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Swedish activist Greta Thunberg landed in Greece on Monday alongside scores of fellow campaigners expelled from Israel after trying to ship aid to Gaza, AFP journalists saw.The 22-year-old climate campaigner was one of hundreds of people who had boarded a flotilla that tried to break through an Israeli blockade of the war-stricken territory, with many complaining on their return to Europe of mistreatment at the hands of the Israeli authorities.Thunberg and 160 others landed at Athens International Airport, where crowds of activists welcomed them.She called the Global Sumud Flotilla “the biggest ever attempt to break Israel’s illegal and inhumane siege by sea”.”That this mission has to exist is a shame,” she added, urging the world to act to prevent Israel’s “genocide” of the Palestinians.”We are not even seeing the bare minimum from our governments,” Thunberg said.Activists unfurled a huge Palestinian flag in the arrivals hall and chanted: “Freedom for Palestine” and “Long live the flotilla!”- Parliamentarian ‘beaten’ -One of those landing in Greece, Rima Hassan, a French-Palestinian member of the European Parliament, reported having been hit by Israeli police after the flotilla was intercepted.”I was beaten by two police officers when they put me in the van,” she told AFP.Hassan said she and other detainees were kept in groups of up to 15 per cell on mattresses in a high-security Israeli prison.Yasmin Acar, a member of the flotilla’s steering committee, said the detainees were “treated like animals” and “terrorists”.”We were physically assaulted, we were deprived of sleep,” Acar said. “We did not have any clean water. The first 48 hours, there was no food, no water at all.”Israel has rejected the accusations of mistreatment as untrue.The Greek foreign ministry said the “special repatriation flight” that landed in Athens carried 27 Greeks and 134 other nationals from 15 European countries.Israel’s foreign ministry said on Monday it had deported 171 activists overall to Greece and Slovakia.Bratislava’s foreign ministry confirmed that one Slovak had returned to the central European country, along with nine other people from the Netherlands, Canada and the United States.The flotilla departed from Barcelona in Spain in early September and was intercepted by the Israeli navy off Egypt last week.Israel has branded the flotilla an offshoot of Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist movement that it is battling to destroy in Gaza.It said the boats violated a prohibited zone and that little humanitarian aid was found on board the vessels.Israeli police said more than 470 people aboard the flotilla boats were arrested.Israel’s foreign ministry told AFP that 138 flotilla participants remained in detention in Israel.Thirteen Brazilians are among them, including three who are holding a hunger strike, a spokeswoman for the Brazilian delegation in the flotilla, Lara Souza, told AFP.Brazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva demanded in a post on X that this “absurd situation end as soon as possible” and the Brazilians be released.He said that Israel had “violated international law” by intercepting the flotilla “and it continues to commit violations by keeping them detained”.

