Zionist Occupation Military Closes Gaza Border Crossings amid Airstrikes
Zionist Entity has closed border crossings into the Gaza Strip as the regime steps up its aerial assaults against the besieged coastal enclave.
The Israeli military said in a statement that “due to the security events and in accordance with security assessments” Kerem Shalom crossing – the main passage point for goods entering the Gaza Strip, and the Erez pedestrian crossing – would be shut as of Thursday until further notice.
Shutting the two border crossings effectively cuts off Gaza from the rest of the world by land, save for its small Egyptian border, which is generally closed. The territory is also under a naval blockade by the Israeli navy.
Meanwhile, the Israeli army said earlier in the day that it had targeted three facilities belonging to Palestinian resistance movement in the southern Gaza Strip before dawn.
The assault, it claimed, was a response to rockets fired from Gaza towards the southern parts of the occupied territories.
The Gaza Strip, home to 1.8 million, has been under an Israeli siege since June 2007. The blockade has caused a decline in the standards of living as well as unprecedented levels of unemployment and unrelenting poverty.
The development comes amid simmering tensions in the occupied Palestinian territories after US President Donald Trump announced on December 6 that the US was recognizing al-Quds as Israel’s “capital” and tasked the State Department with making preparations for the relocation of Washington’s embassy from Tel Aviv to the occupied Palestinian city.
Trump’s move upended decades of American diplomacy, causing an overwhelming global diplomatic backlash and sparking protests by Palestinians and their clashes with Israeli forces.
The Thursday assaults came as Gazans are marking 30 years since the founding of the Hamas resistance movement, which had been governing the territory since 2009.
The movement has defended the impoverished enclave against three deadly Israeli wars since then.
Over the past week, Gaza has repeatedly come under similar Israeli air raids.
On Tuesday, two people were killed when an Israeli unmanned aerial vehicle carried out an attack in the besieged Gaza Strip.
17 Palestinians injured in clashes with Israeli forces near Nablus
At least 17 Palestinians have been injured during clashes between Palestinian protesters and Israeli forces at the entrance to the town of Naqurah, ten kilometers northwest of Nablus in the occupied West Bank.
The clashes erupted when Israeli forces fired rubber bullets and deployed teargas grenades in response to apparent stone-throwing by Palestinian protesters.
This marked the eighth day of unrest as protesters continue to rally against US President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem al-Quds as Israel’s capital.
Palestinian diplomats push for UN resolution rejecting Trump’s al-Quds move
On the other hand, Palestinian officials are reportedly pushing for a UN Security Council resolution that rejects US President Donald Trump’s decision to recognize al-Quds as Israel’s “capital.”
The measure, which would strongly condemn Washington’s decision and demand its reversal, would almost certainly face a US veto, diplomats said Wednesday.
According to senior council diplomats, Egypt is expected to circulate the draft resolution to council members, possibly as early as this week.
Palestinian Ambassador to the UN Riyad Mansour said late Tuesday that he was working on a draft text that would “reaffirm the positions of the Security Council and ask the Americans to rescind.”
On December 6, Trump sparked international outrage as he declared that Washington was recognizing Jerusalem al-Quds as the “capital” of Israel and that he had instructed his administration to begin the process of moving the American embassy from Tel Aviv to the ancient city.
Trump’s move upended decades of American diplomacy, causing an overwhelming global diplomatic backlash and sparking protests by Palestinians and their clashes with Israeli forces.
Last week, the US found itself isolated at the Security Council when all 14 other members including allies Britain, France and Italy condemned Trump’s decision.
However, other diplomats said that the proposed draft resolution would force the US to resort to its veto power, saying the wording would not be so strong.
Al-Quds remains at the core of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, with Palestinians hoping that the eastern part of the city would eventually serve as the capital of a future independent Palestinian state.
Several UN resolutions call on Israel to withdraw from territory seized during the 1967 war and have reaffirmed the need to end the occupation of that land.
The 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) issued a communiqué at the end of an emergency summit in Turkey on Wednesday, declaring that it would recognize “East al-Quds as the capital of the State of Palestine and invite all countries to recognize the State of Palestine and East a-Quds as its occupied capital.”
Netanyahu ‘not impressed’
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday he was “not impressed” by the Muslim leaders’ statements, claiming that many countries would follow Trump’s lead and recognize al-Quds as Israel’s “capital.”
“The Palestinians would do better by recognizing reality and acting in favor of peace and not extremism,” Netanyahu said.
Renouncing Trump’s move as “null and void legally,” the OIC members said the decision was tantamount to “an attack on the historical, legal, natural and national rights of the Palestinian people, a deliberate undermining of all peace efforts, an impetus to extremism and terrorism, and a threat to international peace and security.”
The OIC was established during a summit in Rabat, Morocco, in 1969.
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