Middle East crisis live: Irish PM demands Israel stop firing at UN peacekeepers; strikes in Gaza kill at least 61 | Israel-Gaza war

Israeli strikes kill dozens in Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp, officials say, as thousands remain trapped

Helen Livingstone

At least 30 people have been killed by Israeli strikes throughout the day in northern Gaza’s Jabalia town and refugee camp, Gaza’s civil defence agency has said, a week after Israel launched an offensive there which it claims is aimed at stopping Hamas regrouping.

The agency’s spokesperson, Mahmud Bassal, said a strike that occurred before 9.40pm local time killed 12 people including women and children, while 14 were missing and likely trapped under the rubble.

Before that incident, Ahmad al-Kahlut – director of the agency in northern Gaza – said 18 people had been killed by several strikes, including hits on eight schools in the camp that were serving as shelters for displaced people.

In total, the day’s strikes left at least 110 injured, according to figures provided by Bassal and Kahlut. The Israeli military did not respond to questions posed by the news agency AFP about the strikes on schools in Jabalia, the largest of Gaza’s historic refugee camps.

Medics told Reuters that at least 61 Palestinians were killed across the Gaza Strip on Friday.

The Israeli military claims it has killed dozens of militants in Jabalia, without providing any evidence. Photos published from the area by news wires have shown many children among the dead. It is not possible to independently verify death tolls from the camp as Israel does not allow foreign journalists in.

The charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), meanwhile, said thousands of people remained trapped in the camp while one staff member said people trying to leave – Israel has issued widespread evacuation orders for northern Gaza – are being shot.

At least 42,175 Palestinians have been killed and 98,336 others injured in Israel’s military offensive on Gaza since 7 October 2023, Gaza’s health ministry said on Saturday.

The ministry does not distinguished not distinguish between militant and civilian deaths.

Lebanese militant group Hezbollah on Saturday said it launched a salvo of missiles at an Israeli military base south of the coastal city of Haifa, as Israelis marked the Yom Kippur holiday.

Hezbollah fighters struck a base “south of the city of Haifa, targeting the explosives factory there with a salvo of … missiles”, the group said in a statement, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Health of Al Jazeera cameraman deteriorating, colleague says and appeals for help

Helen Livingstone

The health of Al Jazeera cameraman, Fadi Al-Wahidi, who was shot by Israeli forces in northern Gaza on Wednesday, has deteriorated “significantly”, his colleague has said, appealing for help in evacuating him from the area. Anas Al-Sharif wrote on X:

Fadi was shot by an Israeli sniper while professionally covering events, and he was wearing a press vest clearly marking him as a journalist.

We are currently in northern Gaza, under siege by Israeli forces. If he does not receive urgent medical treatment abroad, his life is at serious risk.”

In an earlier post Sharif said that Al-Wahidi had been permanently paralysed in the attack.

Foreign doctors who have deployed in Gaza have said that many patients who could be saved given the right medical treatment have died in Gaza due to grossly inadequate treatments available in the territory as Israel targets hospitals and limits humanitarian aid.

Ireland’s prime minister urged Israel on Saturday to heed “the concerns of the international community” and not repeat recent firing on UN peacekeepers in southern Lebanon.

“Israel must stop firing on UN peacekeepers serving with Unifil in Lebanon,” Simon Harris said in a statement, his latest comments on the recent incidents that have sparked a fierce diplomatic backlash. He added:

Israel must listen to the voice and the concerns of the international community.”

Ireland accounts for 347 of the 10,000 soldiers serving in Unifil, the UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon, which is charged with maintaining peace in the country’s south.

Israel said its forces fired at a threat near a Unifil position in Lebanon on Friday, acknowledging that a “hit” was responsible for wounding two blue helmets.

The two Sri Lankan peacekeepers were hurt at Unifil’s main base in Naqura, southern Lebanon, according to the mission. It follows two Indonesian soldiers suffering injuries when tank fire hit a watchtower the previous day, the mission said.

The Irish military has said none of its staff were hurt in Thursday’s incident.

Harris, who visited Joe Biden earlier in the week, said he and the US president “agreed that those who serve in blue helmets on behalf of the UN must always be afforded full protection”.

