A series of Israeli airstrikes across southern Lebanon on Wednesday killed at least 16 people, including paramedics, in one of the deadliest days of fighting in the Israel-Lebanon border since the war in Gaza broke out almost six months ago.
A barrage of rockets also killed one Israeli and was claimed by the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, which said it was responding to a deadly airstrike targeting a paramedic center linked to a Sunni Muslim group.
International mediators are scrambling to prevent an all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah amid near-daily violence, mostly confined to the area along the Lebanon-Israel border.
Hezbollah has been launching rockets toward Israel since Oct. 8, the day after Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel, triggering the war in Gaza. Some 1,200 people were killed in Israel and another 250 people abducted.
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More than 32,000 people have been killed in Gaza and 74,000 wounded, according to the Health Ministry, which doesn't differentiate between civilians and combatants in its tally. The ministry says women and children make up two-thirds of the dead.
Meanwhile, talks restarted aimed at bringing top Israeli officials to Washington to discuss potential military operations in Gaza, after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu canceled a planned visit this week because he was angry about the U.S. abstention on a U.N. cease-fire resolution, the White House said Wednesday.
“So we’re now working with them to find a convenient date that’s obviously going to work for both sides," said press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre. No date has been finalized yet.
An Israeli official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the White House reached out with the goal of setting a new meeting. Netanyahu’s office said the prime minister “did not authorize the departure of the delegation to Washington.”
The prime minister canceled the trip this week after the U.N. vote to demand a cease-fire in Gaza; the U.S. abstained from the vote but did not veto it.
Netanyahu accused the United States of “retreating” from a “principled position” by allowing the resolution to pass without conditioning the cease-fire on the release of hostages held by Hamas.
The delegation to the U.S. was meant to discuss a promised ground invasion of the southern Gaza city of Rafah, which is overflowing with displaced civilians. Israel has so far rejected American appeals to call off the planned operation.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant was already in Washington by the time Netanyahu canceled the trip by other officials. Gallant met with Biden's national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. The Gaza operation was one of many topics they discussed.
Netanyahu said Wednesday his decision to cancel was meant to deliver a message to Hamas that international pressure against Israel will not prompt it to end the war without concessions from the militant group, an apparent attempt to smooth over the clash between the allies.
Netanyahu downplayed U.S. fears of a humanitarian catastrophe if Israel launches the planned ground invasion into Rafah, saying civilians would be able to flee the fighting into other parts of the war-torn territory.
Speaking Wednesday to a bipartisan U.S. Congressional delegation visiting Israel, Netanyahu said people sheltering in Rafah — now more than half of Gaza’s 2.3 million population — will be able to move away from the fighting.
“People just move, they move with their tents,” Netanyahu said. “People moved down (to Rafah). They can move back up.”
U.N. humanitarian officials said Wednesday that two-thirds of Gaza's 36 hospitals aren't functioning after Al Amal Hospital in the south of the territory ceased operation amid intense military activity.
According to the U.N. World Health Organization, Gaza now has just 12 operating hospitals — two that are "minimally functional" and 10 that are partially functional, four in the north and six in the south, U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters.
Andrea De Domenico, the head of U.N. humanitarian operations in the Palestinian territories, visited the partially functioning Kamal Adwan hospital in the north last week and reported that it is receiving "about 15 malnourished children a day and is struggling to maintain services," Dujarric said.
"The hospital's only generator has been heavily damaged, and health workers and patients desperately need food, water and sanitation assistance," the U.N. spokesman said.
According to the U.N. World Food Program, Dujarric said, about 70% of northern Gaza's population "is facing catastrophic hunger" but efforts to deliver life-saving aid have been impeded by fighting and "access constraints" in getting food to those in need.
This month, WFP was only able to send 11 convoys to the north with food for some 74,000 people, far below the colossal needs of the population, Dujarric said.