Heavy fighting rocked besieged Gaza as aid agencies warned of looming famine and new talks were held in Cairo towards an Israel-Hamas ceasefire and hostage release deal. The White House sent Middle East envoy Brett McGurk for renewed talks, a day after a UNSC resolution calling for a ceasefire was...

The International Court of Justice is holding a week of hearings after a request from the UN, with an unprecedented 52 countries giving their views on Israel's occupation. Most speakers have demanded that Israel end its occupation, which came after a six-day Arab-Israeli war in 1967, but Washington came to...

Tehran, Iran--Iran said Wednesday that Israel was behind twin sabotage attacks against gas pipelines that disrupted supplies in at least three provinces last week.The February 14 explosions hit pipelines in the cities of Safashahr in the southern province of Fars and Borujen in the southwestern province of Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari.Officials...

Geneva, Switzerland - The World Health Organization said on Tuesday it had transferred 32 patients out of the besieged Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza but feared for the patients and medics still inside.WHO staff said the scenes around the hospital in the southern city of Khan Yunis were "indescribable", while calling...

The World Food Program (WFP) resumed deliveries on Sunday after a three-week halt but its convoy "faced complete chaos and violence due to the collapse of civil order", it said. Twenty weeks into Israel's war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, UN agencies have warned that food and safe water...

"We as South Africans sense, see, hear and feel to our core the inhumane discriminatory policies and practices of the Israeli regime as an even more extreme form of the apartheid that was institutionalized against black people in my country," said Vusimuzi Madonsela, South Africa's ambassador to the Netherlands, where...

The resolution, which Algeria had been working on for three weeks, had demanded "an immediate humanitarian ceasefire that must be respected by all parties." "Proceeding with a vote today was wishful and irresponsible... we cannot support a resolution that would put sensitive negotiations in jeopardy," said Washington's ambassador to the...

The European Union has struggled for a united response on Israel's military operation following the October 7 attack by Hamas. But Borrell said foreign ministers from 26 states had agreed a statement calling for "an immediate humanitarian pause that would lead to a sustainable ceasefire".

Twenty weeks into Israel's war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, UN agencies warned that food and safe water had become "incredibly scarce" in the Palestinian territory, adding that virtually all young children had infectious illnesses. UN assessment indicated that more than 15 percent of children under the age of...

The Brazilian foreign ministry said it has also recalled its own ambassador from Tel Aviv for consultations, after Israel summoned the Brazilian envoy and declared Lula "persona non grata" over his remarks on Sunday. The president said the conflict in the Gaza Strip "isn't a war, it's a genocide".

Lula's remarks on Sunday sparked outcry in Israel after the Brazilian leader said the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip "isn't a war, it's a genocide" and compared it to "when Hitler decided to kill the Jews". On Sunday, the head of Yad Vashem, Dani Dayan, said that Lula's remarks...

Dubai, UAE -- The United States has proposed a rival draft resolution at the United Nations Security Council, emphasizing its support for a temporary ceasefire in Gaza, Reuters reported. The proposed resolution echoes the language US President Joe Biden's said he used in his recent discussions with Israel's Prime Minister...

Overall, Israel's GDP grew by 2.0 percent in 2023, short of the 2.3 percent projection made by the Bank of Israel after the war's outbreak in October, the Central Bureau of Statistics figures showed.

Israeli swimmer Anastasia Gorbenko faced crowd jeering at Qatar's World Acquatics Championships after winning a silver medal in the women's 400m individual medley in a public outburst as a response to Israel's ongoing war against Gaza. However, the swimmer said in a statement that she felt 'safe' in Qatar.

"The Palestinians have endured colonialism and apartheid... There are those who are enraged by these words. They should be enraged by the reality we are suffering," Al-Maliki said. The ICJ is holding hearings all week on the legal implications of Israel's occupation since 1967, with an unprecedented 52 countries expected...

The portion of the revenues that Israel will transfer to Norway will remain in a Norwegian account until the parties agree whether Norway may release the funds to the Palestinian Authority. Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store hailed the agreement.

