According to state broadcaster IRIB, Tehran's response, passed to Pakistani mediators, focuses on ending the war "on all fronts, especially Lebanon" - where Israel has kept up its fight with Iran-backed Hezbollah - as well as on "ensuring shipping security".

US President Donald Trump had said he was expecting Iran's reply by Friday, but as the wait dragged on, the ceasefire in the Gulf came under increasing strain, including from Sunday's drone strikes, one of which hit and damaged a freighter sailing towards a port in Qatar.

The United Arab Emirates accused Iran of being behind another attack that targeted its territory in what would be, if confirmed, only the second alleged strike on a Gulf country since the start of the month-old truce.

"We will never bow down to the enemy, and if there is talk of dialogue or negotiation, it does not mean surrender or retreat," Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said on X Sunday.

Tehran's military chief Ali Abdollahi, meanwhile, met the country's supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei and received "new directives and guidance for the continuation of operations to confront the enemy", according to Iranian state television.

'Restraint over'

Qatar's defence ministry said a freighter arriving in the country's waters from Abu Dhabi was hit by a drone on Sunday off the port of Mesaieed.

The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations centre said the bulk carrier reported being struck by an unknown projectile.

"There was a small fire that has been extinguished, there are no casualties. There is no reported environmental impact," it said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Iran's Fars news agency reported that "the bulk carrier that was struck near the coast of Qatar was sailing under a US flag and belonged to the United States".

In a social media post on Sunday, the spokesman for the Iranian parliament's national security commission warned the United States: "Our restraint is over as of today."

"Any attack on our vessels will trigger a strong and decisive Iranian response against American ships and bases," Ebrahim Rezaei said.

Iran's Revolutionary Guards had threatened the day before to target US interests in the Middle East if its tankers came under fire - as they did on Friday when a US fighter jet fired on and disabled two Iran-flagged vessels in the Gulf of Oman.

Drone strikes

The United Arab Emirates said that its territory had also come under attack, and called out Iran by name.

"UAE air defence systems successfully engaged two UAVs launched from Iran," the defence ministry said, in a social media post.

Iran's neighbour Kuwait also reported an attempted attack.

"At dawn today, the armed forces detected a number of hostile drones in Kuwaiti airspace, which were dealt with in accordance with established procedures," the military posted.

In Seoul, defence ministry spokesman Park Il told reporters that a South Korean cargo vessel had been hit on Monday and was damaged by fire before making its way to port in Dubai.

"On May 4, two unidentified aircraft struck the outer plate of the port-side ballast tank at the stern of the HMM Namu at roughly one-minute intervals, causing flames and smoke," he said.

Iran has choked off the Strait of Hormuz - a vital route out of the Gulf for oil, gas and fertiliser, seeking to wield economic leverage over the United States and its allies.

The US Navy, meanwhile, is blockading Iran's ports, at times disabling or diverting ships heading to and from them.

Iran has set up a payment mechanism to extract tolls from shipping crossing the strait, but US officials have stressed it would be "unacceptable" for Tehran to control what had been an international waterway and the route of a fifth of the world's oil exports.

The bill, submitted by the Knesset Deputy Speaker Limor Son Har-Melech, would revoke the historic agreement signed by former prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian Liberation Organisation leader Yasser Arafat.

The agreement is the cornerstone of the two-state solution, the main peace initiative that sought to bring an end to Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories and create an independent Palestinian State.

Har-Melech, who is a member of far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir's Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power), said in a post on X: "We promised to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state, and now it is time to encourage settlement in Areas A and B and cancel the disastrous Oslo Accords."

She added that this bill was "a first and necessary step" in overturning the current governing arrangement of the occupied West Bank.

Under the Oslo Accords, governance over the West Bank is divided into three zones, Areas A, B and C.

Area A is under de facto full control of the Palestinian Authority, which itself was set up as part of the Oslo process, though it is still subject to Israeli military and financial control. 

Area B is also officially administered by the PA but Israel retains control of its security, with Area C fully administered by Israeli forces.

Despite the continued existence of the Oslo framework and the governing arrangement in the occupied West Bank, the Israeli government has in recent years sought to undermine the accords, approving a record number of illegal settlement projects in the territory, a policy that goes back decades.

The process of settlement expansion, spearheaded by Israel's far-right and settlers in the government, is also part of attempts to annex the territory, which saw approval in a symbolic Knesset vote in 2025.

As far back as 2001, current Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was caught on camera boasting about "putting an end" to the Oslo Accords. 

More recently in a press conference in Tel Aviv, Netanyahu said he was "proud" of preventing the establishment of a Palestinian state. 

The Knesset also voted in favour of a resolution rejecting Palestinian statehood in 2024.

If the bill seeking to repeal the Oslo Accords gets the support of the Ministerial Committee for Legislation, it can then be put into the Knesset Praesidium for approval, which, if passed, allows it to have Knesset readings, votes and be scrutinised by Knesset committees.

Troops moved in to the Al Kayli area near the city of Al-Kurmuk in Sudan's southeastern Blue Nile region after inflicting heavy losses on the RSF and the allied Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-North), it said.

Meanwhile, an alliance led by the RSF reported that more than a dozen people were killed in an army drone strike in South Kordofan.

The fighting in the south comes amid diplomatic crisis between Sudan and Ethiopia, triggered by a series of attacks launched by the RSF and an allied faction of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North in several areas of the state.

Khartoum this week recalled its ambassador to Ethiopia, accusing the country of being behind drone attacks in several areas of the country, including on Khartoum airport. It also accused the United Arab Emirates of supplying the aircraft.

"The Fourth Infantry Division and supporting forces succeeded in liberating the Al-Kayli area located on the outskirts of Al-Kurmuk city on the southern front after heroic battles against the terrorist RSF militia and Joseph Tuka’s forces affiliated with SPLM-North," the army said in a statement.

The nearby city of Al-Kurmuk was seized by the rebel militia on 24 March.

Meanwhile, the Sudan Founding Alliance, an RSF-led coalition of anti-government factions, accused the army of systematically targeting civilians after a drone strike hit a truck in South Kordofan, killing 15 people and injuring several others.

The truck was carrying 37 civilians along the main road to Abu Zabad in West Kordofan, it said.

Around 700 civilians have been killed in drone strikes by both sides in Sudan since January, according to the UN.

The SPLM-North said on Friday that its forces in the Blue Nile region had seized control of the strategically important Khawr al-Hassan area.

Stephen Amad, deputy chief of staff of the movement’s People’s Army, reported that its forces were advancing on the regional capital, Damazin, and other areas in the state.

Meanwhile, the Popular Resistance Forces supporting the Sudanese army in North Darfur state said that RSF movements in recent days suggested it is preparing for an attack on the border area of Al-Tina between Sudan and Chad.

The war has killed tens of thousands of people, uprooted more than 11 million from their homes and triggered what the UN describes as the world's largest displacement and hunger crises.

Famine was declared last year in El-Fasher in North Darfur and Kadugli in South Kordofan, with 20 more areas at risk, according to a UN-backed assessment.

The Arab League will on Sunday hold an emergency meeting to discuss the ongoing fighting.

Mehdi Taj was speaking after the federation (FFIRI) said on Saturday that Iran would take part in the men's football showpiece this summer despite the Middle East war, but demanded that joint hosts the United States, Mexico and Canada agree to its conditions.

"If we do not participate in the World Cup, we will lose a major diplomatic asset," Taj said in an interview broadcast late Saturday on state television.

Iran's participation in the tournament has been surrounded by uncertainty since the outbreak of war in February, following strikes carried out by the United States and Israel against the Islamic Republic.

But on Saturday, the FFIRI said on its official website: "We will definitely participate in the 2026 World Cup, but the hosts must take our concerns into account.

"We will participate in the World Cup tournament, but without any retreat from our beliefs, culture, and convictions."

Taj has set 10 conditions for attending the global spectacle, seeking assurances over the country's treatment.

The conditions include visas being granted and respect for the national team staff, the team's flag and its national anthem during the tournament, as well as demands for elevated security at airports, hotels and routes to the stadiums where they will play.

World football's governing body FIFA has insisted for weeks that Iran will take part.

Iran, who are due to be based in Tucson, Arizona, during the World Cup, face New Zealand, Belgium and Egypt in Group G.

The Iranians open their World Cup campaign against New Zealand in Los Angeles on June 15.

Writing in the Hebrew-language news website Walla, Burg argued Israel’s wars since 1967 had produced tactical victories but wider strategic defeats, saying the current crisis was even more severe.

"Between Gaza and Tehran, Israel has not won on any front," Burg wrote.

The former speaker, now one of the Israeli establishment’s sharpest critics of the country's various wars, said Israel was trapped in a cycle of escalating conflict that was draining resources, destroying lives and eroding international support.

"In Gaza, in the occupied territories, in Lebanon and against Iran - everything represents a disastrous failure that continues to accumulate," he wrote.

"Every arena has become a swamp, and they all feed into one another, draining enormous resources from us, taking lives, and wasting more time and opportunities that will never return."

Burg sharply criticised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and members of his government, accusing them of promoting illusions of "absolute victory" while leading the country towards collapse.

"The 'absolute victory' in Gaza has become a hollow farce filled with graves, mourning houses and the wreckage of life," he wrote.

The remarks come as reports from earlier this year said that the economic toll from the war on Gaza is estimated to be at $112 bn, including $77 bn in direct defence costs.

Burg also argued that Israel’s confrontation with Iran had backfired strategically, saying the consequences of the war continued long after the bombing campaign ended.

"The war with Iran did not end when the bombing stopped," he wrote. "Its consequences continue to hurt us more than they hurt them."

He warned that support for Israel in the US was steadily eroding.

"The resentment toward Israel in Congress and among the American public is not background noise, but a political force taking shape and becoming threatening," Burg wrote.

The former Knesset speaker argued Israel needed to abandon the pursuit of total military victory and instead adopt what he described as a strategy of "calculated defeat".

"Sometimes the only way to win is to know how to lose," he wrote. 

Using the analogy of two sumo wrestlers pushing against each other, Burg argued that stepping back at the right moment could destabilise an opponent more effectively than relentless confrontation.

"What appears for a moment to be defeat is the key to a real, sustainable and entirely different kind of victory," he said.

Burg cited the US war in Vietnam and Napoleon’s invasion of Russia as examples of powers unable to recognise when to retreat. He contrasted this with former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin's return of the Sinai to Egypt after the Camp David Accords.

The former Knesset speaker also attacked key far-right figures in Netanyahu’s coalition, including Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.

"Smotrich is ignorant, Ben Gvir is a reckless child, and Netanyahu is weak, frail and detached from reality," he wrote.

From his point of view, an alternative to endless confrontation with Iran was accepting the long-term reality of Iran as a regional power and developing diplomatic channels with Tehran.

"There is a painful truth narcissistic leaders refuse to admit: sometimes defeat is the only possible victory," Burg wrote.

He concluded by calling for Israeli leaders to step back from further escalation.

"One small step backwards. Just one small step," he wrote.

"Let the terrifying forces of today lose their balance and fall. Netanyahu first."

Following the attack, US President Donald Trump has claimed that Iran had "taken some shots" at the Panama-flagged vessel and urged South Korea to join American operations aimed at restoring normal shipping through the strait.

The waterway has been virtually closed since the United States and Israel launched a war against Iran in late February, with Tehran responding with attacks across the Middle East and imposing a chokehold on the strait, rattling global energy markets.

On Monday, "two unidentified aircraft struck the outer plate of the port-side ballast tank at the stern of the HMM Namu at roughly one-minute intervals, causing flames and smoke", Seoul's foreign ministry spokesman Park Il told a news briefing.

He did not specify what kind of aircraft had been involved in the attack, saying they "were captured on CCTV footage, but there are limitations in identifying the exact type, launch origin and physical size of the objects".

Further analysis will be conducted on "engine debris and other fragments", he added.

The damage to the cargo ship, which had 24 crew members on board, spanned about "five metres (16.5 feet) wide and extended roughly seven metres (23 feet) into the hull" on the port-side stern, Park said.

"The engine room fire is believed to have been ignited by the first strike, with the second strike appearing to have caused the blaze to spread rapidly."

Tehran has denied responsibility for the attack, with its embassy in Seoul posting a statement on its website saying that it "firmly rejects and categorically denies any allegations regarding the involvement" of its forces.

Iran's ambassador to South Korea was summoned to the foreign ministry to explain Tehran's position regarding the findings, Park said.

Medics said an airstrike killed one person in the Maghazi refugee camp, while another killed the head of the criminal police force in Khan Younis, Wessam Abdel-Hadi, and his aide, according to Gaza's interior ministry.

Reuters has previously reported that Israel has heightened its attacks on Gaza's police ⁠force.

The Israeli military did not immediately comment on either incident.

The blast that killed the two police officers left only a mangled metal skeleton where their car had stood in the Al-Amal neighbourhood of Khan Younis in southern Gaza.

Mourners chanted "there is no God but Allah, the martyrs are beloved by Allah" as the men's white-shrouded bodies were carried on shoulders through the streets during the funeral.

One of the mourners, Ali Mousa, condemned Israel's killing of members of the enclave's police force.

"Although the ceasefire came into effect several months ago, the occupation continues to target the police officers to cause chaos among the people of the same nation," Mousa told Reuters.

"The occupation aims to create chaos and confusion within the Gaza Strip. This is its sole objective," he added.

Violence in Gaza has persisted despite an October 2025 ceasefire, with Israel conducting almost daily attacks.

At least 850 Palestinians have been killed since the​ceasefire took ​effect, local medics say, while Israel says militants have killed four of its soldiers over ​the same period.

More than 72,500 Palestinians have been killed since the Gaza war started in October 2023, Gaza health authorities say, most ⁠of ​them civilians.

The man, who has been named as Tarek al-Husseini, had worn fake military insignia during meetings to present himself as a colonel and the embassy's head of security, Lebanese intelligence and military sources said.

Al-Husseini built a wide network of relationships with high-ranking figures in Lebanon, including security officials and heads of government agencies, according to the report.

Investigators are reportedly exploring potential links with political and security networks used by Iraqis, Yemenis, and Iranians.

Investigations are still ongoing to uncover more information.

According to preliminary information, Al-Husseini had previously worked at the embassy before becoming a delivery driver. He is reportedly married to a Lebanese woman.

He also reportedly introduced himself within some Shiite circles as being affiliated with the Iran-aligned Iraqi faction Asa’ib Ahl al-Haq.

Lebanese media have drawn parallels with the infamous 'Abu Omar', the Lebanese man who posed as a Saudi prince to gain access to the country's political and business elite.

Israeli strikes killed two Syrian nationals between Qlailah and Deir Qanoun on Sunday, while an attack on the town of Bdeyas killed one and wounded 13, Lebanon's National News Agency reported.

Other strikes have been reported in Majdal Selm and al-Mansouri, as well as a factory near the town of Al-Ramadiyah, and Blat.

At least 24 people were killed on Saturday, as strikes pounded Nabatiyeh, killing a Syrian man and his daughter. 

The toll also includes an attack on the town of al-Sakaieh in southern Sidon, where at least seven were killed, including a child, the Ministry of Public Health reported. 

Israel has continued to shell the city of Bint Jbeil and the town of Tayri, close to the frontline, where fighting has been reported between Hezbollah and the Israeli army.

The strikes came after Israel issued displacement orders for nine new villages in southern Lebanon on Saturday.

Hezbollah has responded to the strikes with attacks on Israeli soldiers occupying south Lebanon using drones, announcing on Sunday that a drone strike targeted a D9 bulldozer in the town of Deir Seryan.

Hezbollah also struck Israeli troops in northern Israel, wounding three soldiers in a drone attack, and firing several rockets at troops in southern Lebanon.

Hezbollah has increasingly turned to using fibre-optic guided first-person view (FPV) drones with attached explosives against Israeli forces. 

The tactic, whose use has been pioneered in Ukraine, has allowed Hezbollah to bypass Israeli electronic jamming against drones and strike troops, tanks, and medical evacuations.

The Israeli army itself claimed to have struck 40 Hezbollah targets across south Lebanon over the weekend, killing 10 fighters.

The Israeli attacks come despite a ceasefire being announced on 16 April by US President Donald Trump, as well as negotiations between the Israeli and Lebanese governments.

Israel has killed at least 2,727 people in Lebanon and wounded a further 8,438, according to the country's Health Ministry.

Saudi oil giant Aramco said Sunday its net profit rose by 25.5 percent in the first quarter compared to the same period last year, after the Middle East war sent oil and gas prices soaring.

The result comes as uncertainty plagues global markets over the conflict's trajectory, with Iran restricting the passage of hydrocarbons through the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

Aramco, the world's biggest oil exporter, said in a statement published on the Saudi stock exchange website that its "increase in revenue was mainly due to higher prices and volumes sold of refined and chemical products as well as higher crude oil volumes sold and higher crude oil prices".

Crude prices jumped during the first quarter from the mid $60s in early February to more than $100 a barrel in March as Iran's shutdown of the strait sparked a global energy crisis.

Aramco, majority-owned by the state, said in its statement that net income in the first quarter of 2026 reached 120.13 billion Saudi riyals ($32.04 billion), compared to 95.68 billion riyals ($25.51 billion) for the same quarter in 2025.

"The increase was mainly driven by higher revenue and other income related to sales, partially offset by higher operating costs and an increase in income taxes and zakat driven by higher taxable income compared to the same quarter of the previous year," it said.

The median analyst consensus for first quarter adjusted net income had been $31.16 billion - an external estimate based on 13 forecasts.

Aramco's increase in net income is its first quarterly rise after 12 consecutive quarters of decline.

President and CEO Amin H. Nasser said the result reflected "resilience and operational flexibility in a complex geopolitical environment".

He said the company was "leveraging both its domestic infrastructure and its global network to navigate disruption".

East-west pipeline

Aramco is the flagship company of the Saudi economy and one of the largest firms in the world by market capitalisation.

Despite the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, it has been able to deliver millions of barrels of crude to markets daily through its massive east to west pipeline, which connects its energy installations on the Gulf to export terminals on the Red Sea.

The company said "a significant increase in pumping through the east-west pipeline to reach its maximum capacity of 7 million barrels per day in the first quarter supports exports from the kingdom's west coast".

Last month, Saudi Arabia's energy ministry said the pipeline and other facilities had been restored following attacks by Iran.

The oil-rich Gulf region has borne the brunt of Iran's attacks during the war, which came in response to US-Israeli strikes in late February that triggered the conflict.

Tehran has targeted US assets but also civilian infrastructure including energy facilities and airports.

In Saudi Arabia, facilities in Riyadh, the Eastern Province and the industrial city of Yanbu were all targeted. They included infrastructure for oil and gas production, transport and refining, and petrochemical plants and power facilities.

The surge in prices for oil and gas has also created a windfall for other major energy firms.

In late April, French oil and gas giant TotalEnergies said its net profits had risen 51 percent in the first quarter, while British energy giant Shell saw profits after tax jump 19 percent.

If crude oil prices remain at current levels, Aramco's profits are expected to continue rising in the second quarter after Saudi Arabia, Russia and the rest of the OPEC+ countries raised their oil production quotas as expected.

According to the official, parliament will summon the defence and interior ministers, alongside security commanders involved in field operations, after the Wall Street Journal claimed Israel had established a covert military site in Iraq’s western desert near the Saudi border.

The report alleged the base, located in the Nukhayb desert between Najaf and Anbar provinces, was used to support Israeli military operations during the US-Israeli war on Iran and hosted Israeli special forces and search-and-rescue units.

"Parliament will summon the defence and interior ministers and security leaders connected to the field situation to discuss the issue," an Iraqi official within parliament’s leadership told The New Arab.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Israel established the facility with US knowledge and used it as a logistical support hub for the Israeli air force. The newspaper also alleged Israeli aircraft carried out strikes against Iraqi forces that approached the site in March.

Iraqi authorities had allegedly previously believed the unidentified force operating in the area was American and functioning under the umbrella of the international coalition.

The Iraqi official said that the Joint Operations Command had confirmed an attack took place on 4 March 2026 against an Iraqi army force in the Nukhayb desert near the Saudi border after it approached a site hosting an "unknown force".

The official said initial assessments suggested the force was American and linked the incident to a broader series of attacks targeting the Popular Mobilisation Forces, Iraqi army units and border guards.

Another Iraqi security official told The New Arab that the government would issue clarifications later on Sunday, but stressed that the site mentioned in the report was now "clean", indicating no forces remained there.

The Wall Street Journal said the secret base nearly came to light after a shepherd reportedly alerted Iraqi authorities to suspicious military activity, including helicopter landings and armed men in the area. Iraqi forces dispatched to investigate allegedly came under heavy fire and withdrew.

At the time, Baghdad condemned the attack, which killed one Iraqi soldier and wounded two others, without publicly identifying the perpetrators.

According to an Iraqi military statement issued after the incident, a force from Karbala Operations Command came under "aerial bombardment and gunfire" while carrying out a search mission in the desert area linking Karbala and Najaf provinces.

The statement said one soldier was killed and two others injured. Iraqi authorities later announced the formation of a high-level investigative committee into the incident.

Iraqi MP Raed al-Maliki accused Washington of enabling Israeli operations inside Iraq.

"The United States handed Iraqi airspace to the entity [Israel] during the war and ordered the radars to be shut down," he wrote in a Facebook post.

"It has now become clear that Iraqi territory was also used to establish a secret intelligence centre or base for the entity."

He described the allegations as "a major breach for which all national intelligence and security bodies must be held accountable".

The Iraqi government has yet to officially comment on the Wall Street Journal report.

"Last night in the Fateh Khel area of Bannu, a suicide bomber rammed an explosives-laden vehicle into a police checkpoint, after which multiple militants entered the post," Bannu police official Muhammad Sajjad Khan told AFP.

He said that 15 officers were confirmed dead, the latest attack in the border province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa during a wave of militancy that has strained ties between Islamabad and Kabul.

Gunmen stormed the police checkpoint after the car blast and opened fire, according to officials, who said the militants also used small drones in the attack.

"During the assault, the militants used quadcopters along with heavy weaponry," a senior administrative official in Bannu told AFP on condition of anonymity.

He said more than 100 militants took part in the attack.

"In addition, while retreating, the attackers took police personnel and weapons from the station with them," he added.

Bannu has been gripped in recent years by militant activity that has grown across Pakistan's border regions.

The Taliban government in Kabul denies Pakistan's accusations that Afghan territory is a safe harbour for militants, but the frosty relationship has spiralled into deadly armed conflict, including Pakistani airstrikes on cities in Afghanistan in recent months.

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday that Russia and Ukraine had agreed to a three-day ceasefire from May 9 to May 11, as a broader peace effort to end the more than four-year-old war has stalled.

One person each in the Zaporizhzhia, Dnipropetrovsk and Kherson regions were killed in Russian drone attacks, regional governors and police said in separate reports on Sunday.

In the northeastern Kharkiv region, governor Oleh Syniehubov said eight people including two children were wounded in drone strikes on the regional capital and nearby settlements.

Seven people including a child were also wounded in the Kherson region in drone or artillery attacks since early Saturday, regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin said on Sunday.

The State Emergencies Service said Russian forces attacked one of its rescue vehicles in the Dnipropetrovsk region with a drone, wounding a 23-year-old driver.

Kyiv's air force said Russia had launched 27 long-range drones at Ukraine overnight - a lower number than usual - but that air defences had downed all of them.

In its daily morning report, Ukraine's General Staff said 147 clashes had taken place along the front line during the past 24 hours.

Ukrainian officials have not yet publicly commented on any Russian violations of the U.S.-brokered ceasefire, which was also meant to include a swap of 1,000 prisoners of war from each side.

Russia's Defence Ministry said on Sunday that Ukraine had violated the ceasefire by launching drones and artillery strikes against its troops. It said Russian forces had shot down 57 Ukrainian drones.

Earlier this week, Russia and Ukraine had each announced separate ceasefires - starting on Friday and Wednesday respectively - but quickly accused one another of breaking them.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and White House envoy Steve Witkoff were both involved in the talks, two sources with knowledge of the matter told the news outlet.

The talks came as Iran continued to consider a new US proposal to end the crisis in the Strait of Hormuz.

Pakistan has led international efforts to broker an end to the war, hosting an initial round of peace talks in Islamabad last month that failed to break the deadlock.

But Doha has also been working behind the scenes to bring the two countries closer together and prevent a resumption of a regional war that caused unprecedented destruction across the region and threw the global economy into a severe energy crisis.

The US State Department said in a statement Rubio and Al-Thani discussed US support for Qatar's defence but did not mention Iran.

The Florida meeting came a day after Al-Thani had met US Vice President JD Vance in Washington. He was supposed to travel back to Qatar the same day but changed his plans and flew to Miami to meet Rubio and Witkoff, a source told Axios.

US officials said the Qataris had been "especially effective in negotiations in Iran".

Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia have also been involved in mediation efforts.

"The mediators are urging both parties to de-escalate and focus on getting a deal," a source said.

Tehran has given no indication about whether it will accept the Trump administration's latest offer, which would see the US gradually lift its blockade on Iranian ports and Iran re-open the strait over the next month.

Trump said Friday he had expected a response "tonight" and reiterated threats to escalate the conflict if Iran did not respond positively. However, Iran said it would respond at a time it deemed appropriate. 

The two countries exchanged fire in the strait on Thursday and Friday for the first time since the month-old ceasefire.

The US struck Iranian tankers and military targets and Iran fired on three American warships, threatening to unravel the 8 April truce.

Iran's military spokesperson issued a new warning on Sunday, saying it would escalate the conflict in new and unexpected ways if the US mounts new attacks.

The two countries have engaged in a standoff over the crucial shipping corridor, which has been largely closed since the US and Israel launched the war 10 weeks ago.

Iran has insisted it should retain control over the strait as part of a peace settlement and wants to impose transit fees on ships to generate billions of dollars of revenues.

The closure has triggered a severe global energy crisis and provoked a US blockade on Iran's ports which it has refused to lift until Tehran agrees to a peace deal.

A recent CIA assessment suggested that the blockade would need to remain in place for another four months until Iran's economy faces crisis.

Smotrich, who also holds a ministerial role within the Defence Ministry, said the trees were removed on Wednesday by the Civil Administration, a branch of the Defence Ministry’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), which oversees civilian affairs in the occupied territory. 

"We are building the Land of Israel and destroying the idea of a Palestinian state," Smotrich said, reiterating his longstanding anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian rhetoric. 

He claimed the trees had been planted illegally and said the operation was intended to "prevent attempts by the Palestinian Authority to establish facts on the ground". 

According to Israeli media reports, the trees had been planted across around 50 acres of land near the Shakak Industrial Park, close to the Shaked settlement in the northern West Bank, before being uprooted. 

All Israeli settlements are illegal under international law, however, Smotrich has continued to push for the expansion of them, despite growing criticism of Israeli uprooting operations and home demolitions across the territory. 

Israeli soldiers also uprooted hundreds of olive trees near the Palestinian village of Qaryut, south of Nablus, in December 2025, Haaretz reported.

At the time, the village council warned that "the aim is to take over our land" after the Israeli military ordered the removal of what it described as "excess vegetation".

Residents expressed concern that many of the trees had been destroyed and could not be replanted again. 

Israeli forces have also justified similar uprooting campaigns following attacks involving settlers. 

After a shooting near the settlement outpost of Adei Ad last August, the army said it had uprooted more than 3,000 trees in the village of al-Mughayyir in the Ramallah governorate, as part of alleged efforts to locate the assailant, including "uncovering vegetation, arresting suspects and searches". 

Rights groups, including Yesh Din, condemned the latest operation following Smotrich’s announcement. 

"While the state supports hundreds of illegal outposts which constitute focal points for severe violence by Israelis against Palestinians, it compounds one crime with another, by cutting down thousands of olive trees just because they belong to Palestinians and thereby does mortal damage to the income of thousands of people," the organisation said. 

The Israeli military has uprooted olive trees, a key cultural and economic symbol for Palestinians, across the occupied Palestinian territories for decades as part of broader policies linked to land confiscation and the displacement of residents. 

The latest development comes as Palestinians continue to face escalating violence across the West Bank amid Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza and the Iran conflict. 

Since the outbreak of the Gaza war on 7 October 2023, the occupied West Bank has experienced a sharp rise in Israeli military raids and settler violence, with tens of thousands of Palestinians displaced from their homes. 

According to the latest figures from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), 42 Palestinians had been killed by Israeli forces or settlers in 2026 as of April, including 10 children and two women. 

OCHA also reported at least 30 settler attacks causing casualties, property damage, or both, bringing the total number of such incidents since the beginning of 2026 to more than 700 across over 200 Palestinian communities. 

The organisation added that the village of al-Mughayyir has increasingly faced repeated attacks by Israeli settlers believed to be from Adei Ad and surrounding settlement outposts, alongside intensified Israeli military operations. 

According to Iran's proposal, the current phase of negotiations will focus exclusively on the cessation of hostilities in the region, a source familiar with the matter told IRNA.

Sources in both camps have told Reuters the latest ​peace efforts are aimed at a temporary memorandum of understanding to halt the war and allow traffic through the Strait of Hormuz while they discuss a fuller deal, which would have to address intractable disputes such as Iran's nuclear programme.

Drones were launched at several targets in the Gulf on Sunday, with one hitting a freighter sailing towards Qatar. Kuwait also reported an attempted attack at dawn.

The United Arab Emirates said that its territory had also come under attack, and called out Iran by name. "UAE air defence systems successfully engaged two UAVs launched from Iran," the defence ministry said, in a social media post.

Iran's soccer federation said on Saturday that the country "definitely" will participate in the 2026 FIFA World Cup and insisted that the tournament hosts, the United States, Canada, and Mexico, consider Tehran's concerns about the team's travel and how it will be treated.

"All players and technical staff, especially those who served their military service in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, should be granted visas without problems," Football Federation Islamic Republic of Iran president Mehdi Taj said, according to Iranian media.

The team represents a country in a fragile ceasefire with the United States after the US and Israel sparked a war with attacks on Iran on 28 February, and whose citizens are subject to a travel ban imposed by the Trump administration.

In the statement carried by the state-run IRNA news agency, Taj said Friday that Iran had presented conditions tied to participation, including guarantees regarding visas, security, and the treatment of Iranian players and officials, and added that the Islamic Republic would take part "without retreating from our beliefs, culture and convictions".

The remarks came after Canadian authorities last month denied entry to Taj ahead of a FIFA Congress, reportedly because of his past ties to Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guard, which both the US and Canada have designated as a terrorist organisation.

Taj has repeatedly said that Iran would seek assurances from FIFA that Iranian officials, players, national flag and anthem would be treated with respect during the World Cup.

Concerns about issuing visas to people who had completed their mandatory military service in the Guard had previously been raised by others.

The matter could potentially affect one of Iran's key players, Mehdi Taremi, the team captain and a striker who had completed his mandatory military service in the Guard. In Iran, conscripts can also be assigned to the police or the army, often at random.

Iran's team has drawn with Belgium, New Zealand and Egypt in Group G and opens the World Cup against New Zealand in Inglewood, next to Los Angeles.

Iran has qualified for four consecutive World Cups and seven overall, but has never advanced out of the group stage. Currently ranked No. 21 in the world, Iran lost just one match in the Asian qualifying.

The new appointments include former Homs governor Abdul Rahman Badreddine al-Aama, who replaces Sharaa's brother Maher as secretary-general of the Syrian presidency, a move that had drawn criticism from opponents who accused the administration of favouring nepotism over merit.

Sharaa appointed Khaled Zaarour as information minister, replacing Hamza Mustafa, who was moved to the foreign ministry.

Information Minister Hamza Almustafa and Agriculture Minister Amjad Badr were replaced by Khaled Fawaz Zaarour and Bassel Hafez al-Sweidan, respectively.

Zaarour was head of the media faculty at Damascus University before his appointment.

As agriculture minister, he named Bassel Sweidan, who also heads a committee tasked with reaching settlement agreements with business tycoons linked to the Assad-era elite.

Sharaa replaced governors in the provinces of Homs, al Quneitra and Deir Ezzor, the eastern province where most of Syria's oil fields are located.

The reshuffle is the first since the ouster of former President Bashar al-Assad and comes around a year and a half into the five-year transitional period set out in Syria's constitutional declaration.

No official reason was given for the changes, but protests and social media campaigns have emerged in recent months over worsening economic conditions and what critics describe as poor government performance.

