Egypt deplores Israeli assaults on civilians in Gaza Strip

This image made from a video, shows the yard of a school after being hit by an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City Saturday, Aug. 10, 2024. (AP)
This image made from a video, shows the yard of a school after being hit by an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City Saturday, Aug. 10, 2024. (AP)
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Updated 11 August 2024
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Egypt deplores Israeli assaults on civilians in Gaza Strip

Egypt deplores Israeli assaults on civilians in Gaza Strip
  • Egypt called for a unified and effective international stance to protect the Palestinian people in Gaza

CAIRO: Egypt has condemned in the strongest terms the bombing of a school where displaced Palestinians were sheltering in eastern Gaza.

In a statement issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Emigration and Egyptian Expatriates, Egypt denounced the continued Israeli assaults on civilians in the Gaza Strip as an unprecedented disregard for international law and international humanitarian law.

Egypt called for a unified and effective international stance to protect the Palestinian people in Gaza and to end the targeting of unarmed civilians.

Egypt said the continued perpetration of these “large-scale crimes and the deliberate killing of such large numbers of unarmed civilians whenever mediators intensify efforts to reach a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip as clear evidence of the Israeli side’s lack of political will to end this brutal war.”

The ministry statement added that Israel’s actions reflect “a persistent intent to prolong the humanitarian suffering of Palestinians under the weight of an international humanitarian catastrophe that the world remains powerless to stop.”

Egypt affirmed that it will continue its efforts and diplomatic endeavors, as well as its intensive communications with all internationally influential parties, to ensure the delivery of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip by all possible means and to work toward achieving a ceasefire, regardless of the challenges or obstacles it may face.

At least 100 Palestinians were killed on Saturday by Israeli airstrikes at the Al-Taba’een school being used as a shelter for displaced people in Al-Daraj neighborhood in Gaza City. 


Iraq sets November 11 for parliamentary election

Iraq sets November 11 for parliamentary election
Updated 23 sec ago
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Iraq sets November 11 for parliamentary election

Iraq sets November 11 for parliamentary election

BAGHDAD: The Iraqi cabinet has set November 11 as the date for a parliamentary election, it said on Wednesday.


US says it is aware of Palestinian American’s killing by Israeli forces in West Bank

US says it is aware of Palestinian American’s killing by Israeli forces in West Bank
Updated 09 April 2025
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US says it is aware of Palestinian American’s killing by Israeli forces in West Bank

US says it is aware of Palestinian American’s killing by Israeli forces in West Bank
  • Israel has expanded and consolidated settlements in the occupied West Bank as part of the steady integration of these territories into the state of Israel in breach of international law, the UN human rights office said last month

WASHINGTON: The US State Department said on Tuesday it was aware of the killing by Israeli forces of a Palestinian American teenager in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and was seeking more information about the incident.
A State Department spokesperson made the comments to reporters when asked about the killing of US citizen Omar Mohammad Rabea, 14, and the shooting of two other teenagers.
“We are certainly aware of that dynamic,” the State Department spokesperson said. “There is an investigation that is going on. We are aware of the reports from the IDF that this was a counterterrorism act, we need to learn more about the nature of what happened on the ground.”
The Palestinian foreign ministry condemned the weekend incident as an “extra-judicial killing” by Israeli forces during a raid. A local mayor said Rabea was shot along with two other teenagers by an Israeli settler and that the Israeli army pronounced him dead after detaining him.
The Israeli military said it shot a “terrorist” who endangered civilians by hurling rocks.
“We don’t have the complete picture of what was going on on the ground,” the State Department spokesperson added.
Israel has expanded and consolidated settlements in the occupied West Bank as part of the steady integration of these territories into the state of Israel in breach of international law, the UN human rights office said last month.
Settler violence in the West Bank, including incursions into occupied territory and raids, has intensified since the start of Israel’s war in Gaza that has killed over 50,000, according to Gaza’s health ministry, and led to genocide and war crimes accusations that Israel denies.
The Israeli onslaught in Gaza followed a Hamas attack in October 2023 in which 1,200 were killed and about 250 taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies.
 

