Starmer calls Gaza City takeover plan wrong and urges Israel to reconsider

UK prime minister says occupation approved by Benjamin Netanyahu’s war cabinet will only bring more bloodshed

Keir Starmer has urged Benjamin Netanyahu to reconsider his plans to take over Gaza City and said the move would only bring more bloodshed.

The British prime minister said Israel’s decision to escalate a conflict that has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians over the past 22 months while pushing the territory into famine was wrong and would do nothing to secure the release of Israeli hostages.

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Natsiaa 2025: Gaypalani Waṉambi wins $100,000 award for ‘exquisite’ artwork made with discarded road signs

Waṉambi takes home Australia’s most prestigious First Nations art prize for her artwork Burwu, blossom, which saw her etch thousands of stringybark blossoms and bees

Gaypalani Waṉambi grew up surrounded by art, with her family home in north-eastern Arnhem Land doubling as a studio where her parents and siblings painted on bark and wooden poles. In her late teens, she started assisting her father, esteemed artist Mr W Waṉambi, who taught her how to paint the clan’s ancient designs, using traditional materials such as ochre. As he branched into more experimental forms such as animation and etching on metal, she too began to experiment with these new mediums.

On Friday night, the Yolŋu woman was awarded the $100,000 top prize at the 42nd National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art awards (Natsiaas), one of Australia’s richest and most prestigious art prizes, for an artwork that honoured his legacy while forging her own path.

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NSW police officers jailed for assaulting woman suffering mental health episode during welfare check

Nathan Black, 28, and Timothy John Trautsch, 30, sentenced to at least three years in prison for attack in Sydney in 2023

Two police officers who punched, kicked and pepper-sprayed a naked woman experiencing a mental health episode will spend the next three years behind bars.

Nathan Black, 28, and Timothy John Trautsch, 30, were sentenced in the Penrith district court in Sydney on Friday.

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‘They must not touch the Strait’: Sicily bridge opponents vow to put up a fight – Reuters

  1. 'They must not touch the Strait': Sicily bridge opponents vow to put up a fight  Reuters
  2. Italy OKs $15.5 billion project to build world's longest suspension bridge from mainland to Sicily  AP News
  3. Record-breaking bridges: How Italy and China are pushing engineering limits  ABC News
  4. Meloni revives €13.5bn Sicilian bridge proposal as part of defence planning  Financial Times
  5. Italy gives final approval for world's longest suspension bridge to Sicily  BBC
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Israel-Gaza war live: security cabinet approves Gaza City take over; opposition leader calls decision ‘a disaster’

Yair Lapid says far-right ministers dragged Benjamin Netanyahu into ‘exactly what Hamas wanted’ after security cabinet approves take over plan

The UK’s ambassador to Israel has said extending the war in Gaza would only lead to more deaths and that occupying Gaza would be a “huge mistake”.

Simon Walters was quoted by Israel’s Haaretz newspaper as saying on Thursday:

The IDF has achieved all that it can achieve in Gaza, and extending the war any further will simply lead to more deaths. Deaths of soldiers, deaths of Palestinians, deaths of hostages.

If you want to defeat Hamas, you cannot achieve that through military force. You need to use politics and diplomacy and you need to give the people of Gaza an alternative to Hamas.

We are working with friends, allies in Europe and in the Middle East to generate a real plan for what happens after the fighting stops, after the war.

It needs to be a description of what the governments will be for Gaza. That has to be governance by Palestinians who are not members of Hamas with a role for the Palestinian Authority.

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Penny Wong warns Israel that occupying Gaza could violate international law

Australia’s foreign minister says two-state solution the only pathway to peace as Israel’s security cabinet approves plan to take over Gaza City

Penny Wong has urged Israel not to follow through on its plans to occupy Gaza, a step she said could constitute a breach of international law.

In a statement to Guardian Australia, Australia’s foreign minister pushed back on Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to take control of the whole Gaza Strip. The plan approved by Israel’s security cabinet after an overnight meeting on Thursday – to take over Gaza City – stopped short of that, but will likely displace tens of thousands of Palestinians already suffering from famine.

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Neo-Nazi leader sentenced to 20 years for plot to attack Maryland’s power grid

Brandon Russell, founder of neo-Nazi group Atomwaffen Division, was convicted of plotting to blow up Baltimore power grid

The founder of a Florida-based neo-Nazi group has been sentenced to 20 years in federal prison for conspiring with his girlfriend to plan an attack on Maryland’s power grid in furtherance of their shared racist beliefs.

Brandon Russell, 30, was convicted by a jury earlier this year. Prosecutors presented evidence detailing his longstanding affiliation with white supremacist causes and his recent efforts to organize “sniper attacks” on electrical substations around Baltimore.

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Emergency care at Lucy Letby hospital falls short of legal standards, CQC finds

Countess of Chester receives urgent warning notice over ‘visibly dirty equipment’ and routine corridor care

Emergency care at the hospital where Lucy Letby worked is falling far short of legal standards, the healthcare watchdog has found, with routine corridor care and “critical gaps” in sepsis treatment.

The Countess of Chester hospital, in north-west England, was issued with an urgent warning notice after inspectors found “repeated breaches” of regulations in its emergency care unit.

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