Two-day Israeli raid on West Bank city leaves 12 Palestinians dead

Two-day Israeli raid on West Bank city leaves 12 Palestinians dead
A Palestinian man inspects the damage, in the aftermath of an Israeli raid on Jenin camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. (Reuters)
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Updated 23 May 2024
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Two-day Israeli raid on West Bank city leaves 12 Palestinians dead

Two-day Israeli raid on West Bank city leaves 12 Palestinians dead
  • Israeli troops withdrew from the city after carrying out raids in the city’s refugee camp and exchanging fire with masked gunmen
  • Four children among the dead, and 25 wounded during the fighting

JeNIN: A two-day Israeli raid on the occupied West Bank city of Jenin killed at least 12 Palestinians, health authorities and an AFP correspondent said Thursday.
Israeli troops withdrew from the city early Thursday, the correspondent said, after carrying out raids in the city’s refugee camp and exchanging fire with masked gunmen in a nearby neighborhood in the city center.
The Palestinian health ministry in Ramallah said Israeli forces had killed 12 people including four children, and wounded 25 during the fighting which began on Tuesday morning.
The official Palestinian news agency Wafa and medical charity Doctors Without Borders reported that surgeon Usaeed Jabareen, from Jenin’s Khalil Suleiman government hospital, was among those killed on Tuesday.
An AFP correspondent on Thursday saw five bodies at the hospital morgue, including Jabareen’s.
A schoolteacher and a student were also among the dead, Wafa reported, quoting hospital director Wissam Bakr.
Several of the bodies were draped in flags and carried among crowds of Palestinians, including armed militants, through the streets as gunfire rang out.
Both Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas and Palestinian militant group Hamas condemned the raid.
Israel’s army said on Wednesday troops had “exchanged fire with armed men and killed a number of terrorists, including two terrorists who threw explosives at the forces.”
The army said it had raided the house of Ahmed Barakat, who was suspected of involvement in an attack on an Israeli civilian last year.
Meir Tamari, 32, was killed in May 2023 at the entrance to a Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank, medics and military officials said at the time.
Jenin has long been a stronghold of Palestinian militant groups, and the Israeli army routinely carries out raids in the city and adjacent camp.
The West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967, has seen a surge in violence for more than a year, but especially so since the Israel-Hamas war erupted on October 7.
At least 518 Palestinians have been killed in the territory by Israeli troops or settlers since the Gaza war broke out, according to Palestinian officials.
Attacks by Palestinians have killed at least 12 Israelis in the West Bank over the same period, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
The Gaza Strip has been gripped by more than seven months of war since Hamas’s unprecedented October 7 attack on Israel that resulted in the deaths of more than 1,170 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 35,709 people in Gaza, most of them civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.


Over 200 killed in three-day Sudan paramilitary assault: lawyers

Over 200 killed in three-day Sudan paramilitary assault: lawyers
Updated 14 sec ago
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Over 200 killed in three-day Sudan paramilitary assault: lawyers

Over 200 killed in three-day Sudan paramilitary assault: lawyers
The Emergency Lawyers group, which documents rights abuses, said RSF attacked unarmed civilians in the villages of Al-Kadaris and Al-Khelwat
The lawyer group said some residents were shot at while attempting to flee across the Nile River

PORT SUDAN: Sudanese paramilitaries have killed more than 200 people, including women and children, in a three-day assault on villages in the country’s south, a lawyer group monitoring the war said Tuesday.
The Emergency Lawyers group, which documents rights abuses, said the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces attacked unarmed civilians in the villages of Al-Kadaris and Al-Khelwat, in White Nile state.
The RSF carried out “executions, kidnappings, enforced disappearances and property looting” during the assault since Saturday, which also left hundreds wounded or missing, it said.
The lawyer group said some residents were shot at while attempting to flee across the Nile River. Some drowned in the process, with the lawyers calling the attack an act of “genocide.”
Sudan’s army-aligned foreign ministry said the death toll from the RSF attacks so far was 433 civilians, including babies. It called the assault a “horrible massacre.”
Both the army and the RSF have been accused of war crimes, but the paramilitaries have been specifically notorious for committing ethnic cleansing and systematic sexual violence.
The war has killed tens of thousands, displaced over 12 million and created what the International Rescue Committee has called the “biggest humanitarian crisis ever recorded.”
White Nile state is currently divided by the warring parties.
The army controls southern parts, including the state capital, Rabak, as well as two major cities and a key military base.
The RSF meanwhile holds northern parts of the state, bordering the capital Khartoum, which include several villages and towns and where the latest attacks took place.
Witnesses from the two villages, about 90 kilometers (55 miles) south of Khartoum, said thousands of residents fled their homes, crossing to the western bank of the Nile following RSF shelling.
A medical source speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity for their safety on Monday said some bodies were lying in the streets while others were killed inside their homes with no one able to reach them.
Fighting has intensified in recent weeks as the army advances in its bid to reclaim full control of the capital from paramilitaries.
The UN’s children agency, UNICEF, said on Sunday that those trapped in areas and around the fighting in Khartoum had reported indiscriminate shooting, looting, and forced displacement, as well as alarming accounts of families being separated, children missing, detained or abducted and sexual violence.
Many children, it added, showed signs of distress having witnessed the events around them.
“This is a living nightmare for children, and it must end,” said Sheldon Yett, UNICEF representative for Sudan.
Elsewhere, RSF shelling and gunfire shook the streets this week in a famine-hit camp near North Darfur’s besieged capital El-Fasher in the country’s west.
Hundreds of families fled the violence to neighboring towns with civilians saying that they were robbed and attacked on the roads.
The Zamzam camp, home to between 500,000 and a million people according to aid groups, was the first place famine was declared in Sudan last August under a UN-backed assessment.

