Israel-Gaza war: Turkey dismisses ‘fictional’ Israeli claims it is easing trade ban – as it happened

It has gone 5pm in Gaza and Tel Aviv. We will be closing this blog soon, but you can stay up to date on the Guardian’s Israel-Gaza war coverage here and follow the reaction to Joe Biden’s threat to stop Israel arms shipments with the Guardian US team here.

Here is a recap of the latest developments:

• Turkish trade minister Omer Bolat said on Thursday that Israeli claims of Ankara easing its trade ban with Israel are “absolutely fictional and have nothing to do with reality”. Turkey’s trade ban with Israel will remain in place until a permanent ceasefire in Gaza and humanitarian aid flow to the region is secured, the minister said in a post on X.

• Bolat’s comments come after Israel’s foreign minister said on Thursday that Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had retreated on his earlier position and lifted many of the trade restrictions he imposed on Israel.

• Two top Israeli officials criticised US president Joe Biden on Thursday for threatening to stop certain arms supplies to Israel if it invades Rafah. “This is a difficult and very disappointing statement to hear from a president to whom we have been grateful since the beginning of the war,” Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Gilad Erdan, said on public radio in Israel’s first reaction to Biden’s warning. Israel’s far-right finance minister Bezalel Smotrich said his government would pursue its goals in Gaza despite the US threat.

• The decision also drew a sharp rebuke from House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who said they only learned about the military aid holdup from press reports.

• Independent senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, a Biden ally, said in a statement the pause on big bombs must be a “first step.” “Our leverage is clear,” Sanders said. “Over the years, the United States has provided tens of billions of dollars in military aid to Israel. We can no longer be complicit in Netanyahu’s horrific war against the Palestinian people.”

• Israel’s former head of defence production and procurement on Thursday rejected the claim the country could manage without US arms, saying Israel would be forced to source arms elsewhere, according to Israeli public radio.

• Slovenia’s government on Thursday passed a decree on recognising a Palestine state that will be sent to parliament for approval by mid-June. “The decree for the recognition of Palestine is part of the government’s efforts to end as soon as possible the atrocities in Gaza,” prime minister Robert Golob told a news conference, adding that the final decision could be adopted earlier than a 13 June target date.

• Ireland, Spain and other EU countries could recognise Palestine as an independent state as soon as 21 May, Ireland’s public broadcaster has reported. Two sources told RTÉ the date was being looked at. The Guardian has contacted Ireland’s foreign ministry for comment.

• The report comes as EU leaders come under growing pressure to respond to Israel’s operation in Rafah. At least 67 MEPs have signed a letter urging EU leaders to convene “an urgent meeting … to discuss the EU response to the events in Rafah”. The MEPs – Greens, Socialists, radical left and a few liberals and centre right members – call for EU sanctions against Israel, as “the only adequate response to this horrendous and reckless military campaign in Rafah and the rest of the Gaza Strip”.

• Agence France-Presse (AFP) journalists reported heavy shelling in Rafah early on Thursday. According to AFP, the Israeli military later said it was also striking “Hamas positions” farther north in the centre of the Gaza Strip.

• Israel’s assault around Rafah on the southern edge of the Gaza Strip is finally bringing what was left of Gaza’s medical system to its knees, doctors told Reuters. Rafah’s main al-Najjar hospital abruptly shut as fighting came close, while the Emirati maternity hospital, where 85 babies a day were being born, stopped receiving patients. The two checkpoints into southern Gaza have also been shut, blocking the arrival of basic supplies such as fuel, though Israel says it reopened its Kerem Shalom crossing on Wednesday and is trying to get aid through.

• The World Health Organization (WHO) says it has only three days of fuel for its medical operations in southern Gaza. Speaking about the closure of the Rafah crossing from Egypt on Wednesday, WHO’s director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said: “Fuel that we expected to be allowed in today has not been allowed in, meaning that we only have enough fuel to run health services in the south for three more days.”

