Category: 2. Middle East

WASHINGTON — The United States on Wednesday vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, the release of hostages and the unrestricted flow of aid. 

The council’s remaining 14 members voted in favor of the resolution, which demanded “an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in Gaza respected by all parties.” 

Under the Biden administration, the United States repeatedly exercised its veto authority on the Security Council…

Thousands of demonstrators gathered Wednesday outside parliament in London to demand the government stop arming Israel and sanction Tel Aviv as part of a new action called a “Red Line for Palestine,” Anadolu reports.

Several MPs and celebrities joined the “Red Line for Palestine” around the building when the weekly Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs) session was underway at the House of Commons.

Protesters chanted: “Stop arming Israel” and “Full…

An elderly Palestinian detainee from the Gaza Strip died in Israeli detention, bringing the death toll since October 2023 to 71, prisoners’ affairs groups said on Wednesday, Anadolu reports.

Mohammad Ibrahim Abu Habel, 70, breathed his last in the notorious Sde Teiman facility in southern Israel, the Commission of Detainees’ Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoner Society said in a joint statement.

A father of 11, Abu Habel was detained by Israeli army forces on…

Ireland’s prestigious Trinity College Dublin said on Wednesday that it would cut all links with Israel in protest at “ongoing violations of international and humanitarian law”.

The university’s board informed students by email that it had accepted the recommendations of a taskforce to sever “institutional links with the State of Israel, Israeli universities and companies headquartered in Israel”.

The recommendations would be “enacted for the duration of the ongoing violations of international…

US President Donald Trump said he spoke to Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin Wednesday about Ukraine and Iran, warning that the Kremlin leader had “very strongly” pledged to respond to Kyiv’s stunning drone attack on Russian bombers.

Trump said that there was no “immediate peace” on the horizon in Ukraine — which Russia invaded in 2022 — following what he described as a one hour and 15 minute call with the Russian president.

On Iran, Trump said that Putin had offered to “participate” in…

The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a widely criticised US-Israeli initiative accused of facilitating Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, has appointed an evangelical Christian Zionist, Rev Johnnie Moore, a close ally of Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu, as its new executive director.

Moore’s appointment follows the abrupt resignation of Jake Wood, a former US marine and humanitarian aid leader, who left the role citing the GHF’s inability to operate…

Working day and night in front of maps, screens and seemingly endless data, Saudi officials have harnessed artificial intelligence to help manage the million-strong sea of pilgrims during the hajj.

The technology has proven pivotal to track the overwhelming amount of footage from more than 15,000 cameras in and around the holy city of Mecca.

The systems are tuned to spot abnormal crowd movements or predict bottlenecks in foot traffic — a potential life-saver at a packed event with a history…