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UN Security Council to Consider Urging Gaza Ceasefire

An empty UN Security Council chamber is seen in January 2018. Drew Angerer / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File
An empty UN Security Council chamber is seen in January 2018. Drew Angerer / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File
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UN Security Council to Consider Urging Gaza Ceasefire

An empty UN Security Council chamber is seen in January 2018. Drew Angerer / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File
An empty UN Security Council chamber is seen in January 2018. Drew Angerer / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File

The UN Security Council meets on Gaza Friday under acute pressure from Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and will vote on urging an immediate ceasefire after weeks of ruinous war.
Even though the civilian death toll in the Palestinian territory is mounting and living conditions are described as catastrophic amid Israel's bombardment, the outcome of the session is up in the air, said AFP.
In a letter to the council on Wednesday, Guterres took the extraordinary step of invoking the UN charter's Article 99, which states that the secretary-general may bring to the attention of the council "any matter which in his opinion may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security."
No one in his job had done this in decades.
Guterres wrote: "Amid constant bombardment by the Israel Defense Forces, and without shelter or the essentials to survive, I expect public order to completely break down soon due to the desperate conditions, rendering even limited humanitarian assistance impossible."
He called for a "humanitarian ceasefire" to prevent "a catastrophe with potentially irreversible implications for Palestinians" and the entire Middle East.
UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric expressed hope that the council will heed Guterres' urgent appeal.
Dujarric said that since Wednesday the UN chief has spoken with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and British Foreign Secretary David Cameron and their counterparts from several other countries.
'Catastrophic'
Israel has been pressing for the destruction of Hamas over the October 7 attack, when militants broke through Gaza's border, killing around 1,200 people and seizing hostages, 138 of whom remain captive, according to Israeli figures.
The bloodiest ever war between Israel and Hamas is now in its third month, with the death toll in Gaza soaring above 17,000, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
Israel's relentless bombardment and shelling has reduced much of Gaza to rubble.
Israel is severely restricting the entry of food, water, fuel and medicine, and 1.8 million people (80 percent of Gaza's population) have been forced to leave home to escape Israeli attacks.
After Guterres sent his urgent letter, the United Arab Emirates prepared a draft resolution that will be put to a vote on Friday, said the delegation from Ecuador, which chairs the council this month and thus decides on scheduling issues.
The latest version of this document seen Thursday by AFP calls the humanitarian situation in Gaza "catastrophic" and "demands an immediate humanitarian ceasefire."
The short text also calls for protection of civilians, the immediate and unconditional release of all the hostages Hamas is still holding, and humanitarian access to the Gaza Strip.
But the outcome of a vote is not clear -- four earlier drafts presented since the war broke out were rejected by the Security Council.
The council finally managed to speak out on the war in mid-November as it approved a resolution calling for "humanitarian pauses and corridors" in Gaza -- not a ceasefire.
The United States, Israel's most powerful ally, which vetoed one of the earlier draft resolutions and rejects the idea of a ceasefire, has said a new resolution from the council at this stage would not be "useful."
"Our position hasn't changed," said the deputy US ambassador, Robert Wood.
"We again think that the best thing that we can do, all of us, for the situation on the ground, is to let the quiet behind-the-scene diplomacy that is going continue," Wood said.
Agnes Callamard, secretary general of Amnesty International, said "the US and all other members of the UN Security Council have a clear obligation under international law to prevent atrocities."
"There can be no justification for continuing to block meaningful action by the UN Security Council to stop massive civilian bloodshed, the complete collapse of the humanitarian system, and even worse horrors resulting from the breakdown of public order and massive displacement," she added.
The Palestinian ambassador to the UN, Riyad Mansour, said "we sincerely hope that the Security Council will adopt that resolution and will listen to brave, courageous, principled position of the secretary-general."
Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen on Wednesday said Guterres' tenure was "a danger to world peace" after he invoked Article 99.

