Israeli athletes receive threats in Paris as tensions simmer over Gaza

Israeli athletes receive threats in Paris as tensions simmer over Gaza
Israeli cyclist Rotem Gafinovitz, center, at the 2024 Summer Olympics in France on Aug. 6, 2024. (AP)
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Updated 07 August 2024
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Israeli athletes receive threats in Paris as tensions simmer over Gaza

Israeli athletes receive threats in Paris as tensions simmer over Gaza
  • Paris prosecutors opened an investigation into emailed death threats to Israeli athletes last week
  • Palestinian delegation has used the Games as a way to generate conversation about the day-to-day struggles of those in Gaza

PARIS: Israel’s Olympic team said some athletes have received threats as they compete in Paris amid larger tensions over Palestinian deaths during the war in Gaza and the threat of a wider regional conflict in the Middle East.
Yael Arad, president of the Israeli National Olympic Committee, said on Tuesday that team members had received “centralized” threats meant to generate “psychological terror” in athletes, without giving further details.
Last week, Paris prosecutors opened an investigation into emailed death threats to Israeli athletes, and the national cybercrime agency is looking into the leak of some Israeli athletes’ personal data online, which has since been taken down. Prosecutors also launched an inquiry into inciting racial hatred after Israeli athletes received ‘’discriminatory gestures” during an Israel-Paraguay match.
Tom Reuveny, a 24-year-old Israeli athlete who won a gold in wind surfing over the weekend, was among those who said he’s received threats. Politics “should be put aside” during the Games, he said speaking during a memorial Tuesday of the deadly attack that targeted the Israeli delegation at the 1972 Olympics in Munich, Germany. The Sept. 5, 1972, assault by the Palestinian group Black September killed 11 Israelis and a police officer.
“I don’t think any politics should be involved in sport, especially in the Olympic Games,” Reuveny said. “Unfortunately, there is a lot of politics involved — not in the Games — of the people who don’t want us to compete and don’t want us to be here. I’ve gotten quite a few messages and threats.”
While Israel has called for the Olympics to remain a neutral space, the Palestinian delegation has used the Games as a way to generate conversation about the day-to-day struggles of those in Gaza. The Israel-Hamas war has claimed more than 39,000 Palestinian lives.
“The thing that really hurts me is that people are looking at Palestinians as just numbers now. The number of people that died. The number of people displaced,” Palestinian American Olympic swimmer Valerie Tarazi told the AP on Sunday.
“As athletes, we’re here just as everyone else. We want to compete. As people, we have lives. ... We want to live in our homes, just like everyone else in the world,” she added.
The world is coming together in Paris at a moment of global political upheaval, multiple wars, historic migration and a deepening climate crisis, all issues that have risen to the forefront of conversation in the Olympics.
Tensions across the Middle East are spiking following the killings last week of a senior Hezbollah commander in Lebanon and Hamas’ top political leader in Iran, in suspected Israeli strikes. Both groups are backed by Iran.
Tuesday’s memorial of the 1972 attack underscored how the Olympics have frequently found themselves caught up in international crises that aren’t directly related to sport.
International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach called it “the darkest day in Olympic history” and “an attack on the culture of peace that the Olympic games promote.”
French authorities have cited the Munich attack as among reasons for heightened security for the Paris Olympics, and Israeli athletes are under 24-hour guard by a French police unit.
Palestine’s Olympic team has demanded that the IOC ban Israel from competing in Paris, alleging the country has violated the Olympic charter. Last week, the Palestinian delegation said it had not received a response from the IOC and that it planned to take its plea to higher sports courts.
Israel’s team has been met by jeers in stadiums during the country’s national anthem, and athletes have arrived to events under a heavy police escort, including riot police vans.
“It’s not easy to be an Israeli athlete in the international arena these days,” said Arad, head of Israel’s Olympic committee. The Olympics is “a bridge between people, between countries, between religions. And we are here to compete.”


