Analysis: No easy options for Biden as he weighs response to deadly drone attack

ERBIL, Iraq — There are no easy options for President Joe Biden.

The U.S. has launched multiple airstrikes against Iranian-backed militia in Iraq, Syria and Yemen since October but those strikes don’t seem to have worked as deterrence.

Now, Blinken is talking of a “multileveled” and “sustained” response that could come in stages. 

But local reports here in northern Iraq say Iranian backed militia are evacuating installations along the country’s border with Syria in anticipation of a U.S. response while continuing to launch attacks. 

The question the Biden administration is weighing up right now: Can you escalate against Iran in order to de-escalate the broader situation, and avoid slipping into direct war.

China warns against ‘vicious cycle of retaliation’ after three U.S. soldiers killed

HONG KONG — China has warned against a “vicious cycle of retaliation” after three U.S. troops were killed in a drone attack in Jordan.

China “has taken note of the reports of casualties resulting from the attack on the U.S. military base, as well as Iran’s statement that it had nothing to do with the attack,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin told reporters in a daily press briefing this morning.

In light of what he said was the complicated and sensitive situation in the Middle East, he added that China called on all parties concerned to exercise “calm and restraint” to “avoid being caught in a vicious cycle of retaliation and prevent further escalation of tension in the region.”

U.N. chief to meet with key aid donors as more countries suspend funding

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres will meet with key donors to the U.N. humanitarian agency for Palestinian refugees today as fears grow for Gaza aid funding.

Several countries, including the U.S. and the U.K., announced the suspension of funding to UNRWA — which has been crucial support for Gazans — after allegations that some staff members were involved in the Hamas attacks in Israel on Oct. 7.

Guterres is “personally horrified” by these allegations, his spokesperson said in a statement yesterday, but the chief called on countries to “at least guarantee the continuity of UNRWA’s operations, as we have tens of thousands of dedicated staff working throughout the region.”

“The dire needs of the desperate populations they serve must be met,” the spokesperson added.

Hamas is ‘studying’ new hostage deal proposal for Gaza cease-fire, leader Haniyeh says he will travel to Cairo to discuss it

Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’ Qatar-based political leader, said he will travel to Cairo to discuss a cease-fire proposal that was formulated in Paris over the weekend.

In a press statement posted on the group’s Telegram channel, Hamas confirmed it was looking at the plan and that “it is in the process of studying it and submitting its response to it on the basis that the priority is to stop the aggression and the brutal attack on Gaza and the complete withdrawal of the occupation forces from the Strip.”

The statement added that “the movement is open to discussing any serious and practical initiatives or ideas, provided that they lead to a comprehensive cessation of aggression.”

Israeli, Qatari, Egyptian and American officials in Paris reached a “unified position” on a framework for a hostage deal that would involve a 60-day pause of hostilities in Gaza, a source familiar with the talks told NBC News.

Cold temperatures, heaps of waste plague displaced Palestinians in southern Gaza

Stray cats pick through piles of discarded waste, heavy rainfall seeps through nylon tents and Gazans transport their mattresses and belongings on their back as they flee for relative safety farther south.

An NBC News team on the ground filmed the scenes and dire conditions unfolding for displaced Palestinians taking shelter in the Nasser Hospital medical complex in Khan Younis over the weekend.

Imra Fija Bitarrabish, a concerned mother, showed NBC News around her tent, which she said sustained rips through the nylon fabric and allowed rain to fall through, worsening the already basic conditions she and her two children are weathering in the makeshift tent campsite.

“A little while ago a bomb fell behind us,” Bitarrabish told NBC News. “I went to the people responsible for Gaza over there, I told them a bomb fell, and the nylon ripped. I can be hurt because of all the water falling on me but no one believed me. I begged for nylon.”

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Bombardments continue in southern Gaza

A smoke plume erupts after an Israeli bombardment over Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip this morning.

Video shows undercover Israeli forces raiding hospital dressed as women and medics

TEL AVIV — Surveillance video appears to show the dramatic undercover raid by Israeli forces this morning inside a hospital in the occupied West Bank.

