There are many articles about the War in Gaza – About Palestinians and Israelis. For those who are following the stories of either side – I have listed 3 initial stories, and then links to follow up stories below.
1) Palestinians In Gaza Struggle To Follow Israeli Evaculation Order And Face Dire Water Shortage.
2) (UPDATE) Humanitarian Aid Is Stuck At Gaza-Egypt Border As Israeli Siege Strains Hospitals Water Supply (Article Below)
3) First Group Of Canadians Leave West Bank For Jordan As Those In Gaza Brace For Worst (Article below)
4) PALESTINIAN MEDICS IN GAZA STRUGGLE TO SAVE LIVES UNDER ISRAELI SIEGE AND BOMBARDMENT: Link: https://barrie360.com/palestinian-medics-gaza-israeli-siege/
5) (UPDATE) BLAST KILLS HUNDREDS AT GAZA HOSPITAL; HAMAS AND ISRAEL TRADE BLAME, AS BIDEN HEADS TO MIDEAST, Link: https://barrie360.com/israeli-airstrike-gaza-hospital/
6) MISSING ISRAELI WITH TIES TO CANADA DEAD, JOLY CALLS FOR CANADIANS TO LEAVE LEBANON, Link: https://barrie360.com/missing-israeli-canada-dead/
7) ISRAELI BOMBINGS KILL DOZENS OF PEOPLE IN THE GAZA REGION WHERE CIVILIANS WERE TOLD TO SEEK REFUGE, Link: https://barrie360.com/israeli-airstrike-gaza-hospital/
8) BIDEN SAYS ISRAEL HAS AGREED TO ALLOW HUMANITARIAN ASSISTANCE TO MOVE INTO GAZA FROM EGYPT Link: https://barrie360.com/israel-huminiatrian-aid-gaza-biden/
9) GAZA CARNAGE SPREADS ANGER ACROSS MIDEAST, ALARMING U.S. ALLIES AND THREATENING TO WIDEN CONFLICT https://barrie360.com/gaza-carnage-palestinians-mideast-conflict/
10) GAZA’S DOCTORS STRUGGLE TO SAVE HOSPITAL BLAST SURVIVORS AS MIDDLE EAST RAGE GROWS Link: https://barrie360.com/gaza-doctors-hospital-blast/
11) MOST CANADIANS THINK LASTING PEACE BETWEEN ISRAEL, PALESTINIANS IS NOT POSSIBLE: POLL, Link: https://barrie360.com/canada-poll-israel-palestine/
12) GAZA AWAITS AID FROM EGYPT AS ISRAEL READIES TROOPS FOR GROUND ASSAULT, Link: https://barrie360.com/gaza-aid-israel-ground-assault/
13) ISRAEL POUNDS GAZA AND EVACUATES TOWN NEAR LEBANON AHEAD OF EXPECTED GROUND OFFENSIVE AGAINST HAMAS, Link: https://barrie360.com/israel-pounds-gaza-and-evacuates-town-near-lebanon-ahead-of-expected-ground-offensive-against-hamas/
14) ISRAEL SAYS TWO AMERICANS HELD HOSTAGE BY HAMAS, A MOTHER AND DAUGHTER, HAVE BEEN RELEASED, Link: https://barrie360.com/israel-americans-hostage-hamas/
1) Palestinians In Gaza Struggle To Follow Israeli Evaculation Order And Face Dire Water Shortage.
Courtesy of Barrie360.com and Canadian PressPublished: Oct 14th, 2023
By Wafaa Shurafa And Joseph Krauss in Deir el-Balah, The Associated Press
Medical officials say an estimated 35,000 have crammed into the grounds of Gaza City’s main hospital, seeking refugee ahead of an expected Israeli ground offensive.
Mohammad Abu Selim, general director of Shifa Hospital, confirmed that massive crowds had thronged the building and the courtyard outside. Shifa is the largest hospital in the entire Gaza Strip.
“People think this is the only safe space after their homes were destroyed and they were forced to flee,” said Dr. Medhat Abbas, a Health Ministry official. “Gaza City is a frightening scene of devastation.”
The Israeli military has ordered roughly half of Gaza’s population, including all of Gaza City, to evacuate as it prepares to send in ground forces.
Israel has been bombing Gaza for the past week in response to a bloody cross-border Hamas attack that killed over 1,300 Israelis.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
Palestinians struggled Saturday to flee from areas of Gaza targeted by the Israeli military while grappling with a growing water and medical supply shortage ahead of an expected land offensive a week after Hamas’ bloody, wide-ranging attack into Israel.
