October 23, 2025
The US and Israeli-created GHF began operations in May, but the amount of aid it distributed was negligible for Gaza’s roughly 2 million people, aid groups and some Israeli officials have said.
At the same time, Israel sought to cut off aid distribution from the UN and international humanitarian groups in Gaza as part of its effort to starve Palestinians and force them to move to the southern region of the strip.
At least 1,000 Palestinians were killed by live fire from Israeli troops while seeking food from GHF sites, which have been described as “death traps.”
The GHF stopped operations in the strip after the ceasefire was reached in Gaza earlier this month. The distribution of humanitarian aid to the starving Palestinian population is once again being led by the UN.
But the GHF is now lobbying for a role in post-war Gaza, four people familiar with the matter told FT.
US-Israeli businessman and GHF founder Michael Eisenberg is in discussions with senior US military officers and officials at the Civil-Military Coordination Center (CMCC), a multinational body established by US President Donald Trump to monitor the ceasefire between Hamas and Israel.
According to Hebrew media reports, Eisenberg will be appointed as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s personal representative to the CMMC.
The GHF is proposing that it continue its role of operating food distribution centers in Gaza territory still under Israeli military control, managing logistics hubs for reconstruction, or supplying aid to other foreign aid groups.
The foundation is seeking to continue, but “under a different cover,” sources familiar with Gaza humanitarian issues told FT.
The “founders are on to bigger and better things, and bigger and better deals,” the sources added.
“In principle, they’re supposed to be done, but the people behind GHF are poking around … telling [US officials] how successful it was,” said one former senior Israeli official.
Salim, a 19-year-old Palestinian displaced to a tent with his family in the so-called Al-Mawasi safe zone on the Gaza coast, told FT he was happy the GHF had ceased operations.
“It was humiliating, but we were forced to go because there was no food to buy and we had little money. If they reopen, I won’t go again,” he said.
Israeli fighter jets launched a
massive and deadly wave of airstrikes on eastern Lebanon on 23 October,
coinciding with reports that Tel Aviv will not allow any reconstruction of the
southern border villages, which were destroyed by Israel.
Violent air raids hit the western part of the Bekaa Valley and the outskirts of Hermel, as well as the town of Shmistar, where a school was damaged by the attacks.
Two people were killed, according to a preliminary Lebanese Health Ministry toll. Video footage shows several blasts from the strikes.
Israeli drones also flew at low altitude over Beirut and the south.
The Israeli army claimed it struck a Hezbollah precision missile production site, as well as a “camp used for training by Hezbollah terrorists.”
Israel has been launching near-daily attacks on Lebanon since the ceasefire agreement reached last year.
These attacks have escalated in recent days, coinciding with increased US pressure on the Lebanese government to quickly implement a cabinet decision on disarming the resistance, which was adopted by Beirut in August.
However, Hezbollah rejects the decision. It says it is willing to discuss a defense strategy that would incorporate its weapons into the Lebanese army for use in defending the country from attacks when needed.
Yet the resistance group refuses to engage in any such discussions until Israel ends its attacks on Lebanon and withdraws from the several hilltops it occupied after the ceasefire.
During the war, which began in October 2023 and escalated into a full-scale assault in September 2024, Lebanon’s southern border villages were wiped out by Israel.
Since the ceasefire was reached in November, Israeli occupation forces continued to rig and detonate Lebanese homes along the border. Tens of thousands of houses and buildings have been destroyed.
Recent Israeli airstrikes on Lebanon have destroyed reconstruction equipment, aimed at preventing Lebanon from rebuilding. Israel claims the equipment is used by Hezbollah to rebuild infrastructure.
“There is no reason for civilians and buildings to exist near the border fence – they serve as a civilian cover for Hezbollah,” an Israeli security source told Saudi news channel Al-Hadath on Thursday.
The source said any withdrawal from southern Lebanon would be a “political decision,” while adding that Israel has “targeted more than 300 Hezbollah members since the ceasefire.”
