January 10, 2024 Israel-Hamas war

Nick Maynard still remembers treating the little boy from the Al-Maghazi refugee camp.

The British surgeon found the 6-year-old on the floor of the emergency ward of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in central Gaza.

Maynard has recounted the daily horror of working at the hospital: Scores of displaced civilians covering every inch of the medical facility, hundreds of wounded people – mainly children – arriving every day with traumatic burns, missing limbs and shrapnel injuries to the chest and abdomen.

Leading a five-member emergency team of clinicians, he worked with Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) and the International Rescue Committee (IRC) from December 26 to January 5.

Maynard, who has been coming to Gaza for 14 years, told CNN the overcrowding in and around the hospital in Deir al-Balah, one of the last remaining functioning hospitals in the enclave, was like “something I’ve never, ever seen before.”

“When you're dealing with acutely ill patients like that, you have to have a really comprehensive triage system where you can prioritize, and that system collapsed completely,” he said on Tuesday, speaking from the Egyptian capital Cairo.

The ratio of doctors to patients spiraled, as medical workers who were volunteering at the hospital increasingly fled south after the Israeli military issued evacuation orders.

In Al-Aqsa hospital, many of the patients were refugees from local camps including Al-Maghazi, Al-Bureij and Nuseirat, in what Maynard called “the clearest evidence you could ever want that there was an indiscriminate slaughter of people.”

The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the military “does its utmost to avoid civilian casualties including providing early warning before attack, safe passage corridors and designated safer zones."

“Hamas targets Israeli civilians and embeds itself in Palestinian civilian neighborhoods, using Palestinian civilians and Israeli hostages as human shields,” the office added.

Israeli attacks on Gaza have killed at least 23,210 Palestinians since October 7, and injured another 59,167, according to the Hamas-run Ministry of Health — more than 1% of the enclave’s total pre-war population of 2.27 million people.

Israeli forces are “deliberately blocking the delivery of water, food, and fuel,” and “depriving the civilian population of objects indispensable to their survival,” Human Rights Watch has warned. The World Health Organization (WHO) reported the enclave's healthcare sector is crumbling at a "rapid pace."

Maynard said most patients arrived at Al-Aqsa with “dirty wounds” after bomb blasts had pelted fallen glass, gravel, dust and dirt into their injuries. Rampant shortages of painkillers, drinkable water, and medical equipment including gloves, and skin staple removers meant “the wound infection rate was stratospheric.”

Some patients suffered blast injuries where shrapnel passed through multiple parts of the body, damaging the liver, the spleen, the stomach and bowel, while others sustained internal bleeding in the lungs. Worst of all, Maynard said, was the sheer number of Palestinians, mainly children, arriving with traumatic burns and amputations.

More than 10 children on average have lost one or both of their legs every day in Gaza since October 7, Save the Children said on Sunday.

He still thinks of the little boy he found on the floor at the hospital. The kid was just one of many orphaned by the war and coming in with no family, “screaming for their parents” who had been killed.“He was alive when we left, but I don't know whether he survived,” Maynard said.

The post was updated with more details from the interview with Maynard.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said he believes that Hamas “can and will engage” on hostage talks even after an Israeli strike killed a senior Hamas official in Beirut last week.

“We succeeded before in the midst of this conflict in getting more than a hundred hostages out, and it’s my belief that they can and will engage on this, and that’s something we’re intensely focused on with Qatar and with Egypt,” Blinken said in an interview with NBC News' Andrea Mitchell on Tuesday, which aired Wednesday.

On Sunday, Qatari Prime Minister and Minster of Foreign Affairs Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said that the assassination of Saleh al-Arouri “is something that can affect such a complicated process.”

“We are not giving up; we are moving forward. We are continuing our discussions with the parties and trying to achieve as soon as possible an agreement that can bring assistance for humanitarian relief and the release of the hostages,” Al Thani said at a press conference alongside Blinken in Doha.

Blinken told NBC News that he again met with hostage families on his trip, saying that “for them, these three months have been an eternity; every day, every hour, every minute feels like an eternity.”

Hamas is no longer in control in large parts of the Gaza Strip, Israeli war cabinet member Benny Gantz said.

He also reiterated the importance of the return of all hostages abducted in the October 7 attack, saying this is the priority in every combat decision. "If any of the abductees are watching us now, it is important for you to know — we are doing everything so that you return to your loved ones who never stop fighting for you," Gantz added.  

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned "there will be consequences" for the continued Houthi attacks in the Red Sea.

Amid the efforts to prevent a regional conflict from spreading, it is "particularly important that we respond when we see something like the aggression coming from the Houthis," the top US diplomat said.

He noted that the threat posed by the Houthi attacks has drawn together an international coalition to counter it.

One of the largest Houthi attacks to date was on Tuesday — when three US Navy destroyers, Navy F/A-18s from the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, and a UK destroyer, the HMS Diamond — shot down 21 missiles and drones. There were no ships damaged by the attack and no injuries reported.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has landed in Bahrain, where he will meet with King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa after meeting earlier in the day with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

After his meeting with Blinken, Abbas traveled to the Jordanian city of Aqaba for a summit with Egyptian President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi and Jordanian King Abdullah II.

