Gaza ceasefire could lead to more Israeli alliances in Middle East, Vance says at Netanyahu meeting – live | Middle East and north Africa

Dozens of people, some carrying Palestinian flags, gathered outside the Nasser hospital in Khan Younis for funeral prayers over the bodies of 54 Palestinians clad in white shrouds, the Associated Press (AP) reports.

The unidentified bodies were among 165 that Israel sent back to Gaza last week. They will be transported to Gaza’s central city of Deir al-Balah for burial.

A senior health official in Gaza said some bodies bore “evidence of torture” and called for an investigation.

Israel has not provided identification for the bodies or explained their origins. They could include Palestinians who died during the 7 October attacks, detainees who died in custody or bodies that were taken from Gaza by Israeli troops during the war.

So far, authorities in Gaza have identified 52 of the returned bodies, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

Joseph Gedeon

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday that ideas for “the day after” in Gaza had been discussed, particularly how the territory would be governed, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.

He said:

We’re just creating an unbelievable day after with a completely new vision of how to have the civil government, how to have the security there, who could provide that security there.

It’s not going to be easy, but I think it’s possible … we’re really creating a peace plan and an infrastructure here where nothing existed even a week and a day ago.

That’s going to require a lot of work. It requires a lot of ingenuity.

Gaza ceasefire could lead to more Israeli alliances in the Middle East, Vance says

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that when handling Israel’s security, “we do what we have to do”.

Speaking alongside US vice-president JD Vance at a joint press conference in Jerusalem, he was reported in Al Jazeera as saying:

A strong Israel serves America’s interests in stabilising this very unstable region, and you can’t stabilise it without a strong Israel.

So we make the decisions with the security of Israel. We make common decisions, which I think [serve] both, and that’s what we discussed today.

US vice-president JD Vance has repeated earlier comments that he is “optimistic” that the ceasefire deal brokered by the US will hold, Al Jazeera reports.

He told reporters at a joint press conference with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu:

It’s not easy. I never said it was easy. But what I am is optimistic that the ceasefire is going to hold and that we can actually build a better future for the entire Middle East … But that’s going to require some work

The vice-president was asked why the US was continuing to send several high-level officials to Israel if the ceasefire is reportedly in good shape.

He replied:

It’s not about monitoring it, in the sense of monitoring a toddler … It’s important for the administration to make sure our people continue to keep doing what we need them to do.

Vance meets with Netanyahu in Jerusalem

A top Palestinian non-governmental organisation that offers mental health services to people in Gaza said on Wednesday that there had been an “armed raid and brutal takeover” of one its facilities in the territory last week, the Associated Press (AP) reports.

The Gaza Community Mental Health Programme said an “armed group” it didn’t identify stormed the facility in Gaza City on 13 October, seized the building, expelled guards by force and put up their own families there.

“This blatant attack and serious crime represents a flagrant violation of all laws and norms,” the group said.

It was unclear why the organisation waited more than a week to report the takeover, but it said that although it had made immediate requests for authorities to intervene, there had been no “concrete action” to return the facility “despite repeated promises to evacuate.”

It urged Palestinian authorities to act immediately so that the facility is returned to its hands, ensure that patients and staff are protected and to hold those responsible to account “without any delay or leniency.”

It also called on countries sponsoring the ceasefire agreement to “intervene decisively” and prevent actions undermining humanitarian work.

Israel has completed the identification of the bodies of two more hostages, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said on Wednesday, the Associated Press (AP) reports.

Authorities identified the deceased hostages as Arie Zalmanovich and Tamir Adar. Their bodies were transported in coffins by the Red Cross and handed over to the Israeli military in the Gaza Strip. A military ceremony attended by the chief rabbi of the Israel Defense Forces was planned for later in the day, Netanyahu’s office said.

The two were killed in kibbutz Nir Oz during the 7 October 2023, attack by Hamas militants, which triggered the two-year war.

Since the ceasefire began on 10 October, the remains of 15 hostages have been returned to Israel. Another 13 still need to be recovered in Gaza and handed over, a key element to the ceasefire agreement.

Meanwhile, the burial of more than 50 Palestinians is set for Wednesday at a cemetery in Deir al-Balah, Gaza. The bodies were displayed outside Nasser hospital in Khan Younis ahead of burial. The 50 are among the 165 bodies of Palestinians that Israel has so far handed over.

Qatar and the US have written to EU heads of state expressing concern over the bloc’s corporate sustainability rules and their potential impact on liquefied natural gas exports, a statement from QatarEnergy showed on Wednesday, Reuters reports.

Last week, Qatar’s energy minister, Saad al-Kaabi, told Reuters that Qatar would not be able to do business in the EU, including supplying Europe with LNG to plug its energy gap, unless more changes are made to its Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive.

The letter signed by Kaabi and US energy secretary Chris Wright said the directive “poses a significant risk to the affordability and reliability of critical energy supplies for households and businesses across Europe and an existential threat to the future growth, competitiveness, and resilience of the EU’s industrial economy.”

