Israel tells UN it is cutting ties with Palestinian aid agency
JERUSALEM
Palestinians gather to receive bags of flour distributed by UNRWA, the U.N. agency helping Palestinian refugees, and sent by Türkiye in Deir al Balah, central Gaza Strip, Saturday, Nov. 2, 2024.
Israel said Monday it had notified the United Nations that it was severing ties with the U.N. agency supporting Palestinian refugees after the country's parliament approved the controversial move as violence persists in Gaza and Lebanon.
"On the instruction of Foreign Minister Israel Katz, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs notified the U.N. of the cancellation of the agreement between the State of Israel and UNRWA," the ministry said in a statement.
Israel's parliament last month approved a proposal to shut down UNRWA's operations in Israel and occupied east Jerusalem, despite condemnation from the international community, including its ally the United States.
The ban on the U.N. agency - which has provided essential aid and assistance across Palestinian territories and to Palestinian refugees elsewhere for more than seven decades - would be a blow to humanitarian work in Gaza if implemented, according to experts.
Israel on Sunday pressed on with its campaigns in Lebanon and Gaza, launching several deadly strikes as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited his country's northern border.
Netanyahu's visit came after an airstrike killed at least three people near the southern Lebanese city of Sidon, the Lebanese health ministry said, as more bombs hit the country's east.
"I want to be clear: with or without an agreement, the key to restoring peace and security in the north... is first and foremost to push Hezbollah back beyond the Litani River, secondly to target any attempt to rearm, and thirdly to respond firmly to any action taken against us," Netanyahu told troops at the border, according to a statement from his office.
Netanyahu's border visit came as Israel's military reported that more than 100 projectiles were fired from Lebanon into Israeli territory on Sunday. Several were intercepted, and some fell in unpopulated areas.
Hezbollah later said it also fired a barrage of missiles at an Israeli air force "technical base" in the northern coastal city of Haifa.
Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon have been at war since September 23, when Israel escalated cross-border air raids after a year of tit-for-tat exchanges of fire.
A week later, it sent in ground troops on "targeted raids."
Hezbollah stated it was acting in support of Palestinian militants Hamas, whose unprecedented attack against Israel on Oct. 7 last year triggered the ongoing war in Gaza.
"The Israeli enemy's raid on Haret Saida resulted in an initial death toll of three people killed and nine others injured," Lebanon's health ministry reported, referring to a densely populated area near Sidon.
Lebanon's official National News Agency (NNA) reported another Israeli strike south of Sidon, on the town of Ghaziyeh. An AFP correspondent noted that a child was rescued from the rubble of a residential building.
NNA stated that other Israeli strikes hit near a hospital in Tebnine, a town in the southern Lebanon district of Bint Jbeil.
The health ministry said the hospital sustained "severe damage" and that seven people were wounded.
Neither the Haret Saida strike nor those in southern Lebanon were preceded by a warning to evacuate.
The health ministry also reported a strike near Tyre that killed two rescue workers from the Hezbollah-affiliated Islamic Health Committee.
Heavy air raids
Israel's military did issue a warning for Lebanon's eastern Baalbek area, stating it would attack Hezbollah-linked facilities.
An AFP correspondent later reported at least three strikes in the Baalbek area, where Hezbollah holds sway and which has seen heavy air raids over the past few days.
Also on Sunday, NNA reported the recovery of five out of 21 bodies that had been buried under the rubble for about a week in the flashpoint southern town of Khiam.
Hezbollah on Sunday published an undated video of an underground facility dubbed "Imad 5," showing a hatch opening and a missile pointing skyward. Fighters are also seen moving through an apparently underground tunnel carved into the rock.
The war has killed more than 1,940 people in Lebanon since September 23, according to an AFP tally of Lebanese health ministry figures.
Israel's military reports that 38 soldiers have been killed since it began ground operations in Lebanon.
Iran and Israel have also attacked each other directly, heightening fears of an even wider conflict.
But Iran's President Masoud Pezeshkian on Sunday stated that a potential ceasefire with its allies Hamas and Hezbollah "could affect the intensity and type of our response."
The Islamic Republic's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, had on Saturday warned that Israel and the United States "will definitely receive a tooth-breaking response."
Israel has warned Iran against responding to its Oct. 26 attack.
Sacks of flour
In Gaza, Israel's military again reported "dozens" of militants killed in the northern Jabalia area, where it has carried out a major air and ground assault since Oct. 6 to prevent Hamas from regrouping.
Gaza rescuers and medics indicated that Israeli strikes in Gaza on Sunday killed at least 30 people across the territory.
In central Gaza, people crowded to receive sacks of flour from a U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) at a distribution point in Deir el-Balah.
Israel's parliament last Monday banned UNRWA—the main aid agency in Gaza—from operating in Israel and annexed East Jerusalem, despite international objections.
If implemented, the ban would impact humanitarian work in Gaza, experts say.
This came after the United States on Oct. 15 warned Israel that it could withhold some of its billions of dollars in military assistance unless it improves aid delivery to Gaza within 30 days.
Also in Deir el-Balah on Sunday, relatives at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital mourned a father and son killed during Israeli bombardment.
Hamas's Oct. 7 attack on Israel resulted in 1,206 deaths, mostly civilians, according to Israeli official figures.
Israel's military response against Hamas has killed 43,341 people in Gaza, a majority of them civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory's health ministry, which the United Nations considers reliable.
The ongoing violence and humanitarian crisis have drawn widespread international concern, with calls for urgent ceasefire negotiations and humanitarian aid access for those affected in both Gaza and Lebanon.
In the face of rising casualties, diplomatic efforts from various governments and organizations are ramping up as they push for a temporary cessation of hostilities to allow aid to reach those in need.