GAZA CITY: Close to one million Palestinians have been trapped at Gaza’s fortified northern border with Israel after walking from the south of the territory searching for their homes.

A United Nations’ spokesperson said a long line of Palestinians had started walking north when the Israel-Hamas ceasefire was announced.

“Unfortunately they have all kept going and reached the northern limits of Gaza because along the way they have not been able to recognise any visible landmarks that might have given them some indication of where in Gaza they were or where their homes might be or had been,” the spokesperson said. (main picture)

“So they just kept going and now there is a crush of people trying to turn around and head south again and hopefully find their homes.”

The spokesperson said an offer by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to help by providing night-time illumination for the Palestinians walking south seeking to locate their homes had been rejected.

“It sounded like a good idea, but when we looked into it, Mr Netanyahu’s offer relied on the Israeli Defence Force using hundreds of white phosphorous bombs, so on behalf of the Palestinians we said we’d pass,” the spokesperson said.

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SYDNEY: NSW Police say they have further reduced the number of complaints they had previously received and recorded as being linked to antisemitic behaviour.

A NSW parliamentary inquiry was last week told by police that a review of almost 400 incidents first labelled as antisemitic had shown dozens had been wrongly classified or counted twice. (below)

In some cases, police said incidents were incorrectly characterised as antisemitic based solely on the fact that the person reporting them or the victim was Jewish.

“We’ve now gone even further and taken many more off the list today,” a NSW Police spokesperson said.

“The latest ones removed were all lodged by the Albanese Government’s special envoy against antisemitism, Jillian Segal, and all contain allegations against a librarian at a Sydney municipal library frequented by Ms Segal.”

The spokesperson said the allegations had involved the alleged use of antisemitic language by the librarian relating to the recent Israel-Hamas ceasefire in Gaza.

But further inquiries showed that the librarian had merely told Ms Segal on numerous occasions that she was returning a book late by saying: “It’s overdue.”

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CANBERRA: ABC TV says an internal review has recommended cutting the length of its weekly Sunday morning political analysis program Insiders from one hour to 15 minutes.

Spokesperson for the ABC, Tess Patten, said viewers need not be concerned because most of the new 15-minute format would continue to be taken up by the 10-minute Talking Pictures segment fronted by Mike Bowers.

“The remaining five minutes can then cover any relevant comments by the three panel members appearing in each episode,” Ms Patten said.

“The internal review just completed showed the bulk of the existing hour-long program is currently wasted by host David Speers summarising comments made by the three panellists immediately after one speaks and dressing them up as his own,” Ms Patten said.

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