Tag Archives: Benjamin Netanyahu

Kamala Harris expressed her “serious concern” to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu telling him it is time to lock down a ceasefire deal

cnn.com 2024.07.25 harris-netanyahu-israel-hamas-ceasefire

Important Takeaways:

  • Harris’ comments provided the clearest explanation yet of her views on the conflict as she works to balance the issue that has not only divided the country but caused friction within the Democratic Party.
  • Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said that committing to the deal in its current form would mean “surrendering” to Hamas’ leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar. A deal would “allow Hamas to rehabilitate… abandoning most of the hostages in Hamas captivity.” Smotrich wrote on X. “Do not fall into this trap!”
  • The Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir wrote on X Friday, “The war won’t be ceased, Madame candidate.”
  • Following Harris’ remarks, Israeli media have been quoting a “senior Israeli official” as saying that pressure from the US vice president to reach a ceasefire and hostages deal in Gaza is counter-productive and may put at risk efforts to reach an agreement
  • The October 7 attacks killed 1,200 people in Israel and saw more than 250 others taken hostage.

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Protests and boycotts ahead of Netanyahu’s address to Congress

American-Jews-protest-Israel

Important Takeaways:

  • Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin will preside over Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s joint address to Congress on Wednesday as he faces calls to boycott the speech.
  • The Maryland office of Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, urged the Maryland senator to boycott what the largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization referred to as Netanyahu’s “war criminal” address to Congress.
  • “It is deeply troubling that Sen. Cardin would choose to lend legitimacy and support to a war criminal who is responsible for egregious violations of human rights and international law,” said CAIR’s Maryland Director Zainab Chaudhry.
  • Netanyahu arrived Monday in Washington, D.C., where he will hold meetings with the Biden administration and will address the joint session of the House and Senate on Wednesday, as he seeks bipartisan support for Israel just days after President Joe Biden announced he would end his re-election bid.
  • As Netanyahu addresses the joint Congress on Wednesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson has warned lawmakers that there will be a “zero-tolerance” policy for anyone who disrupts the speech and that law enforcement “will remove … offending visitors from the gallery and subject them to arrest.”
  • On Tuesday, hundreds of members of the group Jewish Voice for Peace were arrested during a demonstration inside the Cannon House Office Building in Washington, D.C., according to the group.
  • “Arrests are beginning as over 400 American Jews refuse to leave Congress, but we won’t leave until our government stops arming Israel and ends the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza!” the group wrote Tuesday in a post on X.

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Benjamin Netanyahu delivers a 4th of July message to the American People

Netanyahu-with-flags

Important Takeaways:

  • Freedom is the most precious gift humanity will ever know. And freedom isn’t free. You have to be willing to fight for it.
  • On this Fourth of July, I want to thank the American people for being true to their birthright, the Spirit of 1776, and wish them a happy and blessed Independence Day.
  • Through thick and thin, for the past nine months, Israel has deeply appreciated vital American support.
  • In these times of national crisis, as the people of Israel fight a seven-front war for our national survival against Iran and its terror proxies, it is heartening to know that far from standing alone, we have the support of the greatest democracy the world has ever known.
  • Character is revealed in times of crisis. In the face of Hamas’s savagery on October 7, the people of Israel connected to the deepest foundations of our national being. As one, we rose to fight our enemies with the heroism, determination, and resilience that characterized our heroes from the days of Joshua and the Maccabees, passed down across time to the warriors of the modern State of Israel.
  • What makes the US-Israel relationship a stellar duo
  • America stands with Israel because Americans are similarly moved by the legacy of their forefathers. At their base, Israel and America are guided by the same twin insights. Freedom is the most precious gift humanity will ever know. And freedom isn’t free. You have to be willing to fight for it.
  • Israelis saw on October 7 what it would mean if we ever lost our freedom. We understood this is not a war of choice but a war for survival.
  • Americans saw the atrocities of October 7, and they understood the stakes as well, not just for Israel but for the free world as a whole. Israel, a peace-loving democracy and America’s closest ally in the Middle East, was invaded by an army of jihadists bent on annihilation and subjugation. The same forces attacked America on September 11. Standing with Israel came naturally and immediately for Americans. They understood that for this march of murder and tyranny to end, Israel must win this war.
  • Tyrannical ayatollahs that rule Iran stand at the apex of the axis of jihad, murder, and war. They and their henchmen view Israel and the United States as their mortal enemies.
  • The outcome of this war is not in question. Israel will remain true to our ancient and modern legacy. We will win this war. We are strengthened with the sure knowledge that as we move forward toward victory we will be supported by our great friend, the United States of America.

