The US secretary of state is expected to discuss a proposed truce hammered out in a Paris meeting in January of top US, Israeli, Egyptian and Qatari officials. The diplomatic push has become more urgent with the surge in attacks by Iran-backed groups in solidarity with Hamas, triggering counterattacks by...

The Gaza health ministry said that at least 127 people were killed in Israeli strikes in the previous 24 hours in the territory. A kindergarten where families were sheltering was hit in Rafah, which is teeming with Palestinians displaced by the war, ahead of another visit to the region by...

JERUSALEM - When Fatima, an Arab Israeli married to a Palestinian from the Gaza Strip, fled Israel's bombardment of the territory, she was terrified they would run out of fuel."We feared that the gas wouldn't be enough. The road was deserted. All the way along, we saw devastated houses," the...

French Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne was in Egypt and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken expected in the region in the coming days to push for a ceasefire and hostage release. The health ministry in the territory, most of which has been left uninhabitable by Israeli bombardments, said at least...

Since Hamas fighters stormed across the border on October 7, Israeli forces have targeted structures in Gaza within a kilometre (0.6 miles) of the border, said Adi Ben Nun, a professor at Hebrew University of Jerusalem who has carried out an analysis of satellite imagery.

Scaling up attacks in the Middle East, US and UK carried out joint air raids in Yemen after a separate wave of US strikes on targets in Iraq and Syria carried out in response to the killing of three US soldiers in Jordan. It is the third time the western...

Osama Hamdan, a top Hamas official in Lebanon, said the movement's leaders were reviewing a proposed framework hammered out by top officials from Israel, Qatar, Egypt and the United States. Speaking at a news conference, he said Hamas "has repeatedly said" it was "open to discussing any initiative.

Palestinian group Hamas condemned overnight US strikes in Iraq and Syria, saying Washington had poured "oil on the fire" in the Middle East. The US "bears responsibility for the consequences of this brutal aggression against both Iraq and Syria, which pour oil on the fire," the group said in a...

Washington, US - American forces shot down eight drones near Yemen and destroyed four more on the ground, the US military said on Saturday, announcing a series of incidents that took place the previous day.The strikes and shootdowns in and around Yemen came as American forces launched a wave of air raids...

Tyre, Lebanon - When Ines Tehini and her family fled their south Lebanon village after Hizbollah and Israel began exchanging fire in October, she thought they would be home in a matter of days.But nearly four months later in a school turned shelter, her hopes for a swift return to normality...

ABU DHABI, UAE – As per the directives of President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan announced that the UAE has allocated US$5 million to support the efforts of the United Nations Senior Humanitarian and Reconstruction Coordinator for Gaza.Sheikh Abdullah...

The attack was the latest in a series of drone and missile strikes launched by the Houthis since the start of the Gaza war between Israel and Palestinian fighters group Hamas nearly four months ago. The Houthis have also repeatedly targeted vessels in the Red Sea with strikes they say...

"The United States does not seek conflict in the Middle East or anywhere else in the world. But let all those who might seek to do us harm know this: If you harm an American, we will respond," US president Joe Biden said.

"Any (US) strike will result in an appropriate response," Al-Nujaba leader Akram al-Kaabi said in a statement, adding the group would continue its actions until its demands are met for US troops to leave Iraq and an end to Israel's war on Hamas in Gaza.

The targets included a site operated by Lebanese group Hezbollah on a road leading to the Sayyida Zeinab district and a site on the road to Damascus airport that had recently been vacated by pro-Iran groups, the Britain-based war monitor said.

A Hamas source had told AFP the three-stage plan would start with an initial six-week halt to the fighting that would see more aid deliveries into Gaza. Only "women, children and sick men over 60" held by fighters would be freed during that stage in exchange for Palestinian captives in...

Paris, France - Hackers have used the notorious Pegasus spyware to break into the phones of dozens of journalists and activists in Jordan over the past four years, according to the findings of an investigation released Thursday.The Access Now NGO highlighted 35 cases of hacking that date back to 2019, with...