Delegations from Hamas and Israel on Monday began indirect talks in Egypt on ending the nearly two-year war in Gaza, with US President Donald Trump judging that the Palestinian militant group was ready to compromise over his proposals for a deal.Al-Qahera News, which is linked to Egyptian state intelligence, said the first round of talks ended “amid a positive atmosphere” and would continue on Tuesday.Behind closed doors and under tight security, negotiators were to speak through mediators shuttling back and forth, only weeks after Israel tried to kill Hamas’s lead negotiators in a strike on Qatar.Al-Qahera News earlier said delegations were “discussing preparing ground conditions for the release of detainees and prisoners”.”Egyptian and Qatari mediators are working with both sides to establish a mechanism” for the release of hostages held in Gaza in exchange for Palestinians held in Israeli jails, it said.Trump told reporters at the White House he was “pretty sure” a peace deal was possible.”I think Hamas has been agreeing to things that are very important… I think we’re going to have a deal.”Hamas’s lead negotiator Khalil al-Hayya, who survived Israel’s attack on the Palestinian Islamist movement’s leaders in Doha last month, held a meeting with Egyptian intelligence officials ahead of the talks, an Egyptian security source said.This round of negotiations, launched on the eve of the second anniversary of Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack that sparked the war, “may last for several days”, said a Palestinian source close to Hamas’s leadership.”We expect the negotiations to be difficult and complex, given the occupation’s intentions to continue its war of extermination,” he told AFP.Trump, whose envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner are expected in Egypt, has urged negotiators to “move fast” to end the war in Gaza, where Israeli strikes continued on Monday.At least seven Palestinians were killed in the latest Israeli air strikes, according to Mahmud Bassal, spokesman for Gaza’s civil defence agency.AFP footage showed explosions in the Gaza Strip, with plumes of smoke rising over the skyline, even after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Israel must stop bombing the territory.- ‘Require several days’ -Both Hamas and Israel have responded positively to Trump’s proposal, but reaching an agreement on the details is set to be a huge task.The plan envisages the disarmament of Hamas, which the militant group is unlikely to accept.It also provides for the gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, but Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to redeploy troops “deep inside” the territory while securing the release of hostages.According to the Palestinian source, the initial hostage-prisoner exchange will “require several days, depending on field conditions related to Israeli withdrawals, the cessation of bombardment and the suspension of all types of air operations”.Negotiations will look to “determine the date of a temporary truce”, a Hamas official said, as well as create conditions for a first phase of the plan, in which 47 hostages held in Gaza are to be released in return for hundreds of Palestinian detainees.The International Committee of the Red Cross said it was ready to help with hostage and detainee returns and to facilitate aid access across Gaza, where the UN has declared a famine.”The war has destroyed everything I built throughout my life,” said Mohammed Abu Sultan, 49, who fled Gaza City with 20 family members to Nuseirat camp in central Gaza.”We have been running from death for two years.”- Military halt -A Palestinian source close to Hamas said it would halt its military operations in parallel with Israel stopping its bombardment and withdrawing its troops from Gaza City.Israeli military chief Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir however warned that if the negotiations failed, then the military would “return to fighting” in Gaza.Militants seized 251 hostages during their October 7, 2023 attack, 47 of whom are still in Gaza. Of those, the Israeli military says 25 are dead.According to Trump’s plan, in return for the hostages, Israel is expected to release 250 Palestinian prisoners with life sentences and more than 1,700 detainees from Gaza taken during the war.Hamas has insisted it should have a say in the territory’s future, though Trump’s roadmap stipulates that it and other factions “not have any role in the governance of Gaza”.Under the proposal, administration of the territory would be taken up by a technocratic body overseen by a transitional authority headed by Trump himself.”We hope Trump will pressure Netanyahu and force him to stop the war,” said Ahmad Barbakh, from the Al-Mawasi area.”We want the prisoner exchange deal to be completed quickly so that Israel has no excuse to continue the war.”Hamas’s October 2023 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 67,160 Palestinians, according to health ministry figures in the Hamas-run territory that the United Nations considers reliable.burs-bha/dv/jsa/rlp/rmb/sla

