Hezbollah leader breaks silence; US drones search for Israeli hostages in Gaza: Updates

Editor's Note: For the latest news on the Israel-Hamas conflict, please see Saturday's updates file here.

On Friday, Israel fired an airstrike on an ambulance outside of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, killing at least 15 people and injuring 50 others, according to health authorities in Gaza, CNN reported.

Israel Defense Forces said in a statement that they targeted the ambulance because it was being used by Hamas and carrying militants, according to Reuters.

“An IDF aircraft struck an ambulance that was identified by forces as being used by a Hamas terrorist cell in close proximity to their position in the battle zone,” the statement reads. "A number of Hamas terrorist operatives were killed in the strike."

Dr. Ashraf Al-Qidra, a spokeperson for the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza, concurred that Israel was responsible for the attack on the vehicle, which was headed to the Rafah Crossing, CNN reported.

Official: Hamas tried to get its wounded fighters out of Gaza

The Palestinian militant group Hamas tried to secure passage out of the Gaza Strip for some its wounded fighters as part of an agreement that allowed for limited evacuations from the besieged territory, a U.S. official said Friday.

Hamas’ demands during negotiations with Egypt, Israel and the U.S. slowed down the talks, said a senior administration official, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

Hamas said it would allow foreign nationals to leave through the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and Gaza as long as a number of wounded Palestinians were on the list, the official said. But once negotiators vetted the list of possible evacuees provided by Hamas, they discovered that one-third of them were Hamas fighters, the official said.

“It was just unacceptable to Egypt, to us, to Israel,” the official said.

The deal that was eventually reached allowed wounded Palestinian civilians, but not Hamas fighters, to leave Gaza along with foreign passport holders. More than 1,000 people, including more than 100 Americans, have evacuated Gaza since the arrangement was announced Wednesday.

Israel 'refuses a temporary cease-fire that doesn’t include a return of our hostages'

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other top officials about "concrete steps" to minimize the deaths of civilians in Gaza, securing the release of more hostages, increasing humanitarian aid to the region and the ongoing ground offensive as Israeli forces encircle Gaza City.

Blinken stressed the United States' support for Israel's right to defend itself with the caveat that how Israel carries out its military campaign to defeat Hamas "matters," adding that it threatens to limit public support and eventual peace talks. He did not offer details about the steps he discussed with Israeli officials, including the humanitarian pauses he and President Joe Biden have encouraged.

Shortly after Blinken spoke in Tel Aviv, Netanyahu said in a statement that Israel "refuses a temporary cease-fire that doesn’t include a return of our hostages.”

Meanwhile, thousands of stranded Palestinian laborers in Israel and the West Bank have been expelled and began their return to the besieged enclave.

At the Rafah crossing, more foreign nationals and wounded Palestinians in Gaza were allowed to leave the Gaza Strip on Friday under an apparent agreement among the U.S., Egypt, Israel and Qatar, which mediates with Hamas. Over 800 people have escaped since Wednesday's partial opening of the Rafah crossing, the only viable way out of Gaza.

Israel has allowed over 260 trucks carrying food, water and medicines through the Rafah crossing, but aid workers say it’s not enough and will not reach civilians in north Gaza where Israeli troops have tightened their perimeter around Gaza City, and where tens of thousands of civilians remain in the path of escalating battles between militants and Israeli ground forces.

Nearly half of the hospitals across Gaza, including the only cancer facility, are not operating amid a massive fuel shortage. Netanyahu on Thursday said his administration has not made a decision on whether to allow fuel to get to the medical facilities.

'Circle of blood': The club no Israeli or Palestinian wants to be in. Yet, they urge peace.

The Palestinian death toll − which has surpassed 9,000, including more than 3,600 children − and images of widespread destruction in densely populated areas of Gaza have contributed to growing unease among Israel supporters and Arab nations with which it has peaceful relations. Since the war began, more than 1,400 Israelis have died, most of them civilians killed in the first hours of Hamas' surprise attack.

Other Developments:

∎ World Health Organization spokesperson Christian Lindmeier told reporters Friday that 70% of the victims in Israel and Gaza who've been killed since Oct. 7 are women and children. “It’s the innocent civilians that are losing here," said Lindmeier. "Let’s think about the victims."

∎ Israeli military forces killed a "Hamas battalion commander during overnight operations," according to a statement on X, formerly Twitter, by the Israel Defense Forces, adding: "Our ground, aerial and naval forces continue to operate to eliminate Hamas’ chain of command and terrorist capabilities."

∎ In raids across the occupied West Bank overnight, Israeli forces killed seven Palestinians and arrested many others. Since the Oct. 7 Hamas rampage, 130 Palestinians have been killed and more than 820 have been displaced amid settler violence and increased movement restrictions.

∎ The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, on Friday said nearly 50 of their buildings, including schools and shelters where around 700,000 Palestinians have taken refuge, have been struck by airstrikes. Four of its schools-turned-shelters in Gaza were damaged by airstrikes in the past day, killing a reported minimum of 24 people.

