Washington, United States - Unconditional support for Israel has long been an entry requirement in US Republican politics, but that orthodoxy is being challenged by Donald Trump's populist base -- where invocations of the "special relationship" are falling on deaf ears. Images of starvation and suffering in Gaza have given...

The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification Initiative, a coalition of monitors tasked by the UN to warn of impending crises, stopped short of declaring a state of famine, but made clear the situation is critical.

It remains unclear how much damage was caused by the US strikes on Tehran's nuclear facilities, which came after Israel launched a surprise bombing campaign that it said was aimed at preventing Iran from obtaining an atomic weapon.

Russia, a close ally of Syria's former long-time ruler Bashar al-Assad, who reportedly fled to Moscow with his family, still has two military bases in the country, and is also close to Iran, having boosted military ties amid the Kremlin's offensive in Ukraine.

Ever since the partition of Palestine into Jewish and Arab states in 1947, the United Nations has been inextricably linked to the fate of Palestinians, with the organization meeting this week hoping to revive the two-state solution.

UN's World Food Programme said a third of the population of Gaza had not eaten for days, and 470,000 people were "enduring famine-like conditions" that were already leading to deaths.

Israel imposed a total blockade on Gaza on March 2 after ceasefire talks broke down. In late May, it began allowing a small trickle of aid to resume, amid warnings of a wave of starvation.

Syrian diplomatic source said Saturday that a US-mediated meeting with Israeli officials in Paris this week sought to "contain the escalation" after recent sectarian violence in southern Syria prompted Israeli intervention.

Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli military operations killed at least 23 people on Friday across the Palestinian territory, with another five killed in an overnight air strike.

"The negative statements of the US envoy Witkoff run completely counter to the context in which the last negotiations were held, and he is perfectly aware of this, but they come to serve the Israeli position," said Hamas political bureau member Bassem Naim.

The US special envoy for Syria said he held talks with Syrian and Israeli officials in Paris on Thursday on de-escalating sectarian violence in Syria.

At least 142 countries now recognise or plan to recognise Palestinian statehood, according to an AFP tally -- though Israel and the United States strongly oppose the move.

Mediators have been shuttling between Israeli and Hamas delegations in Qatar for more than two weeks, but the indirect talks have so far failed to yield an elusive truce.

Hamas confirmed on Thursday that it has responded to an Israeli proposal for a 60-day ceasefire in Gaza, after more than two weeks of indirect talks in Qatar have failed to yield a truce.

The UN said on Tuesday that Israeli forces had killed more than 1,000 Palestinians trying to get food aid since the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation started operations in late May

Hussein al-Sheikh, vice-president of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), on Tuesday said he met the US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, in the occupied West Bank.

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the Israeli military had entered the UN agency's staff residence, forced women and children to evacuate on foot, and handcuffed, stripped and interrogated male staff at gunpoint.

US President Donald Trump was "caught off guard" by Israeli strikes in Syria last week, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said Monday, adding that he discussed the issue with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

"The suffering of civilians in Gaza has reached new depths," the signatories, including Britain, France, Australia, Canada and 21 other countries, plus the EU, said in a statement.

UNRWA said that shortages in the Palestinian territory had caused food prices to increase by 40 times, while the aid stockpiled in its warehouses outside Gaza could feed "the entire population for over three months."

Iran's air defence network includes systems like the domestically built Bavar-373 and Khordad-15, designed to counter missiles and aircraft, in addition to Russia's S-300 air defense systems installed in 2016.

Sweida, Syria - Syrian Bedouin and their allies fought Druze fighters in the community's Sweida heartland for a seventh day Saturday despite a ceasefire ordered by the government following a US-brokered deal to avert further Israeli military intervention. AFP correspondents reported clashes in the west of the provincial capital as...

UN has said it had recorded 875 people killed in Gaza while trying to get food, including 674 in the vicinity of sites run by US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which replaced UN agencies.

The armed wing of the Palestinian militant group Hamas on Friday accused Israel of blocking a deal in talks for a temporary ceasefire and the release of hostages in Gaza.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday accused Israel of using the Druze minority in Syria as a pretext for expanding into the war-torn country.

Syria said a new ceasefire reached on Wednesday in the Druze-majority city of Sweida will bring a complete halt to military operations and be overseen by government officials and local representatives.

