TEL AVIV: US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin discussed with Israeli leaders Monday ways to scale back major combat operations in Gaza but said Washington was not imposing a timetable despite international calls for a ceasefire.
Austin and other US officials have repeatedly expressed concern about the large number of civilian deaths in Gaza, even while underscoring American backing for Israel’s campaign aimed at crushing Hamas. Neither side elaborated Monday on what needed to change on the ground for a shift to more precise operations after weeks of devastating bombardment and a ground offensive.
At a press conference alongside Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, Austin said, “This is Israel’s operation. I’m not here to dictate timelines or terms.” The US has vetoed calls for a ceasefire at the UN and rushed munitions to Israel.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has insisted that Israel will keep fighting until it ends Hamas rule in Gaza, crushes its formidable military capabilities and frees the dozens of hostages still held in Gaza since the deadly Oct. 7 attack inside Israel that ignited the war.
Israeli protesters have demanded the government relaunch talks with Hamas on releasing more hostages after three were mistakenly killed by Israeli troops.
Talks were underway Monday to broker freedom for more hostages, as CIA Director William Burns met in Warsaw with the head of Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency and the prime minister of Qatar, a US official said. It was the first known meeting of the three since the end of a weeklong ceasefire in late November, during which some 100 hostages were freed in exchange for the release of around 240 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.
More than 100 people were killed in Israeli strikes on residential buildings in northern Gaza on Sunday, a Health Ministry official in the Hamas-run territory said.
The 10-week-old war has killed more than 19,000 Palestinians and transformed much of the north into a moonscape. Some 1.9 million Palestinians — nearly 85 percent of Gaza’s population — have fled their homes, with most packing into UN-run shelters and tent camps in the southern part of the besieged territory.
US pressure on Israel
Austin, who arrived in Israel with Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. CQ Brown, said he and Israeli officials exchanged “thoughts on how to transition from high intensity operations” and how to increase the flow of humanitarian aid to Gaza.
American officials have called for targeted operations aimed at killing Hamas leaders, destroying tunnels and rescuing hostages. Those calls came after US President Joe Biden warned that Israel is losing international support because of its “indiscriminate bombing.”
Speaking alongside Austin, Gallant said only that “the war will take time.” Last week, Gallant said Israel would continue major combat operations for several more months.
European countries also appear to be losing patience. “Far too many civilians have been killed in Gaza,” EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell posted on X. “Certainly, we are witnessing an appalling lack of distinction in Israel’s military operation in Gaza.”
Under US pressure, Israel provided more precise evacuation instructions earlier this month as troops moved into the southern city of Khan Younis. Still, casualties have continued to mount and Palestinians say nowhere in Gaza is safe as Israel carries out strikes in all parts of the territory.
Israel reopened its main cargo crossing with Gaza to allow more aid in — also after a request from the US — but the amount is less than half of prewar imports, even as needs have soared and fighting hinders delivery in many areas. Israel blocked entry off all goods into Gaza soon after the war started and weeks later began allowing a small amount of aid in through Egypt.
Human Rights Watch on Monday accused Israel of deliberately starving Gaza’s population — which would be a war crime — pointing to statements by senior Israeli officials expressing the intent to deprive civilians of food, water and fuel or linking the entry of aid to the release of hostages.
Unprecedented death and destruction
The war began with an unprecedented surprise attack by Hamas that overwhelmed Israel’s border defenses. Thousands of militants rampaged across southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting around 240 men, women and children.
Hamas and other militants are still holding an estimated 129 captives after most of the rest were freed in return for Israel’s release of 240 Palestinian prisoners during a truce last month. Hamas has said no more hostages will be released until the war ends.
More than 19,400 Palestinians have been killed, according to the Health Ministry, which has said most are women and minors, and that thousands more are buried under the rubble. The ministry does not differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths.
Israel’s military says 127 of its soldiers have been killed in the Gaza ground offensive. It says it has killed thousands of militants, without providing evidence.
Israel blames civilian deaths on Hamas, saying it uses them as human shields. But the military rarely comments on individual strikes.
At least 110 people were killed in Israel’s bombardment of residential buildings in the urban Jabaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza on Sunday, Munir Al-Boursh, a senior Health Ministry official, told Al Jazeera television.
The area has seen heavy fighting in recent days. “No one can retrieve the martyrs or take the wounded to hospitals,” said Amal Radwan, who is staying at a UN shelter in Jabaliya.
The military released pictures of what it said was around $1.3 million in Israeli currency found in the home of a senior Hamas operative in the camp.
Regional tensions
Yemen’s Houthi militia continued attacks on shipping in the Red Sea in a campaign that has prompted a growing list of companies to halt their operations in the major trade route. The latest company was oil and natural gas giant BP, which said Monday it was suspending shipments through the Red Sea.
