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A privately run aid organisation brought in to distribute food rations in war-hit Gaza last month with US and Israeli backing said Saturday that people in the Palestinian territory “desperately need more aid”.The admission by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) that it has been unable to meet demand came after severe criticism from other aid groups and near-daily deadly shootings near distribution points.Gaza’s civil defence agency said Saturday that Israeli troops had killed at least 17 people, including eight who were seeking food in the territory which is suffering from famine-like conditions due to Israeli restrictions, according to aid groups.In a statement on Saturday, GHF interim executive director John Acree said that the organisation was “delivering aid at scale, securely and effectively… But we cannot meet the full scale of need while large parts of Gaza remain closed.”He said the GHF was “working with the government of Israel to honour its commitment and open additional sites in northern Gaza”.”The people of Gaza desperately need more aid and we are ready to partner with other humanitarian groups to expand our reach to those who need help the most,” Acree said.GHF’s operations have been slammed as a “failure” by the United Nations, while other aid groups have raised concerns about the group’s opaque structure and neutrality in the conflict that has been raging since October 2023.According to figures issued Saturday by the health ministry in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip, at least 450 people have been killed and nearly 3,500 injured by Israeli fire since GHF began distributing meal boxes in late May.GHF has denied responsibility for deaths near its aid points, contradicting statements from witnesses and Gaza rescue services.It has said deaths have occurred near UN food convoys.On Monday, the head of aid group Doctors Without Borders, Christopher Lockyear, said that the “imposed system of aid delivery” in Gaza was “not only a failure, but it is dehumanising and dangerous”.Israel’s military has continued its operations in Gaza, even as attention has shifted to its ongoing war with Iran since June 13.- Restrictions -Israel’s ban on foreign media entering the Gaza Strip and difficulties for local journalists to travel in the territory mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by rescuers and authorities.The Israeli army told AFP Saturday it was “looking into” the deaths which the civil defence agency reported near GHF distribution centres.In the past, the military has said that its troops have fired on crowds approaching them in a threatening fashion and only after warning shots.Witnesses have told AFP about injuries caused by drones and tank rounds.Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that three people were killed by gunfire in the southern Gaza Strip, with another five killed in a central area known as the Netzarim corridor, where thousands of Palestinians have gathered daily in the hope of receiving rations from a GHF centre.Earlier this week, the UN’s World Health Organization warned that Gaza’s health system was at a “breaking point”, pleading for fuel to be allowed into the territory to keep its remaining hospitals running.The Hamas attack on Israel in October 2023 that sparked the war resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.Israel’s retaliatory military campaign has killed at least 55,908 people, also mostly civilians, according to the Gaza health ministry. The UN considers these figures reliable.

Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian warned Saturday of a “more devastating” retaliation should Israel’s nine-day bombing campaign continue, saying the Islamic republic would not halt its nuclear programme “under any circumstances”.Israel said on Saturday it had killed three more Iranian commanders in its unprecedented offensive, while Foreign Minister Gideon Saar claimed Tehran’s alleged progress towards a nuclear weapon had been set back by two years.”We will do everything that we can do there in order to remove this threat,” Saar told the German newspaper Bild, asserting Israel would keep up its onslaught.Israel and Iran have traded wave after wave of devastating strikes since Israel launched its aerial campaign on June 13, saying Tehran was on the verge of developing a nuclear weapon.On Saturday, Israel said it had attacked Iran’s Isfahan nuclear site for a second time, with the UN nuclear watchdog reporting that a centrifuge manufacturing workshop had been hit.Iran denies seeking an atomic bomb, and on Saturday Pezeshkian said its right to pursue a civilian nuclear programme “cannot be taken away… by threats or war”.In a phone call with French President Emmanuel Macron, Pezeshkian said Iran was “ready to discuss and cooperate to build confidence in the field of peaceful nuclear activities”.”However, we do not agree to reduce nuclear activities to zero under any circumstances,” he added, according to Iran’s official IRNA news agency.Referring to the Israeli attacks, he said: “Our response to the continued aggression of the Zionist regime will be more devastating.”Iran’s armed forces threatened to strike shipments of military aid to Israel “from any country”.Israel’s main arms supplier is the United States, whose President Donald Trump warned on Friday that Tehran had a “maximum” of two weeks to avoid possible American air strikes as Washington weighed whether to join Israel’s campaign.