Update Mar 1st (Day 147)

UPDATES ON THE WAR – Day 148 (Mar 2^nd):

*We are one Day 148 (Mar 2^nd). VERY CLOSE TO A CEASE FIRE / HOSTAGE RELEASE!

[We have created categories to make our summaries easier to read and understand.]

Headlines:

• After conducting a detailed security analysis, United Airlines is set to Resume Direct Flights to Israel beginning on March 3^rd.
• Delta will also return their direct services into TLF beginning May 1^st.
• Anticipation fills the air as Israeli Tourist Agencies are eagerly prepare to extend a warm welcome thousands of travelers arriving in diverse groups from various corners of the globe throughout March. These tours are thoughtfully crafted, following their accustomed routes to ensure an enriching and memorable experience for each participant.
• U.S. President Joe Biden said Israel would be willing to halt the war in Gaza during the upcoming Muslim fasting month of Ramadan if a deal is reached to release some of the hostages held in Gaza by Hamas. Speaking to reporters on Monday (Feb 26^th), he also said he hopes that “by next Monday we’ll have a cease-fire.”
• Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh and his government have submitted their resignations, he announced Monday (Feb 26^th).
• Thursday Feb 29 a disaster occurred when a mass of Palestinians fell on aid trucks in the area of the marina on the shore of Gaza City. Over 100 Palestinians were reportedly killed and at least 700 wounded in Gaza City yesterday after Israeli forces opened fire on crowds gathering near a convoy of aid trucks. The chaotic scene drew conflicting accounts—witnesses accused Israeli troops of firing as residents received food supplies, while the Israeli military claimed the crowd stampeded toward the trucks and allegedly looted supplies. Israeli officials attributed many casualties to overcrowding, trampling, and being run over by the trucks and said they would look into adapting its aid delivery protocols.
• The head of the World Health Organization said that the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza led to the deaths of Gazans at the aid convoy Thursday.
• Sources familiar with the meeting that took place Friday night (Feb 23^rd) in Paris between the Israeli delegation and representatives of the United States, Egypt and Qatar, told and Israeli News Source that the talks were “very good” and that “significant progress was made.”

OUCH:

• The Hamas-controlled Health Ministry in Gaza said that at least 30,000 Palestinians have been killed and over 70,000 wounded since the war began.

YEAH:

• United Airlines Set to Resume Flights to Israel in March! The U.S.-based airline will resume daily flights between Newark and Tel Aviv on March 6 ■ Prior to that, United is expected to operate the route with a layover in Germany.
• Earlier this week, Israel’s Airport Authority said that both United and Delta Airlines had notified that they plan to resume flights to Israel.
• “United conducted a detailed safety analysis in making this decision, including close work with security experts and government officials in the United States and Israel,” the airline said in a statement, “United will continue to monitor the situation in Tel Aviv and adjust the schedule as warranted, including changes to the resumed service from New York/Newark announced today.”
• Israel said that 245 trucks of aid entered Gaza on Sunday (Feb 25^th)
• USAID administrator Samantha Power announced the U.S. will provide an additional $53 million in “urgently needed” humanitarian aid for Gaza and the West Bank. Jordan’s King Abdullah said on Tuesday that aid to Gaza must be doubled to prevent a deterioration in a hunger crisis affecting over two million people.
• President Biden confirmed Friday that the U.S. will drop food aid into the Gaza Strip, saying that not enough aid is currently getting in. The White House spokesperson added that the U.S. will redouble efforts to open up a maritime corridor for aid into Gaza.
• Senior Hamas official Mousa Abu Marzouk told Alghad TV he believes a new cease-fire/hostage deal is possible and there could soon be a breakthrough.
• On Friday, Feb. 23, 2024, approximately 1,000 children and youth from Christian schools in Jerusalem walked the Via Dolorosa in the Old City, offering prayers for peace. The crowd brought life to the streets of the Holy City for the first time since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war last October.

