December 31, 2023 Israel-Hamas war

Our live coverage of Israel's war in Gaza has moved here.

Israel intercepted at least 12 rockets fired from Gaza just minutes into the start of 2024, according to a CNN team in Tel Aviv that witnessed the attack.

Sirens were heard across the southern and central Israel regions.

Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, published a statement claiming they had bombarded Tel Aviv with a barrage of "M90" rockets at midnight local time.

The Israel Defense Forces early on Monday acknowledged the rocket fire in a post on social media.

“New year, same Hamas terrorism. While 129 Israelis are still being held captive by Hamas in Gaza, Hamas also decided to start 2024 by launching a barrage of rockets at Israel. There is no 'happy' New Year until they are all home,” the IDF said.  

Iranian-backed Houthi rebels have stepped up their attacks in the Red Sea, which they say are revenge against Israel for its military campaign in Gaza.

There are fears that the attacks could escalate Israel’s war against Hamas into a wider regional conflict.

On Sunday, the US sunk three Houthi boats and killed those aboard after coming under fire, marking the first occasion since tensions broke out earlier this year that the US has killed members of the rebel group.

The US said Sunday that it has no desire to enter a wider war, but that it will act in its own self-defense. The helicopters had been responding to a distress call from a merchant ship — which the Houthis had fired on and attempted to board — when the rebels turned their guns on the US aircraft, according to US Central Command.

If you're just joining us, here are other headlines from today:

• Genocide allegations: The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected South Africa’s claim that the country is committing genocide in its war against Hamas. Netanyahu's comments came after South Africa filed an application with the International Court of Justice Friday to begin proceedings over the genocide allegations. The prime minister called the claims "false" and accused South Africa of ignoring other world conflicts.
• Netanyahu won't resign: The prime minister also said Sunday that he would not resign from office as criticism that he failed to anticipate the October 7 attacks by Hamas grows. Winds have been shifting against the prime minister as Israel’s war in Gaza drags and as Hamas continues to hold hostages.
• Shots fired near aid convoy: The Israel Defense Forces have confirmed they fired shots near a UN convoy on Thursday. The UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in Gaza told CNN earlier this week that Israeli soldiers had fired at its convoy while it was traveling along a route designated by the Israeli army. The IDF said its troops had fired warning shots due to a miscommunication, and that it would take steps to prevent such an incident from happening again. No one was wounded but a vehicle was damaged by the fire.
• Palestinian leader condemns displacement: On the 59th anniversary of the founding of the Fatah party, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas says Palestinian people will not accept displacement from their land, the news agency Wafa reported Sunday. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are internally displaced as Israel carries out a ground offensive in Gaza.
• Palestinians struggle to find food: Palestinians displaced inside Gaza have described cramped living conditions, sky-high prices for food, children going hungry and poor sanitation. CNN spoke by phone with several people trying to survive in Rafah, in the south, which tens of thousands have fled to despite it already being the most densely populated part of Gaza.

The Israel Defense Forces says it soldiers in northern Gaza attempted to stop a UN humanitarian convoy Thursday and fired "warning shots that were not aimed at the vehicles."

The UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in Gaza told CNN earlier this week that Israeli soldiers had fired at its convoy while it was traveling along a route designated by the Israeli army.

Upon review of the incident, the IDF on Sunday said the convoy, after completing its aid delivery, was asked by Israeli troops to change its return route south "in order to protect the safety of the convoy from combat that was ongoing in proximity of that area."

“IDF soldiers present in the field were not aware of the change in route. As a result of this, when the convoy arrived, the soldiers in the field operated to stop it, including the firing of warning shots that were not aimed at the vehicles. When the vehicles came to a stop, the forces ceased fire,” it said.

There were no casualties in the incident, but one of the vehicles was damaged by “ricochets from the warning shots that were fired,” the IDF said.

The IDF said it had learned from the incident and would take those lessons forward to "prevent future incidents of this nature."

The United Nations relief chief Martin Griffiths condemned the incident in a statement Friday, saying the convoy was clearly marked and that attacks on humanitarian workers are unlawful.

Griffiths has previously described the "impossible situation" of getting aid into Gaza amid "constant bombardments," poor communications, damaged roads and delays at checkpoints.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected South Africa’s claim that Israel is committing genocide in its war against Hamas.

Netanyahu's comments came after South Africa filed an application with the International Court of Justice Friday to begin proceedings over the genocide allegations.

"I would like to say a word on South Africa's false accusation that Israel is 'committing genocide.' No, South Africa, it's not us who came to commit genocide, it's Hamas. They would kill us all if they could," he said, adding that the Israel Defense Forces is acting in “the most moral way” and “does everything to avoid harming civilians.”

