Israel-Hamas war live updates: UN chief says Hamas comments were misrepresented amid resignation calls; Gaza fuel running out

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Wednesday hit back at claims that he had justified Hamas attacks on Israel, calling them a misrepresentation.

On Tuesday, Guterres told the U.N. Security Council in New York that “clear violations of international law” had been committed in Gaza and said it was important to recognize that Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks “did not happen in a vacuum.”

The comments prompted outrage from Israel, with Israel’s representative to the U.N. subsequently calling for Guterres’ resignation.

Speaking to reporters Wednesday, Guterres said he was shocked by the backlash he had received.

“I am shocked by the misrepresentations by some of my statement … as if I was justifying acts of terror by Hamas. This is false. It was the opposite,” he said.

“I believe it’s necessary to set the record straight — especially out of respect for the victims and their families.”

— Karen Gilchrist

U.S. Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin said he would support former Treasury Secretary Jack Lew to be President Joe Biden’s next ambassador to Israel. Lew was nominated last month by Biden.

“I look forward to supporting Jack’s nomination for Ambassador to Israel, and it’s essential that the Senate act on his nomination quickly so he can go to Israel and get to work immediately,” Manchin wrote in a statement, calling Lew an “honest and straightforward person.”

With Manchin’s support, Lew is expected to win Senate confirmation.

Last week, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Ben Cardin (D-Md.) said the Senate could vote on Lew’s nomination as soon as this week.

— Amanda Macias

Messaging app Telegram has restricted access to channels belonging to Palestinian militant group Hamas.

The platform blocked access to the official channel of Hamas, hamas_com and the Al-Qassem brigades, the military wing of the organization, for Android users, CNBC verified Wednesday.

Social media companies have been under intense pressure to act on the spread of misinformation and pro-Hamas propaganda amid the war in Israel.

Read the full story here.

– Ryan Browne

A plane carrying British humanitarian aid to support Palestinian civilians is currently en route to Egypt, the U.K. Ministry of Defense said on social media.

Aid delivered to Egypt typically travels onward by truck to the besieged Gaza Strip through the Rafah crossing.

The international community has been sending humanitarian assistance since the first convoys were permitted to enter over the weekend. Relief groups have warned that the aid received so far is insufficient to meet the needs of the Palestinian people, who especially urgently require fuel.

— Ruxandra Iordache

An Israeli missile attack targeted Syria’s Aleppo airport and damaged one of its runways, the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) said Wednesday.

CNBC was not able to verify the report.

The Aleppo airport was already offline since being struck by an Israeli missile on Oct. 22. Both it and Damascus’ international airport have come under Israeli fire since the start of the Israel-Hamas conflict.

The Israel Defense Forces did not publicly comment on Wednesday’s alleged strike.

Earlier Wednesday, SANA reported eight Syrian soldiers were killed and seven injured in a different Israeli attack, while the IDF said it had targeted Syrian military infrastructure and mortal launchers in response to rocket launches from Syria.

— Ruxandra Iordache

The president of the World Bank on Tuesday said that it will be some time before progress toward a more peaceful Middle East can resume in earnest.

Ajay Banga told CNBC that the onset of the Israel-Hamas war has thrown nascent normalization talks off course, making regional cooperation much more difficult.

“We were working towards a more peaceful Middle East and many countries in this region have begun to speak to each other about the opportunity of moving forward with a new platform of being together,” Banga told CNBC’s Dan Murphy.

“I think it’s clearly going to be a little while until this sort of works out one way or the other,” he added.

— Karen Gilchrist

Qatar’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Majed al-Ansari on Wednesday said that an Israeli ground incursion into the Gaza Strip will complicate efforts to bring home hostages held by Hamas, Reuters reports.

“Qatar has focused its mediation efforts on the release of hostages, which is separate from broader discussions on de-escalation,” al-Ansari said.

Israeli military estimates that Hamas took around 222 hostages during its multi-pronged terror attacks of Oct. 7 — of whom only four captives have been released so far.

A spokesperson of the Israel Defense Forces earlier this week said that the full return of hostages and the complete surrender of Hamas would be the only way to end the war.

Qatar has attempted to position itself as an intermediary in the conflict, but its emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, on Tuesday urged not to give Israel “unrestricted authorisation to kill” Palestinian people throughout its offensive in the Gaza Strip.

— Ruxandra Iordache

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Palestinian group Hamas is not a terrorist organization and stressed that he will not be carrying out a planned visit to Israel, amid the country’s ongoing campaign in the Gaza Strip.

“Hamas is not a terrorist organization, but a group of liberation and mujahideen who struggle to protect their lands and citizens,” he said during a speech to his Justice and Development Party, according to Google-translated comments carried by Turkey’s state-run Anadolu agency. The mujahideen are combatants who engage on behalf of the Muslim faith or community.

