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Gaza rescuers say Israeli strikes kill 44

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli strikes killed at least 44 people on Sunday as Israel’s prime minister vowed a “strong response” to a rare salvo of rockets fired from the Hamas-ruled territory.Dozens of Palestinians have been killed almost daily since Israel resumed its military offensive in Gaza on March 18, ending a two-month ceasefire that had brought relative calm to the territory.”The death toll as a result of Israeli air strikes since dawn today is at least 44, including 21 in Khan Yunis,” a city in the southern Gaza Strip, civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.One strike killed six people on Al-Nakheel Street in the Al-Tuffah neighbourhood of Gaza City, where a group had gathered near a bakery, Bassal said.Three children were among the dead, he said.A Hamas statement called the strike “a deliberate act of child killing” and a “confirmation of the sadistic and barbaric nature of the occupation and its fascist leaders”.AFP footage captured thick plumes of smoke rising from central and northern Gaza as Israeli forces bombarded areas of the besieged Palestinian territory.A ceasefire brokered by the United States, Egypt and Qatar ended on March 18 as Israel resumed its offensive in response to the Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023.Elsewhere Israel said it shot dead “one terrorist” in the West Bank for throwing rocks, with Palestinian officials claiming it was a 14-year-old boy with US citizenship.- ‘Like a nuclear bomb’ -Gaza has since endured a new wave of relentless strikes and artillery fire, with dozens of fatalities reported on a near-daily basis.Efforts to revive the ceasefire and secure the release of the remaining hostages held in Gaza have so far failed.The stalled efforts will be on the agenda during a meeting between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump, set for Monday in Washington.Netanyahu ordered a “strong response”, his office said, after the Israeli military reported about 10 “projectiles” had been fired from Gaza within minutes of each other on Sunday. Most were intercepted.The Israeli offensive since 2023 has severely weakened Hamas, but the army has recorded 10 other rockets fired at Israel over the past two weeks.Israeli police said debris fell in Ashkelon, near the Gaza border, and paramedics said one man had been wounded.”The prime minister instructed to deliver a strong response and approved the continuation of the intensified IDF operations in Gaza against Hamas,” Netanyahu’s office said.One Israeli strike on Sunday hit the home of the Abu Issa family in Deir el-Balah, killing women and children, according to witnesses.”There were no wanted individuals in the house — even the men were at the mosque,” said Mohammad al-Azaizeh, a resident.”They were all civilians — children, women and girls. A missile tore through every floor, flattening the house. It felt like a nuclear bomb had hit us.”AFP footage from another strike late on Saturday in Gaza City showed scenes of devastation at a hospital, where men and women mourned bodies wrapped in white shrouds.”We heard the explosion and rushed to check on the children,” said Umm Haytham al-Salakhi through tears, as she grieved a relative at Al-Ahli Hospital.”I kept calling out for all our children.”One sobbing man cradled a relative’s body, as dozens gathered to perform funeral prayers before the victims were taken for burial.”They struck unarmed civilians while they slept,” said another resident, Mohammad Rahmi, who also lost a relative in the bombing.Several men held the bodies of children wrapped in shrouds, while rescuers transported the wounded to the hospital, according to AFP images.Some of the wounded, including children, were treated in the hospital’s corridor as relatives gathered nearby.- More than 50,000 dead -Scenes from a destroyed home revealed collapsed concrete slabs and twisted metal, as children sifted through the rubble in search of salvaged belongings.Since Israel’s military resumed its offensive in Gaza last month, more than 1,330 people have been killed in the territory, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.The war began after Palestinian militants attacked southern Israel on October 7, 2023, resulting in the deaths of 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.The overall death toll since the war erupted now stands at 50,695, according to the Gaza health ministry.