• Cypriot officials confirmed that a vessel carrying aid to a pier built by the US off Gaza set sail from Cyprus on Thursday. The US flagged Sagamore left the port of Larnaca in the morning and US officials have said the vessel will be used to offload supplies on to a floating pier.

• At least 34,904 Palestinians have been killed and 78,514 injured in Israel’s military offensive in Gaza since 7 October, Gaza’s health ministry said in a statement on Thursday. The Hamas-run health ministry does not distinguish between combatants and non-combatants.

• Israeli protesters blocked aid trucks headed from Jordan to Gaza, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported. Hundreds of residents of Israel’s southern-most city, Eilat, joined the protest blocking the convoy at the border crossing with Jordan, the newspaper reported.

• Israeli strikes on Syria early on Thursday targeted facilities belonging to Iraq’s al-Nujaba armed movement, a war monitor and the pro-Iran group said, with Damascus saying an unidentified building was attacked. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said “Israeli airstrikes targeted a cultural centre” and a “training facility” of the Iraqi al-Nujaba movement in the Sayyida Zeinab area south of Damascus. Three members of the group were wounded according to the UK-based Observatory.

• An Israeli airstrike on a car in southern Lebanon killed four people on Thursday, according to Lebanon’s civil defence, with security sources saying those killed were members of armed group Hezbollah. According to Reuters, the Israeli military did not immediately reply to a request for comment on Thursday’s strikes.

• The UK’s foreign secretary David Cameron has again said the UK would not support a major Israeli assault on Rafah without a clear plan for protecting civilians. But he said there was a major difference between the US situation, where President Joe Biden has warned he will stop supplying some weapons to Israel if there is a Rafah offensive, and the UK.

• The second semi-final of this year’s Eurovision song contest will take place in Sweden on Thursday, with Israel’s performance expected to draw attention due to large pro-Palestinian protests planned in host city Malmö. Tens of thousands are expected at a pro-Palestinian demonstration in central Malmö at 1pm GMT (2pm BST) on Thursday. A smaller nearby pro-Israel demonstration is scheduled for 4pm GMT (5pm BST).

• Students at Trinity College Dublin ended a five-day encampment after the university pledged to cut ties with Israeli companies. Student leaders claimed victory on Wednesday night for a US-style campaign that had disrupted the campus and blocked access to the Book of Kells.

• University vice-chancellors need to “show leadership” in response to student protests over Israel’s military action in Gaza, the UK’s education secretary has said. Gillian Keegan told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme that she wanted “our campuses to be a safe place where students feel welcomed, where students can express different views”. Keegan’s comments came as the UK’s prime minister Rishi Sunak hosted a meeting at Downing Street with vice-chancellors from leading UK universities on tackling antisemitism.

• Yemen’s Houthis targeted two ships, the MSC DEGO and the MSC GINA, in the Gulf of Aden using a number of ballistic missiles and drones, the group’s military spokesperson Yahya Sarea said in a televised speech on Thursday. Sarea said the group also targeted the MSC VITTORIA in the Indian Ocean and again in the Gulf of Aden.

• Iran will have to change its nuclear doctrine if its existence is threatened by Israel, an adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader, Kamal Kharrazi said, raising concerns about an Iranian nuclear weapon. “We have no decision to build a nuclear bomb, but should Iran’s existence be threatened, there will be no choice but to change our military doctrine,” Kharrazi said, as reported by Iran’s Student News Network on Thursday, adding that Tehran has already signalled it has the potential to build such weapons.

Defence minister Yoav Gallant told Israel’s “enemies and friends” on Wednesday that it would do whatever necessary to achieve its war aims in Gaza and the north, in an apparent response to US pressure to halt its operation in Rafah, reports Reuters.

The comments, at a ceremony to commemorate Israel’s war dead, followed US president Joe Biden’s warning that the US would halt weapons supplies if Israel moved into Rafah, the southern Gaza city where more than a million displaced Palestinians are sheltering.

