Compilation of news reports – IAK staff 

In war-battered Gaza, Israeli forces continued pounding several parts of the enclave, killing 29 people Wednesday, including women and children, according to Gaza’s civil defense agency.

• The Israeli military struck a house northeast of Rafah city, killing four people, two of them women, the Palestinian civil defense agency says.
• Six Palestinians were killed in Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip. Among them were three children, a seven-month-old baby and a woman.
• An Israeli air strike in Deir el-Balah killed a pregnant woman and her four children, according to Palestinian medical officials at Al-Aqsa Hospital.

In Lebanon, 72 people were killed Wednesday in Israeli attacks, and nearly 400 people were wounded. The death toll from Israel’s recent bombings surpassed 620.

• At least 23 Syrian nationals, mostly women and children, were killed in an overnight strike in the Lebanese town of Younine.
• Five Lebanese people were killed in Israeli attack near southern Lebanon’s Tyre, one of them a baby, Lebanon’s National News Agency reports.

West Bank: Israeli Forces Kill a Woman, Injure Three

IMEMC reports:

Media sources said that occupation forces shot and killed a woman, Zohour Qassem Amour, 32, and injured three other females, two critically, and one seriously, on Wednesday afternoon, after storming Anza village, southwest of Jenin.

The Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) transported the slain woman, in addition to three severely injured citizens, including an elderly woman, a teenage girl, and a 9-year-old girl to hospital.

The PRCS said their ambulance crews transported a 73-year-old woman whom soldiers shot in the head with live rounds, causing critical injuries, a 9-year-old girl who sustained a critical gunshot wound in the head, and a 15-year-old girl suffered serious injuries after soldiers shot her in the jaw with live ammunition.

Sources added that an undercover Israeli unit infiltrated the village of Anza in a civilian vehicle, randomly firing live rounds, and abducted the young man, Mohammad Walid Brahma, taking him to an unknown location.

Several military reinforcements arrived at the village, while soldiers opened fire with live rounds, striking a nearby home where a funeral was being held for a local citizen, killing the married mother of four, and injuring three others.

Since the beginning of the Israeli military onslaught against the Gaza Strip on October 7, 2023, Israeli forces have killed 718 Palestinians in the West Bank, including 196 in Jenin.

Israeli forces also injured a Palestinian child, on Wednesday evening, after running him over with an army vehicle in the northern West Bank city of Nablus.

Media sources said that occupation forces struck a 15-year-old child with a military jeep during an incursion into the city; he was transported to hospital for treatment.

RECOMMENDED READING: Genocide alert issued over Israeli violence in West Bank

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Israeli Bulldozers Flatten Mile After Mile in the West Bank

New York Times reports:

Over two weeks, Palestinians watched as Israeli military bulldozers tore up mile after mile of their streets and alleys, sewage seeping into the dusty ruts left behind.

The people of Tulkarm and Jenin, the two West Bank towns that were the focus of Israel’s latest military raids, said they had never before experienced such a scale of destruction.

Visual evidence analyzed by The New York Times supports accounts from residents about the damage from Israel’s latest raids. Videos filmed in Tulkarm and Jenin show bulldozers destroying infrastructure and businesses, and soldiers impeding local emergency responders.

“We watched their bulldozers tear up streets, demolish businesses, pharmacies, schools. They even bulldozed the town soccer field, and a tree in the middle of a road,” said Kamal Abu al-Rub, the governor of Jenin, a governorate in the northern West Bank. “What was the point of all of this?”

In late August, the Israeli military launched one of its most extensive and deadliest raids in the West Bank in years, an escalation from the nearly nightly raids that have become the norm since the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attacks.

Israel has described the operations as counterterrorism efforts, aimed at rooting out Hamas and other armed militants who have increased their attacks against Israelis. The military said it had found stockpiles of weapons in its recent operations in the northern West Bank, killed 23 militants and arrested 45. One Israeli soldier was killed in Jenin, it said.

In a response to a detailed list of questions from The Times, the Israeli military said that it operated in accordance with international law and “undertakes all feasible precautions to avoid damaging essential infrastructure.” It said military engineers had to undertake such operations to de-mine roads or destroy arms stores hidden on private property.

But it acknowledged that these “operations in the area have caused unavoidable harm to certain civilian structures.”

RECOMMENDED READING: While Gaza suffers physical genocide, the West Bank faces economic genocide.

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Hezbollah targets Mossad HQ near Tel Aviv with first ballistic missile

The Cradle reports:

Hezbollah targeted an Israeli intelligence headquarters on the outskirts of Tel Aviv on 25 September, using a ballistic missile for the first time in this war.

The targeted base is where Israel’s pager terror attack on Lebanon originated and is where the assassination of resistance leaders and commanders is planned, according to a Hezbollah statement released on Wednesday morning.

