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Arab, Turkish foreign ministers call for urgent Gaza ceasefire during Canada visit

The delegation was headed by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan. (Ekhbariya TV)
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The delegation was headed by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan. (Ekhbariya TV)
The delegation was headed by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan. (SPA))
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The delegation was headed by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan. (SPA))
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Updated 10 December 2023
Arab News
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Arab, Turkish foreign ministers call for urgent Gaza ceasefire during Canada visit

Arab, Turkish foreign ministers call for urgent Gaza ceasefire during Canada visit
  • The delegation urged the international community to quickly assume its responsibility to protect civilians
  • It stressed the importance of ensuring relief corridors are secured
Updated 10 December 2023
Arab News
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LONDON: A delegation of Arab and Turkish foreign ministers on Saturday reiterated the importance of an immediate ceasefire to return security and stability to the Gaza Strip during a visit to the Canadian capital.
The delegation, headed by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan, was received by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Ottawa, before beginning an official round of talks with Foreign Minister Melanie Joly, the Kingdom’s Foreign Ministry said.
The talks were also attended by Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad Al-Maliki and Turkish counterpart Hakan Fidan.

The officials discussed developments in Gaza and their repercussions, as well as Israel’s military escalation against Palestinian civilians, the ministry said in a statement.
The delegation urged the international community to quickly assume its responsibility to protect civilians, adding that discussions around Gaza’s future and the Palestinian issue “must come after an immediate ceasefire and a calming of the unjustified military escalation.”
The delegation stressed the importance of taking serious steps to ensure the securing of relief corridors for the delivery of urgent humanitarian, food and medical aid to Gaza.
It also stressed the importance of creating political conditions for the establishment of a Palestinian state, and rejected discussing Gaza’s future separately from the wider Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The ministers said they were dissatisfied with the blocking of a UN Security Council calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, and expressed their concern about the expanding scope of blatant attacks carried out by Israeli forces against civilians, and the repeated violations of international law. 
The delegation — made up of officials from Egypt, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkiye and the Palestinian Authority — on Friday met with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken after Washington vetoed the resolution.
Health officials in the besieged enclave on Saturday said the death toll had surpassed 17,700, with 70 percent of the dead being women and children, while more than 46,000 had been wounded.
The majority of Gaza’s population of more than 2 million have been forced to flee their homes.

Topics: Saudi Arabia Palestine Turkiye Gaza Canada Melanie Joly Justin Trudeau Prince Faisal bin Farhan War on Gaza

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UN sanctions two generals from Sudan’s paramilitary force

UN sanctions two generals from Sudan’s paramilitary force
Updated 48 min 57 sec ago
AP
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UN sanctions two generals from Sudan’s paramilitary force

UN sanctions two generals from Sudan’s paramilitary force
  • Sudan plunged into conflict in mid-April 2023, when long-simmering tensions between its military and paramilitary leaders broke out in the capital
  • The UN sanctions order all countries to freeze the asses and impose a travel ban on the generals
Updated 48 min 57 sec ago
AP

UNITED NATIONS: The United Nations Security Council imposed sanctions Friday on two generals in Sudan’s paramilitary force for their key roles in the war against the country’s military that has seen ethnically motivated attacks and atrocities.
Sudan plunged into conflict in mid-April 2023, when long-simmering tensions between its military and paramilitary leaders broke out in the capital, Khartoum, and spread to other regions, including Darfur. The UN says over 14,000 people have been killed and 33,000 injured, and recently warned that the country has been pushed to the brink of famine.
The council’s sanctions committee added Maj. Gen. Osman Mohamed Hamid Mohamed, head of the Rapid Support Forces’ operations department, and Maj. Gen. Abdel Rahman Juma Barkalla, the RSF commander in West Darfur, to the sanctions blacklist.
Britain’s UN Mission tweeted on X that the two generals were added for threatening the peace, security and stability of Sudan, “including acts of violence and human rights abuses.”
The UN sanctions order all countries to freeze the asses and impose a travel ban on the generals. The United States Treasury imposed sanctions on both generals earlier in the year, freezing any assets in the US and banning all financial transactions with them.
Two decades ago, Darfur became synonymous with genocide and war crimes, particularly by the notorious Janjaweed Arab militias, against populations that identify as Central or East African. Up to 300,000 people were killed and 2.7 million were driven from their homes. That legacy appears to have returned, with the International Criminal Court’s prosecutor, Karim Khan, saying in January there were grounds to believe both sides may be committing war crimes, crimes against humanity, or genocide in Darfur. The RSF was born out of the Janjaweed.
Human Rights Watch said in a report in May that attacks by the paramilitary force and its allied militias, which killed thousands in Darfur in 2023, constituted a campaign of ethnic cleansing against the area’s non-Arab population.
The rights group said the RSF and its militias targeted the ethnic Masalit and other non-Arab groups in El Geneina, the capital city of West Darfur state. Masalit who were captured were tortured, women and girls were raped and entire neighborhoods were looted and destroyed, Human Rights Watch said.
Its report is entitled “The Massalit Will Not Come Home: Ethnic Cleansing and Crimes Against Humanity in El Geneina, West Darfur, Sudan.”
The RSF controls the capitals of four of the five states in Darfur and has intensified its military campaign for control of the lone holdout, North Darfur capital El Fasher.