He went on to accuse South Africa of only filing the case for show, and listed other conflicts where he said the country did not take steps to intervene.

"And I ask: Where were you, South Africa — and the rest of those who slander us — where were you when millions were murdered and displaced from their homes in Syria, Yemen and other arenas? You weren't there," he said.

Some background: Israel’s aerial bombardment and ground invasion of Gaza, in response to Hamas’ deadly terror attacks and kidnapping rampage on October 7, have caused widespread devastation in the densely-inhabited coastal strip, prompting outcry from aid groups and growing pressure from the international community.

US President Joe Biden said earlier this month that Israel is engaged in “indiscriminate bombing” in Gaza. US intelligence assessments suggest nearly half of the air-to-ground munitions that Israel has used in Gaza have been unguided, otherwise known as “dumb bombs.” Unguided munitions are typically less precise and can pose a greater threat to civilians.

Proponents of Israel’s campaign argue such heavy munitions act as bunker busters, helping to destroy Hamas’ underground tunnel infrastructure. However, such bombs are normally used sparingly by Western militaries, experts say. International humanitarian law prohibits indiscriminate bombing.

Nearly 21,700 people have been killed in Gaza since October 7, according to the enclave’s Hamas-controlled health ministry. CNN cannot independently verify the ministry's figures.

Pierre Meilhan, Bethlehem Feleke and Tamar Michaelis contributed reporting to this post.

Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels are stepping up their strikes on ships in the Red Sea, which they say are revenge against Israel for its military campaign in Gaza.

There are fears that the attacks could escalate Israel’s war against Hamas into a wider regional conflict.

The US said Sunday that it has no desire to enter a wider war, but that it will act in its own self-defense, after US Navy helicopters sank three Houthi boats that the US says fired on the aircraft in the Red Sea. The helicopters had been responding to a distress call from the latest commercial vessel to come under Houthi fire.

The attacks have forced some of the world’s biggest shipping and oil companies to suspend transit through one of the world’s most important maritime trade routes, which could potentially cause a shock to the global economy.

Here’s what we know about the Houthis:

Who are the Houthis? The Houthi movement, also known as Ansarallah (Supporters of God), is one side of the Yemeni civil war that has raged for nearly a decade. It emerged in the 1990s, when its leader, Hussein al-Houthi, launched “Believing Youth,” a religious revival movement for a centuries-old subsect of Shia Islam called Zaidism.

His closest followers became known as Houthis.

How did they gain power? Ali Abdullah Saleh, the first president of Yemen after the 1990 unification of North and South Yemen, initially supported the Believing Youth. But as the movement’s popularity grew and anti-government rhetoric sharpened, it became a threat to Saleh. Things came to a head in 2003, when Saleh supported the United States invasion of Iraq, which many Yemenis opposed.

For al-Houthi, the rift was an opportunity. Seizing on the public outrage, he organized mass demonstrations. After months of disorder, Saleh issued a warrant for his arrest.

Al-Houthi was killed in September 2004 by Yemeni forces, but his movement lived on. The Houthi military wing grew as more fighters joined the cause. Emboldened by the early Arab Spring protests in 2011, they took control of the northern province of Saada and called for the end of the Saleh regime.

How powerful are the Houthis? American officials have been tracking iterative improvements in the range, accuracy and lethality of the Houthis’ domestically produced missiles. Initially, home-grown Houthi weapons were largely assembled with Iranian components smuggled into Yemen in pieces, an official familiar with US intelligence told CNN previously.

But they have made modifications that have added up to big overall improvements, the official said. In a novel development, the Houthis have used medium-range ballistic missiles against Israel, firing a salvo of projectiles at Israel’s southern region of Eilat in early December, which Israel said it intercepted.

While the Houthis may not be able to pose a serious threat to Israel, their technology can wreak havoc in the Red Sea. They have used drones and anti-ship missiles to target commercial ships — some of which aren’t believed to be linked to Israel — prompting the USS Carney, a warship in the Red Sea, to respond to distress calls.

Read more about the Houthis.

On the 59th anniversary of the founding of the Fatah party, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas says Palestinian people will not accept displacement from their land, the news agency Wafa reported Sunday.

"Today, our steadfast Palestinian people are subjected to a comprehensive war of extermination in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and Jerusalem, with the aim of liquidating our national cause and turning it into a humanitarian cause, in a repetition of the 1948 Nakba," Abbas is quoted as saying in the report.

The Nakba, or "catastrophe," is when roughly 700,000 Palestinians fled or were expelled from their homes in what is now Israel. 

