Israel-Hamas war day 214: What's going on in Gaza?

The majority of Jewish Israelis (56%) share the opinion that the release of hostages should be considered Israel’s highest priority, according to a newly published survey by the  Israel Democracy Institute's Viterbi Center for Public Opinion.

The survey was conducted online and by phone between the dates of May 1, 2024 until May 6, 2024. A total of 600 participants were interviewed in Hebrew and 150 were interviewed in Arabic, constituting a nationally representative sample of the entire adult population in Israel aged 18 and over. The maximum sampling error for the entire sample is ±3.65 at a confidence rate of 95%.

While 56% of Jewish Israelis said that the hostages should be the greatest priority, 37% of those surveyed said that a military operation in Rafah is top priority in terms of Israel’s national interest.

A suspicious aerial target was intercepted near Eilat on Tuesday night, however, no sirens were sounded, according to Israeli media.

On Tuesday, approximately 12 launches were identified originating from the Rafah area in the southern Gaza Strip towards the Eshkol region. Air defense fighters successfully intercepted five launches, while the rest fell in open areas with no casualties.

 Seven months to the day after more than 1,200 people in Israel were killed and another 253 were taken hostage, US President Joe Biden and congressional leaders joined Holocaust survivors at the Holocaust Memorial Museum’s annual remembrance ceremony on Capitol Hill with the escalation of Israel’s war with Hamas looming large.

Biden was greeted with a standing ovation in sharp contrast to the scores of anti-war and pro-Palestinian protesters who have become a fixture at the president’s events.

“During these sacred days of remembrance, we grieve. We give voice to the six million Jews who were systematically targeted, murdered by the Nazis and their collaborators during World War Two,” Biden said in his opening remarks.

“We honor the memory of the victims, the pain of the survivors, and the bravery of the heroes who stood up to Hitler’s unspeakable evil,” Biden added. “We recommit to heading and heeding the lessons of one of the darkest chapters in human history, to revitalize and realize the responsibility of ‘Never Again, Never Again.’”

A history of antisemitism

The ancient hatred of Jews didn’t begin with the Holocaust and it didn’t end with the Holocaust either, Biden stressed, and it was brought to life on October 7, when Hamas unleashed the deadliest attack on the Jewish people since the Holocaust, driven by the ancient desire to wipe the Jewish people off of the face of the earth.

US President Joe Biden meets with holocaust survivors Dr. Gita Cycowicz and Rena Quint during his visit to the Yad Vashem Holocaust Remembrance Center in Jerusalem, July 13, 2022. (credit: REUTERS/EVELYN HOCKSTEIN)

The Hostages and Missing Families Forum announced on Tuesday that Lior Rudaeff, who was previously considered to be in Gaza captivity, was murdered on October 7, and his body was taken to Gaza.

The Hostages and Missing Families Forum provided the following statement:

"The Hostages Families Forum mourns the murder of Lior Rudaeff. May his memory be a blessing.

We share in the profound grief of the Rudaeff family.

The Families Forum bows its head in sorrow and with a broken heart following the determination that Lior Rudaeff, of blessed memory, was murdered on October 7 and that his body was kidnapped to Gaza by Hamas terrorists. The Forum will continue providing assistance and support to Lior's family during this immensely difficult time until his body is returned to Israel for a proper burial.

Israelis gather in Tel Aviv for the release of Gaza hostages on November 25, 2023 (credit: AVSHALOM SASSONI/MAARIV)

The Israeli government has a profound moral duty to pursue every avenue in the current negotiations to bring Lior home. He deserves a dignified burial in his homeland, alongside the 38 other hostages brutally murdered. The government must also secure the swift return of all living hostages so they can begin the long road to healing and recovery.

US President Joe Biden's administration has been holding up several Boeing-made arms shipments to Israel for at least two weeks, a source familiar with the matter said on Tuesday.

The shipments involved Boeing-made Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAM), which convert dumb bombs into precision-guided ones and Small Diameter Bombs.

The sources did not elaborate further.

The White House and Pentagon declined to comment. The news of a delayed arms shipment was first reported by Axios over the weekend, and Politico first reported on the types of arms delayed and the reasoning on Tuesday.

Without addressing whether there had been a suspension in arms shipments, the Pentagon said on Monday that there had not been a policy decision to withhold arms from Israel, America's closest Middle East ally. 

