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Gaza Health Officials Say Israeli Strike on Police Station Kills 9

Palestinians inspect the damage at a police station that was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, Wednesday, Aug. 19, 2026. (AP)
Palestinians inspect the damage at a police station that was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, Wednesday, Aug. 19, 2026. (AP)
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Gaza Health Officials Say Israeli Strike on Police Station Kills 9

Palestinians inspect the damage at a police station that was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, Wednesday, Aug. 19, 2026. (AP)
Palestinians inspect the damage at a police station that was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, Wednesday, Aug. 19, 2026. (AP)

Gaza health officials said an Israeli strike on the municipal police headquarters in Gaza City killed nine people on Wednesday, with the Israeli military saying it targeted a Hamas commander in that strike and another further south.

Attacks in the Palestinian territory have continued in recent days, despite a renewed push by the United States to advance a long-term Gaza peace plan.

Gaza City's Al-Shifa Hospital reported the arrival of nine bodies, including a woman and a girl, and at least 20 wounded following the strike in Gaza City.

The territory's civil defense agency, which operates as a rescue service under Hamas, confirmed the toll.

The Israeli military said the strike on the police headquarters targeted a Hamas commander who it said had planned to carry out attacks against troops in the territory.

"Prior to the strike, steps were taken to mitigate harm to civilians, including the use of precise munitions and aerial surveillance," it added.

It said it had also struck a commander in Hamas's military wing in the Nuseirat area in the central Gaza Strip.

Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem condemned what he called Israel's "complete disregard for all calls for a ceasefire".

He said US President Donald Trump's Board of Peace, which is tasked with implementing the ceasefire plan agreed last October, "bears responsibility for this escalation due to its failure to fulfill its obligations by pressuring the occupation" to abide by its commitments.

Trump's envoy Jared Kushner had said on Monday that progress towards disarming Hamas and moving forward with the Gaza peace plan could begin within a month following a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The sit-down came two weeks after Hamas endorsed the latest stage of Trump's Gaza plan.

Netanyahu, however, has refused to support the roadmap, vowing not to withdraw troops until the Palestinian movement is "genuinely disarmed".

Gaza health officials said Tuesday that an Israeli airstrike killed six people in the port of Gaza City, with the Israeli army saying it had targeted several Hamas commanders.

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Arab World

Israeli Threat to Expand Lebanon’s Occupation, Displace More Than a Million Lebanese

File photo of Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz in the Tulkarm refugee camp in the northern West Bank (Israeli Army)
File photo of Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz in the Tulkarm refugee camp in the northern West Bank (Israeli Army)
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Israeli Threat to Expand Lebanon’s Occupation, Displace More Than a Million Lebanese

File photo of Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz in the Tulkarm refugee camp in the northern West Bank (Israeli Army)
File photo of Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz in the Tulkarm refugee camp in the northern West Bank (Israeli Army)

Defense Minister Israel Katz has ⁠warned Hezbollah against attacking Israel, saying the Israeli army was capable of occupying more Lebanese territories and displacing more than a million Shiites.

"Hezbollah will suffer a severe blow and lose additional territories in southern Lebanon within the Nabatieh and Litani regions, which will become part of Israel's permanent security zone. The IDF (Israel Defense Forces) is prepared to carry out the maneuver," Katz said on Wednesday.

Speaking from the self-declared security zone Israeli forces are ⁠occupying in southern Lebanon, Katz said that a million Shiites would be displaced and that Hezbollah's stronghold in Beirut would not be spared.

Israel launched airstrikes and a ground invasion in southern Lebanon this year in parallel with the war in Iran, after Hezbollah fired into Israel in revenge ​for Israeli-American attacks against Tehran.

Hundreds of ​thousands of people from Lebanon's Shiite community were uprooted by the fighting.

Arab World

UN Peacekeeping Chief Says Talks on Future of Lebanon Mission Must Begin Soon

United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix in Beirut, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Beirut, Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2026. (AP)
United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix in Beirut, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Beirut, Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2026. (AP)
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UN Peacekeeping Chief Says Talks on Future of Lebanon Mission Must Begin Soon

United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix in Beirut, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Beirut, Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2026. (AP)
United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix in Beirut, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Beirut, Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2026. (AP)

UN peacekeeping chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix on Wednesday urged the UN Security Council to begin negotiations on the future of peacekeepers deployed in Lebanon, as Beirut campaigns for an extension to the mandate set to expire at the end of this year.

The UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) has been deployed in southern Lebanon since 1978, but the Security Council last year ordered the mission to begin withdrawing at the end of 2026.

Since a new war erupted in March between Israel and Iran-backed Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, ‌the Lebanese government has ‌campaigned for an extension to UNIFIL's mandate, citing its ‌role ⁠in monitoring hostilities ⁠and facilitating aid deliveries to villages in Israeli-occupied zones.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres earlier this year presented proposals for a continued uniformed UN presence in Lebanon, but no action has been taken yet, Lacroix told Reuters in Beirut.

"These proposals are on the table of the Security Council. There has been no movement in the Security Council until now, but I believe that the negotiations will begin ... shortly, in earnest," he said.

"I think ⁠it would be better to have a decision soon ‌rather than later, right? Because that would clarify ‌also the horizon for us, certainly from the more limited point of view of our ‌own planning," he said.

FORCES OPERATE HOTLINE TO EASE TENSIONS

Diplomats say the US ‌is not supportive of an extended mandate for UNIFIL, but Lacroix said it was important to focus on Lebanon’s request and that negotiations at the Security Council could yield a constructive outcome.

Some 7,500 UNIFIL peacekeepers are still deployed at about 50 positions in southern Lebanon, which ‌would be expected to be handed over to Lebanese army troops if no new UN force is agreed.

But since most ⁠of those ⁠posts lie in territory now occupied by the Israeli military, it remains unclear how Lebanese soldiers could deploy to take over the positions.

Lacroix said that clarity on whether a new UN force would deploy to southern Lebanon would help UNIFIL make sure it does not "leave those positions prematurely before we know what could come next".

In addition to facilitating aid deliveries and monitoring hostilities, the force operates a hotline to ease any tensions between the Lebanese and Israeli militaries.

Lacroix said the deconfliction role was particularly crucial given the presence of Israeli troops in a self-declared security zone deep in Lebanese territory.

He said that Israeli and Lebanese troops in the same geographic area presented "the risk of escalation, the risk of incidents getting out of control" and that "there is a need for a third party to de-escalate".

Arab World

Gaza Officials Say Israeli Strikes Kill Four

Palestinians walk along a street lined with buildings destroyed during the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza City Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2026. (AP)
Palestinians walk along a street lined with buildings destroyed during the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza City Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2026. (AP)
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Gaza Officials Say Israeli Strikes Kill Four

Palestinians walk along a street lined with buildings destroyed during the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza City Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2026. (AP)
Palestinians walk along a street lined with buildings destroyed during the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza City Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2026. (AP)

Palestinian officials said Israeli strikes killed four people in Gaza on Wednesday, days after the anniversary of the declaration of a US-mediated ceasefire.

Two young men died when Israeli forces struck a vehicle near Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip, civil defense spokesman Mahmoud Bassal and Nasser Hospital said.

Two other people, including a woman, were killed when an Israeli aircraft struck an apartment building in Gaza City, according to Bassal and Al-Shifa hospital.

The Israeli military did not immediately give details on the strikes. Earlier Wednesday, it said it had killed more than 100 "terrorists" over the past four months in an operation in the north of the Gaza Strip.

The military said it also destroyed around eight kilometers (five miles) of tunnels used by fighters.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who faces a tight reelection battle this month, has vowed no let-up in targeting Hamas despite the ceasefire that went into effect on October 10, 2025, leading Hamas to free its remaining living hostages.

Hamas stormed into Israel on October 7, 2023, the deadliest day ever for the country. The attack resulted in the deaths of 1,221 people, according to an AFP tally from official Israeli figures, with fighters also dragging 251 hostages into Gaza, 44 of them already dead.

Israel's massive offensive in Gaza has since killed more than 74,300 people, according to the territory's health ministry, which operates under Hamas and whose figures are generally considered reliable by the United Nations.