Category Archives: Middle East and North Africa

Israeli police ​attack funeral procession for shot journalist Shireen Abu Aqleh

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TV images show Al Jazeera reporter Shireen Abu Aqleh’s coffin falling as police grab Palestinian flags from crowd

Israeli forces have attacked a funeral procession for a Palestinian American journalist shot dead this week, kicking and hitting people with batons and causing mourners carrying her coffin to lose balance and drop it to the ground.

Palestinian flags – which are rarely seen – were openly waved by many of the thousands of people who circumvented roadblocks in occupied East Jerusalem to join the funeral procession on Friday for Al Jazeera reporter Shireen Abu Aqleh. Mourners sang the Palestinian national anthem and chanted “Palestine! Palestine!”.

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UAE ruler Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan dies aged 73

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Ministry of presidential affairs announces 40-day mourning period for ruler who succeeded father in 2004

The United Arab Emirates’ long-ailing ruler, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, has died aged 73, the government’s state-run news agency has announced

Khalifa, the president of the UAE, oversaw much of the country’s blistering economic growth and his name was immortalised on the world’s tallest building, the Burj Khalifa, after bailing out debt-crippled Dubai during its financial crisis more than a decade ago.

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Iran arrests French couple and threatens to execute Swedish-Iranian

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Cécile Kohler and her husband held after holiday, while threat to kill scientist seen as reprisal for Swedish war crimes trial

Iranian authorities have arrested a French teaching union official and her husband and threatened to execute a Swedish-Iranian man who has been held in jail for six years by 21 May, in fresh moves against foreign and dual nationals.

The threat to execute Ahmadreza Djalali, a scientist, is widely seen as a reprisal for Sweden starting the trial in Stockholm of Hamid Nouri, who is accused of war crimes and murder committed during and after the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s.

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Shireen Abu Aqleh: thousands attend state memorial in West Bank

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Palestinians line streets in Ramallah as journalist’s coffin travels through, after shooting in Jenin on Wednesday

Shireen Abu Aqleh, the Palestinian American journalist shot dead during an Israeli army operation, has been honoured with a full state memorial in the West Bank city of Ramallah.

At least 5,000 people lined the streets on Thursday as her coffin, draped in the Palestinian flag, was driven through the city and the Qalandia checkpoint en route to St Joseph hospital nearer her home in occupied East Jerusalem. Her funeral will be held in the holy city on Friday.

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Saudi Aramco overtakes Apple as world’s most valuable company

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Soaring commodity prices swell oil giant’s profits as tech stock slide pegs back iPhone maker

Apple has lost its crown as the world’s most valuable company to the oil giant Saudi Aramco, as soaring commodity prices swell profits at energy companies and technology stocks continue to slide.

In a sign that the old economy is reasserting itself over the new this year, Aramco eclipsed Apple on Wednesday night amid the ongoing rout on Wall Street.

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Israel approves 2,700 housing units in illegal West Bank settlements

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Slew of approvals for construction in occupied areas comes weeks before planned visit by US president

Israel has approved 2,700 housing units in illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank, and advanced plans for another 1,600, a military body has said, a move likely to displease Washington before an expected visit to the region next month by the US president, Joe Biden.

An Israeli Civil Administration subcommittee meeting on Thursday approved the building plans and retroactively “legalised” two outposts in Area C, the 60% of the West Bank under full Israeli control. The news came a day after the Israeli military demolished Palestinian homes in an area where about 1,000 people face the threat of eviction to make way for a military training zone.

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Greg Norman says ‘we all make mistakes’ when asked about Khashoggi killing

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Australian golf champion makes remarks about journalist’s murder at Saudi-backed league event

The golf champion Greg Norman has attempted to dismiss questions over the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi at a Saudi consulate as a “mistake,” adding the Saudi government “wants to move forward”.