Israel renewed calls on social media and in leaflets dropped from the air for Gaza residents to move south, while Hamas urged people to stay in their homes. The U.N. and aid groups have said such a rapid exodus would cause untold human suffering, especially for hospitalized patients, older adults and others unable to relocate.
The evacuation directive covers an area of 1.1 million residents, or about half the territory’s population. The Israeli military said “hundreds of thousands” of Palestinians had already heeded the warning and headed south. It said Palestinians could travel within Gaza without being harmed along two main routes from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. local time.
A week after Hamas’ attack, Israel was still working to assess the casualties. With special rabbinic approval, workers at a military base in central Israel continued the gruelling task of identifying the bodies of the Israelis and foreign nationals who were killed, most of them civilians. Work is normally halted on Saturday, the Jewish sabbath.
It was not clear how many Palestinians remained in north Gaza by Saturday afternoon, said Juliette Touma, a spokesperson for the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees. “What we know is that hundreds of thousands of people have fled. And that 1 million people have been displaced in total in one week,” she said.
Families in cars, trucks and donkey carts packed with possessions crowded a main road heading away from Gaza City as Israeli airstrikes continued to hammer the 40-kilometer (25-mile) long territory, where basic necessities like food, fuel and drinking water were running low because of a complete Israeli siege.
Water has stopped coming out of taps across the territory. Amal Abu Yahia, a 25-year-old pregnant mother in the Jabaliya refugee camp, said she waits anxiously for the few minutes each day or every other day when contaminated water trickles from the pipes in her basement. She then rations it, prioritizing her 5-year-old son and 3-year-old daughter. She said she is drinking so little herself, she only urinates every other day.
Near the coast, the only tap water is contaminated with Mediterranean Sea water because of the lack of sanitation facilities. Mohammed Ibrahim, 28, said his neighbours in Gaza City have taken to drinking the salt water.
The Israeli military’s evacuation would force the territory’s entire population to cram into the southern half of the Gaza Strip as Israel continues strikes across the territory, including in the south.
Rami Swailem said he and at least five families in his building decided to stay put in his apartment near Gaza City. “We are rooted in our lands,” he said. “We prefer to die in dignity and face our destiny.”
Others were looking desperately for ways to evacuate. “We need a number for drivers from Gaza to the south, it is necessary #help,” read a post on social media. Another person wrote: “We need a bus number, office, or any means of transport,” posted another.
The U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians expressed concern for those who could not leave their current locations, “particularly pregnant women, children, older persons and persons with disabilities,” saying they must be protected. The agency also called for Israel to not target civilians, hospitals, schools, clinics and U.N. locations.
Officials at Gaza City’s largest hospital said evacuation was impossible. Al-Shifa was receiving hundreds of wounded every hour and had used up 95% of its medical supplies, hospital director Mohammed Abu Selmia said. Water is scarce and the fuel powering its generators is dwindling.
“The situation inside the hospital is miserable in every sense of the word,” he said. “The operating rooms don’t stop.”
Selmia estimated that 40,000 displaced civilians were sitting under the trees in the empty grounds surrounding the hospital, as well as inside the building’s lobby and corridors, hoping they would be protected there from the fighting.
Patients and personnel from the Al Awda Hospital in Gaza’s far north spent part of their night in the street “with bombs landing in close proximity,” the medical aid group Doctors Without Borders said.
An Israeli military spokesperson, Jonathan Conricus, said the evacuation was aimed at keeping civilians safe and preventing Hamas from using them as human shields. He urged people in the targeted areas to leave immediately and to return “only when we tell them that it is safe to do so.”
“The Palestinian civilians in Gaza are not our enemies. We don’t assess them as such, and we don’t target them as such,” Conricus said. “We are trying to do the right thing.”
Thousands of people crammed into a U.N.-run school-turned-shelter in Deir al-Balah, a farming town south of the evacuation zone. Many slept outside on the ground without mattresses, or in chairs pulled from classrooms.
“I came here with my children. We slept on the ground. We don’t have a mattress, or clothes,” Howeida al-Zaaneen, 63, who is from the northern town of Beit Hanoun, said. “I want to go back to my home, even if it is destroyed.”
The Israeli military said its troops conducted temporary raids into Gaza on Friday to battle militants and hunted for traces of some 150 people — including men, women and children — who were abducted during Hamas’ shocking Oct. 7 assault on southern Israel.
The Gaza Health Ministry said Saturday that over 2,200 people have been killed in the territory, including 724 children and 458 women. The Hamas communications office said that Israel has “completely demolished” over 7,000 housing units so far.