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Xi invites Benjamin Netanyahu to China

Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.

Important Takeaways:

  • Benjamin Netanyahu announces China invite as Biden keeps him at arm’s length
  • Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu revealed Tuesday he has been invited to China before receiving a similar honor from the Biden White House.
  • The prime minister’s office tweeted that Netanyahu had informed visiting members of Congress about the invitation.
  • “The projected visit will be Prime Minister Netanyahu’s fourth visit to China; the American administration was updated one month ago,” Netanyahu’s office added, without indicating whether the 73-year-old had accepted the invite or when the trip would take place.
  • Netanyahu began his third term as prime minister of America’s staunchest Middle Eastern ally in December, but he has yet to be invited to visit Washington by President Biden.

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Netanyahu in lead as vote count nears end

  • Israel’s Vote Count Nearly Complete, as Netanyahu and Religious Parties Win Big
  • With nearly 100 percent of the votes counted in the Israeli elections, it seems that Former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Likud Party will return to power.
  • According to the count so far, it seems clear that Netanyahu has a solid majority to form an ideologically conservative government.
  • Netanyahu’s main rival, Prime Minister Yair Lapid of the Yest Atid Party, reminded his supporters it’s not over until the last vote is counted.
  • John Waage, CBN News political analyst, says there were several issues that concerned Israelis, starting with a deteriorating security situation in areas of the West Bank, biblical Judea and Samaria

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Inaugurating embassy in UAE, Israel tells region: “We’re here to stay”

By Lisa Barrington

DUBAI (Reuters) -Israel’s new foreign minister inaugurated its embassy in the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday and offered an olive branch to other former adversaries, saying: “We’re here to stay.”

Yair Lapid’s two-day visit is the first to the Gulf state by an Israeli cabinet minister since the countries established ties last year. He was due to sign a bilateral agreement on economic cooperation and open an Israeli consulate in Dubai on Wednesday.

The trip is also an opportunity for the two-week-old Israeli government of Naftali Bennett, a nationalist who heads an improbable cross-partisan coalition, to make diplomatic inroads despite long-stymied talks with the Palestinians.

“Israel wants peace with its neighbors – with all its neighbors. We aren’t going anywhere. The Middle East is our home,” Lapid said during the ribbon-cutting ceremony at the Abu Dhabi high-rise office serving as a temporary embassy.

“We’re here to stay. We call on all the countries of the region to recognize that and to come to talk to us,” he said.

Brought together by shared worries about Iran and hopes for commercial boons, the UAE and Bahrain normalized relations with Israel last year under so-called “Abraham Accords” crafted by the administration of then U.S.-President Donald Trump. Sudan and Morocco have since also moved to establish ties with Israel.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken, welcoming Lapid’s visit, said Washington “will continue to work with Israel and the UAE as we strengthen all aspects of our partnerships and work to create a more peaceful, secure, and prosperous future for all the peoples of the Middle East”, the State Department said.

The regional rapprochement was deplored by the Palestinians, who want their demands for statehood free of Israeli occupation addressed first.

President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed the accords as “an illusion” and asserted that colonial powers had “implant(ed) Israel as a foreign body in this region in order to fragment it and keep it weak,” according to a report on Tuesday by the official Palestinian news service WAFA.

Tuesday’s agreement will be the 12th between Israel and the UAE, Lior Haiat, spokesman for Israel’s Foreign Ministry, said. Lapid is also set to visit the site of Expo 2020 Dubai, a world fair opening in October where Israel has built a pavilion.

