Washington, United States - US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna agreed to seek steps to avoid a wider Middle East war following strikes in Lebanon and Iran, the State Department said on Thursday. In a telephone call the day before, the two top diplomats "discussed...

"I think that hardly anyone of our counterparts will deny the fact that developments in the Red Sea are the direct projection of violence in Gaza, where the cruel operation of Israel continues already for three months," the Russian diplomat said at the meeting of the UN Security Council.

The detained people were wanted in the United States, Germany, India, and several former Soviet republics as well as other parts of Asia and the Middle East.

Ben-Gvir on Monday called for promoting "a solution to encourage the emigration of Gaza's residents" and the re-establishment of Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip. His comments came the day after Smotrich also called for the return of settlers to Gaza, adding that Israel should "encourage" the territory's approximately 2.4 million Palestinians to...

Washington has called out both Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who have called for Israeli settlers to return to Gaza and for the territory's Palestinian inhabitants to leave. "Gaza is Palestinian land and will remain Palestinian land," the State Department said. Expelling civilians during a conflict or creating unlivable...

Washington, United States - Israel has rejected a new proposal from Hamas through Qatari and Egyptian mediators for a deal involving the release of hostages in three phases, Axios portal reported citing sources. Each phase, according to the proposal, would include a pause in fighting for more than a month in...

Tehran, Iran - Iran's nuclear program remains peaceful, said Nasser Kanani, the spokesman for the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, on Friday in response to a joint statement from the United States and three European countries. In a press release on Friday, Kanani suggested that these countries should reconsider their...

Washington, United States - The United States on Friday announced the approval of a $147.5 million sale of 155mm high-explosive artillery munitions and related equipment to Israel under an emergency provision that waives the usual congressional review. The same provision was used earlier this month to approve the sale of nearly...

Google has agreed to settle a consumer privacy lawsuit seeking at least $5 billion in damages over allegations it tracked the data of users who thought they were browsing privately. In a court filing, the judge confirmed that lawyers for Google reached a preliminary agreement to settle the class action...

The car manufactured by Xiaomi likely to enter market by 2025.

The company contends that the ITC finding was in error.

The Tuesday meeting additionally provided a chance for Israel and the United States to talk about the eventual "governance and security in Gaza, a political horizon for the Palestinian people, and continued work on normalization and integration," the White House official said.

The Security Council has faced sharp international opprobrium as it has managed to pass only one resolution on Gaza since the start of the war, in which the 15-member body called for "humanitarian pauses" -- after five other resolutions were rejected, including two thanks to American vetoes.

Biden told a campaign event in Washington that Israel had "most of the world supporting it" after the Hamas attacks, in which Israel tallied 1,200 deaths, mostly civilians. Around 240 were also taken hostage. "But they're starting to lose that support by the indiscriminate bombing that takes place," Biden said.

Washington, US - The Israel-Hamas war in Gaza is having a severe impact on the Palestinian economy, according to the World Bank, which now estimates sharp economic contraction this year and next. The conflict, sparked by Hamas' cross-border attacks on October 7 that killed 1,200 people, according to Israeli figures, and...

COP28 has debated a historic first-ever global "phase-out" from oil, gas and coal, the main culprits in a planetary crisis of warming. A draft put forward on Monday by COP28 president Sultan Al Jaber fell well short, instead presenting reductions in fossil fuels as one of several options.

With calls for a ceasefire multiplying, "it is safe to assume that the majority will be greater" this time, Richard Gowan of the International Crisis Group told AFP. This may bring the Assembly closer to the 140 or so countries (out of 193 member states) that have repeatedly denounced the...

Indonesia is TikTok's second-largest global market.

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia - Collaboration between Saudi Arabia and Russia to drive OPEC+ members toward output cuts has resulted in a 2.29% surge in crude oil prices. Despite these global efforts, US output continued at a high of over 13 million barrels per day, contributing to a surplus in the...

FTX, the world's second-biggest crypto exchange, dramatically went under last year, and its boss Sam Bankman-Fried faces up to 110 years in prison for what prosecutors described as "one of the biggest financial frauds in American history".

The other countries that signed up to the declaration include Britain, Bulgaria, Canada, the Czech Republic, Finland,  France, Hungary, South Korea,  Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania,  Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden,  Ukraine and the United Arab Emirates.

The five-day saga began on Friday, when Altman was abruptly sacked by the board for reasons that are still unclear. The board said in a statement that it had sacked Altman because "he was not consistently candid in his communications with the board," without elaborating further.

Dubai, UAE - The ongoing conflict between Israel and Gaza could result in a significant economic toll for Israel, with estimations pointing to a potential cost of $48 billion over the current and upcoming year, Turkey's Anadolu Agency reports. Yali Rotenberg, the chief accountant at the Israeli Ministry of Finance, was...

According to witnesses, the car was running at a speed of more than 160 km/h. As a result, the car caught fire. There were two people inside, both died. A border officer who happened to be nearby received minor injuries. According to the local media, it was a stolen car.

Two people have been killed as a result of a car explosion at the Rainbow Bridge at the US-Canada border near Niagara Falls. The explosion happened on the US side of the border. Terrorism link is being investigated. It could be a reckless driver, sources say.

In a letter released to media, the vast majority of the company's 770-strong staff suggested they would follow Altman unless the board responsible for his departure resigned. Among the signatories was co-founder Ilya Sutskever, OpenAI's chief scientist and a member of the four-person board who pushed Altman out.

