Live updates: Israel-Hamas war

The Israeli army “indiscriminately, and therefore unlawfully, used white phosphorous in an attack on Dhayra, in south Lebanon, on October 16,” according to a new investigation by the UK-based rights group.

“The attack must be investigated as a war crime,” Amnesty International said on X.

Israel, which has refuted similar charges in the past, did not respond right away.

Human rights organisations have accused Israel of using white phosphorous in its attacks on Lebanon and Gaza.

Israeli troops pushed deeper into Gaza Tuesday, driving tanks and armoured bulldozers through the rubble of shattered buildings and hunting for Hamas fighters who carried out the worst attack in Israel´s history.

Army footage showed soldiers, who are also seeking to free at least 240 hostages, advancing through a devastated landscape, with buildings reduced to a mangled mess of stone and twisted metal by weeks of relentless Israeli bombing.

Israel said it had struck 300 targets in the fourth night of land operations in Gaza, coming under Hamas anti-tank and machine-gun fire, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissed growing international calls for a ceasefire.

A child is being killed every five minutes in the besieged Gaza Strip due to Israeli attacks, as per a Palestinian envoy for the United Nations.

Gaza has become a children’s cemetery with at least 940 children missing in the occupied territory since October 7, as per UNICEF.

There is a risk of death of infants due to lack of water in Gaza. Only 5% of normal water supply is available in Gaza, it added.

It further demanded that immediate ceasefire in Gaza and delivery of humanitarian aid should be allowed.

Following the rejection of requests by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for a ceasefire to alleviate an increasingly dire humanitarian situation, Israel stated that its forces had attacked Hamas fighters under the group’s extensive tunnel network beneath the Palestinian enclave of Gaza.

After Hamas’s devastating surprise strike on southern Israel three weeks ago, Israel has made eliminating the tunnels a top priority as it increases its operations inside Gaza.

“Over the last day, combined IDF (Israel Defense Forces) struck approximately 300 targets, including anti-tank missile and rocket launch posts below shafts, as well as military compounds inside underground tunnels belonging to the Hamas terrorist organization,” the Israeli military said in a statement.

Gaza´s Hamas-run health ministry said Tuesday that at least 8,525 people have been killed in the Palestinian territory since the start of the war with Israel on October 7.

The ministry said at least 3,542 children and 2,187 women were among the dead, as Israel pressed on with its air and ground campaign against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

He said the ministry has received reports of 2,000 people still trapped under the rubble, including 1,100 children.

Thousands of Palestinians have been killed, injured and missing since the Israel-Hamas war began on October 7.

The massive casualties include a devastatingly large number of children.

Additionally, UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell, during a UN Security Council meeting on Monday said that, as a result of the ongoing war, children are “experiencing terrible trauma — the consequences of which could last a lifetime.”

If the war between Israel and Hamas spreads throughout the Middle East, it may cause price shocks for basic goods like oil and agricultural products, the World Bank said in a report released on Monday.

Oil has already risen six percent since the latest round of fighting, sparked when Hamas from Gaza stormed southern Israel and killed more than 1,400 people, mostly civilians, and seized nearly 240 hostages, according to Israeli officials.

Israel has responded with an unrelenting bombardment of Gaza, which the Hamas-run health ministry says has killed more than 8,000 people, nearly half of them children.

An Israeli soldier who was being held in Gaza has been released by the Israeli army, as reported by Reuters and military announcement.

“Militants in southern Lebanon targeted 31 Israeli bases with missiles”, claims Hezbollah.

26 trucks of aid goods entered Gaza from Rafah Crossing, as per US media.

Canada calls for a humanitarian pause in Gaza. 400 Canadian citizens are trapped in Gaza, as per Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Joly.

“Time is running out, there should be an agreement to evacuate foreigners, hostages from Gaza,” said the Canadian Foreign Minister.

“There should also be an agreement to allow food, water and fuel into Gaza”, he added.

It appears that the conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza may be the bloodiest single incident to affect journalists in recent memory.

The Committee to Protect Journalists reports that in the twenty-three days after Hamas launched its initial strikes in Israel, at least 31 journalists have perished: 24 Palestinian, 4 Israeli, and 1 Lebanese. (An extra nine are reportedly missing or in custody at this time.)

To put that figure in perspective, 57 journalists and media professionals lost their lives globally in 2022. The amount in Gaza is more than halfway there in less than a month, on and around a single piece of land about the size of Denver, Colorado.

Israel’s Ministry of Intelligence released a covert ten-page paper detailing the Palestinian population’s exodus from Gaza to northern Sinai, Egypt, one week following the Hamas attack:

1. Instruct Palestinian civilians to vacate north Gaza ahead of land operations;

2. Sequential land operations from north to south Gaza;

3. Routes across Rafah to be left clear;

4. Establish tent cities in northern Sinai and construct cities to resettle Palestinians in Egypt