Topics: Sudan Unrest UN rapid support forces (RSF)

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Syrian state news agency reports Israeli strike in Aleppo region

Syrian state news agency reports Israeli strike in Aleppo region
Updated 09 November 2024
AFP
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Syrian state news agency reports Israeli strike in Aleppo region

Syrian state news agency reports Israeli strike in Aleppo region
  • The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor, reported that the strikes had targeted military installations
Updated 09 November 2024
AFP

 

DAMASCUS: Syrian state media reported an Israeli strike Saturday on the countryside of Aleppo and Idlib that injured soldiers and caused damage.
“At around 00:45 after midnight, the Israeli army launched an air aggression from the direction of southeast Aleppo, targeting a number of sites in the countryside of Aleppo and Idlib,” the official SANA news agency said.
The report added that the attack had “resulted in the injury of a number of soldiers and some material losses,” without providing further details.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor, reported the strikes had targeted military installations.
The war monitor also said members of the Iranian revolutionary guards and pro-Tehran factions were based in the area.
Since the beginning of the Syrian civil war in 2011, Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes in Syria, mainly targeting army positions and Iran-backed fighters including from Hezbollah.
The Israeli military has intensified its strikes on Syria since it launched its war on Hezbollah in neighboring Lebanon.
Israeli authorities rarely comment on the strikes but have repeatedly said they will not allow arch-enemy Iran to expand its presence in Syria.
 

 


 

Topics: Syria Aleppo Israeli aggression

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UN probe says women, children comprise the majority of Gaza war dead

UN probe says women, children comprise the majority of Gaza war dead
Updated 09 November 2024
AFP
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UN probe says women, children comprise the majority of Gaza war dead

UN probe says women, children comprise the majority of Gaza war dead
  • The report detailed a raft of violations of international law since Oct. 7
Updated 09 November 2024
AFP

GENEVA: The UN on Friday condemned the staggering number of civilians killed in Israel’s war in Gaza, with women and children comprising nearly 70 percent of the thousands of fatalities it had managed to verify.
In a fresh report, slammed by Israel, the United Nations human rights office (OHCHR) detailed a raft of violations of international law since Hamas’s deadly Oct. 7 attack in Israel sparked the war in the Gaza Strip.
Many could amount to war crimes, crimes against humanity and possibly even “genocide,” it warned, demanding international efforts to prevent “atrocity crimes” and ensure accountability.
“Civilians in Gaza have borne the brunt of the attacks, including through the initial ‘complete siege’ of Gaza by Israeli forces,” the UN said.
“Conduct by Israeli forces has caused unprecedented levels of killings, death, injury, starvation, illness and disease.”
It pointed to “the Israeli government’s continuing unlawful failures to allow, facilitate and ensure the entry of humanitarian aid, the destruction of civilian infrastructure, and repeated mass displacement.”
Israel’s mission to the UN in Geneva “categorically” rejected the report, decrying “the inherent obsession of OHCHR with the demonization of Israel.”
“Gaza is now a rubble-strewn landscape,” Ajith Sunghay, head of the UN rights office’s activities in the Palestinian territories, said via video-link from Amman.
“Within this dystopia of destruction and devastation, those alive are left injured, displaced and starving.”
Friday’s report also found that Hamas and other armed groups had committed widespread violations that could amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity, including seizing hostages, killings, torture and sexual violence.
Those violations, it said, were especially committed in connection with the October 7, 2023 attack, which resulted in 1,206 deaths, mostly of civilians, according to an AFP tally of official Israeli figures.
The report also tackled the contentious issue of the proportion of civilians among the nearly 43,500 people killed in Gaza so far, according to the health ministry in the Palestinian territory.
UN agencies have been relying on death tolls provided by the authorities in Hamas-run Gaza due to lack of access. This has sparked harsh criticism from Israel but the UN has repeatedly said the figures are reliable.
The rights office said it had now managed to verify around 10,000 of the more than 34,500 people reportedly killed during the first six months of the war.
“We have so far found close to 70 percent to be children and women,” Sunghay said, highlighting the stringent verification methodology that requires at least three separate sources.
He said the findings indicated “a systematic violation of the fundamental principles of international humanitarian law.”
He said 4,700 of the verified fatalities were children and 2,461 were women.
The rights office found that about 80 percent of all the verified deaths in Gaza had occurred in Israeli attacks on residential buildings or similar housing.
Children between the ages of five and nine made up the largest group of victims, with the youngest victim a one-day-old boy and the oldest a 97-year-old woman, it said.
Israel says its operations in Gaza target militants and are in line with international law.
But Friday’s report stressed that the verified deaths largely Gaza’s demographic makeup rather than that of combatants.
This, it said, clearly “raises concerns regarding compliance with the principle of distinction and reflect an apparent failure to take all feasible precautions to avoid, and in any event to minimize, incidental loss of civilian life.”
UN rights chief Volker Turk called on all countries to work to halt the violations and to ensure accountability, including through universal jurisdiction.
“It is essential that there is due reckoning with respect to the allegations of serious violations of international law through credible and impartial judicial bodies,” he said.
“The violence must stop immediately, the hostages and those arbitrarily detained must be released, and we must focus on flooding Gaza with humanitarian aid.”

