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On Monday, September 30, the Berlin police, on behalf of the public prosecutor’s office, conducted house raids with a total of 125 officers, on the homes of five pro-Palestinian activists ranging in age from 18 to 40. The simultaneous raids took place around 6:00 a.m., in what police describe as a series of “pro-Palestinian motivated crimes.”

As Israel’s military escalates its attacks on Lebanon, it has continued its relentless bombardment of the Gaza Strip, where almost a year of war has now wiped 902 entire Palestinian families off the civil registry.

There are another 1,300 families where only one family member has survived. The official death toll in Gaza has reached nearly 41,800, but that is believed to be a vast undercount.

Gaza-based journalist Akram al-Satarri says one year into Israel’s war, the medical and humanitarian crisis remains unchanged. He describes some of the horrific injuries suffered by Palestinians, including many children, that have resulted in mass amputation of limbs, and says people are in a constant struggle for shelter and safety.

“The suffering is continuous, and now the war in Lebanon is adding further burdens on the Palestinians and is giving more space for the Israeli forces to continue the bombardment in different areas,” says al-Satarri.

In a devastating letter sent to President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris this week, 99 health workers who have volunteered in Gaza amid the genocide wrote that Israel has likely already killed over 118,908 Palestinians in Gaza. This is approximately 5.4 percent of Gaza’s population, meaning Israel has killed 1 of every 20 Palestinians in the Strip in less than a year, according to this estimate.

Not only is this figure horrific, it is also the “most conservative estimate” possible of the true death toll in Gaza, the health workers wrote in an appendix to the letter. The workers calculated this based on estimates from food insecurity researchers on the death toll caused by famine; rough estimates of deaths by disease; and other estimates of deaths that Gaza health officials are unable to count.

The workers, who spent a combined 254 weeks in Gaza, specifically emphasize the impact that Israel’s genocide has had on children. For instance, they point out that, according to officially reported figures, Israel has killed at least 2,100 babies and toddlers since October 7 — a toll that is higher than the combined Israeli death toll from the First Intifada, the Second Intifada and October 7 attack.

According to the feature-length documentary Gaza, published online by Al Jazeera's Investigative Unit on Thursday, Israeli forces routinely shared abuses they committed on platforms including TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and Facebook after invading the enclave.

The crimes ranged from wanton destruction and looting, to the demolition of entire neighbourhoods and possible unlawful killings.

Al Jazeera said it was able to track down the names, ranks and military units of many of the soldiers after compiling a database of "over two and a half thousand social media accounts, containing photos and videos placed online by Israeli soldiers".

Investigating War Crimes in Gaza | Al Jazeera Investigations

Overnight on Wednesday, Israeli forces dropped bombs across the strip and undertook a ground incursion in Khan Yunis, killing at least 90 Palestinians and injuring dozens of others.

Israeli forces bombed two schools, in Gaza City and central Gaza. They also bombed an orphanage in western Gaza City, the Al-Amal Orphanage. The orphanage posted on Facebook that the bombing killed eight people, including children, and caused a “large number” of injuries.

In southern Gaza, Israeli forces sent tanks into Khan Yunis on Wednesday, where troops killed at least 51 people, according to Gaza officials. At least 12 children, including a 22-month-old baby, were killed by the combination of the ground and air attack. Israel has repeatedly sent troops into Khan Yunis, and this time launched an overnight operation into three neighborhoods of the city.

After nearly a year of unrelenting attacks in Gaza, Israel further escalated and expanded its war by invading Lebanon late Monday. Iran responded the following evening by launching ballistic missiles into Tel Aviv, stoking fears that the region is on the precipice of an even broader war.

The Israeli military has tried repeatedly to minimize the perceived scope of its attacks, describing its ongoing invasion of Lebanon as “limited, localized, and targeted ground raids” against Hezbollah. Such semantics are also in play in the U.S., where President Joe Biden publicly called for a ceasefire, while reporting suggests the White House privately condoned Israel’s expansion of its war into Lebanon.