France and Algeria set aside a two-year diplomatic falling-out to agree on intensified cooperation on domestic security and defence at a meeting on Saturday between Algerian President Abdelmajid Tebboune and French Armed Forces Minister Alice Rufo.

As part of Rufo's visit, France's ambassador to the North African country and former French colony, Stephane Romatet, returned to his post after being recalled about a year ago at the height of the dispute.

Following her two-hour meeting with the Algerian leader, Rufo said it had provided an opportunity to discuss "security and defence cooperation".

Tebboune and Rufo also discussed ways to "intensify" their cooperation on migration issues, as well as "judicial cooperation", particularly in the area of drug trafficking.

The diplomatic spat between Paris and Algiers began in 2024 when France declared its support for a Moroccan plan to grant autonomy to the disputed territory of Western Sahara under Moroccan sovereignty.

Algeria is the main foreign backer of the Polisario Front, which seeks independence for the former Spanish colony, which Morocco controls and claims as an integral part of its kingdom.

The row then escalated over a number of other issues, including the detention of Boualem Sansal, a Franco-Algerian writer.

After the meeting, Rufo also said that French sports journalist Christophe Gleizes would receive a first consular visit since being detained on terror charges a year ago.

Gleizes was sentenced to seven years in prison last December, and on Tuesday his family said he had withdrawn his appeal in the hopes of receiving a presidential pardon.

Israel built the installation, which housed special forces and served as a logistical hub for the Israeli air force, with the knowledge of the US just before the start of the US-Israeli war against Iran, the newspaper said.

It also included search-and-rescue teams positioned to assist any downed Israeli pilots, the Journal said.

Reuters could not independently verify the report. There was no immediate response from the Israeli prime minister's office to a Reuters request for comment.

The base was almost discovered in early March after Iraqi state media said a local shepherd reported unusual military activity, including helicopter movements in the area.

Iraqi troops were dispatched to investigate, but Israeli forces used airstrikes to keep them at a distance and prevent the site from being discovered, the paper said, citing one of the sources.

The Journal cited a complaint filed with the United Nations later in March in which Iraq said the attack involved foreign forces and airstrikes and attributed it to the US.

The WSJ cited a person familiar with the matter as saying the United States was not involved in the attack.

Iran's Revolutionary Guards threatened Saturday to target US sites in the Middle East if its tankers come under fire, Iranian media reported, as Washington was left waiting for Tehran's response to its latest negotiating position.

"Any attack on Iranian tankers and commercial vessels will result in a heavy attack on one of the American centres in the region and enemy ships," the Guards said, a day after US strikes on two Iranian tankers in the Gulf of Oman.

US President Donald Trump said on Friday he expected Iran's response to Washington's latest peace deal proposal "supposedly tonight".

But if Tehran sent Pakistani mediators a response, there was no public sign of it, and Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi reportedly questioned the reliability of US leadership.

"The recent escalation of tensions by American forces in the Persian Gulf and their numerous actions in violating the ceasefire have added to suspicions about the motivation and seriousness of the American side in the path of diplomacy," he said in a call with his Turkish counterpart, according to Iran's ISNA news agency.

On Friday, a US fighter jet fired on and disabled two Iranian-flagged tankers that Washington accused of challenging its blockade of Iran's ports. An Iranian military official told local media the navy had responded with strikes.

That incident followed another flare-up the night before in the Strait of Hormuz, the vital international sea lane that Iran is seeking to control in order to extract tolls and wield economic leverage over the United States and its allies.

The US says it is unacceptable for Tehran to control the key oil route.

Washington has sent Iran, via Pakistani mediators, a proposal to extend the truce in the Gulf to allow for talks on a final settlement of the war, launched 10 weeks ago with US-Israeli strikes on Iran.

A reporter for French broadcaster LCI, Margot Haddad, said Saturday that Trump had told her in a brief interview he still expected to find out Iran's answer "very soon".

Iran's foreign ministry spokesman said Friday the proposal was still "under review".

Oil slick

Top US diplomat Marco Rubio met Saturday with the leader of Qatar, a key intermediary for Washington in dialogue with Iran, discussing "continued close coordination to deter threats and promote stability and security across the Middle East," the State Department said.

Qatar's Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani met the previous day with US Vice President JD Vance to discuss the Pakistani-led efforts to broker a permanent peace.

Iran has attacked sites in Qatar during the war, pointing to the wealthy emirate's role as host of a major US air base.

Meanwhile, satellite images have shown an apparent oil slick spreading off the coast of Iran's Kharg Island, a key oil export terminal for the Islamic Republic.

It was not immediately clear what caused the apparent spill, which was off the island's west coast and appeared to cover more than 20 square miles (52 square kilometres), according to global monitor Orbital EOS.

A UK-based non-governmental organisation, the Conflict and Environment Observatory, told AFP that by Saturday the slick was "much reduced", and may have been caused by leaking oil infrastructure.

Kharg Island is at the heart of Iran's oil export industry, a lynchpin of its battered economy, and lies in the Gulf far north of the narrow Strait of Hormuz.

Following the start of the war on 28 February, Iran largely closed the strait, throwing global markets into turmoil and driving up oil prices.

The US later imposed its own blockade of Iranian ports in response, and Trump this week abandoned a short-lived US naval operation to reopen the strait to commercial shipping.

A successful passage would mark the first transit by a Qatari LNG tanker through the strait since the start of the war on Iran. There was no immediate comment from QatarEnergy.

The LNG is being sold by Qatar to Pakistan, a mediator in the war, under a government-to-government deal, according to two people familiar with the matter. They said Iran had approved the shipment to help build confidence with Qatar and Pakistan.

Pakistan has been in discussions with Iran to allow a limited number of LNG tankers to pass through the strait, as Islamabad urgently needs to address its gas shortage, a source briefed on the agreement told Reuters.

Iran agreed to assist, and the two sides are coordinating the first vessel's safe passage carrying gas supplied under Pakistan's agreement with Qatar, its main LNG supplier, the source added.

The vessel, managed by Nakilat Shipping Qatar Ltd and sailing under the Marshall Islands flag, has a cargo capacity of 211,986 cubic metres, according to LSEG data.

Iran's Revolutionary Guards halted two Qatar LNG tankers, Al Daayen and Rasheeda, that had been heading towards the Strait of Hormuz on 6 April and instructed them to hold position without explanation, a source told Reuters at the time.

Qatar is the world's second-largest exporter ⁠of LNG, ​with shipments mostly going to buyers in Asia. Iranian attacks knocked out 17 percent of Qatar's ​LNG export capacity, with repairs expected to sideline 12.8 million tons per year of the fuel for three to five years.

Eurovision Song Contest director Martin Green said videos published by the artist representing Israel had broken the rules and spirit of the competition.

Organisers were made aware of videos shared by the singer, Noam Bettan, telling viewers to "vote 10 times" for Israel.

Kan has since removed the videos and stopped their distribution after receiving a written warning, Green said.

Professional juries account for half of the final result, with the remainder decided by viewers who can cast up to 10 votes.

This is not the first time Israel is alleged to have tried to manipulate voting in the world's largest live music competition.

The European Broadcasting Union, the organiser of the contest, was forced to tighten voting rules last year after several countries raised concerns over Israel's second-place finish in 2025.

Singer Yuval Raphael's first-place finish in the public vote resulted in speculation that the Israeli government had rigged the vote by running large-scale promotional campaigns.

The song competition has been thrown into crisis over Israel's inclusion in the 2026 event, which drew widespread outrage over its genocidal war in Gaza.

Five countries, Iceland, Ireland, the Netherlands, Slovenia and Spain, all pulled out of the contest after organisers allowed Israel to participate.

Ireland's RTE said its participation would be "unconscionable" given Israel's behaviour in Gaza while the Netherland's public broadcaster said its participation "cannot be reconciled" with its values.

The EBU has justified keeping Israel inside the competition by claiming it is politically neutral, though barred Russia just a day after it invaded Ukraine in 2022.

More than 1,000 musicians and artists last month renewed calls for participants to boycott the contest over Israel's involvement.

"How can any performer or Eurovision fan in good conscience participate at the contest’s next edition in Austria amidst US-Israeli plans for hyper-surveilled concentration camps in 'New Gaza'?” the letter reads, co-signed by artists including Macklemore, Paloma Faith, Kneecap, Massive Attack and former winners of the Eurovision contest.

The contest will take place in Vienna later this month, with two semi-finals on 12 and 14 May and a final on 16 May.

Salam led a ministerial delegation to Damascus for high-level discussions focused on border security, smuggling, detainees, Syrian refugees, economic cooperation and transport links between the neighbouring countries.

The Lebanese delegation included the country’s deputy prime minister, and ministers of Public Works and Transport, Energy and Water, and Economy and Trade. They met with their Syrian counterparts.

The visit is part of an ongoing effort to reset Lebanese-Syrian relations following the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad in December 2024. Ties had long been fraught between the two states during the Assad regime era.

Speaking after the meeting, Salam said the two sides had achieved "significant progress in addressing our shared issues, especially those that had remained unresolved," adding that talks were conducted in a "positive spirit" and with a commitment to cooperation "without reservation or hesitation."

He said he expected "tangible results" to emerge soon.

The premier said discussions included implementation of an agreement signed in February allowing the transfer of Syrian prisoners in Lebanese jails to Syria, as well as efforts to determine the fate of missing and forcibly disappeared people in both countries.

Thousands of Lebanese are believed to have gone missing in Syria during Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war and when Assad’s forces occupied Lebanon until 2005.

Syria is also emerging out of its own civil war which began in 2011 when the Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests.

The two sides also agreed on the need to tighten control along their porous border and combat smuggling, while facilitating the movement of travellers and goods through official crossings.

Salam said officials held detailed talks on land transport, border crossings and infrastructure, including the rehabilitation of border bridges and efforts to resolve customs-related obstacles affecting trade between the two countries. The discussions also covered transit fees and tariffs imposed on exports.

The prime minister added that Beirut and Damascus agreed to strengthen cooperation on technical standards and laboratory inspections, while accelerating plans to establish a joint Lebanese-Syrian business council expected to convene in Damascus in the coming weeks.

Energy cooperation also featured prominently in the talks.

Salam said the two countries discussed improving electricity interconnection to facilitate Lebanon’s import of power through Syria, as well as a possible natural gas transit agreement. He said joint technical committees would be formed and ministerial-level coordination intensified.

Lebanon has suffered with a decades-long electricity crisis due to what observers say is widespread corruption and mismanagement in the energy sector. Syria’s energy sector has also been battered by the conflict.

Salam and Sharaa also stressed the importance of continued dialogue over the "safe and dignified" return of Syrian refugees from Lebanon and the regulation of Syrian labour in Lebanon.

Over a million Syrian refugees who escaped the violence in their country still reside in Lebanon. Many have returned since fighting resumed between Hezbollah and Israel two months ago.

"The pre-positioning of HMS Dragon is part of prudent planning that will ensure that the UK is ready, as part of a multinational coalition jointly led by the UK and France, to secure the strait, when conditions allow," a ministry spokesperson told AFP.

Britain and France said last month that military plans to secure the Strait of Hormuz were coming together and would succeed in restoring trade flows through the vital passage.

The MoD said deploying HMS Dragon would strengthen the confidence of commercial shipping and support mine clearance efforts once hostilities end.

At a two-day meeting in London in April involving more than 44 countries, military planners discussed the practicalities of a multinational mission led by the UK and France to protect navigation in the key waterway.

Some 40 countries are understood to have agreed to participate in plans for the mission to free up navigation in Hormuz.

Before the US-Israel war on Iran started on 28 February, about a fifth of the world's oil was shipped through the strait.

But that has dwindled in past months. Iran largely closed the strait, throwing global markets into turmoil and driving up oil prices. The US later imposed its own blockade of Iranian ports in response.

On Saturday Iran questioned the seriousness of American diplomacy to bring about a ceasefire in the wake of renewed naval clashes in the Gulf region.

In an incident on Friday, a US fighter jet fired on and disabled two Iranian-flagged tankers that Washington accused of challenging its naval blockade of Iran's ports. The US action prompted Iranian retaliatory attacks.

It came after a flare-up overnight Thursday to Friday in the strait, where Iran is seeking to extract tolls from foreign vessels and wield economic leverage over the US and its allies.

Since 2009, the country has been battling Boko Haram and its splinter faction the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), which both seek to establish an Islamist caliphate in the region.

The military said the Islamist militants were killed Thursday as forces fought off a coordinated ISWAP assault on the headquarters of its 27th brigade in the town of Buni Gari, as well as a nearby checkpoint in Yobe state.

"The assault, launched at approximately 0200 hours under the cover of darkness by a large number of terrorists from multiple axes, was met with devastating firepower, tactical brilliance and resolute determination by troops," the arm said in a Friday statement.

It added that "no fewer than 50 terrorists were neutralised" and a large cache of weapons and ammunition was recovered, though two soldiers were also killed.

Photographs released by the military and seen by AFP showed bodies along with seized weapons and ammunition.

An intelligence source who requested anonymity confirmed the attack and the army's counteroffensive.

However, the source said the military had "grossly underdeclared its casualties and bloated the losses suffered by the terrorists", without giving exact figures.

Another intelligence source said military casualties, both dead and wounded, had been taken to Maiduguri, the capital of neighbouring Borno state, in six ambulances, adding the exact number was unclear.

Boko Haram and ISWAP have stepped up attacks in recent months after a period of relative calm.

Since 2019, the army has shut down smaller outposts and regrouped its forces into larger, heavily fortified bases known as "super camps", designed to better withstand attacks.

But some analysts say this strategy has allowed armed groups to move more freely in rural areas with less military presence.

The Islamist insurgency has killed more than 40,000 people and displaced around two million in northeast Nigeria, according to the United Nations, and has spilled over into parts of neighbouring Niger, Cameroon and Chad in recent years.

Data from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees states that improved living conditions in the country, better security, and more facilities available at border crossings mean that people continue to return to Syria.

Mazen Alloush, director of relations at the General Authority for Ports and Customs in Syria, told The New Arab that 1,211,000 people have returned to Syria from December 2024 until April 2026.

Alloush added that around 715,000 of those returnees were based in Turkey, and 120,000 people in Lebanon returned to Syria since the start of this year.

The ouster of Assad put an end to the repressive Ba’athist regime, which lasted 54 years, and a 14-year-long war, resulting in one of the world’s biggest migration crises.

The brutal persecution of civilians and opposition groups under Assad resulted in around a third of the country, or 6.8 million people, fleeing.

Over the last year, Syrian authorities under the government of President Ahmed al-Sharaa, have been working to simplify procedures at border crossings to facilitate the return of people.

According to Alloush, these efforts include ensuring there is medical help available at crossings to treat people who need assistance, as well as providing transport to move people and their belongings and exempting people from duties for their luggage.

Fatima al-Ahmed, a Syrian woman who fled to Turkey in 2013, returned to Homs earlier this year, and was surprised at the changes in the country.

"After around five months of my return, life has become easier than before, and there is an improvement in several services," she told The New Arab, while noting that people still face challenges such as rebuilding their homes.  

Others remain reluctant to return to Syria.

"The desire to return to Syria is there, but it is contingent on securing work and housing, things which are essential for stability," Amer Talawi, who has been based in Germany since 2016 told The New Arab.

"There are some things in Syria that are discouraging me from returning at the moment, especially compared to life in Germany," he added.

The Hind Rajab Foundation announced that Peru’s First Central Criminal Prosecutor’s Office for Human Rights and Counterterrorism had ordered a 15-day preliminary investigation into a soldier from the Israeli army’s 424th "Shaked" Battalion of the Givati Brigade.

According to the foundation, the investigation relates to allegations of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide committed during Israel’s war on Gaza.

The complaint was filed by Peruvian lawyer Julio Cesar Arbizu Gonzalez of the Arbizu & Gamarra law firm after reports indicated the soldier was present in Peru, allegedly in the capital Lima and possibly the city of Cusco.

The foundation said the case activates Peru’s obligations under the principle of universal jurisdiction, which allows states to prosecute suspects accused of the gravest international crimes regardless of where the alleged offences took place or the nationality of those involved.

According to the organisation, investigators reconstructed the soldier’s alleged operational role during the Gaza war between November 2023 and October 2024, with the case file documenting what it described as specific violations of international humanitarian law.

The foundation accused the soldier of participating in the "systematic destruction of civilian objects", including the levelling of residential neighbourhoods and civilian infrastructure in densely populated parts of Gaza, particularly the al-Rimal neighbourhood and Jabalia refugee camp.

It said the evidence includes photographs and video testimony, much of it allegedly sourced from the soldier’s own social media accounts, showing burned homes and widespread destruction of civilian property.

The complaint also alleges the soldier was identified operating near facilities belonging to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, and essential medical infrastructure, including a health centre in Jabalia.

According to the foundation, military operations in those areas caused "catastrophic structural damage" and harmed protected civilians and medical workers.

The organisation further argued that the soldier was not acting individually, but as part of military units involved in "ground assaults and large-scale destruction operations" contributing to what it described as a systematic pattern of violence directed against Gaza’s civilian population.

The statement noted that the 424th "Shaked" Battalion has repeatedly appeared in investigations conducted by the Hind Rajab Foundation relating to the Gaza war.

The foundation said Peruvian prosecutors formally recognised the legal basis of the complaint under Peru’s ratification of the 1949 Geneva Conventions and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.

According to the statement, prosecutors also issued urgent directives to verify the soldier’s presence in Peru, review social media material and open-source evidence, and formally confirm the suspect’s identity.

Diab Abu Jahjah, director-general of the Hind Rajab Foundation, said the organisation "welcomes the decision of the Peruvian prosecutor’s office to open the investigation".

"Peru has a long and honourable tradition in defending human rights, and by activating universal jurisdiction it is honouring this legacy," he said.

He added: "Once the suspect’s presence on Peruvian soil is confirmed, we call on the authorities to issue an arrest warrant without delay. The victims of these atrocities deserve nothing less than a state that stands firmly on the side of justice."

Natasha Brack, the foundation’s litigation officer, said the case file contains "irrefutable digital forensic evidence", including geolocated photographs, military unit records, and social media posts allegedly published by the soldier himself.

She described an arrest warrant as "the logical and necessary next step" to prevent the suspect from fleeing and to ensure justice is served.

The Times of Israel (TOI) said Israeli soldiers stood by and watched as this happened near the settlement of Sa-Nur, which was evacuated 20 years ago and officially reopened last month.

Despite the military acknowledging that the funeral had been coordinated in advance, settlers from Sa-Nur later arrived at the site with digging tools and forced the Palestinians to dig up the grave.

The Israeli military said it arrived at the scene after reports of tensions, adding that it confiscated the digging tools from the settlers "and remained at the location to prevent further friction," according to TOI.

Footage shared online shows Palestinians moving the exhumed body, wrapped in a white cloth, as the soldiers and settlers look on.

It was not clear where the body of Hussein Asasa was later buried. The family said settlers threw stones at them as they moved his body.

The military claimed it would "investigate" the incident.

Ajith Sunghay, head of the UN Human Rights Office for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, said he was shocked at the incident.

"This is horrifying and embodies the dehumanisation of Palestinians that we are witnessing unfold across the entire Occupied Palestinian Territory without anyone being spared, neither the living nor the dead," he said in a statement published on X.

"The cemetery sits 300 meters from Sa Nur settlement, re-established in 2025. Palestinians must now obtain Israeli permits to bury their dead there, as Hussein's family had done that same morning."

Israel’s Jewish settlements in the West Bank are illegal under international law, and settler attacks have increasingly risen in the territory over the past few years.

Near-daily assaults have killed and injured scores of Palestinians, who often complained of settlers harassing them, torching their groves, attacking their homes and vehicles, and shooting at them.

Iran's oil infrastructure may be the source of a suspected slick off a key island export terminal, but satellite images showed it was "much reduced" Saturday, an environmental group said.

Satellite images in past days appeared to show an oil slick spreading off the coast of the Islamic republic's Kharg Island.

It was not immediately clear what had caused the apparent spill off the west coast of the small Gulf island.

"The cause and origin of the slick remain unknown and cannot be determined conclusively from the available imagery alone," a UK-based non-governmental organisation, the Conflict and Environment Observatory, told AFP.

"While offshore infrastructure in the wider area could be a potential source, we are unable to identify a definitive point of origin or attribute the spill to a specific cause at this time," said Leon Moreland from the observatory.

But he added "the slick appears visually consistent with oil based on analysis" of imagery from the Copernicus Data Space browser.

Some media reports, including by Fox News, suggested Iran's oil storage facilities may be coming under strain as a US naval blockade disrupts the country's ability to export or store crude.

Moussa Ahmadi, head of the Iranian parliament's energy commission, told ISNA news agency on Saturday there was "no official report so far confirming" that Iran's oil facility was leaking due to strained storage facilities.

"Production in various oil fields in the country continues incessantly and without any problem," he said.

Earlier, Jafar Pourkabgani, a lawmaker representing the coastal city of Bushehr, dismissed the reports as "false".

"The stains observed in satellite images around the resilient Kharg Island are related to oil and ballast water waste from oil tankers, which was dumped into the sea by a European oil tanker to the detriment of the environment," he said, according to state television.

Moreland said there was "no obvious evidence of additional active spills around the island, although the earlier slick can still be observed moving south".

Copernicus images on Saturday appeared to show that the suspected slick was "much reduced" from the first pictures seen on Wednesday, the observatory added.

It put the spread of the original slick at about 44 square kilometres (17 square miles).

But Orbital EOS, which monitors oil spills, told The New York Times the spill appeared to cover more than 20 square miles (52 square kilometres) as of Thursday.

Kharg Island is at the heart of Iran's oil export industry, a lynchpin of the country's battered economy. It sits off Iran's Gulf coast, hundreds of kilometres northwest of the narrow, strategic Strait of Hormuz.

Iran largely closed the strait at the start of its conflict with the United States and Israel on 28 February. The United States has since imposed a blockade of Iranian ports. Many tankers are stranded in the area as a result of both blockades.

The country's interior ministry said it had detained 41 people who it said were linked to Iran's Revolutionary Guards.

It later accused the clerics of "financing terrorist operations" by raising money for the Iranian paramilitary.

The war has emerged as a flashpoint in the Sunni-ruled country, whose large Shia population have staged small sporadic protests expressing sympathy for Iran.

Bahrain, which hosts a major US naval base, was among the hardest-hit Gulf states by Iran's retaliatory drone and missile strikes.

Among those arrested on Saturday were some of the country's most prominent Shia religious figures, including sheikhs Mohammed Sanqour and Ali Al-Sadadi.

"This scale of arrests has not happened in our lifetimes," human rights activist Sayed Ahmed Alwadaei told The New Arab, calling recent government actions "unprecedented".

Unlike during the Arab Spring protests, authorities are targeting people on sectarian lines and carrying out a "persecution of the Shia," said Alwadaei, head of advocacy at London-based NGO Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy.

Al-Wefaq, a Shia political party outlawed following the 2011 protests, described the arrests as part of a "systematic crackdown tied to political expression and public positions regarding the war against Iran".

The unrest triggered by the war has been met with an escalating campaign of repression against the Shia majority involving hundreds of arrests, heavy jail sentences, and dozens of people stripped of their citizenship.

Most of the arrests have been in relation to peaceful protests against the war and critical posts on social media.

A 32-year-old man, Sayed Mohamed Almosawi, died in custody after being arrested, with rights monitors reporting signs of torture on his body.

Meanwhile, three lawmakers were expelled from the parliament on Thursday after opposing moves by King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa to arbitrarily strip Bahrainis of their citizenship. The king had earlier suggested the MPs could also be deported for voting against the decree.

Last month, 69 people had their citizenships revoked for allegedly sympathising with Iran.

Around 350 people have been detained by authorities since the start of the war, said Bahraini human rights researcher Sayed Almuhafdha, who described the current period of repression as the worst since 2011.

Those arrested in Saturday's raids are likely to lose their citizenships and some could face the death penalty, he told The New Arab.

According to the Israeli rights group Adalah, Brazilian socio-environmentalist Thiago Avila and Spanish-Swedish national of Palestinian origin Saif Abukeshek will be transferred to Israel’s immigration authorities following their release and remain in custody pending deportation. 

"Adalah is closely monitoring development to make sure that the release from detention goes ahead, followed by their deportation from Israel in the coming days," the organisation said in a statement. 

Abukeshek and Avila were brought to Israel for questioning last week after their flotilla was intercepted by the Israeli navy in international waters off Greece, raising concerns over the legality of their detention.  

All of the activists detained during the interception were later released, except for Abukeshek and Avila. 

Adalah said the two human rights defenders were "held unlawfully by Israel", adding that "they were held in total isolation under punitive conditions despite the purely civilian nature of their mission."

The organisation added: "Both activists have been on a hunger strike since that time, which Abukeshek escalated to refusing water on the evening of 5 May."

Pablo Castilla, a spokesperson for the GSF in Catalonia, also alleged that Abukeshek and Avila had been "subjected to physical and psychological torture", held "in total isolation", exposed to "constant light 24 hours a day to prevent them from sleeping", and moved "with their eyes covered" whenever they were taken elsewhere, including to the infirmary. 

On Tuesday, an Israeli court extended the pair’s detention until Sunday to allow police additional time to interrogate them, according to their lawyers. 

Their legal team subsequently appealed against the continued detention, but the appeal was rejected by a district court on Wednesday. 

Spain, Brazil and the United Nations have all called for the activists’ immediate release.  

Spain’s consul in Tel Aviv visited Abukeshek on Tuesday and reportedly reiterated that his arrest was “illegal”. 

Israeli authorities have denied allegations of abuse but have not filed any charges against either man. 

Adalah previously said Israeli authorities accused the pair of "assisting the enemy during wartime" and "membership in and providing services to a terrorist organisation". 

Israel has alleged that both men were affiliated with the Popular Conference for Palestinians Abroad, a group Washington has accused of "clandestinely acting on behalf of" Hamas. However, no evidence has been publicly presented to support the allegation. 

The flotilla departed from France, Spain and Italy with the stated aim of breaking Israel’s blockade on Gaza and delivering humanitarian aid to the war-ravaged Palestinian territory.  

Israel has controlled all entry points into Gaza since imposing a blockade on the enclave in 2007. 

According to GSF representatives, an international assembly is due to take place in Turkey this weekend to determine the flotilla’s next steps.

The interior ministry said it detained Sahr Fajr Hassan, a brigadier general in the former regime, during what it described as a "precise" security operation, but did not state where he was arrested.

In a statement, the ministry said Hassan was considered a prominent military figure involved in the violent repression against Syrians when the revolution began in 2011.

The ministry said that he had held a series of senior and "sensitive" positions, including commander of a battalion in the Republican Guard in Deir Ezzour province, and membership in the security committee in the city of Aleppo.

Hassan had been involved in commanding battlefronts in the provinces of Homs and Idlib before being transferred to southern Syria with the rank of brigadier general, the statement added.

He was later assigned as deputy commander of the 15th Division in the Suweida province before eventually leading the division.

Hassan had been referred to the relevant judicial authorities to complete investigations, the ministry said.

Dozens of officials have been detained by Syria’s new authorities since President Bashar al-Assad was ousted in December 2024.

Last month, authorities arrested a key suspect in the 2013 Tadamon massacre, one of the most notorious mass killings of civilians carried out by forces of the regime of former dictator Bashar al-Assad.

Assad’s forces brutally suppressed peaceful anti-government protests that erupted in March 2011, igniting a civil war that would see hundreds of thousands killed and large parts of the country left in ruins.

Since toppling the Ba'athist regime, Syria’s government has vowed to impose its authority in the country and protect minorities, despite frequent outbreaks of sectarian violence, in which government-aligned forces and militias have been accused of committing human rights violations.

Extremist groups like the Islamic State continue to operate in small cells and have claimed a string of attacks.

The bombing of the house, belonging to the al-Adham family, came following an evacuation order for the building and others in the area, spreading panic among civilians.

Sources on the ground told The New Arab that Israeli warplanes launched three missiles, two of which exploded, while the third failed to detonate.

The house was completely destroyed, and several near it were also severely damaged, the sources added.

Those wounded were transferred to the al-Shifa Medical Complex in Gaza City, with medics stating the injuries were related to the shrapnel from the attack.

This marks the first time since the October ceasefire that Israel has issued evacuation orders for homes before bombing them. Since the truce came into effect, Israel has carried out field assassinations or strikes targeting vehicles and infrastructure.

The Israeli military has increased its attacks on Gaza since the joint US-Israeli war on Iran on 28 February, while talks regarding the next phase of the truce with Hamas have largely stalled.

Hamas has repeatedly reiterated that Israel must abide by the terms of the truce before moving onto the next phase of the deal and fulfil its obligations regarding daily aid deliveries.

Since the October ceasefire, Israel has killed at least 846 Palestinians and wounded 2,418 others. In the same time frame, rescue teams have recovered 769 bodies from under the rubble, Gaza’s Ministry of Health said.

The latest developments come as the UN said that 40,000 Palestinians have been displaced in the occupied West Bank since the start of 2025.

The deputy spokesperson for the UN Secretary-General, Farhan Haq, said in a press statement that Israeli settlers had carried out house demolitions in the first week of May, resulting in 42 Palestinians being displaced.

In the latest string of violent settler attacks in the West Bank, a Palestinian man and his child were attacked with "sharp instruments" south of Hebron on Friday, later seeking treatment at the hospital for head injuries.

Israeli settlers also torched a home south of Nablus, while settlers stormed a village and burned a vehicle in Abu Falah, northeast of Ramallah.

The settlers also vandalised homes, writing racist slogans on the walls, the official Palestinian Wafa news agency reported.

Settler violence has surged since the start of the war on Gaza, with human rights group B’Tselem stating the Israeli military avoids confronting settlers as a matter of policy and enable the violence against Palestinians and their property.

The call comes after Canada refused entry to the federation's chief last month before the FIFA Congress because of his links to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the ideological arm of Iran's military, which it designated as a terror group in 2024.

Iran's presence at the tournament, which will take place between 11 June and 19 July, has been shrouded in uncertainty since the eruption of war in the Middle East in February following strikes by the United States and Israel.

"We will definitely participate in the 2026 World Cup, but the hosts must take our concerns into account," the Iranian federation said on its official website.

"We will participate in the World Cup tournament, but without any retreat from our beliefs, culture, and convictions."

The Iranian football federation (FFIRI) president Mehdi Taj told state TV on Friday that Tehran has 10 conditions for attending the global spectacle, seeking assurances over the country's treatment.

The conditions include visas being granted and respect for the national team staff, the team's flag and its national anthem during the tournament, as well as demands for high security at airports, hotels and routes to the stadiums where they will play.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has insisted that Iran's footballers would be welcome at the tournament.

But he warned that the US may yet bar entry to members of the Iranian delegation with ties to the IRGC, which it also designates as a terrorist organisation.

"All players and technical staff, especially those who have served their military service in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps or IRGC, such as Mehdi Taremi and Ehsan Hajsafi, should be granted visas without any problems," said Iranian football chief Taj.

FIFA chief Gianni Infantino has reiterated that Iran will play their World Cup games in the United States as scheduled.

Iran, who are due to be based in Tucson, Arizona, during the World Cup, face New Zealand, Belgium and Egypt in Group G.

The Iranians open their World Cup campaign against New Zealand in Los Angeles on 15 June.

"No external power can deprive Iran of its participation in a cup to which it has qualified with merit," the Iranian federation said on Saturday.

World conflict is looming large over the Venice Biennale this year with the simultaneous presence of Russia, Ukraine, Israel and the Palestinians, with one participant describing the mix as akin to "inviting a serial killer to a dinner" among friends.

In the gardens where the world's largest contemporary art event opens to the public Saturday, the Russian pavilion stands just a few paces from a deer sculpture that was rescued from the Ukrainian front lines.

Russia's return to the Biennale - from which it had been absent since its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine - has sparked an international outcry since being announced in early March.

"Having them here in the Biennale is like inviting a serial killer to a dinner with your friends," Ukrainian Culture Minister Tetiana Berejna said Thursday at Venice.

Those who argue that war should not make a difference when it comes to art and that all should be welcome at the prestigious festival are "absolutely wrong," Berejna told AFP, adding that 346 Ukrainian artists have been killed by Russia since the war began.

"When Russia comes to our country, they destroy our libraries, they burn our books, they destroy our museums," she said.