Many countries have denounced the terror attacks perpetrated by Hamas against Israel on Oct. 7.

Erdogan said that Ankara has “no problem with the state of Israel,” while levying hard criticism against “the way it acts as an organization, rather than a state.” It accused Israel of the “brutal killing of children” and decried he is “deeply saddened by this image of impotence that the U.N. has fallen into” in its mediation of the conflict.

The Turkish president once more urged a cease-fire and proposed to organize a peace conference to seek a diplomatic solution to the war.

Israel has said that it doesn’t target civilians, and its offensives against the besieged Gaza enclosure target stripping away the military capabilities of Hamas.

— Ruxandra Iordache

The head of the International Monetary Fund on Wednesday dubbed the worsening Israel-Hamas conflict as another cloud on the horizon of an already gloomy economic outlook.

“What we see is more jitters in what has already been an anxious world,” Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva told a panel hosted by CNBC’s Dan Murphy at the Future Investment Initiative Institute conference in Riyadh.

“And on a horizon that had plenty of clouds, one more — and it can get deeper.”  

Georgieva said that the economic fallout from the war, now in its third week, would be “terrible” for the sides involved, as well as have significant repercussions for the region.

Read the full story here.

— Karen Gilchrist

The United Nations Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) has warned that its shelters in the Gaza Strip are four times over their capacity after an influx of refugees from the Israeli-Hamas war.

In a social media post on Wednesday, the agency said that it is sheltering nearly 600,000 internally displaced people in its 150 facilities.

“Many people are sleeping in the streets as current facilities are overwhelmed,” it said.

UNRWA previously flagged that it will be unable to carry out its operations after Wednesday night if fuel supplies critical to medical facilities, water desalination and transport, are not delivered to the besieged Gaza Strip.

— Ruxandra Iordache

The Israel Defense Forces said on Telegram that they killed Taysir Mubasher, Hamas commander of the North Khan Yunis battalion.

CNBC could not independently verify the report.

Mubasher previously served as commander of the Palestinian militant group’s naval forces and held several roles in weapons manufacturing.

Khan Yunis is a city in the southern Gaza Strip. The IDF say that 300 rockets and mortar shells have been launched toward Israeli territory since the start of the conflict.

Israel has launched its retaliatory military campaign against the Gaza Strip, with the aim of stripping away all the military capabilities of Hamas.

— Ruxandra Iordache

Israel’s representative to the U.N. has called for the resignation of the organization’s Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, following his remarks on the Israel-Hamas conflict and action in Gaza.

Read the full story here.

— Ruxandra Iordache

Israel’s military has accused Iran of ordering attacks by militia groups it supports in Yemen, Iraq and Lebanon.

In Reuters-reported comments from a briefing, chief military spokesperson Daniel Hagari said Iran is supplying Palestinian militant group Hamas with intelligence and deploying an online messaging campaign to bolster anti-Israel sentiment.

Iran and Israel have long been at odds, with Tehran celebrating but denying involvement in the Hamas terror attacks of Oct. 7. Tehran backs Hamas, the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad and Lebanese militant group Hezbollah — all three of which have exchanged fire with Israel since early October.

— Ruxandra Iordache

Israel’s long-anticipated ground incursion into Gaza could set the tone for a Western response against Hamas-backing Iran and spell consequences for the oil market, said Helima Croft, head of global commodity strategy at RBC Capital Markets.

Speaking to CNBC’s Dan Murphy in Saudi Arabia, she said, “It certainly looks like the United States is trying to delay an Israeli ground operation because they want to get out the hostages, they want to get out the hundreds of Americans that are trapped in Gaza, but the question is, is this going to be postponed indefinitely, but I think people are bracing for some type of escalation in Gaza.”

Describing the oil price reaction to the Israel-Hamas war as “sanguine” so far, she nevertheless said that “a lot’s going to hinge on what does a potential ground incursion look like” and that a widening of the conflict into the broader Middle Eastern region could affect the crude supplies of OPEC member Iran. Brent futures with December delivery were trading at $87.78 per barrel at 7:34 a.m. London time, down 29 cents per barrel from the Tuesday settlement.

Tehran has historically financially supported Hamas and has praised the Palestinian militant group’s multi-pronged terror attacks of Oct. 7 against Israel — but has denied involvement.

Croft said the West and U.S. President Joe Biden would, “at a minimum,” consider a retaliatory gesture of curbing Iranian exports, which she estimates have climbed near levels seen before 2018, when Donald Trump’s administration reimposed sanctions against Tehran’s crude.

“The argument is, can you continue to allow Iran to keep the bank open for groups like Hamas? So I think the Biden administration is going to have to tighten those sanctions.”

She expects such measures to come into effect soon, amid rising bipartisan U.S. congressional pressure to cut off the availability of Iranian financing for groups like Hamas.