Lapid’s plane transited through Saudi airspace. Riyadh, although not having normalized relations with Israel, last year opened its skies to Israel-UAE flights.

The UAE formally opened its embassy in Israel, temporarily located in the Tel Aviv stock exchange, this month.

Israel’s Abu Dhabi embassy still has only three diplomats and a head of mission, Eitan Na’eh, who has yet to be confirmed as full ambassador. The consulate in Dubai is similarly located in temporary premises.

Lapid was conciliatory toward former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose attempts to organize a trip to the UAE while in office were scotched by COVID-19 restrictions and who has sought to cast his ouster by Bennett as illegitimate.

Thanking Netanyahu as “the architect of the Abraham Accords,” Lapid said: “This moment is his, no less than it is ours.”

(Reporting by Ari Rabinovitch and Dan Williams; Additional reporting by Nidal Al-Mughrabi’Writing by Lisa Barrington; Editing by Clarence Fernandez, John Stonestreet, Nick Macfie, William Maclean)

New Israeli government seals coalition deals as Netanyahu era approaches its end

By Ari Rabinovitch

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – The new Israeli government set to end Benjamin Netanyahu’s 12-year tenure as prime minister signed its final coalition agreements on Friday, pointedly including term limits.

The coalition of parties from far-right to left is expected to focus mostly on economic and social issues rather than risk exposing internal rifts by trying to address major diplomatic issues such as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving leader, will be succeeded on Sunday by a coalition that includes for the first time a party from Israel’s Arab minority.

Under a power-sharing agreement, Naftali Bennett, of the ultra-nationalist Yamina (Rightwards) party, will serve as prime minister for two years.

Bennett on Friday said the coalition “brings to an end two and a half years of political crisis,” although it was unclear how long the coalition’s disparate elements would hold together. He will then hand over to Yair Lapid of the centrist Yesh Atid (There is a Future) party.

Among the agreements outlined by parties in what Lapid described as a “unity government” are:

* Limiting the prime minister’s term of office to two terms, or eight years.

* An infrastructure push to include new hospitals, a new university and a new airport.

* Passing a two-year budget to help stabilize the country’s finances – the prolonged political stalemate has left Israel still using a pro-rated version of a base 2019 budget that was ratified in mid-2018.

* Maintaining the “status-quo” on issues of religion and state, with Bennett’s Yamina party to have a veto. Possible reforms include breaking up an ultra-Orthodox monopoly on overseeing which foods are kosher, and decentralizing authority over Jewish conversions.

* An “overall plan for transportation” in the Israeli- occupied West Bank.

* A general goal to “ensure Israel’s interests” in areas of the West Bank under full Israeli control.* Allocating more than 53 billion shekels ($16 billion) to improve infrastructure and welfare in Arab towns, and curbing violent crime there.

* Decriminalizing marijuana and moving to regulate the market.

($1 = 3.2529 shekels)

(Reporting by Ari Rabinovitch; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Out, but not down, Netanyahu could be tough opposition leader

By Jeffrey Heller

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Long the familiar face of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu is headed to the political sidelines after serving as prime minister for more than a decade.

But even as he battles in court against corruption charges that he denies, Netanyahu, as opposition leader, will be poised to pounce on a new governing coalition of right-wing, centrist and Arab parties with little in common other than a desire to unseat him.

In a likely taste of things to come, a stern-looking Netanyahu, 71, has decried the creation of a “dangerous, left-wing government.”

“Fraud of the century,” he declared indignantly after fellow right-winger Naftali Bennett turned against him on Sunday and opted to align with centrist opposition chief Yair Lapid despite a public promise that he would not do so.

Under a power-sharing deal that follows a March 23 election – Israel’s fourth in two years – Bennett, a former defense minister and a high-tech millionaire, will become prime minister.

He will later turn over the post to Lapid, who once served as finance minister in a Netanyahu-led government.

The diverse composition of the Lapid-Bennett alliance could make it particularly unstable in a country so riven by political divisions that “do-over” elections have become the norm.

That means that no one in Israel is ruling out a Netanyahu political comeback.

Already, the tone of his remarks has echoes of his closest international ally, former U.S. President Donald Trump, himself now unseated but still commanding loyalty from supporters.

