Jordan closes border crossing into Syria, ministry says
Jordan has closed its only passenger and commercial border crossing into Syria, the interior ministry said on Friday.
A Syrian army source told Reuters that armed groups had been firing at Syria’s Nassib border crossing into Jordan. “Armed groups who infiltrated the crossing attacked Syrian army posts stationed there,” the source added, according to Reuters. The source said dozens of trailers and passengers were now stranded near the area.
Jordan’s interior minister said Jordanians and Jordanian trucks would be allowed to return via the crossing, known as the Jaber crossing on the Jordanian side, while no one would be allowed to cross into Syria.
Reuters reports that onn Friday, Cogat, the Israeli government body that oversees aid to Gaza, said it had facilitated the delivery of thousands of food packages and sacks of flour into Beit Hanoun, in collaboration with international aid agencies, for distribution to the remaining population.
In a distress call on Friday, the Gaza health ministry accused the Israeli military of committing a “war crime” in Kamal Adwan hospital by perpetrating “all forms of killing and violence inside and around it”, reports Reuters.
Accoding to Reuters, the ministry said only half of the 37 hospitals and clinics in the war-devastated territory remained operational but lacked essential equipment, manpower, and medical and fuel supplies.
On Friday, the World Health Organization (WHO) said that Israeli forces had bombed Kamal Adwan hospital early on Thursday apparently without warning its staff in advance. “That is extremely concerning and should never happen,” WHO spokesperson, Rik Peeperkorn, told a Geneva briefing by video link. The hospital is now “minimally functional”, he added.
According to Reuters, residents of Beit Lahiya said the army blew up several houses overnight not far from Kamal Adwan hospital. Palestinians say Israel plans to carve out a buffer zone along the northern fringes of Gaza after depopulating the area. Israel denies this.
Israeli forces storm into Gaza hospital, its director says
Israeli forces stormed into Kamal Adwan hospital in Beit Lahiya in north Gaza overnight on Friday and expelled some staff and displaced people before withdrawing, its director said.
The attack had begun with a series of airstrikes on the western and northern sides of Kamal Adwan accompanied by intensive shooting, hospital director Hussam Abu Safiya said, speaking via an online chatroom monitored by Reuters.
According to Reuters, he said troops who swept into the hospital ordered all staff, patients and displaced people into its courtyard before allowing them hours later to return inside, though some staff including its Indonesian emergency surgery team and some displaced were ordered to leave the premises for good.
Israel’s military did not immediately respond to a request by Reuters for comment.
Israel has accused Hamas militants of using civilian buildings including hospitals and schools for operational cover throughout the 14-month Gaza war. Hamas has denied this, accusing Israel of indiscriminate bombings and assaults.
Kamal Adwan hospital has been caught in renewed Israeli military operations in north Gaza against regrouping militants. “This morning, we were shocked to see hundreds of bodies and wounded individuals in the streets surrounding the hospital,” Abu Safiya said in another statement posted online, according to Reuters.
“The situation inside the hospital and in its vicinity is catastrophic. There are a large number of (dead) martyrs and wounded individuals, and no surgeons are left,” he said.
Reuters could not independently authenticate his account, given a lack of media access to the Israeli-besieged Gaza Strip.
Gaza’s health ministry said the three main hospitals on the northern end of the territory are barely functioning and have been under repeated attack since Israel sent tanks into Beit Lahiya and nearby Beit Hanoun and Jabalia in October.
Israel announces it is ‘reinforcing aerial and ground forces’ in Golan Heights after developments in Syria
Israel’s military has announced that as a result of developments in Syria it is “reinforcing aerial and ground forces in the Golan Heights area”, strategically valuable territory that it captured from Syria in 1967.
In a message posted on its official Telegram channel, the IDF said:
Based on the situational assessment that has been ongoing since yesterday in the general staff and northern command, and following developments in the internal conflict in Syria, the IDF is reinforcing aerial and ground forces in the Golan Heights area.
IDF troops are deployed along the border and the IDF is monitoring developments and is prepared for all scenarios, offensive and defensive alike. The IDF will not tolerate threats near the Israeli border and will thwart any threat against the state of Israel.
After seizing the area during the 1967 war, Israel unilaterally annexed the Golan Heights in 1981. The Golan Heights affords whoever controls it a significant vantage point over Lebanon, Syria and Israel, and is considered at the UN to still be occupied Syrian territory. The first Donald Trump administration changed the US position to recognise the Golan Heights as part of Israel, a policy that has not been reversed by Joe Biden’s administration.
The Guardian