Benjamin Netanyahu - The African Mirror

Jan

2024

Gaza hostage relatives burst into Israeli parliament, calls for action mount

A group of relatives of Israelis held hostage by Palestinian gunmen in Gaza stormed a parliamentary committee session in Jerusalem, demanding that the lawmakers do more to try to free their loved ones. The action by about 20 people signalled growing domestic dissent in the fourth month of the Gaza war against Hamas. One woman held up pictures of three family members who were among the 253 people seized in the cross-border Hamas rampage of October 7 that triggered the worst fighting in decades. Some 130 remain in captivity after others were brought home in a November truce. "Just one…

Jan

2024

By MOHAMMED SALEM, NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI and ANTHONY DEUTSCH

Netanyahu condemns ICJ genocide case; Gazans return to wasteland in north

WORLD

BENJAMIN Netanyahu condemned South Africa's genocide case against Israel in Gaza as "hypocrisy and lies", as some Gazans returned to scenes of total devastation in the north of the enclave where Israeli forces have begun withdrawing. Three months of Israeli bombardment have laid much of the coastal enclave to waste, killing more than 23,000 people and driving nearly the entire population of 2.3 million Palestinians from their homes. An Israeli blockade has sharply restricted supplies of food, fuel and medicine, creating what the United Nations describes as a humanitarian catastrophe. Israel says its only means to defend itself is by eradicating…

Jan

2024

By NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI, ARAFAT BARBAKH and DAN WILLIAMS

Israeli jets pound central Gaza as Netanyahu indicates longer war

WORLD

ISRAELI jets intensified attacks on central Gaza, residents and medics said, as battles raged through the rubble of towns and refugee camps in a war that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said would take "many more months" to end. Netanyahu's comments signal no let-up in a campaign that has killed many thousands and levelled much of Gaza, while his vow to restore Israeli control over the enclave's border with Egypt raises new questions over an eventual two-state solution. Air strikes pounded al-Maghazi and al-Bureij in the centre of Gaza, killing 10 people in one house and driving more to flee…

Dec

2023

By NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI, BASSAM MASOUD and EMILY ROSE

Israel’s Netanyahu vows no let-up in war against Hamas as Gaza deaths mount

WORLD

ISRAELI Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to keep up the fight against Hamas militants while Palestinians mourned more than 100 people who Gaza health officials said were killed overnight in Israeli airstrikes. Netanyahu visited Israeli troops in the northern Gaza Strip just hours after one of the besieged enclave's deadliest nights in the 11-week-old battle between Israel and Hamas. Retaliating against Hamas for its deadly October 7 cross-border rampage, Israel has been under pressure from its closest ally the United States to shift operations in Gaza to a lower-intensity phase and reduce civilian deaths. But Netanyahu told lawmakers from his…

Dec

2023

By NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI and BASSAM MASOUD

Israel keeps pounding Gaza, Houthis vow more Red Sea attacks

WORLD

ISRAEL kept pounding the shattered Gaza Strip while Yemen's pro-Palestinian Houthi movement vowed to defy a U.S.-led naval mission and keep hitting Israeli targets in the Red Sea. Israel's campaign to eradicate Hamas militants behind an October 7 massacre has left the coastal enclave in ruins, brought widespread hunger and homelessness, and killed nearly 20,000 Gazans, according to the Palestinian enclave's health ministry. Under foreign pressure to avoid killing innocents, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the war will not stop until the remaining 129 hostages are freed and Hamas is obliterated after its fighters slay 1,200 Israelis. The conflict has spread beyond Hamas-ruled…

Dec

2023

By NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI, BASSAM MASOUD and JAMES MACKENZIE

U.S. defence chief urges Israel to do more to protect Gaza civilians

WORLD

U.S. Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin said that Washington's support for Israel was "unshakable" but he urged its ally to do more to protect civilians as its war against Hamas brought yet more death and destruction to Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Lloyd, speaking during a visit to Israel, said Hamas was a "fanatical terrorist group" which should never again be able to make attacks on Israel from Gaza. His visit came amid growing concern from foreign governments and international organisations over the death toll among civilians in Gaza from Israeli bombardments as well as rising hunger and destitution. The Gaza…

Dec

2023

By HUMEYRA PAMUK, JONATHAN SAUL and MAGGIE FICK

Despite Gaza death toll soaring, U.S. unlikely to rethink weapons supplies to Israel

WORLD

FACING a soaring death toll from Israel's renewed offensive in southern Gaza, the Biden administration is trying to pressure its ally to minimize civilian deaths while stopping well short of the kind of measures that might force it to listen, such as threatening to restrict military aid. Top U.S. officials, including Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, have urged Israel publicly to conduct a more surgical offensive in the south to avoid the heavy civilian casualties inflicted by its attacks in the north. About 900 people in Gaza were killed in Israeli airstrikes between Friday when a truce…

Nov

2023

By NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI and EMILY ROSE

Netanyahu, Hamas leader indicate deal on Gaza truce and hostages is close

WORLD

THE leader of Hamas said that a truce deal with Israel was close and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he hoped for good news soon about hostages, the most optimistic signals so far of a deal to pause the war in Gaza and free captives. Hamas officials were "close to reaching a truce agreement" with Israel and the group had delivered its response to Qatari mediators, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said in a statement sent to Reuters by his aide. Netanyahu said: "We are making progress. I don't think it's worth saying too much, not at even this moment, but…

Nov

2023

By NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI and DOINA CHIACU

Israel agrees to pauses in Gaza attacks, US says, but fighting rages

WORLD

ISRAEL has agreed to pause military operations in northern Gaza for four hours a day from Thursday, the White House said, in the first sign of a respite in more than a month of fighting that has killed thousands and stoked fears of a regional conflict. The pauses, which would allow people to flee along two humanitarian corridors and could be used for the release of hostages, were significant first steps, White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said. Minutes later, U.S. President Joe Biden told reporters he was pushing for even longer pauses in Gaza to get hostages held…

Oct

2023

By JAMES MACKENZIE and MAAYAN LUBELL

Israel launches Gaza war’s second phase with ground operation, Netanyahu says

WORLD

PRINE Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israeli forces had entered the second phase in the war in Gaza as they pressed ground operations against Hamas militants running the Palestinian enclave. Gaza's besieged people had barely any communication with the outside world as Israeli jets dropped more bombs and military chiefs said a long-threatened ground offensive against Hamas militants was gearing up. Speaking at a press conference in Tel Aviv, Netanyahu warned that the war would be long and difficult and reiterated Israel's appeal to Palestinian civilians to evacuate the northern Gaza Strip where Israel was focusing its attack. He vowed that every…