Israel-Hamas War: What happened on Day 112?

The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) agency and British maritime security firm Ambrey on Friday said they had received reports of a vessel being struck in the Red Sea near Yemen's Aden and a fire breaking out aboard.

UKMTO received a report of an incident approximately 60 nautical miles south east of Aden where "a vessel has been struck and is currently on fire."

"The vessel is requiring assistance. Authorities have been informed and are responding," UKMTO added.

Ambrey also said that it was aware of an incident 55 miles southeast of Aden where a fire broke out after a merchant vessel was hit by a "missile," though the crew were reported safe.

Houthis have continued to attack commercial vessels 

Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthi terrorists, who control the most populous parts of Yemen, have launched wave after wave of exploding drones and missiles at commercial vessels since Nov. 19, in what they say is a protest against Israel's military operations in Gaza.

Warships in Gulf of Aden (credit: Reuters)

The Houthi military spokesperson said on Friday that naval forces carried out an operation targeting "the British oil tanker Marlin Luanda" in the Gulf of Aden, causing a fire to break out.

The Houthi campaign has been very disruptive to international shipping, causing some companies to suspend transits through the Red Sea and instead take the much longer, costlier journey around Africa.

US and British warplanes, ships and submarines have launched dozens of air strikes across Yemen against Houthi forces in retaliation.

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant visited the LOTAR counterterrorism unit at the unit's training facilities in the Adam Base on Friday afternoon.

During the visit, Gallant was shown the unit's activities starting from October 7 during fighting in the Gaza border towns until right now.

They showed him how regular and reserve fighters operate across all sectors, and simultaneously lead training and assimilation efforts while cooperating with the many of the units in the field.

Gallant told the fighters "We will eliminate Hamas, there will be no quick fix. We will ensure that the government in Gaza will not be the government of Hamas and the army in Gaza will not be the army of Hamas.

"Regarding terrorism, we will fight for a long time, it will not take one day, it will take much longer. Therefore, prepare yourselves for this, you have the duty, may I say, the right to fight, the most just war that the people of Israel and the State of Israel can have."

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant meeting members of the LOTAR counter-terrorism unit, January 26, 2024. (credit: ELAD MALKA/DEFENSE MINISTRY)

Gallant: Who is the Hague to pass judgment?

Gallant then went after the International Court of Justice in the Hague, accusing them of having no moral standing.

"At this very moment, as we stand here, the Hague Tribunal is trying to pass judgment on something that is the opposite of justice.

"They created the International Court of Justice and gave it the authority to discuss the crime of genocide, because of what happened to the Jews, especially to the Jews of Europe during World War II."

"Sanctomoniusly, they come and sue the State of Israel, which defends itself, for trying to destroy the State - they kill children, rape women, kidnap old people, and for that they take the State of Israel to court."

"Those who sit in their leather armchairs in The Hague, who in some of their countries 80 years ago exterminated Jews. They come today to teach us what justice is and how we should behave?"

"An IDF soldier goes on a mission with the values of the IDF on his heart and in his memory, the spirit of the IDF, which talks about what values are and what true warfare is, and who should be hurt and who should not be hurt."

"A Hamas terrorist, on whom we found notes in their pockets, on each one written 'The blood of the Jews is tastier than the blood of someone else, go and drink it' - that's the message."

Regarding conspiratorial rumours

"Recently, in many places and unfortunately also from members of the public, I heard attacks on IDF officers, on the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), on the Mossad, on others, and the IDF and all the security organizations are parts of the body of the State of Israel."

"The State of Israel is always behind you, and we give you full backing, and I, as the Defense Minister, [along with] the Chief of Staff, the head of the Shin Bet, the head of the Mossad, all these people give full backing to the IDF. We stand behind everything you do, everyone here is an emissary of ours going to carry out the mission. We stand behind you, we are with you in everything even if you hear, someone say one thing and someone says the other, be sure of the rightness of your way, both as soldiers and as fighters."

US President Joe Biden on Friday spoke with Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani about Gaza and efforts to secure the release of hostages taken by Hamas, the White House said.

The White House expressed hope on Friday about progress in talks to release hostages held by Hamas in Gaza as President Joe Biden's Middle East envoy Brett McGurk returns to Washington from a trip to the region.

White House spokesperson John Kirby said McGurk was returning after holding hostage talks in the region.

