Hezbollah said it targeted three Israeli military positions on the border with Lebanon on Friday, with Israel’s army earlier saying it hit Hezbollah targets.
In the southern city of Khan Younis in Gaza, people reported that Israel had dropped leaflets telling them to flee to “known shelters.” That’s raising concerns the military may expand its battle against Hamas, designated a terrorist organization by the US and European Union, outside the north of Gaza, where it’s focused its ground assault so far.
To support the water and sewerage system and prevent the outbreak of disease in Gaza, Israel plans to allow the entry of two diesel tankers a day, an Israeli official said. Gaza’s telecommunications services stopped on Thursday after providers reported running out of fuel used for generators, according to the UN.
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Israel Says Two Diesel Shipments Can Enter Gaza Per Day (1:50 p.m.)
Israel’s war cabinet approved the entry of two diesel tankers a day into Gaza, complying with a US request, an Israeli official said. Coordinated with the UN, the tankers will pass through the Rafah crossing to the civilian population in the southern Gaza Strip, provided that the fuel does not reach Hamas, the Israeli official added. The aim is to support the water and sewerage system to prevent the outbreak of disease.
Israel has been reluctant to allow fuel into Gaza through the Rafah border crossing with Egypt because it says Hamas hoards it from the civilian population. UN organizations have warned that hospitals in the enclave have closed down or operate at a very limited level, in part because of a lack of fuel. They have asked that fuel supplies be allowed in at much higher volumes
Hezbollah Targets Israeli Positions on Border (1 p.m.)
Hezbollah said it targeted two Israeli army infantries in separate attacks on Friday and an army post on the border with Lebanon. The attacks took place in the morning.
Israel’s army said earlier it hit Hezbollah targets including a weapons warehouse and a military building.
Erdogan in Store for ‘Criticism’ From Germany (12:40 p.m.)
Recep Tayyip Erdogan can expect “harsh criticism” from Olaf Scholz over his stance on the Israel-Hamas war when he meets with the German chancellor in Berlin on Friday, according to a senior member of Scholz’s Social Democratic Party.
“With regard to Hamas there is no common ground and we will see to which extent Erdogan’s posturing was tactical or a real political conviction,” Nils Schmid, foreign affairs spokesman for the SPD caucus in the lower house of parliament, said Friday in an interview with Bloomberg Television.
UN Says Gaza Telecom Providers Halt Service (11 a.m.)
Gaza’s telecommunications services stopped Thursday after providing companies said the fuel used for generators had been depleted, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said on its website.
The fuel shortage has also prevented the UN agency from receiving and distributing aid.
It also said that UNRWA, a UN agency that works with Palestinian refugees, also announced that it would be unable to manage or coordinate humanitarian aid convoys starting Friday due to fuel shortage.
Syria Says Israel Targeted Sites in Damascus (7:44 a.m.)
Syria’s aerial defenses intercepted some Israeli missiles that were fired at 2:25 a.m. local time against a number of targets in Damascus, state-run Sana news agency reported.
The attack resulted in some material damage, it added.
UN Says No Aid Trucks Entered Gaza for Second Day (5:19 a.m.)
No aid trucks entered Gaza for a second consecutive day on Thursday, the UN said in a daily update. A lack of fuel for trucks is hindering the UN Relief and Works Agency’s ability to receive and distribute goods, it said, adding that no vehicles were expected on Friday either because of a continuing communications shutdown in Gaza.
Netanyahu Says Command Center Was Under Hospital (3 a.m.)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his country’s forces had discovered a command center under Al Shifa Hospital in the Gaza Strip, along with bombs and weapons. The country has faced criticism from leaders in the Middle East and even the West for the raid, given that many patients are still there.
In an interview on the CBS Evening News on Thursday, Netanyahu said “terrorist chieftains and terrorists” had fled the hospital grounds as the Israeli military approached.
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“We’re doing this very gingerly, because we’re trying to do the moral thing, the right thing,” the prime minister said. “To deprive Hamas of having this safe zone in the hospital but at the same time to neutralize its use as a command center for terrorists.”
Blinken Urges Israel to Address ‘Settler Extremist Violence’ (2:15 a.m.)
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Thursday discussed clashes between Palestinians and Israeli settlers in the West Bank with Benny Gantz, a member of Israel’s war cabinet, according to a State Department statement. Blinken, the department said, “stressed the urgent need for affirmative steps to de-escalate tensions in the West Bank, including by confronting rising levels of settler extremist violence.”
Read More: Flaring Tensions in West Bank Risk New Front for Israel at War
Early this month, the West Bank Health Authority said eight Palestinians had been killed by settlers since Oct. 7. According to the Israeli military, at least 17 Israelis had been killed by Palestinians in the West Bank since the beginning of the year, many of them settlers. In their call, Blinken and Gantz also spoke about efforts to speed up and enhance the delivery of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip.
