October 30, 2023 - Israel-Hamas war news

The US is working to send a “strong” message of deterrence to Iran as concerns of a wider regional conflict escalate, the White House said Monday.

“We’re certainly going to act — if we have to— to continue to protect our troops and our facilities. We have proven that we will strike and act to do that. And that's a strong message that Iran needs to take away. We take those responsibilities seriously,” said John Kirby, National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications.

Remember: Iran's President Ebrahim Raisi said Sunday that Israel has "crossed the red lines" and it "may force everyone to take action." There are concerns that Israel's fierce military campaign in Gaza will open up more fronts. There are already crossfire exchanges on northern Israel and southern Lebanon border — separate from Israel's fighting with Hamas farther south, which is centered around Gaza. But an uptick in clashes with Hezbollah has raised fears that the powerful Lebanese paramilitary group could actively participate in the conflict. It comes as the US national security adviser warned of an "elevated risk" of the war expanding into a broader Middle East conflict.

Israeli soldiers have advanced more than 2 miles into Gaza, a CNN analysis has found. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced Friday it was “expanding ground operations” in the besieged enclave. Gaza residents told CNN earlier that they had been subjected to the most intense airstrikes since Hamas’ October 7 attack and that their communications links had been severed.

Since then, United Nations agencies have warned that “civil order” is deteriorating in Gaza after weeks of siege and bombardment, with people breaking into warehouses to take survival essentials.

Meanwhile, Shani Louk, a 23-year-old German-Israeli woman kidnapped by Hamas gunmen during the October 7 attack and taken to Gaza, has been found dead, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.

Here are the latest developments:

Note: Israeli authorities previously announced that Louk had been "found and identified" but did not specify that a bone fragment was found.

The United Nations Security Council will hold an emergency meeting Monday regarding Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza, diplomatic sources confirmed.

The United Arab Emirates will seek a binding resolution from other Security Council members for an "immediate humanitarian pause" in the fighting, the sources said.

The emergency meeting comes after 120 countries voted for a United Nations resolution on Friday, introduced by Jordan, that called for a “sustained humanitarian truce” in Gaza. The United States was one of 14 countries that voted against the resolution, with 45 countries abstaining.

The sources said the draft text of the Security Council resolution calls for “an immediate humanitarian truce” and further “humanitarian pauses.”

Remember: Earlier this month, the United States vetoed a draft resolution at the UNSC which called for a humanitarian pause. 

The UAE is the only Arab country currently a member of the UNSC.

US President Joe Biden pressed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Sunday to “immediately and significantly” scale up the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza, according to a White House summary of the first call between the two leaders since Israel's expanded operation began.

The request for increased flow comes as a dire humanitarian crisis grows worse following the enlargement of Israeli’s assault on the strip. Aid agencies say food, water and medicine are in short supply.

American officials have said the US is pressing Israel to expand aid into Gaza, describing the conversations as occasionally difficult.

“We have conversations, like friends do, on the hard questions … on issues associated with humanitarian aid,” US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Sunday on CBS.

US officials expect that in the coming days, up to 100 aid trucks will begin to enter into Gaza per day, after Israel agreed to speed up inspections of the convoys carrying vital humanitarian support, per a source familiar. 

An Israeli tank was filmed apparently opening fire on a passenger vehicle as it executed a U-turn on the main road running through Gaza.

The footage — filmed by Palestinian freelance journalist Yousif Al Saifi and geolocated by CNN — shows the tank close to the Netzarim Junction, a key crossroad to the south of Gaza City, and about three kilometers (1.8 miles) from the Strip’s eastern boundary.

“The tank was standing there and targeting anyone who came close to it,” Al Saifi said, describing the incident on his Telegram account. “A car and a bus were both targeted in that area; there was also a bulldozer beside the tank.”

It is not known who was driving the vehicle, nor their condition after the incident.

In response to the video, Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson Maj. Nir Dinar told CNN that Hamas uses civilian equipment inside Gaza, acknowledging he didn’t know who was inside that particular car. “How can you tell there aren’t terrorists inside that car? Hamas has no jeeps or tanks, they use civilian equipment for their military purposes.”

