Israel / Palestine

Palestinian militants fired volleys of rockets from Gaza into Israel, which responded with air strikes in the early hours of Thursday in the biggest escalation since an 11-day war last year. 

Five Palestinians have been killed in the past 24 hours amid operations by Israel to crack down on militants after a spate of deadly attacks on Israelis.

Little has changed in the calculations of the main actors in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, despite the dramatic upsurge in violence almost a year ago. To prevent a reprise, outside powers should push for interim steps as they revisit the core assumptions of their diplomacy.

The destabilizing deterioration of the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory continues in the absence of political solutions that would “reset the trajectory”, the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process said on Wednesday. 

Israel announced it would not cooperate with the UN Human Rights Council's investigation into alleged abuses against Palestinians, saying it was unfairly biased against Israel.

Germany is hoping to revitalize the Middle East peace process that has laid mostly dormant since 2014. Foreign Minister Baerbock is set to visit Israel, the Palestinian territories, Jordan and Egypt.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres said on Tuesday that he is encouraged by the recent engagement between senior Israeli and Palestinian officials. Arguing that “piecemeal approaches” to the question of Palestine would only ensure that the “underlying issues perpetuating the conflict remain unaddressed”, the UN chief urged both sides to “expand these contacts”.

Urgent action is required to prevent further deterioration of the economic, security and political situation across the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the UN’s Middle East envoy, Tor Wennesland, told the Security Council on Wednesday. 

Palestinians in villages in the West Bank have voted in municipal polls amid a boycott by the main opposition Hamas. The Islamist group is protesting against the indefinite postponement of a general election.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, said on Tuesday that the human rights situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory has become “disastrous”, with severe infringements occurring effecting some four million people.