Israel military strikes kill 32 Palestinians in Gaza
Immunity efforts for Israeli war criminals ‘reflection of extreme racism’: Palestine
GAZA/WEST BANK: At least 32 Palestinians were killed in Israeli military strikes across Gaza overnight and into Saturday, with most casualties reported in northern areas.
Later on Saturday medics said seven people were killed when an Israeli air strike targeted a vehicle near a gathering of Palestinians receiving aid in the southern area of Khan Younis south of the enclave.
According to residents and a Hamas source, the vehicle targeted near a crowd receiving flour belonged to security personnel responsible for overseeing the delivery of aid shipments into Gaza.
Among the 32 killed, at least seven died in an Israeli strike on a house in central Gaza City, according to a statement from the Gaza Civil Defense and the official Palestinian news agency WAFA early on Saturday.
The Gaza Civil Defense also reported that one of its officers was killed in attacks in northern Gaza’s Jabalia, bringing the total number of civil defense workers killed since October 7, 2023, to 88.
Earlier on Saturday, WAFA reported that three employees of the World Central Kitchen, a US-based, non-governmental humanitarian agency, were killed when a civilian vehicle was targeted in Khan Younis, southern Gaza.
The World Central Kitchen has not yet commented on the incident.
Meanwhile, the Palestinian National Council (PNC), the legislative body of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the supreme authority of the Palestinian people, has condemned on Saturday efforts to grant diplomatic immunity to “Israeli war criminals.”
In a statement, PNC President Rawhi Fattouh denounced the “horrific massacres carried out by the occupation, which claimed the lives of over 100 martyrs in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza.”
He called for “immediate international intervention to rescue two million people from famine and ethnic cleansing.”
Fattouh criticized “attempts by some nations to shield Israeli war criminals” in the wake of the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) decision, describing them as “a reflection of extreme racism and support for an unprecedented apartheid system.”
These actions, he said, “only embolden the occupation to persist with its blockade and crimes.”
On Friday, 100 Palestinians were killed in Israeli attacks in Jabalia and Beit Lahia, according to Palestinian sources.
French Prime Minister Michel Barnier, addressing the general assembly of the parliament, referenced the ICC arrest warrants issued for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
Barnier emphasized that the Rome Statute mandates full cooperation with the ICC but also stipulates that no actions should contradict international law concerning the immunity of states not party to the ICC.
Israel has launched a genocidal war on the Gaza Strip following a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas in October last year, killing over 44,300 people, most of them women and children, and injuring over 105,000.
The second year of the genocide in Gaza has drawn growing international condemnation, with officials and institutions labeling the attacks and blocking of aid deliveries as a deliberate attempt to destroy a population.
The ICC issued arrest warrants on Nov. 21 for Netanyahu and Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its deadly war on Gaza.
Monitoring Desk
