Israel-Hamas war day 333: What happened in Gaza and Lebanon?

Britain's defense minister John Healey said the country's suspension of 30 of its 350 arms export licenses to Israel will not threaten Israel's ability to defend itself.

"It will not have a material impact on Israel's security," he told Times Radio on Tuesday, the day after the suspension was announced.

The IDF and Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) eliminated on Tuesday Ahmed Fozi Nazer Muhammad Wadia, the commander of the Nukhba company who oversaw the massacre in Netiv Ha'asara on October 7, the military said.

Wadia was eliminated along with eight Hamas terrorists of the Daraj Tuffah Battalion in an Israel Air Force strike on a compound in Gaza City, which was located in the vicinity of the Al-Ahli Hospital compound, the IDF added. 

On October 7, Wadia, an operative in Hamas's Paraglider Array, reportedly raided Netiv Ha'asra, an Israeli community on the Gaza border, using a paraglider and oversaw the killing on site.

A 2019 Hamas handbook unearthed by IDF troops in the Gaza Strip illustrates how Hamas prepared itself for underground operations in Gaza, the New York Times reported on Tuesday. 

The text of the handbook contains instructions for Hamas terrorists on how to operate within the underground tunnels, how to hide the entrances to the networks, and how to find them, the report noted.

"While moving in the dark inside the tunnel, the fighter needs night-vision goggles equipped with infrared," the NYT quoted a passage in the handbook as stating. 

The rocket alerts that sounded at 6:52 a.m. in several localities in northern Israel were false alarms, the IDF said on Tuesday. 

The military added that the alerts were triggered due to fear of falling shrapnel from an interceptor.

The United Nations Security Council is set to convene on Wednesday for an official discussion regarding the hostages, Israel's Ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, stated on Tuesday.

Danon wrote in a post on X/Twitter, "Following my urgent request, the UN Security Council will finally convene on Wednesday for the first time since the October 7 massacre to hold an official discussion on the hostages."

Following my urgent request, the UN Security Council will finally convene on Wednesday for the first time since the October 7 massacre to hold an official discussion on the hostages.

It is a disgrace that it has taken the Council 11 months and the brutal execution of six…

— Danny Danon 🇮🇱 דני דנון (@dannydanon) September 3, 2024

"It is a disgrace that it has taken the Council 11 months and the brutal execution of six hostages by Hamas terrorists to finally convene this discussion," he added.

An IAF aircraft struck an armed terror cell that fired at IDF troops during a counterterrorism operation in Tulkarm, the military reported on Monday.

Later, the Hamas-affiliated Safa News Agency reported that one Palestinian had been killed and another had been wounded by Israeli small arms fire in Tulkarm.

The Hamas-affiliated outlet did not provide specifics on the incident or note if those reportedly killed and wounded were armed combatants.

Community figures and members of the general public expressed distress at the language used by international media to describe the murder of six hostages in Hamas captivity.

The bodies of six hostages were found on Saturday in a Hamas tunnel in Rafah, the IDF announced at the time. Early on Sunday morning, the names of the hostages killed were released: Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Eden Yerushalmi, Carmel Gat, Almog Sarusi, Alexander Lobanov, and Ori Danino. 

The IDF said on Sunday that the hostages had been killed only days before the IDF arrived, and Hamas confirmed on Monday that they had intentionally killed the captives.  Additionally, Hamas made clear that they intended to kill other abductees should IDF forces approach them in a rescue attempt - a policy the terror group made after the rescue of four hostages during Operation Arnon. 

The United States military warned Iran and its proxy terror groups not to take up arms against the US and its allies, using the Tinder dating app as a platform to broadcast the message across Lebanon, the Washington Post reported last week. 

“Do not take up arms against the United States or its partners,” the profiles read, in Arabic, noting that the US “will protect its partners in the face of threats from the Iranian regime and its proxies.”

The message also featured images of US warplanes.

No mention of Israel or Gaza was made on Monday, Labor Day in the United States, when Vice President Kamala Harris, Vice Presidential Nominee Gov. Tim Walz and President Joe Biden addressed union workers across critical states Michigan and Pennsylvania. 

Biden, who introduced Harris in Pittsburgh, briefly told reporters before leaving Washington, D.C. that he didn't think Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyhau was doing everything possible to free the hostages. 

Adi and Yael Alexander, the parents of hostage Edan Alexander, fear their child will meet the same fate as the six hostages recently killed in Hamas captivity, they said in an opinion piece published by the New York Times on Sunday. 

On Saturday evening, the IDF announced that they had discovered bodies while operating in the Gaza Strip. Early on Sunday morning, the military announced that the body’s were of slain captives Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Eden Yerushalmi, Carmel Gat, Almog Sarusi, Alexander Lobanov, and Ori Danino. 

The bodies were found in a Hamas tunnel in Rafah, only days after they had been killed, the IDF said.