Thank you for following our LIVE coverage of day 94 of the Israel-Hamas war. We will be back tomorrow with more news updates.
Jordan's Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi has told his French counterpart that the threat of the spread of the Gaza war is increasing "by the day," Reuters. reports.
The UN on Monday voiced alarm at the number of journalists killed in the war in Gaza, a day after two Al Jazeera reporters died in an alleged Israeli strike on their car.
"Very concerned by high death toll of media workers in Gaza," the UN rights office wrote on X. More details here.
BREAKING: Three Palestinians have been shot dead by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank village of Tulkarm, Reuters reports, citing the Palestinian Health Ministry.
Here's what happened in south Lebanon in the past hour, according to local residents:
-Israel fired a shell that struck between the southern villages of Tayr Harfa and Jibbayn, both located in the Sour district.
-Israel shelled the outskirts of Aitaroun (Bint Jbeil district.)
-Israel targeted the road leading to the "Iran Garden," a local park, in Maroun al-Ras, with five shells.
Blinken also said Houthi attacks on international shipping in the Red Sea have to stop, adding countries have made clear that there have to be consequences if the attacks continue.
Washington's preference is the Houthis get the message countries around the world are sending that this needs to stop, Reuters cites Blinken as telling reporters in Saudi Arabia.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken says he found leaders in the Middle East determined to prevent the conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza from spreading, Reuters reports.
Blinken, in the region for a week of shuttle diplomacy, told reporters that all of those he spoke to realized the extent of the challenges, adding "no one thinks that anything will happen overnight."
BREAKING: Israel's military says it killed a central figure in Syria who was responsible for Hamas rocket attacks against Israel, Reuters reports.
"The IDF [Israeli army] eliminated Hassan Hakashah in Beit Jinn in Syria. He was a central figure responsible for rockets fired by Hamas from Syrian territory toward Israel in recent weeks," Reuters cites the Israeli military as saying.
"We will not allow terrorism from Syrian territory and hold Syria responsible for all activity emanating from its territory."
BREAKING: US President Joe Biden says he is working to get Israel to cut its military presence in Gaza, after protesters calling for a cease-fire disrupted him during a campaign speech, AFP reports.
"I've been quietly working with the Israeli government to get them to reduce and significantly get out of Gaza," Biden said at a church in Charleston, South Carolina, where a white supremacist shot dead nine Black parishioners in 2015.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has discussed efforts to prevent the Gaza conflict from spreading during a meeting with EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell in Saudi Arabia, Borell said on X.
Two members of the family of Al Jazeera's Gaza bureau chief, Wael Dahdouh, were killed today in a strike on their vehicle in Rafah, in the south of the territory, the Gaza Health Ministry and relatives announced, AFP reports.
The Israeli army "murdered three citizens by targeting a civilian car," a ministry spokesman said, offering condolences to Dahdouh, whose wife and three of his children have been killed since the start of the war.
The journalist confirmed to AFP that Mohammed and Ahmed Dahdouh, two brothers, were Wael Dahdouh's nephews. AFPTV footage shows the roof of the car ripped open and a body being removed.
Mohammed and Ahmed Dahdouh, an accountant and an engineer aged 30 and 26, respectively, according to another of their relatives, lived with their family in the north of the Palestinian territory, near Gaza City, before fleeing southwards to the Rafah area two weeks ago.
The White House's Coordinator for Strategic Communications at the National Security Council, John Kirby, says humanitarian aid for Gaza must be increased, Reuters reports.
The Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad has released video footage it claims shows an Israeli hostage alive in its custody in Gaza. More details here.
Sirens went off in Tel Aviv and other cities in central Israel today, sending residents running for shelter, and Hamas in Gaza said it had fired a barrage of rockets, Reuters reports, adding that there were no immediate reports of injuries.
Hamas, whose Oct. 7 attack on southern Israeli towns sparked the war in Gaza, has kept up cross-border rocket fire throughout Israel's military offensive.
An Israeli was slightly injured in an anti-tank missile attack in northern Israel, near the border with Lebanon, Haaretz reports.
