Live Updates
The Israel-Hamas war has entered Day 179 – Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on Tuesday vowed that Israel “will be punished” after the assassination of Mohammad Reza Zahedi, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander for Syria and Lebanon.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has been sworn in for his third term at a time when tensions in the Middle East run high and Egypt, alongside Qatar, is under increasing pressure to push Hamas to agree to a ceasefire with Israel.
In war-torn Gaza, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) expressed sorrow for the killing of seven staff members of American food charity World Central Kitchen (WCK) in an airstrike attributed to Israel.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will hold talks in Paris following the deaths of WCK staffers delivering food aid for Gaza residents when the charity organization’s convoy was struck by what the WCK said was an Israeli airstrike.
In Israel’s northern border with Lebanon, Iranian-backed Hezbollah claimed an attack on an IDF post near the Israeli-Lebanese border.
Suspected gunshots were heard in the Red Sea after an entity claiming to be the Yemeni Navy hailed a commercial vessel off of Houthi-controlled Hodeidah, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) said.
The fighting in Gaza, which sparked tensions across the Middle East, stems from the violent history of the Israel-Palestine conflict that erupted on Oct. 7, when Hamas militants broke into Gaza’s border with Israel, murdering over a thousand people and dragging over 250 hostages into the Gaza Strip, some 130 of which are still in Hamas captivity.
Gaza has suffered the brunt of the fighting, as the Hamas-run health ministry said more than 32,000 have been killed so far and over 75,000 others have been wounded.