Israel Renews Strikes on Gaza After Weeklong Truce

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at resumed Israeli strikes in Gaza, fossil fuel disagreements at COP28, and army clashes in Guinea-Bissau.

Return to Strikes

Israel renewed airstrikes on the Gaza Strip on Friday following the expiration of the seven-day cease-fire with Hamas. Negotiations to extend the temporary truce reached an impasse after Israeli officials accused Hamas militants of violating the agreement by firing rockets into Tel Aviv before the deal was set to expire as well as not releasing all of the kidnapped women it had promised to return that day. The cease-fire deal had originally allowed more humanitarian aid into Gaza and led to the release of more than 100 hostages held in Gaza and 240 Palestinian prisoners detained by Israel.

“The Israeli government is committed to achieving the goals of the war: to release our abductees, to eliminate Hamas, and to guarantee that Gaza will never again pose a threat to the residents of Israel,” Netanyahu’s office said on Friday.

Already, at least 109 Palestinians have been killed since the cease-fire ended and hundreds more have been injured, the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry said on Friday. More than 15,000 Palestinians have been killed in the war thus far, with numbers expected to rise as Israel moves to expand its ground operations into southern Gaza. Israeli forces dropped leaflets into the streets of the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis on Friday that urged civilians to evacuate the “fighting zone.” And locals report that Israeli strikes hit targets near Egypt’s Rafah border crossing, including an apartment building near an open market.

Talks to renew the cease-fire, though, remain ongoing. Washington urged Israeli officials on Friday to extend the humanitarian pause in Gaza as well as to limit the loss of civilian life and internal displacement there. Egypt and Qatar, as the conflict’s lead regional mediators, also remain focused on restarting hostage negotiations.

Around 140 hostages remain in captivity in Gaza, including two children and 10 people over the age of 74. However, “Hamas has so far failed to produce a list of hostages that would enable a further extension of the pause,” a U.S. National Security Council spokesperson said, shedding greater uncertainty over the future of hostage negotiations. According to U.S. and Egyptian officials, Hamas said it was having trouble getting access to four women who are being held hostage by other groups in Gaza.

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What We’re Following

Competing fossil fuel visions. United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres and COP28 President Sultan Ahmed al-Jaber butted heads over fossil fuels on Friday at the U.N. climate change summit in Dubai. “We cannot save a burning planet with a fire hose of fossil fuels,” Guterres said, urging all nations to completely stop burning carbon emissions. His statement followed Jaber’s remarks a day earlier, which called for “the inclusion of the role of fossil fuels” in efforts to meet global climate goals.

As the host of this year’s climate conference, the United Arab Emirates’ climate track record has been on full display, with Jaber himself denying reports this week that Dubai is using COP28 to strike oil deals with other nations. Emirati President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan’s announcement of a $30 billion private fund dedicated to climate change “solutions” on Friday may have softened some of the international backlash, but Guterres’s “minutes to midnight” warning of a “planetary crash and burn” served as a reminder of the dire stakes of the issues being debated at the summit.

Opposition unrest. Army factions clashed in Guinea-Bissau overnight on Friday after members of the country’s national guard raided a police station to free two opposition officials. Finance Minister Suleimane Seidi and Treasury Secretary Antonio Monteiro, both members of the country’s main opposition party, were detained on Thursday for allegedly withdrawing almost $10 million in state funds without permission.

Military officials arrested national guard leader Col. Victor Tchongo, who led the raid, and rearrested Seidi and Monteiro, though Tchongo has since been freed. The home of the leader of the opposition party also came under fire. The national guard reports to parliament, whereas the military reports to the president.

Seidi and Monteiro are part of the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde, which won a legislative majority in June that halted President Umaro Sissoco Embaló efforts to consolidate power. Embaló has been the target of coup attempts in the past, including one in February 2022 that was led by members of the West African country’s security forces.

Guyana’s uncertain fate. The U.N. Court of Justice on Friday warned Venezuela to “refrain from taking any action” to alter the status quo in neighboring Guyana. The warning came just two days before Caracas plans to holds a referendum on sovereignty over Guyana’s oil-rich Essequibo region, which makes up around two-thirds of that country. Although Guyana’s current borders are internationally recognized, Caracas has long claimed that the region belongs to Venezuela. However, the court did not outright ban Venezuela from holding the vote despite Guyana’s request.

“Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s scheduling of the referendum is seen largely as a measure to rile up nationalism ahead of next year’s elections,” FP’s Catherine Osborn explains in Latin America Brief. Venezuelan officials have not provided details on how or when they would turn the Essequibo region into a Venezuelan state, should voters approve the proposed measures, and current troop movements do not suggest that a Venezuelan invasion of Guyana is imminent. “But it’s a definite increase in discursive temperature,” Osborn writes.

Odds and Ends

A top Paraguayan official has stepped down after he accidentally granted government recognition to a fictional country. Arnaldo Chamorro, the chief of staff for Paraguay’s Agriculture Ministry, resigned on Wednesday after signing a memorandum of understanding with the United States of Kailasa, a fake Hindu nation led by a self-styled guru and wanted Indian criminal. But Chamorro wasn’t the first government official to get duped by Kailasa. This year, U.S. and Canadian officials also signed agreements with Kailasa representatives at the United Nations. Whoops.