- ‘Not prepared to negotiate’ -Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi was in Istanbul on Saturday for a meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation to discuss the conflict.Top diplomats from Britain, France and Germany met Araghchi in Geneva on Friday and urged him to resume nuclear talks with the United States that had been derailed by the war.But Araghchi told NBC News that “we’re not prepared to negotiate with them (the Americans) anymore, as long as the aggression continues”.Trump, dismissive of European diplomatic efforts, said he was unlikely to ask Israel to stop its attacks to get Iran back to the table.”If somebody’s winning, it’s a little bit harder to do,” he said of Israel’s campaign. Any US involvement would likely feature powerful bunker-busting bombs that no other country possesses to destroy an underground uranium enrichment facility in Fordo.US B-2 stealth bombers capable of carrying bunker busters were flying across the Pacific Ocean, according to tracking data and media reports, fuelling speculation over their intended mission.Iran’s Huthi allies in Yemen on Saturday threatened to resume their attacks on US vessels in the Red Sea if Washington joined the war, despite a recent ceasefire agreement.- Hundreds killed -A US-based NGO, the Human Rights Activists News Agency, said on Friday that based on its sources and media reports at least 657 people have been killed in Iran, including 263 civilians.Iran’s health ministry on Saturday gave a toll of more than 400 people killed and 3,056 in the Israeli strikes.Iran’s retaliatory strikes have killed at least 25 people in Israel, according to official figures.The Israeli military said it launched a fresh wave of strikes on Saturday in the area of southern Iran’s Bandar Abbas, targeting drones storage sites and a weapons facility.Iran’s Tasnim news agency said air defences were activated in the area.Overnight, Iran said it targeted central Israel with drones and missiles. Israeli rescuers said there were no casualties after an Iranian drone struck a residential building.On the Mediterranean island of Cyprus, Israel said Saturday that an Iranian terror plot targeting Israeli citizens had been “thwarted”.- ‘Tired’ -Israel’s National Public Diplomacy Directorate said more than 450 missiles had been fired at the country so far, along with about 400 drones.In Tel Aviv, where residents have faced regular Iranian strikes for nine days, some expressed growing fatigue under the constant threat from Iran.”In the middle of the night, we have to wake the children and take them to the shelter,” Omer, who gave only his first name, told AFP, adding he still supported Israel’s war aim of denying Iran a nuclear weapon.The streets of Tehran, meanwhile, were still largely quiet Saturday, though a few cafes and restaurants were open.In the afternoon, supporters of the government gathered briefly in front of the headquarters of state television to wave Iranian, Palestinian and Hezbollah flags to a soundtrack of electronic music whose lyrics called for the “death of Israel”.Western powers have repeatedly expressed concerns about the expansion of Iran’s nuclear programme, questioning in particular the country’s accelerated uranium enrichment.International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Grossi has said Iran is the only country without nuclear weapons to enrich uranium to 60 percent.However, his agency had “no indication” of the existence of a “systematic programme” in Iran to produce a bomb.Grossi told CNN it was “pure speculation” to say how long it would take Iran to develop weapons.burs-csp/smw/ami

Thousands marched on Saturday outside a French trade fair, calling for an end to war profiteering and Israel’s offensive in Gaza in the latest demonstration to hit the event.The long-planned protest at the Paris Air Show outside the French capital also comes as Israel’s war with Iran drags on into a ninth day, with Tehran threatening to hit back in force at Israel’s offensive against its arch-rival.The presence of Israeli defence firms at the show has already become a bone of contention, with the French government on Monday sealing off the booths of five Israeli firms on the grounds that they were displaying offensive weapons that could be used in Gaza.”Their wars, their profits, our deaths, stop the genocide in Palestine,” read the banner at the head of the march, which organisers claimed drew more than 4,000 protesters.”As we speak, people are dying and our governments are not doing anything to stop it,” Nora, 29, told AFP at the protest. Draped in a Palestinian flag, the project leader in the pharmaceutical industry said that she felt “rage” at the footage coming out of Gaza, including that of “mothers kissing their dead children” in the besieged Palestinian territory.Police have arrested seven people aiming to disrupt the trade fair, the Paris public prosecutor office said, with officers discovering a helium canister and nearly 200 balloons during the searches.Six of the arrests were made on Friday and the other on Saturday, the prosecutor’s office added.Drawing some 100,000 visitors a day, the Paris Air Show at the Le Bourget airfield, nine kilometres (five miles) to the north of the capital, is usually dominated by displays of the aerospace industry’s latest cutting-edge planes. But Monday’s shuttering of the stands of Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), Rafael, UVision and Elbit, as well as Aeronautics, which make drones and guided bombs and missiles, sparked a row with Israel.Israel’s President Isaac Herzog branded Paris’s closure of the Israeli firms’ booths “outrageous”, comparing it to “creating an Israeli ghetto”.It came days after Israel, claiming Iran was on the verge of obtaining a nuclear bomb, launched a surprise barrage on June 13 which killed top Iranian commanders and nuclear scientists.Tehran immediately hit back with a flurry of missiles, with the two countries trading wave after wave of devastating strikes since.

