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'Time for EU to Act' on Gaza, Urges Humanitarian Chief

22 August 2025, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: The father of five-month-old Ghadeer Brika holds her lifeless body, showing signs of malnutrition, at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Yunis, southern Gaza Strip. (dpa)
22 August 2025, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: The father of five-month-old Ghadeer Brika holds her lifeless body, showing signs of malnutrition, at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Yunis, southern Gaza Strip. (dpa)
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'Time for EU to Act' on Gaza, Urges Humanitarian Chief

22 August 2025, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: The father of five-month-old Ghadeer Brika holds her lifeless body, showing signs of malnutrition, at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Yunis, southern Gaza Strip. (dpa)
22 August 2025, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: The father of five-month-old Ghadeer Brika holds her lifeless body, showing signs of malnutrition, at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Yunis, southern Gaza Strip. (dpa)

The EU's humanitarian chief Hadja Lahbib on Wednesday urged the bloc to take tougher action over the war in Gaza as divisions among member states stall moves to punish Israel.

"We are at a turning point and now it's time for the EU to act in a way that matches its international stature," Lahbib, European Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management, told journalists.

"Now it's time for the EU to find a collective voice on Gaza."

Splits within the 27-nation bloc between countries backing Israel and those favoring the Palestinians have seen the EU often left hamstrung in the face of the dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

"We cannot stand by and simply watch innocent civilians, aid workers, journalists being killed and starving to death," Lahbib said.

"Saving lives takes the political courage to find a strong voice that reflects our values and principles."

EU foreign ministers meeting in Denmark this week will discuss a proposal to suspend funding to Israeli start-ups as punishment for the situation in Gaza.

But the bloc has so far failed to garner the majority needed to take that step -- let alone move ahead with more forceful measures against Israel.

The EU's top diplomat Kaja Kallas announced a deal in July with Israel to increase the flow of aid into Gaza but so far it has not met expectations.

Lahbib said that the situation had improved "very, very partially" but that the aid getting into the territory remained a "drop in the ocean".

The United Nations declared a famine in Gaza on Friday, blaming the "systematic obstruction" of aid by Israel during its nearly two-year war with the Palestinian group Hamas.

"My role is to denounce and to say loudly what is happening there. This is a tragedy," Lahbib said.

"We will be judged by history and by our grandchildren. That's for sure."

The war was sparked by Hamas's October 2023 attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.

Out of 251 hostages seized during the attack, 49 are still held in Gaza, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead.

Israel's retaliatory offensive has killed at least 62,819 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to figures from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza that the United Nations considers reliable.

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Arab World

Egyptian Gaza Relief Group Says Israeli Strike on Photographers Was Deliberate

An aid distribution point in northern Gaza operated by the Egyptian Relief Committee (Egyptian Relief Committee)
An aid distribution point in northern Gaza operated by the Egyptian Relief Committee (Egyptian Relief Committee)
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Egyptian Gaza Relief Group Says Israeli Strike on Photographers Was Deliberate

An aid distribution point in northern Gaza operated by the Egyptian Relief Committee (Egyptian Relief Committee)
An aid distribution point in northern Gaza operated by the Egyptian Relief Committee (Egyptian Relief Committee)

The spokesperson for the Egyptian Relief Committee in Gaza, Mohamed Mansour, said Israel deliberately targeted three photojournalists while they were carrying out a humanitarian mission inside the Netzarim camp, an area located about six kilometers away from Israeli army forces.

Mansour told Asharq Al-Awsat that the attack was “a continuation of Israeli pressure on the committee’s work since it began operating, as part of the occupation’s efforts to tighten restrictions on anyone attempting to provide relief work and humanitarian services to the people of Gaza.”

The Israeli army killed three photojournalists on Wednesday who were working as a media team for the Egyptian Relief Committee for Gaza.

Field sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that the victims were Mohammed Salah Qashta, Abdul Raouf Shaat, and Anas Ghneim.

They were carrying out a filming mission using a small drone and cameras to document stages of work at camps that the Egyptian committee is helping to establish.

Mansour stressed that “the targeting of the photographers will only increase the committee’s determination to provide relief services and shelter to the Palestinian people.”

He said the committee would continue its work as usual to be “a genuine support for the people of the Strip, amid extremely complex security conditions.”

Israeli Army Radio reported, citing sources, that Egypt sent an angry message to Israel following the attack in Gaza in which Palestinians working for the Egyptian committee for the reconstruction were killed.

According to the radio report, Egypt expressed its protest that the attack took place outside the boundaries of the so-called yellow line, in an area that does not pose a threat to Israeli forces.

For its part, the Israeli army claimed it had targeted suspects operating a “Hamas-affiliated drone” in central Gaza.

In a statement on Wednesday, the army said: “Following the identification of the drone and due to the threat it posed to the forces, the Israeli army precisely struck the suspects who were operating the drone.”

The army said the details were under review.