For Netanyahu’s grassroots backers, dubbed “Bibists”, he remains a leader tough on security and a bulwark against pressure, even from Trump’s successor President Joe Biden, for any bold steps that could lead to a Palestinian state.

From the opposition benches, Netanyahu is likely to press on with a message that the new coalition will be hobbled by its left-wing members if military steps are needed against Israel’s enemies.

Claiming the spotlight even as Lapid was deep in negotiations on a change in government, a combative Netanyahu seemed to pick a fight with Biden on Tuesday over how to deal with Iran’s nuclear program, again hinting at the possibility of Israeli attack.

“If we have to choose, I hope it doesn’t happen, between friction with our great friend the United States and eliminating the existential threat – eliminating the existential threat wins,” Netanyahu said in a speech.

BORROWED TIME

It has been a rocky few years for Netanyahu, whose stewardship of Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout was not enough to halt his political decline.

A sense that he was living on borrowed time after 12 consecutive years in office was compounded by criminal charges over alleged favors to media tycoons and illegal receipt of expensive cigars and champagne.

Netanyahu has denied all wrongdoing and says, without offering any evidence, that he is a victim of a deep state conspiracy against him.

Popularly known by his childhood nickname, Bibi, Netanyahu is the son of a historian and attended high school and college in the United States, where his father taught.

Never lost for a soundbite, his booming baritone has resounded on the world stage since serving as Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations from 1984 to 1988.

Entering politics in Israel as a Likud legislator, he became party leader in 1993 and exerted hegemony for decades over Israeli politics.

The formation of the new government marked a rare defeat for Netanyahu: the last time he and his wife Sara had to pack their bags and move out of the prime minister’s residence was before the turn of the millennium.

(Editing by Angus MacSwan)

Netanyahu vows to fight on as Biden urges Gaza ‘de-escalation’

By Nidal al-Mughrabi, Jeffrey Heller and Andrea Shalal

GAZA/JERUSALEM/ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE (Reuters) -Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to press on with operations against Gaza’s ruling Hamas militants after U.S. President Joe Biden urged him to seek a “de-escalation” on Wednesday in the 10-day conflict on the path to a ceasefire.

An Egyptian security source said the two sides had agreed in principle to a ceasefire after help from mediators, although details were still being negotiated in secret amid public denials of a deal to prevent it from collapsing.

Palestinian medical officials said that since fighting began on May 10, 227 people had been killed in aerial bombardments that have destroyed roads, buildings and other infrastructure, and worsened the already dire humanitarian situation in Gaza.

Israeli authorities put the death toll at 12 in Israel, where repeated rocket attacks have caused panic and sent people rushing into shelters. Regional and U.S.-led diplomatic efforts to secure a ceasefire have intensified but so far failed.

Netanyahu has repeatedly hailed what he has described as support from the United States, Israel’s main ally, for a right to self-defense in battling rocket attacks from Gaza.

But Biden put the Israeli leader on notice in a telephone call that it was time to lower the intensity of the conflict.

“The two leaders had a detailed discussion on the state of events in Gaza, Israel’s progress in degrading the capabilities of Hamas and other terrorist elements, and ongoing diplomatic efforts by regional governments and the United States,” White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters.

“The president conveyed to the prime minister that he expected a significant de-escalation today on the path to a ceasefire.”

‘QUIET AND SECURITY’

In a statement released soon after her comments, Netanyahu said: “I am determined to continue this operation until its objective is achieved – to restore quiet and security to you, the citizens of Israel.”

Earlier, in remarks reported by Israeli media from a closed question-and-answer session with foreign envoys to Israel, Netanyahu was quoted as saying: “We’re not standing with a stopwatch. We want to achieve the goals of the operation. Previous operations lasted a long time so it is not possible to set a timeframe.”

In response to Biden’s de-escalation call, Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassam said those who sought to restore calm must “compel Israel to end its aggression in Jerusalem and its bombardment of Gaza”.

Once that happened, Qassam said, “there can be room to talk about arrangements to restore calm”.