Hamas’ surprise attack killed more than 1,300 people on the Israeli side, most of them civilians, and roughly 1,500 Hamas militants died during the fighting, the Israeli government said.
Egyptian officials said the country’s Rafah border crossing with Gaza would open Saturday for the first time in days to allow foreigners out. One official said both Israel and Palestinian militant groups had agreed to facilitate the departures, but by Saturday evening there had been no movement.
There were believed to be some 1,500 people in Gaza holding Western passports and additional people with passports from other parts of the world.
Fearing a mass exodus of Palestinians, Egyptian authorities erected “temporary” blast walls on Egypt’s side of the crossing, which has been closed for days because of Israeli airstrikes, two Egyptian officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.
Israel’s raids into Gaza on Friday were the first acknowledgment that Israeli troops had entered the territory since the military began its round-the-clock bombardment in retaliation for the Hamas massacre. Palestinian militants have fired more than 5,500 rockets into Israel since the fighting erupted, the Israeli military said.
Israel has called up some 360,000 military reserves and massed troops and tanks along the border with Gaza. A ground assault in densely populated Gaza would likely bring even higher casualties on both sides in brutal house-to-house fighting.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan in Riyadh on Saturday, and both called for Israel to protect civilians in Gaza.
“As Israel pursues its legitimate right to defend its people and to trying to ensure that this never happens again, it is vitally important that all of us look out for for civilians, and we’re working together to do exactly that,” Blinken said.
Hamas said Israel’s airstrikes killed 22 hostages, including foreigners. It did not provide their nationalities. The Israeli military denied the claim. Hamas and other Palestinian militants hope to trade the hostages for thousands of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.
In the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Health Ministry says 53 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the war, including 16 on Friday. The U.N. says attacks by Israeli settlers have surged there since the Hamas assault.
The U.S. and Israel’s other allies have pledged ironclad support for the war on Hamas. The European Union’s foreign policy chief, however, said Saturday that the Israeli military needed to give people more time to leave northern Gaza.
Josep Borrell welcomed the evacuation order but said, “You cannot move such a volume of people in (a) short period of time,” noting a lack of shelters and transportation.
Hamas’ media office said airstrikes hit cars in three locations as they headed south from Gaza City, killing 70 people. There was no comment from the Israeli military.
2) (UPDATE) Humanitarian Aid Is Stuck At Gaza-Egypt Border As Israeli Siege Strains Hospitals Water Supply
Courtesy of Barrie360.com and Canadian PressPublished: Oct 16th, 2023
By Najib Jobain, Samya Kullab And Joseph Krauss in Rafah – The Associated Press
Hospitals in Gaza faced collapse Monday as water, power and medicine neared depletion, and hundreds of thousands of Palestinians searched for dwindling food supplies while Israel maintained punishing airstrikes in retaliation for last week’s deadly rampage by Hamas. Thousands of patients’ lives were at risk, U.N. officials said, and mediators struggled for a cease-fire to let in aid waiting at the Egyptian border.
More than a week after Israel stopped entry of essential supplies, all eyes were on the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, where trucks carrying aid have waited for days to pass through. Israeli airstrikes last week forced the shutdown of Rafah, Gaza’s only connection to Egypt.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry said Israel “has not taken a position” on allowing access. The Israeli government did not respond to a request for comment.
As Israel prepared a likely ground offensive into Gaza that would mean deadly house-to-house fighting, fears rose over the conflict spreading. Israel evacuated towns near its northern border with Lebanon. Hamas militants in Gaza continue to fire rockets into Israel.
Speaking to the Israeli Knesset on Monday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Iran and Hezbollah, “Don’t test us in the north. Don’t make the mistake of the past. Today, the price you will pay will be far heavier,” referring to Israel’s 2006 war with Hezbollah, which operates out of Lebanon.
This has become the deadliest of the five Gaza wars for both sides. At least 2,778 have been killed and 9,700 wounded in Gaza, according to the Health Ministry there. More than 1,400 Israelis have been killed, the vast majority civilians massacred in Hamas’ Oct. 7 assault. The Israeli military said Monday that at least 199 hostages were taken into Gaza, more than previously estimated. The military did not specify whether that number includes foreigners.
The combination of airstrikes that pulverize entire neighborhoods, depleting supplies, and Israel’s mass evacuation order for the north of the Gaza Strip, has thrown the tiny territory’s 2.3 million people into upheaval. More than 1 million have fled their homes, and 60% of them are now in the approximately 14-kilometer-long (8 mile) area south of the evacuation zone, according to the U.N.
