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  • Israeli strikes kill 46 people in the Gaza Strip and 33 in Lebanon, medics say

    WAFAA SHURAFA and SAMY MAGDY|Nov 13, 2024

    DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli airstrikes killed at least 46 people in the Gaza Strip in the past day, including 11 at a makeshift cafeteria in an Israeli-declared humanitarian zone, medics said. In Lebanon, warplanes struck Beirut's southern suburbs and killed 33 people elsewhere in the country on Tuesday. The latest bombardment came as the United States said it would not reduce its military support for Israel after a deadline passed for allowing more humanitarian aid into Gaza. The State Department cited some progress, even as i...

  • Trump builds out national security team with picks of Hegseth for Pentagon, Noem for DHS

    ZEKE MILLER and MICHELLE L. PRICE|Nov 13, 2024

    WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump moved to build out his national security team Tuesday, announcing he is nominating Fox News host and Army veteran Pete Hegseth to serve as his defense secretary and former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe to lead the Central Intelligence Agency. In a flurry of announcements, Trump said he had chosen former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee as ambassador to Israel and his longtime friend Steven Witkoff to be a special envoy to the Middle East. Trump also said he would n...

  • North Korea ratifies major defense treaty with Russia

    HYUNG-JIN KIM|Nov 13, 2024

    SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea ratified a major defense treaty with Russia stipulating mutual military aid, the North's state media reported Tuesday, as the U.S., South Korea and Ukraine say North Korea has sent thousands of troops to Russia to support its war against Ukraine. Russia had completed the ratification of the treaty last week after it was signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in June. It is considered both countries' biggest defense deal since the end of the Cold War. The C...

  • Russia blasts Ukraine with more aerial attacks as part of an intensified campaign

    ILLIA NOVIKOV|Nov 8, 2024

    KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian missiles, bombs and drones battered three regions of Ukraine in targeted nighttime attacks, officials said Friday, as Russia mounts an intensified aerial campaign that Ukrainian officials say they need more Western help to counter — even as doubts deepen over what Kyiv can expect from a new U.S. administration. Since the war began almost three years ago following Russia's full-scale invasion of its neighbor, the Russian military has repeatedly used its superior air power to blast civilian targets across Ukr...

  • Qatar suspends its mediation efforts on Gaza and the Hamas office there may have to leave

    WAFAA SHURAFA and SAMY MAGDY|Nov 8, 2024

    DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Qatar has suspended its key mediation efforts between Hamas and Israel, it said Saturday, after growing frustration with the lack of progress on a cease-fire deal for Gaza. It wasn't immediately clear whether the remaining Hamas leadership hosted by Qatar must leave, or where it would go. Hamas has good relations with Iran and Turkey, and some of its leaders are now in Lebanon. However, Qatar is highly likely to return to mediation efforts if both sides show "serious political willingness" to reach a deal, accor...

  • Hungry Palestinians in north Gaza search for food, sealed off from aid for a month by Israeli siege

    SAMY MAGDY and JULIA FRANKEL|Nov 8, 2024

    JERUSALEM (AP) — With virtually no food allowed into the northernmost part of Gaza for the past month, tens of thousands of Palestinians under Israeli siege are rationing their last lentils and flour to survive. As bombardment pounds around them, some say they risk their lives by venturing out in search of cans of food in the rubble of destroyed homes. Thousands have staggered out of the area, hungry and thin, into Gaza City, where they find the situation little better. One hospital reports seeing thousands of children suffering from malnutriti...

  • Rocket fire from Lebanon kills 7 in Israel as US officials try to push for cease-fires

    MELANIE LIDMAN and JULIA FRANKEL|Nov 1, 2024

    TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Rocket barrages from Lebanon into northern Israel killed four foreign workers and three Israelis on Thursday, Israeli medics said, the deadliest cross-border strikes in Israel since it invaded Lebanon. Israel kept up airstrikes it says targeted Hezbollah militants across Lebanon, where health authorities on Thursday reported 24 people killed. U.S. diplomats were in the region pushing for cease-fires in both Lebanon and Gaza, hoping to wind down the wars in the Middle East as the Biden administration enters its final mont...

  • Israel pummels Lebanon and Gaza, killing dozens in fresh waves of airstrikes

    SALLY ABOU ALJOUD and WAFAA SHURAFA|Nov 1, 2024

    BEIRUT (AP) — Israel launched dozens of intense airstrikes across Lebanon's northeastern farming villages on Friday, killing at least 52 people and wounding scores more, the Lebanese Health Ministry reported. In central Gaza, Palestinians recovered the bodies of 25 people killed in a barrage of Israeli aerial attacks that began Thursday, hospital officials said. The latest violence comes against the backdrop of the Biden administration's renewed diplomatic push, days before the U.S. election, to reach temporary cease-fire deals. Israel has s...

