Jenin A European envoy blasted Israel Saturday over the proportionality of the force it uses, as international envoys toured Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank following this weeks deadly raid.

His remarks echoed UN chief Antonio Guterres who on Thursday told reporters there was an excessive force used by Israeli forces in its 48-hour operation, the largest Israel has staged in the Palestinian territory for years.

It included air strikes and armoured bulldozers ripping up streets.

Jenin is a centre for multiple armed Palestinian groups, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called the refugee camp a terrorist nest.

European Union representative to the Palestinian territories Sven Kuehn von Burgsdorff made his comments as he led a delegation of UN officials and diplomats from 25 countries to the camp in the northern West Bank.

We are concerned about the deployment of weaponry and weapons systems which question the proportionality of the military during the operation, Kuehn von Burgsdorff said of the operation in which 12 Palestinians and one Israeli soldier were killed.

This cycle of violence has to end, it cannot continue. If there is no political solution to the conflict, we are going to stand here in a weeks time, in a months time, in a years time, with nothing changed, he added.

As the delegation toured the camp, residents peered out of holes left in the walls by Israeli rockets, and local authorities tested a new camp-wide alarm system to warn of future raids.

UN plea for funds

Jenin camp has been the site of several large-scale raids by the Israeli military this year, but this weeks was the biggest such operation in the West Bank since the second Palestinian intifada or uprising of the early 2000s.

The camps infrastructure was severely damaged during the raid, which Israel said was targeting militants. 

Eight kilometres (five miles) of water pipes and three kilometres of sewage pipes were destroyed, the UN said. More than 100 houses were damaged and a number of schools were also lightly damaged.

The refugee camp in one of the poorest and most densely populated in the West Bank, with some 18,000 people living in just 0.43 square kilometres (0.16 of a square mile).

UN officials on Saturday made a plea for funds to help rebuild the camp.

To restore services and scale up support to the children, we need cash our appeal is desperately underfunded, Leni Stenseth, deputy commissioner-general of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), said.

I would urge you to consider announcing your support for the work we are going to do here in Jenin camp in the coming weeks and months as soon as possible, she added.

On Thursday Algeria...

Johannesburg South Africa, which has experienced crippling electricity outages in recent months, will survive this winter season thanks to a huge improvement in generation, a cabinet minister said on Saturday.

Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, who had last month forecast an incredibly difficult southern hemisphere winter, on Saturday said power generation had been ramped up to achieve an average output of 60 percent, from 48 percent weeks ago.

The state utility Eskom imposes daily scheduled blackouts, called load-shedding, to safeguard the grid whenever demand outstrips supply. 

These have in recent weeks drastically dropped from 12 to around two hours a day.

We are succeeding in maintaining those levels of efficiency, said the minister. 

He credited the change to Eskom mobilising some of the best generation experts and deploying them at the worst-performing power stations whose output is now surpassing our expectations.

We are more than confident that we should be able to survive the winter, he told journalists at a national executive committee meeting of the governing African National Congress, taking place at a hotel east of Johannesburg.

We will not experience the worst-case scenario that we had projected and we will continue to see the improvement, said the minister. 

Peak winter demand, projected at 34,000 megawatts, has been down at 30,000 megawatts, he said.

Power cuts have forced many South Africans, who had become hardened to the rolling outages, to find alternative sources such as installing solar units at household level. 

Im very confident load-shedding will be behind us very soon and we begin to work on creating an additional buffer reserve margin to allow the economy to grow at the desired level, said Ramokgopa.

In May, the central bank forecast GDP will grow by just 0.3 percent this year and that the power cuts alone would cost the continents most industrialised economy at least two percentage points of growth.

The post Energy-short South Africa will survive winter: minister appeared first on Iraqi News.

Kolkata At least seven people were killed and dozens more injured in India Saturday after clashes over local polls in West Bengal, a state notorious for political violence during election campaigns.

Indias ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has in recent years worked hard to gain a toehold in West Bengal ruled by a communist party for much of its history to expand its reach beyond its Hindi-speaking northern heartlands.

Voters are currently casting their ballots in a fierce contest to elect municipal leaders, with more than 200,000 candidates across the state of 104 million people.

Seven people have been killed and dozens wounded in poll-related violence in different villages across the state, Jawed Shamim, a senior officer in West Bengals police force, told AFP.

Another police official, requesting anonymity as they were not authorised to speak to the media, said five of the dead were from the states ruling Trinamool Congress party.

The other two were affiliated with the BJP and West Bengals Communist Party of India (Marxist).

Footage aired by local broadcasters showed rival party workers roaming streets with batons, as well as ballot boxes snatched and set alight outside polling stations.

