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Gaza truce talks limp on, Trump hopeful to have deal ‘straightened out’

Update U.S. President Donald Trump gestures as he speaks with the media after attending the FIFA Club World Cup final upon his arrival at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, U.S, July 13, 2025. (REUTERS)
US President Donald Trump gestures as he speaks with the media after attending the FIFA Club World Cup final upon his arrival at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland on July 13, 2025. (Reuters)
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Updated 14 July 2025

Gaza truce talks limp on, Trump hopeful to have deal ‘straightened out’

Gaza truce talks limp on, Trump hopeful to have deal ‘straightened out’
  • US backing 60-day ceasefire with phased release of hostages and Israeli troop withdrawals from parts of Gaza
  • Indirect negotiations in Doha appeared deadlocked at the weekend

DOHA: Stuttering Gaza ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas entered a second week on Monday, with US President Donald Trump still hopeful of a breakthrough and as more than 20 people were killed on the ground.

The indirect negotiations in the Qatari capital, Doha, appeared deadlocked at the weekend after both sides blamed the other for blocking a deal for a 60-day ceasefire and the release of hostages.

In Gaza, the Palestinian territory’s civil defense agency said at least 22 people were killed in the latest Israeli strikes on Monday in and around Gaza City, and Khan Younis in the south.

One strike on a tent in Khan Younis on Sunday killed the parents and three brothers of a young Gazan boy, who only survived as he was outside getting water, the boy’s uncle told AFP.

Belal Al-Adlouni called for revenge for “every drop of blood” saying it “will not be forgotten and will not die with the passage of time, nor with displacement or with death.”

AFP reporters in southern Israel meanwhile saw large plumes of smoke in northern Gaza, where the military said fighter jets had pounded Hamas targets over the weekend.

Trump, who met Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington last week, is keen to secure a truce in the 21-month war, which was sparked by Hamas’s deadly October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

“Gaza, we are talking and hopefully we’re going to get that straightened out over the next week,” he told reporters late on Sunday, echoing similarly optimistic comments he made on July 4.

A Palestinian source with knowledge of the talks told AFP on Saturday that Hamas rejected Israeli proposals to keep troops in over 40 percent of Gaza and plans to move Palestinians into an enclave on the border with Egypt.

In response, a senior Israeli political official accused Hamas of inflexibility and trying to deliberately scupper the talks by “clinging to positions that prevent the mediators from advancing an agreement.”

Israel’s Foreign Minister Gideon Saar and the Palestinian minister of state for foreign affairs Varsen Aghabekian Shahin headed to Brussels on Monday for talks between the EU and its Mediterranean neighbors.

But the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority denied media reports that any meeting between the two was on the agenda.

In Israel, Netanyahu has said he would be ready to enter talks for a more lasting ceasefire when a deal for a temporary truce is agreed and only when Hamas lays down its weapons.

But he is under pressure to quickly wrap up the war, with military casualties mounting and with public frustration both at the continued captivity of the hostages and a perceived lack of progress in the conflict.

Politically, his fragile governing coalition is holding, for now, but Netanyahu is seen as beholden to a minority of far-right ministers in prolonging an increasingly unpopular conflict.

He also faces a backlash over the feasibility and ethics of a plan to build a so-called “humanitarian city” from scratch in southern Gaza to house displaced Palestinians if and when a ceasefire takes hold.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees has described the proposed facility as a “concentration camp” and Israel’s own security establishment is reported to be unhappy at the plan.

Israeli media said the costs were discussed at a security cabinet meeting at the prime minister’s office on Sunday night, just hours before his latest court appearance in a long-running corruption trial on Monday.

Hamas’s attacks on Israel in 2023 resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

A total of 251 hostages were taken that day, of which 49 are still being held, including 27 that the Israeli military says are dead.

Israel’s military reprisals have killed 58,026 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to the health ministry in Gaza.


Israeli airstrike kills Houthi militant prime minister in Sanaa

Updated 8 sec ago

Israeli airstrike kills Houthi militant prime minister in Sanaa

Israeli airstrike kills Houthi militant prime minister in Sanaa
Ahmed Al-Rahawi was killed in a Thursday strike in Sanaa
Al-Rahawi was targeted along with other members of his Houthi-controlled government

CAIRO: The Iranian-backed Houthis said Saturday an Israeli airstrike killed the prime minister of the militant-controlled government in the Yemeni capital, Sanaa.