The conference, co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia, was originally planned for mid-June to revive work on the long-standing diplomatic effort to find a way for Israeli and Palestinian states to live side-by-side in peace. It was postponed at the last minute after Israel's military campaign against Iran.

The measures range from suspending the entire accord or curbing trade ties to sanctioning Israeli ministers, imposing an arms embargo and halting visa-free travel.

Washington and Tehran had been engaged in several rounds of negotiations seeking to strike a deal on the Islamic Republic's nuclear programme, but Israel derailed the talks when it launched a wave of surprise strikes on its regional nemesis.

The indirect negotiations in Qatar appear deadlocked after both sides blamed the other for blocking a deal for the release of hostages and a 60-day ceasefire after 21 months of fighting.

Israel's military blamed it on a "technical error" when targeting a militant in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, adding "the munition fell dozens of meters from the target".

On the ground, civil defense agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said at least 43 people were killed in the latest Israeli strikes, including 11 when a market in Gaza City was hit. Elsewhere, eight children were among the 10 victims of a drone strike at a water point in the Nuseirat...

There are frequent reports of Israeli forces firing on people seeking aid, with Gaza's civil defence agency saying 10 Palestinians were killed Friday while waiting at a distribution point near the southern city of Rafah.

Like most women at the Gaza City hospital where she attends her pregnancy check-ups, Fatima Arafa's face looks fatigued, a sign of the malnutrition affecting her due to wartime shortages.

"This deal means more crossings open, aid and food trucks entering Gaza, repair of vital infrastructure and protection of aid workers. We count on Israel to implement every measure agreed," said EU foreign affairs chief Kaja Kallas.

The Israeli army said early Thursday it had intercepted a missile launched from Yemen, days after carrying out strikes on Huthi rebel targets in the country.

Tirabin al-Sana in Israel's Negev desert is the home of the Tirabin (also spelled Tarabin) Bedouin tribe, who signed a contract with an Israeli solar energy company to build the installation

The group's statement came after four days of indirect talks brokered by Qatar and as the United States signalled its belief that agreement for a 60-day truce would be struck before the end of the week.

Iran's nuclear programme has been "very, very delayed" by US and Israeli strikes, France's foreign intelligence chief said on Tuesday, wading into a contentious debate over just how hard it was hit.

Saudi Prince Mohammed bin Salman said his country hoped the truce would contribute to regional stability, and emphasised Riyadh's position "in supporting dialogue through diplomatic means as a path to resolving disputes."

Five Israeli soldiers were killed and 14 others injured late Monday night when a roadside bomb exploded during an ongoing ground operation in Beit Hanoun, northern Gaza, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced.

Jerusalem, Undefined - The Israeli army announced Sunday that it would begin sending draft notices to 54,000 ultra-Orthodox Jewish men who were previously exempt from military service, a move that threatens to split the governing coalition. "The army will begin this week issuing summons to complete the enlistment process for...

Speaking before boarding Israel's state jet bound for Washington, Netanyahu said: "We are working to achieve this deal that we have discussed, under the conditions that we have agreed to."

"We cannot remain indifferent to the genocide carried out by Israel in Gaza, the indiscriminate killing of innocent civilians and the use of hunger as a weapon of war," President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva told leaders from China, India, and other nations.

But Netanyahu, who is due to meet with President Donald Trump in Washington on Monday, said the Palestinian group's proposals for changes to a draft US-backed ceasefire deal were "unacceptable".

"The movement is ready to engage immediately and seriously in a cycle of negotiations on the mechanism to put in place" the US-backed truce proposal, the militant group said in a statement.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said the army must draw up a plan to prevent Iran from threatening Israel again after the arch-foes fought a 12-day war last month, in comments released Friday.

Syria said on Friday it was willing to cooperate with the United States to reimplement the 1974 disengagement agreement with Israel, which created a UN-patrolled buffer zone separating the two countries' forces.

Sinjil, Palestinian Territories - Dozens of Israeli settlers and Palestinians clashed Friday in the occupied West Bank village of Sinjil, where a march against recent settler attacks on nearby farmland was due to take place. AFP journalists saw local residents and activists begin their march before locals reported that settlers...

The United Nations and major aid groups have refused to cooperate with the Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation over concerns it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives and violates basic humanitarian principles.