- The eastern part of Rafah is under constant artillery shelling as a senior Israeli official says the military is “moving ahead” with its planned ground invasion, ignoring a growing chorus of international warnings to call it off.
- Students and faculty members at US universities continue to protest in solidarity with Palestinians, with similar demonstrations also spreading in other countries.
- The UN chief’s spokesperson says it is “important that all forensic evidence be well preserved” from Gaza’s mass graves, but that a mandate from a UN legislative group is required to allow the world body to take legal possession of such material.
- The Palestinian Civil Defence says it will cooperate with an independent investigation into three separate mass graves found in Gaza containing 392 bodies.
- At least 34,356 Palestinians have been killed and 77,368 wounded in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7. The death toll in Israel from Hamas’s October 7 attacks stands at 1,139, with dozens still held captive in Gaza.
- In case you’re just joining usLet’s bring you up to speed on the latest developments.
- Overcrowded conditions and battered waste-management facilities have caused more and more waste to spill into the streets of Rafah, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud reports.Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) says at least 344 aid trucks entered Gaza on Thursday and about 100 of these were directed to northern Gaza.Footage published online and verified by Al Jazeera shows Israeli soldiers preventing a number of young men from entering the mosque and assaulting some of them.US Secretary of State Antony Blinken says he “very much understands” the frustration of demonstrating pro-Palestinian students and respects their right to demonstrate as a “hallmark of our democracy.”Gaza’s Health Ministry says that 51 people were killed and 75 injured in the latest 24-hour reporting period.
- US military says two drones destroyed in Houthi-controlled areaThe US Central Command reports that its forces “successfully engaged and destroyed” two drones in a Houthi-controlled area of Yemen on Thursday.The US strike occurred hours after a missile was launched from the area in Yemen towards the Gulf of Aden, near where US coalition ships are stationed.The missile fire caused no casualties, said CENTCOM.Since November, Yemen’s Houthis have waged dozens of missile and drone attacks near the Red Sea on passing vessels they say are linked to Israel or the US, though there has been a lull in recent weeks.The Houthis say their attacks are in solidarity with Gaza and will continue until Israel ends its war on Gaza.
- Inside the Gaza solidarity encampment at Columbia UniversityUniversity encampments have spread across the US since New York police first came onto Columbia University’s campus last week. In the second of a two-part series, Al Jazeera’s The Take takes a look inside the Columbia encampment and the impact it’s having on campus.
- Israeli snipers shoot Palestinians, kill one: PRCSThe Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) says its ambulance crews transferred the dead body of a Palestinian and a wounded person from Nuseirat following an Israeli attack.The organisation said on X the two Palestinians were targeted by Israeli snipers in the city of az-Zahra in the middle of the Gaza Strip.In a video that the group posted, PRCS crew are seen taking a body from a car and putting it in the ambulance as people surround the vehicle.Click here to share on social media
- Israeli government pushes illegal Jerusalem settlement projectsDuring the war on Gaza, Israel’s government has ramped up illegal settlement projects in occupied East Jerusalem, announcing plans to build thousands of new housing units in the Palestinian neighbourhoods of Beit Safafa and Sharafat.The plan “is to build on the last empty land that these villages have”, Yoni Mizrahi, a member of the anti-occupation group Peace Now, tells Al Jazeera.
Source: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/4/26/israels-war-on-gaza-live-un-says-preserve-evidence-of-gaza-mass-graves