Ukraine’s air defense units trying to repel Russian drone attack on Kyiv, Ukraine’s military says

Ukraine’s air defense units trying to repel Russian drone attack on Kyiv, Ukraine’s military says
Updated 14 sec ago
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Ukraine’s air defense units trying to repel Russian drone attack on Kyiv, Ukraine’s military says

Ukraine’s air defense units trying to repel Russian drone attack on Kyiv, Ukraine’s military says

KYIV: Ukraine’s air defense systems were engaged on the outskirts of Kyiv in trying to repel a Russian drone attack, the military administration of the Ukrainian capital said on Wednesday on the Telegram messaging app.
Reuters witnesses said they heard several blasts in what sounded like air defense units in operation.


Trump says will meet India’s Modi during US visit

Trump says will meet India’s Modi during US visit
Updated 3 min 8 sec ago
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Trump says will meet India’s Modi during US visit

Trump says will meet India’s Modi during US visit

Flint, US: Former US president Donald Trump said Tuesday he plans to meet next week with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who will be visiting the United States for several official events.
During a campaign event in Michigan, Trump slammed India as a “very big abuser” on trade, but said Modi was “fantastic.”
“He happens to be coming to meet me next week,” Trump told the crowd without providing further details.
Modi will be traveling this weekend to Wilmington, Delaware — President Joe Biden’s hometown — as part of the “Quad Leaders” summit alongside Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio.
The four-way Quad grouping dates back to 2007, but Biden has strongly pushed the alliance as part of an emphasis on international alliances to rein in adversaries — especially China.
The upcoming summit marks Biden’s last with the group as US president, having abandoned his bid for another White House term, with Vice President Kamala Harris replacing him at the top of the Democratic ticket.
After the summit, Modi will attend the United nations General Assembly in New York, as well as a meeting with Indian community members.
Despite no longer being president, Trump met in Florida in July with Hungary’s nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban, a close ally who is hoping the Republican reclaims the White House in November.


Portugal battles ferocious wildfires as toll rises to seven

Portugal battles ferocious wildfires as toll rises to seven
Updated 50 min 45 sec ago
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Portugal battles ferocious wildfires as toll rises to seven

Portugal battles ferocious wildfires as toll rises to seven

AGUEDA, Portugal: Thousands of firefighters on Tuesday battled wildfires in Portugal that have killed seven people and burnt more land in a matter of days than the rest of the summer combined.
Fanned by bellowing winds in the stifling heat, the three largest fires concentrated in the northern Aveiro region scorched some 10,000 hectares (24,700 acres) by Monday evening, according to a civil protection report.
Three firefighters died on Tuesday when their vehicle was trapped by the flames, civil protection authorities said, bringing the fire-related toll up to seven, with some 50 injured.
The two women and a man were killed while fighting flames in the central region of Coimbra, the interior ministry said. The trio was previously reported to have been killed in the north.
Across the Iberian nation, more than 4,500 firefighters, more than 1,000 vehicles and around 20 aircraft on Tuesday were battling some 50 fires in all, with an alert warning in force since Saturday afternoon extended until Thursday evening.
“We’re in for some very difficult times over the next few days,” Portugal’s Prime Minister Luis Montenegro — who canceled all his Tuesday engagements in response to the blaze — warned on Monday evening.
“Nobody is sleeping here, we’ve been up since two o’clock in the morning,” Maria Ludivina Castanheira, 63, said in the village of Arrancada, south of the coastal city of Porto, where villagers hurried to a small warehouse to fight a fire there.
“We opened the cages so that the pigeons could escape” and “we moved the chickens to a neighbor’s,” Antonia Estima, 39, said as she took a break from helping to fight the flames.
Portuguese authorities have invoked the European Union’s civil protection mechanism to obtain eight additional firefighting aircraft.
Following the two Canadair water bombers sent from Spain on Monday, aircraft made available by France, Italy and Greece were also expected to arrive.
In the municipality of Albergaria-a-Velha, a 28-year-old Brazilian employed by a forestry company died after he became trapped by the flames as he tried to collect some tools.
Another person suffered a heart attack on Monday, while on Sunday a volunteer firefighter died suddenly while taking a lunch break from battling a blaze near Oliveira de Azemeis in hard-hit Aveiro.
Raging since the weekend before worsening on Monday, the blazes have also left around 50 people injured, including 33 firefighters, according to the latest figures from the authorities.
Several roads are still cut off in the northern Portuguese districts of Aveiro, Viseu, Vila Real, Braga and Porto as well as in the central Coimbra region.
Monday saw the highest fire-risk weather conditions in the northern half of the country since 2001, according to experts interviewed by the weekly Expresso.
Scientists say that fossil fuel emissions are worsening the length, frequency and intensity of heatwaves across the world.
The rising temperatures are leading to longer wildfire seasons and increasing the area burnt in the flames, according to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.


