Israel’s war on Gaza updates: US vetoes ceasefire as north Gaza starves

This live page is now closed. Follow along with our coverage of Israel’s war on Gaza here.

To learn more about the US decision to veto a UN Security Council draft resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, you can read our coverage here.

You can also read about the latest developments in a case before the International Court of Justice regarding the legality of Israel’s decades-long occupation of the Palestinian territories, which critics have said constitutes a system of apartheid.

We will be closing the live blog soon. Here’s a recap of the day’s main events.

• The United States vetoed a resolution introduced by Algeria at the UN Security Council calling for an immediate ceasefire, the third time it has blocked such measures since Israel began its offensive in Gaza.
• The World Food Programme announced suspending aid deliveries to northern Gaza, citing a “breakdown of social order” in an area of the territory where extreme hunger is spreading amid an Israeli blockade.
• Clashes were reported in Jenin in the occupied West Bank as Israel stepped up its military raids in the Palestinian territory.
• Hamas and the Islamic Jihad reported attacks against Israeli troops in Gaza City, in the north of the besieged enclave.
• Colombian President Gustavo Petro voiced support for Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva who is facing outrage in Israel over comparing the war on Gaza with the Holocaust.
• The Gaza Health Ministry said 103 people were killed in Israeli attacks in the previous 24 hours.
• UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini said Israel has yet to provide the agency with evidence for allegations that 12 of its employees took part in the October 7 attacks on Israel.

The Lebanese group says it fired rockets and targeted a group of Israeli troops in a base on the eastern side of the border.

The attacks also included targeting Israeli army positions in the disputed Shebaa Farms, which Lebanon claims as its own.

The White House has been saying it is working on a strategy to combat Islamophobia – an effort that has been largely dismissed by Muslim-American advocates as a ploy to distract from Washington’s unconditional backing for the war on Gaza.

But as Biden faces mounting outrage from Arab and Muslim Americans, today, he is holding a fundraiser with outspoken Israel advocate Haim Saban, according to US media reports.

In 2015, Saban called for more “scrutiny” of Muslims broadly, suggesting that civil liberties can be suspended in the name of security.

“I’m not suggesting we put Muslims through some kind of a torture room to get them to admit that they are or they’re not terrorists,” Saban told TheWrap publication at that time. “But I am saying we should have more scrutiny.”

Additionally to reigniting anger over his “unwavering” support for Israel, Biden’s association with Saban has raised questions over the US president’s commitment to fighting bigotry at home.

Palestinian politician and rights advocate Mustafa Barghouti has denounced the US veto against a UN Security Council ceasefire resolution, saying that the decision is a green light for Israel to continue its abuses in Gaza.

“USA used the Veto power to block a UN security council resolution of immediate ceasefire in Gaza although 13 out of 15 members supported it,” Barghouti said in a social media post.

“A shameful American position allowing the continuation of the Genocide, collective punishment and starvation of 2.3 million Palestinians.”

Dawisson Belem Lopes, a professor of international and comparative politics at the Federal University of Minas Gerais in Brazil, has stressed the geopolitical weight of Brazil in the Global South, given the size of its population, territory and economy.

“When Brazil speaks, it projects [the] voice of South America to the rest of the world,” Belem Lopes said.

Lula had outraged Israeli leaders when he compared the mass killing of Palestinians in Gaza to the Holocaust. His remarks turned into a major diplomatic spat as Brazil recalled its ambassador from Israel.

“Lula, the president of Brazil, has found something to fight for, and which can be very rewarding for him … in international affairs,” Belem Lopes told Al Jazeera.

The humanitarian group’s CEO Tjada D’Oyen McKenna has decried the Security Council’s inability to pass the draft resolution calling for a ceasefire, which was blocked by the US.

“The Biden Administration has acknowledged that innocent people are starving in Gaza,” D’Oyen McKenna said in a statement.

“Yet, it is impossible to deliver the scale of humanitarian assistance needed to avert mass starvation and death under the current conditions. Let’s be clear – these outcomes are entirely preventable. As we have said for months, a ceasefire is the only way to save innocent lives. The Security Council must reconvene to pass a resolution to that end.”

The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) has said that Israel continues to detain 12 members of its staff, including seven who were arrested during an Israeli raid on Al-Amal Hospital nearly two weeks ago. Israel has faced allegations of disappearing medical workers and doctors throughout the current war.

“PRCS expresses deep concern for the safety of its detained teams, whose fate remains unknown, and calls on the international community to urgently intervene to pressure the Israeli occupation authorities to immediately release our detained teams,” the group said in a social media post.

Izzat al-Rishq says the Israeli prime minister is misleading relatives of the captives by saying that Israelis held in Gaza can be freed by force.

“The victory Netanyahu is seeking is a mirage that only exists in his imagination,” al-Rishq said in a statement.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) says Muslim Americans are “running out of words” to decry the US president’s support for the “genocide” in Gaza.

“The latest US veto of a UN ceasefire resolution is shameful. President Biden should stop acting like Benjamin Netanyahu’s defense lawyer and start acting like the President of the United States,” CAIR director Nihad Awad said in a statement.

