Netanyahu demands lie detector tests for cabinet ministers after leaks
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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly demanded high ranking Israeli officials take lie detector tests, saying too many government deliberations are being leaked to the press.
“We have a plague of leaks and I am not willing to continue like this, which is why I directed the promotion of a law that everyone who sits in cabinets and security discussions, including the political and professional ranks – will undergo a polygraph,” Mr Netanyahu said during Sunday’s cabinet meeting, Channel 12 reported.
The prime minister’s comments come after widespread press coverage of how a meeting last Thursday, which was called to discuss postwar Gaza, ended in acrimony and recriminations.
Support for Mr Netanyahu has fallen sharply of late despite Israeli public opinion remaining firmly behind its military’s offensive in Gaza.
The prime minister has refused to take direct responsibility for the security failures that allowed Hamas to stage its October 7 massacre, but has vowed to press on with the retaliatory action.
05:00 PM GMT
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The key developments from the day were:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly demanded high ranking Israeli officials take lie detector tests, saying too many government deliberations are being leaked to the press.
The eldest son of Al Jazeera’s Gaza bureau chief was killed in an Israeli strike in southern Gaza. Hamza al-Dahdouh, himself an Al Jazeera journalist and cameraman, was travelling with other reporters in southern Gaza when he was struck by a drone.
Washington has stressed its opposition to the forced displacement of Palestinians from Gaza or the occupied West Bank.
The Israeli army signalled that it has wrapped up major combat in northern Gaza, saying it has “completed the dismantling” of Hamas’s command structure there.
At least 113 Palestinians have been killed and 250 others injured over the past 24 hours in Israeli strikes on the Gaza strip, the health ministry in Gaza said.
US officials are worried that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may see an expanded fight in Lebanon as key to his political survival amid domestic criticism, according to a report by the Washington Post.
At Egypt’s Rafah border crossing, lines of hundreds of trucks carrying aid wait for weeks to enter Gaza, and a warehouse is full of goods rejected by Israeli inspectors, everything from water testing equipment to medical kits for delivering babies, two US senators said after a visit to the border.
04:35 PM GMT
Al Jazeera bureau chief's son killed
04:29 PM GMT
Al Jazeera bureau chief's son killed in Gaza
The eldest son of Al Jazeera’s Gaza bureau chief has been killed in an Israeli strike in southern Gaza.
Hamza al-Dahdouh, himself an Al Jazeera journalist and cameraman, was travelling with other reporters in southern Gaza when he was struck by a drone.
Another journalist, freelancer Mustafa Thuraya was also killed, and a third reporter was wounded.
A video posted online showed Wael Al-Dahdouh crying next to his son’s body and holding his hand. Later, after his son’s burial, he said that journalists in Gaza would keep doing their job.
“All the world needs to see what is happening here,” he said.
Wael Al-Dahdouh is particularly well known to viewers across the Middle East after he learned during a live broadcast last month that his wife, another son, daughter and grandson had been killed in an Israeli air strike.
The Israel-Hamas war has been deadly for journalists. The Committee for the Protection of Journalists, an international watchdog, said that as of Saturday, 77 journalists and media workers had been killed – 70 Palestinians, four Israelis and three Lebanese.
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the strike.
04:00 PM GMT
US stresses opposition to forced displacement of Palestinians from Gaza
Washington has stressed its opposition to the forced displacement of Palestinians from Gaza or the occupied West Bank.
In his meeting with King Abdullah in Amman, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken “stressed US opposition to forcible displacement of Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza and the critical need to protect Palestinian civilians in the West Bank from extremist settler violence,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement.
Most of Gaza’s residents have been displaced by the conflict, and violence has also flared in the West Bank, including in a deadly clash in the city of Jenin on Sunday.
Mr Blinken is touring the region amid heightened fears Israel’s offensive against Palestinian Hamas militants in Gaza will spark a broader regional conflagration.
King Abdullah told Mr Blinken that Washington had a major role to play in pressuring Israel into an immediate ceasefire, and warned of the “catastrophic repercussions” of the continuation of the war in Gaza.
Washington is also rallying allies to deter attacks on Red Sea shipping by Houthi militants who control most of Yemen.
03:45 PM GMT
Israel taps Supreme Court ex-president Barak for ICJ panel
Israel has named its former Supreme Court president Aharon Barak as its addition to an International Court of Justice panel due this week to hear a genocide allegation filed against it, an Israeli official said on Sunday.
Under the ICJ’s rules a state that does not have a judge of its nationality already on the bench can choose an ad hoc judge to sit in their case.
Barak, a champion of Supreme Court activism, was a focus of opposition for members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, whose judicial reform push last year bitterly polarised the public.