Hamas began firing rockets on May 10 in retaliation for what it said were Israeli rights abuses against Palestinians in Jerusalem during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

The rocket attacks followed Israeli security police clashes with worshippers at al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem and a court case by Israeli settlers to evict Palestinians from a neighborhood in Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem.

In a 25-minute attack overnight into Wednesday, Israel bombarded targets including what its military said were tunnels in southern Gaza used by Hamas.

Some 50 rockets were fired from the enclave, the Israeli military said, with sirens sounding in the coastal city of Ashdod, south of Tel Aviv, and in areas closer to the Gaza border. There were no reports of injuries or damage overnight but days of rocket fire have unsettled many Israelis.

CRATERS AND RUBBLE

Nearly 450 buildings in densely populated Gaza have been destroyed or badly damaged, including six hospitals and nine primary-care health centers, and more than 52,000 Palestinians have been displaced, the U.N. humanitarian agency said.

The damage has left large craters and piles of rubble across the coastal enclave.

“Whoever wants to learn about the humanity of the (Israelis) should come to the Gaza Strip and look at the houses that got destroyed on top of those who lived in them,” said university lecturer Ahmed al-Astal, standing by the rubble of his house in Khan Younis in southern Gaza.

He said there had been no warning before his home was destroyed in an air strike before dawn.

Israel says it issues warnings to evacuate buildings that are to be fired on and that it attacks only what it regards as military targets.

The hostilities are the most serious between Hamas and Israel in years, and, in a departure from previous Gaza conflicts, have helped fuel street violence in Israeli cities between Jews and Arabs.

The conflict has also spilled over to the Israel-Lebanon frontier and stoked violence in the occupied West Bank.

Four rockets were launched towards Israel from Lebanon on Wednesday, the third such incident since the Gaza conflict began, the military said. Israeli forces responded with artillery fire towards targets in Lebanon.

There was no claim of responsibility for the rocket attack.

In the West Bank, Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian woman who the military said had fired a rifle at troops and civilians at a bus stop near the city of Hebron.

At least 21 Palestinians have been killed in clashes with Israeli troops or other incidents in the West Bank since May 10, Palestinian health officials said.

The latest deaths in Gaza included three Palestinians killed in overnight air strikes, one of them a journalist with Hamas’s Al-Aqsa radio station, officials said.

Gaza medical officials say the Palestinian death toll includes 64 children, and that more than 1,600 people have been wounded since the fighting began. Israeli authorities say the death toll in Israel includes two children.

(Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi and Jeffrey Heller; Additional reporting by Aidan Lewis in Cairo and Ari Rabinovitch in Jerusalem; Editing by Peter Cooney, Michael Perry, Timothy Heritage, William Maclean and Gareth Jones)

Israel pounds Gaza to curb Palestinian militants but rockets still fly

By Nidal al-Mughrabi and Stephen Farrell

GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel pummeled Gaza with artillery fire and air strikes on Friday as it targeted Palestinian militant tunnels to try to stop persistent rocket attacks on Israeli towns.

The 40-minute, pre-dawn offensive killed 13 Palestinians, including a mother and her three children whose bodies were pulled from the rubble of their home, health officials in Gaza said.

The Israeli operation included 160 aircraft as well as tanks and artillery firing from outside the Gaza Strip, Israeli military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Conricus said.

Palestinian rocket barrages against southern Israel swiftly followed on the fifth day of the most serious fighting between Israel and Gaza militants since 2014.

Egypt was leading international efforts to secure a ceasefire and ensure the conflict does not spread. Security sources said neither side appeared amenable so far but a Palestinian official said negotiations intensified on Friday.

French President Emmanuel Macron spoke to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday, urging a return to peace in the region.

Hamas, the Islamist group that rules Gaza, launched the rocket attacks on Monday, in retaliation for Israeli police clashes with Palestinians near al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam’s third holiest site, in East Jerusalem.

Violence has since spread to cities where Jews and Israel’s minority Arab community live side by side. There have also been clashes between Palestinian protesters and Israeli security forces in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where health officials said seven Palestinians were killed on Friday.