“In support of our steadfast Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip, and in support of their valiant and honorable resistance, and in defense of Lebanon and its people, the Islamic Resistance launched a Qader 1 ballistic missile on Wednesday morning, 9/25/2024, at 6:30, targeting the Mossad headquarters in the suburbs of Tel Aviv, which is the headquarters responsible for assassinating leaders and blowing up pagers and wireless devices,” the Lebanese resistance group announced.

Sirens were set off in Tel Aviv and its surrounding areas.

The Israeli army said in a statement that its air defenses intercepted the missile. The army also claimed the launcher from which it was fired in Lebanon was “attacked.” The David’s Sling system was reportedly used to bring down the missile.

AL JAZEERA ADDS: The White House has said that a missile launched by Hezbollah in Lebanon at Tel Aviv in Israel was “deeply concerning” to the US, Israel’s top political and military backer, but that a diplomatic offramp remains to avoid “all-out war”.

“It’s certainly deeply concerning, obviously to the Israelis, of course, but also to us,” White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told CNN.

NOTE: In his address to the United Nations General Assembly Tuesday, President Biden mentioned Lebanon only once, saying, “Almost a year later, too many on each side of the Israeli-Lebanon border remain displaced.” 

Israeli Campaign against Lebanon could Push Poverty Rate to 50%

Informed Comment reports:

Lebanon is a country of some 5.8 million residents, though a good million and a half are refugees from Syria and elsewhere. It has seen its economy contract every year for the last 7 years, with the gross domestic product falling dramatically from $50 billion a year to only $20 billion a year.

In the past few years, crises and instability have led to the Lebanese pound losing 90% of its value. The percentage of the population below the UN poverty line increased from 12% in 2012 to 44% in 2022. There has been intermittent exchange of fire between Israel and the Hezbollah party-militia in Lebanon since October 7.

The U.N. has characterized the Lebanese economic crisis as one of the worst in the world. The Economist estimates that the current Israel-Hezbollah [conflict] will cause the economy to contract between 10% and 25% this year, depending on how long the Israeli campaign continues. If 44% of the Lebanese were already in poverty, an economic crash of that magnitude would likely make half the country poverty-stricken.

Lebanese photojournalist killed in Israeli airstrike

Anadolu Agency reports:

A photojournalist working for local television station al-Manar was killed in an Israeli airstrike in southern Lebanon on Wednesday.

In a statement, al-Manar mourned the death of Kamel Karaki in the strike that targeted his hometown of Qantara.

His death came one day after Hadi al-Sayyed, a journalist for Al-Mayadeen television, was killed in an Israeli attack on his home in southern Lebanon.

Israeli settlers publish map of south Lebanon with Hebrew names

The Cradle reports:

The Movement for Settlement in Southern Lebanon has published a map with “the new Hebrew names for the settlements of Southern Lebanon,” based on the current names of the Lebanese towns and villages.

The Israeli movement seeks to promote the conquest, ethnic cleansing, and settlement of southern Lebanon by Israeli Jews, just as Israel has been doing in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.

The map was published amid the Israeli army’s massive bombing campaign in southern Lebanon that has killed over 500 people in just three days and displaced tens of thousands more who have fled north toward Beirut.

Jewish Currents reports that in the movement’s worldview, “the Israeli settlement of southern Lebanon will begin with a war with Hezbollah – which they view not as a last resort barring a diplomatic solution, but as the only reasonable path forward.”

Political analyst James Dorsey notes that the movement claims a Biblical justification for the conquest of Lebanon in the book of Deuteronomy chapter 3, verse 25. As Moses appeals to God to allow him to enter the Promised Land, he asks, “Let me go over and see the good land beyond the Jordan – that fine hill country and Lebanon.”

Uri Tzafon (“Awaken North”), an Israeli group demanding the conquest and Jewish settlement of Lebanon, sent drones and balloons into southern Lebanon in June carrying eviction notices to the region’s residents.

“The announcements make clear to the residents that they are in the Land of Israel, which belongs to the Jewish people, and that they are required to evacuate immediately,” the group said in a statement.

CAIR Calls for Resignation of Secretary of State Blinken After Report He Lied to Congress About Israel Blocking Aid to Gaza

Press release from Council on American-Islamic Relations:

In a statement, CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad said:

Secretary Blinken and the Biden administration ignored Israel’s blocking of humanitarian aid to the suffering people of Gaza – which is a violation of American law – and lied about it to Congress.

When a senior American official lies to Congress in the middle of genocide so that the government can keep funding that genocide, he is deliberately flouting the law and prolonging the suffering of millions of innocent people who desperately need our government to stop funding their slaughter.

Secretary Blinken may have committed a crime with his lies. The American people deserve honest and upright leaders to represent their values and protect their interests. 

He must resign, and the Biden administration must be held accountable for its violation of the law and its complicity in the Israeli genocide in Gaza. 