Other voting booths saw a heavy security presence with paramilitary troops standing guard to keep order.

More than 200 crude bombs a staple of West Bengal elections that are sold cheaply on the black market to maim or intimidate voters had also been seized during the polls, police said.

State election commissioner Rajiv Sinha told local broadcaster Republic that his agency had received more than 1,300 complaints of vote-rigging, interference at polling booths and sporadic incidents of violence.

We cannot claim that polling was peaceful, he added.

Decades of violence

West Bengal has been ruled by Trinamool leader Mamata Banerjee since 2011, when her party defeated the Communist-led administration that had ruled the state for the prior three decades.

Banerjee, a fierce critic of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, has accused his Hindu-nationalist BJP of attempting to import divisive sectarian politics into the state, which has a large Muslim minority.

Modi has in turn accused her administration of endemic corruption.

But the roots of political violence in the state stretch back decades, with police recording thousands of murders around election time since the 1960s.

During state polls in 2021 won emphatically by Trinamool but with a strong BJP showing several activists from both parties were shot or hacked to death, their bodies sometimes hung from trees as an intimidation tactic.

The post Seven killed i...

The Hague Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte will personally tender his resignation to the king on Saturday after his coalition government collapsed in a row over migration, triggering elections later this year.

King Willem-Alexander was out of the country on holiday when the government fell and flew back to the Netherlands to meet Rutte, who is the countrys longest-serving premier and has been in power since 2010.

I will catch up with him tomorrow and explain exactly what happened, a sombre Rutte, the leader of the centre-right VVD party, told a press conference on Friday night after the coalition toppled.

Their meeting is due at around 1100 GMT on Saturday at the royal Huis Ten Bosch palace in a forest near The Hague. Rutte is leading a caretaker government until the elections expected in mid-November.

Europe has faced rising tensions over how to deal with migration and it was the issue that finally tore apart the Netherlands shaky coalition government, Ruttes fourth.

The four coalition parties fell out over Ruttes plans to tighten curbs on reuniting families of asylum seekers, a bid to curb numbers following a scandal last year over overcrowded migration centres.

ChristenUnie   a Christian Democratic party that draws its main support from the staunchly Protestant Bible Belt in the central Netherlands  and centre-left D66 had strongly opposed Ruttes plan.

Dutch newspapers picked over the carcass of the unstable coalition that only took office in January 2022, after a record 271 days of negotiations. 

The Volkskrant daily said that the cabinet stumbled from the starting blocks and never managed to recover.

Beautiful country

The elections now promise to be some of the most divisive in a generation, with a toxic brew of issues including migration, angry farmers and the cost of living.

The newest challenge to Ruttes bid for a fifth term comes from an upstart farmers party that opposes EU-backed environmental rules, while the Dutch far-right remains a threat as ever.

We can make the Netherlands a beautiful country again with fewer asylum seekers and crime, more money and houses for our own people, decent care, plenty of room for our farmers and fishermen, anti-Islam leader Geert Wilders tweeted.

The Farmer-Citizen Movement (BBB) will be seeking to repeat the success of senate elections that it won earlier this year.

Its leader Caroline van der Plas has refused to serve in a coalition with Rutte, and she didnt rule out standing to be prime minister.

Despite leading them to electoral success for nearly 13 years, Ruttes bid for an unprecedented fifth term also faces challenges from within the VVD.

If the farmers party does well enough in the elections to demand a place in a...

Nikopol On the 500th day since Russias invasion and as the war grinds on, Ukrainian forces are advancing slowly without enough arms and ammunition and with its main cities under constant threat.

Since the beginning of June, Ukraines army has been on the offensive to reconquer territory captured by Russian forces in the east and the south.

While suffering losses, Russian forces are putting up a ferocious resistance.

Russian forces have built solid fortifications, they have a lot of equipment, said Antonina Morakhovska, a 73-year-old retired teacher in the city of Nikopol in southern Ukraine.

I see how our forces advance. Its not easy for them in this heat. I think about them all the time, poor things.

It will be tough but we will still win. I dont think it will be soon but we will win, she told AFP.

Despite receiving billions of euros in Western military aid, the Ukrainian army has only managed to take back around a dozen villages and a few hundred square kilometres of territory since the start of the offensive.

There is no comparison to last year when Ukraines forces re-captured 9,000 square kilometres in the Kharkiv region in September and 5,000 square kilometres in the Kherson region in November.

Offensive not fast

In the run-up to a NATO summit next week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has pressed Western powers for long-range weapons and F-16 fighter jets.

The offensive is not fast, that is a fact. But nevertheless we are moving forward, he said during a visit to Prague this week.

Ukraines military commander-in-chief Valery Zaluzhny has also expressed frustration at the slow deliveries of promised weaponry from the West.

