LiveMiddle East latest: 15 killed in Israeli strike on shelter in Gaza, Palestinians say

Palestinian officials in Gaza reported at least 15 dead, including five children, after a strike on a school being used as a shelter, while Syria’s military said an Israeli strike early Thursday wounded two civilians and damaged a military post.

Separately, the Israeli military said Thursday it was looking into whether Hamas’ top leader Yahya Sinwar was killed in a military operation in Gaza.

Israel regularly targets military sites in Syria linked to Iran and to Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group and has escalated its campaign against Hezbollah in recent weeks, after a year of near-daily exchanges of cross-border fire.

Lebanon says more than 2,300 people have been killed in the past year and 77% of public schools are out of service, either due to their use as shelters or their location in areas directly affected by the war.

On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led militants blew holes in Israel’s security fence and stormed in, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting another 250. Israel’s offensive in Gaza has killed over 42,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities, who do not distinguish combatants from civilians. The war has destroyed large areas of Gaza and displaced about 90% of its population of 2.3 million people.

Israel’s military says it has allowed 50 trucks of humanitarian aid into northern Gaza on Wednesday, after the United States warned it to boost aid efforts or risk losing weapons funding. The region has suffered heavy destruction and has been completely encircled by Israeli forces for nearly a year.

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Here’s the latest:

Philippines evacuate dozens of workers from Lebanon

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine government has evacuated dozens of Filipino workers from Lebanon — including one who urged thousands of compatriots to leave the war-hit nation before it’s too late.

The 45 Filipino workers and two children who arrived Thursday in the Philippine capital were a fraction of about 10,000 to 11,000 Filipinos, many of whom have refused to leave their jobs in Lebanon for their poverty-stricken homeland.

“I hope they would return home because it has become too dangerous there,” Felicilda Aboc, a 56-year-old who has worked for 18 years as a house helper in Lebanon, told reporters at Manila’s international airport. She recounted how a powerful blast two years ago shook the house where she worked.

The Philippine government has offered free chartered flights, cash and new livelihood training to encourage Filipinos in Lebanon to return home but has yet to issue a mandatory evacuation order.

“I was told that even if the bombs are in front of them, they may not go home as long as they still have employers,” Philippine Foreign Undersecretary Eduardo de Vega said of the many Filipinos in Lebanon.

Israel’s military looking into whether Hamas leader Sinwar was killed in Gaza

JERUSALEM — The Israeli military said Thursday it was looking into whether Hamas’ top leader Yahya Sinwar was killed in a military operation in Gaza, while an Israeli air strike on a school sheltering displaced Palestinians killed at least 15 people, including five children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

The military did not give any details on the military operation.

The military said in a statement Thursday that three militants were killed during operations in Gaza, without elaborating. It said the identities of the three were so far not confirmed, but it was “checking the possibility” that one of the three was Sinwar.

Sinwar was one of the chief architects of Hamas’ attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. He was chosen as the group’s top leader following the assassination of Ismael Haniyeh in July in an apparent Israeli strike in the Iranian capital Tehran.

German military says it intercepted drone off Lebanese coast

BERLIN — The German military says a German navy ship deployed to the U.N. peacekeeping mission off the Lebanese coast has intercepted and brought down a drone.

The military said a defense system on board the corvette, the Ludwigshafen am Rhein, brought the drone down in the water around 0500 GMT Thursday and that the drone’s explosive load detonated in the process.

It said it did not know where the drone came from. The military didn’t specify the location of the ship at the time of the incident.

The Ludwigshafen am Rhein is currently participating in the UNIFIL mission in Lebanon. Germany also has soldiers at the mission’s headquarters in Naqoura.

Norwegian embassy in Beirut evacuated after receiving bomb threat

OSLO, Norway — Norway’s foreign ministry said the Norwegian embassy in Beirut was evacuated received a “bomb threat” on Thursday. No one has been injured.

A spokeswoman said the small number of Norwegian diplomats in Beirut were all safe.

“The acts of war in Lebanon make the security situation very unpredictable and tense. This threat is another example of that,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Ragnhild Simenstad said.

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“The Foreign Ministry is continuously assessing the situation, including the safety of our colleagues who work in Beirut. The embassy has already implemented measures, as we have routines for in situations like this.”

Strike on Gaza school-turned-shelter kills at least 15

An Israeli strike on a school sheltering displaced people in northern Gaza on Thursday killed at least 15 people, including five children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

The Israeli military said the strike targeted dozens of Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants who had gathered at the school.

The strike hit the Abu Hussein school in Jabaliya, an urban refugee camp in northern Gaza where Israel has been waging a major air and ground operation for more than a week.

Read more here.

Hezbollah official says the group will keep fighting ‘with all available means’

BEIRUT — A Hezbollah official says that the aim of the group’s military command is to keep fighting “with all available means” to prevent Israel from achieving its goals and to eventually agree on a cease-fire.

Legislator Hassan Fadlallah told reporters that since Israel’s invasion began on Oct. 1, Israeli troops have not been able to capture any village.

Fadlallah said the aim of his group now is to stop the war but he refused to go into details saying that Lebanon’s parliament speaker and caretaker prime minister are leading the efforts.

