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Israeli army kills Palestinian in Qalandiya incursion

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At least ten Palestinians injured by live fire in clashes with Israeli army in occupied West Bank refugee camp.

Clashes between Palestinian residents and Israeli forces broke out after soldiers entered the Qalandiya camp [File: Majdi Mohammed/AP]

Clashes between Palestinian residents and Israeli forces broke out after soldiers entered the Qalandiya camp [File: Majdi Mohammed/AP]

by Al Jazeera

Israeli forces have killed a Palestinian and injured several more by live ammunition during an incursion into a refugee camp in the occupied West Bank.

Eyad Omar Sajadiya, 22, was shot dead, while at least ten others were injured by live fire during Tuesday morning’s clashes with Israeli troops in the Qalandiya refugee camp, according to Palestinian medical sources.

The armed clashes broke out after an army jeep entered the camp – situated between occupied East Jerusalem and the central West Bank city of Ramallah – by mistake, an Israeli police spokesperson told the AFP news agency.

Palestinian protests against Israel’s occupation have increased and tensions have soared in the occupied territories and Israel since October, as anger gave way to violence.

A wave of violence in Israel and the Palestinian territories since October has killed 178 Palestinians as well as 28 Israelis, an American, a Sudanese and an Eritrean, according to an AFP toll.

Arrests

Before dawn on Monday morning, Israeli forces carried out raids in cities and towns across the West Bank, arresting at least 27 Palestinians.

Later in the day, Israeli troops arrested two Palestinians who allegedly carried out shooting attacks in the southern West Bank city of Hebron, a focal point during the recent unrest.

In a statement, the Israeli army said the two men – Nazar Badi, 23, and Akram Badi, 23 – both confessed to carrying out at least five shooting attacks targeting Israeli settlers in Hebron’s Old City between November and January, according to the Palestinian Ma’an News Agency.

Hebron is divided into three spheres of control – including full Palestinian Authority administration, joint administration between Israeli military forces and PA police, and full Israeli control.

Amid the 37,000 Palestinians that live there, thousands of soldiers are stationed in the “H2 area” of the city – under full Israeli military control – to protect the 600-strong Jewish settler population.

Dozens of Israeli military checkpoints severely restrict Palestinian movement into, out of and within Hebron.

Upwards of half-a-million Israelis live in more than 150 Jewish-only settlements across the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, according to the Israeli rights group B’Tselem.

Pakistan hangs Mumtaz Qadri for murder of Salman Taseer

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Mumtaz Qadri was executed for the 2011 killing of Punjab Governor Salman Taseer, who sought to reform blasphemy laws.

Pakistan hanged the convicted killer of a former governor shot dead in 2011 [Anjum Naveed/AP]

Pakistan hanged the convicted killer of a former governor shot dead in 2011 [Anjum Naveed/AP]

by Al Jazeera

Pakistan has hanged the assassin of a governor who sought to reform the country’s controversial blasphemy laws, officials and supporters said

Mumtaz Qadri – feted as a hero by many supporters – was executed at a prison in Rawalpindi.

“I can confirm that Qadri was hanged in Adialia jail early Monday morning,” police official Sajjid Gondal told the AFP news agency.

Qadri, a bodyguard of Salman Taseer, the governor of Punjab province, shot him dead in the capital, Islamabad, in 2011.

Dozens of rangers and police in riot gear as well as ambulances were stationed outside Qadri’s home in the city early on Monday.

During his trial, Qadri’s legal defence was that Taseer opposed Pakistan’s so-called blasphemy laws by supporting Christian woman Asia Bibi, who was charged with allegedly desecrating Islam’s holy book, the Quran.

Qadri was convicted and sentenced in late 2011. But he is viewed as a hero by many people who thought Taseer was a blasphemer.

Blasphemy is a highly controversial issue in Pakistan, and angry mobs have killed many people accused of insulting Islam in the Muslim-majority country. The law does not define blasphemy but stipulates that the penalty is death.

Since 1990, dozens of people have been extrajudicially killed as a result of blasphemy cases.

The main road between Rawalpindi and the capital Islamabad was blocked by protesters within hours of the hanging.

“At this time, the sentiments of all Muslims have been injured, and our feelings have been badly hurt. For any Muslim believer – no matter what school of thought he belongs to – Ghazi Mumtaz Qadri is a hero of Islam,” said Tahir Iqbal Chistie, president of Sunni Tehreek, Rawalpindi Chapter, during the protest.

“He sent to hell a person who showed disrespect for the holy Prophet. What he did was according to the orders of the Quran and the collected reports of what the Prophet Muhammad said and did during his lifetime,” he added.

