Page 106 - Israel

Iran executes 4 convicted of planning sabotage, alleged links with Mossad

Iran executed on Monday four men convicted of planning sabotage and alleged links with Israel's Mossad secret service, state media reported. The official IRNA news agency said the men were convicted of planning to target a factory in 2022 belonging to Iran's defense ministry and involved in missile and defense equipment in the central city of Isfahan. The operation was allegedly engineered by Mossad and the four were trained by the Israeli agency in an African country before entering Iran, it said. The four were identified as Iranian nationals: Mohammad Faramarzi, Mohsen Mazloum, Vafa Azarbar and Pejman Fatehi. The execution was carried out after the country's Supreme Court upheld their death sentences, handed down by another court in September. The report did not say how the death sentences were carried out, but in Iran it's usually by hanging. In 2022, Iran said its intelligence agents had dismantled a group linked to Mossad that had allegedly planned terror operations inside Ira

Israel notes 'significant gaps' after cease-fire talks with US, Qatar

Israel said significant gaps remain after cease-fire talks Sunday with the United States, Qatar and Egypt but called them constructive and said they would continue in the week ahead, a tentative sign of progress on a potential agreement that could see Israel pause military operations against Hamas in exchange for the release of remaining hostages. The US announced its first military deaths in the region since the war began and blamed Iran-backed militants for the drone strike in Jordan that killed three American service members amid concerns about a wider conflict. The statement from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office on the cease-fire talks did not say what the significant gaps were. There was no immediate statement from the other parties. The war has killed more than 26,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials, destroyed vast swaths of Gaza and displaced nearly 85 per cent of the territory's people. Israel says its air and ground offensive has killed

UN court misrepresented my comments in genocide ruling: Israel's president

Israel's president on Sunday accused the UN world court of misrepresenting his words in a ruling that ordered Israel to take steps to protect Palestinians and prevent a genocide in the Gaza Strip. The court's ruling on Friday cited a series of statements made by Israeli leaders as evidence of incitement and dehumanizing language against Palestinians. They included comments by President Isaac Herzog made just days after the October 7 Hamas cross-border attack that triggered Israel's war against the Islamic militant group. Hamas militants killed around 1,200 people in that attack and took about 250 others hostage. The Israeli offensive has left more than 26,000 Palestinians dead, displaced more than 80 per cent of Gaza's inhabitants and led to a humanitarian crisis in the territory. Talking about Gaza's Palestinians at an October 12 news conference, Herzog said that an entire nation was responsible for the massacre, the report by the International Court of Justice noted. But Herzog s

US, Qatar lead high-stakes talks in Paris on Gaza hostage, ceasefire

Recent reports indicate a potential deal is closer, envisioning a two-month suspension of fighting in Gaza. The release of hostages would occur in two or three phases

American-led negotiators close in on Gaza agreement to halt fighting

"The abhorrent alleged acts of these staff members must have consequences," Secretary General Antonio Guterres said Sunday, referring to the UN Relief and Works Agency

What's arming Hamas? Increasingly stolen weapons from Israeli military

Analysts have pointed to smuggling routes to explain how Hamas stayed so heavily armed despite an Israeli military blockade of the Gaza Strip

Iran launches 3 satellites into space as tensions grip wider Mideast

Iran said Sunday it successfully launched three satellites into space, the latest for a programme that the West says improves Tehran's ballistic missiles. The state-run IRNA news agency said the launch also saw the successful use of Iran's Simorgh rocket, which has had multiple failures in the past. The launch comes as heightened tensions grip the wider Middle East over Israel's continued war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip. While Iran has not intervened militarily in the conflict, it has faced increased pressure within its theocracy for action after a deadly Islamic State suicide bombing earlier this month and as proxy groups like Yemen's Houthi rebels conduct attacks linked to the war. Footage released by Iranian state television showed a nighttime launch for the Simorgh rocket. An Associated Press analysis of the footage's details showed that it took place at the Imam Khomeini Spaceport in Iran's rural Semnan province. State TV named the launched satellites Mahda, Kayhan-2 and Hatef

Embattled UN agency warns operation in Gaza collapsing over funding cuts

The head of the main UN aid agency in the war-battered Gaza Strip warned late Saturday that its work is collapsing after nine countries decided to suspend funding over allegations that several agency employees participated in the deadly Hamas attack on Israel four months ago. Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, said he was shocked such decisions were taken as famine looms in the Israel-Hamas war. Palestinians in Gaza did not need this additional collective punishment, he wrote on X. This stains all of us. His warning came a day after he announced he had fired and was investigating several agency employees over allegations that they participated in the Oct. 7 attack on Israel that sparked the war. The United States, which said 12 agency employees were under investigation, immediately suspended funding, followed by several other countries, including Britain, Germany and Italy. The agency, with its 13,000 employees in Gaza, most of them Palestinians, is

