18/07/2025

FRIDAY | JULY 18, 2025

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‘Israel must follow principles on civilian protection’

Military shipment to Tel Aviv blocked in Greece ATHENS: Hundreds of Greeks gathered on Wednesday at the Piraeus Port to block a shipment of military-grade steel to Israel, Anadolu Ajansi reported. The participants, including port workers, members of pro-Palestinian progressive organisations and associations, and sympathisers of various leftist parties, carried Palestinian flags and banners expressing solidarity with the Palestinian cause. Dock workers union Enedep president Markos Bekris said the action intended to block the transfer of five containers of military grade steel that arrived from India to another ship destined for Israel. “We do not want our country and our port to be involved in this war or in the transportation of military equipment to be used in the war. “We do not want this military equipment to be used against the Palestinian people, who are struggling to establish their own state, nor do we want it to lead to the killing of women and children. “We will not stain our hands with the blood of innocents.” – Bernama/Anadolu MOSCOW: Russian air defence units downed three Ukrainian drones headed for Moscow on Thursday, said the capital’s Mayor Sergei Sobyanin on Telegram. He said specialists were examining drone fragments at the sites where they hit the ground. A Ukrainian drone attack also killed one person and injured six in Russia’s southern city of Belgorod, said regional Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov. He said the injured were being treated in hospital for shrapnel wounds while six homes were damaged. Twenty-nine of the drones were destroyed over Belgorod region on the Ukrainian border, with a further 16 over Bryansk region, another border region to the west. The governor of Voronezh region, also on the border, said several Ukrainian drones had been downed and the governor of Smolensk region in western Russia said air defences had downed one drone. – Reuters GOOD NEWS ON GAZA, CLAIMS TRUMP WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday there is “good news” on Gaza as he prepared to meet Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed Abdulrahman Jassim Jaber Al Thani at the White House, Anadolu Ajansi reported. “We have some good news on Gaza and good news on a couple of things that we are working on at a very high level, but you have done a fantastic job,“ Trump told his envoy for the Middle East Steve Witkoff. The comments come as he prepares to host Sheikh Mohammed for dinner at the White House amid ongoing negotiations for a ceasefire in Gaza. – Bernama-Anadolu RUSSIAN AIR DEFENCE DOWNS DRONES

o We hold all parties to standards of international law in conflict: UN

“disastrous decision” while another implied that starvation might be “justified and moral” until hostages are freed, said Fletcher. “Intentionally using the starvation of civilians as a method of warfare would be a war crime.” Most recently, Israel’s defence minister talked openly about moving Palestinians into what he called a “humanitarian city”, he said. “We understand that the proposal is to forcibly displace Palestinians to a designated zone. I do not know how to describe this but it is not humanitarian.” He warned that the humanitarian situation in Gaza is dire as starvation rates among children hit their highest levels in June, with over 5,800 children diagnosed as acutely malnourished. Last week, children and women were killed in a strike while waiting for food supplements, he said. Only 17 of 36 hospitals and 63 of 170 primary health care centres are

