Category: 2. Middle East

Gaza is at “critical risk of famine”, with 22 percent of the population facing an imminent humanitarian “catastrophe” after more than two months of an aid blockade by Israel, a food security monitor warned Monday.

Gaza’s entire population of around 2.4 million people is at risk of a food crisis “or worse” by September, the UN- and NGO-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) said in a report.

“Nineteen months into the conflict, the Gaza Strip is still confronted with a…

Saada Arbane has lived without a voice since her throat was slit during the Algerian civil war. But now, the 31-year-old woman has vowed to make herself heard after she said a best-selling novel plagiarised her life.

Kamel Daoud’s novel “Houris” — banned in Algeria and awarded France’s top literary prize Prix Goncourt last year — tells the story of a child who loses her voice when an Islamist cuts her throat during the 1990s war.

Last November, Arbane took the literary world by storm when…

Palestinians in Gaza are starving as a result of a “deliberate, entirely engineered” policy being implemented by Israel, Oxfam said today.

Commenting on the recent Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report on Gaza warning that a risk of famine is “increasingly likely” if intense hostilities and restricted humanitarian access persist or worsen, Oxfam’s Food Security and Livelihoods Coordinator, Mahmoud Alsaqqa said: “Gaza’s…

Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad Al-Shaibani announced that Damascus will dispatch a special team to Sudan to assess the situation of Syrians currently residing there.

Al-Shaibani wrote: “In line with the directives of His Excellency President Ahmed Al-Sharaa, we will send a special team to Sudan to assess the situation of Syrians under the current circumstances.”

“The team will provide the necessary support, work to evacuate them and ensure their safety.”

A creeping Israeli presence is nothing new for the Bedouins who inhabit the arid hills east of Jerusalem, but a recently approved road in the area means the spectre of annexation now looms large.

Israeli authorities in March green lit the construction of a separate route for Palestinian vehicles to bypass a central stretch of the occupied West Bank –- one of the territory’s most disputed parcels of land.

Israel has promoted the project as a way to further facilitate settlement expansion in…

Hundreds of Palestinian Red Crescent staff marched in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah on Monday to protest the killing of medical workers in Gaza over the past 19 months of war.

Gathering in the city’s Clock Square, medical personnel, support staff and volunteers wore white and orange vests and waved flags bearing the Red Crescent’s emblem.

The demonstration marked World Red Cross and Red Crescent Day, usually observed on May 8, and called for the “protection for medical and…

Hamas is part of the Palestinian political system and cannot be excluded, Palestinian Vice President Hussein Al-Sheikh said yesterday.

In an interview with Al Arabiya, Al-Sheikh said: “The United States is the only side capable of forcing Israel to stop the war in the Gaza Strip,” expressing hope that Hamas would also take action to facilitate peace.

He acknowledged Hamas as an integral part of the Palestinian people, stating: “Hamas is part of the people…

Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, the world’s largest, said it had sold all of its shares in Israel’s Paz Retail and Energy PAZ.TA because the company owns and operates infrastructure supplying fuel to Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, Reuters reports.

The divestment, announced yesterday, was the second of its kind by the fund after its ethics watchdog in August adopted a tougher interpretation of standards for businesses that aid Israel’s…

The entire population of Gaza faces a critical risk of famine, with half a million Palestinian facing starvation in the enclave, a global hunger monitor said today, calling this a major deterioration since its last report in October, Reuters reports.

The latest assessment by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) analysed a period from 1 April to 10 May this year and projected the situation until the end of September, according to a summary of…