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Italy demands Israel stops strikes, blasts expulsions of Gazans

Italy demands Israel stops strikes, blasts expulsions of Gazans
Above, Palestinians carry the body of a man killed in an Israeli strike in the Saftawi neighborhood west of Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on May 27, 2025. (AFP)
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Updated 28 May 2025

Italy demands Israel stops strikes, blasts expulsions of Gazans

Italy demands Israel stops strikes, blasts expulsions of Gazans
  • Antonion Tajani: ‘The bombings must stop, humanitarian assistance must resume as soon as possible, respect for international humanitarian law must be restored’

ROME: Italy’s foreign minister on Wednesday again urged Israel to stop its strikes on Gaza, while warning that expelling Palestinians from the territory “is not and never will be an acceptable option.”
“The legitimate reaction of the Israeli government to a terrible and senseless terrorist act has unfortunately taken on absolutely tragic and unacceptable forms, that we ask Israel to stop immediately,” Antonion Tajani told parliament, referring also to Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel.
“The bombings must stop, humanitarian assistance must resume as soon as possible, respect for international humanitarian law must be restored,” he said.
“Hamas must immediately free all the hostages which are still today in its in hands, and who have the right to return to their homes.”
Tajani also condemned US President Donald Trump’s plan for US control of Gaza and the forced displacement of the Palestinians living there.
“I want to reiterate today in this chamber with the utmost clarity – the expulsion of Palestinians from Gaza is not and will never be an acceptable option,” Tajani said.
“This is why we wholeheartedly support the Arab plan led by Egypt for the recovery and reconstruction of the (Gaza) Strip, which is incompatible with any hypothesis of forced displacement.”


Lebanon cabinet to meet again on Hezbollah disarmament

Lebanon cabinet to meet again on Hezbollah disarmament
Updated 57 min 52 sec ago

Lebanon cabinet to meet again on Hezbollah disarmament

Lebanon cabinet to meet again on Hezbollah disarmament
  • Amid fears Israel could expand its strikes in Lebanon, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam tasked the army with developing a plan to restrict weapons to government forces by the end of 2025

BEIRUT: Lebanon’s cabinet is set to meet again on Thursday to discuss the thorny task of disarming Hezbollah, a day after the Iran-backed group rejected the government’s decision to take away its weapons.
With Washington pressing Lebanon to take action on the matter, US envoy Tom Barrack has made several visits to Beirut in recent weeks, presenting officials with a proposal that includes a timetable for Hezbollah’s disarmament.
Amid the US pressure and fears Israel could expand its strikes in Lebanon, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said Tuesday that the government had tasked the army with developing a plan to restrict weapons to government forces by the end of 2025.
The decision is unprecedented since the end of Lebanon’s civil war more than three decades ago, when the country’s armed factions — with the exception of Hezbollah — agreed to surrender their weapons.
The government said the new disarmament push was part of implementing a November ceasefire that sought to end more than a year of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah.
That conflict culminated last year in two months of full-blown war that left the group badly weakened, both politically and militarily.
Hezbollah said on Wednesday that it would treat the government’s decision to disarm it “as if it did not exist,” accusing the cabinet of committing a “grave sin.”
It added that the move “undermines Lebanon’s sovereignty and gives Israel a free hand to tamper with its security, geography, politics and future existence.”
The Amal movement, Hezbollah’s main ally headed by parliament speaker Nabih Berri, also criticized the move and called Thursday’s cabinet meeting “an opportunity for correction.”
Iran, Hezbollah’s military and financial backer, said on Wednesday that any decision on disarmament “will ultimately rest with Hezbollah itself.”
“We support it from afar, but we do not intervene in its decisions,” Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi added, saying the group had “rebuilt itself” after the war with Israel.
Two ministers affiliated with Hezbollah and the Amal movement walked out of Tuesday’s meeting on disarmament in protest.
Hezbollah described the walkout as a rejection of the government’s “decision to subject Lebanon to American tutelage and Israeli occupation.”
Citing “political sources” with knowledge of the matter, pro-Hezbollah newspaper Al Akhbar said the group and its Amal allies could choose to withdraw their four ministers from the government or trigger a no-confidence vote in parliament by the Shiite bloc, which comprises 27 of Lebanon’s 128 lawmakers.
Israel — which routinely carries out air strikes in Lebanon despite the ceasefire, saying it is targeting Hezbollah fighters and infrastructure — has already signalled it would not hesitate to launch destructive military operations if Beirut failed to disarm the group.
Israeli strikes in south Lebanon killed two people on Wednesday, according to the Lebanese health ministry.


UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed arrives in Moscow 

UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed arrives in Moscow 
Updated 07 August 2025

UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed arrives in Moscow 

UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed arrives in Moscow 
  • Sheikh Mohamed is accompanied by a high-level delegation

DUBAI: UAE President His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan arrived in Moscow on Thursday for an official visit to the Russian Federation.

As the President's plane entered Russian airspace, it was greeted and escorted by Russian military jets.

An official reception was held at Vnukovo Airport, where the national anthems of the UAE and Russia were played. An honor guard was present as Sheikh Mohamed was greeted by senior Russian officials.

Sheikh Mohamed is accompanied by a high-level delegation that includes a number of senior UAE officials.


