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At least 50 people killed in Israeli strikes on homes, camps in Gaza

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At least 50 people killed in Israeli strikes on homes, camps in Gaza

At least 50 people have been killed in Israeli air strikes across Gaza, Palestinian medics say, as Israeli tanks push into northern parts of the Khan Younis area in southern Gaza.

Medics said at least 20 people were killed and others wounded in an Israeli attack on Wednesday on a tent encampment in al-Mawasi near Khan Younis. The Palestinian Civil Defence said the attack set several tents housing displaced families ablaze.

Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud, reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, said the death toll was expected to rise.

Patients who are in the hospital were “expected to lose their lives simply because there is no medical care, medical supplies and insufficient medical staff,” Mahmoud said.

“This is not the first time we’ve seen this happening. There’s a growing frustration among the displaced population in the al-Mawasi evacuation zone,” he said. “The Israeli military ordered them in the initial weeks of this genocidal war to evacuate in order to avoid being bombed, but they repeatedly find themselves the victims of these unpredictable attacks.”

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At least 10 people were killed in an Israeli air strike that hit three houses in Gaza City, the Civil Defence said. Many victims were still trapped under the rubble with rescue operations under way.

Medics said 11 people were killed in three air strikes on areas in central Gaza, including six children and a medic. Five of the dead had been queueing outside a bakery, they said.

A further nine Palestinians were killed by tank fire in Rafah near the border with Egypt, medics said.

‘Extremely urgent’

Israeli forces also fired on Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza for the fifth straight day, hospital Director Hussam Abu Safiya said. Three of his medical staff had been wounded, one critically, on Tuesday night, he said.

“Drones are dropping bombs filled with shrapnel that injure anyone that dares to move,” Abu Safiya said. “This situation is extremely urgent.”

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He said more than 100 patients inside the besieged hospital are at risk of death and Israeli forces are preventing access to the nearby al-Awda Hospital.

Residents in the north’s main three towns – Jabalia, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoon – said Israeli forces have blown up dozens of houses.

Palestinians said Israel’s army is trying to drive people out of the northern edge of Gaza by issuing threats that if residents do not flee, they risk death and by carrying out bombardments to create a buffer zone. The Israeli military has besieged the area since it began a renewed ground offensive there nearly two months ago.

The siege has worsened an already dire humanitarian crisis amid a looming famine.

Hamas said the bombings of homes in Beit Lahiya and the targeting of Kamal Adwan Hospital are “an insistence on the ongoing war” and “genocide” in Gaza.

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The group said in a statement that Israel is showing it plans to keep disregarding international law “in light of the shameful failure of the international system to put an end to these horrific crimes”.

Hamas said Israeli actions “are carried out under the full cover and protection of the American administration and some Western capitals”.

In the Khan Younis area, residents told the Reuters news agency that Israeli tanks advanced a day after the military issued new evacuation threats, saying there had been rocket launches by Palestinian groups from the area.

With shells crashing near residential areas, families left their homes on Wednesday and headed westwards towards al-Mawasi, which was designated by the Israeli military as a “safe zone” but has since repeatedly come under attack.

Palestinian and United Nations officials said there are no safe areas left in Gaza and almost all of its 2.3 million residents have been displaced multiple times.

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Israel’s military campaign has killed more than 44,500 Palestinians, injured many others and reduced much of the enclave to rubble since it began in October last year.

Israel agreed to a ceasefire with the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah last week that has halted most fighting in a conflict that has unfolded in Lebanon in parallel with the Gaza war.

But the war in Gaza has ground on with only a single ceasefire more than a year ago that lasted for one week.

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Why is the opposition capture of Hama in Syria so important?

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Why is the opposition capture of Hama in Syria so important?

Opposition fighters in Syria captured the strategic city of Hama on Thursday in a matter of hours.

Fighters from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which means the Committee for the Liberation of the Levant, led the offensive as they stormed the city. Government forces quickly retreated.

Inhabitants appeared to welcome what many described as the liberation of their city from Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s clutches.

One HTS fighter, who did not want to give his name, told Al Jazeera after entering Hama: “Thank God we liberated the city of Hama and now we are securing [it]. With God’s blessing, we will enter the city of Homs next.”

Analysts and observers believe antigovernment fighters could capture most of the country, but say Hama has a particular value for the Syrian opposition.

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This is what we know about the strategic and symbolic significance of the city.

