Israeli authorities have re-arrested a prominent Palestinian lawmaker in an overnight raid over her leadership in a movement Israel considers a terrorist organisation, officials said Sunday. Khalida Jarrar was arrested in the raid in the Ramallah area in the occupied West Bank, Israel’s army said. The 54-year-old was released in June 2016 after 14 months … Read more
A court in Cairo has recommended the death penalty for 30 people convicted of involvement in the killing of Egypt’s top public prosecutor. Hisham Barakat was assassinated in a car bomb attack in June 2015. He was the most senior state official to be killed by militants in recent years. Mr Barakat had sent thousands … Read more
Palestinian militant factions on Saturday dismissed a claim by the Islamic State group that it was behind the fatal stabbing of an Israeli policewoman in Jerusalem saying the assailants came from their ranks. The Israeli security services also raised doubts about the veracity of the IS claim — its first for an attack in Jerusalem … Read more
Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas accused US President Donald Trump on Monday of smearing the name of Palestinian “resistance” to Israeli occupation during a speech on Islam. Addressing Muslim leaders in Riyadh on Sunday, Trump called for unity against “Islamic terror”, specifically naming Hamas and the Islamic State group. Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum said Trump’s remarks … Read more
A military court in Gaza on Monday held the first hearing of three men accused of assassinating a Hamas military leader, naming the chief suspect for the first time. Hamas has accused Palestinian “collaborators” of working with Israel to commit the murder. “In Gaza today, the first hearings were held for three (men) accused of … Read more
Hamas has arrested the suspected murderer of one of its key military commanders in Gaza, the Palestinian Islamist movement’s leader said Thursday, while maintaining Israel was behind the March assassination. “We announce that the killer and criminal that carried out the orders of the officers of the Zionist security services is in the hands of … Read more
The radical Palestinian group Islamic Jihad has rejected Hamas’s new policy of easing its stand on Israel and accepting the establishment of a Palestinian state limited to the 1967 borders. “As partners with our Hamas brothers in the struggle for liberation, we feel concern over the document” which the main Islamist movement that rules Gaza … Read more
Gaza’s Hamas rulers hanged three men they accused of collaborating with Israel Thursday following calls for revenge for the killing of one of their commanders last month, an AFP journalist reported. Hamas says that the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad and its “collaborators” killed Mazen Faqha in the Palestinian territory on March 24, but has offered … Read more
Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman said Sunday Israel did not seek “adventures” in Gaza after Hamas accused it of assassinating an official, and suggested the group itself could have killed him. Hamas, which runs the Gaza Strip, has blamed Israeli intelligence agency Mossad and its “collaborators” for the March 24 killing of Mazen Faqha in the … Read more
Thousands of Hamas supporters on Saturday called for “revenge” during the Gaza funeral of an official from the Palestinian Islamist movement gunned down the previous day. “Revenge, revenge!” called participants at the procession for Mazen Faqha, 38, who was shot dead by unknown gunmen in the Gaza Strip on Friday. Hamas-nominated attorney general Ismail Jaber … Read more
Facebook has shut down the page of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas’s party Fatah, apparently over a picture of late leader Yasser Arafat with a weapon, the movement said on Monday. “We received a message that our page violated Facebook’s regulations,” Munir al-Jaghub, a media officer with Fatah and one of the page’s administrators, told AFP. … Read more
At least two rockets fired from Egypt’s Sinai peninsula on Monday hit southern Israel, causing no damage, the army said, the second such incident this month. “Earlier today, projectiles launched from the Sinai Peninsula hit an open area in the Eshkol Regional Council,” the army said in a statement. “No injuries have been reported. Forces … Read more
Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas elected a hardline member of its armed wing as its new Gaza head Monday, Hamas officials said. “Yahya Sinwar was elected to head the Hamas political office in the Gaza Strip”, the officials said. He will succeed Ismail Haniya, who is seen by many observers as the most likely successor to … Read more
Police in Israel have arrested two people accused of inciting violence against judges who convicted a young soldier of manslaughter for shooting dead a wounded Palestinian attacker. The military court’s decision to convict Sgt Elor Azaria on Wednesday has sharply divided opinion, with some threatening the judges online. The three judges who ruled on the … Read more