Jordan restarts airdrops into Gaza after pause of 2 months

Jordan restarts airdrops into Gaza after pause of 2 months
This handout picture released by the Jordanian army shows humanitarian aid being airdropped from a military aircraft over the Gaza Strip on May 30, 2024. (File/AFP)
Short Url
Updated 02 September 2024
Follow

Jordan restarts airdrops into Gaza after pause of 2 months

Jordan restarts airdrops into Gaza after pause of 2 months
  • Aid dropped in areas inaccessible to land convoys

AMMAN: The Jordanian Armed Forces carried out two airdrops of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip on Monday after a two-month pause, the Jordan News Agency reported.

The drops were in areas of the war-torn enclave inaccessible to land convoys.

The conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza has killed 40,786 Palestinians and injured 94,000 more, according to figures from Gaza’s Health Ministry.

The JAF has reiterated its resolve to work with the Jordan Hashemite Charity Organization to send land convoys carrying medical and humanitarian supplies to Gaza “during these challenging times.”

Palestinians are still able to receive medical care from Jordanian field hospitals in Ramallah, Jenin, and Nablus in the West Bank, as well as in the northern and southern sections of Gaza.

The JAF has conducted 119 airdrops and 266 in cooperation with other Arab and countries of the world since the start of Israel’s war on Gaza last October.
 


Iran resumes flights after attack on Israel: state media

Iran resumes flights after attack on Israel: state media
Updated 29 sec ago
Follow

Iran resumes flights after attack on Israel: state media

Iran resumes flights after attack on Israel: state media
  • The Islamic republic launched 200 missiles at Israel on Tuesday evening
  • Both domestic and international flights were grounded for security reasons

TEHRAN: Iran resumed flights at its airports on Thursday, state media said, after a brief suspension following its missile attack on Israel.
The Islamic republic launched 200 missiles at Israel on Tuesday evening, marking its second-ever direct attack on its sworn enemy, following a missile and drone attack in April.
Both domestic and international flights were grounded for security reasons until 05:00 a.m. on Thursday.
Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization spokesman, Jafar Yazarloo, confirmed the resumption, citing the lifting of restrictions.
“After ensuring favorable and safe flight conditions and ending of the restrictions, airlines are allowed to carry out flight operations,” he said, quoted by the official IRNA news agency.
The European Union Aviation Safety Agency has advised European airlines to avoid Iranian airspace until October 31, with the situation under ongoing review.
Similar warnings were issued for Israel and Lebanon at the weekend.


Nobel Peace Prize could honor UNRWA, ICJ, UN chief Guterres

Nobel Peace Prize could honor UNRWA, ICJ, UN chief Guterres
Updated 3 min 5 sec ago
Follow

Nobel Peace Prize could honor UNRWA, ICJ, UN chief Guterres

Nobel Peace Prize could honor UNRWA, ICJ, UN chief Guterres
  • Prize will be announced on Oct. 11 in Oslo
  • Experts say UNRWA a potential winner, but would be controversial
OSLO/STOCKHOLM: The United Nations Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA), the International Court of Justice and UN chief Antonio Guterres are among the favorites for this year’s Nobel Peace Prize, experts said, in a year marked by the wars in Gaza and Ukraine.
Given past form, the Norwegian Nobel Committee is capable of springing a complete surprise in the Oct. 11 announcement — including not giving the prize at all.
Bookmakers have Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, who died in an Arctic penal colony in February, as a favorite to win this year’s award. But that is not possible as he cannot receive the prize posthumously.
Another bookies’ favorite, Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky, is unlikely to win because he is the leader of a nation at war.
Instead, with 2024 marked by the now spreading Israel-Hamas war, a Ukraine conflict in its third year and bloodshed in Sudan displacing more than 10 million, the committee may want to focus on humanitarian actors helping to relieve civilian suffering.
“UNRWA could be one such candidate. They’re doing extremely important work for civilian Palestinians that experience the sufferings of the war in Gaza,” Henrik Urdal, director of the Peace Research Institute Oslo, told Reuters.
A prize to UNRWA would be controversial, he added, given the allegations made by Israel that some of its staff took part in the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel by militant group Hamas that triggered the war in Gaza.
Some countries halted their funding to UNRWA as a result of the allegations. Most donors have since resumed. In August, an internal UN investigation said that nine staff members may have been involved in the attack and have been fired.
UNRWA has said Israel is trying to have the organization disbanded. The agency, set up in 1949 in the aftermath of the war over Israel’s creation, provides humanitarian assistance to millions of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon.

