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LAST UPDATE | 13 May 2021
*Updated at 08.40 AM Friday
THE ISRAELI MILITARY continued its assault on the Gaza Strip as part of the ongoing military operation against the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, but clarified reports that its ground troops were entering Gaza.
On Thursday night, the Israel Defense Forces said, “IDF air and ground troops are currently attacking in the Gaza Strip”, prompting concerns of a major escalation in Palestinian territory.
However, the IDF later clarified that an “internal miscommunication” had resulted in the incorrect information being released, saying its troops were continuing ground operations “against Palestinian militants”, but not inside Gaza.
As violence escalated throughout the day, Israeli security forces also scrambled to contain deadly riots between Jews and Arabs, with projectiles also fired on Israel from Lebanon.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Washington was “deeply concerned about the violence in the streets of Israel”, voicing support for a United Nations Security Council meeting “early next week” on the crisis.
“We believe that Israelis and Palestinians deserve equal measures of freedom, security, dignity and prosperity,” Blinken said.
There were intense artillery exchanges tonight, and AFP reporters saw Israeli troops assembling at the security barrier.
Balls of flames rose high into the sky after strikes smashed into densely packed Gaza.
Dozens of rockets were fired from Gaza towards the southern Israeli coastal cities of Ashdod and Ashkelon, and in the vicinity of Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport.
“We are prepared, and continue to prepare for various scenarios,” Conricus said, earlier describing a ground offensive as “one scenario”.
In Gaza, AFP photographers said people were evacuating their homes in the northeastern part of the enclave ahead of possible Israeli attacks, with Hamas, the Islamist group that controls Gaza, warning of a “heavy response” to a possible ground incursion.
‘Massive reinforcement’
With the conflict showing no signs of easing, Israel has been rocked by an unprecedented wave of mob violence, in which both Arabs and Jews have been savagely beaten and police stations attacked.
Defence Minister Benny Gantz ordered a “massive reinforcement” to suppress the internal unrest.
Despite global alarm and diplomatic efforts to de-escalate Gaza hostilities, which US President Joe Biden said he hoped would end “sooner than later”, hundreds of rockets again tore through the skies.
The heavy bombardments coincided with the start of Eid al-Fitr, which marks the end of the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan, and saw the faithful pray at mosques and amid the rubble of Gaza’s collapsed buildings.
Israel’s air force launched multiple air strikes, targeting locations linked to Hamas, with the air force saying jets had struck a “military compound” of the group’s “intelligence headquarters”.
At least 103 people have been killed since Monday, including 27 children, and more than 580 wounded, the health ministry in Gaza said.
Heavy bombardments have brought down entire tower blocks.
Inside Israel, seven people have been killed since Monday, including one six-year-old, after a rocket struck a family home.
‘Preventing pogroms’
The Israeli military said it had hit targets in Gaza more than 600 times while 1,750 rockets were fired from the enclave.
Hundreds of rockets were intercepted by the Iron Dome air defence system.
Three rockets were also fired from southern Lebanon towards Israel, landing in the Mediterranean Sea, Israel’s army said.
A source close to Israel’s arch-enemy Hezbollah said the Lebanese Shiite group had no link to the incident.
The military escalation was triggered by weekend unrest at Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa mosque compound, which is sacred to both Muslims and Jews.
The disturbances, in which riot police had repeatedly clashed with Palestinians, has been driven by anger over the looming evictions of Palestinian families from the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood of east Jerusalem.
The surging tensions sparked clashes in many of Israel’s mixed towns where Jews live alongside Arabs, who make up about 20% of the country’s population.
Nearly 1,000 border police were called in to quell the violence, and over 400 people were arrested.
Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said inter-communal violence in multiple towns was at a nadir not seen for decades, and that police were “literally preventing pogroms”.
‘Two-front battle’
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said police were increasing their use of force, warning of the “option” of deploying soldiers in towns.
Israeli far-right groups have clashed with security forces and Arab Israelis, with television footage Wednesday airing footage of a far-right mob beating a man they considered an Arab in Bat Yam, near Tel Aviv, leaving him with serious injuries.
In Lod, which has become a flashpoint of Arab-Jewish clashes this week with an Arab resident shot dead and a synagogue torched, a gunman opened fire Thursday at a group of Jews, wounding one.
Netanyahu said the violence was “unacceptable”.
“Nothing justifies the lynching of Arabs by Jews, and nothing justifies the lynching of Jews by Arabs,” he said, adding Israel was fighting a battle “on two fronts”.
Amid the rocket fire, Israel’s civil aviation authority said it had diverted all incoming passenger flights headed for Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport to Ramon airport in the south.
Hamas announced it had also fired a rocket at Ramon, in a bid to stop all air traffic to Israel.
Israeli media said the rocket missed its target, but a number of international airlines cancelled flights amid the aerial onslaught.
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I didn’t know she was broke.
What she sees in that billionaire I’ll never know…
Because small bald 84 year old men are every womans dream.
True love she’s not after his money
Her last husband was a bi sexual, her new husband is a buy sexual.
Best of luck to them. She deserves to be loved and secure after all she put up with from Jagger.
Is she guaranteed security from someone with 3 ex wives?
I wonder, does he move like Jagger?
Lovely couple. Wish ‘em all the best
Bill Wyman’s carer could have dressed him a bit better in that photo with the Geldofs. The reason I assume she’s his carer as she’s far too old to be his girlfriend.
4 times a charm. This should be his last marriage. At his age he surely hasn’t the time to break up with Jerry, meet someone else & marry them.
His kids look happy – wave goodbye to the inheritance
Only getting 3 billion each instead of 4 billion. How on earth will they survive?
She may be banking on his failing circulation, not to mention the newspapers.
” without Viagra”, the blonde stunner said, ” I can’t get no satisfaction”
I think the Irish equivalent would be DOB marrying Shirley Templebar.
So jerry, what first attracted you to the billionaire Rupert Murdoch???
She can wake up in the morning and think how great it is to be 24 younger than her billionaire lover.at least he is a kind sensitive soul.
Will Rupert,be able for a “harlem shuffle” with Jerry?
No, Start me Up, is his favourite.
Sympathy for the Devil
Bianca jagger isn’t looking so great
Sympathy for the Devil?
Can’t understand why she married an old man those cock is impotence!
I’d say somebody put him up to it ;-)
There’s still lead for a good story in the media moguls pencil.
Tracy Emin looking good…
59 ? Yeah right
What about her?
Hall pass?
His winding up British journalist by going to that church !
have your say