JERUSALEM: A Palestinian attempted to stab Israeli police near a flashpoint holy site in Hebron in the occupied West Bank on Thursday and was shot and wounded, Israeli authorities said.The incident occurred near the site known to Muslims as the Ibrahimi Mosque and to Jews as the Cave of the Patriarchs in the tense city, where several hundred Israeli settlers live under heavy guard among some 200,000 […]
By Jeff Mason and Matt Spetalnick | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON President Donald Trump vowed on Wednesday to do “whatever is necessary” to broker peace between Israel and the Palestinians as he hosted Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas at the White House, but offered no sign of how he could revive long-stalled negotiations. In their first face-to-face meeting, Trump pressed Abbas and other Palestinian leaders to “speak in a unified […]
“All the Rivers,” the new English title of the book, was published last week in the United States by Random House, and Ms. Rabinyan, 44, seemed a little nervous. She wanted Americans to read the book for what she said it is — a story of a specific love and its boundaries — and not because of the free speech controversy here or the backdrop of a […]
A big part of that is its watering down of the anti-Semitic language of the original Hamas charter in 1988, with its talk of war between Arabs and Jews. “We are making it clear that ours is a liberation project — not about religion or the Jews,” Mr. Meshal said in an interview on Tuesday in Doha, his latest home. Continue reading the main story His offer […]
Mr. Abbas’s visit to the White House will present Mr. Trump with the Palestinian viewpoint more directly than he has ever heard it as president. But at 82, Mr. Abbas is a weakened political figure facing public discontent and divisions at home. Continue reading the main story His Palestinian Authority operates in the West Bank, while the more militant rival Hamas faction rules in Gaza. Despite an […]
By Matt Spetalnick | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON Donald Trump’s national security adviser described his boss’s foreign policy approach as “disruptive” on the eve of the U.S. president’s first White House meeting with the Palestinian leader, saying his unconventional ways could create an opportunity to ultimately help stabilize the Middle East. Trump faces deep skepticism at home and abroad over his chances for a breakthrough with Palestinian President Mahmoud […]
Hamas, the militant Islamist group, on Monday dropped a call for Israel’s destruction and endorsed the creation of a Palestinian state inside 1967 borders, in a rhetorical shift that analysts said reflected the group’s political ambitions and changing priorities in a new Middle East. A policy paper released in Doha by Khaled Meshaal, Hamas’s political leader, described the creation of an interim Palestinian state in the 1967 […]
DOHA The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas will drop its long-standing call for Israel’s destruction as well as its association with the Muslim Brotherhood in a new policy document to be issued on Monday, Gulf Arab sources said. Hamas’s move appears aimed at improving relations with the West, Gulf Arab states and Egypt, which label the Brotherhood as a terrorist organisation. Many Western countries classify Hamas as a […]
Mr. Abbas was scheduled to meet with Mr. Trump in Washington on Wednesday as the sole representative of the Palestinian people. He has sought in recent weeks to rein in Hamas, cutting salaries and refusing to pay for electricity, in a bid to undermine the group’s authority. Gazans now have only a few hours of power a day. Continue reading the main story “Whether it’s a coincidence […]
JERUSALEM Israel intends to build 15,000 new settlement homes in East Jerusalem, the Housing Ministry said on Friday despite U.S. President Donald Trump’s request to “hold back” on settlements as part of a possible new push for Israeli-Palestinian peace. A formal announcement of the settlement plan, quickly condemned by the chief Palestinian negotiator, could come around the time Trump is scheduled to visit Israel next month. Israel […]
The Israeli agency that liaises with the Palestinians on civilian affairs, known as Cogat (an acronym for Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories), said Israel supplies Gaza with 30 percent of its total electricity needs at a monthly cost of about $11 million. Continue reading the main story Israel did not immediately cut off the supply, apparently hoping that international donors would step in and pay. […]
By Jeffrey Heller | JERUSALEM JERUSALEM The Palestinian Authority told Israel on Thursday it will no longer pay for the electricity Israel supplies to Gaza, Israeli officials said, a move that could lead to a complete power shutdown in the territory whose two million people already endure blackouts for much of the day. The decision was another sign of a hardening of Palestinian Authority policy towards its […]
