BRUSSELS: The European Union on Friday welcomed a cease-fire between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, and vowed to increase efforts for a long-term “political solution” to resolve the crisis.
“The European Union welcomes the announced cease-fire bringing to an end the violence in and around Gaza. We commend Egypt, Qatar, United Nations, United States and others who have played a facilitating role in this,” EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said in a statement.
“We are appalled and regret the loss of life over these past 11 days. As the EU has consistently reiterated, the situation in the Gaza Strip has long been unsustainable.”
The statement insisted that “only a political solution will bring sustainable peace and end once for all the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.”
“Restoring a political horizon toward a two-state solution now remains of utmost importance. The EU is ready to fully support Israeli and Palestinian authorities in these efforts,” it said.
“The EU is renewing its engagement with key international partners, including the United States, and other partners in the region, as well as with the revitalized Middle East Quartet, to this end.”
A cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, appeared to be holding Friday after 11 days of deadly fighting that pounded the Palestinian enclave and forced countless Israelis to seek shelter from rockets.
EU welcomes Gaza cease-fire, urges ‘political solution’
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EU welcomes Gaza cease-fire, urges ‘political solution’
- EU vowed to increase efforts for a long-term “political solution” to resolve the crisis
Israeli missiles strike Gaza hospital, patients evacuated
- The Hamas-run government media office condemned the attack as a “heinous and filthy crime,” saying that Israel “deliberately destroyed and rendered out of service 34 hospitals
CAIRO: Two Israeli missiles hit a building inside a main Gaza hospital on Sunday, destroying the emergency and reception department and damaging other structures, medics said, in a strike which Israel said was against Hamas fighters exploiting the facility.
Health officials at the Al-Ahli Arab Baptist Hospital evacuated the patients from the building after one person said he received a call from someone who identified himself with the Israeli security shortly before the attack took place.
No casualties were reported, according to the civil emergency service.
The Israeli military said in a statement it had taken steps to reduce harm to civilians before it struck the compound, which was being used by Hamas militants to plan attacks.
Images circulating on social media, which Reuters could not immediately verify, showed dozens of people leaving the premises, with some appearing to be dragging sick relatives on hospital beds.
The Palestinian foreign ministry and Hamas condemned the attack at Al-Ahli and said in a statement that Israel was destroying Gaza’s health care system.
Israel says Hamas systematically exploits civilian structures, including hospitals, which the militant group denies. Israeli forces have carried out numerous raids in medical facilities in the enclave.
In October 2023, a deadly blast at a parking lot in the compound of Al-Ahli hospital was blamed by Hamas on an Israeli air strike. Israel said a failed rocket launch by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group had caused the blast.
The militant group denied it was responsible. An investigation by Human Rights Watch later concluded the 2023 explosion was most likely caused by a failed Palestinian rocket launch.
Separate strikes in the enclave on Sunday killed the head of a police station in Khan Younis, in the southern part of the Hamas-run enclave, according to Hamas media.
At least eight more people, including a woman, were killed further north, according to the official Palestinian news agency WAFA. There was no immediate Israeli comment on those reports.
The war in Gaza was triggered by Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel, in which 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies.
Since then, more than 50,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli offensive, according to local health authorities. Much of Gaza is in ruins and most of its population has been displaced.
Algeria protests detention, indictment of consular agent in France
- Algeria’s foreign ministry said it had hauled in French Ambassador Stephane Romatet to “express its strong protest”
- It said the indicted consular officer “was arrested in public and then taken into custody without notification through the diplomatic channels”
ALGIERS: Algeria protested strongly Saturday after French prosecutors indicted one of its consular officials on suspicion of involvement in the April 2024 abduction of an Algerian influencer in a Paris suburb.
The indictment comes at a delicate time in relations between Algeria and its former colonial power, with Algiers claiming the move was aimed at scuppering recent attempts to repair ties.
Three men, one of whom works at an Algerian consulate in France, were indicted Friday in Paris on suspicion of involvement in the abduction of 41-year-old Amir Boukhors.
Boukhors, known as “Amir DZ,” is an opponent of the Algerian government and has more than a million followers on TikTok.
The three were indicted on grounds including abduction, arbitrary detention and illegal confinement, in connection with a terrorist enterprise, according to France’s National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office.
They were later detained in custody.
Algeria’s foreign ministry said it had hauled in French Ambassador Stephane Romatet to “express its strong protest.”
It said the indicted consular officer “was arrested in public and then taken into custody without notification through the diplomatic channels.”
It denounced a “far-fetched argument” based “on the sole fact that the accused consular officer’s mobile phone was allegedly located around the home” of Boukhors.
The Algerian influencer has been in France since 2016 and was granted political asylum in 2023. He was abducted in April 2024 and released the following day, according to his lawyer.
Algiers is demanding the influencer’s return to face trial, having issued nine international arrest warrants against him, accusing him of fraud and terror offenses.
The Algerian foreign ministry demanded the immediate release of its consular officer.
It said the “unprecedented” turn of events was “no coincidence,” and was “aimed at torpedoing the process of reviving bilateral relations” agreed by French President Emmanuel Macron and Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune in a March 31 telephone call.
Relations between Paris and Algiers came under strain last year when France recognized Moroccan sovereignty over the disputed Western Sahara, where Algeria has long backed the pro-independence Polisario Front.
Algeria recalled its ambassador from Paris in protest of the policy shift it has viewed as favoring its North African rival.
Relations soured further in November when Algeria arrested French-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal on national security charges, after he told a French far-right media outlet that Morocco’s territory was truncated in favor of Algeria during French colonial rule.