Blinken will return to Tel Aviv Wednesday afternoon, before traveling to Egypt Thursday.

The top US diplomat has held a flurry of meetings with regional leaders over the past several days, traveling to Turkey, Greece, Jordan, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia. He was in Israel for key meetings with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other officials on Tuesday.

Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels are stepping up their strikes on ships in the Red Sea, which they say are revenge against Israel for its military campaign in Gaza.

The strikes have forced some of the world's biggest shipping and oil companies to suspend their travel through the sea and has prompted the US and UK to supply warships to the region in an attempt to deter further attacks.

While — through a combination of geography and technology — the Houthis may lack the capabilities of Hamas and Hezbollah, their strikes on commercial vessels in the Red Sea may inflict a different sort of pain on Israel and its allies.

The global economy has been served a series of painful reminders of the importance of this narrow stretch of sea, which runs from the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait off the coast of Yemen to the Suez Canal in northern Egypt – and through which 12% of global trade flows, including 30% of global container traffic.

In 2021, a ship called the Ever Given ran aground in the Suez Canal, blocking the vital trade artery for nearly a week – holding up as much as $10 billion in cargo each day – and causing disruptions to global supply chains that lasted far longer.

There are fears that the Houthi drone and missile attacks against commercial vessels, which have occurred almost daily since December 9, could cause an even greater shock to the world economy.

The Houthis say they will only relent when Israel allows the entry of food and medicine into Gaza; its strikes could be intended to inflict economic pain on Israel’s allies in the hope they will pressure it to cease its bombardment of the enclave.

Fueling international tensions

Championing the Palestinian cause could also be an attempt to gain legitimacy at home and in the region as they seek to control northern Yemen, which they have dominated since the start of a bloody civil war almost a decade ago.

It could also give them an upper hand against their Arab adversaries, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, who they accuse of being lackeys of the US and Israel.

But, there is also concern that the attacks could draw more countries into the conflict.

In December, the US announced a multinational naval task force comprising the United Kingdom, Bahrain, Canada, France, Norway and others, to “tackle the challenge posed by this non-state actor” that “threatens the free flow of commerce, endangers innocent mariners, and violates international law.”

Read the full story.

The Iran-backed Houthis said the barrage of missiles and drones fired on the Red Sea on Tuesday was in response to a US attack on the group last week. 

The US sank three Houthi boats in the Red Sea, killing all those aboard, on December 31 after coming under fire.

It was the first time the US had targeted members of the Iranian-supported Houthi rebel group since the escalation of tensions in October.

In a statement, the Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said Tuesday’s attack was a "coordinated offensive" targeting an American ship "aiding" Israel in the Red Sea. 

Saree said that the operation involved a “substantial deployment” of ballistic and naval missiles, along with drones in response to what he described as a "treacherous attack" by US forces on Houthi naval units on last week.

The group has reassured their "commitment to maintaining maritime traffic” in the Red Sea and Arabian Sea, with the sole exception of vessels connected to Israel, Saree said.  

Attacks by Iran-backed militants in the Red Sea have effectively closed one of the world’s main trade routes to most container ships — vessels that carry everything from car parts to Crocs from one corner of the globe to another.

A prolonged closure of the waterway, which connects with the Suez Canal, could snarl global supply chains and drive up the prices of manufactured goods at a crucial moment in the battle to defeat inflation. The Suez Canal accounts for 10-15% of world trade, which includes oil exports, and for 30% of global container shipping volumes.

Houthi militants, based in Yemen, say they are taking revenge for Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza. The US military and its allies have beefed up maritime security but the attacks continue, with 21 Houthi missiles and drones shot down late Tuesday.

As the crisis persists, the stakes for the global economy are rising. Retailers are already warning of delays, and the cost of shipping goods is increasing.

Six of the 10 biggest container shipping companies — namely Maersk, MSC, Hapag-Lloyd, CMA CGM, ZIM and ONE — are largely or completely avoiding the Red Sea because of the threat from the Houthi militants.

The danger to crew, cargo and vessels has forced carriers to reroute ships around the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa, resulting in delays of up to three weeks.

This has already significantly increased shipping costs, which could ultimately show up in consumer prices.

If the Israel-Hamas war escalates into a wider regional conflict or the Houthis decide to redirect their attacks toward oil tankers and bulk carriers — which transport crucial raw materials such as iron ore, grain and timber — the consequences for the global economy would be altogether more severe.

Read more about how shipping costs could be affected.

The UN Security Council will vote on Wednesday morning on a US-led resolution condemning the spate of Houthi attacks in the Red Sea.

The resolution, a copy of which was obtained by CNN, "condemns in the strongest terms the at least two dozen Houthi attacks on merchant and commercial vessels since November 19, 2023, when the Houthis attacked and seized the Galaxy Leader and its crew." 

Here's what else is in the resolution:

The text does not name Iran for its support of the Houthis. No timings were immediately given.