Eliya Cohen spent more than 500 days in captivity fearing Ziv Abud had died in Hamas attacks in 2023
An Israeli hostage only discovered his fiancee had survived the 7 October attacks after his release on Saturday, Israeli media has reported.
Eliya Cohen had spent more than 500 days in captivity fearing his bride-to-be, Ziv Abud, was dead. The last time they had seen each other, they were hiding in a shelter with relatives and friends after attending the Nova festival.
Continue reading...Accident happened in Siem Reap province that saw heavy fighting in 1980s between government soldiers and Khmer Rouge
A grenade believed to be more than 25 years old killed two toddlers when it blew up near their homes in rural Cambodia, officials said.
The accident happened on Saturday in Siem Reap province’s Svay Leu district, where there had been heavy fighting in the 1980s and 90s between Cambodian government soldiers and rebel guerrillas from the communist Khmer Rouge. The group had been ousted from power in 1979.
Continue reading...Macron says knife attack is ‘without any doubt an act of Islamist terrorism’
A 69-year-old man who intervened when a suspected terrorist attacked police officers with a knife shouting “Allahu Akbar” has died in eastern France.
Two police officers were also seriously injured in the suspected Islamist terrorist act, which took place in the city of Mulhouse during a demonstration in support of the Congo on Saturday afternoon. Three other police officers were lightly wounded.
Continue reading...Pontiff had fallen into critical condition, receiving high flows of oxygen and blood transfusions in hospital as he battles complex lung infection
Pope Francis had a “restful night” in hospital, the Vatican said on Sunday morning, after announcing on Saturday that he was in critical condition following a prolonged asthmatic respiratory crisis linked to pneumonia and a complex lung infection.
The 88-year-old pope received “high flows” of oxygen to help him breathe, it was announced on Saturday. He also received blood transfusions after tests showed low counts of platelets, which are needed for clotting, the Vatican said in a late update.
Continue reading...A probe to be launched this week aims to pinpoint sites of lunar water, which could help plan to colonise the Earth’s satellite
Space engineers are set to launch an unusual mission this week when they send a probe built by UK and US researchers to the moon to map water on its surface. Lunar Trailblazer’s two year mission is scheduled to begin on Thursday when the probe is blasted into space from Florida on a Space X Falcon rocket.
Its goal – to seek out water on the lunar surface – may seem odd given that the moon has traditionally been viewed as an arid, desiccated world. However, scientists have recently uncovered strong hints that it possesses significant quantities of water. It will be the task of Lunar Trailblazer to reveal just how much water there is near the lunar surface and pinpoint its main locations.
Continue reading...Joël Le Scouarnec’s ‘black books’ of handwritten notes in which alleged sexual abuse was recorded are at the heart of case against him
When two gendarmes knocked on her door in 2019, Marie had no idea that she was about to find herself at the dark heart of one of the world’s biggest child abuse cases.
The French mother of three, now 38, was shocked when the officers told her she had been the victim of Joël Le Scouarnec, a surgeon and an alleged serial paedophile accused of raping and sexually abusing hundreds of children.
Continue reading...Ceasefire in jeopardy as Israel says it will wait ‘until release of next hostages is guaranteed’
Hamas released six Israeli hostages on Saturday, but Israel delayed the handover of more than 600 Palestinians it was due to free from its prisons in exchange, putting the five-week-old ceasefire agreement once more in jeopardy.
The government said the release would be delayed “until the release of the next hostages is guaranteed, and without the degrading ceremonies” at handovers of Israeli captives in Gaza.
The statement by Benjamin Netanyahu’s office came as vehicles apparently carrying prisoners left the open gates of Ofer prison, only to turn around and go back in.
The release of 620 Palestinian prisoners had been delayed for several hours and was meant to occur just after six Israeli hostages were released on Saturday.
Archaeologist believes his ‘find of the century’ – of Pharaoh Thutmose II – could be surpassed by ongoing excavation
To uncover the location of one long-lost pharaoh’s tomb is a career-defining moment for an archaeologist. But to find a second is the stuff of dreams.
Last week British archaeologist Piers Litherland announced the find of the century – the first discovery of a rock-cut pharaoh’s tomb in Egypt since Tutankhamun’s in 1922.
Continue reading...FBI says Aurora Phelps met men online for dating then drugged them and stole cars and money
A woman used online dating apps to lure at least four older men to meet her in person, drugged them with sedatives and stole hundreds of thousands of dollars in a “sinister” romance scheme, FBI officials in Las Vegas said on Friday.
Three of the men died, authorities said, and she has been charged in one of their deaths.
Continue reading...Home Office moved to cancel Menatalla Elwan’s leave to remain over posts on Hamas’s 7 October attack
An Egyptian NHS doctor who “glorified terrorist violence” by mocking Israeli civilians fleeing the Hamas attacks in October 2023 has won a legal challenge against deportation.
In one of three social media posts hours after the attacks began, Dr Menatalla Elwan, 34, who worked at an NHS trust in Liverpool, reposted footage of music festivalgoers running from Hamas terrorists and wrote “if it was your home, you would stay and fight”, accompanied by a smiling face emoji.