“We are operating within a coordination mechanism cooperating with Washington, UNIFIL, and the Lebanese army,” the sources went on to say, referring to a ceasefire mechanism established after the war to oversee violations of the agreement.
The mechanism has failed to prevent Israel from attacking Lebanon. Tel Aviv claims Hezbollah is rearming and reconstituting itself in violation of the agreement.
As part of the truce, the Lebanese army deployed across south Lebanon and dismantled several Hezbollah sites south of the Litani River.
Hezbollah has withdrawn to the north of the river with its heavy weapons, in line with the deal.
The presence of Israeli troops inside Lebanon has hindered the Lebanese army’s implementation of the ceasefire. Lebanese troops have been attacked by Israeli forces and drones several times.
In the last few days, the rhetoric in Israeli media has also escalated.
According to the Jerusalem Post, Israeli forces recently conducted around 30 hours of training, simulating a Hezbollah invasion of the Galilee.
Hezbollah’s former secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah, who was assassinated last year, warned years ago that an Israeli assault on Lebanon could trigger Hezbollah to invade the Galilee. After targeting and assassinating leaders of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Unit in September last year, Tel Aviv claimed it had completely thwarted the “Galilee Invasion Plan” – as it called it at the time.
Now, a senior Israeli military source tells the Jerusalem Post that during the simulation this week, “there were places where battalions failed their missions severely.” The source said some Israeli units had to be replaced mid-drill or recover from serious setbacks.
The source also noted, however, that Hezbollah has been weakened, and that any assault would come as a surprise. He said that despite the drill being designed to “overload the system,” there was no “collapse” within the Israeli military’s ranks.
“We have no choice but to learn from the failures of 7 October,” he added.
The report comes after new US threats against Lebanon. “If Beirut fails to act, Hezbollah’s military wing will inevitably face a major confrontation with Israel, at a moment when Israel is at peak strength and Iranian support for Hezbollah is at its weakest,” US envoy Tom Barrack said on Monday.
“Lebanon now faces a defining choice: to seize the path of national renewal or remain mired in paralysis and decline,” he added.
The International Court of
Justice (ICJ) ruled on 22 October that Israel, as the occupying power in Gaza,
is legally obliged to ensure the local population is adequately supplied with
essential goods and services and to support relief efforts carried out by UN
agencies.
This includes the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), which has been responsible for providing relief and assistance to Palestinian refugees and remains deeply integrated into Gaza’s local infrastructure, supplying food, water, healthcare, and shelter.
Presiding judge Yuji Iwasawa, delivering the ruling at The Hague, said Israel “may never invoke reasons of security to justify the general suspension of all humanitarian activities in occupied territory.”
He stressed that the occupying power must “use all means at its disposal so that these items are distributed in a regular, fair, and non-discriminatory manner,” and must refrain from violence against civilians seeking relief.
The court found that Palestinians in Gaza “have been inadequately supplied within the meaning of Article 59 of the Fourth Geneva Convention,” and ordered Israel to “agree to and facilitate relief schemes” provided by the UN and other impartial humanitarian bodies.
Rejecting Israeli claims that UNRWA had been infiltrated by Hamas, the judges said the information presented was “not sufficient to establish UNRWA’s lack of neutrality.”
They emphasized that “there is no evidence that UNRWA as an entity breached the principle of impartiality” or discriminated based on “nationality, race, religious belief, class, or political opinion.”
The court added that UNRWA has become “an indispensable provider of humanitarian relief” and “cannot be replaced on short notice and without a proper transition plan.”
It also noted that Israel had “blocked the delivery of humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip starting from 2 March 2025” and only allowed limited deliveries to resume in May, leaving no replacement system for over 10 weeks.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres welcomed the ruling and urged Israel “to comply with its obligations.” His spokesperson said the opinion “will be decisive to improve the tragic situation in Gaza.”
The Israeli Foreign Ministry dismissed the ruling, calling it “shameful,” and claimed it “fully upholds its obligations under international law.”
