Tag: Hamas

  • Pro Hamas protester sets self on fire outside White House

    Pro Hamas protester sets self on fire outside White House

    A man attempted to set himself on fire in Lafayette Park on Saturday during a pro-Palestinian rally. Photos and footage captured by Washington Free Beacon reporter Jessica Costescu show the moment when Samuel Mena Jr. ignited his arm while standing across the street from the White House.

    He was seen waving his arm and screaming in pain. Police officers approached him in an attempt to intervene, while bystanders rushed to pour water on him to extinguish the flames.

    As Mena screamed in pain, he was reportedly shouting about “misinformation” and declared, “I’m a journalist, and I said it was okay.” Mena is believed to be a graduate of Arizona State University’s School of Journalism and is a self-described production specialist employed as a photojournalist with AZFamily Channels 3 and 5.

    One bystander successfully poured water on Mena before a police officer moved in, shouting at the crowd to “back it up!”

    The protest occurred almost one year after Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel, which killed more than 1,200 Israelis and triggered the ongoing conflict in Gaza. According to the Daily Mail, Mena had a website that included an essay explaining his actions and his disagreement with “objectivity as it relates to journalism” in the context of the Gaza conflict.

    Mena’s X account features a photo of him in front of a Palestinian flag. He also had posts announcing his plan to livestream from outside the White House, along with a call to “end settler colonialism.”

    Mena’s act of protest follows a similar incident that happened earlier this year when an Air Force servicemember lit himself on fire outside the Israeli Embassy in Washington DC. The man, identified as Aaron Bushnell, shouted “Free Palestine” as he eventually died from his wounds.

  • Israel strikes Lebanon, hitting Beirut suburbs and the north

    Israel strikes Lebanon, hitting Beirut suburbs and the north

    Israel expanded its bombardment in Lebanon on Saturday (October 5, 2024), hitting Beirut’s southern suburbs with 12 airstrikes and striking a Palestinian refugee camp deep in northern Lebanon for the first time.

    The attack on the Beddawi refugee camp near the northern city of Tripoli killed an official with Hamas’s military wing, along with his wife and two young daughters, the Palesitnian militant group said in a statement. Tripoli is much farther north than the majority of Israel’s strikes, which have been concentrated in southern Lebanon and Beirut.

    The attack on the Beddawi refugee camp near the northern city of Tripoli killed an official with Hamas’s military wing, along with his wife and two young daughters, the Palesitnian militant group said in a statement. Tripoli is much farther north than the majority of Israel’s strikes, which have been concentrated in southern Lebanon and Beirut.

    Israel has killed several Hamas officials in Lebanon since the Israel-Hamas war began in October last year, in addition to most of the top leadership of Hezbollah.

    At least six people were killed in more than a dozen Israeli airstrikes overnight and into Saturday, according to National News Agency, Lebanon’s official news agency.

    The Israeli military said special forces were carrying out targeted ground raids against Hezbollah infrastructure in southern Lebanon, destroying missiles, launchpads, watchtowers and weapons storage facilities. The military said troops also dismantled tunnel shafts that Hezbollah used to approach the Israeli border.

    Some 1,400 Lebanese, including Hezbollah fighters and civilians, have been killed and some 1.2 million driven from their homes since Israel escalated its strikes in late September aiming to cripple Hezbollah and push it away from the countries’ shared border. On Tuesday, Israel launched what it called a limited ground operation into southern Lebanon. Nine Israeli troops have been killed in close fighting in the area in the past few days, the military said.

    Nearly 375,000 people have crossed from Lebanon into Syria fleeing Israeli strikes in less than two weeks, according to a Lebanese government committee. Associated Press journalists saw thousands of people continuing to cross the Masnaa Border Crossing on foot even after Israeli airstrikes left huge craters in the road leading up to it on Thursday.

    Also on Saturday, Palestinian medical officials say Israeli strikes in northern and central Gaza early Saturday have killed at least 9 people, including two children.

    One strike hit a group of people in the northern town of Beit Hanoun, killing at least five people, including two children, according to the Health Ministry’s Ambulance and Emergency service.

    Another strike hit a house in the northern part of the Nuseirat refugee camp, killing at least four people, the Awda hospital said. The strike also left a number of people wounded, it said.

    The Israeli military did not have any immediate comment on the strikes, but it has long accused Hamas of operating from within civilian areas.

    The Israeli military warned Palestinians to evacuate along the strategic Netzarim corridor in central Gaza, which was at the heart of obstacles to a ceasefire deal earlier this summer. The military told people in parts of the Nuseirat and Bureij refugee camps to evacuate to Muwasi, an area along Gaza’s shore the military has designated a humanitarian zone.

    It’s unclear how many Palestinians are currently living in the areas ordered evacuated, parts of which were evacuated previously.

    Almost 42,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza during the nearly year-long war, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry, which does not differentiate between civilian and militant deaths.