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Israeli Ultra-Nationalists to March in Jerusalem Despite Ban

Israelis wave Israeli flags outside Jerusalem's Old City, June 15,2021. (File/Reuters)
Israelis wave Israeli flags outside Jerusalem's Old City, June 15,2021. (File/Reuters)
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Israeli Ultra-Nationalists to March in Jerusalem Despite Ban

Israelis wave Israeli flags outside Jerusalem's Old City, June 15,2021. (File/Reuters)
Israelis wave Israeli flags outside Jerusalem's Old City, June 15,2021. (File/Reuters)

A group of Israeli ultra-nationalists said it is determined to go ahead with a flag-waving march around predominantly Palestinian areas of Jerusalem's Old City later Wednesday, brushing aside a police ban of an event that served as one of the triggers of last year's Israel-Gaza war.

Israeli police said a large number of officers were deployed around Jerusalem's historic Old City, home to religious sites for Jews, Christians and Muslims, out of concern that confrontations could further ignite an already tense atmosphere in the city during the Jewish holiday of Passover and the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Palestinian militant groups said Tuesday evening that they were “raising the state of general alert” and warned against Israeli radicals holding a flag march in Jerusalem, The Associated Press reported.

“At this stage the police are not approving the protest march under the requested layout,” the police said in a statement, without elaborating. They could not be reached for comment Wednesday on whether the march would be banned altogether, or just on the proposed route past the Damascus Gate.

In a similar situation last May, Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip fired rockets toward Jerusalem as Israeli nationalists holding a flag march were making their way to the Old City. The events set off an 11-day war between Israel and the militant group Hamas that rules Gaza.

Israeli-Palestinian tensions have surged in recent weeks after a series of deadly attacks inside Israel, followed by military operations in the West Bank.

On Monday, Palestinian militants fired a rocket from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel for the first time in months, and Israel responded with airstrikes. These followed days of clashes between Israeli police and Palestinians at a flashpoint holy site in Jerusalem.

Noam Nisan, one of the organizers of the planned march, told Kan public radio that it would proceed as planned on Wednesday.

“A Jew with a flag in Jerusalem is not a provocation," he said.

He said that the demonstration was a response to buses being stoned earlier this week while driving to the Western Wall, the holiest place where Jews can pray, located in Jerusalem's Old City.

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Arab World

Erdogan: Israel's Attacks on Syria, Lebanon Threaten Türkiye Too

FILED - 30 October 2025, Türkiye, Ankara: FILE PHOTO - Recep Tayyip Erdogan, President of Türkiye, speaks at the presidential palace. Photo: Michael Kappeler/dpa
FILED - 30 October 2025, Türkiye, Ankara: FILE PHOTO - Recep Tayyip Erdogan, President of Türkiye, speaks at the presidential palace. Photo: Michael Kappeler/dpa
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Erdogan: Israel's Attacks on Syria, Lebanon Threaten Türkiye Too

FILED - 30 October 2025, Türkiye, Ankara: FILE PHOTO - Recep Tayyip Erdogan, President of Türkiye, speaks at the presidential palace. Photo: Michael Kappeler/dpa
FILED - 30 October 2025, Türkiye, Ankara: FILE PHOTO - Recep Tayyip Erdogan, President of Türkiye, speaks at the presidential palace. Photo: Michael Kappeler/dpa

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday that Israel's attacks on Syria and Lebanon had reached a point where they also threaten Türkiye, adding Israel's "aggression" ⁠posed a threat ⁠to the whole world and must be stopped.

Speaking to lawmakers in parliament, ⁠Erdogan also said there were initiatives, led by Israel, to destabilize the Mediterranean region and warned that "nobody should chase adventures" or join Israel's "boat of mischief.”

Ankara's response ⁠to ⁠moves violating the rights of Turks and Turkish Cypriots would be met with a clear and strong response, he warned.

Arab World

Russia Says it is Discussing 'Reformatting' of Military Facilities in Syria

People rest outside the Kremlin on a warm summer day in downtown Moscow, Russia, 05 June 2026. EPA/MAXIM SHIPENKOV
People rest outside the Kremlin on a warm summer day in downtown Moscow, Russia, 05 June 2026. EPA/MAXIM SHIPENKOV
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Russia Says it is Discussing 'Reformatting' of Military Facilities in Syria

People rest outside the Kremlin on a warm summer day in downtown Moscow, Russia, 05 June 2026. EPA/MAXIM SHIPENKOV
People rest outside the Kremlin on a warm summer day in downtown Moscow, Russia, 05 June 2026. EPA/MAXIM SHIPENKOV

Russia's foreign ministry said on Wednesday that cooperation with Syria was developing very actively and that Moscow was discussing with Damascus a "possible reformatting" of its military facilities in Syria.

