Middle East crisis live: Houthis claim it won’t expand Red Sea attacks; Hamas delegation visited Russia, says foreign ministry | Israel-Gaza war

Yemen’s Houthis have said they do not intend to expand their attacks on shipping in and around the Red Sea, beyond their stated aims of blockading Israel and retaliating against the US and Britain for airstrikes.

In an interview with Reuters, spokesperson Mohammed Abdulsalam, who is also the chief Houthi negotiator in peace talks over Yemen’s decade-old civil war, said the group had no plans to target its longstanding foes Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

“We do not want the escalation to expand. This is not our demand. We imposed rules of engagement in which not a single drop of blood was shed or major material losses,” said Abdulsalam. “It represented pressure on Israel only, it did not represent pressure on any country in the world.”

The Iran-aligned Houthis, who control most of Yemen’s populated areas, have attacked ships at the mouth of the Red Sea since October, in what they say is a show of solidarity with Palestinians by targeting vessels linked to Israel.

“What the Yemeni people did in the beginning was to target Israeli ships heading to Israel without causing any human or even significant material losses, just preventing ships from passing as a natural right,” said Abdulsalam. “Now, when America joined in and escalated the situation further, there is no doubt that Yemen will respond.”

The Houthi attacks have forced international shipping companies to route trade between Europe and Asia around Africa, adding time and costs. The US and Britain bombed Houthi targets last week in what they called an intervention to keep one of the world’s busiest shipping routes open.

“We do not want the conflict to expand in the region and we do not prefer that, and we are still working on non-escalation, but the decision is up to the Americans, as long as they continue to attack,” said Abdulsalam. “Yemen is concerned with responding, and is interested in verifying or maintaining its position by preventing Israeli ships from heading to the occupied Palestinian territories.”

It is 5.08pm in Gaza City, Tel Aviv and Beirut. Here’s a recap of the latest developments:

• EU foreign ministers will hold a series of meetings on Monday with counterparts from Israel, the Palestinian Authority and key Arab nations about the war in Gaza and prospects for a future peace settlement. The Israeli foreign minister Israel Katz and his Palestinian counterpart Riyad al-Maliki are not expected to meet each other.

• There can be “no security and stability in the region” without a Palestinian state, said the spokesperson for the Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas. The remarks come in response to Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s rejection on Thursday of calls by the US to take steps toward the establishment of a Palestinian state after the war.

• Only a ceasefire deal can win the release of dozens of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza and that those claiming they can be freed through military pressure are spreading illusions, said former army chief and member of Israel’s war cabinet, Gadi Eisenkot. In a thinly veiled criticism of Netanyahu, Eisenkot also said strategic decisions about the direction of the war must be made urgently.

• Unicef described the Gaza Strip as “the most dangerous place in the world to be a child” in a statement released after a visit to the area by its deputy executive director Ted Chaiban. Of the nearly 25,000 people reported to have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the escalation in hostilities, up to 70% are reported to be women and children, he said, calling the conditions faced some of the “most horrific” he had ever seen.

• Detainees in Gaza described being “beaten, humiliated, subjected to ill-treatment, and to what may amount to torture” said the spokesperson for the UN high commissioner for human rights, Ravina Shamdasani. She said there had also been reports of men who were subsequently released in “only diapers”. Reporting from Rafah, the UN envoy described the situation in Gaza as a “massive human rights crisis” and a “major, human-made, humanitarian disaster”.

• The WHO said overnight it had counted 24 cases of hepatitis A and “thousands” of cases of jaundice likely linked to the spread of the viral liver infection in Gaza. The WHO chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus described the health crisis in the Palestinian territory as “explosive”

• Israeli shelling has killed two people in the Abasan area of Khan Younis, bringing the number killed in the city to 10 since last night. Al Jazeera reported that Israeli forces were continuing to shell Khan Younis while bringing in reinforcements to the area. The death toll from Thursday night’s strike on a home in western Khan Younis rose to eight, while 15 people were killed by an Israeli airstrike that hit an apartment block near the Gaza City health facility. Another strike in the northern city’s Sabra neighbourhood had also injured several civilians, Al Jazeera said, citing the Palestinian news agency Wafa.

• Israeli gunboats are hitting coastal areas of Gaza City, which has also been the site of heavy airstrikes. At least 12 people have been killed and several have been injured from a strike that hit a residence near the city’s al-Shifa hospital. Reporting from Tulkarm refugee camp in the West Bank, Al Jazeera’s reporter Hoda Abdel-Hamid said the “mood is one of anger” and that “the raid lasted nearly 40 hours, one of the longest we have seen in the occupied West Bank since 7 October”.

