WASHINGTON: The US Defense Department announced Friday that it would include close ally Israel in the area covered by its Middle East-focused Central Command.
In another sign of the rapprochement brokered by President Donald Trump between Israel and Arab countries, the Pentagon said US military dealings with Israel would no longer be handled by its European Command.
“We structure boundaries to best mitigate risk and protect US interests and partners,” the Pentagon said in a statement.
“The easing of tensions between Israel and its Arab neighbors subsequent to the Abraham Accords has provided a strategic opportunity for the United States to align key partners against shared threats in the Middle East.”
That was mainly a reference to Iran, which the United States, Israel and Arab countries view as the leading security threat to the region.
For decades at odds with its Arab neighbors over its treatment of Palestinians, Israel has over the past year broken barriers on open cooperation and communications with Gulf countries under the Trump-fostered Abraham Accords.
Moving it under the Central Command potentially makes security cooperation with the United States on regional matters easier, and could bring Israeli military officials in closer proximity to those of Gulf neighbors.
But it could also complicate CentCom cooperation with Iran allies like Iraq, where the US retains 2,500 troops.
“Israel is a leading strategic partner for the United States, and this will open up additional opportunities for cooperation with our US Central Command partners, while maintaining strong cooperation between Israel and our European allies,” the Pentagon said.
Pentagon includes Israel in Middle East command area
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Pentagon includes Israel in Middle East command area
- Moving Israel under the Central Command potentially makes security cooperation with the US on regional matters easier
- The move could bring Israeli military officials in closer proximity to those of Gulf neighbors
Iraq MPs to debate revised bill after outcry over underage marriage
- Proposed amendments would let people choose between religious or state regulations for family matters
- A revised version of the bill sets the minimum age at 15 with court approval and retains ‘current conditions’
The proposed amendments would let people choose between religious or state regulations for family matters, such as marriage, inheritance, divorce and child custody.
Critics fear the move could erode protections for Muslim women by lowering the legal age for marriage – currently set at 18, or 15 with the consent of legal guardians and a judge – and pave the way for the adoption of Islamic jurisprudence that could allow marriages as young as nine years old.
A revised version of the bill sets the minimum age at 15 with court approval and retains “current conditions,” according to MP Raed Al-Maliki, who backs the new proposals.
Couples could opt for Shiite Muslim or Sunni Muslim rules under the amendment.
If passed, clerics and lawyers would have four months to establish community-specific regulations. Parliament would then vote again to finalize the changes.
The draft law has already undergone two readings, with votes previously delayed.
An earlier version faced backlash from feminists and civil society groups.
In October, Amnesty International warned the amendments could legalize unregistered marriages – often used to bypass child marriage bans – and strip protections for divorced women.
The London-based rights group also voiced concerns that the amendments would strip women and girls of protections regarding divorce and inheritance.
Sunday’s parliament session will also include a vote on a general amnesty law.
Excluded from amnesty are convictions for terrorism and crimes like rape, incest, human trafficking and kidnapping.
The amnesty, covering 2016-2024, could apply to drug users but not traffickers, according to Maliki.
Cases based on evidence from “secret informants” may qualify for retrial.
The previous 2016 amnesty reportedly covered 150,000 people.
UNRWA chief says pausing aid delivery through key Gaza-Israel crossing
- Delivery through Israeli-controlled Kerem Shalom crossing has been paused due to unsafe route and looting by armed gangs inside Gaza
“We are pausing the delivery of aid through Kerem Shalom... The road out of this crossing has not been safe for months. On 16 November, a large convoy of aid trucks was stolen by armed gangs. Yesterday, we tried to bring in a few food trucks on the same route. They were all taken,” UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini said in a post on X.
Turkish-backed Syrian militants blocked Kurdish plan, Turkish security sources say
- Militants blocked an attempt by Kurdish groups to establish a corridor connecting Tel Rifaat to northeastern Syria
ANKARA: Turkiye-backed Syrian militants who are fighting Syrian President Bashar Assad have blocked an attempt by Kurdish groups to establish a corridor connecting Tel Rifaat to northeastern Syria, Turkish security sources said on Sunday.
Turkiye refers to this group of rebels as Syrian National Army.
The sources said that Kurdish groups, including the PKK and YPG, had sought to take advantage of Syrian government forces withdrawing from parts of the country under the control of Assad’s forces.
The corridor would have linked the Kurdish-held northeastern regions to Tel Rifaat, a strategic area northwest of Aleppo.