The Houthis, who control vast swathes of Yemen, have said the attacks, beginning in November, have targeted vessels linked to Israel, in solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza. In December the United States announced a maritime security initiative, Operation Prosperity Guardian, to protect shipping in the area.

Mediator Qatar acknowledged that separate ceasefire talks had also hit an impasse after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected some Hamas demands as "ludicrous". Israel has concentrated its military operations in Khan Yunis, the hometown of Hamas's Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar, whom it accuses of masterminding the October 7 attack.

Two Palestinian men, including one member of an armed group, were killed in an Israeli raid, in the latest surge in violence in the occupied West Bank. The Palestinian health ministry said the two, aged 19 and 36, were pronounced dead from gunshot wounds after the raid in the Tulkarm...

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the situation in the Israel-occupied West Bank posed a major obstacle to finding a long-term solution for peace between Israel and the Palestinians. "The West Bank is the real obstacle for the two-state solution," Borrell said at the Munich Security Conference.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva accused Israel of committing "genocide" against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and compared its actions to Adolf Hitler's campaign to exterminate Jews. "What's happening in the Gaza Strip isn't a war, it's a genocide," Lula said in Addis Ababa where he was attending...

The UN's top court will hold hearings on the legal consequences of Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories since 1967, with an unprecedented 52 countries expected to give evidence. Nations including the United States, Russia, and China will address judges in a week-long session in The Hague, seat of the International...

Truce efforts intensified this week as Qatar and fellow mediators Egypt and the US scrambled to secure a ceasefire before Israeli troops enter Rafah, the last major population center in Gaza untouched by Israeli ground troops. Despite a direct appeal from US President Joe Biden earlier this week, Netanyahu insisted...

Speaking at a televised news conference, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that critics exhorting Israel not to lauch offensive in Rafah were telling the Jewish country to "lose the war" against Hamas. He suggested that troops would go in regardless of whether a hostage release is reached.

Tehran, Iran - Iran unveiled two new air defense systems on Saturday, state media reported, with tensions high in the Middle East amid the war in Gaza."The Arman anti-ballistic missile system and the Azarakhsh low-altitude air defense system, built by the ministry of defense, were unveiled this morning," the official IRNA...

Palestinian Territories - Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh on Saturday reiterated the group's demand of a complete ceasefire in Gaza, a day after US President Joe Biden called for a "temporary truce" to secure the release of hostages.High-level negotiations to pause the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza were held this week in...

Geneva, Switzerland - Israel is waging a concerted campaign aimed at destroying UNRWA, the head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees said in an interview published on Saturday.Philippe Lazzarini said calls for his resignation were part of the Israeli government's push."Right now we are dealing with an expanded, concerted campaign...

Jenin, Palestinian Territories - A climate of fear pervades a hospital in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin, where patients and doctors are reeling from last month's deadly raid by Israeli agents disguised as medics.At the rehabilitation ward at Jenin's Ibn Sina hospital, two patients recalled hearing the screams of...

Friday's strike came as a US decision in January to redesignate the Houthis as "terrorists" formally came into force. The designation would not prohibit "the shipping of commercial goods into ports and airports in Houthi-controlled areas," the State Department spokesperson said.

Five patients from the intensive care unit had died "as a result of the stopping of generators that caused a cut in oxygen supply", the health ministry in Gaza said, raising fears for four other patients admitted at the unit and three children in a nursery. A witness, who declined...

Nasrallah said the killing of civilians was aimed at "putting pressure" on Hizbollah to stop attacks on Israel, but stressed that the group will intensify its cross-border fire. "The response to the massacre must be to pursue the resistance (against Israel)" and Hizbollah will not just strike "(military) positions... and...

"The recognition of a Palestinian state is not a taboo for France," he said at a joint press conference in Paris with Jordan's King Abdullah II. Macron also repeated a warning against Israel attacking the city of Rafah, the southernmost point in the besieged and bombarded Palestinian territory of Gaza.

Palestinian Territories -- The health ministry in Gaza said five patients died Friday due to lack of oxygen at one of the war-torn Palestinian territory's few operating hospitals that had been raided by Israeli forces."A fifth patient at Nasser hospital was martyred as a result of the stopping of generators...