Police later dispersed the demonstrators and closed off the road to prevent more protests.

Qadri’s attorney, Ghulam Mustafa Chaudhry, predicted larger demonstrations coinciding with Qadri’s funeral, which his legal group said would be held on Tuesday.

Some lawyers showered Qadri with rose petals when he first arrived in court days after the killing. The judge who first convicted him was forced to flee the country after death threats.

Thousands may have starved to death in Syria: UN

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As UN prepares to roll out aid in besieged areas, official says “thousands” cut off may have already starved to death.

Residents work on fixing a house in the town of Darat Izza, province of Aleppo on Sunday [Reuters]

Residents work on fixing a house in the town of Darat Izza, province of Aleppo on Sunday [Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

The United Nations human rights chief warned on Monday that thousands of people may have died of starvation during sieges affecting nearly half a million people in war-torn Syria.

The comments by Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein came as the first major ceasefire in the five-year conflict entered its third day, and as the UN prepared to deploy trucks loaded with humanitarian aid into the country during the lull in fighting.

“The deliberate starvation of people is unequivocally forbidden as a weapon of warfare. By extension, so are sieges,” said Hussein.

He added: “Thousands of people may have starved to death.”

Al Jazeera’s Jamal Elshayyal, reporting from the Turkish border town of Gaziantep, noted that US Secretary of State John Kerry had accused the Syrian government of using food as “a weapon of war”.

“This war in recent months hasn’t just been fought with weapons – it has also been fought through the use of food,” he said. “The guns here haven’t gone totally silent, so it’s still dangerous for aid workers.”

The UN and its partner organisations were planning to start delivering aid to Syrians in several besieged areas previously cut off by the violence.

A UN spokesman told Al Jazeera that trucks bound for Mouadamiya in the southern outskirts of Damascus were loaded and were planning to move shortly.

Aid deliveries were also planned to arrive in the towns of Zabadani, Kefraya, Fouaa and Madaya by Wednesday.

The deliveries are part of humanitarian aid planned for 1.7 million people in hard-to-reach areas in the first quarter of 2016, Yacoub El Hillo, UN Resident Coordinator in Damascus, said in a statement on Sunday.

The UN estimates there are almost 500,000 people living under siege of a total of 4.6 million who are hard to reach with aid.

“It is the best opportunity that the Syrian people have had over the last five years for lasting peace and stability,” El Hillo said.

“But we all know that without a meaningful political process and a political solution, both cessation of hostilities and entry of humanitarian assistance will not be enough to end the crisis in Syria.”

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and US Secretary of State John Kerry spoke on the phone on Sunday at the initiative of Moscow on the progress of the ceasefire, Russia’s foreign ministry reported on Monday.

Syria’s main opposition grouping, the High Negotiations Committee (HNC), on Sunday described the ceasefire as “positive”, but lodged a formal complaint with the UN and foreign governments about breaches on the first day.

A HNC letter to Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, accused Bashar al-Assad’s government and its allies of committing “24 violations with artillery shelling and five ground operations … in 26 areas held by the moderate opposition”.

The letter, signed by HNC head Riad Hijab, also criticised Russia for conducting “26 air strikes on areas falling within the ceasefire”.

It said continued breaches of the ceasefire would make peace talks unattainable.

Syria’s ally Russia has said it has only targeted areas under the control of  al-Nusra Front, which is linked to al-Qaeda, and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). Nusra and ISIL are excluded from the terms of the international pact.

Iran elections: Crucial polls a test for Rouhani

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After nuclear deal and the lifting of sanctions, voting will gauge reaction to political policies of Iran’s moderates.

iran_elections

by Al Jazeera

Iranians cast their ballots to elect new members of parliament and a council of clerics in elections seen as a referendum on President Hassan Rouhani’s rule.

An estimated 50 million people are eligible to vote on a pre-selected list of candidates during the polls on Friday.

The elections take place just a month after years of economic sanctions against the country were lifted.

Surveys indicated a higher turnout than at the previous parliamentary polls four years ago, but lower than the presidential contest that elected Rouhani in 2013.

Voting started at 8am local time (04:30 GMT).

Rouhani said he had reports of a high turnout, the official IRNA news agency reported.

“Election is a symbol of the political independence of a country. By voting people decide the future of their country,” Rouhani was quoted as saying after casting his vote.

The parliament, also known as the Majlis, has 290 members who are responsible for passing legislation in the country, approving the annual budget and international agreements, including the recent nuclear deal with the West.

Al Jazeera’s Andrew Simmons, reporting from a packed polling station in Tehran, described the vote as a litmus test for Rouhani’s signature move – the nuclear deal with the West and the subsequent lifting of economic sanctions that had strangled its economy.

