Category: 2. Middle East

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan and his Saudi counterpart Prince Faisal bin Farhan will co-chair the second session of their joint Coordination Council in Riyadh on Sunday, according to the Turkish Foreign Ministry, Anadolu reports.

Fidan will travel to Riyadh on Sunday for the second meeting of the Turkish-Saudi Coordination Council, his third visit to Saudi Arabia in the past year. His most recent trip was a working visit on Jan. 28-29.

Meanwhile, Prince…

The 34th Arab League Summit began on Saturday in Baghdad, with Israel’s war on Gaza dominating the talks besides other regional issues. It is Iraq’s fourth summit and first since 2012, Anadolu reports.

The summit began with a speech by Bahraini Foreign Minister Abdullatif Al-Zayani, as Manama held the presidency of the 33rd Arab League Summit.

Zayani emphasized Bahrain’s commitment to the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip and to upholding ceasefire…

The Palestinian resistance group, Hamas, hailed several European countries on Friday that demanded an end to the Israeli genocide in the Gaza Strip, Anadolu reports.

Hamas welcomed the positions of Spain, Norway, Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta and Slovenia, in “rejecting silence in the face of the worsening humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, and calling for halting the aggression, completely lifting the unjust siege.”

The seven countries said earlier that…

The UN relief chief said Friday that the UN has a plan to resume aid deliveries to the Gaza Strip, Anadolu reports.

“To those proposing an alternative modality for aid distribution, let’s not waste time: We already have a plan,” Tom Fletcher said in a statement.

Since March 2, Israel has kept Gaza’s crossings closed to food, medical and humanitarian aid, deepening an already worsening humanitarian crisis in the enclave.

“It is rooted in the…

Tunisia urged an “immediate” halt to escalation in all parts of Libya on Friday, citing dangers that developments pose to the country’s future and the safety of its people, Anadolu reports.

The Foreign Ministry expressed in a statement Tunisia’s readiness to host a Libyan-led dialogue, facilitated by the UN Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL), to reach a peaceful resolution to the conflict, according to the TAP News Agency.

The statement voiced concern…

Israel’s military said it killed a local Hezbollah commander on Saturday in south Lebanon, where authorities reported one dead in the fourth Israeli strike within days despite a November ceasefire.

Lebanon’s health ministry said one person was killed in an Israeli “drone strike” on a vehicle in south Lebanon’s Tyre district.

An AFP correspondent saw the charred wreckage of a vehicle in Abu al-Aswad, an area around 30 kilometres (20 miles) from the Israeli border.

The Israeli military said in a…

 Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian said on Saturday that US President Donald Trump speaks simultaneously about peace and threats, Reuters reports.

“Which should we believe?” Pezeshkian said at a naval event in Tehran. “On the one hand, he speaks of peace and on the other, he threatens with the most advanced tools of mass killing.”

Tehran would continue Iran-US nuclear talks but is not afraid of threats. “We are not seeking war,” he said.

Trump 

Seven European countries said Friday they would “not stay silent” in response to Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip, Anadolu reports.

“We will not be silent in front of the man-made humanitarian catastrophe that is taking place before our eyes in Gaza. More than 50.000 men, women, and children have lost their lives,” Ireland, Iceland, Luxembourg, Slovenia, Malta, Spain and Norway said in a statement.

Warning that many more people could starve to death in…

Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty stressed to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Friday the importance of mobilizing funds to implement the “Arab Reconstruction Plan for Gaza” at both the regional and international levels, amid Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza, Anadolu reports.

According to an Egyptian Foreign Ministry statement, Abdelatty met with Guterres on the sidelines of the preparatory ministerial meeting for the 34th Arab Summit, which…