Jordan: State Security Court Rules against Terror Suspects

Jordan: State Security Court Rules against Terror Suspects
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Jordan: State Security Court Rules against Terror Suspects

Jordan: State Security Court Rules against Terror Suspects

Jordan's State Security Court issued on Wednesday 16 verdicts on terrorism cases in which the defendants planned to target national security, security headquarters, army barracks, a number of strategic government sites and a number of foreign embassies.

Some of the accused were convicted of belonging to ISIS, promoting its ideology and attempting to join terrorist groups.

In its verdicts, which were issued under the chairmanship of its State Security Court President Colonel Mohammed al-Afif and membership of the civilian judges Ahmed al-Qatarneh and Dr. Nasser al-Salamat, the court explained that the defendants were members of terrorist organizations and that most of them belong to ISIS.

The verdicts ranged from 15 years imprisonment (maximum) to two and a half years of imprisonment, while there are some convicts who were acquitted.

The court convicted two of the accused with possession and manufacture of explosives for the purpose of illegal use and ordered the imprisonment of one of them for 15 years and the other for 10 years.

According to the indictment, the first suspect was wanted in several cases and classified as "very dangerous". He disappeared in a non-populated area and was possessing explosive devices he has manufactured already to attack security men when they try to arrest him.

The defendant was able to manufacture 18 explosive devices with the help of the second defendant. While driving a stolen pickup truck carrying 10 explosive devices, one of which was within his reach, security officers apprehended him, arrested him, seized the devices and eight others from his house.

The court also sentenced the accused to 15 years in prison and three others to five years each.

The main suspect planned to attack security guards of a foreign embassy in Amman and carry out an "incursion operation" by stabbing the security men with a large knife.

The indictment said that the accused worked as a butcher, and he brought the knife before the operation to his home and wrote a will to his parents asking them to smile when receiving his corps because he called himself a "martyr". However, the suspect was arrested before carrying out the operation, and the knife and the will were seized from inside his house.



UN: Drone Attack Hits Sudan Aid Truck

Shops operate beneath a war-damaged building in Omdurman, on the outskirts of Khartoum, Sudan, Thursday, April 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)
Shops operate beneath a war-damaged building in Omdurman, on the outskirts of Khartoum, Sudan, Thursday, April 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)
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UN: Drone Attack Hits Sudan Aid Truck

Shops operate beneath a war-damaged building in Omdurman, on the outskirts of Khartoum, Sudan, Thursday, April 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)
Shops operate beneath a war-damaged building in Omdurman, on the outskirts of Khartoum, Sudan, Thursday, April 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)

A drone attack hit an aid truck in Sudan's North Darfur state, destroying all the supplies on board, the UN refugee agency said on Sunday, without identifying who was responsible.

Drone strikes by both the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), who have been locked in a brutal war since April 2023, have escalated in recent months, often killing dozens at a time.

The UNHCR-operated vehicle "came under drone attack" on Friday while transporting emergency shelter kits to Tawila, home to more than 700,000 displaced people who fled fighting elsewhere in the western Darfur region, AFP quoted the agency as saying.

The driver escaped unhurt, but all supplies were destroyed in the resulting fire, it added.

UNHCR condemned the attack, warning that it would "leave 1,314 families living in desperate conditions in Tawila without shelter" at a time when humanitarian needs are already overwhelming.

More than 127,000 people fled El-Fasher, North Darfur's capital and the army's last stronghold in the region, after it fell to paramilitary forces in October, with reports of mass killings, sexual violence, looting and rape following the takeover.

Fighting has since spread to neighboring Kordofan, now the main theatre of the war, and the southeastern Blue Nile state, raising fears of a longer and increasingly fragmented conflict.

According to the UN, nearly 700 civilians have been killed in drone strikes by both sides since January alone.

UNHCR voiced "deep concern" over the rising use of drones, calling repeated attacks on humanitarian operations "particularly abhorrent".

According to an assessment by the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization, 28.9 million people, around 62 percent of Sudan's population, are facing acute food insecurity.

That includes 10.2 million who face severe food insecurity, in particular in the wider Darfur region and South Kordofan state.