"Culture is targeted during this war."

Besides Russia and Ukraine, other countries involved in conflicts are represented in Venice, including the United States and Israel, which attacked Iran in late February. Tehran, originally scheduled to participate, ultimately decided not to attend.

This year, Israel has a pavilion at the Arsenale, a former shipyard that serves as additional exhibition space at the Biennale, not far from Ukraine's.

The Palestinians, whose state is not recognised by Italy, do not have their own pavilion but are represented by an exhibition dedicated to Gaza at the Palazzo Mora, titled "Gaza - No Words - See the Exhibit".

"There's really no way to describe the horror that was inflicted upon the Palestinians in Gaza, and I don't think we would want to be in the same place as the people who did that," said the exhibition's curator, Faisal Saleh, founder of the Palestine Museum in the US state of Connecticut.

Police officers stationed near the Russian, Israeli and US pavilions serve as a reminder that the global geopolitical situation makes coexistence between countries at war - including within the realm of art - potentially explosive.

On Friday, a fresh pro-Palestinian demonstration brought together about 2,000 people in Venice, according to the Italian news agency Ansa, to protest against Israel's presence at the Biennale.

Artists as spokespeople?

Russia's pavilion became the epicentre of protests against Moscow's presence on Wednesday, as members of the Russian activist group Pussy Riot and the Ukrainian feminist collective Femen staged their first joint action, appearing with hooded faces and breasts bared.

"If the Biennale were to start selecting not works but affiliations, not visions but passports, it would cease to be what it has always been: the place where the world comes together, and all the more so when the world is torn apart," argued Biennale President Pietrangelo Buttafuoco Wednesday.

Israeli artist Belu-Simion Fainaru told AFP that the divisions at the Biennale were "destroying the meaning of art... to unite people".

"I don't think we should reduce the art world to a political arena," added the sculptor, whose installation, "The Rose of Nothingness", is a water basin fed by a drip irrigation system.

That position was also voiced by Italy's Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini who visited the Biennale Friday: "I don't think American, Chinese, Israeli, or Russian artists are spokespeople for ongoing conflicts."

At Palazzo Mora, about a hundred pieces of embroidery, hand-woven by Palestinian women in refugee camps, reproduce images "more vivid than photographs" of what has gone on in Gaza over the past two years, explained Saleh.

As if to calm the controversy, three evenings dedicated to reflection and "the theme of peace" were scheduled during the pre-opening week, featuring Russian director Alexander Sokurov and Palestinian writer and architect Suad Amiry.

The 9 May parade on Red Square marks Russia's most revered national holiday - a time to celebrate the Soviet Union's victory over Nazi Germany and to pay homage to the 27 million Soviet citizens, including many from Ukraine, who perished.

Once used to show off Russia's vast military, including its nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missiles, the parade this year had no tanks or other military equipment rolling over the cobbles of Red Square.

Instead, weapons including a Yars intercontinental ballistic missile, the new Arkhangelsk nuclear submarine, the Peresvet laser weapon, the Sukhoi Su-57 fighter, the S-500 surface-to-air missile system and a host of drones and artillery were shown on giant screens on Red Square, and on state television.

Soldiers and sailors, some of whom have served in Ukraine, marched and cheered as President Vladimir Putin looked on, seated beside Russian veterans in the shadow of Vladimir Lenin's Mausoleum. North Korean troops, who fought against Ukrainians in Russia's Kursk region, also marched.

Fighter planes flew above the towers of the Kremlin and Putin made an eight-minute speech, promising victory in the war in Ukraine which the Kremlin calls the "special military operation".

"The great feat of the victorious generation inspires the soldiers carrying out the tasks of the special military operation today," Putin said. "They are confronting an aggressive force armed and supported by the entire NATO bloc. And in spite of that, our heroes march forward."

Trump wants 'big extension' to ceasefire

After Russia and Ukraine accused each other of violating unilateral ceasefires they had each declared over recent days, US President Donald Trump announced a three-day ceasefire from Saturday to Monday that was supported by the Kremlin and Kyiv. The two sides also agreed to exchange 1,000 prisoners.

"I'd like to see it stop. Russia-Ukraine - it's the worst thing since World War Two in terms of life. Twenty-five thousand young soldiers every month. It's crazy," Trump told reporters in Washington. He added that he would "like to see a big extension" of the ceasefire. There were no reports of violations of the ceasefire from either Moscow or Kyiv.

Russia, which invaded Ukraine in 2022, had warned that any attempt by Kyiv to disrupt Saturday's event would lead to a massive missile strike on the Ukrainian capital. Moscow told foreign diplomats that they should evacuate Kyiv staff in the event of such an attack.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky issued a tongue-in-cheek decree "allowing" Russia's 9 May military parade to proceed and saying Ukrainian weapons would not target Red Square.

Security was tight in Moscow. Reuters pictures showed soldiers with guns atop pickup trucks and roads blocked around the centre of the capital, which along with the surrounding region has a population of 22 million

War in Ukraine haunts Russia's parade

After Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, the Red Army eventually pushed Nazi forces back to Berlin, where Adolf Hitler killed himself and the red Soviet Victory Banner was raised over the Reichstag in May 1945.

Nazi Germany's unconditional surrender came into force at 11:01 p.m. on 8 May, 1945, marked as "Victory in Europe Day" by Britain, the United States and France. In Moscow it was already 9 May, which became the Soviet Union's "Victory Day" in what Russians call the Great Patriotic War of 1941-45. But this year's parade comes amid a wave of anxiety in Moscow about the ultimate outcome of the conflict in Ukraine.

The war has killed hundreds of thousands of people, left swathes of Ukraine in ruins and drained Russia's $3 trillion economy, while Russia's relations with Europe are worse than at any time since the depths of the Cold War.

"The crisis is still deepening gradually, but any sharp movement can send the economy (and not only the economy) into a tailspin," jailed pro-war Russian nationalist Igor Girkin, who has criticised the Kremlin for its conduct of the war, said in a post on Telegram.

Girkin, a former Federal Security Service officer, used a naval analogy to say that Russia's leaders were more worried about being kicked out of their cabins than about a shipwreck.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov this week dismissed CNN and other Western media reports that Putin's protection had been intensified because of fears of a coup or assassination. Russian officials have dismissed reports of a coup plot as nonsense.

CNN cited an unidentified European intelligence agency as saying that Putin's former defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, was seen as a potential coup leader.

Security Council Secretary Shoigu, who attended an online meeting of the Security Council chaired by Putin on Friday, was at the parade on Saturday, sitting beside some of Putin's most powerful officials.

An Israeli drone strike Saturday afternoon targeted a car and killed three people in a Mount Lebanon area, the state-run National News Agency (NNA) reported. The attack took place in an area known as Moltaka al-Nahrayn (the meeting of two rivers) in the Chouf district.

Two separate drone strikes also targeted two vehicles on the busy coastal highway in Saadiyat, about 35 kilometres south of Beirut, NNA reported. Ambulances were seen rushing to the scene where black smoke filled the sky. It was not immediately clear how many people died in those strikes.

Both areas are far from southern Lebanon, where Israeli strikes killed several people on Saturday.

In Saksakiyeh, a strike destroyed a residential building and killed at least four people as rescuers searched for six others. Another strike killed one man and his daughter in Nabatiyeh, while three others were killed in a strike on the Burj Rahhal-Abbasiyeh road.

Residents of Tayr Debba, Abbasiyeh, Burj Rahhal, Maaroub, Barish, Arnoun, Jannata, Zrariyeh, and Ain Baal were ordered by the Israeli army Saturday morning to distance themselves at least one kilometre from their villages.

In an earlier statement, the Israeli military claimed it had struck more than 85 Hezbollah infrastructure sites "from the air and on the ground" in the past 24 hours. It said these included weapon storage facilities, launchers, and structures used by the Iran-backed militant group.

On Friday, Hezbollah said it launched missiles and drones at military bases in northern Israel in retaliation for a recent attack south of Beirut, which Israel says killed a top commander.

Since fighting resumed between Israel and Hezbollah on 2 March, Israeli forces deepened their invasion of southern Lebanon and now occupy the entire border area, establishing a buffer zone where dozens of towns and villages have been flattened.

Around a million people have been forcibly displaced from much of the south and Beirut’s southern suburbs. More than 2,700 people have been killed.

Intensive talks

Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said on Friday that his government was seeking full implementation of the 17 April ceasefire ahead of planned talks with Israel next week. The ceasefire was brokered by the US and later extended.

Lebanese and Israeli delegations will meet again at the US State Department on 14 and 15 May in a new round of direct, preliminary discussions aimed at putting an end to the decades-long conflict.

Full-fledged negotiations are yet to begin; however, next week’s talks will include more senior Lebanese diplomats and Israeli officials.

The State Department said that the US will facilitate two days of intensive talks between the governments of Israel and Lebanon.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the Lebanese government needed to be strengthened to extend its sovereignty over all of Lebanon and have exclusive control over all arms, adding that the US will not engage in any talks with Hezbollah.

Beirut has stressed that its priority was a permanent ceasefire, an end to the Israeli occupation of Lebanese territory, and the return of Lebanese detainees in Israel, and stated that the aim of the talks was a peace deal and not normalisation. 

Israel has warned that it will stay in southern Lebanon and continue its attacks if Hezbollah is not fully stripped of its weapons, a demand the militant group has refused.

Hezbollah has slammed the talks and said it was not concerned with their outcome.

Basel Adra, speaking more than a year after the documentary examining Israeli settler and military violence in the West Bank won an Academy Award, described the continued mistreatment of Palestinian villagers.

The acclaimed film drew international attention to the destruction of Palestinian communities in Masafer Yatta by Israeli settlers, whom Adra said act with the support and complicity of the Israeli army. 

"This is our daily life. The settlers ban pogroms to torture our homes, to destroy our properties and to kill us," Adra told the UN.

"The soldiers are there to give a hand to the settlers and to make sure that the settlers do what they came to do, which is to attack, destroy, and to burn cars, homes, farms, and to steal and to kill."

"So there’s no difference in our daily life in what the soldiers, police, and settlers [commit]. We are the innocent living in these communities facing violations from all these Israeli settlers, soldiers, and police," he continued.

The filmmaker warned that Masafer Yatta faces "a serious threat of destruction" due to demolition orders issued by Israeli authorities, as well as "serious threat[s] of attacks by the settlers living in illegal outposts and settlements nearby this village". 

"Settler harassment is happening every day in Masafer Yatta and across the West Bank. In the last three years, dozens of Palestinian communities have fled from their villages under the attacks and torture of Israeli soldiers and settlers," Adra said. 

"Some of the people lost their life like my best friend and brother Awdah Hathaleen who was murdered at the hands of the settlers just last July."

Awdah Hathaleen, a Palestinian activist and consultant on No Other Land, was shot dead by Israeli settler Yinon Levi. Adra described Hathaleen, who campaigned against Israeli efforts to expel Masafer Yatta residents from their land, as "an amazing activist" and "a person who loved life". 

Adra also argued that "Israeli courts are built to legalise and legitimise the existence of the occupying power, the army and the settlers and to delegitimise our villages and our existence on our land". 

He added: "Masafer Yatta is really the clearest example of what’s happening to millions of Palestinians across the West Bank."

Adra’s warning about the worsening humanitarian situation in the occupied West Bank comes amid increased forced displacement of Palestinians and an escalation in attacks by Israeli settlers, which have surged since the outbreak of the war on Gaza in October 2023.

Settler violence has also intensified across the West Bank since the start of the Iran war on 28 February. 

This week alone, three Palestinians were injured in a settler attack in Masafer Yatta, according to the Palestinian news agency WAFA. 

Citing local activist Osama Makhamra, WAFA reported that settlers targeted the community of Rujum I‘li, injuring three people, including a child. All those wounded were members of the al-Adra family. 

Settlers reportedly assaulted herders and attempted to seize livestock, while attacks were also reported in the nearby communities of Khallet Amira and Umm al-Qubur. Several Palestinians were treated for tear gas inhalation during the incident. 

'Act now'

Thursday’s UN briefing on the West Bank also followed an open letter signed on Wednesday by more than 400 former diplomats, ministers, and senior officials urging the European Union to "act now" against Israel’s illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank. 

The appeal comes as Israel plans to advance the E1 settlement project, a proposed development spanning around 12 square kilometres and including approximately 3,400 housing units in the occupied West Bank. 

The project would further separate East Jerusalem- occupied and annexed by Israel and predominantly inhabited by Palestinians- from the rest of the West Bank. 

The letter was signed by more than 440 figures, including former EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell and former Belgian prime minister Guy Verhofstadt. 

The signatories called for targeted sanctions, including visa bans and business restrictions, against "all those engaged in illegal settlement activity", as well as measures targeting those promoting or implementing the E1 project. 

According to the letter, the Israeli government plans to publish an initial tender on 1 June for housing intended for up to 15,000 settlers, urging the EU and its member states to "act now". 

The proposal has drawn widespread international condemnation.  

A spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the plan would pose an "existential threat" to the viability of a contiguous Palestinian state. 

According to a recent UN report, the expansion of Israeli settlements in 2025 reached its highest level since at least 2017, when the United Nations began monitoring the data. 

Excluding East Jerusalem, more than 500,000 Israelis now live in settlements across the occupied West Bank, which are considered illegal under international law, alongside around three million Palestinians. 

Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967. 

Salah Khalil Faisal Na’ameh and two relatives were allegedly assaulted and arrested last week after police entered their apartment in the Israeli city of Beersheba following a complaint about loud music, according to Israeli newspaper Haaretz. 

Na’ameh suffered a broken nose requiring surgery, as well as injuries to one eye and both kidneys, the report added.

Police claimed Na’ameh and his relatives, both medical professionals, assaulted officers at the scene.

The prosecutor and his colleagues rejected claims that he acted violently before officers allegedly tackled and beat him, Haaretz reported. 

The outlet later published body-camera footage from one of the officers involved in the arrest, which appeared to contradict the police’s version of events. 

Lawyers representing Na’ameh and his relatives, Tomer Gonen, Ali Abu Laban, and Tamer Asadi, told Haaretz the three had been sitting on a balcony listening to music last Friday when three plain-clothes officers entered the property. 

Speaking to the newspaper, Gonen said one of the officers lived nearby and that police did not present a warrant, prompting the group to ask them to leave. The officers initially departed but later returned with reinforcements. 

After spotting a large group of police officers wearing helmets and masks outside the building, Na’ameh reportedly phoned the police himself.

According to Haaretz, the dispatcher advised him not to open the door, but officers soon forced their way into the flat and violently detained the three men. 

Na’ameh later described the arrest during court testimony.

"They stomped on my head, kicked me, told me that I’m ‘resisting arrest’, and cursed me. During the entire ride, they hit me and treated me like the worst of the criminals," he said. "I didn’t believe that police could do such things."

כמה סאדיזם יש בקרב השוטרים האלה שפוצצו במכות את הסניגור בפרקליטות דרום סאלח ח׳ליל נעמה בדירתו בבאר שבע.וגם את הרופא ואח מבית החולים סורוקה ששהו יחד בדירה , בטענה לרעש .אגב הם נכנסו לדירה ללא צו.
הוא נזקק לניתוח ארוך . https://t.co/VVvSYUbL4M

— Ahmad Tibi (@Ahmad_tibi) May 8, 2026

His father, Khalil Na’ameh, told Nazareth-based Nas Radio that officers allegedly continued beating his son inside the police vehicle and at the station after switching off their body cameras. 

Police maintained that Na’ameh and his relatives attacked officers first while they were attempting to deal with the complaint. 

The three men were held for three days on suspicion of assaulting police officers, Haaretz ​​​​​​reported.

The Beersheba Magistrate’s Court said there was reasonable suspicion that violence had been used against officers, while it also acknowledged that Na’ameh had sustained serious injuries. 

The incident has reportedly heightened tensions between police and the Southern District Attorney’s Office, where Na’ameh works, with colleagues said to support his account of events.

His father said the family intended to continue legal proceedings against the officers involved. 

Israeli lawmaker Gilad Kariv of the Democrats party called for the officers to be suspended and accused far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir of fostering a "racist and violent spirit". 

"No citizen should look like this after an encounter with police," Kariv wrote on X. "Especially when it comes to entering a private home without a warrant. Especially when it comes to a lawyer and public servant." 

He added: "More and more parts of the Israel Police are turning into a danger to the public instead of protecting it." 

The case comes amid growing concern over violence affecting Palestinian citizens of Israel.

Israeli NGO Abraham Initiatives said this week that the number of violent deaths in the Arab community had risen to 104, marking the fastest increase recorded in more than five years. 

"The data proves the simple truth," the organisation wrote on X earlier this week.  

"The increase in murder cases in Arab society is the result of a racist policy of neglect. Under the current government, the murder rate has nearly tripled in four years of tenure, and in contrast, under the change government, the rate decreased from year to year."

Israeli officials have conveyed a message to Washington that any future military campaign against Iran should include strikes on the country’s energy sector, Israel’s Channel 12 reported, citing what it described as an "informed" Israeli source.

According to the report, Israeli officials believe Iran’s energy infrastructure could be destroyed "within 24 hours", forcing Tehran into negotiations "from a position of severe weakness".

One Israeli official cited by the broadcaster said: "If the regime does not fall, then at the very least it will become paralysed."

The report said Israel is attempting to convince the US that targeting Iran’s energy infrastructure is the only practical way to pressure Tehran, particularly as disputes remain unresolved over the Strait of Hormuz and Iran’s nuclear programme.

The warnings come amid heightened tensions between Washington and Tehran following recent military escalation in the Gulf region, although both sides are also reportedly seeking to avoid a slide into full-scale war.

Israeli officials also received assessments last week suggesting US President Donald Trump was leaning towards resuming military operations against Iran, Israel’s public broadcaster Kan reported.

The US had allegedly made concrete preparations for strikes on Iranian energy infrastructure before the plan was ultimately frozen.

An Israeli source told Kan that Trump backed away from attacking Iran’s energy facilities not only because of pressure from Gulf states, but from US envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, who reportedly believe Iranian concessions can still be extracted through negotiations.

Both Washington and Tehran are reluctant to engage in a comprehensive regional war, even though fundamental disagreements remain over Iran's nuclear programme, the source added. 

Despite ongoing contacts between Washington and Tehran, the Channel 12 report said Israeli officials fear an agreement that does not align with Israel’s strategic vision regarding Iran.

The report noted that while neither the US nor Iran currently appears interested in returning to a full-scale conflict, neither side is moving closer to resolving core disputes, particularly regarding the Strait of Hormuz and Tehran’s civil nuclear programme.

Israeli officials reportedly hope the continuing deadlock increases the likelihood of renewed military escalation in the coming months, especially if negotiations fail to produce significant Iranian concessions.

The latest developments come amid continuing tensions surrounding the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most strategically important shipping lanes, through which a significant proportion of global oil exports pass.

Israeli officials increasingly appear to be advocating for a strategy aimed at crippling Iran’s economy and energy capacity rather than containing the conflict diplomatically.

The reports echo tensions earlier in the conflict over Israeli attacks on Iranian energy infrastructure.

In March, US officials reportedly rebuked Israel after strikes on Iranian oil depots and the South Pars gas field, with American officials fearing the attacks could trigger wider regional escalation and destabilise global energy markets.

According to reports, Trump privately urged Israel not to target key Iranian energy facilities

Iranian officials have repeatedly warned that any attempts to threaten Tehran economically or militarily could have even more consequences for shipping through the vital waterway.

Tehran has not indicated whether it could agree to the Trump administration's latest offer, which would see the US gradually lift its blockade and Iran re-open the strait over the next months.

Iran is continuing to review the proposal, the spokesperson for Iran's foreign ministry told Tasnim news agency on Friday, without providing further details.

Trump said Friday he was expecting a response "tonight" and threatened again to escalate the conflict if it did not respond positively.

"We may go back to Project Freedom if things don't happen," Trump told reporters in the White House, referring to the aborted attempt to escort stranded ships through the strait.

"It'll be Project Freedom Plus, meaning Project Freedom plus other things."

This came as the two countries exchanged fire in the strait and Iran launched attacks on the United Arab Emirates for the second day running.

The US struck Iranian tankers and military targets and Iran fired on three American warships in the strait, despite the ceasefire that came into force on 8 April.

Iran's Mehr news agency said one crew member was killed, 10 wounded and six missing in the US attack on one of the ships.

"Every time a diplomatic solution is on the table, the U.S. opts for a reckless military adventure," Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said.

The US military said it targeted the tankers because they were trying to break the blockade.

The two countries have engaged in a standoff over the crucial shipping corridor, which has been largely closed since the US and Israel launched the war 10 weeks ago.

Iran has insisted it should retain control over the strait as part of a peace settlement and wants to impose transit fees on ships to generate billions of dollars of revenues.

The closure has triggered a severe global energy crisis and provoked a US blockade on Iran's ports which it has refused to lift until Tehran agrees to a peace deal.

A recent CIA assessment suggested that the blockade would need to remain in place for another four months until Iran's economy faces crisis.

The US has also ramped up sanctions as part of its economic pressure campaign on Iran and its allies.

The Treasury on Friday imposed sanctions on another 10 companies and individuals, including some in China and Hong Kong, for providing Iran's military with weapons and raw materials used to manufacture its Shahed drones.

China has vowed to ignore US sanctions over Iran, which were last week extended to Chinese refineries Washington says have bought Iranian crude.

The IMF said Pakistan would be able to draw around $1.1 billion under the Extended Fund Facility and about $220 million under the Resilience and Sustainability Facility, lifting total disbursements under the two ongoing programmes to about $4.8 billion.

Earlier on Friday, Reuters reported, citing sources, that the IMF's executive board voted to approve an agreement it previously reached with Pakistan. The country is on a $7 billion IMF program and reached a staff-level agreement in March.

"Amid a more challenging and highly uncertain external environment since the onset of the war in the Middle East, Pakistan needs to maintain strong macroeconomic policies while accelerating reform efforts," the IMF said in a statement.

In April, Pakistan's central bank raised its key policy rate by 100 basis points to 11.5 percent, marking its first hike in almost three years.

"The State Bank of Pakistan has acted proactively to maintain an appropriately tight monetary policy stance," the IMF added. 

Lebanon's National News Agency reported that Israel had struck targets across the south, killing at least 19 people. Those strikes came after the Israeli army announced new displacement orders on nine villages near Tyre, Sidon, and Nabatiyeh.

Meanwhile, Iran is set to respond to the latest US proposal on ending the war, despite sporadic clashes between the two in the Gulf that have been ongoing over the past week.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio had said the US was expecting a response on Friday, though Iran's foreign ministry said it would be given at the appropriate time. 

Clashes on Friday saw the US strike two Iran-linked vessels around the Strait of Hormuz, with the UAE saying its air defences engaged two ballistic missiles and three drones fired from Iran.

Global stock markets diverged and oil prices rose Friday as fresh US-Iran clashes in the Strait of Hormuz jolted hopes for a deal to end the Middle East war and reopen the crucial waterway.

While European bourses retreated, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq indices both pushed to fresh records on solid US jobs numbers. The Dow ended flat.

"No negative news sticks to this bull market, and it just keeps working its way higher," said CFRA Research's Sam Stovall.

A US fighter jet disabled two Iranian-flagged tankers to enforce a port blockade on Friday, prompting retaliatory attacks from Iran. The latest incident came after another flare-up overnight in the strait.

Meanwhile, US data showed the economy added 115,000 jobs in April, more than double the forecast.

But US consumer confidence was at an all-time low according to a University of Michigan survey, with Americans weighed down by concerns about high prices and the fallout of the US-Israel war on Iran.

Stovall cited both the consumer confidence figure and the brittle conditions in the Middle East as headwinds the market has shrugged, but added, "I would not be surprised if we do see some digestion of recent gains take place in the near-term."

Bret Kenwell, eToro's US investment analyst, noted that if the labor market and broader economy continue to hold up as rising energy prices fan inflation, the Fed will have less justification to cut interest rates.

"In other words, good news may actually be good news again -- just not for investors hoping the Fed rides in with quick rate cuts," he said.

Investors often consider bad economic news to be good news in the sense it increases chances of interest rate cuts.

The dollar retreated against its main rivals.

Europe's main stock markets finished the day lower.

Pound holds up

The British pound held up as Keir Starmer vowed to carry on as UK prime minister after his Labour Party suffered big losses to the hard-right in local elections.

Critics say Starmer has swerved from one policy misstep to another, and he has been embroiled in a scandal over Peter Mandelson, who was sacked as ambassador to Washington over his links to US sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

The prime minister has also failed to fulfil his main promise of spurring economic growth, with impatient Britons still suffering a cost-of-living crisis, including from high energy prices.

Elsewhere on Friday, the yen firmed after Japanese media reported that authorities had spent around $64 billion since last week propping up the currency.

The market interventions reportedly began on April 30 when the yen weakened to near 160 per US dollar, the lowest in almost two years.

Since then there have been several spikes in the value of the Japanese currency, sparking speculation of further moves by the government.

A Chinese veto would be awkward ahead of U.S. President Donald Trump's trip to China next week, where the Iran war is likely to be high on the agenda.

An updated draft shared with Security Council members on Thursday afternoon and seen by Reuters removed a clause invoking Chapter VII of the U.N. Charter, which allows the council to impose measures ranging from sanctions to military action.

However, tough language against Iran remained, as well as a clause that in the event of non-compliance the council would "meet again to consider effective measures ... including sanctions measures, in order to ensure the freedom of navigation in the area."

It was unclear when the council might vote on the resolution.

While the text does not explicitly authorize force, it does not rule it out, and "reaffirms the right of member States ... to defend their vessels from attacks and threats, including those that undermine navigational rights and freedoms."

A previous resolution backed by the United States that appeared to open a path to legitimizing U.S. military action against Iran failed last month after Russia and China exercised their vetoes in the 15-member U.N. Security Council.

Diplomats said the original version of the current resolution, drafted by the United States and Bahrain, and submitted to council members for review this week ran into strong Chinese and Russian objections.

A U.N. diplomat said that despite dropping the Chapter VII reference, which was also done with the last month's resolution, the new draft did not address Chinese and Russian objections.

China's U.N. mission said it had no comment on the new draft, and the Russian mission did not immediately respond.

A statement from Russia's mission on Thursday said Security Council members should refrain from "pushing through one-sided and confrontational draft resolutions" that could "trigger a new wave of escalation in the Middle East."

"It is precisely for this reason that on April 7, Russia, along with China, blocked the adoption of a draft resolution on the situation in the Strait of Hormuz," it said.

On Tuesday, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the proposed resolution a test of the utility of the United Nations and urged China and Russia not to veto it.

Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani met with Vance and discussed Pakistani-led efforts to broker a permanent peace amid a shaky ceasefire.

The Qatari prime minister "stressed the need for all parties to engage with the ongoing mediation efforts, to pave the way for addressing the root causes of the crisis through peaceful means and dialogue, leading to a comprehensive agreement that achieves lasting peace in the region," the Qatari foreign ministry said on X.

Iran has repeatedly attacked sites in Qatar during the war, pointing to the wealthy emirate's role as host of a major US air base.

Qatar has, over the last few weeks, been attempting to manage a backchannel mediation route between Washington and Tehran with the aim of reaching an agreement to end the war.

In an interview published this week by The New Arab, Sheikh Mohammed said there was "positive progress" in the exchange of messages between the two parties and that there was a "high possibility" of reaching a diplomatic solution despite continuing tensions.

He stressed that any future US-Iran agreement must safeguard the interests of Gulf states and the wider international community and reopen space for diplomacy in the Strait of Hormuz.

In August 2013, the army under Assad's rule was accused of using chemical weapons to target areas then under rebel control, killing more than 1,400 men, women and children, according to US intelligence and rights groups.

With Syria at the height of its civil war, the Assad government denied responsibility, but agreed to hand over its chemical arsenal in order to avert US strikes.

Assad went on to remain in power for more than a decade, only to be ousted in 2024 by the HTS rebels led by now President Ahmed al-Sharaa.

On Friday, the ministry said it arrested "Khardal Ahmed Dayoub, a former brigadier general in the forces of the ousted regime and former head of the Air Force Intelligence branch in Daraa, for his direct involvement in systematic violations against civilians".

The ministry accused Dayoub of being "implicated in chemical attacks during his service in the Damascus branch and his presence in the Harasta area" where "he oversaw repressive operations and contributed to the logistical coordination for the bombing of Eastern Ghouta with internationally prohibited chemical weapons".

Dayoub, the latest in a string of Assad-era officials detained in recent months, is also accused of extrajudicial killings and coordination with Iran and its Lebanese proxy Hezbollah, both of which were backing the ousted government.

Survivors of the attacks, including medics, at the time risked their lives by posting dozens of videos online, and spoke to journalists about the horror they had witnessed.

The footage showed dozens of corpses, many of them children, outstretched on the ground.

Other images showed unconscious children, people foaming at the mouth and doctors trying to help them breathe.

Global condemnation

The scenes provoked revulsion and condemnation around the globe.

A United Nations report later said there was clear evidence sarin gas had been used.

Syria agreed that year to join the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and disclose and hand over its toxic stockpile under Russian and US pressure, averting the threat of strikes by Washington and its allies.

But that was not the last of the chemical attacks: the OPCW went on to blame Assad's forces for others later in the civil war.

Syria's civil war had begun in 2011, with a brutal crackdown on dissent that yielded an armed rebellion. More than half a million people ended up being killed, and millions more forced into exile.

Last month, Interior Minister Anas Khattab announced the arrest of Adnan Abboud Hilweh, one of the Syrian generals internationally sanctioned over involvement in the Ghouta attack.

Syria's new authorities have vowed to provide justice and accountability for Assad-era atrocities, while activists and foreign governments have emphasised the importance of transitional justice to ensure the country moves forward.

Last month, a Syrian court conducted the first hearing in an in absentia trial of Assad himself, alongside several senior members of his government.

Assad fled to Moscow as his country fell to rebel hands in December 2024, bringing to a stunning end decades of rule by his clan.

The coordinated deadly offensive by Al-Qaeda-linked jihadists and Tuareg separatists on April 25 and 26 targeted strategic towns and killed the country's influential defence minister.

"The government of Mali does not envisage any dialogue with the lawless terrorist armed groups that bear responsibility for the tragic events our people have been experiencing for years," Foreign Minister Abdoulaye Diop said, meeting the country's diplomats on Thursday.

The junta-led west African country has grappled with more than a decade of violence and last month's attacks were reminiscent of a crisis that rocked Mali in 2012.

Under a new alliance forged a year ago, Tuareg rebels of the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA) teamed up with the Al-Qaeda-linked jihadist Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM) to launch the latest assaults.

"The FLA has freely chosen to take up the cause of an extremist group recognised as terrorist by the United Nations," the minister said, referring to the JNIM.

The key town of Kidal and other towns and villages in the north were captured and are now controlled by the FLA and the jihadists, who have since imposed a blockade on the capital, Bamako.

On Wednesday, security, legal and family sources told AFP that several opposition figures and military personnel had been detained or abducted following the attacks.

Verification of the number and identity of those involved is difficult.

Since 2012, Mali has faced a deep security crisis fuelled in particular by violence from fighters affiliated with Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group, as well as local criminal gangs and pro-independence groups.

The unrest fed a political crisis, leading to two military coups in 2020 and 2021.

A combination of multiple failed rain seasons, which have wiped out crops and livestock, and ongoing conflict and insecurity is pushing people in Somalia into dangerous levels of hunger at a time of radical cuts in foreign aid and aid shortages sparked by the war on Iran, the WFP said.

Some 6 million people in Somalia, or almost one in three, are facing acute hunger, while 1.9 million children are acutely malnourished, according to the WFP.

"Somalia faces a really severe malnutrition crisis and is one of the biggest malnutrition hotspots in the world," Matthew Hollingworth, WFP assistant executive director for programme operations, told reporters in Geneva. He spoke via video link from Rome.

Somalia faces several overlapping conflicts, including a long-running Islamist insurgency by the Al-Shabaab militant group against the federal government as well as political disputes between Mogadishu and regional states over power and security.

The situation in the country bears similar warning signs to 2022, when Somalia was on the brink of famine following a prolonged drought, but the difference this time is that aid agencies do not have the funding to respond at a massive scale, the WFP said.

