Trump pushes for ethnic cleansing in Gaza, deportation of pro-Palestine students in US – Ceasefire Day 12

Trump pushes for ethnic cleansing in Gaza, deportation of pro-Palestine students in US – Ceasefire Day 12

Compilation of news reports – IAK staff

Since the “ceasefire” went into effect last week, Israel repeatedly violated the agreement, killing more than 80 Palestinians across Gaza, Dr. Zaher al-Wahaidi, director of the information center at the Ministry of Health, told Drop Site News.

Over 470 bodies have been recovered since January 19.


Hamas releases 3 more Israeli captives under Gaza ceasefire deal

The Palestinian resistance group Hamas set free three more Israeli captives in Gaza on Thursday under a ceasefire agreement with Israel: female soldier Agam Berger was handed over to the ICRC (Red Cross) in the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, two more captives – Arbel Yehud and Gadi Mozes – were also released and handed over to the Red Cross in the southern city of Khan Younis.

Five Thai workers were also released outside the ruins of the house of former Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar.

Israeli media sources initially reported the suspension of the handover of Palestinian prisoners, due to be released later in the day, citing the chaos and crowding as a threat to the safety of the Israeli hostages, despite the fact that the Red Cross received all the captives in good condition.

The suspension was eventually reversed, as the Palestinian Prisoners’ Information Office announced that after following up on the matter with mediators, the Palestinian prisoners would be released at 5 p.m.

RELATED: American hostage to be released from Gaza on Friday, Trump’s envoy says
Israeli female hostage, Arbel Yehud held in Gaza is handed over to Red Cross teams at Yahya Sinwar's house in Khan Younis, Gaza on January 30, 2025.
Israeli female hostage, Arbel Yehud held in Gaza is handed over to Red Cross teams at Yahya Sinwar’s house in Khan Younis, Gaza on January 30, 2025. (Hasan Eslayeh – Anadolu Agency)

110 Palestinian prisoners released, “many with bruises on their heads”

In Ramallah, the released Palestinian prisoners arrived in two Red Cross buses at the Ramallah municipality’s recreational center at around 6 p.m. Israeli forces raided the Palestinian town of Betunia and forcibly dispersed crowds of Palestinians who were waiting for the arrival of prisoners, firing rubber-coated bullets, tear gas canisters, and stun grenades at Palestinians.

The released Palestinian prisoners, all wearing grey sweatsuits, heads shaven, and many with bruises on their heads, were welcomed in Ramallah by large crowds who carried them on their shoulders, waving flags, and chanting in support of the resistance. The youngest of the 110 prisoners was Saif Darwish, 14.

A NOTEWORTHY CONTRAST: While Israeli forces fired at Palestinian crowds, and Palestinian prisoners showed signs of torture,  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described the chaos surrounding the release of Israeli prisoners as “shocking” and “further proof of the unimaginable cruelty of the Hamas terrorist organization.” 

Nineteen Palestinian prisoners were set free from the Moskobiya Detention Center in Jerusalem, and five additional prisoners will be released from the Negev prison in southern Israel and sent to Gaza, while 20 others will be transferred to Egypt.

Palestinian prisoners are welcomed by their relatives within in the town of Beitunya in the West Bank city of Ramallah on January 30, 2025.
Palestinian prisoners are welcomed by their relatives within in the town of Beitunya in the West Bank city of Ramallah on January 30, 2025. (İssam Rimawi – Anadolu Agency)

Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA work in Gaza continues

A ban on the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) from operating in Occupied East Jerusalem and within Israel came into effect Thursday. The ban follows a Knesset vote three months ago and a recent Israeli Supreme Court ruling that dismissed an appeal to halt its implementation in what the court referred to as “the sovereign territory of the state of Israel.”

UNRWA’s international staff in East Jerusalem have already vacated their offices, according to UN sources. The ban also prohibits contact between UNRWA staff and the Israeli authorities, raising uncertainty about how operations across the occupied Palestinian territories will be affected.

Nevertheless, UNRWA said on social media that it is continuing to provide essential services to Palestinian refugees, including health clinics across the Occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.

‘They’re going to do it’: Trump says Egypt, Jordan will take Palestinians from Gaza

US President Donald Trump doubled down Thursday on his controversial proposal to relocate Palestinians from Gaza to Egypt and Jordan, insisting that the two countries will comply, despite their repeated rejections.

