Israel claims control of corridor along Gaza-Egypt border

French President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday urged Mahmoud Abbas to "implement necessary reforms" to the Palestinian Authority, during a phone call with Palestinian president.

Macron's office said he raised the prospect of French support for Palestinian statehood but added that this would "come at a useful moment," and not be based on "emotion."

The French leader said his country supported the idea of, "a reformed and strengthened Palestinian Authority, able to carry out its responsibilities throughout the Palestinian Territories, including the Gaza Strip, for the benefit of the Palestinian people."  

Macron also called for an end to the "systematic postponement" of implementing a so-called two-state solution and expressed his "sincere condolences to the Palestinian people" over what he deemed "intolerable" civilian casualties in Gaza.

The call came in the wake of Ireland, Norway and Spain announcing recognition of a Palestinian state, something French Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne called "political positioning" on their part and not a step that would resolve the larger conflict between Israel and the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank.

Abbas and the Palestinian Authority are currently broadly seen internationally as the more viable leaders of a future Palestinian state. However, the organization has not administered Gaza since losing control to Hamas following the territory's 2006 elections, and it has not held elections in the occupied West Bank since then either.

France is one of three UN Security Council permanent members, along with the US and UK, that do not recognize a Palestinian state.

Israel on Wednesday announced that three of its soldiers had been killed by an explosive device hidden in a building in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where Israeli Defense Forces are currently engaged in pitched battles against Hamas Islamists.

Three more soldiers were reportedly seriously injured in the incident.

Israel's military said at the beginning of May that 290 IDF soldiers had been killed since the offensive to root out Hamas militants began in retaliation for the October 7, Hamas terror attack on Israel that killed nearly 1,200 people and saw more than 240 kidnapped.

Israeli National Security Advisor Tzachi Hanegbi on Wednesday said he expected the offensive to last for several more months, adding that the Cabinet had "designated 2024 as the year of war."

Israel's military on Wednesday said it had achieved full operational control of the so-called Philedelphi Corridor along the length of Gaza's shared border with Egypt.  

Israeli Defense Forces troops are currently engaged in a military offensive in the nearby southern Gaza city of Rafah. 

Israel says that numerous smuggling tunnels belonging to Hamas run beneath the corridor.

The narrow corridor is part of a larger demilitarized zone along Israel's border with Egypt, with both sides only allowed to station a small number of troops and guards there. At the time of the accord, Israel's troops controlled Gaza, prior to its 2005 withdrawal of troops and settlers.

Egypt warned earlier in the conflict that an Israeli "occupation" of the corridor would breach the bilateral treaty's terms.

Brazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva on Wednesday withdrew his country's ambassador to Israel.

The move came after months of criticism of Israel's military operation in Gaza, in which Lula often went so far as to compare it to the Holocaust — in which an estimated 6 million Jews were industrially exterminated by Nazi Germany during World War II.

That comparison prompted Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz to summon the Brazilian ambassador to Jerusalem's National Holocaust Museum for a public rebuke.

Brazil's neighbor Colombia, whose President Gustavo Petro has also compared Israel's military offensive in Gaza to the Holocaust, broke off diplomatic relations with Israel earlier this month.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has managed to deliver aid to Gaza City for the first time in two weeks, supplying the Al-Ahli Hospital with 15,000 liters of fuel, 14 hospital beds and various medicines and other supplies.

"Amid ongoing intense hostilities, WHO and partners still managed to reach Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City," wrote WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on the social media network X, formerly Twitter, saying it was the first mission into the north of the Gaza Strip since May 13.

He said the supplies were enough to cover the needs of 1,500 people but insisted that more was needed, with the WHO trying to deploy "an emergency medical team" there.

"Al-Ahli Hospital is serving twice the number of people it is designed for, lacking essential surgical supplies, and salaries for the staff," said Tedros. "No lifesaving surgery can be performed in the evening due to the lack of specialized staff."

The mission also escorted five Palestinian Red Crescent ambulances to the north of the besieged enclave but said it was unable to reach a second hospital due to delays at a checkpoint.

Aid deliveries across Gaza have been hindered by Israeli air strikes, Israeli checks on shipments and destroyed roads and infrastructure.  Aid workers in Gaza have also been killed by Israeli missile and drone strikes.

London's Metropolitan Police said on Wednesday that they had arrested 40 people after a pro-Palestinian rally because some protesters refused to disperse. 

The individuals were arrested on Tuesday night for breaching public order conditions, obstructing roads and assaulting emergency workers, police said.

In a statement posted on social media platform X, formerly Twitter, the police said some 8,000 to 10,000 people had gathered around the UK government headquarters in London protesting against Israel's latest offensive in the southern city of Rafah in Gaza. They were required to disperse by 8 p.m. (1900 GMT) under the Public Order Act. 

Some 500 people remained in the area after 8 p.m. and continued to protest, police added. 

As officers moved in, "some in the crowd resisted physically, requiring officers to use force to extract those who had been arrested," the statement read. 

Three officers were injured during the confrontation, police said. Two sustained minor injuries while a third was left with a "serious facial injury" when she was struck by a bottle thrown from within the crowd. 

The police said it is investigating the incident.

A temporary US-built pier used to bring aid into Gaza by sea has been damaged by bad weather and high seas, DW correspondent Tania Krämer reported on Wednesday.

"It was very stormy here in the past days," she said, adding that the US military had to suspend aid deliveries after parts of the pier were torn apart.

The Pentagon said the repairs will take about a week but it did not give an exact timeline, she noted.

