An Indian lawyer hurled a shoe at Chief Justice BR Gavai during court proceedings in Delhi on Monday, following remarks the judge reportedly made about Hinduism.

According to Indian media reports and witnesses present in the courtroom, the shoe narrowly missed Chief Justice Gavai and another justice before falling behind them. The incident has been described as both a serious breach of courtroom security and a grave act of public disrespect.

The lawyer, identified as Rakesh Kishore, was immediately restrained by security officials. 

“We will not tolerate any insult to Sanatan Dharma,” the attacker, whose name was not given in reports on the incident, shouted as he was being led out, referring to another name for Hinduism, the Hindustan Times newspaper said.

An association of Supreme Court lawyers condemned Monday’s incident and demanded that the court initiate proceedings against the lawyer involved.

“This behaviour is antithetical to the dignity of the legal profession and contrary to the constitutional values of decorum, discipline, and institutional integrity,” the Supreme Court Advocates-on-record Association said in a statement.

India’s Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta said the attack was a result of misinformation on social media.

“I have personally seen Chief Justice visiting religious places of all religions with full reverence,” Mehta told Reuters in a text message

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi called the shoe attack “utterly condemnable”, joining a chorus of criticism from across the political spectrum. Modi spoke to Justice Gavai and said the attack had angered every Indian, PTI reports. “There is no place for such reprehensible acts in our society,” the PM said.

Throwing a shoe at someone in public is seen as an act of disrespect and humiliation in India and many other countries.

— With additional input from Reuters

October 7 marks the completion of two years since the Gaza conflict began. Israel’s relentless war on Gaza has since killed over 67,000 Palestinians. Experts and rights groups have slammed Israel for engineering famine in Gaza through a policy of starvation, turning food and water into weapons of war.

The UN formally declared famine in parts of Gaza in late August. A month later, a UN independent international inquiry commission concluded that Israel had committed genocide in Gaza.

Top humanitarian figures, including UN relief chief Tom Fletcher, have issued urgent appeals to end what they call Israel’s “systematic obstruction” of essentials and aid — a characterisation that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government refuses to acknowledge.

Ramy Abdu, chair of the Geneva-based Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, said the policy left no doubt about Israel’s intent. “Gaza’s famine differs from others in that it is not caused by natural disasters or economic collapse,” he told Anadolu. “It is a policy of using food and water as weapons of war and tools of genocide.”

Ramy Abdu, chair of the Geneva-based Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, said Gaza’s famine “is a policy of using food and water as weapons of war and tools of genocide,” adding that “starvation as a weapon against civilians is a war crime.”

‘Weapon of slow annihilation’

Israel had devastated Gaza’s food security for a long time before October 2023, imposing a blockade in 2006 that controlled border crossings and, at times, even calculated daily calories. 

On Oct 9, 2023, Israel declared a “complete siege,” cutting food, water, fuel, and electricity. Imports stopped overnight; fuel blocks shuttered bakeries, stalled pumps, and halted deliveries. Farmland destruction and fishing bans further eliminated food sources. Abdu called it turning “engineered fragility” into “a weapon of slow annihilation.”

Forced displacements have deepened hunger. An estimated 2 million Palestinians remain displaced, with children and pregnant women among the hardest hit as hunger combines with disease and lack of clean water.

By early 2024, donor suspensions crippled UNRWA; warehouses were bombed, convoys blocked, and looting reported. Israel blocked aid to northern Gaza and sealed Rafah in May. In May 2025, Israel, with US support, launched the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF). 

The UN and major NGOs denounced it as militarising relief, and its “aid zones” were described as “death traps.” Since then, more than 1,760 Palestinians have been killed while trying to reach food, nearly 1,000 of them near GHF sites, according to the UN human rights office.

Famine declared, genocide found

On August 22, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) formally declared famine in parts of Gaza. 

According to the Gaza Health Ministry, at least 460 Palestinian deaths are linked to hunger and famine, including more than 150 children. One in every five children in Gaza City is malnourished.

In September, the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry concluded that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, finding four of five genocidal acts under the 1948 Genocide Convention. 

The commission’s September 16 statement said Israel must end its policy of starvation, lift the siege, and ensure unimpeded large-scale aid access, including for UNRWA and OHCHR staff. 

Abdu said the designation should trigger obligations under the Genocide Convention, but “in practice, little has been done.”

Toll and talks

After 732 days, Israel has killed over 67,000 Palestinians, a conservative count that experts say is higher. 

The enclave is largely in ruins, with over 28,000 women and girls and over 20,000 children killed, according to UN and Gaza Health Ministry figures. The war is the deadliest for journalists in modern history, with nearly 250 killed. Israel has killed at least 383 aid workers, according to the UN.