Hezbollah leader says group will not limit involvement in conflict

Hezbollah's leader Hassan Nasrallah broke his silence for the first time since the start of the Israel-Hamas war, saying Friday that the Iran-backed group would not limit its involvement in the conflict to the northern border between Israel and Lebanon.

However, Nasrallah, who has not appeared in public for years over fears he could be assassinated by Israel, appeared to stop short of formally declaring war on Israel.

Lebanon-based Hezbollah, considered a terrorist organization by the U.S. and U.K., has since the outbreak of the war been attacking Israel's military across the border with shells and rockets.

Nasrallah said the Hamas attacks exposed "the frailty, weakness and total fragility of Israel," adding that Israel is "more fragile than a spider’s web."

In his speech, held in a secret location but broadcast live to thousands of people at a rally in Beirut, Nasrallah said the Hamas attacks were "100% Palestinian"; that no other groups were involved in its planning. He also cast doubt on Israel’s ability to achieve its aim of releasing the hostages held in Gaza.

‒ Kim Hjelmgaard

US uses unarmed drones to search for hostages in Gaza

The Pentagon has been flying unarmed drones over Gaza in search of hostages, the Defense Department acknowledged on Friday.

The drone flights began after the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks that killed 1,400 people, Air Force Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said in a statement. Hamas militants also seized 200 people hostages in the attacks, including U.S. citizens.

The drone flights indicate deeper involvement by the U.S. military in the conflict than previously acknowledged. U.S. military experts have advised their Israeli counterparts on lessons learned from urban combat in Iraq, U.S. officials have said.

Drones have the ability to feed video and still footage from surveillance sensors to forces involved in hostage rescue attempts.

‒ Tom Vanden Brook

Blinken says Israel must do more to protect Palestinian civilians

Blinken told reporters Friday that he's urged Israel "to do more to protect Palestinian civilians" in both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. The secretary of state said Israeli leaders agreed to address and "hold accountable" extremist settlers attacking and displacing Palestinians in the West Bank.

“We’ve provided Israel advice that only the best of friends can offer on how to minimize civilian deaths while still achieving its objectives of finding and finishing Hamas terrorists and their infrastructure of violence,” he said.

Humanitarian pauses were an “important area of discussion," Blinken said, adding that questions raised in his various meetings asked how, when and where humanitarian pauses can happen, as well as how to connect a pause to the release of hostages, and how to ensure that "Hamas doesn’t use these pauses or arrangements to its own advantage."

"Ultimately, we believe this can be a critical mechanism for protecting civilians," he said. Blinken also reiterated that while balancing urgent needs, the United States is focused on "setting the conditions for a durable and sustainable peace and security."

"The United States continues to believe that the best viable path, indeed the only path, is through a two state solution," he said. "That's the only guarantor of a secure Jewish and democratic Israel, the only guarantor of Palestinians realizing their legitimate right to live in a state of their own, enjoying measures of security, freedom, opportunity and dignity. The only way to end a cycle of violence once and for all."

Israel expels workers, 'severing all contact with Gaza'

Israel's security cabinet late Thursday announced that it is expelling thousands of Palestinian workers who have been stranded in Israel and the West Bank since the outbreak of the war almost a month ago.

About 18,000 Palestinians in Gaza previously routinely crossed into Israel for work via the now sealed off Gaza-Israel border. But since Oct. 7 many of them have been arbitrarily detained by Israel.

USA TODAY last month encountered a group of about 130 workers who had been arrested, beaten and then transferred from Israel to Ramallah, a Palestinian city in the West Bank. In addition to their ill-treatment, they spoke about the difficulties of staying in touch with family members in Gaza amid Israel's intensifying bombing campaign that has now claimed more than 9,000 lives.

"I am powerless to help them, and for every 10 times I try to reach them on the phone, I get through maybe once," said one worker, speaking about his wife and 12 children from the grounds of a school in Ramallah where he and other Palestinians in Gaza had been given temporary shelter.

In a statement, Israel's security cabinet said the move to expel the workers was aimed at "severing all contact with Gaza,” adding that there "will be no more Palestinian workers from Gaza."

The statement did not explain how, when or to where precisely the workers would be returned. Gaza is an active war zone that Israel's military is bombarding hundreds of times per day.

‒ Kim Hjelmgaard

What is the Rafah border crossing?

The Rafah crossing is a pedestrian border between Gaza and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula. It's currently the only viable point of exit for Palestinians and others seeking to escape the besieged enclave.

Egypt, Hamas and Israel agreed to open the border for a limited time to allow for people with foreign passports, some critically injured Palestinians and aid workers to cross, the embassy said. One of those aid groups includes 22 Doctors Without Borders staffers.

"There are still over 20,000 injured people in Gaza with limited access to health care due to the siege," the nonprofit said.

The United Nations said in an Oct. 22 update that truckloads of humanitarian aid has poured into Gaza via the crossing. The U.N. also said on Wednesday about 80 sick and wounded Palestinians and 500 foreign passport holders gained entry into Egypt via the crossing.

Contributing: Jorge Ortiz, USA TODAY; The Associated Press

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Israel Hamas war updates: Hezbollah leader speaks; US drones