Tel Aviv: Israeli forces conducted another ground raid in Gaza in advance of an expected invasion of the Hamas-ruled territory. U.S. warplanes, meanwhile, struck targets in eastern Syria after attacks on U.S. forces by Iran-backed fighters, adding to regional tensions fueled by the 3-week-old Gaza war.
The Palestinian death toll passed 7,000 as Israel launched waves of airstrikes in response to the bloody Hamas rampage in southern Israel on Oct. 7. The Health Ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza, which tracks the toll, released a detailed list including names and ID numbers Thursday. In the occupied West Bank, more than 110 Palestinians have been killed in violence and Israeli raids since Oct. 7.
More than 1,400 people in Israel have been killed, mostly civilians slain during the initial Hamas attack. In addition, 229 people including foreigners, children and older adults were taken by Hamas during the incursion and remain in captivity in Gaza. Four hostages were released earlier.
Currently:
1. U.S. strikes Iran-linked sites in Syria in retaliation for attacks on U.S. troops
2. How did they get it wrong: Israel-Hamas war has upended years of conventional wisdom
3. Data from the Gaza Health Ministry, questioned after the hospital explosion, has withstood past scrutiny
4. Parts of Gaza look like a wasteland from space. Look for the misshapen buildings and swaths of gray
5. Palestinians plead "stop the bombs" at U.N. meeting, but Israel insists Hamas must be "obliterated."
Here’s what’s happening in the latest Israel-Hamas war:
- MISSILE HITS EGYPTIAN RED SEA CITY NEAR ISRAEL BORDER
A missile that landed in Egypt’s Red City of Taba early on Friday injured six people, state media said. The source of the missile was not identified. An Israeli army spokesman said that “an aerial threat was identified in the area" of the Red Sea earlier on Friday, forcing Israel to scramble fighter planes.
- US TARGETED 2 SITES TIED TO IRAN-BACKED FIGHTERS, ACTIVISTS SAY
The U.S. airstrikes on Syria’s eastern province of Deir el-Zour targeted two locations where Iran-backed fighters are based, according to Syrian opposition activists. Omar Abu Layla, a Europe-based activist who heads the Deir Ezzor 24 media outlet, said the main target was an area known as the farms just outside the town of Mayadeen. The site had been evacuated and no one was hurt, he said.
The second strike early Friday hit an area known as the “green belt” in the Boukamal area that borders Iraq, he said.
- UNGA SESSION ON THE WAR RESUMES FRIDAY MORNING
“Stop the bombs and save lives!” the Palestinian ambassador pleaded at an emotional U.N. meeting Thursday on the war in Gaza. But Israel’s envoy was adamant, declaring again, “We will not rest until Hamas is obliterated.”
The war sparked by Gaza’s Hamas rulers’ surprise attacks on Israel on Oct. 7 played out in the vast hall of the 193-nation General Assembly, where Arab nations expected to adopt a resolution Friday calling for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza after the Security Council’s four failed attempts to agree on any action.
At the assembly’s resumed emergency special session, speaker after speaker backed the Arab resolution’s cease-fire call — except for Israel’s U.N. Ambassador Gilad Erdan, who told the 193-member world body, “A cease-fire means giving Hamas time to rearm itself, so they can massacre us again.”
- US strikes come Iran-linked sites in Syria in retaliation for attacks on US troops
The U.S. military launched airstrikes early Friday on two locations in eastern Syria linked to Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps, the Pentagon said. The strikes come in retaliation for drone and missile attacks against U.S. bases and personnel in the region that began early last week. The U.S. wants to hit Iranian-backed groups suspected of targeting the U.S. to deter future aggression, possibly fueled by Israel's war against Hamas, while also working to avoid inflaming the region and provoking a wider conflict.
- EGYPTIAN STATE MEDIA SAYS 5 HURT IN EXPLOSION AT RESORT TOWN ON BORDER WITH ISRAEL
An explosion hit the Egyptian resort town of Taba on the border with Israel, wounding five people, Egyptian state-run media outlet Al Qahera News reported early Friday. The cause of the blast was not immediately clear, and The Associated Press could not immediately confirm the details.
- AIRSTRIKES IN GAZA: AMBULANCES, CHAOS AND TWISTED METAL
A cloud of grey dust fills a street as men and ambulances rush to the site of an Israeli airstrike. An AP videojournalist sprints beside them, the chaos growing more intense as they draw closer to the destroyed residence. Dozens of people pick their way across the remains of the building, which has been reduced to a jumble of concrete and metal. They scramble to pull the living and the dead from the wreckage.
