The Telegraph, The Evening Standard and the Daily Mail report that the Royal Society for Arts (RSA) is embroiled in a row after its staff walked out over an event where Israel’s ambassador made a speech about the nation’s “resilience”. Workers gathered outside the organisation’s building on Thursday to protest the event, which aimed to promote trade between the UK and Israel. Oliver Dowden, the Deputy Prime Minister and Tzipi Hotovely, the Israeli Ambassador to the UK, attended the event in Charing Cross, which was held to promote UK-Israeli trade ties and investment in startups. But the presence of the ambassador – who is understood to have made a speech about Israeli resilience – was thought to have inflamed tensions as protesters encouraged others to join through social media and WhatsApp. In a statement the RSA Union said staff were “shocked and disgusted” to discover that the organisation was hosting the event.

Sky News also reports on Hotoveley’s interview, seeming to rule out the pursuit of a two state solution. It says: “there is no longer any pretence. Israel is no longer dancing around the idea of two states. It isn’t going to happen – that is their policy. Remember, the Western world continues to insist two states is the only answer to end this decades-long conflict.” Sky News then adds that Rishi Sunak ‘does not agree’ with Hotoveley’s comments.

Sky News further reports that four alleged members of Hamas have been detained on suspicion of planning attacks on Jewish institutions in Europe. Three of the men were detained in Berlin, while another was picked up in the Netherlands. The members of the group are believed to be long-standing members of Hamas with close links to its military wing, having served in operations abroad, according to German prosecutors.

The BBC and Reuters report that the IDF has condemned the behaviour of some of its soldiers who were filmed singing and praying down a microphone in a mosque in Jenin in the occupied West Bank. It comes during an operation against militants in the city, which has so far left 11 Palestinians dead, the Palestinian health ministry says. The IDF said the soldiers “will be disciplined accordingly”.

The BBC publishes an article on “how Israel jails hundreds of Palestinians without charge”.

The Guardian, The BBC, The Financial Times and The Economist report that US efforts to show it retains significant influence over the Israeli government were dealt a double blow yesterday when the Israeli defence minister said it would take months to complete the task of rooting out Hamas. The BBC adds that a ceasefire at this stage of the conflict would be “a gift” to Hamas and allow it to return, Foreign Minister Eli Cohen warned. Israel is facing mounting pressure over the number of Palestinian civilians killed by its military in Gaza and the worsening humanitarian crisis there.

The Times reports that almost half of the 29,000 airstrikes that Israel has carried out on Gaza in the past two months used “dumb bombs” rather than precision-guided missiles, US intelligence is said to have found. Unguided missiles are significantly more likely to cause greater civilian harm in urban warfare than precision-guided missiles.

The Times also reports that Britain will impose a travel ban on Israeli settlers who commit violence against Palestinians in a sign of growing western frustration with Netanyahu’s government. Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton denounced Israeli “extremists” who commit “intimidating acts” and said they would be barred from the UK.

The Financial Times reports that The US, the UK and France are exploring ways to convince Hezbollah to pull back from the Lebanon-Israel border in a diplomatic push to prevent a full-blown conflict erupting between the militant group and Israel. Under the initiative, western officials have been talking to Lebanon and Israel to get both countries to implement a long-ignored UN resolution, known as 1701, which requires the Iran-backed militant group to withdraw its fighters from the border region.

In The New Statesman, Alona Ferber writes: “The evidence – and silence – was there from the beginning. With Israel, and the world, still reeling from the 7 October attack on southern Israel, horrific footage and snippets of testimony emerged: the young woman filmed being taken on to a truck, her trousers soaked in blood around the groin; semen found on a dead woman’s body; another female body paraded naked by militants. And yet, in the days following the attack, as the bodies piled up in Israeli morgues and a bloody Gaza offensive began, there was little discussion of how the massacre seemed to involve not only mass murder, but mass rape.”

In The Telegraph Richard Kemp writes: “I was inside the Gaza Strip yesterday and witnessed two terrorist tunnels being destroyed with explosives by IDF engineers in Shejaiya. In the same area of Gaza City, a short time later, the IDF suffered one of its deadliest single skirmishes since the ground offensive began, with nine soldiers of the Golani Brigade killed in a gun and explosives battle with terrorists.” Kemp also writes for The Telegraph, saying: “You may not realise it from social media and much mainstream media, but Israel is winning decisively in Gaza, with Hamas consistently outgunned and outfought. The butchers of 7th October are beginning to lay down their weapons and surrender in droves or just run away.”

The Sun reports that Israel has “slammed the UN’s call for a ceasefire in Gaza” and offered Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar’s phone number, telling diplomats to call him and ask for one instead.

Reuters reports that almost three in four Palestinians believe the October 7 attacks by Hamas on Israel was correct, and the ensuing Gaza war has lifted support for the Islamist group both there and in the West Bank, a survey from a respected Palestinian polling institute found. The Palestinian Center for Policy Survey and Research (PCPSR) findings were published as international alarm grows over the spiralling Palestinian civilian toll in the Israeli counter-offensive against Hamas, now in its third month.

The Guardian reports that a school teacher in the US state of Georgia was arrested after allegedly threatening to behead a student who expressed taking offence over his Israeli flag, according to authorities. Benjamin Reese’s arrest at the middle school named after the town of Warner Robins occurred after a student approached and told him she was offended by the Israeli flag hanging in his classroom, the local news station WMAZ reported, citing a police account of the case.

All the Israeli media features US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan’s arrival in Israel yesterday. He met with Israeli Defence Minister Gallant in the Kirya, where Gallant thanked Sullivan for his personal efforts on behalf of the hostages, but stressed that contrary to US hopes, dismantling Hamas would take several months. Sullivan also met with Prime Minister Netanyahu and also attended a meeting of the war cabinet.