Israel targets Hezbollah in south Lebanon as US envoy visits

Israel staged a strike in south Lebanon on Sunday that it said had targeted Hezbollah, and authorities said killed two people, as a US envoy visited for talks on the militant group and economic reforms.The strike came more than four months into a fragile truce between Israel and Hezbollah, and a day after US deputy special envoy for the Middle East, Morgan Ortagus, discussed disarming the Iran-backed with senior figures, according to a Lebanese official.The Lebanese health ministry said two people were killed in an “Israeli enemy” strike on the town of Zibqin in the south of the country near the border.The Israeli military said it targeted two Hezbollah operatives in the area who were “attempting to rebuild Hezbollah terror infrastructure sites”.The Lebanese army said the strike hit “a bulldozer and an excavator”, and that “there was no military equipment at the site”.Israel has continued to launch strikes on Lebanon since the November 27 ceasefire that largely halted more than a year of hostilities, with raids this week in south Lebanon and even on Hezbollah’s south Beirut stronghold.The truce accord was based on a UN Security Council resolution that says Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers should be the only forces in south Lebanon, and calls for the disarmament of all non-state groups.The Lebanese official, speaking anonymously as they were not authorised to brief the media, said Saturday that Ortagus discussed “intensifying and speeding up” the Lebanese army’s work in “dismantling Hezbollah’s military infrastructure, leading to restricting weapons to state hands, without setting a timetable”.- ‘Free’ -Under the truce, Hezbollah was to redeploy fighters north of the Litani River, about 30 kilometres (20 miles) from Israel, and dismantle remaining military infrastructure in the south.Israel was to withdraw its forces across the UN-demarcated Blue Line, the de facto border. But it has missed two deadlines to do so and continues to hold five positions in south Lebanon that it deems “strategic”.In an interview with Lebanese television channel LBCI, Ortagus said that “we continue to press on this government to fully fulfil the cessation of hostilities, and that includes disarming Hezbollah and all militias”.She said it should happen “as soon as possible”.”The sooner that the LAF (army) is able to meet these goals and to disarm all militias in the state, the sooner the Lebanese people can be free… from foreign influence, free from terrorism.”Hezbollah was the only Lebanese armed group that refused to surrender its weapons following a 1975-1990 civil war.The group has been severely weakened by the latest conflict with Israel however.Ortagus said she has had “fantastic meetings” in Lebanon.President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam — whose appointments  this year ended a more than two-year leadership vacuum — also called their discussions with her on Saturday positive.They said the talks addressed events in the south as well as economic reforms.- Reforms -The Lebanese official said Ortagus had “implied” that the reconstruction of war-ravaged areas “requires first achieving reforms and the expansion of state authority”.International creditors have long demanded reforms to unlock bailout funds that could help ease Lebanon’s five-year economic crisis, which has been widely blamed on mismanagement and corruption.Lebanon’s finance ministry said Ortagus met Sunday with Finance Minister Yassine Jaber, Economy Minister Amer Bisat and new central bank governor Karim Souaid.Discussions included “reforms initiated by the government… and the economic reform programme”, a ministry statement said.It added that the bank chief and the two ministers would attend  International Monetary Fund meetings in Washington later this month.Ali Fayyad, a member of Lebanon’s parliament for Hezbollah, condemned what he called “flagrant interference in reforms and financial, monetary and administrative matters”.”We don’t want reforms tailored to foreign wills and their politics seeking to dominate the country.”Ortagus, during the LBCI interview, said: “If they make the choice to work together and partner with the US government to disarm Hezbollah, to fulfil the cessation of hostilities, to end endemic corruption in this country, we’re going to be a wonderful partner and friend.”burs-str-lg/ami/tw

Thousands rally in Morocco at pro-Palestinian protest

Tens of thousands of people demonstrated in Morocco’s capital on Sunday against the conflict in the Gaza Strip where Israel has resumed its anti-Hamas offensive after a two-month ceasefire.The largest pro-Palestinian protest in the capital Rabat for several months was called by the Islamist-dominated coalition the Justice and Development party.Protesters were accompanied by chanting and the beating of drums as they marched down the city’s Mohammed V Avenue near parliament.They waved flags including one bearing the image of slain Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar.Children carried white shrouds stained in red to symbolise the thousands of young victims killed in the Palestinian territory during a year and a half of war.Israel’s military resumed its offensive in Gaza on March 18, and since then, more than 1,330 people have been killed in the territory, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.The war began after Palestinian militants attacked communities in southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.The overall death toll since the war erupted now stands at 50,695, according to the Gaza health ministry.On Sunday, demonstrators chanted slogans including “The people want the liberation of Palestine!”, called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a criminal, and demanded an end to the siege of Gaza and for aid to be allowed in.There were also calls for Morocco’s relations with Israel, re-established in 2020 under the US-brokered Abraham Accords, to be scrapped, with protesters calling such ties “treason”.Rabat has officially called for an immediate and lasting cessation of the war in Gaza, without mention to the country’s ties with Israel.