  • Israel investigates leaks that appear to have bolstered Netanyahu as Gaza truce talks stalled

    TIA GOLDENBERG|Nov 1, 2024

    TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — An Israeli court on Sunday loosened a gag order on a case investigating leaks of classified information suspected to involve one of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's media advisers. Critics say the leaks were aimed at giving Netanyahu political cover as Gaza cease-fire talks ground to a halt. Netanyahu has denied any wrongdoing, downplaying the affair and publicly calling for the gag order to be lifted. Netanyahu has said the person in question "never participated in security discussions, was not exposed to or r...

  • Israel says it carried out ground raid into Syria, seizing a Syrian citizen connected to Iran

    MELANIE LIDMAN and SAMY MAGDY|Nov 1, 2024

    JERUSALEM (AP) — The Israeli military said Sunday it has carried out a ground raid into Syria, seizing a Syrian citizen involved in Iranian networks. It was the first time in the current war that Israel announced its troops operated in Syrian territory. Israel has carried out airstrikes in Syria multiple times over the past year, targeting members of Lebanon's Hezbollah and officials from Iran, the close ally of both Hezbollah and Syria. But it has not previously made public any ground forays into Syria. The Israeli military said the seizure w...

  • Israel must step in if it bans the UN agency that is a lifeline for Gaza, UN says

    EDITH M. LEDERER and JAMEY KEATEN|Oct 30, 2024

    UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United Nations stressed Tuesday that if Israel puts in place new laws cutting ties with the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, the Israeli government will have to meet their needs under international law. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres says there is no other U.N. alternative to the agency, known as UNRWA. It has been a lifeline during the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, and the Israeli legislation "will have a devastating impact on the humanitarian situation" in the Palestinian territories, U.N. spokesman Stephane D...

  • Israeli strikes in northern Gaza kill at least 88, officials say

    WAFAA SHURAFA and SAMY MAGDY|Oct 30, 2024

    DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Two Israeli airstrikes in the northern Gaza Strip on Tuesday killed at least 88 people, including dozens of women and children, health officials said, and the director of a hospital said life-threatening injuries were going untreated because a weekend raid by Israeli forces led to the detention of dozens of medics. Israel has escalated airstrikes and waged a bigger ground operation in northern Gaza in recent weeks, saying it is focused on rooting out Hamas militants who have regrouped after more than a year o...

  • Putin launches drills of Russia's nuclear forces simulating retaliatory strikes

    Oct 30, 2024

    MOSCOW (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday launched a massive exercise of the country's nuclear forces featuring missile launches in a simulation of a retaliatory strike, as he continued to flex the country's nuclear muscle amid spiraling tensions with the West over Ukraine. Speaking in a video call with military leaders, Putin said that the drills will simulate top officials' action in using nuclear weapons and include launches of nuclear-capable ballistic and cruise missiles. Defense Minister Andrei Belousov reported that t...

  • North Korean troops in Russian uniforms are heading toward Ukraine, US says

    TARA COPP and LOLITA C. BALDOR|Oct 30, 2024

    WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Wednesday that North Korean troops wearing Russian uniforms and carrying Russian equipment are moving to the Kursk region near Ukraine, in what he called a dangerous and destabilizing development. Austin was speaking at a press conference in Washington with South Korean Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun, as concerns grow about Pyongyang's deployment of as many as 11,000 troops to Russia. The U.S. and South Korea say some of the North Korean troops are heading to Russia's Kursk region on the bor...

  • A new push to wind down the Middle East wars faces familiar challenges

    BASSEM MROUE and JULIA FRANKEL|Oct 30, 2024

    BEIRUT (AP) — The United States and other mediators are ramping up efforts to halt the wars in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, circulating new proposals to wind down the regional conflict during the Biden administration's final months. Negotiations on both fronts have been stalled for months and none of the warring parties have shown any sign of backing down from their demands. Senior White House officials Brett McGurk and Amos Hochstein are scheduled to visit Israel on Thursday for talks on possible cease-fires in both Lebanon and Gaza, and the re...

  • Israeli strike on Gaza shelter kills 17 as Blinken says cease-fire talks will resume

    WAFAA SHURAFA and FARNOUSH AMIRI|Oct 25, 2024

    DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — An Israeli strike on a school where displaced people were sheltering in the central Gaza Strip killed at least 17 people on Thursday, nearly all women and children, Palestinian medical officials said. The strike came as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Israel had accomplished its objective of "effectively dismantling" Hamas, and that negotiations over a cease-fire and the release of dozens of Israeli hostages would resume "in the coming days." Another 42 people were wounded in the strike in the b...

  • Israel launches strikes on military targets in Iran, escalating Mideast wars

    JON GAMBRELL|Oct 25, 2024

    DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Israel launched airstrikes early Saturday on what it described as military targets in Iran in retaliation for a ballistic missile assault Oct. 1, officials said. There was no immediate information on damage in the Islamic Republic. The attack, threatened for weeks by Israel, comes as the Middle East sits on the precipice of a regional war more than a year after an initial attack by the militant group Hamas on Israel. In the time since, Israel has launched a devastating ground offensive in the Gaza Strip and an...