Why is Hama so significant in Syria?

The city witnessed one of the most brutal acts of repression in Syrian history, analysts and observers say.

In 1982, al-Assad’s father, Hafez, who was then president, ordered the killing of members of the Muslim Brotherhood who were occupying the city.

The targeted people were part of a movement trying to remove the al-Assads from power and had taken over the city after ambushing army troops.

They killed senior officers and leaders within the government and looted their homes, according to a report by the European Council for Foreign Relations, a think tank based in the United Kingdom.

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The group’s operations attracted widespread support and triggered an uprising against the government in the city.

The government responded by bombing Hama for several days while Syrian troops moved in to crush the uprising.

Syrian opposition fighters standing on a mat bearing drawings of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his late father Hafez [AFP]

In the following weeks, Syrian forces laid siege to the city, going door to door to kill, torture and arrest any young men they believed to be with the opposition, according to Amnesty International.

It is estimated that between 10,000 and 40,000 people were killed in Hama – the precise figure is still unknown.

“It was the awareness of the mass arrests and executions that terrified people,” said Robin Yassin-Kassab, an expert on Syria and the co-author of, Burning Country: Syrians in Revolution and War.

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“[The episode] made Syria a kingdom of silence,” he told Al Jazeera.

The 2011 Syrian uprising momentarily shattered that barrier of fear.

As protests swept the country, inhabitants of Hama gathered and sang “Yalla erhal ya Bashar,” which translates to “Come on and leave, Bashar!”

Protesters in Hama carried olive branches and crowds reached more than 500,000 people, activists told Al Jazeera in 2011.

What did the Syrian regime do to Hama in 2011?

All across Syria, government forces violently repressed demonstrations in 2011, including in Hama.

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For more than a decade, the regime barrel-bombed cities and arrested and tortured activists and perceived opponents.

The government often relied on Alawi, as well as Shia, armed groups, both from Syria and across the region, to crack down on protesters.

The Alawi sect in Syria is an offshoot of Shia Islam to which al-Assad and his family belong.

Yassin-Kassab said many believe the barrier of fear has been shattered for a second time after rebel groups captured Aleppo and now Hama within days.

In Hama, scenes of prisoners of conscience being liberated from the central prison prompted celebrations by Syrians.

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In the city, inhabitants tore down a statue of Hafez al-Assad.

“I presumed Hama is where [the government and its loyalists] would put up a serious fight … but they weren’t capable,” said Yassin-Kassab.

“After Hama [was liberated], I thought to myself: ‘The Syrian revolution is back.’”

An abandoned Syrian army armoured vehicle sits on a field controlled by Syrian insurgents in the outskirts of Hama, Syria
An abandoned Syrian army armoured vehicle sits on a field controlled by Syrian opposition fighters in the outskirts of Hama, on December 3, 2024 [Ghaith Alsayed/AP]

Is Hama strategically important?

Very much so.

The capture of Hama allows rebel groups to keep moving down the Aleppo-Damascus M5 highway towards Homs, which if captured, could split apart the regime’s strongholds.

Opposition fighters appear to have reached the outskirts of the city, according to reports, while thousands of people have fled.

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Homs has a larger population of Alawis than Hama, but HTS has reportedly offered assurances that minorities in Syria will not be harmed.

The city is effectively a gateway to Syria’s capital, Damascus, as well as to the coastal provinces of Tartous and Latakia, which are Alawi heartlands and where Russian naval and air bases are located.

If Homs falls to the opposition, then opposition fighters are likely to push on to try to take Damascus, said Yassin-Kassab.

“I do think if Homs falls, then that will be the beginning of the end for the [Assad regime],” he told Al Jazeera.

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Berlin's new panda twins have been named. Meet Leni and Lotti, or Meng Hao and Meng Tian

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Berlin's new panda twins have been named. Meet Leni and Lotti, or Meng Hao and Meng Tian

BERLIN (AP) — Germany’s new panda twins now have names — or rather, two names apiece.

The two female cubs, born at the Berlin Zoo on Aug. 22, were introduced Friday as Meng Hao and Meng Tian (“good dream” and “sweet dream.”) Alternatively, they also answer to the very Berlin names of Leni and Lotti.

The pair, who lay on their bellies on a mattress and peered at photographers as the Chinese ambassador to Germany and Berlin’s mayor unveiled their names, are the second pair of giant pandas born in Germany.

