Israeli

Hamas said Tuesday that the Gaza ceasefire plan cannot move to its second phase while it accuses Israel of ongoing violations, even as an Israeli official announced the Allenby crossing would reopen to allow aid trucks bound for Gaza for the first time since late September. The U.S.-sponsored truce, in effect since Oct. 10, has halted large-scale fighting but remains fragile amid near-daily allegations of breaches by both sides. Hamas political bureau member Hossam Badran accused Israel of failing to meet commitments under…

JERUSALEM — Israeli authorities entered the shuttered East Jerusalem compound of the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, raised Israel’s flag and began seizing equipment in a raid they said was ordered over unpaid municipal taxes — a move the United Nations condemned as a violation of international law. The Jerusalem municipality said tax collectors entered the U.N. Relief and Works Agency’s compound to recover 11 million shekels (€3 million) in property taxes after “repeated requests” and warnings. UNRWA, which Israel has…

Human Rights Watch says Israel’s expulsions from West Bank refugee camps amount to war crimes Human Rights Watch released a 105-page report alleging that about 32,000 Palestinians were forcibly displaced from the Jenin, Tulkarm and Nur Shams refugee camps during Israeli "Operation Iron Wall" in January and February. The rights group says the expulsions, destruction of homes and denial of return meet the thresholds for war crimes and crimes against humanity. The report, titled "All My Dreams Have Been Erased," documents…

Ceasefire Holds as Gazans Stream Back to Ruins and Uncertainty Under a truce that went into effect at midday local time, thousands of displaced Palestinians began a slow, solemn return to the shattered neighborhoods of Gaza on Saturday as Israeli forces pulled back from some urban positions. The first trickle of people soon became a flood, as families who had lived for months in tented camps walked north along the coastal road toward Gaza City, many stepping over rubble and past burnt-out buildings to stand again where…

Two years on, ceasefire talks shadowed by airstrikes and the weight of memory On the second anniversary of the October 7 attacks that plunged Israel and Gaza into an ever-expanding war, negotiators gathered in Sharm el‑Sheikh for what many describe as the most serious attempt yet to halt the fighting. Yet beneath the diplomatic fanfare, tanks rolled, jets and naval vessels struck and families on both sides marked the day with grief that a single negotiated text has so far failed to touch. The talks — cautious hope,…

Humanitarian access collapses in Gaza City as MSF suspends operations Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said it has been forced to suspend all operations in Gaza City after its clinics were surrounded by Israeli forces — a blunt sign of how rapidly humanitarian space is narrowing as the Israeli military presses a major offensive into the densely populated urban centre. "We have been left with no choice but to stop our activities as our clinics are encircled by Israeli forces," Jacob Granger, MSF's emergency coordinator in…

Netanyahu’s UN rebuke exposes a deeper diplomatic rupture over Gaza When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took the podium at the United Nations General Assembly this week, it was not just another speech. It was a coda to a seismic shift in Western policy — and a defensive, at times embittered, attempt to push back. "Over time, many world leaders buckled," Mr. Netanyahu told delegates, accusing governments of caving "under the pressure of a biased media, radical Islamist constituencies and antisemitic mobs." Scores…

Gaza’s skyline is being erased — and with it a fragile chance for peace Israel’s campaign in Gaza has entered a new, harsher phase: airstrikes and ground operations that have begun to smash the high-rises that once housed families, businesses and entire neighbourhoods. The intensified demolition of towers in Gaza City — as many as 20 high-rise buildings hit this week — is part of an assault that health authorities say left dozens dead and has pushed the territory further toward a humanitarian abyss. At the same time,…

Gaza City assault exposes the limits of force and the widening diplomatic rupture Israeli tanks and bulldozers have pushed deeper into Gaza City in recent days, flattening apartment blocks and killing dozens of civilians in strikes that have left families digging through rubble for shreds of their lives. Gazan health authorities say at least 31 people were killed when residential buildings were blasted; among them, medics reported, were a pregnant woman and two children. One man, his leg later amputated after he was rushed…

Somalia’s Public Embrace of Qatar Signals Shifting Alignments in the Gulf–Horn of Africa Nexus DOHA — When Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud stepped into the Amiri Diwan in Doha on Monday, he did more than pay a diplomatic courtesy call. In a terse, unequivocal statement — “The Somali government and its people stand in full solidarity with our Qatari brothers. We will not accept any violation of the sovereignty or stability of the State of Qatar” — Mohamud signalled a wider intent: to knit Somalia closer to a Gulf…