Israel marks October 7 anniversary, continues to hit Gaza and Lebanon

Israel is marking the one-year anniversary of Hamas's deadly October 7 attack, which led to the devastating conflict in Gaza and has since expanded into Lebanon.

With troops fighting what Israel says is a war for its very existence, people gathered at vigils at massacre sites and rallies calling for the return of hostages still in Gaza a year on from their abduction.

The October 7 attack killed 1,205 people according to official Israeli figures, and with the trauma far from healed, families of the dead attending a memorial cried as President Isaac Herzog met the crowd.

Herzog began the day with a moment of silence at 6:29 am - the exact time the attack began - at Kibbutz Reim, the site of the Nova music festival where at least 370 people were killed by heavily armed Hamas fighters in the deadliest attack that day.

Gaza's mounting death toll

Israel's military offensive in the Gaza Strip has killed at least 41,909 Palestinians and wounded 97,303 since October 7, 2023, the enclave's health ministry says.

The toll includes 39 deaths in the previous 24 hours, according to the ministry.

The casualty figures are believed to be far higher with thousands of bodies buried in the debris of collapsed buildings and unrecoverable during the Israeli onslaught.

One year on, the Palestinian territory is unrecognizable and its residents are exhausted by displacement and shortages, with no end in sight.

"It felt like the first day of the war all over again," said Khaled al-Hawajri, 46, as the Israeli forces bombarded his Gaza neighborhood, even as Israel marked the anniversary of Hamas attack.

The United Nations says 92 percent of Gaza's roads and more than 84 percent of its health facilities have been damaged or destroyed in the war.

About 90 percent of the population has been displaced at least once, according to the UN.

Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to bring back all captives in Gaza.

"On this day, in this place, and in many places across our country, we remember our dead, our hostages, whom we are obligated to bring back and our heroes who fell in defense of the homeland and the nation. We went through a terrible massacre a year ago," Netanyahu said in a statement released by his office.

Fears of all-out regional war

The anniversary comes with Israel still fighting in Gaza and engaged in a new war to the north in Lebanon against Hamas ally Hezbollah. 

It is also preparing its retaliation against Iran over its missile attack last week, raising fears of all-out regional war.

Hamas and its Lebanese allies vowed to keep fighting, with the Palestinian fighters describing their attack as "glorious" and Hezbollah branding Israel as a "cancerous" entity that must be "eliminated."

Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi arrived on a plane carrying 13 tonnes of aid in Lebanon.

During a press conference, Safadi said Jordan is continuing its efforts to stop "the Israeli aggression on Gaza and Lebanon."

"We will provide urgent aid to Lebanon and confirm our solidarity with our brothers against the Israeli aggression," Safadi said, adding it won't "allow anyone" – including Iran and Israel – to threaten his country's security or "violate" Jordanian airspace.

"Israel bears responsibility for this aggression and escalation in the region and any new escalation."

Israeli warplanes hit a fire station building affiliated with the Islamic Health Authority in the town of Baraachit, according to Lebanon's official National News Agency.

The attack killed at least eight people, the report added.

According to Al Jazeera media network, at least 10 people have been injured after rockets from southern Lebanon landed in the city of Haifa in northern Israel.

It was the first time the port city has been hit since the war on Gaza began a year ago. Haifa is situated on Israel's Mediterranean coast, about 30 kilometers from the border with Lebanon.

The former head of Israel's National Security Council, Giora Eiland, says Israel will not be able to achieve "complete victory" in Gaza or Lebanon.

In an interview with the Israeli Channel 12, Eiland reiterated Hamas and Hezbollah "will not surrender and there will always be those who continue to fire," adding continuing the war on two fronts won't serve Israel's interest and would be "wise" to open the door to political settlements.

"It is unfortunate to continue believing that military pressure in Gaza and Lebanon alone can achieve salvation," Eiland said.

Qassam Brigades, Hamas's armed wing, earlier launched a barrage of missiles from southern Gaza towards Tel Aviv on the anniversary of the deadly October 7 attack.

The Israeli army said that at least four projectiles were fired from Gaza just minutes after the commemorations began, adding it had "struck Hamas launch posts and underground terrorist infrastructure throughout the Gaza Strip."

Hamas's armed wing said in a statement that its fighters had fired rockets at "enemy gatherings" near the border with Gaza.

It later said it had fired a barrage of rockets at Tel Aviv.

The military said sirens sounded in northern and central Israel, which has experienced daily rocket fire from Lebanon and Gaza. 

With Israel expanding the focus of its war to Lebanon, it has conducted massive strikes on Hezbollah strongholds around Lebanon and launched ground operations across the border.

'We no longer have the energy to bear all this'

The war has killed more than 1,110 people in Lebanon and forced more than one million to flee their homes.

To the south, Israel's campaign in Gaza is far from over, with the military saying it has encircled the Jabaliya area after indications Hamas was rebuilding there.

Rescuers said 17 people, including nine children, had been killed on Sunday by Israeli air strikes on the area.

On the ground, people are yearning for an end to the violence.

"If I had known that the war would last a whole year, I would never have moved from northern Gaza," Mona Abu Nahl, 51, told journalists in Deir al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip.

"We no longer have the energy to bear all this... I would have put a tent over my destroyed house and sat down, rather than endure this humiliation, hunger and displacement," she said.

The fighting in Gaza and Lebanon has been accompanied by the threat of war with Iran, which last week fired more than 200 missiles at Israel in retaliation for the death of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and Iranian general Abbas Nilforoushan in a September 27 strike on Beirut.

Tehran said it had prepared a plan to hit back against any possible Israeli reprisal, before Israel's Defense Minister Yoav Gallant warned Iran it could end up looking like Gaza or Lebanon's capital Beirut.

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