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Hamas to give Israel another hostage body, vows to return rest

Hamas promised to hand over to Israel the remains of one more hostage on Friday night, after insisting it was committed to returning all the dead captives still unaccounted for under Gaza’s ruins.Turkey, responding to a Hamas call for help in finding the remaining hostage bodies, has dispatched a team of specialists to help retrieve remains buried under the rubble, but the group was still waiting Friday for Israeli permission to enter the territory.The 81-member team from Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) is equipped with specialised search-and-rescue tools, including life-detection devices and trained search dogs.”It remains unclear when Israel will allow the Turkish team to enter Gaza,” a Turkish official told AFP, noting the team’s mission included locating both Palestinian and hostage remainsA Hamas source told AFP the Turkish delegation was expected to enter by Sunday.Under a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas spearheaded by US President Donald Trump, Hamas returned 20 surviving hostages and the remains of nine of 28 known deceased ones — along with another body which Israel has said was not that of a former hostage.In exchange, Israel freed nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners from its jails and halted the military campaign it launched in Gaza after Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack.Hamas said Friday that as part of the deal, its armed wing “will hand over the body of one of the Israeli captives, which was recovered today in the Gaza Strip, at 11:00 pm Gaza time (2000 GMT)”.- ‘May require some time’ -Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reaffirmed on Thursday his determination to “secure the return of all hostages”, and his defence minister has warned that the military will restart the war if Hamas fails to do so.Senior Hamas official Ghazi Hamad on Friday called those threats “unacceptable pressure tactics”.”The issue of the bodies is complex and requires time, especially after the occupation changed the landscape of Gaza,” Hamad said in a statement.”We will return the bodies and adhere to the agreement as we promised.”The ceasefire deal has so far seen the war grind to a halt after two years of agony for the hostages’ families, and constant bombardment and hunger for Gazans.The UN’s World Food Programme said on Friday it had been able to move close to 3,000 tonnes of food supplies into Gaza since the ceasefire took hold.But it cautioned it would take time to reverse the famine in the Strip, saying all crossings needed to be opened to “flood Gaza with food”.Trump’s 20-point plan for Gaza calls for renewed aid provision, with international organisations eagerly awaiting the reopening of southern Gaza’s strategic Rafah crossing.UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher entered Gaza on Friday, where he watched a convoy of aid head to Rafah from Israel’s Kerem Shalom crossing and later visited a bakery making pita bread. “We’ve begged for this access for months and finally we’re seeing goods moving at scale: food, medicine, tents, fuel, a lot of fuel got in today,” he said, in a video message posted to social media.The next phases of the truce should also include the disarmament of Hamas, the offer of amnesty to Hamas leaders who decommission their weapons and establishing the governance of post-war Gaza.- ‘Better than living on street’ -The families of the surviving hostages have been able to rejoice in their return after two long years. Others have had to endure the agony of burying the returned remains of their loved ones.”We’ve been waiting for this for so long, two years that we’ve been fighting for him every single day,” said 30-year-old Gal Gilboa Dalal, the older brother of Guy Gilboa Dalal, who was released after two years in Hamas captivity.Gal told AFP that Hamas had intentionally starved his brother and another prisoner for three-and-a-half months to use him as a prop in a propaganda video about hunger.”Their bones hurt, their muscles hurt. Their recovery will be very long.”At the Nasser Hospital in Gaza, meanwhile, families gathered in front of a screen, hoping to find their loved ones among the bodies of Palestinians returned by Israel.One, Akram Khalid al-Manasra, told AFP he identified his son “thanks to the birthmark on his nose and his teeth”.Others were clearing the rubble from their destroyed homes, undercutting their relief that the bombing had stopped.”I’m right under the threat of death. It could collapse at any moment,” said Ahmad Saleh Sbeih, a Gaza City resident. “But there is no choice.”The war has killed at least 67,967 people in Gaza, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory — figures the United Nations considers credible.The data does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but indicates that more than half of the dead are women and children.Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,221 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.

US Treasury chief to meet China counterpart as tensions flare

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Friday that he would likely meet Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng next week to prepare for the upcoming high-stakes talks between the presidents of the world’s two biggest economies.Bessent’s high-level meeting comes as trade tensions flare between Washington and Beijing over China’s announcement of tighter export controls on the …

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Gazans return to damaged mosques for first post-truce Friday prayers

