Fighting yesterday raged across the Gaza Strip, whose health ministry reported a surging death toll, as Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corp (IRGC) said that four of its members were killed by a strike in Syria that it blamed on Israel.
The Syria strike is the latest regional incident raising fears of wider conflagration.
It came even as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Joe Biden discussed the postwar future of Gaza, where the humanitarian situation remains dire.
Photo: AFP
Gaza’s health ministry reported at least 165 people killed over the previous 24 hours — by far the largest such toll it has issued in days, and more than double the previous day’s figure.
An Agence France-Presse correspondent reported gunfire, airstrikes and tank shelling into the morning, particularly in southern Gaza’s Khan Yunis.
Israel is pressing southward, after the army early this month said the Hamas command structure in northern Gaza had been dismantled, leaving only isolated fighters.
However, the armed wing of Hamas reported fierce combat with Israeli troops in north Gaza yesterday.
The military said that troops backed by air and naval support were striking militant infrastructure throughout the Gaza Strip, including the north.
An Israeli strike on Damascus killed the IRGC’s spy chief for Syria and three other Guards members, Iranian media reported.
Israel has intensified attacks on targets in Syria, often against Iran-backed forces, since the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct. 7.
Hamas, like Lebanon’s Hezbollah, is an ally of Israel’s archfoe Iran.
The unprecedented October attacks by Hamas resulted in the deaths of about 1,140 people in Israel, mostly civilians, a tally based on official Israeli figures showed.
Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas in response. Its relentless bombardment and ground offensive have killed at least 24,927 people, mostly women and children, Gaza’s health ministry says.
Biden said it was still possible Netanyahu could agree to some form of Palestinian state, after the two leaders spoke for the first time in nearly a month.
Netanyahu had on Thursday said that Israel “must have security control over the entire territory west of the Jordan River,” which “contradicts the idea of [Palestinian] sovereignty.”
A Ministry of Foreign Affairs official yesterday said that a delegation that visited China for an APEC meeting did not receive any kind of treatment that downgraded Taiwan’s sovereignty. Department of International Organizations Director-General Jonathan Sun (孫儉元) said that he and a group of ministry officials visited Shenzhen, China, to attend the APEC Informal Senior Officials’ Meeting last month. The trip went “smoothly and safely” for all Taiwanese delegates, as the Chinese side arranged the trip in accordance with long-standing practices, Sun said at the ministry’s weekly briefing. The Taiwanese group did not encounter any political suppression, he said. Sun made the remarks when
The Taiwanese passport ranked 33rd in a global listing of passports by convenience this month, rising three places from last month’s ranking, but matching its position in January last year. The Henley Passport Index, an international ranking of passports by the number of designations its holder can travel to without a visa, showed that the Taiwan passport enables holders to travel to 139 countries and territories without a visa. Singapore’s passport was ranked the most powerful with visa-free access to 192 destinations out of 227, according to the index published on Tuesday by UK-based migration investment consultancy firm Henley and Partners. Japan’s and
BROAD AGREEMENT: The two are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff to 15% and a commitment for TSMC to build five more fabs, a ‘New York Times’ report said Taiwan and the US have reached a broad consensus on a trade deal, the Executive Yuan’s Office of Trade Negotiations said yesterday, after a report said that Washington is set to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent. The New York Times on Monday reported that the two nations are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent and commit Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to building at least five more facilities in the US. “The agreement, which has been under negotiation for months, is being legally scrubbed and could be announced this month,” the paper said,
Japan and the Philippines yesterday signed a defense pact that would allow the tax-free provision of ammunition, fuel, food and other necessities when their forces stage joint training to boost deterrence against China’s growing aggression in the region and to bolster their preparation for natural disasters. Japan has faced increasing political, trade and security tensions with China, which was angered by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s remark that a Chinese attack on Taiwan would be a survival-threatening situation for Japan, triggering a military response. Japan and the Philippines have also had separate territorial conflicts with Beijing in the East and South China
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