No flour, no fuel – no bread: war on Gaza Day 543

One more Palestinian journalist, along with his entire family, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in the southern Gaza Strip, as Israel’s genocidal war continues.

In a statement on Tuesday, the Al-Aqsa local radio announced that journalist Mohammed Al-Bardaweel and his family were killed in the airstrike on their apartment in Khan Younis.

“The criminal Israeli occupation army, by targeting Palestinian journalists, is desperately trying to silence the Palestinian narrative and obscure the truth,” the statement said.

The Gaza-based Government Media Office condemned Israel’s killing of the journalist and his family, calling on the international community, including global press organizations, to denounce Israel’s systematic targeting of Palestinian journalists and pursue legal action through international courts.

Al-Bardaweel’s death brought the number of Palestinian journalists killed in Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7, 2023, to 209, the media office also said.

RELATED: Israel’s war on Gaza is the deadliest conflict on record for journalists.

Severe Threat of Famine: Last UN Bakery Closes in Gaza Month After Israel’s Humanitarian Aid Halt

The United Nations World Food Program (WFP) announced on Tuesday that the last of 25 bakeries it had been supporting in the Gaza Strip has ceased operations, following the closure of border crossings by Israel and the suspension of aid shipments a month ago.

International aid agencies are continuously warning of the threat of famine looming over hundreds of thousands of Palestinians across Gaza, as the food supply in the strip is running out.

Since the beginning of the war, and especially during the cease-fire, WFP has supplied dozens of bakeries with raw materials and baking fuel – either gas or diesel – allowing them to sell bread at a subsidized price (approximately 50 cents for a bag of about 23 pitas).

“Anyone who wanted bread got it,” said Abdel Nasser Al-Ajrami, the head of the Bakery Owners Association in Gaza in an interview with Al-Alam news network. “It was hard to obtain bread recently as the production volume didn’t meet the demand, but anyone who asked received bread.”

The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which also distributes food in Gaza, has stopped handing out flour in recent days due to a shortage. A UN statement said that last week, around ten community kitchens across Gaza were closed due to hostilities and a fuel shortage (continue reading here).

The Israeli army issued evacuation orders on Tuesday for Palestinians in a city in the northern Gaza Strip in a move widely seen as a form of collective punishment, following the firing of a rocket from the enclave.

Israeli army spokesman Avichay Adraee ordered the immediate evacuation of Beit Hanoun before the army carries out strikes in the area.

Adraee said earlier that the army’s air defense intercepted a rocket launched from northern Gaza toward Sderot.

The evacuation order policy is part of Israeli army tactics widely used in the course of its genocidal war on Gaza.

The army also issued evacuation orders Monday to Palestinians in several areas in Rafah, the southernmost area of Gaza, worsening the dire conditions of residents under ongoing Israeli deadly attacks.

Israel submitted a new proposal Monday for a ceasefire in Gaza, local media reported.

The Haaretz daily, citing a senior Israeli official, said Israel had asked the Palestinian group Hamas through mediators Egypt and Qatar for the release of 11 living hostages and the return of 16 bodies, in addition to providing information on the remaining captives in Gaza, in return for a 40-day suspension of hostilities.

In addition to the ceasefire, Israel would release an unspecified number of Palestinian prisoners from its jails, the newspaper said (continue reading here).

West Bank: More than 100 Israeli settlers attack Palestinian village

Former Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said Tuesday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has officially recognized 28 new settlements in the occupied West Bank since it came to power — the most significant expansion since 1967, according to the far-right politician.

In a lengthy post on X following a tour of settlements alongside Defense Minister Israel Katz and senior military officials, Smotrich hailed what he described as a “revolution” in settlement policy.

“Since 1967 until today, no such revolution has taken place in Judea and Samaria (West Bank),” he wrote. “The Israeli government is working to develop settlements and will not allow the rampant illegal Arab construction that has become a scourge of the state in recent decades.”

Smotrich claimed that a record number of demolitions of Palestinian structures occurred in the past year, and called for additional strategic tools must be used that will lead to the desired revolution.”

The far-right politician, who stepped down Monday amid a dispute with National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, insisted that illegal settlers are not second-class citizens. “The government will insist that they be entitled to security like all Israeli citizens,” he wrote.

RELATED: Israeli army claims it discovered explosives lab, arrests Palestinians in West Bank

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Pro-Israel groups, politicians demand Francesca Albanese’s UN mandate end now

Francesca Albanese, the UN Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, has recently faced an incitement campaign from various political entities demanding her removal from her position, as her three-year term concludes this week.

The UN Human Rights Council is scheduled to hold a session on renewing her mandate for another three years on April 4th.

However, several countries have expressed their unwillingness to renew Albanese’s mandate, including the Netherlands, due to her positions on the Palestinian issue. 

Albanese has repeatedly warned of ethnic cleansing and genocide against the Palestinian people in her UN reports and press interviews.

British Labour MP David Taylor said in an interview today with the Jewish Chronicle, a pro-Israel newspaper, “Albanese’s response to the largest anti-Semitic massacre of the 21st century was to describe it as a reaction to Israel’s actions.

She described Israel as a settler-colonial invasion and described America as subservient to the Jewish lobby.”

UN Watch also asserts that Albanese has used her UN mandate to disseminate anti-Semitism and Hamas propaganda, based on a 60-page report titled “A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing,” which charges her with advancing “anti-Semitism and Jihadi terrorism,” according to the organization.

Another Zionist organization, “Betar”, threatened in mid-March to target Albanese with a pager attack – a reference to Israel’s deadly and indiscriminate attacks in Lebanon last September – during a recent visit to London.