  • Israel's first open attack on Iran targets missile sites and apparently spares oil and nuclear ones

    JON GAMBRELL and ADAM SCHRECK|Oct 25, 2024

    TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Israel attacked military targets in Iran with pre-dawn airstrikes Saturday in retaliation for the barrage of ballistic missiles the Islamic Republic fired on Israel earlier this month. It was the first time Israel's military has openly attacked Iran. The Israeli military said its aircraft targeted facilities that Iran used to make the missiles fired at Israel as well as surface-to-air missile sites. Crucially, there was no indication that Iran's oil or nuclear sites were struck. Iran insisted the strikes caused only "...

  • US approves $2 billion in arms sales to Taiwan including advanced missile defense system

    Oct 25, 2024

    TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — The United States has approved $2 billion in arms sales to Taiwan, including the first-time delivery to the self-ruled island of an advanced surface-to-air missile defense system, in a move sure to anger China. Taiwan's presidential office on Saturday thanked Washington for greenlighting the potential arms sales. Under the island's new president, Lai Ching-te, Taiwan has been stepping up defense measures as China increased its military threats against the territory it claims as its own. Beijing last week held war games e...

  • Israel says it killed a Hezbollah official expected to be the group's next leader

    SARAH EL DEEB and FARNOUSH AMIRI|Oct 23, 2024

    BEIRUT (AP) — Israel said Tuesday that one of its airstrikes outside Beirut earlier this month killed a Hezbollah official widely expected to replace the militant group's longtime leader, who was killed by an Israeli airstrike last month. There was no immediate confirmation from Hezbollah about the fate of Hashem Safieddine, a powerful cleric who was expected to succeed Hassan Nasrallah, one of the group's founders. Safieddine was killed in early October in a strike that also killed 25 other Hezbollah leaders, according to Israel, whose a...

  • South Korea warns it can send arms to Ukraine after reports of North's troops in Russia

    HYUNG-JIN KIM|Oct 23, 2024

    SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea warned Tuesday it could consider supplying weapons to Ukraine in response to North Korea allegedly dispatching troops to Russia, as both North Korea and Russia denied the movements. NATO's secretary general said that would mark a "significant escalation." South Korea's statement was apparently meant to pressure Russia against bringing in North Korean troops for its war against Ukraine. South Korean officials worry that Russia may reward North Korea by giving it sophisticated weapons technologies that can bo...

  • Israeli strikes pound Lebanese coastal city after residents evacuate

    MOHAMMED ZAATARI and KAREEM CHEHAYEB|Oct 23, 2024

    TYRE, Lebanon (AP) — Israeli jets struck multiple buildings in Lebanon's southern coastal city of Tyre on Wednesday, sending up large clouds of black smoke, while Hezbollah confirmed that a top official widely expected to be the militant group's next leader had been killed in an Israeli strike. The state-run National News Agency reported that an Israeli strike on the nearby town of Maarakeh killed three people. There were no reports of casualties in Tyre, where the Israeli military had issued evacuation warnings prior to the strikes. H...

  • Israel says it has killed Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in Gaza

    JOSEF FEDERMAN and MELANIE LIDMAN|Oct 18, 2024

    JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli forces in Gaza killed Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, a chief architect of last year's attack on Israel that sparked the war, the military said Thursday. Troops appeared to have run across him unknowingly in a battle, only to discover afterwards that a body in the rubble was Israel's most-wanted man. Israeli leaders celebrated his killing as a settling of scores just over a year after Hamas-led militants killed some 1,200 people in Israel and kidnapped 250 others in an attack that stunned the country. They also presented i...

  • Who was Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas leader Israel says it killed?

    BASSEM MROUE|Oct 18, 2024

    BEIRUT (AP) — Yahya Sinwar masterminded an attack on Israel that shocked the world, unleashing a still-widening catastrophe with no end in sight. In Gaza, no figure loomed larger in determining the war's trajectory than the 61-year-old Hamas leader. Obsessive, disciplined and dictatorial, he was a rarely seen veteran militant who learned Hebrew over years spent in Israeli prisons and who carefully studied his enemy. On Thursday, Israel said troops in Gaza had killed Sinwar. There was no immediate confirmation from Hamas of his death. The s...

  • What's next for Hamas after its leader Yahya Sinwar's death?

    ABBY SEWELL|Oct 18, 2024

    BEIRUT (AP) — The killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar by Israeli forces in Gaza this week leaves the Palestinian militant group considering new leadership for the second time in less than three months. Will Hamas now turn away from its hard-line wing or will it double down, and what will it mean for the group's future and for the revival of cease-fire and hostage exchange negotiations between Hamas and Israel? Sinwar replaced Hamas' previous leader, Ismail Haniyeh, after Haniyeh was killed in July in a blast in Iran that was widely blamed o...

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