The first were their elder brothers Meng Xiang and Meng Yuan, who became far better known by the German names Pit and Paule. The cubs were born in August 2019 and were a star attraction in Berlin until they were flown to China nearly a year ago — a trip that was contractually agreed from the start but delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

All are the offspring of mother Meng Meng and father Jiao Qing, who arrived in Berlin in 2017.

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Zoo director Andreas Knieriem said the youngsters are growing fast, putting on nearly 100 grams (3.5 ounces) per day and now weighing in at almost 6 kilos (13.2 pounds) each.

Giant pandas have difficulty breeding and births are particularly welcomed. There are about 1,800 pandas living in the wild in China and a few hundred in captivity worldwide.

Meng Meng was artificially inseminated in March. Female pandas are fertile only for a few days per year at most.

China gifted friendly nations with its unofficial mascot for decades as part of a “panda diplomacy″ policy. The country now loans pandas to zoos on commercial terms.

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South Korean lawmakers support suspending president’s powers after short-lived martial law declaration

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South Korean lawmakers support suspending president’s powers after short-lived martial law declaration

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South Korean lawmakers are calling for suspending the constitutional powers of President Yoon Suk Yeol after his short-lived martial law declaration earlier this week, raising the prospects of impeachment. 

Opposition parties are pushing for a parliamentary vote on Yoon’s impeachment on Saturday, calling his martial law declaration an “unconstitutional, illegal rebellion or coup.” 

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President Yoon shocked democratic allies by declaring martial law late Tuesday night, sending the East Asian country into chaos. South Korea’s parliament voted to cancel martial law just six hours later, but the episode has effectively frozen the country’s politics. Thousands of protesters have marched in the streets of Seoul since Wednesday, calling for Yoon to resign and be investigated. 

Still, passing an impeachment motion would need support from some members of the president’s People Power Party to get the required two-thirds majority. The opposition parties who jointly brought the impeachment motion have 192 seats combined. PPP has 108 lawmakers.

SOUTH KOREAN PRESIDENT’S MARTIAL LAW DECLARATION A ‘BLUNDER,’ COULD EMBOLDEN NORTH KOREA, EXPERT SAYS

South Korea’s main opposition Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung, bottom center, shouts slogans during a joint press conference with members of civil society and the five opposition parties to condemn the ruling People Power Party at the National Assembly in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Dec. 6, 2024.  (Park Dong-ju/Yonhap via AP)

During a party meeting, PPP leader Han Dong-hun said it was important to suspend Yoon’s presidential duties and power quickly, saying he poses a “significant risk of extreme actions, like reattempting to impose martial law, which could potentially put the Republic of Korea and its citizens in great danger.”

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CNN PANEL SEES ‘PARALLELS’ BETWEEN SOUTH KOREAN PRESIDENT DECLARING MARTIAL LAW AND TRUMP, JAN. 6 RIOTS

Han said he had received intelligence that the president had ordered the arrests of unspecified politicians based on accusations of “anti-state activities” during martial law. 

South Korea's ruling People Power Party leader Han Dong-hun

South Korea’s ruling People Power Party leader Han Dong-hun, right, speaks during a press conference at the National Assembly in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Dec. 6, 2024. (Jo Sung-bong/Newsis via AP)

Han leads a minority faction within the ruling party, and 18 lawmakers in his faction voted with opposition lawmakers to overturn Yoon’s martial law decree. 

JAPAN SAYS IT WILL WATCH CHINA’S MILITARY ACTIVITY AFTER BEIJING ADMITS VIOLATING JAPANESE AIRSPACE

If Yoon is impeached, he would be suspended until the Constitutional Court rules on whether to remove him from office or restore his presidential power. 

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The main liberal opposition Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung said in a televised speech Friday that it was crucial to suspend Yoon as “quickly as possible.”

Protesters

Protesters march to the presidential office after a candlelight vigil against South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol in Seoul, South Korea, Thursday, Dec. 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Lee said Yoon’s martial law enforcement amounted to “rebellion and also a self-coup.” He said Yoon’s move caused serious damage to the country’s image and paralyzed foreign policy, pointing to criticism from the Biden administration and foreign leaders canceling their visits to South Korea. 

President Yoon has issued no response to Han’s comments. Nor has he made any public appearances since he made a televised announcement that his martial law was lifted. 

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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