Multiple projectiles were fired at the Swan Atlantic, a Cayman Islands-flagged tanker, in the Red Sea off Yemen on Monday, a US official said. The USS Carney, an American warship, responded, the official said without providing further details. The official was not authorized to speak publicly about the attack and so spoke on condition of anonymity.
Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree, the Houthi military spokesman, confirmed the attack and said the group would continue targeting ships bound for Israeli ports as long as the blockade of Gaza continued.
The tanker was not heading toward Israel, according to ship tracking website VesselFinder, and there was no indication it was linked to the country.
Austin said he would hold talks Tuesday morning with his counterparts in the Middle East and beyond on an international coalition to respond to the attacks. “It is an international problem. That’s why it deserves an international response,” he said.
Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah have traded fire along the border nearly every day since the war began, In the Israeli-occupied West Bank, over 300 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the war, including four overnight during an Israeli military raid in the Faraa refugee camp, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.
This has been the deadliest year for Palestinians in the West Bank since 2005. Most have been killed during military raids, which often ignite gunbattles, or during violent demonstrations.
US defense secretary, Israeli leaders discuss more targeted approach in Gaza
https://arab.news/m97wp
US defense secretary, Israeli leaders discuss more targeted approach in Gaza
- The US has vetoed calls for a ceasefire at the UN and rushed munitions to Israel
- Human Rights Watch on Monday accused Israel of deliberately starving Gaza’s population
Sister act: Saudi sibling filmmakers Raneem and Dana Almohandes talk musicals, inspiration and telepathy
JEDDAH: A trip to Saudi Arabia’s AlUla, a chance encounter with a persistent mosquito on the streets of New York and an enduring love for musicals inspired Saudi filmmaking sisters Dana and Raneem Almohandes to create their animated short film “A Mosquito,” which screened at the recently concluded Red Sea International Film Festival in Jeddah.
“We were walking in New York, having a good time, and there was this mosquito who kept coming back to me,” explained older sister Raneem. “This is how it all started, with one question: ‘What does this mosquito want?’ We thought, ‘She wants to talk to us, but we’re not giving her the chance.’ So, that’s where the story was born.”
Set in 1969, “A Mosquito” follows Zozo — a tiny mosquito with big dreams. While her peers are content with ordinary life in the majestic landscapes of AlUla, Zozo dares to dream of becoming a famous singer — heading to Egypt to sing before the legendary Umm Kulthum.
“A Mosquito” began life as a two-minute short — part of Raneem’s university project. It turned into its fully realized version after they took their idea to the AlUla Creates program, a local initiative that provides funding, mentorship and networking opportunities for Saudi filmmakers and fashion designers.
“When AlUla invited us to apply, we had this idea already, and we wanted to expand on it, because, you know, university projects are victims of time and resources. We developed the story with the AlUla Creates team,” said Raneem.
“We went to AlUla earlier, and we captured the aesthetics from there. The frames that you see in the film are identical to the pictures we took during our trip,” added Dana.
Raneem graduated from New York University in musical theater writing (Dana, the younger of the two, is studying filmmaking at Princess Nourah Bint Abdul Rahman University in Riyadh). “We grew up watching musicals, but we felt like we don’t have any that are in the Saudi dialect, so we wanted to create (them),” said Raneem. “That’s why I studied musical theater writing.
“We’ve always loved expressing ourselves through art. For example, Dana will do a dance whenever she wants to express how she feels about someone. Like, for my birthday, she would do a choreographed dance. I used to do small videos for our family — sometimes they’re music videos, sometimes short films … this is how we started. And then I started an Instagram page for DIY videos, and we worked together on it. It was one of the first (Instagram accounts) to reach 1 million followers in the Middle East,” said Raneem. “Dana was, like, 10 years old back then.”
Before they had received any formal training, the duo were chosen as For Change Ambassadors of Saudi Arabia. The screenplay for their first musical feature (“Dandana”) was shortlisted in the second round of Sundance’s Screenwriters Lab 2020. Their first short, “A Human,” was funded by Google and premiered in Riyadh.
The sisters reiterate that their filmmaking career is closely tied to the history of cinema in the Kingdom.
“We put ‘A Human’ up on YouTube in parallel with Saudi Arabia opening its cinemas again,” Raneem said. It went on to become one of the first 100 films to be shown in cinemas after they reopened in the country and, according to Raneem, the very first short film.
In 2022, the pair wrote and directed the musical short “A Swing,” which was selected for the official competition at the Saudi Film Festival and was screened as part of the Kingdom’s participation at Cannes in 2022.
Despite the eight-year age gap between the two sisters, the duo say they have a seamless working relationship.