Iran says to ‘firmly support’ Damascus after militant attacks
- Iran’s top diplomat Abbas Araghchi will leave Tehran for Damascus on Sunday
Tehran: Iran’s top diplomat Abbas Araghchi said Sunday he will leave Tehran for Damascus to deliver a message of support for Syria’s government and armed forces, state media said, after a lighting advance by rebels.
Tehran has been a staunch ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad during the civil war that broke out in 2011. Iran maintains it does not have combat troops in Syria, only officers who provide military advice and training.
Iran-backed Hezbollah, of Lebanon, has for years fought on the side of the Syrian government.
“I am going to Damascus to convey the message of the Islamic Republic to the Syrian government,” Araghchi said, emphasising Tehran will “firmly support the Syrian government and army,” the IRNA state news agency reported.
Islamist-led rebels on Saturday seized Aleppo’s airport and dozens of nearby towns after overrunning most of Syria’s second city Aleppo, a war monitor said.
Syria’s army confirmed that the rebels had entered “large parts” of the city of around two million people and said “dozens of men from our armed forces were killed.”
Araghchi again called the surprise rebel offensive a plot by the United States and Israel.
“The Syrian army will once again win over these terrorist groups as in the past,” the foreign minister added.
An Iranian news agency reported earlier that a general in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps was killed in Syria on Thursday during the fighting.
On Saturday, Iran’s foreign ministry said its consulate in Aleppo had come under attack, but staff members were safe.
Foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said Araghchi who will visit Ankara for consultations with Turkish officials after his stop in Damascus.
Since 2020, the rebel enclave in Syria’s northwestern Idlib region has been subject to a Turkish- and Russian-brokered truce that had largely been holding despite repeated violations.
But the insurgents’ launch on Wednesday of a surprise offensive against the city of Aleppo shattered the truce, the same day a fragile ceasefire took effect in neighboring Lebanon between Israel and Hezbollah.
The Syrian government had regained control of a large part of the country in 2015 with the support of its Russian and Iranian allies, and in 2016 the entire city of Aleppo.
Israeli strikes kill 15 in Gaza, Cairo holds fresh talks with Hamas
- The strike in the Muwasi area is a sprawling tent camp housing hundreds of thousands of displaced people
- Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed over 44,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children
CAIRO: Israeli military strikes killed at least 15 Palestinians in Gaza on Sunday, medics said, as Israeli forces kept up bombardments across the enclave and blew up houses on its northern edge.
In the central Gaza camp of Nuseirat, an Israeli airstrike killed six people in a house, and another attack killed three in a home in Gaza City, medics said.
Two children were killed when a missile hit a tent encampment in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, while four other people were killed in an airstrike in Rafah, near the border with Egypt, medics told Reuters.
Residents said the military blew up clusters of houses in the northern Gaza areas of Jabalia, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun, where Israeli forces have operated since October this year.
Palestinians say Israel’s operations on the northern edge of the enclave are part of a plan to clear people out through forced evacuations and bombardments to create a buffer zone — an allegation the army denies.
The military says it has killed hundreds of Hamas militants there as it fights to stop the faction regrouping almost 14 months since the war in Gaza started. Hamas’s armed wing says it has killed many Israeli forces in anti-tank rocket and mortar fire attacks, and in ambushes with explosive devices since the new operation started.
Prisoners, Talks
Two Palestinian detainees from Gaza have died in Israeli custody, prisoner advocacy groups said on Sunday, bringing the number of detainees reported killed since the start of the war to 47.
They named the two men as Mohammad Idris and Muath Rayyan, both in their 30s.
The Israel Prison Service said the cases were not under its jurisdiction and there was no immediate comment from the military which runs detention camps.
Israel has denied accusations from Palestinian and international human rights organizations that detainees have been mistreated and tortured in its jails and detention camps.
Meanwhile, Hamas leaders held talks in Cairo with Egyptian security officials to explore ways to reach a deal with Israel that could secure the release of hostages in return for Palestinian prisoners.
The visit was the first since the United States announced on Wednesday it would revive efforts in collaboration with Qatar, Egypt and Turkiye to negotiate a ceasefire in Gaza.
Hamas is seeking an agreement that would end the war while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the war will only end when Hamas is eradicated.
Israel’s military campaign in Gaza has killed more than 44,300 people and displaced nearly all of the enclave’s population, Gaza officials say. Vast swathes of Gaza lie in ruins.
The conflict when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israeli communities on Oct. 7, 2023, killing about 1,200 people and abducting more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli officials.
