The Yemeni militia allied with Iran, the Huthi, hijacked a cargo ship in the Red Sea this Sunday due to the Israeli invasion of Gaza. The Israeli army considers it a “very serious incident with global consequences,” although it clarifies that the ship is neither Israeli nor did it have Israelis on board. The Houthis do define it as such and warn that they will continue their military operations until the end of the “horrible aggression” against their “Palestinian brothers in Gaza and the West Bank.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks of a “leap forward in Iranian aggression” through a rebel militia that has already launched missiles and drones against the Jewish State in recent weeks.
Netanyahu has noted that the ship, which was traveling from Turkey to India, is owned by a British company and was operated by a Japanese company. The Al Arabiya television network identifies him as the Galaxy Leader, a Bahamian-flagged cargo ship owned by Ray Shipping, a company partially controlled by a British-Israeli businessman, Abraham Ungar, one of Israel’s richest men. Another ship connected to his companies suffered an explosion in the Gulf of Oman in 2021, for which Israel also blamed Iran.
Two sources from the United States Department of Defense have confirmed to the Associated Press agency that the rebels attacked the cargo ship by descending a rope from a helicopter. Yahya Saree, a Houthi military spokesman, has noted that the ship is now in a port under his control, as is the case in much of Yemen, including the capital. “We are treating the crew in accordance with Islamic principles and values,” he added in a statement. Netanyahu assures that it is made up of 25 people, including Mexicans, Ukrainians, Bulgarians and Filipinos. No Israeli.
Shortly before, the Houthis had announced that they will attack ships owned or operated by Israeli companies, flying their flag or heading to the country. The rebel militia has launched drones and projectiles against Eilat – the southernmost city in Israel, very close to Saudi Arabia – in “revenge” for the deaths in the Strip, which exceed 13,000.
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Meanwhile, in Gaza, the Red Crescent evacuated 31 babies this Sunday from the main hospital, Al Shifa, occupied since last Wednesday by Israeli armored vehicles and soldiers in search – so far, without success – of the famous Hamas command center that The Israeli army places it in its basements and tunnels.
Israel, in need of a positive photo in Gaza to compensate for the destruction caused by its bombings, had proposed it, but the leadership refused. Finally, it was a third party, as the hospital requested. This Saturday, a humanitarian evaluation team with personnel from different UN agencies was the first from an international organization to access the center, which with hardly any electricity, food and water, no longer functions as such. The team, led by the World Health Organization (WHO) and in coordination with the Israeli army, has described it as a “death zone” in which the situation is “desperate” and there are signs of shelling and shooting, “ obvious,” the WHO said in a statement. The team was only there for one hour, for security reasons,
The director general of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, stated that the evacuated babies were “very sick” and that they were transferred in ambulances along with six health workers and 10 family members. The vehicles were from the Red Crescent, which refused to carry out the operation alone, without the umbrella of the UN, after Israel bombed one of its convoys at the gates of the same hospital, on the 4th. The babies, premature and who ended up on a stretcher with aluminum foil to maintain their body heat due to the lack of electricity to power the incubators, were transferred to the neonatal intensive care unit of Al-Helal Al-Emirati, a hospital in the city of Rafah, in southern Gaza, which is partially functional.
There are none operational in the north of the Strip. The WHO explained that new missions are prepared – for the next 24 to 72 hours – to urgently transport the patients and health personnel remaining in Al Shifa to two hospitals in southern Gaza. The final green light depends on guarantees of safe passage by all parties to the conflict. The problem, he noted, is that these two medical centers “are already working above capacity,” so the new referrals “will increase pressure on already overstretched staff and healthcare resources.”
About 260 patients and 25 health workers remain in Al Shifa, according to the UN team. There are no longer displaced people, who numbered in the tens of thousands at the height of the aerial bombardments. On Saturday, the Israeli troops who already occupied the center gave the evacuation order to the 2,500 still in the compound. The Palestinians left it heading south, waving white cloths, in the shape of a flag, so that no one would open fire on them.
“Very minor” fringes
At the diplomatic level, the Prime Minister of Qatar, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al Thani, stated this Sunday that there are only “very minor” issues left to reach an agreement between Israel and Hamas for the release of dozens of hostages kidnapped by the fundamentalist militia in the attack of October 7. “The challenges facing the agreement are simply practical and logistical,” he said at a press conference in Doha with the head of EU diplomacy, Josep Borrell. Shortly before, the White House clarified that the pact is not yet sealed. “We have not reached an agreement yet, but we continue to work hard to reach it,” wrote Adrienne Watson, spokesperson for the National Security Council, on X (formerly Twitter).
The Israeli government is divided over the agreement, between those who advocate expanding the offensive to pressure Hamas to lower its demands and those who fear that the opportunity will be wasted and that other hostages will die in the bombings, according to the newspaper. Haaretz. It would consist of the release of between 50 and 70 mothers and children, in exchange for between three and five days of humanitarian pause, and the release of 150 Palestinian minors and women. They would be part of the around 240 hostages in the Strip. They are mainly in the hands of Hamas, but also Islamic Jihad, other smaller armed groups and even civilians.
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