Gaza update

“Since the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks, one of the main U.S. priorities has been to prevent the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza from spilling over into a wider regional conflict, which could force the U.S. to take a more direct military role,” The Messenger’s Joshua Keating reports. But the violence is spreading to neighboring countries, with Syria increasingly in the crosshairs. Already, the U.S. has launched three rounds of airstrikes against targets in Syria in the past two weeks — most recently, on Sunday — that it says are linked to militant groups backed by Iran. Israel has also hit targets in Syria, including airstrikes on military infrastructure and air raids against the country’s two largest airports in Damascus and Aleppo. 

The EU’s foreign affairs chief, Josep Borrell, has urged the Middle East not to “go back to 20 years ago” with repeated cycles of violence and conflict as he continues his four-day diplomatic push to get a plan under way for enduring peace. On Thursday, he called on Israel not to be “consumed by rage” in its response, saying he understood the “anguish” “fears” and “pain” of Israelis following the 7 October attacks. Over the weekend he is visiting the West Bank, Bahrain, Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi and Jordan with a blueprint for so-called for “day after” plan.

“The important thing today is to bring to the minds of everyone we have to engage in a peace process,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Friday. “If we don’t stop this cycle of violence it will happen again and now there is an opportunity, a kind of wake up [call] in order to deal with the problem that we have almost forgotten about. \Borrell’s blueprint centres on a six-point plan with the EU and Arab world leading, alongside the US:

• No reduction in territory size of Gaza

• No long-term security presence by Israel

• No forced displacement of people from Gaza

• A single Palestinian Authority for West Bank and Gaza

• Involvement of the Arab leaders

• Involvement of Europe

The UN said Gaza’s civilians faced the “immediate possibility” of starvation, and overcrowding and the lack of clean water were speeding the spread of disease as winter approaches. Deliveries of already scarce food and other supplies have been halted in recent days because of shortages of fuel for trucks and a communications blackout that made it impossible to coordinate deliveries, aid agencies said. Palestinian network operators said they had no fuel to power phone and internet systems.

Civilians in parts of south-east Gaza have been told in leaflets dropped by Israeli aircraft to move into a smaller “safe zone” in the coastal town of Mawasi, which covers just 14 sq km (5.4 sq miles), prompting warnings from the heads of 18 UN agencies and international aid groups. There are already 1.6 million displaced people in Gaza, more than two-thirds of its population. Most fled the north after similar warnings that nowhere in or around Gaza City would be safe for civilians.