At least 122 people have been killed since Monday in Gaza, including 31 children and 20 women, and 900 others wounded, Palestinian medical officials said.

Among eight dead in Israel were a soldier patrolling the Gaza border, six Israeli civilians – including two children, an elderly woman and an Indian worker, Israeli authorities said.

SYSTEM OF TUNNELS

The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said there were reports of more than 200 housing units destroyed or severely damaged in Gaza and hundreds of people seeking shelter in schools in the north of the coastal enclave.

Israel says it makes every effort to preserve civilian life, including warning in advance of attacks.

“What we were targeting is an elaborate system of tunnels that spans underneath Gaza, mostly in the north but not limited to, and is a network that the operatives of Hamas use in order to move, in order to hide, for cover,” Conricus told foreign reporters, adding that the network was known as “the Metro”.

Israeli warplanes bombed the houses of three senior Hamas military commanders in central Gaza on Friday that had already been evacuated, local residents said.

An Israeli plane also bombed the building that housed the National Production Bank in Gaza City, with bricks and debris sent flying and windows shattered in some nearby buildings, witnesses said.

Dozens of mourners took part in the funeral of six people – members of two families whose houses were hit by Israeli air strikes on Thursday – in the southern Gaza town of Rafah.

Holding the cloth-bound body of his 19-month-old nephew in his arms, Khamees al-Rantissi said their house was bombed without prior warning. “What was this child doing? What threat did he pose for the state of Israel?” Rantissi asked.

Netanyahu said on Thursday the campaign “will take more time”. Israeli officials said Hamas must be dealt a strong deterring blow before any ceasefire.

The Israeli military’s build-up of forces on the Gaza border has raised speculation about a possible repeat of ground invasions during Israel-Gaza wars in 2014 and 2009, but Israel is loath to risk a sharp increase in military casualties.

FLURRY OF DIPLOMACY

Egypt was pushing for both sides to cease fire from midnight on Friday pending further negotiations, two Egyptian security sources said, with Cairo leaning on Hamas and others, including the United States, trying to reach an agreement with Israel.

“The talks have taken a real and serious path on Friday,” a Palestinian official said. “The mediators from Egypt, Qatar and the United Nations are stepping up their contacts with all sides in a bid to restore calm, but a deal hasn’t yet been reached.”

The hostilities have fueled tension between Israeli Jews and the country’s 21% Arab minority. Violence continued in mixed communities overnight after street fighting and tit-for-tat attacks that prompted Israel’s president to warn of civil war.

Sheikh Ikrima Sabri, who led Friday prayers at al-Aqsa Mosque, decried the treatment of the mosque by Israeli forces. He said its “sanctity has been violated several times during the holy month of Ramadan” in what he called violations “unprecedented” since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

Israel’s military said a Palestinian tried to stab a soldier near the West Bank city of Ramallah. The soldier shot the attacker. Palestinian health officials said the man was killed.

Major airlines have suspended flights to Israel and at least two owners of tankers delivering crude oil asked to divert from Ashkelon to the port of Haifa, farther north of Gaza, because of the conflict, shipping sources said on Friday.

There were pro-Palestinian protests in Jordan and Lebanon, on the borders of the West Bank and Israel, and in Bangladesh, where thousands marched from Dhaka’s national mosque.

But the broader picture across the Middle East and the Islamic world, where Muslims are marking the Eid al-Fitr holiday and where restrictions on movement due to COVID-19 are in place in some countries, was noticeably muted.

The U.N. Security Council will publicly discuss the worsening violence on Sunday, diplomats said after the United States had objected to a meeting on Friday.

The Israeli military has put the number of militants killed in Israeli attacks at between 80 and 90. It said that so far, some 1,800 rockets have been fired at Israel, of which 430 fell short in Gaza or malfunctioned.

(Additional reporting by Rami Ayyub, Dan Williams and Ari Rabinovitch in Israel; Aidan Lewis in Cairo, Nandita Bose and Steve Holland in Washington, Michelle Nichols in New York and Emma Farge in Geneva; Editing by Philippa Fletcher, Mark Heinrich and Frances Kerry)