CIA director Bill Burns is going to discuss the contours of the emerging agreement when he meets on Sunday in France with Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency David Barnea, Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, and Egyptian intelligence Chief Abbas Kamel for talks on a potential deal to halt temporarily Israel’s attack with prisoners exchanged.
United Nations Secretary Secretary-General Antonio Guterres pleads with donor nations to continue funding aid for the two million desperate people of Gaza.
Thousands fleeing fighting in Khan Younis arrived in overcrowded Rafah where people are sleeping on the street and in tent camps flooded with sewage. Cold, rainy weather making war-wracked Gaza uninhabitable.
The UN’s human rights office warns about the impact of continued Israeli bombardment and worsening weather on civilians in Gaza. At a makeshift camp in Rafah, displaced Palestinians use a bucket to clear water from a tent drenched by heavy rain.
The United Nations Human Rights Office (OHCHR) has warned that relentless Israeli attacks against infrastructure in Gaza and cold weather are making the Palestinian enclave completely rundown. Ajith Sunghay, the head of the OHCHR for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, said on Friday I fear that many more civilians will die.
He added by saying the continued attacks on specially protected facilities, such as hospitals, will kill civilians, and there will be a further, massive impact on access to health care, safety, and security in general for Palestinians.
Furthermore, Sunghay said his office was also very worried about the impact of the rainy, cold weather, which was entirely predictable at this time of the year. He said the weather risks making an already unsanitary situation derelict for the people. Most have no warm clothes or blankets.
Most Palestinians in the Gaza Strip have been displaced internally by Israeli attacks, and many are crammed into overcrowded shelters where they are threatened by the worsening weather, diseases, and acute shortages of food, water, and medicine.
It would be disastrous if the bombardment or the street-to-street fight, taking place in Khan Younis moved further south to Rafah, where a massive 1.3 million people are now in the town bordering Egypt in an attempt to evade the Israeli assault.
Meanwhile, Georgios Petropoulos, the director of the UN Office for Humanitarian Affairs in Gaza has said clearly the months-long war has left 2.2 million people at risk of starvation in the Strip. Everyone in Gaza needs aid now and the war must stop, he said.
On a rainy day, the displaced Palestinian women stand at the entrance of tents flooded by heavy rain in Gaza. Children spend their time in front of makeshift tents during the cold weather as Palestinians who fled their homes take shelter in the city of Rafah.
On other occasions, a woman helps a man lay down on a bed in a makeshift camp where Palestinians took refuge after fleeing their homes. They left their homes to protect themselves from Israeli bombardment.
A man is seen transporting a gas canister on a bicycle on a showery day in Rafah. Displaced Palestinian children in Gaza stand amid tents flooded by heavy rain while a rainbow appears over Rafah. Palestinian men help the women find their way between tents flooded by heavy rain. A displaced Palestinian clears water from a tent drenched by heavy rain. A woman prepares bread in a makeshift tent in Gaza. Displaced Palestinians try to warm up around a fire in the middle of cold and heavy rain.
Death toll reaches over 27,000 Palestinians killed and 64,797 others wounded in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7. The death toll in Israel from the October 7 Hamas attacks stands at 1,139.