UNESCO executives voted Monday to make an Egyptian ex-antiquities minister the UN culture body’s next leader, as it grapples with accusations of pro-Israel bias that prompted the United States to say it would quit the organisation.The board voted to appoint Khaled el-Enany, Egypt’s former antiquities and tourism minister, to replace French director-general Audrey Azoulay after her two four-year terms in office.The United States did not take part in the vote, having announced its future withdrawal from the organisation, which is best known for designating world-famous heritage sites.Enany, 54, has said he would seek to bring back the United States — which contributes eight percent of UNESCO’s overall funding — into the organisation.”The current challenge is the budget. That is going to be the priority of all of us,” he told reporters after the vote.He said he would strive for “technical” deliberations in UNESCO “rather than the politicisation of the organisation”.Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi issued a statement speaking of a “historic success” for his country and wishing Enany the best for his “noble mission”.- US funding blow -The United States announced in June that it would leave UNESCO, claiming it was biased against Israel and promoted “divisive” causes.That move, set to take effect at the end of 2026, will deal a major blow to the agency’s finances.Only two candidates were in the running for the top job, after a Mexican contender backed out in August.Enany faced off against the Republic of Congo’s Firmin Edouard Matoko, who had served as UNESCO’s de facto foreign minister until March.Enany oversaw antiquities, and later also tourism, from 2016 to 2022 under Sisi.Since announcing his bid more than two years ago, he claimed to have visited 65 countries, meeting 400 people over 30 months on the campaign trail.If his nomination is confirmed, he will take office on November 14 as UNESCO’s first director-general from an Arab country and the second from an African nation, after Senegal’s Amadou Mahtar Mbow, who served from 1974 to 1987.Enany won 55 of the 57 votes cast, said the board’s chair, Vera Lacoeuilhe.The organisation’s general assembly must now ratify his appointment during its meeting in Uzbekistan on November 6.The body has never gone against a recommendation by the executive board, which is made up of representatives from 58 of the 194 member states.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva urged US President Donald Trump to lift punitive trade tariffs in their first official talks Monday after months of animosity — with both suggesting an in-person meeting in the near future.The two leaders spoke for 30 minutes in a “friendly tone” and Lula raised the possibility of a …

Brazil’s Lula asks Trump to remove tariffs in ‘friendly’ phone call Read More »

Stock markets were mixed Monday as a deepening political crisis in France sent Paris into a tailspin while a new Japanese ruling party leader boosted Tokyo and the AI investment boom lifted US stock indices to fresh heights.Gold pushed ever closer to $4,000 an ounce as the US government shutdown and expected interest cuts from …

Paris stocks slide amid French political upheaval, Tokyo soars Read More »

Swedish activist Greta Thunberg landed in Greece on Monday alongside scores of fellow campaigners expelled from Israel after trying to ship aid to Gaza, AFP journalists saw.The 22-year-old climate campaigner was one of hundreds of people who had boarded a flotilla that tried to break through an Israeli blockade of the war-stricken territory, with many complaining on their return to Europe of mistreatment at the hands of the Israeli authorities.Thunberg and 160 others landed at Athens International Airport, where crowds of activists welcomed them.She called the Global Sumud Flotilla “the biggest ever attempt to break Israel’s illegal and inhumane siege by sea”.”That this mission has to exist is a shame,” she added, urging the world to act to prevent Israel’s “genocide” of the Palestinians.”We are not even seeing the bare minimum from our governments,” Thunberg said.Activists unfurled a huge Palestinian flag in the arrivals hall and chanted: “Freedom for Palestine” and “Long live the flotilla!”- Parliamentarian ‘beaten’ -One of those landing in Greece, Rima Hassan, a French-Palestinian member of the European Parliament, reported having been hit by Israeli police after the flotilla was intercepted.”I was beaten by two police officers when they put me in the van,” she told AFP.Hassan said she and other detainees were kept in groups of up to 15 per cell on mattresses in a high-security Israeli prison.Yasmin Acar, a member of the flotilla’s steering committee, said the detainees were “treated like animals” and “terrorists”.”We were physically assaulted, we were deprived of sleep,” Acar said. “We did not have any clean water. The first 48 hours, there was no food, no water at all.”Israel has rejected the accusations of mistreatment as untrue.The Greek foreign ministry said the “special repatriation flight” that landed in Athens carried 27 Greeks and 134 other nationals from 15 European countries.Israel’s foreign ministry said on Monday it had deported 171 activists overall to Greece and Slovakia.Bratislava’s foreign ministry confirmed that one Slovak had returned to the central European country, along with nine other people from the Netherlands, Canada and the United States.The flotilla departed from Barcelona in Spain in early September and was intercepted by the Israeli navy off Egypt last week.Israel has branded the flotilla an offshoot of Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist movement that it is battling to destroy in Gaza.It said the boats violated a prohibited zone and that little humanitarian aid was found on board the vessels.Israeli police said more than 470 people aboard the flotilla boats were arrested.Israel’s foreign ministry told AFP that 138 flotilla participants remained in detention in Israel.