Region

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM - Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday condemned as "false and absurd" a UN investigation that found Israel had committed "genocidal acts" in the Gaza Strip.

"The anti-Israeli circus known as the UN Human Rights Council has long been exposed as an anti-Semitic, corrupt, terror-supporting, and irrelevant body," Netanyahu said in a statement issued by his office.

"Instead of focusing on crimes against humanity and the war crimes committed by the Hamas terrorist organisation in the worst massacre against the Jewish people since the Holocaust, the UN once again chooses to attack the state of Israel with false accusations, including absurd claims" of destroying sexual and reproductive healthcare facilities in Gaza, he said.

Earlier on Thursday, the UN Commission of Inquiry said Israel had "intentionally attacked and destroyed" the Palestinian territory's main fertility centre, and had simultaneously imposed a siege and blocked aid including medication for ensuring safe pregnancies, deliveries and neonatal care.

The commission found that Israeli authorities "have destroyed in part the reproductive capacity of Palestinians in Gaza as a group through the systematic destruction of sexual and reproductive healthcare", it said in a statement.

It said this amounted to "two categories of genocidal acts" during Israel's offensive in Gaza, launched after the attacks by Hamas militants on Israel on October 7, 2023.

The three-person Independent International Commission of Inquiry was established by the UN Human Rights Council in May 2021 to investigate alleged international law violations in Israel and the Palestinian territories.

THE HAGUE — The International Court of Justice will hold hearings next month on Israel's humanitarian obligations towards Palestinians, amid claims the Israeli government is blocking aid access to Gaza.

The United Nations General Assembly approved a resolution in December requesting that the world body's top court give an advisory opinion on the matter.

The hearings will open on April 28 at the court's seat in The Hague, it said in a statement. 

The resolution, submitted by Norway in October, was adopted by a large majority.

It calls on the ICJ to clarify what Israel is required to do to "ensure and facilitate the unhindered provision of urgently needed supplies essential to the survival of the Palestinian civilian population".

Although the ICJ's decision are legally binding, the court has no concrete means to enforce them.

But they increase the diplomatic pressure on Israel. 

Last July, the ICJ issued an advisory opinion stating that Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory was "illegal" and must end as soon as possible.

Israel strictly controls all inflows of international aide vital for the 2.4 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip hit by a humanitarian crisis.

The Israeli government often criticises humanitarian organisations for their inability to distribute large quantities of aid.

Norway's initiative was triggered by an Israeli law banning from the end of January the UN agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA from operating on Israeli soil and coordinating with the Israeli government.

The Israeli authorities accuse some UNRWA employees of taking part in the attack on Israel on October 7, 2023 by Hamas.

Israeli forces reported fresh arrests as they kept up raids in the northern occupied West Bank on Wednesday, a day after troops shot dead three Palestinians as part of an ongoing military operation.

Overnight, Israeli troops conducted raids in the villages of Qabatiya and Arraba, arresting about a dozen Palestinians. Several of those arrested, their eyes blindfolded, were escorted by Israeli soldiers to military vehicles before being taken to a building in Arraba that was used by troops as an interrogation centre, an AFP correspondent reported.

In Qabatiya, army bulldozers were seen tearing up sections of road, the correspondent added. 

The Israeli military frequently destroys roads in the West Bank. 

The Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority confirmed the deaths and reported that a Palestinian woman was also killed Tuesday by Israeli forces.

The operation, dubbed "Iron Wall", has resulted in dozens of deaths, including Palestinian children and Israeli soldiers, according to the UN.

BRUSSELS, Belgium - The EU has welcomed Syria's establishment of a fact-finding committee to investigate a recent wave of deadly violence, calling for perpetrators to be "brought to justice".

"We strongly condemn the attacks by pro-Assad militias against security forces," the EU said in a statement released late Tuesday. 

"We also condemn in the strongest terms the horrific crimes committed against civilians, including summary killings, many of which have been allegedly perpetrated by armed groups supporting the security forces of the transitional authorities."

A wave of violence broke out last Thursday, the deadliest since longtime strongman Bashar Al Assad was ousted in December.

The UN Human Rights Office said it had documented "summary executions" that appeared "to have been carried out on a sectarian basis".