“This whole business right now is colossal for Iran. This about the influence of Rouhani and his more moderate policies – reformist policies that he wants to bring through against the conservatives,” Simmons said.

The council of clerics, also known as the Assembly of Experts, is composed of 88 members who will pick the next Supreme Leader in case of a vacancy. Members serve for eight years.

The current Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is 76 and has a history of health issues, making the role of this elected body crucial.

Among the most prominent candidates are Rouhani and former President Hashemi Rafsanjani.

Hassan Khomeini, a reformist and grandson of the first Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, was disqualified.

Last week, the Guardian Council – the electoral body under the Supreme Leader – disqualified almost half of the 12,000 candidates.

A total 6,229 were allowed to run including 586 women – or 9.4 percent of the total candidates.

Hopefuls only had one week to campaign from February 18 to last Wednesday, giving establishment candidates the advantage and party backing. Some 250 parties are registered.

An estimated 60 percent of Iran’s 81 million population is 30 years old or younger.

Among the the most pressing issues in the elections are the economy, foreign affairs, and human rights.

In 2015, the country faced 15.3 percent inflation. An estimated 25 percent of its youth are unemployed.

With the lifting of sanctions, Iran aims to improve its economy by producing an additional one million barrels per day (bpd) of oil in 2016, and return to the 3.5 million bpd level it produced before economic sanctions were imposed in 2011 and 2012.

Its move to increase oil production is a factor in the drop of oil prices in the world market, hurting other oil-producing countries including its main rival, Saudi Arabia.

Meanwhile, the country continues to engage in a high-stakes proxy war with Saudi in places such as Syria, Iraq, and Yemen, and relations between the two countries remain tense after the execution of Saudi Shia cleric Nimr al-­Nimr and the storming of the Saudi embassy in Tehran in early January.

Freedom of expression also remains a major issue in Iran, with several journalists, artists, and other activists imprisoned.

The most prominent figure in the Green Movement, Mir ­Hossein Mousavi – who was a 2009 presidential candidate – remains under house arrest.

Iran ranks second to China in the number of death penalties. The latest figures from Amnesty International in July 2015 said 694 people were executed, although official numbers during the same period indicated 246 executions.

Syria government willing to accept cessation deal

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Damascus accepts terms of US-Russia agreement, as opposition raises concerns about armed groups not included in deal.

bashar-al-assad

by Al Jazeera

Syria’s government has said it will accept a halt to “combat operations”, after the US and Russia agreed on a plan for the cessation of hostilities to begin this weekend.

Several parties to the conflict, however, were sceptical that any peace deal would actually take effect.

In a statement on Tuesday, President Bashar al-Assad’s government said it would coordinate with Russia to decide what other groups – along with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and al-Nusra Front – should be excluded from the plan.

The government stressed the importance of sealing its borders, halting foreign support to armed groups and “preventing these organisations from strengthening their capabilities or changing their positions, in order to avoid what may lead to wrecking this agreement”.

The announcement from Damascus came after the US and Russia said on Monday that the International Syria Support Group had agreed to terms for a cessation of hostilities in Syria.

The agreement called on all sides to sign up to the agreement by midday on Friday, February 26 and to stop fighting by midnight.

Hours after the agreement was announced, the Syrian Opposition High Negotiations Committee (HNC) – the major opposition bloc involved in negotiations – said it would accept the terms of the deal.

It added, however, that it does not believe Assad’s regime and its allies would do the same.

“Our main concern in the opposition is that both Russia and the regime are not serious about their commitments to the cessation of hostilities,” said HNC spokesman Riyad Naasan Agha.

“Excluding ISIL and Nusra can be a ploy by the regime and their allies to keep slaughtering our civilians and trying to finish off the real Syrian opposition.”

Al Jazeera’s diplomatic editor James Bays, reporting from New York, said some critics believed the timing of the deal would allow different sides in the conflict to push for more territory in the lead-up to the truce on Friday.

“Given everything that is happening in Syria, there is not a great deal of optimism about the proposed cessation of hostilities, particularly as many observers fear there will be an increase in the violence – with the warring sides trying to make gains in the days before it is due to start,” he said.

Underscoring those concerns, Russian air strikes continued to pound rebel-held areas of Aleppo city on Monday night, as the government’s offensive continued in the province.

Elsewhere, fighting took place on Tuesday between Syrian rebels and the Kurdish People’s Protection Units in rural areas in the north and west of the province.

Syria’s civil war started five years ago when initially peaceful protests against Assad’s rule gave way to a war that has killed at least 250,000 people and forced millions from the country.

