Deaths inside Tulkarem refugee camp and near Balata camp are latest in an explosion of violence in the Palestinian territory since the start of Israel’s war on Gaza
A new wave of violence has swept the occupied West Bank, with a series of major raids launched by the Israeli military across much of the territory.
Ten people were killed by Israeli forces in the West Bank on Wednesday, Palestinian officials have said, one of the highest single daily death tolls for many months.
Continue reading...Decision means Yemeni group’s funds will be frozen in US and members are banned from the country
US Navy Seals boarded a boat heading for Yemen and seized Iranian-made missile components and other weaponry bound for Houthi forces, in an operation in which two Seal commandos went missing, the US military has said.
US Central Command (Centcom) posted pictures of the missile parts on X, including what appeared to be the components of a complete small missile, rocket motors and guidance systems, as well as a photograph of the small cargo vessel that was allegedly carrying the arms.
Continue reading...Shipment of medicine has arrived in Egypt on way to conflict zone under deal brokered by Qatar and France
A shipment of medicine for Israeli hostages and Palestinian civilians has arrived in Egypt on its way to Gaza under a deal mediated by Qatar and France, as fighting continues across much of the territory after a deadly night of bombardments.
The agreement marks the first significant progress in indirect talks between Israel and Hamas since December, when a short-lived ceasefire collapsed.
Continue reading...Attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea by the Houthi rebel group in Yemen have been met with airstrikes from the UK and US. Patrick Wintour reports
Since the Hamas attacks on Israel on 7 October and Israel’s military response in Gaza, there has been an effort by western leaders led by the US to avoid the conflict spreading to the wider region. That attempt looks increasingly tenuous now. US and UK airstrikes have targeted the Houthi rebel group in Yemen after a series of attacks by the group on commercial ships in the Red Sea.
As Patrick Wintour, the Guardian’s diplomatic editor, tells Michael Safi, the Houthis say they are targeting Israeli-linked ships in an attempt to force a ceasefire. In doing so they are are positioning themselves as the foremost champions of Palestinians in the region. In reality, they have struck shipping interests beyond Israel and ignored warnings from the US to desist. Now, with Washington promising further strikes if necessary, the threat of a wider regional escalation is growing and with it the danger of a far more deadly conflict.
Iraqi Kurdish prime minister Masrour Barzani accuses Iran after its strikes in Kurdistan region; EU adds Yahya Sinwar to terrorist list
The Israeli military said on Tuesday that its special forces had carried out a strike in the area of Ayta ash Shab in Lebanon.
“IDF special forces struck in order to remove a threat in the area of Ayta ash Shab in Lebanon,” the military said.
Continue reading...Search still under way for the two Seals involved in mission targeting supply of arms to Yemeni rebels
US Navy Seals boarded a boat heading for Yemen and seized Iranian-made missile components and other weaponry bound for Houthi forces, in an operation in which two Seal commandos went missing, the US military has said.
US Central Command (Centcom) posted pictures of the missile parts on X, including what appeared to be the components of a complete small missile, rocket motors and guidance systems, as well as a photograph of the small cargo vessel that was allegedly carrying the arms.
Continue reading...UN agencies issue joint plea for entry routes to Gaza, where Israel’s war with Hamas has damaged swaths of territory
Aid officials in Gaza believe that pockets of famine already exist in the territory, with parents sacrificing remaining food for their children, an apple costing $8 (£6.30) and fuel for cooking almost impossible to find.
UN agencies have said that Gaza urgently needs more humanitarian assistance as Palestinian authorities reported that the death toll in the territory during the Israeli offensive there had risen to more than 24,000.
Continue reading...Civilians killed in strikes on Erbil include millionaire Kurdish businessman and his family, medical sources say
Iraq has vowed to take Iran to the UN security council after the Iran Revolutionary Guard Corps claimed they had attacked an Israeli “espionage headquarters” in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region.
Iran said it was acting in defence of its sovereignty and as a counter-terrorism measure in response to an Islamic State suicide attack in Kerman this month that killed more than 80 people.
Continue reading...US military says anti-ship ballistic missile fired by Houthi militants hit container ship; police describe incident in Raanana, north of Tel Aviv, as terrorist attack
A video journalist from the Cairo-based television channel Al Ghad was killed in the Gaza Strip on Sunday in a strike that the channel blamed on the Israeli army.
In a post on X, the station said it was announcing “with a heavy heart” that Yazan al-Zwaidi was “murdered by Israeli fire”, Agence France-Presse reports.
Continue reading...In unverified video, woman also held captive and speaking under duress says two men have been killed
Hamas has released a video announcing the death of two Israeli hostages and claimed that they were killed by Israeli airstrikes.
The video showed a female hostage named in Israeli media as Noa Argamani, 26, speaking under duress, revealing that two men she was held captive with had been killed in captivity. It was not clear when or where the video was filmed and there was no independent confirmation of Hamas’s claims.
Continue reading...This blog is now closed.
PM says $15bn reconstruction fund is ‘open for business’ despite inability to apply for it
The prime minister was asked why the $15bn national reconstruction fund is “taking so long”, having passed through the parliament in March last year and being brought into effect in July.
Whether the website is there or not, is it is an interesting point that you’re making, but businesses that are interested in this would have looked at a video from the finance minister Kate Gallagher in November, that set out the investment mandate that was agreed to by the government and the National Reconstruction Fund, which importantly, is an independent body at arm’s length in terms of making those decisions because we want those decisions.
