ROME: As the US works on its military withdrawal from Afghanistan, members of the global coalition fighting the Daesh group met Monday to plot future steps against the extremist group.
The meeting came just a day after the US launched airstrikes against Iran-backed militias near the Iraq-Syria border.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio were co-chairing the gathering of senior officials from the seven-year-old, 83-member bloc. Participants were taking stock of their current efforts to ensure the complete defeat of IS, whose remnants still pose a threat in Iraq and Syria and have shown signs of surging in parts of Africa.
Amid significant other international priorities, including taming the coronavirus pandemic and stepping up the fight against climate change, the coalition is hoping to stabilize areas liberated from IS, repatriate and hold foreign fighters accountable for their actions and combat extremist messaging.
Blinken and Di Maio urged representatives of the 77 other countries and five organizations that make up the coalition not to drop their guard despite the destruction of the extremist group’s hold over broad swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria.
“Daesh can still be a threat and attract support,” Di Maio said. He appealed for special attention to be paid to Africa, notably in the Sahel region, where IS is gaining traction and called for the coalition to create a special mechanism to deal with that threat.
Blinken noted that despite their defeat, IS elements in Iraq and Syria “still aspire to conduct large-scale attacks.”
“Together, we must stay as committed to our stabilization goals as we did to our military campaign that resulted in victory on the battlefield,” he said.
Blinken announced a new US contribution of $436 million to assist displaced people in Syria and surrounding countries and called for a new effort to repatriate and rehabilitate or prosecute some 10,000 IS fighters who remain imprisoned by the Syrian Defense Forces.
“This situation is simply untenable,” Blinken said. “It just can’t persist indefinitely.”
He also announced sanctions against Ousmane Illiassou Djibo, a native of Niger, who is a key leader of the Daesh affiliate in the greater Sahara. Djibo was designated a global terrorist, meaning that any assets he may have in the US are frozen and Americans are barred from any transactions with him.
Monday’s meeting was the first the coalition has had at a senior level that has been held in-person since the COVID-19 pandemic began.
In addition to the meeting on IS, foreign ministers of countries concerned with the broader conflict in Syria were to meet in Rome on Monday ahead of a critical vote at the United Nations on whether to maintain a humanitarian aid corridor from Turkey. Russia has resisted reauthorizing the channel amid stalled peace talks between the Syrian government and rebel groups.
Last week, the UN special envoy for Syria, Geir Pederson, said there were worrying signs that Daesh may be getting stronger in the country and called for a boost in cooperation to counter it. Pederson has also joined calls for new international talks on ending Syria’s civil war.
Since the Syrian conflict erupted in March 2011, numerous high-level gatherings aimed at ending the fighting and guiding the country to a political transition have failed to have any lasting impact.
The UN, US, Russia and many other countries support a December 2015 Security Council resolution endorsing a road map to peace in Syria that calls for a new constitution followed by UN-supervised elections.
Nations chart future steps against Daesh extremists
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Nations chart future steps against Daesh extremists
- US Secretary of State Antony Blinken noted that despite their defeat, Daesh elements in Iraq and Syria “still aspire to conduct large-scale attacks"
Head of controversial US-backed Gaza aid group resigns
- Jake Wood says he accepted the role as head of Gaza Humanitarian Foundation "to help alleviate the suffering" in Gaza
- But he is stepping down because “it had become clear that implementing the organization’s plan was not possible”
WASHINGTON: The head of a controversial US-backed group preparing to move aid into the Gaza Strip announced his abrupt resignation Sunday, adding fresh uncertainty over the effort’s future.
In a statement by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), executive director Jake Wood explained that he felt compelled to leave after determining the organization could not fulfil its mission in a way that adhered to “humanitarian principles.”
The foundation, which has been based in Geneva since February, has vowed to distribute some 300 million meals in its first 90 days of operation.
But the United Nations and traditional aid agencies have already said they will not cooperate with the group, amid accusations it is working with Israel.
The GHF has emerged as international pressure mounts on Israel over the conditions in Gaza, where it has pursued a military onslaught in response to the October 7, 2023 attacks by Hamas.
A more than two-month total blockade on the territory only began to ease in recent days, as agencies warned of growing starvation risks.
“Two months ago, I was approached about leading GHF’s efforts because of my experience in humanitarian operations” Wood said.
“Like many others around the world, I was horrified and heartbroken at the hunger crisis in Gaza and, as a humanitarian leader, I was compelled to do whatever I could to help alleviate the suffering.”