Norman was speaking at a promotional event in the UK for a Saudi-backed golf tournament, the LIV Golf Invitational Series. The 67-year-old is chief executive of LIV Golf Investments, funded primarily by the Saudi sovereign wealth fund.

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Hunger crisis grips Horn of Africa – but 80% of Britons unaware, poll shows

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UK government urged to act as worst drought in 40 years threatens region while aid efforts and global attention remain focused on Ukraine war

The UK government has been urged to give the hunger crisis gripping the Horn of Africa “proper attention”, as new polling showed just two in 10 people in Britain are aware that the worst drought in 40 years is even taking place, let alone threatening famine.

As the war in Ukraine rages, the combined effect of three failed rainy seasons has pushed parts of Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia to the brink, killing livestock, forcing people to leave their homes and increasing levels of child malnutrition. The Russian invasion has exacerbated the situation, pushing up the price of staples such as wheat and sunflower oil, as well as fuel.

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Two Britons testify against Interpol chief in UAE torture claim

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Matthew Hedges and Ali Issa Ahmad allege Ahmed Naser al-Raisi was responsible for abuse in detention

Two British men who spent time in detention in the United Arab Emirates have testified in Paris that an Emirati security official who is now the president of Interpol was responsible for their alleged torture.

Matthew Hedges, an academic imprisoned in the UAE for seven months on espionage charges he denies, and Ali Issa Ahmad, who was detained in Dubai for wearing a Qatar football shirt, testified before the investigating judge of the specialised judicial unit for crimes against humanity and war crimes of the Paris tribunal.

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Al Jazeera accuses Israeli forces of killing journalist in West Bank

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Israeli official appears to back away from earlier claims Palestinians to blame for death of Shireen Abu Akleh

Al Jazeera has accused Israel of deliberately killing one of its reporters during a military raid in the occupied West Bank town of Jenin.

Shireen Abu Akleh, 51, a Palestinian American and one of the Arab world’s best-known journalists, who had covered the conflict for decades, was shot in the head on Wednesday morning and taken to hospital in a critical condition.

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Shireen Abu Akleh killing: ‘She was the voice of events in Palestine’

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Tributes paid to Al Jazeera journalist and authority on Israeli-Palestinian conflict who has been shot in West Bank

Shireen Abu Akleh, the Al Jazeera correspondent who has been shot and killed in Jenin in the West Bank, was a veteran observer of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, renowned across the Arab world as an authoritative voice on the region’s most contested story.

The 51-year-old joint Palestinian and US citizen had reported from nearly every flashpoint in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem over three decades, during which she regularly crisscrossed between both sides telling the stories of Palestinians and Israelis from homes, battlegrounds and the drawing rooms of leaders.

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Nine arrested in Israel after air crash images sent to plane passengers

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Authorities believe suspects used iPhone AirDrop to share photos before takeoff at Ben Gurion airport

A taxiing plane returned to the gate at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport after photos of aviation disasters popped up on passengers’ phones – sent, Israeli authorities believe, by nine people onboard using the iPhone AirDrop function.

The incident happened shortly before the AnadoluJet passenger plane was readying for takeoff for Istanbul, the Israel Airports Authority (IAA) said.

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Israeli police arrest two Palestinians over independence day attack

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Pair suspected of killing three Israelis caught outside town of Elad after massive manhunt

Two Palestinians believed to have killed three people in a terrorist attack on Israel’s independence day – the latest incident in the worst wave of attacks in Israel in years – have been apprehended by police after a three-day manhunt.

The suspects, identified as As’ad Yousef As’ad al-Rifa’i, 19, Subhi Emad Subhi Abu Shqeir, 20, both from the occupied West Bank village of Rumana, were caught near a quarry outside the town of Elad in central Israel on Sunday, according to a statement by Israel’s police, military and internal security agency.

