Category: 2. Middle East

“They will destroy you and they will destroy the court,” an Israeli ICC lawyer connected to Benjamin Netanyahu warned Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan while urging him to drop the war crimes probe against the Israeli Prime Minister and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.

The warning was delivered during a private meeting in The Hague on 1 May by Nicholas Kaufman, a British-Israeli lawyer who currently defends former Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte at the…

Israel said it bombed Syrian army headquarters in Damascus on Wednesday after warning the Islamist-led government to leave the Druze minority alone in its Sweida heartland where a monitor says sectarian clashes have killed nearly 250 people.

Syrian government forces entered the majority-Druze city of Sweida on Tuesday with the stated aim of overseeing a ceasefire agreed with Druze community leaders after clashes with local Bedouin tribes left more than 100 people dead.

However, witnesses…

The United Nations warned Tuesday that mass displacement in the occupied West Bank has reached unprecedented levels since the start of Israel’s occupation of the territory nearly 60 years ago.

The military operation “has been the longest since … the second Intifada”, in the early 2000s, said Juliette Touma, spokeswoman for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

“It is impacting several refugee camps in the area, and it is causing the largest population…

In a significant move after years of tension, Iran has removed a street name honouring Khaled al-Islambouli, the chief suspect in the 1981 assassination of former Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. The street has been renamed “Hassan Nasrallah Street,” in tribute to the former Secretary-General of Lebanese Hezbollah, who was killed in an Israeli airstrike on Beirut on 27 September.

The renaming ceremony, attended by officials from the Tehran City Council and the…

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) estimated that since October 2023, Israel, the occupying power, has been killing the equivalent of a classroom full of children each day, with the number of students ranging between 35 and 45.

“Every single day since the start of the war in Gaza, on average, a classroom full of children has been killed,” said Acting Director of UNRWA Affairs in Gaza, Sam Rose.

Before the outbreak of the…

Spain’s Foreign Minister, Jose Manuel Albares, has called for an immediate stop to arms sales to Israel due to its violations in the Gaza Strip. His remarks come as EU foreign ministers continue to discuss possible measures against Israel over human rights abuses in Gaza.

Speaking to Al Jazeera on Tuesday, Albares said Israel’s human rights violations in Gaza can no longer be ignored. He reaffirmed the European Union’s commitment to a two-state solution.

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News Source: www.middleeastmonitor.com

The Palestinian Centre for the Missing and Forcibly Disappeared has reported that 350 people have gone missing under the rubble in Gaza over the past two weeks, describing the situation as a crime that requires international intervention.

In a statement released on Tuesday and shared with the Palestinian Information Centre, the organisation said that around 20 members of the Arafat family went missing on Monday after an airstrike destroyed a five-storey building…

Egypt has officially informed the United States and Israel of its firm rejection of a proposed plan to establish humanitarian camps in the border city of Rafah, according to Egyptian diplomatic sources quoted by the the Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar on Tuesday.

The sources said Cairo warned that the plan could violate terms of the peace treaty’s security agreement with Israel, which prohibits any breach of agreed security arrangements in the border areas.

The…

Iranian authorities have seized a foreign oil tanker carrying more than 2 million liters (528,000 gallons) of fuel, accusing it of smuggling, the state-run IRNA news agency reported Wednesday, Anadolu reports.

Mojtaba Ghahremani, judiciary chief for Iran’s southern Hormozgan province, said the vessel was intercepted in the Sea of Oman “due to deficiencies in the legal documents concerning the vessel’s cargo” and was charged with transporting smuggled…

Israel has withdrawn certain administrative powers over the Ibrahimi Mosque from the Palestinian-run Hebron Municipality, transferring them to the religious council of the Israeli Kiryat Arba settlement, an Israeli newspaper reported on Tuesday. 

According to Israel Hayom daily, this move represents a “historic and unprecedented step” that changes the status quo at what it referred to as the Cave of the Patriarchs (Ibrahimi Mosque).

The paper said that…