“Our goal today is to end the aggression. We will not go into any detail related to the mechanism or solutions,” he said when asked whether Hezbollah still insists that it will only stop fighting once Israel’s offensive on Gaza stops.

Fadlallah said that Israel has not been able to push deeper into Lebanon, stop Hezbollah rocket fire or create the conditions for its citizens to return to communities in the north near the border, which Israel says is its main war aim.

Strike on Gaza tent camp kills 3

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Palestinian medical officials say an Israeli strike on a tent camp in the Gaza Strip killed three men and wounded eight other people, including women and children.

The bodies were taken to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah after the strike on Thursday. An Associated Press reporter counted the bodies.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.

Israel has repeatedly struck tent camps and schools sheltering displaced people in Gaza. The military says it carries out precise strikes on militants who shelter among civilians, putting them in danger.

Hamas-led militants triggered the war when they stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting around 250 others. Some 100 captives are still inside Gaza, about a third of whom are believed to be dead.

Israel’s offensive has killed over 42,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. It does not differentiate between civilians and combatants but says women and children make up a little more than half of the fatalities.

Iranian foreign minister makes rare visit to Egypt to discuss tensions

CAIRO — Iran’s foreign minister has paid a rare visit to Egypt to discuss regional tensions linked to Israel’s war with Iran-allied groups in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.

Abbas Araghchi met with Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sissi and other top officials on Thursday to discuss ways of de-escalating tensions, according to an Egyptian statement.

Egypt was the first Arab country to make peace with Israel and is a close U.S. ally. Araghchi visited Jordan, another close U.S. ally, on Wednesday.

Israel has vowed to respond to an Iranian ballistic missile attack earlier this month, raising fears of a regionwide war that could draw in the U.S. and its allies.

Egypt and Jordan have repeatedly called for a cease-fire in Gaza, and Egypt has been a key mediator between Israel and Hamas.

Israel says it has killed local Hezbollah commander

JERUSALEM — The Israeli military says it has killed a local Hezbollah commander in a southern Lebanese town near the border.

The military said Thursday that an airstrike on Bint Jbeil killed Hussein Awada, who it said was in charge of firing projectiles into Israel from areas near the town.

Israeli strikes in recent weeks have killed Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, and most of his senior commanders.

Also on Thursday, the Israeli military warned people to stay away from two buildings in the eastern villages of Saraaine and Tamnine, in the Bekaa Valley, where Israel has carried out scores of airstrikes over the past two weeks.

Iranian commander repeats threats to Israel

TEHRAN, Iran — The chief of Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened Israel on Thursday with more missile barrages if it strikes Iran.

“Do not repeat your mistake — if you misbehave, if you strike anything of ours either in the region or in Iran, we will again hit you painfully,” said Gen. Hossein Salami in a funeral ceremony for Iranian Guard commander Abbas Nilforoushan, who was killed alongside the head of the Hezbollah militant group in Beirut in September.

Salami said a missile barrage by Iran on Israel earlier in October in retaliation of killing Nasrallah and Nilforoushan was the “tiniest” action by Iran. He said an air defense battery deployed to Israel by the U.S. will not prevent Iranian retaliation.

“We do know about your weakness, and you know too,” said Salami.

Earlier this month, Iran launched some 180 missiles at Israel in retaliation for the death of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, killed in Iran in July, as well as Nilforoushan and Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who were killed in Israel strikes on Beirut in September.

Iran is the main backer of Hezbollah and supports militant groups opposed to Israel across the region including Hamas.

An Israeli strike wounds 2 in Syria, its military says

DAMASCUS, Syria — Syria’s military says Israel carried out a strike early Thursday in the coastal city of Latakia, wounding two civilians and damaging a military post.

The military statement that was carried by state media did not give further details.

Israel regularly targets military sites in Syria linked to Iran and to Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group. Those strikes have become more frequent after exchanges of fire along the Lebanon-Israel border began in October 2023, with Hezbollah attacking Israeli posts in support of the Palestinians and its ally, Hamas.

The exchanges intensified over the past three weeks, and on Oct. 1, Israel began a ground invasion of southern Lebanon.

US B-2 stealth bombers strike bunkers of Yemen’s Houthi rebels

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Long-range American B-2 stealth bombers launched airstrikes early Thursday morning targeting underground bunkers used by Yemen’s Houthi rebels, officials said.

It wasn’t immediately clear what damage was done in the strikes.

However, there are no previous reports of the B-2 Spirit being used in the strikes targeting the Houthis, who have been attacking ships for months in the Red Sea corridor over the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip.

The Houthis’ al-Masirah satellite news channel reported airstrikes around Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, which the group has held since 2014. They also reported strikes around the Houthi stronghold of Saada. They offered no immediate information on damage or casualties.

United States Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement that the B-2 bombers targeted “five hardened underground weapons storage locations in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen.”

The strike also appeared to be an indirect warning to Iran, the Houthis’ main benefactor, which has targeted Israel with ballistic missile attacks twice over the past year. The nuclear-capable B-2, which first saw action in 1999 in the Kosovo War, is rarely used by the U.S. military in combat as each aircraft is worth some $1 billion.