Wood stressed that he was “proud of the work I oversaw, including developing a pragmatic plan that could feed hungry people, address security concerns about diversion, and complement the work of longstanding NGOs in Gaza.”
But, he said, it had become “clear that it is not possible to implement this plan while also strictly adhering to the humanitarian principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality, and independence, which I will not abandon.”
Gaza’s health ministry said Sunday that at least 3,785 people had been killed in the territory since a ceasefire collapsed on March 18, taking the war’s overall toll to 53,939, mostly civilians.
Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the war resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.
Militants also took 251 hostages, 57 of whom remain in Gaza including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.
Wood called on Israel “to significantly expand the provision of aid into Gaza through all mechanisms” while also urging “all stakeholders to continue to explore innovative new methods for the delivery of aid, without delay, diversion, or discrimination.”
Israeli strike kills 20 in Gaza school housing displaced people, health authorities say
- Medics said the dozens of casualties in the strike on the school, in the Daraj neighbourhood of Gaza City, included women and children
GAZA CITY: An Israeli strike on a school housing displaced people in Gaza killed at least 20 people and injured dozens, local authorities told Reuters early on Monday.
Israel stepped up its military operations in the enclave in early May, saying it is seeking to eliminate Hamas' military and governing capabilities and bring back the remaining hostages who were seized in October 2023.
Medics said the dozens of casualties in the strike on the school, in the Daraj neighbourhood of Gaza City, included women and children.
Some of the bodies were badly burned according to images circulating on social media, which Reuters could not immediately verify.
There was no immediate comment by the Israeli military.
Despite mounting international pressure that pushed Israel to lift a blockade on aid supplies in the face of warnings of looming famine, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last week that Israel would control the whole of Gaza.
Israel has taken control of around 77% of the enclave either through its ground forces or evacuation orders and bombardments that keep residents away from their homes, Gaza's media office said.
The Israeli campaign, triggered after Hamas Islamist militants attacked Israeli communities on October 7, 2023, killing about 1,200 people, has devastated Gaza and pushed nearly all of its two million residents from their homes.
The offensive has killed more than 53,000 people, many of them civilians, according to Gaza health authorities.
Israel leader meets visiting US homeland security secretary: PM’s office
- The visit comes as Israel ramps up its offensive in the Gaza Strip
JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with visiting US Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in Jerusalem on Sunday, his office said.
US and Israeli media reported that Trump had sent Noem to Jerusalem following the killing of two Israeli embassy staffers in Washington last week.
Noem was accompanied at her meeting with Netanyahu by US Ambassador Mike Huckabee, Netanyahu’s office said in a brief statement Sunday night.
The office added that during the meeting Noem “expressed her unreserved support for the prime minister and the State of Israel.”
The visit comes as Israel ramps up its offensive in the Gaza Strip in what it says is a renewed effort to destroy Hamas.
Earlier in the evening, Noem and Huckabee had visited the city’s Western Wall, where early celebrations for Monday’s “Jerusalem Day” holiday were taking place.
The holiday commemorates what Israel considers Jerusalem’s reunification under its authority after the city’s eastern sector was captured by its forces in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
’Death is sometimes kinder’: Relatives recount Gaza strike that devastated family
- The paediatrician, with no means of transport, ran from the Nasser Hospital to the family house in the city of Khan Yunis, a relative told AFP, only to be met with every parent’s worst nightmare
GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories: Alaa Al-Najjar was tending to wounded children at a hospital in the southern Gaza Strip when the news came through: the home where her own 10 children were staying had been bombed in an Israeli air strike.
The paediatrician, with no means of transport, ran from the Nasser Hospital to the family house in the city of Khan Yunis, a relative told AFP, only to be met with every parent’s worst nightmare.
“When she saw the charred bodies, she started screaming and crying,” said Ali Al-Najjar, the brother of Alaa’s husband.
Nine of her children were killed, their bodies burned beyond recognition, according to relatives.
The tenth, 10-year-old Adam, survived the strike but remains in critical condition, as does his father, Hamdi Al-Najjar, also a doctor, who was also at home when the strike hit.
Both are in intensive care at Nasser Hospital.
When the body of her daughter Nibal was pulled from the rubble, Alaa screamed her name, her brother-in-law recounted.
The following day, under a tent set up near the destroyed home, the well-respected paediatric specialist sat in stunned silence, still in shock.