Efforts ongoing to release more Gaza hostages this week: Israeli, Palestinian sources

Efforts ongoing to release more Gaza hostages this week: Israeli, Palestinian sources
Updated 14 min 3 sec ago
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Efforts ongoing to release more Gaza hostages this week: Israeli, Palestinian sources

Efforts ongoing to release more Gaza hostages this week: Israeli, Palestinian sources
  • A Palestinian source said “a proposal was presented by the mediators in recent days” for Gaza militants “to deliver the bodies of several Israeli prisoners before Friday”
  • Top Hamas leader Khalil Al-Hayya said Tuesday that the militant group will release six living Israeli hostages on Saturday.

JERUSALEM: Efforts were underway to secure the release this week of all remaining living hostages eligible to be freed from Gaza under the first phase of the Israel-Hamas ceasefire deal, an Israeli official source said Tuesday.
Of the 33 hostages set to be freed under phase one of the deal, 19 have already been released and Israel says eight are dead. That leaves just six living hostages slated for release in the current stage.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin “Netanyahu is making tremendous efforts to release all six remaining living hostages” this week, and to secure the bodies of four others, the Israeli official source told AFP.
A Palestinian source close to the negotiations said that “a proposal was presented by the mediators in recent days” for Gaza militants “to deliver the bodies of several Israeli prisoners before Friday, and to increase the number” of living captives to be released during the seventh hostage-prisoner swap on Saturday.
“The mediators are continuing their efforts as they aim for this step to create a positive atmosphere, insisting on the continuation of the ceasefire and the implementation of the agreement,” the Palestinian source added.
The fragile truce took effect on January 19 after more than 15 months of fighting between Israel and Hamas, sparked by the Palestinian militant group’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
Since the first phase of the ceasefire began, 19 Israeli hostages have been released in exchange for more than 1,100 Palestinian prisoners.
Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said Tuesday that Israel would begin negotiations “this week” on the second phase of the truce, which aims to lay out a more permanent end to the war.
Meanwhile, top Hamas leader Khalil Al-Hayya said Tuesday that the militant group will release six living Israeli hostages on Saturday.
The six are the last living hostages set to be freed under the first phase of the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. Three hostages had been expected to be freed on Saturday.
The warring sides have yet to negotiate the second and more difficult phase, in which Hamas would release dozens more hostages in exchange for a lasting ceasefire and an Israeli withdrawal.


Zelensky meets Turkiye’s Erdogan amid US shift on Ukraine

Zelensky meets Turkiye’s Erdogan amid US shift on Ukraine
Updated 18 February 2025
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Zelensky meets Turkiye’s Erdogan amid US shift on Ukraine

Zelensky meets Turkiye’s Erdogan amid US shift on Ukraine
  • Volodymyr Zelensky flew into the Turkish capital from the UAE late on Monday
  • Kyiv seeks to shore up its position in response to US-Russia talks

ISTANBUL: Turkiye’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan met with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky in Ankara on Tuesday, as Kyiv seeks to shore up its position in response to US-Russia talks.
Zelensky flew into the Turkish capital from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) late on Monday, saying on Telegram he would discuss prisoner exchanges and other issues with Erdogan.
The talks at Erdogan’s presidential palace, which began around 1115 GMT, came several hours after top US and Russian diplomats met in Saudi for their first high-level talks since Moscow invaded Ukraine nearly three years ago.
Zelensky, who last visited Turkiye in March 2024, is himself due in Riyadh for a visit on Wednesday.
Top Erdogan aide Fahrettin Altun on Monday said the pair would discuss how to “further strengthen cooperation” between their two nations.
NATO member Turkiye has sought to maintain good relations with its warring Black Sea neighbors, with Erdogan pitching himself as a key go-between and possible peacemaker between the two.
Ankara has provided drones for Ukraine but shied away from Western-led sanctions on Moscow.
Alongside Saudi and the UAE, Turkiye has played a role in brokering several prisoner swap deals between Russia and Ukraine which have seen hundreds of prisoners returning home despite the ongoing conflict.
Earlier on Tuesday, Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov met in Riyadh with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio as part of what the Kremlin says is a bid to re-open ties with Washington.
US and Russian officials are eyeing a summit between their two leaders, with Europe and Kyiv worried they will try to end the war in Ukraine without them.