Meanwhile in Gaza, at least 61 Palestinians were killed in Israeli strikes on Friday, nearly half of the them killed in Jabalia, the northern district which is the largest of Gaza’s refugee camps.

Gaza’s civil defence agency said at least 30 people were killed by Israeli strikes throughout the day in northern Gaza’s Jabalia town and refugee camp.

At least 12 people were killed, including women and children, in an evening strike, it said. Dozens of Palestinians were reported to have been injured when an Israeli military quadcopter drone opened fire on a school sheltering displaced people in the Jabalia camp.

In other developments:

• Hezbollah said on Saturday it launched a salvo of missiles at an Israeli military base south of the coastal city of Haifa, as Israelis marked the Yom Kippur holiday. Hezbollah fighters struck a base “targeting the explosives factory there with a salvo of … missiles”, the Lebanese militant group said in a statement.

• Joe Biden, the US president, said he was asking Israel not to hit UN peacekeepers, and the UN secretary general, António Guterres, told Israel that attacks on the peacekeeping force were intolerable. Downing Street said Keir Starmer, the UK prime minister, was “appalled” at reports Israel deliberately fired on the peacekeepers. The leaders of France, Italy and Spain said in a joint statement the attacks were “unjustifiable” and a “serious violation of the obligations of Israel” under humanitarian international law.

• Thousands of Palestinians are trapped in Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, the charity Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said, including five of its staff, who were “fearing for their lives”. “Nobody is allowed to get in or out – anyone who tries is getting shot,” MSF project coordinator Sarah Vuylsteke said. It called on Israeli forces to stop forced displacements and stop the “all-out war on the people of Gaza”.

• At least 42,126 Palestinians had been killed by the Israeli military in Gaza since the war started a year ago, according to the latest figures from the Hamas-run health ministry on Friday. The figures were released prior to the latest deadly Israeli strikes on Friday, including in Jabalia in northern Gaza.

• At least eight people were killed in Israeli airstrikes across villages in southern and eastern Lebanon on Friday evening, according to the country’s health ministry. Three people were killed, including a two-year-old and a 16-year-old, when an Israeli airstrike hit Baysarieh, a village in Sidon province. Three others were injured, the Lebanese ministry said. Five people were killed and five others injured in additional airstrikes in Baalbeck-Hermel province, located in the Bekaa valley, it said.

• An Israeli airstrike killed two Lebanese soldiers and wounded three others in the southern Bint Jbeil province on Friday, prompting futher concern over Israel’s escalating campaign. Lebanon’s army has not been involved in the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, and it withdrew its forces from the border between the two countries when Israel launched its invasion last month.

• At least 60 people were killed and 168 injured in the past 24 hours in Lebanon, the country’s crisis response unit said on Friday. The latest figure takes the total number of people killed in Lebanon over the past year to 2,229 killed and 10,380 injured, according to Lebanon’s health ministry. The crisis response unit also reported 57 airstrikes and incidents of shelling in the past day, mostly concentrated in southern Lebanon, the southern suburbs of Beirut and the Bekaa valley. The UN human rights office said more than 100 medics and emergency workers had been killed in Lebanon since a conflict between Israel and Hezbollah began a year ago.

• Israel’s military said air raid sirens sounded in several areas in central Israel on Friday due to a “hostile aircraft infiltration”. Israel’s military said two drones were detected “from the moment when they crossed the Lebanese border” late on Friday, and that it had successfully intercepted one of them. However, one building in Herzliya sustained some damage, the IDF and Israeli police said.

• UN officials voiced concerns that an Israeli offensive and evacuation orders in northern Gaza could affect the second phase of its polio vaccination campaign, scheduled to start next week.

• Abbas Araqchi, Iran’s foreign minister, said Tehran would not hesitate to take “stronger defensive actions” if Israel retaliated for last week’s missile attack. Araqchi said Iran’s missile attack on Israel had been in accordance with its right to self-defence under international law and followed much restraint as it sought a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.

• Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the UN relief organisation for Palestinian refugees across the region (Unrwa), said people in Gaza had become accustomed to being moved about “like pinballs” by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) operations. He feared that the people of southern Lebanon were facing a similar plight, he said.