Tens of thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters marched in London and Berlin on Saturday calling for an end to the war in Gaza, amid concerns that the Iran-Israel conflict could spark wider regional devastation.Protesters in the British capital waved Palestinian flags, donned keffiyeh scarves and carried signs including “Stop arming Israel” and “No war on Iran” as they marched in the sweltering heat.”It’s important to remember that people are suffering in Gaza. I fear all the focus will be on Iran now,” said 34-year-old Harry Baker, attending his third pro-Palestinian protest.”I don’t have great love for the Iranian regime, but we are now in a dangerous situation,” he added.There have been monthly protests in the British capital since the start of the 20-month-long war between Israel and Hamas, which has ravaged Gaza.Saturday’s march comes amid heightened global tensions as the United States mulls joining Israel’s strikes against Iran.Cries of “Palestine will be free” rang out as protesters carried signs saying “Hands off Gaza” or “Stop starving Gaza”.Gaza is suffering from famine-like conditions according to UN agencies in the region following an Israeli aid blockade. Gaza’s civil defence agency has reported that hundreds have been killed by Israeli forces while trying to reach the US- and Israeli-backed aid distribution sites.”People need to keep their eyes on Gaza. That’s where the genocide is happening,” said 60-year-old protester Nicky Marcus.”I feel frustrated, angry because of what’s happening in Gaza,” said 31-year-old data analyst Jose Diaz.”It’s in everyone’s eyes. It’s still on after so many months,” Diaz added.- ‘Scared’ -The overall death toll in Gaza since the war broke out has reached at least 55,637 people, according to the health ministry.Israel has denied it is carrying out a genocide and says it aims to wipe out Hamas after 1,219 people were killed in Israel by the Islamist group’s October 7, 2023, attack.A 31-year-old Iranian student who did not want to share her name, told AFP she had family in Iran and was “scared”.”I’m worried about my country. I know the regime is not good but it’s still my country. I’m scared,” she said.Tehran said over 400 people have been killed in Iran since Israel launched strikes last week claiming its arch-foe was close to acquiring a nuclear weapon, which Iran denies.Some 25 people have been killed in Israel, according to official figures.In Berlin, more than 10,000 people gathered in the centre of the city in support of Gaza, according to police figures.”You can’t sit on the sofa and be silent. Now is the time when we all need to speak up,” said protestor Gundula, who did not want to give her second name.”Germany finances, Israel bombs” was among the chants from the crowd, which gathered mid-afternoon close to the German parliament.For Marwan Radwan, the point of the protest was to bring attention to the “genocide currently taking place” and the “dirty work” being done by the German government.

Israel said Saturday it had killed three more Iranian commanders in its unprecedented bombing campaign against the Islamic republic, which Foreign Minister Gideon Saar claimed had delayed Tehran’s alleged progress towards a nuclear weapon by two years.Israel’s military said a strike in Qom south of Tehran successfully targeted top Iranian official Saeed Izadi, in charge of coordination with Palestinian militant group Hamas, adding two other commanders from Iran’s Revolutionary Guards were also killed overnight.As Israel continued to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities and military targets, Saar said in an interview that by his country’s own assessment, it had “already delayed for at least two or three years the possibility for them to have a nuclear bomb”.”We will do everything that we can do there in order to remove this threat,” Saar told German newspaper Bild, asserting Israel’s onslaught would continue.Israel and Iran have traded wave after wave of devastating strikes since Israel launched its aerial campaign on June 13, saying Tehran was on the verge of developing a nuclear weapon — an accusation the Islamic republic has denied.Israel said it had attacked Iran’s Isfahan nuclear site for a second time after its air force announced it had also launched salvos against missile storage and launch sites in the centre of the country.The army later said it was striking military infrastructure in southwest Iran.US President Donald Trump warned on Friday that Tehran had a “maximum” of two weeks to avoid possible American air strikes, as Washington weighs whether to join Israel’s campaign.