The first -- a hulking gray-painted watercraft known as a Logistics Support Vessel -- slowly churned away from the pier at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, Virginia. It was followed by three smaller vessels that will also make the roughly 30-day trip to the eastern Mediterranean for the port mission.

ROME, ITALY – The situation in the Red Sea has not yet been reflected in the pace of prices for foods monthly reflected in the FAO Food Price Index, Monika Tothova, the economist at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) said. “Following on its 2023 and...

As the Muslim world welcomed Ramadan with the customary daytime fast, many Gazans awoke to bombardment that saw residents once more search through the rubble of destroyed homes for survivors and bodies.

"We have witnessed month after month of civilian killing and destruction at a level that is unprecedented in all my years as Secretary-General," he said.

Canada and Sweden announced over the weekend they were resuming funding for the cash-strapped UN agency, weeks after having suspended it over Israeli accusations that several UNRWA employees were involved in the Hamas attack that triggered the ongoing war. Israel's foreign ministry called on both governments to cut funding and...

A boat laden with food for Palestinians in war-ravaged Gaza was "ready" to set sail from Cyprus, an NGO said, as fighting raged between Israeli troops and Hamas ahead of Ramadan. The sea route aims to counter aid access restrictions, which humanitarians and foreign governments have blamed on Israel.

Geneva, Switzerland - The war in Gaza has "ruptured any sense of a shared humanity," the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross said on Saturday. ICRC head Mirjana Spoljaric called for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza, saying Israel and Hamas must respect international law and protect civilians caught...

In his annual State of the Union address to Congress, President Joe Biden said the US military would "lead an emergency mission to establish a temporary pier in the Mediterranean on the coast of Gaza that can receive large shipments carrying food, water medicine and temporary shelters."

UN rights chief warned Volker Turk said there had been a drastic acceleration in Israeli illegal settlement building in the occupied West Bank as it wages a relentless war in the Palestinian territory of Gaza. He said creating and expanding settlements amounted to the transfer by Israel of its own...

The UN aid coordinator for the Palestinian territory Sigrid Kaag said her message to UN Security Council was that the international community must "flood the market in Gaza with humanitarian goods" and "re-energize the private sector" so more commercial goods can enter to meet civilians' needs.

Rome, Italy - The UN's food agency on Thursday said it was pressing Israel to allow it to use the Ashdod port north of Gaza to make it easier to reach starving Palestinians. "We have several requests with the Israelis," World Food Program (WFP) Deputy Executive Director Carl Skau told AFP in...

Libya earns around $20 billion per year in net revenues from oil and gas exports, which accounts for around 95 percent of state revenue. Much of this wealth pays for a bloated public sector that employs almost one third of the population, as well as for state subsidies meant to...

The foreign minister said that the catastrophe in Gaza once again reminded the world that "the fact that the Palestinian territories have been occupied for a long time can no longer be ignored." Beijing has been calling for an immediate ceasefire since the start of the current Israel-Hamas war in...

Pointedly declining to endorse the man she has portrayed as chaotic and mentally incompetent, former UN ambassador Haley said Trump would have to earn the support of moderates who backed her longshot campaign. Her withdrawal leaves America facing a battle for the White House between two elderly men that many...

"The 2023 death toll represents a tragic increase of 20 percent compared to 2022, highlighting the urgent need for action to prevent further loss of life," the IOM said in a statement. Last year's total surpassed the previous record reached in 2016, when 8,084 people died during migration.

PARIS, FRANCE – Heatwaves and floods inflict greater economic pain on rural women than men because climate change intensifies existing inequalities, the United Nations' food and farming agency said on Tuesday. Scientists say the effects of rising temperatures are already being felt most acutely by the poorest and most vulnerable people...

UNRWA chief's comments capped a tumultuous day during which Israel and UNRWA have traded accusations, with Israel accusing the agency of having employed more than 450 "terrorists." Israel also recalled its ambassador to the UN for consultations after the country accused the organization of failing to adequately address claims of...

Global attention turned to the dire humanitarian conditions in Gaza on Thursday, when the health ministry said more than 100 people were killed after desperate Palestinians rushed an aid convoy. Israel's retaliatory offensive to eliminate Hamas has now killed at least 30,228, mostly women and children, according to the ministry's...

Paris, France - Extraction of Earth's natural resources could surge 60 percent by 2060, imperiling climate goals and economic prosperity, the UN said on Friday, calling for dramatic changes in energy, food, transport and housing. Enormous expansion of infrastructure, energy demand and consumer consumption over the last half century, particularly in...