The rocket reportedly hit a house in the western Galilee town of Shtula. The man was wounded as he arrived home for the first time since the evacuation of this locality three months ago, the news outlet said.
Earlier, Hezbollah had reported targeting Israeli soldiers in Shtula, which faces the Lebanese village of Aita al-Shaab (Bint Jbeil district).
Israeli artillery has again targeted the area around Houla (Marjayoun district) in southern Lebanon, a security source tells our correspondent.
Here's what happened in south Lebanon, and northern Israel in the past 30 minutes:
-An Israeli drone launched a rocket between the southern towns of Dhaira and Yarin, both located in Sour district, local residents told our correspondent. According to residents, the shelling targeted a civilian house in Dhaira.
-According to other residents from Rmaish, there was artillery shelling on the outskirts of the town, located in the Bint Jbeil district.
-Hezbollah announced that it targeted at 3:35 p.m. the Israeli military site of Ruwaisat al-Alam, located in the occupied Lebanese Shebaa Farms, "with rocket fire, causing confirmed injuries."
-Earlier Haaretz reported, at around 4 p.m., sirens were activated in the Israeli northern towns of Shlomi and Rosh Hanikra, near the southern Lebanese town of Alma al-Shaab, Haaretz reported.
-Hezbollah also announced that at 4 p.m., its fighters targeted Israeli soldiers in the vicinity of the Israeli Jal al-Alam site, facing the Labbouneh southern village [Naqoura district] "with rocket fire, resulting in casualties and injuries."
-In another statement, the party said that its fighters targeted at 3:45 p.m. Israeli soldiers in Shtula, which faces the Lebanese southern village of Aita al-Shaab (Bint Jbeil district.)
Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid has urged ministers Benny Gantz, Gadi Eizenkot and Gideon Saar to step down from the government, Haaretz reports. According to Lapid, "The government is not capable of leading the country, and Netanyahu is not fit to lead the country."
Lapid added that the Yesh Atid party will fully support any move to replace the government, whether through elections or by forming an alternative government led by "Benny, Gadi or Yuli Edelstein."
He also said that it is possible to establish, in a short time, a "broad, reasonable, caring government" that will support the Israeli army and reserve soldiers, allocate the budget for the benefit of citizens, bring those who have been evacuated from the northern border area back to their homes, and put a reconstruction plan on the table.

Graphic: (Credit: Guilhem Dorandeu)
Jordan’s King Abdullah II said on X that “everyone must acknowledge the brutality of what was committed in Gaza before we work to achieve peace.”
“Resignation to reality reaches the point of complicity,” he added in a follow-up post on the social media platform.
Abdullah had urged US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Sunday to push for a cease-fire in Gaza and bring an end to the humanitarian crisis in the besieged strip, AFP reported.
Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today met with soldiers based on Israel's northern border and said he would do everything "to restore security to the north" and allow residents from the north to return home, adding, "know that you cannot mess with us," Haaretz reports.
"We of course prefer that this not be done in a broad campaign, but that will not stop us," the Israeli media outlet also cites Netanyahu as saying.

Wissam Tawil (left in the photo), a Hezbollah commander killed on Monday by an Israeli strike, shaking hands with the party's secretary general, Hassan Nasrallah, in an undated photo provided by the Hezbollah press office.
Two United Nations human rights experts have called for the perpetrators of numerous alleged crimes, including sexual violence, committed during the Oct. 7 attack on Israeli soil by Hamas to be punished, according to AFP. “The growing evidence of reported sexual violence is particularly harrowing,” UN Special Rapporteur on Torture Alice Jill Edwards and Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Executions Morris Tidball-Binz said in a statement. They denounced “allegations of sexual torture (including) rape, gang rape, sexual assault, mutilation and shooting of the genitals”. “Bodies of women were found with clothes pulled up to their waists, underwear removed or torn or stained with blood,” they added.

