Articles written by Najib Jobain & Samy Magdy


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  • 31 Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes in Rafah after Netanyahu says invasion there is inevitable

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Feb 9, 2024

    RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli airstrikes killed at least 31 Palestinians in Rafah early Saturday, hours after Israel's prime minister said he asked the military to plan for the evacuation of hundreds of thousands of people from the southern Gaza city ahead of a ground invasion. Benjamin Netanyahu did not provide details or a timeline, but the announcement set off widespread panic. More than half of Gaza's 2.3 million people are packed into Rafah, many after being uprooted repeatedly by Israeli evacuation orders that now cover two-thirds of G...

  • Israel issues its most detailed warning yet to Hezbollah, while the war in Gaza marks 4 months

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Feb 2, 2024

    RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel's military on Saturday issued its most detailed warning yet to Hezbollah in neighboring Lebanon that it would be "ready to attack immediately" if provoked, as it recounted its actions along the northern border during four months of war in Gaza and made a rare acknowledgement of dozens of airstrikes inside Syria against the militant group. "We do not choose war as our first priority, but we are certainly prepared," military spokesperson Daniel Hagari said, adding: "We will continue to act wherever Hezbollah is p...

  • Palestinian death toll soars past 25,000 in Gaza with no end in sight to Israel-Hamas war

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Jan 19, 2024

    RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — The Palestinian death toll in Gaza from over three months of war between Israel and the territory's Hamas rulers has soared past 25,000, the Gaza Health Ministry said Sunday. At least 178 bodies were brought to Gaza's hospitals in 24 hours along with nearly 300 wounded people, according to Health Ministry spokesperson Ashraf al-Qidra. Women and children are the main victims in the Israel-Hamas war, according to the United Nations. The war began with Hamas' surprise attack into Israel on Oct. 7, in which Palestinian m...

  • A defiant Netanyahu says no one can halt Israel's war to crush Hamas, including the world court

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Jan 12, 2024

    RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel will pursue its war against Hamas until victory and will not be stopped by anyone, including the world court, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a defiant speech Saturday, as the fighting in Gaza approached the 100-day mark. Netanyahu spoke after the International Court of Justice at The Hague held two days of hearings on South Africa's allegations that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians, a charge Israel has rejected as libelous and hypocritical. South Africa asked the court to order I...

  • Palestinians stream into a southern Gaza town as Israel expands its offensive in the center

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Dec 27, 2023

    RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Tens of thousands of Palestinians streamed into an already crowded town at the southernmost end of Gaza in recent days, according to the United Nations, fleeing Israel's bombardment of the center of the strip, where hospital officials said dozens were killed Friday. Israel's unprecedented air and ground offensive against Hamas has displaced some 85% of the Gaza Strip's 2.3 million residents, sending swells of people seeking shelter in Israeli-designated safe areas that the military has nevertheless also bombed. That h...

  • Israel strikes 2 homes, killing more than 90 Palestinians. Biden says he didn't request a cease-fire

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Dec 24, 2023

    RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — More than 90 Palestinians, including dozens from an extended family, were killed in Israeli airstrikes on two homes in Gaza, rescuers and hospital officials said Saturday, a day after the U.N. chief warned that nowhere is safe in the territory and that Israel's offensive creates "massive obstacles" to distribution of humanitarian aid. U.S. President Joe Biden spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday, calling it a long and private conversation a day after the Biden administration again shielded I...

  • Communications blackout and spiraling hunger compound misery in Gaza Strip as war enters 11th week

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Dec 15, 2023

    RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — A prolonged communications blackout that severed telephone and internet connections compounded the misery Saturday in the besieged Gaza Strip, where a United Nations agency said hunger levels had spiraled in recent days. Internet and telephone lines went down Thursday evening and were still inaccessible Saturday morning, according to internet access advocacy group NetBlocks.org, hampering aid deliveries and rescue efforts as Israel's war against Gaza's ruling militant group Hamas stretched into the 11th week. "The i...