— Ruxandra Iordache

Eight Syrian soldiers were killed and seven others injured following an Israeli strike in Daraa, in southwest Syria, the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency said Wednesday, according to a Google translation.

The Israeli offensive targeted a number of Syrian military positions in the Daraa countryside, a military source told SANA.

The Israel Defense Forces said early Wednesday on social media that its fighter jets struck military infrastructure and mortal launchers belonging to the Syrian army, in response to rocket launches from Syria on Tuesday. The IDF did not mention any casualties in its report.

Israel and the Iran-backed Syrian regime of Bashar Assad have been inimical and repeatedly exchanged fire since the start of Israel’s war with Palestinian militant group Hamas. This and Israeli hostilities with neighboring Lebanon have bolstered fears of the Israel-Hamas conflict spilling into the broader Middle East.

— Ruxandra Iordache

The situation in the Middle East is “growing more dire by the hour,” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned overnight, urging respect for civilian lives as the Israel-Hamas conflict unfolds.

“The grievances of the Palestinian people cannot justify the horrific attacks by Hamas. Those horrendous attacks cannot justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people,” he said on the X social media platform, previously known as Twitter.

Guterres has repeatedly pleaded for the safety of civilians across both Israel and the Palestinian territories, requesting a humanitarian pause to the hostilities to allow the delivery of aid to the besieged Gaza Strip.

U.N. relief chief Martin Griffiths reiterated that call, stressing on social media, “The aid delivered to Gaza so far is barely making a dent. We need more, and we need it now. We need it to include fuel.”

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) has previously noted it would be unable to carry out aid operations after Wednesday night, if it does not receive fuel supplies necessary for transport, water desalination and running medical equipment

The Israel Defense Forces insist that fuel is present in Gaza, but monopolized by Hamas:

“These fuel tanks are inside Gaza,” the military said on social media in response to UNRWA, alongside a wide-shot picture of what could be tanks. “They contain more than 500,000 liters of fuel. Ask Hamas if you can have some.”

CNBC could not independently verify what area the IDF picture featured.

— Ruxandra Iordache

Intelligence officials told reporters that U.S. spy agencies believe the blast at a Gaza hospital that killed hundreds a week ago was caused by a Palestinian rocket that suffered engine failure and broke apart into two pieces, NBC News reported.

“We assess with high confidence that Israel was not responsible for the explosion at the hospital and that Palestinian militants were responsible,” an intelligence official said. “We assess with low confidence that Palestine Islamic Jihad was responsible for launching the rocket that landed on the hospital.”

Read the full NCB News story here.

— Riya Bhattacharjee

A group of more than two dozen Republican lawmakers urged the mayor of Washington, D.C., to rename “Black Lives Matter Plaza,” claiming that the group for which the plaza is named has voiced support for Hamas following the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks in Israel.

The lawmakers, including Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Florida’s Marco Rubio, also argued that the street painting reading “Black Lives Matter” should be scrubbed from the plaza due the group’s “celebration of violent antisemitic terrorism.”

The plaza, a two-block-long pedestrian zone just north of the White House, got its name in 2020 amid the rapid rise of Black Lives Matter, the political movement that emerged in response to the killings of Black Americans.

In a letter to D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, the group of eight senators and 17 House members cited a handful of posts from BLM chapters and entities that expressed support for Palestine, criticized Israel or “cast doubt” on the Oct. 7 attacks.

“These posts are meant to delegitimize Israel and rationalize brutal attacks on the Jewish people,” the letter read. “It is hard to escape the conclusion that these statements are motivated by an ugly animus against the Jewish people.”

“America must clearly affirm its stance against antisemitism, wherever it appears. We therefore urge you to immediately rename the Black Lives Matter Plaza, to remove the associated street painting in the plaza, and to end the city’s celebration of this terrorist sympathizer group.”

BLM and Bowser’s office did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment on the letter.

— Kevin Breuninger

Crowds of people gather to assess residential damage in the southern Gaza Strip after an Israeli strike on Tuesday. Israel has been launching hundreds of airstrikes daily while demanding that Hamas release its remaining 222 hostages.

Correction: The Reuters photo above was taken on Tuesday, Oct. 24. The day of the week was misstated in an earlier version.

— Elisabeth Cordova

Columbia University postponed a major annual fundraising event this week as the campus grapples with fallout triggered by the ongoing Israel and Hamas conflict.

“After careful consideration and consultation with University and alumni leadership, we decided that this is not the appropriate time to move forward with Columbia Giving Day. It is postponed for the time being, and a decision on rescheduling will be made in the near future,” said Samantha Slater, a university spokeswoman, in a statement.

Last year, Columbia Giving Day raised almost $30 million in about 24 hours, according to The New York Times.

— Amanda Macias