Kirby said Biden spoke with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi on Friday.

German state broadcaster ARD on Friday said Israel was blocking two of its long-term Palestinian workers from leaving Gaza, where they fear for their lives, citing security concerns the broadcaster said did not make sense.

Israel's offensive against Gaza has killed more than 26,000 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-controlled Palestinian Health Ministry, with thousands more feared buried under rubble and most of the 2.3 million residents displaced, facing acute shortages of food, water and medicine.

Israel launched its offensive following an Oct. 7 rampage by Hamas terrorists who killed 1,200 people and seized some 240 hostages.

The ARD said it had been pushing for two of its workers to be able to leave Gaza for more than two months, with support from the German government. Israel has so far refused, citing security concerns.

The foreign ministry and prime minister's office did not immediately respond to request for comment.

Fritz Raff, director of German television company ARD, poses before a news conference after a meeting in Berlin, February 19, 2008. (credit: REUTERS/Tobias Schwarz)

"This does not make sense because they would not even be stepping onto Israeli soil," said ARD senior editor Christian Nitsche. "These colleagues are no security risk, and we call therefore on the Israeli authorities, on the government, to let our colleagues leave."

German foreign ministry shares ARD's concerns

The German foreign ministry said in a post on social media platform X, formerly Twitter, that it shared the ARD's concerns about their local staff and would continue to push for them to be able to leave.

One of the two ARD workers, Mohammed Abusaif, had already been evacuated eight times since the beginning of the Israeli offensive and was now living in a tent in the southern town of Rafah, the broadcaster said. He was worried both about the Israeli strikes and about reprisals from Hamas.

"Ultimately he has been working for more than two years for the ARD, a German outlet - and Germany has positioned itself clearly on the side of Israel in this war," the broadcaster wrote.

At least 83 journalists and media workers have been killed in the Israel-Hamas war, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, in what it says has proven to be the deadliest conflict for reporters since the CPJ started gathering data in 1992.

Israel's government must establish a state commission of inquiry into Hamas's October 7 massacre, Shin Bet director Ronen Bar demanded of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a Thursday evening cabinet meeting, Israeli media reported.

"Establish a committee, and everything will become clear," Bar was quoted as saying.

This is a developing story.

How is it possible that deceitful information from antidemocratic entities, like the new Hamas manifest, is permitted to massively spread on American social media?

This week, I got an awkward message from one of my Instagram followers in Canada.

“After seeing so many ‘colonizer’ and ‘settler’ statements and thinking this was regarding Palestinians and settlers in the West Bank, and after seeing some of the footage from those ‘reporters’ that came along on October 7 and were posting videos bragging and laughing while terrorists were raping and murdering people in their homes inside Israeli territory, I noticed instances of calling Israeli kidnapped females ‘settlers.’

It’s now finally sinking in that what Hamas really means is that all of the land Israel exists on right now is supposedly ‘occupied’ and all Israelis are ‘settlers.’ This is the craziest thing that makes it all even more horrifying. Am I getting this right?”

This follower is not Jewish, just someone interested in current world events, and, yes, she’s getting it right. Not only that – what many people still do not get right is not a coincidental misunderstanding. Creating confusion about the situation is all part of the Hamas tactic of constant deceit, backed by Iran.

Pro-Palestinian protesters attend ''Flood Brooklyn for Gaza'' demonstration, as the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas continues, in New York, US, October 28, 2023. (credit: CAITLIN OCHS/REUTERS)

These two fundamentalist entities know very well that if Western people would know the truth, no one would support them. So instead of calling for the annihilation of Israel (which is something that both Hamas and Iran constantly do in Arabic and Persian), they put a great deal of effort into creating confusion about the facts, in English.

Using Western ignorance 

Since most English-speakers don’t know that “settlers” (those who live in the disputed territories of Judea and Samaria) actually constitute less than 5% of Israelis, and since “settlers” is a word with a negative image, they refer to all Israelis as settlers.

Since most people in English-speaking countries don’t know that the region of Palestine was never an independent country but an occupied “no-man’s-land” populated by Jews, Arabs, Christians, Bedouin and others through many centuries, they claim that it has always been theirs.

