Category Archives: Middle East and North Africa

A broken economy and an emboldened regime: Iranians abandoned to endure fallout from war

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Some Iranians hoped foreign intervention would unseat the regime but instead the US-Israel war has damaged livelihoods and strengthened those in power

As Donald Trump swung this week between threats of new military action against Iran and predictions that a lasting ceasefire deal was imminent, many Iranians were left exhausted and gripped by uncertainty.

Despite the partial lifting of an internet shutdown that began when the war started on 28 February, fears of worsening repression at home have also fuelled pessimism about the future among some of those to whom the Guardian spoke.

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Donald Trump shares draft Iran peace agreement with Israel and other allies

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US president’s move comes as both sides try to prevent fresh ceasefire breaches scuppering a potential deal

Donald Trump has circulated a draft peace agreement for the war with Iran among allies including Israel as both sides try to prevent fresh breaches of the ceasefire escalating out of control and scuppering any deal.

In an attempt to speed up the negotiations, Pakistan’s foreign minister, Mohammad Ishaq Dar, will fly to Washington on Friday to meet his US counterpart, Marco Rubio.

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Global heating is making hajj ever more dangerous, report finds

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Rising heat in Saudi Arabia threatens millions of Muslim pilgrims – but cutting fossil fuels would keep it safer

Global heating has “fundamentally altered” the climate of Mecca and is exposing millions of hajj pilgrims to extreme and dangerous heat even in months outside summer, new analysis has found.

Carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels means scorching temperatures of 40C (104F) are now regularly experienced in May, the study showed. In past decades, such peaks would only have occurred in summer. The researchers said that hajj, the annual Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca, would take place amid dangerous heat almost all year round by the end of the century without a rapid transition away from fossil fuels.

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Israel’s defence minister says large-scale Palestinian migration from Gaza will go ahead

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Human rights groups and lawyers say policy amounts to ethnic cleansing

Israel’s defence minister has said he is committed to the ethnic cleansing of Gaza through large-scale migration of Palestinians as part of Israel’s long-term plans for the territory.

Israel Katz said the government would implement a plan for large numbers of Palestinians to leave Gaza “at the right time and in the right manner”, in a statement on Wednesday marking the targeted killing of Mohammed Odeh, Hamas’s most recent military commander.

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‘This isn’t freedom’: anger, anxiety and tears as Iran’s internet flickers back

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After 88 days of near-total blackout, first reactions to the return of partial connectivity were not celebratory

After 88 days of near-total internet blackout in Iran, long-delayed messages, images and poems flooded phones and social media feeds at about 5pm on Tuesday, when still-limited connectivity flickered back to life.

The first reactions, however, were not celebratory. Many new posts were threaded with scepticism, anxiety and anger.

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Israel launches more than 120 airstrikes against Lebanon in a day

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One of heaviest days of bombing in weeks complicates peace talks as Israel targets sites linked to Hezbollah

Israel launched more than 120 airstrikes against Lebanon on Tuesday in one of the heaviest days of bombing in weeks, as the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said his military was escalating its offensive against Hezbollah.

A ceasefire brokered by the US last month between Israel and the militant Islamist movement now appears close to total collapse, complicating negotiations to bring a definitive end to the war with Iran.

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Iran remains in peace talks despite ‘bad faith’ US bombings of Iranian targets

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Tehran condemns ‘definitive violation’ but announces no specific reprisals as negotiations near decisive stage

A proposed peace agreement between Iran and the US seemed to remain on the table on Tuesday despite US bombings of Iranian targets.

The Iranian foreign ministry denounced the US attack – aimed at missile launchers and efforts to lay fresh mines in the strait of Hormuz – as “an act of bad faith” and “a definitive violation of the ceasefire” and said it would not leave aggression unanswered. But it did not pull out of the talks that were continuing under the joint mediation of Pakistan and Qatar.

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Iran’s access to global internet starts to resume after 88-day blackout

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End of shutdown comes despite interim court order questioning authority of body overseeing the move

Iran’s access to the global internet slowly restarted on Tuesday, ending a record 88-day blackout that has contributed to thousands of Iranians losing their jobs and provided cover for the Iranian security services to mount a large-scale wartime crackdown.

The resumption came despite an interim administrative court order questioning the authority of the body overseeing the move, called the “special headquarters for leading the country’s cyberspace”. The body had been set up by the president, Masoud Pezeshkian, a week ago.

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Middle East crisis live: US attacks Iran missile sites as Tehran negotiators hold talks in Qatar

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US Central Command claims targets also included boats trying to lay mines, rattling ceasefire, while Iranians meet with Qatari prime minister in Doha

Welcome to the Guardian’s continuing live coverage of the crisis in the Middle East.

US forces attacked missile sites in southern Iran and boats trying to lay mines on Monday, US Central Command said, as top Iranian negotiators arrived in Doha for talks to end the war.

Trump said the enriched uranium held by Iran could be destroyed inside the country, in a process overseen by an international nuclear agency. Experts said his announcement could amount to a major concession to Tehran.

Trump also said any deal to end the war with Iran should require certain countries in the region – Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey and Pakistan – to sign up to the Abraham accords. The agreements aimed at normalising relations with Israel were brokered by the US during Trump’s first term.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to “crush” Hezbollah in Lebanon, dealing another blow to hopes for a US-Iran deal. Tehran has demanded that any peace accord apply to the fighting in Lebanon as well.

Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi praised Hezbollah for the Tehran-backed militant group’s ongoing resistance in Lebanon against Israel.

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US strikes Iran missile sites and mine laying vessels as Trump’s promised peace deal remains elusive

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Negotiators from Iran travelled to Qatar on Monday, with the fate of the country’s nuclear programme and access to frozen assets under discussion

The US has launched strikes on southern Iran in a test of the seven-week long ceasefire, as both sides played down hopes for an imminent peace deal even as negotiators from Tehran began new talks in Qatar.