"We welcome the commitments made by the transitional authorities, and in particular the establishment of an investigative committee, in order to hold the perpetrators accountable," the EU said. 

The bloc called on the authorities to also allow international investigators to probe the violence.

"Everything must be done to prevent any such crimes from happening again," it said.

The 27-nation bloc in addition welcomed an agreement to integrate the autonomous Kurdish administration that has governed much of the northeast for the past decade into the national government.

Syria's new authorities under interim President Ahmed Al Sharaa have sought to disband armed groups and establish government control over the entirety of the country.

"This agreement could pave the way for increased stability and a better future for many Syrians. We encourage the parties to work on implementation and we stand ready to support," the EU said.

The international community is closely following developments in Syria as it hopes the country will steer away from years of bloodshed after almost 14 years of civil war. 

The EU has suspended sanctions on key sectors of the Syrian economy in a bid to help the country's recovery.

But the bloc has warned it could reimpose the measures if the new authorities do not make good on promises for an inclusive transition. 

By Nina Larson

GENEVA - Palestinians who say they suffered brutal beatings and sexual abuse in Israeli detention and at the hands of Israeli settlers testified about their ordeals at the United Nations this week.

"I was humiliated and tortured," said Said Abdel Fattah, a 28-year-old nurse detained in November 2023 near Gaza City's Al Shifa hospital where he worked.

Ahead of the hearings Daniel Meron, Israel's ambassador to the UN in Geneva dismissed them as a waste of time, saying Israel investigated and prosecuted any allegations of wrongdoing by its forces.

Fattah gave his testimony from Gaza via video-link to a public hearing, speaking through an interpreter.

He described being stripped naked in the cold, suffering beatings, threats of rape and other abuse over the next two months as he was shuttled between overcrowded detention facilities. 

"I was like a punching bag," he said of one particularly harrowing interrogation he endured in January 2024.

The interrogator, he said, "kept hitting me on my genitals... I was bleeding everywhere, I was bleeding from my penis, I was bleeding from my anus".

"I felt like my soul [left] my body."

'Shocking' -

Fattah spoke Tuesday during the latest of a series of public hearings hosted by the UN's independent Commission of Inquiry (COI) on the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

This week's hearings, harshly criticised by Israel, are specifically focused on allegations of "sexual and reproductive violence" committed by Israeli security forces and settlers. 

"It's important," COI member Chris Sidoti, who hosted the meeting, told AFP. Victims of such abuse are "entitled to be heard", he said.

Experts and advocates who testified Tuesday spoke of a "systematic" trend of sexual violence against Palestinians in detention, but also at checkpoints and other settings since Hamas's October 7, 2023 attacks inside Israel sparked the war in Gaza.

Meron, for Israel, slammed attempts to equate allegations against individual Israelis with Hamas's "shocking... sexual violence towards Israeli hostages, towards victims on October 7".

Any such comparison was "reprehensible", he told reporters on Monday.

He insisted the hearings were "wasting time", since Israel as "a country with law and order" would investigate and prosecute any wrongdoings.

But Palestinian lawyer Sahar Francis decried a glaring lack of accountability, alleging that abuse had become "a widespread policy".

All those arrested from Gaza were strip-searched, she said, with the soldiers in some cases "pushing the sticks" into the prisoner's anus.

Sexual abuse happened "in a very massive way" especially in the first months of the war, she said.

"I think you can say that most of those who were arrested in these months were subjected to such practice." 

'Just shoot me' 

The allegations of abuse are not limited to detention centres.

Mohamed Matar, a West Bank resident, said he suffered hours of torture at the hands of security agents and settlers, even as Israeli police refused to intervene.

Just days after the October 7 attack, he and other Palestinian activists went to help protect a Bedouin community facing settler attacks.

As they were leaving the compound, they were chased and caught by a group of settlers, who he said were joined by members of Israel's Shabak security agency.

He and two other men were blindfolded, stripped to their underwear and, had their hands tied before being taken into a nearby stable.

The leader stood "on my head and ordered me to eat ... the faeces of the sheep", said Matar. 

With dozens of settlers around, the man urinated on the three, and beat them so badly during the nearly 12 hours of abuse that Matar said he cried: "just shoot me in the head".

The man, he said, jumped on his back and repeatedly "tried to introduce a stick into my anus".