It pisses me off that some in the West complain about the slow start and progress of the long-awaited push against Russian forces, Zaluzhny told The Washington Post last month.

At a street market in Nikopol, Lyudmila Shudinova, 82, said her thoughts were focused on her 49-year-old son, a volunteer fighter recovering from a wound.

She said she had come to buy him potatoes.

I am very scared that, after he heals, he will again be sent to the front, she said, with tears in her eyes.

Ukrainians remain united in the effort to repel Russian forces but their resilience is constantly being tested.

The UN has documented the deaths of 9,000 civilians, including more than 500 children, in the conflict so far.

The real toll could be much higher.

Despite a significant strengthening of Ukraines air defence capability this year, the threat of drone and missile attacks across the country is constant.

In June, a missile hit a restaurant in Kramatorsk in the east killing 13 people, and on Thursday 10 people were killed in a stri...

London Former Wimbledon finalist Matteo Berrettini takes on big-serving Alexander Zverev at Wimbledon on Saturday as British wildcard Katie Boulter faces defending womens champion Elena Rybakina.

Frances Tiafoe flies the flag for America in the mens draw against Grigor Dimitrov, who is hoping to roll back the years.

AFP Sport picks out three standout matches on the sixth day of the 2023 tournament in London (x denotes seeded player):

Alexander Zverev (GER x19) v Matteo Berrettini (ITA)

Alexander Zverev and Matteo Berrettini have flown under the radar at the All England Club this year but both men have the weapons to go deep in the draw.

Berrettini was the runner-up to Novak Djokovic in 2021 but had to pull out last year after testing positive for coronavirus.

That still hurts the 27-year-old Italian.

Not being able to play was something that, even when I was better physically, was really tough mentally to overcome, he said.

He is up against a tough opponent in Zverev, who has been ranked as high as number two in the world but missed a huge chunk of last season after tearing ankle ligaments.

Katie Boulter (GBR) v Elena Rybakina (KAZ x3)

Defending champion Elena Rybakina was not at her best against French veteran Alize Cornet in the second round and will now be battling the home crowd when she takes on Katie Boulter.

The Kazakh player hit a total of 40 unforced errors in her straight-sets win on Thursday, although she balanced that out with 36 winners.

Britains Boulter, 26, reached the third round at Wimbledon last year.

I think its a super great opportunity for me, she said. Ive got nothing to lose. Shes clearly the defending champion for a reason. 

Im going to have a swing and go for it. Ive got a lot of tennis behind me. Its time for me to test my skills against an incredible champion.

Frances Tiafoe (USA x10) v Grigor Dimitrov (BUL x21)

Charismatic American Frances Tiafoe is counting on the crowd to give him a lift when he takes on Grigor Dimitrov.

The 10th seed is the highest-ranked American man left in the tournament after ninth-seed Taylor Fritz was knocked out.

Since Pete Sampras hung up his racquet, Wimbledon has not been a happy hunting ground for US male players. 

But 25-year-old Tiafoe is banking on winning the fans over against the experienced Bulgarian, who reached the semi-finals way back in 2014.

As soon as I start getting amped up and get on a run, the crowd is really behind me, he said.

I feel like its pretty one-sided honestly, once Im out there playing, especially playing well. 

As soon as I smile, the crowd erupts. Its crazy, but its cool. I mean, I guess its a blessing, and hopefully they like...

Tehran Iran hanged two men in public on Saturday over an October attack on a shrine in the southern city of Shiraz that claimed over a dozen lives, the judiciary said.

The October 26 attack on the revered Shiite Muslim shrine of Shah Cheragh, which left 13 people dead and 30 wounded, was claimed by the Sunni Muslim extremist Islamic State (IS) group.

The death sentences of two of the perpetrators of the Shah Cheragh terrorist attack were carried out in public this morning, the judiciarys Mizan Online website said.

The pair were hanged at dawn on a street near the shrine in Shiraz, the capital of Fars province, the official news agency IRNA reported. Mizan identified them as Mohammad Ramez Rashidi and Naeem Hashem Qatali.

Iran had previously said the attack involved people from other countries, including neighbouring Afghanistan, but the nationalities of the executed men were not immediately revealed.

The area of Iran that borders Afghanistan and Pakistan is a hotbed of unrest, and on Saturday four armed assailants killed an Iranian policeman in the Sunni-majority city of Zahedan near the same frontier, state media said.

It was not immediately clear what was behind the attack in the capital of Sistan-Baluchistan province, a flashpoint for clashes with Sunni extremists as well as drug smugglers and rebels from the Baluchi minority.

Mizan said one of the men executed on Saturday, Rashidi, had confessed to having collaborated with IS to carry out Octobers shrine attack.

