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The United States on Wednesday slapped sanctions on a shipping empire controlled by the son of a top political advisor to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The Treasury Department said the sanctions were being imposed on companies and vessels operated by Mohammad Hossein Shamkhani, the son of Ali Shamkhani, who has been subject to US sanctions since 2020.

It said Hossein operates a fleet of more than 50 tankers and container ships that transport Iranian and Russian oil and…

OTTAWA (Reuters) -Canada intends to recognize a Palestinian state at the United Nations in September, Prime Minister Mark Carney said on Wednesday.

Carney told reporters that the planned move was predicated on the Palestinian Authority’s commitment to reforms, including commitments to fundamentally reform its governance and to hold general elections in 2026 in which Hamas can play no part.

(Reporting by David Ljunggren; Editing by Leslie Adler)

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli forces killed at least 30 people when they opened fire Wednesday on a crowd waiting for humanitarian aid in the north of the Palestinian territory.

The Israeli military said it was reviewing the incident north of Gaza City, as the United Nations said that pauses in Israel’s offensive against Hamas were not enough to help the population through a deepening hunger crisis.

The UN humanitarian agency, OCHA, said that four days into Israel’s “tactical…

Within sight of Gaza, the devastated Palestinian enclave ravaged by nearly 22 months of war, hundreds of Israeli settlers marched Wednesday to stake their claim to the battered territory.

Waving Israeli flags alongside the orange banners of Gush Katif — a bloc of settlements dismantled in 2005 — the marchers went from the town of Sderot to the Asaf Siboni observation point, overlooking the ruins of Beit Hanun.

Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza 20 years ago ended 38 years of military presence….