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House Ways and Means Committee chair calls on IRS to revoke pro-Palestinian groups’ tax-exempt status

Jewish Insider reports:

House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (R-MO) called on the Internal Revenue Service to revoke the tax-exempt status of several U.S.-based charitable organizations linked to anti-Israel protests, accusing the groups of being tied to foreign terrorist organizations and other illegal activity.

The requests target Americans for Justice in Palestine Educational Foundation, American Muslims for Palestine, Students for Justice in Palestine, the Alliance for Justice, Islamic Relief USA, Jewish Voice for Peace, The People’s Forum, the Tides Foundation, the Adalah Justice Project, the Arab Resource and Organizing Center, United Hands Relief Inc., WESPAC, Within Our Lifetime, the U.S. Palestinian Community Network and the Palestinian Youth Movement.

“The evidence uncovered by the Ways and Means Committee strongly suggests that several American tax-exempt organizations are operating outside of their tax-exempt purpose, fueling antisemitic activities, breaking multiple laws and fueling hate and chaos in America,” Smith said in a statement. “The Biden-Harris Administration must waste no time in revoking these organizations’ tax-exempt status or risk sending the message that this type of behavior is permissible under our tax code.”

He alleged that American taxpayers are effectively subsidizing these groups’ activities “and potentially terrorist organizations overseas” due to their tax-exempt statuses.

 NOTE: A number of US-based nonprofit organizations openly support Israel, including Israeli movements that violate international law. Read about some of them here and here. Canada recently revoked the charitable status from the Jewish National Fund.

RECOMMENDED READING: Philanthropic colonialism: US non-profits supporting Israel’s settlements

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Tlaib Slams Biden for Deploying Troops to Middle East as Israel Bombs Lebanon

Truthout reports:

Progressive lawmakers and advocacy groups are sharply criticizing the Biden administration for its decision this week to deploy additional troops to the Middle East as Israel is carrying out a major escalation of its attacks on Lebanon.

Outspoken advocates for Palestinian rights, including Representatives Rashida Tlaib (D-Michigan) and Cori Bush (D-Missouri), have said that bolstering the U.S.’s military presence in the region will only worsen an already catastrophic situation created by Israeli forces over the past year — and could increase the already strong threat of a regional war.

The lawmakers pointed out that only an arms embargo to Israel — as has been ordered by international and domestic law — can result in the de-escalation of tensions that the Biden administration has claimed that it supports.

“The Biden-Harris administration continues to allow Netanyahu and the Israeli government to operate with impunity as they carry out war crimes. After facing no red line in Gaza, in an attempt to remain in power, Netanyahu is now expanding his genocidal campaign to Lebanon, using the same tactics the Biden-Harris administration has endorsed,” Tlaib said in a fiery statement on Wednesday.

“Deploying more U.S. troops and sending more U.S. bombs will only lead to more suffering and carnage,” she said. “The Biden-Harris administration is capable of stopping the bloodshed. President Biden must implement an immediate arms embargo to end the slaughter and de-escalate the risk of a wider regional war.”

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Beirut Suburbs or “Hezbollah Stronghold”? U.S. Media Parrots Israeli Propaganda to Justify Bombing Civilians

The Intercept reports:

Almost every time news emerges from south Beirut, the Western news media parrots the language of the Israeli military, as if “Hezbollah stronghold” is part of the neighborhood’s name.

Casting south Beirut, colloquially known in Arabic as Dahiya, as a military stronghold, gives Israel license to apply massive force — targeting civilian infrastructure as part of its main thrust, just as it would Hezbollah leaders. The stated aim is to deter any future attacks by hitting Hezbollah’s most concentrated base of support. Israel makes civilians pay the price for whatever Hezbollah ostensibly does and, thereafter, blames Hezbollah for the deaths the Israelis themselves cause.

The strategy even has a name: the Dahiya Doctrine, coined after Israel almost destroyed the area in the 2006 war with Hezbollah. It would go on to become Israel’s modus operandi in future wars, and the road map for today’s total destruction of Gaza.

Now, with Israeli attacks on Lebanon rapidly escalating, the Dahiya Doctrine is coming back home — justified by the language of the area as a militant “stronghold.”

In a 2008 interview, Israeli Gen. Gadi Eisenkot, who helped formulate the doctrine, made it clear that disproportionate attacks against civilian infrastructure was the strategy, not an unintended effect.

“What happened in the Dahiya quarter of Beirut in 2006 will happen in every village from which Israel is fired on,” he said. “We will apply disproportionate force on [the village] and cause great damage and destruction there. From our standpoint, these are not civilian villages, they are military bases.”

He added, “This is not a recommendation. This is a plan. And it has been approved.”

(Read the full article here.)

