Category: 2. Middle East

The Israeli army announced “extensive ground operations” Sunday as part of its newly expanded campaign in the Gaza Strip, where rescuers reported dozens killed in a wave of Israeli strikes.

The announcement came just hours after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signalled Israel was open to a deal with Hamas that involved “ending the fighting” in the besieged Palestinian territory.

The military said that over the past day, troops had “begun extensive ground operations throughout the northern…

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli air strikes on Sunday killed at least 33 people, more than half of them children, a day after Israel announced an expanded military campaign in the besieged territory.

Israel’s military has said the expansion of its operations is aimed at “achieving all the war’s objectives” including releasing hostages and “the defeat of Hamas”.

The intensified assault comes as international concern has mounted over worsening humanitarian conditions in Gaza due to an…

Israel signalled Sunday that it was open to striking a deal with Hamas that included “ending the fighting” in Gaza, where rescuers reported dozens killed a day after Israel stepped up its offensive.

Israel’s military has said the expansion of its campaign is aimed at “achieving all the war’s objectives” including releasing hostages and “the defeat of Hamas”.

But as the intensified operations got underway, Israel and Hamas were entering indirect talks in Qatar that the Palestinian group said…

Israel will allow a “basic amount” of food into the Gaza Strip, the prime minister’s office said Sunday, after facing mounting pressure to lift a total blockade imposed more than two months ago.

The announcement came hours after the military said it had begun “extensive ground operations” in a newly intensified campaign in Gaza, and as Israel and Hamas engaged in indirect talks on a deal to potentially halt the fighting.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said that at the military’s…

Syrian Foreign Minister Assad al-Shaibani said Saturday that Israel’s violations against his country’s sovereignty pose a “threat to regional stability,” while praising the “effective mediation” efforts by Türkiye and Saudi Arabia to lift US sanctions on Syria, Anadolu reports.

Speaking at the 34th Arab League Summit in Baghdad, Shaibani expressed Damascus’ hope for “a unified Arab position” in support of Syria’s right to regain full…

Hasan Hadi, the first filmmaker from Iraq to be selected for the prestigious Cannes Festival, said economic embargoes like those imposed in his childhood under Saddam Hussein did not work.

“Sanctions empower dictators,” he told AFP, as they concentrate scant resources in their hands and only make them “more brutal”.

“In the history of the world, there was no one time when they (imposed) sanctions and the president couldn’t eat.”

Hadi’s first feature film, “The President’s Cake”, has received…

Syria on Saturday announced the formation of a national commission for missing persons and another for transitional justice, more than five months after the ouster of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad.

Syria’s new authorities have pledged justice for victims of atrocities committed under Assad’s rule, and a five-year transitional constitution signed in March provided for the formation of a transitional justice commission.

The fate of tens of thousands of detainees and others who went missing…

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators clashed with riot police in Basel as the Swiss city hosted the Eurovision Song Contest Saturday, AFP journalists at the scene witnessed.

Protesters demonstrating against Israel’s participation in the contest while it ramps up its war in Gaza clashed briefly with police in the centre of the city shortly before Israel’s Eurovision entrant Yuval Raphael took to the stage at the St. Jakobshalle venue across town.

Blows were exchanged and police used tear gas and…

Germany on Saturday criticized Israel’s latest military attacks in Gaza, warning that the offensive could undermine ceasefire efforts, endanger the lives of hostages, and worsen the already catastrophic humanitarian crisis, Anadolu reports.

“The launch of a renewed Israeli ground offensive in Gaza is cause for deep concern – both with regard to Israel’s strategic objectives and the humanitarian situation in Gaza,” the German Foreign Ministry said in a…

“People of Gaza, the Israeli army is coming,” read leaflets dropped by Israel on Gaza on Saturday, threatening to escalate its ongoing military campaign, which has lasted for 19 months, with a new ground offensive, Anadolu reports.

The leaflets were scattered over several neighborhoods and bore the warning: “People of Gaza, the Israeli army is coming,” eyewitnesses told Anadolu.

The leaflets were dropped a day after the Israeli military announced the…