Air France suspends services to Beirut and Tel Aviv

Air France suspends services to Beirut and Tel Aviv
Updated 18 September 2024
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Air France suspends services to Beirut and Tel Aviv

Air France suspends services to Beirut and Tel Aviv

Air France is suspending services from the French capital’s Charles de Gaulle airport to Beirut and Tel Aviv up to and including Sept. 19 due to escalating security concerns in the Middle East, the airline said on Tuesday.
The operations will resume following an assessment of the situation, Air France added.
Earlier in the day, Lufthansa Group said it is suspending all connections to and from Tel Aviv and Tehran and will bypass Israeli and Iranian airspace up to and including Sept. 19.


US senator accuses Muslim advocate of supporting extremism in hearing on hate

Republican US Senator John Kennedy. (REUTERS file photo)
Republican US Senator John Kennedy. (REUTERS file photo)
Updated 18 September 2024
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US senator accuses Muslim advocate of supporting extremism in hearing on hate

Republican US Senator John Kennedy. (REUTERS file photo)
  • “This harassment is alarming,” Muslim American advocacy group Engage Action said

WASHINGTON: Republican US Senator John Kennedy accused a leading Muslim civil rights advocate of supporting extremism during a Senate hearing on hate incidents in the US, drawing criticism from many rights groups.
“You support Hamas, do you not?” Kennedy told Arab American Institute Executive Director Maya Berry, who replied by saying: “You asking the executive director of the Arab American Institute that question very much puts the focus on the issue of hate in our country.”
In a follow-up question, the senator asked, “You support Hezbollah, too, don’t you?” He later told her, “You should hide your head in a bag.”
Berry repeatedly said in her responses that she did not support those groups, and added that she found the line of questioning “extraordinarily disappointing.”
Islamist militant groups Hamas, which carried out a deadly Oct. 7 attack on Israel, and Hezbollah are both designated as “foreign terrorist organizations” by the US government.
Multiple rights advocates denounced Senator Kennedy.
“It is absolutely reprehensible that a US senator would weaponize the racial identity of a witness and accuse her of supporting terrorism by using an anti-Arab and anti-Muslim trope in a hearing meant to tackle precisely that kind of bigotry,” Council on American Islamic Relations Government Affairs Director Robert McCaw told Reuters.
“This harassment is alarming,” Muslim American advocacy group Engage Action said.
The Democratic-led Senate Judiciary Committee, which organized Tuesday’s hearing, also condemned the senator and called Berry’s response to him “powerful.”
Rights advocates have warned about rising threats against American Muslims, Arabs and Jews since the eruption of Israel’s war in Gaza following Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack.
US incidents in recent months include the attempted drowning of a 3-year-old Muslim girl in Texas, the fatal stabbing of a 6-year-old Muslim boy in Illinois, the stabbing of a Muslim man in Texas, the beating of a Muslim man in New York, threats of violence against Jews at Cornell University that led to a conviction and sentencing, and an unsuccessful plot to attack a New York City Jewish center.