Yet on the ground, Israel continues to restrict aid deliveries despite the declared ceasefire.
According to Gaza’s Government Media Office, only 986 out of 6,600 planned aid trucks have entered the strip since the ceasefire began on 11 October, amounting to barely 15 percent of the agreed amount.
Officials said the limited supplies of food, fuel, and gas fall far short of the 600 trucks per day promised under the truce, accusing Israel of maintaining a “policy of strangulation and starvation” against nearly two million residents.
Israel’s Knesset passed two West
Bank annexation bills on 22 October following preliminary readings, despite
opposition from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Likud party.
The first bill called for applying Israeli “sovereignty” over all settlements in the occupied West Bank. It passed with 25–24 votes in the Knesset.
A more limited bill focusing on the annexation of the Maale Adumim settlement passed with a vote of 32–9. Both bills require another three readings.
All members of Netanyahu’s Likud boycotted the vote except for MK Yuli Edelstein.
“Israeli sovereignty in all parts of our homeland is the order of the day,” Edelstein said in a statement.
The lawmaker was reportedly removed from the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee as a result.
The passing of the two bills – described by the Times of Israel as an “embarrassment” to Netanyahu – coincided with visits to Israel by US Vice President JD Vance, envoy Steve Witkoff, and US President Donald Trump's former advisor Jared Kushner.
Trump’s government has previously announced opposition to Israeli plans for annexing the occupied West Bank.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday, before departing for Israel, that annexation plans could threaten the ceasefire agreement in Gaza.
“They passed a vote in the Knesset, but the president has made clear that’s not something we’d be supportive of right now. We think there’s potential for [it to be even] threatening to the peace deal,” Rubio said.
Israel has rapidly accelerated the expansion of illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank recently.
Last month, Netanyahu signed off on reviving the controversial E1 settlement project. The project aims to link Maale Adumim to occupied East Jerusalem – which is viewed as integral to a future Palestinian state.
Settlers have also escalated brutal attacks on Palestinian communities, forced displacement, and illegal land grabs.
Israel’s expansion in the occupied West Bank comes in response to the recent recognition of Palestine by several European and western countries.
A few months ago, Israel's cabinet voted to take full responsibility for land registration in Area C of the occupied West Bank – an area comprising around 60 percent of the territory and home to the vast majority of Israeli settlements. The move was described as a de facto annexation.
In a statement, Hamas said Wednesday’s Knesset votes “expose the ugly face of the Zionist colonial occupation, which insists on pursuing its attempts to ‘legalize’ settlement activity and impose Zionist ‘sovereignty’ over occupied Palestinian land – in blatant violation of all relevant international laws and resolutions.”
“We affirm that the occupation’s frenzied attempts to annex West Bank territory are null and void and will not alter the reality that the West Bank is Palestinian land – as affirmed by history, international law, and the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice issued in 2024,” it added.
At least 1,000 Palestinians
seeking food from GHF sites in Gaza were shot and killed by Israeli troops
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation
(GHF), a deadly aid scheme operating in the Gaza Strip, is in talks with US and
Israeli officials about a potential new post-war role in the enclave, the
Financial Times (FT) reported on 23 October.
The US and Israeli-created GHF began operations in May, but the amount of aid it distributed was negligible for Gaza’s roughly 2 million people, aid groups and some Israeli officials have said.
At the same time, Israel sought to cut off aid distribution from the UN and international humanitarian groups in Gaza as part of its effort to starve Palestinians and force them to move to the southern region of the strip.
At least 1,000 Palestinians were killed by live fire from Israeli troops while seeking food from GHF sites, which have been described as “death traps.”
The GHF stopped operations in the strip after the ceasefire was reached in Gaza earlier this month. The distribution of humanitarian aid to the starving Palestinian population is once again being led by the UN.
But the GHF is now lobbying for a role in post-war Gaza, four people familiar with the matter told FT.
US-Israeli businessman and GHF founder Michael Eisenberg is in discussions with senior US military officers and officials at the Civil-Military Coordination Center (CMCC), a multinational body established by US President Donald Trump to monitor the ceasefire between Hamas and Israel.