“We sometimes fight, as all sisters do, but we have telepathy most of the time,” said Raneem. “We are in sync in terms of ideas. Filmmaking is all about communication.”
Working as two young women in the Saudi film industry is, Dana said, “magical.” Raneem agreed.
“It’s overwhelmingly beautiful, because the support is magnificent,” she said. “Each and every project and idea that we’ve had, we knew for a fact that if we approached the right decision maker, it would happen.”
Pakistan stocks bounce back strongly a day after ‘massacre’ at bourse
- The KSE-100 index gained 3238 points to close the weekend trading session at 109,513 points
- Stock analysts attribute strong recovery of the market to easing pressure at local mutual funds
ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Stock Market on Friday bounced back strongly and gained more than 3,000 points, stock analysts said, a day after it witnessed a “massacre” on the back of significant redemptions from local mutual funds and year-end profit-taking.
The benchmark KSE-100 index gained 3238.17 points to close the weekend trading session at 109,513.14 points. On Thursday, the index plummeted by 5,132 points, or 4.32 percent, to close at 106,274.97 points, compared to Wednesday’s close of 111,070.29 points.
Stock analysts attributed the strong recovery to easing pressure at local mutual funds.
“Likely easing redemption pressure at local mutual funds together with the opening up of attractive valuations encouraged value buyers to reenter the market,” Raza Jafri, head of equities at Intermarket Securities, told Arab News.
Thursday’s slump was led by Hub Power Company Limited, United Bank Limited, Oil and Gas Development Company, and ENGRO, cumulatively contributing a staggering 1,556 points to the index’s overall decline, according to Topline Securities.
The sharp sell-off was triggered by significant redemptions from local mutual funds, compounded by year-end profit-taking by institutions, that dragged the market into a “turmoil,” it added.
The decline came days after Pakistan’s central bank cut its key interest rate by 200 basis points to 13 percent, marking the fifth straight reduction since June.
Yousuf M. Farooq, head of research at Chase Securities, said the market had entered a corrective phase, following a significant rally over the past year.
“We believe that earnings will now drive market performance rather than valuation rerating,” he added.
Anger in Germany after Elon Musk backs far right
- Musk post on X claims only the far-right AfD party can 'save Germany'
- Politicians from major parties accuse tech billionaire of interfering in election
FRANKFURT, Germany: A post from Elon Musk on his platform X that only the far-right AfD party can “save Germany” sparked accusations Friday that he was seeking to interfere in the country’s upcoming polls.
The tech billionaire posted the message over a video commentary that criticized the leader of Germany’s CDU party Friedrich Merz, on course to become the next chancellor, for his refusal to work with the AfD.
The anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) has enjoyed a surge in the polls, and is currently second-placed, but mainstream parties have ruled out cooperating with it.
While the German government refused to be drawn on the comments by Musk, set to be “efficiency czar” under US President-elect Donald Trump, politicians from major parties reacted with outrage.
“It is threatening, irritating and unacceptable for a key figure in the future US government to interfere in the German election campaign,” Dennis Radtke, an MEP for the center-right CDU, told the Handelsblatt daily.
Germans are set to go to the polls on February 23 after the collapse of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition last month in a row over the budget.
Musk was a “threat to democracy in the Western world,” Radtke added, accusing the world’s richest man of turning X, previously called Twitter, into a “disinformation slingshot.”
Alex Schaefer, a lawmaker from Scholz’s center-left SPD party, said Musk’s post was “completely unacceptable.”
“We are very close to the Americans, but now bravery is required toward our friend. We object to interference in our election campaign,” Schaefer told the Tagesspiegel daily.
The AfD however celebrated Musk’s praise in its own X message, which said “millions of people have long recognized this — and the number is growing.”
The German government was reluctant to be drawn into commenting on Musk’s post, with a spokeswoman telling a regular press conference in Berlin that “freedom of expression also applies to X.”
But the spokeswoman, Christiane Hoffmann, added the government was worried about “how X has developed in recent years, especially since Elon Musk took over.”
Despite such concerns, the government had decided not to close their accounts on the platform as it remained “an important medium for reaching and informing people,” she said.
It is not the first time Musk has weighed in on German politics.
Last month he tweeted in German that “Olaf is a fool” after the collapse of Scholz’s government.
Pakistan province aims to collect weapons to stem clashes, tribesmen may resist
- Kurram, a tribal district near the border with Afghanistan, has been a flashpoint for sectarian tensions for decades
- Last month’s clashes between Sunni and Shiite tribes have triggered a humanitarian crisis with reports of starvation
PESHAWAR: Provincial authorities in northwestern Pakistan said on Friday they planned to collect heavy weapons to stop sectarian clashes that have killed hundreds, but tribesmen in the historically lawless region said they would not give up their arms.
