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US has Gaza peace plan and hopes for breakthrough soon, says envoy

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The United States shared a 21-point Middle East peace plan at this week’s U.N. meetings and is hopeful for a breakthrough on Gaza in the coming days, its envoy to the region said on Wednesday.

U.S. President Donald Trump presented proposals to leaders from several Muslim-majority countries – including Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Egypt – during a meeting held on the sidelines of the annual General Assembly on Monday, U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff said, Reuters reported.

“I think it addresses Israeli concerns and, as well, the concerns of all the neighbors in the region,” he said on Wednesday.

“We’re hopeful, and I might say even confident that in the coming days we’ll be able to announce some sort of breakthrough,” he added.

Israel has drawn global condemnation over its war in Gaza, which is nearing the two-year mark with no ceasefire in sight. The conflict has caused major destruction and killed more than 65,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities.

A global hunger monitor says part of the territory is suffering from famine.

The current war began when Hamas stormed into Israel on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages, according to Israeli tallies. About 48 hostages, 20 of whom are believed to be alive, are still being held.

The White House remains a staunch ally of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is scheduled to address the General Assembly in New York on Friday during a U.S. trip that also includes a meeting with Trump.

Both leaders have condemned the recognition of a Palestinian state by Western powers such as France and Britain over the last few days.

Israel has meanwhile pressed on with its military campaign on Gaza City, despite repeated calls for it to pull back.

Hamas’ armed wing told the Israeli military that an expansion of its operation in Gaza City would put Israeli hostages at risk, while Israel’s military called on Gazan residents to “rise up and break away from Hamas” to end the war.

In parallel to Trump’s plan, several European powers and Arab states have also been working on an initiative for what happens after the war in Gaza ends, including creating a stabilization force made up of European and Muslim countries.

They met on Tuesday after Trump had held his meeting.

European diplomats hope that their work and a declaration endorsed by the General Assembly to support the deployment of a temporary international stabilization mission can converge with U.S. plans.

MANY REMAIN IN GAZA CITY AMID SECURITY CONCERNS

But as diplomatic efforts continue to falter, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have left Gaza City in the northern part of the territory, while others have hesitated because of security risks and widespread hunger.

“We moved to the western area near the beach, but many families didn’t have the time. Tanks took them by surprise,” said Thaer, a 35-year-old father of one from Tel Al-Hawa, a suburb of Gaza City.

Israeli forces began closing in on the city of more than a million in August, with Israel saying it aimed to destroy the last stronghold of Hamas militants.

Israeli airstrikes killed at least 50 people across Gaza on Wednesday, medics said, most of them in Gaza City when a strike hit a shelter for displaced families near a market. Two more died in a nearby house, they said.

The Israeli military said the strike had targeted two Hamas militants and that its forces tried to reduce harm to civilians.

Video obtained by Reuters showed people sifting through the rubble.

“We were sleeping in God’s care. There was nothing – they did not inform us, or not even give us a sign. It was a surprise,” said Sami Hajjaj. “There are children and women, around 200 people maybe, six to seven families — this square is full of families.”

In Tel Al-Hawa, tanks entered populated areas trapping people in their homes, while more tanks were stationed close to Al-Quds Hospital, witnesses said.

The Palestinian Red Crescent Society said an oxygen station had been damaged.

Tanks have also advanced closer to Gaza’s largest hospital, Al Shifa, witnesses and Hamas media said. The Israeli military said the group’s militants had opened fire from within the hospital compound, which Hamas denied.

“We fear these lies may be a prelude to another raid on the hospital,” said Ismail Al-Thawabta, the director of the Hamas-run Gaza government media office, in reference to several previous raids by Israeli forces.

Israel’s military released grainy aerial footage, which appeared to show gunfire coming from two windows. The military did not immediately respond to Reuters queries about how it established it was Hamas militants who had opened fire and at whom.

A Hamas security official said “criminal gangs” had opened fire at the hospital from outside the complex.

Reuters was unable to independently verify the conflicting accounts.

Separately, Israeli troops killed one Palestinian in a raid in Anza village outside Jenin and an Israeli settler shot another in al-Mughayyir village northeast of Ramallah over the past 24 hours, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.

Violence in the West Bank has intensified during the Gaza war, as Israel has stepped up raids across the territory. The Israeli military had no immediate comment on the incidents.

In southern Gaza, at least 13 people were killed in Nuseirat and near Rafah, medics said. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military, which says its attacks are aimed at ending Hamas rule of the enclave.

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Suspected suicide bombing at police station kills at least 14 in Pakistan, officials say

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At least 14 people were killed in a suspected suicide bombing outside ​a police station in northwestern Pakistan on ‌Sunday, a rescue group and a regional police official said, as the country battles widening insurgencies.

The explosion took place ​in the Kabal area of Swat, a district ​in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Reuters reported.

A pro-police rally of ⁠local residents was taking place in the same ​area on Sunday, but it was not immediately ​clear whether the rally was the intended target.

Fida Hussain, a regional police official, said the victims included five police officers and ​eight civilians. The 14th person was believed to ​be the suicide bomber, he told Reuters.

At least 18 people ‌were ⁠wounded, according to a police statement. It said an operation had been launched to arrest anyone who may have assisted the attack.

Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif ​in a statement ​expressed “deep grief ⁠and sorrow over the suicide blast”.

