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JD Vance has ‘great optimism’ truce will hold as he prepares to meet Netanyahu
US vice-president JD Vance expressed “great optimism” that the Gaza truce would hold, before a meeting on Wednesday in Jerusalem with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.
Vance is in Israel to shore up support for the US-brokered ceasefire and postwar reconstruction plans.
Despite concerns in Israel that Hamas has seized on the pause to reassert itself in Gaza, Vance said Washington would not set a deadline for the group to disarm under the US-brokered deal.
That came after Donald Trump warned that allied nations in the region would invade Gaza to wipe out Hamas if it failed to comply with the truce.
Vance said during a press conference in Kiryat Gat, a city in southern Israel where a US-led mission is monitoring the Gaza ceasefire:
What we’ve seen the past week gives me great optimism the ceasefire is going to hold
I think that everybody should be proud of where we are today. It’s going to require constant effort. It’s going to require constant monitoring and supervision
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Here are some of the latest photos from Gaza coming through over the wires:
Australian visa holders in Gaza have the paperwork they need to flee the razed Palestinian territory but remain trapped due to closed borders, prompting refugee advocates to intensify calls for support.
Ahmed Abumarzouq’s two nephews were granted humanitarian visas on 15 October – two days after all living Israeli hostages were returned to Israel under the tentative Gaza ceasefire plan, which has not yet produced a possible border re-opening. For the small number who are eligible for Australian consular assistance – those whose immediate family members are citizens or permanent residents – the pathway to Australia is still complex.
Abumarzouq’s two nephews, aged 18 and 19, are ineligible for this assistance. All the teenagers can now do is wait in their makeshift home in Gaza City for the territory’s Rafah crossing – controlled by Israeli forces – to open.
I was hoping that the border will open and I’d be able to get them out,” said Abumarzouq, a chief financial officer with the Western Australian government who lived through multiple wars in Gaza before moving to Perth in 2014.
But, there’s not really anything I can do.
You can read the full piece from Daisy Dumas and Adeshola Ore here: Palestinians in Gaza with Australian visas remain trapped as Israel keeps borders closed
The top United Nations court is set to give an opinion on Wednesday on Israel’s legal obligations to ensure desperately needed humanitarian aid reaches Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, the Associated Press (AP) reports.
The UN general assembly asked the international court of justice last year to give an advisory opinion on Israel’s legal obligations after the country effectively banned the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, the main provider of aid to Gaza, from operating in the territory.
Advisory opinions carry significant legal weight and experts say the case could have broader ramifications for the UN and its missions worldwide.
The proceedings predate the current fragile US-brokered Gaza ceasefire agreement, which took effect on 10 October. Under the agreement, 600 humanitarian aid trucks are to be allowed to enter daily.
The UN has announced plans to ramp up aid shipments into Gaza. On Monday, Hamas chief negotiator Khalil al-Hayya told Egypt’s Al-Qahera News that Israel has complied with aid deliveries per the ceasefire agreement.
During the hearings in April, Palestinian ambassador to the Netherlands Ammar Hijazi told the 15-judge panel that Israel was “starving, killing and displacing Palestinians while also targeting and blocking humanitarian organisations trying to save their lives.”
Israel denied it violated international law, saying the proceedings are biased, and did not attend the hearings. However, the country provided a 38-page written submission for the court to consider.
JD Vance has ‘great optimism’ truce will hold as he prepares to meet Netanyahu
US vice-president JD Vance expressed “great optimism” that the Gaza truce would hold, before a meeting on Wednesday in Jerusalem with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.
Vance is in Israel to shore up support for the US-brokered ceasefire and postwar reconstruction plans.
Despite concerns in Israel that Hamas has seized on the pause to reassert itself in Gaza, Vance said Washington would not set a deadline for the group to disarm under the US-brokered deal.
That came after Donald Trump warned that allied nations in the region would invade Gaza to wipe out Hamas if it failed to comply with the truce.
Vance said during a press conference in Kiryat Gat, a city in southern Israel where a US-led mission is monitoring the Gaza ceasefire:
What we’ve seen the past week gives me great optimism the ceasefire is going to hold
I think that everybody should be proud of where we are today. It’s going to require constant effort. It’s going to require constant monitoring and supervision
Opening summary
Hello and welcome to our continuing Middle East coverage.
JD Vance has expressed “great optimism” that the Gaza truce would hold, during a visit to Israel aimed at shoring up support for a ceasefire and postwar reconstruction plans.
The US vice-president – who was preparing to meet Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday – said “I think that everybody should be proud of where we are today. It’s going to require constant effort. It’s going to require constant monitoring and supervision.”
Despite concerns in Israel that Hamas has seized on the pause to reassert itself in Gaza, Vance said Washington would not set a deadline for the group to disarm under the US-brokered deal.
That came after Donald Trump warned that allied nations in the region would invade Gaza to wipe out Hamas if it failed to comply with the truce.
Meanwhile there have been tensions after Hamas said it needed time and technical assistance to find the remaining dead Israeli hostages. The Israeli military said on Wednesday the remains of two more hostages returned the day before had been identified.
Hamas has now released 13 of the 28 hostage bodies pledged to be returned under the deal, but say the search is hampered by the level of destruction in the territory.
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The top United Nations court will rule on Wednesday on Israel’s obligations towards agencies providing humanitarian assistance to Palestinians in Gaza, as aid groups scramble to scale up assistance after a ceasefire. Judges at the International Court of Justice in The Hague have been asked for an “advisory opinion” laying out Israel’s duty to facilitate aid in Gaza.
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At a press conference in Israel on Tuesday, JD Vance referred to Hamas as a “terrorist organisation” and said the Israeli army was “defending itself” throughout the conflict. He said there is “a lot of work left to do” and that it is going to take a “long time” and thanked the Israeli government.
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Vance said that unless Hamas disarms, “very bad things are going to happen”. But he declined to put a deadline on Hamas disarming, adding: “I don’t think it’s actually advisable to say this has to be done in a week.”
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Meanwhile, Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner said there had been “surprisingly strong communication” between the United Nations and Israel over humanitarian aid. He echoed Vance’s comments about people “getting a little hysterical about supposed incursions” of the ceasefire.
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International organisations said they were scaling up humanitarian aid entering Gaza, while Hamas-led security forces launched a crackdown against what it called price gouging by private merchants. The World Food Program said it had sent more than 530 trucks into Gaza in the past 10 days, enough to feed nearly half a million people for two weeks. That’s still well under the 500 to 600 that entered daily before the war.
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Israel urged Canadian prime minister Mark Carney to drop his pledge to honour the international criminal court’s arrest warrant for prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he travelled to the country. Carney was asked in an interview with Bloomberg published last week if he would fulfil the commitment of his predecessor Justin Trudeau to arrest Netanyahu on war crimes charges if he came to Canada, to which he replied “yes”.
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The Gaza health ministry said that Israel has transferred the bodies of 15 further Palestinian people to Gaza as part of the ceasefire. The International Committee of the Red Cross handed over the bodies to the Nasser hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis, it said.
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The EU has been criticised for pausing sanctions against Israel’s government in response to Donald Trump’s peacemaking efforts in the Middle East, as the fragile ceasefire came under threat. After meeting EU foreign ministers on Monday, the European foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, announced a pause on efforts to suspend preferential trade with Israel and sanctions against people responsible for fuelling the conflict on both sides.
