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As Israel’s military sent phone messages telling Palestinians to leave some areas of Gaza after Saturday’s deadly Hamas raid, Mohammad Brais did not know where to seek safety from an assault that residents expect to be the worst they have ever faced.
Palestinians are preparing for an offensive of unprecedented scale on the tiny, crowded enclave, exceeding previous bouts of destructive warfare that they fear will leave survivors destitute, without homes, water, electricity, hospitals or food.
Front Page
Israel orders complete siege on Gaza, Hamas threatens to kill hostages if fresh bombing (Page no. 3)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
Israel’s military ordered a “complete siege” on the Gaza Strip, halting entry of food, fuel and supplies to its 2.3 million people as it pounded the Hamas-ruled territory with waves of airstrikes in retaliation for the militants’ bloody weekend incursion.
More than two days after Hamas launched its surprise attack from Gaza, the Israeli military said it had largely gained control in its southern towns where it had been battling Hamas gunmen.
Israel’s vaunted military and intelligence apparatus was caught completely off guard by Hamas, resulting in heavy battles in its streets for the first time in decades.
Tanks and drones were deployed to guard breaches in the border fence to prevent new incursions. Thousands of Israelis were evacuated from more than a dozen towns near Gaza, and the military summoned 300,000 reservists — a massive mobilization in a short time.
CJI bench pauses transfer of Armed forces Tribunal Judge after Bar strike (Page no. 3)
(GS Paper 2, Judiciary)
The Supreme Court effectively stayed the transfer of a judge from the Armed Forces Tribunal’s (AFT) Chandigarh bench to Kolkata and directed the tribunal’s chairperson to submit in a sealed cover a report detailing why the transfer was effected.
Following the transfer of Justice (retd) Dharam Chand Chaudhary, the AFT Chandigarh Bar Association had on September 26 launched an indefinite strike.
It also wrote twice to Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud, terming the transfer as “a direct assault on the independence of judicial functioning” of the AFT. It alleged that Justice Chaudhary was transferred because “he refused to buckle under the pressure of the Ministry of Defence”.
Editorial
A straw in the whirlwind (Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
The October 7 attack in Israel by Hamas spells a major defeat for Israel as well as for the efforts at normalisation and peace in the region.
For Israel, the failure involves poor intelligence and inadequate military preparedness. More importantly, the country’s reputation of military invincibility has been shattered.
Israel is now resorting to a massive attack on Gaza to try to restore the deterrence it once enjoyed, yet it is far from certain that it can accomplish this even if Gaza is destroyed and re-occupied.
Furthermore, it is hard to see how Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will survive politically given the loss of civilian Israeli lives and the large number of Israeli hostages now in Hamas’s hands.
Of course, the Palestinians are also losers in that this attack is unlikely to get them any closer to establishing their state or to lead to the destruction of Israel, which is Hamas’s aim.
What will happen instead is that more misery and violence will be heaped on the Palestinians in retaliation by Israel. Thus, the circle of violence continues unabated, and with greater ferocity in the Middle East with no winners on any side.
Ideas Page
Place the child at the centre (Page no. 15)
(GS Paper 2, Governance)
The 283rd report of the Law Commission of India (LCI), which has advised against tinkering with the existing age of consent under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, is a lost opportunity.
The judicial references called for reviewing the criteria for the age of consent to sexual activity, to mitigate the “gross injustice in cases of statutory rape where de facto consent is present”.
The increase in the age of consent from 16 to 18 years with the enactment of the POCSO ACT, 2012, has magnified the volume of prosecutions against adolescents engaged in non-coercive consensual sexual activity with devastating outcomes, primarily for adolescents and youth from marginalised populations.
Economy
Unemployment rate drops to 6.6% in urban areas in Q1 (Page no. 17)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
Urban unemployment rate in April-June, the first quarter of this fiscal, slid to 6.6 per cent, the quarterly bulletin of Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) released by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI).
Even though the unemployment rate for urban areas, which was at the lowest level since the launch of the PLFS bulletin in 2018, nearly 14 states recorded a higher urban unemployment rate than the national average.
For males, the urban unemployment rate, based on current weekly status for persons above 15 years, declined to 5.9 per cent in the April-June quarter from 6.0 per cent in the previous quarter and 7.1 per cent in the year-ago period.
For females also the unemployment rate eased to 9.1 per cent in April-June from 9.2 per cent in the previous quarter and 9.5 per cent in the year-ago period.
Employment of both males and females, however, increased in self-employed categories such as own account worker, helper in household enterprise.
Explained
Gaza, a history of war (Page no. 19)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
In January 2018, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu joined Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Teen Murti Chowk in the heart of New Delhi to pay homage to Indian soldiers who fell in the Battle of Haifa in Israel a century ago.
The chowk was renamed Teen Murti Haifa Chowk, its three statues commemorating the heroism of the lancers from Jodhpur, Mysore, and Hyderabad who were part of the Imperial Service Cavalry Brigade, and had distinguished themselves in the Sinai and Palestine campaign during World War I.
Ten months before Haifa, the lancers and Gurkha riflemen had played a key role in another battle, fought south of Haifa in a land hugging the same Mediterranean coastline. The Third Battle of Gaza in November 1917 became the turning point in the Palestine campaign.
Third Intifada (Page no. 19)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
Palestinian fighters in the Gaza Strip crossed over and infiltrated into southern Israel on Saturday (October 7), and fired thousands of rockets into the country, as the ruling Hamas announced the beginning of a new operation.
Enough is enough,” Mohammed Deif, the elusive leader of Hamas’ military wing, said in a recorded message as he called on Palestinians to join “Operation Al-Aqsa Storm”, Hamas’ biggest military offensive in years. Salah Arouri, an exiled Hamas leader.
Meanwhile, Israel, perpetually in a state of military readiness, has wasted no time to hit back, launching its own rockets into targets in Gaza and declaring a “state of war alert”. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and top security officials have convened for an emergency meeting.