 

 

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Bomb carried by woman kills three, injures 21 near Moscow restaurant, authorities say

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A homemade bomb carried by a woman killed three people and injured at least 21 in an explosion near an upscale restaurant in central Moscow ​on Saturday evening, the authorities said.

The explosion occurred just before 2000 ​local time close to an Italian restaurant located in one ⁠of Moscow’s seven Stalin-era skyscrapers at Kudrinkskaya Square, the police said, Reuters reported.

Russia’s Anti-Terrorism Committee said that ​an unidentified woman had tried to get into the restaurant but was stopped by ​a security guard, the state RIA news agency reported.

It said the woman, the security guard and a customer at the Balzi Rossi Italian restaurant had been killed in the ​blast that followed.

Those injured received wounds of varying seriousness, the police said.

Russia’s state ​RIA news agency released video of heavily armed law enforcement officers at the scene, which ‌had ⁠been closed off to the public.

The authorities did not name those killed or injured nor did they say who they thought might have been responsible.

More than four years into a full-scale war with Ukraine, Russia’s FSB security service said earlier ​this year that authorities would step ​up protection for ⁠high-ranking military officials after a series of assassinations and attempted killings it blamed on Kyiv.

The Kommersant daily newspaper cited its ​own sources as saying that the bomb had been intended ​to maim ⁠and kill guests who were enjoying themselves on the restaurant’s summer terrace outside.

It suggested that the bomb had been set off by someone else remotely and ⁠that the ​woman carrying it may not have known ​that it was an explosive device.

The restaurant’s website said the venue had been closed on Saturday for ​a private event.

 

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Trump says he will hold off on fresh Iran attack in hope of quick deal

The Saudi crown prince spoke to Trump, a White House official told Reuters, but did not provide details.

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U.S. President Donald Trump said ​late on Saturday he would hold off on a fresh attack on Iran as long as a deal could be reached quickly to halt Iran’s nuclear ‌ambitions and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, Reuters reported.

Iran and “other Middle Eastern Countries” asked for a time to complete a deal that would lead to “the Immediate, Complete and Total” reopening of the Strait and “an end to Iran’s nuclear threat,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. “Based on this request, I have agreed, for the future benefit of the WORLD and, likewise, the survival of a successful and prosperous Iran, to cancel the attack, subject ​to being able to rapidly make a DEAL.”

Israel “joins me in this commitment,” Trump wrote. Israel did not immediately make a public statement on the issue.

Iran warned the U.S. this ​weekend against any “adventurous action” and said it would retaliate decisively if American forces followed through on Trump’s threats of fresh attacks on Iranian targets.

Iranian ⁠Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi’s comments in separate phone calls on Saturday with senior Turkish, Pakistani and Saudi officials came just hours after Kuwait’s army said it destroyed hostile drones launched by ​Iran against several vital facilities.

Speaking to Pakistan’s Army Chief Field Marshal Asim Munir and Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, Araqchi said Iran would respond decisively to any “aggression” and discussed the consequences ​of “destabilizing actions” by the U.S., as well as prospects for heightened regional insecurity, according to Araqchi’s Telegram account.

Araqchi later told Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan that any attacks by the U.S. and Israel or participation by regional countries in such actions would be met with a “proportionate response.” Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman spoke to Trump on Saturday and “expressed concern and asked for clarity” about U.S. plans for Iran, ​a U.S. official told Axios.

The Saudi crown prince spoke to Trump, a White House official told Reuters, but did not provide details.

Nournews, a media outlet affiliated with Iran’s top security body, ​said on Saturday that U.S. attacks on Iranian energy infrastructure would prompt Iranian strikes on oil fields in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, as well as the gas fields of Qatar and ‌Israel, saying, “all ⁠will be burned to ashes.”

At a cabinet meeting on Friday at the Camp David retreat, Trump said he believed U.S. negotiators, including his son-in-law Jared Kushner, special envoy Steve Witkoff and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, could still reach a deal with Iran, read the report.

But Trump also said he was losing faith in the Iranians, saying, “They break their word so often” — a claim Tehran has frequently leveled at Washington — and said he would be “hitting them.”

Oil prices have stayed high since U.S. and Israeli forces started the war with strikes on Iran on February 28. Trump has ​argued that his stated goal of keeping ​Iran from gaining nuclear weapons justifies higher fuel ⁠costs in the near term, but the economic pain has put political pressure on him to find a way to end the war.

Benchmark Brent crude futures rose 24% in July, and analysts polled by Reuters expect prices to rise further this year.

The risk of Iranian attacks has deterred ​most shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, an important conduit for global energy supplies, since the start of the conflict, sending shockwaves through ​the world economy.

A government ⁠facility in northern Kuwait and civilian property belonging to a company on Bubiyan Island were hit on Saturday, with falling shrapnel causing material damage but no casualties, the Kuwaiti army said.

Adding to the energy industry’s concerns, Iran’s Houthi allies in Yemen recently began threatening the Bab el-Mandeb, the strait at the other end of the Red Sea from the Suez Canal, another export route for Saudi ⁠crude.

The United Kingdom ​Maritime Trade Operations said on Saturday it had received reports of two maritime incidents off Oman, including one ​in which a tanker was struck by an unknown projectile that damaged the engine room. In the other incident, the master of a tanker reported seeing a large splash and an explosion close to the vessel, though no ​damage was reported.

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