“They will do it. They will do it. They’re going to do it, okay? We do a lot for them, and they’re going to do it,” Trump told reporters when asked if he would consider measures to pressure Cairo and Amman to accept his plan.

Trump called over the weekend to “clean out” Gaza and resettle Palestinians to Egypt and Jordan, describing the enclave as a “demolition site” after Israel’s genocidal war.

The two countries vehemently rejected any call for the displacement or relocation of Palestinians from Palestine, however.

NOTE: Forced transfer of a people group is a crime against humanity.
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West Bank: Israeli Forces Assassinate a Palestinian Man in Nablus, Two in Jenin

Israeli forces executed a Palestinian man, 42-year-old Qasim Aboud Mutie Al-Aklik, on Thursday, after shooting and abducting him in the northern occupied West Bank city of Nablus.

Media sources said that an undercover Israeli unit “Musta’ribeen” infiltrated Nablus, before opening fire at the young man, Al-Aklik, shooting him in the head with live ammunition, and abducting him.

Occupation forces withheld the body of the slain man.

The Israeli army also shot the slain man’s 7-year-old daughter, Hajar, in the thigh with live ammunition.

Al-Aklik was a former detainee who spent a total of 18 years in Israeli occupation prisons.

The Quds News Network reported that two Palestinians were also killed during exchanges of fire with Israeli soldiers in Jenin as the army continued its onslaught on the city and the refugee camp for the tenth day. Israeli forces confiscated the bodies.

The slain Palestinians were later identified as Amin Ahmad Abdul-Rahman Abu Hasan, 37, from Jenin refugee camp, and Yazan Hatem Atiya Al-Hasan, 21, from Al-Yamun town, west of Jenin.

The Israeli army also caused massive destruction to many homes, buildings, and infrastructure amidst the ongoing invasion, bulldozing, and bombing.

Israel’s assault has so far led to the deaths of nineteen Palestinians and caused dozens of injuries, in addition to scores of Palestinians who were abducted by the invading soldiers.

Qasim Aboud Mutie Al-Aklik, 42, Amin Ahmad Abdul-Rahman Abu Hasan, 37, and Yazan Hatem Atiya Al-Hasan, 21, killed Jan. 30, 2025 by Israeli forces in the West Bank
Qasim Aboud Mutie Al-Aklik, 42, Amin Ahmad Abdul-Rahman Abu Hasan, 37, and Yazan Hatem Atiya Al-Hasan, 21, killed Jan. 30, 2025 by Israeli forces in the West Bank (IMEMC)

West Bank: Israeli troops forcibly displace 20,000 Palestinians from Jenin

The Jenin Governorate said in a statement on 30 January that “most of the Jenin Camp residents, estimated at 20,000 citizens, were displaced as a result of the Israeli aggression.” 

The Israeli operation in Jenin – dubbed Iron Wall – has entered its 10th day. At least 16 Palestinians have been killed. The operation also includes violent Israeli army raids in other areas of the West Bank, such as Nablus and Tulkarem. 

Israeli troops have been systematically destroying homes and expelling residents from the Jenin and Tulkarem Camps. 

Palestinian families forced to flee their homes, on the move, January 22, 2025 in Jenin, West Bank
Palestinian families forced to flee their homes, on the move, January 22, 2025 in Jenin, West Bank (Issam Rimawi/Anadolu Agency)

Trump lays out blueprint to deport pro-Palestinian foreign nationals

US President Donald Trump on Wednesday issued a new executive order that aims to deport any international students on university campuses who have expressed pro-Palestinian sentiments or participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations.

The order comes just a week after Trump instated a new travel ban that vaguely seeks to deport individuals “espousing hateful ideology”.

The two orders highlight the Trump administration’s focus on eliminating the pro-Palestinian movement on university campuses in the US, which has grown exponentially since October 2023.

“Taken together, these two executive orders essentially ban all non-citizens, including green card holders, from criticizing the US government, its institutions, or the state of Israel on penalty of deportation,” Eric Lee, an immigration attorney working with affected students, told Middle East Eye.

