Israel orders ‘complete siege’ of Gaza, cutting off food, water, electricity; Hamas fires more rockets: Live updates

Air raid alerts sounded in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and other areas in Israel Monday afternoon after Hamas announced on social media that it had launched rockets at both cities. Jerusalem residents reported hearing air defense interceptions over the city.

Israel’s Magen David Adom ambulance service said it is checking for casualties in the areas where impacts were reported, but that none have been found so far.

— Natasha Turak

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant ordered a “complete siege” of the Gaza Strip, pledging to entirely cut off the already-blockaded territory of roughly 2 million people after a massive surprise attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas killed more than 700 people in Israel.

“I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed,” Gallant said. “We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly.”

Hamas governs the Gaza Strip, which is one of the most densely populated territories on Earth and has been kept under an Israeli land, air and sea blockade since 2007.

Human rights groups and United Nations officials have called Gaza “the world’s largest open-air prison,” as those living inside it cannot leave, have limited access to the outside world, and are frequently cut off from electricity and internet.

Israel says the blockade is necessary to protect its citizens from Hamas, which has controlled the Gaza Strip since 2007. The United Nations classifies Israel as an occupier state over the Palestinian territories, whose occupations and annexations following the 1967 Six-Day War remain in violation of international law.

— Natasha Turak

The European Union’s chief diplomat Josep Borrell on Monday said he is convening an emergency meeting of EU foreign ministers on Tuesday to “address the situation in #Israel and in the region.”

He made the announcement on the X social media platform, formerly known as Twitter.

Borrell is currently in Muscat, Oman, to co-chair the 27th meeting of the EU-Gulf Cooperation Council and “reaffirm the EU’s strong commitment to a strategic partnership with the Gulf,” according to an EU statement.

In a Sunday statement on behalf of the EU, Borrell expressed solidarity with Israel and condemned the surprise attacks carried out against it on Saturday by Palestinian militant group Hamas.

“The EU calls for an immediate cessation of these senseless attacks and violence, which will only further increase tensions on the ground and seriously undermine Palestinian people’s aspirations for peace,” he said at the time.

— Ruxandra Iordache

Fighting has stopped between Israeli troops and Hamas fighters inside Israel as Israeli Defense Forces have regained control of the areas outside Gaza, IDF spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari told press.

The announcement follows more than 48 hours of fighting following a surprise attack from Palestinian militant group Hamas early Saturday morning. The attack, carried out with the help of thousands of rockets and gunmen, is the largest Israel has seen in 50 years and resulted in more than 700 Israeli deaths.

Israel carried out multiple airstrikes on buildings in Gaza overnight in response, with retaliatory attacks and destruction inside the densely-populated and blockaded territory expected to continue.

— Natasha Turak

At least 260 bodies have been found at the site of a music festival in southern Israel attacked by Hamas militants on Saturday, the Israeli rescue service Zaka reported.

Hundreds of people, including many foreign visitors, attended the Supernova Festival, an all-night dance party event held in a rural farmland area near the Gaza-Israel border. The festival was meant to celebrate the Jewish holiday of Sukkot. 

Witnesses to the Saturday morning attacks described hearing rockets and sirens as dawn broke. Videos posted to social media show scores of attendees running across an open field as gunfire can be heard. Israel says more than 100 people have been taken hostage by Hamas, many of whom were at the festival and several of whom are foreign nationals. Israel’s government says that rescue operations are underway.

— Natasha Turak

The current conflict between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas represents a “very great danger for the region,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Monday.

Russia is closely monitoring the “dangerously expanding” situation in Israel, Peskov added in Google-translated comments posted by Russian state news agency Tass on Telegram. The spokesperson said that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s schedule does not currently include engagements with the leadership of Israel or Palestinian territories, but that such outreach can be “promptly” agreed.

Russia’s foreign minister Sergey Lavrov will on Monday hold talks with the League of the Arab States over Palestine, the foreign ministry said on Sunday.

Moscow has previously called for a ceasefire in hostilities sparked by a surprise attack by Hamas on Saturday, and laid fault for the conflict at the feet of Western nations:

“We regard the current large-scale escalation as another extremely dangerous manifestation of a vicious circle of violence resulting from chronic failure to comply with the corresponding resolutions of the UN and the Security Council and the blocking by the West of the work of the Middle East Quartet of international mediators made up of Russia, the United States, the EU and the UN,” Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said, in comments carried Saturday on the Russian foreign ministry’s Telegram account.

The comments come as the Kremlin continues its full-scale invasion in Ukraine, throughout which it has repeatedly criticized Western involvement.

— Ruxandra Iordache

Iran called for an emergency meeting of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation over recent hostilities between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas, the Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson said Monday.

“In the recent contact of the Foreign Minister of our country with some of our counterparts, including the Iraqi Foreign Minister, we suggested that an extraordinary meeting of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation be held and we emphasized that the Palestinian issue is still the first issue of the Islamic world,” Nasser Kanaani said, in Google-translated comments carried by Iran’s state-run Islamic Republic News Agency.

Historically a supporter of Hamas, Iran has congratulated the militant group on its surprise Saturday offensive against Israel but denied involvement in the initiative.

“We have not yet seen evidence that Iran directed or was behind this particular attack, but there is certainly a long relationship,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

— Ruxandra Iordache

The surprise attack by Hamas on Israel suggests a massive intelligence failure as the Israeli government appeared blindsided by the infiltration of Hamas fighters across the southern border and the launch of thousands of rockets.

The Hamas assault by air, land and sea also raised questions as to why U.S. intelligence agencies apparently did not see it coming, experts and former intelligence officials said. 

