Israel-Gaza War LIVE Updates: No Electricity In Gaza, Death Count Stands At 3,600

US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Wednesday that providing support to Ukraine and Israel are “absolute top priorities” for the United States and she expects bipartisan support despite political upheaval in Congress.

The ouster of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy last week by Republican hardliners has raised concerns about a prolonged paralysis in Congress.

Military and economic support for Ukraine “along with resources for Israel are our absolute top priorities for the Biden administration,” Janet Yellen said.

The Indian Ambassador to Israel, in a message to the Indian community of the war-torn country, said that the situation is being monitores “closely”. 

In a video message, he said that the embassy is working constantly for the safety and welfare of Indians in Israel.

Gaza has lost all mains electricity after the only power station in the Palestinian enclave ran out of fuel and had to shut down, Reuters reported Wednesday evening citing Hamas media sources.

Norway, which chairs an international donors group for Palestine, on Wednesday urged the international community to maintain its aid to Palestinians following the Hamas militant group’s attack on Israel.

“The situation will only deteriorate further if the international community suspends or reduces its assistance at this critical juncture,” Norwegian Foreign Minister Anniken Huitfeldt told AFP in an email.

Russia is set to benefit from the Israel-Hamas conflict, as Israel’s requests for US military aid risk diverting weapons and focus from Ukraine while the rising price of oil bolsters Moscow’s economy.

The Hamas group in the massive terror attack on Israel last week used some tactics that military experts say was rarely used earlier.

Apart from the use of powered gliders to insert heavily armed men into Israel from the Gaza Strip, the Hamas also deployed weaponised commercial drones to incapacitate static Israeli defences.

Four paramedics of the Palestinian Red Crescent were killed in Israeli air strikes in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, the humanitarian organisation said.

Three of them died when a strike “directly targeted an ambulance” of the Red Crescent north of Gaza, and the fourth in a separate strike in the east of the enclave, the aid group said.

4 paramedics killed in Israel strike on Gaza, says Palestinian Red Crescent: News Agency AFP

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and a visiting delegation of US senators on Wednesday condemned the “indiscriminate attack” by Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel after a meeting in Seoul, Yoon’s office said.

The bipartisan delegation, led by US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, also discussed the North Korean nuclear threat during the visit, which follows a high-profile trip to Beijing where the senators met with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

“The president and the Senate delegation condemned Hamas’ indiscriminate attack on Israel,” Yoon’s office said, adding the two countries would “play a constructive role” in easing tensions in the Middle East.

As the war between Israel and Gaza entered its fifth day on Wednesday, a heartbreaking video has surfaced, showing how Hamas is using Israeli hostages – including children – as bargaining chips. 

The video, live-streamed by Hamas, shows a gunman ordering a family to talk while a man bleeds from his leg and his wife sits next to him, with a young girl in her lap. Two other children sit on either side of the couple, with a sobbing girl holding her mouth to keep from screaming.

Congress under fire for its statement on the Hamas attack on Israel, the party’s senior leader Shashi Tharoor said today that the terror group does not represent Palestine. “The Centre’s stand on Israel war doesn’t go far enough, India should also stand behind Palestinians… The country should not forget the cause of Palestine,” he told NDTV in an exclusive interview.

EU chief Ursula von der Leyen said on Wednesday that the Palestinian group Hamas’s killing of Israeli civilians was a cold-blooded act of war and reflected an “ancient evil”.

“We have to be clear in defining this kind of horror,” she said. “And there can only be one response to it. Europe stands with Israel. And we fully support Israel’s right to defend itself.” 

Addressing the start of a meeting of European commissioners, von der Leyen also supported a full review of the EU’s multi-million-euro financial support for Palestinian projects.

At least 169 Israeli soldiers have been killed in fighting with the Hamas group after it launched a shock cross-border attack, the army said on Wednesday.

“As of this morning, we’ve informed the families of 169 fallen IDF (army) soldiers,” military spokesman Daniel Hagari told reporters, adding that the families of 60 people abducted and taken to Gaza have also been contacted.

Israel is not conducting itself “like a state” in the Gaza Strip, Turkey’s president said on Wednesday, as Israel pounded the territory after a Hamas onslaught.

“Israel should not forget that if it acts more like an organisation rather than a state, it’ll finish by being treated as such,” Recep Tayyip Erdogan said, attacking “shameful methods” of the Israeli army in the densely-populated Gaza Strip.

The death count in the Gaza Strip surged to 1,055 on Wednesday, the Hamas-controlled health ministry said, as Israel pounded targets across the densely populated territory.

“We have at least 1,055 martyrs and 5,184 people suffering from different injuries,” the ministry said in an update on casualties since Israel unleashed a fierce air campaign in response to a surprise attack on Israel by Hamas terrorists on Saturday.

Israeli troops have killed at least 1,000 Palestinian gunmen who infiltrated from Gaza in incursions that began at the weekend, and have reinforced all communities in Israel as hostilities spread to other fronts, the military said.