The two were sentenced to death in March after being convicted of corruption on earth, armed rebellion and acting against national security.

They were also charged with membership of IS and conspiracy against the security of the country.

Takfiri arrests

At the time, Fars chief justice Kazem Moussavi said they were directly involved in the arming, procurement, logistics and guidance of the main perpetrator.

Three other defendants in the case were sentenced to prison for five, 15 and 25 years for being members of IS, he said.

The main assailant, who was later identified by media in Iran as Hamed Badakhshan in his 30s, died of injuries sustained during his arrest, the authorities said.

In November, the Islamic republic said 26 takfiri terrorists from Afghanistan, Azerbaijan and Tajikistan had been arrested in connection with the attack.

In Shiite-dominated Iran, the term takfiri generally refers to jihadists or proponents of radical Sunni Islam.

The shrine attack came more than a month after protests spread across Iran over the death in custody of 22-year-old Iranian Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini, following her arrest in Tehran for allegedly violating the countrys dress code for women.

In October, Irans President Ebrahim Raisi blamed the...

Tokyo Japan on Saturday marked a year since the shock assassination of former prime minister Shinzo Abe, the countrys longest-serving leader and a towering political figure.

Abe was gunned down in broad daylight while giving a campaign speech in western Japan, targeted by a man allegedly angry over the former leaders links to the Unification Church.

The suspect, Tetsuya Yamagami, was apprehended on the spot and is said to have resented the sect over large donations that his mother made that bankrupted his family.

Gun violence is extremely rare in Japan which has strict gun laws. Yamagami is believed to have used a homemade weapon.

On Saturday, visitors from all walks of life formed a long queue outside Tokyos Zojoji Buddhist temple, offering flowers before framed pictures of a smiling Abe.

I think he was the icon of Japanese people. He was the icon of the conservatives, said mourner Tomoko Shimoda, 57. 

She said the way he communicated with other people, what he said publicly, and the way he behaved made a lasting impression on her. 

Hiroyuki Kumagi, 69, said he was a real worshipper of Mr. Abe. 

I participated in the prayer at the last years national funeral, and of course I am here today, he told AFP.

In the western Nara region, people brought flowers and prayed outside Yamato-Saidaiji Station the site of Abes shooting.

Abes death prompted a flood of condolences from international leaders, many of whom met the former prime minister as he worked to raise Japans diplomatic profile.

But at home, the assassination caused waves of political upheaval.

First, the renewed attention on the Unification Church whose members are sometimes called Moonies prompted revelations of deep ties between Japans conservative lawmakers and the sect.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, who saw his approval ratings tumble as the revelations emerged, was forced to first investigate the ties and then announce his party would sever any relations with the church.

Abes murder also prompted soul-searching over Japans security arrangements, with pledges to improve the protection of politicians.

Less than a year later, an attacker was able to approach Kishida at a campaign event and throw a homemade explosive. The prime minister was unharmed in the April event, and his attacker was detained at the scene.

A real patriot

An outspoken scion of a political dynasty, Abe invigorated socially conservative movements through his push to amend the post-war pacifist constitution.

He attempted to move Japans regional relations past the bitter memories of World War II, stressing the nations history of pacifism since the war.

While he was perhaps Japan...

Beijing It is critical for Washington and Beijing to keep working together on climate finance, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Saturday, urging deeper cooperation in addressing the existential threat of global warming.

Her comments, on a four-day trip to Beijing that follows Secretary of State Antony Blinkens visit, come as the United States seeks to cool tensions and stress areas of collaboration between the worlds two biggest economies.

As the worlds two largest emitters of greenhouse gases and the largest investors in renewable energy, we have both a joint responsibility - and ability - to lead the way, Yellen told a roundtable of experts in China, underlining a key area of cooperation despite tense bilateral relations.

Climate change is at the top of the list of global challenges, and the United States and China must work together to address this existential threat, she added.

Saying that climate finance should be targeted efficiently and effectively, she pressed China to support existing multilateral institutions like the Green Climate Fund, while urging for the inclusion of the private sector in transitioning towards net zero.

Both our economies seek to support partners in emerging markets and developing countries as they strive to meet their climate goals, and I believe continued US-China cooperation on climate finance is critical.

China last year briefly said it was suspending talks on the climate after Nancy Pelosi, then speaker of the House of Representatives, visited Taiwan the self-ruling democracy claimed by Beijing.

But there are signs that talks might restart again soon, with US envoy John Kerry due to travel to China soon to discuss cooperation on climate change, a US official said Friday.

Besides working together on climate, Yellen said in a Friday meeting with Chinese Premier Li Qiang it was also key that Washington and Beijing closely communicate on global economic and financial affairs while making joint efforts on international challenges such as debt distress.