U.S. officials said that if the Israelis knew an attack was imminent, they did not share it with Washington.

“We were not tracking this,” one senior U.S. military official told NBC News. 

Read the full story here.

— NBC News

Israel’s counteroffensive against the Palestinian Hamas militant group will likely stretch for months — even years. That’s especially so if suspicions that Iran was involved in the militants’ ambush on Israel turn out to be true.

“Jews have not faced this kind of atrocity in the world since the Holocaust, so … everything is on the table if you are an Israeli Jew today,” Ian Bremmer, president and founder of political consultancy Eurasia Group told CNBC.

“To take out the leadership of Hamas, it is not going to be a matter of days or weeks. This is months or maybe years. This is going to go on for a long, long time,” he added.

The weekend assaults happened a day after the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War, inviting comparisons with the deadliest Arab-Israeli war in 1973 that threatened to imperil the state of Israel.

For more, please read the full story.

— Clement Tan

Israel’s central bank on Monday announced it will sell up to $30 billion in foreign reserves to support its currency which has fallen sharply following the deadly incursion by Hamas militants over the weekend.

“The Bank will operate in the market during the coming period in order to moderate volatility in the shekel exchange rate and to provide the necessary liquidity for the continued proper functioning of the markets,” the Bank of Israel said in a statement.

The Israeli shekel last weakened 1.63% to trade at 3.90 against the greenback — its weakest in seven years.

—Lee Ying Shan

China called for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas conflict — and for “establishing an independent State of Palestine,” according to a Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement Sunday.

“The fundamental way out of the conflict lies in implementing the two-state solution and establishing an independent State of Palestine,” the Chinese foreign ministry said.

Its online statement described the situation as an “escalation of tensions and violence between Palestine and Israel.”

It did not mention the Palestinian militant group Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip and has been designated a terrorist group by the U.S. and the European Union.

— Evelyn Cheng

Jonathan Conricus, spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), said Saturday’s surprise attack by Hamas on Israel marked “by far the worst day in Israeli history.”

Speaking in a video on X, formerly known as Twitter, Conricus said: “If you are Americans, and want to compare this to something in American history, then this could be a 9/11 and a Pearl Harbor wrapped into one.”

He said the Israeli military had amassed around 100,000 reserve troops in the south of the country.

“Our job is to make sure that at the end of this war, Hamas will no longer have any military capabilities to threaten Israeli civilians with,” he said.

“In addition to that, we are also to make sure that Hamas will not be able to govern the Gaza Strip.”

Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip — a small strip of land between Israel and Egypt — in 2005 and Hamas took control of the area in 2007. Currently, more than 2 million Palestinians live in Gaza.

— Katrina Bishop

The Israel Defense Forces said it struck more than 500 enemy targets in an overnight attack on Gaza following a surprise offensive by Palestinian militant group Hamas early Saturday.

The targets included seven command centers used by Hamas, the IDF said in a Google-translated update on Monday.

“The IDF will continue to attack with force in the Gaza Strip and deal lethal damage to the terrorist organizations,” the force said.

Israel has pledged war and is carrying out a spate of retaliatory attacks following the Hamas attack of Saturday, which left more than 1,100 dead across Israel and the Gaza Strip.

— Ruxandra Iordache

Thailand’s government confirmed that 12 of its citizens were killed in the violence that engulfed southern Israel over the weekend as the Palestinian terrorist organization Hamas launched a surprise attack of unprecedented scale on the country.

Eleven Thai citizens were also kidnapped as Hamas took an unknown number of hostages from the area, the Thai foreign ministry said. The total number of hostages is more than 100, Israeli officials say.

Eight Thais were also injured since the fighting began. More than 1,000 Thai workers in Israel have asked to be evacuated. Some 30,000 Thai nationals work in Israel, the foreign ministry said.

Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin said that the Royal Thai Air Force is on standby to evacuate its citizens from Israel.

— Natasha Turak

A spokesman for the Israeli Defense Forces said that Israeli troops were still battling with Hamas on the ground but have so far not progressed at the expected pace, more than 48 hours after the initial attack by the Palestinian terrorist group.

“We are still fighting. Seven to eight open places around Gaza where we still have warriors fighting terrorists,” IDF spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht said. “It is taking us more time than we expected … We thought this morning we would be in a better place.”

He added that Hamas fighters may still be entering Israel from Gaza, and said that Hamas did not “knock the roof” before attacking civilian areas, which is the term for what Israel says is its warning to civilians before it bombs a building.

“When they came in and threw grenades at our ambulances they did not knock on the roof,” Hecht said. “This is war. The scale is different.”

— Natasha Turak

Oil prices jumped 4% as the Israel-Hamas conflict extended into its third day following a surprise attack on Israel by Palestinian militant group Hamas.

Global benchmark Brent traded 4.53% higher at $88.33 a barrel Monday, while the U.S. West Texas Intermediate futures rose 4.69% to $86.63 per barrel.

At dawn on Saturday during a major Jewish holiday, Palestinian militant group Hamas launched a multi-pronged infiltration into Israel — by land, sea and air using paragliders. The attack came hours after thousands of rockets were sent from Gaza into Israel.

Read the full story here.

— Lee Ying Shan

More than 1,100 people have been killed since the terrorist group Hamas launched a massive surprise attack on Israel in the early hours of Saturday morning.

Israeli authorities say at least 700 Israelis have been killed, with Gaza’s health ministry reporting more than 400 Palestinians dead in retaliatory airstrikes carried out by the Israel Defense Forces. An unconfirmed number of foreign nationals were also killed.

Medical treatment for Palestinians in Gaza is being hampered by Israel cutting power to the blockaded territory.

— Natasha Turak