Qatar's foreign ministry confirmed the deal, saying that "a number of Palestinian women and children detained in Israeli prisons" would be released in exchange for the hostages. "The starting time of the pause will be announced within the next 24 hours and last for four days, subject to extension," the...

Two years after attaining statehood, the world's newest nation collapsed into a civil war that claimed 400,000 lives before a peace deal birthed a power-sharing government in early 2020. But many of the milestones of that pact have been missed, and key conditions paving the way for free and fair...

"Such an incredibly successful day," a SpaceX announcer said. "Even though we did have a… rapid unscheduled disassembly of both the Super Heavy Booster and the ship." The largest rocket ever built blasted off from the company's Starbase in Boca Chica, Texas shortly after 7:00 am local time.

Washington, United States - Google said on Thursday that Google Photos now groups together similar photos and organizes screenshots and photos of documents into easy-to-find albums. The company said in a blog post that Google Photos will automatically identify and group similar photos that were taken close together into Photo...

Central to the discussions was the commitment to restore military-to-military communications, previously severed after a visit by former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Taiwan in 2022. The US raised concerns over China's military buildup around Taiwan and urged respect for the upcoming elections in the self-ruled island, slated for January.

Washington, United States - Israel and the Hamas are close to reaching agreements that will make possible to free the majority of Israeli women and children captured on October 7, a columnist of The Washington Post (WP) David Ignatius wrote in his op-ed, citing sources in the Israeli government. The agreement can...

Erdogan returned from a summit on Saturday of Arab and Muslim leaders in the Saudi capital Riyadh, which condemned Israeli forces' "barbaric actions" in Gaza without approving concrete punitive measures. He is due to visit Germany on Friday and plans to travel to Egypt and host Iran's president in the...

Real-estate tycoon Barry Sternlicht has initiated this campaign and sought $1million donations from various affluent business figures, including David Geffen and Michael Dell. This initiative comes at a time when recent polls from the University of Maryland and Ipsos indicate a shift in American public opinion.

Moody's is the only major agency to maintain its rating for US sovereign debt at its highest level -- underscoring the potential economic danger to the United States of failing to reach an agreement to keep the government funded in one week's time. Neither the Democratic-controlled Senate nor the Republican-led...

Manama, Bahrain - In a convenience store in Bahrain, 14-year-old Jana Abdullah carries a tablet as she shops, checking a list of Western brands to avoid as Israel pounds Gaza in its campaign to destroy Hamas. Jana and her 10-year-old brother, Ali, used to eat at McDonald's nearly daily but they...

Blinken's first visit since Israel went to war with Hamas in reprisal for the militants' October 7 attack comes with fury at both Israel and the West boiling over on the streets of Turkey and in the palace of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Police used tear gas and water cannon...

Tel Aviv, Israel - A senior Biden administration official revealed that Israel has made significant adjustments to its military strategy in its conflict with Hamas after engaging in discussions with the United States. The official emphasized that the US is closely scrutinizing the situation, particularly the rising civilian casualties, and...

Washington, United States - The US is using unarmed assets of the Department of Defense to help locate hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip, a senior US official said at a news conference. "We are using unarmed DoD assets to try to help locate some of the American...

During parliamentary hearings, State Duma speaker Vyacheslav Volodin said the move to revoke the treaty was a response to the United States' "cynicism" and "boorish attitudes" on nuclear weapons.

Novo-Ogaryovo, Russia: The United States and its satellites are benefiting from conflicts in the Middle East and other parts of the world, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Monday. "We must not, have no right and cannot afford to be guided by emotions. We must clearly see who is really...

With the Israel-Hamas conflict raging in the Middle East, Biden also "underscored that the United States and China must work together to address global challenges," it added in a statement. US officials had "expressed our deep concern with the situation (in the Middle East) and pressed China to take a...

The Chinese and Russian reprimands ring hollow for US officials, who doubt the rival powers will engage in painstaking diplomacy along the lines of Secretary of State Antony Blinken's recent trip to the region. But the United States has historically stood out as a lonely voice in its close embrace...

Wang "will conduct in-depth exchanges of views with US leaders on China-US relations and international and regional issues of common interest," foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said at a regular briefing. The top diplomat will "convey China's principles and positions and legitimate concerns about China-US relations," she added.

Biden also called for an end to a surge in both anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim prejudice in the United States, especially after the killing of a six-year-old Palestinian-American boy in an alleged hate crime linked to the Israel-Hamas conflict. "To all of you hurting, I want you to know, I see...

The US president trod a tightrope on his wartime visit to Israel, with key Arab allies Jordan and Egypt calling off a meeting in Amman with him over a deadly strike on a Gaza hospital. Hamas says Israel was to blame for the strike, which sparked fury across the Muslim...

"The United States is disappointed this resolution made no mention of Israel's rights of self-defense," US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield said after the vote. The resolution said the Council "firmly condemns all violence and hostilities against civilians and all acts of terrorism."

Washington, United States - The US Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III has ordered the preparation of approximately 2,000 additional U.S. troops for possible deployment to the Middle East in support of Israel, amid escalating tensions in the region, New York Times reported. These troops, currently stationed in the United...

Shanghai, China - China will this week weigh into the Israel-Hamas war by sending its special envoy to the Middle East, after the United States asked it to use its influence to stop the conflict from spreading. Washington says it hopes China's friendship with Hamas backer Iran could help calm the...

Tens of thousands of US passport holders live in Israel and 29 have been confirmed killed in the Hamas attacks on October 7. Another 15 are missing and believed to be among hostages held by Hamas since the attacks.