ISTANBUL, TURKEY - An assailant on Thursday took a number of people hostage at a plant owned by US cosmetics giant Procter & Gamble near Istanbul in protest at the war in Gaza, a police spokesman said.It was not immediately clear how many people were being held at the plant, which...

UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini said that "if the funding remains suspended, we will most likely be forced to shut down our operations by end of February not only in Gaza but also across the region". Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said after talks with Lazzarini that he "emphasized the immediate...

The trip comes days after the Democratic incumbent's campaign manager traveled to the city of Dearborn -- home to the largest concentration of Arab Americans in the United States -- only to be snubbed by the Detroit suburb's mayor. It was an ominous sign for Biden, for whom swing states...

CENTCOM earlier announced that the USS Carney had shot down an anti-ship ballistic missile fired by the Houthis, and then downed three Iranian drones less than an hour later. It did not specify if the drones shot down by the naval destroyer were designed for attack or surveillance.

As Qatari and Egyptian-led mediation efforts intensified, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was due in Cairo on Thursday to discuss a truce proposal thrashed out in Paris last weekend with CIA chief William Burns. Israel's withering air, land and sea offensive has killed at least 26,900 people in Gaza, most of...

Palestinian Territories - International efforts towards a new pause in the devastating Gaza war gathered pace Wednesday, as Israel bombarded the Palestinian territory during fierce fighting with Palestinian fighters.Hamas was reviewing a proposal for a six-week truce in its war with Israel, a source told AFP, after mediators gathered in...

Since the relentless Israeli aerial and ground assault, triggered by Hamas's deadly October 7 attacks inside Israel, the United Nations said the decline in living conditions had been "precipitous". The UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) estimated that by late November, 37,379 buildings -- the equivalent of 18 percent...

"We urge fellow donor countries to reflect on the wider consequences of cutting their funding to UNRWA," Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide said in a statement to AFP. "UNRWA is a vital lifeline for 1.5 million refugees in Gaza," he said, adding that "to avoid collectively punishing millions of...

The Houthis, part of the anti-Western, anti-Israel "axis of resistance" of Iranian-backed groups, have been harassing Red Sea shipping for months, triggering US and British reprisal attacks. The attacks have prompted some shipping companies to detour around southern Africa to avoid the Red Sea, a vital route that normally carries...

Several countries, including the United States, Britain, Germany and Japan, have suspended funding to the UNRWA agency, and the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was holding crunch talks with donor countries. Agency chiefs in the UN's highest-level humanitarian coordination forum warned defunding UNRWA risked a "catastrophic" humanitarian collapse in Gaza.

Heavy Israeli strikes and urban combat across the besieged Gaza Strip killed 128 more people overnight, the health ministry in the Palestinian territory said. The epicenter of fighting has been the southern city of Khan Yunis, where vast areas have been reduced to a muddy wasteland of bombed-out buildings.

Several countries, including the United States, France, Britain, Germany and Japan, have announced the suspension of further funding to the agency. "The secretary-general is personally horrified by the accusations against employees of UNRWA," Guterres's spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Monday.

Sheikh Mohammed confirmed that the framework -- which he said might lead to a permanent ceasefire -- includes a phased truce that would see women and children hostages released first, with aid also entering besieged Gaza. A senior Hamas official, Taher al-Nunu, said it wanted a "complete and comprehensive ceasefire,...

Taher al-Nunu, a senior Hamas official, said his group wanted a "complete and comprehensive ceasefire, and not a temporary truce." Speaking to AFP, he said that once the fighting stopped "the rest of the details can be discussed" including a hostage release. Qatar, Egypt and the US have led mediation...

Ankara, Turkey - Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan on Monday expressed serious apprehensions about the escalating situation in the Gaza Strip, warning that unless the global community takes immediate action, two million people may die. "Humanitarian aid and medical supplies are not allowed into Gaza. This is a harbinger of...

Palestinian Territories - Even the dead are not spared by the Hamas-Israel war raging in Gaza, with bodies dug up by Israeli troops and hurried burials happening in hospitals and even a school.In Gaza City's Al-Tuffah district, shrouded corpses of Palestinians torn from their graves lay atop muddied earth.Israel's military...