RECOMMENDED READING: Israel is repeating its Gaza assault in Lebanon. Why?

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An Un-Welcoming Committee Awaits Netanyahu’s UN Visit

People’s Dispatch reports:

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is for now set to deliver an address at the United Nations General Assembly on Thursday.

In response, several anti-imperialist organizations, organized under the Shut it Down For Palestine Coalition, are planning a demonstration in New York on Thursday to denounce Netanyahu’s visit and demand that he be arrested for genocide and crimes against humanity.

With heightened tensions between Israel and Lebanon, Netanyahu delayed his visit to the United States, which was originally scheduled for Sept. 24 over security concerns.

In August, International Criminal Court (ICC) Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan urged ICC judges to rule on his request for arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. Khan had applied for arrest warrants back in May for the two top Israeli leaders for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

But this has not stopped Netanyahu from making visits to the United States, a country which is not a state party to the Rome Statute of the ICC.

Netanyahu delivered a special address to a joint session of the United States Congress on July 24, where he received a standing ovation from U.S. lawmakers from both major establishment parties. On his way to the U.S., Netanyahu avoided stopping in Europe, where all nations are members of the ICC, in order to avoid any chance of arrest.

“We must continue to show that the genocidal Israeli regime and its desperate wars of extermination are deeply unpopular in the United States, even as our leaders continue to undemocratically bankroll Netanyahu’s government and furnish it with US-made weapons of death and destruction,” Munir Marwan of the Palestinian Youth Movement told Peoples Dispatch.

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Over 100 US lawmakers urge Biden admin to investigate killing of Turkish American activist

Anadolu Agency reports:

A group of 103 US lawmakers has called on the Biden administration to conduct an independent investigation into the killing of Turkish American activist Aysenur Ezgi Eygi by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank earlier this month.

In a letter sent on Tuesday to President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Attorney General Merrick Garland, the lawmakers demanded a thorough, credible, and transparent investigation into Eygi’s killing.

“Given the evidence, we believe the United States must independently investigate whether this was a homicide,” the letter reads. “To walk away without asking further questions gives Israeli forces unacceptable license to act with impunity. There must be accountability for Ms. Eygi’s death.”

The letter was signed by prominent members of Congress, including Adam Smith, Pramila Jayapal, Rashida Tlaib, Barbara Lee, Jamaal Bowman, Ro Khanna, and Senators Bernie Sanders and Peter Welch.

RECOMMENDED READING: An American was just shot in the West Bank. The American press can’t be bothered.

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MORE NEWS:

IMEMC Daily Reports.

The Cradle: A terror state through time: from Ben Gurion to Netanyahu

Anadolu Agency: Iran’s new president signals openness to nuclear talks at UN Assembly

Scheerpost: NYT Repeats US Gov’s Evidence-Free Claim That Gaza Protests Are Part of Iranian Plot

The #NewsEmmys Award for Outstanding Hard News Feature Story: Short Form goes to It’s Bisan from Gaza and I’m Still Alive | Aj+ Reports (@ajplus). pic.twitter.com/lKTDR9sfys

— News & Documentary Emmys (@newsemmys) September 26, 2024

UNHCR is gravely concerned about the serious escalation in Lebanon since Monday.

International humanitarian law must be upheld & ensuring the protection of civilians is a critical obligation.

We are committed to standing by Lebanon during this critical time. pic.twitter.com/ovPth0jAAI

— UNHCR Lebanon (@UNHCRLebanon) September 25, 2024

STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – SEPTEMBER 25:

Palestinian death toll from October 7, 2023 – September 25, 2024: at least 42,252* (41,534 in Gaza* – 11,308 women (30%), 16,715 children as of September 5. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.]

This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 718 in the West Bank (~148 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 49,032 Palestinian deaths.

Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza.

Ralph Nader earlier estimated 300,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza.

• At least 45 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 23 from West Bank).
• At least 41 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition (at least 37 of them children)**.
• About 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.3 million population are currently displaced.
• Almost 500,000 Gazans are currently experiencing catastrophic levels of food insecurity.

Palestinian injuries from October 7 – September 25: at least 101,792 (including at least 96,092 in Gaza and 5,700 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how many Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]

Reported Israeli death toll from October 7, 2023 – September 25, 2024: ~1,457 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 293*** military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 25 military and civilians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Israel) and~10,000 injured.

The death toll from Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon since Oct. 8 has reached 1,247, including women and children, with some 5,278 injured, a Lebanese official said Wednesday.

NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries of Israelis on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.

*Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.

**Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals. 

***More than 40 of the deaths listed above were Israeli soldiers killed by Hezbollah in fighting at the Israel-Lebanon border. The figure does not include the reportedly 53 Israeli soldiers – nearly 16% of the total Israeli military deaths – killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents. 

† For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics.

Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.

Hover over each bar for exact numbers.
Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org 

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