It isn’t the first time that imprisoned Palestinian activist Marwan Barghouti has written a controversial comment-article for a major newspaper in the United States. In fact, it isn’t even the first time that, in giving him a platform in the western media, an American newspaper has glossed over some details of the life of a man who is now 13 years into five life sentences handed down […]
By Maayan Lubell | JERUSALEM JERUSALEM Israel’s security cabinet on Thursday approved the building of the first new settlement in the occupied West Bank in two decades, even as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu negotiates with Washington on a possible curb on settlement activity. The unanimous vote in favour of construction of the new settlement in an area called Emek Shilo came after Netanyahu earlier told reporters: “I […]
By Ali Sawafta and Suleiman Al-Khalidi | DEAD SEA, Jordan/AMMAN DEAD SEA, Jordan/AMMAN Arab leaders reaffirmed on Wednesday their commitment to a two-state solution to the decades-long Arab-Israeli conflict amid increased unease over the stance of the United States under the new administration of President Donald Trump. Trump rattled Arab and European leaders in February by indicating he was open to a one-state solution, upending a position […]
CAIRO Islamic State’s branch in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula posted a video on Tuesday depicting the beheading of two men the militant Islamist group said it had found guilty of practicing witchcraft and sorcery. The video, posted on a Telegram channel often used by IS, showed the group forming a religious police unit known as the Hasbah in northern Sinai, where it has waged an insurgency for years. […]
The assassination of Mr. Fuqaha could herald a new kind of shadow war between bitter foes — a message from Israel to Hamas’s new, hard-line leader, Yehya Sinwar. Or Mr. Fuqaha’s death could be an ominous sign of internecine rivalries among Palestinian factions and even within Hamas under Mr. Sinwar, who carries a reputation as a harsh enforcer of loyalty in the group. Continue reading the main […]
THE DEAD SEA, Jordan: The Council of Arab Foreign Ministers on Monday approved 17 draft resolutions, including the rejection of unilateral steps that “jeopardize the historic and legal status” of Jerusalem. The draft will be presented to Arab leaders at their summit on Wednesday.It followed an announcement by Jason Greenblatt, US envoy to the Middle East, that he looks forward to attending the Arab Summit as an […]
By Nidal al-Mughrabi | GAZA GAZA A senior Hamas militant was shot dead near his home in the Gaza Strip on Friday, the group said, blaming Israel for the killing. An Israeli military spokeswoman declined to comment on the incident in the Hamas-run Palestinian coastal enclave. Mazen Fuqaha, a militant from the occupied West Bank whom Israel released in a prisoner swap in 2011 and exiled to […]
By Matt Spetalnick | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON The Trump administration reiterated its concerns about Israeli settlement activity, the two sides said on Thursday, as a round of talks ended without agreement over limiting future construction on land the Palestinians want for a state. The four days of high-level meetings in Washington marked the latest step by President Donald Trump’s aides aimed at opening the way to renewed peace […]
By Luke Baker | JERUSALEM JERUSALEM Russia and other world powers must move to limit Iran’s growing military strength in Syria because it poses a regional threat, the director-general of Israel’s Intelligence Ministry told Reuters in an interview. Israeli officials estimate Iran commands at least 25,000 fighters in Syria, including members of its own Revolutionary Guard, Shi’ite militants from Iraq and recruits from Afghanistan and Pakistan. It […]
BEIRUT A U.N. agency published a report on Wednesday accusing Israel of imposing an “apartheid regime” of racial discrimination on the Palestinian people, and said it was the first time a U.N. body had clearly made the charge. Israel’s Foreign Ministry spokesman likened the report, which was published by the U.N. Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA), to Der Sturmer – a Nazi propaganda publication […]
Photo Mahmoud Abbas, right, the president of the Palestinian Authority, met with Jason Greenblatt, President Trump’s envoy to the Middle East, in the West Bank on Tuesday. Credit Mohamad Torokman/Reuters JERUSALEM — President Trump’s new envoy to the Middle East met on Tuesday with Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority, striving in the administration’s first diplomatic undertaking here to maintain a public evenhandedness amid the […]
Photo Palestinians waiting for travel permits to cross into Egypt through the Rafah border crossing this week. In an effort to improve relations with the Egyptian government a new Hamas document would declare that the group is not a part of the Muslim Brotherhood. Credit Said Khatib/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images CAIRO — Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist group that has governed the Gaza Strip for a decade, […]
