போராட்டக்காரர்கள் இஸ்ரேல் மீது கோபத்தை வெளிப்படுத்தும் போது, மருத்துவமனை குண்டுவெடிப்புக்குப் பின்னால் காசா போராளிகள் இருப்பதாகத் தெரிகிறது என்று பிடென் கூறுகிறார்.
நிடல் அல்-முக்ராபி மற்றும் ஸ்டீவ் ஹாலண்ட் மூலம் அக்டோபர் 18, 2023 (ராய்ட்டர்ஸ்)
பிடென் கூறுகிறார், 'இன்று எங்களிடம் உள்ள தகவல்களின் அடிப்படையில், இது காசாவில் உள்ள ஒரு பயங்கரவாத குழுவால் ஏவப்பட்ட தவறான ராக்கெட்டின் விளைவாக ஏற்பட்டது என்று தோன்றுகிறது'
மேல்நிலைப் படங்கள், இடைமறிப்புகள் மற்றும் திறந்த மூலத் தகவல் ஆகியவற்றின் தற்போதைய அமெரிக்க மதிப்பீட்டின்படி, காசா மருத்துவமனையின் குண்டு வெடிப்பிற்கு இஸ்ரேல் பொறுப்பல்ல என்று வெள்ளை மாளிகை கூறுகிறது.
காசா/டெல் அவிவ், அக்டோபர் 18 (ராய்ட்டர்ஸ்) - அமெரிக்க ஜனாதிபதி ஜோ பிடன் புதன்கிழமை மத்திய கிழக்குக்கு அவசர அமைதிப் பயணம் மேற்கொண்டபோது, நடந்த
காசா மருத்துவமனை ``கொடிய குண்டுவெடிப்பு`` ஹமாஸ் போராளிகளால் ஏற்பட்டதாகத் தெரிகிறது என்று கூறினார்.மேலும் இஸ்ரேலுக்கான அமெரிக்காவின் ஒத்துழைப்பையும் அவர் உறுதி செய்தார்.
செவ்வாய்கிழமை பிற்பகுதியில் அல்-அஹ்லி அல்-அராபி மருத்துவமனையை சூழ்ந்த தீப்பிழம்பால் மத்திய கிழக்கைச் சுற்றியுள்ள எதிர்ப்பாளர்கள் இஸ்ரேலின் மீது கடும் கோபத்தை வெளிப்படுத்தினர், இதில் 471 பேர் கொல்லப்பட்டதாக பாலஸ்தீனிய அதிகாரிகள் தெரிவித்தனர், இது ஸ்திரமின்மை பரவுவது பற்றிய அச்சத்தை எழுப்பியுள்ளது.
குண்டுவெடிப்புக்கு வான்வழித் தாக்குதலை காரணம் காட்டி அவர்கள் இஸ்ரேலை குற்றம் சாட்டினர், ஆனால் இஸ்ரேல் காசாவின் இஸ்லாமிய ஜிஹாத் போராளிக் குழுவின் திசை தவறிய ராக்கெட் ஏவுதலால் ஏற்பட்டது என்று கூறி குற்றச்சாட்டை மறுத்தது.அதே நேரத்தில் ஜிஹாத் போராளிக் குழுவும் இதை நிராகரித்தது.
இந்த மாத தொடக்கத்தில் 1,400 இஸ்ரேலியர்களைக் கொன்றதன் விளைவாக, காசாவை ஆளும் ஹமாஸ் குழுவில் இருந்து போராளிகளை வேரறுக்க காசா மீது குண்டுவீசித் தாக்கும் இஸ்ரேலுக்கு கூடுதல் உதவிகளை பிடென் தனது திடீர் ஒரு நாள் பயணத்தின் முடிவில் உறுதியளித்தார்.
மருத்துவமனை குண்டுவெடிப்பு பற்றி : "இன்று நாம் பார்த்த தகவல்களின் அடிப்படையில், இது (வெடிப்பு) காசாவில் ஒரு பயங்கரவாத குழுவால் ஏவப்பட்ட தவறான ராக்கெட்டின் விளைவாக தோன்றுகிறது." என அவர் கூறினார்.
வாஷிங்டனில், வெள்ளை மாளிகையின் தேசிய பாதுகாப்பு கவுன்சில் பிடனை கூற்றை எதிரொலித்தது. அமெரிக்க மதிப்பீடு ஆனது மேல்நிலை படங்கள், குறுக்கீடுகள் மற்றும் திறந்த மூல தகவல்களின் பகுப்பாய்வு அடிப்படையில் அமைந்தது என்று அது கூறியது.