Big ticket items

On Saturday, in addition to meeting people involved in climate finance, she is also expected to speak with women economists and see Vice Premier He Lifeng, a key Chinese economic official.

And a key question is whether big ticket items that are in the category of global challenges, like debt distress and climate cooperation, get bumped to the top of the agenda, said Lindsay Gorman, senior fellow for emerging technologies at the German Marshall Fund of the United States.

Yellens talks on Saturday follow meetings with US businesses, who have expressed a host of concerns ranging from level playing fields with the Chinese, reduced people-to-people exchanges, and an uncertain business...

Las Vegas NBA top draft pick Victor Wembanyama played his long-awaited first game with the San Antonio Spurs on Friday, the 19-year-old Frenchman starting in an NBA Summer League contest against Charlotte.

A sellout crowd of 17,500 spectators jammed the Thomas & Mack Arena to watch the 7-foot-4 (2.24m) prodigy, considered the NBAs greatest prospect since LeBron James arrived two decades ago, against other young prospects.

Wembanyama won the opening tip-off and had an assist on the first Spurs possession, but missed his first three shots a baseline jumper, an outside jumper and a layup attempt.

Wembanyama made his first basket in a Spurs uniform with 7:02 remaining in the first quarter, banking in an inside turnaround jumper in the lane while being fouled. He sank the free throw to complete a three-point play.

His opponents, the Hornets, were the club that made forward Brandon Miller the second overall pick.

Already a star in the French league, Wembanyama was considered a runaway choice for the top pick when the Spurs won the NBA Draft Lottery in May and global attention has followed him even before San Antonio made him the first selection last month.

The Summer League, featuring young talent seeking NBA roster spots, offered Wembanyama his first game in a Spurs uniform, but more contests will be coming, including pre-season games and San Antonios 2023-24 regular-season games starting in October.

There were cautionary notes for Wembanyama before he even took the court.

The third pick in the NBA Draft, Portland guard Scoot Henderson, suffered a right shoulder injury in the third quarter against Houston and didnt return to the game played just before the Spurs met the Hornets.

The fourth pick, Houston guard Amen Thompson, limped off in the final seconds of the fourth quarter, having grabbed his left ankle after falling to the court under the basket.

The Spurs will face Portland on Sunday.

Wembanyamas Spurs debut was played hours after Las Vegas police said no charges will be filed from an incident where guards protecting Wembanyama were involved in an incident with Britney Spears.

The post Wembanyama starts for Spurs in NBA Summer League debut appeared first on Iraqi News.

Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) The Iraqi Counter Terrorism Service (ICTS) carried out an air strike on Friday targeting five terrorists belonging to ISIS group in Kirkuk governorate in northern Iraq, Alsumaria News reported.

The ICTS issued a statement confirming that Iraqi forces launched an air strike targeting five terrorists belonging to ISIS according to directives issued by the Iraqi Prime Minister, Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani.

The statement elaborated that the head of the ICTS, Abdul-Wahab Al-Saadi, personally oversaw preemptive operations carried out in Kirkuk to target terrorists.

In mid-May, the Iraqi authorities announced the killing of six terrorists belonging to ISIS in an air strike in the northern governorate of Kirkuk.

Iraq announced in late 2017 the liberation of all its territories from the grip of ISIS, but the authorities are constantly launching security operations to pursue remnants of the terrorist group that carry out attacks from time to time in the country.

The Iraqi security forces waged battles in several Iraqi governorates, including Nineveh, Kirkuk, Diyala, Salah Al-Din, Anbar, and the outskirts of Baghdad, to eliminate the remaining members of the ISIS group following the elimination of the terrorist group, which occupied large areas in Iraq and Syria for years.

The Iraqi authorities have confirmed more than once that the security forces are trying to eliminate remnants of terrorist organizations in the country and tighten restrictions on firearms.

The post 5 ISIS terrorists killed in Kirkuk appeared first on Iraqi News.

Baghdad Iraq has opened an investigation into the suspected kidnapping of an Israeli-Russian academic after her disappearance in Baghdad, a government spokesman said.

Elizabeth Tsurkov, a doctoral student at Princeton University and fellow at the New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy, has been missing in Iraq for more than three months.

The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday accused Iraqs Kataeb Hezbollah of holding her, but the pro-Iran armed faction has implied it was not involved in her disappearance.

Kataeb Hezbollah is part of the Hashed al-Shaabi force, former paramilitaries that were integrated into Iraqi security forces in recent years.

Asked about her disappearance on television late Thursday, government spokesman Bassem al-Awadi said the Iraqi government is indeed conducting an official investigation.

