudi Arabia to kick off a Middle East tour.
Blinken will make the previously unscheduled visit to discuss “the ongoing negotiations to secure the release of all hostages” and efforts to boost aid deliveries to Gaza, Matthew Miller told journalists travelling with Blinken.
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21 hours ago
Blinken lands in Saudi Arabia for Gaza talks
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken landed in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday to discuss efforts to secure a ceasefire in Gaza and ramp up aid deliveries to the Palestinian territory.
The US top diplomat touched down in Jeddah where he was to meet Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, said an AFP journalist on board, the first stop on Blinken’s sixth Middle East tour since the Israel-Hamas war started on October 7.
Blinken on Thursday is due to travel on to Egypt, which neighbours Gaza and whose envoys have been involved in previous mediation efforts.
In Jeddah and Cairo, Blinken will discuss efforts to reach an “immediate ceasefire agreement that secures the release of all remaining hostages”, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said on Tuesday.
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a day ago
Dozens protest outside UNRWA’s office in Jerusalem, demanding agency be dismantled
A few dozen Israelis protested outside the Jerusalem office of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) on Wednesday, calling for its dismantling after Israel accused some staff of colluding with Hamas.
“UNRWA has allowed terrorism,” said American-Israeli protester Allison Epstein. “It is not an organisation for peace. It has taught generations of Palestinians to hate Jews. It’s time to dismantle it.” Around her in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem, protesters chanted: “UNRWA is Hamas! Hamas is UNRWA!”.
The agency came under heavy criticism since Israel accused 12 of its Gaza staff of 13,000 of being implicated in the October 7 Hamas attack on southern Israel. Multiple governments suspended their contributions to UNRWA, although several have since resumed payments.
Washington has said the agency has an “absolutely indispensable role” to play in distributing aid in Gaza, which the United Nations has warned is on the brink of famine.
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a day ago
French hate crimes spiked following Gaza war
Racist, xenophobic and religion-based hate crimes surged 32 percent in France last year, government figures showed Wednesday, with a spike following the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
Police recorded 8,500 crimes and misdemeanours “committed because of the ethnicity, nationality, supposed race or religion” of the victims across 2023, the interior ministry’s statistics service (SSMSI) said.
There were twice as many crimes and misdemeanours recorded in October-December as in the same period in 2022. “The increase can be seen from October, with a level of offences holding at the same high level in November before falling back in December,” the report said.
The SSMSI did not break down its figures by religion of the victim. Most racist, xenophobic or anti-religious acts were “provocations, insults and defamation”, the report found.
FRANCE 24
French hate crimes surged in wake of Gaza war, government report shows
Racist, xenophobic and religion-based hate crimes surged 32 percent in France last year, government figures showed Wednesday, with a spike following the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
Read the article on https://www.france24.com
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a day ago
Pope issues fresh call for peace talks
Pope Francis on Wednesday repeated his call for negotiations to end the war in Gaza.
At his weekly audience at the Vatican, the 87-year-old turned his thoughts to the populations of “the Holy Land, Palestine, Israel, who suffer so much from the horror of war”.
“Let us never forget, war is always a defeat. We cannot go forward during a war. We must make every effort to talk, to negotiate.”
The pope also called for peace through negotiation in Ukraine.
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a day ago
Death toll in Gaza rises to 31,923, says Hamas-run health ministry
At least 31,923 Palestinians have been killed and 74,096 have been injured in Israel’s military offensive on Gaza since October 7, the Hamas-run health ministry said in a statement on Wednesday.
Some 104 Palestinians were killed and 162 injured in the previous 24 hours, the ministry added.
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20th Mar
04:52
Israeli defence minister to visit Washington
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant is to visit Washington in the coming week, the government said Wednesday, as pressure builds to call off a planned offensive in Gaza’s Rafah.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office also announced that a delegation would visit Washington at “the request of US President Joe Biden” to discuss the planned assault, which the United States opposes.
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20th Mar
04:11
Israeli military says it killed 90 gunmen at Gaza’s Al Shifa hospital
Israel’s military said on Wednesday it had killed around 90 gunmen and arrested 160 in a raid on Gaza’s Al Shifa hospital.
“Over the past day, the troops have eliminated terrorists and located weapons in the hospital area, while preventing harm to civilians, patients, medical teams, and medical equipment,” the military said in a statement.
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Yesterday’s key developments:
Canada will halt all arms shipments to Israel, a government source said Tuesday, a decision that has sparked the wrath of Israel as it faces growing international scrutiny over its war in the Gaza Strip.
Qatari officials said they were “cautiously optimistic” after talks with Israel’s intelligence chief in Doha aimed at trying to reach a ceasefire, the Qatari foreign ministry said Tuesday.
At least 15 people were killed by an Israeli airstrike targeting a house in the al Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, Palestinian health officials said on Tuesday.
Hamas’s chief Ismail Haniyeh has accused Israel of attempting to “sabotage” ceasefire talks following its raid on Gaza’s Al-Shifa Hospital, which the Israeli army says is being used for military purposes.
The United States called on Israel to allow Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA into Gaza after he was reportedly denied entry.
About casualty figures from Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry:
Gaza’s health ministry collects data from the enclave’s hospitals and the Palestinian Red Crescent.
The health ministry does not report how Palestinians were killed, whether from Israeli airstrikes and artillery barrages or errant Palestinian rocket fire. It describes all casualties as victims of “Israeli aggression”.
The ministry also does not distinguish between civilians and combatants.
Throughout four wars and numerous skirmishes between Israel and Hamas, UN agencies have cited the Hamas-run health ministry’s death tolls in regular reports. The International Committee of the Red Cross and Palestinian Red Crescent also use the numbers.
In the aftermath of war, the UN humanitarian office has published final death tolls based on its own research into medical records. The UN’s counts have largely been consistent with the Gaza health ministry’s, with small discrepancies.
For more on the Gaza health ministry’s tolls, click here.
(FRANCE 24 with AP)
(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)