ஜோர்டானில் பிடெனுடனான உச்சிமாநாட்டை ரத்து செய்வதன் மூலம், இஸ்ரேல் மீது குற்றம் சாட்டிய அரபுத் தலைவர்கள் மருத்துவமனையின் உயிர் இழப்புக்கு பதிலளித்தனர். இம்மாநாடு ஒரு பரந்த மத்திய கிழக்குப் போரைத் தவிர்ப்பதற்காக, கூட்டாளி நாடுகளுடன் அவசர சந்திப்புகளுக்காக, கவனமாக அரங்கேற்றப்பட்ட நாடகத்தின் இரண்டாம் பாதியாகக் கருதப்பட்டது.
Biden says Gaza militants appear to be behind hospital blast as protesters vent fury with Israel
By Nidal Al-Mughrabi and Steve Holland October 18, 2023
Summary
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS:
Biden says 'based on information we have today, it appears the result of an errant rocket fired by a terrorist group in Gaza'
White House says current US assessment of overhead imagery, intercepts and open source info is that Israel not responsible for explosion at Gaza hospital
Biden hugs survivors of Hamas rampage
GAZA/TEL AVIV, Oct 18 (Reuters) - U.S. President Joe Biden pledged solidarity with Israel on Wednesday and said a deadly blast at a Gaza hospital appeared to have been caused by Hamas militants as he wrapped up an urgent Middle East peace mission that was curtailed by the explosion.
Raising fears of wider instability, protesters around the Middle East vented fury with Israel over the fireball that engulfed the Al-Ahli al-Arabi hospital late on Tuesday, which Palestinian officials said killed 471 people.
They blamed an Israeli air strike for the blast, while Israel it was caused by a failed rocket launch by Gaza's Islamic Jihad militant group, which denied blame.
Biden promised more aid to Israel at the end of his impromptu one-day visit to the country, which is bombarding Gaza to try to root out militants from its ruling Hamas group after they killed 1,400 Israelis in a rampage earlier this month.
He said of the hospital blast: "Based on the information we have seen today, it (explosion) appears the result of an errant rocket fired by a terrorist group in Gaza."
In Washington, the White House National Security Council echoed Biden, saying the U.S. assessment was based on analysis of overhead imagery, intercepts and open source information.
Arab leaders responded to the loss of life at the hospital, which they blamed on Israel, by cancelling a summit with Biden in Jordan. This had been intended as the second half of his carefully choreographed itinerary for emergency meetings with allies to avert a wider Middle East war.
DON'T BE CONSUMED BY RAGE, BIDEN SAYS
Biden said the United States would do everything it could to ensure Israel was safe while also urging Israelis not to be consumed by rage, reiterating that the vast majority of Palestinians were not affiliated with Hamas.
The Gaza health ministry said 3,478 Palestinians have been killed and 12,065 injured in Israeli air strikes since Oct 7.
Biden said the U.S. would provide $100 million in new funding for humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza and the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
"What sets us apart from the terrorists is we believe in the fundamental dignity of every human life," Biden said. If that was not respected, "then the terrorists win."
He also said he would ask Congress for an "unprecedented" aid package this week, before flying out of Israel after what ended up being a less than eight-hour visit.
Biden faced intense pressure to secure a clear Israeli commitment to let aid into Gaza from Egypt, to ease the plight of civilians in the small, densely populated coastal enclave.
At the end of his visit, Netanyahu's office put out a statement saying Israel would let food, water and medicines reach southern Gaza via Egypt. It reiterated that it would not let aid in from Israel until Hamas released Israeli hostages.
BIDEN SUMMIT WITH ARABS CANCELLED
Biden's Middle East trip was designed to calm the region, but Jordan called off his planned summit in Aman with Egypt and the Palestinian Authority after the hospital blast. Instead, he was expected to speak to the Jordanian and Egyptian leaders by phone from Air Force One on his way home.
After talks with Netanyahu’s war cabinet, Biden held an emotional meeting with Israeli survivors of the Oct. 7 slaughter. He hugged retired grandmother Rachel Edri, who was held hostage at gunpoint in her home for 20 hours by Hamas and used food and conversation to stall them until their capture.