Famine was declared last year in El-Fasher and Kadugli, the capital of South Kordofan, with 20 other areas at risk in Darfur and Kordofan, a UN-backed assessment found.

The conflict has already killed tens of thousands, uprooted over 11 million and created the world's largest displacement and hunger crises.


Palestinian Leader's Loyalists Win Local Elections, including Some in Gaza

A Palestinian man votes during the municipal election at a polling station in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza Strip April 25, 2026. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
A Palestinian man votes during the municipal election at a polling station in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza Strip April 25, 2026. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
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Palestinian Leader's Loyalists Win Local Elections, including Some in Gaza

A Palestinian man votes during the municipal election at a polling station in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza Strip April 25, 2026. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
A Palestinian man votes during the municipal election at a polling station in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza Strip April 25, 2026. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa

Loyalists of President Mahmoud Abbas won most races in Palestinian municipal elections, election officials said on Sunday, in a vote that for the first time in nearly two decades included a city in the Gaza Strip run by rival Hamas.

Saturday’s ballot marked the first elections of any kind in Gaza since 2006 and the first Palestinian polls since the Gaza war began more than two years ago with Hamas' cross-border attack on southern Israel.

Abbas' West Bank–based Palestinian Authority (PA) said the inclusion of the Gaza city Deir al-Balah, which suffered less damage than other areas of the coastal territory during the war, was intended to show that Gaza was an inseparable part of a future Palestinian state.

The elections, in which voter turnout was low, had been held "at a highly sensitive moment amid complex challenges and exceptional circumstances", Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa said as results were announced on Sunday.

But they represented "an important first step in a broader national process aimed at strengthening democratic life ... and ultimately achieving the unity of the land", he said.

POSSIBLE INDICATOR OF HAMAS SUPPORT

Hamas, which ousted the PA from Gaza in 2007, did not formally nominate candidates in Gaza and boycotted the race in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where Fatah's victory was widely expected.

But some candidates on one of the Deir al-Balah lists were widely seen by residents and analysts as aligned with the movement, making the vote a potential indicator of support for the Islamist group.

Preliminary results showed that the list, known as Deir al-Balah Brings Us Together, won only two of the 15 seats contested in Gaza.

The Nahdat Deir al-Balah list, backed by Abbas' Fatah party and the Western-backed PA, secured six seats. The remaining seats were won by two other Gaza-based groups, Future of Deir al-Balah and Peace and Building, not affiliated with either faction.

Abbas loyalists swept the election in the West Bank, running unchallenged in many seats.

"By electing figures linked to Fatah, voters appear to be seeking unrestricted international support for municipal governance and a gradual political shift that could extend beyond the local level," said Palestinian political analyst Reham Ouda.

The recent war has left much of Gaza reduced to rubble, with many residents displaced and focused on survival. Israel has continued conducting strikes despite an October ceasefire.

In Gaza voter turnout reached just 23%, while in the West Bank it was 56%, according to Chairman of the Central Elections Commission Rami al-Hamdallah.

Al-Hamdallah said some of the ballot boxes and voting equipment did not make it into the enclave because of Israeli security restrictions, though those challenges were overcome.

Hamas' Gaza spokesperson, Hazem Qassem, downplayed the significance of the election results, saying that they had no impact on wider national issues.

 

 

 


Arab Parliament Condemns Attack Targeting Two Border Posts in Kuwait

Arab Parliament logo
Arab Parliament logo
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Arab Parliament Condemns Attack Targeting Two Border Posts in Kuwait

Arab Parliament logo
Arab Parliament logo

Arab Parliament Speaker Mohammed Al-Yamahi has condemned the blatant attack that targeted two sites at the northern land border posts of Kuwait using two explosive-laden drones coming from Iraq, SPA reported.

In a statement, Al-Yamahi stressed the Arab Parliament’s condemnation and categorical rejection of any infringement on the sovereignty of Kuwait or any attempt to undermine its security and stability.

He stressed the Arab Parliament’s full solidarity and support for Kuwait in confronting such attacks, reiterating its backing for all measures taken to protect its security and noting that the security of Kuwait is an integral part of Arab national security.