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UN leads £65m plan to stop huge oil spill off Yemen during first ceasefire in six years

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Decrepit tanker used for storage at risk of creating a disaster worse than Exxon Valdez in 1989

The UN is to stage a rare donor conference on Wednesday in a bid to raise the $80m (£65m) necessary to prevent an ageing oil tanker off the west coast of Yemen exploding and causing an environmental disaster potentially four times worse than the Exxon Valdez spill near Alaska in 1989.

The money is needed to offload more than 1.14m barrels of oil that have been sitting in the decrepit cargo ship, Safer, for more than six years because of an impasse between Houthi groups and the Saudi-backed government over ownership and responsibility.

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Egypt says 11 troops killed in militant attack in northern Sinai

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At least five others wounded in one of deadliest attacks against Egyptian security forces in recent years

At least 11 troops, including an officer, have been killed in a militant attack in the restive northern part of the Sinai peninsula, Egypt’s military said on Saturday.

It said in a statement that the militants attacked a water pumping station east of the Suez canal. It did not give further details on the location.

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Trump sought strike on top Iran military figure for political reasons – Esper book

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Robert O’Brien told top general shortly before 2020 election that Trump wanted to kill unnamed official, according to Esper memoir

Shortly before the 2020 election, Donald Trump’s national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, “stunned” the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff by saying the president wanted to kill a senior Iranian military officer operating outside the Islamic Republic.

“This was a really bad idea with very big consequences,” Mark Esper, Trump’s second and last secretary of defense, writes in his new memoir, adding that Gen Mark Milley suspected O’Brien saw the strike purely in terms of Trump’s political interests.

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Guardian wins Amnesty media award for best use of digital media

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Award given for the interactive reconstruction of the moment Israeli forces hit a residential tower block in Gaza

The Guardian has won a prestigious Amnesty media award for the interactive reconstruction Countdown to the airstrike: the moment Israeli forces hit al-Jalaa tower, Gaza, showing the race to evacuate residents of a block of flats before their homes were turned to rubble.

The Best Use of Digital Media award was given to the Guardian’s Global Development reporter Kaamil Ahmed and interactive designer Garry Blight, Airwars’ Joe Dyke and the Gaza-based journalist Anas Baba for their use of video, images and audio captured by the residents of al-Jalaa tower in the hour after Israeli forces called to tell them it would be demolished.

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Three people killed and at least four injured in attack in Israeli town of Elad

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Israel launches hunt for suspects after two Palestinian suspects carrying axe and firearm attacked passersby

Three people have been killed and at least four more injured in the central Israeli town of Elad, in the latest in a spate of street attacks that have sent tensions soaring in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in recent weeks.

Israeli forces have launched a hunt for two Palestinian suspects, backed by a large deployment of security personnel, helicopters, drones and roadblocks. Police said the suspects were 19 and 20 years old and came from the town of Jenin in the occupied West Bank.

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Ministers accused of abandoning UK geologist at risk of execution in Iraq

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Family ‘baffled’ by Foreign Office after Jim Fitton arrested for taking pottery pieces from ancient site

The family of a British man who has been detained in Iraq for more than six weeks and faces execution for collecting fragments of pottery at an ancient site has accused British ministers of abandoning him, and expressed concern over the conditions he is being held in.

Jim Fitton, 66, who was on an organised geology and archaeology trip, was arrested at Baghdad airport as he tried to fly out. He was detained on suspicion of smuggling, after pieces of pottery he had been assured by guides were worthless were found in his luggage.

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Hundreds of Iraqis hospitalised as thick sandstorm blankets country

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Flights suspended and authorities urge people to stay indoors as fifth sandstorm in a month hits Iraq

Hundreds of Iraqis have been taken to hospitals with breathing problems and Baghdad airport suspended flights for several hours as a thick sandstorm blanketed the country, the fifth to engulf Iraq within a month.

Iraqi state media said most of the patients suffered respiratory issues as clinics across the country’s north and west struggled to keep up with the influx. Authorities urged citizens to stay indoors.

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