“We call on the American people to continue expressing their opposition to the Biden administration’s support for the Israeli government’s war crimes by contacting the White House and their elected officials and calling on them to demand a ceasefire, access to humanitarian aid, and the pursuit of a just, lasting peace.”

It is a little after 11:35pm (20:35 GMT) in the occupied Palestinian territories and Rafah. Here’s a summary of the recent events:

• The US has vetoed a UN Security Council proposal calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, sparking global outrage and accusations of complicity in Israeli abuses.
• Hamas and the Islamic Jihad say their fighters engaged in fierce fighting with Israeli forces in Gaza City.
• Fighting erupts after Israeli forces raid Jenin in the occupied West Bank; Israeli sources report an air raid in the Palestinian city.
• Yemen’s Houthis claim an attack on US Navy ships as the US military confirms that Houthi drones targeted two commercial vessels yesterday.
• Rights advocates warn that deadly hunger may spread in northern Gaza after the UN World Food Programme decided to suspend aid deliveries there due to the deteriorating security situation.

Agnes Callamard, the director of the human rights group Amnesty International, has said that Washington had a chance to protect Palestinian civilians but chose “the opposite path” at the UN Security Council.

“And yet again… when the US could do the right thing: protect Palestinians against serious risks of genocide; respect international law and universality; prevent massive killings and sufferings – it chose the opposite path,” Callamard said.

While the US has said that it cast the sole vote against the ceasefire resolution because it did not pave the way towards “lasting” peace, the overwhelming majority of UN member states have come out in support of such a step over the last several months.

The United States has, for the third time, used is veto power in the UN Security Council to kill a resolution aimed at bringing an end to the fighting in Gaza.

Watch our video to see US envoy Linda Thomas-Greefield’s reasoning:

Gustavo Petro has voiced “complete solidarity” with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who is feuding with Israel over comments he made comparing Israel’s war on Gaza to the Holocaust.

“I express my complete solidarity to President Lula of Brazil. In Gaza there is a genocide and thousands of children, women and elderly civilians are cowardly murdered,” Petro said in a social media post today.

“Lula has only spoken the truth and the truth is defended or barbarism will annihilate us. The entire region must unite to immediately end the violence in Palestine.”

US President Joe Biden has arrived in Los Angeles, where he will attend a fundraiser at the home of pro-Israel donor Haim Saban.

The event is expected to draw protests, as schisms emerge within the Democratic Party as progressives express outrage over the Biden administration’s continued support for Israel’s war in Gaza, which has killed more than 29,000 Palestinians, the majority of them women and children, and been described as one of the most destructive military campaigns in modern history.

Saban has famously described himself as a “one-issue guy”, with the issue being support for Israel.

Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Ministry has released a statement expressing disappointment over the US decision to veto a UN Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza.

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs expresses the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s regret over the veto of the draft resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and its surroundings, which was submitted by the People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria to the Security Council on behalf of the Arab countries,” the ministry said in a social media post.

Riyad Mansour tells Al Jazeera that it is “very regrettable” that the US used its veto power to kill yet another UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

“Call it whatever, humanitarian, describe it as you wish, but immediate ceasefire, as requested by the secretary-general of the UN, and almost all humanitarian agencies of the United Nations, and a massive number of countries in the General Assembly,” he said.

“It is the wrong message to be sending by the Security Council to Israel,” he continued, adding that Palestine will not give up its efforts to find sympathy at the UN.

“We will continue knocking on the door of the Security Council, the General Assembly, all components of the United Nations,” he said.

When asked for a response to US envoy Linda Thomas-Greenfield’s justification for the veto, that a ceasefire would harm now-stalled negotiations for a truce deal, Mansour was dismissive.

“That is not true, because two of those who are involved in these sensitive negotiations the representatives of Qatar and Egypt indicated that that is not so,” he said.

“A ceasefire will help the negotiation to move forward swiftly, and to accomplish the objective of the exchange of prisoners, and hostages”.

Shaina Low, of the Norwegian Refugee Council, an organisation that works to distribute aid in the Gaza Strip, says that extreme danger to humanitarian workers factored heavily into the World Food Programme’s decision to halt aid deliveries to northern Gaza.

Earlier today, we reported on the WFP’s decision to halt these aid deliveries, citing the chaos there caused by starvation and the “breakdown of social order”.

“In any other context, humanitarians would be pulling out at this point because it is simply so dangerous, and there are no guarantees of the safety of humanitarian staff,” she told Al Jazeera from occupied East Jerusalem.

The dangers, she said, include “Israeli targeting of convoys, Israeli targeting of police who are there to protect aid convoys, and then of course due to the desperation, because of the lack of aid that’s getting in, there’s just been a deterioration of civil order in Gaza that’s led to the charging and looting of aid convoys as they’re trying to make their way.”

Low explained that in Rafah, aid convoys were accompanied by Palestinian police officers to ensure order during distribution, but that this is no longer the case because the Israeli army targeted these aid convoys in order to kill the Palestinian police.