Israel approves West Bank land as state property, continues Gaza bombardment: report

GAZA CITY: The Israeli government on Sunday approved a proposal to register areas of the West Bank as “state property,” and continued its bombardment of the Gaza Strip, killing at least 12 people, Al Jazeera reported. 

Israeli broadcaster Kan reported that the country’s Minister of Finance, Bezalel Smotrich, Minister of Justice, Yariv Levin, and Minister of Defense, Israel Katz, submitted the proposal. The finance minister said the country was “continuing the settlement revolution to control all our lands.” 

Article 49 of the Geneva Convention states, “The occupying power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.” 

According to Wafa, the Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates said the decision marked a first step toward annexation and undermined the foundations of a Palestinian state.

Separately, Gaza's civil defense agency reported that Israeli strikes killed at least 12 people since dawn, while a military official said the attacks were in response to ceasefire violations.

Despite a US-brokered truce that entered its second phase last month, violence has continued in the Palestinian territory, with Hamas blaming Israel for violating the agreement.

The civil defense agency, which operates as a rescue force, said one strike hit a tent of displaced people in northern Gaza and another targeted an area in the south.

Five people were killed, and several were injured when an air strike targeted a tent sheltering displaced people in Jabalia in the north, the agency said in a statement.

Five more were killed, and several were injured in a separate early morning strike in the southern city of Khan Yunis, the agency said, adding that one more was killed in Israeli shelling in Gaza City.

The agency also said that one person was killed by Israeli gunfire in Beit Lahia in north Gaza.

The Al-Shifa and Nasser hospitals confirmed they had received the bodies of at least seven people.

"Israel doesn't understand ceasefires or truces," said Osama Abu Askar, who lost his nephew in the Jabalia attack.

He said the people killed there were hit as they slept.

"We've been living under a truce for months, and they've still targeted us. Israel operates on this principle — saying one thing and doing another," Askar told AFP.