December 22, 2023 Israel-Hamas war

The number of people killed in Gaza since October 7 has risen to 20,057, according to a statement from the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health in the strip on Friday.

A total of 53,320 people have also been wounded in the conflict, it said.

CNN cannot independently verify the numbers.

The ministry said 390 people died in the past 48 hours while communication networks had been offline across much of the territory.

On Thursday night, telecom provider Paltel said in a statement that services in central and southern Gaza were gradually coming back online after being disrupted due to Israeli bombardment.

The risk of famine in Gaza is increasing every day that hostilities persist or worsen, according to a report released Thursday by a United Nations-backed food security agency.

In its report on the ravaged enclave, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) said though acute malnutrition and non-trauma-related mortality have not crossed famine thresholds yet, "these are typically the outcomes of prolonged and extreme food consumption gaps."

It added that hostilities — including bombardment, military ground operations and the besiegement of Gaza’s entire 2.2 million population — have already caused catastrophic levels of acute food insecurity across the territory.

The report said virtually all households in Gaza are skipping meals, with four in five northern households and about half the displaced households in the south going entire days without eating. 

According to the report, the entire population of Gaza is classified in a state of crisis (IPC Phase 3). 

“This is the highest share of people facing high levels of acute food insecurity that the IPC initiative has ever classified for any given area or country,” the report states.

At least 79% of Gaza’s population is classified as being in a state of emergency (IPC Phase 4) or catastrophe (IPC Phase 5), according to the report.

The classification indicates that more than half a million people are experiencing catastrophic acute food insecurity conditions, marked by extreme food shortages, alarming rates of acute malnutrition in children under 5, and a significant rise in mortality rates.  

The United States is ready to vote on a United Nations Security Council resolution on Gaza after several delays, the US ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield said Thursday night.

Thomas-Greenfield spoke after a closed-door meeting in which the Security Council again delayed a vote on the resolution, which calls for a suspension of fighting between Israel and Hamas and an increase in humanitarian aid to the Gaza. 

The vote is now expected to take place on Friday.

Thomas-Greenfield didn't share how she will vote on the measure, but said “it will be a resolution — if the resolution is put forward as is — that we can support.”

The resolution will bring humanitarian assistance and support “the priority that Egypt has in ensuring that we put a mechanism on the ground that will support humanitarian assistance,” she added.

Some context: The US has previously voted against a call for a ceasefire in the larger UN General Assembly and earlier this month, vetoed a resolution in the 15-member Security Council that included the word “ceasefire” in the text. Deputy Ambassador to the UN Robert Wood told the Security Council at the time it was because there was no mention of the October 7 Hamas attacks in the draft.

As one of the five permanent members of the Security Council, a resolution vetoed by the US will not pass.

Israel’s most recent proposal to Hamas is a one-week pause in the war for the return of around 35 hostages, including the remaining women, elderly, wounded and sick men held in Gaza, a senior US official told CNN. 

This group would include the three elderly men abducted from Kibbutz Nir Oz near the Gaza border who were recently featured in a video released by the Qassam Brigades, Hamas’ military wing, in which they are pleading to be released.

CNN was unable to independently verify when or where the footage was shot or the condition of the captives. 

And despite Hamas stating on its Telegram channel on Thursday that it would not agree to any discussions about prisoner swaps until after Israel ends its military operation, US officials continue to believe that there is a pathway to secure the release of more hostages, that official said. 

The senior US official declined to say whether Hamas’ most senior leader in Gaza, Yayha Sinwar, had responded to Israel’s latest proposal on the hostages. Sinwar is Israel’s primary target in Gaza, the Israel Defense Forces has called him a “dead man walking.”

Both Israeli and American officials have indicated they believe Sinwar could be in the network of tunnels below his hometown of Khan Younis.

While Israel has returned to the negotiating table to get more of the hostages taken by Hamas during the October 7 attack, both Israeli and US officials have made clear that a deal does not appear imminent, CNN previously reported.

Eight Americans remain unaccounted for since the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel. Four Americans — three women and a toddler — have been successfully released since the start of the Israel-Hamas war. 

The US and Qatar have continued to push Israel to get back to the negotiating table, ever since a seven-day truce ended three weeks ago and efforts to get hostages released stalled.

The Israel Defense Forces destroyed a "strategic terror tunnel network" in central Gaza City on Thursday, IDF spokesperson Daniel Hagari said in a media briefing. 

On Wednesday, the IDF released several videos they said show a network of tunnels that connect to residences and offices of senior Hamas leadership.

CNN cannot independently verify the IDF's claims. 

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has expressed “deep concerns” over the rapidly worsening food security situation in Gaza.

Nearly all of the enclave's 2.2 million residents are now facing acute hunger, according to a report by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) released Thursday.  

According to the report, the entire population of Gaza is classified in a state of crisis (IPC Phase 3). 

At least 79% of Gaza’s population is classified as being in a state of emergency (IPC Phase 4) or catastrophe (IPC Phase 5), according to the report.

The classification indicates that more than half a million people are experiencing catastrophic acute food insecurity conditions, marked by extreme food shortages, alarming rates of acute malnutrition in children under 5, and a significant rise in mortality rates.  

In November, FAO Director-General Qu Dongyu reaffirmed the organization’s commitment to addressing the humanitarian needs and safeguarding agriculture-based livelihoods in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.

“An immediate ceasefire and peace are prerequisites for food security, and the Right to Food is a basic human right,” Dongyu said in a statement. 

Israel has assured the United States of its plans “to transition from a higher intensity level of operations ... to something a bit lower-intensity,” as its objectives shift in Gaza, the White House said Thursday.

Kirby declined to offer a timeline on when exactly Israel would transition to that new phase, adding the Israelis “will decide when (and) they will decide what lower intensity looks like and what that means.” 

Kirby pointed to a series of high-level trips to the region, noting Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and national security adviser Jake Sullivan have all traveled to Israel recently, where officials “talked to them about our lessons learned in doing those kinds of transitions … as well as asking them some tough questions.”

Northern Gaza no longer has a functioning hospital, the World Health Organization (WHO) said Thursday, detailing "unbearable" scenes teams observed during a recent mission. 

"There are actually no functional hospitals left in the north," Richard Peeperkorn, WHO representative in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, told a press briefing. 

According to Peeperkorn, the last functioning hospital in northern Gaza was Al-Ahli Hospital but fuel, power, medical supply and staffing shortages have rendered it "minimally functional." 

Of 36 hospitals in Gaza, only nine located in the south are functioning, Peeperkorn said.

The WHO representative spoke to journalists in the wake of WHO missions carried out in recent days to Al-Ahli and Al-Shifa Hospital, located in Gaza City. 

Sean Casey, who led the missions, recounted the "unbearable" scenes WHO workers witnessed at a church in the Al-Ahli compound that had been converted into a makeshift ward.

"A church with 30 or so patients, almost none of them ambulatory. So bedridden patients, some of them with serious trauma wounds... We saw many patients who had said they hadn't bathed or changed their clothes in weeks," Casey said.

Casey said describing Al-Ahli as a hospice implied a "level of care" that the five doctors and five nurses working there are "simply unable to provide" in light of the virtually non-existent resources.

He said Al-Ahli is rather now a "place where people are waiting to die" unless they can be moved to a "safer location" capable of providing care.