According to Hebrew media reports, Eisenberg will be appointed as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s personal representative to the CMMC.
The GHF is proposing that it continue its role of operating food distribution centers in Gaza territory still under Israeli military control, managing logistics hubs for reconstruction, or supplying aid to other foreign aid groups.
The foundation is seeking to continue, but “under a different cover,” sources familiar with Gaza humanitarian issues told FT.
The “founders are on to bigger and better things, and bigger and better deals,” the sources added.
“In principle, they’re supposed to be done, but the people behind GHF are poking around … telling [US officials] how successful it was,” said one former senior Israeli official.
Salim, a 19-year-old Palestinian displaced to a tent with his family in the so-called Al-Mawasi safe zone on the Gaza coast, told FT he was happy the GHF had ceased operations.
“It was humiliating, but we were forced to go because there was no food to buy and we had little money. If they reopen, I won’t go again,” he said.
The massive attacks on the Bekaa
region coincided with reports that the Israeli army recently simulated a
Hezbollah invasion of the Galilee
Violent air raids hit the western part of the Bekaa Valley and the outskirts of Hermel, as well as the town of Shmistar, where a school was damaged by the attacks.
Two people were killed, according to a preliminary Lebanese Health Ministry toll. Video footage shows several blasts from the strikes.
Israeli drones also flew at low altitude over Beirut and the south.
The Israeli army claimed it struck a Hezbollah precision missile production site, as well as a “camp used for training by Hezbollah terrorists.”
Israel has been launching near-daily attacks on Lebanon since the ceasefire agreement reached last year.
These attacks have escalated in recent days, coinciding with increased US pressure on the Lebanese government to quickly implement a cabinet decision on disarming the resistance, which was adopted by Beirut in August.
However, Hezbollah rejects the decision. It says it is willing to discuss a defense strategy that would incorporate its weapons into the Lebanese army for use in defending the country from attacks when needed.
Yet the resistance group refuses to engage in any such discussions until Israel ends its attacks on Lebanon and withdraws from the several hilltops it occupied after the ceasefire.
During the war, which began in October 2023 and escalated into a full-scale assault in September 2024, Lebanon’s southern border villages were wiped out by Israel.
Since the ceasefire was reached in November, Israeli occupation forces continued to rig and detonate Lebanese homes along the border. Tens of thousands of houses and buildings have been destroyed.
Recent Israeli airstrikes on Lebanon have destroyed reconstruction equipment, aimed at preventing Lebanon from rebuilding. Israel claims the equipment is used by Hezbollah to rebuild infrastructure.
“There is no reason for civilians and buildings to exist near the border fence – they serve as a civilian cover for Hezbollah,” an Israeli security source told Saudi news channel Al-Hadath on Thursday.
The source said any withdrawal from southern Lebanon would be a “political decision,” while adding that Israel has “targeted more than 300 Hezbollah members since the ceasefire.”
“We are operating within a coordination mechanism cooperating with Washington, UNIFIL, and the Lebanese army,” the sources went on to say, referring to a ceasefire mechanism established after the war to oversee violations of the agreement.
The mechanism has failed to prevent Israel from attacking Lebanon. Tel Aviv claims Hezbollah is rearming and reconstituting itself in violation of the agreement.
As part of the truce, the Lebanese army deployed across south Lebanon and dismantled several Hezbollah sites south of the Litani River.
Hezbollah has withdrawn to the north of the river with its heavy weapons, in line with the deal.
The presence of Israeli troops inside Lebanon has hindered the Lebanese army’s implementation of the ceasefire. Lebanese troops have been attacked by Israeli forces and drones several times.
In the last few days, the rhetoric in Israeli media has also escalated.
According to the Jerusalem Post, Israeli forces recently conducted around 30 hours of training, simulating a Hezbollah invasion of the Galilee.
