Unrwa chief says compound has faced a number of attacks, with lives of UN staff at serious risk
The UN agency for Palestinian refugees has temporarily closed its East Jerusalem headquarters after weeks of attacks.
“This evening, Israeli residents set fire twice to the perimeter of the Unrwa headquarters in occupied East Jerusalem,” the head of the agency, Philippe Lazzarini, tweeted, lamenting that it was the second attack on the compound within days.
Continue reading...Deep concern displaced people will return to rubble of former homes without ‘basic essentials necessary for life’
More than 100,000 people have fled Rafah after Israel intensified its bombardment, UN officials have said, in the largest movement of population in Gaza for many months.
Humanitarian officials are tracking the number of people fleeing Rafah, the southernmost city in Gaza, where more than 1 million people displaced from elsewhere in the territory have been sheltering.
Continue reading...Police arrested dozens of people in Amsterdam, with university occupations continuing in Netherlands, Belgium and Spain
Thirty-two people were arrested as Dutch police broke up a Gaza war protest at the University of Amsterdam, in a second day of unrest over the conflict. Police said the offences included public violence, vandalism and assault.
Video captured by Reuters appeared to show officers in riot gear striking protesters and police knocking down makeshift barricades of desks, bricks and wooden pallets that seemingly had been used to set off fire extinguishers in hopes of pushing them back. The footage appeared to also show police dragging several students away as hundreds shouted: “Shame on you!”
Continue reading...As El Fasher stands on the ‘precipice of a massacre’, rights groups call for sanctions after new testimony describes atrocities carried out by RSF paramilitaries in Sudan
Gruesome new testimony details one of the worst atrocities of the year-long Sudanese civil war – the large-scale massacre of civilians as they desperately tried to flee an ethnic rampage in Darfur last summer.
Witnesses describe children, still alive, being “piled up and shot” by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) as they attempted to escape the regional capital of El Geneina in June last year during a bout of ethnic violence in which thousands of civilians were killed.
Continue reading...Andrew Mitchell says military action on city will not eradicate Hamas and priority is to secure a permanent ceasefire
An Israeli military offensive on the city of Rafah would break international humanitarian law and not lead to the eradication of Hamas, Andrew Mitchell, the UK’s deputy foreign minister, said on Tuesday, but he held back from spelling out any planned British consequences if a full-scale invasion goes ahead.
The line, agreed with the US, is aimed at limiting the options of the Israeli government so that it will accept a version of the three-stage peace deal adopted by Hamas. The UK said its aim was to secure a permanent and sustained ceasefire, and the removal of Hamas from the future governance of Gaza.
Continue reading...With the world’s humanitarian system in crisis, many NGOs now recognise that local charities can deliver much more at far less cost
Before civil war engulfed her Ethiopian home region of Tigray in 2020, Tsega Girma was a prosperous trader who sold stationery and other goods. But when hungry children displaced by the conflict started appearing in the streets, she sold everything and used the proceeds to buy them food.
After that money dried up, Tsega appealed to Tigray’s diaspora for donations. At the height of the war, her Emahoy Tsega Girma Charity Foundation provided meals to 24,000 children a day.
Continue reading...Organisers of this year’s environmental conference hope cooperation on green issues could help ease global tensions
This year’s Cop29 UN climate summit will be the first “Cop of peace”, focusing on the prevention of future climate-fuelled conflicts and using international cooperation on green issues to help heal existing tensions, according to plans being drawn up by organisers.
Nations may be asked to observe a “Cop truce”, suspending hostilities for the fortnight-long duration of the conference, modelled on the Olympic truce, which is observed by most governments during the summer and winter Olympic Games.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Penny Wong says a two-state solution is ‘the only path out’ of a cycle of violence as she meets Germany’s Annalena Baerbock
The Australian government faces a decision next week on whether to support admitting Palestine as a full member of the UN and is swapping notes with allies including South Korea and Germany.
A copy of the draft resolution, seen by Guardian Australia, expresses “deep regret and concern” that the US used its veto power to block the proposal at the UN security council last month.
Continue reading...Report to United Nations security council says remnants of Hwasong-11 violate arms export embargo on Russian ally
The debris from a missile that landed in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv on 2 January was from a North Korean Hwasong-11 series ballistic missile, UN sanctions monitors told a security council committee in a report seen by Reuters.
In the 32-page report, the UN sanctions monitors concluded that “debris recovered from a missile that landed in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on 2 January 2024 derives from a DPRK Hwasong-11 series missile” and is in violation of the arms embargo on North Korea.
Continue reading...Islamist group release new video apparently showing two hostages as UN warns famine thresholds will be breached within six weeks
Hamas has said it is studying the latest Israeli counterproposal regarding a potential ceasefire in Gaza, a day after media reports said a delegation from Egypt had arrived in Israel in an attempt to jumpstart stalled negotiations.
The signs of renewed truce talks come as the UN warned that “famine thresholds in Gaza will be breached within the next six weeks” unless massive food assistance arrives.
Continue reading...Top UN demining official outlines scale of devastation as Egypt officials fly into Israel in attempt to revive ceasefire talks
Israel’s war in Gaza has created 37m tonnes of debris, much of it laced with unexploded bombs, which could take more than a decade to remove, a top UN demining official said.