The Israeli military says it is trying to clear away civilians for their safety ahead of a major campaign against Hamas in Gaza’s north, where it says the militants have extensive networks of tunnels and rocket launchers. Much of Hamas’ military infrastructure is in residential areas.
Those fleeing northern Gaza still faced the threat of airstrikes in the south. Before dawn Monday, a strike hit a building in the town of Rafah where three displaced families who fled Gaza City were sheltering. At least 12 people were killed and nine others remained missing, said survivors from the al-Masry, al-Akhras and Hamouda families. The strike reduced the house to a vast crater blanketed with wreckage.
More than 400,000 displaced people in the south were crowded in schools and other facilities of the U.N. agency for Palestinians, UNRWA. But the agency can’t provide them aid, leaving them to search for water and food. UNRWA said it has only 1 liter of water a day for each of its staff members trapped in the territory.
Hundreds of thousands more displaced people have moved in with family members, packing dozens into homes.
With taps dry, many have resorted to drinking dirty or sewage-filled water, risking the spread of disease.
“Gaza is running out of water, and Gaza is running out of life,” said UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini, calling for a lifting of the siege. “We need this now.”
The few operating bakeries had long snaking lines of people. Ahmad Salah in the city of Deir al-Balah said he waited 10 hours to get a kilo (2 pounds) of bread to feed 20-30 family members.
For a third day, Israel’s military announced a safe corridor for people to move from north to south between the hours of 8 a.m. and noon. It said more than 600,000 people have already evacuated the Gaza City area.
In northern Gaza, unknown numbers remained, either unwilling or unable to leave.
UNRWA said 170,000 people were sheltering at its schools in the north when the order to leave came. But it couldn’t evacuate them and doesn’t know if they remained. More than 40,000 have crowded in the grounds of Gaza City’s al-Shifa Hospital and surrounding streets, hoping it will be safe from bombardment.
UNRWA said Monday it received reports that the Hamas-run Ministry of Health removed fuel and medical equipment from its evacuated compound in Gaza City.
Hamas urged people to ignore the evacuation order. The Israeli military on Sunday released photos it said showed a Hamas roadblock preventing traffic from moving south.
Hospitals in Gaza are expected to run out of generator fuel in the next 24 hours, the U.N. said.
Four hospitals in northern Gaza are no longer functioning and 21 have received Israeli orders to evacuate. Doctors have refused, saying it would mean death for critically ill patients and newborns on ventilators.
The medical aid group Doctors Without Borders said many of its personnel decided to stay in the north to treat wounded. They had run out of painkillers, and staff reported “wounded screaming in pain,” it said.
Israel has said the siege won’t be lifted until Hamas releases all the captives. The country’s water ministry said water had been restored at one “specific point” in Gaza, outside the southern town of Khan Younis, but aid workers in Gaza said they had not yet seen evidence the water was back.
The World Health Organization said assistance for 300,000 patients was currently awaiting entry through Rafah. On the Gaza side of the crossing, crowds of Palestinians with dual citizenship waited anxiously, sitting on suitcases or crouched on the floor, some comforting crying infants.
“They are supposed to be a developed country, talking about human rights all the time,” Shurouq Alkhazendar, whose two kids are American citizens, said of the United States. “You should protect your citizens first, not leave them all alone suffering and being humiliated in front of the crossing.”
After increasing cross-border exchanges with Hezbollah in the north, the Israeli military ordered residents to evacuate 28 communities within 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) of the Lebanese border.
“Israel is ready to operate on two fronts, and even more,” said Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, a military spokesman.
Hezbollah released video showing snipers shooting out cameras on several Israeli army posts along the border, apparently to prevent Israel from monitoring movements on the Lebanese side.
The U.S. government began evacuating some 2,500 American citizens by ship from the Israeli port city of Haifa to Cyprus. Commercial airlines have largely stopped flying into Israel’s Ben-Gurion International Airport.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken returned to Israel for a second time in less than a week after a six-country tour through Arab nations aimed at preventing the fighting from igniting a broader conflict. President Joe Biden is also considering a trip to Israel, though no plans have been finalized.
Biden postponed a planned trip to Colorado on Monday to talk about his domestic agenda and instead will hold meetings with top aides on the Israel-Hamas conflict.
In a television interview Sunday night, Biden, who has repeatedly proclaimed support for Israel, said he thought it would be a “big mistake” for the country to reoccupy Gaza.
Israel’s ambassador to the U.N., Gilad Erdan, told CNN the country does not want to occupy Gaza but will do “whatever is needed” to obliterate Hamas’ capabilities.