Thousands of worshippers returned on Friday to the Gaza Strip’s few intact and many damaged mosques, where for the first time in months loudspeakers blared the Islamic call to prayer.”God is the greatest, glory to God, Lord of worlds,” echoed through mosques at roughly the same time Friday, one week after a ceasefire took place in the devoutly Muslim coastal Palestinian territory.To be united for prayer again “is an indescribable feeling after two years of privation”, Ghalid al-Nimra told AFP at Gaza City’s Sayed Hachem mosque.Sayed Hachem, one of the oldest mosques in Gaza’s largest city, was miraculously mostly spared during two years of air strikes and fighting between Israel and Hamas.As he watched the hundreds of worshippers, Nimra was moved to see “such a large crowd gathered here” for the first time since Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack sparked the war.As the prayer rang out at 12:30 pm (0930 GMT), many hastened as they crossed the building’s Ottoman-era door.Old and young, many of their faces solemn, prayed together inside, where even the minbar, the imam’s raised platform, seemed intact.Out of Gaza’s 1,244 mosques, 1,160 were partly or wholly destroyed, according to Hamas’s media office in the Palestinian territory.- Dispersed prayer -Several worshippers expressed a state of spiritual confusion.”I feel like my soul is getting lost amid all this destruction,” Abu Mahmud Salha told AFP.The 52-year-old from northern Gaza still lives in a camp for the displaced in Al-Mawasi, on the other end of the Gaza Strip.”We pray inside the tent, I miss group prayer and the imam’s voice,” he said.”When I hear the prayer call echoing on loudspeakers from recordings, I feel like a part of our lives was broken.”The mosque in his neighbourhood, al-Falluja, was destroyed, forcing him to pray on the street.On Friday, most residents stuck to the habits they developed over the past few months. Some unfurled prayer mats on the road, on rubble, or in mosques with collapsed walls.Others bowed near rows of tents housing thousands of displaced Palestinians across Gaza, in living conditions that remain difficult.”Every Friday, we try to gather on a small patch of land under the sky, to pray,” Moataz Abu Sharbi told AFP.”Sometimes we pray on sand or on pieces of cardboard, which is very difficult psychologically,” the 27-year-old added.”The mosque was a pillar of life in our neighbourhoods and a precious part of our religious traditions,” said Abu Sharbi, who was displaced to the central Gaza city of Deir al-Balah.”Losing both one’s home and one’s spiritual refuge — that’s the hardest part,” Abu Sharbi added. “We used to find shelter for our worries in the mosque.”- Rebuilding -Speaking from Gaza City’s Al-Shati camp, Abu Mohammad al-Hattabn said “the mosque near my home was our refuge, not only for prayer, but also to find peace and remember God”.”When it was destroyed, it felt like a piece of my heart flew away,” the 54-year-old said.Hundreds of Palestinians also gathered in a destroyed mosque in the southern Gaza city of Khan Yunis, an AFP photographer reported.As an imam led prayers through a loudspeaker, the worshippers seemed absorbed in devotion, despite the mosque’s gaping walls and exposed frame.”We hope that everything will be rebuilt in Gaza, including the mosques,” 22-year-old Salim al-Farra said.

Hamas says committed to Gaza truce and returning hostage remains

Hamas insisted it was committed to returning all the hostage remains still unaccounted for under Gaza’s ruins, as a Turkish official said specialists dispatched to help find bodies were on Friday awaiting Israeli permission to enter.Responding to a call from Hamas for help locating the bodies of the 19 hostages, buried under the rubble alongside an untold number of Palestinians, Ankara sent specialists to help in the search.A Turkish official told AFP on Friday that dozens of disaster response specialists were at the Egyptian side of the border awaiting a green light from the Israeli government to enter the war-shattered Palestinian territory.The 81-member team from Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) is equipped with specialised search-and-rescue tools, including life-detection devices and trained search dogs.”It remains unclear when Israel will allow the Turkish team to enter Gaza,” the official said.Under a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas spearheaded by US President Donald Trump, Hamas returned 20 surviving hostages and the remains of nine of 28 known deceased hostages — along with another body, which Israel has said was not that of a former hostage.In exchange, Israel freed nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners from its jails and halted the military campaign it launched in Gaza after Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack.A Hamas source told AFP the Turkish delegation is expected to enter Gaza by Sunday.The Turkish official noted that the recovery team’s complicated mission included locating both Palestinian and hostage bodies.- ‘May require some time’ -Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reaffirmed on Thursday his determination to “secure the return of all hostages” after his defence minister warned that the military would restart the conflict if Hamas failed to do so.Hamas later insisted on “its commitment to the agreement and its implementation, including its keenness to hand over all remaining corpses”.But it said the process “may require some time, as some of these corpses were buried in tunnels destroyed by the occupation, while others remain under the rubble of buildings it bombed and demolished”.Trump appeared on Wednesday to call for patience when it came to the bodies’ return, insisting Hamas was “actually digging” for hostages’ remains.The ceasefire deal has so far seen the war grind to a halt after two years of agony for the hostages’ families, and constant bombardment and hunger for Gazans.The UN’s World Food Programme said on Friday it had been able to move close to 3,000 tonnes of food supplies into Gaza since the ceasefire took hold.But it cautioned it would take time to reverse the famine in the Gaza Strip, saying all crossings needed to be opened to “flood Gaza with food”.Trump’s 20-point plan for Gaza calls for renewed aid provision, with international organisations eagerly awaiting the reopening of southern Gaza’s strategic Rafah crossing.UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher entered Gaza on Friday and watched a convoy of aid crossing to Rafah from Israel’s Kerem Shalom crossing.”We’ve begged for this access for months and finally we’re seeing goods moving at scale: food, medicine, tents, fuel, a lot of fuel got in today,” he said, in a video message posted to social media.The next phases of the truce should also include the disarmament of Hamas, the offer of amnesty to Hamas leaders who decommission their weapons and establishing the governance of post-war Gaza.- ‘Better than living on street’ -The families of the surviving hostages have been able to rejoice in their return after two long years. Others have had to endure the agony of burying the returned remains of their loved ones.”We’ve been waiting for this for so long, two years that we’ve been fighting for him every single day,” said 30-year-old Gal Gilboa Dalal, the older brother of Guy Gilboa Dalal, who was released after two years in Hamas captivity.Gal told AFP that Hamas had intentionally starved his brother and another prisoner for three-and-a-half months to use him as a prop in a propaganda video about hunger.”It’s hard for him to eat much, even though he wants to. He has severe stomach pain and digestive issues. Their skin is very pale and sensitive. Their bones hurt, their muscles hurt. Their recovery will be very long.”Mourners clutching Israeli flags lined the streets in Rishon Lezion on Friday for the funeral convoy of Inbar Hayman, whose body was returned on Wednesday.For Palestinians in Gaza, meanwhile, while there was relief that the bombing had stopped, the road to recovery felt impossible as people began clearing the rubble from their destroyed homes.”I’m right under the threat of death. It could collapse at any moment,” said Ahmad Saleh Sbeih, a Gaza City resident. “But there is no choice. This is better than living on the street.”The war has killed at least 67,967 people in Gaza, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory, figures the United Nations considers credible.The data does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but indicates that more than half of the dead are women and children.Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,221 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.