“I turn to Israel’s enemies as well as to our best of friends and say – the State of Israel cannot be subdued,” he said, according to remarks released by his office. “We will stand strong, we will achieve our goals – we will hit Hamas, we will hit Hezbollah, and we will achieve security.”

The comments, from one of the war cabinet ministers considered to be most sensitive to the risk of alienating the US, underlined the scale of the standoff between the Biden administration and the Israeli government, said Reuters.

“We have no choice, we have no other country. We will do whatever is necessary, and I repeat – whatever is necessary, in order to defend the citizens of Israel, to remove the evil threats against us, and to stand up to those who attempt to destroy us,” he said.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has defied mounting international pressure to agree to a ceasefire but has not so far ordered troops to enter Rafah, where Israel says four battalions of Hamas fighters are based.

In the north, Israeli forces have been engaged in exchanges of fire across the Lebanon border with forces of the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militia ever since the start of the war in Gaza last October.

Slovenia’s government on Thursday passed a decree on recognising a Palestine state that will be sent to parliament for approval by mid-June, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).

“The decree for the recognition of Palestine is part of the government’s efforts to end as soon as possible the atrocities in Gaza,” prime minister Robert Golob told a news conference, adding that the final decision could be adopted earlier than a 13 June target date.

In March, Slovenia joined Spain, Ireland and Malta in a joint statement announcing the EU countries were “ready to recognise Palestine” once the conditions for setting up a state were met.

“We will continue to follow the progress concerning peace talks, the release of hostages and the reform of the Palestinian Authority and, if it proves to be faster, we might end the recognition process earlier,” Golob said.

Slovenia has urged Israel to stop its offensive in Gaza and warned that a threatened attack on the city of Rafah will worsen the humanitarian crisis in the Palestinian territory.

Foreign minister Tanja Fajon said she was “glad over the decisive and irreversible step towards recognition”, in a message posted on X.

A simple majority is needed to approve a decree in the 90-seat parliament where Golob’s centre-left coalition holds 51 seats.

Almost 60% of Slovenians back recognition of a Palestine state while 20% oppose it, according to an April poll of 600 people published by the Dnevnik daily.

According to AFP, about 100 Ljubljana University students on Wednesday started a pro-Palestinian protest, demanding that Slovenia recognise the Palestinian state.

AFP reports that, according to a Palestinian count, 137 of the 193 member states of the United Nations have recognised a Palestinian state.

Turkish trade minister Omer Bolat said on Thursday that Israeli claims of Ankara easing its trade ban with Israel are “absolutely fictional and have nothing to do with reality”, reports Reuters.

Turkey’s trade ban with Israel will remain in place until a permanent ceasefire in Gaza and humanitarian aid flow to the region is secured, the minister said in a post on X.

Bolat’s comments come after Israel’s foreign minister said on Thursday that Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had retreated on his earlier position and lifted many of the trade restrictions he imposed on Israel.

Israel’s assault around Rafah on the southern edge of the Gaza Strip is finally bringing what was left of Gaza’s medical system to its knees, doctors have told Reuters.

The news agency reports that tanks are massed on the outskirts of the city and a huge population of sick and injured are running out of places to go and safe ways to get there.

According to Reuters, fighting has directly shut some of the main medical facilities that had served the half of Gaza’s 2.3 million people who have been sheltering in Rafah. The two checkpoints into southern Gaza have also been shut, blocking the arrival of basic supplies such as fuel, though Israel says it reopened its Kerem Shalom crossing on Wednesday and is trying to get aid through.

Reuters reports that Rafah’s main al-Najjar hospital abruptly shut as fighting came close, while the Emirati maternity hospital, where 85 babies a day were being born, stopped receiving patients.

Closing the sole checkpoint to Egypt means patients needing emergency care can no longer be evacuated out of the Gaza Strip and volunteer foreign medics can no longer get in, or go home, says Reuters.