Iran rejects Trump call for direct nuclear talks

Iran’s top diplomat has dismissed direct negotiations with the United States as pointless, his office said Sunday, after US President Donald Trump said he preferred face-to-face talks over its nuclear programme.Trump sent a letter to Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last month calling for negotiations but warning of military action if diplomacy failed.On Thursday, the US president said he favoured “direct talks”, arguing they were “faster” and offered a better understanding than going through intermediaries.But Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said direct talks made no sense with a country “that constantly threatens to resort to force in violation of the UN Charter and that expresses contradictory positions from its various officials”.”We remain committed to diplomacy and are ready to try the path of indirect negotiations,” he was quoted as saying in a statement issued by his ministry.”Iran keeps itself prepared for all possible or probable events, and just as it is serious in diplomacy and negotiations, it will also be decisive and serious in defending its national interests and sovereignty.”On Saturday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said his country was willing to engage in dialogue with the United States on an “equal footing”.He also questioned Washington’s sincerity in calling for negotiations, saying “if you want negotiations, then what is the point of threatening?”Iran and the United States have had no diplomatic relations since shortly after the 1979 Islamic Revolution with some regional countries like Oman playing a mediating role between the two sides.- Letter diplomacy -Trump’s letter was delivered to Iran via the United Arab Emirates, and Tehran responded at the end of March via the Sultanate of Oman.On Sunday, the chief of staff of the Iranian armed forces, General Mohammad Bagheri, said Iran’s response stressed that “we seek peace in the region”.”We are not the ones who start wars, but we will respond to any threat with all our might,” he said of the content of Iran’s response.Western countries, led by the United States, have for decades accused Tehran of seeking to acquire nuclear weapons.Iran rejects the allegation and maintains that its nuclear activities exist solely for civilian purposes.In 2015, Iran reached a landmark deal with the permanent members of the UN Security Council, namely the United States, France, China, Russia, and the United Kingdom, as well as Germany, to limit its nuclear activities.The 2015 agreement — known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action — gave Iran sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its nuclear programme to guarantee that Tehran could not develop a nuclear weapon.In 2018, during Trump’s first term in office, the United States withdrew from the agreement and reinstated biting sanctions on Iran.A year later, Iran began rolling back on its commitments under the agreement and accelerated its nuclear programme.On Monday, Ali Larijani, a close adviser to Khamenei, warned that while Iran was not seeking nuclear weapons, it would “have no choice but to do so” in the event of an attack against it.

Migrants driven from Tunisian olive groves left in limbo

Batons in hand, Tunisian police marched in single file down a dirt path flanked by olive trees. Ahead of them, migrants fled as their tents burned.Some migrants stood by helplessly, watching the smoke swirl into the sky just a few hundred metres (yards) away after the authorities torched what had been their temporary homes.”I don’t know what to do,” said Bakayo Abdelkadeur, a 26-year-old from Mali, clutching two worn blankets.For nearly two years, olive groves around El Amra, a town south of Tunis, served as informal camps for thousands of migrants from sub-Saharan Africa.This week, authorities launched a sweeping operation to clear out the makeshift shelters located a few kilometres (miles) from Tunisia’s Mediterranean coast.It’s a growing flashpoint, fuelled by an anti-migrant campaign and rising tensions with local residents, who complain about the camps and demand that the land be cleared.Tempers flared in 2023 after President Kais Saied said that “hordes of sub-Saharan migrants” threatened to change the country’s demographics.Many migrants arrived after crossing the deserts of Algeria and Mali, hoping to reach Italy. But tighter controls on the sea route have left them stranded.Last year, Tunisia signed a 255-million-euro (almost $280-million) deal with the European Union, nearly half of which is earmarked for tackling irregular migration.- ‘Confused’ -Benjamin Enna picked up a spoon and a sachet of powdered juice — remnants of the so-called “Kilometre 25″ camp.The 29-year-old Nigerian said he survived a Mediterranean shipwreck and had hoped to join his brother in Italy.Now he’s torn between going home, working in Tunisia and trying to reach Europe again.”My head’s all mixed up,” he said.While some expressed a desire to go home and others insisted on pushing for Europe, nearly all migrants AFP spoke to around El Amra agreed on one thing: they want to leave Tunisia.”We’ve suffered a lot,” said Camara Hassan, 25, a former student of international relations from Guinea who spent two months in a Tunisian prison.Despite the many obstacles, he remains determined to reach Europe.”One way or another we’ll make it,” he said.Others are frustrated by delays in voluntary return flights facilitated by the UN’s International Organization for Migration.”I want to go back to Ivory Coast, but the IOM (flights) are full,” he said, before darting away when a National Guard vehicle approached.A visibly exhausted 29-year-old Cameroonian, who asked not to be named, described her anguish.”It’s horrible,” she said. “They treat us like we’re not human.”- New camps? -National Guard spokesman Houcem Eddine Jebabli defended the police operation as “humane”, saying that officers did not use tear gas.Asked what would happen to the migrants now their shelters were gone, he said many would benefit from the “voluntary returns”, while others have “dispersed into the wild”.As of Wednesday, the IOM said it had arranged 1,740 voluntary returns, following nearly 7,000 last year — triple the 2023 figure.But rights groups are sceptical.Dozens of police vans and tractors were deployed in the operation, which Romdhane Ben Amor of the Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights (FTDES) said aimed to scatter migrants to ease local anger.”It won’t work,” he warned. “They’ll regroup and build new camps because they have nowhere else to go.”On Saturday, a short drive from El Amra, groups of migrants were already walking along the roadside, heading towards other olive groves.