Krämer said that the suspension of aid from the pier comes at the worst possible time, as the Israeli offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah continues with the fighting also ongoing in the wider strip.

She added that the Rafah crossing with Egypt, a key entry point of aid into the enclave, has been closed since early May when the Israeli military took control of the Palestinian side of the crossing. Some of the trucks waiting there have been diverted to the Kerem Shalom crossing but aid agencies say it is very difficult to distribute aid.

Krämer said evacuations were taking place in the Rafah area amid the fighting with UNRWA saying on Tuesday that 1 million people had been forced to flee.

"There is a lot of movement, people are not sure where is safe," Krämer added.

A draft resolution presented by Algeria to the UN Security Council calls for an "immediate cease-fire" in the Gaza Strip, according to news agencies.

The draft resolution "decides that Israel, the occupying power, shall immediately halt its military offensive, and any other action in Rafah," according to the circulated document.

The text "demands an immediate cease-fire respected by all parties, and also demands the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages."

China's envoy to the UN, Fu Cong, expressed hope that the resolution could be voted on this week. "We hope that it could be done as quickly as possible because life is in the balance," Fu said.

US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said: "We're waiting to see it and then we'll react to it." 

Diplomats said some council members were aiming for a vote as early as Wednesday. 

The UN Security Council called for an immediate cease-fire and the unconditional release of all hostages in late March in a resolution that had 14 votes in favor and US abstention. Washington had vetoed previous attempted cease-fire resolutions.

Algeria will present a draft UN resolution to halt fighting in Rafah in the southern Gaza strip, according to the North African country's ambassador to the UN.

"It will be a short text, a decisive text, to stop the killing in Rafah," Ambassador Amar Bendjama told reporters following an emergency Security Council meeting on the situation in Gaza.

Algeria requested the meeting after an Israeli strike hit an area near the city of Rafah where displaced people were sheltering in tents.

The Health Ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza said that 45 people, most of them women and children, were killed in the strike on Sunday.

A temporary pier used to get aid into Gaza will be removed from the coast of the Palestinian territory for repairs, according to the Pentagon.

Washington said the US-built structure was damaged in rough seas and weather.

The pier will be sent to the southern Israeli port city of Ashdod, where it will be repaired by US Central Command. 

Pentagon spokesperson Sabrina Singh said the repairs will take at least a week.

"From when it was operational, it was working, and we just had sort of an unfortunate confluence of weather storms that made it inoperable for a bit," Singh said. "Hopefully just a little over a week, we should be back up and running."

Sam Cook, the director of planning at the UN's agency for Palestinian refugees, UNWRA, has said that the southern Gazan city of Rafah came under intense bombardment after a deadly Israeli strike on Sunday. 

"We thought the situation was bad... when the horrific incident involving the strikes on the tented camp inside Rafah took place. But over the past 24 hours, bombardment has continued [and] intensified," he said. 

Health authorities in the Hamas-run Palestinian territory said that the strike on Sunday killed at least 45 people. Israel said it was investigating the "tragic mistake." 

On Tuesday, Israel's military denied striking another tent camp, west of Rafah, after Gaza health authorities said Israeli tank shelling had killed at least 21 people there. 

"And we understand from our staff and other people on the ground that, indeed, Israeli troops have pushed further into the center of Rafah. I've not seen them myself, but those those reports that we're hearing," Cook said. 

"What I can tell you, without any doubt, is that the bombardment has intensified in areas to the West of Rafah, including on the coast where I am right now."

Former US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley visited an Israeli military post to show support for Israel's operations against the Hamas militant Islamist group.

Israeli lawmaker Danny Danon posted images to the platform X, formerly Twitter, that showed Haley writing a message on an Israeli missile.

"'Finish Them'. This is what my friend the former ambassador Nikki Haley wrote," Danon said.

"[The US] supports Israel. Today, Israel is fighting against the enemies of the US. Don't stop until you've won," she said during her visit alongside Israeli lawmaker Danny Danon.

Danon, who is also a former UN envoy, said Haley wrote "on a shell during a visit to an artillery post on the northern border."

Israel and the Lebanese group Hezbollah have exchanged fire across Israel's northern border since the beginning of the war on October 7, following the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel.  

Haley, who ended her campaign for the Republican nomination in March,  has now endorsed former President Donald Trump for the upcoming election.

The White House said that Israel has not yet reached the stage of a "major ground operation" in Rafah that would prompt a change in US policy.

"We have not seen them smash into Rafah," White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said, referring to Israeli forces.

"We have not seen them go in with large units, large numbers of troops in columns and formations in some sort of coordinated maneuver against multiple targets on the ground," he said.

"That is a major ground operation. We have not seen that."

Kirby insisted that Israeli forces were not active in Rafah, but along a corridor outside of the border city.

"These tanks are moving along a corridor that they have told us previously that they would use on the outskirts of the town to try to put pressure on Hamas," he said.

"I don't know how anybody could dispute that they were trying to go after Hamas in a targeted precise way," Kirby stressed.

His remarks came amid reports that Israeli forces were seen in the center of Rafah.  

US President Joe Biden has warned Israel against launching a large-scale offensive in the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, saying Washington could suspend arms deliveries if Israel does so without a credible plan to protect civilians.

On Sunday, an Israeli airstrike hit tents housing displaced people on the outskirts of Rafah, killing 45 people, according to authorities in Gaza. The strike prompted international condemnation. 

sdi/fb (AFP, AP, Reuters, dpa, EFE)