• Israeli forces have advanced further into southern Gaza’s main city, pounding areas near the Nasser hospital (the territory’s biggest hospital still partially working) sparking fears it could be forced to close due to Israeli bombardments and evacuation orders.

• A Hamas delegation has visited Moscow, says the Russian foreign ministry. During the talks, the Russian side emphasised the need for Hamas to release Israeli hostages and condemned the “catastrophic” humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip.

• Essential aid including food and medical supplies are being prevented from entering Gaza, says the charity ActionAid UK, criticising “confusing and arbitrary rules about the type of aid permitted to enter Gaza”. The charity says it had resulted in thousands of essential items being stopped at border crossings as well as increasing the time spent on screening trucks, leading to a backlog at the border.

• The IDF appeared to confirm reports that its soldiers had dug up graves in a Gaza cemetery, explaining that it took the action in order to verify that the bodies of hostages were not buried there, reports the Times of Israel. Responding to a query from US outlet NBC, the IDF said in a statement that it is “committed to fulfilling its urgent mission to rescue the hostages and find and return the bodies of hostages that are held in Gaza”.

• Pakistan’s prime minister held an emergency security meeting on Friday with military and intelligence chiefs after trading deadly airstrikes with Iran on militant targets this week.

• Thousands of Houthi supporters took to the streets in Sana’a, Yemen on Friday to express their solidarity with Palestinians, protest against US air raids and to denounce the US labeling of Houthis as a ‘specially designated global terrorist’ group.

• Demonstrators in Amman, Jordan carried flags and signs reading: ‘100 days of resilience, sacrifice, heroism and pride’ during a protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.

• A senior Houthi official promised safe passage for Russian and Chinese vessels through the Red Sea, where the Iran-backed Yemeni militant group has been carrying out attacks on commercial ships in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza.

• Israel’s emergency government is “close to collapse” as Gaza war continues, with “the question no longer being whether an election will take place in 2024”, but rather when in 2024, reports The Jerusalem Post.

• Belgium will supply a vessel to an EU mission to protect shipping from attacks by Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi militia in the Red Sea, the Belgian broadcaster VRT reports, citing government sources. The Netherlands and Germany have also said they are willing to contribute ships to mission.

• Some cruise operators have cancelled or adjusted their itineraries to avoid the Red Sea due to attacks on ships by Houthi militia. Royal Caribbean said it had cancelled two voyages so far: one from Muscat to Dubai and another from Dubai to Mumbai. The Swiss-Italian operator MSC Cruises said on Wednesday it had cancelled three trips in April from South Africa and the United Arab Emirates to Europe due to the Red Sea crisis.

Lisa O’Carroll

My colleague, the Guardian’s Brussels correspondent Lisa O’Carroll, has more on the news about next week’s meeting of EU ministers, leaders from across the Middle East and a representative from Israel:

Leaders from across the Middle East and a representative from Israel will meet EU foreign ministers on Monday.

It is understood EU ministers will convey their strong opposition to the Israeli representative to Benjamin Netanyahu after yesterday’s declaration that he rejects any moves to establish a Palestinian state when Israel ends its war on Gaza.

But their main mission is to progress the so-called “day after” plan to rebuild Gaza physically and politically when the war is over.

Attending the meetings will be the Palestinian foreign minister and the prime ministers of Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the secretary general of the Arab League as well as the EU’s chief diplomat, Josep Borrell.

Financial sanctions against Hamas are also expected to be agreed at the meeting of EU foreign ministers along with the final touches to a new deal with Eygpt on investment, water supplies and migration.

EU foreign ministers will hold a series of meetings on Monday with counterparts from Israel, the Palestinian Authority and key Arab nations about the war in Gaza and prospects for a future peace settlement, reports AFP citing official sources.

The Israeli foreign minister, Israel Katz, and his Palestinian counterpart, Riyad al-Maliki, are not expected to meet each other.

The foreign ministers of Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia will also meet European ministers in Brussels. According to AFP, European diplomats said their aim is to sound out each side over ways to end the violence on the ground and the next steps towards a longer-term solution.

The EU has struggled for a united stance on the conflict in Gaza as staunch backers of Israel such as Germany have rejected demands for an immediate ceasefire from the likes of Spain and Ireland.

