عربي English Türkçe اردو فارسى
Logo
Latest News
Arab World

Gaza Ceasefire Negotiations Extend to Another Day

FILE - Palestinians bury the bodies of people who were killed in fighting with Israel and returned to Gaza by the Israeli military, during a mass funeral in Rafah, Gaza Strip, Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Shbair, File)
FILE - Palestinians bury the bodies of people who were killed in fighting with Israel and returned to Gaza by the Israeli military, during a mass funeral in Rafah, Gaza Strip, Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Shbair, File)
TT
TT

Gaza Ceasefire Negotiations Extend to Another Day

FILE - Palestinians bury the bodies of people who were killed in fighting with Israel and returned to Gaza by the Israeli military, during a mass funeral in Rafah, Gaza Strip, Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Shbair, File)
FILE - Palestinians bury the bodies of people who were killed in fighting with Israel and returned to Gaza by the Israeli military, during a mass funeral in Rafah, Gaza Strip, Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Fatima Shbair, File)

Negotiators were to meet in the Qatari capital Doha again on Friday in an effort to hammer out a Gaza ceasefire agreement as Israel continued to slam targets in the Palestinian enclave.
Gaza health officials reported separately on Thursday that the death toll there had surpassed 40,000 people after more than 10 months of fighting.
This round of negotiations opened on Thursday, and the talks would resume on Friday for a second day, Qatari and US officials said.
A US official briefed on the discussions in Doha, who declined to be identified, told Reuters that Thursday's talks were "constructive."
"This is vital work. The remaining obstacles can be overcome, and we must bring this process to a close," US national security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters at the White House.
Israel, meanwhile, pressed its assault on Gaza. Gaza health officials said at least six Palestinians were killed on Thursday night in an Israeli air strike on a house in Jabalia in northern Gaza Strip.
Israeli troops earlier hit targets in the southern cities of Rafah and Khan Younis.
In a statement issued late on Thursday on Telegram, Hamas politburo member Hossam Badran said Israel's continuing operations were an obstacle to progress on a ceasefire. Hamas officials did not join Thursday's talks.
Badran said the talks must move toward implementation of a framework agreement accepted previously and achieve a complete ceasefire, withdrawal of Israeli forces, return of displaced Palestinians and a hostage exchange deal.
"Hamas looks at the ongoing negotiations in Doha regarding a ceasefire and a hostage exchange from a strategic perspective with the goal of ending the aggression on Gaza," he added.
Mediators planned to consult with Hamas' Doha-based negotiating team after the meeting, the US official told Reuters.
The Israeli delegation includes spy chief David Barnea, head of the domestic security service Ronen Bar and the military's hostages chief Nitzan Alon, defense officials said.
The White House sent CIA Director Bill Burns and US Middle East envoy Brett McGurk. Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani and Egypt's intelligence chief Abbas Kamel also took part.
The negotiations, an effort to end bloodshed in Gaza and bring 115 Israeli and foreign hostages home, were put together as Iran appeared poised to retaliate against Israel after the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on July 31.
ESCALATION RISK
With US warships, submarines and warplanes dispatched to the region to defend Israel and deter potential attackers, Washington hopes a ceasefire agreement in Gaza can defuse the risk of a wider regional war.
The White House said late on Thursday attacks by Israeli settlers on Palestinian civilians in the West Bank were "unacceptable and must stop," after dozens of settlers assaulted a village, killing at least one person.
With US presidential elections looming on Nov. 5, Republican candidate Donald Trump criticized the Biden administration's months-long calls for a ceasefire, saying it "would only give Hamas time to regroup."
Israel and Hamas have each blamed the other for failure to reach a deal yet neither side has ruled out an agreement.
On Wednesday, a source in the Israeli negotiating team said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has allowed significant leeway on a few of the substantial disputes.
Gaps include the presence of Israeli troops in Gaza, the sequencing of a hostage release and restrictions on the free movement of civilians from southern to northern Gaza.
UN human rights chief Volker Turk said the Gaza death toll of more than 40,000 reported by the enclave's health ministry was a "grim milestone for the world".
Separately, Israel's military said it had "eliminated" more than 17,000 Palestinian fighters in its Gaza campaign.
In shattered Gaza where the war has driven almost all of its 2.3 million population from their homes, there was a desperate desire for an end to the fighting.
"We are hopeful this time. Either it's this time or never I am afraid," Aya, 30, sheltering with her family in Deir Al-Balah in the central part of the Gaza Strip, told Reuters via a chat app.
The war started after a Hamas raid on southern Israel on Oct. 7 in which Israel says Hamas killed some 1,200 people, prompting Israel to attack Gaza in retaliation.