Kurram, a tribal district of around 600,000 near the border with Afghanistan where federal and provincial authorities have traditionally exerted limited control, has been a flashpoint for sectarian tensions for decades.
Fresh clashes between Sunni and Shiite Muslims erupted last month, triggering a humanitarian crisis with reports of starvation, lack of medicine and oxygen shortages following the blocking of the main highway connecting Kurram’s main city of Parachinar to the provincial capital Peshawar.
Mohammad Ali Saif, spokesman for the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial government, said authorities had decided to dismantle private bunkers — observation posts used in the fighting by both sides — and collect heavy weapons from tribesmen in Kurram to stop the violence.
However, local tribesmen have refused to surrender their weapons, citing concerns about their safety.
“Our weapons are for self-defense, not against the state,” said Jalal Hussain Bangash, a local tribal leader.
Another tribal elder, Zakir Hussain, warned that disarmament would leave the Shiite community vulnerable to attacks. “The government is ignoring ground realities in Kurram,” he said.
“We don’t have medicine in medical stores and edibles in the markets. Previously we would use Afghanistan when the road was closed, but now the Afghan border is also closed for us after the Taliban took over the country.”
Mehdi Hussain, a doctor at the District Headquarters Hospital in Parachinar, told Reuters that more than 80 people, including children, had died in recent weeks due to the lack of medical supplies.
The provincial government and Edhi Foundation have started sending medicines to the region via helicopters.
Kurdish fighters in Syria face dual threats
- Suppressed for decades, the Kurds took advantage of the weakness of Bashar Assad’s government during the civil war
- But with the rise of the new authority following his ouster, they are left navigating a complex and uncertain future
BEIRUT: Kurdish fighters in northern Syria are increasingly under pressure from Turkish-backed armed groups while also fearing the new authorities in Damascus will upend their hard-won autonomy.
Suppressed for decades, the Kurds took advantage of the weakness of Bashar Assad’s government during the civil war, but with the rise of the new authority following his ouster, they are left navigating a complex and uncertain future.
As Islamist-led militants pressed their lightning 12-day offensive that toppled Assad on December 8, Turkish-backed fighters began a parallel operation against Kurdish-led forces in the north.
They quickly seized Tal Rifaat and Manbij, two key Kurdish-held areas in a 30-kilometer (17-mile) stretch along the Turkish border where Ankara wants to establish a so-called “security zone.”
Following a wave of fighting, a US-brokered truce took hold on December 11, although Kurdish forces say it has not been respected by Turkish forces in the area nor their proxies.
Kurdish fighters make up the bulk of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) which was formed in 2015 and is seen as the Kurds’ de facto army.
The SDF spearheaded the fight that defeated Daesh group militants in Syria in 2019 and is still seen by the US as a “crucial” to prevent a militant resurgence in the area.
They have warned about a possible Turkish assault on the Kurdish-held border town of Kobani, also known as Ain Al-Arab, which has become a symbol of the fight against IS.
On Tuesday, SDF leader Mazloum Abdi proposed setting up a “demilitarized zone” in Kobani under US supervision.
There are also US troops in Syria as part of an international coalition against the militants, whose numbers doubled earlier this year to around 2,000, the Pentagon said Thursday.
As well as relying on pro-Turkish fighters, Ankara has between 16,000 to 18,000 troops in northern Syria, Turkish officials say, indicating they are ready for deployment “east of the Euphrates” if Kurdish fighters don’t disarm.
But Turkiye’s top diplomat Hakan Fidan on Wednesday said there would be no need for Ankara to intervene if the new government was to “address this issue properly.”
Observers say Ankara wants to take advantage of the Syrian upheaval to push Kurdish forces away from the border zone, seeing them as “terrorists” over their ties with the PKK which has fought a decades-long insurgency on Turkish soil.
Since 2016, the Turkish military has launched several operations in northern Syria targeting the YPG (the People’s Protection Units), which makes up the bulk of the SDF.
Turkish troops have remained in a large stretch of land on the Syrian side of the border.
Syria’s Kurds have made several gestures of openness toward the new authorities in Damascus, fearing for the future of their autonomous region.
They have adopted three-starred independence flag used by the opposition that is now flying over Damascus, and said Wednesday they were canceling customs and other taxes on goods moving between their area and the rest of Syria.
HTS’ military chief Murhaf Abu Qasra, whose nom de guerre is Abu Hassan Al-Hamawi, said Tuesday Kurdish-held areas would be integrated under the new leadership because Syria “will not be divided.”
“The region currently controlled by the SDF will be integrated into the new administration of the country,” he said.