Hopeful peace talks are being held in Cairo, but Israel continues to strike and kill Palestinians in Gaza.

According to Al-Qahera News, which is affiliated with Egyptian intelligence, the talks are centered on laying the groundwork for a possible exchange of hostages and prisoners, with Egyptian and Qatari mediators working to establish a concrete mechanism for the process.

The dialogue is taking place behind closed doors under tight security, with intermediaries shuttling between both sides.

The talks follow an Israeli strike in Qatar that recently targeted Hamas’s negotiation team, narrowly missing senior negotiator Khalil al-Hayya, who now leads the group’s delegation in Egypt.

An Egyptian security source confirmed that al-Hayya held a preliminary meeting with Egyptian intelligence officials ahead of the negotiations to outline Hamas’s main conditions and expectations.

A Palestinian official close to Hamas described the latest round as “delicate and complicated,” noting that it coincides with the second anniversary of the October 7, 2023 attacks that triggered the ongoing conflict.

Meanwhile, President Trump whose envoy Steve Witkoff and senior adviser Jared Kushner are due to arrive in Egypt has urged negotiators to move swiftly toward a lasting ceasefire and the release of detainees, emphasizing his administration’s commitment to ending the Gaza war.

Despite the diplomatic momentum, Israeli airstrikes continued on Monday, highlighting the fragile nature of the talks and the steep challenges mediators face in achieving a breakthrough.

At least seven Palestinians were killed in the latest Israeli air strikes, according to Mahmud Bassal, spokesman for Gaza’s civil defence agency.

AFP footage showed explosions in the Gaza Strip, with plumes of smoke rising over the skyline, even after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Israel must stop bombing the territory.

Require several days

Both Hamas and Israel have responded positively to Trump’s proposal, but reaching an agreement on the details is set to be a herculean task.

The plan envisages the disarmament of Hamas, which the militant group is unlikely to accept.

It also provides for the gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, but Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to redeploy troops “deep inside” the territory while securing the release of hostages.

According to the Palestinian source, the initial hostage-prisoner exchange will “require several days, depending on field conditions related to Israeli withdrawals, the cessation of bombardment and the suspension of all types of air operations”.

Previous rounds of negotiations have also stalled over the names of Palestinian prisoners the Islamist group proposed for release.

Negotiations will look to “determine the date of a temporary truce”, a Hamas official said, as well as create conditions for a first phase of the plan, in which 47 hostages held in Gaza are to be released in return for hundreds of Palestinian detainees.

Mirjana Spoljaric, head of the International Committee of the Red Cross which has coordinated previous exchanges, said its teams were standing at the ready “to help bring hostages and detainees back to their families”.

The ICRC said it was ready to facilitate aid access, which must resume “at full capacity” and be distributed safely across the territory, where the UN has declared a famine.

The war has left Gazans exhausted and displaced, with many saying they see little hope even as peace efforts resume.

“The war has destroyed everything I built throughout my life,” said Mohammed Abu Sultan, 49, who fled Gaza City with 20 family members to Nuseirat camp in central Gaza.

“We have been running from death for two years.”

MOVE FAST

Posting on his Truth Social platform on Sunday, Trump praised “positive discussions with Hamas” and allies around the world, including Arab and Muslim nations.

“I am told that the first phase should be completed this week, and I am asking everyone to MOVE FAST,” he wrote.

On Monday, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi praised Trump’s plan, saying it offered “the right path to lasting peace and stability”.

A Palestinian source close to Hamas said it would halt its military operations in parallel with Israel stopping its bombardment and withdrawing its troops from Gaza City.

Israeli military chief Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir however warned that if the negotiations failed, then the military would “return to fighting” in Gaza.

Militants seized 251 hostages during their October 7, 2023 attack, 47 of whom are still in Gaza. Of those, the Israeli military says 25 are dead.

According to Trump’s plan, in return for the hostages, Israel is expected to release 250 Palestinian prisoners with life sentences and more than 1,700 detainees from Gaza taken during the war.

Hamas has insisted it should have a say in the territory’s future, though Trump’s roadmap stipulates that it and other factions “not have any role in the governance of Gaza”.

Under the proposal, administration of the territory would be taken up by a technocratic body overseen by a transitional authority headed by Trump himself.

“We hope Trump will pressure Netanyahu and force him to stop the war,” said Ahmad Barbakh, from the Al-Mawasi area.

“We want the prisoner exchange deal to be completed quickly so that Israel has no excuse to continue the war.”

Hamas’s October 2023 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 67,160 Palestinians, according to health ministry figures in the Hamas-run territory that the United Nations considers reliable.