South Africa, which accuses Israel of genocide in the Gaza war, has also appointed an ad hoc judge, former deputy chief justice Dikgang Moseneke, South African media said
03:44 PM GMT
Watch: IDF releases footage of airstrikes on Hezbollah targets in Lebanon
03:05 PM GMT
Pictures from Jan 7
02:43 PM GMT
Israel cabinet slated to vote on 2024 war budget this week
Israel’s cabinet is set to approve a 2024 wartime budget on Thursday, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said, after ministers approved 9 billion shekels ($2.5 billion) in financial support for military reservists.
“The state of Israel puts the reservists and their families at the center and this is the anchor of the budget for 2024 that we will deliver this weekend,” Smotrich said in a joint statement with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, reported by Reuters.
Israel last year approved a two-year budget for 2023 and 2024, but the war against Hamas in Gaza has shaken government finances.
In December parliament approved a special budget for 2023 of nearly 30 billion shekels to help fund the war and compensate those impacted by Hamas’ Oct 7 attacks that sparked the war.
Smotrich’s spokesman clarified that the budget vote would likely take place on Thursday but offered no further details.
The Finance Ministry has said that the war will likely cost at least another 50 billion shekels in 2024 and result in a near-tripling of its budget deficit to around 6 per cent of GDP, in a projection that fighting will last through February.
The Bank of Israel is urging the government to rein in spending unrelated to the war to balance out the additional defence and home-front expenses, saying looser fiscal policy could slow the pace of interest rate reductions.
01:39 PM GMT
Doctors Without Borders evacuating staff from Deir al-Balah’s Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Hospital
The international medical charity Doctors Without Borders said it was evacuating its medical staff and their families from Deir al-Balah’s Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Hospital because of the growing danger.
“The situation became so dangerous that some staff living in the neighbouring areas were not able to leave their houses because of the constant threats of drones and snipers,” said Carolina Lopez, the group’s emergency coordinator at the hospital.
She said a bullet penetrated a wall of the hospital’s intensive care unit on Friday, and that “drone attacks and sniper fire were just a few hundred metres from the hospital” over the past couple of days.
The group had about 50 Palestinian and international medical staff in the hospital. Lopez said the hospital has received between 150 and 200 injured people daily in recent weeks. “On some days, we have received more dead than injured,” she said. “No one and nowhere is safe in Gaza.”
01:16 PM GMT
Hamas command in north Gaza destroyed, Israel says
The Israeli army signalled that it has wrapped up major combat in northern Gaza, saying it has “completed the dismantling” of Hamas’s command structure there.
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesman Daniel Hagari told reporters that the terror group’s fighters are now only operating sporadically and “without commanders” in the area.
He added that Israel had killed around 8,000 Hamas fighters in northern Gaza, a figure which the Telegraph was unable to independently verify.
IDF troops are now focused on dismantling Hamas in south and central Gaza and strengthening defences along the Israel-Gaza border fence, Mr Hagari said.
In recent weeks, Israel had already been scaling back its military assault in northern Gaza and pressing its offensive in the territory’s south, where most of Gaza’s 2.3 million Palestinians are being squeezed into smaller areas amid a mounting humanitarian disaster.
01:09 PM GMT
Bodies arrive at Nasser Hospital
Officials at Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis said they received the bodies of 18 people, including 12 children, who were killed in an Israeli strike late Saturday.
More than 50 people were injured in the strike on a home in the Khan Younis refugee camp, which was set up decades ago to house refugees from the 1948 Mideast war over Israel’s creation and morphed into a neighborhood of the city.
12:40 PM GMT
The car in which two journalists were reportedly killed in Israeli strike
12:22 PM GMT
Netanyahu tells 'enemies and friends' he is committed to eliminating Hamas
At the opening of the cabinet meeting at the Kirya IDF headquarters in Tel Aviv, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel is not about to wind down its campaign against Hamas in Gaza.
“The war must not be stopped until we complete all of its goals – the elimination of Hamas, the return of all our hostages, and a promise that Gaza will no longer pose a threat to Israel,” said Mr Netanyahu. “I say this to both our enemies and our friends. This is our responsibility and this is the commitment from all of us.”
“We must put every other consideration aside, and continue together until total victory. This victory will only be achieved when we complete our goals and when we restore security to the residents of the north and the south alike,” he said.
12:08 PM GMT
Rockets and tanks on Jan 7
12:04 PM GMT
113 Palestinians killed in 24 hours
At least 113 Palestinians have been killed and 250 others injured over the past 24 hours in Israeli strikes on the Gaza strip, the health ministry in Gaza said in a statement on Sunday, Reuters reports.
Sunday’s tally brings the latest death toll in Gaza to 22,835 Palestinians killed and 58,416 injured since 7 October, the statement added.