Sudan’s PM in Egypt on first foreign visit

Sudan’s PM in Egypt on first foreign visit
Updated 07 August 2025

Sudan’s PM in Egypt on first foreign visit

Sudan’s PM in Egypt on first foreign visit
  • Sudan’s Prime Minister Kamil Idris arrived in Cairo on Thursday morning for his first official foreign visit since assuming office in May, as his country’s army remains gripped by a brutal war

CAIRO: Sudan’s Prime Minister Kamil Idris arrived in Cairo on Thursday morning for his first official foreign visit since assuming office in May, as his country’s army remains gripped by a brutal war with paramilitaries.
Idris, a career diplomat and former UN official, is expected to hold talks with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, according to Sudan’s state news agency SUNA.
He will also hold expanded talks with his Egyptian counterpart Mostafa Madbouly and “discuss ways of enhancing bilateral cooperation in various fields,” according to a statement from Egypt’s cabinet.
Egypt has backed Sudan’s military leadership since war erupted in April 2023, when a fragile alliance between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) collapsed.
The RSF swiftly seized large parts of Khartoum, but after months of urban warfare, the army recaptured the capital in March this year.
Fighting has since shifted to other parts of the country — most notably the western regions of Darfur and Kordofan.
The conflict in Sudan has killed tens of thousands, displaced over 14 million and created what the United Nations describes as the world’s largest displacement and hunger crises.
Sudan is now effectively split, with the army in control of the north, east and center, while the RSF dominates nearly all of Darfur and parts of the south.
The RSF has been working to establish a rival administration in western Sudan — a move the United Nations warned could deepen divisions in the already fractured country.
Critics meanwhile say the new civilian-led government under Idris risks serving as a facade for continued military rule.


Mothers in Gaza stretch meager ingredients where they can, but say hunger persists

Mothers in Gaza stretch meager ingredients where they can, but say hunger persists
Updated 07 August 2025

Mothers in Gaza stretch meager ingredients where they can, but say hunger persists

Mothers in Gaza stretch meager ingredients where they can, but say hunger persists
  • Some survive on stale pita, raw beans or whatever they can get when charity kitchens have food left. Gas is scarce, vegetables are costly and meat has all but disappeared from markets
  • The struggle to survive on limited ingredients is being felt across Gaza as the territory plunges deeper into what international experts have called “the worst-case scenario of famine”

DEIR AL-BALAH: A single bowl of eggplant stewed in watery tomato juice must sustain Sally Muzhed’s family of six for the day. She calls it moussaka, but it’s a pale echo of the fragrant, layered meat-and-vegetable dish that once filled Gaza’s kitchens with its aroma.
The war has severed families from the means to farm or fish, and the little food that enters the besieged strip is often looted, hoarded and resold at exorbitant prices. So mothers like Muzhed have been forced into constant improvization, reimagining Palestinian staples with the meager ingredients they can grab off trucks, from airdropped parcels or purchase at the market.
Israel implemented a total blockade on trucks entering the besieged strip in early March and began allowing aid back in May, although humanitarian organizations say the amount remains far from adequate.
Some cooks have gotten inventive, but most say they’re just desperate to break the dull repetition of the same few ingredients, if they can get them at all. Some families say they survive on stale, brittle pita, cans of beans eaten cold for lack of cooking gas, or whatever they can get on the days that they arrive early enough that meals remain available at charity kitchens.
“The children remain hungry. Tomorrow we won’t have any food to eat,” Muzhed said from the tent where her family has been displaced in central Gaza’s Deir Al-Balah.
Once, her bowl would barely have fed one child. Now she ladles it out in spoonfuls, trying to stretch it. Her son asks why he can’t have more.
The Muzhed family’s struggle is being repeated across Gaza as the territory plunges deeper into what international experts have called “the worst-case scenario of famine.”
On some days, mothers like Amani Al-Nabahin manage to get mujaddara from charity kitchens. The dish, once flavored with caramelized onions and spices, is now stripped to its bare essentials of rice and lentils.
“Nearly nine out of ten households resorted to extremely severe coping mechanisms to feed themselves, such as taking significant safety risks to obtain food, and scavenging from the garbage,” the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification said on July 29.
Gas for cooking is scarce, vegetables are costly and meat has all but vanished from the markets.
Families in Gaza once dipped pieces of bread into dukkah, a condiment made of ground wheat and spices. But today, 78-year-old Alia Hanani is rationing bread by the bite, served once a day at noon, allowing each person to dip it in a wartime dukkah made of flour, lentils and bulgur.
“There’s no dinner or breakfast,” the mother of eight said.
Some people don’t even have enough to improvise. All Rehab Al-Kharoubi has for her and her seven children is a bowl of raw white beans.
“I had to beg for it,” she said.
For some, it’s even less. Kifah Qadih, displaced from Khuza’a east of Khan Younis, couldn’t get any food — the bowl in front of her has remained empty all day.
“Today there is no food. There is nothing.”


Kurdish-led SDF not complying with Syria integration deal, Turkish source says

Kurdish-led SDF not complying with Syria integration deal, Turkish source says
Updated 07 August 2025

Kurdish-led SDF not complying with Syria integration deal, Turkish source says

Kurdish-led SDF not complying with Syria integration deal, Turkish source says
  • Turkiye views the US-backed SDF as a terrorist organization and has repeatedly said it expects the group to abide by the deal to disarm and integrate into the Syrian state apparatus

ANKARA: The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) is not acting in line with an accord it signed with Syria’s government this year to join the country’s state institutions, and the recent clashes between the group and government forces damages Syria’s unity, a Turkish Defense Ministry source said on Thursday.
Turkiye views the US-backed SDF as a terrorist organization and has repeatedly said it expects the group to abide by the deal to disarm and integrate into the Syrian state apparatus.
“It has not escaped our attention that the SDF terrorist organization’s voice has become louder, empowered by the clashes in Syria’s south,” the source told reporters at a briefing in Ankara, in a reference to the fighting between Druze and Bedouin forces last month.
“The SDF terrorist organization’s attacks in the outskirts of Manbij and Aleppo against the Syrian government in recent days damage Syria’s political unity and territorial integrity,” the person added.