Category: 2. Middle East

Gaza rescuers said Israeli gunfire killed at least 22 Palestinians near a US-backed aid distribution site on Sunday, shortly after Washington rejected Hamas’s response to a ceasefire proposal as “totally unacceptable”.

International critics, including some allies, have condemned Israel over the humanitarian crisis in war-ravaged Gaza, where the United Nations has warned the entire population faces famine after a more than two-month blockade on aid.

Israel recently introduced a revamped aid…

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli gunfire killed at least 31 Palestinians near a US-backed aid distribution site on Sunday, with both the group in charge of the site and the military denying any such incident took place.

Israel has faced growing condemnation over the humanitarian crisis in the war-ravaged Gaza Strip, where the United Nations has warned the entire population faces the risk of famine after no aid was allowed to enter for more than two months.

Israel recently eased its…

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli gunfire killed at least 31 Palestinians near a US-backed aid distribution site on Sunday, with the group in charge of the new delivery mechanism denying any incident.

Israel has faced growing condemnation over the humanitarian crisis in the war-ravaged Gaza Strip, where the United Nations has warned the entire population faces famine after no aid had been allowed to enter for more than two months.

Israel has recently eased its blockade and introduced a…

Iran has ramped up production of highly enriched uranium, according to a confidential UN watchdog report, as Tehran said Saturday that it had received US proposals to settle its long-running nuclear dispute with the West.

Iran rejected the report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the latest move in years-long efforts to restrict its nuclear activities over fears that it is seeking to develop nuclear weapons.

The IAEA report, seen by AFP, said Iran had sharply increased its…

Egypt, Tunisia, and Algeria—Libya’s three neighboring countries—on Saturday called on all Libyan parties to put an “immediate” end to escalation and hold simultaneous parliamentary and presidential elections, Anadolu reports.

The call was made in a joint statement released by the Egyptian Foreign Ministry following a Libya-related trilateral meeting in Cairo.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty, Tunisian Foreign Minister Mohamed Ali Nafti, and…

Hamas announced on Saturday that it had replied to a US-backed Gaza ceasefire proposal, but Washington’s main negotiator criticised the response as “totally unacceptable”.

The Palestinian militant group said its response was positive while emphasising the need for a permanent ceasefire — long a sticking point for Israel.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu echoed US envoy Steve Witkoff’s assessment that the response was “unacceptable”, accusing Hamas of clinging “to its…

Hamas announced on Saturday that it had submitted its response to a ceasefire proposal from US envoy Steve Witkoff, saying 10 living hostages would be freed from Gaza under the deal.

The White House had said the latest proposal for a deal was approved in advance by Israel, which on Friday warned Hamas to either accept the deal and free the hostages “or be annihilated”.

The Palestinian militant group did not explicitly say it had accepted the version of the proposal it received on Thursday,…

Illegal Israeli settlers began setting up a new outpost on Saturday in the village of Khilet al-Daba, south of Hebron in the occupied West Bank, on the rubble of a Palestinian home demolished by the Israeli army weeks earlier.

Mohammad Rab’i, head of the village council in nearby At-Tawani, told Anadolu that illegal Israeli settlers erected a tent on the remains of a Palestinian resident’s home.

The house was one of 25 structures, including homes,…

The Palestinian group Hamas announced on Saturday that it has submitted its response to the latest Gaza ceasefire proposal by US envoy Steve Witkoff through mediators Egypt and Qatar, Anadolu reports.

In what appeared to be a list of demands, Hamas issued a statement calling for “a permanent ceasefire, a complete Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, and guarantees for the continuous flow of humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people in the…

A Lebanese was killed on Saturday in an Israeli air strike targeting a vehicle in the town of Deir El-Zahrani in southern Lebanon, marking a new violation of the ceasefire agreement between the two sides, the Health Ministry said, Anadolu reports.

The ministry’s Emergency Operations Center said the man was killed in the strike on a vehicle in Deir al-Zahrani in the Nabatieh district.

Despite a November ceasefire, Israeli forces continue to carry out attacks in…