Analysis: The White House is playing for time and needs to decide quickly how to deal with Trump’s legacy of unwavering support for Netanyahu
Joe Biden came into office thinking he could put the Israel-Palestine issue on the back burner to focus on other, bigger, issues. That is not working out well.
The upsurge in violence has caught the new administration on the back foot, under-staffed and without a clearly defined approach.
Continue reading...Further airstrikes and rocket fire reported early on Wednesday in Gaza, Tel Aviv and Beersheba
Israeli jets and Palestinian militants traded fresh airstrikes and rocket fire early on Wednesday as the UN’s Middle East envoy called for a cessation of hostilities, warning: “We’re escalating towards a full-scale war.”
The death toll since unrest broke out early on Tuesday rose to 40 – 35 in Gaza and five in Israel – as Israel carried out hundreds of airstrikes in Gaza and Palestinian militant groups fired multiple rocket barrages at Tel Aviv, Beersheba, and other central Israeli cities.
Continue reading...Israel has vowed to further intensify its attacks on Gaza, after a day of ferocious confrontations that left more than 30 people dead. On Tuesday evening, a 13-storey tower collapsed after being hit by an Israeli airstrike. In response, Hamas’s military wing said it had fired 130 rockets towards Tel Aviv.
Israel launches strikes on Gaza as Hamas militants fire rockets after weeks of rising tensions in Jerusalem
Israeli jets and militants in Gaza have traded airstrikes for rocket attacks, in a ferocious confrontation that has continued almost non-stop since sundown on Monday, killing 24 Palestinians, including nine children, according to the enclave’s health ministry, and leaving two Israeli women dead and scores wounded.
After weeks of intense violence in Jerusalem, Hamas, the Islamist group that rules inside Gaza, fired a barrage of rockets towards the holy city on Monday evening, believed to be the first time it had targeted Jerusalem in more than seven years.
Continue reading...Tensions between Israel and the Palestinians escalated dramatically on Monday as militant groups in Gaza fired rockets into Israel and Israel responded with strikes on the Palestinian territory following a police raid on the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem that left hundreds injured.
Gaza health ministry says 20 Palestinians were killed in Israeli strikes after Palestinian groups fired rockets into Israel
Tensions between Israel and the Palestinians escalated dramatically on Monday as militant groups in Gaza fired rockets into Israel and Israel responded with strikes on the Palestinian coastal territory following a police raid on the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem that left hundreds injured.
The rocket attacks were launched just minutes after the passing of a Hamas-issued ultimatum for Israel to withdraw security forces from both the Jerusalem compound that is home to the al-Aqsa mosque and the Old City’s Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood.
Continue reading...A series of events come together to inflame an already volatile situation in the holy city
It was strikingly clear that the most dangerous moment in Jerusalem’s worst unrest for years would arrive on Monday. After weeks of mounting anger, a series of provocative events were all set to spiral together at once, creating a tinderbox situation that world powers warned needed delicate handling.
The European Union had called on authorities to “act urgently to de-escalate the current tensions in Jerusalem” while the US said the Israeli government should “pursue appropriate measures to ensure calm”.
Continue reading...Israeli police published dramatic CCTV video from a road near the Old City in Jerusalem of a white car being pelted with stones by Palestinian demonstrators, before the driver reverses and hits one of them. The car then speeds forward, hitting another person and colliding with a wall.
An armed Israeli police officer runs in to protect the driver, believed to be Israeli, who faces more rock-throwing.
Tensions have soared in recent days in advance of the now-delayed Israeli court ruling on whether authorities were able to evict dozens of Palestinians from the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood, just outside the Old City, and give their homes to Jewish settlers
Reports seven were injured in Palestinian clashes with Israeli police on Sunday, despite now-delayed court ruling on East Jerusalem settlements
Israeli police faced off with Palestinian protesters in another full night of clashes in East Jerusalem, ahead of a planned parade by hardline Israeli nationalists through the Old City in an annual flag-waving march meant to cement Israeli claims to the contested area.
The Palestine Red Crescent reported seven injuries, including four hospitalisations, as officers in riot gear clashed with Palestinian demonstrators clashed in East Jerusalem. Confrontations continued until after dawn, when police stormed into the Old City’s al-Aqsa mosque, the third holiest site in Islam, and fired stun grenades at worshippers, who lobbed stones.
Continue reading...More than 120 injured in continuing Palestinian protests over planned evictions in the Sheikh Jarrah area
Israel’s supreme court has delayed a deeply contentious decision on whether Palestinians can be evicted by force to make way for Jewish settlers, after hundreds of Palestinians were wounded in confrontations with the police in some of Jerusalem’s worst unrest in years.