Blinking back tears, Matar showed Sidoti a photograph taken by the settlers showing the three blindfolded men lying in the dirt in their underwear. 

Other pictures taken after the ordeal showed him with massive bruises all over his body.

Speaking to journalists after his testimony, he said he had spent months "in a state of psychological shock".

"I didn't think there were people on Earth with such a level of ugliness, sadism and cruelty." 

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Israel said Tuesday it killed a senior Hizbollah militant responsible for drones and missiles, even as it freed Lebanese prisoners as a "goodwill" gesture to the country's new president.

Despite a ceasefire between Israel and Hizbollah, Israel has continued to carry out air strikes in Lebanon, claiming they are necessary to prevent the Iran-backed militant group from rearming or re-establishing a presence along its northern border.

"Earlier today, the IAF (air force) conducted a precise intelligence-based strike in the area of Nabatieh in southern Lebanon, eliminating Hassan Abbas Ezzedine, the head of Hizbollah's aerial array in the Bader regional unit," the military said in a statement.

It said it carried out a second strike on Tuesday in the Froun area, targeting several militants.

"Several terrorists were identified in a site used by Hizbollah in the area of Froun in southern Lebanon," the military said. "An IAF aircraft struck the suspects."

Lebanon's official National News Agency reported that two people were killed in the Israeli strikes.

"An enemy Israeli drone strike targeting a car on the Deir El-Zahrani road resulted in one fatality," the news agency said, citing the health ministry.

It later reported that a second person was killed in an Israeli air strike on a vehicle in the Froun area.

Although a truce reached on November 27 largely ended more than a year of hostilities - including two months of full-scale war in which Israeli ground troops crossed the border - Israel has continued to launch periodic strikes in Lebanese territory.

Israel was initially expected to withdraw from Lebanon by February 18, after missing a January deadline, but it has maintained a presence in five strategic locations.

The ceasefire also required Hizbollah to pull back north of the Litani River, about 30 kilometres from the border, and to dismantle any remaining military infrastructure in southern Lebanon.

Border disputes 

In a separate development on Tuesday, Israel announced it had agreed to release five Lebanese citizens detained during its war with Hizbollah.

"In coordination with the United States and as a gesture to Lebanon's new president, Israel has agreed to release five Lebanese detainees," a statement from prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said. 

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun's office said four of the prisoners had been freed on Tuesday and the fifth would follow on Wednesday.

Their release followed a meeting earlier Tuesday in the Lebanese border town of Naqoura, attended by representatives of Israel, Lebanon and mediators France and the United States.

"During the meeting, it was agreed to establish three joint working groups aimed at stabilising the region," the prime minister's statement said. 

"These groups will focus on the five points controlled by Israel in southern Lebanon, discussions on the Blue Line and remaining disputed areas, and the issue of Lebanese detainees held by Israel."

The Blue Line is the UN-patrolled demarcation line that has served as de facto border since 2000.

In an interview with Lebanese news channel Al Jadeed, US Deputy Special Envoy for the Middle East Morgan Ortagus emphasised Washington's efforts to resolve the border issue.

"We want to get a political resolution, finally, to the border disputes," Ortagus said.

"When it comes to the border agreement, the land border agreement, there are 13 points -- I think that six are still problematic," she said.

Ortagus said Israel had "withdrawn from over 99 percent of the territory".

"I feel fairly confident that... we can have final resolution on the five points and ultimately on the remaining issues related to the Blue Line".

DAMASCUS — A fact-finding committee formed by Syria's new authorities to investigate a wave of deadly violence said on Tuesday the country was determined to "prevent unlawful revenge".

A wave of violence broke out last Thursday, mainly along the Mediterranean coast, the worst since former president Bashar Al Assad was ousted in December.

The UN Human Rights Office on Tuesday said it had documented "summary executions" that appeared "to have been carried out on a sectarian basis".

"In a number of extremely disturbing instances, entire families -- including women, children and individuals hors de combat -- were killed, with predominantly Alawite cities and villages targeted in particular," it said.

At a press conference in Damascus, fact-finding committee spokesman Yasser Al Farhan said, "The new Syria is determined to enshrine justice and the rule of law, protect the rights and freedoms of its citizens, prevent unlawful revenge and guarantee that there is no impunity."

