08/12/2025

MONDAY | DEC 8, 2025 9 Qatar, Egypt call for next steps in Gaza truce DOHA: Qatar and Egypt, guarantors of the Gaza ceasefire, called on Saturday for the withdrawal of Israeli troops and the deployment of an international stabilisation force as the necessary next steps in fully implementing the fragile agreement. The measures were spelt out in the US- and UN-backed peace plan that has largely halted fighting, though the warring parties have yet to agree on how to move forward from the deal’s first phase. Its initial steps saw Israeli troops pull back behind a so-called “yellow line” within Gaza’s borders, while Hamas released the living hostages it still held and handed over the remains of all but one of the deceased. “Now we are at the critical moment ... A ceasefire cannot be completed unless there is a full withdrawal of the Israeli forces (and) there is stability back in Gaza, Qatari premier Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani told the Doha Forum, an annual diplomatic conference. Qatar, alongside Egypt and the United States, helped secure the long-elusive truce, which remains delicate as Israel and Hamas accuse each other of breaching its terms. Key sticking points have also emerged over the implementation of the second phase, which has yet to begin, including the question of Hamas’s disarmament. Hamas is supposed to disarm under the 20 point plan first outlined by US President Donald Trump, with members who decommission their weapons allowed to leave Gaza. The group has repeatedly rejected the proposition. Hamas said on Saturday that it was ready to hand over its weapons in the Gaza Strip to a Palestinian authority on the condition that the Israeli army’s occupation ends. “Our weapons are linked to the existence of the occupation and the aggression,” Hamas chief negotiator Khalil al-Hayya said in a statement. “If the occupation ends, these weapons will be placed under the authority of the state.” Asked by AFP, Hayya’s office said he was referring to a sovereign and independent Palestinian state. Under the plan endorsed by the UN in November, Israel is to withdraw from its positions, Gaza is to be administered by a transitional governing body known as the“Board of Peace”, and an international stabilisation force is to be deployed. – AFP Venezuela swears in 5,600 new troops CARACAS: The Venezuelan army swore in 5,600 new soldiers on Saturday, as the United States cranks up military pressure on the oil-producing country. President Nicolas Maduro has called for stepped-up military recruitment as the United States deployed a fleet of warships and the world’s largest aircraft carrier to the Caribbean under the pretext of combating drug trafficking. American forces have carried out deadly strikes on at least 22 vessels, killing at least 83. Washington has accused Maduro of leading the alleged Cartel of the Suns, which it declared a terrorist organisation last month. Maduro asserts the American deployment aims to overthrow him and seize the country’s oil reserves. “Under no circumstances will we allow an invasion by an imperialist force,” Colonel Gabriel Alejandro Rendon Vilchez said on Saturday during the ceremony at Fuerte Tiuna, Venezuela’s largest military complex, in Caracas. According to official figures, Venezuela has 200,000 troops and 200,000 police officers. Also Saturday, a former opposition governor died in prison where he had been detained on charges of terrorism and incitement, a rights group said. – AFP

Ukraine peace deal really close

LOS ANGELES: President Donald Trump’s outgoing Ukraine envoy said a deal to end the Ukraine war was “really close” and now depended on resolving two main outstanding issues: the future of Ukraine’s Donbas region and the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant. Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022 after eight years of fighting between Russian backed separatists and Ukrainian troops in the Donbas, which is made up of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. The Ukraine war is the deadliest European conflict since World War Two and has triggered the biggest confrontation between Russia and the West since the depths of the Cold War. US Special Envoy for Ukraine Keith Kellogg, who is due to step down in January, told the Reagan National Defence Forum that efforts to resolve the conflict were in “the last 10 metres” which he said was always the hardest. The two main outstanding issues, Kellogg said, were on territory – primarily the future of the Donbas – and the future of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, Europe’s largest, which is under Russian control. “If we get those two issues settled, I think the rest of the things will work out fairly well,” Kellogg said on Saturday at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum in Simi Valley, California. “We’re almost there.” “We’re really, really close,” said Kellogg. Kellogg, a retired lieutenant general who served in Vietnam, Panama and Iraq, said the scale of the death and injuries caused by the

o Remaining issues are Donbas region and nuclear power plant, says US envoy and unprecedented in terms of a regional war. Kellogg said that, together, Russia and Ukraine have suffered more than 2 million casualties, including dead and wounded since the war began. Neither Russia nor Ukraine disclose credible estimates of their losses. Moscow says Western and Ukrainian estimates inflate its losses. Kyiv says Moscow inflates estimates of Ukrainian losses. Russia controls 19.2% of Ukraine, including Crimea, which it annexed in 2014, all of Luhansk, more than 80% of Donetsk, about 75% of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, and slivers of the Kharkiv, Sumy, Mykolaiv and Dnipropetrovsk regions. Ukraine war was “horrific”

A leaked set of 28 US draft peace proposals emerged last month, alarming Ukrainian and European officials who said it bowed to Moscow’s main demands on Nato, Russian control of a fifth of Ukraine and restrictions on Ukraine’s army. Those proposals, which Russia now says contain 27 points, have been split up into four components, according to the Kremlin. The exact contents are not in the public domain. Under the initial US proposals, the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, whose reactors are in cold shutdown, would be relaunched under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency, and the electricity produced would be distributed equally between Russia and Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Saturday that he had had a long and “substantive” phone call with Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son in-law Jared Kushner. The Kremlin said on Friday it expected Kushner to be doing the main work on drafting a possible deal. – Reuters

Bethlehem Christmas tree lit up again BETHLEHEM: Christmas cheer returned to the traditional birthplace of Jesus Christ on Saturday as Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank lit up a tree for the first time since the war in Gaza began over two years ago. Residents and visitors enjoying the view of the Christmas tree in Manger Square. – REUTERSPIC

Mike Shahen, 43, said at his ceramic store on the square. Thousands of people attended, including Christians and Muslims, and many who travelled from Palestinian territories and Israel, some from even further afield, to enjoy the festive spirit return. Nuns could be seen watching from one roof, while many families including small children filled balconies and roofs to catch a glimpse of the tree lit up. Laughter filled the air as many could not help but smile despite some rain. – AFP

luminescent, almost full moon. It is the first time the city has held the celebrations since the outbreak of the war in Gaza. “It’s like a symbol for resilience,” said 27 year-old Abeer Shtaya, who works at Al Zaytoonah University of Science and Technology in Salfit in the West Bank. She had travelled 100km with a group of the university’s students because “we want to celebrate and be with our brothers and sisters in Bethlehem to enjoy this day”. “It’s a message for the world that it’s calm,”

Covered in red and gold baubles, the Christmas tree standing metres away from the Church of the Nativity on Manger Square has become a symbol of hope. At the end of a two-hour ceremony, the tree was illuminated to cheers, its yellow lights twinkling and a bright red star on top shining against the clouded night sky irradiated by a