Israeli forces, supported by a growing deployment of U.S. warships in the region and the call-up of some 360,000 reservists, have positioned themselves along Gaza’s border and drilled for what Israel said would be a broad campaign to dismantle Hamas. Israel said it has already struck dozens of military targets, including command centers and rocket launchers, and also killed Hamas commanders.
Kullab reported from Baghdad. Krauss reported from Jerusalem. Associated Press writers Julia Frankel and Amy Teibel in Jerusalem, Abby Sewell in Beirut and Samy Magdy in Cairo contributed to this report.
3) First Group Of Canadians Leave West Bank For Jordan As Those In Gaza Brace For Worst
Courtesy of Barrie360.com and Canadian PressPublished: Oct 16th, 2023
By Stephanie Taylor in Ottawa
Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly announced Monday that the first group of Canadians have crossed safely from the West Bank into neighbouring Jordan as violence continues in Israel’s escalating war against Hamas.
Joly made the announcement this morning on X, the platform previously known as Twitter, thanking the Global Affairs staff who she says worked around the clock to make it happen.
The federal government says 21 Canadians, plus 10 foreign nationals from Australia and New Zealand, took a bus out of the West Bank, a Palestinian territory that Israel has occupied since 1967, and where it has established numerous settlements.
Long-simmering tensions in the region exploded on Oct. 7 when fighters with Hamas — a group Canada has designated a terrorist entity — stormed into Israel from the Gaza Strip, killing hundreds of civilians and taking more than 150 people hostage.
More than 1,400 Israelis have been killed. So far, Canadian officials have confirmed at least five Canadians were killed in the attacks.
Israel has responded by bombarding Hamas-controlled Gaza and cutting off food, water and electricity to 2.3 million Palestinians.
At least 2,778 have been killed and 9,700 wounded in Gaza, according to the health ministry there, and more than a million have fled their homes. Many people have resorted to drinking dirty or sewage-filled water, risking the spread of disease.
Hospitals in Gaza face collapse as water, power and medicine near depletion, and hundreds of thousands of Palestinians searched for dwindling food supplies
Thousands of patients’ lives were at risk, U.N. officials said, and mediators struggled for a ceasefire to let in aid waiting at the Egyptian border. Israel has said the siege will end only when hostages are freed.
Israel is planning a massive ground invasion, and Canada is working to try to help as many as 300 Canadians and their families escape Gaza after a plan to allow people to leave via Egypt over the weekend fell through.
Canadians need to register with Global Affairs in order to get help leaving the region. Officials say more than 6,800 Canadians are registered in Israel, and more than 450 in the West Bank and Gaza.
Canada has also arranged airlifts out of Israel. The first flights departed last week, with 128 citizens, permanent residents or their relatives landing in Athens on the first military flight from Tel Aviv, followed by a second flight of roughly 153 people.
Defence Minister Bill Blair said Sunday that the Canadian Armed Forces has taken 1,000 people out of Israel since Oct. 12.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has said he remains “deeply concerned” about the situation in Gaza, where millions remain trapped.
Last week he pledged an initial $10 million in aid for urgent needs in Israel and the Gaza Strip.
— With files from The Associated Press
Patricia is the Business Mentor and owner of Grow Vantage and a Past President of the Barrie Chamber of Commerce. She applies over 30 years of business experience (from start-up to corporate) to mentor entrepreneurs. Since 2011, she has held over 6,500 coaching and training sessions in-person and online. Through Ask For Directions Training, her entrepreneurial training program (and parent company Grow Vantage), and as a business coach, she works with start-ups who are new (or who have lost traction) to design, launch and grow their businesses. Along with 20 other expert instructors she teaches strategies in marketing, sales, communications, and finance, as well as practical techniques to increase productivity, and manage their businesses. In other words, everything entrepreneurs need to learn to grow and run their businesses successfully, and avoid the costly mistakes they can't even see coming - that lead to delays in growth and getting stuck.
- Canada – US Relations: 1) (Updated) Ford pitches Trump on grand energy plan in effort to avoid tariffs; 2) No ‘snowball’s chance in hell’ of Canada becoming 51st state: Trudeau; 3)No ‘snowball’s chance in hell’ of Canada becoming 51st state (original); 4) (Updated) Ontario launches border-strengthening operation as Trump tariff threat looms - January 10, 2025
- Average asking rents declined to 17-month low across Canada at end of year - January 10, 2025
- New warming centre opens in Barrie, Wasaga Beach - January 10, 2025