"Please keep supporting us in eliminating Hamas once and for all," a soldier told Biden.
Hamas and witnesses later said Israel was bombarding Gaza City's Zeitoun district, and the group's armed wing said it fired more rockets towards Israel's biggest city Tel Aviv on Wednesday over what it called Israeli attacks on Gaza civilians.
Sirens sounded in central Israel but there were no immediate reports of casualties or damage.
'HELP US, HELP US!'
The accounts of destruction at the hospital were horrific even by the standards of the past 12 days, which have confronted the world with relentless images, first of Israelis murdered by Hamas gunmen in their homes and then of Palestinian families buried under rubble from Israel's retaliatory strikes.
Rescue workers scoured blood-stained debris for survivors. The Gaza health ministry put the death toll at 471, though Israel disputed those figures. Palestinian ministry spokesperson Ashraf Al-Qudra said rescuers were still recovering bodies.
"People came running into the surgery department screaming, 'Help us, help us, there are people killed and wounded inside the hospital!'" said Dr Fadel Naim, head of the hospital's Orthopedic Surgery Department.
Israel later released drone footage of the scene of the explosion, which it said showed it was not responsible because there was no impact crater from any missile or bomb and no structural damage to surrounding buildings.
The Israeli military published what it said was an audio recording of "communication between terrorists talking about rockets misfiring".
Palestinians were convinced the explosion was an Israeli attack, with no warning for civilians to leave a hospital being used as a shelter by Gazans already made homeless by bombing.
FURY ACROSS MIDDLE EAST
World leaders from U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres to Russian President Vladimir Putin denounced the blast in statements that nonetheless avoided addressing who was to blame.
The blast unleashed anger across the Middle East.
Palestinian security forces fired tear gas and stun grenades to disperse anti-government protesters in the West Bank city of Ramallah, seat of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, one of the Arab leaders who cancelled a meeting with Biden.
Tensions also ran very high on Israel's border with Lebanon, where clashes between the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement and Israel over the past week have been the deadliest since the last all-out war in 2006.
On Wednesday, the Israeli army said troops exchanged fire with militants across the border and a tank destroyed two militant positions on Lebanese soil after spotting fighters trying to fire an anti-tank rocket.
Reporting By Nidal Mughrabi in Gaza, Steve Holland aboard Air Force One, and Jerusalem Bureau Writing by Peter Graff and Mark Heinrich Editing by Gareth Jones and Philippa Fletcher
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
The US government currently believes that Israel “is not responsible” for the blast at a hospital in Gaza on Tuesday, according to the National Security Council, following President Joe Biden’s comments that a Palestinian militant group was behind the strike.
A spokesperson for the NSC, Adrienne Watson, said the assessment is based on analysis of overhead imagery, intercepts and open-source information.
“While we continue to collect information, our current assessment, based on analysis of overhead imagery, intercepts and open-source information, is that Israel is not responsible for the explosion at the hospital in Gaza yesterday,” Watson said in a statement on Wednesday.
Officials told CNN separately that the initial evidence gathered by the US intelligence community suggests that the hospital strike came from a rocket launched by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group.
Hospital blast looms over Biden's complicated diplomatic mission to Israel
Among the evidence that’s been gathered is a blast analysis that suggests it was a ground explosion rather than an airstrike that hit the hospital, one of the sources said. There was no singular crater suggesting there was a bomb, but there was extensive fire damage and scattered debris that is consistent with an explosion starting from the ground level, according to the source.
That analysis is one datapoint that’s led intelligence officials to lean toward assessing that the attack on the hospital was a rocket launch gone wrong.
Still, the blast analysis is just one of the things being examined by the intelligence community, which has surged intelligence collection assets to the region. US intelligence officials have not made a final assessment and are still gathering evidence, the officials said.
In addition to the blast analysis, the initial US assessment was based on overhead imagery collected from US satellites and intelligence intercepts provided by the Israelis, according to officials.
Current and former law enforcement officials say US the assessment of the cause of the blast is being hampered because of the lack of access to the site and analysis of the bodies recovered. FBI teams can typically use samples from the scene to, within hours, identify the rocket fuel and explosives used, one former FBI official said. Without examining the scene, US officials are left to analyze signals and other intelligence that can help make a strong circumstantial assessment of the cause but is not definitive.