Sansal has since been sentenced to five years in jail.
Tensions eased somewhat thanks to the recent phone call between Macron and Tebboune, who voiced their willingness to repair relations.
And French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot expressed hope last Sunday for a “new phase” in relations with Algeria, during a visit aimed at mending the diplomatic rift.
Syrian forces deploy at key dam under deal with Kurds
- Syria’s state news agency SANA reported “the entry of Syrian Arab Army forces and security forces into the Tishrin Dam ... to impose security in the region, under the agreement reached with the SDF”
DAMASCUS: Security forces from the new government in Damascus deployed on Saturday around a strategic dam in northern Syria, under a deal with the autonomous Kurdish administration, state media reported.
Under the agreement, Kurdish-led fighters of the Syrian Democratic Forces will pull back from the dam, which they captured from Daesh in late 2015.
The Tishrin dam near Manbij in Aleppo province is one of several on the Euphrates and its tributaries in the Syrian Arab Republic.
It plays a key role in the nation’s economy by providing water for irrigation and hydro-electric power.
On Thursday, a Kurdish source said the Kurdish authorities in northeast Syria had reached an agreement with the central government on running the dam.
A separate Kurdish source said on Saturday that the deal, supervised by the US-led anti-terror coalition, stipulates that the dam remain under Kurdish civilian administration.
Syria’s state news agency SANA reported “the entry of Syrian Arab Army forces and security forces into the Tishrin Dam ... to impose security in the region, under the agreement reached with the SDF.”
The accord also calls for a joint military force to protect the dam and for the withdrawal of factions “that seek to disrupt this agreement,” SANA said.
It is part of a broader agreement reached in mid-March between Syria’s President Ahmed Al-Sharaa and SDF commander Mazloum Abdi, aiming to integrate the institutions of the Kurdish autonomous administration into the national government.
The dam was a key battleground in Syria’s civil war that broke out in 2011, falling to Daesh before being captured by the SDF.
Days after Al-Sharaa’s coalition overthrew Syrian leader Bashar Assad in December, Turkish drone strikes targeted the dam, killing dozens of civilians and Kurdish officials, as Britain-based war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Hamas releases video showing Israeli-American hostage alive
- Israeli campaign group the Hostages and Missing Families Forum identified the hostage as Edan Alexander
- Alexander, a soldier in the Israeli army, said on the video that he wants to return home to celebrate the holidays
GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories: Hamas’s armed wing released a video on Saturday showing an Israeli-American hostage alive, in which he criticizes the Israeli government for failing to secure his release.
Israeli campaign group the Hostages and Missing Families Forum identified him as Edan Alexander, a soldier in an elite infantry unit on the Gaza border when he was abducted by Palestinian militants during their October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
AFP was unable to determine when the video was filmed.
Hamas’s armed wing, the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, published the more than three-minute clip showing the hostage seated in a small, enclosed space.
In the video, he says he wants to return home to celebrate the holidays.
Israel is currently marking Passover, the holiday that commemorates the biblical liberation of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt.
Alexander, who turned 21 in captivity, was born in Tel Aviv and grew up in the US state of New Jersey, returning to Israel after high school to join the army.
“As we begin the holiday evening in the USA, our family in Israel is preparing to sit around the Seder table,” Alexander’s family said in a statement released by the forum.
“Our Edan, a lone soldier who immigrated to Israel and enlisted in the Golani Brigade to defend the country and its citizens, is still being held captive by Hamas.
“When you sit down to mark Passover, remember that this is not a holiday of freedom as long as Edan and the other hostages are not home,” the family added.
The family did not give a green light for the media to broadcast the footage.
Alexander appears to be speaking under duress in the video, making frequent hand gestures as he criticizes Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government for failing to secure his release.
The video was released hours after Defense Minister Israel Katz announced military control of what it called the new “Morag axis” corridor of land between the southern cities of Rafah and Khan Yunis.
Katz also outlined plans to expand Israel’s ongoing offensive across much of the territory.
In a separate statement earlier Saturday, Hamas said Israel’s Gaza operations endangered not only Palestinian civilians but also the remaining hostages.
The offensive not only “kills defenseless civilians but also makes the fate of the occupation’s prisoners (hostages) uncertain,” Hamas said.
During their October 7, 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the war in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian militants took 251 hostages.
Fifty-eight hostages remain in captivity, including 34 whom the Israeli military says are dead.
During a recent ceasefire that ended on March 18 when Israel resumed air strikes on Gaza, militants released 33 hostages, among them eight bodies.
Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.
Gaza’s health ministry said Saturday at least 1,563 Palestinians had been killed since March 18 when the ceasefire collapsed, taking the overall death toll since the war began to 50,933.
UAE president meets with US Congressional delegation in Abu Dhabi to discuss ties and regional stability
- American delegation included Senator Joni Ernst and Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz
ABU DHABI: UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan met with a delegation from the US Congress at Qasr Al-Shati in Abu Dhabi on Saturday, Emirates News Agency reported.
The American delegation included Senator Joni Ernst and Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, both prominent members of the US legislative branch.
The meeting focused on enhancing the strategic partnership between the two nations across a range of sectors and reaffirmed their commitment to advancing mutual interests for the benefit of both peoples.
Discussions covered key regional and international issues, particularly efforts to bolster security and stability in the Middle East.
Both sides emphasized the importance of continued collaboration to promote peace, development, and prosperity across the region and beyond.
The meeting was also attended by senior UAE officials and Yousef Al-Otaiba, the Emirati ambassador to the US.