Ahmed Al-Rahawi was killed in a Thursday strike in Sanaa along with a number of ministers, the militants said in a statement.

The Israeli military said Thursday that it “precisely struck a Houthi terrorist regime military target in the area of Sanaa in Yemen.”

Al-Rahawi, who served as prime minister to the Houthi-led government since August 2024, was targeted along with other members of his Houthi-controlled government during a routine workshop held by the government to evaluate its activities and performance over the past year, the militants’ statement said.

Palestinian president's office urges US to reinstate his visa ahead of key UN meetings

Palestinian president's office urges US to reinstate his visa ahead of key UN meetings
Updated 30 August 2025

Palestinian president's office urges US to reinstate his visa ahead of key UN meetings

Palestinian president's office urges US to reinstate his visa ahead of key UN meetings
  • “This decision will only increase tension and escalation," Palestinian presidential spokesperson Nabil Abu Rudeineh said
  • “We have been in contact since yesterday with Arab and foreign countries, especially those directly concerned with this issue”

RAMALLAH: Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ office on Saturday urged the U.S. government to reverse its unusual decision to revoke his visa, weeks before he was meant to appear at the U.N.’s main annual meeting and an international conference about creating a Palestinian state.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio rescinded the visas of Abbas and 80 other officials ahead of next month’s annual high-level meeting of the U.N. General Assembly, the State Department disclosed Friday. Abbas has addressed the General Assembly for many years, and generally leads the Palestinian delegation.

“We call upon the American administration to reverse its decision. This decision will only increase tension and escalation," Palestinian presidential spokesperson Nabil Abu Rudeineh told The Associated Press in Ramallah on Saturday.

“We have been in contact since yesterday with Arab and foreign countries, especially those directly concerned with this issue. This effort will continue around the clock," he said.

He urged other countries to put pressure on the Trump administration to reverse the decision, notably the countries that have organized a high-level conference on Sept. 22 about reviving efforts for a two-state solution for the Middle East. It is co-hosted by France and ֱ.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot protested restrictions on access to the U.N. General Assembly, and said he would discuss the issue with EU counterparts.

“The United Nations headquarters is a place of neutrality, a sanctuary dedicated to peace, where conflicts are resolved," he said Saturday. “The UN General Assembly … cannot suffer any restrictions on access.”

Abu Rudeineh also urged an end to Israel’s offensive in Gaza and "escalation in the West Bank, because none of this will lead to any solution.”

The move came as the Israeli military declared Gaza’s largest city a combat zone. Israel says Gaza City remains a stronghold of Hamas.

The Trump administration has taken several steps to target Palestinians with visa restrictions.

“It is in our national security interests to hold the PLO (Palestinian Liberation Organization) and PA (Palestinian Authority) accountable for not complying with their commitments, and for undermining the prospects for peace,” the State Department said in a statement.

The Palestinian Authority denounced the visa withdrawals as a violation of U.S. commitments as the host country of the United Nations. U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the world body would be seeking clarification from the State Department.


UAE sends ninth humanitarian ship for Gaza

UAE sends ninth humanitarian ship for Gaza
Updated 30 August 2025

UAE sends ninth humanitarian ship for Gaza

UAE sends ninth humanitarian ship for Gaza
  • The ship departed from Khalifa Port in Abu Dhabi and will dock at Egypt’s Al-Arish Port

DUBAI: The UAE has sent its ninth Hamdan humanitarian ship on Saturday to deliver vital supplies for the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, as part of the country’s continuing ‘Operation Chivalrous Knight 3’ relief campaign.

The ship departed from Khalifa Port in Abu Dhabi and will dock at Egypt’s Al-Arish Port, where its cargo will be unloaded and subsequently delivered for residents in the besieged enclave, state news agency WAM reported.

The ship carries a total of 7,000 tonnes of relief supplies, including 5,000 tonnes of food parcels, 1,900 tonnes of food items to support community kitchens, 100 tonnes of medical tents for healthcare facilities and five fully equipped ambulances, WAM added.

The UAE and Cyprus have earlier engaged in a joint initiative to deliver vital humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza, under the Amalthea Maritime Corridor program established in March 2024, to complement other international efforts to send aid to Gaza by land, air and sea.

The UAE also inaugurated a 7.5-km pipeline that will deliver desalinated water from Emirati desalination plants in Egypt to the Gaza Strip.