Israel says any disruption to aid from its latest assault should be brief, and additional field hospitals will be provided near the coast in an area it says is safe.

Meanwhile, the sick and wounded are crowding into al-Aqsa hospital in Deir al-Balah. “There used to be medical aid coming in, and now there is no medical aid,” Ali Abu Khurma, a Jordanian laproscopic surgeon volunteering at al-Aqsa, told Reuters. Basic supplies were missing, like sterile gauze and surgical gowns.

“There are no beds for the patients. The patients are all over the hospital; in the corridors, in the halls, there are beds everywhere. Some have one or two patients on them. In the reception, there are patients on the floor,” he told Reuters. “The entire medical sector has collapsed.”

Relaxing Turkey’s ban on exports to Israel is “out of the question” though companies have three months to fulfil existing orders via third countries, a Turkish trade ministry source said on Thursday, reports Reuters.

In a document seen by Reuters, the Trade Ministry outlined the three-month reprieve for companies exporting to Israel. Ankara introduced the trade ban with Israel last week.

Separately, Israel’s foreign minister said on Thursday that Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had retreated on his earlier position and lifted many of the trade restrictions he imposed on Israel.

Cypriot officials have confirmed that a vessel carrying aid to a pier built by the United States off Gaza set sail from Cyprus on Thursday.

Reuters reports that the US flagged Sagamore left the port of Larnaca in the morning. US officials have said the vessel will be used to offload supplies onto a floating pier built to expedite aid into the besieged enclave.

Cyprus opened a sea corridor in March to ship aid directly to Gaza, where deliveries via land have been severely disrupted by border closures and Israel’s military offensive.

A senior Biden administration official last month said aid going ashore would still be subject to inspection by Israeli authorities, raising the prospect of additional delays in getting desperately-needed supplies to Palestinians.

That is seemingly at odds with Cyprus’ stated objective which was to screen cargoes on the island with Israeli oversight to eliminate bottlenecks at the other end. Two Cypriot officials said they were not aware of further checks. “No other inspection is foreseen beyond what the mechanism that is carried out in Cyprus prescribes,” one of them told Reuters.

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The UK’s foreign secretary Lord Cameron has again said the UK would not support a major Israeli assault on Rafah without a clear plan for protecting civilians.

But he said there was a major difference between the US situation, where President Joe Biden has warned he will stop supplying some weapons to Israel if there is a Rafah offensive, and the UK, the Press Association reports.

Answering questions following a speech in London, he said: “There’s a very fundamental difference between the US situation and the UK situation. The US is a massive state supplier of weapons to Israel. We do not have a UK government supply of weapons to Israel, we have a number of licences, and I think our defence exports to Israel are responsible for significantly less than 1% of their total. That is a big difference.

“On Rafah, we are clear that we would not support some major operation in Rafah unless there was a very clear plan for how to protect people and save lives, and all the rest of it. We have not seen that plan, so in the circumstances we will not support a major operation in Rafah.

“We have very clear licensing procedures, some of the toughest and most rigorous in the world. We follow them through very closely and that’s what we’re doing, and will continue to do, in the period ahead.”

Pro-Palestinian protesters briefly interrupted the US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, during a Senate hearing, calling for a free Palestine while raising their palms painted red.

Austin confirmed that the US paused a shipment of bombs to Israel last week over concerns the country was approaching a decision to launch a full-scale assault on the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

Here is a video of the moment when protesters interrupted the Senate hearing:

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The second semi-final of this year’s Eurovision song contest will take place in Sweden on Thursday, with Israel’s performance expected to draw attention due to large pro-Palestinian protests planned in host city Malmö, reports Reuters.

About 100,000 visitors have gathered in the southern Swedish city for the annual song contest, which is taking place amid protests and boycotts over the Israeli military campaign in Gaza.

Swedish authorities have heightened security and are bracing for possible unrest during Eurovision week. According to Reuters, police officers have been seen patrolling the streets of Malmö and, from water scooters, on the city’s canals.