- ‘Not prepared to negotiate’ -Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi arrived in Istanbul on Saturday for a meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation to discuss the conflict.Top diplomats from Britain, France and Germany met Araghchi in Geneva on Friday, and urged him to resume talks with the United States that had been derailed by Israel’s attacks.But Araghchi told NBC News after the meeting that “we’re not prepared to negotiate with them (the United States) anymore, as long as the aggression continues”. Trump, dismissive of European diplomatic efforts, also said he was unlikely to ask Israel to stop its attacks to get Iran back to the table.”If somebody’s winning, it’s a little bit harder to do,” he said. Any US involvement would likely feature powerful bunker-busting bombs that no other country possesses to destroy an underground uranium enrichment facility in Fordo.A US-based NGO, the Human Rights Activists News Agency, said on Friday that based on its sources and media reports at least 657 people have been killed in Iran, including 263 civilians.Iran’s health ministry on Saturday gave a toll of more than 400 people killed and 3,056 in the Israeli strikes.Nasrin, 39, who was receiving treatment at Hazrat Rasool hospital in Tehran and who gave only her first name, said she had been thrown across a room in her home by an Israeli strike on the Iranian capital”I just hit the wall. I don’t know how long I was unconscious. When I woke up, I was covered in blood from head to toe,” she told AFP from her hospital bed. – ‘Pure speculation’ -Traffic police and the Fars news agency reported congestion on roads heading into Tehran on Saturday, indicating some inhabitants were returning to the capital. Internet access remained highly unstable and limited in Tehran, with slow connections and many sites still inaccessible, according to AFP journalists.Iran’s retaliatory strikes have killed at least 25 people in Israel, according to official figures.Overnight, Iran said it targeted central Israel with drones and missiles. Israeli rescuers said there were no casualties after an Iranian drone struck a residential building in Beit She’an.At the site of the strike in the north of Israel, mounds of soil had been gouged from the ground and the wall of a ground-floor room was destroyed.Israel’s National Public Diplomacy Directorate said more than 450 missiles have been fired at the country so far, along with about 400 drones.Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they had targeted military sites and air force bases.In Tel Aviv, where residents have faced regular Iranian strikes for nine days, some expressed growing fatigue under the constant threat from Iran.”In the middle of the night, we have to wake the children and take them to the shelter,” Omer, who gave only his first name, told AFP. “They are tired all day after that,” he added, explaining he still supported Israel’s war aim of denying Iran a nuclear weapon. Western powers have repeatedly expressed concerns about the expansion of Iran’s nuclear programme, questioning in particular the country’s accelerated uranium enrichment.International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Grossi has said Iran is the only country without nuclear weapons to enrich uranium to 60 percent.However, he added that there was no evidence Tehran had all the components to make a functioning nuclear warhead.Grossi told CNN it was “pure speculation” to say how long it would take Iran to develop weapons.burs-csp/smw

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli fire killed at least 12 people on Saturday, including eight who had gathered near aid distribution sites in the Palestinian territory suffering severe food shortages.Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that three people were killed by gunfire from Israeli forces while waiting to collect aid in the southern Gaza Strip.In a separate incident, Bassal said five people were killed in a central area known as the Netzarim corridor, where thousands of Palestinians have gathered daily in the hope of receiving food rations.The Israeli army told AFP it was “looking into” both incidents, which according to the civil defence agency occurred near distribution centres run by the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.Its operations began at the end of May — when Israel eased a total aid blockade that lasted more than two months — but have been marred by chaotic scenes and neutrality concerns.UN agencies and major aid groups have refused to cooperate with the foundation over concerns it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives.The health ministry in the Hamas-run territory said on Saturday that 450 people had been killed and 3,466 others injured while seeking aid in near-daily incidents since late May.The Israeli blockade imposed in early March amid an impasse in truce negotiations had produced famine-like conditions across Gaza, according to rights groups.Israel’s military has pressed its operations across Gaza more than 20 months since an unprecedented Hamas attack triggered the devastating war, and even as attention has shifted to the war with Iran since June 13.Bassal told AFP that three people were killed on Saturday in an Israeli air strike on Gaza City in the north, and one more in another strike on the southern city of Khan Yunis.Israeli forces also demolished more than 10 houses in Gaza City “by detonating them with explosives”, he added.Israeli restrictions on media in the Gaza Strip and difficulties in accessing some areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by rescuers and authorities.Earlier this week, the UN’s World Health Organization warned that Gaza’s health system was at a “breaking point”, pleading for fuel to be allowed into the territory to keep its remaining hospitals running.The Hamas attack in October 2023 that sparked the war resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.Israel’s retaliatory military campaign has killed at least 55,908 people, also mostly civilians, according to the Gaza health ministry. The UN considers these figures reliable.