The caretaker Lebanese Prime Minister, Najib Mikati, discussed the situation in southern Lebanon on Monday with the caretaker Minister of Foreign Affairs, Abdallah Bou Habib, according to a press release from the Grand Serail.
At the end of the meeting, Bou Habib said that after having received, at the end of last week, the chief European diplomat, Josep Borrell, he will soon meet with the German Minister of Foreign Affairs, Annalena Baerbock, who is expected in Beirut. He further stressed that "if the situation is positive," Amos Hochstein, the American envoy, charged by the Biden administration with monitoring the situation in the region, could also come to Lebanon. “We affirmed to our interlocutors that we are ready to apply resolution 1701,” which notably requires the withdrawal of Hezbollah fighters north of the Litani, if “Israel withdraws from all Lebanese territories and puts an end to its land incursions, maritime and air."
Israeli artillery targeted the surroundings of Houla (Marjayoun) and Dhaira (Sour), a security source told our correspondent.
23,084 people have been killed and 58,926 others injured in the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7, reports the Hamas Ministry of Health, according to AFP.
In the last 24 hours, the death toll stood at 249, adds the ministry, noting that the dead and injured are mainly women and minors.
According to reporting by Reuters, the Hezbollah commander killed in an Israeli strike on his car was part of the party's elite unit, the Radwan force.
Find here an article by Zeina Antonios, published in mid-November, on this Hezbollah commando unit.
Hezbollah officially announced, in a statement, the death of “Commander Wissam Hassan Tawil,” nicknamed “al-Hajj Jawad” and originally from Khirbet Silm. As usual, the party did not specify the circumstances of the deceased's death.
According to our count, 154 Hezbollah fighters have died in Israeli strikes in Lebanon and Syria since Oct. 8, 2023.
A military leader of Hezbollah was killed in the Israeli strike targeting a car in Khirbet Silm (Bint Jbeil) security sources told our correspondent. Another person was also in the vehicle and is currently in serious condition.
According to three security sources cited by Reuters, the targeted commander is part of Hezbollah's elite Radwan force.

Palestinian onlookers gather around a car wreck following reported Israeli bombardment in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on Jan. 8, 2024 amid continuing battles between Israel and the militant group Hamas. (Credit: AFP)
Hezbollah claimed, in two separate press releases, to have launched two strikes towards Israeli territory: the first, at 11 a.m., targeted the Israeli site of Hadeb al-Boustan (opposite the town of Boustan in Sour), inflicting “direct injuries.” The second, at 11:40 a.m., targeted the Israeli position of Ruwaissat al-Alam, in the occupied Shebaa farms (Hasbaya).
The Israeli army shells the outskirts of Wazzani and Kfar Shouba in the last 30 minutes, residents of the villages told L'Orient Today. The Mukhtar of Wazzani told L'Orient Today that a chicken farm was hit in the bombardment.
Four Israeli rockets targeted the southern outskirts of Kfar Shouba (Hasbaya), residents of the region told our correspondent in South Lebanon.
Rockets were also fired from southern Lebanon toward Israeli positions, according to security sources.
The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said its installations have been attacked 220 times since the start of the war, including 63 times directly.
1.4 million Palestinians are housed in 155 UNRWA facilities, spread across the five governorates of the Gaza Strip, and half a million others reside in the surrounding area.
Only five of the UN agency's 22 health centers are still operational in the central and southern parts of the enclave, the organization said in its latest report.
Speaking about the conflict in the Middle East in his annual address to diplomats, Pope Francis called for "a cease-fire on all fronts, including in Lebanon," according to comments reported by Reuters.
Describing the October 7 attack as an “atrocious” act of “extreme terrorism,” the pontiff reiterated his call for the “immediate release” of the hostages and stressed that hospitals, schools and places of worship in Gaza must “receive the necessary protection. The pope also deplored the fact that the Israeli response had caused “an exceptionally serious humanitarian crisis and inconceivable suffering for civilians” in Gaza.

