Israel-Hamas War Day 198: What's going on in Gaza, Lebanon?

Iraq’s Kataib Hezbollah said Iraqi armed groups had decided to resume attacks on US forces in the country after seeing little progress on talks to achieve the exit of American troops during a visit by the Iraqi prime minister to Washington.

“What happened a short while ago is the beginning,” the group said in an apparent reference to an attack late on Sunday with multiple rockets from northern Iraq on a base housing US forces in Syria.

A surface-to-air missile was launched at an Israeli unmanned aircraft flying above Lebanon on Sunday night, and the Israeli craft fell in Lebanese territory. 

Israel Air Force fighter jets attacked the site from which the missile was launched.

The Palestinian political faction Fatah charged on air that Hamas had deliberately killed aid workers, stolen aid and manufactured a food crisis in Gaza, according to a Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) investigation published on Sunday.  

A Fatah TV anchor reported that Hamas had attacked aid workers, stolen food and water and caused food prices to skyrocket in the Gaza Strip – which PMW said constituted a triple crime. 

“Hamas’ persecution of any party who is a source for distributing the [humanitarian] aid or securing it began from the start of the war, as Hamas persecuted well-known figures and teams of volunteers on the ground in mid-October [2023,” the anchor said. ”It attacked them and killed some of them for two reasons: Firstly, preventing any activity by any [other] party in the Gaza Strip; and secondly, ensuring Hamas control over the aid and its storage, which of course leads to these crazy and unreal prices that no one can pay in the shadow of this destruction. 

The majority of Israelis support the Damascus strike, which Israel has not claimed responsibility for, according to a new survey by The Israel Democracy’s Institute’s Viterbi Family Center for Public Opinion and Police Research published on Sunday.

A total of 514 respondents were interviewed via an internet panel and by telephone in Hebrew and 98 in Arabic. he maximum sampling error was ±4.04% at a confidence level of 95%.

Mohammed Reza Zahedi, the top commander in the Quds Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) for Lebanon and Syria was assassinated in an airstrike, The Jerusalem Post reported. He was killed alongside a lieutenant and about five other officers, according to the IRGC. Bloomberg reported that an entire IRGC command wing was killed. 

At least five rockets were launched from Iraq's town of Zummar towards a US military base in northeastern Syria on Sunday, two Iraqi security sources told Reuters.

The attack against US forces is the first since early February when Iranian-backed groups in Iraq stopped their attacks against US troops.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attacked members of the negotiating team responsible for ceasefire and hostage release talks, accusing them of conducting "false briefings" and "seeding desperations among the families of the hostages," during a war cabinet meeting on Sunday, according to Israeli media.

"The false briefings from the negotiation team only harm the effort to return the abductees," said Netanyahu, according to N12. "If there is someone on the negotiating team who is not ready to accept the decisions of the political echelon just to get anonymous and false headlines in the media for political purposes - let him be decent and not be here."

The war cabinet met on Sunday evening for the first time in 12 days to discuss the issue of the hostages.

The Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry said on Sunday that the death toll in the Strip since October 7 has reached 34,097.

The ministry does not differentiate between civilians and terrorist combatants in their toll.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hinted that the IDF would soon launch a military operation in Rafah as he vowed to free the remaining 133 hostages held in Gaza in a special address to the nation he delivered Sunday in advance of the Passover holiday

“In the coming days, we will increase the military and political pressure on Hamas because this is the only way to free our hostages and achieve our victory,” Netanyahu said.

“Until now, all proposals for the release of our hostages have been rejected by Hamas outright,” Netanyahu explained as he blamed the terror group for the failed talks for a hostage deal.

IDF Maj. (res.) Dor Zimel, 27, who was wounded in a Hezbollah drone attack in Arab al-Aramshe on Thursday, succumbed to his wounds on Sunday, the IDF announced.

Zimel was set to be married to his fiance, Shir Sagiv, in just over a month. Zimel and Sagiv lived in Even Yehuda.

Zimel served as a deputy company commander in the 8103rd Battalion of the IDF's Etzioni Brigade.

Fourteen IDF soldiers and four civilians were wounded in the drone and anti-tank missile attack launched by Hezbollah on Thursday.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz had a telephone call on Sunday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and discussed the state of the region, a spokesperson for the German government said.

"The Chancellor emphasized that it was essential to avoid a regional escalation," the spokesperson said.