EU officials have sketched out broad demands for “the day after” the current war ends in Gaza, calling for no long-term Israeli occupation, an end to Hamas’s rule and a role for the Palestinian Authority in running the territory.

The 27-nation bloc, along with the US, believes the creation of a Palestinian state remains the only viable way to secure a lasting peace. But Israel’s rightwing prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, on Thursday flatly rejected that suggestion.

In the face of growing violence across the region, EU countries this week gave initial backing to setting up a naval mission to help protect shipping in the Red Sea from attacks by Yemen’s Houthi.

A proposal for deployment says it could have three frigates and a mandate to defend ships, but not attack the Houthis onshore, like a US-led coalition operating in the region. EU ministers meeting on Monday are set to discuss the mission, but it is only expected to be finalised next month.

The Netherlands and Germany have said they are willing to contribute ships to mission.

Pakistan’s prime minister held an emergency security meeting on Friday with military and intelligence chiefs after trading deadly airstrikes with Iran on militant targets this week, reports AFP.

Iran carried out a missile and drone attack on what it called “terrorist” targets in Pakistan on Tuesday night, with Pakistan in turn striking militant targets inside Iran on Thursday.

Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar, Pakistan’s caretaker prime minister summoned a meeting of the national security committee, with the chief of army staff and head of the intelligence services believed to be attending.

As the meeting began, Islamabad said the foreign minister, Jalil Abbas Jilani, had spoken to his Iranian counterpart, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, by phone.

“Jilani expressed Pakistan’s readiness to work with Iran on all issues based on [a] spirit of mutual trust and cooperation,” said a foreign ministry statement. “He underscored the need for closer cooperation on security issues.”

The muted rhetoric matched analysts’ predictions that both sides would seek to de-escalate the confrontation.

“The upshot of the new situation is that the two countries are seemingly and symbolically even,” said Antoine Levesques, of the International Institute for Strategic Studies. “The risks of further escalation are slight and maybe diminishing with time”.

A delegation of members from Hamas has visited Moscow, reports Al Jazeera, citing information released by the Russian foreign ministry.

According to Al Jazeera’s report, the foreign ministry said that during the talks, the Russian side emphasised the need for Hamas to release Israeli hostages. It also condemned the “catastrophic” humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip.

Israel’s emergency government is “close to collapse” as Gaza war continues, with “the question no longer being whether an election will take place in 2024”, but rather when in 2024, reports the Jerusalem Post.

“The Americans have realised that prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is incapacitated because of the political situation he is in,” a senior official from one of Israel’s opposition parties told the publication’s Yanir Cozin last week.

“In fear of voters’ reaction, moreover, Netanyahu has even gone as far as to conceal his transition to stage three of the war not only from his own war cabinet, but also from the general public,” Cozin reported the source as saying.

While Cozin says “the question is no longer whether an election will take place in 2024, but rather when in 2024”, he also states that most coalition members “have no desire to hold an election anytime soon”. “They already have their budget for the year, have nailed down good positions, and are in no hurry to let the people have their say, even though so many Israelis are hurting now,” he writes.

Detainees in Gaza described being “beaten, humiliated, subjected to ill-treatment, and to what may amount to torture” said the spokesperson for the UN high commissioner for human rights, Ravina Shamdasani.

Shamdasani, who has been in Rafah since Monday, made the comments in a blog post for the OHCHR website:

During my time here, I have managed to meet a number of released detainees. These are men who were detained by Israeli security forces in unknown locations for 30-55 days. They described being beaten, humiliated, subjected to ill-treatment, and to what may amount to torture. They reported being blindfolded for long periods – some of them for several consecutive days. One man said he had access to a shower only once during his 55 days in detention. There are reports of men who were subsequently released – but only in diapers, without any adequate clothing in this cold weather.

What the detainees told her, she said, was consistent with reports her office has been gathering of the detention of Palestinians on a broad scale. This includes many civilians, held in secrecy, often subject to ill-treatment, with no access to their families, lawyers or effective judicial protection, she added.

“Israel must take urgent steps to ensure that all those arrested or detained are treated in line with international human rights and international humanitarian law norms and standards, notably with full respect for their due process rights,” wrote Shamdasani.

She also described the situation in Gaza as a “massive human rights crisis” and a “major, human-made, humanitarian disaster”, describing how heavy bombardment of middle Gaza and Khan Younis was “clearly visible and audible”. Shamdasani said she could hear bombing “sometimes several times an hour” from her location in Rafah.

