Victims of the Israeli airstrike on Jabalia refugee camp. Mahmoud Abusalama
Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi group on Tuesday announced it had launched a “large number” of drones and ballistic missiles at Israeli targets, as global outrage mounted over Israeli strikes on the Jabalia refugee camp that killed at least 50 people and injured 150 others.
In a video statement, Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree said the latest assault was the third targeting Israel, warning these would continue until “Israeli aggression” against Gaza stopped. The Israeli military, in response, announced that its “systems identified an aerial target approaching Israeli territory” but stressed there was “no threat or risk to civilians.”
Meanwhile, global outrage over Israeli strikes on the Jabalia refugee camp—one targeting its southeast and a second its northwest—is mounting, with several states severing ties with Israel, as others reiterate calls for an immediate ceasefire. According to authorities, a complete telecommunication blackout is worsening the situation, preventing information from reaching the world, and also making it harder for paramedics to reach sites of bombings to help victims.
“I strongly condemn the rising Israeli hostilities and aggression against civilians in Gaza,” interim Prime Minister Anwaarul Haq Kakar wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “Yesterday’s air raid on Jabalia camp, where hundreds of lives were lost, including women and children, was a stark reminder of ongoing Israeli brutalities and war crimes in Gaza. Such reprehensible acts can never be condoned or forgotten. The world must act now to end this carnage,” he added.
Similarly, former prime minister Shehbaz Sharif—also on X—described the airstrike as a “war crime” on the innocent, civilian population of Gaza. “As the death toll rises by the day with children being the worst victims of the conflict, the Israeli atrocities in Gaza will continue to weigh heavily on the world conscience,” he wrote. “The scars of oppression, silence and inaction will be hard to erase. History will remember how the world community engaged in meaningless debates, while the innocent men, women and children were being butchered by the apartheid state of Israel,” he added.
Israeli aggression, coupled with rising global sympathies for Palestinians, has led to Latin American states either cutting ties with Israel or recalling their envoys. Bolivia has officially cut all ties to Israel over its “disproportionate” attack on Gaza, while Colombia and Chile have recalled their ambassador for further consultations. Israel has accused Bolivia of “capitulation to terrorism and to the ayatollah regime in Iran.” Hamas, meanwhile, has welcomed the decision and urged Arab countries that have normalized ties with Tel Aviv to do the same.
The current offensive, which commenced in the aftermath of a Hamas assault in southern Israel, has thus far seen Israeli bombardment kill at least 8,525 Palestinians and injured more than 12,000 others, most of them children. The bombardment has also resulted in the deaths of over 50 hostages, with Hamas declaring that Israel does not care about their welfare despite claiming to the world that its aggression is aimed at their freedom.
According to the Israeli army, its forces have carried out attacks on more than 11,000 targets in the Gaza Strip since the beginning of its ongoing war with Hamas. In a statement lamenting the conflict, UNRWA—the U.N.’s agency for Palestinian refugees—has claimed the entire population of Gaza is being de-humanized to bolster Israel’s actions. A day earlier, the director of the U.N.’s New York tendered his resignation over the U.N.’s inability to prevent the ongoing genocide of Palestinians in Gaza. Describing the governments of the U.S., the U.K., and much of Europe as “wholly complicit” in the “horrific assault,” he said it was time to abandon the failed Oslo Accords and adopt position “unapologetically based on international human rights and international law.”