The agency, which manages 90% of the food security response to Somalia, has had to reduce the number of people it can reach to 500,000 from 2 million, and could have to halt its services altogether by July due to funding cuts, Hollingworth added.

The WFP and the wider humanitarian sector also face widespread shortages of life-saving aid, with Ready-to-use-Therapeutic-Food facing delays of up to 40 days, due to supply chain disruption sparked by the war in the Middle East, Hollingworth said.

Security forces and military units carried out raids and arrests from dawn across the city west of the capital, Tripoli, by just some 45 kilometres (28 miles), an official statement said.

The operation went after "criminal hideouts and wanted individuals" who were "involved in serious acts", the authorities said, citing "murder and attempted murder, kidnapping and extortion, drug, arms and human trafficking, and illegal migration".

Videos circulating on social media, which AFP could not independently verify, appeared to show armed clashes in residential neighbourhoods and near the refinery complex - one of Libya's most important - on the western outskirts of the city.

A Zawiya resident reached by AFP by phone said "the first clashes began in the early hours of Friday", adding that they heard "explosions across the city".

Local emergency services urged residents to remain indoors while midday Friday prayers - when large numbers of worshippers go to mosques - were set to take place.

The city of some 250,000 people has experienced repeated clashes between armed groups.

In addition to housing important oil infrastructure, Zawiya has been notorious for smuggling networks involved in fuel and other smuggling across the nearby Tunisian border.

It is also a key departure point for irregular migrants seeking to reach Europe by crossing the Mediterranean.

Libya is still plagued by division and instability after years of unrest, following the NATO-backed uprising that toppled longtime leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.

It remains divided between the UN-recognised government in the west and its eastern rival, backed by military commander Khalifa Haftar.

Christian leaders from New York, California, New Jersey, Virginia, and Maryland, among others, joined the campaign and raised the alarm over the treatment of Palestinians by Israeli forces.

Dozens of Christian organisations also took part in a demonstration in front of Capitol Hill in Washington DC on Thursday, emphasising their rejection of any further US funding of Israel.

The religious leaders urged members of Congress to instead provide funding for hospitals in occupied East Jerusalem and in Gaza, as well as to restore funds to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), which serves as a lifeline for many Palestinians.

Several of the church leaders visited members of Congress at their offices this week, where they detailed the dire conditions in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.

Some of the primary concerns mentioned were the lack of access to medical treatment for children and the daily suffering of civilians, particularly as Israel continues to launch daily attacks and killings in Gaza despite an October ceasefire.

Eli McCarthy, a member of the Franciscan Action Network, said in a press conference this week that arms sent to Israel were being used to kill civilians in Gaza and Lebanon.

"Our political demands focus on the need to provide funding for the East Jerusalem hospital network, allow access for the people of Gaza, restore funding to UNRWA, and prevent the transfer of weapons and bombs to Israel," McCarthy said.

During the demonstration on Thursday, Reverend Mira Solan of Riverside Church in New York said the killing of children in Gaza was a "disgrace".

"Nearly 80 percent of children in Gaza do not have access to their basic needs or healthcare, and nearly half of families in the Strip cannot access a health facility. As a result, children are dying at a higher rate than ever before," she said.

Prominent New York-based Greek Orthodox nun, Agapia Stephanopoulos, said Israel’s actions against Muslims and Christians in occupied East Jerusalem can only be described as a "slow genocide".

Drawing on the nine years she spent in Palestine, she decried Israeli oppression during the demonstration and shed light on the plight of civilians in the occupied West Bank.

"I am here today to sound the alarm. I said about 25 years ago that this is a slow-moving genocide, and now we see Christians leaving the Holy Land because of the difficult conditions they are living in, where there are settlers in Christian towns who are trying to seize the property of its people," she said.

Other speakers at the demonstration shared their experiences from their time in the West Bank, with one pastor from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the United States saying he witnessed "the ongoing oppression, genocide, apartheid, and ethnic cleansing imposed on the Palestinian people".

Reverend Allison Tanner, who works for the American Friends Service Committee, also joined the bid to pressure US members of Congress.

In a speech on Thursday, she said: "We are here to denounce the cruel and inhumane policies against Palestinians implemented by our government, and to demand a ban on the sale of weapons used in genocide by Israel, and the restoration of the humanitarian aid programme to Palestinians and the end to injustice and inhumane practices against them".

"Under international law, Israel is committing war crimes, crimes against humanity, apartheid," Tanner added.

The campaign comes against the backdrop of increased Israeli raids on Christian villages in the occupied West Bank.

This week, residents of Taybeh, a largely Christian town, told reporters that Israeli settlers were trying to force them off their land through intimidation.

Residents have taken to social media to decry the raids and ongoing harassment, stating that settlers have threatened to kill them if they return to their land.

Family members of Hamza Mahmoud Al-Habashi said on Wednesday that he had been killed while fighting with Russian forces.

Al-Habashi grew up in Dhale Governorate in central Yemen and left the country for Russia about two-and-a-half years ago, sources close to the family told The New Arab.

He wanted to travel to Europe in search of work, but was misled into signing a contract to fight in the Russian military. Recruiters from Egypt persuaded him over seven months to sign a contract for a job he thought involved providing security for commercial property, the sources said.

Several Yemenis have previously been reported killed in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, most of whom were students living in Russia who were recruited to fight for its forces. Others were reportedly brought from Yemen through recruitment companies reportedly led by Abdul Wali Al-Jabri, a figure affiliated with Yemen's rebel Houthi movement.

Last August, another young man, Issam Ali al-Mashouli, was killed while fighting in Ukraine. Al-Mashouli had been a Yemeni soldier stationed on the Saudi border before being recruited by Houthi officials to fight on behalf of Russian forces.

In June 2024, former Yemeni diplomat Ahmed Al-Sahmi was killed while fighting in the ranks of the Russian army in Ukraine. He had worked as a diplomat at Yemen’s embassy in Moscow until 2017, before marrying a Russian woman, obtaining Russian citizenship, and contracting with a Russian military company.

Human rights and media reports had previously spoken about the transfer and recruitment of Yemenis to fight in Ukraine alongside Russian forces through misleading contracts and fake employment companies, amid economic deterioration and widespread unemployment pushing many Yemeni youths to risk irregular migration and unofficial work.

These incidents come as Yemen continues to suffer worsening humanitarian and economic conditions triggered by the outbreak of war more than a decade ago. The crisis has seen a rise in human trafficking and illegal recruitment networks that exploit people wanting to migrate or find work abroad.

The debate intensified after Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly inaugurated The Spine project, a smart-city development by Talaat Moustafa Group valued at more than 1.4 trillion Egyptian pounds ($27 billion), while many Egyptians face rising rents and property prices even within state-backed housing schemes.

The project, located inside the Madinaty real estate development east of Cairo, spans 3.9 million square metres and is backed by financing from the state-owned National Bank of Egypt amounting to roughly 24% of its value.

The launch has triggered widespread debate over whether the Egyptian state is prioritising luxury real estate investment over affordable housing in a country where independent studies estimate that more than a third of the population suffers from "urban deprivation", including inadequate housing and poor access to services.

A study published in early May by the Alternative Policy Solutions Centre at the American University in Cairo said the state was increasingly shifting towards luxury and upper-middle-income housing projects, particularly in the New Administrative Capital and smart cities, while low-cost housing had declined relative to actual demand.

The study noted that the collapse of the Egyptian pound and persistent inflation had pushed government housing prices beyond the reach of most Egyptians, with some units rising from around two million pounds to more than 10 million pounds.

Last week, Egypt’s Housing Ministry announced plans to open both the water sector and social-housing projects to private investors under the state ownership policy framework, arguing that private companies possess greater financing flexibility and access to modern technologies.

The ministry also offered land this week for the construction of around 19,000 low-income housing units in eight new cities through subsidised mortgage financing at a declining interest rate of 8% over 20 years.

The Spine has emerged as a symbol of Egypt’s new urban-development model, joining projects such as the New Administrative Capital and New Alamein.

The development reportedly generated almost 40 billion pounds in sales during its first week, reinforcing criticism that luxury real estate is increasingly being treated as a vehicle for investment and protection against inflation rather than a response to genuine housing demand.

Economist Ahmed Badra warned that relying on property as a store of value carried long-term economic risks, saying the real economy could not be sustained through "value preservation" in non-productive real estate assets.

He warned against directing capital away from productive sectors such as industry and agriculture, arguing that excessive dependence on speculative property investment could deepen structural imbalances in the Egyptian economy over time.

Former Social Solidarity Minister and economist Gouda Abdel Khaleq also raised concerns over the spread of "empty cities" filled with closed housing units.

In comments to The New Arab, Abdel Khaleq said public anger at The Spine project reflected growing frustration with housing inequality.

While luxury units are marketed with down payments worth millions of pounds and monthly instalments exceeding 200,000 pounds, reports suggest that an average Egyptian could require 150 years of work to buy a small apartment and as long as 600 years to own a unit in one of Egypt’s smart cities.

Housing expert Mamdouh Hamza called for a "radical reassessment" of Egypt’s housing strategy.

Hamza argued that the state had gradually abandoned its social role and transformed itself into a real estate developer competing with the private sector in upper-income markets.

"Housing should be treated as a public service like education and healthcare," Hamza told The New Arab.

Lebanon and Israel's US ambassadors had previously met twice in Washington over the past weeks, in an attempt to end the war that resumed between Hezbollah and Israel on March 2. 

Foreign Minister Youssef Raggi said in a statement Friday that Lebanon's goals from the negotiations were "consolidating the ceasefire, securing Israel's withdrawal from occupied Lebanese territory, and restoring the state's full sovereignty over its national territory".

Despite a truce that has been in place since April 17, Israel has repeatedly bombed Lebanon, mostly in the south, and is occupying the entire border area.

In a statement from the presidency, Aoun said he and Karam discussed "preparations for the meeting scheduled for next Thursday in Washington between the Lebanese, American and Israeli delegations".

Aoun provided Karam with "directives outlining Lebanon's firm positions regarding the negotiations", the statement added.

A Lebanese official who requested anonymity told AFP that Karam "will head to Washington soon" to lead the Lebanese delegation.

The Lebanese ambassador to the US, the deputy chief of mission and a military representative will also be part of the delegation, the official added.

The ambassador-level meeting on April 14 was the first of its kind in decades, as the two countries have officially been at war since Israel was founded in 1948.

Following the first round of talks, US President Donald Trump announced a 10-day ceasefire, with a three-week extension announced after the second round.

Trump also said he expected Aoun and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to meet jointly with him at the White House "over the next couple of weeks".

But Aoun said on Monday that "we must first reach a security agreement and stop the Israeli attacks on us before we raise the issue of a meeting between us".

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, at a news conference on Tuesday, said "there's no problem between the Lebanese government and the Israeli government" and that Hezbollah was the issue.

"By and large, I think a peace deal between Lebanon and Israel is eminently achievable and should be," Rubio said.

Hezbollah is strongly opposed to the direct talks, calling them a "sin" and urging Beirut to withdraw from them.

Israeli strikes have killed more than 2,700 people in Lebanon since March 2, including dozens since the ceasefire was announced.

Mollah Fazlullah, head of the Movement for the Enforcement of the Sharia (Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi) had wrought bloody havoc in Pakistan’s Swat valley until the army ousted him along with his fighters in June 2009. Fazlullah fled to the Afghan province of Kunar and from there he would launch regular attacks on that famous Durand Line.

In the same way, the Pakistani Taliban of the TTP (Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan), forcefully evicted from Waziristan province in 2014, crossed the Line and joined forces with the Afghan Taliban, helping them regain power in 2021. Job done, they went back to their home ground, on both sides of that Durand Line, where they launch daily attacks on the federal forces’ border posts inside the former tribal areas and throughout the province of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KP), but also along the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC): there they attack Chinese workers, from the high valley of the Indus, where two big hydro-electric dams are being built, to Gwadar port, also being built by China in Baluchistan on the Sea of Oman.

An explosive combination

But since 2022 the novelty is the ad hoc alliance between the very Islamist TTP and the very secular Baluchistan Liberation Army (BLA). In its annual report, “DHAK 2024”, published by The Balochistan Post on 2 January 2025, the BLA declared itself “ready to work with any entity against the common enemy for mutual benefit,” targeting only what it calls the “Pakistani occupation of Baluchistan”, presenting a range of targets it has in common with the TTP: the army, the federal administration, and the CPEC.

In the same report, the BLA declares that it carried out 302 attacks in 2024, causing 545 fatalities in “enemy ranks”. Six of these attacks were carried out by the “fedayin branch” of the TTP – a branch assigned to train volunteers for suicide missions.

All this constitutes an explosive combination which imperils the stability of Pakistan. In 2025, according to the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), terrorism caused 2,356 deaths in KP, 1,534 in Baluchistan and 486 on the Afghan side of the Durand Line, a total of 4,376. The escalation of violence was such that at the end of 2025, Pakistani Defence Minister Khawaja Asif, accusing Afghanistan of backing the TTP, threatened it with “open war”.

This became reality on 27 February 2026, with simultaneous air strikes on Kabul and the provinces of Nangarhar, Paktika and Kandahar, killing 274 TTP fighters according to the Pakistani army. On 16 March, another strike on Kabul, the fifth in five months, caused over 400 deaths according to the Afghan government, and at least 145 according to the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) which also estimates the number of displaced persons  since the end of February at 115,000.

A legacy of the British “Raj”

So we are at the peak of one of the most serious confrontations that Pakistan has known since its inception in 1947. However, it would be a mistake to limit our analysis to the return to power of the Taliban in August 2021, neglecting the deeper causes of these armed clashes which have all revolved around the Durand Line since it was established in 1893 by the British imperial rulers of India (the British Raj).

Take for example the legendary Faqir from the village of Epi (abutting the Line) who fought the British from Khost, his Afghan base, and who proclaimed an independent State of Pashtunistan there in 1938, complete with an official flag and parliament !

After the birth of Pakistan in 1947, he defied the country’s fledgling army for eighteen months. He was supported and financed by the three successive kings of Afghanistan, Amanullah Khan, Nadir Shah and Zaher Shah, but also by the Pashtun nationalist parties, known as the “Red Shirts”, and on the Pakistani side by the National Awami Party and the Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami party, both still active today. There followed countless incidents, such as the campaign launched by Afghan Prime Minister Daoud Khan to recover what he called “the usurped territories”.

When he became President of the Republic (1973-1978), he never ceased to confront the Pakistani Prime Minister, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto (1971-1977) on the issue of the Durand Line.

Paradoxically, that line became a protection for Afghanistan after the Soviet invasion (1979), since it was on the Pakistani side of the line that the Mujahedin organised their resistance. And it was from that same side that the Taliban came when they entered the Afghan scene in 1994.

Afghan is synonymous with Pashtun

But why was that Durand Line never recognised as an international frontier, neither by the peaceable King Zaher Shah, nor by President Mohammad Daoud Khan, nor by the four successive communist leaders, nor by the Taliban ? The reason is simple enough but its consequences are anything but! The line divided the Pashtun into two uneven groups: two-thirds on the side of the British Raj and only one third on the Afghan side, though the country bears that people’s name: Afghan is synonymous with Pashtun. In fact the whole country, created in 1747, was originally conceived as a confederation of Pashtun tribes.

None of this was of any concern to the Raj, which was interested in creating not a border – by their very nature, empires have no fixed, definitive borders – but a demarcation line in order, as documented in the archives of the India Office in London, “to define the respective spheres of influence of the British Government and the Emir […] The ’Durand Line’ had none of the rigidity of other international borders.”

Afghanistan was already a buffer state between the Raj and the Russian Empire, and the text goes on: “The tribes between the administrative frontier of India and the ’Durand Line’ were buffer to the buffer.” It consisted of tribal areas which would be formally established by the Raj in 1901... and would become the breeding ground for the Taliban in 1994 and for the TTP in 2005.

Hence the existence of a whole array of arguments on the basis of which the Afghan State can claim that the Durand Line was not conceived strictly as an international border: in British English, ’border’ was an international demarcation, whereas ’frontier’ referred rather to the ’edges’ of empire.

While the Indian Empire managed happily with such vagueness, the same cannot be said of Pakistan which, as a state, needed fixed borders and thus as soon as it came into existence adopted the Durand Line, citing the legacy of treaties. A complex case in international law, but “it is a no-question”, as Pakistani officials are in the habit of responding when anyone tries to question them on the subject.

Indeed for Islamabad, questioning its borders encourages Pashtun and Baluch separatism and threatens the integrity of the country. After all, an international border can only play its role if it is recognised by the two countries which share it. This is not the case here.

The very name of Mortimer Durand seems to be taboo, for fear that evoking it might awaken the elephant in the room. And this is exactly what is happening today. A few examples: “The issue of the ’Durand Line’ still remains to be settled,” (Zabulla Mujahid, Afghan Information Minister, Dawn, 4 January 2022); “The Durand Line is an imaginary line,” (Nabi Omari, Afghan Deputy Minister of Interior Affairs, Afghanistan International, 15 October 2025); and Omari again, three days later, on Ariana News:

“The historic territories of Afghanistan [have] remained on the Pakistani side of the so-called line drawn between us: Allah the all-powerful will create the means to bring them back again to our homeland.”

“The Taliban are our own product”

Which explains why Pakistan practically created the Taliban movement in 1994. Khawaja Asif, the present Defence Minister, admits it frankly: “Taliban are in fact our own product. We created, nurtured and developed them… "(Amu TV, 14 October 2025). The strategy was quite simple and General Naseerullah Babar, Interior Minister in Benazir Bhutto’s government, was blunt about it: the Taliban are all Pashtuns. By installing them in Kabul in 1996 and making sure their power would last, Islamabad expected to get them to recognise the Durand Line as the border between the two countries.

Yet despite this unwavering support, the Taliban resisted this demand until the fall of their regime brought about by the intervention of the United States and their allies in 2001. They took to the hills again, while the TTP made their appearance in 2005, originally quite separate from the “historic” Taliban.

The latter is a conglomerate of some twenty groups: rebel Pashtun tribes, among them the Mehsud tribe, terrorist organisations banished in 2002 by Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, as well as ancillary al-Qaida armed groups, including the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan and the Islamic Party of East Turkestan (Uighurs ).

From 2007 to 2014, the TTP plunged Pakistan into unprecedented violence, aimed at high-level political and military officials, the main army headquarters, naval bases and NATO convoys. It claimed responsibility for assassinating Benazir Bhutto in December 2007. The SATP counts 12,000 killed by bomb attacks and reprisal air strikes by the army between December 2007 and December 2008, i.e. 35 deaths per day.

In 2014, Pakistan mounted the Zarb-e-Azb operation, with a force of 30,000 soldiers which drove the TTP out of Waziristan, so that it joined the Afghan Taliban in their Jihad against the armies of occupation. All the ingredients were in place for the present conflagration.

The US withdrawal

In order to understand this, we must go back to the “Agreement for Bringing Peace to Afghanistan”, known as the Doha Accords, between the United States and the Taliban, signed on 29 February 2020, a few months before the latter took over their country again. They did not commit themselves to much except to break off all connections with terrorist groups likely to threaten the security of the United States, which had painful memories of 9/11.

By inviting the TTP to go back to where it belonged in the tribal areas on the border, the Taliban hoped to distance themselves from al-Qaida since all of the latter’s cells belong to the conglomerate, and thus be able to claim they were respecting their commitments to the United States.

But nothing happened according to plan. The head of TTP, Nur Wali Mehsud, encouraged by the victory of the Afghan Taliban over the world’s most powerful military coalition (38 countries), was convinced that he in turn could bring Pakistan to its knees and immediately began fighting on the Durand Line.

The NGO Pakistan Institute of Peace Studies (PIPS) recorded a 61 % increase in attacks between August 2021 and August 2022. Sirajuddin Haqqani, the Afghan Interior Minister, offered his services as mediator. But the ceasefire concluded in June 2022 was broken five months later, because TTP’s demands amounted to a Pakistani capitulation, in other words a return to the status quo ante in the tribal areas which would be managed by the TTP in the form of a “mini-emirate”.

As for the Afghan Taliban, they say they don’t want to go against their “brothers in arms”. But, reading all their statements, it would appear that their support for the TTP amounts rather to a proxy relationship and that they are not prepared to relinquish their hold over the Pashtun border zones. In an interview with Tolo News on 7 March 2026, the Defence Minister, Maulawi Yaqoob – son of Mullah Omar, former head of the Taliban from 1994 until his death which probably took place in 2013 – warns Pakistan:

“We have a long experience of war, and while we do not have the technology to reply to your air strikes, we have always won our wars on the ground.”

We are witnessing a new episode in that old story: “Enter Sir Mortimer Durand..." So there is nothing very new here apart from the unprecedented magnitude of the present war which is breaking out again in a regional environment which doesn’t inspire optimism.

India’s relations with Pakistan are still very tense, while they are better than ever with Afghanistan. It has recently invested $120m in the development of the Iranian port of Chabahar, a gateway for its trade with central Asia, a route competing with the CPEC and bypassing Pakistan. It’s hard to predict how the situation will evolve, both in Iran and between Afghanistan and Pakistan.

As for Mortimer Durand syndrome, perhaps we can still hope that one day the two neighbouring countries will understand that they are both victims of the same poisoned legacy bequeathed by the Raj in 1947. That would be a calming prelude to negotiation between two nations which are neither responsible nor to blame for this disastrous situation – better than locking horns for 79 years and producing nothing but death.

Translated from French by Noël Burch.

This article was originally published by our partners at Orient XXI.

Georges Lefeuvre is a former diplomat, anthropologist, specialist in Pakistan and Afghanistan, researcher at the Institute of International and Strategic Relations (IRIS).

Have questions or comments? Email us at editorial-english@newarab.com

Opinions expressed in this article remain those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The New Arab.

Demonstrators accused the banking giant of "bankrolling genocide" and demanded it end its role as a "primary dealer" in Israeli government bonds and halt investments and loans to arms companies supplying Israel. 

According to reports from inside the meeting, Barclays chairman Nigel Higgins was repeatedly interrupted during his opening remarks by protesters waving Palestinian flags and chanting "Free, free Palestine" and "Everyone here is profiting from genocide".  

Higgins responded that the board had "heard your point" and said questions on the issue would be addressed during the AGM’s Q&A session. 

The bank’s links to the Israeli government came under renewed scrutiny after a UN report by Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese last year identified Barclays among firms potentially profiting from what it described as a “genocidal economy” in Gaza.  

Higgins said Barclays did not accept the report’s conclusions, stating: “We’ve read it and we don’t agree with the characterisation of the financial sector in it.” 

He added the bank followed guidance from the British government regarding dealings with foreign governments and defence firms. 

"These are deeply political and complicated questions and at one level, certainly, we take a steer from where our country’s Government is," he said. 

The UK government has continued to export weapons to Israel amid the genocidal war on Gaza.

Higgens also stated that Barclays provides finance to international defence companies involved in supplying arms for Britain and Ukraine but declined to discuss specific clients or future financing arrangements linked to Israel. 

One shareholder interrupted to say: "That’s not going to happen, Mr Chairman, unless commercial companies and banks stop financing Israel."

Climate activists also disrupted the meeting, criticising Barclays over fossil fuel financing and accusing the bank of contributing to the climate crisis.  

Security staff eventually escorted several protesters from the venue after repeated interruptions. 

Barclays has faced mounting criticism in recent years over investments in Israeli government bonds and arms firms connected to military operations in Gaza. 

Research by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Campaign Against Arms Trade and War on Want claimed the bank holds more than £2 billion in shares across nine companies accused of complicity in Israeli attacks on Palestinians since October 2023, alongside providing an estimated £6.1 billion in loans and underwriting to the same firms. 

PSC deputy director Ryvka Barnard said: "There can be no business as usual for Barclays while it bankrolls Israel’s genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, and wider regime of military occupation and apartheid." 

She added: "The only way to get Barclays to do the right thing is by drawing public attention to their role in facilitating Israel’s genocide and hitting their profits."

Barclays branches across the UK have repeatedly been targeted by pro-Palestine demonstrations and boycott campaigns. 

Israel's genocidal war in Gaza killed over 72,000 people according to the Gaza health ministry, with daily attacks continuing despite a US-brokered ceasefire introduced last October.

 Israeli forces have killed at least 840 Palestinians since the truce began.

Kurdish media outlets and political parties have been trading accusations over the arrival and alleged theft of the weapons. The controversy has in recent days expanded to involve Kurdish groups in Iraq, Syria, and Turkey, even as evidence for the arms shipments remains scant.

Soon after the US and Israel launched their war on Iran, US officials began briefing news outlets about a possible role for Iranian Kurdish opposition groups in the destabilisation of Iran and the toppling of the Iranian government.

There were reports of phone calls between Trump and Iran’s most wanted Kurdish opposition figure Mustafa Hijri, and Iraqi Kurdistan's two most powerful leaders, Kurdistan Democratic Party chief Masoud Barzani and leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) Bafel Talabani.

One month later, the US president told Fox News that the US had sent "a lot of rifles" to Iranian Kurdish opposition groups, claiming that the Kurds kept them without offering further details. In the following days, Trump repeated the claim more explicitly, using the word "theft".

The Daily Beast quoted him on 1 May saying he was "not happy" with the way the weapons had been delivered and that a "small quantity" of weapons had been sent to the Kurds. "We’ll see who has those weapons. I’m not happy with what happened with the Kurds. The Kurds did not deliver the weapons," he said.

The wording suggested the existence of an intermediary that was supposed to pass the weapons on to Iranian Kurds, with suspicion naturally falling on the Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), which maintains close security and political ties with Washington. The Daily Beast had reported that the weapons were sent to "a Kurdish group based in northern Iraq" and were supposed to be delivered to Iranian Kurds, which allegedly never happened.

Iranian Kurdish groups deny receiving American weapons

Iranian Kurdish opposition groups quickly denied receiving weapons and argued that Trump’s remarks provided Iran with a pretext for further attacks against them. These included the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (KDPI), the Communist Komala Party of Iranian Kurdistan, the nationalist Kurdish Khabat Organization, and the Kurdistan Free Life Party (PJAK), which is close to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). The Kurdistan Regional Government also described the claims as "completely false" and denied any involvement in the alleged plans to destabilise Iran.

Meanwhile, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard have repeatedly accused the Iranian Kurdish groups of receiving American support and has continued launching artillery and drone attacks against them in Iraq. Kurdish Iraqi officials interviewed by Al-Araby Al-Jadeed suggested that pro-Iranian Iraqi militias may also have carried out drone attacks on the groups.

The controversy intensified after Bafel Talabani, the head of the Iraqi Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) did not deny receiving arms from the US in an interview with British journalist Piers Morgan. "I can confirm that the weapons President Trump said the Kurds seized were not stolen in Sulaymaniyah, and I cannot speak on behalf of the other side because there are two different administrations," he said, referring to the KDP administration in Erbil.

Talabani added in the interview, which circulated widely inside the Kurdistan Region last week: "Trump’s remarks did not come out of nowhere. What happened is very shameful. Using the Kurds as shields in war is a bad idea, but that does not mean you steal from your allies. We do not want to steal from President Trump, and this will have very bad consequences."

Over the past five days, The New Arab contacted Kurdish officials and politicians in Erbil and Sulaymaniyah, as well as a senior member of an Iranian Kurdish party living in Sweden. All stated that there was no evidence confirming that any weapons shipment reached Iranian Kurds through Iraq. One official pointed to how quickly information and photos of US weapons shipments to the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) through Harir base had leaked between 2018 and 2022.

“Washington cancelled the idea of arming Iranian Kurds because Iranian Kurdish groups did not engage with the plan, and no weapons or support were ever sent to them, as we understood before and shortly after the attack on Iran began," a senior Kurdish official in Erbil, speaking anonymously, told The New Arab.

He added: "Iraqi Kurds believed that becoming intermediaries in transferring weapons would not only make them a party in the war against Iran but would also create consequences with Turkey and Baghdad."

The official stressed that no US weapons had arrived in the first place. "What Trump said is inaccurate, and we asked White House officials to clarify it, but it seems difficult for officials in his administration to publicly deny or call his statements inaccurate," they said.

Another official commented briefly by phone: "If even a single bullet had arrived, the world would know about it. What Trump said is incorrect. He does not understand the difference between the Kurds of Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey and thinks they are all one group. We asked a US State Department official for clarification, but nothing has happened so far."

KDP leader Majid Shingali said that "the American president said the Kurds in Iraq support Iranian protesters and spoke about stolen weapons intended for them, but Kurdish party leaders in the region reject being part of any external conflict." He added that the Kurdistan Regional Government had worked to prevent Iranian opposition groups from participating in the recent war against Iran.

He told The New Arab that "some information on the matter remains unclear, and the KDP has distanced itself from the issue of these American weapons," warning that "continued internal exchanges of accusations do not serve Kurdish interests."

In PUK-controlled Sulaymaniyah, officials pointed fingers at the KDP. "Anyone following the situation in Kurdistan knows very well that Erbil controls the issue of military aid and weapons deliveries, and agreements with Washington are usually handled by one Kurdish side - Erbil," senior party member Ghiyath Surji told The New Arab.

American planes land in Erbil

A member of the PUK political bureau in Sulaymaniyah responded to questions about evidence of the alleged weapons shipment by saying: "American planes land and take off from Erbil airport and Harir base; this certainly does not happen at Sulaymaniyah airport. Therefore, the Erbil government should be questioned, and Trump’s words must have some basis for him to say them."

He added: "The only confirmed fact we have is that the Iranian Kurdish parties based in the region did not receive anything. So either the shipment really arrived, as Trump said, and was seized, or it never arrived at all. We are not accused, but others need to deny and clarify."

Soran Berfan, a member of the PUK in Sulaymaniyah, said: "We are searching for evidence that weapons actually arrived, but so far we have found nothing confirming the shipment Trump spoke about." He asked: "Why is the KDP upset by our statements about the issue while not denying Trump’s claims directly?"

Meanwhile, Milan Saeed, a researcher specialising in Kurdish political affairs, said the claims of stolen weapons are false. "No Kurdish party could realistically play such a role," he said, noting that Trump's statements are often inaccurate.

He added that the Kurdistan Regional Government should have addressed Trump directly to ask what evidence he had instead of allowing the matter to become an internal crisis between the region’s two ruling parties.

This view was echoed by Aram Behzad, a member of an Iranian Kurdish opposition organisation living in Sweden. "The story about an American weapons shipment to Iranian Kurds may have been part of the information chaos during the war, intended to confuse Iranians internally," he told Al-Araby Al-Jadeed.

"Trump may have exaggerated or confused discussions about support with an actual delivery operation, something he does often even in domestic US issues," he added.

"The arrival of new weapons in a region so heavily exposed to security and intelligence monitoring, and with highly competitive media activity driven by conflicting political agendas, without any details leaking out, would be extremely difficult."

(Othman al-Mukhtar and The New Arab)

"I don't understand why anybody would not be supportive," Rubio told reporters, adding that countries needed "something more than just strongly worded statements" if they opposed Iran's actions.

Rubio was wrapping up a two-day trip aimed at easing ties with Pope Leo after attacks on the pontiff by President Donald Trump, while also addressing Washington's frustration over Italy's refusal to support the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.

Meloni had been one of Trump's firmest allies in Europe, cultivating close ties with him and presenting herself as a natural bridge between Washington and other EU states that had no natural political affinity with the Republican U.S. leader.

But that alignment has come under increasing strain in recent months, as the Iran war has forced her to balance loyalty to the United States against Italian public animosity to the war and the growing economic cost of the conflict.

Meloni and Rubio met for one to one-and-a-half hours, in what she described in a post on social media platform X as "an extensive and constructive discussion", saying the talks included the Middle East, Libya and the peace processes in Lebanon and Ukraine.

"It was a frank dialogue between allies who defend their own national interests while fully recognising the value of western unity," Meloni said.

Rubio declined to give full details. However, he warned that Tehran's claim to control access to Hormuz risked setting a dangerous precedent.

"The fundamental question every country, not just Italy ... needs to ask themselves is, are you going to normalise a country claiming to control an international waterway? Because if you normalise that, you've set a precedent that's going to get repeated in a dozen other places," he said.

'The United States needs Europe and Italy'

Italy and other European allies have said they would be willing to help keep the strait open once there was a lasting ceasefire or the conflict ends, but have refused to be drawn into direct confrontation with Iran.

Before seeing Meloni, Rubio met Italy's Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, who said he hoped the visit had helped calm tensions with the United States.