The money is available now.
I’ll examine the issue of the website, that is a reasonable point that you make. But people who are actually following this and interested in applying will have seen Katie Gallagher’s release setting out what the what the process is.
At a time when members of the Australian community are unhoused as a result of fire, as a result of flood, it seems unacceptable … that we could be giving large benefits to those who already have a great deal.
… inequality is an issue and the government has looked at ways in which we can improve that position.
Continue reading...Israel will not have security until Palestinians have their own state, Ami Ayalon says in Guardian interview
A former leader of the Shin Bet domestic security force has said Israel will not have security until Palestinians have their own state, and Israeli authorities should release Marwan Barghouti, jailed leader of the second intifada, to direct negotiations to create one.
Ami Ayalon, a retired admiral who also commanded Israel’s navy and was wounded in battle and decorated for his service, also said destroying Hamas was not a realistic military goal, and the current operation in Gaza risked entrenching support for the group.
Continue reading...Israeli PM says it is ‘possible and necessary to continue until victory’ in televised press conference, days after South Africa launches genocide case against Israel in The Hague
Britain could strike Houthi targets in Yemen again if the rebel group continues to attack ships in the Red Sea, the UK’s foreign secretary, David Cameron, has indicated.
The former Conservative prime minister warned that the Iran-linked militants could force up prices in Britain if they are allowed to block the passage of container ships in the busy trade route.
Continue reading...Thousands of demonstrators gather at Freedom Plaza for the march on Washington for Gaza
US strikes in Yemen, including the latest one on a military base in Sana’a, had no significant impact on Houthis’ capabilities to continue preventing Israel-affiliated vessels from passing through the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea, Yemen’s Houthis’ spokesperson Mohammed Abdulsalam told Reuters.
Houthi Ansarullah official Nasruldeen Amer speaking to Al Jazeera, said that there were no injuries in the latest US strike in Yemen and vowed a “strong and effective response”. “There were no injuries, no material nor human losses,” he said.
Continue reading...World Bank warns of surging energy prices, slower growth and higher inflation as threat rises of disruption to world trade
A prolonged conflict in the Red Sea and escalating tensions across the Middle East risk having devastating effects on the global economy, reigniting inflation and disrupting energy supplies, some of the world’s leading economists warn this weekend.
Before a statement expected on Monday by Rishi Sunak in the House of Commons about UK and US airstrikes on Houthi sites in Yemen, economists at the World Bank say the crisis now threatens to feed through into higher interest rates, lower growth, persistent inflation and greater geopolitical uncertainty.
Continue reading...Meir Baruchin, who was fired and jailed for criticising the military, says that many who agree with him are afraid to go public
An unlikely charge of intent to commit treason landed Meir Baruchin, a grey-haired, softly spoken history and civics teacher, in the solitary confinement wing of Jerusalem’s notorious “Russian Compound” prison in early November.
The evidence compiled by police who handcuffed him, then drove to his apartment and ransacked it as he watched, was a series of Facebook posts he’d made, mourning the civilians killed in Gaza, criticising the Israeli military, and warning against wars of revenge.
Continue reading...Saturday’s march for Gaza ceasefire as part of global day of action will be followed by static rally for Israel on Sunday
Hundreds of thousands of people are expected to gather in London over the weekend in protest against the war in Gaza as the conflict widens to Yemen.
On Saturday, protesters are expected to gather at Bank Junction at midday as part of a global day of action involving 30 countries, the Palestine Solidarity Campaign said.
Continue reading...With Palestinian plight supercharging movement, restraint may only come with regional pressure on resources
The near-official slogan of the Houthi movement is: “God is the Greatest / Death to America / Death to Israel / A curse upon the Jews.” Crowds of supporters in the group’s northern Yemen strongholds have been chanting it for more than 20 years, ever since the phrase was brought back from Tehran at the turn of the century, when it was first directed at the then Yemeni president, Ali Abdullah Saleh.
So those who claim the Houthis are not serious in attempting to block Israeli-linked trade in the Red Sea underplay the extent to which the defence of Palestine is a foundational principle of the Houthi movement, and highly popular among Yemeni people. The rebel stance over the past two months has afforded this relatively obscure Shia group a status in recent weeks that even Hezbollah in Lebanon cannot claim. They are deeply authoritarian, but skilled mobilisers of popular opinion.
Continue reading...Israeli legal team calls South African accusation of genocidal acts in Gaza ‘a partial and deeply flawed picture’
Israel has accused South Africa of presenting a “profoundly distorted” view of hostilities, “barely distinguishable” from that of Hamas, as it presented its defence at the international court of justice in The Hague against accusations of genocide.
A day after South Africa argued that it had committed genocidal acts in Gaza with intent from “the highest levels of state”, Israel said on Friday that was a “partial and deeply flawed picture”.
Continue reading...Group’s military spokesperson says they will continue to block passage of ships in Red Sea
Lebanon’s powerful armed group Hezbollah has also reacted on Friday to the airstrikes and condemned them.
Reuters says that the group has released a statement saying:
The American aggression confirms once again that the US is a full partner in the tragedies and massacres committed by the Zionist enemy in Gaza and the region
We strongly condemn the military attacks carried out this morning by the United States and the United Kingdom on several cities in Yemen ….
We consider it a clear violation of Yemen’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and a breach of international laws, regulations, and rights.
Continue reading...