Hezbollah’s former secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah, who was assassinated last year, warned years ago that an Israeli assault on Lebanon could trigger Hezbollah to invade the Galilee. After targeting and assassinating leaders of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Unit in September last year, Tel Aviv claimed it had completely thwarted the “Galilee Invasion Plan” – as it called it at the time.
Now, a senior Israeli military source tells the Jerusalem Post that during the simulation this week, “there were places where battalions failed their missions severely.” The source said some Israeli units had to be replaced mid-drill or recover from serious setbacks.
The source also noted, however, that Hezbollah has been weakened, and that any assault would come as a surprise. He said that despite the drill being designed to “overload the system,” there was no “collapse” within the Israeli military’s ranks.
“We have no choice but to learn from the failures of 7 October,” he added.
The report comes after new US threats against Lebanon. “If Beirut fails to act, Hezbollah’s military wing will inevitably face a major confrontation with Israel, at a moment when Israel is at peak strength and Iranian support for Hezbollah is at its weakest,” US envoy Tom Barrack said on Monday.
“Lebanon now faces a defining choice: to seize the path of national renewal or remain mired in paralysis and decline,” he added.
Israeli authorities have allowed
only a small fraction of the agreed-upon aid shipments into Gaza under the
pretext of security
This includes the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), which has been responsible for providing relief and assistance to Palestinian refugees and remains deeply integrated into Gaza’s local infrastructure, supplying food, water, healthcare, and shelter.
Presiding judge Yuji Iwasawa, delivering the ruling at The Hague, said Israel “may never invoke reasons of security to justify the general suspension of all humanitarian activities in occupied territory.”
He stressed that the occupying power must “use all means at its disposal so that these items are distributed in a regular, fair, and non-discriminatory manner,” and must refrain from violence against civilians seeking relief.
The court found that Palestinians in Gaza “have been inadequately supplied within the meaning of Article 59 of the Fourth Geneva Convention,” and ordered Israel to “agree to and facilitate relief schemes” provided by the UN and other impartial humanitarian bodies.
Rejecting Israeli claims that UNRWA had been infiltrated by Hamas, the judges said the information presented was “not sufficient to establish UNRWA’s lack of neutrality.”
They emphasized that “there is no evidence that UNRWA as an entity breached the principle of impartiality” or discriminated based on “nationality, race, religious belief, class, or political opinion.”
The court added that UNRWA has become “an indispensable provider of humanitarian relief” and “cannot be replaced on short notice and without a proper transition plan.”
It also noted that Israel had “blocked the delivery of humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip starting from 2 March 2025” and only allowed limited deliveries to resume in May, leaving no replacement system for over 10 weeks.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres welcomed the ruling and urged Israel “to comply with its obligations.” His spokesperson said the opinion “will be decisive to improve the tragic situation in Gaza.”
The Israeli Foreign Ministry dismissed the ruling, calling it “shameful,” and claimed it “fully upholds its obligations under international law.”
Yet on the ground, Israel continues to restrict aid deliveries despite the declared ceasefire.
According to Gaza’s Government Media Office, only 986 out of 6,600 planned aid trucks have entered the strip since the ceasefire began on 11 October, amounting to barely 15 percent of the agreed amount.
Officials said the limited supplies of food, fuel, and gas fall far short of the 600 trucks per day promised under the truce, accusing Israel of maintaining a “policy of strangulation and starvation” against nearly two million residents.
The prime minister’s opposition
to the bills comes as US officials have been warning Tel Aviv against
implementing its annexation plans
The first bill called for applying Israeli “sovereignty” over all settlements in the occupied West Bank. It passed with 25–24 votes in the Knesset.
A more limited bill focusing on the annexation of the Maale Adumim settlement passed with a vote of 32–9. Both bills require another three readings.
All members of Netanyahu’s Likud boycotted the vote except for MK Yuli Edelstein.
“Israeli sovereignty in all parts of our homeland is the order of the day,” Edelstein said in a statement.
The lawmaker was reportedly removed from the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee as a result.