Given the level of the case, its intricacies, there will be no official statement regarding this matter until the Iraqi government completes its official investigation and reaches conclusions, he said.

After that, there will be statements or announcements on official stances, he told Al-Ahd station, which is close to Hashed al-Shaabi.

Tsurkov had arrived in Baghdad at the beginning of December 2022, a Western diplomat in Iraq said on Wednesday on condition of anonymity.

The academic has not been active on Twitter, where she has almost 80,000 followers and describes herself as passionate about human rights, since March 21.

An Iraqi intelligence source said Tsurkov was kidnapped in Baghdad at the beginning of Ramadan, the Muslim fasting month which this year commenced on March 23.

On Wednesday, Netanyahus office said Tsurkov is still alive and we hold Iraq responsible for her safety and well-being.

She had travelled to Iraq on her Russian passport at her own initiative pursuant to work on her doctorate and academic research on behalf of Princeton University in the US, it added.

On her personal website, Tsurkov said she wanted to understand and convey the views and experiences of people in the Middle East and highlight abuses by powerful actors in the region.

In a statement on Thursday evening, Kataeb Hezbollah said it was doing everything it could to uncover the fate of Zionist hostage or hostages in the country.

The post Iraq opens probe into Israeli academic kidnapping appeared first on Iraqi News.

Nablus Israeli forces killed two Palestinian militants Friday as a firefight erupted during a military raid on the occupied West Bank city of Nablus, Israeli and Palestinian officials said.

The Palestinian health ministry announced two martyrs and three injured as a result of the occupation (Israeli) aggression on Nablus. The Israeli army reported no injuries among its forces.

The army said it had entered Nablus to arrest two individuals wanted over a shooting earlier this month at Israeli police in a West Bank settlement that resulted in no casualties.

The Palestinian health ministry in a statement identified the two dead as Khairi Shaheen, 34, and Hamza Maqbul, 32, who the army said were killed following an exchange of fire with security forces.

During the activity, weapons which were used by the terrorists were confiscated, the army added.

Witnesses told AFP Israeli troops had entered Nablus, a stronghold of armed Palestinian groups in the northern West Bank, on Friday morning and surrounded a house in the Old City before calling on those inside to turn themselves in.

The Abu Ali Mustapha Brigades, the armed wing of the leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), claimed Shaheen and Maqbul as its members.

Fridays raid came days after Israel had launched its largest operation in years in the West Bank, which it has occupied since 1967.

Twelve Palestinians and one Israeli soldier were killed during the large-scale raid on Jenin refugee camp which lasted more than 48 hours and ended Wednesday.

Violence linked to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict this year has killed at least 192 Palestinians, 27 Israelis, one Ukrainian and one Italian, according to an AFP tally compiled from official sources from both sides.

They include, on the Palestinian side, combatants and civilians, and on the Israeli side, mostly civilians and three members of the Arab minority.

The post Israeli forces kill two Palestinian gunmen in West Bank raid appeared first on Iraqi News.

Jerusalem The Israeli army said Thursday it was conducting strikes on southern Lebanon after a mortar launched from its northern neighbour exploded in the border area between the two foes.

The latest military action comes three months after the two countries saw their worst cross-border fire in years.

It also comes amid rising tension between Israel and Arab countries after Israel carried out its biggest military operation in years in the occupied West Bank targeting the Jenin refugee camp, a Palestinian militant stronghold. 

A launch was carried out from Lebanese territory which exploded adjacent to the border in Israeli territory, an Israeli army statement said.

An army spokesman said the projectile was a mortar, after an army statement earlier reported the explosion had hit near the border town of Ghajar.

In response, the IDF (Israeli military) is currently striking the area from which the launch was carried out in Lebanese territory, an army spokesman told AFP.

Lebanons official National News Agency said Israel had fired more than 15 artillery shells which hit around the communities of Kfar Chouba and Halta.

The two countries are still technically at war, and peacekeepers from the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) patrol the border between them.

Earlier on Thursday, Lebanons armed Hezbollah movement denounced Israel for building a concrete wall around Ghajar, a small town that straddles their common border.

The Iran-backed Shiite group called on the Lebanese state to take action to prevent the consolidation of this occupation by Israel of Ghajar, home to around 3,000 people.

Hezbollah denounced Israel for the erection of a barbed wire fence and the construction of a concrete wall around the entire locality.

Rockets and drones

Thursdays cross-border fire follows Israel bombarding Lebanon in April, in response to a barrage of rockets fired from the country.

The April incident was the heaviest rocket fire from Lebanon since Israel fought a war with Hezbollah in 2006.

UNIFIL, which was established in 1978, was beefed up in response to that 34-day conflict.

