Author: ALJAZEERA

On Thursday morning, US State Department official Ian McCary sat down in a blue suit, red tie and brown shoes for a question-and-answer session at The Washington Institute to mark the fifth anniversary of the “defeat” of ISIL (ISIS) in Syria. The US-led coalition, along with its local partners, had on March 23, 2019 pushed the armed group out of Baghuz in Syria — a country where it once had its de facto capital, in Raqqa. “This was and remains a milestone in our continued efforts to ensure ISIS cannot resurge,” McCary said in his comments. Just a day later,…

The line of blocked aid trucks stuck on Egypt’s side of the border with the Gaza Strip while Palestinians face starvation on the other side is a “moral outrage”, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on a visit to the Rafah crossing. “I have come to Rafah to shine a spotlight on the pain of Palestinians in Gaza,” the UN chief said on Saturday, addressing a news conference in El Arish, in Egypt’s northern Sinai, where much of the international relief for Gaza is stockpiled as Israel continues to block aid from entering. “Here, from this crossing, we see the…

In the days leading up to Ramadan, we heard the hopeful word “ceasefire”. The US president uttered it, and the media repeated it. For a short moment, the lives of Palestinians in Gaza hung in the balance, caught between the possibility of a truce for the holy month and Israel’s relentless drive to eliminate my people from the face of the Earth. International Women’s Day came and went; women in Canada, where I physically live, celebrated; women in Gaza, where my heart is, faced another day struggling to help their families survive. Still, no sign of a ceasefire. In the evening,…

At least three patients at al-Shifa Hospital have died amid a five-day blockade on the facility by Israel.Here’s how things stand on Saturday, March 23 2024: Fighting and humanitarian crisis Israeli air strikes are continuing to pound the besieged al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, according to the Wafa News agency. Israeli troops also clashed with Palestinian fighters around the hospital complex. At least three patients have died in the hospital from a lack of medical supplies, sources in the hospital told Wafa, as Israel has blocked supply inflows for five days. Al-Shifa was first raided last November amid heavy criticism…

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has told the United States’s top diplomat that Israel is determined to send troops into the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where some 1.5 million Palestinians are sheltering, and will do so without US backing if necessary. Following a meeting with visiting US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday, Netanyahu said he told the US official there was no other way to defeat Hamas. “I told him that I hope we will do it with the support of the US, but if we have to – we will do it alone,” he said in…

blinking-dotLive updatesLive updates, After top US envoy Antony Blinken calls for restraint on Rafah invasion, PM Netanyahu says attack will go ahead ‘with or without US support’. Source link

Washington, DC – Describing the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza as a genocide, progressive Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has called on the United States to suspend weapons transfers to Israel. In an impassioned speech on the floor of the House of Representatives on Friday, Ocasio-Cortez condemned the Israeli blockade on Gaza, which the United Nations says has put the territory on the verge of famine. “This is a mass starvation of people, engineered and orchestrated following the killing of another 30,000, 70 percent of whom were women and children killed. There is hardly a single hospital left. And this was all accomplished,…

Former United States President Donald Trump has built a self-styled reputation as an ultra-wealthy businessman with a vast real-estate portfolio. But now, the properties and businesses emblazoned with his name face an unprecedented threat, following a ruling against him in a civil fraud case last month. On Monday, Trump faces a deadline to post his bond, after Judge Arthur Engoran ordered him to pay a total of $454m for inflating his wealth to fraudulently secure loans and business deals. If he fails to meet the cut-off date, New York Attorney General Letitia James could start to seize Trump’s assets, including…

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s announcement comes despite international pressure against Israel’s building of illegal settlements.Israel’s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has declared 800 hectares (1,977 acres) in the occupied West Bank as state land, in a move that will facilitate the use of the ground for settlement building. The announcement on Friday came as United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Israel for talks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Smotrich underlined the government’s determination to press ahead with settlement building in the West Bank, despite growing international opposition. “While there are those in Israel and in the world who seek…

IMF says inflation has dropped from 70 percent, economy expanded in the second half of 2023.The economic situation in debt-stricken Sri Lanka has started to gradually improve following its worst economic crisis two years ago, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said. Inflation has come down from a peak of 70 percent in 2022 to 5.9 percent last month and the country’s economy expanded in the second half of last year following a year and a half of contraction, the IMF said on Thursday. Sri Lanka’s year-on-year economic expansion in the third quarter of 2023 was 1.6 percent, and in…