IN THE SOUTH (RED SEA):

• German frigate deployed to Red Sea repels first Houthi attack: The German naval frigate Hessen, deployed to Red Sea as part of an EU naval mission to protect shipping, has repelled an attack by the Iran-backed Houthi militia in Yemen for the first time, according to DPA sources.
• US, UK forces launch wave of strikes against Houthi rebels in Yemen, the fourth such mission in recent weeks.
• The IDF said its Arrow defense system intercepted a long-range ballistic missile launched at the southern Israeli city of Eilat on Thursday morning (Feb 22^nd), the seventh such missile likely originating from Houthi-controlled Yemen intercepted since the war began.
• The U.S. military said it destroyed seven anti-ship missiles, one missile launcher and a drone originating from Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen which “presented an imminent threat to merchant vessels and to the U.S. Navy ships in the region.”
• Yemen’s Houthis said that they will “ban” all U.S. and U.K.-owned ships from passing through the Red Sea.
• U.S. and British forces struck 18 Houthi targets across eight different locations in Yemen on Saturday (Feb 27^th), according to a joint statement.

GAZA (NORTH):

• Israel’s war cabinet approved the direct entry of humanitarian aid into the northern Gaza Strip in order to prevent the looting of convoys by residents, PM Netanyahu’s office said.
• The IDF said that 160 packages of food and medical equipment were airdropped into southern Gaza and the Jordanian field hospital in Khan Yunis as part of an international effort by Israel, the U.S., UAE, Jordan, Egypt and France.

GAZA (SOUTH):

• Israeli officials to consider evacuation plan for the southern Gazan city of Rafah this week, ahead of a planned operation; an estimated 1 million refugees are in the immediate area
• An Israeli military offensive in Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah could be “delayed somewhat” if a deal is reached for a weekslong cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday (Feb 25th), and claimed that total victory in the territory would come within weeks once the offensive begins. “Once we begin the Rafah operation, the intense phase of the fighting is weeks away from completion. Not months,” Netanyahu told CBS. ““If we don’t have a deal, we’ll do it anyway.” He said four of the six remaining Hamas battalions are concentrated in Rafah.
• Early Monday (Feb 26^th) Netanyahu’s office said the army had presented to the War Cabinet its “operational plan” for Rafah as well as plans to evacuate civilians from the battle zones. It gave no further details.

POST WAR GAZA:

• The Russian foreign minister said that Palestinian factions including Hamas and Fatah made progress towards establishing a unity government after holding talks in Moscow, according to a report by the Guardian.
• Netanyahu outlines official blueprint for postwar Gaza: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unveiled a two-page outline of his plans to his security cabinet, mostly reflecting his public statements. The plan includes Israel’s military operating in Gaza indefinitely and shuttering the United Nations Relief and Works Agency in Gaza and the West Bank, which faces allegations that some of its workers are linked to militants. The US has pushed for the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority to play a role in governing Gaza.
• The Palestinian Authority (PA) was set up in the mid-1990s as an interim government pending Palestinian independence after the Palestine Liberation Organization signed the Oslo Accords with Israel. It is headquartered in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah and exercises nominal self-rule in parts of the territory. The government, which is dominated by the Fatah political party, held administrative control over Gaza until 2007, after Hamas won the 2006 legislative elections in the occupied territories and expelled it from the strip. Israel has rejected the prospect of the PA returning to Gaza after the war, and has dismissed the idea of establishing a Palestinian state in the territories.
• The US however favors a reformed PA being in control of both the West Bank and Gaza as part of a future independent state.
• The PA is also very unpopular among Palestinians, who see it as unable to provide security in the face of regular Israeli incursions in the West Bank. A survey conducted by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research in December showed that more than 60% of Palestinians want the PA to be dissolved. Meanwhile, support for President Abbas, who has held the position since 2005, has collapsed. In the West Bank, 92% of respondents want him to resign, according to the poll.