Israel-Hamas war: US sees signs of progress on deal to release hostages

US negotiators are making progress on a potential agreement under which Israel would pause military operations against Hamas in Gaza for two months in exchange for the release of more than 100 hostages who were captured in the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, according to two senior administration officials. The officials, who requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive discussions, said Saturday that emerging terms of the yet-to-be sealed deal would play out over two phases. In the first phase, fighting would stop to allow for the remaining women, elderly and wounded hostages to be released by Hamas. Israel and Hamas would then aim to work out details during the first 30 days of the pause for a second phase in which Israeli soldiers and civilian men would be released. The emerging deal also calls for Israel to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza. While the proposed deal would not end the war, U.S. officials are hopeful that such an agreement could lay the groundwork for a durable ...

Hamas war: Countries halt funding to UNRWA over complicity in Oct 7 attacks

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz called on the UN to dismiss UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini and vowed to prevent the agency from having a role in post-war Gaza

Netanyahu defiant after UN court ruling, says aiming for 'complete victory'

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday pushed back after an International Court of Justice ruling to limit death and destruction in the military's Gaza offensive, declaring that we decide and act according to what is required for our security and vowing to press on until complete victory. Witnesses said three Palestinians were killed earlier Saturday in an airstrike that Israel's military said was targeting a Hamas commander in southern Gaza. Israel's military is under increasing scrutiny now that the top United Nations court has asked Israel for a compliance report in a month. The court's binding ruling on Friday stopped short of ordering a cease-fire, but its orders were in part a rebuke of Israel's conduct in its nearly 4-month war against Gaza's Hamas rulers. The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, the main organization aiding Gaza's population amid the humanitarian disaster, saw more countries suspend its funding following allegations that a number of Gaza staf

Israel-Hamas war: Starbucks, Coke, McDonald's hit by Middle East boycotts

In Cairo, on a recent weekday, dozens of usually bustling Starbucks and McDonald's stores stood completely empty

Israel must take steps to prevent acts of genocide in Gaza, says ICJ

South Africa brought the case to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) earlier this month, asking it to grant emergency measures to halt the fighting, which has killed more than 26,000 Palestinians

Israel's El Al airline suspends South Africa route over World Court case

'Israelis don't want to fly to South Africa,' said an El Al spokesperson. "They are cancelling flights and planes are pretty empty... We understand it's the situation because it was different before

Gaza blames Israeli troops for deadly shooting as crowd waited for aid

Gaza's Health Ministry and witnesses said Israeli troops opened fire as a crowd of Palestinians gathered for humanitarian aid in Gaza City on Thursday, killing at least 20 and wounding dozens. The Israeli military said it was looking into the reports. The Associated Press could not independently confirm the details of what happened. Witnesses and health officials said the shooting took place at a roundabout on Gaza City's southern edge, where a large crowd had gathered for distribution of food. Footage posted online and confirmed to have been taken on the main road near the roundabout showed hundreds of people fleeing, some carrying boxes of aid, as fire rang out in the background. Men loaded wounded Palestinians onto horse and donkey carts that took off charging down the avenue. At Shifa Hospital, where casualties were treated, Mohammad al-Reafi lay on the floor, his bloodied leg bandaged, as medics worked on other wounded around them. He said Israeli troops fired into the crowd.

Israel instructs Northern farmers to be prepared for expansion of war

People are also instructed to check the functioning of generators, to increase food stocks and to perform any additional action they think is right in order

Israeli tanks pound hospitals in Khan Younis forcing displaced to flee

Gaza health officials said at least 50 Palestinians had been killed in the past 24 hours in Khan Younis, where Israel has shifted full-blown military operations after starting to pull forces out

LIVE news: Centre announces Padma awardees on eve of Republic Day

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UN Court to rule on South Africa's genocide case against Israel in Gaza

South Africa submitted a plea with the International Court of Justice for provisional measures, including a halt to Israel's Gaza offensive that has claimed at least 23,000 Palestinian lives

'Mass casualties' at UN centre as Israel forces advance through Khan Younis

"Dismantling Hamas' military framework in western Khan Yunis is the heart of the logic behind the operation," it said