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Arab World

Israeli Military Says It Is Examining Killing of Palestinian Teen in West Bank 

Israeli soldiers carrying weapons walk during a weekly settlers' tour in Hebron, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, December 20, 2025. (Reuters)
Israeli soldiers carrying weapons walk during a weekly settlers' tour in Hebron, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, December 20, 2025. (Reuters)
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Israeli Military Says It Is Examining Killing of Palestinian Teen in West Bank 

Israeli soldiers carrying weapons walk during a weekly settlers' tour in Hebron, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, December 20, 2025. (Reuters)
Israeli soldiers carrying weapons walk during a weekly settlers' tour in Hebron, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, December 20, 2025. (Reuters)

The Israeli military said it was reviewing an incident in the occupied West Bank in which soldiers shot dead a 16-year-old Palestinian who they said had thrown a brick at them, after CCTV footage appeared to show he was not doing so when shot.

Asked about the video, an Israeli military spokesperson said: "A Palestinian suspected of hurling a block at Israeli soldiers was shot. The incident is under review."

Palestinian officials said that Rayyan Mohammad Abu Mualla was shot and killed on Saturday in the northern West Bank town of Qabatiya, during a raid by the Israeli military.

The Israeli military initially said on Saturday: "During operational activity in the area of ‌Qabatiya, a ‌terrorist hurled a block toward the soldiers, who responded ‌with ⁠fire and eliminated ‌the terrorist."

CCTV footage showed two Israeli soldiers - one crouching and one standing on a lit street corner at dark - and a third soldier appearing to take position in an adjacent street leading to the same corner.

A person is then seen walking down a street and as he reaches the corner, he is shot by the crouching soldier and falls back and onto the ground.

The video does not appear to ⁠show him throwing a block or holding one.

The video starts six minutes before the shooting, showing the streets ‌empty and then a military vehicle driving down ‍the street as one person peers off ‍a rooftop and another through a window as the soldiers arrive at ‍the scene.

The person who is shot appears in the video three seconds before the shooting, and it is not possible to ascertain what the person was doing or holding before he is seen.

The footage was obtained from the owner of the security camera and its location and date were verified by Reuters. The incident is partly obscured because of the angle of the camera and the ⁠low light.

Abu Mualla's mother, Ibtihal, said that the Israeli military had taken his body away.

CCTV footage from around 22 minutes after the shooting appears to show his body being placed by soldiers on a stretcher and driven away in a military vehicle 11 minutes after that, 33 minutes after the shooting.

"They could have shot him in the leg, my son didn't throw anything towards them," said Mualla. "I want to bury my son with dignity," she said.

The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Since January, when Israel began stepping up raids in the northern West Bank, 53 Palestinian minors have been killed by Israeli forces, according to ‌the Palestinian health ministry.

Arab World

High-Level Turkish Team to Visit Damascus on Monday for Talks on SDF Integration 

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan attends a press conference, with Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yvan Gil Pinto (not pictured), in Caracas, Venezuela February 24, 2024. (Reuters)
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan attends a press conference, with Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yvan Gil Pinto (not pictured), in Caracas, Venezuela February 24, 2024. (Reuters)
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High-Level Turkish Team to Visit Damascus on Monday for Talks on SDF Integration 

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan attends a press conference, with Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yvan Gil Pinto (not pictured), in Caracas, Venezuela February 24, 2024. (Reuters)
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan attends a press conference, with Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yvan Gil Pinto (not pictured), in Caracas, Venezuela February 24, 2024. (Reuters)

A high-level Turkish delegation will visit Damascus on Monday to discuss bilateral ties and the implementation of a deal for integrating the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) into Syria's state apparatus, a Turkish Foreign Ministry source said.

The visit by Türkiye’s foreign and defense ministers and its intelligence chief comes amid efforts by Syrian, Kurdish and US officials to show some progress with the deal. But Ankara accuses the SDF of stalling ahead of a year-end deadline.

Türkiye views the US-backed SDF, which controls swathes ‌of northeastern Syria, as ‌a terrorist organization and has ‌warned of ⁠military action ‌if the group does not honor the agreement.

Last week Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said Ankara hoped to avoid resorting to military action against the SDF but that its patience was running out.

The Foreign Ministry source said Fidan, Defense Minister Yasar Guler and the head of Türkiye’s MIT intelligence agency, Ibrahim Kalin, ⁠would attend the talks in Damascus, a year after the fall of ‌former President Bashar al-Assad.

