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Israel faces growing isolation, Biden criticism, as Gaza deaths mount Summary LATEST DEVELOPMENTS: 1 Worst Israeli combat losses in more than a month 2 Heavy fighting in north and south simultaneously 3 British doctor at Khan Younis hospital: medics 'are stepping over the bodies of children to treat children who will die' CAIRO/GAZA, Dec 13 (Reuters) - Israel faced growing diplomatic isolation in its war in Gaza on as the United Nations demanded an immediate humanitarian ceasefire and U.S. President Joe Biden said "indiscriminate" bombing of civilians was costing international support. With intense fighting now being waged simultaneously in the north and south of the enclave, Israeli troops on Wednesday reported their worst combat losses for more than a month, including a colonel, the highest-ranking officer yet killed in the ground campaign. Warplanes again bombed the length of Gaza and aid officials said the arrival of rainy winter weather worsened the conditions for hundreds of thousands of families sleeping rough in makeshift tents. The vast majority of Gaza's 2.3 million people have already been made homeless. Israel launched its campaign to annihilate the Hamas militant group that controls Gaza with global sympathy after fighters stormed across the border fence on Oct. 7, killing 1,200 Israelis, mostly civilians, and seizing 240 hostages. But since then, Israeli forces have besieged the enclave and laid much of it to waste, with more than 18,000 people confirmed killed according to Palestinian health authorities, and many thousands more feared lost in the rubble or beyond the reach of ambulances. Since a week-long truce collapsed at the start of December, Israeli forces have extended their ground campaign from the northern Gaza Strip into the south with the storming of the main southern city of Khan Younis. Meanwhile, fighting has only intensified amid the rubble of the north, where Israel had previously announced that its military objectives had been largely met. Israel reported ten of its soldiers killed in the past 24 hours, including a full colonel commanding a forward base and a lieutenant-colonel commanding a regiment. It was the worst one-day loss since 15 were killed on Oct. 31. According to Army Radio, most of the deaths came in the Shejaiya district of Gaza City in the north, when an infantry unit hunting Hamas gunmen entered a building and lost contact with the rear base. When another unit was sent in after them, bombs were set off in the building and gunmen opened fire. 'BRINGING DESTRUCTION AND DEATH' Hamas said the incident showed that Israeli forces could never subdue Gaza: "We say to the Zionists that your failed leadership has no regard for the lives of your soldiers," it said. "The longer you stay there, the greater the bill of your deaths and losses will be, and you will emerge from it carrying the tail of disappointment and loss, God willing." In the north, heavy fighting has also taken place in the Jabaliya district, where Gaza health officials say Israeli forces have besieged and stormed a hospital and detained and abused medical staff. In the south, Israeli forces storming Khan Younis advanced in recent days to city centre. Residents said there was heavy fighting there but no further attempts to advance in the last 24 hours. Displaced Palestinians, who fled their houses due to Israeli strikes, walk following heavy rains at tent camps, as the conflict between Israel and Hamas continues, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza... Acquire Licensing Rights Read more “The Israeli tanks have not moved further from the centre of the city. They are facing fierce resistance and we hear the exchanges of fire, explosions too,” Abu Abdallah, a father of five who lives 2 km away, told Reuters. The Israelis had brought bulldozers and were destroying the road near the Khan Younis home of the Hamas leader in Gaza, Yahya Al—Sinwar, Abu Abdallah said. "They are only bringing destruction and death wherever they go at the expense of our innocent defenceless civilians.” Hospitals in the north have largely ceased functioning altogether. In the south, they have been overrun by dead and wounded, carried in by the dozen throughout the day and night. "Doctors including myself are stepping over the bodies of children to treat children who will die," Dr Chris Hook, a British physician deployed with medical charity MSF at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis, told Reuters. International agencies say the limited aid reaching Gaza is being distributed only in parts of Rafah near the Egyptian border. Even there, the situation has become far more extreme this week, with hundreds of thousands of people sheltering under tarps. Gemma Connell, based in Rafah as Gaza team leader for the U.N. humanitarian office OCHA, told Reuters in a message: "Heavy rains and winds overnight. So awful for all of these people in makeshift shelters." Israel says it has been encouraging increased aid to Gaza through Egypt's border, and is announcing daily four-hour pauses in operations near Rafah to help civilians get to it. The U.N. says cumbersome inspections and insecurity have slowed aid to a trickle. U.N. VOTE The U.N. General Assembly vote demanding a ceasefire has no legal force but was the strongest sign yet of eroding international support for Israel's actions. Three-quarters of the 193 member states voted in favour and only eight countries joined the United States and Israel in voting against. Before the vote, Biden said Israel still has support from "most of the world" including the U.S. and European Union for its fight against Hamas. "But they're starting to lose that support by indiscriminate bombing that takes place," he told a campaign donor event in Washington. Close U.S. intelligence sharing allies Canada, Australia and New Zealand said in a joint statement: "The price of defeating Hamas cannot be the continuous suffering of all Palestinian civilians." In the most public sign of division between the U.S. and Israeli leaders so far, Biden said that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu needed to change his hardline government and that ultimately Israel "can't say no" to an independent Palestinian state, opposed by far-right members of the Israeli cabinet. Netanyahu said Israel disagrees with Washington about the future for Gaza after the war, and opposes U.S. calls for Gaza to be governed by the Western-backed Palestinian Authority that now exercises partial self rule in the West Bank.