Farhan said the committee was working on "gathering and reviewing evidence" related to the wave of violence.

He added the committee would "listen to the eyewitnesses" and establish mechanisms for people to contact the investigators, as well as gather and verify video evidence.

The findings will be submitted to the presidency and the judiciary, Farhan said.

 Seven arrests 

The presidency announced on Sunday the formation of the committee to "investigate the violations against civilians and identify those responsible for them".

It said it would present its findings within 30 days and that those found to be responsible for violations would be referred to the judiciary.

The violence began on Thursday, after the attempted arrest of a wanted suspect, with an attack by Assad loyalists against security spiralling into clashes.

Farhan said the committee would investigate events that occurred between Thursday and Saturday.

The authorities have announced the arrest of at least seven individuals since Monday accused of having committed violations against civilians, according to SANA.

UN rights commissioner Volker Turk has called for accountability for the deadly violence.

Human Rights Watch on Tuesday also called on Syria's new authorities to ensure accountability for the mass killings of hundreds of civilians in recent days in the coastal heartland of the Alawite minority.

GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories - For Gazan teacher Abdullah Mortaja, Israel's decision to cut off electricity to the war-battered territory was "a joke", having already lived with little power supply since war began more than 16 months ago.

The announcement Sunday by Israeli Energy Minister Eli Cohen followed a decision to block the entry of aid into the Gaza Strip in a bid to pressure Hamas to extend a fragile ceasefire on Israel's terms.

But for many in the Palestinian territory where Israel had imposed a "complete siege" at the start of the war in October 2023, living without electricity has become the norm.

"What electricity do they want to cut?" said Mortaja, 40.

"There is no electricity in Gaza".

Of the nearly dozen high-voltage power lines cut at the start of the war -- along with food and water supply -- one was reconnected by Israel in November to restart Gaza's main water desalination plant.

On Monday, employees at the facility in the central city of Deir el-Balah filled large tanks with water that had been treated before the cut-off, which brought the plant to a near-complete halt.

Around 600,000 people -- about a quarter of Gaza's population -- rely on the plant's supply of drinking water, according to UN figures.

Solar panels, which together with fuel-powered generators have become key sources of electricity in Gaza, allow only for extremely limited activity at the desalination plant, said a UN source.

Instead, many people are now left to rely on brackish well water or the occasional supply of potable water from international humanitarian aid groups, added the source involved in work in the Gaza Strip.

Power grid ravaged 

Announcing the electricity cut on the eve of a new round of ceasefire negotiations in Qatar, Cohen said Israel "will use all the tools at our disposal" to secure the release of hostages held by Gaza militants since Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack that sparked the war.

Hamas called Cohen's decision "cheap and unacceptable blackmail" as the sides fail to agree a path toward a permanent end to their war.

The first phase of the fragile Gaza truce began on January 19 and ended in early March, with no agreement yet on subsequent stages.

More than 15 months of intense Israeli bombardment and fighting before the truce began had left electricity pylons collapsed and mangled across Gaza.

One official from the Gaza Electricity Company, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, said Israeli attacks "destroyed 70 percent of the electricity distribution networks".

At night, the territory is plunged into almost total darkness.

In the relatively few buildings left standing, the odd window is illuminated by a small square of white LED light.

The war has displaced nearly all of Gaza's 2.4 million inhabitants and triggered widespread hunger, according to the UN, with hundreds of thousands living in tents as their homes were damaged or destroyed.

"Cutting electricity will only worsen our suffering," said Jihan Khalil, 35, who has taken shelter in a school building in Nuseirat refugee camp.

'Went back to 50 years ago' 

For 47-year-old Baha Al Helou, living conditions were as if "we went back to 50 years ago".

"We sleep without electricity, wash our clothes by hand, cook with wood, and there is no gas for cooking," he told AFP.

"Now our lives depend on wood, fire and candles."

From apartment blocks to hospitals, fuel-powered generators have been a common alternative for years in Gaza, where the electricity supply was precarious even before the war, in part due to a crippling Israeli-led blockade.

Israel's power supply to Gaza depended on payments from the Palestinian Authority -- based in the occupied West bank, a separate territory, and dominated by political rivals of Hamas.