The pipeline, built under the UAE’s Operation Chivalrous Knight 3, has a capacity of about 2 million gallons per day, serving about 1 million people.


Red Cross chief says mass evacuation of Gaza City ‘impossible’

Red Cross chief says mass evacuation of Gaza City ‘impossible’
Updated 30 August 2025

Red Cross chief says mass evacuation of Gaza City ‘impossible’

Red Cross chief says mass evacuation of Gaza City ‘impossible’
  • “It is impossible that a mass evacuation of Gaza City could ever be done in a way that is safe,” the Red Cross says

GENEVA: The head of the international Red Cross on Saturday denounced Israel’s plans for a mass evacuation of Gaza City ahead of a military takeover, insisting there was no way it could be done safely.
“It is impossible that a mass evacuation of Gaza City could ever be done in a way that is safe and dignified under the current conditions,” International Committee of the Red Cross president Mirjana Spoljaric said in a statement.
“Such an evacuation would trigger a massive population movement that no area in the Gaza Strip can absorb, given the widespread destruction of civilian infrastructure and the extreme shortages of food, water, shelter and medical care,” she warned.
Her comments came after Israel’s military on Friday declared Gaza City “a dangerous combat zone,” as it prepared to conquer the occupied Palestinian territory’s largest city after almost two years of war.
The Israeli military did not call for the population to evacuate immediately but the army’s Arabic-language spokesman, Avichay Adraee, said on Wednesday that the city’s evacuation was “inevitable.”
Israel is under mounting pressure at home and abroad to end its devastating offensive in Gaza, where the vast majority of the population has been displaced at least once and the United Nations has declared a famine.
The UN estimates that nearly a million people currently live in Gaza governorate, which includes Gaza City and its surroundings in the north of the territory.
Any evacuation order “would be imposed on civilians who are already traumatized by months of fighting and terrified by what could come next,” Spoljaric said.
“Many are unable to comply with evacuation orders because they are starving, sick, injured or suffering from physical disabilities,” she pointed out, stressing that “all civilians are protected by international humanitarian law (IHL), whether they leave or stay behind, and must be allowed to return home.”
Spoljaric highlighted that “IHL requires that when evacuation orders are issued, Israel must do everything to ensure that civilians have satisfactory conditions of shelter, hygiene, health, safety and nutrition, and that families are not separated.”
“These conditions cannot currently be met in Gaza,” she said.
“This makes any evacuation not only unfeasible but incomprehensible under the present circumstances.”
The ICRC president reiterated the call for an immediate ceasefire, a mass-influx of aid and for Palestinian group Hamas to release its remaining Israeli hostages.
“Any further escalation of the conflict will only lead to more death, destruction and displacement,” she said.


Iran says eight arrested for suspected links to Israel’s Mossad spy agency

Iran says eight arrested for suspected links to Israel’s Mossad spy agency
Updated 30 August 2025

Iran says eight arrested for suspected links to Israel’s Mossad spy agency

Iran says eight arrested for suspected links to Israel’s Mossad spy agency
  • They are accused of having provided the information to the Mossad spy agency during Israel’s air war on Iran in June

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on Saturday they had arrested eight people suspected of trying to transmit the coordinates of sensitive sites and details about senior military figures to Israel’s Mossad, Iranian state media reported.

They are accused of having provided the information to the Mossad spy agency during Israel’s air war on Iran in June, when it attacked Iranian nuclear facilities and killed top military commanders as well as civilians in the worst blow to the Islamic Republic since the 1980s war with Iraq.

Iran retaliated with barrages of missiles on Israeli military sites, infrastructure and cities. The United States entered the war on June 22 with strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.

A Guards statement alleged that the suspects had received specialized training from Mossad via online platforms. It said they were apprehended in northeastern Iran before carrying out their plans, and that materials for making launchers, bombs, explosives and booby traps had been seized.

State media reported earlier this month that Iranian police had arrested as many as 21,000 “suspects” during the 12-day war with Israel, though they did not say what these people had been suspected of doing.

Security forces conducted a campaign of widespread arrests and also stepped up their street presence during the brief war that ended in a US-brokered ceasefire.

Iran has executed at least eight people in recent months, including nuclear scientist Rouzbeh Vadi, hanged on August 9 for passing information to Israel about another scientist killed in Israeli airstrikes.