TRANSCRIPT
The United States has suspended a shipment of weapons to Israel.
It includes heavy bombs the US ally used in its campaign against Hamas militants in Gaza which has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians.
The suspension comes as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues a military assault on the outskirts of the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
US State Department Spokesman Matthew Miller says the delayed bombs were part of an earlier approved shipment to Israel, not the recent A$144 billion (USD$95 billion) supplemental aid package the US Congress passed in April.
“You look at the fact that there are so many people crowded into such a small area. When you look at the way Israel has conducted its operations in the past and what the impact on the civilian population has been. And we also have concerns about the impact of any potential operation on the delivery of humanitarian assistance. So we have paused one shipment of near-term assistance, and we are reviewing others."
International humanitarian law does not explicitly ban aerial bombing in densely populated areas, however civilians cannot be targets and a specific military aim must be proportionate to possible civilian casualties or damage.
Israel denies targeting Palestinian civilians, saying its sole interest is to annihilate Hamas and that it takes all precautions to avoid unnecessary deaths.
Meanwhile, Israeli women have rallied in Tel Aviv demanding the release of around 130 hostages still held in Gaza.
Demonstrations against the government by families and supporters of some of the hostages have become a constant fixture.
Ajdas Zubary is the aunt of hostage Naama Levy.
“Yes for us every minute that there is a little bit hope sometimes it makes it even harder because you allow yourself to hope and then you fall again because again it fails so, it’s like a roller coaster, it’s really really emotional, ups and downs, gets worse and harder every day.”
In Madrid, Spanish students and professors have joined the movement of pro-Palestinian university campus protests worldwide.
In Madrid’s Complutense University, hundreds of people from different public universities in the region set up camp and have vowed to keep it going indefinitely.
"The actions of the students in the United States have been a logical inspiration for us. In the end it is a movement that is also taking place in Europe and we understood that it was a call for all the students to mobilise and we believe that it is absolutely necessary, that we have been in this situation of recognition of violence for quite some time and still no measures have been taken by the states, more than even increasing support for the State of Israel and the genocide that is being carried out.”
The humanitarian situation in Gaza remains a top priority for aid organisations, with the United Nations saying it's not prepared for the needs in crisis-hit Lebanon which would come with an escalation of the conflict in Rafah.
The World Food Program is currently providing aid to over 158,000 people in Lebanon who are affected by the hostilities, including 93,000 who are displaced from their homes.
But the agency says it does not have the funding to address the growing humanitarian needs should the situation further escalate and further deteriorate.
Deputy executive director Carl Skau says Israel's operations in Rafah are deeply concerning.
“I don’t know how much I can stress how deeply concerned we are about the announcement of operations beginning in Rafah, first and foremost of course for the 1.2 or 1.3 million civilians that are now in Rafah. I was there and it is a cramped place. People are sleeping and camping on the streets on the sidewalks and it's people are everywhere. And to have a military operation in that environment is going to have a serious toll on the civilian population."
Aid for the Gaza strip has been loaded onto a ship in Cyprus in what is expected to be the first cargo delivered using a newly-built US pier.
Containers have been stacked on the US-flagged ship Sagamore, with some labelled as aid from the United Arab Emirates.
It's not known when it will depart for Gaza.