Nearly seven months into the war, there is an average 300kg of rubble a square metre of land in Gaza, Pehr Lodhammar, the former United Nationals Mine Action Service chief for Iraq, told a news conference.
Continue reading...Moscow described the security council resolution, which would have called on countries not to deploy weapons of mass destruction in outer space, a ‘dirty spectacle’
Russia has vetoed a UN security council resolution calling on all nations to prevent a dangerous nuclear arms race in outer space, describing it as “a dirty spectacle”.
The resolution, sponsored by the United States and Japan, would have called on all countries not to develop or deploy nuclear arms or other weapons of mass destruction in space, which are already banned under a 1967 international treaty.
Continue reading...Berlin restores ties with UN agency after review says Israel has provided no evidence of terrorist links
Germany has said it will restore cooperation and funding to Unrwa operations in the Gaza Strip after an independent review said Israel had not provided evidence to back up claims that hundreds of employees of the UN agency for Palestinians were members of terrorist organisations.
Berlin’s foreign and development ministries said in a joint statement on Wednesday that following Monday’s publication of the review, conducted by the former French foreign minister Catherine Colonna, the German government would soon resume cooperation with the UN’s Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa).
Continue reading...Children among those killed in second fatal incident in two weeks close to the Horn of Africa, says UN agency
At least 21 people have died after a boat capsized off the coast of Djibouti, the UN’s migration agency has said.
It was the second fatal maritime accident in two weeks off the Horn of Africa nation, which lies on the perilous so-called eastern migration route from Africa to the Middle East.
Continue reading...UN and Council for Europe add voices to outcry as more people drown within hours of ‘cruel’ Rwanda bill being passed
Humanitarian groups have called for new safe routes to Britain after five people died trying to cross the Channel within hours of ministers passing the controversial Rwanda bill.
A child and four adults drowned on Tuesday while trying to reach the UK in a boat from Wimereux, in France. More than 110 people were said to have been on board the vessel when it left the French coastline at 5am.
Continue reading...Spokesperson says some bodies allegedly had their hands tied while others were bound and stripped
The UN human rights chief, Volker Türk, has said he was “horrified” by reports of mass graves containing hundreds of bodies at two of Gaza’s largest hospitals.
Palestinian civil defence teams began exhuming bodies from a mass grave outside the Nasser hospital complex in Khan Younis last week after Israeli troops withdrew. A total of 310 bodies have been found in the last week, including 35 in the past day, Palestinian officials have said.
Continue reading...Prime minister says that deaths of five people attempting to cross the Channel shows need to stop boats and bill is intended to stop people smuggling
Rishi Sunak has said that the deaths of five people who were crossing the Channel in the early hours of this morning underlines the need to stop the boats.
Speaking to reporters on his plane to Poland, he argued that there was an “element of compassion” in his Rwanda policy because it is intended to stop people smuggling. He said:
There are reports of sadly yet more tragic deaths in the Channel this morning. I think that is just a reminder of why our plan is so important because there’s a certain element of compassion about everything that we’re doing.
We want to prevent people making these very dangerous crossings. If you look at what’s happening, criminal gangs are exploiting vulnerable people. They are packing more and more people into these unseaworthy dinghies.
Continue reading...Inquiry has not backed up allegations of ties to Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which led to loss of $450m as people died in droves
Unsupported Israeli allegations about Unrwa links to terrorism led major donors to cut $450m in funding to the main humanitarian agency working in Gaza at a time when people there were dying in droves.
Three months later, the situation has only worsened with the onset of a human-made famine on top of the bombing, the collapse of healthcare, the lack of water and a rise in epidemics. And despite a rigorous inquiry by the former French foreign minister Catherine Colonna, supported by three well-respected research institutes, there is still no evidence for the claim that significant numbers of Unrwa employees have Hamas or Islamic Jihad ties.
Continue reading...Exclusive: review finds government yet to substantiate claims UN relief agency staff have ties to Hamas or Islamic Jihad
Israel has yet to provide supporting evidence of its claims that employees of the UN relief agency Unrwa are members of terrorist organisations, an independent review led by the former French foreign minister Catherine Colonna has said.
The Colonna report, which was commissioned by the UN in the wake of Israeli allegations, found that Unrwa had regularly supplied Israel with lists of its employees for vetting, and that “the Israeli government has not informed Unrwa of any concerns relating to any Unrwa staff based on these staff lists since 2011”.
Continue reading...Tit-for-tat attacks have breached taboo of direct strikes on each other’s territory but Tehran has no ‘immediate’ plans to retaliate
World leaders urged calm on Friday after Israel conducted a pre-dawn drone sortie over Iran following a cycle of tit-for-tat attacks that crossed an important red line that has for decades held the Middle East back from a major regional conflict.
There were tentative hopes late on Friday that the apparent strike attempt against an airbase near the city of Isfahan was sufficiently limited to fend off the threat of a bigger Iranian response and an uncontrolled spiral of violence between a nuclear power and a state with the capacity to develop nuclear weapons quickly.
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