Gazans lamented the suspension of funding to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees by several donor countries after Israel charged that some UNRWA staff took part in Hamas's October 7 attack. The agency has fired several staff over Israel's accusations and has promised a thorough investigation into these claims, which...

Israel's relentless military offensive has since killed at least 26,422 people in Gaza, most of them women and children, according to the territory's health ministry. The Gaza war has forced more than one million Palestinians to flee to the far-southern Rafah area near the Egyptian border, according to the UN,...

Tehran carried out strikes against an anti-Iran group in Pakistan on January 16, the same week the nation's military targeted Iraq and Syria. Two days later, Pakistan responded in kind with a pre-dawn raid on "militant targets" in Iran's Sistan-Baluchistan province, one of the few mainly Sunni Muslim regions in...

The carrier flies mostly throughout Europe.

The four defendants, identified as Mohammad Faramarzi, Mohsen Mazloum, Wafa Azarbar, Pejman Fatehi, were arrested in July 2022 and accused of plotting to carry out an operation in Isfahan. "The death sentence of a group affiliated with the Zionist spy organization was carried out this morning," Mizan Online reported.

The firebrand politician Itamar Ben-Gvir said Israel should "encourage voluntary emigration" of Palestinians from Gaza, echoing past remarks that drew sharp rebuke from close ally the United States and the wider international community. Several participants carried guns, while outside the convention center vendors sold t-shirts that read: "Gaza is part...

French authorities were also in touch with these four countries with the aim of negotiating a halt to hostilities between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas in the besieged territory, the sources said. A security source on Friday told AFP that CIA chief William Burns would meet his counterparts...

Heavy fighting raged in Gaza amid a row over the UN agency for Palestinian refugees that has called its future into question. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on donor states to guarantee aid to Gaza after several halted funding to UNRWA, over Israeli claims that some of its staff participated...

The row between Israel and UNRWA follows the UN's ICJ ruling that Israel must prevent possible acts of genocide in the conflict and allow more aid into Gaza. Israel's envoy to the UN slammed Guterres, saying the UN chief had repeatedly ignored "evidence" presented to him regarding UNRWA's involvement in...

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz called on UNRWA Commissioner-General to quit his post. Katz said in a statement that the UNRWA "must be replaced with agencies dedicated to genuine peace" in Gaza's rebuilding. Hamas slammed Israeli "threats" against UNRWA, urging the UN not to "cave in to the threats and...

Waving Palestinian flags and shouting slogans denouncing Israel, protestors expressed gratitude to South Africa for having brought the case against Israel to the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Spain has been one of the most critical voices in Europe of Israel's offensive against Hamas and was one of those to...

Doha, Qatar - Musab Al-Battat has led Palestine on the pitch with his all-action performances and off it as the voice of a team who have battled the odds to reach the Asian Cup knockout rounds for the first time.The 30-year-old captain will be the man his team look to once...

US forces struck an anti-ship missile in Houthi-held Yemen that they said was ready to fire, hours after the Iran-backed rebels caused a fire on a British tanker in the Gulf of Aden. US and British forces have launched joint strikes aimed at reducing the Houthis' ability to target vessels...

The British government said it had "considerable concerns" about a ruling by the United Nation's top court that Israel should do everything it can to prevent any acts of genocide in Gaza. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague handed down its first judgement in a landmark case...

The exchange came as the head of the CIA is to meet in Europe with his counterparts from Israel and Egypt and the prime minister of Qatar with the goal of negotiating a truce and the release of the remaining hostages in the Israeli-Hamas war, US media reported. Biden also...

Australia and Canada have suspended their funding to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, after Israel accused several employees of involvement in Hamas's October 7 attack. Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong said she was "deeply concerned" by the allegations against the agency, UNRWA.

The reactions to the top UN court's ruling Friday in the Israel-Gaza case were split along the lines of the war raging in the Palestinian territory. Saudi Arabia welcomed the ICJ's decision and called for the international community to "hold Israel accountable" for "violations" of international law.