The Palestinian Authority had previously withheld funds as a means of exerting pressure on Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007.

Carpenter Hani Ajour said he had little choice but to use a public generator in the street.

But that option is expensive, and he can only afford to plug in his machines for a few minutes a day.

Some Gazans rely on solar panels, but these are less efficient and sell for around $2,000, a fortune in the impoverished territory.

For the most destitute, street vendors offer to charge telephones on a multi-socket cable for a few Israeli shekels, the equivalent of several quarter dollars.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM - Israel's military said on Tuesday that its warplanes struck southern Syria overnight, targeting air defence systems and other military sites in the latest attack on the neighbouring country.

Syrian state media had said Israel hit the southern province of Daraa, with a war monitor reporting at least 17 strikes on positions of the former Syrian army, including an observation platform and tanks.

A statement from the Israeli military said its "fighter jets struck radars and detection assets used for constructing aerial intelligence assessments" as well as "command positions and military sites containing weapons and military equipment belonging to the Syrian regime".

Since the overthrow of Syrian president Bashar Al Assad in December, Israel has carried out hundreds of air strikes in Syria and deployed troops to a UN-patrolled buffer zone on the strategic Golan Heights.

The Israeli military statement said that the targets hit overnight "were struck in order to eliminate future threats".

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last month that southern Syria must be completely demilitarised, warning that his government would not accept the presence of the forces of the new Islamist-led government near its territory.

Even before Assad's fall, during Syria's civil war which broke out in 2011, Israel carried out hundreds of strikes in the neighbouring country, mainly on government forces and Iranian-linked targets.

DAMASCUS — The Syrian presidency announced on Monday an agreement with the head of the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) to integrate the institutions of the autonomous Kurdish administration in the northeast into the national government.

Syria's new authorities under interim President Ahmed Al Sharaa have sought to disband armed groups and establish government control over the entirety of the country since ousting long-time leader Bashar Al Assad in December after more than 13 years of civil war.

The new accord, which is expected to be implemented by the end of the year, comes after days of violence that has posed the most serious threat yet to the country's stability since Assad's fall.

The presidency published a statement on Monday signed by both parties laying out the agreement on "the integration of all the civilian and military institutions of the northeast of Syria within the administration of the Syrian state, including border posts, the airport, and the oil and gas fields".

State media released a photo of Sharaa shaking hands with SDF leader Mazloum Abdi following the signing of the agreement.

The statement said "the Kurdish community is an essential component of the Syrian state", which "guarantees its right to citizenship and all of its constitutional rights".

It also rejected "calls for division, hate speech and attempts to sow discord" between different segments of Syrian society.

The SDF did not immediately respond to a request for comment by AFP.

'Supporting the state' 

The SDF serves as the de facto army of the de facto autonomous Kurdish administration that controls large swathes of northern and eastern Syria, including most of the country's oil and gas fields, which may prove a crucial resource for the new authorities as they seek to rebuild the country.

The new agreement also references "supporting the Syrian state in its fight against Assad's remnants and all threats to [the country's] security and unity".

Marginalised and repressed 

Marginalised and repressed during decades of Assad family rule, the Kurds were deprived of the right to speak their language and celebrate their holidays and, in many cases, of Syrian nationality.

The SDF took advantage of the withdrawal of government forces during the civil war which broke out in 2011 to establish de facto autonomy in the north and northeast.

The US-backed SDF played a key role in the fight against the Daesh terror group, which was defeated in its last territorial stronghold in 2019.

Since Assad's overthrow, the Kurds have shown a degree of willingness to engage with the new authorities, but they were excluded from a recent national dialogue conference over their refusal to disarm.

The agreement comes nearly two weeks after a historic call by jailed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) founder Abdullah Ocalan for the militant group to lay down its weapons and disband.

The SDF maintains it is independent from the PKK, which has waged a decades-long insurgency against the Turkish government.

It is dominated, however, by the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG), which Ankara views as an offshoot of the PKK.

The Turkish government, which is close to Syria's new authorities, has designated the PKK a terrorist organisation, as have the United States and the European Union.

The Turkish army, which has troops deployed in northern Syria, regularly carries out strikes on areas controlled by Kurdish forces, and Turkish-backed groups have been attacking SDF-held areas of northern Syria since November.