Scholz stresses humanitarian aid, civilians’ safety in Gaza in call with Netanyahu.
Ministry: At least 9,061, including 3,760 children, killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a telephone call Wednesday that protecting civilians in the Gaza Strip and ensuring humanitarian aid were crucial, Berlin said.
Scholz “renewed Germany’s unwavering solidarity with Israel,” his office said in a statement after the call.
“He underlined the importance of protecting civilians and humanitarian supplies for the people of the Gaza Strip.”
Hamas militants killed 1,400 people and kidnapped more than 230 on October 7 according to Israeli officials, in the deadliest attack in the country’s history.
Since then, Israel has relentlessly bombarded the Palestinian territory and sent in ground troops as they seek to destroy Hamas, with the health ministry in Gaza saying 8,796 people have been killed, two-thirds of them women and children.
Scholz welcomed the fact the first ambulances carrying wounded Palestinians from Gaza were able to enter Egypt Wednesday and said he and Netanyahu “agreed to work together to prevent the conflict from spreading.”
The call with Netanyahu came one day after an Israeli strike on Jabalia refugee camp.
At least 47 people were killed in the strike which Israel said had hit a vast tunnel complex, assassinating a senior Hamas commander behind the October 7 attacks.
In a separate interview later, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock accused Hamas of using civilians as “human shields” in the camp.
“Israel not only has a right to defend itself but rather, like every other country in the world, has the duty to protect its citizens,” she told public broadcaster ZDF.
She condemned “a situation in which Hamas very consciously uses the people in this refugee camp as human shields.
West Bank settlers’ violence ‘incredibly destabilizing’: US
The United States on Wednesday called violence by West Bank settlers in tandem with the Israel-Hamas war “incredibly destabilizing” and urged Israel to rein them in.
Settler violence in the West Bank is “incredibly destabilizing and counterproductive to Israel’s long-term security in addition to, of course, being extremely harmful to the Palestinians living in the West Bank,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters.
“We have sent a very clear message to them that it’s unacceptable, it needs to stop and those responsible for it need to be held accountable,” Miller said of US contact with the Israeli government.
Violence in the West Bank has been on the rise since early last year, marked by frequent army raids, attacks by Israeli settlers and Palestinian attacks on Israeli forces and settlers.
More than 120 West Bank Palestinians have been killed since the Gaza war began on October 7 after Hamas militants stormed over the border killing more than 1,400 people, mostly civilians, according to Israeli authorities.
Since then, the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza says more than 8,500 people have been killed in Israel’s bombardment, two-thirds of them women and children.