US PRESIDENT Joe Biden meets with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the sidelines of the annual opening of the UN General Assembly last September. At that point, holding such a meeting at the White House was not even in the cards, the writer notes. (credit: KEVIN LAMARQUE/REUTERS)

Washington has said, however, it could not support an Israeli invasion of the Gaza border city of Rafah without an appropriate and credible humanitarian plan.

The United Nations called on Israel to immediately open the Kerem Shalom and the Rafah Crossings into Gaza to allow for the entry of humanitarian assistance on Tuesday.

UN and other international aid agencies said the closures had virtually isolated the enclave from outside aid, and very few stores were available inside.

Red Crescent sources in Egypt said shipments had halted entirely.

In addition to beinga critical entry point for aid, the Rafah crossing was the only exit point for those needing to leave Gaza for medical treatment that is no longer available in the enclave.

The UN warned that Gaza could run out of fuel unless action was taken, which is needed to sustain communications networks and transportation.

Smoke rises after an Israeli strike as Israeli forces launch a ground and air operation in the eastern part of Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip May 7, 2024. (credit: REUTERS/Hatem Khaled)

“The closure of both the Rafah and Karem Shalom crossings is especially damaging to an already dire humanitarian situation,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told reporters in New York on Tuesday. “They must be re-opened immediately,” he stressed.

Last Thursday, IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Herzi Halevi was engulfed in controversy when he appointed Brig.-Gen. Shlomi Binder to replace Maj.-Gen. Aharon Haliva as the next chief of military intelligence.

The controversy has multiple fronts, but the irony is that nearly none have to do with Binder himself. Certainly, until October 7, Binder was viewed as one of the top officers in the army, possibly a future IDF chief. The initial dilemmas actually have to do more with Halevi.

Dilemma have to do with Halevi, not Binder

Many political and military officials believe he should have already resigned since October 7 took place under his watch. He himself has made it clear that he intends to resign.

Initially, he and other defense chiefs delayed their resignation, arguing that carrying out the war against Hamas would be more efficient and quicker under their watch, rather than a whole new slew of staff, that time was of the essence.

Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi (credit: IDF SPOKESMAN’S UNIT)

Halevi will also be issuing his own report on what led to the October 7 failure, likely by around mid-June.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly rejected Hamas’s proposal for a deal — that delayed the return of the hostages and demanded an end to the war — even as he sent a team to Cairo to discuss it.

“The Hamas proposal is very far from [meeting] Israel’s requirements,” he stated in a video message he delivered on Tuesday night.

“Israel cannot accept a proposal that endangers the security of our citizens and the future of our country,” Netanyahu stated.

Israel’s negotiating team, he explained, was instructed “to stand firm” on principled points regarding hostages and security.

IDF has begun a military campaign in Rafah

The IDF has also begun its military campaign in Gaza to destroy four Hamas battalions there, seizing the Palestinian side of the Rafah crossing at the Egyptian border, he said, referencing the War Cabinet’s decision on Monday night to embark on that operation.

Benjamin Netanyahu speaks about hostage deal, May 7, 2024. (credit: PRIME MINISTER'S OFFICE)

“Within hours, our forces raised the Israeli flags at the Rafah crossing and took down the Hamas flags,” he said. 

Hamas spokesperson Abu Obaida claimed on Telegram that Israeli-US-Canadian citizen Judy Weinstein, 70, and another unnamed hostage held in Gaza succumbed to their wounds as a result of Israeli bombardment. 

Kibbutz Nir Oz already confirmed Judy Weinstein's death on October 7 in December. 

In a later video published to Telegram, the Hamas spokesperson stated in the caption, “Your army's destruction of hospitals and putting them out of service is what caused the suffering and death of your detainees, just as our people suffer,” in English, Arabic, and Hebrew. 

In the video, text appears again in all three languages saying, “Judith Weinstein was seriously injured on October 7 and was given intensive treatment in a hospital in the Gaza Strip. Immediately upon her recovery, she was returned to her place of detention.”

The video continues to show a series of videos of buildings struck in Israeli airstrikes.

Screenshots of a Hamas video in which the terror group claims the death of Israeli hostage Judith Weinstein on May 7, 2024 (credit: screenshot)

Then a second text appears discussing the unnamed hostage saying, “A month ago she was seriously injured in a Zionist airforce attack along with another detainee but she died due to the lack of intensive treatment in the Gaza Strip because the Zionist army destroyed the hospitals.”

The video cuts to footage of Shifa hospital after the IDF operation, showing the building’s destruction.