Topics: War on Gaza

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After Hamas rejection of hostage deal, US asked Qatar to expel the group

After Hamas rejection of hostage deal, US asked Qatar to expel the group
Updated 09 November 2024
Reuters
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After Hamas rejection of hostage deal, US asked Qatar to expel the group

After Hamas rejection of hostage deal, US asked Qatar to expel the group
  • Negotiators from Israel’s Mossad spy agency have repeatedly met mediators in Doha over the last year and Qatari government officials have shuttled back-and-forth to Hamas leaders in the political office
Updated 09 November 2024
Reuters

WASHINGTON/DOHA: The US has told Qatar that the presence of Hamas in Doha is no longer acceptable in the weeks since the Palestinian militant group rejected the latest proposal to achieve a ceasefire and a hostage deal, a senior administration official told Reuters on Friday.
“After rejecting repeated proposals to release hostages, its leaders should no longer be welcome in the capitals of any American partner. We made that clear to Qatar following Hamas’s rejection weeks ago of another hostage release proposal,” the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
Qatar then made the demand to Hamas leaders about 10 days ago, the official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said. Washington has been in touch with Qatar over when to close the political office of Hamas, and it told Doha that now was the time following the group’s rejection of the recent proposal.
Three Hamas officials denied Qatar had told Hamas leaders they were no longer welcome in the country.
Qatar, alongside the US and Egypt, has played a major role in rounds of so-far fruitless talks to broker a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of hostages the militant group is holding in the enclave.
The latest round of Doha talks in mid-October failed to reach a ceasefire, with Hamas rejecting a short-term ceasefire proposal.
The spokesperson for Qatar’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for confirmation or comment.
Last year, a senior US official said Qatar had told Washington it was open to
reconsidering the presence of Hamas
in the country once the Gaza war was over.
This came after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken
told leaders
in Qatar and elsewhere in the region that there could be “no more business as usual” with Hamas after the group led the Oct. 7 attacks on Southern Israel.
Qatar, an influential Gulf state designated as major non-NATO ally by Washington, has hosted Hamas’ political leaders since 2012 as part of an agreement with the US Doha has come under criticism from within the US and Israel over its ties to Hamas since Oct. 7.
Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani has said repeatedly over the last year that the Hamas office exists in Doha to allow negotiations with the group and that as long as the channel remained useful Qatar would allow the Hamas office to remain open.
Negotiators from Israel’s Mossad spy agency have repeatedly met mediators in Doha over the last year and Qatari government officials have shuttled back-and-forth to Hamas leaders in the political office.

 

 

Topics: War on Gaza Palestine Gaza Lebanon US

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US defense chief holds first call with new Israeli counterpart

US defense chief holds first call with new Israeli counterpart
Updated 09 November 2024
AFP
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US defense chief holds first call with new Israeli counterpart

US defense chief holds first call with new Israeli counterpart
  • Katz was sworn in before parliament the previous day
  • The US defense chief also discussed “the need to improve the dire humanitarian conditions in Gaza“
Updated 09 November 2024
AFP

WASHINGTON: US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin discussed Lebanon and Gaza on Friday in his first call with his new Israeli counterpart Israel Katz, the Pentagon said.
Katz was sworn in before parliament the previous day, after his predecessor’s shock dismissal by the prime minister over a breakdown in trust during the war in Gaza — a conflict that began with a devastating Hamas attack against Israel on October 7, 2023.
Austin “held an introductory call today with the new Israeli minister of defense, Israel Katz, and congratulated him on his recent appointment,” Pentagon spokesman Major General Pat Ryder said in a statement.
He told Katz that Washington is committed to a deal that allows Lebanese and Israeli citizens displaced by more than a year of cross-border violence to return to their homes, as well as to the return of hostages seized by Palestinian militant group Hamas, Ryder said.
The US defense chief also discussed “the need to improve the dire humanitarian conditions in Gaza,” after he and Secretary of State Antony Blinken told Israel in a letter earlier this month that it needed to allow more aid into the small war-wracked coastal territory.

Topics: War on Gaza Israel Katz US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin Israel Lebanon

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