  • Israel widens evacuation orders as it shifts its offensive to southern Gaza amid heavy bombardments

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Dec 3, 2023

    KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel's military on Sunday ordered more areas in and around Gaza's second-largest city of Khan Younis to evacuate, as it shifted its offensive to the southern half of the territory where it says many Hamas leaders are hiding. Heavy bombardments were reported overnight and into Sunday in the area of Khan Younis and the southern city of Rafah, as well as parts of the north that had been the focus of Israel's blistering air and ground campaign. Many of the territory's 2.3 million people are crammed in the south a...

  • Red Cross bus carrying freed Palestinian prisoners arrives in West Bank town

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Nov 26, 2023

    AL BIREH, West Bank (AP) — A bus carrying nearly three dozen Palestinian prisoners released by Israel arrived in the West Bank early Sunday, following Hamas' release of 13 Israelis and four foreigners in the second round of swaps under a cease-fire deal. Hundreds of people greeted the International Committee of the Red Cross bus as it arrived in Al Bireh. Crowds chanted "God is great" as the bus arrived, and several young men stood on the roof of the vehicle. Many in the crowd held Hamas flags and chanted pro-Hamas slogans. The Israeli m...

  • Health workers evacuate 31 'very sick' babies from Gaza's largest hospital

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Nov 19, 2023

    KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip (AP) — The World Health Organization says 31 "very sick" premature babies have been evacuated from Gaza's largest hospital and safely transported to another in the south. A U.N. team said earlier Sunday that more than 250 patients remained after thousands of patients and displaced people left the day before. Israel meanwhile signaled that it plans to expand its operations to southern Gaza, where it had told hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to seek refuge early in the war. Israel has long alleged that Hamas maintains...

  • Thousands flee north Gaza on foot as desperation grows over dwindling supplies and Israeli advance

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Nov 8, 2023

    KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip (AP) — Thousands more Palestinians have fled northern Gaza on foot, the U.N. said Wednesday, as desperation grew over the dwindling supply of food and water, intensified shelling and the approach of Israeli troops and tanks. Over 70% of Gaza's population of 2.3 million have already left their homes, but the number of people making their way south has quickened recently, as the war triggered by Hamas' Oct. 7 assault inside Israel entered its second month. With no end in sight to the fighting, an increasingly dire humanita...

  • A month into war, Netanyahu says Israel will have an 'overall security' role in Gaza indefinitely

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Nov 5, 2023

    KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel will take "overall security responsibility" in Gaza indefinitely after its war with Hamas, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, the clearest indication yet that Israel plans to maintain control over the coastal enclave one month into a conflict that has claimed thousands of lives and leveled whole swaths of the territory. In an interview with ABC News that aired late Monday, Netanyahu expressed openness to "little pauses" in the fighting to facilitate the delivery of aid to Gaza or the release of some o...

  • Second aid convoy reaches Gaza as Israel attacks targets in Syria and occupied West Bank

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Oct 22, 2023

    RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — The second aid convoy destined for desperate Palestinian civilians reached Gaza on Sunday, as Israel widened its attacks to include targets in Syria and the occupied West Bank and the Israeli prime minister warned Lebanon's Hezbollah militant group that if it launches its own war, "we will cripple it with a force it cannot even imagine." For days, Israel has been on the verge of launching a ground offensive in Gaza following Hamas' brutal Oct. 7 rampage through a series of Israeli communities. Tanks and troops have been...

  • Egypt's border crossing opens to let a trickle of desperately needed aid into besieged Gaza

    NAJIB JOBAIN and SAMY MAGDY|Oct 20, 2023

    RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — The border crossing between Egypt and Gaza opened on Saturday to let a trickle of desperately needed aid into the besieged Palestinian territory for the first time since Israel sealed it off in the wake of Hamas' bloody rampage two weeks ago. Gaza's 2.3 million Palestinians, half of whom have fled their homes, are rationing food and drinking dirty water. Hospitals say they are running low on medical supplies and fuel for emergency generators amid a territory-wide power blackout. Israel is still launching waves of a...