IN THE NORTH (LEBANON):

• Israel launched airstrikes targeting Iran-backed Hezbollah militants in Lebanon, killing at least two fighters and one commander.
• At least nine rockets were fired from Lebanon at the northern Golan Heights a short while ago (Feb 22) according to initial military assessments. Several projectiles were intercepted by the Iron Dome air defense system. There are no immediate reports of injuries in the attack.
• The IDF said that fighter jets attacked Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon. Interceptor missiles were launched toward two suspicious aerial targets that crossed from Lebanon into northern Israel. A home in an Israeli community on the border with Lebanon caught on fire after it was struck by an anti-tank missile.
• Monday Feb 26^th Israel’s Airstrikes Reach Hezbollah Stronghold ‘Deep Inside Lebanon’ for First Time in War. The IDF said it assassinated the head of Hezbollah’s eastern command, Hassan Hossein Salami, after the organization announced his death in an Israeli strike in southern Lebanon.
• Later on Monday, Hezbollah claimed it retaliated against Israeli-attributed airstrikes in eastern Lebanon by firing 60 rockets toward an IDF division command in northern Israel.
• CNN: American administration and intelligence officials are concerned that Israel is planning a ground incursion into Lebanon that could be launched in the late spring or early summer if diplomatic efforts fail to push Hezbollah back from the northern border with Israel, senior administrations officials and officials familiar with the intelligence say.
• Israel Claims Responsibility for Killing Three Iran-linked Hezbollah Members in Lebanon: The Israeli army said it had ‘struck a vehicle in southern Lebanon, in which a number of terrorists who launched rockets into Israeli territory were driving.’ It said the militants operated under the Iran-affiliated Imam Hossein Division of Hezbollah

IN THE EAST (IRAQ/SYRIA):

• Two Hezbollah members were killed in an Israeli airstrike on the Syria-Lebanon border, the Syrian Center for Human Rights reported.
• Syria Says It Thwarted Israeli Strike in Damascus

JERUSALEM:

• On Friday, Feb. 23, 2024, approximately 1,000 children and youth from Christian schools in Jerusalem walked the Via Dolorosa in the Old City, offering prayers for peace. The crowd brought life to the streets of the Holy City for the first time since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war last October.
• The head of Hamas’ political bureau Ismail Haniyeh called on the Muslims “in the West Bank, in Jerusalem and within the green line to come en masse to the Al-Aqsa Mosque and fortify it on the first day of Ramadan.”
• The initiative, titled “The Way of the Cross… A Way of Peace,” was organized by the Custody of the Holy Land and involved 12 institutions, including two schools of the Anglican Church and the school of the Armenian Apostolic Church, as well as various Catholic groups. Father Francesco Patton, the custos of the Holy Land, and the apostolic delegate to Jerusalem, Father Adolfo Tito Yllana, were also present.
• U.S. State Dep’t continues to urge Israel to facilitate access to Temple Mount during Ramadan: The U.S. State Department said on Wednesday (Feb 28^th) that it continues to urge Israel to facilitate access to Temple Mount/Al-Aqsa Compound for peaceful worshipers during Ramadan, in line with the past.

TEL AVIV/SOUTHERN ISRAEL:

• There are protests across the country demonstrating for the release of the hostages, also protests against the Netanyahu government.
• War cabinet minister Benny Gantz told protesters outside his house that “We need to get to elections in the fastest and most consensual way,” he said, adding that “we are at war, I am not in favor of the streets being lit up here again as it was until October 6th,” referring to the nationwide pro-democracy protests.
• Families of Israeli hostages held by Hamas in Gaza began a four-day march from the parking lot in Re’im – near the site of the Nova music festival massacre – to Jerusalem, calling for the release of the hostages after more than four months in captivity.