Roland Friedrich, director of Unrwa affairs in the occupied West Bank, has warned of settlement expansion in the area, “paving the way for annexation”.

He said in a statement on X:

The three refugee camps of Jenin, Tulkarm, and Nur Shams have been emptied, and residents actively prevented from returning. Settler violence and settlement expansion have spiralled, pushing vulnerable Palestinian communities from their lands amid increasingly coercive conditions – paving the way for annexation.

Israeli anti-UNRWA laws have seen UN schools shuttered and international staff de facto evicted.

The future of Gaza and West Bank are one. A drawdown in Gaza should not become an opportunity to tighten the grip of occupation elsewhere.

Israeli settlers descended on Palestinian olive harvesters and activists this week in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, beating them with clubs in an attack Palestinian health officials said sent at least one woman to the hospital with serious injuries, according to footage seen by the Associated Press (AP).

The attack reportedly occurred on Sunday in the town of Turmus Ayya.

Ajith Sunghay, the head of the UN Human Rights Office in the Palestinian territory, said in a statement released on Tuesday:

Settler violence has skyrocketed in scale and frequency.

Two weeks into the start of the 2025 harvest, we have already seen severe attacks by armed settlers against Palestinian men, women, children and foreign solidarity activists.

In one of the videos obtained by the AP, a masked man was seen running through an olive grove and beating at least two people with a club, including a woman as she lay motionless on the ground. The masked man appeared to be wearing tzitzit, a ritual fringed garment for Jews.

The woman was hospitalised with serious injures, the Ramallah-based Palestinian Health Ministry said.

In a separate video, more than a dozen masked men were seen running down a village road alongside an olive grove, pursuing a car. One settler clubbed the car and opened the door. A passenger managed to escape and run away with the group of men running after him.

A third video showed flames and smoke rising from several torched cars.

Israel’s Channel 12 reported that the head of the West Bank police force said in an internal police WhatsApp group that the footage of the masked settler beating the woman “kept him up at night” and instructed officers to bring the settler to justice.

Israel’s military and police did not respond to an AP request for comment on the attack.

The United Arab Emirates normalised relations with Israel to foster tolerance and change mindsets in the region, UAE minister of state Lana Nusseibeh said during a panel at the Reuters NEXT Gulf Summit in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday, Reuters reports.

Anwar Gargash, the diplomatic adviser to the UAE president, said in an interview during the same summit that he would scale up the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza, according to Al Jazeera.

He reportedly said discussions are being held on the deployment of security forces around the Palestinian territory.

Here are some of the latest photos from Gaza coming through over the wires:

Australian visa holders in Gaza have the paperwork they need to flee the razed Palestinian territory but remain trapped due to closed borders, prompting refugee advocates to intensify calls for support.

Ahmed Abumarzouq’s two nephews were granted humanitarian visas on 15 October – two days after all living Israeli hostages were returned to Israel under the tentative Gaza ceasefire plan, which has not yet produced a possible border re-opening. For the small number who are eligible for Australian consular assistance – those whose immediate family members are citizens or permanent residents – the pathway to Australia is still complex.

Abumarzouq’s two nephews, aged 18 and 19, are ineligible for this assistance. All the teenagers can now do is wait in their makeshift home in Gaza City for the territory’s Rafah crossing – controlled by Israeli forces – to open.

I was hoping that the border will open and I’d be able to get them out,” said Abumarzouq, a chief financial officer with the Western Australian government who lived through multiple wars in Gaza before moving to Perth in 2014.

But, there’s not really anything I can do.

You can read the full piece from Daisy Dumas and Adeshola Ore here: Palestinians in Gaza with Australian visas remain trapped as Israel keeps borders closed

The top United Nations court is set to give an opinion on Wednesday on Israel’s legal obligations to ensure desperately needed humanitarian aid reaches Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, the Associated Press (AP) reports.

The UN general assembly asked the international court of justice last year to give an advisory opinion on Israel’s legal obligations after the country effectively banned the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, the main provider of aid to Gaza, from operating in the territory.

Advisory opinions carry significant legal weight and experts say the case could have broader ramifications for the UN and its missions worldwide.

The proceedings predate the current fragile US-brokered Gaza ceasefire agreement, which took effect on 10 October. Under the agreement, 600 humanitarian aid trucks are to be allowed to enter daily.

The UN has announced plans to ramp up aid shipments into Gaza. On Monday, Hamas chief negotiator Khalil al-Hayya told Egypt’s Al-Qahera News that Israel has complied with aid deliveries per the ceasefire agreement.

During the hearings in April, Palestinian ambassador to the Netherlands Ammar Hijazi told the 15-judge panel that Israel was “starving, killing and displacing Palestinians while also targeting and blocking humanitarian organisations trying to save their lives.”

Israel denied it violated international law, saying the proceedings are biased, and did not attend the hearings. However, the country provided a 38-page written submission for the court to consider.

JD Vance has ‘great optimism’ truce will hold as he prepares to meet Netanyahu

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