Turkey’s capital Ankara rocked by deadly explosion

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At least 28 killed and 61 wounded after car bomb reportedly targets military personnel travelling in heart of city.

Ankara-car-bomb

by Al Jazeera

At least 28 people have been killed and 61 more wounded in a large explosion targeting a military vehicle in heart of the Turkish capital of Ankara.

Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr, reporting from Gaziantep, said officials believe a car bomb had caused the explosion on Wednesday evening and the target had been Turkish military personnel, who were travelling in a vehicle which was stopped at a traffic light.

The death toll rose steadily on Wednesday night, with those wounded in the blast sent to hospitals across the city.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called for an urgent emergency meeting with top level security officials in Ankara.

“We will continue our fight against the pawns that carry out such attacks, which know no moral or humanitarian bounds, and the forces behind them with more determination every day,” Erdogan said in a statement.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but government officials said they were treating the incident as a “terrorist” attack.

Analysts and unnamed Turkish officials said the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) armed group would be among the leading suspects.

The explosion was heard across the capital when it went off at about 6.15pm local time.

The attack happened at the height of evening rush hour, not far from Turkey’s parliament, government buildings and military headquarters.

Witnesses shared images on social media showing a large plume of smoke rising into the sky and and local news footage showed a large fire burning at the site of the explosion.

“This is really in the heart of the Turkish capital – it is clearly a message to the Turkish government,” Khodr said.

“This is the fourth major explosion in Turkey in the past few months.”

‘Terrorist’ act

Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said in a speech that the “blatant, treacherous attack” was well organised.

Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdag said on Twitter the attack was an act of terrorism. Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, who had been due to leave for a trip to Brussels later on Wednesday, cancelled the trip, an official in his office said.

A Saudi-born Syrian suicide bomber, widely believed to be inspired by the Isamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), detonated a bomb in the historic district of Istanbulin January, killing at least 10 people and injuring 15 others.

Turkey has become a target for ISIL, with two bombings last year blamed on the armed group in the town of Suruc near the Syrian border and in the capital Ankara. The latter killed more than 100 people.

Violence has also escalated in the mainly Kurdish southeast since a two-year ceasefire collapsed in July between the state and the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) armed group, which has been fighting for three decades for Kurdish autonomy.

Former UN chief Boutros Boutros-Ghali dies at 93

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UN announces death of 93-year-old Egyptian who was the body’s first African secretary-general.

Boutros-Ghali led the UN during the period that saw genocide in Rwanda, civil war in Angola, the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia [Reuters]

Boutros-Ghali led the UN during the period that saw genocide in Rwanda, civil war in Angola, the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia [Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

The UN Security Council has announced the death of former UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, who lived until the age of 93.

Venezuela’s UN Ambassador Rafael Ramirez, the current council president, made the announcement at the start of a meeting on Yemen’s humanitarian crisis on Tuesday, before asking members to rise for a moment of silence.

Born in November 14, 1922, in Cairo, Boutros-Ghali studied in the Egyptian capital and Paris and became an academic specialising in international law.

The Egyptian politician and diplomat was the sixth secretary-general of the United Nations, serving from January 1992 to December 1996.

He led the UN during the period that saw genocide in Rwanda, civil war in Angola, the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia – all of this amidst increasingly stormy relations between the US and the UN.

Al Jazeera interviewed Boutros-Ghali, a Coptic Christian, in 2009, when he spoke in part on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

In his farewell speech to the UN, Boutros-Ghali said he had thought when he took the post that the time was right for the UN to play an effective role in a world no longer divided into warring Cold War camps.

“But the middle years of this half decade were deeply troubled,” he said. “Disillusion set in.”

Turkey pushes for ground operation in Syria

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turkish_military

by Al Bawaba

Turkey has announced it is in favor of a military deployment on the ground in Syria but on the condition that its allies participate in the operation, according to a statement released by a senior Turkish official said on Tuesday.

“We want a ground operation with our international allies,” the official told reporters in Istanbul.

“There is not going to be a unilateral military operation from Turkey to Syria,” the official remarked, before adding that: “Without a ground operation it is impossible to stop the fighting in Syria.”

Turkey considers the removal of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad as essential to ending the protracted war in Syria which is currently in its fifth year. The Turkish state is also highly critical of the involvment of Iran and Russia and their support for the Assad regime.

“We are asking the coalition partners that there should be a ground operation,” the official said.

Turkey has attacked Kurdish militia targets in Syria over the past few days, a move which has strained relations between Ankara and Washington. The United States has been supportive of Syrian Kurds fighting Daesh, but Turkey fears this will embolden Kurds living within Turkish borders to push for independence.