“It is a pressure cooker environment here, in the midst of utter chaos, given the terrible humanitarian situation, shortages, and pervasive fear and anger.” She concluded her statement with: “A resounding plea from Gaza, above all, for an immediate ceasefire, for human rights and humanitarian reasons, and for all hostages to be released.” “These horrors must not become normalised,” said Shamdasani.

Unicef described the Gaza Strip as “the most dangerous place in the world to be a child” in a statement released after a visit to the area by its deputy executive director Ted Chaiban.

Chaiban has just finished a three-day visit to the Gaza Strip where he was able to coordinate with local and international organisations about the emergency response and take stock of humanitarian operations since the last time he was there two months ago. In the statement, published on Unicef’s website, Chaiban said he met “children and their families suffering some of the most horrific conditions I have ever seen”.

He said: “Since my last visit, the situation has gone from catastrophic to near collapse. Unicef has described the Gaza Strip as the most dangerous place in the world to be a child. We have said this is a war on children. But these truths do not seem to be getting through.”

Of the nearly 25,000 people reported to have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the escalation in hostilities, up to 70% are reported to be women and children, he said. “The killing of children must cease immediately.”

In the statement, Chaiban recalled meeting wounded children, such as 13-year-old Ibrahim who had undergone an arm amputation without anaesthetic after developing gangrene because of a lack of medicine for his infected and damaged hand. He was in “a designated shelter with his family, in an area they were told was safe, when everything collapsed around them”.

Chaiban continued: “The sheer mass of civilians on the border is hard to fathom and the conditions they live in are inhumane. Water is scarce and poor sanitation is inescapable. The cold and rain this week created rivers of waste. The little food that is available doesn’t meet children’s unique nutritional needs. As a result, thousands of children are malnourished and sick.

Cases of diarrhoea were up 40% from two months ago, before the escalation in hostilities, said Chaiban, adding that by mid-December, 71,000 cases were recorded among children under five, a more than 4000% increase since the war began.

“This is nothing short of a staggering decline in conditions for the children of Gaza. If this decline persists, we could see deaths due to indiscriminate conflict compounded by deaths due to disease and hunger. We need a major breakthrough,” he said. Chaiban has called to an end to the “intense bombardment”, which is not only killing thousands of people, but also impeding the delivery of aid he said.

“Before the conflict more than 500 trucks entered the Gaza Strip every day. When I was there in November, about 60 aid trucks a day entered. Now, it is about 130 trucks a day alongside an average of 30 commercial trucks a day. This is with the opening of a second crossing point but it still remains wholly inadequate. We are trying to drip assistance through a straw to meet an ocean of need,” said Chaiban.

He called for access restrictions to be lifted, reliable ground communications ensured, and movement of humanitarian supplies facilitated to ensure those who have been without aid for days receive desperately needed assistance. “We have to get commercial traffic flowing in Gaza, so that markets can reopen and families can be less dependent on relief,” added Chaiban.

“Finally, we need access to the north,” he said. “The estimated 250,000 to 300,000 people living in north Gaza have no access to clean water and barely any food. In the first two weeks of January, only seven of 29 planned aid deliveries have successfully reached their destinations in northern Gaza. Not a single Unicef convoy has accessed the north of the Gaza Strip in 2024.”

He concluded: “We cannot wait any longer for a humanitarian ceasefire to end the daily killing and injuring of children and their families, enable the urgent delivery of desperately needed aid and the safe and unconditional release of the two remaining Israeli children still held hostage in Gaza. This cannot go on.”

Only a ceasefire deal can win the release of dozens of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza and that those claiming they can be freed through military pressure are spreading illusions, says a member of Israel’s war cabinet reports AP.

Former army chief Gadi Eisenkot, whose son was killed several weeks before while fighting in Gaza, told the investigative programme Uvda, broadcast on Israel’s Channel 12 television station late on Thursday, that “the hostages will only return alive if there is a deal, linked to a significant pause in fighting.”

According to AP’s report, Eisenkot said dramatic rescue operations are unlikely because the hostages are apparently spread out, many of them in underground tunnels. Claiming hostages can be freed by means other than a deal “is to spread illusions” he said.

Netanyahu and his defence minister, Yoav Gallant, have said the fighting will continue until Hamas is crushed, and argued that only military action can win the release of the hostages.

In a thinly veiled criticism of Netanyahu, Eisenkot also said strategic decisions about the direction of the war, now in its fourth month, must be made urgently, and that a discussion about an endgame should have begun immediately after fighting started on 7 October in response to the deadly Hamas attack on southern Israel.