"I am convinced Europe needs America, Italy needs America, but also that the United States needs Europe and Italy," Tajani told reporters.

Besides the war in the Gulf, Meloni and Rubio had also been expected to discuss Russia's war on Ukraine, U.S. tariffs on European goods and the outlook for Cuba, which Washington is seeking to isolate both diplomatically and economically.

The Italians were also keen for a readout on Rubio's meetings at the Vatican. Trump's recent attacks on Pope Leo crossed a sensitive line in overwhelmingly Catholic Italy and prompted Meloni to call them "unacceptable."

Her criticism in turn drew a sharp rebuke from Trump, who said she lacked courage. He subsequently threatened to withdraw U.S. troops from Italy.

Rubio said he didn't get into specifics about U.S. bases, saying it was a decision for Trump to make.

Italy last month refused to allow U.S. aircraft to use the Sigonella air base in Sicily for combat operations linked to the Iran conflict. Italian officials said Washington had not sought prior authorisation from Rome for the use of the site.

Rubio did not mention this incident, but pointed to Spain's decision not to allow its bases or airspace to be used to attack Iran. He said one of the main attractions of NATO for the U.S. was to have forces in Europe that could be swiftly deployed elsewhere.

"Now that's no longer the case, at least when it comes to some NATO members, that's a problem and has to be examined," he said.

One of the key issues shaping debate during the campaign was British foreign policy towards Israel, particularly in the wake of the genocidal war in Gaza and the US-Israeli war on Iran, with observers expecting these issue to influence voting patterns. 

So far, however, results indicate that the main beneficiary has been Reform UK, which has gained more than 300 council seats across England and is now being tipped to emerge as a major opposition force in Scotland and Wales alongside the Scottish National Party (SNP) and Plaid Cymru. 

Amid what analysts describe as one of the most significant shifts in British politics in the past century, The New Arab examines how influential the pro-Palestine vote was in shaping the outcomes of several key city council elections. 

Greens' historic win in Hackney and Lewisham

One of the most significant victories for the Greens, as their leader Zack Polanski pushes for gains in London, was the party’s capture of the Hackney mayoralty from Labour, as well as the Lewisham mayoralty from the Labour Co-op party.

The result has since made Zoë Garbett and Liam Shrivastava the first-ever Green Party mayors in London.

The East London borough of Hackney, where Polanski is based, had been identified as the Greens’ top target in the capital, with polling accurately forecasting "a very bad night for Labour" nationally. 

Garbett told UK outlet The Independent in late April that voters were taking the Greens "more seriously" on issues they had not previously associated with the party.

She said concerns surrounding Gaza, housing, disability support and immigration repeatedly came up as key sticking points. 

Meanwhile, Lewisham mayor‑elect Liam Shrivastava – a former Labour councillor who defected to the Greens in June 2025 – secured victory after the party also targeted control of the council in the south‑east London borough.

Shrivastava had previously said that "the party I joined is unrecognisable from what it has become" when explaining his departure from Labour.

His move further emphasised growing frustration over Labour’s stance on Gaza, with the Green Party manifesto in the borough stating that "Lewisham residents deserve a council that will speak up on national issues, not one that buries its head in the sand."

The manifesto added: "While Labour have ignored the pain of residents witnessing the genocide in Palestine, Lewisham Greens will take decisive action to meet our legal and moral duties, doing everything in our power to divest from companies complicit in human suffering and illegal war."

Garbett and Shrivastava’s victories marks a watershed moment for the Greens in London, particularly as pro-Palestine activists criticise the current Labour leadership for its ongoing support for Israel and arms exports to the country.

'Labour has tied itself to supporting Israel'

The Greens also made significant gains overnight in areas across the country including Salford, Oxford, Southampton and Exeter - Labour lost control of local councils. 

In Oxford, Green Party candidate Edward Mundy won the Cowley ward with 1,031 votes, deespite no party retaining overall control of Oxford City Council following the local elections - ending Labour’s decades-long dominance of the authority.

"Cowley is a diverse neighbourhood and ward in East Oxford, and lots of different local and national issues come up on the doorstep," Mundy told The New Arab. "What did cut through for a lot of people was the crash in the Labour Party’s credibility."

Mundy added that "Labour’s leadership has tied itself to supporting Israel while terror continues to be inflicted on civilians in Lebanon and Palestine."

He continued: "Voters understand why party members and politicians have been leaving Labour, and how the Green Party message of respect for human rights and social justice both home and abroad is what we need."

In the Labour-run council of Birmingham - the most closely watched elections in the West Midlands since the last general election -  the increasingly fragmented political landscape has been fully exposed. 

According to the BBC, all five major parties have established a presence in the city, as Reform UK, independents and the Greens all took seats from Labour in Birmingham.

The final result could also leave Birmingham under no overall control for the first time in more than a decade. 

No Pledge for Palestine in Reform UK

Reform UK has continued to build momentum following major breakthroughs across England, while also seeking future gains in Scotland and Wales through its anti-establishment and anti-immigration messaging. 

No candidates of the hard-right party signed a pledge launched by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign in December 2025 in support of Palestinians ahead of the local elections. 

The Councillor Pledge for Palestine called on politicians to take steps to "uphold the rights" of Palestinians, "stand up to Israel for its crimes of genocide and apartheid" and ensure local councils “are not complicit”. 

Among the signatories were five councillors from the main opposition Conservative Party, alongside hundreds more representing the SNP, Plaid Cymru, the Scottish Greens, various local parties and independents. 

Prominent pro-Palestine figures such as former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn have stressed that the Palestinian issue is "non-negotiable" in this election. 

With pro-Palestine taking a front seat in the campaign effort, the Greens have so far gained a total of 402 seats. 

UK-based grassroots campaign Vote Palestine 2026 argued that despite Reform UK emerging as the biggest winner in England, the elections demonstrated that "Palestine is on the ballot and that Britons do not want a Labour Party that has failed to champion Palestine."

A representative told The New Arab that newly elected mayors Zoë Garbett in Hackney and Liam Shrivastava in Lewisham were "two prominent supporters for council divestment".

The group also pointed to what it described as historic gains by "grassroots campaigners" backing pro-Palestine candidates in Newcastle.

In Westminster, the elections saw the defeat of Reform councillor Alan Mendoza - president of the Zionist Jewish National Fund -  following a campaign by Vote Palestine activists working alongside the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN).

"Although election results are still early, today shows us that Palestine is absolutely a voter issue at the local level," a representative of the group said.

"Local councils currently invest over £12 billion into companies that are complicit in the genocide and occupation of Palestine. That money should be invested here, in Britain,", adding that issues traditionally dominating local elections, including council spending, housing and local services, "are not at odds with Palestine as a local issue".

"In fact, the Vote Palestine campaign has advocated that council investments should serve their local residents and shift funds invested in genocide and war abroad into better services and housing here," they said.

In preliminary results, Reform is reported to have gained 1,221 council seats across England, while Labour stands at a loss of 1,090 seats and the Conservatives were down 470. 

Most of the remaining results, including those from the Scottish and Welsh elections, are expected to be declared later on Friday. 

But the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, said Washington's access to Saudi airspace and bases would continue for other uses.

Saudi Arabia has repeatedly said it will not allow its territory and airspace to be used to attack Iran.

Earlier this week, US President Donald Trump announced a pause in the two-day-old "Project Freedom" to guide ships through the strait, after a flare-up with Iran strained a fragile ceasefire.

US media reports on Thursday said Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the de facto Saudi leader, talked directly to Trump and refused to let US forces use Saudi airspace and bases for the operation.

Saudi Arabia "did not allow flights for operation Freedom", one of the sources told AFP.

"Saudi Arabia was against the operation because it felt it would just escalate the situation and would not work," the source added.

On Friday morning, Saudi Arabia's Deputy Minister for Public Diplomacy Rayed Krimly said the kingdom "maintains its position supporting de-escalation and negotiations efforts", in a post on social media.

The comments came as Trump said the ceasefire with Iran was still in place despite an Iranian attack on three American destroyers in the Strait of Hormuz.

The US military said it carried out strikes on Iranian military targets in response, although Tehran charged that it was Washington that had initiated the exchange of fire.

The deployment was revealed during a visit by UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to an Egyptian fighter detachment stationed in the UAE.

According to the Emirates News Agency (WAM), the two leaders reviewed the unit’s readiness and efforts to strengthen operational capabilities "for various challenges" after discussing regional developments and their implications for regional and international security.

The report noted that this was the first time the presence of such a detachment had been announced, while official Emirati language described it as already "stationed" in the country, suggesting either a previously undisclosed deployment or a recent move whose announcement itself carried strategic messaging.

Images released by WAM showed Dassault Rafale fighter jets bearing Egyptian markings, alongside 13 Egyptian pilots and several personnel in Egyptian military uniform.

However, neither Egyptian nor Emirati officials disclosed the number of aircraft involved, the rules of engagement, the operating base, or the duration of the deployment.

The development comes during a period of heightened regional tensions after the UAE said it had faced Iranian missile and drone attacks.

The UAE Defence Ministry said its air defences were intercepting missile and drone attacks from Iran, while Iran’s joint military command denied carrying out such operations. Reuters said it could not independently verify either side’s claims.

Abu Dhabi described the attacks as a direct threat to the UAE’s security and said it reserved the right to respond.

Cairo condemned the reported attacks on Emirati territory, which the UAE said caused a fire at a fuel facility in Fujairah and resulted in injuries.

According to the Egyptian presidency, Sisi reaffirmed Egypt’s support for the UAE and said that "what affects the UAE affects Egypt".

The timing of the deployment also coincides with emergency security measures implemented by the UAE.

The country restricted flights to approved routes until at least 11 May through NOTAM directives issued by its General Civil Aviation Authority, while multiple commercial flights were reportedly diverted to Muscat or forced to circle over Saudi Arabia amid air-defence activity.

The Pundit also cited previous reports that Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Kuwait had sought Egyptian and Moroccan support to reinforce Gulf air defences.

According to the report, Morocco provided personnel and intelligence support, while Egypt reportedly transferred upgraded Skyguard Amoun air-defence systems to Gulf partners.

The Egyptian deployment also reflects a longer pattern of military cooperation between Cairo and Abu Dhabi.

The two countries have repeatedly conducted joint military drills under the Zayed exercise series. In 2021, the UAE and Egypt concluded the Zayed 3 air exercise in the UAE, involving joint sorties, aerial-refuelling exercises, simulated attacks on hostile targets and training to defend critical infrastructure.

Egypt’s Ministry of Defence said at the time that the exercises were intended to "enhance joint air combat operations and strengthen the ability of both forces to confront risks and challenges affecting regional security and stability".

Still, there has been no public confirmation that Egyptian aircraft or pilots participated in intercepting Iranian missiles or drones, nor any indication that the deployment forms part of a formal collective-defence arrangement.

The report added that while circulated images strongly suggested the presence of Rafale jets, the official Emirati and Egyptian statements do not identify the model.

"I'm not going to walk away and plunge the country into chaos," Starmer said, after his ruling Labour party lost hundreds of councillors in England.

Labour was also braced for humiliating results in voting for devolved parliaments in Scotland and Wales due to be announced later.

"The results are tough, they are very tough, and there's no sugarcoating it," Starmer said.

"We have lost brilliant Labour representatives across the country, these are people who put so much into their communities, so much into our party.

"And that hurts, and it should hurt, and I take responsibility," he added.

The ballot was the biggest electoral test for Starmer since Labour ousted the Conservatives following 14 years in power in a landslide election victory in 2024.

The grim predictions made by opinion polls were borne out in results.

Nigel Farage's anti-immigrant Reform UK party had gained 478 seats while Labour had lost 322 across 57 of the 136 English councils to announce results by mid-Friday.

Reform had taken control of three councils - the counties of Suffolk and Essex in eastern England and the central town of Newcastle-under-Lyme.

Farage said the local election results had demonstrated a "truly historic shift in British politics", adding that Reform was now "the most national of all the parties. We are here to stay".

Big losses for Labour could amplify calls for Starmer, 63, to resign or face a long-rumoured party leadership challenge. Starmer is now one of the most unpopular prime ministers ever, according to polls.

He insisted however that "days like this don't weaken my resolve to deliver the change that I promised".

Missteps

Pollster John Curtice, of Glasgow's University of Strathclyde, said the results illustrated a new fragmentation of British politics with Labour being hit from its right by Reform and its left by the Greens.

Those backing Reform were "broadly people with a relatively socially conservative outlook" who had "lost confidence in the traditional mainstream parties" and were sympathetic to the party's views on issues such as immigration and Brexit, he said.

The ballot decided around 5,000 local council seats, out of 16,000, across England, while in Wales and Scotland voters elected new devolved parliaments.

Reform and the left-wing Greens, led by self-described eco-populist Zack Polanski, benefited from widespread disillusionment with Starmer's government and policy missteps.

In recent weeks, Starmer has become embroiled in a scandal over Peter Mandelson who was sacked as ambassador to Washington over his links to US sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

He has also failed to fulfil his main election promise of spurring economic growth. Impatient Britons are still suffering a cost-of-living crisis, including from high energy prices.

London finance worker Ian Tanner said he disliked Starmer's "dreadful policies" but was fearful any replacement might be "even more left-wing".

"It's a case of you've got to be careful what you wish for," he said.

Another finance worker, Dayo Foster, 60, said she believed Labour was doing "all the right things" and that Starmer just needed more time. "I don't want him to resign, no, I think we need a bit of stability".

Leadership rumours

Surveys suggest Labour will lose control of the devolved Welsh government for the first time since Wales got its own parliament 27 years ago.

Reform or the pro-independence Plaid Cymru are expected to become the biggest party.

Labour also fears a drubbing in Scotland, where the Scottish National Party (SNP) is expected to extend its 19-year control of the parliament in Edinburgh.

In London, the Greens picked up disaffected left-wingers with a pro-Gaza message.

Kemi Badenoch's right-wing Conservatives was also bracing for the loss of traditional strongholds.

Early results in the capital included a mayoral win for the Greens in the east London borough of Hackney.

Hailing the election of Zoe Garbett in one of the party's target areas, Polanski said "two party politics is not just dying, it is dead and it is buried".

Britain's media has been full of rumours that ex-deputy prime minister Angela Rayner or Health Secretary Wes Streeting could try to oust Starmer after the results.

Neither is universally popular within Labour, however, and would need the backing of 20 percent of the party's MPs to launch a contest.

Cristiano Ronaldo scored his 100th Saudi Pro League goal on Thursday as Al-Nassr beat Al-Shabab 4-2 to move five points clear at the top of the table.

The 41-year-old forward converted a Sadio Mané cross at the near post with 15 minutes remaining to record the 971st goal of his career. It was also his 26th league goal of the season.

"Ronaldo is always dangerous going forward and we saw that again today," Al-Nassr coach Jorge Jesus said.

João Félix, signed from Chelsea in July, scored three goals for the league leaders.

The win took Al-Nassr to 82 points from 32 games, five ahead of Al-Hilal, which has three matches, one more than Nassr, left to play. Al-Hilal meets Al-Kholood on Friday and faces Nassr on Tuesday in what could be a title decider against its Riyadh rival.

"Now we have a derby match against our rival, which is a difficult encounter," Jesus said. "We are fully aware of its importance, and we are dealing with it with complete focus as we know that small details could decide the result."

Ronaldo, a five-time Ballon d’Or winner, has yet to secure a major trophy in Saudi Arabia since signing with Al-Nassr in December 2022.

The women, Kawsar Ahmad, 54, and her daughter Zeinab Ahmad, 31, face crimes against humanity charges including owning and using a slave in Syria, which carry a maximum penalty of 25 years in prison, police said. The pair, among a group of four women and nine children who returned to Australia from Syria on Thursday, were arrested at Melbourne airport.

"This remains an active investigation into very serious allegations," Australian Federal Police Assistant Commissioner Counter Terrorism Stephen Nutt said in a statement.

The two women travelled to Syria in 2014 with their families and allegedly kept a female slave at their home, police said. They faced court on Friday and will remain in custody until their next hearings on Monday, the Magistrate's Court of Victoria said.

Reuters could not immediately contact the women or their lawyers.

Separately, 32-year-old woman Janai Safar was arrested at Sydney airport on Thursday and charged with terror-related offences, including allegedly joining IS. The charges carry a maximum jail term of 10 years.

Safar was refused bail by a Sydney court on Friday and will stay behind bars until her next hearing on July 15, court records showed.

Safar travelled to Syria in 2015 to join her husband, who had previously left Australia and joined IS, according to police. The government said earlier this week that the group of 13 women and children planned to return to Australia from Syrian camps without official assistance.

Authorities will 'throw the book' at them

The arrival of the women and children put pressure on Australia's centre-left government with critics blaming the government for not doing enough to prevent their travel home. But the government said there were "very serious limits" on what authorities could do to prevent Australian citizens re-entering the country.

"Australian citizens are entitled to Australian passports. They're entitled to come into Australia," Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on a radio interview with Nova Melbourne.

"What we're entitled to do though is to throw the book at them and that's precisely what we're doing."

Three of the four women who returned faced serious charges, and the other will be monitored, Albanese added.

He later told reporters at a press conference he had sympathy for their children, who were "victims of decisions that their parents have made".

"It is appropriate that they undergo support," he said.

Following IS's territorial defeat, many relatives of suspected fighters were detained in Syrian camps. In January, the United States began moving detained IS members out of Syria after the collapse of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, which had been guarding around a dozen facilities holding fighters and affiliated civilians, including foreigners.

The Australian government repatriated four women and 13 children from Syrian camps in 2022. About 21 Australians remain in al-Roj camp, the Australian Broadcasting Corp reported.

Addis Ababa responded with counter-accusations against Khartoum, alleging support for the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, which opposes the Ethiopian government.

The developments come amid warnings of a possible explosion in tensions along the Sudan-Ethiopia border and fears they could develop into a military confrontation, particularly after Khartoum recalled its ambassador to Addis Ababa, Al-Zain Ibrahim Hussein, and threatened, through Foreign Minister Mohi al-Din Salim during a press conference last Tuesday to respond "in kind".

Meanwhile, military movements and preparations emerged over the past two days in Sudan’s eastern states bordering Ethiopia, which observers say could lead to further developments if diplomatic solutions fail to calm the escalating tensions.

As for the war in Sudan, RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, declared on Thursday that "his forces are prepared to continue fighting until 2040 if circumstances require".

Sudanese website Al-Rakoba reported that Hemedti said during a speech on Wednesday to his forces that "army estimates indicate the war could continue until 2033", stressing his commitment to continuing military operations against the Sudanese army.

He also held "the armed forces leadership responsible for the continuation of the conflict and refusal to engage in peace efforts", asserting that his forces had consistently sought to end the conflict, adding, "We in the Rapid Support Forces seek to stop the war tonight before tomorrow, but can a war stop from one side alone?"

He stressed that ending the conflict requires commitment from all parties, saying his side requires a "radical solution" that guarantees conflicts will not recur in the future, stressing his rejection of a return to the pre-war situation.

Sudan-Ethiopia disputes reignite

Drone attacks launched by the RSF on Khartoum on Monday were enough to reignite disputes between the Sudanese and Ethiopian governments.

This was underscored by the Sudanese foreign minister’s announcement on the same day that strategic drones belonging to the RSF had departed from Ethiopia’s Bahir Dar airport with funding from the UAE.

According to the Sudanese government, the drone attacks recently targeted Khartoum airport, as well as sites in previous attacks inside White Nile and Blue Nile states in southeastern Sudan, where the RSF announced coordinated attacks from several fronts late last month, in addition to North and South Kordofan states.

The forces also attacked Sudanese troops in the border town of Kurmuk between Sudan and Ethiopia during recent battles there. The town fell to the RSF on 24 March.

Ethiopia’s foreign ministry denied the accusations in a statement on Tuesday, instead accusing the Sudanese army of involvement with "mercenaries of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front" in the ongoing conflict and of providing weapons and financial support to them, facilitating incursions along Ethiopia’s western border.

It said the activity of Tigray fighters in Sudan was "documented publicly" and that the government possessed reliable evidence indicating Sudan had become a base for anti-Ethiopian forces operating against it.

For its part, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front rejected the Ethiopian foreign ministry's accusations in a statement on Wednesday, 6 May, denying cooperation with the Sudanese government to destabilise the region.

It said the allegations were baseless, irresponsible, and reflected a recurring pattern of disinformation through misleading information.

The group stressed that at a time when the region requires restraint and constructive engagement, such claims only inflame tensions and obscure the urgent need for accountability and genuine peace efforts.

It stressed that it had neither participated in nor supported any activities undermining regional stability, warning that "escalatory rhetoric, external interventions, and opportunistic alliances" linked to competing regional agendas reflected short-sighted calculations threatening long-term peace.

It added that such actions not only strain relations with neighbouring countries, but also risk entrenching Ethiopia in conflicts that do not serve the interests of its people.
 

Military preparations on the border

The tensions between Sudan and Ethiopia have prompted military preparations by the Sudanese army and allied forces in the eastern states.

Sudan’s Kassala, Gedaref, Sennar and Blue Nile states all share borders with Ethiopia, stretching approximately 769 kilometres.

In this context, the Sudanese army’s Fourth Infantry Division in Damazin, in the Blue Nile region, announced that its forces were prepared for any potential threats.

In a statement issued overnight into Thursday, it said its forces were in a state of full readiness, constant vigilance and capable of dealing with various challenges within their area of responsibility.

It added that troops on the ground were working with determination to secure the region, protect civilians and confront any "potential threat".

The command of the army’s Second Infantry Division in Gedaref State also announced on Tuesday that division commander Major General Youssef Mohamed Ahmed had conducted a series of field inspection visits covering the operational base in Qureisha, the "Tabarak Allah" sector, and the Doka operational base, all near the Ethiopian border.

It added that the visit aimed to assess the morale of soldiers stationed at advanced positions.

The division commander stressed the combat readiness and full alertness of forces in those vital sectors and declared that the Second Division would remain the protective shield and painful strike against anyone "lying in wait for the nation’s security".

As part of these border preparations, the Eastern Battalion Forces, an armed group allied with the Sudanese army, announced on Tuesday that it had raised the level of readiness and maximum alert across all units and deployment positions while suspending leave and unnecessary movements and repositioning according to operational requirements.

The forces, stationed in eastern Sudan, stressed their rejection of any foreign intervention in Sudan’s internal affairs under any pretext.

They said that amid rapid security and military developments and possible threats in the eastern region, including the use of drones and attacks on some sites from outside the border, they were closely monitoring the field situation and continuously evaluating all possible scenarios.

The group also declared its commitment to operating under the leadership of the Sudanese army and dealing firmly with any threat to Sudan’s security or stability, adding that it was "at the highest levels of readiness to carry out the tasks assigned to it at any time".
 

Threats to national security

Sudanese political science professor Al-Nazir Mohamed Al-Toum told The New Arab that "the notable aspect of the latest escalation is that it has moved beyond its traditional context of border disputes, demographic overlap and water competition, which have remained politically and legally unresolved, into the realm of geopolitical and regional escalation".

He noted that with the Sudan war entering its fourth year and Ethiopia’s crisis involving conflict between Amhara and Tigray forces against the central government entering its sixth year, "we find ourselves facing a reality threatening the national security of both countries and the security of the entire region".

He argued that the Sudanese government’s recall of its diplomatic representative from Addis Ababa, "despite being repeated as a form of protest, comes this time in a different context, coinciding with fierce military battles inside Sudan and direct mutual accusations of logistical and human support, with each side claiming the other has become a centre for hostile forces".

Al-Toum said that regardless of the accuracy of the claims, the danger lies in the transformation of the long border into a stage for "proxy wars", opening the door to "empowering militias and counter-militias and supporting pockets of opposition to the central authority on both sides".

He also argued that "this escalation tempts military actors to exploit opportunities, as Ethiopian Shifta militias active along the Sudan border and Amhara forces may seek to impose a new reality in the Greater and Lesser Fashaga areas in Gedaref state, exploiting the Sudanese army’s distraction".

Al-Toum warned that continued escalation or a break in relations "would deepen regional polarisation, particularly amid tensions between Ethiopia and Eritrea, potentially turning eastern Sudan into an arena for settling regional scores".

He added that Sudan’s current weakness and inability to sustain another military front or secure full sovereignty heightened the risks.

He also said, "This tension casts negative shadows over the future of final negotiations regarding the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam".

Al-Toum said field reports and Sudanese accusations concerning the use of Bahir Dar airport as a base for drones targeting Khartoum indicate Addis Ababa may be resorting to a strategy of "escaping forward".

He explained that the Ethiopian government, facing rebellion in the Amhara region by Fano militias, may seek to turn Sudan into a theatre for securing its internal front through a "trade-off of influence", namely, supporting armed activity in Sudan in exchange for guarantees that Sudan would not support Fano or Tigray militias.

In addition, Al-Toum said the Fashaga dispute represents a "winning card for appeasing Ethiopian public opinion, particularly among the Amhara, while economic and political pressures could push Ethiopia to provide logistical support to one side in Sudan’s conflict in exchange for easing those pressures.”

Al-Toum argued that the current escalation "has gone beyond traditional border skirmishes to become a threat of direct confrontation militarily, diplomatically and legally".

He added that “the continuation of war in Sudan and unrest in Ethiopia leaves the parties with zero-sum options for acting against each other.”

According to Al-Toum, this comes "amid a loss of internal balance that has made both states vulnerable to being used as proxies for settling regional and international power struggles, especially in the context of competition over Red Sea influence and ports".

He added that "if proven, Ethiopian intervention stems from internal weakness and a desperate attempt to secure borders and satisfy allies".

In his view, "the only way out remains achieving peace in Sudan and addressing disputes with neighbouring countries through political and legal means, because continuing direct confrontation would inevitably turn Sudan into a rear arena for ethnic conflicts and growing regional ambitions".

Retired officer Hassan Ibrahim also ruled out a direct clash between the Sudanese and Ethiopian armies on the border, telling The New Arab that Sudan and Ethiopia "are engaged in internal conflicts and neither has the interest or capacity to open a new front in difficult areas such as eastern Sudan and western Ethiopia".

He expected the conflict for now to remain confined to mutual support for militias and intensified border skirmishes, particularly since "the Blue Nile region bordering Ethiopia is witnessing continuous activity by the RSF and its ally, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, led by Abdelaziz al-Hilu, which recently captured the town of Kurmuk very close to the Ethiopian border".

According to Ibrahim, this means the forces "have opened a direct route enabling them to use Ethiopian territory to launch drone attacks as happened recently".

He also pointed out that "Ethiopian militias such as the Tigray Front already have relations with the Sudanese government".

At the same time, he noted that "proxy battles are expected and may escalate in the coming days, particularly in the Blue Nile region".

Article translated from Arabic by Afrah Almatwari. To read the original, click here.
 

On Thursday, the Hondurasgate website and  the Mexico-based Diario Red en América Latina reported on audio recordings of alleged conversations between the former Honduran President, Juan Orlando Hernandez, the current president, Nasry Asfura, and the vice president, Maria Antonieta Mejua, all stating their objective to undermine the current administrations of Mexico and Colombia.

The leaked recordings also allege that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had a role in securing the release of Hernandez from prison, after the latter was sentenced in New York in 2024 to 45 years behind bars on drug trafficking charges.

US President Donald Trump’s decision to pardon Hernandez was allegedly tied to wider arrangements involving pro-Israel networks, according to the reports.

In one recording, Hernandez allegedly says: "The pardon money didn’t even come from you. It came from a group of rabbis and people who supported Israel." It was not clear who he was talking to.

In a separate recording, he says that Netanyahu had "everything to do" with his release and the talks that made it possible.

Hondurasgate states the leaked audio recordings were taken from Signal, WhatsApp, and Telegram conversations between January and April 2026, and were analysed using forensic voice authentication software developed by the Czech-based firm Phonexia.

The recordings further suggest that Israeli-linked actors saw Hernandez as a key ally in efforts to counter left-wing influence in Latin America.

Following the leaks, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo, said she had listened to parts of the audio recordings and dismissed the allegations as "smears".

"They can set up a smear campaign office against our government in Honduras," she said, adding "it won’t affect us".

The alleged leak comes amid strained relations between the US and Mexico, over Washington’s indictment request against the governor of Sinaloa, Ruben Rocha Moya, and nine other officials for alleged ties to drug trafficking.

Together, these works reflect a cinema shaped by displacement, labour, war, and the persistence of memory.

Despite this presence, MENA cinema continues to reach the Croisette largely through diaspora networks, international co-productions, and hybrid forms, rather than through volume alone.

This reflects the challenging conditions faced by filmmakers in their home countries, while also highlighting a recurring critique of what is often called the 'world's most important film festival': its relatively limited scope and aesthetic curiosity beyond established production territories.

Short films remain a particularly vital entry point for emerging MENA filmmakers. In the La Cinef selection, which focuses on exceptional works from film schools, Tunisian filmmaker Youssef Handous presents Somewhere I Belong.

The film, produced by Tunisia's ISAMM film school, explores themes of identity and belonging and is invited to the programme for the first time.

Across the parallel sections, narratives of rupture and transition recur.

In What Do the Maknines Dream Of, Algerian director Sarra Ryma follows two young people on the verge of migration; in Nafron, Daood Alabdulaa explores memory and selfhood in a transforming Damascus; while Lebanese artist Ali Cherri blurs reality and dream in The Sentinel, tracing a soldier's nocturnal drift through a suspended world.

Elsewhere, Nothing Happens After Your Absence returns to Sudan, where the act of screening films becomes entangled with bureaucracy and the outbreak of war, highlighting how cinema itself remains precarious in contexts of conflict.

Beyond the screen, prominent Arab figures in cinema also hold key roles within the festival.

French-Algerian actor Leïla Bekhti presides over the Un Certain Regard jury, joined by Lebanese composer Khaled Mouzanar as a jury member, further strengthening the region's presence within Cannes' institutional framework.

With the festival just around the corner, here's a closer look at the MENA-focused features this year has in store.

Parallel Tales

Director: Asghar Farhadi – France, USA, Belgium, Italy

Iranian director Asghar Farhadi returns to the Cannes Competition with Parallel Tales, a French-language ensemble drama loosely inspired by Krzysztof Kieślowski's Dekalog: Six.

Asghar made the decision to stop directing films in Iran after the Islamic Revolutionary Guard enforced the use of hijabs in film and television productions. He has previously directed two feature films outside Iran: The Past (2013), set in France and focusing on the Iranian diaspora, and Everybody Knows (2018), set in Spain.

Set in Paris, Parallel Tales follows Sylvie, a renowned writer played by Isabelle Huppert, who becomes obsessed with observing her neighbours. She hires a mysterious assistant, played by Adam Bessa, setting off a chain of emotional and moral upheavals.

Featuring Virginie Efira, Vincent Cassel, and Catherine Deneuve, the film reflects Asghar's ongoing work in exile.

A major European co-production, Parallel Tales highlights the influence of diasporic authorship in shaping MENA cinema's presence at Cannes, even when the films are produced outside the region.

La Más Dulce (Strawberries)

Director: Laïla Marrakchi – Morocco, France, Spain

French-Moroccan filmmaker Laïla Marrakchi returns to Cannes with a socially grounded drama about migration and labour exploitation.

The film follows Hasna, a Moroccan worker in Spain, who hopes to support her family but faces abuse, harassment, and inhumane living conditions.

As she and her companions begin a legal fight against their employers, the story becomes a portrait of resistance within systems of structural inequality.

Laïla builds on her earlier work by examining cross-border labour dynamics and anchoring the story in contemporary socio-political realities that resonate across North Africa and Southern Europe.

Yesterday the Eye Didn't Sleep

Director: Rakan Mayasi – Belgium, Lebanon, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia

Palestinian filmmaker Rakan Mayasi makes his feature debut with a visually driven, fragmentary narrative set in a Bedouin village in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley.

The story follows the disappearance of a young woman accused of arson, gradually revealing the invisible social structures that govern the community.

Constructed through gestures, silences, and mythic undertones rather than a conventional plot, the film explores the intersection of reality and folklore.

Rehearsals for a Revolution

Director: Pegah Ahangarani – Iran

Iranian filmmaker Pegah Ahangarani presents a personal documentary tracing more than four decades of Iranian history through archival material and intimate storytelling.

The film is structured around five portraits of resistance, blending personal memory with collective experience, from the aftermath of the 1979 revolution to present-day upheavals.