The shocking act was an escalation of recent protests across the United States against Israel's actions in Gaza. Washington last week blocked a UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, its third such use of its veto on the matter.

ABU DHABI, UAE - The director general of the World Trade Organization, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, on Sunday launched a $50 million fund to help female entrepreneurs in developing countries to export more using the opportunities offered by the digital economy. The announcement came ahead of the 13th ministerial conference of the WTO...

"The plan states that Israel will move forward with its already-in-motion project to establish a security buffer zone on the Palestinian side of the strip's border," the report said, adding the zone would remain "as long as there is a security need for it" The plan envisages Gaza's "complete demilitarization."

Major powers trying to find a way to end the destructive Israel-Hamas war have so far failed, but a US envoy was in Israel Thursday in the latest attempt to secure a truce deal. International concern has spiraled over Gaza's escalating civilian death toll and the desperate humanitarian crisis sparked...

Geneva, Switzerland - The World Health Organization voiced alarm on Tuesday at the rapid spread of measles, with more than 306,000 cases reported worldwide last year -- a 79-percent increase from 2022. "We in the measles world are extremely concerned," said Natasha Crowcroft, a WHO technical adviser on measles and rubella....

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...

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...

Renk is just 10 kilometers (six miles) from Sudan, where fighting broke out in April last year between army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, commander of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). Since then, Renk's two UN-run transit centers have been overwhelmed by an...

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...

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...

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...

Algeria has requested a UN Security Council vote on Tuesday, but Washington signaled it is likely to veto the measure. US President Joe Biden is working with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the leaders of Egypt and Qatar on a hostage deal that would bring about six weeks of...

The UN has extended an invitation to the Taliban authorities to participate in the Doha convention, following their exclusion from the first meeting in May. A senior diplomatic source told AFP the Taliban government had said it will only if they are the sole representative of Afghanistan at the convention...

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,...

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...

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...

Hizbollah and Israeli army have traded near-daily fire since war broke out on October 7 between Israel and the Palestinian militant group in the Gaza Strip. In the past few days, a series of Israeli strikes has injured officials from Lebanese and Palestinian armed groups in southern Lebanon.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered his military to prepare for an offensive in the southern Gaza city, where the UN says roughly 1.4 million Palestinians are sheltering after fleeing fighting in other areas of the territory. Israel has carried out a relentless bombardment and ground offensive in Gaza...

DUBAI, UAE- As Houthi attacks roil the Red Sea and Western air raids target the rebels, moves to end Yemen's long-running war are at a standstill, threatening further woe for a country on its knees. As recently as December, painstaking negotiations were gaining ground and the United Nations said the warring...

UN human rights chief Volker Turk urged world powers to "restrain rather than enable" as fears of a looming ground incursion grew among more than one million Palestinians trapped in the territory's far south. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to send ground troops into the crowded Rafah area as...

Despite the last COP in the United Arab Emirates ending with an unprecedented call to "transition" away from fossil fuels, an analysis by the NGO Global Witness based on data from Rystad Energy shows that the upcoming COP29 host aims to hike its gas production from 35 billion cubic meters...

Witnesses heard an intense series of strikes and saw smoke billowing above the city, which now hosts more than half of Gaza's total population after they fled bombardment elsewhere on the Strip. The strikes hit 14 houses and three mosques in different parts of Rafah, according to the Hamas government.

Yemen's Houthi rebels, supported by Iran, have launched dozens of attacks against ships in the Red Sea since November, targeting boats headed for Israel in an act of "solidarity" with inhabitants of the Gaza Strip, which is in the grip of the war between Israel and Hamas. Despite retaliatory strikes...

New defense technologies including artificial intelligence-powered gunsights and robotic drones form a bright spot in an otherwise dire period for Israel's tech industry. Over 150 countries in December backed a UN resolution identifying "serious challenges and concerns" in new military tech, including "artificial intelligence and autonomy in weapons systems."

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken left Israel without securing a pause in fighting, wrapping up his fifth crisis tour of the Middle East since the war started. In fact, Israeli PM said he has ordered troops to 'prepare to operate' in Rafah.

Strasbourg, France - The EU on Tuesday urged a 90-percent cut to its greenhouse gas emissions by 2040, even as the bloc's transition to a greener future was clouded by a widespread farmers' revolt. "Based on the best available science, and a detailed impact assessment, we are recommending that the 2040 target...

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...

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...

Hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians have fled south to Rafah since the outbreak of the war, with the former city of 200,000 now housing more than half of Gaza's two million-plus population, a WHO representative said Friday. The United Nations' humanitarian agency OCHA said it was deeply concerned about...

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...