Palestinian Territories - Israel faced renewed calls from key ally the United States on Friday against launching a large-scale attack on Gaza's southern city of Rafah, where nearly 1.5 million Palestinians are trapped.Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has insisted he would push ahead with a "powerful" operation in the overcrowded...

Speaking before an Arab League meeting in Cairo, President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, on his second trip to Egypt and his first during his current term, condemned Israel's war in the Gaza Strip, saying that there must be and end to "this inhumanity and cowardice" in the besieged enclave...

In a post in Hebrew on social media platform X, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the Jewish country will continue to oppose unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state. Such recognition, in his opinion, would offer an "enormous reward to unprecedented terrorism.

Jerusalem - Israeli settlers established a record number of wildcat outposts in the occupied West Bank in 2023, a watchdog said on Thursday.Twenty-six settlements not recognized by the Israeli government were established last year, including around 10 since the war in the Gaza Strip broke out on October 7, the...

BEIRUT, LEBANON -  A Hizbollah commander, two other fighters and seven civilians were killed in an Israeli strike in south Lebanon, a security source said Thursday, raising the death toll from a raid a day earlier.The same Hizbollah commander had previously been targeted and wounded in an Israeli strike in the...

The raid came after days of intense fighting between troops and Hamas around the Nasser hospital in Khan Yunis -- one of the largest medical sites in southern Gaza, and one of the few hospitals that are still operational in the territory. The health ministry in Gaza reported that thousands...

The leaders of Australia, Canada and New Zealand on Thursday warned Israel against a potentially "catastrophic" ground offensive in the southern Gazan city of Rafah, amplifying a growing chorus of international concern. Urging Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu "not to go down this path", the trio of Commonwealth nations issued a...

Access to reliable, high-speed internet will "enable potentially life-saving medical consultations via real-time video calling," UAE Foreign Ministry spokesperson Afra Al Hameli said on social media, welcoming the deal. Gaza's hospitals have been overwhelmed by more than four months of war, during which 68,291 people have been wounded according to...

In a telephone call that saw Macron toughen his tone, the French leader expressed France's "firm opposition" to an Israeli offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, saying it "could only lead to a humanitarian disaster of a new magnitude" and create a new risk of regional escalation, according...

"A woman was killed along with her child and her stepchild in a strike that targeted Sawwaneh," while a fourth civilian was killed in a strike on a building in Adshit, the security source told AFP. Nine other people were wounded in the strikes on south Lebanon, the source added.

The saboteurs hit pipelines in the cities of Borujen in the southwestern province of Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari, and Safashahr in the southern province of Fars, Aghli said, adding that there were no casualties in the explosions or the ensuing fires.

The UN and many governments across the world have expressed alarm about the possible civilian toll of an Israeli assault against the southern city of Rafah. The negotiations, which also involved Qatar's prime minister and Egyptian officials, were part of an intensifying effort to secure a ceasefire.

Reporter Ismail Abu Omar's life is at risk and cameraman Ahmad Matar was severely wounded when the pair were hit in Gaza's southern city of Rafah. The network said the strike was a "fully fledged crime which adds to Israel's crime against journalists" and was aimed at preventing reporters covering...

Doha, Qatar-- Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani has affirmed that the ties between Qatar and Iran have never been closer.The emir stated this in a meeting with Iran's Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian in Doha.During the meeting, Amir-Abdollahian conveyed the greetings of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi to Al Thani...

It was unclear from the footage where the tunnel was located, but in recent weeks the Israeli military has pounded Khan Yunis, southern Gaza's main city and Sinwar's hometown. Hagari said the video had been filmed on October 10, three days after Hamas carried out an attack on Israel that...

CIA director William Burns met with Mossad chief David Barnea in Cairo for a new round of talks on a Qatari-brokered plan to temporarily halt fighting in exchange for Hamas freeing hostages. The two intelligence chiefs were joined by Qatar's prime minister and Egyptian officials, Egyptian media reported -- two...

"The current military-security situation heralds what is likely to be a more dangerous decade, characterized by the brazen application by some of military power to pursue claims," the report said.