UN Secretary- general Guterres
The secretive five-strong awarding committee, appointed by the Norwegian parliament, may also want to focus on the need to bolster the international world order built after the Second World War and its crowning institution, the United Nations.
That could mean a prize to its secretary-general, Antonio Guterres, with or without its top court, the ICJ, said Asle Sveen, a historian of the Nobel Peace Prize.
“Guterres is the top symbol of the UN,” Sveen told Reuters. “(And) the ICJ’s most important duty is to ensure that international humanitarian law is applied globally.”
The ICJ has condemned Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and called on Israel to ensure that no genocide is committed in Gaza in an ongoing case Israel has repeatedly dismissed as baseless.
But the committee could also decide that no one gets the prize, something that has happened on 19 occasions, the last time in 1972.
“Maybe this is the year in which the Nobel Peace Prize committee should simply withhold the prize and focus attention on the fact that this is a warring planet,” Dan Smith, head of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, told Reuters.
Thousands of people can propose names, including former laureates, members of parliaments and university professors of history or law. Nominations are secret for 50 years, but those who nominate can choose to reveal their choices.
Some of the known nominees include the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, Pope Francis and British naturalist David Attenborough. In total 286 candidates have been nominated for this year’s prize.
Last year’s prize went to Narges Mohammadi, an imprisoned Iranian women’s rights advocate, in a rebuke to Tehran’s theocratic leaders and boost for anti-government protesters.

GCC Ministerial Council condemns escalation of conflict in Lebanon and Palestine

GCC Ministerial Council condemns escalation of conflict in Lebanon and Palestine
Updated 36 min 12 sec ago
Follow

GCC Ministerial Council condemns escalation of conflict in Lebanon and Palestine

GCC Ministerial Council condemns escalation of conflict in Lebanon and Palestine
  • Israel must end occupation, parties should ‘prioritize dialogue’
  • Conflict poses threat to peace and stability of region and world

RIYADH: The GCC’s Ministerial Council has condemned the escalation of conflict in Lebanon and Palestine and has warned that this poses a threat to regional and global security.

In a statement issued from Doha, the council called on all parties to “exercise restraint, cease violence, and prioritize dialogue,” the Saudi Press Agency reported on Thursday.

It urged the international community “to fulfill its responsibilities to maintain security and stability in the region and to implement international legitimacy resolutions related to the area.”

This comes in the wake of Tel Aviv attacking militant targets in Lebanon, and the ongoing conflict in occupied Gaza and the West Bank, Yemen, Iraq and within Israel itself.

The escalation has raised fears that the US and Iran would be sucked into the conflict.

The council reaffirmed the GCC’s support for Lebanon and its people, and called for urgent humanitarian assistance to “alleviate the suffering of civilians and protect them from any serious repercussions.”

It also stressed the necessity of implementing UN Security Council Resolution 1701, related international resolutions and the Taif Agreement.

This would “restore lasting security and stability in Lebanon and ensure respect for the integrity of its territory, political independence, and sovereignty within its internationally recognized borders.”

On Palestine, the council again called for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, the lifting of the blockade and the release of hostages and detainees.

The council emphasized “the importance of opening all crossings immediately and unconditionally.”

This would ensure “the delivery of all relief, humanitarian, medical supplies, and basic needs to the residents of Gaza in accordance with international law and international humanitarian law.”

It emphasized the “importance of deescalation, exercising maximum restraint, and preventing further instability and the dangers of wars and destruction and their effects on the peoples of the region and the world.”


