[Palestinian journalist Ayat al Khaddour was killed along with her entire family in the Israeli strike on their home in Gaza on Monday night.]
Gaza/Occupied Jerusalem: The death toll in Gaza Strip Monday November 20, 2023 reached 13,300 as Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) under the control of Zionists continue to indiscriminately bomb and bulldoze residential areas including hospitals and world leaders watch in silence.
According to the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, approximately 2.46% of the population in Gaza were killed or injured, which is equivalent to 8 million Americans, 3.2 of whom are children, out of the entire population of the United States.
On Monday, another journalist Ayat al Khaddour was killed along with her entire family in the Israeli strike on their home in Gaza. With this, the death toll of journalists targeted and killed by Israeli Occupation Forces reached close to 150.
According to Al Jazeera, hundreds of Palestinians are trapped inside the Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza which is surrounded by Israeli tanks. An earlier Israeli attack at the hospital killed at least 12 people, the WHO reports.
The Israeli forces had earlier killed number of patients, including new born babies, many of them on incubators, after they stormed Al Shifa Hospital.
The Israeli forces are justifying its war on hospitals claiming that they are used as control bases by Hamas – the allegation refuted by the hospital staff and international rights group. Hamas in itself has invited international observes led by the United Nations for inspection of the hospitals in Gaza.
Israel on its part released a couple of videos after seizing Al Shifa Hospital. The veracity of the videos however were disputed by CNN, BBC, The Guardian and other international media.
Along with hospitals and residential buildings, Israeli forces are also targeting mosques. According to government media in the besieged Palestinian enclave, as many as 83 mosques have been destroyed by Israeli air raids across Gaza since October 7 and an additional 170 have sustained damage,
Palestinians have accused Israel of deliberately targeting mosques, while Israeli forces have made unsubstantiated claims that mosques have been used by Hamas to shield them from attack, Al Jazeera reported.
Palestinian Spokesman Abu Obaida in a video released on behalf of Hamas Monday claimed that Israeli forces are incurring huge military losses in the combat operations.
"The Resistance fighters successfully targeted 60 Israeli military vehicles of various types in the past 72 hours and confronted the invading forces in several axes across Gaza", he said.
Israel officially has officially confirmed 68 of its soldiers have been killed since Oct 7 while fighting with Palestinian Resistance Groups in Gaza.
But, local Israeli media on Sunday quoting the Military Cemetery directors had reported that the burial ground for the Israeli soldiers is receiving dead bodies every hour.
David Orin Baruch, the director of the Mount Herzl cemetery, West of Occupied Jerusalem, al-Quds, noted that in the past 48 hours, a huge number of graves have been opened, and "only on Mount Herzl, we have buried about 50 dead."
In another latest developemnet, Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the Hamas Politburo, Tuesday claimed that Israel and the Palestinians are nearing an agreement on a truce amid the war in Gaza.
“We are close to reaching a deal on a truce", Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said in a post on Telegram.
Intense negotiations mediated by Qatar, where Hamas has a political office and where Haniyeh is based, have been under way, according to AFP.
Two sources familiar with the talks told AFP a tentative deal includes a five-day truce, comprised of a ceasefire on the ground and limits to Israeli air operations over southern Gaza.
In return, between 50 and 100 prisoners held by Hamas and Islamic Jihad -- a separate Palestinian group -- would be released. They would include Israeli civilians and captives of other nationalities, but no military personnel.
Under the proposed deal, some 300 Palestinians would be released from Israeli jails, among them women and children.
The number of Palestinians in Israeli prisons has increased to 7000. As many as 64 of them are women and tens of children. Hamas is pressing for prisoners swap in exchange of about 240 people, mostly Israelis, it held captives in its Oct 7 Operation al Aqsa Flood.
In a related development, foreign ministers of Arab and Muslim countries are in China to press for immediate ceasefire in Gaza and West Bank.
Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan during a meeting between China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi and ministers from Arab and Islamic countries Monday said the international community needs to shoulder responsibility to stop Israel’s violations in Gaza.
China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi while addressing his counterparts from Arab and the Muslim countries urged the "international community to act urgently".
“The international community must act urgently, taking effective measures to prevent this tragedy from spreading. China firmly stands with justice and fairness in this conflict,” Wang told the visiting leaders in opening remarks ahead of talks, where he reiterated China’s call for an immediate ceasefire.
“The situation in Gaza affects all countries around the world, questioning the human sense of right and wrong and humanity's bottom line,” he said.
The foreign ministers in China are from Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, Indonesia, Palestine and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), among others. Their next stop in the Russian capital Moscow.
Meanwhile, the BRICS group of nations has called an extraordinary joint meeting on Tuesday to discuss the situation in Gaza six weeks into the war between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas.
According to a statement, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa will chair the virtual meeting, which will also be attended by the leaders of Brazil, Russia, India and China.
New BRICS entrants whose full membership commences next year, including Saudi Arabia, Argentina, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates, have also been invited to join the meeting.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres will also take part in the summit, where the BRICS leaders will deliver country statements on the current humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
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