On this topic, Haaretz’s Amos Harel writes that “as the tenth week of the war draws to a close, the costs of the ground manoeuvre are gradually becoming clear. Hamas isn’t able to block the advance of the Israeli forces in the northern Gaza Strip, but in the places where the organisation operates in an organised manner and is capable of taking an offensive initiative in a particular area, it can still inflict casualties. The IDF’s gaining control of regions does not resemble clearing out zones of resistance. In the northern Gaza Strip, too, where fighting has been underway since the end of October, the IDF is not yet in full control, and certainly we can’t talk about total clearing yet.”

Maariv claims that “the assessment is that the war will enter a new stage after the powerful operations in Khan Yunis, Shajaiya, Jabalya, and perhaps also in the refugee camps in the central Gaza Strip. According to this assessment, the actions in Rafah and more southern parts of the Gaza Strip will be different, less intense, and more focused after the current activity in Khan Yunis ends.”

Kan Radio reports that Sgt. Oz Shmuel Aradi, a 19-year-old from Kibbutz Hatzor, fell in battle in the Gaza Strip yesterday. The IDF Spokesperson’s Office also announced that four soldiers were seriously wounded in combat. The IDF also recovered the body of the hostage Elia Toledano, 28, who was kidnapped from the nature party near Reim on October 7.

Israel Hayom reports Israel agreeing to open the Kerem Shalom crossing to Gaza this week, allowing aid to travel more directly into Gaza. This is in response to US pressure, with Israel previously having insisted that the crossing would not be open to aid.

In Yediot Ahronot, Yossi Yehoshua writes that “Hamas’s tunnel empire in Gaza is one of the most complex challenges that the IDF troops face in the war. Every day, terrorists lie in ambush for the troops and wait for the moment they can leap out and surprise them with gunshots, explosive devices, and anti-tank missiles. The warfare in the tunnels is very troubling for the command and field ranks. Yesterday, there was one promising moment: the IDF spokesperson confirmed that terrorists had been killed inside tunnels using a ‘new method.’ He said that the terrorists would no longer be protected in the tunnels.” Yehoshua notes that such activity in the tunnels could potentially risk hostages being held in them, hence why “the IDF stressed that attacks on tunnels are only carried out in unusual cases in which the risk to the troops is low and there is no indication that there are hostages.”

Yehoshua also considers the West Bank, in particular Jenin, “which bears more of a resemblance to Gaza than to what we are familiar with in Judea and Samaria. IDF troops left the heart of the refugee camp last night after an operation lasting over 60 hours in which dozens of terrorists were killed and dozens were arrested. Central Command and the divisions and brigades have changed the format of operations in this theatre: today it is much more offensive, continuous and includes regular air strikes, something not done since the second Intifada, and with most of the force comprised of reservist battalions.”

Also in Yediot Ahronot, Yoav Zitun writes on Israeli operations in Gaza’s Shajaiya, whose easternmost houses lie only a few hundred yards from Israeli kibbutzim. “Since the ground manoeuvre was resumed two weeks ago,” he writes, “the IDF has begun to partially raze the line of houses in eastern Shajaiya. To speed up the work, mobile artillery guns were brought in for one day in addition to the tanks that directly targeted about 20 such houses.” Zitun situates this activity in the context of a future buffer zone between Israel and the Strip, and potential tension with the US. “The IDF has become sensitive recently to using the term ‘security zone’ for what will be in place on the day after the war. Army officials are alarmed by the analogy to the security zone that was in place in southern Lebanon from the 1980s to 2000, in which more than 1,000 soldiers were killed, but not just because of that traumatic memory: the Americans have displayed great opposition to the establishment of such a security zone in Gazan territory, as it would deny thousands of dunams of agricultural fields to Gazan farmers, further worsening the lives of the residents of Gaza. The IDF prefers to call this a buffer zone, with more means of observation, defence infrastructure, and firepower to repel any threat. In any case, the Gaza Strip is very narrow: barely seven kilometres separate Kibbutz Beeri from the Gaza City beach in the northern Gaza Strip, and in the southern Gaza Strip, which is wider, the distance between the border in the Kerem Shalom area to the Rafah beach is 13 kilometres.”

Maariv features the government denying reports that Mossad Director David Barnea has been blocked from flying to Qatar to hold talks on a new hostage release deal. “As far as the prime minister is concerned,” said an official, “the Mossad director and the hostage team have full freedom of action to do whatever is necessary, including making trips to meet with mediators, to help in the efforts to free our hostages.”

Israel Hayom also focusses on the northern front, and notes that the French foreign minister will arrive in Lebanon on Saturday to explore the feasibility of forcing Hezbollah to withdraw from the border. She will then travel to Israel to meet her counterpart, Minister Cohen. In parallel, American envoy Amos Hochstein is trying to engage on his pre-October 7 proposal for an agreement between Israel and Hezbollah. “Israel is displeased with the American envoy and doesn’t pin much hope on him,” says the paper, basing its assessment on the Netanyahu government’s view of the maritime deal Hochstein brokered between Lebanon and the Lapid government last year.

Maariv features new polling showing that a plurality of Israelis (43 percent) feel Prime Minister Netanyahu has taken the wrong approach to coordinating the war with President Biden. The polling also shows Netanyahu continuing to trail National Unity Party leader Benny Gantz (51 percent to 31) on who would make the better prime minister. In the speculative Knesset, Netanyahu’s Likud polls at 17 seats, and its current coalition on 43 to the current opposition’s 67.