The passing of the two bills – described by the Times of Israel as an “embarrassment” to Netanyahu – coincided with visits to Israel by US Vice President JD Vance, envoy Steve Witkoff, and US President Donald Trump's former advisor Jared Kushner.
Trump’s government has previously announced opposition to Israeli plans for annexing the occupied West Bank.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday, before departing for Israel, that annexation plans could threaten the ceasefire agreement in Gaza.
“They passed a vote in the Knesset, but the president has made clear that’s not something we’d be supportive of right now. We think there’s potential for [it to be even] threatening to the peace deal,” Rubio said.
Israel has rapidly accelerated the expansion of illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank recently.
Last month, Netanyahu signed off on reviving the controversial E1 settlement project. The project aims to link Maale Adumim to occupied East Jerusalem – which is viewed as integral to a future Palestinian state.
Settlers have also escalated brutal attacks on Palestinian communities, forced displacement, and illegal land grabs.
Israel’s expansion in the occupied West Bank comes in response to the recent recognition of Palestine by several European and western countries.
A few months ago, Israel's cabinet voted to take full responsibility for land registration in Area C of the occupied West Bank – an area comprising around 60 percent of the territory and home to the vast majority of Israeli settlements. The move was described as a de facto annexation.
In a statement, Hamas said Wednesday’s Knesset votes “expose the ugly face of the Zionist colonial occupation, which insists on pursuing its attempts to ‘legalize’ settlement activity and impose Zionist ‘sovereignty’ over occupied Palestinian land – in blatant violation of all relevant international laws and resolutions.”
“We affirm that the occupation’s frenzied attempts to annex West Bank territory are null and void and will not alter the reality that the West Bank is Palestinian land – as affirmed by history, international law, and the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice issued in 2024,” it added.
Beijing is seeking to internationalize its currency as BRICS nations move away from the US dollar
Ethiopia's central bank governor, Eyob Tekalign, held meetings to discuss the issue with officials from the Export-Import Bank of China and the People's Bank of China during a visit to Beijing last month, Bloomberg reported on 20 October.
“China is a very important partner for us now, there is a growing volume of trade, investment,” Tekalign said.
“So it really makes sense to arrange some currency swap, but in terms of converting these things as well. So absolutely, this is something in the making – we've requested officially and then working on it.”
Beijing's effort to encourage its debtors to switch from dollar to yuan-denominated loans “is part of the bigger Chinese strategy of internationalizing the yuan,” stated Lesetja Kganyago, South Africa's central bank governor, in an interview last week.
The move is expected to save Ethiopia considerable amounts in interest costs, as the one-year prime rate for yuan is currently three percent, compared with 7.25 percent for US dollars.
“There is savings in this … We're very, very much enthusiastic about this discussion, but it's an early stage,” the Ethiopian bank governor said.
Ethiopia's African neighbor, Kenya, is moving ahead with plans to convert its own Chinese debt to yuan. The Kenyan government said the change is expected to save the country $215 million a year in interest costs.
“My sense is that it's going to yield nontrivial savings,” International Monetary Fund (IMF) Africa director Abebe Selassie said in an interview. “To the extent that it does that over the course of the loan that has to be amortized, then it will be positive for countries like Kenya and others that may want to do it.”
While the vast majority of the world's debt markets are denominated in US dollars, the use of the yuan has increased in recent years as countries seek some independence from the US-dominated world financial system.
Washington has used its position as holder of the world's reserve currency and accompanying financial infrastructure, such as the SWIFT payment system, to impose crippling economic sanctions on countries not complying with US foreign policy.
Efforts to shift away from the US dollar have been led by BRICS, the 10-nation economic bloc of which Ethiopia is a member. Russia, India, China, and South Africa are prominent members.
“De-dollarization” is moving ahead in many BRICS countries, stated Paulo Batista Nogueira, executive director of the IMF, last month.
In an interview with Sputnik, Nogueira said a new reserve currency is needed, arguing that “the United States is undermining its credibility through its behavior.”
No comments:
Post a Comment