Using home videos, protest footage, and recorded voices, Pegah constructs a layered reflection on political repression and the enduring desire for change.

Clarissa

Directors: Chuko Esiri, Arie Esiri – United States, Nigeria, Egypt

Clarissa follows its protagonist over the course of a single evening in Lagos. She prepares to host a reception at her home, but the unexpected arrival of old friends triggers buried memories and unresolved tensions, turning the gathering into a quiet reckoning with the past.

A contemporary reimagining of Mrs Dalloway, the film transposes Virginia Woolf's modernist structure into present-day Nigeria.

Co-directed by Chuko and Arie Esiri and shot on 35mm, it stars Sophie Okonedo, David Oyelowo, Ayo Edebiri, and Nikki Amuka-Bird.

Selected for the Quinzaine (Directors' Fortnight) at Cannes 2026, it reflects a transnational production model while remaining rooted in Lagos' urban landscape.

In Search of the Grey Bird with Green Stripes

Director: Saïd Hamich Benlarbi – France, Morocco

Franco-Moroccan filmmaker Saïd Hamich Benlarbi presents a 45-minute mid-length poetic journey through southern Morocco.

The film follows a solitary traveller crossing the Atlas Mountains in search of a mysterious bird, unfolding as both a physical and symbolic quest.

Expanding into mid-length format, Saïd continues to explore themes of displacement, introspection, and landscape.

The Station

Director: Sara Ishaq – Yemen, Jordan, France, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Qatar

Yemeni-Scottish filmmaker Sara Ishaq, based in Amsterdam, explores a politically charged story set in a women-only petrol station in Yemen.

The station functions as a fragile sanctuary, where its owner, Layal, enforces rules excluding men, weapons, and politics.

When her brother faces forced enlistment, this balance collapses, forcing her to confront the limits of neutrality and protection.

As an international co-production, The Station, alongside Yesterday the Eye Didn’t Sleep, exemplifies the transnational frameworks that bring MENA stories to global audiences.

Living Twice, Dying Thrice

Director: Karim Lakzadeh – Iran

As part of the ACID programme, and the only production there not funded by the French state, Iranian director Karim Lakzadeh presents a darkly ironic narrative about three miners who survive a collapse but choose to fake their deaths so their families can receive compensation.

As they navigate a clandestine existence marked by bureaucratic absurdity and personal crisis, the film becomes a reflection on identity, survival, and the paradox of proving one’s own death.

Mariana Hristova is a freelance film critic, cultural journalist, and programmer. She contributes to national and international outlets and has curated programs for Filmoteca de Catalunya, Arxiu Xènctric, and goEast Wiesbaden, among others. Her professional interests include cinema from the European peripheries and archival and amateur films

In a statement published by its newspaper Al-Naba, the group said that "soldiers of the Caliphate in Wilayat al-Sham - Damascus" carried out a "special bombing operation" targeting what it called "one of the apostate Rafidite imams" near the Sayyida Zainab shrine in the Damascus countryside.

The statement claimed the attack was conducted using a sticky bomb planted inside al-Mansour’s vehicle after he left what the group described as "their polytheistic shrine" in the Sayyida Zainab area.

It described the cleric as "one of the prominent preachers and imams of disbelief" in the district, which it said was under strict protection and surveillance by Syrian government forces.

Al-Mansour was known as the imam and preacher of the Sayyida Zainab shrine and was considered one of the leading Shia clerics in Sayyida Zeinab, a major centre of Shia religious influence in Syria with a heavy security presence due to the sectarian tensions which arose during the Syrian conflict.

An explosive device detonated in al-Mansour’s vehicle on Friday afternoon, killing him instantly. Initial reports had differed over whether the blast was the result of a planned assassination or an accidental explosion.

Following the incident, Syria’s Interior Ministry said it was monitoring "with great concern what the country has witnessed in recent days of systematic attempts aimed at destabilising security and stability, seeking to spread chaos and undermine civil peace".

The ministry said the killing of the Sayyida Zainab shrine preacher came "within the context of a dangerous escalation targeting religious and social figures in order to stir sectarian strife".

It added that "this crime will not pass without accountability", though it did not at the time provide further details regarding those responsible or the findings of preliminary investigations.

Last January, the Syrian Interior Ministry announced that it had foiled an Islamic State attempt to carry out a bombing inside the Sayyida Zainab shrine itself.

At the time, the ministry said the General Intelligence Service, working alongside the Rural Damascus Security Directorate, had arrested those involved and thwarted the plot before it could be carried out.

The latest attack is likely to intensify concerns over Islamic State sleeper cell activity in Syria despite years of military and security operations targeting the group. 

It also raises questions over how the organisation was able to penetrate one of the most fortified and closely monitored districts in the Damascus area.

In recent months, sporadic Islamic State attacks have continued to be reported across several Syrian regions, targeting security personnel, soldiers and civilians. 

Israel has mounted daily attacks across the country in violation of the ceasefire that was supposed to halt the fighting three weeks ago.

In a statement, Lebanon's civil defence said a rescuer was killed "as a result of an Israeli strike that targeted him" on a road in the south.

Israeli forces have killed at least 103 healthcare workers and emergency responders since 2 March, according to Lebanon's health ministry.

The World Health Organization said Wednesday it had verified 152 separate Israeli attacks on healthcare.

The Israeli military ordered residents of seven villages in the south to flee in what the latest in a series of displacement orders targeting Shia-majority areas across the south.

The orders covered six villages east of Tyre and the town of Nmairiyeh north of Nabatieh.

More than one million people have been displaced in Israel's offensive, which has depopulated swathes of southern Lebanon and seen Israeli forces seize territory deep into the country.

Israeli shelling was reported in several areas of the south on Friday morning.

A ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah began on 17 April as part of a truce between Iran and the US, though Israel has violated it daily. On Wednesday, it bombed Beirut for the first time during the ceasefire.

Hezbollah has launched retaliatory attacks against Israeli troops occupying the country.

At least 2,727 people have been killed, and another 8,438 others have been injured in Israeli strikes since 2 March, when Hezbollah targeted Israel in response to the US-Israeli assassination of Iran's supreme leader Ali Khamenei.

Local sources told The New Arab that an Apache helicopter fired at least one missile at a facility belonging to security forces in the Ansar area, west of Gaza City. The sources said that the helicopter was circulating at low altitudes for a while amid intense drone activity.

Gaza’s Ministry of Interior said that three security officers and personnel were killed in the attack, while a fourth was seriously wounded. Several civilians were also injured in the strikes.

The dead and some of the wounded were transferred to the Al-Shifa Hospital, while one of the injured was taken to the Palestinian Red Crescent’s al-Saraya Field Hospital.

Israel has launched near-daily attacks on Gaza despite a ceasefire in place since October while blocking aid and carrying out daily demolition of buildings in the enclave.

This week, the Gaza government media office said Israeli forces had committed at least 377 violations of the truce during April 2026, resulting in the killing of 111 Palestinians and the wounding of 376 others.

The government said the Israeli attacks represent "a clear and serious breach" of the truce that have exacerbated the already dire humanitarian situation in the enclave.

It added that Israel had only allowed 4,503 aid trucks to enter Gaza in April, even though the ceasefire agreement stipulates that 18,000 should enter.

The restrictions on aid have had a knock-on effect on essential services such as healthcare and water supplies, while only a few patients have been allowed to leave Gaza for life-saving treatment.

Hamas slammed the recent bombings, calling them a "repetition of the scenes of the genocide and the daily killing of our people, in complete disregard for the ceasefire".

The movement called on mediators to intervene, stop the killings, and compel Israel to abide by the terms of the ceasefire deal.

Hamas spokesperson Hazem Qassem said on Thursday that the group is in contact with mediators, particularly Egypt, regarding the second phase of the truce agreement.

"What is required is the implementation of the first phase of the deal as stipulated in the agreement, followed by discussions regarding the second phase," he said, noting that calls for Hamas to disarm "align with the Israeli position and aims to undermine the existing agreement".

The latest developments come as authorities in Gaza grapple to deal with the number of missing people and those trapped under the rubble since the truce came into effect.

Continued Israeli attacks and restrictions on equipment needed to remove the rubble have hindered the process. Medical teams have so far recovered 769 bodies from beneath the rubble since October.

The verdict came on the same day that the United Nations' rights chief urged Tunisian authorities to end widening repression targeting civil society organisations, journalists, rights defenders and opposition figures.

Zied el-Heni, a vocal critic of President Kais Saied, was arrested on April 24 after an investigation was opened into remarks he made earlier that month.

At the time, he had decried journalists being "unjustly" convicted by judges he called "criminals", according to his lawyer.

Heni was prosecuted under a law that sets a penalty of up to two years in prison for "anyone who knowingly harms others or disturbs their peace through public telecommunications networks", including social media.

In a statement announcing the verdict, Heni's support committee quoted him as saying the trial was "illegitimate" and that he would "not recognise it nor any outcomes resulting from it, and I will not appeal the verdict".

In 2024, he was given a suspended six-month sentence on the same charge after calling for the dismissal of a former trade minister on a radio programme.

Since President Saied staged a sweeping power grab in 2021 - in what critics have called a coup - rights groups have denounced a regression in freedoms in the country. Dozens of Saied's critics are currently behind bars.

UN rights chief Volker Turk on Thursday pointed to the "continued repression and restrictions on civic space by the Tunisian authorities", and demanded they "release immediately and unconditionally all those detained or imprisoned for having expressed their views".

He is now the new president of the Sudanese Club, founded in 1967 and located at the heart of Beirut.

"These walls have witnessed our joys and sorrows," Kamal tells The New Arab, sitting at his desk, surrounded by stacks of mattresses, boxes of canned goods and hygiene products.

He describes the Sudanese community in Lebanon as one that loves to co-exist and connect in all circumstances.

The Sudanese migrant community in Lebanon is one of its most prominent, as well as one of the most impacted by the country's 2024 and 2026 wars with Israel.

This impact became more layered with the start of the Sudan civil war in April 2023, which entered its fourth year on 15 April 2026.

"War reveals many things," Kamal continues. "The conflict in Sudan affected the Sudanese diaspora worldwide and caused a lot of destruction and death."

The war in Sudan is a brutal struggle for power between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the rival paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), erupting in April 2023 after years of instability following the fall of Omar al-Bashir in 2019.

Increasingly shaped by external backing for both sides, the conflict has evolved into an attritional proxy war and triggered one of the gravest humanitarian catastrophes in the world.

More than 12 million people have been displaced, making Sudan the site of the world's largest and fastest-growing displacement crisis.

War in both homes

Omar* (name changed for anonymity) is a Sudanese refugee who arrived in Lebanon after April 2023 and left during the first Israeli escalation in Lebanon in September 2024.

"A Sudanese friend in Beirut helped me settle," the 33-year-old filmmaker tells The New Arab, "but living through two wars at the same time was too much."

What followed was a fractured journey out of Sudan: from Khartoum to Gezira, into Ethiopia, through Beirut, and at last to the UAE.

"The priority was to get the girls and women in my family out of Sudan as quickly as possible because of the widespread sexual violence," he says.

Sexual violence has become one of the defining brutalities of Sudan's war, with women and girls bearing much of its toll. Between January 2024 and November 2025, at least 3,396 survivors of sexual assault sought medical treatment at Doctors Without Borders-supported facilities in North and South Darfur, a figure the organisation says captures only a fraction of the abuse.

Yet crossing Sudan's borders offered no clean escape. In Lebanon, Sudanese migrants have found themselves trapped between one war and another, navigating economic collapse, repeated displacement and Israeli bombardment since October 2023 in a country that was meant to offer temporary shelter.

Sudanese officials say at least six Sudanese nationals have been killed in Israeli attacks in Lebanon, including two men killed in an airstrike on Beirut on 28 March 2026.

According to Dr Jasmin Lilian Diab, Assistant Professor of Migration Studies and Director of the Institute for Migration Studies at the Lebanese American University, Sudanese migrants in Lebanon face "layered displacement," fleeing war in Sudan to encounter precarity and insecurity in Lebanon.

"While the UNHCR and some NGOs have provided limited assistance, support has been inconsistent, neglecting the legal realities of Sudanese nationals," Dr Jasmin tells The New Arab.

Displaced Sudanese refugees have been demanding resettlement to a third country for a long time, reiterating that the files of many people are on hold at the agency with no explanation.

The UNHCR Communications Associate Liza Abou Khaled tells The New Arab that the agency provides protection and assistance based on the individual needs of refugees and their identified vulnerabilities.

"It is important to note that resettlement in third countries remains a limited protection tool, reserved for refugees facing acute protection risks that cannot be addressed in Lebanon. The process is also dependent on the commitment of said third countries to receive refugees under resettlement programmes," she explains.

The status of refugees and migrants in Lebanon has always been fickle, given that Lebanon has not ratified the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, the primary global foundation for refugee protection, which covers basic human rights such as the right to work, education, shelter, and legal protection.

However, a 2003 Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed with the UNHCR grants the agency jurisdiction over refugees' and migrants' asylum claims and classifies Lebanon as a country of transit rather than a country of asylum.

Community solidarity as a survival strategy

With the onset of the civil war in Sudan, an estimated 2,000 to 4,000 Sudanese arrived in Lebanon, bringing the community's total to approximately 14,600, according to estimates based on IOM Lebanon's 2023 Migrant Presence Monitoring Report.

Sudanese migrants, like all other migrant communities in Lebanon, work under the Kafala System, a sponsorship system that legally binds a migrant worker to a Lebanese sponsor who controls all aspects of their working conditions.

In recent years, their wages have lost significant value, decreasing their remittances home and increasing poverty levels.

Socio-economic conditions continue to deteriorate today due to the drastic spike in food and fuel prices with the onset of the US-Israel offensive on Iran and the consequent closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

But Sudanese communal bonds, visible in spaces like The Sudanese Club, provide a lifeline, especially as the community found itself continuously neglected by the Lebanese government.

"It is a structural problem that has very deep roots. I don't know how this can be fixed," Kamal tells The New Arab, describing the dysfunction in Lebanon's system and how it impacts Sudanese migrants.

"No one contacted us from the Ministry of Social Affairs. Absolutely no one," he says. 

The New Arab reached out to the Ministry of Social Affairs for comment on its current emergency response strategy for displaced Sudanese nationals, but received no response by the time of publication. 

Deflected responsibility and fragmented support leave the Sudanese community with no option but to stand together and provide for itself.

Like many other community leaders, Kamal is closely involved in the club's initiatives.

"Crisis has a ripple effect," Kamal says, describing the impact of Lebanon's economic crisis and wars on his community, "but we are always there for each other."

The Sudanese Club's Ramadan iftar committee is one such example, becoming a disaster management committee at the beginning of the March 2026 escalation.

The club was forced to halt its membership fees temporarily, and was supported by other migrant groups with gas and generator fees.

The Sudanese club is regularly visited by Sudanese migrants from all over the country.

During both escalations, it hosted displaced families and provided for them by leveraging strong networks with solidarity collectives and organisations in Lebanon.

Dr Jasmin says these Sudanese community networks have become a vital yet under-recognised source of aid, information-sharing, and psychosocial support.

"These networks demonstrate strong forms of mutual aid and solidarity, yet remain severely under-resourced and are frequently excluded from formal humanitarian coordination mechanisms," she explains.

"In order for solidarity and communal support to continue, governmental institutions must include Sudanese nationals in decision-making that affects their communities."

Nour Nahhas is an independent writer and researcher based in Beirut

Ties between France and Algeria have been fraught since 2024, when Paris officially backed Moroccan sovereignty over the disputed Western Sahara, where Algeria supports the pro-independence Polisario Front.

French Deputy Armed Forces Minister Alice Rufo landed in Setif, eastern Algeria, on Friday to attend ceremonies marking the 1945 repression of mainly Muslim Algerian protesters by French colonial troops.

Rufo was accompanied by Ambassador Stephane Romatet, who will resume his duties in the North African country more than a year after being recalled from his post.

The visit marks a major sign of rapprochement between Algiers and Paris, with the Elysee saying it reflected the "determination to address relations between France and Algeria with honesty, while respecting all the memories connected to them" and to "restore an effective dialogue".

The 1945 crackdown led by French General Raymond Duval left as many as 45,000 people dead, according to Algerian figures. Pro-independence protests broke out following a rally on May 8 of that year marking the allied victory over Nazi Germany.

Tensions between Algiers and Paris worsened in 2024 over the arrest of French-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal - who was pardoned last November - and in April 2025 when an Algerian consular official was charged in France over the alleged abduction of Algerian influencer and government critic Amir DZ.

Friday's visit is the second trip to Algeria by a French cabinet ministry in less than three months, following Interior Minister Laurent Nunez's visit in February.

While both countries show signs of a diplomatic thaw, an unresolved issue remains the detention of a French sports journalist in Algeria on terror charges.

Christophe Gleizes, 37, was arrested in May 2024 while travelling to northeastern Algeria's Kabylia region to write about the country's most decorated football club, Jeunesse Sportive de Kabylie.

In June last year, he was sentenced to seven years in jail for "glorifying terrorism" after being accused of having been in contact with a member of the Movement for the Self-Determination of Kabylie (MAK), a foreign-based group that Algiers has designated a terrorist organisation.

His family said last week Gleizes had withdrawn his appeal to Algeria's highest court, a move seen as opening the way for a presidential pardon.

This comes amid incendiary rhetoric from US President Donald Trump, who threatened to decimate "a whole civilisation" and bomb Iran "back to the Stone Age".

These remarks have lent credence to growing speculation that the war's ultimate intent is "civilisational erasure."

Attacks on Iran's centuries-old heritage sites, either through direct bombardment or neglect, are spurring calls for a "cultural security" campaign in the region in the face of what some warn may amount to culturecide.

When these sites are hit by drones and missiles, it is not just buildings that are destroyed, but the histories and stories they carry, some of which may be lost for good.

Across the border from Iran, this danger is known all too well in Iraq.

From the Mongol sack of Baghdad in the 13th century to the US-led invasion in 2003, and the devastation wrought by ISIS, much of its ancient heritage has been damaged, looted or reduced to rubble.

It is against this long memory of loss that even the smallest remnants take on outsized meaning.

Enter a crumbling riverside house on the banks of the Tigris in Baghdad, which has become an unlikely cause célèbre.

Local and regional newspapers have returned to it repeatedly, drawn by the suggestion that Agatha Christie and her husband, the archaeologist Max Mallowan, once stayed within its fading walls in what is now a neglected corner of the Karrada district.

The building itself is badly derelict. Balconies sag over the river, plaster peels from the walls.

In the courtyard, a small family of chickens clucks, indifferent to the sudden attention focused on the ruin. The caretaker gestures toward an upstairs room.

"There," he routinely tells visitors, "that's where Miss Christie wrote her novels."

It is, of course, impossible to verify, or even to reach.

Authorities have warned against climbing the unstable stairs, let alone stepping onto a floor that is constantly at risk of collapse.

Whether Christie ever lived there may never be definitively proven. Archival records are scarce, and those who might have remembered those days are long gone.

Yet buildings, even in ruin, have stories to tell. This house holds clues not only to a famous visitor but also to a way of life and to a Baghdad now largely erased.

Beyond the Christie question

The idea of an "Agatha Christie House" offers a ready-made narrative — international, literary and exportable — and it is hardly surprising that it has captured public imagination.

Attention has filtered upward: inspections have reportedly been ordered, and senior figures have made visits.

Recently, Iraq's First Lady, Shanaz Ibrahim Ahmad, visited the house and called for its restoration and conversion into a museum to safeguard the Iraqi capital's cultural legacy for future generations.

Yet beneath the headlines, uncertainty remains.

No document conclusively places Christie there. Oral histories are patchy, and any paper trail that once existed has long since been lost or destroyed.

Public fascination, however, rarely lingers on ambiguity. It gravitates toward celebrity.

While such attention may yet save the house, it also risks eclipsing a more compelling truth. Its significance does not rest solely on who may have passed through its doors.

Stripped of speculation, the house still speaks with remarkable clarity. Its architecture tells a story independent of any famous guest; how Baghdad's riverside families once lived, moved and understood their city.

The courtyard, now cracked and overgrown, was the social heart of the home: a place for conversation, meals and respite from the heat.

The balconies oriented toward the Tigris, known as shenasil in Iraq, were not ornamental but practical, catching the breeze and keeping daily life in constant dialogue with the river below.

Layered thresholds reveal an intricate choreography between public and private space, hospitality and retreat.

Houses like this once lined the banks; few survive today.

With their disappearance comes not only architectural loss, but the erosion of social life, environmental comfort and neighbourhood cohesion.

In this sense, the building is not merely a decorative footnote to someone else's story. Reading They Came to Baghdad today, Christie's novel offers a lens into a Baghdad that has largely vanished, even if it cannot serve as evidence of her actual stays.

Her characters, many of whom were multilingual, mobile, and culturally fluent, bear more than a passing resemblance to real historical figures who moved effortlessly across the late-Ottoman and early-Iraqi landscapes.

Henry "Fakir" Carmichael is the most vivid of these figures: a British agent in his early thirties, born in Kashgar, in China's Xinjiang Province, where his father was a government official, a childhood that saw him grow up speaking many Middle Eastern languages and dialects, making him "an expert at blending in".

He is described in the novel as fluent in Arabic, Kurdish, Persian, Armenian, Hindi, Turkish and "numerous mountain dialects". He is befriended by tribesmen, at ease across borders.

Carmichael slips between Arab and Western identities as circumstances demand. In one scene, dressed as an Arab, he encounters an old Eton schoolmate in the British Consulate's waiting room in Basra.

Figures like Carmichael, the archetypal "third culture kid", were common in a city defined by hybridity.

Diplomats, archaeologists, merchants and local elites who spoke multiple languages, navigated shifting political boundaries and lived lives that blended cultures and traditions.

Steamships, languages, and the making of a river cosmopolitan

Christie did not invent this type from whole cloth. One striking real-life parallel is Lieutenant Commander Charles Henry Cowley, a British naval reserve officer born in Baghdad in 1872 and raised on the banks of the Tigris.

The son of a senior captain with the Euphrates and Tigris Steamship Navigation Company and a woman of Armenian-Persian descent — at a time when borders across what are now Armenia, Iran, and Iraq were far more porous, allowing for this kind of fluidity — Cowley grew up among river pilots, merchants, interpreters and steamship captains, absorbing languages and cultures along Iraq's waterways.

Educated in Liverpool, he returned to Baghdad after his father's death to work in the river trade, eventually becoming the company's senior captain.

During the First World War, tasked with ferrying British troops and supplies up the Tigris, he became a persistent menace to Ottoman forces, who dubbed him "the pirate of Basra."

Fluent in Arabic and other regional languages, Cowley embodied an older Mesopotamian cosmopolitanism rooted in trade rather than borders.

During the doomed 1916 attempt to break the siege of Kut, regarded as Britain's worst military defeat of the war, his ship was ambushed.

Captured, Cowley was almost certainly executed, but later awarded the Victoria Cross.

From Baghdad to Lima

In contrast, Western historiography has relied heavily on figures such as Gertrude Bell and T.E. Lawrence, producing simplified narratives of loyalty, identity and empire that obscure the city's everyday cosmopolitan networks.

Christie's fiction, however, captures the ambiguity and overlap of such lives.

It was these hybrid existences that shaped spaces like the riverside house: courtyards designed for conversation, balconies for observation, thresholds that moderated public and private life.

In accommodating hybridity, the architecture reflects a society at ease with fluid identities, making the house a testament to a cosmopolitan Baghdad that literature preserves even as time steadily erases it.

Yet the reality of preserving the house is stark. Many of its original features may be impossible to save.

Architects and engineers who have glimpsed the interiors warn that any serious restoration could run into the millions of dollars, a daunting figure for a single derelict property. 

Such costs are compounded by the absence of an effective preservation policy.

Heritage institutions are underfunded, lack enforcement power and operate without the political backing needed to protect historic buildings, most of which remain in private hands.

Faced with these realities, the economic question is inevitable: why pour funds into a ruin when a shopping mall promises steady returns, or a residential tower guarantees far greater profit?

Yet this purely financial lens carries a hidden cost: heritage, when measured solely by short-term gain, often loses out.

Buildings like this house do more than provide shelter; they preserve memory, architecture, and urban identity, much as places like Istanbul's Pera Palace Hotel or the steamships that once carried Agatha Christie down the Nile have come to embody histories far larger than their original function.

When market pressures dominate, the city risks erasing these windows into its past.

The challenge is to recognise that the value of preservation cannot always be reduced to dollars.

Some legacies are priceless, even if they do not promise immediate returns. 

In terms of architectural history, this house is connected to a broader Islamicate culture.

Its spatial organisation centres on an interior courtyard, a form shared by Moroccan riads and the cármenes of Andalusia in southern Spain.

The wooden shenasil balconies, known as mashrabiyya in standard Arabic, travelled westward to Seville during the city's Muslim period, and were later carried by the Spanish as far as Lima, Peru.

The same Iraqi balcony tradition would centuries later inspire the Mosul-born architect Dame Zaha Hadid, who reinterpreted it in her designs for a modern high-rise hotel in Qatar. 

A fragile witness to the past

As the Tigris flows past its crumbling walls, the house is a witness to a past that can no longer speak for itself.

Heritage is a civic responsibility, and the attacks on Iran's historical sites are a reminder that they are a global public good that the international community should denounce when targeted during wartime.

Fragile though it may be, the riverside house functions as a civic asset, a pedagogical tool and a spatial archive of a bygone Baghdad that cannot be fully conveyed through books or photographs alone.

Its preservation is a duty of the state, as custodian of the public good.

Should the house vanish, the loss would extend far beyond the uncertainty of an Agatha Christie connection.

We may never know who once slept within its rooms, whether "the Queen of Crime" or another forgotten guest.

What is certain is this: the house itself holds stories. Whether preserved, partially restored or carefully documented, it deserves to be heard before it disappears.

Even in ruin, it still speaks if we choose to listen.

Tanya Goudsouzian is a Canadian journalist who has covered the Middle East and Afghanistan for over two decades and is a former Opinion Editor at Al Jazeera English Online

Ibrahim al-Marashi is an associate professor of Middle East history and visiting faculty at The American College of the Mediterranean. His publications include Iraq's Armed Forces: An Analytical History (2008), The Modern History of Iraq (2017), and A Concise History of the Middle East (2024)

The US State Department on Thursday announced sanctions on Ali Maarij al-Bahadli, saying he "abused his government position to divert Iraqi oil in support of the Iranian regime and its terrorist proxies."

It accused him of fraudulently mixing Iraqi and Iranian oil as part of a scheme to help Iran avoid sanctions.

His ministry said late Thursday that "it denies the accusations" against Bahadli and stressed "the importance of transparency in addressing all... accusations on the basis of evidence and facts," according to the INA state news agency.

The ministry said it was prepared to investigate the matter, but added that "crude oil export operations, marketing, loading onto tankers, and related procedures" were not part of Bahadli's job.

After entities run by an Iraqi businessman were sanctioned over the same accusations last year, Iraq's state oil marketing company SOMO denied that any oil mixing operations were taking place in the country's ports or territorial waters to help Iran.

The United States has unilateral sanctions against Iranian oil, seeking to punish any country or company that buys it.

Iran, led by Shia clerics, has had close relations with many key players in Shia-majority Iraq since the 2003 US invasion toppled Saddam Hussein.

Washington, which holds major sway in Iraq has also been escalating pressure on the Iraqi state to disarm Tehran-backed armed groups, which the US designates as terrorist organisations.

Since the United States and Israel attacked Iran on February 28, those groups have hit US facilities in Iraq more than 600 times before a ceasefire was announced, according to a US official.

Against this backdrop, Haneen Alamssi, 33, an architect from Gaza City, has dedicated herself to preserving culture during the ongoing Israeli aggression, working alongside a dozen young women volunteers who share her commitment to protecting the city's history and passing it on to future generations.

"The initiative was born out of the sheer darkness of the landscape in Gaza," Haneen tells The New Arab.

Her voluntary project seeks to provide "first aid" to the Al-Omari Mosque library's remaining books and ancient manuscripts, which have been targeted by Israeli strikes three times since 2023.

The attacks left the historic building with major structural damage and buried centuries of history beneath the rubble.

With a heavy heart, Haneen, who is also a specialist engineer in the restoration of art, sculptures and murals, and the executive director of the Eyes on Heritage Foundation, describes the Al-Omari library as it stood before 2023.

She recalls the library as a popular destination for school field trips.

"There isn't a child in Gaza, in primary or preparatory school, who hasn't visited it and explored its treasures and manuscripts," she says.

Loss of a historic archive

The library is housed within the Great Omari Mosque, an important Islamic landmark in the heart of Gaza's Old City that resonates with Palestinians.

More than just a building, it gathered the heritage of scholars from Acre, Jerusalem and beyond — a legacy evidenced by handwritten dedications inscribed on the pages of its rare volumes.

As Haneen notes, it served as a vital social institution, uniting the intellectual community. With roots stretching back more than 1,400 years, the landmark has evolved through six distinct architectural eras.

Before its destruction, the library housed 20,000 items, including rare books, periodicals, contracts and journals.

Everything rare was burned. There was an exceptionally rare 700-year-old Mamluk-era manuscript — the Diwan of Ibn Zuqa'a al-Ghazzi — which Haneen pulled from under the rubble, only to find it unrecoverable.

Haneen says this is the only surviving library, as others were directly incinerated and targeted by Israel in what she describes as a systematic cultural genocide.

"We have salvaged what could be salvaged to try to rise again, so that it may be a glimmer of hope for future generations," she says, adding that the losses are "catastrophic and beyond description."

The destruction of Gaza's intellectual landscape is extensive, with UNESCO verifying damage to 164 cultural sites.

At least 13 major libraries have been devastated, including the 150-year-old Central Archives.

The vanishing archive

The Eyes on Heritage Foundation, established in Gaza in 2009 by historian Dr Abd al-Latif Abu Hashem, was completely destroyed in an Israeli strike in September 2025. This follows an earlier incident in 2014, when the foundation's headquarters were also destroyed in a strike.

With its destruction, hundreds of documents, manuscripts and archives have been lost.

According to Haneen, Gaza's community had placed deep trust in the organisation to safeguard their ancestral legacy, as it remained strictly independent and free of political affiliations.

This loss compelled her to preserve whatever she could in the remaining libraries.

In response, Haneen brought together and trained a group of young women to rescue what remained of the Al-Omari library. 

They were driven by a shared sense of responsibility, working in hazardous conditions, including dust, animal remains, high humidity, and the overwhelming smell of decaying books.

Haneen says that she and the team funded all necessary supplies themselves, buying brushes, gloves, and sponges, while each of the women also brought whatever they could from their own homes, such as tissues, towels, and even brooms.

Describing the early stages of the work, Haneen explains how the team approached the task.

"On the first day, before moving a single stone, we held a one-hour training session. I taught them what to document, what to excavate and how to take safety precautions," Haneen tells The New Arab.

"I instructed them to isolate books that were covered in ash or stuck together and to hand them to me personally so I could handle them with extreme care. We haven't moved to full restoration yet; what we are doing is urgent 'first aid' and emergency response," she explains.

A race to preserve a vanishing archive

The team has since been providing 'first aid' to all surviving manuscripts, spanning jurisprudence, poetry, literature and history. They began this work on 29 January 2025, and the timeline remains open-ended.

"This mission is larger than any single organisation," Haneen says.

For now, the focus remains on emergency measures, as full restoration is impossible due to a lack of resources and essential chemicals.

"We need a 70 percent concentration of alcohol. The healthcare system has collapsed, and I have been waiting for six months for someone to provide the alcohol needed to separate fused and mouldy manuscripts through a delicate 'surgical' process," she shares.

"I recently obtained only 40 ml, which I used to work on three sets, but I still have more than 30 sets requiring treatment. This work is expected to continue for the next 20 years," she explains.

Although the team secured a temporary storage site, it was later bombed. Despite this, they have no choice but to continue using what remains.

The original library is currently inaccessible and requires sealing, ventilation, sterilisation, and extensive re-sorting before any materials can safely be returned.

Reflecting on the wider impact, Haneen says: "We are the children of this city, which has endured a genocide affecting people, stone, trees and even the air. The library suffered alongside us and bore the burden. I tell the volunteers, 'Look at the amount of oppression etched onto every book; it has accumulated for years.' The books have grown heavy with moisture and mould."