Israel’s rescue services said Saturday that an Iranian drone had struck a residential building in the north of the country following a wave of attacks reported by the military.”A drone strike hit a two-storey residential building in northern Israel”, the Magen David Adom said in a statement, referring to an impact site in the Beit She’an valley by the northeastern border with Jordan.Israel’s sophisticated air defences have intercepted more than 450 missiles fired at the country by Iran, along with around 400 drones, since the start of the war on June 13, according to official figures.  The locations of strikes in Israel are subject to strict military censorship rules and are not always provided in detail to the public.  The National Public Diplomacy Directorate, which is overseen by Israel’s prime minister, has acknowleged 50 impact sites.At least 19 people were injured in Haifa on Friday following a strike on a building by the city’s docks.The northern Israeli port has been frequently targeted along with coastal hub Tel Aviv and southern Beersheba. AFP photographs from the scene of the drone strike in Beit She’an on Saturday showed a hole torn in the side of the building next to a crater and mounds of earth that appeared to have been thrown up by the drone’s explosives. Magen David Adom said its rescue teams found no visible casualties as they arrived at the scene.In separate statements, the Israeli military reported several drones had been sighted and intercepted at locations in northern Israel mid-morning on Saturday after a barrage of 40 drones overnight.A total of 25 people have been killed in Israel since the start of the war, according to official figures. 

Water levels at Iraq’s vast Dukan Dam reservoir have plummeted as a result of dwindling rains and further damming upstream, hitting millions of inhabitants already impacted by drought with stricter water rationing.Amid these conditions, visible cracks have emerged in the retreating shoreline of the artificial lake, which lies in northern Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region and was created in the 1950s.Dukan Lake has been left three quarters empty, with its director Kochar Jamal Tawfeeq explaining its reserves currently stand at around 1.6 billion cubic metres of water out of a possible seven billion. That is “about 24 percent” of its capacity, the official said, adding that the level of water in the lake had not been so low in roughly 20 years. Satellite imagery analysed by AFP shows the lake’s surface area shrank by 56 percent between the end of May 2019, the last year it was completely full, and the beginning of June 2025.Tawfeeq blamed climate change and a “shortage of rainfall” explaining that the timing of the rains had also become irregular.Over the winter season, Tawfeeq said the Dukan region received 220 millimetres (8.7 inches) of rain, compared to a typical 600 millimetres.- ‘Harvest failed’ -Upstream damming of the Little Zab River, which flows through Iran and feeds Dukan, was a secondary cause of the falling water levels, Tawfeeq explained. Also buffeted by drought, Iran has built dozens of structures on the river to increase its own water reserves. Baghdad has criticised these kinds of dams, built both by Iran and neighbouring Turkey, accusing them of significantly restricting water flow into Iraq via the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.Iraq, and its 46 million inhabitants, have been intensely impacted by the effects of climate change, experiencing rising temperatures, year-on-year droughts and rampant desertification.At the end of May, the country’s total water reserves were at their lowest level in 80 years.On the slopes above Dukan lies the village of Sarsian, where Hussein Khader Sheikhah, 57, was planting a summer crop on a hectare of land.The farmer said he hoped a short-term summer crop of the kind typically planted in the area for an autumn harvest — cucumbers, melons, chickpeas, sunflower seeds and beans — would help him offset some of the losses over the winter caused by drought.In winter, in another area near the village, he planted 13 hectares mainly of wheat.”The harvest failed because of the lack of rain,” he explained, adding that he lost an equivalent of almost $5,700 to the poor yield.”I can’t make up for the loss of 13 hectares with just one hectare near the river,” he added.- ‘Stricter rationing’ – The water shortage at Dukan has affected around four million people downstream in the neighbouring Sulaimaniyah and Kirkuk governorates, including their access to drinking water.For more than a month, water treatment plants in Kirkuk have been trying to mitigate a sudden, 40 percent drop in the supplies reaching them, according to local water resource official Zaki Karim.In a country ravaged by decades of conflict, with crumbling infrastructure and floundering public policies, residents already receive water intermittently.The latest shortages are forcing even “stricter rationing” and more infrequent water distributions, Karim said.In addition to going door-to-door to raise awareness about water waste, the authorities were also cracking down on illegal access to the water networkIn the province of roughly two million inhabitants, the aim is to minimise the impact on the provincial capital of Kirkuk.”If some treatment plants experience supply difficulties, we will ensure that there are no total interruptions, so everyone can receive their share,” Karim said.burx-str-tgg/feb/csp/tc/jsa