Last month, Hezbollah said it shot down an Israeli drone that had flown into Lebanons southern airspace.

Israeli warplanes and drones regularly violate Lebanons airspace, while the powerful Shiite Muslim movement for years has been sending drones towards Israel.

Weeks earlier Hezbollah had put on a display of military might, with mock cross-border raids into Israel a few miles (kilometres) from the border.

The strikes on Lebanon come a day after Israel hit militant targets in the Gaza Strip, in response to rocket fire from the coastal Palestinian territory.

Projectiles were fired from Gaza as Israeli forces drew to an e...

Dubai Irans Revolutionary Guards on Thursday seized a commercial ship possibly engaged in smuggling activity in the Gulf, the US Navy said.

US forces monitored the incident in international waters, the Bahrain-based US Navys Fifth Fleet said in a statement, but assessed the circumstances of this event did not warrant further response.

On Wednesday, the US Navy said it had blocked two attempts by the Iranian navy to seize commercial tankers in international waters off Oman.

Furthermore, Britain on Thursday announced plans for a tougher sanctions regime against Iran over alleged human rights violations and hostile actions on UK soil.

Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said the further measures were a toolkit that I would prefer not to use, but the decision on whether I do so or whether I do not, is firmly in the hands of the Iranian regime itself.

The post Iran Guards seize commercial ship in Gulf appeared first on Iraqi News.

Paris The Emirati oil executive chairing this years UN climate summit, Sultan Al Jaber, told private and national oil and gas companies on Thursday they must slash their planet-warming emissions.

Sultan al-Jaber, head of the UAE national oil company ADNOC, told ministers from countries of the OPEC oil producers grouping the industry must urgently decarbonize its operations and take collective action to eliminate operational emissions.

Jaber, whose appointment to host the COP28 summit in Dubai in November and December was criticised by climate activists and some Western lawmakers, said the entire industry should be aligned to help the world meet the target of net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

This includes not only international oil companies but also national state-controlled ones, Jaber told an OPEC seminar in Vienna.

While a number of multinational companies have stated their emissions-reduction aims, many state-held giants such as ones in the Gulf, China and Iran have yet to set clear targets.

The operational emissions Jaber referred to are the upstream carbon gases released during production and account for 15-20 percent of the companies carbon output.

Also known as scope 1 and 2 emissions, they do not include the gases released when end-users such as the transport industry or factories burn their fuel products.

Jaber urged the producers also to accelerate an industry-wide commitment to reach near zero methane emissions by 2030.

Methane is a potent greenhouse gas and escapes in large volumes from gas fields and pipelines.

If we do this, that takes care of a massive proportion of scope 1 and 2 emissions, he said.

Jaber repeated his warning that energy demand will continue to rise, forcing producers to massively scale up clean energies while also sustaining socio-economic development. 

He reiterated his support for solutions such as carbon capture a warming-reduction method that climate advocates caution is too far from being deployed at scale to make much difference in reaching targets.

The post UAE climate chair urges oil firms to slash emissions appeared first on Iraqi News.

Colombo The snaking queues for food and fuel that crisscrossed Sri Lanka last year have given way to a different kind of line people scrambling for travel documents to flee their bankrupt island.

What we see as normalcy is a mirage, customer care executive Gayan Jayewardena, 43, told AFP while queueing at a government office for a passport for his baby daughter.

The situation is not getting better, said Jayewardena, whose wife and two older daughters already have their papers.

When we consider it from the point of our children, it is better to leave. We want to migrate to a country like New Zealand.

The South Asian nations 22 million people suffered desperate shortages of essentials in 2022 after the government ran out of dollars to finance imports, including life-saving medicines.

Months of protests led to the storming of then-president Gotabaya Rajapaksas palace on July 9 last year.

His successor Ranil Wickremesinghe doubled taxes and cut subsidies, two highly unpopular moves.

The new government may have restored supplies, but at sometimes three times the previous price.

Wickremesinghe secured a $2.9 billion bailout from the International Monetary Fund in March and expects a recovery next year, but many in the country are not so optimistic.

Trying to leave

Software engineer Maduranga, 38, who uses one name, said the high living costs and taxes prompted him to consider migrating to Australia.

The cost is going high, every day it is going higher, but the salary amount is the same, Maduranga said. Companies are not increasing the salaries, so thats why we are trying to leave.

At the foreign employment bureau, where Sri Lankans must register before taking up jobs abroad, numbers surged from 122,000 in 2021 to a record 311,000 last year.

For the first five months of this year, the bureau recorded around 122,000 people leaving the same as in all of 2021 but officials believe many others also left on tourist visas to seek work in the Middle East and elsewhere in Asia.