“The latest order goes even further, attempting to transform universities into a wing of the Department of Homeland Security by pressing them to ‘monitor’ what students say or write in class and what staff teach and ‘report’ them to authorities” so the government can “remove such aliens”.

Trump said in a statement released by the White House that he plans to “quickly cancel the student visas of all Hamas sympathizers on college campuses, which have been infested with radicalism like never before,” he added (continue reading here).

Over 300 workers, students and community members rallied for Palestine in a march ended at the UPenn encampment for Gaza in Philadelphia, May 8, 2024.
Over 300 workers, students and community members rallied for Palestine in a march ended at the UPenn encampment for Gaza in Philadelphia, May 8, 2024. (Joe Piette/CC BY-NC 2.0 DEED)

Private US Company Is Reportedly Hiring US Veterans to Run Gaza Checkpoint

An American private security company is seeking to hire dozens of U.S. special forces veterans to staff and run a key checkpoint in Gaza, aiming to arm the group to monitor and search Palestinians there, new reporting finds.

Reportedly as part of the ceasefire deal in Gaza, three private companies have been chosen to screen Palestinians traveling from southern to northern Gaza; Reuters reports that one of them is seeking 96 green berets to staff the checkpoint. The company is reportedly offering a $10,000 advance and pay starting at $1,100 a day.

Contractors are reportedly already in place at the checkpoint, where they are tasked with searching the vehicles of Palestinians who are headed to northern Gaza, supposedly to confiscate weapons — as hundreds of thousands of Palestinians flood to the north after having been forcibly displaced by Israel’s genocide over the past 15 months.

U.S. private military servicers have a reputation across the world for fomenting violence, particularly in the context of the U.S.’s imperialist projects in the Middle East, while operating under even less transparency than the already-secretive U.S. military.

Prominent U.S. private security companies include contractors like CACI, which carried out horrific acts of torture at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq; and Blackwater, most well-known for killing 14 civilians and wounding 17 in Nisour Square, Baghdad, in 2007. Commentators have noted that the U.S.’s heavy use of private military contractors over the decades has created an international industry centered on the practice (continue reading here).

RELATED: Israeli ‘propaganda’ AI bot turns itself into ‘pro-Palestine machine’ calling troops ‘white colonizers’
An armed man gestures at a checkpoint at the Netzarim corridor as displaced Palestinians make their way to the northern parts of the Gaza Strip, on January 29, 2025.
An armed man gestures at a checkpoint at the Netzarim corridor as displaced Palestinians make their way to the northern parts of the Gaza Strip, on January 29, 2025. (Omar Al-Qattaa / AFP via Getty Images)

MORE NEWS:

IMEMC Daily Reports
Common Dreams: In the Attack on Pro-Palestinian Campus Speech, More Than Jobs Are at Stake
Drop Site News: “Operation Wrath of Zion” Aims to Dox and Deport Pro-Palestinian Protestors in New York City
The New Arab: Colonial desire meets TikTok in Israel’s ‘lingerie genre’
Truthout: Even at an Anti-Racist Educators’ Summit, Decrying Genocide Proved Controversial
Anadolu Agency: German parliament’s antisemitism resolution threatens academic freedom, scholars warn

STATISTICS OCTOBER 7, 2023 – JANUARY 30, 2025 (ongoing count):

At least 48,349 Palestinians killed, 118,580 injured – including:

  • at least 47,460 killed in Gaza (~20,600 children)
  • at least 889 killed in the West Bank (~178 children)
  • at least 111,580 injured in Gaza
  • at least 7,000 injured in the West Bank

WAR STATISTICS OCTOBER 7, 2023 (Hamas attack) – JANUARY 19, 2025 (Ceasefire):

Palestinian death toll from October 7, 2023 – January 19, 2025: at least 48,143 – including at least 47,283 in Gaza (~20,600 children), and 860 in the West Bank (~177 children). Palestinian injuries: at least 118,472 – including at least 111,472 in Gaza, and 7,000 in the West Bank.

Thousands of those killed in Gaza have yet to be identified, and an estimated 11,000 more are still buried under rubble.

Reported Israeli death toll from October 7, 2023 – January 19, 2025: ~1,616 (or 1,590) – including ~1,139 on October 7, 2023 (~36 children), 436 (or 405) military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza, 46 military and civilians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Israel.

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

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

 

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