Tag: Israel

From Lebanon to the Red Sea, a Broader Conflict With Iran Looms

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President Biden and his top national security aides believed last summer that the chances of conflict with Iran and its proxies were well contained. After secret talks, they had just concluded a deal that led to the release of five imprisoned Americans in return for $6 billion in frozen Iranian funds and some Iranian prisoners. The militants that Tehran finances and arms — Hamas in the Palestinian territories, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen — seemed relatively quiet. Iran even slowed enrichment of uranium at its underground nuclear…

The world in 2024: Guardian writers on what to look out for

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The year 2024 will be a critical one. The future of Gaza and the West Bank may hinge in part on whether Donald Trump returns to the White House – as may the outcome of the war in Ukraine. China will be locked in a race against time as its population ages. And the natural world will reach a new series of tipping points. But there are some reasons for cautious optimism. With so much happening, it can be hard to know where to look. Here Guardian correspondents offer their…

Worlds apart: inside the 22 December Guardian Weekly

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The Guardian Weekly magazine looks forward and back in our final edition of 2023, a year overshadowed by war and conflict. In a special essay, diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour reflects on how a perception of US double standards over Ukraine and Gaza has damaged the west in the minds of the global south, and whether an international reckoning of sorts awaits Washington in 2024. “I wanted to illustrate chaos and destruction as testaments of war,” writes Israel G Vargas on his cover artwork for this week’s edition. “Two conflicts shaking…

Almost 100 journalists killed and 400 imprisoned in 2023, says IFJ

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A leading organisation representing journalists worldwide expressed deep concern Friday at the number of media professionals killed around the globe doing their jobs in 2023, with Israel’s war with Hamas claiming more journalists than any conflict in over 30 years. In its annual count of media worker deaths, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) said 94 journalists had been killed so far this year and almost 400 others had been imprisoned. The figure for deaths is up from 67 in the same period of 2022 — including 12 killed in…

Israel-Hamas Truce Appears to Enter Another Day, and More

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The New York Times Audio app is home to journalism and storytelling, and provides news, depth and serendipity. If you haven’t already, download it here — it’s available to Times news subscribers on iOS — and sign up for our weekly newsletter. The Headlines brings you the biggest stories of the day from the Times journalists who are covering them, all in about 10 minutes. NYT

An Oratorio About Shanghai’s Jews Opens in China at a Difficult Time

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“Émigré,” a new oratorio about Jewish refugees who fled Nazi Germany for Shanghai in the late 1930s, begins with a song by two brothers, Josef and Otto, as their steamship approaches a Chinese harbor. “Shanghai, beacon of light on a silent shore,” they sing. “Shanghai, answer these desperate cries.” The emigration of thousands of Central European and Eastern European Jews to China in the late 1930s and early 1940s — and their survival of the Holocaust — is one of World War II’s most dramatic but little-known chapters. In “Émigré,”…

Apec summit ends with unity on WTO reform but not Gaza or Ukraine

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Pacific Rim leaders have shown divisions over the wars in Ukraine and Gaza after a two-day summit of the Apec forum, while pledging support for reform of the World Trade Organization. The 21 economies that make up the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum – among them Russia, China, the US and Australia – did not mention either conflict in their final joint communique. Instead an accompanying chair’s statement noted the bloc had “exchanged views on the ongoing crisis in Gaza”. Days of meetings involving Apec ministers and leaders were dominated by…

London gallery delays Ai Weiwei show over Israel-Hamas tweet

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The artist Ai Weiwei has defended the importance of free speech after a London gallery put his show on hold over a tweet about the Israel-Hamas war. The exhibition of new works by the Chinese dissident, which was due to open at the Lisson gallery this week, was indefinitely put on hold after a tweet posted in response to a follower’s question on X which has since been deleted. It read: “The sense of guilt around the persecution of the Jewish people has been, at times, transferred to offset the…

Iran and Saudi Arabia Demand Gaza Cease-Fire

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After the Saudi and Iranian leaders finished their speeches, they left the main conference hall for a bilateral meeting. Prince Mohammed’s welcoming of Mr. Raisi amounted to a remarkable departure for the Saudi leader, who once bluntly warned Iran not to pursue expansionist policies in the region. “We won’t wait for the battle to be in Saudi Arabia,” he said in a televised interview in 2017. “Instead, we will work so that the battle is for them in Iran, not in Saudi Arabia.” He also once likened Iran’s supreme leader,…

How Chinese firm linked to repression of Uyghurs aids Israeli surveillance in West Bank

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In the occupied Palestinian territories, there are cameras everywhere. In Silwan, in occupied East Jerusalem, residents say cameras were installed by Israeli police up and down their streets, peering into their homes. One resident named Sara said she and her family “could be detected as if the cameras were just in our house … we couldn’t feel at home in our own house and had to be fully dressed all the time.” Surveillance cameras now cover the Damascus Gate, the main entrance into the old city of Jerusalem and one…