In the footage, which circulated widely online, a number of people armed with rifles can be seen sweeping through the third floor of the Ibn Sina Hospital in Jenin disguised as patients, medical staff and women. One person wears what appears to be a doctor’s lab coat. Another wears nurse’s scrubs. A third carries a wheelchair, while a fourth appears to juggle a rifle in one hand with a baby carrier in another. Others are simply dressed in plain clothing, including Muslim headscarves.

Abeer Zeid Al-Kelani, a public relations officer at the Ibn Sina Hospital, told NBC News that the raid was unprecedented at the facility. “This is the first time that occupation soldiers entered the hospital in disguise,” she said.

She said that Basel Ghawazi, who she said was 18, was a patient at the hospital. She said he had been receiving physical therapy after being “injured by an army officer.” She said his brother, Mohammed Ghazawi, 23, had been in his room with him, along with Mohammed Jalamneh, 27, when the three men were killed in the raid, which she said happened in the early hours.

NBC News geolocated the video to a reception area of the Ibn Sina Hospital by comparing it against Facebook photos of the hospital in 2021. The date and time stamp matched the date the IDF said the operation took place, and the date and time of day given by the Palestinian Health Authority and Hamas in their statements.

Blood spatters and bullet holes in aftermath of IDF hospital raid

A bullet hole in a pillow of a hospital bed covered in blood at the Ibn Sina Hospital in Jenin, in the occupied West Bank today.

Israeli forces shot dead three Palestinians at the hospital in the early hours of this morning, the Palestinian Health Ministry said, while the IDF said the three belonged to a Hamas “terrorist cell.”

Israeli forces kill 3 militants in raid on West Bank hospital

TEL AVIV — The Israeli military said it killed three Palestinian militants in a raid on a hospital where they were hiding out in the occupied West Bank.

The Israel Defense Forces said the three men, operating as a “Hamas terrorist cell,” were killed in a joint operation with the Israel Securities Authority and Israel Police this morning at the Ibn Sina hospital in the northern city of Jenin.

The IDF identified the three people killed as Mohammed Jalamneh, 27, Mohammed Ghazawi and his brother Basel Ghawazi. It did not provide the ages of the two brothers. Jalamneh, it said, was a Hamas member who had “recently been involved in promoting significant terrorist activity” and was planning to carry out an imminent attack. It said Mohammed Ghazawi had been involved in “numerous attacks,” including firing at IDF soldiers in the area, while Basel Ghawazi was accused of being “involved in terror activities in the area,” the IDF said. Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad claimed the trio as members.

Palestinian health authorities confirmed the deaths of three young men, saying Israeli forces opened fire inside a hospital ward and calling on the United Nations and international community to respond to the incident.

It comes as Israel continues to face scrutiny over its heavy bombardment and fighting around hospitals in Gaza. The IDF maintains that Hamas uses public buildings and facilities, including hospitals, in its fight. “This is another example of the cynical use of civilian areas and hospitals as shelters and human shields by terrorist organisations,” the IDF said in its statement.

Hamas reiterates no hostages will be released without Israel’s withdrawal

Israeli, Qatari, Egyptian and American officials in Paris have reached a “unified position” on a framework for deal that would enact a 60-day pause of hostilities in Gaza, a source familiar with the talks tells NBC News. The framework was presented to Hamas in Egypt, the source added. Earlier, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said that no final deal has been agreed upon. 

A combination of Egyptian and Qatari proposals would include no bombardment by Israel, no rocket fire from Hamas and the redeployment of Israeli forces away from the southern city Khan Younis. The details of the Israeli military redeployment still need to be negotiated, the source added.

If agreed, the deal would move in phases with a focus on what the source calls the “humanitarian phase” in the first 60 days: Each civilian hostage, women first, would be released in exchange for three Palestinian prisoners. Israel would allow two Qatari field hospitals waiting in Egypt to be set up inside Gaza — along with much more humanitarian aid. 

Any breach would be mediated via a mechanism that still needs to be discussed, but a definitive breach would temporarily end the other terms of the agreement, the source said.

During the last week of the cease-fire, other parties would begin discussing extending the pause and the release of military prisoners, beginning with military women and moving to military men and then the remains of those killed in exchange for all Palestinian prisoners taken since the start of the hostilities, which is close to 7,000. (The number of Palestinian prisoners is growing by the day.)  

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