Five Palestinians killed in Israeli airstrike on school shelter in central Gaza

DUBAI: Rights group Amnesty International urged the United States on Monday to investigate possible violations of international law in a deadly strike on a migrant detention facility in Yemen.
Last month’s attack, which prompted international alarm and was part of the US bombardment campaign against the Houthis, killed 68 people held at a center for irregular migrants in Saada, the rebel authorities said at the time.
Agnes Callamard, Amnesty’s secretary-general, said that “the US attacked a well-known detention facility where the Houthis have been detaining migrants.”
The dead were all migrants from African countries, the Houthis had said.
To Callamard, “the major loss of civilian life in this attack raises serious concerns about whether the US complied with its obligations under international humanitarian law.”
“The US must conduct a prompt, independent and transparent investigation into this air strike,” she added.
A US defense official had told AFP in the aftermath of the strike that the military launched “battle-damage assessment and inquiry” into “claims of civilian casualties related to the US strikes in Yemen.”
Amnesty cited people who work with migrants and refugees in Yemen and visited two hospitals that treated the victims, saying that they had seen “more than two dozen Ethiopian migrants” with severe injuries including amputations.
The morgues at both hospitals had run out of space, the witnesses told Amnesty.
In mid-March, the United States began an intense, near-daily military campaign against the Houthis after they had renewed threats to attack vessels in the vital Red Sea and Gulf of Aden shipping lanes.
The campaign ended with a US-Houthi ceasefire agreement earlier this month.
The Houthis, who control large swathes of Yemen, began firing on Israel and Israeli-linked shipping in November 2023, weeks into the Gaza war triggered by an attack by the Yemeni rebels’ Palestinian ally Hamas.
Amnesty said it had analyzed satellite imagery and footage from the site of last month’s strike on Saada, in Yemen’s north.
The group said it was “unable to conclusively identify a legitimate military target” within the targeted prison compound, citing Houthi restrictions on independent investigations.
“Any attack that fails to distinguish between civilians and civilian objects on the one hand, and legitimate military targets on the other, even within the same compound, constitutes an indiscriminate attack and a violation of international humanitarian law,” Amnesty said.

JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that Israel must prevent famine in Gaza for “diplomatic reasons,” even as he vowed to press ahead with military operations to “take control of all” of the war-torn territory.

His comments came amid mounting international concern over a deepening humanitarian crisis in Gaza and as Israeli forces launched what they called extensive new ground operations against Hamas.

“The fighting is intense and we are making progress. We will take control of all the territory of the Strip,” Netanyahu said Monday in a video posted to his Telegram channel.

“We will not give up. But in order to succeed, we must act in a way that cannot be stopped.”

‘Prevent Famine for Diplomacy’

Netanyahu also said it was necessary for Israel to prevent a famine in Gaza for “diplomatic reasons,” after his government announced it would allow limited food aid into the territory.

The premier’s defense of the decision to at least partially lift a more than two-month aid blockade followed criticism from far-right members of his coalition who opposed the move.

“We must not let the population (of Gaza) sink into famine, both for practical and diplomatic reasons,” Netanyahu said the Telegram video, adding that even friends of Israel would not tolerate “images of mass starvation.”

Israel has said its blockade since March 2 was aimed at forcing concessions from the Palestinian militant group.

But it came under increasing international pressure to restore aid to Gaza, where UN agencies have warned of critical shortages of food, clean water, fuel and medicines.

The territory was at “critical risk of famine,” with 22 percent of the population facing an imminent humanitarian “catastrophe,” the UN- and NGO-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) said this month.

Neytanyahu on Monday shrugged off criticism of the aid resumption as “natural,” calling the decision “difficult, but necessary.”

Evacuation Order

The Israeli military on Monday issued an evacuation order for residents of Gaza’s second-largest city, Khan Younis, and nearby towns.
Avichay Adraee, a military spokesperson, posted the order on his social medial accounts, saying the entire area “will be considered a dangerous combat zone.”
The evacuation order comes as Israel escalates its war in Gaza with new operations.