Israel’s New Defense Minister: Netanyahu Loyalist, Settlers’ Friend 

A file photo taken on March 26, 2010 shows Israeli officer general Yoav Galant, chief of the south command, during a press conference near the border with the Gaza Strip. (AFP)
A file photo taken on March 26, 2010 shows Israeli officer general Yoav Galant, chief of the south command, during a press conference near the border with the Gaza Strip. (AFP)
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Israel’s New Defense Minister: Netanyahu Loyalist, Settlers’ Friend 

A file photo taken on March 26, 2010 shows Israeli officer general Yoav Galant, chief of the south command, during a press conference near the border with the Gaza Strip. (AFP)
A file photo taken on March 26, 2010 shows Israeli officer general Yoav Galant, chief of the south command, during a press conference near the border with the Gaza Strip. (AFP)

Israel's new defense minister Yoav Galant is a former general, a staunch ally of Benjamin Netanyahu and a vocal advocate of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank. 

In the military, the 64-year-old oversaw Israel's 2005 withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and later commanded the "Operation Cast Lead" offensive against its Hamas rulers in 2008-2009.  

Since entering politics in 2015, he has served as minister for education, housing and immigration -- and has been a prominent backer of Israel's settlements, regarded as illegal under international law, that are today home to some 475,000 settlers. 

Some observers fear a radical change in policy on the occupied West Bank under Netanyahu's new government. 

Shlomo Neeman, who heads the Yesha Council, an umbrella group representing Israeli settlers living in the West Bank, welcomed Galant ahead of his appointment on Thursday. 

"Yoav Galant is a man who has done a lot for the settlement of Judea and Samaria," he said, using the Jewish biblical terms for the West Bank. 

Ahead of his nomination, Galant's predecessor Benny Gantz spoke with Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, stressing "the important ties forged between the Israeli defense establishment and political echelon and the Palestinian Authority".  

Galant, born in the Mediterranean port of Jaffa in 1958 to Polish Holocaust survivors, was a career soldier.  

He was an officer in the elite marine unite known as Flotilla-13 when it carried out an operation against the Palestinian Fatah movement in Lebanon in 1978.  

The unit killed around 20 Palestinian gunmen, etching the operation into the Israeli military's history books.  

Top general  

Between 1982 and 1984, Galant took a break from the army to become a lumberjack in Alaska.  

Galant reached the rank of general in 2002, serving as former prime minister Ariel Sharon's military attaché.  

Galant would later rise to become commander of the southern military command, overseeing Israel's 2005 withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, including the evacuation of 8,000 settlers from the Palestinian enclave. 

He then commanded Israel's "Operation Cast Lead", a 22-day operation in Gaza that killed 1,440 Palestinians and 13 Israelis.  

A United Nations report accused both Israel and Hamas of war crimes during that conflict.  

Nominated as the army's chief of staff in 2010, Galant was mired in scandal over the appropriation of public land to build his house.  

An investigative report led to a petition in the supreme court which did not result in criminal charges, but posed potential legal problems to his appointment.  

Instead, Benny Gantz, whom Galant now succeeds at the defense ministry, was selected.  

After leaving the army, he became director of a drilling company owned by Franco-Israeli tycoon Beny Steinmetz, but resigned in 2014 to enter politics.  

In 2015, Galant served as housing minister as part of the center-right Kulanu party, though he later joined Netanyahu's right-wing Likud in 2019.  

Under previous Netanyahu governments, Galant served as both immigration and education minister between 2019 and 2021. 



Crops Wither in Sudan as Power Cuts Cripple Irrigation

FILED - 27 August 2024, Sudan, Omdurman: Young people walk along a street marked by destruction in Sudan. Photo: Mudathir Hameed/dpa
FILED - 27 August 2024, Sudan, Omdurman: Young people walk along a street marked by destruction in Sudan. Photo: Mudathir Hameed/dpa
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Crops Wither in Sudan as Power Cuts Cripple Irrigation

FILED - 27 August 2024, Sudan, Omdurman: Young people walk along a street marked by destruction in Sudan. Photo: Mudathir Hameed/dpa
FILED - 27 August 2024, Sudan, Omdurman: Young people walk along a street marked by destruction in Sudan. Photo: Mudathir Hameed/dpa

Hatem Abdelhamid stands amid his once-thriving date palms in northern Sudan, helpless as a prolonged war-driven power outage cripples irrigation, causing devastating crop losses and deepening the country's food crisis.

"I've lost 70 to 75 percent of my crops this year," he said, surveying the dying palms in Tanqasi, a village on the Nile in Sudan's Northern State.

"I'm trying really hard to keep the rest of the crops alive," he told AFP.

Sudan's agricultural sector -- already battered by a two-year conflict and economic crisis -- is now facing another crushing blow from the nationwide power outages.

Since the war between the regular army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces began in April 2023, state-run power plants have been repeatedly targeted, suffering severe damage and ultimately leaving farms without water.

Like most Sudanese farms, Abdelhamid's depends on electric-powered irrigation -- but the system has been down "for over two months" due to the blackouts.

Sudan had barely recovered from the devastating 1985 drought and famine when war erupted again in 2023, delivering a fresh blow to the country's agriculture.

Agriculture remains the main source of food and income for 80 percent of the population, according to the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

Now in its third year, the conflict has plunged more than half the population into acute food insecurity, with famine already taking hold in at least five areas and millions more at risk across conflict-hit regions in the west, center and south.

The war has also devastated infrastructure, killed tens of thousands of people, and displaced 13 million.

A 2024 joint study by the United Nations Development Programme and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) found that nearly a third of rural households have lost irrigation and water access since the war began.

Without electricity to power his irrigation system, Abdelhamid -- like thousands of farmers across the country -- was forced to rely on diesel-powered pumps.

But with fuel scarce and prices now more than 20 times higher than before the war, even that option is out of reach for many.

"I used to spend 10,000 Sudanese pounds (about four euros according to the black market rate) for irrigation each time," said another farmer, Abdelhalim Ahmed.

"Now it costs me 150,000 pounds (around 60 euros) because there is no electricity," he told AFP.

Ahmed said he has lost three consecutive harvests -- including crops like oranges, onions, tomatoes and dates.

With seeds, fertilizers and fuel now barely available, many farmers say they won't be able to replant for the next cycle.

In April, the FAO warned that "below average rainfall" and ongoing instability were closing the window to prevent further deterioration.

A June study by IFPRI also projected Sudan's overall economic output could shrink by as much as 42 percent if the war continues, with the agricultural sector contracting by more than a third.

"Our analysis shows massive income losses across all households and a sharp rise in poverty, especially in rural areas and among women," said Khalid Siddig, a senior research fellow at IFPRI.