Arab World

Israel Launches Wave of Fresh Strikes on Lebanon

Smoke and sparks ascend from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted a building in the southern Lebanese village of Kfour on January 21, 2026. (AFP)
Smoke and sparks ascend from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted a building in the southern Lebanese village of Kfour on January 21, 2026. (AFP)
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Israel Launches Wave of Fresh Strikes on Lebanon

Smoke and sparks ascend from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted a building in the southern Lebanese village of Kfour on January 21, 2026. (AFP)
Smoke and sparks ascend from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted a building in the southern Lebanese village of Kfour on January 21, 2026. (AFP)

Israel launched fresh strikes on what it said were Hezbollah targets in south Lebanon after raids earlier Wednesday killed two people, the latest violence despite a year-old ceasefire with the group.

The state-run National News Agency said Israeli warplanes launched raids on buildings in several south Lebanon towns including Qanarit and Kfour, after the Israeli army issued evacuation warnings to residents identifying sites it intended to strike there.

An AFP photographer was slightly wounded along with two other journalists who were working near the site of a heavy strike in Qanarit.

The Israeli army said it was striking Hezbollah targets in response to the group's "repeated violations of the ceasefire understandings".

Under heavy US pressure and fears of expanded Israeli strikes, Lebanon has committed to disarming Hezbollah.

But Israel has criticized the Lebanese army's progress as insufficient and has kept up regular strikes, usually saying it is targeting members of the Iran-backed group or its infrastructure.

Earlier Wednesday, the health ministry said an Israeli strike on a vehicle in the town of Zahrani, in the Sidon district, killed one person.

An AFP correspondent saw a charred car on a main road with debris strewn across the area and emergency workers in attendance.

Later, the ministry said another strike targeting a vehicle in the town of Bazuriyeh in the Tyre district killed one person.

Israel said it struck Hezbollah operatives in both areas.

A Lebanese army statement decried the Israeli targeting of "civilian buildings and homes" in a "blatant violation of Lebanon's sovereignty" and the ceasefire deal.

It also said such attacks "hinder the army's efforts" to complete the disarmament plan.

This month, the army said it had completed the first phase of its plan to disarm Hezbollah, covering the area south of the Litani river, around 30 kilometers (20 miles) from the Israeli border.

Most of Wednesday's strikes were north of the river.

More than 350 people have been killed by Israeli fire in Lebanon since the ceasefire, according to an AFP tally of health ministry reports.

The November 2024 truce sought to end more than a year of hostilities, but Israel accuses Hezbollah of rearming, while the group has rejected calls to surrender its weapons.

Arab World

Syria’s Rifaat Al-Assad, ‘Butcher of Hama’, Dies Aged 88, Say Sources

Rifaat al-Assad, uncle of deposed Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad. (AP file)
Rifaat al-Assad, uncle of deposed Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad. (AP file)
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Syria’s Rifaat Al-Assad, ‘Butcher of Hama’, Dies Aged 88, Say Sources

Rifaat al-Assad, uncle of deposed Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad. (AP file)
Rifaat al-Assad, uncle of deposed Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad. (AP file)

Rifaat al-Assad, uncle of deposed Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad and dubbed the "Butcher of Hama" for suppressing an uprising in the 1980s, has died aged 88, two sources close to the family said Wednesday.

Once a pillar of the Assad family's dynastic rule, Rifaat "died after suffering from influenza for around a week", one source who worked in Syria's presidential palace for over three decades told AFP.

A second source, an ex-officer of Syria's army in the Assad era, confirmed the death, saying Rifaat had moved to the United Arab Emirates after his nephew's government was toppled by opposition factions in December 2024, without specifying if he died there.

Rifaat's role in a February 1982 massacre as part of a crackdown on an armed revolt by the Muslim Brotherhood earned him the nickname "the Butcher of Hama", referring to the central Syrian city.

His brother Hafez al-Assad, who ruled Syria at the time, launched the campaign, which government forces carried out under the command of Rifaat, who was the head of the elite "Defense Brigades".

The death toll from 27 days of violence, which took place under a media blackout, has never been formally established, though estimates range from 10,000 to 40,000.

Swiss prosecutors had accused Rifaat of a long list of crimes, including ordering "murders, acts of torture, inhumane treatment and illegal detentions" while an officer in the Syrian army.

He also served as vice president under his brother Hafez but went into exile in 1984 after a failed attempt to overthrow him, moving to Switzerland then France.

He later presented himself as an opponent of his nephew Bashar, who succeeded Hafez in 2000.

In 2021, he returned to Syria from France to escape a four-year prison sentence for money laundering and misappropriation of Syrian public funds.

Two years later, he appeared in a family photo alongside Bashar, the ruler's wife Asma and other relatives.

Shortly after Bashar's ouster, Rifaat crossed into Lebanon and then flew out of Beirut airport, a Lebanese security source said at the time, without specifying his final destination.