Most Viewed

 
 
Arab World

Lebanon PM Pledges Reconstruction on Visit to Ruined Border Towns

This handout picture released by the Lebanese Government Press Office shows Lebanon's Prime Minister Nawaf Salam being showered with confetti as he is received by locals during a tour in the heavily-damaged southern village of Dhayra near the border with Israel on February 7, 2026. (Lebanese Government Press Office / AFP)
This handout picture released by the Lebanese Government Press Office shows Lebanon's Prime Minister Nawaf Salam being showered with confetti as he is received by locals during a tour in the heavily-damaged southern village of Dhayra near the border with Israel on February 7, 2026. (Lebanese Government Press Office / AFP)
TT
TT

Lebanon PM Pledges Reconstruction on Visit to Ruined Border Towns

This handout picture released by the Lebanese Government Press Office shows Lebanon's Prime Minister Nawaf Salam being showered with confetti as he is received by locals during a tour in the heavily-damaged southern village of Dhayra near the border with Israel on February 7, 2026. (Lebanese Government Press Office / AFP)
This handout picture released by the Lebanese Government Press Office shows Lebanon's Prime Minister Nawaf Salam being showered with confetti as he is received by locals during a tour in the heavily-damaged southern village of Dhayra near the border with Israel on February 7, 2026. (Lebanese Government Press Office / AFP)

Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam visited heavily damaged towns near the Israeli border on Saturday, pledging reconstruction.

It was his first trip to the southern border area since the army said it finished disarming Hezbollah there, in January.

Swathes of south Lebanon's border areas remain in ruins and largely deserted more than a year after a US-brokered November 2024 ceasefire sought to end hostilities between Israel and the Iran-backed group.

Lebanon's government has committed to disarming Hezbollah, and the army last month said it had completed the first phase of its plan to do so, covering the area between the Litani River and the Israeli border about 30 kilometers (20 miles) further south.

Visiting Tayr Harfa, around three kilometers from the border, and nearby Yarine, Salam said frontier towns and villages had suffered "a true catastrophe".

He vowed authorities would begin key projects including restoring roads, communications networks and water in the two towns.

Locals gathered on the rubble of buildings to greet Salam and the delegation of accompanying officials in nearby Dhayra, some waving Lebanese flags.

In a meeting in Bint Jbeil, further east, with officials including lawmakers from Hezbollah and its ally the Amal movement, Salam said authorities would "rehabilitate 32 kilometers of roads, reconnect the severed communications network, repair water infrastructure" and power lines in the district.

Last year, the World Bank announced it had approved $250 million to support Lebanon's post-war reconstruction, after estimating that it would cost around $11 billion in total.

Salam said funds including from the World Bank would be used for the reconstruction and rehabilitation projects.

The second phase of the government's disarmament plan for Hezbollah concerns the area between the Litani and the Awali rivers, around 40 kilometers south of Beirut.

Israel, which accuses Hezbollah of rearming, has criticized the army's progress as insufficient, while Hezbollah has rejected calls to surrender its weapons.

Despite the truce, Israel has kept up regular strikes on what it usually says are Hezbollah targets and maintains troops in five south Lebanon areas.

Lebanese officials have accused Israel of seeking to prevent reconstruction in the heavily damaged south with repeated strikes on bulldozers, excavators and prefabricated houses.

Visiting French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot on Friday said the reform of Lebanon's banking system needed to precede international funding for reconstruction efforts.

The French diplomat met Lebanon's army chief Rodolphe Haykal on Saturday, the military said.

Arab World

Over 2,200 ISIS Detainees Transferred to Iraq from Syria, Says Iraqi Official

One of the American buses transporting ISIS fighters, according to a security source from the Syrian Democratic Forces, heads from Syria towards Iraq, in Qamishli, Syria, February 7, 2026. (Reuters)
One of the American buses transporting ISIS fighters, according to a security source from the Syrian Democratic Forces, heads from Syria towards Iraq, in Qamishli, Syria, February 7, 2026. (Reuters)
TT
TT

Over 2,200 ISIS Detainees Transferred to Iraq from Syria, Says Iraqi Official

One of the American buses transporting ISIS fighters, according to a security source from the Syrian Democratic Forces, heads from Syria towards Iraq, in Qamishli, Syria, February 7, 2026. (Reuters)
One of the American buses transporting ISIS fighters, according to a security source from the Syrian Democratic Forces, heads from Syria towards Iraq, in Qamishli, Syria, February 7, 2026. (Reuters)

Iraq has so far received 2,225 ISIS group detainees, whom the US military began transferring from Syria last month, an Iraqi official told AFP on Saturday.

