GAZA CITY: Forty animals including five lions are to be rescued from squalid conditions in the Gaza Strip, an animal welfare group said Wednesday.
The animals would be taken out of a zoo in the Palestinian enclave and relocated to sanctuaries in Jordan next week, the Four Paws organization said.
Among the other animals to be taken out are a hyena, monkeys, wolves and porcupines, the organization said in a statement.
Rafah Zoo in southern Gaza confirmed the agreement, saying they weren’t receiving any funds for the animals and couldn’t provide proper care for them in the strip.
The zoo hit the headlines last month when the cash-strapped owner revealed he had declawed one of the lions there, so that customers could pay to play with her.
The organization condemned the declawing, with almost 150,000 people signing a petition against the treatment.
The animals would be treated and sedated, before being taken through Israel into Jordan, Four Paws said.
“For far too long, the animals of Rafah Zoo have had to live under unimaginably dreadful conditions,” said Four Paws veterinarian Amir Khalil.
“We are happy to finally put an end to this horror,” he said in the statement.
The animal welfare group has previously evacuated two other zoos in Gaza, where desperate poverty often leaves owners unable to assure adequate conditions.
Israel has imposed a crippling blockade on the Gaza Strip for more than a decade, measures it says are necessary to isolate the enclave’s Islamist rulers Hamas.
Israel and Hamas have fought three wars since 2008.
In 2016, Four Paws helped facilitate the transfer of the sole tiger in the Gaza Strip, eventually relocating it to South Africa.
The organization in 2017 rescued a lion and a bear from a zoo in Mosul in northern Iraq, a former stronghold of the Daesh group.
Lions, other animals to be saved from Gaza zoo: welfare group
Lions, other animals to be saved from Gaza zoo: welfare group
- The animals would be taken out of a zoo in the Palestinian enclave and relocated to sanctuaries in Jordan next week
- Rafah Zoo in southern Gaza confirmed the agreement, saying they weren’t receiving any funds for the animals
Israel’s hostage forum releases AI-generated video of last Gaza captive
- The Gaza ceasefire, which came into effect in October, remains fragile with both sides alleging violations, and mediators fearing that Israel and Hamas alike are stalling
JERUSALEM: An Israeli group representing the families of Gaza hostages released on Tuesday an AI-generated video of Ran Gvili, the last captive whose body is still being held in the Palestinian territory.
The one-minute clip, created whole cloth using artificial intelligence, purports to depict Gvili as he sits in a Gaza tunnel and appeals to US President Donald Trump to help bring his body back to Israel.
“Mr President, I’m asking you to see this through: Please bring me home. My family deserves this. I deserve the right to be buried with honor in the land I fought for,” says the AI-generated image of Gvili.
Gvili was 24 at the time of Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
He was an officer in Israel’s Yasam elite police unit and was on medical leave when he learnt of the attack.
He decided to leave his home and brought his gun to counter the Hamas militants.
He was shot in the fighting at the Alumim kibbutz before he was taken to Gaza.
Israeli authorities told Gvili’s parents in January 2024 that he had not survived his injuries.
The AI clip was released by the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, the main group representing those taken captive to Gaza.
The Forum said it was published with the approval of Gvili’s family.
“Seeing and hearing Rani speak in his own voice is both moving and heartbreaking. I would give anything to hear, see and hold him again,” Gvili’s mother Talik said, quoted by the Forum.
“But all I can do now is plead that they don’t move to the next phase of the agreement before bringing Rani home — because we don’t leave heroes behind.”
The Gaza ceasefire, which came into effect in October, remains fragile with both sides alleging violations, and mediators fearing that Israel and Hamas alike are stalling.
In the first stage, Palestinian militants were expected to return all of the remaining 48 living and dead hostages held in Gaza.
Since the ceasefire came into effect on October 10, militants have released 47 hostages.
In the next stages of the truce, Israel is supposed to withdraw from its positions in Gaza, an interim authority is to govern the Palestinian territory instead of Hamas, and an international stabilization force is to be deployed.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to meet Trump in Florida later this month to discuss the second phase of the deal.