U.S. intelligence assesses Ukraine war has Russia 315,000 casualties - source WASHINGTON, Dec 12 (Reuters) - A declassified U.S. intelligence report assessed that the Ukraine war has cost Russia 315,000 dead and injured troops, or nearly 90% of the personnel it had when the conflict began, a source familiar with the intelligence said on Tuesday. The report also assessed that Moscow's losses in personnel and armored vehicles to Ukraine's military have set back Russia’s military modernization by 18 years, the source said. The Russian embassy and the Russian defense ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Russian officials have said Western estimates of Russian death tolls in the war are vastly exaggerated and almost always underestimate Ukrainian losses - which Russian officials say are vast. The source spoke as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy made a last-ditch plea to U.S. lawmakers on Capitol Hill to keep U.S. military aid flowing to Ukraine, first meeting behind closed doors with U.S. senators. The source said the recently declassified U.S. intelligence report assessed that Russia began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 with 360,000 personnel. Since then, the report found, 315,000 Russian troops, or about 87% of the total with which it started the war, have been killed or injured, the source said. The source said those losses are the reason Russia has been forced to loosen recruitment standards and draft convicts and older civilians to deploy in Ukraine. "The scale of losses has forced Russia to take extraordinary measures to sustain its ability to fight. Russia declared a partial mobilization of 300,000 personnel in late 2022, and has relaxed standards to allow recruitment of convicts and older civilians," the assessment said, according to the source. The Russian army has been left with 1,300 armored vehicles on the battlefield and is having to bolster those forces with T62 tanks produced in the 1970s, the source said. Kyiv treats its losses as a state secret and officials say disclosing the figure could harm its war effort. A New York Times report in August cited U.S. officials as putting the Ukrainian death toll at close to 70,000. Writing in the Ukrainian journal Tyzhden, historian Yaroslav Tynchenko and volunteer Herman Shapovalenko last month said Shapovalenko's Book of Memory project had confirmed 24,500 Ukrainian combat and non-combat deaths using open sources. The real figure was likely higher, they said.

Zelenskiy makes 11th hour plea for Ukraine war funds in Washington Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy attends a meeting in the National Defense University in Washington, U.S., December 11, 2023. Ukrainian Presidential Press Service/Handout via REUTERS Acquire Licensing Rights WASHINGTON, Dec 12 (Reuters) - Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Tuesday plans a last-ditch plea to U.S. lawmakers to keep military support flowing as he battles Russia, in visits to the White House and Capitol Hill. Heading into winter, with tens of thousands of Ukrainians dead, a yawning budget deficit and Russian advances in the east, Zelenskiy is scheduled to press U.S. lawmakers to replenish nearly depleted funding, before meeting with President Joe Biden. "If there's anyone inspired by unresolved issues on Capitol Hill, it's just (Russian President Vladimir) Putin and his sick clique," Zelenskiy said at a speech in Washington on Monday to a U.S. military audience. Newly declassified U.S. intelligence shows that "Russia seems to believe that a military deadlock through the winter will drain Western support for Ukraine" and ultimately give Russia the advantage despite Russian losses, said Adrienne Watson, spokesperson for the White House National Security Council. Ukraine is having success stopping Russian forces but Putin is continuing to order his troops forward despite heavy losses of troops and equipment since October, she added. There are just three days before Congress recesses for the year on Friday, and Republicans in the House of Representatives have until now refused to pass a $106 billion supplemental bill that contains Ukraine aid without unrelated, fiercely disputed changes to U.S. immigration. Putin, who said last week he would run for president again in 2024, is betting he can outlast Western aid and attention to score a major strategic victory against the West, Zelenskiy and Biden aides believe. The view is shared by European lawmakers who will send their own last-minute plea to Congress Tuesday. Biden has cast the situation in stark terms, saying "history is going to judge harshly those who turn their back on freedom's cause." Ultimately, U.S. troops could be forced to fight Russia, Biden and others warn, if an unchecked Putin invades a European ally covered by NATO's mutual defense commitments. U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican, said in a letter to the Biden administration released last week that lawmakers need more detail on the administration's objectives in Ukraine and linked the issue to immigration. "President Biden must satisfy Congressional oversight inquiries about the Administration's failure thus far to present clearly defined objectives, and its failure to provide essential weapons (for Ukraine) on a timely basis," Johnson wrote. He added that "supplemental Ukraine funding is dependent upon enactment of transformative change to our nation's border security laws." The White House told Congress on Dec. 4 the government will no longer have funding to provide more weapons for Ukraine after the end of the year. Congress approved more than $110 billion for Ukraine since Russia's February 2022 invasion but no new funds since Republicans took over the House from Democrats in January. UKRAINE INFRASTRUCTURE Bolstered by billions of dollars in U.S. arms, humanitarian aid and intelligence, Ukraine was able to fend off Russia's initial attempt to sweep the country. But Kyiv failed to break through Russian defensive lines in a major counteroffensive push this year and Russia is now on the offensive in the east. "As winter approaches, we're seeing now increased missile and drone attacks by the Russian armed forces against civilian infrastructure," said White House spokesperson John Kirby on Monday. "We expect that that will continue, particularly against energy infrastructure." Some Republicans, particularly those with the closest ties to former President Donald Trump, oppose more Ukraine aid, and are asking about the war aims and how U.S. money is being spent. It was left out of a stopgap funding bill Congress passed in October to keep the government open. Both the war and immigration issues are expected to be lightning-rod issues ahead of the 2024 U.S. presidential and congressional elections. Trump and Biden are both seeking the presidency.

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