WEST BANK:

• Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh and his government have submitted their resignations, he announced Monday. “I would like to inform the honorable council and our great people that I placed the government’s resignation at the disposal of Mr. President (Mahmoud Abbas), last Tuesday, and today I submit it in writing,” Shtayyeh said in a post on Facebook. The resignation comes as the Palestinian Authority (PA) comes under intense pressure from the United States to reform and improve its governance in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. The PA has long been seen as corrupt by US politicians and Palestinians themselves.
• Israel announced it was planning to build thousands of housing units in West Bank settlements, a decision framed as a response to Thursday’s deadly terror attack.
• The Biden administration declared that Israeli West Bank settlements are “inconsistent with international law,” reversing the so-called ‘Pompeo Doctrine,’ a claim made by Trump’s Secretary of State in 2020 that settlements were “not per se inconsistent with international law.”
• Blinken expressed “disappointment” with Israel’s announcement of new settlement construction, noting that the U.S. had long described new settlements as “counterproductive to reaching an enduring peace.” Simon Walters, the U.K. ambassador to Israel, called the plan “deeply concerning.”
• A 26-year-old Israeli was killed and 11 people were wounded, including a pregnant woman, in a shooting attack near the West Bank settlement of Ma’aleh Adumim on Thursday. Three terrorists arrived in two cars at a checkpoint near the settlement and opened fire on cars waiting in a traffic jam. Police shot the three assailants, killing two and wounding one.
• Israel is seeking Palestinians not affiliated with Hamas to manage civilian affairs in areas designated as testing grounds for a post-war administration in Gaza, according to a senior Israeli official, who added the plan would exclude anybody on the payroll of the Palestinian Authority.
• Israeli forces arrested 17 wanted persons in the West Bank overnight into Thursday, the IDF said.

NEGOTIATIONS – HOSTAGE RELEASE – CEASE FIRE:

• Hamas says it has not been involved in the latest proposal developed by the United States, Egypt and Qatar, but the reported outline largely matches its earlier proposal for the first phase of a truce.
• Hamas has received a draft proposal from the talks held in Paris, which includes a 40-day pause in all military operations and the exchange of Palestinian prisoners for Israeli hostages at a ratio of 10 to one, a senior source close to the talks said.
• Netanyahu’s Three Options: A Hostage Deal, Rafah Offensive or More Empty Promises
• The updated U.S.-proposed framework, per the sources, includes: The release of several hundred Palestinian prisoners in exchange for Hamas freeing 35 to 40 Israeli hostages, including civilian women, female soldiers, men over 50 and Israelis in serious medical condition.
• A stipulation that the number of Palestinian prisoners released for each of the female soldiers freed would be higher than that for the other abductees released during the first stage of the deal. The Palestinians released would also include prisoners convicted of killing Israelis and serving long sentences.
• Israel would agree to a day of ceasefire for each hostage released, meaning if Hamas releases the proposed number of abductees — 35 to 40 — for the first phase of a deal, there would be about six weeks of a pause in fighting.
• The U.S. framework also includes an initial and limited return of Palestinian citizens to the northern part of the Gaza Strip that would start during the implementation of the first stage of the deal under conditions that would be defined during the detailed negotiations.
• It includes a significant increase in the scope of humanitarian aid that would enter the Gaza Strip.

GLOBAL RESPONSE & INVOLVEMENT:

• Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan called on the international community to take a more active role towards an urgent cease-fire in Gaza and a two-state solution during talks at the G20 summit in Brazil, a Turkish diplomatic source said.

 

Holy Land Scripture Series

*If you would like to gain more understanding of the history of this country and conflict from a scriptural standpoint we recommend you take our Holy Land Scripture Course created to accompany our Virtual Tour of the Holy Land. Link below:

 

QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER:

What should Israel do in order to secure peaceful borders and relations with the Palestinians and other Arab neighbors as well as facilitate the release the hostages still being held in Gaza?   

How can the IDF minimize harm to Palestinian civilians when Hamas is using them as shields? And under such circumstances, what is the extent of Israel’s responsibility for minimizing harm to civilians when those civilians have been put in harm’s way by their own leaders?

What should Hamas do to get needed support and help?

Who Should Lead the Palestinians After the Gaza War, and How?

*We know the questions are MANY and the issues deep and complex. We hope the information shared on this blog will help you process all the information and issues.

 

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