Despite the despair in her voice, she maintains a sense of purpose.

"To work on rescuing something that almost survived, amidst the execution of culture and the burning of libraries, gives you hope in the middle of suffocating pain," she says.

However, when asked what people outside Gaza can do to support the mission, she gives a clear and serious answer.

"I might sound pessimistic if I say that I hope for nothing. The matter is greater than all of us, and the political reality forces hopelessness upon you," she says.

For Haneen, pursuing a PhD remains a goal, but the manuscripts come first, as she says, "I cannot depart until they have been saved."

Having already witnessed the loss of 80% of Gaza's documentary heritage, she and her team say they are prepared to volunteer for a lifetime to ensure the remaining archives find a dignified home.

As she puts it: "We need a place that protects this legacy so that those who come a hundred years from now can see it."

Tala Halawa is a Palestinian journalist, media trainer, and lecturer with 15+ years in storytelling, podcasts, editorial leadership, and multi-genre content creation

Follow her on Instagram: @talahalawa

Iran and the United States exchanged fire overnight Thursday-Friday despite a truce in place since April 8 that paused the weeks-long war. An Iranian official said that those overnight attacks in and near the Strait of Hormuz struck an Iranian cargo vessel, wounding 10 sailors and leaving five others missing.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington was expecting a response from Iran on Friday to US proposals for a deal to end the conflict. He also slammed as "unacceptable" efforts by Iran to control the Strait of Hormuz, following a report that Tehran has created an authority to approve transit through the vital waterway.

Also on Friday, the United Arab Emirates - which has bore the brunt of Iranian attacks on the Gulf - said an Iranian missile and drone strike on the country resulted in three moderate injuries.

In south Lebanon, Israeli strikes killed several people as fighting continued despite a truce with Hezbollah.

The US military said it carried out strikes on Iranian military targets in response, although Tehran charged that it was Washington that had initiated the exchange of fire.

The violence threatened to unravel a fragile truce in effect since 8 April that brought an end to weeks of US-Israeli attacks on the Islamic republic, which has retaliated with strikes across the Middle East and by blocking the strait, a vital route for oil and gas shipments.

Asked in Washington if the Iran ceasefire was still on, Trump said: "Yeah it is. They trifled with us today. We blew them away. They trifled. I call that a trifle."

US Central Command (CENTCOM) said in a post on X that Iranian forces launched "multiple missiles, drones and small boats" at the three US warships, but none were hit, and that it "eliminated inbound threats and targeted Iranian military facilities responsible".

"CENTCOM does not seek escalation but remains positioned and ready to protect American forces," it said.

For its part, Iran's central military command accused the United States of violating the ceasefire by attacking an oil tanker and another ship, saying Tehran's forces "immediately and in retaliation attacked American military vessels."

Trump had fueled hopes of a deal just the day before, saying an agreement could be near, even as he again threatened to return to bombing if Tehran refused to back down.

He doubled down on that stance after Thursday's clash, posting on his Truth Social platform: "We'll knock them out a lot harder, and a lot more violently, in the future, if they don't get their Deal signed, FAST!" he said.

Iran's foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said Tehran would communicate its position to mediator Pakistan "after finalising its views".

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif had struck an optimistic tone prior to the exchanges of fire on Thursday, saying in televised remarks: "I firmly believe that this ceasefire will turn into a long-term ceasefire."

Lebanon talks

But, inside Iran, civilians were cynical.

"Neither side in these negotiations is really capable of reaching an agreement," 42-year-old photographer Shervin told AFP reporters in Paris, messaging from Tehran.

"This is another one of Trump's games; otherwise, why are so many warships and military forces being sent toward Iran?"

Any agreement between the United States and Iran could also help lower tensions in Lebanon, where a separate truce was under renewed strain after an Israeli strike on southern Beirut killed a commander from militant group Hezbollah on Wednesday.

A US State Department official confirmed on Thursday that the new Israel-Lebanon talks would take place on 14 and 15 May.

It will be the third meeting in recent months between the two countries, which have technically been at war for decades and have no diplomatic relations.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Tuesday that a peace deal between the two sides was "eminently achievable," insisting Hezbollah was the sticking point, rather than any issue between the two governments.

Lebanon was drawn into the Middle East war when Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel in retaliation for the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Ships, crew stranded

A ceasefire between the two countries and including Hezbollah was extended after the last round of talks in Washington, but Israel has kept up its strikes on the group, which has claimed attacks of its own on Israeli forces occupying parts of Lebanon's south.

Lebanon's health ministry reported at least 12 people killed in a series of Israeli airstrikes on Thursday.

Following the start of the war with US-Israeli attacks on 28 February, Iran largely shuttered the Strait of Hormuz.

Around 1,500 ships and 20,000 international crew are now trapped in the Gulf region because of the conflict, the secretary-general of the UN's International Maritime Organization, Arsenio Dominguez, told a Maritime Convention of the Americas meeting in Panama.

Trump had this week briefly launched a naval operation to force open the strait to commercial vessels, only to stand it down within hours, citing progress on negotiations with Iran.

The US president - who has lambasted Europe for not backing his war against Iran - said on Thursday he had a "great call" with European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen, saying they were "completely united that Iran can never have a nuclear weapon".

An Israeli settler suspected of kicking and wounding a French Catholic nun in Jerusalem will go on trial for assault motivated by hostility towards a religious group, Israel's justice ministry said on Thursday.

The assault on the nun, a 48-year-old researcher at Jerusalem's French School of Biblical and Archaeological Research, occurred on Mount Zion, just outside the Old City.

The suspect, named Yona Simcha Schreiber, 36, is from an illegal settlement in the occupied West Bank named Peduel.

He has been under arrest since 29 April, and the prosecution has asked that he remain in detention until the trial, the ministry said in a statement.

The man faces a charge of assault resulting in injuries, motivated by hostility towards a religious group.

Surveillance footage from the scene showed an attacker rushing towards the nun, who was dressed in a white habit and black veil, and violently pushing her to the ground, her head hitting a stone block.

The man leaves, only to return and kick her before being stopped by a passer-by.

The French consulate in Jerusalem had condemned the attack, demanding that the man behind it be brought to trial.

At the time, the Faculty of Humanities at Jerusalem's Hebrew University in a statement expressed "profound shock and condemnation", and deplored the increasingly common nature of the attack.

"This is not an isolated incident, but part of a troubling pattern of rising hostility towards the Christian community and its symbols," the faculty said.

Israel's foreign ministry condemned the "shameful act" in a statement on X, and claimed Israel remained committed "to safeguarding freedom of religion and freedom of worship for all faiths".

Israeli soldiers and individuals, however, have repeatedly attacked both Palestinian Muslim and Christian people and places of worship over the decades.

In a letter to the US Department of Justice - which oversees the Federal Bureau of Investigation - and FBI chief Kash Patel, the global press freedoms group demanded a "public progress update" on Abu Akleh's death.

"Although the FBI reportedly opened an investigation into her killing in November 2022, it has made no demonstrable progress," the letter noted, adding that CPJ was "not aware that any formal interviews have been conducted with witnesses despite the willingness of multiple witnesses to cooperate."

"This troubling lack of concrete progress - four years after Abu Akleh's death - represents a profound failure of the US government to respond promptly and impartially to the killing of one of its citizens by a foreign military."

Abu Akleh was 51 when she was fatally shot on 11 May 2022 by Israeli soldiers while covering an Israeli raid on the Jenin refugee camp in the north of the occupied West Bank, CPJ said.

Then-Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett initially claimed gunfire from Palestinian fighters was the likely cause of her death.

The Israeli military later released a statement saying it was "not possible to unequivocally determine the source of the gunfire" that killed Abu Akleh, adding there was "a high possibility that Ms. Abu Akleh was accidentally hit by IDF gunfire."

Truth in conflict

But CPJ notes that multiple independent investigations from leading news organisations "concluded that Abu Akleh was killed by Israeli military fire; some found evidence that she was deliberately targeted."

Abu Akleh was "a household name across the Middle East, widely respected for her courageous and in-depth reporting on Palestinian life," CPJ said, adding that she was wearing a vest marked "PRESS" and "clearly identified as press at the time of her killing."

In a separate statement on Thursday, Abu Akleh's family also sought justice for violence at the veteran reporter's funeral - Israeli police attacked her pallbearers, who nearly dropped her coffin - saying "no one has been brought to justice, neither for her killing nor for the attack on her funeral."

"Her killing was not only a tragic loss for our family, but also a grave attack on press freedom and the fundamental right to report the truth," the family's statement said. "This ongoing impunity sends a dangerous message that journalists can be targeted without consequence."

Abu Akleh's death also made her a broader symbol of the Palestinian struggle: murals of her face adorn walls, her office's street in Ramallah was renamed in her honor and a museum was named for her.

In addition to demanding a public update on the investigation, press advocates called for the FBI to commit to a timeline to "complete a thorough criminal investigation and publicly release its findings," urging the agency to maintain an impartial and independent inquiry "free from political considerations."

CPJ said since Abu Akleh's killing, Israel has killed 258 more journalists and media workers across the Middle East, including 207 in Gaza alone.

Israel was responsible for two-thirds of journalist deaths in 2025, CPJ said.

Lebanon's health ministry reported at least 12 people killed, including two children and a paramedic, in a series of Israeli airstrikes on Thursday in spite of a ceasefire.

The new deaths came a day after Israel killed a Hezbollah commander in its first attack on Beirut's southern suburbs since the shaky truce sought to end weeks of fighting.

In separate statements, the health ministry reported 11 people killed, two of them children, in strikes on three different villages in Nabatieh district.

Another strike in Marjayoun district killed one paramedic from the Hezbollah-affilitated Islamic Health Committee rescue service and wounded one more, the ministry said, decrying the attack as a crime.

A strike earlier in the day in Nabatieh district had wounded two other paramedics from the same organisation, according to a spokesperson.

Lebanese state media had reported Israeli strikes across a number of southern towns and villages on Thursday, and the Israeli army issued fresh evacuation warnings for three villages north of the Litani River - outside the area still occupied by its troops following their ground invasion.

The Israeli army said on Thursday that its strike the day before on the capital's southern suburbs had killed "the Commander of Hezbollah's 'Radwan Force' Unit", an elite unit within Iran-backed Hezbollah.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later said that "no terrorist is immune" from Israeli strikes, and vowed the same for "anyone who threatens the State of Israel".

A ceasefire in the war between Hezbollah and Israel began on 17 April, but combat has continued in southern Lebanon.

Wednesday's strike near Beirut, however, came as a shock in Lebanon.

AFP photographs taken in the southern suburbs showed the top floors of a residential building totally destroyed, and rescuers searching through the rubble on Thursday morning.

Other Israeli strikes on the southern city of Nabatieh targeted a shopping centre and residential buildings, state media and an AFP correspondent said.

The Israeli military said in a statement Thursday that an "explosive drone impact" wounded four soldiers - one severely -- in southern Lebanon the previous day.

Hezbollah has regularly vowed to respond to Israel's daily violations of the ceasefire with retaliatory attacks.

Since Lebanon was dragged into the Middle East on 2 March following the US-Israeli joint assault on Iran, Israeli strikes have killed more than 2,700 people in the country.

Two attacks in central Mali claimed by Al-Qaeda-linked jihadists have killed more than 30 people, local, security and administrative sources told AFP on Thursday.

The two strikes came less than a fortnight after a large-scale, coordinated offensive by jihadists and separatists on junta positions, which plunged the west African country into a fresh security crisis.

"At least 35 people were killed on Wednesday in near simultaneous attacks" on the villages of Korikori and Gomossogou, a youth official said.

A security and an administrative source both reported more than 30 dead in the assaults, claimed by the Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM).

WAMAPS, a group of west African journalists specialising in Sahel security, said the provisional toll was more than 50 villagers killed and several still missing.

"Villages have been looted and some properties set on fire," the group added.

The security source said on Thursday's assaults were in retaliation for acts committed by the Dan Nan Ambassagou militia, the best-known of the self-defence groups set up by local communities in response to the assaults plaguing central Mali.

"The victims are mostly militiamen. But there are also teenagers and children," the source told AFP.

Made up mainly of traditional ethnic Dogon hunters, Dan Nan Ambassagou has refused an order to disband by the authorities, who accused the militia of a massacre in the central village of Ogossagou that left 160 dead.

The Malian army said on Thursday it had carried out "a targeted operation against terrorist armed groups" in the area and around a dozen fighters were "neutralised".

It did not give further details.

In a statement on Thursday, the governor of the Bandiagara region "condemned these despicable and inhumane acts in the strongest possible terms".

Central Mali violence

The devastating assaults on 25-26 April by the JNIM and the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA), an ethnic Tuareg separatist movement, targeted strategic towns including Kidal in the desert north, and Kati, a garrison town near the capital Bamako.

Defence Minister Sadio Camara, the 47-year-old architect of Mali's military alliance with Russia, was killed by a car bomb at his residence.

Kidal and other towns and villages in the north were captured and are now under the control of the FLA and the jihadists, who have since imposed a blockade on Bamako.

In recent years, central Mali has also been the theatre of deadly violence.

After the 2019 massacre, Ogossagou was the scene of a February 2020 raid that killed some 30 Fulanis, a nomadic people often accused across the Sahel of aiding jihadists.

The UN has accused the Malian army and allied foreign fighters - likely Russian mercenaries from the Wagner paramilitary group - of executing at least 500 people in March 2022 during an anti-jihadist operation in the town of Moura, a claim which the Malian junta denied.

And in June of that year, more than 130 civilians were killed in the town of Diallassagou in attacks attributed to JNIM jihadists.

Wave of arrests, abductions

On Wednesday, security, legal and family sources told AFP that several opposition figures and military personnel had been detained or abducted following the large-scale attacks on the junta.

The military prosecutor's office said last week it had "solid evidence" of the "complicity" of certain members of the military, accusing them of helping with the "planning, coordination and execution" of the attacks.

But a political official said the wave of arrests and abductions smacked of a witch hunt.

"Everything suggests that these events are being used as an opportunity to carry out a purge within the political opposition and the army," the official told AFP, requesting anonymity for security reasons.

Since 2012, Mali has faced a deep security crisis fuelled in particular by violence from fighters affiliated with Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group, as well as local criminal gangs and pro-independence groups.

On 30 April, the JNIM called for a "common front" to "put an end to the junta" and usher in a peaceful and inclusive transition.

The country has been under military rule since back-to-back coups in 2020.

A Chinese veto would be awkward ahead of US President Donald Trump's trip to China next week, where the Iran war is like to be high on the agenda. A previous resolution backed by the United States that appeared to open a path to legitimising US military action against Iran failed last month after Russia and China exercised their vetoes in the 15-member UN Security Council.

Standing alongside envoys of Gulf countries that support the new draft, Washington's UN envoy Mike Waltz told reporters that any countries that "seek to throw it out, are setting a very, very dangerous precedent".

"We have to ask ourselves, if a country chooses to oppose such a simple proposition, do they really want peace?"

The new text was drafted by the US and Bahrain, with support from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Qatar.

Iran’s UN Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani called the resolution "deeply flawed, one-sided, and politically motivated".

"The United States has neither the legal, political, nor moral standing to portray itself as a defender of freedom of navigation or maritime security," he said, referring to the US military’s blockade on Iranian ships.

Diplomats said the resolution ran into strong Chinese and Russian objections when the Security Council discussed it in closed session this week and would likely prompt them to veto this effort.

Bahrain's UN envoy Jamal ⁠Fares Alrowaiei said Bahrain looked forward "to working constructively with all council members in the days ahead to finalize this text." Waltz's comments came as sources and officials said the United States and Iran were edging toward a temporary agreement to halt their war, with Tehran reviewing a proposal that would stop the fighting but leave the most contentious issues unresolved.

While Russia and China have not officially commented, one diplomat said Russia called for the draft to be withdrawn or completely rewritten. The diplomat said China contended the text was biased and criticised its invocation of Chapter VII of the UN Charter, which allows the Security Council to impose measures ranging from sanctions to military action.

The draft condemns Iran's alleged violations of the current ceasefire and its "actions and threats aimed at closing, obstructing, tolling" freedom of navigation through the strait.

It demands Iran immediately cease attacks, disclose the locations of any mines and not impede clearance operations. On Tuesday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the proposed resolution a test of the utility of the United Nations and urged China and Russia not to veto it.

Israel is widely believed to have developed nuclear weapons in the 1960s but keeps a deliberately ambiguous policy by neither confirming nor denying its arsenal, which is is not subject to any international monitoring.

Some 30 Democratic lawmakers led by Representative Joaquin Castro said that the United States needed clear answers after President Donald Trump joined Israel in a war against Iran, launched in part over charges that Tehran has been seeking to build a weapon through its nominally civilian nuclear programme.

"We cannot develop coherent nonproliferation policy for the Middle East, including with respect to Iran's civil nuclear programme and Saudi Arabia's civil nuclear ambitions, while maintaining a policy of official silence about the nuclear weapons capabilities of one party central to the ongoing conflict in which the United States is a direct participant," they wrote in the letter made public late on Wednesday.

"We ask that you hold Israel to the same standard of transparency that the United States expects from any other country that may be pursuing or retaining nuclear weapons capability."

The lawmakers asked Secretary of State Marco Rubio to reply by 18 May to explain Israel's nuclear capabilities as well as its nuclear doctrine, including whether Israel could use the ultra-destructive weapons in Iran.

They also asked for an assessment of risk for US citizens of any future Iranian strike on Israel's secretive Dimona nuclear research center. Iranian missiles injured dozens nearby in March, stunning residents of the tightly guarded desert town.

It is highly unlikely the administration will respond on Israel's nuclear programme, on which administrations across party lines have long refused to comment.

In 2006, then defence secretary Robert Gates indirectly appeared to confirm Israel's nuclear programme in testimony to Congress while discussing Iran.

Following the outbreak of the war in the Gaza Strip in October 2023, a far-right Israeli minister said the country could drop a nuclear bomb on Gaza, a comment from which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu distanced himself.

Prominent Democrats who signed the letter include representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ro Khanna.

The intervention comes amid escalating criticism of Israel from Democrats. The party has almost universally condemned Trump's decision to join the Iran war, with many lawmakers saying their former president Joe Biden should have been tougher on Israel over its relentless military campaign in Gaza.

"We do not want this war to continue," Rapid Support Forces chief Mohamed Hamdan Daglo told a group of soldiers at an undisclosed location late Wednesday.

But "if they (the army) want it to go on for 40 years, it will continue until they are uprooted".

The remarks by Daglo came a day after Sudan's army-aligned government accused Ethiopia and the United Arab Emirates of launching drone attacks since March on several states across Sudan from inside Ethiopian territory, including strikes on Monday against the capital Khartoum and its airport.

The UAE has been accused of arming the RSF but denies the allegation, while Ethiopia has denied hosting RSF and UAE forces on its territory.

Both countries also denied any involvement in the strikes, the details of which AFP could not independently verify.

Daglo said some RSF forces had not left the capital despite being largely ousted by the army last year, and were still positioned on the outskirts of Omdurman, across the Nile river from central Khartoum.

Khartoum, which had seen relative calm since the army recaptured it, has been struck several times in the past couple of weeks.

On Saturday a drone strike killed five civilians in a vehicle in southern Omdurman, while last week another attack damaged a hospital.

More than 1.8 million displaced people have returned to the city since its recapture, according to UN figures, only to find dilapidated infrastructure and limited access to electricity and water.

Drone attacks by both sides have escalated across Sudan in recent months, killing nearly 700 civilians since January, according to the UN.

The war, now in its fourth year, has killed tens of thousands, displaced millions and created what the United Nations describes as the world's largest displacement and hunger crises.

Efforts to end the conflict - including those by the United States, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, a group known as the Quad - have so far faltered, with the two warring sides failing to agree on a humanitarian ceasefire.

Army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan has repeatedly said his forces will fight until victory, insisting the war will not end unless the RSF surrenders their weapons.

Outside the capital, fighting is raging on several other fronts, including in southern Kordofan and Blue Nile state near the Ethiopian border.

"The continued repression and restrictions on civic space by the Tunisian authorities undermine the rights of people protected under the country's constitution and its international human rights obligations," UN high commissioner for human rights Volker Turk said in a statement.

His comment came after Tunisian authorities this week temporarily banned the local branch of international NGO Avocats Sans Frontieres, days after another leading group, the Tunisian League for Human Rights, was targeted by a similar measure.

Avocats Sans Frontieres told AFP they received a 30-day suspension but did not provide details on the reasons.

The UN rights office said that Tunisian authorities often cite funding and audit irregularities as the basis for suspensions.

"We are observing a growing trend in which Tunisian authorities are resorting to the use of judicially imposed sanctions to curb the exercise of the right to freedom of association with barest consideration for the principles of legality, necessity and proportionality required for such limitations to be permissible," Turk said.

He also highlighted that the Tunisian government in parallel was imposing intensifying restrictions on the media.

Late last month, Tunisian journalist Zied el-Heni, who had criticised court decisions against media colleagues and the judges involved, was arrested for causing "harm to others" and their reputations, his lawyer told AFP.

El-Heni remains in pre-trial detention, the UN rights office said, adding that 28 other journalists were arrested last year, and had been sentenced to various prison terms for conduct linked to their professional activities.

Those arrests, it said, had been based on, among other legislation, provisions of a 2022 decree-law entitled "combating crimes related to information and communication systems".

"I urge the Tunisian authorities to release immediately and unconditionally all those detained or imprisoned for having expressed their views, protected under international human rights law, and to lift all arbitrary restrictions on the freedoms of expression and association," Turk said.

"Restrictions on fundamental freedoms must remain exceptional, grounded in clear law, be necessary and proportionate to pursue a legitimate objective, non-discriminatory and accompanied by due process and effective judicial oversight," he said.

"Upholding the rule of law in Tunisia requires stronger institutional safeguards, the protection of civic space, and inclusive, rights-based legislative reform, in line with the country's international human rights commitments."

The countries' latest diplomatic clash came as Spain decorated the UN special rapporteur on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories, Francesca Albanese, who has routinely condemned Israel's war and genocide in the Gaza Strip.

An Israeli court has extended until Sunday the detention of Saif Abu Keshek, a Spanish national of Palestinian origin, as well as another activist, Brazilian Thiago Avila, snubbing international demands for their release.

On Wednesday, "we again summoned Israel's charge d'affaires to convey to her how unacceptable and intolerable it is to extend the detention of our citizen," Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares told parliament.

The Global Sumud Flotilla was the second initiative in a year aiming to break an Israeli blockade on war-ravaged Gaza, which has suffered shortages of food, water, medicine and fuel since the Israel-Hamas war broke out in 2023.

Israeli forces intercepted the flotilla in international waters off Greece last week, expelling the activists to Europe but arresting Abu Keshek and Avila.

Rights groups say the arrests were illegal and that the men have suffered abuse and have been threatened with death in jail.

Israeli authorities have not filed any charges against them.

Relations between Spain and Israel have plummeted since the start of the Gaza war in October 2023, which has killed over 72,500 Palestinians in atrocities labelled as a genocide by the UN, several world leaders, and NGOs.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez himself has called Israel's military campaign in the Palestinian enclave a genocide.

Israel recalled its ambassador after Madrid recognised a Palestinian state in 2024, while Spain formally dismissed its own top envoy in Tel Aviv in March.

On Thursday, Sanchez presented the Order of Civil Merit to Albanese, an Italian, in Madrid "for her extensive work documenting and denouncing the violations of international law in Gaza", his office said in a statement.

Washington announced sanctions on Albanese for "biased and malicious" criticism of the United States and Israel.

Israel has denied the genocide allegations despite strong evidence and the high death toll in the Gaza Strip, and accused those making them of "antisemitism".

Sanchez asked the European Commission on Wednesday to prevent US sanctions on Albanese from being implemented in the bloc, his office added.

Francesca Albanese was awarded the Order of Civil Merit, an honour conferred on Spanish and foreign nationals for exceptional services benefiting the state or society, by Pedro Sánchez in a ceremony in Madrid.

Sanchez praised the UN expert as "a voice that upholds the conscience of the world".

"It is an honour to award the Order of Civil Merit to a voice that upholds the conscience of the world: Francesca Albanese, United Nations Special Rapporteur in the Occupied Palestinian Territory," Sanchez wrote on X.

"Public responsibility also entails the moral obligation not to look the other way."

Albanese and Sanchez also discussed the war on Gaza, which has killed over 70,000 Palestinians since October 2023, the importance of international law and "the need for an immediate end to the violence and the building of a lasting peace based on dignity and humanity".

This comes as the Prime Minister also sent a letter to the European Commission on Tuesday, calling for the activation of the EU's Blocking Statute to counteract the US sanctions imposed on Albanese and her engagement with the International Criminal Court.

The sanctions prevent her from travelling to the US and have frozen her assets there.

The Trump administration imposed financial and visa sanctions on Albanese in July over her work covering Israeli abuses in Palestine, a move that UN and human rights officials condemned.

The president, who has been a strong supporter of a Palestinian state, argued the sanctions “represent a very worrying precedent that compromises the independent workings of institutions that are essential to international justice".

Albanese, who has been known for her fierce condemnation of Israel over its genocidal war on Gaza, has repeatedly faced international backlash over her work, including calls for resignation and allegations of antisemitism.

Since the outbreak of Israel's genocidal war, Albanese published four reports exposing Israeli atrocities and denouncing the systems that have enabled Israel's war.

In a series of posts online, the beauty pageant titleholder complained that Duwaji, the wife of New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, initially appeared willing to take a photograph before allegedly distancing herself once her nationality became known.

Miss Israel went on to accuse Duwaji of spreading "antisemitism" and "anti-Israel propaganda", with pro-Israel accounts amplifying the claims as supposed evidence of hostility towards Israelis abroad.

Many, however, dismissed the accusations as an attempt to recast political opposition to Israel's genocidal war on Gaza as discrimination, noting the incident comes amid growing international outrage over Israeli war crimes against Palestinians.

For many activists, acts of social or cultural distancing from Israeli representatives are part of a broader protest movement rather than expressions of religious or ethnic prejudice.

The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement has called for boycotts against Israel’s participation in international competitions like Miss Universe due to the genocide, arguing that cultural platforms should not be used to normalise or whitewash state violence.

Mamdani himself has been a prominent advocate for Palestinian rights in the United States, backing calls for a ceasefire and an end to US military support for Israel.

While his wife has not publicly commented on the encounter, supporters online argue that individuals have the right to disengage from representatives of a state accused of grave human rights violations.

The episode underscores the increasingly fraught nature of public interactions involving Israeli figures and nationals abroad, as grassroots campaigns continue to push for accountability and isolation of Israel on the global stage.

As Israel faces mounting criticism over its conduct in Gaza, cultural and social spaces have become key arenas for political expression, with activists insisting that silence or neutrality is no longer tenable.

The level of destruction across US bases and sites hosting American forces appears to be far larger than what was publicly acknowledged by Washington, the US newspaper said.

According to the publication, at least 228 installations and pieces of equipment, including hangars, barracks, fuel depots, aircraft, and key radar, communications and air defence equipment, were obliterated or damaged in the Iranian attacks.

Tehran began hitting these sites across the region when the US and Israel launched strikes on Iran on 28 February, dragging much of the Middle East into a wider war which is now largely on hold as a result of an April ceasefire.

Iranian drones and missile slammed into US military sites across Arab Gulf states, Iraq, and Jordan.

The threat of Iranian airstrikes made it too dangerous for staff to remain at these bases at normal levels, prompting US commanders to move personnel out of the range of Iran’s fire at the start of the war, The Washington Post cited officials as saying.

The US suffered human losses as well as extensive material damage. At least seven servicemembers died in the Iranian strikes, most in Kuwait, and more than 400 troops were injured as of late April, the US military has said.

"Shortly after the war began, America's two largest satellite imagery providers, Planet and Vantor, bowed to government requests to withhold imagery of the region while the conflict continued," The Washington Post journalist Evan Hill wrote in a thread on X, sharing satellite images of the destruction.

For the analysis — one of the first detailed public assessments of damage to US facilities in the region — The Washington Post examined more than 100 high-resolution satellite images released by Iran. The newspaper verified 109 of them by cross-checking with lower-resolution imagery from the European Union’s Copernicus satellite system, as well as high-resolution images from Planet Labs where available.

Nineteen images were excluded from the damage assessment because comparisons with Copernicus data were inconclusive.

"No Iranian imagery was found to have been manipulated," The Washington Post said.

According to the newspaper, a US official said bases in Bahrain and Kuwait were two of the worst hit, likely because attacks on Iran were launched from there.

Besides the US military installations, the Gulf state that was hit by Iran the hardest overall was the United Arab Emirates.

Throughout the war, Iranian media frequently published images of the damages at US sites caused by Iranian attacks.

The Post said experts who reviewed the publication’s analysis said the US military had underestimated Iran’s firing capabilities, leaving some bases with lesser protection.

A recent CNN investigation revealed that at least 16 US military sites across eight Middle Eastern countries were damaged in the war. 

Some officials in the Gulf have criticised the deployment of the US military in the region, saying such a presence has become a burden rather than a strategic asset.

Iran and its network of allies in the region made up of several armed groups have repeatedly called on Washington to pull its troops out of the Middle East.

The strategy was announced on Tuesday by Sebastian Gorka, Trump’s counterterrorism director, who has a history of making Islamophobic statements.

In January 2026, the US State Department designated the Muslim Brotherhood’s Lebanese, Egyptian, and Jordanian branches as “terrorist organisations” for the first time.

The strategy document claims that the Muslim Brotherhood is “the root of all modern Islamist terrorism predicated on recreating the Muslim Caliphate and killing or enslaving non-Muslims”.

“President Trump knows that all modern Jihadi groups, from al Qaeda to ISIS to Hamas, can trace their roots back to one organization: the Muslim Brotherhood,” it adds.

Founded in 1928, the Muslim Brotherhood has autonomous branches across the Middle East which have largely engaged in peaceful activity and electoral politics, despite being banned by many Middle Eastern governments.

In 2012, a Muslim Brotherhood member, Mohammed Morsi, won Egypt’s first ever democratic presidential elections but was overthrown in a coup led by current President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

The view of the Muslim Brotherhood presented in the White House document reflects a long-standing view held by Gorka, who in 2016, authored a book titled Defeating Jihad: The Winnable War, in which he argued that the US’s enemy is not terrorism or violent extremism itself, but “global jihadism,” which he described as “a modern totalitarian ideology rooted in Islamic doctrine and military history.”

The book became a US bestseller but was criticised for its simplistic view of Islam and Islamophobia.

In the book Gorka recommended that US citizens carry firearms and report “suspicious” activity to police. He also urged the US government to designate the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist group, and take action against the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) advocacy group.

The strategy document identified three “major types of terror groups”, saying that these were “narcoterrorists and transnational gangs”, “legacy Islamist terrorists”, and “violent left-wing extremists, including anarchists and anti-fascists”.

It said that the first priority was to cripple transnational criminal organizations so they cannot smuggle drugs, gang members, or trafficking victims into the United States.

It also said its second priority is to “target and destroy the five major Islamic terrorist groups,” although it did not mention all five.

It did specifically mention al-Qaeda and its branch in the Arabian Peninsula as well as ISIS, particularly ISIS-Khorasan, which is active in Afghanistan.

It also called for continued pressure on the “global jihadist movement” through further terrorist designations of Brotherhood-linked entities worldwide.

The strategy also criticizes previous US  administrations. It blamed failed “forever war” policies and what it describes as Democratic appeasement of “state sponsors of terrorism”, particularly Obama’s 2015 nuclear deal with Iran.

It also reiterated that the Muslim Brotherhood is “the root of all modern Islamic terrorism” and vowed  “to crush this organization everywhere.”

With polls predicting difficult results for the ruling Labour Party, and Starmer continuing to face criticism over the appointment of Peter Mandelson as ambassador to Washington, candidates outside the traditional parties, particularly Greens, independents and Reform UK, are hoping to make significant gains.

Attention has focused on traditionally Labour-supporting areas including Birmingham and the London boroughs of Newham and Camden, where several pro-Palestine candidates have centred their campaigns on criticism of the Labour government's position on Israel's genocidal war in Gaza.

"In our local area, residents want to know their candidate supports Palestine," Hamzah Sheikh, Green Party candidate for Brandwood and Kings Heath in Birmingham, to The New Arab.