Calls mount for lifting of Western sanctions on Syria

Calls mount for lifting of Western sanctions on Syria
Updated 18 February 2025
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Calls mount for lifting of Western sanctions on Syria

Calls mount for lifting of Western sanctions on Syria
  • Human Rights Watch: Country ‘in desperate need of reconstruction and Syrians are struggling to survive’
  • Current sanctions were imposed on regime of Bashar Assad who was deposed in December

LONDON: Sanctions imposed on the regime of former Syrian President Bashar Assad by the West are harming the country’s recovery, Human Rights Watch said on Tuesday.

Sanctions put in place by the US, the UK, the EU and others are “hindering reconstruction efforts and exacerbating the suffering of millions of Syrians,” and have no clear removal mechanism, HRW added.

Hiba Zayadin, HRW’s senior Syria researcher, said the country “is in desperate need of reconstruction and Syrians are struggling to survive. With the collapse of the former government, broad sanctions now stand as a major obstacle to restoring essential services such as health care, water, electricity, and education.”

HRW said the country’s long-running civil war has left its economy and infrastructure devastated, with millions of people having fled and 90 percent of the remaining population living in poverty.

Around 13 million are unable to access sufficient food, and 16.5 million are reliant on humanitarian aid.

The organization said sanctions, some of which have been in place for almost half a century but which were ramped up by the West in 2011 after the outbreak of the conflict, are making it harder to alleviate this suffering and to deliver aid despite humanitarian exemptions.

HRW said sanctions should be lifted to allow “access to basic rights,” including “restoring Syria’s access to global financial systems, ending trade restrictions on essential goods, addressing energy sanctions to ensure access to fuel and electricity, and providing clear legal assurances to financial institutions and businesses to mitigate the chilling effect of overcompliance.”

US sanctions hinder nearly all trade and financial transactions with Syria, while the Caesar Act sanctions foreign companies doing business with the government, “particularly in oil and gas, construction, and engineering,” HRW said.

EU and UK sanctions focus largely on Syrian crude oil exports, investments, and the activities of Syrian banks.

Western powers have proposed changes to the sanctions regime since Assad’s ouster in December, but the head of the Syrian Arab Republic’s Investment Agency, Ayman Hamawiye, said earlier this year that the only concrete changes — tweaks to US sanctions affecting energy remittance payments — were “inadequate” so far. 

“Rather than using broad sectoral sanctions as leverage for shifting political objectives, Western governments should recognize their direct harm to civilians and take meaningful steps to lift restrictions that impede access to basic rights,” Zayadin said.

“A piecemeal approach of temporary exemptions and limited waivers is not enough. Sanctions that harm civilians should immediately be lifted, not refined.”

HRW said Syria requires at least $250 billion to begin its reconstruction, focusing on essential infrastructure.

It highlighted the crumbling water network and overwhelmed healthcare system as two examples in desperate need of financial help, as well as the education sector, with around 2 million Syrian children out of fulltime school.

HRW said sanctions should not “have a disproportionately negative impact on human rights or create unnecessary suffering,” and “should not be punitive, but should instead be designed to deter and correct human rights abuses.”

It added: “To be effective, sanctions must be tied to clear, measurable, and attainable conditions for their removal, with regular monitoring to assess progress.

“The Caesar Act in the United States was designed to punish the Assad government, but in a post-Assad world, its broad and indefinite restrictions risk harming civilians without advancing clear human rights objectives.”


Arab League summit on Gaza postponed to March 4: Egypt

Arab League summit on Gaza postponed to March 4: Egypt
Updated 18 February 2025
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Arab League summit on Gaza postponed to March 4: Egypt

Arab League summit on Gaza postponed to March 4: Egypt
  • The meeting was called in response to US President Donald Trump’s proposal to take over the war-battered Gaza Strip

CAIRO: An extraordinary Arab League meeting on Gaza, initially set for next week, has been postponed to March 4, host Egypt said on Tuesday.
The Egyptian foreign ministry said the new date was agreed with Arab League members as part of “substantive and logistical preparations” for the summit.
The meeting was called in response to US President Donald Trump’s proposal to take over the war-battered Gaza Strip and move its Palestinian inhabitants elsewhere, including to Egypt and Jordan.
On Thursday, Saudi Arabia is set to host the leaders of Egypt, Jordan, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates to present their own plan for Gaza’s reconstruction while ensuring that Palestinians remain on their land.
Trump’s Gaza plan has sparked outcry across the Arab world, prompting a rare show of unity among Arab nations to block it.