Author: Gulf News Week
Supporters of Palestinian rights say although bill to block arms to Israel failed to pass, vote shows ‘shift’ on issue.Washington, DC – Palestinian rights advocates are hailing the growing number of lawmakers in the United States showing willingness to restrict weapons to Israel over the atrocities in Gaza after a Senate vote on the issue.The majority of Democrats in the Senate voted late on Wednesday in favour of a resolution to block a weapons sale to Israel in what rights advocates have hailed as a major blow to the bipartisan support that Israel has traditionally enjoyed in Congress.The measure, introduced…
Mothers fill bottles with water and whatever food they can find as Israel’s blockade continues to fuel starvation crisis.Palestinian mothers in the Gaza Strip are desperately trying to feed their newborns as Israel’s punishing blockade on the besieged enclave has led to dire shortages of infant formula, with some resorting to filling bottles with water and whatever food they can find.Dr Kahlil Daqran told media on Thursday that as supplies of formula run out, many mothers are often too malnourished to breastfeed their infants.“In the Gaza Strip, we have thousands of children being starved because there is no milk for…
More than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed at food distribution sites since May, fuelling international outcry.The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a US nonprofit backed by the US and Israel, was set up earlier this year to provide humanitarian aid in Gaza. Its aid distribution got under way in May, following a prolonged halt in supply deliveries to the enclave. But according to the UN, more than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed trying to access food at the GHF aid hubs.Starving and beleaguered Palestinians in Gaza have no choice but to walk several miles to collect much-needed food packages from the…
Mohammed Ibrahim, whose cousin was beaten to death by Israeli settlers, suffers from severe weight loss and scabies, his family says.Washington, DC – Israeli authorities have been detaining an American teenager for nearly six months without trial for allegedly throwing rocks at Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank, a claim the 16-year-old’s family denies while expressing concern for his deteriorating health.Mohammed Ibrahim, a Palestinian-American who was born in the US state of Florida, has been completely cut off from his family since his arrest in February without visitation or telephone rights, his father and uncle said.According to an Israeli…
Anthony Aguilar says Amir walked 12km to receive a meagre allotment of aid, only to be fatally shot.Barefoot and dressed in tattered clothes, Amir approached a GHF aid distribution point in Gaza desperate for help. He had walked 12km (7.5 miles) to collect food. And moments after the frail boy received his small packets of aid, the Israeli army opened fire.That was the account Anthony Aguilar, a United States Army veteran, gave during a recent interview. The former GHF contractor has been warning the world about the US- and Israeli-backed aid scheme.On Thursday, outrage over the GHF and the accounts…
Desperate parents in Gaza struggle to feed their children as famine unfolds due to an Israeli blockade.Gaza City, Gaza Strip – Hani Abu Rizq walks through Gaza City’s wrecked streets with two bricks tied against his stomach as the rope cuts into his clothes, which hang loose from the weight he has lost.The 31-year-old searches desperately for food to feed his mother and seven siblings with the bricks pressed against his belly – an ancient technique he never imagined he would need.“We’re starved,” he says, his voice hollow with exhaustion.“Even starvation as a word falls short of what we’re all…
Khamis Ayyad, 40, died of smoke inhalation after settlers set fire to vehicles in town of Silwad, Health Ministry says.A Palestinian man has been killed after Israeli settlers set fire to vehicles and homes in a town in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Ministry of Health says.The ministry said on Thursday that Khamis Ayyad, 40, died due to smoke inhalation after settlers attacked Silwad, northeast of Ramallah, around dawn. Ayyad and others had been trying to extinguish the fires, local residents said.Palestinian news agency Wafa reported that the settlers also attacked the nearby villages of Khirbet Abu Falah and…
Lebanon’s President Aoun has reiterated calls for Hezbollah to disarm, which the group refuses to do under Israeli fire.The Israeli military has launched a massive series of air strikes on several areas across Lebanon, in its latest near-daily violation of a ceasefire agreement with the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah last November.Lebanon’s National News Agency reported at least seven air raids on towns in the Bekaa Valley and a mountainous region in Baalbek in the eastern and northeastern parts of the country, far from the southern border with Israel on Thursday. It also said more attacks targeted the Ghaziyeh area of…
Syria’s new rulers have decided to take a pragmatic approach, despite Russia’s support for previous President Bashar al-Assad.Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani has said his country wants Russia “by our side”, marking the first formal visit to Moscow by an official of the new government in Damascus since Syria’s previous Russian-backed government was overthrown last year.“The current period is full of various challenges and threats, but it is also an opportunity to build a united and strong Syria. And, of course, we are interested in having Russia by our side on this path,” al-Shaibani told his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov…
Stockholm court finds Osama Krayem guilty of ‘serious war crimes and terrorist crimes’ over ISIL killing of Muath al-Kassasbeh in Syria.A court in Sweden has sentenced a Swedish man to life in prison over his role in the killing of a Jordanian pilot who was burned alive in a cage by ISIL (ISIS) in Syria in 2015.Judge Anna Liljenberg Gullesjo said in a statement on Thursday that the investigation has shown the defendant – identified in court documents as Osama Krayem – was “at the execution site, uniformed and armed, and allowed himself to be filmed”.While the video evidence showed…