Saudi Donations to Gaza Exceed $100 Million

Trucks with Saudi aid to the Palestinian people (Asharq Al-Awsat)
Trucks with Saudi aid to the Palestinian people (Asharq Al-Awsat)
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Saudi Donations to Gaza Exceed $100 Million

Trucks with Saudi aid to the Palestinian people (Asharq Al-Awsat)
Trucks with Saudi aid to the Palestinian people (Asharq Al-Awsat)

Saudi donations to the National Campaign to support the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip via the "Sahem" portal exceeded $102 million on its fifth day since its launch.

On Thursday, the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King Salman bin Abdulaziz, and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman issued directives to launch a fundraising campaign on Sahem affiliated with the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center (KSRelief) to aid the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip.

Conditions are worsening in the Gaza Strip under Israeli strikes. The Palestinians need support amid lack of adequate food, shelter, clean water or medicine.

More than half a million donors provided direct financial support to alleviate the suffering in Gaza and contribute to providing the people with the necessities of life.

On Oct. 15, the Saudi Ambassador to Jordan, Nayef bin Bandar al-Sudairi, presented a check for the annual contribution of $2 million from Saudi Arabia to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).

The contribution will allow the UNRWA to continue providing vital relief services such as food, medicine, and humanitarian assistance to the Palestinian people.

UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini lauded the Kingdom for its ongoing support. He said the Kingdom consistently stands in solidarity with the Palestinian people and supports the agency in achieving its humanitarian goals.

Lazzarini stressed the importance of solidarity and support from the international community.

He urged UN member states and the international community to lend their support to the agency's efforts in assisting the Palestinian people, who are currently facing challenging conditions.

KSrelief embodied the Saudi role in supporting reconstruction and development and providing relief worldwide, making it the most significant supporter and prominent source of relief in the Middle East and various regions.

The center provides assistance to 94 countries worldwide, implementing 2,587 humanitarian and relief projects worth more than $6 billion within just eight years of its launch. It targets vital sectors such as food, education, health, nutrition, water, environmental restoration, and shelter.

Saudi diplomacy is exerting extraordinary momentum to mobilize an Arab, regional, and international position toward stopping Israeli military operations in the Palestinian territories and ensuring the arrival of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip.

Riyadh will host four summits within 48 hours early next week, starting with an emergency Arab League summit to discuss the situation in Gaza, two Saudi and Arab summits with Africa, and a summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation countries on Sunday.

The Kingdom repeatedly called on the international community, represented by the Security Council, to assume its responsibilities and stop the escalation, prevent the forced displacement of Gazans, and find a just and comprehensive political solution to the Palestinian cause.

Meanwhile, senior Humanitarian Affairs at the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Abdul Haq al-Amiri, asserted that Saudi Arabia is in constant contact with international relief and humanitarian organizations, maintaining that the Kingdom has no political or ethnic purposes.

Saudi support and relief programs are established through many official platforms that the government founded years ago, including the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center.

The Kingdom focused on rationing support and aid, targeting vital and strategic aspects that benefit individuals and governments of affected countries.



Etidal, Telegram Remove Over 2 Million Extremist Posts During Hajj

Etidal and Telegram have been collaborating since 2022 to prevent and combat terrorism and violent extremism (Asharq Al-Awsat)
Etidal and Telegram have been collaborating since 2022 to prevent and combat terrorism and violent extremism (Asharq Al-Awsat)
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Etidal, Telegram Remove Over 2 Million Extremist Posts During Hajj

Etidal and Telegram have been collaborating since 2022 to prevent and combat terrorism and violent extremism (Asharq Al-Awsat)
Etidal and Telegram have been collaborating since 2022 to prevent and combat terrorism and violent extremism (Asharq Al-Awsat)

During this year’s Hajj season, the Global Center for Combating Extremist Ideology (Etidal) and Telegram removed over 2 million pieces of extremist content.

Etidal and Telegram also noted a 12.82% increase in propaganda activity from ISIS, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, and al-Qaeda in the second quarter of 2024 compared to the previous quarter, a trend that typically spikes during Hajj.

Etidal has been collaborating with Telegram on preventing and countering terrorism and violent extremism by reviewing online content posted in Arabic.

Both organizations have agreed to expand their coordination to detect and remove Arabic material glorifying terrorism.

On June 17, the start of Hajj, extremist propaganda was at its peak. The partnership between Etidal and Telegram led to the removal of more than 18 million pieces of extremist content and the closure of 660 terrorist-linked channels in the second quarter of 2024.

The joint efforts targeted three groups: ISIS, with 14.8 million pieces of content removed and 305 channels shut down; Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), with 3.5 million pieces removed and 281 channels closed; and al-Qaeda, with 231,354 pieces removed and 74 channels shut down.

Among items referred were media files — PDFs, videos, and audio — uploaded by the groups on Telegram and public Telegram channels hosting the material.

The cooperation agreement between Etidal and Telegram aims to protect the platform’s users from extremist content, ideological influences, and attempts to exploit the platform in trading the content.

Since February 2022, the partnership between Etidal and Telegram has removed nearly 94 million pieces of extremist content and closed over 14,000 channels.

Etidal, launched in May 2017 by Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz and other world leaders in Riyadh, focuses on monitoring and blocking extremist content.