Sheikh said voters wanted councillors who defend the right to protest and support measures linked to the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement within local authorities.

"The Green Party has called for an end to the genocide while the Labour government refuses to condemn Israeli war crimes," he said.

In Camden, Green Party candidate Lilac Carr said solidarity with Palestine formed a "key part" of her campaign. She said activists were attempting to pressure Camden Council to divest pension funds from companies linked to Israel's war on Gaza.

“If elected councillor in Bloomsbury, it would be my absolute honour and privilege to support the cause of Palestinian liberation, freedom and equality in any way that I am able,” Carr told The New Arab.

Candidates from the Camden People's Alliance have also criticised Labour councillors over their response to the war.

"No Labour councillor has spoken up either inside or outside the council. This is unforgivable," Shezan Renny, candidate for King's Cross and founding member of Camden Friends of Palestine, told The New Arab.

Renny said campaigners had attempted to bring discussions on Palestine into Camden Council, but only one Green Party councillors had agreed to table a motion on the issue.

"Although elected local officials don't have an international role, they can take a moral stance just like Camden Council did during South African apartheid. To be silent is to be complicit," she said.

Palestine solidarity activists have long condemned the current Labour Party leadership for failing to denounce the war in Gaza while continuing arms exports despite allegations of Israeli war crimes.

In Newcastle, Green candidate Chandni Chopra accused Labour politicians of remaining silent during Israel's onslaught in Gaza.

"We must never forget that whilst the people of Gaza were being genocided, the Labour government not only armed Israel to do so, but actively provided cover for their crimes," Chopra told The New Arab.

"Our Labour MPs and councillors remained silent to protect their careers whilst babies were being deliberately killed and starved to death and while the whole of Gaza’s medical infrastructure was being decimated," she said.

She questioned how the public could trust the same democratically elected officials with public services and children’s futures if they remained silent in the face of such horror.

"We can't. The system must be challenged. We need democratically elected officials with compassion to represent us," she said.

Similar criticism emerged in Oxford, where Green candidate Edward Mundy said voters had been deeply disappointed by Labour’s position.

"The genocide will never be forgotten, as will the participation in that genocide by the UK, which has supplied military components to Israel and flown spy flights over Gaza," Mundy told The New Arab.

"The Labour Party and our human rights lawyer prime minister Keir Starmer are utterly complicit, continuing the country's unwavering support for Israel and trying to stop expressions of solidarity with the Palestinian people," he added.

In Birmingham, Corinthia Ward, a candidate for the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, linked anger over Gaza to wider frustrations over living standards and public services.

"Keir Starmer can find money for war but not for welfare, and our communities are faced with a second cost of living crisis in five years," Ward told The New Arab.

"The destruction of Gaza and the West Bank is an attack on our working-class brothers and sisters. It is never workers who start these wars, but ultimately it’s our lives that pay for them," she added.

At the centre of this transformation is Hezbollah's growing use of fibre-optic guided drones, a weapon that has quickly evolved from a supplementary tool into a defining feature of the current fighting.

According to sources who spoke to The New Arab, Hezbollah has deployed Kamikaze drones guided via fibre-optic cables to strike Israeli troop gatherings, tanks, and artillery positions, framing these attacks as a response to ongoing Israeli violations and attempts to entrench forces in the south.

These drones, the sources said, now represent a "major operational challenge" for Israeli forces, particularly given their low cost, high precision, and resistance to interception.

A battlefield shift driven by fibre-optic drones

At the core of this shift lies a relatively simple but highly effective technological adaptation. Instead of relying on radio signals, which can be jammed, these drones are physically connected to their operators via thin fibre-optic cables that can extend for several kilometres.

This removes one of Israel's key battlefield advantages, rendering electronic warfare systems largely ineffective.

Sources close to Hezbollah told The New Arab that the group had "previously used drones in its battles against Israel, but today it has introduced very advanced technologies that are difficult to detect or uncover, and the [group] possesses many of them".

They added that "the aim of these drones, like many of Hezbollah's operations during the ceasefire period that Israel continues to violate, is to confront any attempt by Israel to establish itself on the ground or build infrastructure in border villages".

Lebanon-based military analyst Omar Maarabouni described the use of fibre-optic first-person-view (FPV) drones as a turning point rooted in lessons from previous confrontations.

"The biggest surprise came with the entry of FPV drones into the battlefield," he told The New Arab, adding that their deployment was the result of "drawing lessons from previous battles, particularly those of 2024".

According to Maarabouni, Hezbollah has shifted away from fixed frontline deployments to a more flexible model based on dispersed "combat nodes", making its presence harder to detect and target, and making drones central to how the group operates.

"These drones are likely to play a major role in preventing Israelis from establishing permanent positions inside Lebanon," he said, noting that even protective measures offer limited defence. "It is impossible to protect individuals moving in the field, even with iron cages or nets."

The drones' technical features reinforce this advantage. Maarabouni explains that they are "cheap, with some estimates putting the cost at no more than $500 per unit", while still capable of carrying between 1.5 and 3.5 kilograms of explosives, including anti-armour warheads. Their speed, he added, can reach between 150 and 185 kilometres per hour, allowing them to strike quickly and with precision.

Retired Lebanese brigadier general and military expert Bassam Yassin said the shift towards drones was driven by changing battlefield conditions, particularly the difficulty of targeting Israeli forces using traditional weapons.

"Israel has positioned its forces on mountain tops and in locations that give it visibility, while [Hezbollah fighters] cannot easily detect Israeli units inside what is known as the 'Yellow Zone'," he said, adding that this had reduced the effectiveness of anti-tank guided missiles that Hezbollah previously relied on.

"In the recent period, we have seen much less reliance on guided missiles such as Kornet and Almas, because there is no longer the ability to clearly identify and track Israeli units," he said.

"In some limited areas, such as parts of the eastern sector towards Taybeh, these missiles can still be used, but the intensity of artillery shelling, air strikes and constant surveillance makes it extremely dangerous for any unit attempting to deploy them."

Yassin added that drones have effectively replaced the need for elevated observation points, introducing a new dimension to battlefield targeting.

"These drones are remotely guided and can carry anti-armour payloads or explosives against personnel," he said. "Instead of relying on high ground to detect the enemy, these drones operate in the third dimension. They are equipped with cameras, allowing the operator to both conduct reconnaissance and guide the drone towards a specific target before striking."

Israeli forces acknowledge defence gap

Israeli military officials have acknowledged a widening gap between the growing drone threat and their ability to counter it. They have openly described the threat as a major operational challenge that requires rethinking how forces are deployed and protected. These admissions from within the Israeli security establishment suggest that this challenge was not adequately anticipated.

Israel's Army Radio reported on Tuesday that five Israeli soldiers had been killed and 33 others wounded since the ceasefire with Lebanon took effect, with the vast majority of casualties linked to explosive drones. Three of those killed were struck by drones, while 31 of the wounded were injured in such attacks.

On Thursday, the Israeli military said that a further eight soldiers had been injured over the past 24 hours by FPV drones in south Lebanon.

A senior Israeli source cited by Israeli broadcaster Kan last week acknowledged that explosive drones "constituted a major surprise on the battlefield, and we were not sufficiently prepared for them", adding that training to address the threat began only after fighting was already underway.

Other assessments have pointed to a longer-term failure, with Israeli security sources quoted by Haaretz newspaper as saying that the threat had been known for years, but that "the preparedness for it was insufficient, and now we are paying the price".

What is happening on the ground shows the scale of the problem, with Israeli soldiers describing drones that are difficult to detect until the final moments before impact, leaving little time to respond. This was seen in rare footage released by Israeli forces from 26 April in Taybeh, southern Lebanon, where a Hezbollah drone targeted a rescue helicopter as wounded soldiers were being loaded before take-off.

According to Israeli media reports, dozens of such drones are now being used weekly across different fronts, either as loitering munitions or direct explosive devices.

The psychological impact has also become increasingly evident, with reports from the field describing a constant sense of exposure, particularly in open areas where troops remain vulnerable. Hezbollah has amplified this effect by regularly releasing footage captured from the drones themselves, showing the final seconds before impact and reinforcing the perception of a persistent, unpredictable threat.

Scrambling for solutions under pressure

Faced with a rapidly evolving threat, Israel has begun deploying a range of countermeasures, though these efforts increasingly point to a reactive approach rather than a coherent solution.

Experimental systems have been introduced in southern Lebanon, including drone-based interceptors designed to capture incoming drones using nets. The Iron Drone Raider system, currently operating on a trial basis, has yet to demonstrate meaningful success. Earlier tests had already indicated limited effectiveness in detecting such drones.

Yassin said these systems are unlikely to deliver meaningful results, arguing that they are fundamentally mismatched with the nature of Hezbollah's drones.

"This new system involves launching drones carrying nets to fly over deployed forces and try to detect Hezbollah's drones coming from outside the 'Yellow Zone'," he said.

"In my view, it will be very difficult to detect Hezbollah’s drones because of their small size. They are made of fibre, so their radar signature is almost non-existent. And because they are guided via fibre-optic cables, not wirelessly, they are not exposed to jamming," he added.

"For all these reasons, I do not believe this system will be effective. Over time, it will become clear that it is extremely difficult, except by chance, to intercept any of Hezbollah’s drones."

Alongside experimental technologies, more basic measures are also being adopted, with units installing nets over positions and vehicles, while soldiers have been equipped with modified optics and, in some cases, weapons intended to improve their ability to hit small aerial targets.

Operational procedures have also been adjusted, including reducing the time helicopters spend on the ground during evacuations to minimise exposure.

Despite these efforts, the limitations remain clear, with one Israeli field commander cited by Haaretz acknowledging that there was "no real solution", and by the time a drone is detected, it is often already too late to prevent an attack.

Meanwhile, the United States has recently approved the sale of nearly $1bn in counter-drone systems to Israel, including thousands of precision-guided kits designed to intercept aerial threats. Yet these systems are not designed to counter small fibre-optic drones, which can evade both air defence systems and electronic countermeasures.

Although the impact of Hezbollah's drone campaign remains primarily tactical, its cumulative effect is significant as the drones complicate Israeli movement, increase the cost of holding territory, and introduce a constant element of uncertainty into operations.

Maarabouni argues that the consequences could be decisive in one key respect.

"While Israel is capable of advancing and occupying territory," he told The New Arab, "it is unlikely to be able to stabilise and hold the areas it enters under these conditions".

What is emerging in southern Lebanon is a broader pattern of adaptation and counter-adaptation, with Hezbollah applying lessons from previous conflicts to exploit the limitations of more advanced military systems, while Israel is forced to adjust in real time.

Yassin said this shift reflects a deeper transformation in how wars are fought.

"In 2006, Kornet missiles were Hezbollah's surprise in the war. Today, FPV drones are the surprise," he said. "Israel is now living with the constant concern of their presence and is searching for any method to counter them, but it will take a long time to reach an effective solution."

Sarah Khalil is a senior journalist at The New Arab

Rita El Jammal is a journalist and reporter for Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, The New Arab's Arabic-language sister publication

Edited by Charlie Hoyle

France's far-right leaders have met the ambassadors of Germany and Israel in recent months as their party, once deemed antisemitic, seeks to court foreign envoys in the run-up to next year's presidential elections.

Marine Le Pen's anti-immigration National Rally (RN) party is eyeing its best chance yet at taking power, with President Emmanuel Macron stepping down after hitting the two-term limit.

Le Pen hopes to run for president for a fourth time in 2027, after twice making it to the runoffs against Macron in the last two votes.

But if an appeals court in July bars the 57-year-old from public office over an alleged fake jobs scam in European Parliament, her lieutenant Jordan Bardella, 30, is expected to run in her place.

France is home to western Europe's largest Jewish population, at around half a million people.

Le Pen has long sought to make the party she inherited from her father Jean-Marie more palatable, including by distancing it from the antisemitic legacy of a man convicted for Holocaust denial.

As polls suggest she or Bardella could well lead in the first round of the election, the strategy seems to have paid off.

Bardella, who is RN party leader after taking over from Le Pen, in February met the German ambassador, his party and a participant said.

The embassy did not confirm the meeting.

But AFP reported citing a diplomatic source who said that it was "the responsibility of a foreign mission to maintain contacts with all the political forces in the host country concerned".

Germany has long been among Israel's staunchest allies, something Berlin has grounded in the country's responsibility for the Holocaust.

"Yes, they met in February," a member of Bardella's team said, seeking to present it as a routine meeting.

He "meets many ambassadors as part of his duties as head of the RN party and as leader of a group in the European Parliament," the person said.

Bardella is head of the Patriots for Europe group, the EU legislature's third-largest bloc that was co-founded in 2024 by former Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban.

 'Areas of convergence'

The participant said the discussion between Bardella and the German ambassador made it possible to identify "areas of convergence" on several issues in France and neighbouring Germany.

They focused in particular on "budgetary discipline" in both leading EU member states.

The episode follows Le Pen last month meeting the Israeli ambassador for the first time.

The embassy confirmed the meeting, with a diplomatic source adding that the ambassador "received all political parties" except from the hard-left France Unbowed (LFI).

LFI has criticised Israel over the war in Gaza, and its leader Jean-Luc Melenchon -- also a candidate next year -- has been accused of making antisemitic comments.

Before the meeting with the Israeli envoy, Le Pen had the previous day been seen meeting the Lebanese ambassador, who thanked her for her solidarity as his country sought a lasting ceasefire with neighbouring Israel.

Both Le Pen and Bardella also met the US ambassador late last year.

US ambassador Charles Kushner in December on X posted a picture of himself with them, saying he appreciated the chance to learn from them "about the RN's economic and social agenda and their views on what lies ahead for France".

The slowdown comes despite months of talks under Ankara's "Turkey free of terrorism" initiative, launched in late 2024 to end the decades-long conflict between the Turkish state and the PKK.

Although the PKK formally announced its dissolution and the end of armed conflict on 12 May 2025, progress has stalled over competing demands from both sides.

The group carried out a symbolic handover of weapons in the Iraqi Kurdish city of Sulaymaniyah in July 2025, but Kurdish parties and PKK figures say Ankara has failed to follow through with promised political and legal measures.

PKK Executive Committee member Murat Karayilan accused Turkish authorities of “effectively stopping the process” by refusing to take what he described as concrete steps toward peace.

In comments to the PKK-linked Firat News Agency, Karayilan said the continued isolation of Ocalan was undermining negotiations, adding that the jailed leader had not met representatives from the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party for a month.

"One of the main conditions for continuing the agreement is the release of Abdullah Ocalan," Karayilan said, describing it as essential for the success of the process.

Other senior PKK figures, including Mustafa Karasu and Sozdar Avista, also called on Ankara to remove what they described as obstacles to the talks and introduce legal guarantees for Kurdish political participation.

The PKK has argued that legislative reforms must accompany disarmament, including changes related to prosecutions, political participation, and the status of Kurdish politicians removed from office over alleged PKK links.

Turkish authorities, however, insist the group must fully disarm before any legal changes are introduced.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said last week that the process remained on track despite criticism from Kurdish groups.

"Despite all covert and overt attempts at sabotage, we have passed the 18th month of the process and succeeded in overcoming many critical obstacles calmly," Erdogan said during a parliamentary group meeting.

He added that the atmosphere surrounding the talks remained positive and that the next stage would require "careful management".

Erdogan later met coalition partner Devlet Bahceli, whose nationalist party has unexpectedly backed the peace initiative.

Bahceli recently proposed granting Ocalan a formal role in the process through an "Office of Coordination for the Peace and Politicisation Process", arguing that the PKK founder should work within a defined legal framework.

The talks were initially launched after meetings with Ocalan in prison and appeals from him for the group to dissolve and lay down arms, culminating in the PKK's announcement last year.

However, key Kurdish demands remain unresolved, including possible legal reforms linked to Ocalan’s life sentence and the fate of imprisoned Kurdish politician Selahattin Demirtas.

DEM Party foreign relations spokesperson Ebru Gunay said contact with Ocalan had been cut since 27 March, calling the interruption "a serious problem given the sensitivity of the process".

She said the government had yet to implement recommendations prepared by a parliamentary committee tasked with advancing the initiative.

"Legal arrangements and guarantees are among the most important confidence-building measures, but there is no initiative from the government," Gunay said.

Security sources in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq told The New Arab that PKK fighters remain active in areas near the Turkish border, including the Qandil Mountains, Zakho, Amadiya and Soran.

A commander from the Kurdish Peshmerga forces said Turkish drone surveillance and military monitoring continued along border regions, although direct clashes and airstrikes had decreased significantly compared with previous years.

Directed by Palestinian filmmaker Omar Rammal, the 16-minute movie captures the realities of daily life for Palestinians living under genocide, where even the simplest acts – such as caring for children, working or studying – take on the meaning of resistance.

The film follows the Farra family: husband Mohammed, his wife Yusra, and their three children. Mohammed, a barber from al-Qarara in Khan Younis, continues working despite being displaced more than seven times during the war.

“In our homes and in our land, we live and we die,” Mohammed says in the film. “We do not abandon them.”

Mohammed and Yusra describe the heartbreak of being unable to provide for their children – struggling to bathe them, wash their clothes, and secure enough food despite spending hours waiting in line.

“I can’t hold my son,” Mohammed says in the film. “He’d hear my fearful heartbeat.”

The film was shot by Gaza-based journalist Soliman Hijjy between April and May 2025 as part of a project funded by the European Union in collaboration with Save the Children.

It resonated with audiences at Rome’s Cinecittà studios on Wednesday night during the 71st edition of the awards ceremony, which honours the best in Italian and international cinema.

“I stand here today, but my heart and mind are still behind the borders,” Rammal said as he accepted the award. He added that the honour “does not belong to me, but to the people who risked their lives to document the truth.”

He also criticised what he described as the “double standards of many governments (who) have helped allow this genocide to continue,” and stressed that art carries “position and responsibility.”

“As artists, we cannot celebrate creativity while children, civilians, journalists and filmmakers are being killed in Gaza and Lebanon,” he said. “Enough silence and enough killing.”

To date, the film has been screened in more than 90 cinemas worldwide.

Rammal’s work is the latest in a series of films from or about Gaza gaining international recognition.

“The Voice of Hind Rajab”, directed by Kaouther Ben Hania, was nominated for Best International Feature Film at the 98th Academy Awards and also received a nomination for Best International Film at the Italian awards.

“Palestine 36”, directed by Annemarie Jacir, was selected as Palestine’s entry for Best International Feature Film at this year’s Oscars after winning at the 38th Tokyo International Film Festival in November 2025.

The attack late Wednesday killed a senior commander of Hezbollah, with Israel saying it will keep targeting the Iranian-backed group despite a ceasefire in place in Lebanon.

Next week's talks will be the third between Israel and Lebanon, which had not spoken directly for decades and have no diplomatic relations.

"There will be talks between Lebanon and Israel Thursday and Friday next week in Washington," a State Department official said on condition of anonymity.

Israeli strikes in Lebanon have killed more than 2,700 people since March 2, including dozens since a ceasefire was declared, according to Lebanese authorities.

At the last talks on April 23, the two sides met in the White House with President Donald Trump, who announced a three-week extension of the ceasefire.

He also said that he expected a historic meeting within the ceasefire period between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Lebanese President Joseph Aoun.

But Aoun said Monday that the timing was not yet right for a meeting, saying that first the two countries must reach a security agreement.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, at a news conference on Tuesday, said that "there's no problem between the Lebanese government and the Israeli government" and that Hezbollah was the issue.

"By and large, I think a peace deal between Lebanon and Israel is eminently achievable and should be," Rubio said.

Israel has carried out heavy bombings of Lebanon and as well as a ground invasion of southern Lebanon.

It was responding to rocket fire by Hezbollah, a Shia group backed by Iran's ruling clerics which had vowed to avenge the killing of Iran's long-time supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, at the start of the war on Iran launched by Trump and Netanyahu on February 28.

An Israeli strike on Wednesday also killed four people in the eastern Bekaa Valley, with Israel saying it was targeting Hezbollah.

The two previous rounds of talks in Washington were held between the Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors to the United States.

Light filters through the wooden latticework in fractured patterns, cooling the air and softening the grandeur. Below, a black marble fountain anchors the room in stillness.

Into this layered interior, over 7,500 rounded, deep-turquoise glazed ceramic discs now hang, suspended beneath the chandelier, their perforations fracturing the light further still and casting new shadows across ornate surfaces already dense with history.

Syriac in origin, each of these charms measures about 2.5 centimetres, perforated with multiple holes, and woven together by golden chains into a dense, armour-like canopy.

Together, they form Atlas of an Entangled Gaze, an installation by artist Ramzi Mallat, commissioned by Leighton House Museum to mark its centenary.

Their form gestures towards protection through an ancient visual language, warding against the evil eye.

Yet here, suspended above the fountain of Lord Leighton's Hall, they seem to do something else: they look back.

The Arab Hall itself, where Ramzi intervenes, has long been framed through a particular lens.

As one early description puts it: "Built originally to provide a setting for some exquisite blue tiles, brought by Lord Leighton from Damascus, the Arab Hall remains the most perfect representation of an oriental interior to be found in London."

Drawing on the Hall's layered history, and Lord Leighton's fascination with Middle Eastern craft traditions, Ramzi's installation works within his conceptual and visual vocabulary, creating constellations of protection – a phrase that recurs across his practice – referencing symbols of the evil eye, often rendered in shades of blue.

Where the amulet "uses its powers ceaselessly on behalf of the person who carries it," the talisman is "intended to perform one specific task." Ramzi's installation operates on both registers: each charm is an amulet in its own right, imbued with protective power, while the whole is a talisman with a singular intent.

But, rather than directing that protection outward, Ramzi turns it back onto the space itself.

Lord Leighton's orientalist gaze, which originally shaped the Arab Hall, becomes the locus of inquiry. Here, the eyes no longer simply adorn or guard; they look back at the space, implicating the viewer in the act of looking.

It is no coincidence that Leighton conceived the Hall as a private indulgence: "For the sake of something beautiful to look at once in a while." Ramzi takes that invitation literally, and charges it, proposing a work that instead "could be something beautiful to look back at you."

Toxic dust, sacred objects

Ramzi came across the Syriac evil eye charm almost by accident during his research, through a conversation with a curator.

Unlike the turquoise teardrop, or the circular and spherical illustrative eye motif familiar across the Mediterranean, the Arab world, and beyond, this version resembles a cog more than an eye – its symbolic legibility worn away by its deceptive simplicity, and centuries of civilisational overlap.

That opacity matters to him. "If I come from that region, and have never been able to see that before," he says, "then audiences wouldn't be able to either." The charm carries the weight of something almost lost: an artefact whose meaning has eroded, even in its place of origin.

The choice of blue and gold is deliberate. While blue is associated with protective amulets, gold, Ramzi notes, reads differently on darker skin – warmer, more resonant. The Hall's own visual language, its blues and golds already encoding what he describes as a specifically "Eastern" aesthetic, makes the installation feel less like an intervention and more like a continuation.

Mass-produced in factories, where the glaze routinely clogs the perforations and where very few kilns remain capable of firing them, the ceramic discs that make up the installation are produced in Turkey's industrial regions and shipped from Istanbul.

In doing so, Ramzi has brought objects back into Sir Leighton's Arab Hall from the very regions that inspired it.

For Ramzi, the process is as painstakingly deliberate as it is meditative.

Spanning several months, the work involves inspecting each disc, examining its weak points, identifying where it is possible to interject with the diamond drill without breaking the piece, and conceiving how it will fit into the larger installation.

The discs take multiple days to dry and must be cleaned individually. They are drilled in water because the dust is highly toxic – the toxicity of the process stands in stark contrast to its protective purpose.

Carrying history

In the chaining process, he considers how much weight each piece can hold, choosing varying thicknesses to layer individual pieces at the top and at the bottom, carefully constructing the cascade of amulets.

For Ramzi, it is an enjoyable process because he is handling an object that carries so much history and presenting it anew.

Each of the amulets comes with its own imperfections; what Ramzi describes as "deformations" asserts a sense of individualism, adept for their purpose, and a deliberate rejection of the smooth, frictionless aesthetic increasingly associated with AI-generated imagery.

In their errors, they insist on the human hand, "allowing errors to be part of the work."

Beneath the installation's visual language lies a sharper critique of cultural extraction. Ramzi zeroes in on the jarring disjunction experienced by diasporic communities when they encounter their own familiar heritage – like the intricate woodwork of a mashrabiya one might see walking through Cairo – recontextualised as an orientalist trophy in a British aristocrat's home.

Heritage is encountered not on its own terms, but through the validating, and often hoarding, lens of Western institutions.

The work does not try to neatly resolve this tension. Instead, it holds it. Like the talisman itself, which has functioned for millennia as a vessel for anxiety, grief, and superstition across religions, traditions, and geographies, the installation forces the Arab Hall to sit with its own colonial complexities, without explaining them away.

Ramzi describes his practice as something closer to necessity than intention. "Like giving birth," he says, "or something less polite."

What he seeks, ultimately, is friction – the productive discomfort of sitting with the unknown, grappling with complexity, resisting the urge to resolve, and the notion that a space like Leighton House can rest comfortably within its own mythology.

Yet the installation's ambitions are perhaps hindered by the very colonial density it seeks to critique.

At the scale Ramzi has chosen, the amulets struggle to assert themselves against the Arab Hall's overwhelming visual density. Suspended beneath the chandelier, the work lacks the formal rigour needed to stand apart from its surroundings.

The cascade descends in an uneven V, before tapering at the back, a silhouette that feels unresolved rather than intentional. It reads less like a sharp sculptural interjection, and more like a loose, ornamental drapery – a curtain of blue and gold that the room's heavy history easily absorbs.

The choice of the Syriac charm, however poetically resonant, further compounds this difficulty: its symbolic legibility so eroded that even Ramzi himself had not encountered it before his research. It asks too much of a viewer, with no prior knowledge, of what they are looking at.

The concept is genuinely compelling. The gaze that looks back deserves to be felt, not merely understood.

As Edward Said reminds us, "We too are looking, we too are scrutinising, assessing, judging. We are more than someone's object. We do more than stand passively in front of whoever, for whatever reason, has wanted to look at us."

Ramzi's eyes are gazing back, and for once, they belong to someone else.

Nadine Nour el Din is a writer, researcher, and art historian

Follow her on Instagram: @nadinenour

Rutgers University has canceled a planned graduation speech by business leader Rami Elghandour after some students raised concerns about the speaker's criticism of Israel's genocidal war on Gaza on social media.

Elghandour, the CEO of biotech company Arcellx and an alumnus of the New Jersey university, had been set to give the May 15 convocation address at the Rutgers School of Engineering.

His invitation was rescinded after the university learned that "some graduating students would not attend their graduation ceremony due to concerns about the invited speaker’s social media posts,” a Rutgers spokesperson said in a statement.

The spokesperson declined to specify the offending posts, but confirmed they were focused on Israel. Elghandour did not respond to a message seeking comment.

An outspoken Palestinian advocate, Elghandour has used his social media platform to accuse Israel of committing war crimes, share footage of destruction in Gaza and praise pro-Palestinian student activists.

He also served as the executive producer of the “The Voice of Hind Rajab,” a documentary about a 5-year-old Palestinian girl who was killed by Israeli Defense Forces.

The cancellation comes as the springtime commencement season ignites yet another round of debate about student protests against the war in Gaza, which have roiled U.S. campuses in recent years and led to canceled speeches and disruptions during graduations.

Earlier this week, the University of Michigan publicly disavowed a commencement speech delivered by Derek R. Peterson, a history professor, that briefly lauded pro-Palestinian student activists.

That speech sparked threats from donors and Republican officials to strip the university of funding, alleging the comments created a hostile environment for Jewish students. The university president’s subsequent apology has drawn condemnation from academic and free-speech groups.

On Tuesday, Elghandour shared a clip on X of Peterson’s speech at the University of Michigan, along with the caption: “Most people choose convenience. Professor Peterson chose principle. True leadership. Much respect.”

A U.S. immigration judge in February had rejected efforts by President Donald Trump's administration to deport the Columbia University student, who was arrested last year following his participation in pro-Palestinian protests.

Nina Froes, the Chelmsford, Massachusetts-based immigration judge who blocked the government's efforts to deport Mahdawi, was fired by the Trump administration last month.

The Board of Immigration Appeals, part of the Department of Justice's Executive Office for Immigration Review, overturned Froes' decision.

Trump alleges activists like Mahdawi are antisemitic, support extremism and threaten U.S. foreign policy.

Activists, including some Jewish groups, say the government conflates criticism of Israel's assault on Gaza and its occupation of Palestinian ⁠territories with ​antisemitism, and advocacy for Palestinian rights with support for extremism.

"The government continues to weaponize the immigration system to silence dissent," Mahdawi said in a statement shared by his legal team on Wednesday.

Mahdawi, born and raised in a refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, was arrested in April 2025 upon arriving for an interview for his U.S. citizenship petition. He was released after two weeks in detention following a judge's order and was never charged with a crime.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which represented Mahdawi, says the government cannot deport him for the moment as his arrest was still being challenged in federal court.

Trump has cracked down on pro-Palestinian movements by attempting to deport ​foreign protesters, threatening to freeze funds for universities where protests were held and scrutinizing ​immigrants' online speech.

The crackdown has led to concerns among rights experts about free speech, due process and academic freedom. It has also faced legal and judicial roadblocks.

U.S. colleges have seen campus movements against Israel's war in Gaza since late 2023. Demonstrations peaked in 2024. While the intensity of the movements has declined since then, there have been occasional flashes.

Over the weekend, University of Michigan professor Derek Peterson praised pro-Palestinian protesters in a spring commencement program, prompting the university to issue an apology.

On Wednesday, Rutgers University said it withdrew an invitation to pro-Palestinian business leader Rami Elghandour for a graduation speech next week. Elghandour criticized the decision that the university said was based on complaints by some students about his online posts.

Salam will be accompanied by Deputy Prime Minister Tarek Mitri and several other cabinet ministers, Lebanese sources told The New Arab. The prime minister last met with Sharaa in Damascus in April last year.

Saturday's visit will explore ways to boost cooperation across security, economic and trade sectors and bolster bilateral relations. Each minister is expected to meet their Syrian counterpart to address outstanding issues, the sources said.

Talks between the governments in Beirut and Damascus have largely focused on border control and demarcation, and the return of more than a million Syrian refugees still in Lebanon.

The 375-kilometre border between Lebanon and Syria has long been notorious for smuggling—notably cross-border human trafficking and the smuggling of drugs, fuel and other goods—with authorities in both countries finding it difficult to control.

But reports over the past year have indicated that joint efforts have successfully clamped down on many traffickers.

The porous border has yet to be fully demarcated, with Saudi Arabia playing a mediating role in talks over its delineation.

The Lebanese ministerial sources told The New Arab that discussions on Saturday in Damascus would address the conflict in the region, including Israel's offensive on Lebanon, and talks between Beirut and Tel Aviv.

Syria has managed to distance itself from the Middle East war triggered by US-Israeli strikes on Iran, but Israeli forces still occupy parts of southwestern Syria and have conducted strikes across the country.

A main topic of discussion will be unresolved judicial matters and the issue of Syrian refugees who fled to Lebanon to escape the Syrian civil war, especially attacks by the Assad regime. Many have returned to Syria since Israel resumed its wide-scale attacks on Lebanon in March.

In February, Lebanon and Syria also signed a deal to begin transferring Syrian prisoners back to their country, which had been a key demand by Damascus to improve ties. Many detainees are in prison for suspected ties to extremist armed groups.

Lebanon and Syria share a turbulent history. The former Assad regime occupied its smaller neighbour and dominated it politically between 1990 and 2005, when it was forced to leave after the assassination of then Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri.  

Since President Bashar al-Assad's ouster in December 2024 and a new Lebanese government took hold, both countries have reiterated the need to rebuild ties based on mutual respect, without interfering in each other's affairs.

Salam's government has said it would prioritise the return of Syrian refugees through a clear plan and open a serious dialogue with Syrian authorities to review bilateral agreements in a way that serves the interests of both countries.

Many agreements signed under the deposed Assad regime were seen in Lebanon as disproportionately serving Syrian interests.

The new Islamist-led government in Damascus resents the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, which fought alongside Assad's forces during Syria's civil war, and has accused the group of planning and conducting attacks in Syria. Hezbollah has denied the allegations.