ANKARA SAYS ITS ‍NATIONAL SECURITY IS AT ‍STAKE

The source said the integration deal "closely concerned Türkiye’s national ‍security priorities" and the delegation would discuss its implementation. Türkiye has said integration must ensure that the SDF's chain of command is broken.

Sources have previously told Reuters that Damascus sent a proposal to the SDF expressing openness to reorganizing the group's roughly 50,000 fighters into three main divisions and smaller ⁠brigades as long as it cedes some chains of command and opens its territory to other Syrian army units.

Türkiye sees the SDF as an extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) group and says it too must disarm and dissolve itself, in line with a disarmament process now underway between the Turkish state and the PKK.

Ankara has conducted cross-border military operations against the SDF in the past. It accuses the group of wanting to circumvent the integration deal ‌and says this poses a threat to both Türkiye and the unity of Syria.

Arab World

Israel Demolishes Residential Building in East Jerusalem 

Israeli forces gather as an excavator demolishes a building built without a permit in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Wadi Qaddum on December 22, 2025. (AFP)
Israeli forces gather as an excavator demolishes a building built without a permit in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Wadi Qaddum on December 22, 2025. (AFP)
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Israel Demolishes Residential Building in East Jerusalem 

Israeli forces gather as an excavator demolishes a building built without a permit in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Wadi Qaddum on December 22, 2025. (AFP)
Israeli forces gather as an excavator demolishes a building built without a permit in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Wadi Qaddum on December 22, 2025. (AFP)

Israeli bulldozers tore through a four-storey residential building in east Jerusalem on Monday, displacing scores of Palestinians in what activists said was the largest such demolition in the area this year.

The building, located in the Silwan neighborhood near the Old City, comprised a dozen apartments housing approximately 100 people, many of them women, children and elderly residents.

It was the latest in a series of buildings to be torn down as Israeli officials target what they describe as unauthorized structures in annexed east Jerusalem.

"The demolition is a tragedy for all residents," Eid Shawar, who lives in the building, told AFP.

"They broke down the door while we were asleep and told us we could only change our clothes and take essential papers and documents," said the father of five.

With nowhere else to go, Shawar said his seven-member family would have to sleep in his car.

Three bulldozers began ripping into the structure early on Monday as residents looked on, their clothes and belongings scattered across nearby streets, an AFP journalist saw.

Israeli police cordoned off surrounding roads, with security forces deployed across the area and positioned on rooftops of neighboring houses.

Built on privately owned Palestinian land, the building had been slated for demolition for lacking a permit, activists said.

Palestinians face severe obstacles in obtaining building permits due to Israel's restrictive planning policies, according to activists, an issue that has fueled tensions in east Jerusalem and across the occupied West Bank for years.

- 'Ongoing policy' -

The building's destruction "is part of a systematic policy aimed at forcibly displacing Palestinian residents and emptying the city of its original inhabitants", the Jerusalem governorate, affiliated with the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority, said in a statement.

"Any demolition that expels residents from their homes constitutes a clear occupation plan to replace the land's owners with settlers."

The Jerusalem municipality, which administers both west and east Jerusalem, has previously said demolitions are carried out to address illegal construction and to enable the development of infrastructure or green spaces.

In a statement, the municipality said the demolition of the building was based on a 2014 court order, and "the land on which the structure stood is zoned for leisure and sports uses and construction, and not for residential purposes".

Activists, however, accuse Israeli authorities of frequently designating areas in east Jerusalem as national parks or open spaces to advance Israeli settlement interests.

The demolition was "carried out without prior notice, despite the fact that a meeting was scheduled" on Monday to discuss steps to legalize the structure, the Israeli human rights groups Ir Amin and Bimkom said in a statement, calling it the largest demolition of 2025.

"This is part of an ongoing policy. This year alone, around 100 east Jerusalem families have lost their homes," they added.

The status of Jerusalem remains one of the most contentious issues in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Israel occupied east Jerusalem, including the Old City, in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, and swiftly annexed the area.

Silwan begins at the foot of the Old City, where hundreds of Israeli settlers live among nearly 50,000 Palestinians.