11:07 AM GMT
Israel’s talk of expanding war to Lebanon alarms US
US officials are worried that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may see an expanded fight in Lebanon as key to his political survival amid domestic criticism, according to a report by the Washington Post.
Mr Netanyahu has dipped in opinion polls since the war began, facing criticism of his government’s failure to prevent Hamas’s Oct 7 attack.
Multiple senior Israeli leaders have repeatedly said Hezbollah must be driven away from the Israel-Lebanon border, vowing that if this isn’t achieved with diplomacy it will be achieved militarily.
In private conversations, the US administration has warned Israel against a significant escalation in Lebanon, the Washington Post said.
The newspaper cited over a dozen unnamed Biden administration officials and diplomats and said the US has dispatched senior envoys to Israel in order to prevent a full-blown war between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah.
10:52 AM GMT
Jordan's King Abdullah says US must push Israel to agree to ceasefire in Gaza
Jordan’s King Abdullah on Sunday warned US Secretary of State Antony Blinken of the “catastrophic repercussions” of the continuation of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, a palace statement said.
The monarch also told Mr Blinken that Washington had a major role to play to put pressure on Israel to agree to an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, the statement said.
Mr Blinken arrived in Jordan late on Saturday. He is now set to visit Qatar and end the day in the United Arab Emirates.
Mr Blinken planned to use the visits to press hesitant Muslim nations to prepare to play a role in the reconstruction, governance and security of Gaza if and when Israel achieves its goal of eliminating Hamas, a senior State Department official travelling with the Biden administration’s top diplomat said.
10:33 AM GMT
Two journalists reportedly killed in Israeli strike
The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said Sunday an Israeli air strike killed two journalists in the Palestinian territory.
Mustafa Thuria, a video stringer for AFP news agency, and another journalist Hamza Wael Dahdouh, were killed while they were travelling in a car, the ministry and medics said.
10:27 AM GMT
Pictures from inside Gaza
09:55 AM GMT
‘Arbitrary' Israeli inspections slowing aid into Gaza, US senators say
At Egypt’s Rafah border crossing, lines of hundreds of trucks carrying aid wait for weeks to enter Gaza, and a warehouse is full of goods rejected by Israeli inspectors, everything from water testing equipment to medical kits for delivering babies, two US senators said Saturday after a visit to the border.
Senators Chris Van Hollen and Jeff Merkley said a cumbersome process is slowing relief to the Palestinian population in the besieged territory – largely due to Israeli inspections of aid cargos, with seemingly arbitrary rejections of vital humanitarian equipment. The system to ensure that aid deliveries within Gaza don’t get hit by Israeli forces is “totally broken,” they said.
“What struck me yesterday was the miles of backed-up trucks. We couldn’t count, but there were hundreds,” Merkley said in a briefing with Van Hollen to a group of reporters in Cairo, reported by the Associated Press.
The US has been pressing Israel for weeks to let greater amounts of food, water, fuel, medicine and other supplies into Gaza, and the UN Security Council passed a resolution on December 22 calling for an immediate increase in deliveries.
Still, the rate of trucks entering has not risen significantly.
This week, an average of around 120 trucks a day entered through Rafah and Kerem Shalom, according to UN figures, far below the 500 trucks of goods crossing daily before the war.
09:39 AM GMT
Six Palestinians and Israeli police officer killed in West Bank clashes
Israeli forces killed six Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry said on Sunday, and an Israeli police officer was killed, Israeli officials said.
Israel said its aircraft fired on Palestinian militants who had attacked troops in the city of Jenin. The Palestinian ministry said the strike targeted people who had gathered at the site. Eyewitnesses said the attack happened as Israeli forces were withdrawing.
Four of those killed were brothers, according to family members.
Mujahid Nazzal, a Palestinian doctor and first responder at the scene, told Reuters one of the dead was hit directly by a missile and the strike also seriously wounded a seventh person.
Another witness, Ahmed Suleiman, said, “Blood and body parts scattered everywhere.”
An Israeli border police officer was killed and others wounded when their vehicle was hit by an explosive device during operations in Jenin, the Israeli military and police said.
The Jenin Brigade, an armed wing of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement, issued a statement claiming responsibility for the attack on the Israeli security forces.
The West Bank had already seen its highest levels of unrest in decades during the 18 months before the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by the militant Hamas group that rules Gaza.
Confrontations in the West Bank have risen sharply since Israeli forces launched their retaliatory offensive on Gaza, seeking to wipe out Hamas.
09:28 AM GMT
Israeli civilian killed in West Bank shooting attack
An Israeli civilian was shot dead on Sunday in the West Bank, the army said, in the latest incident to rock the occupied territory where deadly violence has surged.
The civilian was “killed adjacent to the British police junction” north of Ramallah, the army said, adding police were searching for the attacker.