The December 2024 ousting of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, a close Russian ally, raised questions about the future of Russia's Hmeimim airbase in Latakia and its naval facility at Tartous. But Moscow has since built relations with Ahmed al-Sharaa, who is now Syria's president.

"Russian-Syrian ⁠cooperation is developing ⁠very actively," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said when asked about reported plans for the creation of a logistics hub in Tartous to distribute goods imported from Russia across Syria.

"Within the framework of contacts with Syrian partners, the issue of ⁠Russia's military presence in Syria is also being discussed, including in the context of a possible reformatting of the functionality of Russian military facilities,” Reuters quoted her as saying.

The bases in Syria are an integral part of Russia's global military presence: The Tartous naval base is Russia's only Mediterranean repair and resupply hub, while Hmeimim is a major staging post for military and mercenary activity in Africa.

Russia intervened militarily in Syria in ⁠2015 ⁠to back Assad in a civil war. Reuters reported in 2024 that Russia was pulling back forces from front lines in northern Syria and from posts in mountains dominated by Assad's Alawite community, but was not leaving its Mediterranean bases in Hmeimim and Tartous.

Arab World

Amnesty Accuses Israel of ‘Ethnic Cleansing’ of West Bank Bedouins

An aerial view shows the Bedouin hamlet of Khan al-Ahmar in the West Bank, Jan. 24, 2023. (AP)
An aerial view shows the Bedouin hamlet of Khan al-Ahmar in the West Bank, Jan. 24, 2023. (AP)
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Amnesty Accuses Israel of ‘Ethnic Cleansing’ of West Bank Bedouins

An aerial view shows the Bedouin hamlet of Khan al-Ahmar in the West Bank, Jan. 24, 2023. (AP)
An aerial view shows the Bedouin hamlet of Khan al-Ahmar in the West Bank, Jan. 24, 2023. (AP)

Amnesty International accused Israel on Wednesday of conducting an "ethnic cleansing" campaign against Bedouin and herding communities in the occupied West Bank, saying the measures were designed to accelerate the annexation of the Palestinian territory.

A new report by the rights group found that these rural Palestinian communities are bearing the brunt of Israeli settler violence and forced displacement.

"Israeli authorities are accelerating annexation through a state-driven campaign of ethnic cleansing targeting Palestinian Bedouin and herding communities" of the West Bank, said the report released on Wednesday.

Amnesty said its research showed that 27 Bedouin and herding communities comprising hundreds of Palestinians were forcibly displaced between 2023 and 2025 or were at risk of displacement in the West Bank's Area C, which encompasses 60 percent of the territory and is under Israeli control under the 1990s Oslo agreements.

In the report titled "Erasing anything Palestinian: Israel's ethnic cleansing of West Bank Bedouin and herding communities", Amnesty accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government, one of Israel's most right-wing to date, of catering to the settler movement's religious nationalist agenda.

"It has accelerated settlement expansion and land grabs, increased financial and logistical support to settlements, and it has armed settlers, thereby enabling a brutal state-sanctioned campaign of settler violence," the report said.

In an apparent effort to counter arguments by Israeli officials that settler violence is caused by bad actors in that community, Amnesty pointed to "explicit calls by Israeli officials for settlement expansion" and "measures aimed at minimizing Palestinian presence in Area C".

The "ethnic cleansing campaign is state-led, and state-sponsored, not driven by rogue settlers or so-called extremist ministers", the report concluded.

- 'Unlawful deportation' -

Far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who himself lives in a settlement, is a vocal proponent of West Bank's annexation and on Tuesday was banned from France for actively promoting it.

In May 2026, the UN rights office had also decried indications of "ethnic cleansing" in Gaza and the West Bank.

Amnesty pointed to Israel's legal responsibilities as an occupying power in the West Bank, and its violations of international humanitarian law.

"These violations include the war crime of unlawful deportation and transfer and the crime against humanity of deportation or forcible transfer of population," the report said.

Bedouin and herders' communities, often isolated and without security services, are particularly vulnerable to the threat of violence or displacement.

Since 2023, AFP reporters have witnessed the departure of several Bedouin communities of the West Bank under pressure from settler groups, including the community of Ras Ein al-Auja in early 2026.

"What is happening today is the complete collapse of the community as a result of the settlers' continuous and repeated attacks," Farhan Jahaleen, a Bedouin from the village, told AFP in January.

Since Netanyahu's government came to power in late 2022, it has greenlighted the creation of 102 settlements in the West Bank, according to settlement watchdog Peace Now.

Excluding east Jerusalem, more than 500,000 Israelis live in settlements in the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967, among some three million Palestinians.

All Israeli settlements are considered illegal under international law.

Some settlers have engaged in arson, vandalism, theft of private property in Palestinian communities, as well as physical assaults and sometimes murder, according to rights groups.

The number of such incidents steadily increased after the start of the war in Gaza in 2023, reaching an average of six per day in the West Bank in 2026, according to the UN humanitarian agency OCHA.