“Fighter jets recently attacked the Islamic University, which serves as an important center of political and military power for the terrorist organization Hamas in the Gaza Strip and a training institution for the development and production of weapons,” the tweet reads

At least 169 Israeli soldiers have been killed in fighting with Palestinian Islamist group Hamas after its militants launched a shock cross-border attack, the army said on Wednesday. “As of this morning, we’ve informed the families of 169 fallen IDF (army) soldiers,” military spokesman Daniel Hagari told reporters, adding that the families of 60 people abducted and taken to Gaza have also been contacted.

Here are airlines that have temporarily halted flights to and from Israel:

AFRICA

Royal Air Maroc

AMERICAS

United Airlines, Delta Air Lines and American Airlines

Air Canada 

ASIA

Hainan Airlines

Cathay Pacific

Korean Air 

EUROPE

Norwegian Air

Lufthansa

Austrian Airlines

Swiss International Airlines

Brussels Airlines

EasyJet

Ryanair

Air France KLM

Finnair

Wizz Air

TAP

Iberia Airlines

Vueling canceled

Air Europa

ITA

Aegean Airlines

Bulgaria Air

Air Malta

Icelandair

Virgin Atlantic

LOT

MIDDLE EAST

Etihad Airways

Gulf Air

Hezbollah claims missile fire on Israel as retaliation for slain members, news agency AFP reported.

A French leftist party, the New Anti-Capitalist Party, is being investigated for glorifying “terror” over comments following the deadly Hamas raids on Israel, French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said on Tuesday. Darmanin told a TV news show prosecutors referred the case to police after the far-left NPA affirmed “its support for the Palestinians and the means of struggle they have chosen to resist”.

Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant will hold video talks Thursday with his NATO counterparts, after the surprise Hamas attack on his country, alliance chief Jens Stoltenberg said. “Tomorrow, we will also be briefed by the Israeli defence minister Gallant on the situation in Israel,” Stoltenberg told journalists Wednesday at a two-day meeting of ministers in Brussels. “Allies condemned the horrific terrorist attacks on innocent civilians in Israel over the weekend, and we are looking forward to the briefing from the defence minister.”

The Israeli military said one of its northern positions was attacked with anti-tank fire from Lebanon on Wednesday, but did not immediately provide details on any casualties or who might have been responsible. The attack took place near the Israeli town of Arab al-Aramshe, opposite the Lebanese village of Dhayra, the statement said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky urged the Western countries to support the people of Israel as they did Ukraine after Russia’s invaded to show them they are not “alone”. “My recommendation to the leaders to go to Israel and I think to support people, just people I’m not speaking about any institutions, just to support people who have been under terrorist attacks,” he said.

Israeli fighters jets struck the Islamic University in Gaza City on Wednesday, an news agency AFP correspondent and an official with the Hamas-linked institution said. “The intense air strikes destroyed completely some buildings of the Islamic University,” Ahmed Orabi of the university management told AFP.

Australia has launched two special flights to help bring its citizens from Israel back home, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said. The first flight will leave on Friday followed by the second on Sunday. The flights will begin from Ben Gurion airport and halt at London. “We are assessing all options to get Australians home as soon as possible who wish to travel back here,” said  the prime minister.

Twenty Thai nationals have been killed in the conflict between Israel and militant group Hamas, the kingdom’s government said Wednesday, up from the previous toll of 18. The foreign ministry said the number of Thais held hostage had increased by three to 14, based on unofficial reports from Thai citizens in Israel. 

At least 30 people were killed and hundreds wounded after Israel attacked the Gaza Strip with hundreds of rockets overnight, a Hamas government official said. Dozens of residential buildings, factories, mosques and shops were hit, the official told news agency AFP.

Thailand’s foreign ministry has said it received reports that three more of its nationals had been taken hostage in Gaza. So far, 14 national have been abducted and 20 citizens have been killed and 13 others injured.

Hacktivist groups say they are hitting Israeli targets online amid the war in Israel and Gaza, disrupting and defacing websites like the Jerusalem Post. The conflict between Israel and its Arab neighbors routinely attracts both intense global interest and politically minded hackers – dubbed hacktivists – who piggyback on the fighting, either to support their favored side or simply get attention. “There are dozens of victims per day, claimed by both pre-established and new (hacktivist) groups,” cyber intelligence firm Recorded Future said.

Israel has added more flights to help bring home more military reserve force members as its war rages against Hamas, said news agency Reuters Israel had said that it had called up an unprecedented 300,000 reservists to help its retaliation against the Hamas strikes.

Thailand: 18 dead, 11 hostages

US: 14 dead, others missing

Nepal: 10 dead

France: Eight dead, 20 missing

Argentina: Seven dead, 15 missing

Russia: Four dead, six missing 

Ukraine: Two dead

UK: Two dead

Canada: One dead, Three missing

Cambodia: One dead

Germany: Several hostages

Philippines: Five missing

Chile: Three dead, one missing

Peru: two dead, three missing

Austria: Three missing

Brazil: Two dead

Italy: Two missing

Paraguay: Two missing

Peru: Two missing

Sri Lanka: Two missing

Tanzania: Two missing

Mexico: Two hostages

Colombia: Two hostages

Ireland: One missing