A former Israeli defence official described the atmosphere as like a powder keg ready to explode at any time, after more clashes erupted outside the Old City overnight on Saturday.
Continue reading...Palestinian Red Crescent says 80 people were hurt during clashes with Israeli police outside Jerusalem’s Old City
Clashes have erupted for a second night between Palestinians and Israeli police outside the Old City of Jerusalem as tens of thousands of Muslim worshippers prayed at the nearby al-Aqsa Mosque.
At least 80 people were injured, including a one-year-old, and 14 were taken to hospital, the Palestine Red Crescent said. Israeli police said at least one officer was hurt.
Continue reading...Israeli police broke into the prayer room at the mosque in East Jerusalem as several hundred Palestinians stayed on after Friday prayers to protest against potential evictions of Palestinians from homes on land claimed by Jewish settlers.
At least 178 Palestinians and six officers were injured in the night-time clashes at Islam’s third-holiest site and around East Jerusalem.
Israel’s supreme court will hold a hearing on the long-running eviction legal case in Sheikh Jarrah on Monday, as nightly clashes have continued during Ramadan
Continue reading...Confrontations at holy site leave 17 Israeli police officers wounded, with international calls for calm
More than 205 Palestinians and 17 Israeli police officers were wounded during a night of intense clashes at a sacred Jerusalem site that holds the Dome of the Rock, medics and police said, a serious escalation in a weeks-long rise in violence.
Tensions in Jerusalem have soared recently, with Palestinians complaining of oppressive restrictions during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. An upcoming Israeli court ruling on whether authorities can evict dozens of Palestinians – and give their homes to Jewish settlers – has further inflamed the situation.
Continue reading...A roundup of the coverage on struggles for human rights and freedoms, from Colombia to China
Continue reading...The government has revealed the destinations to which quarantine-free holidays will be allowed
The government has just announced its green list for quarantine-free international travel into England. The countries on it are Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Brunei, Iceland, the Faroe Islands, Gibraltar, the Falkland Islands, Israel, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, and Portugal, including the Azores and Madeira.
Related: England’s traffic-light system for foreign travel: all you need to know
Continue reading...Australian tycoon was obsessed with Israel’s elite, once kissing feet of an ex-president, local media reports
James Packer’s entanglement with Israel’s elite, including a close personal relationship with Benjamin Netanyahu and the now Mossad chief, was considered a “national risk”, according to an Israeli report, quoting testimony from witnesses in Netanyahu’s corruption trial.
The Australian casino mogul, 53, developed an obsession with the Jewish state over the past few years, once kissing the feet of the former president Shimon Peres when he came for a dinner, according to “a person who was close” to Peres. He also considering converting to Judaism, Haaretz newspaper reported.
Continue reading...First research of its kind shows power of vaccines to stem pandemic, cutting hospitalisation, death and infection rates
Two doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine have proved more than 95% effective against infection, hospitalisation and death from Covid-19 in Israel, the country with the highest proportion of its population vaccinated in the world, research has found.
One shot of the vaccine was partially effective, offering 58% protection against infection, 76% against hospitalisation, and 77% against death. The authors of the observational study in the Lancet medical journal say this shows the importance of having the second shot.
Continue reading...President Reuven Rivlin chooses another candidate to build a government after Benjamin Netanyahu fails to meet deadline
Israel’s president has tasked the head of the opposition, Yair Lapid, with forming a government after Benjamin Netanyahu failed to do so, leaving the country’s longest-serving leader facing a fresh challenge to his historic hold on power.
Netanyahu’s rightwing Likud party won the most seats in a March election and was given 28 days to build a majority coalition government. But that deadline passed on Tuesday, allowing Reuven Rivlin to choose another candidate.
Continue reading...Veteran leader proves unable to create a coalition after inconclusive election on 23 March
Benjamin Netanyahu has failed to form a coalition government, extending a two-year political deadlock in Israel – and putting the country’s longest-serving leader back on the defensive as his rivals move to unseat him.
Following an inconclusive snap election on 23 March – the fourth since 2019 – the 71-year-old leader had hoped to clinch what would be a unique and historic partnership in Israeli politics.
Continue reading...Bergman, 24, had been in Israel to train as a rabbi before dying at Mount Meron
A British man who died in a crowd crush at a Jewish festival in Israel has been named as Moshe Bergman.
The 24-year-old from Salford, Manchester, had been in the country to train to be a rabbi in Jerusalem. He had been living in the city for two years and had married 18 months ago.
Continue reading...