Defense Minister Ismet Yilmaz previously stated on Sunday that Turkey had no plans of intervening on the gound in Syria.

Deadly air strikes hit hospitals in northern Syria

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At least 21 people killed in suspected Russian raids on two hospitals and a school in provinces of Aleppo and Idlib.

MSF's destroyed hospital in Idlib [Syria Civil Defence]

MSF’s destroyed hospital in Idlib [Syria Civil Defence]

by Al Jazeera

At least 21 people have been killed and dozens others injured in air strikes and rocket attacks on a school and two hospitals in separate locations in northern Syria, Al Jazeera has learned.

In the deadliest incident, at least 14 people were killed and about 30 injured when air strikes and rocket artillery damaged parts of a hospital in the town of Azaz in Aleppo province, the media office at the rebel-controlled Aleppo local council said on Monday.

In the same raid, a school where refugees were sheltering was also hit. No death toll has been confirmed.

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said in a news conference in Kiev on Monday that a Russian balistic missile hit the school and hospital in Azaz.

The head of the media office, Abu Thaer al-Halabi, told Al Jazeera that a section of a highway that facilitates the main supply line for humanitarian aid to the region was destroyed in the raids.

Halabi also said the strikes were carried out by Russian fighter jets.MSF hospital hit

MSF hospital hit

Meanwhile, air strikes also targeted a hospital run by Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in the town of Maaret al-Numan in Idlib province, killing at least seven people, the charity’s France president said on Monday.

“There were at least seven deaths among the personnel and the patients, and at least eight MSF personnel have disappeared, and we don’t know if they are alive,” Mego Terzian told Reuters, adding that he believed Russia or Syrian government forces were behind the attack.

The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said nine people, including a child, had been killed in the “presumambly Russian” raids.

A spokesman for the Syria Civil Defence in Idlib confirmed that the hospital was hit but said four people were killed.

“At least four people have been killed while several others have been injured. We expect the death toll to rise. There are doctors and MSF staff missing,” Radi said, without stating his full name.

At least 13 people were reportedly injured in the strikes, as rescue workers were trying to reach several people buried under the rubble.

“Extreme damage has been caused to the hospital. Six floors have been almost reduced to rubble. This hospital is located in an area previously surrounded by restaurants and has no rebel strongholds. It has been functioning for over a year now,” Radi said.

MSF condemned the attack in a report released on Monday.

“This appears to be a deliberate attack on a health structure, and we condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms,” said Massimiliano Rebaudengo, MSF’s head of mission.

“The destruction of the hospital leaves the local population of around 40,000 people without access to medical services in an active zone of conflict,” Massimiliano said.

Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr, reporting from the Turkish town of Gaziantep near the Syria border, said:

“This is not the first time a hospital or a health facility has been targeted in Syria.

“What we understand is the facility in Idlib that was hit this morning was serving up to 40,000 people who live in what MSF called an active zone of conflict, so they will be denied health services,” she added.

“The health system in Syria as a whole really has all but collapsed and undoubtedly a very grim situation.”

Report: Death toll from Syrian conflict now 470,000

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Syrian girls react following a reported Syrian regime air strike in a rebel-controlled area in the northern city of Aleppo on February 8, 2016. (AFP/Ameer al-Halbi)

Syrian girls react following a reported Syrian regime air strike in a rebel-controlled area in the northern city of Aleppo on February 8, 2016. (AFP/Ameer al-Halbi)

by Andolu Ajansi

A report by the Syrian Center for Policy Research has said that nearly 12 percent of the Syrian population have been killed or injured in civil war.

According to the report released on Thursday, 470,000 Syrians were killed and 1,900,000 others injured in the war which has entered in its fifth year, following the involvement of other actors such asRussia, Iran and Hezbollah.

This is far above the United Nation’s last death-toll figure of 250,000. The UN stopped collecting statistics about the casualties of Syrian stalemate 18 months ago.

In addition, the conflict-hit country’s infrastructure and health system were nearly decimated, researchers said. It added that 400,000 people were killed directly by the violence and another 70,000 lost their lives due to lack of food and medicine plus disease and sanitation problems.

Thursday’s report also said life expectancy had dropped from 70 to 55.4.

The report said that 45 percent of the Syrian population had been displaced, more than four million have become refugees in other countries and six million others were internally displaced. The report also touched upon economic losses in Syria, saying the war had cost $255 billion and that almost 14 million people had lost their livelihoods.

It also added that poverty increased by 85% in 2015 and health, education and income standards have sharply deteriorated.

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