- PENTAGON SAYS AIR BASE IN IRAQ SUSTAINED MINOR DAMAGE AFTER ATTEMPTED ATTACK
The Pentagon said Thursday that there was an attempted attack at Irbil air base in Iraq but there were no casualties and only minor damage to the facilities. Air Force Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder, Pentagon press secretary, declined to detail which Iranian-backed groups may be responsible for the recent spate of attacks at bases in Iraq and Syria.
He said there have been at least 12 attacks in Iraq and four in Syria, and 21 U.S. personnel sustained minor injuries in two separate attacks early last week. Of those, 19 had some type of traumatic brain injury, and all 21 returned to duty. There have been no reported injuries since those two attacks on Oct. 17-18.
- FAMILY OF 6 AMERICANS TRAPPED IN GAZA PLEAD FOR HELP FROM BIDEN
Family members of six American citizens trapped in Gaza pleaded Thursday for President Joe Biden to help their relatives get out from what started as a long-awaited vacation and turned into a horrific nightmare of bombardments and smoke. Shamiss Kaoud, 33, of Moreno Valley, California, said she and her sister have been calling the U.S. State Department daily to try to get her 68-year-old father, Jamal, his four brothers and one of her cousins evacuated from the war zone.
- US WILL RESPOND TO RECENT ATTACKS ON TROOPS STATIONED IN MIDEAST AT TIME 'OF OUR CHOOSING,' WHITE HOUSE SAYS
A White House spokesman said Thursday that the United States would respond at a "time of our choosing and a manner of our choosing" to a recent spate of attacks said to have been carried out by Iranian-backed groups against U.S. troops stationed in the Middle East. The blunt warning from White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby came a day after President Joe Biden said Iran Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had been directly warned that the U.S. would respond if Iran or its proxies continued to attack U.S. troops. Attacks on U.S. troops in the region have increased since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on Oct. 7.
- IRAQI MILITIA SAYS IT ATTACKED BASE HOUSING US TROOPS
An Iranian-backed militia says it carried out an attack Thursday with two suicide drones against a base housing U.S. troops in northern Iraq. The Islamic Resistance, an umbrella group for several Iran-backed militias, said in a statement that it attacked the "American occupation base" near the airport of the city of Irbil with two drones that directly hit their targets.
- CYPRUS PITCHES LINKING ITS MAIN PORT TO GAZA AS A HUMANITARIAN AID CORRIDOR
Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides says the island nation is ready to act as a hub for humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip. Christodoulides told reporters in Brussels on Thursday that he proposed to fellow European Union leaders the establishment of a "humanitarian aid corridor" linking Cyprus' main port of Limassol to Gaza. The Cypriot president said he discussed the idea with both Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Egyptian counterpart Abdel Fattah el-Sissi.
- DISPLAYS AND DEMONSTRATIONS AROUND THE WORLD SPOTLIGHT PLIGHT OF HOSTAGES
The absence of more than 200 people held hostage by Hamas is being felt — and seen — in places around the world. Thirty empty baby strollers were displayed on a lawn in front of the Eiffel Tower on Thursday, each with a photo of one of the children being held. Two hundred empty plastic chairs were also lined up outside the United Nations' European headquarters in Geneva with photos of the missing.
- IRAN'S FOREIGN MINISTER SAYS IT 'STANDS READY' TO PLAY ITS PART IN RELEASE OF HOSTAGES
Iran's foreign minister says Hamas is ready to release civilian prisoners abducted from Israel and is stressing that the international community must take responsibility for releasing 6,000 Palestinian prisoners held in Israel. Hossein Amirabdollahian told an emergency meeting of the U.N. General Assembly on Thursday that Iran "stands ready to play its part in this very important humanitarian endeavor, along with Qatar and Turkey."
- RUSSIAN AND IRANIAN OFFICIALS MEET IN MOSCOW TO DISCUSS ISRAEL-HAMAS WAR
A senior Iranian diplomat discussed the situation in the Gaza Strip with a Kremlin Mideast envoy Thursday. Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri met with Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov, who serves as the Kremlin envoy for the Middle East. The Russian Foreign Ministry said diplomats emphasized "the need for a cessation of hostilities in and around the Gaza Strip and the prompt provision of humanitarian assistance to the affected Palestinian population."
It added that they also reaffirmed a shared commitment by Moscow and Tehran to "continue close coordination of efforts in the interests of stabilizing the situation in the Middle East." (With AP inputs)