"But we tell them, the more your aggression and terrorism increase, the stronger, more determined, and more determined our people will become in adhering to their land and their legitimate national rights," Abbas is quoted as saying.

Tens of thousands internally displaced: Israel has urged more residents to evacuate as it expands its ground offensive into parts of central and southern Gaza. The United Nations warns that some 150,000 people in those areas — many already internally displaced from northern parts of the enclave — have "nowhere to go."

About 100,000 more people have recently crowded into Rafah at the far southern end of Gaza, already the most densely populated part of the territory, the UN says. Civilians there say conditions are abysmal.

Some context: Abbas is the leader of the Palestinian Authority, a government body with limited self-rule in the West Bank. It is a separate entity from Hamas, which controls Gaza and is at war with Israel.

The Palestinian Authority was established in the 1993 Oslo Accords, a peace pact between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization that saw the PLO give up armed resistance against Israel in return for promises of an independent Palestinian state.

Hamas took control of Gaza after a brief civil war with Fatah, a rival Palestinian faction that is the backbone of the Palestinian Authority.

The White House said Sunday it is not seeking a wider conflict in the Middle East after US helicopters sank three Houthi boats in the Red Sea after coming under fire. 

The helicopters sank the boats and killed those aboard, marking the first occasion since tensions broke out earlier this year that the US has killed members of the Iranian-backed Houthi rebel group — which has been targeting commercial and merchant vessels in the Red Sea. 

The US has so far avoided directly striking the group inside Yemen as it seeks to avoid escalating the crisis further. 

But a National Security Council spokesperson said Sunday that the US would continue acting in its own self defense.

“We don't seek a conflict wider in the region and we're not looking for a conflict with the Houthis. The best outcome here would be for the Houthis to stop these attacks, as we have made clear over and over again,” the spokesperson, John Kirby, said on ABC News. 

More on the latest Houthi attack: Four small boats originating from “Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen” attacked the Maersk Hangzhou on Saturday with small arms and attempted to board the merchant vessel, according to a statement from US Central Command, which added that a security team on board had returned fire.

CENTCOM said helicopters from the USS Eisenhower and USS Gravely responded to the Maersk Hangzhou’s distress call — the second in less than 24 hours — and were fired on by the Houthi boats.

“The U.S. Navy helicopters returned fire in self-defense, sinking three of the four small boats, and killing the crews. The fourth boat fled the area,” the statement said, adding that there was “no damage to U.S. personnel or equipment.”

More background: The Houthis have launched dozens of attacks on commercial vessels since October 7, saying they are acting in solidarity with Hamas. The US has deployed warships to the Red Sea to beef up security in the critical global shipping lane. 

While US President Joe Biden has authorized strikes on other Iranian proxy groups that have attacked American troops in Iraq and Syria, he has stopped short of striking the Houthis in Yemen. 

“We've got significant national security interests in the region just on our own, the United States, and we're going to put the kind of forces we need in the region to protect those interests and we're going to act in self-defense going forward,” Kirby said. 

Asked about the prospect of a preemptive strike in the region, Kirby repeated the White House stance: “We're not ruling anything in or out, but we have made it clear publicly to the Houthis and privately to our allies and partners in the region we take these threats seriously, and we're going to make the right decisions going forward.”

 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told reporters on Saturday that he will not resign from office after facing criticism for failing to anticipate the October 7 attacks.

Netanyahu was pressed about taking accountability during a news conference.

"Your question about the willingness to resign — that comes back again and again ... The only thing I intend to resign from is Hamas. That’s what I’m going to resign from. That’s what I’m dealing with and nothing else," Netanyahu said.

Winds have been shifting against the prime minister as Israel’s war in Gaza drags and as Hamas continues to hold hostages.

Multiple opinion polls suggest national favor toward Netanyahu and his governing coalition is collapsing, despite continued overwhelming support in Israel for the war on Hamas.

A long war lies ahead: Netanyahu also said during the news conference on Saturday that Israel’s war against Hamas "will continue for many more months."

"My policy is clear: We are continuing to fight until the goals of the war have been achieved, especially the elimination of Hamas and the release of all our hostages," the prime minister said, according to a translated transcript of his comments released by his office.

Netanyahu also said the Israeli military is "fighting with force and new systems above and below the ground," according to Israel’s Army Radio. "We have the upper hand, we have killed more than 8,000 terrorists," he claimed.

CNN is unable to independently confirm casualty figures provided by the Israel Defense Forces or Hamas, due to restricted access to the region and the difficulty in verifying accurate numbers amid an ongoing conflict.

CNN’s Tara John, Pierre Meilhan, Michael Schwartz and Ibrahim Dahmin contributed to this report.