Palestinian activist wins prize for peaceful resistance

Palestinian activist wins prize for peaceful resistance
Updated 54 min 40 sec ago
Follow

Palestinian activist wins prize for peaceful resistance

Palestinian activist wins prize for peaceful resistance
  • The rights campaigner has been repeatedly detained and tortured by both the Palestinian Authority and by Israel, the foundation said

STOCKHOLM: Palestinian activist Issa Amro on Thursday accepted the Right Livelihood prize — considered by some an alternative Nobel — for his “nonviolent resistance to Israel’s illegal occupation” in the West Bank, the jury said.
Amro was born in the city of Hebron, a flashpoint West Bank city where roughly 1,000 Jewish settlers live under heavy Israeli military protection amid some 200,000 Palestinians.
He has dedicated his life to fighting against Israel’s occupation of the West Bank.
The 44-year-old founded the Youth Against Settlements group, which campaigns against the proliferation of Jewish settlements in the territory — communities widely regarded as illegal under international law.
The rights campaigner has been repeatedly detained and tortured by both the Palestinian Authority and by Israel, the foundation said.
“It’s a miracle that I still exist,” said Amro.
When Palestine Polytechnic University, where he was studying, closed in 2003 during the Second Intifada, Amro successfully led a six-month civil disobedience campaign.
“I managed to reopen the university with other students,” Amro said in a statement.
“I graduated as an engineer and as an activist — it became part of my character,” he added.
The Sweden-based Right Livelihood Foundation also honored Joan Carling, a Filipino champion of indigenous rights and Anabela Lemos, a climate activist from Mozambique.
It also gave the nod to research agency Forensic Architecture for its work in uncovering human rights violations around the world.
The foundation said the four prize winners had “each made a profound impact on their communities and the global stage.”
“Their unwavering commitment to speaking out against forces of oppression and exploitation, while strictly adhering to non-violent methods, resonates far beyond their communities,” Right Livelihood said in a statement.
Carling from the Philippines was recognized for having defended the rights of indigenous communities for three decades, particularly in their fight against mining projects.
The foundation celebrated Lemos, who heads the NGO Justica Ambiental (JA!), for her role in opposing liquefied natural gas extraction projects in northern Mozambique.
Forensic Architecture, a London-based research laboratory known for 3D modelling conflict zones, won the distinction for “pioneering digital forensic methods” to ensure accountability of human rights violations around the world.
By teaming up with Ukraine’s Center for Spatial Technologies to reconstruct Mariupol’s Drama Theatre before it was destroyed in 2022, the firm highlighted Russia’s “strategies of terror” and “attempts to obscure evidence of their own crimes,” the foundation said.
Swedish-German philatelist Jakob von Uexkull sold part of his stamp collection to found the Right Livelihood award in 1980, after the foundation behind the Nobel Prizes refused to create new distinctions honoring efforts in the fields of environment and international development.


Yemen’s Houthis claim drone attack on Tel Aviv

Yemen’s Houthis claim drone attack on Tel Aviv
Updated 42 min 32 sec ago
Follow

Yemen’s Houthis claim drone attack on Tel Aviv

Yemen’s Houthis claim drone attack on Tel Aviv
  • The Israeli military said it intercepted “a suspicious aerial target” off central Israel overnight

Sanaa: Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels on Thursday said they carried out a drone attack on Tel Aviv, although there was no direct confirmation from Israeli authorities.
In a statement, the Houthis said they “carried out a military operation targeting a vital target in the Jaffa (Tel Aviv) area in occupied Palestine with a number of Jaffa drones.”
“The operation achieved its goals successfully as the drones reached their targets without the enemy being able to confront or shoot them down.”
The Israeli military said it intercepted “a suspicious aerial target” off central Israel overnight, without giving further details.
On Wednesday, the Houthis claimed to have fired cruise missiles at Israel, following Iran’s mass bombardment of the country the night before.
Last week, the rebels said they fired a missile at Ben Gurion International Airport near Tel Aviv, prompting Israeli air strikes on Yemen including the vital port of Hodeida.
The Houthis, who have controlled large swathes of war-torn Yemen for a decade, are part of Iran’s “Axis of Resistance” against Israel and the United States.
Since November, they have been attacking ships off Yemen’s coast in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden in what they say is a show of solidarity with Palestinians during the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.