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Metal barricades and large concrete blocks have been put up around Malmö arena, which is hosting the competition, with police guarding the venue and checking visitors’ bags.

Reuters reports that tens of thousands are expected at a pro-Palestinian demonstration in central Malmö at 1pm GMT (2pm BST) on Thursday. A smaller nearby pro-Israel demonstration is scheduled for 4pm GMT (5pm BST).

There is high security around the delegations from all the countries, according to Malmö police. “We’re keeping a bit of an extra eye on Israel of course, because of the situation,” Lotta Svensson, a police incident commander, told Reuters on Sunday.

The European Broadcasting Union (EBU), which organises the event, has resisted calls for Israel to be excluded but asked the country to modify the lyrics of its original song ‘October Rain’, which appeared to reference the Hamas attack.

Eleni Courea is a political correspondent for the Guardian.

University vice-chancellors need to “show leadership” in response to student protests over Israel’s military action in Gaza, the education secretary has said.

Gillian Keegan told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme that she wanted “our campuses to be a safe place where students feel welcomed, where students can express different views”.

Pro-Palestine encampments have been set up by students at more than a dozen universities across the UK against the war in Gaza, including in Cambridge and Oxford.

Referring to the encampments, Keegan said: “We have seen how this can escalate very quickly in other countries.” Pro-Palestinian student protesters in the US have clashed with police.

Keegan’s comments came as Rishi Sunak was hosting a meeting at Downing Street with vice-chancellors from leading UK universities on tackling antisemitism. Vice-chancellors from Leeds, Bristol, Middlesex and Sussex were among the first to arrive for the meeting, followed by about 12 more university leaders who all remained silent as they entered Downing Street.

You can read more on this story here:

The World Health Organization (WHO) says it has only three days of fuel for its medical operations in southern Gaza, and shortages have already forced one of three hospitals in the city of Rafah to shut down, reports the Associated Press (AP).

The Rafah border crossing with Egypt has been closed since Israel’s military took control of the Palestinian side early on Tuesday, blocking the entry of vital humanitarian aid.

Israel said it reopened the Kerem Shalom crossing, the other main aid entry point, on Wednesday. However, the World Food Programme (WFP) says no aid has entered, and there is no one to receive it on the Palestinian side. The UN says northern Gaza is already in a state of “full-blown famine.”

Two top Israeli officials criticised US president Joe Biden on Thursday for threatening to stop certain arms supplies to Israel if it invades Rafah, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).

“This is a difficult and very disappointing statement to hear from a president to whom we have been grateful since the beginning of the war,” Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Gilad Erdan, said on public radio in Israel’s first reaction to Biden’s warning.

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Israel has defied international objections by sending in tanks and conducting “targeted raids” in the eastern areas of Rafah. It says Rafah is home to Hamas’s last remaining battalions but the city on the border with Egypt is also crammed with displaced Palestinian civilians.

“If they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used … to deal with the cities,” Biden told CNN, in his starkest warning to Israel since the start of the war.

“Civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence of those bombs,” Biden said. “It’s just wrong.”

According to AFP, Erdan said Biden’s comments would be interpreted by Israel’s foes Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah as “something that gives them hope to succeed”.

“If Israel is restricted from entering an area as important and central as Rafah where there are thousands of terrorists, hostages and leaders of Hamas, how exactly are we supposed to achieve our goals?” he said.

“This is not a defensive weapon. This is about certain offensive bombs. In the end the State of Israel will have to do what it thinks needs to be done for the security of its citizens.”

Israel’s far-right finance minister Bezalel Smotrich said his government would pursue its goals in Gaza despite the US threat.

“We will achieve complete victory in this war despite President Biden’s push back and arms embargo,” he said in a statement.

“We must continue the war until Hamas is totally eliminated and our hostages are back home. This involves conquering Rafah completely and the sooner the better.”