Current events: 2023-10-17

[Wikipedia Current Events]

Armed conflicts and attacks

• Arab–Israeli conflict
  • October 2023 Israel–Hezbollah fire exchanges
    • Five Hezbollah fighters are killed by Israeli soldiers when they tried to cross a barrier at the border with Lebanon. (Reuters)
• Israeli–Palestinian conflict
  • 2023 Israel–Hamas war
    • Al-Ahli Arab Hospital explosion
      • Around 500 people are killed in an explosion at the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health. (Reuters) (AP)
      • The Ministry of Health blames the explosion on an Israeli airstrike, while the Israeli military claims that the explosion was a failed Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket launch. A spokesman for Islamic Jihad calls the Israeli claims "a lie and fabrication". (Reuters) (The Times of Israel)
      • Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas declares three days of mourning in the Palestinian territories following the explosion. (BBC News)
      • U.S. President Joe Biden postpones an upcoming visit to Jordan following the explosion. (Politico)
    • October 2023 Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip, Evacuation of the northern Gaza Strip
      • The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights says that Israel's blockade of Gaza and its evacuation order in northern Gaza may amount to a forcible transfer of civilians, which is a violation of international law. (The Washington Post) (Reuters)
    • October 2023 UNRWA school airstrike
      • An Israeli airstrike hits a United Nations school inside a refugee camp, killing at least six of the more than 4,000 people sheltering there. Dozens more were injured, including UNRWA staff. (United Nations)
    • The Israeli Ministry of Health says that 4,399 people in Israel have been wounded since the start of the war, of whom 333 are still hospitalized. (The Times of Israel)
    • The World Health Organization says that 2,800 people have died and 11,000 have been injured in Gaza since Israeli air strikes began, with about half of those being women and children. The organization also says that there have been 51 attacks against healthcare facilities in Gaza, killing 15 health workers and injuring 27 others, and that "we have seen consistent attacks on healthcare in the occupied Palestinian territory". (Reuters) (Reuters 2)
    • Hamas announces that Ayman Nofal, a member of the general military council and commander of the central command in the Al-Qassam Brigades, was killed in an Israeli airstrike. (Al Arabiya)
• Russian invasion of Ukraine
  • 2023 Ukrainian counteroffensive
    • Ukraine launches ATACMS tactical ballistic missiles at Russian bases in Berdiansk and Luhansk, destroying nine helicopters and a supply depot and killing several Russian military personnel. (BBC News) (AP)
• 2023 Brussels terrorist attack
  • Police in Brussels, Belgium, shoot and kill a Tunisian man who killed two Swedish tourists yesterday. (BBC News)

International relations

• Russia and weapons of mass destruction
  • The State Duma votes unanimously to revoke Russia's ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. (AFP via The Moscow Times)
• Hungary–Russia relations
  • Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Russian President Vladimir Putin hold talks at the Belt and Road Initiative forum in Beijing, China. (AP)

Law and crime

• LGBT rights in India
  • The Supreme Court of India refuses to legalize same-sex marriage, saying that this is a decision that needs to be made by parliament. (AP)

Politics and elections

• October 2023 Speaker of the United States House of Representatives election
  • The Republican majority fails to deliver enough votes for Jim Jordan to become House Speaker on the first vote, with 20 members of the Republican party voting against him. (CNN)

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