They are among up to 7,000 ISIS detainees whose transfer from Syria to Iraq the US Central Command (CENTCOM) announced last month, in a move it said was aimed at "ensuring that the terrorists remain in secure detention facilities".

Previously, they had been held in prisons and camps administered by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in northeast Syria.

The announcement of the transfer plan last month came after US envoy to Syria Tom Barrack declared that the SDF's role in confronting ISIS had come to an end.

Saad Maan, head of the security information cell attached to the Iraqi prime minister's office, told AFP on Saturday that "Iraq has received 2,225 terrorists from the Syrian side by land and air, in coordination with the international coalition", which Washington has led since 2014 to fight IS.

He said they are being held in "strict, regular detention centers".

A Kurdish military source confirmed to AFP the "continued transfer of ISIS detainees from Syria to Iraq under the protection of the international coalition".

On Saturday, an AFP photographer near the Kurdish-majority city of Qamishli in northeastern Syria saw a US military convoy and 11 buses with tinted windows.

- Iraq calls for repatriation -

ISIS seized swathes of northern and western Iraq starting in 2014, until Iraqi forces, backed by the international coalition, managed to defeat it in 2017.

Iraq is still recovering from the severe abuses committed by the extremists.

In recent years, Iraqi courts have issued death and life sentences against those convicted of terrorism offences.

Thousands of Iraqis and foreign nationals convicted of membership in the group are incarcerated in Iraqi prisons.

On Monday, the Iraqi judiciary announced it had begun investigative procedures involving 1,387 detainees it received as part of the US military's operation.

In a statement to the Iraqi News Agency on Saturday, Maan said "the established principle is to try all those involved in crimes against Iraqis and those belonging to the terrorist ISIS organization before the competent Iraqi courts".

Among the detainees being transferred to Iraq are Syrians, Iraqis, Europeans and holders of other nationalities, according to Iraqi security sources.

Iraq is calling on the concerned countries to repatriate their citizens and ensure their prosecution.

Maan noted that "the process of handing over the terrorists to their countries will begin once the legal requirements are completed".

Arab World

Drone Attack by RSF in Sudan Kills 24, Including 8 Children, Doctors’ Group Says

Displaced Sudanese wait to receive humanitarian aid at the Abu al-Naga displacement camp in the Gedaref State, some 420km east of the capital Khartoum on February 6, 2026. (AFP)
Displaced Sudanese wait to receive humanitarian aid at the Abu al-Naga displacement camp in the Gedaref State, some 420km east of the capital Khartoum on February 6, 2026. (AFP)
TT
TT

Drone Attack by RSF in Sudan Kills 24, Including 8 Children, Doctors’ Group Says

Displaced Sudanese wait to receive humanitarian aid at the Abu al-Naga displacement camp in the Gedaref State, some 420km east of the capital Khartoum on February 6, 2026. (AFP)
Displaced Sudanese wait to receive humanitarian aid at the Abu al-Naga displacement camp in the Gedaref State, some 420km east of the capital Khartoum on February 6, 2026. (AFP)

A drone attack by a notorious paramilitary group hit a vehicle carrying displaced families in central Sudan Saturday, killing at least 24 people, including eight children, a doctors’ group said.

The attack by the Rapid Support Forces occurred close to the city of Rahad in North Kordofan province, said the Sudan Doctors Network, which tracks the country’s ongoing war.

The vehicle transported displaced people who fled fighting in the Dubeiker area of North Kordofan, the doctors’ group said in a statement. Among the dead children were two infants, the group said.

The doctors’ group urged the international community and rights organizations to “take immediate action to protect civilians and hold the RSF leadership directly accountable for these violations.”

There was no immediate comment from the RSF, which has been at war against the Sudanese military for control of the country for about three years.

Sudan plunged into chaos in April 2023 when a power struggle between the military and the RSF exploded into open fighting in the capital, Khartoum, and elsewhere in the country.

The devastating war has killed more than 40,000 people, according to UN figures, but aid groups say that is an undercount and the true number could be many times higher.

It created the world’s largest humanitarian crisis with over 14 million people forced to flee their homes. It fueled disease outbreaks and pushed parts of the country into famine.