US forces targeted missile launch sites and boats attempting to lay mines, US central command (Centcom) said on Tuesday, but stressed that the strikes did not indicate the ceasefire with Iran was over.

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Israel escalates strikes in Lebanon as Netanyahu vows to ‘crush’ Hezbollah

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Hezbollah and Israel launch attacks amid increasingly imperilled ceasefire and stalling talks between US and Iran

The Israeli army has intensified strikes in southern Lebanon, as prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had ordered the military to escalate its offensive in an effort to “crush” Hezbollah in a further erosion of an already fragmented ceasefire.

In turn, Hezbollah said it staged several attacks on Monday on three barracks and a military post in northern Israel “in response to the violation of the ceasefire” by Israel.

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Iran denies deal with US is imminent despite some progress

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Tehran says ‘contradictory statements’ from US and Israeli interference hindering negotiations

Iran has poured cold water on suggestions that a deal with the US is imminent, pointing to the confusion in US positions and Israeli interference as key factors in why a complete agreement is proving difficult to secure.

Speaking at the weekly foreign ministry press briefing, Esmail Baghaei, the spokesperson for Iran’s negotiating team, also said future management of the strait of Hormuz was a matter for Oman and Iran to reach agreement on, and that it was not tolls that were being proposed but “fees for navigational services”.

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Opposition divided: battle among Iranian regime’s opponents plays out on London streets

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Supporters of Reza Pahlavi, exiled son of the late shah, are clashing with those who oppose a return of monarchy

Wearing a bucket hat, a blue Adidas hoodie and khaki shorts, Tony Mohraz, also known as 021kid, chest-bumps a friend in front of a memorial wall in Golders Green, in north London.

Photographs can be seen behind him of those who were killed protesting against the Iranian regime. As a large lion and sun flag used in Iran before the Islamic revolution is waved overhead, Mohraz starts to rap.

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Israeli strikes pound Lebanon despite signs US and Iran are close to peace deal

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Some casualties after attacks on multiple locations in south and east of country on Sunday, state media reports

Israeli strikes have hit southern and eastern Lebanon, a day after 11 people were killed in a single raid on the south despite a ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war and claims that the US and Iran are about to reach a peace deal.

Saturday’s strike in Sir al-Gharbiyeh “resulted in a massacre whose final toll is 11 dead including a child and six women, and nine wounded including four children and a woman,” Lebanon’s health ministry said.

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US and Iran inch closer to peace deal as Trump faces criticism from GOP hawks

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American president says he is not rushing into a deal after proposed plan to end war prompts Republican backlash

Donald Trump defended himself against criticism from fellow Republicans on Sunday as he appeared on the verge of agreeing a deal with Iran to end the war.

As hawks in his party called the proposed agreement a disaster and questioned why the US president had launched the conflict in the first place, Trump claimed on social media that his deal would be “THE EXACT OPPOSITE” of the one agreed by Barack Obama, which Trump pulled out of in 2018.

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With oil markets nearing the danger zone, a US-Iran deal can’t come soon enough | Heather Stewart

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Global prices are approaching a tipping point that could trigger inflation, shortages and, over time, recession

If a US-Iran deal is about to be reached, three months on from the launch of Donald Trump’s Operation Epic Fury, it will not be a day too soon for oil markets, which are approaching a dangerous tipping point.

The cost of a barrel of crude on the spot market – for immediate purchase, effectively – has bounced about $100 since Iran predictably responded to the onslaught from the US and Israel by closing the strait of Hormuz.

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What may be included in proposed Iran ceasefire deal?

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Proposed framework hinges on a 60-day truce, reopening strait of Hormuz, and revived talks on limiting Iran nuclear programme

• Middle East crisis: live updates

Donald Trump has said a “memorandum of understanding” in talks to end the US-Israel war on Iran “has been largely negotiated”.

Official details of the deal remain scant and it remains possible some aspects of the memo could change, but here is what we know so far about the potential agreement that could bring an end to the war.

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Hunger increasingly used as weapon of war as ‘food-related violence’ surges, analysis shows

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More than 20,000 attacks on markets, farmland and food distribution systems have been recorded since 2018

Hunger is being increasingly exploited as a weapon of war with more than 20,000 documented incidents of “food-related violence” in the past eight years, new analysis reveals.

Attacks include 1,261 strikes on markets used by families for daily groceries and 863 incidents in which food distribution systems were targeted and workers killed.

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Middle East crisis live: Pakistan hopes to host US-Iran peace talks ‘very soon’, says PM, after Trump claims Tehran deal ‘largely negotiated’

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Shehbaz Sharif congratulates US president on his peace efforts after Trump claims strait of Hormuz will be opened as part of deal

In Lebanon, the civil defence agency said early on Sunday its regional facility in the southern city of Nabatieh had been destroyed by an Israeli strike.

The Directorate General of Civil Defence said the building had collapsed and a large number of vehicles and equipment had been damaged by a “direct hit in a hostile Israeli strike”.

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Board of Peace focus on Hamas risks return to war in Gaza, critics say

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US-backed board has put sole blame for stalled ceasefire on militant group despite Israel not fulfilling its obligations, analysts say

The top diplomat from the Board of Peace has blamed Hamas for the stalled ceasefire, but critics have said the US-backed board’s lack of even-handedness in implementing the truce risks a return to war.

The “high representative for Gaza”, Nickolay Mladenov, told the UN security council on Thursday that Hamas was the “principal obstacle” to the ceasefire’s continued implementation because “it refused to accept verified decommissioning, relinquish coercive control and allow a genuine civilian transition”.

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