Some context: Hamas-ruled enclave of Gaza is a poor, densely populated area, with few resources. The Islamist militant group's attack on October 7 was fueled by cheap, second-hand, and purloined weapons — homemade rockets, modified AK-47s and decades-old Soviet machine guns, a CNN analysis showed. Many of the weapons appeared to be altered Russian or Chinese firearms, presumedly left behind on the battlefield in decades past that eventually made their way into the hands of Hamas terrorists, experts say. The weapons are far less sophisticated than Israel’s — a military that has access to some of the best equipment the US can provide.

The number of children reported killed in Gaza during Israel’s military campaign over the past three weeks has surpassed the annual number of children killed in armed conflict globally in each of the past four years, according to Save the Children.

More than 3,000 children have been reported killed in Gaza since October 7 by the enclave's Hamas-controlled health authorities. 

A total of 2,985 children were killed across 24 countries in 2022, 2,515 were killed in 2021 and 2,674 in 2020, according to the United Nations secretary general's annual report on children and armed conflict, cited by Save the Children.

In 2019, the UN reported 4,019 children were killed in conflicts around the world. 

Save the Children has added its voice to those calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. 

Israel sent more ground forces into Gaza overnight, according to Israeli military spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari.

“Additional forces have entered the strip. Our activity there is only set to intensify,” he said during a daily morning briefing. 

Dozens of Hamas gunmen had been killed in recent fighting as Israeli ground forces advanced towards Hamas positions, he added.

He explained one type of tactical maneuver. 

"We are carrying out an extended ground operation. Ground forces, tanks, infantry, armored forces move towards the terrorists, [who take positions] in a compound in an attempt to attack us. Then we target them from the air,” Hagari said.

Some context: Israeli troops have advanced more than 2 miles [about 3 kilometers] into Gaza in their expanding ground operation, a CNN analysis has found.

Israel over the weekend announced it had entered a “second stage” of its war against Hamas and on Sunday said its ground operation in Gaza would intensify, following weeks of aerial strikes on the Hamas-controlled territory.

CNN's Hadas Gold contributed to the reporting in this post.

The World Bank warns that an escalation of the conflict between Israel and Hamas could cause oil prices to sharply increase. In a new report, it says the impact of the conflict has been limited so far, with oil prices rising about 6% and prices of other commodities – such as food and metals – barely moving. The Bank says the global economy is much better-placed to cope with a major oil price move than in the 1970s, but cautions that an escalation of the conflict – combined with the disruptions from the Russian invasion of Ukraine – could lead to a dual shock. 

If the conflict escalates, the Bank has laid out three possible scenarios for oil prices, depending on the degree of disruption to oil supplies. In a "small disruption scenario,” similar to that resulting from the Libyan civil war in 2011, it says oil prices could jump to as much as $103 a barrel.

In a "medium disruption scenario", which the World Bank says would be equivalent to the Iraq war in 2003, oil prices could jump as much as 35% to $121 a barrel.

A "large disruption scenario" – which the Bank says would be comparable to the Arab oil embargo in 1973 – would see oil prices climb up to 75% higher, at $157 a barrel. 

The World Bank also warned higher oil prices would lead to higher food prices, increasing food insecurity across the world. 

The Biden administration is announcing new actions Monday aimed at combating a series of antisemitic incidents on college campuses across the United States in the wake of the Hamas terror attacks on Israel.

The White House highlighted a series of steps taken by the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Justice, and the Department of Education, including engagement with campus law enforcement officials, which comes amid rising tension on campuses.

CNN has reported that at many universities, students are engaging in fervent protests as some administrators grapple with how to acknowledge students’ wide-ranging concerns while also fielding backlash from influential donors demanding the colleges take a clearer stance on the conflict. Over the weekend, a series of antisemitic threats were made against Cornell University’s Jewish community in online posts.  

The Justice Department’s Community Relations Service is providing support to Jewish, Muslim, Arab, and other impacted communities, the official added.

And the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, part of DHS, is working to “proactively engage with schools to assess and address need,” the official said. 

The Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights is also “(expediting) its update of the intake process for discrimination complaints under Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, to specifically state that certain forms of Antisemitism and Islamophobia are prohibited by this law.”

That means that, for the first time, the complaint form will make clear that “discrimination on the basis of national origin in federally funded programs or activities -- including ethnic or ancestral slurs or stereotypes against students who are for example Jewish, Muslim, Sikh, or Hindu — are forms of prohibited discrimination under this law,” the White House official said. That is expected to formally be updated later this week.