(New York Times) Israel Rescues 4 Hostages in Military Operation; Gazan Officials Say Scores Are Killed - On Saturday Israeli forces rescued four hostages who had been held in Gaza since the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7, the military said.
- During the rescue operation, the Israeli air force struck the town of Nuseirat, where the hostages were rescued, and residents reported intense bombardments.
(New York Times) Hospital officials say more than 200 people were killed in central Gaza. - The Israeli operation to rescue four hostages in the town of Nuseirat in central Gaza on Saturday unleashed a heavy aerial bombardment and ground operations that killed more than 200 people, according to two hospital officials in the area.
- Residents there said it was the heaviest onslaught they could recall during the eight-month-old war. One hospital official said Israel struck a busy market, and video footage from the immediate aftermath of the attack showed bloodied bodies on the ground in what appeared to be a market that was struck.
- The New York Times could not independently verify the death toll and it was not clear how many were civilians and how many were Hamas militants.
- In a news conference outside Al Aqsa hospital, Dr. Daqran called on Palestinians in Gaza to donate blood and on the international community to help Gaza’s hospitals.
- The flood of victims into the hospitals came at a time when the few still functioning hospitals in Gaza are struggling to continue operating as a result of continued Israeli strikes and a lack of medicine, medical equipment and overworked generators.
(New York Times) The U.N. is adding Israel, Hamas and Islamic Jihad to its list of countries and groups that harm children in conflict zones. - The United Nations will add Israel, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad to a list of countries and armed groups that harm children when it releases its annual report on children and armed conflict, citing the heavy toll the war in Gaza has taken on minors, including killing, maiming and starvation, U.N. officials said.
- The report will be presented to members of the Council next Friday and released publicly on June 18, Mr. Dujarric said.
- During Hamas’s terrorist attack on Oct. 7, armed men kidnapped children, some of them toddlers and babies, and held them hostage in Gaza. Children were also among the roughly 1,200 Israelis and foreigners killed.
- Israel’s retaliatory bombing campaign and ground war in Gaza has killed at least 36,000 people, Gazan health officials say, a large portion of them women and children. The United Nations has said that children in Gaza also face famine and starvation because Israel has restricted humanitarian aid. Many children have also lost limbs or been gravely wounded in other ways.
(Reuters) Israel's centrist minister Benny Gantz quits Netanyahu government - Israeli minister Benny Gantz announced his resignation from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's emergency government on Sunday, withdrawing the only centrist power in the embattled leader's far-right coalition amid a months-long war in Gaza.
- The departure of Gantz's centrist party will not pose an immediate threat to the government. But it could have a serious impact nonetheless, leaving Netanyahu reliant on hardliners, with no end in sight to the Gaza war and a possible escalation in fighting with Lebanese Hezbollah.
- With Gantz gone, Netanyahu would lose the backing of a centrist bloc that has helped broaden support for the government in Israel and abroad, at a time of increasing diplomatic and domestic pressure eight months into the Gaza war.
- Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir demanded Gantz's now vacant seat at the war cabinet soon after the resignation was announced.
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