Continue reading...Democrat Jasmine Crockett calls it ‘really wild’ that it is foreign leaders who are speaking truth to power
The congresswoman Jasmine Crockett has revealed she is “rooting” for Canada and Mexico over Donald Trump in their attempts to stand up to him, saying it is “really wild” to find herself in that position given he is the president of the US.
“They are really the ones that are speaking truth to power right now,” the Democratic representative from Texas said on Friday on the popular Breakfast Club podcast, alluding to the political feuds Trump has engaged in with the US’s two North American neighbors during the first month of his second presidency. “They can see what it is and they were like, ‘We are not messing with this crazy regime.’”
Continue reading...Moscow and Washington held their first talks on ending the nearly three-year war in Ukraine on Tuesday
Some 62% of Britons believe Ukraine should be allowed into Nato, according to new polling.
The research by YouGov also suggested 68% think the UK should maintain its commitment to defend allies in the military bloc, but when asked specifically about defending the US this figure fell to 42%.
Continue reading...Gaza ceasefire deal still on track amid uproar over fate of two Israeli boys and initial false return of their mother’s body
The body of the Israeli hostage Shiri Bibas has been identified, Israel’s army radio reported early on Saturday, adding that Bibas was likely killed in captivity with her children.
The confirmation came as Israelis and Palestinians braced for another tense exchange of hostages, prisoners and detainees on Saturday after uproar in Israel over allegations that two child hostages were “brutally murdered” by Hamas, and the group’s initial failure to deliver the body of their mother, instead returning the corpse of an unidentified woman.
Continue reading...Surgeons who worked in Gaza fear disease, malnutrition and eradication of healthcare will reverberate for decades
British doctors who worked in Gaza during the war have issued dire predictions over the long-term health of Palestinian civillians, warning that large numbers will continue to die.
The prevalence of infectious disease and multiple health problems linked to malnutrition, alongside the destruction of hospitals and killing of medical experts, meant mortality rates among Palestinians in Gaza would remain high after the cessation of Israeli shelling.
Continue reading...Pete Hegseth supports cuts of up to 8% of civilian workforce as Trump bids to institute massive government cuts
The Pentagon announced plans Friday to fire 5-8% of its civilian workforce, staring next week with layoffs of 5,400 probationary workers, a Department of Defense official said in a statement.
The initial civilian layoffs will be followed by a Department of Defense hiring freeze to analyze the military’s personnel needs in compliance with Donald Trump’s political goals, Darin Selnick, the acting under-secretary of defense for personnel and readiness, said in the statement.
Continue reading...Adam Abeldon rules that president’s efforts to ban DEI programs likely violate first amendment of constitution
A federal judge in Maryland on Friday temporarily blocked Donald Trump from implementing bans on diversity, equity and inclusion programs at federal agencies and by businesses that contract with the federal government.
US district judge Adam Abelson said the directives by Trump and an order urging the Department of Justice to investigate companies with DEI policies likely violate the first amendment of the US constitution.
Continue reading...Keith Kellogg takes different tone from Trump, who contrasted ‘very good talks’ with Putin with cooler relationship with Ukraine’s leader
The US envoy to Ukraine, Gen Keith Kellogg, has praised Volodymyr Zelenskyy as “the embattled and courageous leader of a nation at war”, striking a dramatically different tone from Donald Trump, who has called Ukraine’s president a “dictator”.
Kellogg left Kyiv on Friday after a three-day visit. Posting on social media, he said he had engaged in “extensive and positive discussions” with Zelenskyy and his “talented national security team”. “A long and intense day with the senior leadership of Ukraine,” he said.
Continue reading...Pair declined to give public endorsement of Trump in wake of 7 October attacks, All or Nothing by Michael Wolff reveals
Donald Trump’s Jewish daughter and son-in-law, Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, refused to sign a statement saying Trump was not antisemitic, according to a new book by the veteran Trump tell-all author Michael Wolff.
“As he kept seeming to be incapable of offering absolute support for Israel in the wake of October 7,” Wolff writes, referring to the deadly 2023 attacks by Hamas, “Trump, not for the first time, turned to Jared for Jewish cover, explicitly asking him and Ivanka for a public endorsement.
Continue reading...UK prime minister aiming to cool escalating transatlantic row over war in Ukraine
Keir Starmer will not risk riling Donald Trump by challenging him over his attack on Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, when the pair finally meet next week, as the prime minister seeks to cool an escalating transatlantic row.
Starmer will fly to the US in the coming days for what could be a defining moment for his leadership, as Europe and the US trade accusations and insults about the origins of the war in Ukraine and the best way to end it.
Continue reading...Chronic illness remains but pontiff, 88, is stable and in good humour, doctor says
Pope Francis, who is in hospital undergoing treatment for double pneumonia, is “not yet out of danger” and will remain in hospital for at least the whole of next week, one of his doctors has said.
Francis, 88, was stable but “the chronic illness remains”, Sergio Alfieri, a general surgeon at Rome’s Gemelli university hospital, told reporters on Friday.
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