Not long after landing in Israel on Wednesday, Biden weighed in on who was behind the strike on the hospital. “Based on what I’ve seen, it appears as though it was done by the other team, not you,” Biden told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after his arrival in Israel on Wednesday.
Asked what made him confident the Israelis weren’t behind the hospital strike, Biden said: “The data I was shown by my Defense Department.”
In his remarks later on Wednesday, Biden reiterated that based on the information the US has seen, the blast appears to have been “the result of an errant rocket fired by a terrorist group in Gaza.”
“The Palestinian people are suffering greatly as well – we mourn the loss of innocent Palestinian lives,” he said. “Like the entire world, I was outraged and saddened by the enormous loss of life yesterday in the hospital in Gaza. Based on the information we’ve seen to date, it appears the result of an errant rocket fired by a terrorist group in Gaza. The United States unequivocally stands for the protection of civilian life during conflict, and I grieve, I truly grieve for the families were killed or wounded by this tragedy.”
Authorities in Gaza have said Israel was behind the deadly blast at the hospital, while the Israel Defense Forces said its intelligence showed a “failed rocket launch” by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group was responsible for the explosion.
An IDF spokesman said Wednesday that imagery following the blast showed “no cratering and no structural damage to nearby buildings.”
“There are no craters here. The walls stay intact. This shows is it not an aerial munition that hit the parking lot” of the hospital, IDF spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said at a news conference Wednesday. “Analysis of our aerial footage confirms that there was no direct hit of the hospital itself. The only location damaged is outside the hospital in the parking lot where we can see signs of burning.”
The US intelligence community has been reviewing different kinds of intelligence to try to reach an assessment, including overhead imagery from satellites as well as the blast analysis, the officials said.
“I’m not sure the IC is ready to make an absolutely conclusive attribution but what we’re hearing is consistent with what the president said,” Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said following a classified briefing on Capitol Hill on Wednesday morning.
House Intelligence Chairman Mike Turner of Ohio and Himes issued a joint statement Wednesday, saying, “Based on information the House Intelligence Committee received from the administration regarding the hospital attack in Gaza, we believe this was not the result of Israeli military action.”
Israel provided US with intelligence
Israel has also provided the US with intelligence it has gathered related to the explosion, according to an Israeli official and another source familiar with the matter. The Israeli official said that Israel had passed signal intelligence on the explosion to US intelligence. Signals intelligence includes intercepted communications and other forms of data collected through various means.
“I believe the US intelligence community likely has enough imagery, communications intercepts, and other data to determine where the projectile originated that stuck in the Al-Ahli al-Arabi hospital and what the original statements of people on the ground were as to what they believed happened,” said Mick Mulroy, a former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East and retired CIA officer.
“In addition, from the video released publicly, the explosion is consistent with a rocket that still had a lot of rocket fuel at the time of impact,” Mulroy added.
Retired Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling, a CNN national security and military analyst, said the US military has overhead platforms that see “a missile burn when it takes off or when something explodes and comes out of the sky.”
The imagery released by the Israeli military of the explosion site was also “compelling,” Hertling said.
“It is very compelling, but when you also look at that aftermath, where’s the crater? When you’re talking about a crater from an Israeli bomb, there’s going to be a hole there,” he said.
British officials in public and private on Wednesday have not yet gone as far as the US. One official said it’s “not conclusive, but the Israeli assertion is not unfounded.”
“We’re not quite there yet,” another official said. “Not because we dispute what they’ve seen. We’re still at ‘Let’s look at all the facts.’”
UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said Wednesday that British intelligence services were working “rapidly” to establish the facts behind the deadly blast.
“We should not rush to judgments before we have all the facts on this awful situation,” Sunak told lawmakers in the UK parliament.
US intel surges collection in the region
Multiple officials said that the US intelligence community has surged intelligence collection assets to the region, primarily through overhead intelligence collection as well as some special operations support.
One military source described the move as “a major shift” and “lots of focus on this from across the IC,” though the source said it’s not clear how long this shift will last.
It’s not clear how helpful the additional resources will be when it comes to both hostage intelligence and Hamas planning in such a densely populated area, according to a US official – especially if most of the hostages are in the tunnels.
It might help a little bit with planning for potential ground clearance, and some of the signals intelligence collection capabilities could detect Hamas communications to help pinpoint hotspots of their activity. But the official noted that Hamas has been pretty smart about staying off communications – one of the reasons, sources say, the group was able to avoid Israeli detection during the planning of the October 7 attack in Israel.
