Here's what happened on Tuesday, February 6, 2024.
Gaza humanitarian crisis
- Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7 have left at least 27,478 people dead and 66,835 injured.
- On Monday, a convoy of trucks waiting to deliver food to the Gaza Strip was hit by Israeli fire. According to UNRWA Director Thomas White. There were no casualties, but property was damaged.
- The World Health Organization (WHO) said there was a “surge in the number of injuries” at Ahly Arab Hospital in Gaza City due to the “rapid deterioration” of Al Shifa Hospital.
- According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), around 6,000 people are waiting to be evacuated from the Strip to receive vital medical care.
- According to the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS), around 8,000 people at Al Amal Hospital were able to evacuate after a two-week siege.
- OCHA said 66 percent of planned humanitarian missions to provide food and water distribution and support to hospitals were rejected by Israeli authorities in January. Meanwhile, Jordanian and Dutch forces jointly airdropped aid as well as medical supplies into Gaza.
Regional tensions and diplomacy
- US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is visiting the Middle East to call for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas and the release of Gaza prisoners of war and Palestinian prisoners of war in Israel.
- A British-owned Barbados-registered cargo ship was attacked by a drone in the Red Sea, 57 kilometers (about 35 miles) west of the Yemeni city of Hodeidah. Yemen's Houthis have been attacking cargo ships in the Red Sea since November in protest of Israel's war on Gaza.
- The U.N. follows accusations that staff from UNRWA, the Palestinian refugee aid agency, were involved in an Oct. 7 Hamas attack in southern Israel, after which funding from major donor countries such as the United States and Germany was cut. , appointed an independent commission to investigate.
- Representatives from China and Russia at a UN Security Council meeting said the US was escalating tensions and violating other countries' sovereignty by airstrikes in Syria and Iraq over the weekend. The airstrike was a response to the killing of a US soldier in Jordan last week, but the US admitted it did not notify Iraq of the airstrike in advance.
- Parliament Speaker Amir Ohana spoke with U.N. national security adviser Jake Sullivan on Monday and said Israel's goal in Gaza is “the complete defeat of Hamas.” Ohana also noted rising tensions in Yemen, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria, saying, “The Iranian-led Axis of Evil must feel the resolve of the free world in the form of a diplomatic and military iron curtain.” It must be done,” he said.
occupied west bank
- Israel is accused of separating the body of a 14-year-old Palestinian boy killed by Israeli forces from his relatives in the occupied West Bank on Monday. Civil society group Defense for Children International said the act violated international law.
- Israeli forces arrested a minor from the village of Aka and two young brothers from the village of Asfi in the Masafel Yatta settlement south of Hebron in the occupied West Bank, Wafa news agency reported. Attacks have also been reported in five other areas of the West Bank in the past few days.