Author: Arshad Shaheen

President Biden appointed Lise Grande as the new Special Envoy for Middle East Humanitarian Issues. Lise’s decades of humanitarian experience will build on the foundation built by Ambassador David Satterfield and his team to urgently address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. President Biden created this position in the immediate aftermath of the horrific October 7th terrorist attacks to lead U.S. regional diplomacy to surge humanitarian aid to Gaza. For the past seven months David Satterfield – one of our most senior and experienced diplomats – has been leading this effort. His tireless contributions have been essential to the expansion of humanitarian aid…

The funeral has been held of an Al Jazeera cameraman who was killed by an Israeli drone strike on Gaza. Samer Abudaqa was wounded in the strike on a school in Khan Younis on Friday along with his colleague, Wael Al-Dahdouh. Al Jazeera said Abudaqa bled to death because a heavy bombardment prevented paramedics from reaching him. The Qatar-based network said it had referred the case to the International Criminal Court (ICC). Posting on X, formerly known as Twitter, Al Jazeera referred to Abudaqa’s death as an “assassination”, and said that its legal filing to the ICC would include repeated…

The military correspondent of Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper, Yossi Yehoshua, said the Hamas movement and its leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, have been manipulating Israel in recent days with regards to the humanitarian pause. Yehoshua added that Hamas is determining the terms of the deals with Israel and the number of Palestinians released, as well as the identity of the Israeli prisoners of war it wishes to release. “Our enemies are looking at us from all sides to see how we are behaving and how we prefer a ceasefire over continuing fighting in exchange for the recovery of a small number of kidnapped…

Egypt has launched its first automated teller machine (ATM) to sell gold bullion bars to citizens. The machine will dispense one gramme bars and will be updated continuously and in real-time so that the buyer is correctly billed. The initiative, a collaboration between Banque Misr and local e-payment technology firm Finway, was inaugurated yesterday in Cairo by Minister of Supply and Internal Trade, Ali Moselhi, at the Third NEBU International Gold and Jewelry Exhibition. According to Egypt Today, citizens would be able to conveniently purchase gold bars, “democratising access to the precious metal.” The outlet noted that the minister said that there are efforts to position the North African country as an exporter of gold to the…

OPEC Secretary-General, Haitham Al Ghais, on Monday accused the International Energy Agency (IEA) of vilifying the oil and gas industry, in the latest clash between the groups over climate policy, Reuters reports. Al Ghais was referring to a note published by the West’s energy watchdog on Thursday that said the fossil fuel industry was facing a “moment of truth”, where producers had to choose between deepening the climate crisis or shifting to clean energy. “It also unjustly vilifies the industry as being behind the climate crisis.” The Organisation of the Petroleum-Exporting Countries (OPEC) and the Paris-based IEA have repeatedly clashed in recent…

Jordan, on Monday, said that what is happening in Gaza is a “humanitarian tragedy” and Israel should be held accountable for it, Anadolu Agency reports. Addressing the 8th Regional Forum of Foreign Ministers of the Union for the Mediterranean, held on 26-27 November in Barcelona, Spain, Jordan’s Foreign Minister, Ayman Safadi, said the situation in Gaza is tragic, with massacres occurring and families dying. Israel launched a massive military campaign in the Gaza Strip following a cross-border attack by Hamas on 7 October. It has since killed at least 14,854 Palestinians, including 6,150 children and over 4,000 women, according to health authorities…

Iranian authorities have denied a man executed for murdering a government agent and taking part in last year’s anti-government protests a burial in a Muslim cemetery, and his parents were arrested during his funeral, reports the opposition outlet, Iran International. According sources cited by BBC Persian, Milad Zohrevand, 21, was “secretly executed” on Thursday in the western city of Hamadan. He was accused of being among a group of five masked men who fatally shot Ali Nazari, a member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ intelligence service, amid protests following the death of 22-year-old Iranian-Kurdish woman, Mahsa Amini in police custody. Hengaw, a human…

The US has expanded its military deployments across the Middle East in support of Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip, even as one historian has warned that the occupation state is carrying out a “textbook case of genocide” in the besieged enclave. Israeli historian Raz Segal’s claim was reported in Jewish Currents. He condemned the latest bombing of Gaza. Open-source information gathered by Haaretz newspaper reveals that close to 80 US military and dozens of leased civilian aircraft are hauling equipment in a massive weapons airlift to Israel and Cyprus. At least 62 US and Israeli transport aircraft had landed in Israel by…

The Freedoms Committee in the Tunisian Parliament, on Tuesday, approved a draft law criminalising the normalisation of relations with Israel, amid ongoing protests in solidarity with Palestinians in the country. Reuters reports. The move paves the way for hearings on the bill followed by a public session for discussion and vote. The draft comes as Israeli reprisal strikes on blockaded Gaza have killed more than 5,000 people in response to Hamas, who killed at least 1,400 Israelis in a rampage after breaching the fence enclosing Gaza on 7 October. Tunisia does not have diplomatic ties with Israel, but Israeli tourists, most of…

Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir today agreed to form an unconditional unity government, Haaretz reported. “Reality dictates that unity and cohesion are what’s needed to defeat our enemies,” Smotrich said. He added: “Leave behind teams and leave negotiations. I call on Prime Minister Netanyahu and [head of the opposition] Benny Gantz to rise to the occasion, meet immediately and agree on the establishment of a national emergency government that will unite the people, raise the spirit, provide full support to the IDF [army] and bring about the complete elimination of Hamas and the terrorist organisations in…