 


Israel troops shoot dead woman in alleged West Bank knife attack

Israel troops shoot dead woman in alleged West Bank knife attack
Updated 09 April 2025
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Israel troops shoot dead woman in alleged West Bank knife attack

Israel troops shoot dead woman in alleged West Bank knife attack
  • Yaqub was a lawyer and mother of three from nearby Biddya, the village’s mayor, Ahmed Abu Safiyeh, told AFP
  • The Israeli military said Tuesday that Israeli settlers set fire to a Palestinian event hall overnight in the area of Biddya, and that no injuries were reported

HARES, Palestinian Territories: The Palestinian health ministry said Israeli troops killed a 30-year-old woman near the West Bank city of Salfit on Tuesday after what the army described as an attempted stabbing.
The ministry reported the death of Amana Ibrahim Mohammed Yaqub, 30, “who was shot by (Israeli) forces near Salfit,” south of Nablus.
The Israeli military said it had “neutralized a terrorist who hurled rocks and attempted to stab soldiers adjacent to the Gitai Avisar junction” close to the West Bank village of Hares.
An AFP journalist reported seeing a lifeless body under a foil blanket by the roadside at the scene of the attack.
Yaqub was a lawyer and mother of three from nearby Biddya, the village’s mayor, Ahmed Abu Safiyeh, told AFP.
The Israeli military said Tuesday that Israeli settlers set fire to a Palestinian event hall overnight in the area of Biddya, and that no injuries were reported.
An AFP journalist reported most of the hall was burned to the ground, and that settlers left graffiti in Hebrew on nearby walls.
The area around Salfit and Biddya is dense with Israeli settlements, including the town of Ariel.
Since the start of the Gaza war in October 2023, violence has soared in the occupied West Bank. Israeli troops and settlers have killed at least 918 Palestinians in the territory, according to health ministry figures.
Palestinian attacks and clashes during military raids have killed at least 33 Israelis, including soldiers, over the same period, according to Israeli figures.
 

 


Hamas official says ‘necessary to reach a ceasefire’ in Gaza

Hamas official says ‘necessary to reach a ceasefire’ in Gaza
Updated 09 April 2025
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Hamas official says ‘necessary to reach a ceasefire’ in Gaza

Hamas official says ‘necessary to reach a ceasefire’ in Gaza
  • “This war cannot continue indefinitely, and it is therefore necessary to reach a ceasefire,” Hossam Badran, a member of Hamas’s political bureau, told AFP

GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories: A Hamas official told AFP on Tuesday that it was “necessary to reach a ceasefire” in the Gaza Strip, three weeks after Israel resumed bombardments on the Palestinian territory.
“This war cannot continue indefinitely, and it is therefore necessary to reach a ceasefire,” Hossam Badran, a member of Hamas’s political bureau, told AFP, adding that “communication with the mediators is still ongoing” but that “so far, there are no new proposals.”
 

 


Iran-backed militias in Iraq ‘ready to disarm’

Iran-backed militias in Iraq ‘ready to disarm’
Updated 08 April 2025
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Iran-backed militias in Iraq ‘ready to disarm’

Iran-backed militias in Iraq ‘ready to disarm’
  • They fear threat of US airstrikes

BAGHDAD: Powerful Iran-backed militias in Iraq are ready to disarm to avert the threat of US airstrikes, they said on Tuesday.

The move follows repeated private warnings by US officials to the Iraqi government since Donald Trump took office as US president in January.
They told Baghdad that unless it acted to disband the militias on its soil, America could attack the groups.
“Trump is ready to take the war with us to worse levels, we know that, and we want to avoid such a bad scenario,” said one commander of Kata’ib Hezbollah, the most powerful militia.

BACKGROUND

Militia leaders said the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps had told them to do whatever they deemed necessary to avoid being drawn into a potentially ruinous conflict with the US.

The others that have offered to lay down their weapons are Nujabaa, Kata’ib Sayyed Al-Shuhada and Ansarullah Al-Awfiyaa.
Militia leaders said their main ally and patron, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iran, had told them to do whatever they deemed necessary to avoid being drawn into a potentially ruinous conflict with the US.
The militias are part of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, about 10 armed factions with about 50,000 fighters and arsenals that include long-range missiles and anti-aircraft weapons.
They are a key pillar of Iran’s network of regional proxy forces, and have carried out dozens of missile and drone attacks on Israel and US forces in Iraq and Syria since the Gaza war began in 2023.
Iraqi security officials said Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ Al-Sudani was pressing for disarmament by all militias that declared their allegiance to the Revolutionary Guards or its Quds Force rather than to Baghdad.
Some have already quit their bases and reduced their presence in major cities including Mosul and Anbar for fear of airstrikes.