LIVE | Israel-Hamas War Day 34: Israel agrees to 4-hour daily pauses in Gaza

The US launched an airstrike Wednesday on a facility in eastern Syria used by Iranian-backed militias, in retaliation to an increasing number of attacks over the past several weeks on bases housing US troops, the Pentagon said.

Two US F-15 fighter jets carried out the strike on a weapons storage facility linked to Iran's Revolutionary Guard.

President Joe Biden "directed today's action to make clear that the United States will defend itself, its personnel, and its interests,” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement.

This is the second time in less than two weeks that the U.S. has bombed facilities used by the militant groups, many operating under the umbrella of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, which U.S. officials say have carried out at least 40 such attacks in the region since October 17. (AP)

The UN human rights chief said collective punishment by Israel of Palestinian civilians and their forced evacuation, as well as atrocities committed by Palestinian armed groups on Oct. 7 and their continued holding of hostages, amount to war crimes.

Volker Türk, standing in front of Egypt’s Rafah border crossing into Gaza, told reporters Wednesday: “These are the gates to a living nightmare.”

“We have fallen off a precipice. This cannot continue,” he said later in Cairo.

Türk said international human rights and humanitarian law must be respected to help protect civilians and allow desperately needed aid to reach Gaza's beleaguered population of some 2.3 million people.

He said the UN rights office received reports in recent days about an unspecified orphanage in northern Gaza with 300 children who need urgent help, but communications were down and access were impassable and unsafe, so “we cannot get to them.”

“I feel, in my innermost being, the pain, the immense suffering of every person whose loved one has been killed in a kibbutz, in a Palestinian refugee camp, hiding in a building or as they were fleeing,” Türk said. “We all must feel this shared pain - and end this nightmare.” (AP)

Hospitals in Gaza are nearing collapse under Israel's wartime siege, which has cut power and deliveries of food, fuel and other necessities to the territory.

Inside the maternity department at Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis, the workload has doubled because of the mass displacement from Gaza's north. That's according to neonatal specialist Dr Asaad al-Nawajha, who said Wednesday his team has seen an increase in premature births as the monthlong war intensifies.

Shouq Hararah is one of those mothers. She says her delivery took place with “no proper birth procedures, no anesthesia, painkillers or anything.” “I gave birth to twins. The boy was discharged, but the girl remains in the maternity ward,” she said.

Standing before a row of beeping incubators, al-Nawajha emphasized the war's life-threatening consequences.

“All of our work depends on electricity; all the machines you see here rely on it,” the doctor said. “When the electricity is cut, these devices stop working, and all the babies will face certain death.” (AP)

Israel airstrikes hit several Syrian military positions late Wednesday, Syrian state media reported.

Quoting an unnamed military source, state news agency SANA said the strikes caused material damage, and did not mention any casualties nor the locations where the airstrikes took place. Pro-government radio station Sham FM said the sounds of explosions could be heard in southeast Sweida province and in some suburbs of the capital, Damascus.

Meanwhile, Britain-based opposition war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the strike in Sweida province targeted an air defence and radar unit, while at least three strikes in suburbs near Damascus were not far from Syria's military airbase and wounded three people, without giving further details.

Israel, which has vowed to stop Iranian entrenchment next door, has carried out hundreds of strikes on targets in government-controlled parts of neighbouring Syria in recent years, but it rarely acknowledges them. Israel did not immediately comment on the alleged airstrikes. (AP)

A group of 93 Romanian citizens landed Wednesday evening at an airbase near Romania's capital on a flight from Egypt after being evacuated from the Gaza Strip.

The specially chartered flight touched down at Base 90 at Bucharest's Otopeni Airport around 10.00 p.m. local time. The plane also brought back 36 Moldovan citizens, according to Romania's foreign ministry.

Romania's Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu had flown to Egypt earlier on Wednesday to meet the evacuees and returned with them on the flight to Romania.

“I was overwhelmed to see the joy and hope in the eyes of the children who escaped the hell in Gaza,” Ciolacu wrote on Facebook after arriving in Egypt. “The Romanian Government will continue to act to facilitate the evacuations by all the means at our disposal.” Another 51 Romanians have also been granted permission to leave Gaza into Egypt through the Rafah border crossing, the foreign ministry said, but did not specify when.

Six Romanians who hold dual Romanian-Israeli citizenship are among the hostages held by Hamas. Since Hamas launched its attack on Israel on Oct. 7, at least five Romanian citizens have been confirmed killed. (AP)

Authorities in Brazil foiled a terror plot on Wednesday when they arrested two people in Sao Paulo state, the Federal Police said in a statement.

The two suspects were recruited and financed by the Lebanese militia Hezbollah and planned to target buildings tied to the Jewish community, according to an official with information about the plot who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

The police statement did not give details about the suspects. It said police also executed 11 search warrants in Sao Paulo, Minas Gerais and the Federal District that were aimed at obtaining proof of possible recruitment of Brazilians for carrying out extremist acts in the country, adding that it was targeting both recruits and recruiters.

Local paper O Globo reported that police arrested one of the two suspects when they returned to the international airport in Sao Paulo, with information in hand to carry out the attack. There are two additional targets for arrest in Lebanon, the paper reported, without saying how it obtained that information.

The Brazilian Israelite Confederation celebrated the police operation on X, formerly Twitter.

“The tragic conflicts in the Middle East cannot be imported into our country, where different communities live peacefully, harmoniously and without fear of terrorism,” the group said.

Brazil has one of the world's largest Lebanese populations; most estimates put their total well above that of Lebanon itself. (AP)

A US drone was shot down by Yemen's Houthi rebels on Wednesday, according to the Iran-backed group’s military arm and a senior US military official.

The Houthis said it was an MQ-9 Reaper drone that was in Yemeni air space and was shot down by air defences. The senior U.S. official said the military is still analysing the episode, including whether the drone was in international airspace or over Yemen. A second US official said the MQ-9 Reaper was over international waters when it was shot down. The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss details not yet made public.

The Houthis have fired at least four batches of drones and missiles toward southern Israel since October 7. The group controls the capital and much of northern and western Yemen where the majority of the county's population lives. (AP)