Since most people aren’t familiar with Middle Eastern history, they say that the Jews don’t belong in Israel, although Jews have been residing there since biblical times. Since many don’t even bother to Google it, they say that Palestine was a country, although Arabs only began to identify themselves as Palestinians after 1967.

They use words such as “colonizers” or “oppressors” because they know these are trigger words, sensitive words, meant to create an impression that has nothing to do with the reality in the Middle East. Throwing these words at Israel is meant to hide the fact that Israel is the only anti-colonial project in the Middle East, a democracy with equal rights for all citizens, whether Jewish, Christian, or Muslim (20% of Israelis are Muslim). It is also meant to hide the fact that both Iran and Hamas run autocratic, cruel, religiously primitive, and oppressive regimes.

Everything I’ve written here is basic knowledge for every Israeli and also for most Jews around the world. Still, it’s important to state this clearly for those who are not personally involved but kind of “join the crowds,” cheering for one of the sides. It’s important because without confusion, Hamas and Iran would get zero support for their side. It is the confusion that allows them to sell a narrative based only on bits and pieces of the story and padded with lies.

The new manifest issued by Hamas this week is part of the same confusion scheme. When Israelis saw it on social media like X (formerly Twitter), they rolled their eyes. The denial of the mass murder of civilians on October 7 seemed too delusional to bother to react to. But the manifest isn’t directed at Israelis. It is directed at Arab and Muslim audiences, and also at audiences like my Canadian follower, who is neither Jewish nor an expert on the subject and is therefore easy to confuse.

Iran and Hamas will probably keep exploiting democratic freedom in order to spread their antidemocratic narratives, wrapped in a cloud of confusion. The real question is – how is it possible that American social media permit such materials, which are owned by designated foreign terrorist groups, to be wildly spread on their platforms?

The writer is a senior analyst for Maariv.

US President Joe Biden on Friday spoke with Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani about Gaza and efforts to secure the release of hostages taken by Hamas, the White House said.

United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) said it had received on Friday a report of an incident 60 nautical miles south east of Yemen's Aden.

Authorities are investigating, it added. 

British network Sky News apologized on Friday evening for making a comparison between MK Danny Danon's comments on the voluntary relocation of Gazan civilians with the "voluntary relocation" of Jews during the Holocaust.

Danon was interviewed by Sky News about an article he wrote for the Wall Street Journal, where he advocated for the voluntary resettlement of Gazan civilians to surrounding countries.

This insolent interviewer from @SkyNews disgracefully drew comparisons between the situation in Gaza and the Holocaust. Shame on her pic.twitter.com/GyhkL2W1co

— Danny Danon 🇮🇱 דני דנון (@dannydanon) January 26, 2024

The interviewer called Danon's idea "ethnic cleansing", saying that he "suggested the ethnic cleansing of some of Gaza's population to Western countries," at this point, Danon interrupts to dispute the claim that he called for ethnic cleansing.

She asks if he stands by that article, he highlights that he called for voluntary migration and asserted that this should be an option for any Gazan who chooses to.

The interviewer retorts with "Yes the sort of voluntary relocation of many Jewish people during the Holocaust, I imagine was not voluntary."

"How can you even compare that‽ Shame on you! That is a shameful antisemitic equation. This is pure antisemitism what you just said!" 

Righteous fury

Danon completely infuriated at the comments refuses to let the interviewer space to speak continuing to shame her for desecrating the memory of the holocaust through such antisemitic comparisons.

Sky News apologized for the comments only 30 minutes later, saying: "Sky News recognizes the complete inappropriateness of this comparison and the offensive nature of those comments."

A statement from Sky News pic.twitter.com/XTQZnTcp31

— Sky News (@SkyNews) January 26, 2024

"Sky News would like to apologize unreservedly for the comparison and to Mr Danon personally for making the comparison."

The United States on Friday said the ruling of the International Court of Justice on the Israel-Hamas war was consistent with Washington's view that Israel has the right to take action, in accordance with international law, to ensure the Oct. 7 attack cannot be repeated.

"We continue to believe that allegations of genocide are unfounded and note the court did not make a finding about genocide or call for a ceasefire in its ruling and that it called for the unconditional, immediate release of all hostages being held by Hamas," a State Department spokesperson said.

The World Court ordered Israel on Friday to prevent acts of genocide against the Palestinians and do more to help civilians, although it stopped short of ordering a ceasefire as requested by the plaintiff South Africa.