functioning, and only partially, even as mass casualties arrive daily, with sanitation systems broken and the fuel crisis in Gaza remaining critical, he added. Gaza’s soaring humanitarian needs must be met without drawing people into a firing line and Israel, as the occupying power, is obligated to ensure people have food and medical supplies but that is not happening, he said. Instead, civilians are exposed to death and injury, he added. “Surely, we do not need to debate whether killing civilians waiting in line for life’s essentials meets the responsibility to provide for civilian needs,” he said, referring to the militarised mode of aid distribution carried out by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which is run by the United States with the approval of Israeli authorities. Contrary to established international humanitarian norms for distributing relief in hundreds of local communities, GHF set up only four sites in the whole of Gaza in restricted Israeli military zones, where starving civilians enter through fenced lanes under the eyes of armed security contractors. Chaos results in gunfire. Fletcher said humanitarians face access barriers created by the Israeli authorities, who make the delivery of aid in Gaza complicated. With these obstacles in place, the aid may never reach UN distribution points and even if it does, getting it at scale to those in need remains uncertain, he said. The International Court of Justice has demanded that Israel take immediate and effective measures to enable the provision of urgently needed basic services and humanitarian assistance, he said. “I ask you as a council to assess whether Israel is meeting its international legal obligations and whether we humanitarians can fulfil our mandate. Is this allowing rapid, unimpeded passage of impartial humanitarian relief, as the rules of war demand? Or is it obstruction?” – Bernama-Xinhua defence and interior ministry forces had “succeeded in returning stability” despite the intervention of Israel, which has bombed the country’s south and capital Damascus. Israel, which has its own Druze community, has presented itself as a defender of the Syrian minority, although some analysts say it is a pretext for pursuing its own military goal of keeping Syrian government forces as far from their shared frontier as possible. “The Israeli entity resorted to a wide-scale targeting of civilian and government facilities“ that would have pushed “matters to a large-scale escalation, except for the effective intervention of American, Arab and Turkish mediation, which saved the region from an unknown fate.” – AFP

Cabinet that you have consistently overestimated your powers of quiet persuasion. “We hold all parties to the standards of international law in this conflict. We do not have to choose, in fact, we must not choose, between demanding the end to the starvation of civilians in Gaza and demanding the unconditional release of all hostages. And we must reject antisemitism. But we must also hold Israel to the same principles and laws as other states.” Civilians must be protected wherever they are, hostages must be released, humanitarian aid must be allowed to enter at scale and humanitarian workers must be protected, he stressed. Weeks ago, an Israeli minister called allowing aid into Gaza a

NEW YORK: On Wednesday, United Nations (UN) Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Under-Secretary-General Tom Fletcher said Israel must be held to the same principles and laws on civilian protection as other states, reported Xinhua. States and armed groups must uphold the rules that protect civilians in war, Fletcher told a Security Council meeting on the humanitarian situation in Gaza. “Today, across the world, we watch these rules being corroded and degraded. It is of course for you (the Security Council members) to decide how you act to ensure all parties respect international humanitarian law. But I agree with some members of the Israeli

BR I E F S

Palestinians searching for items to salvage in the rubble of buildings destroyed in Israeli strikes in Gaza City. – AFPPIC

Syria vows accountability for violence against Druze

DAMASCUS: Interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa vowed yesterday that those behind the violence against the Druze minority would be held accountable after deadly clashes in their southern heartland, saying security responsibility would be returned to local authorities. “We are keen on holding accountable those who abused our Druze people as they are under the protection of the state.“ The Syrian government announced on Wednesday a new ceasefire in Sweida and a halt to military operations there after days of violence that killed more than 350 people, according to a war monitor. It said the army has begun withdrawing from the Druze-majority city. Syrian

and freedom is one of our priorities”. Syria’s Islamist authorities, who toppled longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in December, have had strained relations with Syria’s religious and ethnic minorities, and have been accused of not doing enough to protect them. March saw massacres of more than 1,700, mostly Alawite civilians, in their coastal heartland, with government affiliated groups blamed for most of the killings. Government forces also battled Druze fighters in Sweida province and near Damascus in April and May, leaving more than 100 people dead. Sharaa said “outlaw groups”, whose leaders “rejected dialogue for many months”, had committed “crimes against civilians” recently. He said the deployment of

Security forces had been deployed there a day earlier with the stated aim of overseeing a previous truce, following days of deadly clashes between Druze fighters and local Bedouin tribes. But witnesses said the government forces had joined the Bedouin in attacking Druze fighters and civilians. Sharaa said “responsibility” for security in Sweida would be handed to religious elders and some local factions “based on the supreme national interest”. Before the government intervention, Druze areas were mainly controlled by fighters from the minority. Sharaa said the Druze community is “a fundamental part of the fabric of this nation. Protecting your rights