What happened to the Kadhafi family after Libyan leader’s death

After nearly a decade of pre-trial detention in Lebanon, Hannibal Kadhafi, one of longtime Libyan ruler Moamer Kadhafi’s sons, was ordered by a Lebanese court on Friday to be released on bail.Since a NATO-backed revolt toppled and killed Moamer in 2011, the Kadhafi family have scattered across different parts of the world.Here’s a look at where some of its members are today.- HANNIBAL KADHAFI -Hannibal Kadhafi was arrested in Lebanon in 2015 and has since been detained pending trial.He was accused of withholding information about the disappearance of Lebanese Shiite cleric Mussa Sadr in 1978.On Friday, a Lebanese judge ordered his release on a $11 million bail and banned him from travel, a judicial source told AFP.- SEIF AL-ISLAM KADHAFI -The second of Kadhafi’s eight children, Seif al-Islam had long been seen as his father’s successor.While he held no official position in the north African country, he had been described as Libya’s de facto prime minister, cultivating an image of moderation and reform.But that reputation soon collapsed when he promised “rivers of blood” in the face of the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings.He was arrested in November 2011 in southern Libya following a warrant by the International Criminal Court (ICC).Reports suggested he had been detained while in western Libya’s city of Zenten. He was sentenced to death in 2015 after a speedy trial but was granted amnesty.In 2021, he announced he would run for president, but those elections were indefinitely postponed.His current whereabouts are unknown.- AISHA KADHAFI AND HER MOTHER -Born in 1977, Aisha was a lawyer and had fled in August 2011 to neighbouring Algeria with her mother — Kadhafi’s second wife Safiya Farkach — and one of her brothers, Mohammed.In 2013, she moved to Oman, where she was granted political asylum.Safiya is based between Egypt and Oman, according to a source close to the family.- SAADI KADHAFIBorn in 1973, he was a footballer who had a playboy reputation. He currently lives in Turkey, according to the same family source.Saadi had led an elite unit of his father’s army before fleeing to Niger in September 2011, where he was placed under house arrest.Following his escape, he vowed to return to Libya and launch a new rebellion.After his recapture, Niger extradited him to Libya, where he was detained until September 2021 before moving to Turkey.- MUTASSIM KADAHFI -Born in 1975, Mutassim had been promoted by his father to head the National Security Council in 2007.A career soldier and doctor, he was seen as his brother Seif al-Islam’s main competitor. Suspected of attempting a coup, he was exiled to Egypt but later pardoned and returned home.In October 2011, like his father, he was captured and killed in northern Libya’s Sirte. His burial site is unknown.- KHAMIS KADHAFI – Kadhafi’s youngest son, born in 1983, commanded a battalion of army loyalists and mercenaries, and played a major role in putting down the 2011 uprising in Benghazi.He also headed the last base to fall amid the uprisings in Tripoli and was announced dead in October 2011.- MOHAMMED KADHAFI – Moamer’s eldest son and only child from his first wife Fatiha al-Nuri, Mohammed headed the Libyan Olympic Committee and was chairman of Libya’s General Post and Telecommunications Company.Along with Aisha and her mother, he escaped to Algeria before relocating to Oman.