Overhead surveillance would likely be much more helpful for keeping an eye on Hezbollah and Iran, according to two officials. The US would absolutely not want to be surprised by a Hezbollah attack, however unlikely, and could provide the Israelis with warnings and indications of any imminent operation.
CNN’s Alex Marquardt, Evan Perez, Zachary Cohen, Oren Liebermann, DJ Judd and Niamh Kennedy contributed to this report.
Peter Baker
Oct. 18, 2023, Peter Baker Traveling with President Biden in Israel
Here’s the latest on the war.
As outrage grew over a blast that ripped through a hospital in Gaza, American and Israeli intelligence said early evidence showed the deadly explosion was caused by an errant rocket fired by Palestinian fighters.
Making a rare wartime visit to Israel on Wednesday, President Biden firmly backed the Israeli’s government’s assertion that it had nothing to do with the deadly explosion. “Based on what I’ve seen, it appears as though it was done by the other team, not you,” he said, appearing with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel in Tel Aviv.
The evidence American intelligence has gathered includes satellite and other infrared data showing a launch of a rocket or missile from Palestinian fighter positions within Gaza, U.S. officials said. The United States has also analyzed open-source video showing the launch did not come from Israeli military positions. In addition, Israeli officials have provided intercepted communications of Hamas officials saying the strike came from forces aligned with Palestinian militant groups.
Adrienne Watson, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, said on the X social media platform that “our current assessment, based on analysis of overhead imagery, intercepts and open-source information, is that Israel is not responsible.”
Mr. Biden also said he had secured Israel’s agreement to allow some humanitarian aid into the besieged strip, offering the first hint of relief to a humanitarian crisis that has left the strip’s two million residents facing acute shortages of basic necessities. Mr. Netanyahu’s office said Israel would not block the provision of food, water and medicine from Egypt to civilians in southern Gaza, but warned, “Any provisions that reach Hamas will be thwarted.”
There was no immediate comment from the government in Egypt, where emergency supplies are waiting to cross through a key land border with Gaza.
Here’s what else to know:
The Israel Defense Forces outlined at a news conference early Wednesday their version of the cause of the hospital explosion. Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, an Israeli military spokesman, said that the Islamic Jihad group fired 10 rockets at 6:59 p.m. local time. One of the rockets, he said, fell to earth prematurely, hitting a parking lot outside the hospital. He said that Israel had not fired any ordnance in the area of the hospital at that time.
President Biden also announced $100 million in aid to help civilians in Gaza and the West Bank and said he had secured a commitment from Israel’s government to allow food, water and medicine to be delivered to Palestinians in Gaza from Egypt in a humanitarian effort overseen by the United Nations and others.
The United States vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution on the conflict put forth on Wednesday by Brazil. The text called for humanitarian aid to be allowed into Gaza and the protection of civilians, and also condemned the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel. The U.S. ambassador, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, said she had vetoed the resolution because it did not state that Israel has a right to defend itself and because she wanted to give Mr. Biden’s diplomatic efforts a chance.
The Gaza City hospital explosion sparked protests in cities across the Middle East that stretched into Wednesday morning, bringing defiant crowds to embassies and consulates of countries that demonstrators said were complicit in the humanitarian crisis facing Palestinians in Gaza.
Matthew Rosenberg contributed reporting from London.
NPR NewsArab governments blame Israel for the hospital explosion, Israel says a militant group is to blame
Palestinian authorities, along with Arab governments including Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, accused Israel of bombing the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza.
But in a statement to NPR, the Israel Defense Forces said it considers a hospital a sensitive building and not an IDF target.
In an official statement, the IDF put the blame of the hospital blast on another militant group, smaller than Hamas, called the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
"The hospital was hit as a result of a failed rocket launched by the Islamic Jihad terrorist organization," IDF Spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said. "The terrorist organizations within the Gaza Strip fire indiscriminately toward Israel. Since the beginning of the war, approximately 450 rockets launched toward Israel have fallen within Gaza, endangering and harming the lives of Gazan residents."
Organizers of the protest by the Capitol say about 400 people, led by 25 rabbis who are praying and reading testimonials of Palestinians, went inside the Cannon House Office Building. About 200 people seem to have been arrested, organizers estimated, but since arrestees are being led out through a back door, the precise number is unclear.
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