At the funeral of a Hezbollah fighter killed in exchanges of fire with Israel in JibSheet, the head of the party's parliamentary group, Mohammad Raad, declared that Hezbollah "does not want the war to spread, but that the [Israeli] aggression stops.” “No one will be able to discuss with us anything relating to Lebanon before the Israeli enemy puts an end to its attacks,” he added, echoing the words of Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah, in his speech last Friday.
“If you want to extend the war, during which you attack our country, we will go to the end. We do not fear your threats or your strikes,” said Raad, whose son was killed in an Israeli strike on Nov. 22, 2023.
(Photo: Hezbollah press office)
The Israeli army announced strikes on Khan Younis killing "ten terrorists preparing to fire rockets at Israel," according to AFP.
Another rocket barrage was fired from southern Lebanon at northern Israel, security sources told out correspondent in southern Lebanon.
The Israeli strike on a car in Khirbet Silm killed at least one person, a security source told our correspondent.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant threatened Hezbollah, saying Israel was ready to engage in a destructive war against the party. “We are ready to sacrifice. They see what is happening in Gaza. They know we can do the same in Beirut,” Gallant warned in statements to the Wall Street Journal.
The minister also said Israel will move away from the "intense maneuver phase of the war" in Gaza and toward "different types of special operations," without abandoning its goal of destroying Hamas. The next chapter of the war “will last longer,” he stressed. “We are close to the next phase in the north [of Gaza], including in Gaza City,” where Israeli troops claim to have “dismantled” the Hamas command, he declared. “It will take time, but we will not give up.”
A missile launched by an Israeli drone targeted a car in the village of Khirbet Silm (Bint Jbeil), reports our correspondent in southern Lebanon. Civil defense teams from the Amal movement (Al-Risala Scouts) were sent to the scene.
Four Israeli rockets also targeted the village of Adaisseh (Marjayoun)
73 dead and 99 wounded Palestinians arrived at al-Aqsa Hospital in the central Gaza Strip in the last 24 hours, reports the Hamas Ministry of Health, according to Haaretz.
International humanitarian organizations had earlier announced that they had to evacuate this health establishment, one of the last still partially operational in the enclave, due to the fighting.
Three Israeli artillery shells fell on the hill of Awaida (Marjayoun), residents of the region told our correspondent in southern Lebanon.
Four missiles were fired by Israeli combat planes on the outskirts of the village of Aita al-Shaab (Bint Jbeil), residents of the region told our correspondent in southern Lebanon.
Local residents also told our correspondent that there were further airstrikes between Marwahin and Jabal Blat (Sour).
A number of rockets were launched from southern Lebanon at northern Israel, a security source told our correspondent.
A source at the public electricity supplier Électriqué du Liban (EDL) told L'Orient-Le Jour that this morning's Israeli strike on Khiam prevented one of these teams of technicians from repairing breakdowns that occurred on the network. After other strikes yesterday, part of the area has been left without electricity. “We are waiting for the situation to calm down to go to the area and repair these outages, hoping that this can happen quickly,” added this source.

The Israeli army fired what appears to be phosphorous shells on the outskirts of the south Lebanon border village of Khiam (Marjayoun), residents of the village told L'Orient Today.
Recap of the night in south Lebanon:
• The Israeli army shelled the outskirts of Aitaroun, Blida, and Maroun al-Ras, an area between Yaroun and Jibain, the outskirts of Ramieh and Jabal al-Blat around 9 p.m., a security source told L'Orient Today.
• The Israeli army struck on the outskirts of Aita al-Chaab and in an area between Aita al-Chaab and Debel, a security source told L'Orient Today.
• The Israeli army shelled the outskirts of Mais al-Jabal and Houla, a security source told L'Orient Today.
American Secretary of State Antony Blinken is expected in Israel on Monday evening for difficult talks on the war in Gaza against a backdrop of renewed tension on the Lebanese-Israeli border, raising fears of a regional conflagration.
Blinken must pass through the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia before landing in Tel Aviv where he will meet with Israeli leaders on Tuesday. This is his fourth regional tour since the start of the war.
Here is the Morning Brief so that you can get caught up with what has been happening.
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