Nine Arab States Condemn the Targeting of Civilians in Gaza

Black smoke raise from Eastern Gaza City, Thursday, Oct. 26, 2023 following Israeli airstrikes. (AP Photo/Abed Khaled)
Black smoke raise from Eastern Gaza City, Thursday, Oct. 26, 2023 following Israeli airstrikes. (AP Photo/Abed Khaled)
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Nine Arab States Condemn the Targeting of Civilians in Gaza

Black smoke raise from Eastern Gaza City, Thursday, Oct. 26, 2023 following Israeli airstrikes. (AP Photo/Abed Khaled)
Black smoke raise from Eastern Gaza City, Thursday, Oct. 26, 2023 following Israeli airstrikes. (AP Photo/Abed Khaled)

Nine Arab countries called on Thursday for an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and an end to the targeting and death of civilians.

“The right to self-defense by the United Nations Charter does not justify blatant violations of humanitarian and international law,” said the statement, signed by the Foreign Ministers of Egypt, Jordan, Bahrain, The United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Kuwait and Morocco.

They rejected “any attempts to liquidate the Palestinian issue at the expense of the Palestinian people and the peoples of the region, or to displace the Palestinian people from their land in any way, considering it a serious violation of international humanitarian law and tantamount to a war crime.”

They called on the UN Security Council to mandate the parties for an immediate and sustainable ceasefire, and affirmed that the failure to describe flagrant violations of international humanitarian law effectively constitutes a green light for the continuation of these practices and complicity in committing them.



Hezbollah Says Fired Missiles at Base Near South Israel's Ashdod

Israel’s Iron Dome anti-missile system operates to intercept incoming projectiles, amid hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, in Nahariya, Israel, November 21, 2024. REUTERS/Thomas Peter
Israel’s Iron Dome anti-missile system operates to intercept incoming projectiles, amid hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, in Nahariya, Israel, November 21, 2024. REUTERS/Thomas Peter
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Hezbollah Says Fired Missiles at Base Near South Israel's Ashdod

Israel’s Iron Dome anti-missile system operates to intercept incoming projectiles, amid hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, in Nahariya, Israel, November 21, 2024. REUTERS/Thomas Peter
Israel’s Iron Dome anti-missile system operates to intercept incoming projectiles, amid hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, in Nahariya, Israel, November 21, 2024. REUTERS/Thomas Peter

Hezbollah said its fighters on Thursday fired missiles at a military base near south Israel’s Ashdod, the first time it has targeted so deep inside Israel in more than a year of hostilities.

Hezbollah fighters "targeted... for the first time, the Hatzor air base" east of the southern city, around 150 kilometers from Lebanon’s southern border with Israel, "with a missile salvo," the Iran-backed group said in a statement.

A rocket fired from Lebanon killed a man and wounded two others in northern Israel on Thursday, according to the Magen David Adom rescue service.
The service said paramedics found the body of the man in his 30s near a playground in the town of Nahariya, near the border with Lebanon, after a rocket attack on Thursday.
Israel meanwhile struck targets in southern Lebanon and several buildings south of Beirut, the Lebanese capital.

Israel has launched airstrikes against Lebanon after Hezbollah began firing rockets, drones and missiles into Israel the day after Hamas' attack on Israel last October. A full-blown war erupted in September after nearly a year of lower-level conflict.
More than 3,500 people have been killed in Lebanon, according to the country’s Health Ministry, and over 1 million people have been displaced. It is not known how many of those killed were Hezbollah fighters and how many were civilians.
On the Israeli side, Hezbollah’s aerial attacks have killed more than 70 people and driven some 60,000 from their homes.