For the past two weeks, Israel’s bombing campaign across Lebanon, including strikes into the densely populated capital Beirut, has killed more than 1,000 people, including at least 243 children and women, the country’s health minister said. One million people in Lebanon — nearly a fifth of the country — have been displaced from their homes. Over the weekend, Israel bombed Lebanon, Gaza, the West Bank, Yemen, and Syria within a 24-hour span, damaging civilian infrastructure and killing dozens. In Lebanon on Sunday alone, Israeli strikes killed at least 105 people, a single-day death toll from Israeli strikes previously seen only in Gaza.

While the IDF has said it doesn’t seek any long-term occupation of Lebanon, El-Sadany pointed to the war in Gaza where Israel continually moved its goal posts.

Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip has been the deadliest year of conflict for women and children anywhere in the world over the past two decades, according to an analysis released Tuesday as Israeli forces continued to bombard the Palestinian enclave and launched a ground invasion of Lebanon.

The global humanitarian group Oxfam noted in its new report that Israel’s U.S.-backed assault on Gaza has killed more than 6,000 women and 11,000 children, estimates that the organization deemed “conservative” given that the figures don’t include the tens of thousands of kids who are missing.

Many children who have survived Israel’s year-long assault thus far have been left with debilitating psychological and physical trauma. Umaiyeh Khammash, a physician who directs the West Bank-based group Juzoor, said Tuesday that more than 25,000 children in Gaza “have either lost a parent or become orphans, leaving them in deep emotional distress.”

Oxfam also outlined in broad strokes how Israel has obliterated Gaza’s civilian infrastructure, pointing to estimates showing that, on average over the past year, Israeli forces have bombed homes every four hours, shelters for displaced people every 17 hours, schools and hospitals every four days, and aid distribution points and facilities roughly every two weeks.

The call from Veterans for Peace (VFP) comes days after the investigative outlet ProPublica published a detailed account of how the U.S. State Department submitted a report to Congress that contradicted the findings of the department’s own experts and those of other agencies.

The Blinken-led State Department’s May report concluded that Israel was not “prohibiting or otherwise restricting the transport or delivery of U.S. humanitarian assistance,” despite internal assessments from State Department experts and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) arguing that Israel had deliberately impeded American aid shipments to Gaza and that weapons transfers to the country should be cut off in line with Section 620I of the U.S. Foreign Assistance Act.

VFP’s letter came days after the U.S. and Israel reached a deal for an additional $8.7 billion in American military support, even as the Israeli military continues to obstruct aid deliveries in Gaza, bombard the enclave’s starving population, and expand the assault on Lebanon.

Susan Schnall, VFP’s president, said Monday that U.S. military aid to Israel amounts to “a theft from millions of Americans who have none of the health insurance every Israeli enjoys; from millions of Americans living in horrific housing while Israel builds thousands of upscale homes on land stolen from Palestinians; from millions of young Americans who can’t afford college because America’s top priorities are weapons and death, not human needs.”

Netanyahu told attendees that Israel will “continue degrading Hezbollah” until its military objectives are met and vowed to keep bombing Gaza until “total victory” is achieved. He also threatened Iran, who he claimed was behind many of the problems in the region.

Netanyahu also lashed out at the very body he was addressing, accusing the United Nations of being a “house of darkness” and a “swamp of antisemitic bile.”

Netanyahu was greeted by protest as soon as he arrived in New York City on Thursday. Thousands rallied and then marched to the United Nations headquarters, in an action organized by the Shut It Down For Palestine Coalition, which includes which includes the Palestinian Youth Movement, PAL-Awda NY, the People’s Forum, Nodutdol, the ANSWER Coalition and other groups.

Shortly after Netanyahu’s speech Israel bombed south Beirut, leveling six residential buildings. Israeli media has reported that it was an attempted assassination of Hezbollah’s Secretary General, Hasan Nasrallah. Lebanese sources told the Iranian news agency, Tasnim that Nasrallah is in a safe place. Reuters and AFP also quoted sources close to Hezbollah who say Nasrallah is still alive.

The Times of Israel reports approved of the strikes from his New York City hotel, right before he gave his U.N.

The Biden administration was reportedly informed of the attack shortly before it happened. It just comes just one day after Israel announced that it had secured an $8.7 billion military aid package from the United States.