Around her, women wept as the sounds of explosions echoed across the Palestinian territory, battered by more than a year and a half of war.
The air strike on Friday afternoon was carried out without warning, relatives said.
Asked about the incident, the Israeli military said it had “struck a number of suspects who were identified operating from a structure” near its troops, adding that claims of civilian harm were under review.
“I couldn’t recognize the children in the shrouds,” Alaa’s sister, Sahar Al-Najjar, said through tears. “Their features were gone.”
“It’s a huge loss. Alaa is broken,” said Mohammed, another close family member.
According to medical sources, Hamdi Al-Najjar underwent several operations at the Jordanian field hospital.
Doctors had to remove a large portion of his right lung and gave him 17 blood transfusions.
Adam had one hand amputated and suffers from severe burns across his body.
“I found my brother’s house like a broken biscuit, reduced to ruins, and my loved ones were underneath,” Ali Al-Najjar said, recalling how he dug through the rubble with his bare hands alongside paramedics to recover the children’s bodies.
Now, he dreads the moment his brother regains consciousness.
“I don’t know how to tell him. Should I tell him his children are dead? I buried them in two graves.”
“There is no safe place in Gaza,” he added with a weary sigh. “Death is sometimes kinder than this torture.”
Israel’s latest strikes in Gaza kill 38 people including a journalist and children
- Local journalist and several family members were killed by an airstrike that hit his house earlier on Sunday
- Latest deaths resulted from Israeli strikes in Khan Younis in the south, Jabalia in the north and Nuseirat in central Gaza Strip
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip: Israeli strikes over the past 24 hours killed at least 38 people in Gaza, including children, a local journalist and a senior rescue service official, local health officials said Sunday.
The latest deaths in the Israeli campaign resulted from separate Israeli strikes in Khan Younis in the south, Jabalia in the north and Nuseirat in the central Gaza Strip, medics said.
In Jabalia, they said local journalist Hassan Majdi Abu Warda and several family members were killed by an airstrike that hit his house earlier on Sunday.
Another airstrike in Nuseirat killed Ashraf Abu Nar, a senior official in the territory’s civil emergency service, and his wife in their house, medics added.
There was no immediate comment by the Israeli military.
The Hamas-run Gaza government media office said that Abu Warda’s death raised the number of Palestinian journalists killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023, to 220.
In a separate statement, the media office said Israeli forces were in control of 77 percent of the Gaza Strip, either through ground forces or evacuation orders and bombardment that keeps residents away from their homes.
The armed wing of Hamas and the Islamic Jihad said in separate statements on Sunday that fighters carried out several ambushes and attacks using bombs and anti-tank rockets against Israeli forces operating in several areas across Gaza.
On Friday the Israeli military said it had conducted more strikes in Gaza overnight, hitting 75 targets including weapons storage facilities and rocket launchers.
Further details emerged of the Palestinian doctor who lost nine of her 10 children in an Israeli strike on Friday.
Gaza’s Health Ministry said 3,785 people have been killed since Israel ended a ceasefire in March.
Israel launched an air and ground war in Gaza after Hamas militants’ cross-border attack on October 7, 2023, which killed 1,200 people by Israeli tallies with 251 hostages abducted into Gaza. Hamas has yet to release the 58 hostages it still holds.
The conflict has killed more than 53,900 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities, and devastated the coastal strip. Aid groups say signs of severe malnutrition are widespread.
Israel also blocked all food, medicine and fuel from entering Gaza for 2 1/2 months before letting a trickle of aid enter last week, after experts’ warnings of famine and pressure from some of Israel’s top allies.
Israel is pursuing a new US-backed plan to control all aid to Gaza, but the American heading the effort unexpectedly resigned Sunday, saying it had become clear that his organization would not be allowed to operate independently.
The United Nations has rejected the plan. UN World Food Program executive director Cindy McCain told CBS she has not seen evidence to support Israel’s claims that Hamas is responsible for the looting of aid trucks. “These people are desperate, and they see a World Food Program truck coming in and they run for it,” she said.
COGAT, the Israeli defense body overseeing aid for Gaza, said 107 trucks of aid entered Sunday. The UN has called the rate far from enough. About 600 trucks a day entered during the ceasefire.
Israel also says it plans to seize full control of Gaza and facilitate what it describes as the voluntary migration of its over 2 million population, a plan rejected by Palestinians and much of the international community.
US Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem visited Israel on Sunday and met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