Last year, the number of people applying for passports more than doubled from over 382,500 in 2021, when the economy grew by 3.3 percent, to a record 911,689 passports in 2022, when the economy contracted 7.8 percent.

The trend has continued.

This year through May, 433,000 overseas travel documents have been issued, according to the Immigration and Emigration Department.

An online system was launched in June to cope with the swelling demand, but those urgently seeking passports must apply in person.

My number was 976 and I think after me there would have been about 500 people, said Damitha Hitihamu, 51, after handing in his papers to renew his passport in a day.

I never expec...

Beijing US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen begins a full day of meetings in Beijing including with Premier Li Qiang on Friday, as Washington seeks to steady the tense relationship between the worlds top two economies.

Yellens four-day trip is her first to China as Treasury chief, and she is the second high-ranking US official to visit the country after Secretary of State Antony Blinken last month.

Washington and Beijing have traded barbs over a host of issues including export controls, human rights and national security.

And China has stepped up its response to US curbs on its access to chips and, ahead of Yellens trip, unveiled new export controls on metals key to semiconductor manufacturing.

But Beijing has struck an optimistic tone about Yellens visit, with Chinas finance ministry saying Friday it would serve to strengthen communication and exchange between the two countries.

The nature of China-US economic and trade relations is mutually beneficial and win-win, and there is no winner in a trade war or decoupling and breaking chains, an official said in a statement.

And in a tweet after arriving in Beijing on Thursday, Yellen said that although the United States would protect its national security when needed, this trip presents an opportunity to communicate and avoid miscommunication or misunderstanding.

The United States does not expect specific policy breakthroughs over the next few days, but hopes for frank and productive conversations that can pave the way for future talks, a Treasury official told reporters.

But, they said, especially if theyre things that we may disagree about, its even more important that were talking.

Healthy economic competition-

On Friday, Yellen is due to meet with Chinese Premier Li Qiang at the Great Hall of the People, where she will have a chance to discuss the economic relationship, raise concerns and find opportunities for collaboration, the official added.

She will also meet her former counterpart ex-vice premier Liu He with whom she is set to trade views on the status of the US and Chinese economies, as well as on the international outlook.

Yellen is expected to see representatives of American firms in China as well, at a session hosted by the American Chamber of Commerce.

That session will allow her to hear about the challenges that US companies face while doing business in China, and she is expected to stress the concept of healthy economic competition that involves addressing what Washington deems unfair practices.

These include barriers to market access and actions targeting US firms.

And she faces an uphill struggle in persuading officials in Beijing that US actions such as tightened export curbs on high-e...

Hong Kong Stocks tumbled again Friday in Asia after another round of strong US data reinforced expectations the Federal Reserve will resume its interest rate hikes as officials wrestle with stubbornly high inflation.

After a strong start to the week fuelled by signs that US prices were stabilising, regional markets have taken a turn for the worse as traders come to terms with an extended period of central bank policy tightening.

Minutes from the Feds last meeting showed officials plan to ramp up borrowing costs again this month, having paused for the first time in more than a year in June, dealing a blow to hopes it was at or near the end of its cycle.

That came as Chinese figures confirmed the worlds number two economy had run out of steam, just months after the lifting of painful zero-Covid measures.

And equity-buying sentiment was hammered again on Thursday by news that US private firms created twice as many jobs as expected in June, while the crucial services sector saw solid growth.

The readings pointed to an economy that remained in rude health, even after 10 straight interest rate hikes, and analysts said it solidified bets on a July hike at least.

Treasuries yields spiked on the news, with two-year notes just below five percent, having hit a 16-year high at one point, while 10-year bonds passed four percent. The higher rate for shorter-term Treasuries is seen as a signal of a looming recession.

Investors are now girding themselves for the release later Friday of the closely watched non-farm payrolls figures, which are used as a guide to the state of the economy and could provide some clues about the Feds plans.

All three main indexes on Wall Street sank, while European equities suffered their worst day since March during the US regional banking crisis.

And Asia fared no better, with Hong Kong losing more than one percent along with Sydney, Seoul and Wellington while Tokyo, Shanghai, Singapore, Taipei, Manila and Jakarta also dropped.

SPI Asset Managements Stephen Innes warned the longer the data points to a strong economy, the longer the Fed will turn the screws.

As the growth trajectory of the US economy improves, it becomes increasingly more challenging to envision what would cause the Fed to CUT rates anytime soon, as many market participants have been anticipating, he said in a note.

If the US achieves a soft landing of its economy especially if growth reaccelerates and inflation remains mute the Fed may be more likely to simply pause its rate hiking cycle until it is sure that inflation does not accompany any growth re-acceleration.

Traders are keeping tabs on China, where US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is on a four-day visit for talks with top policy officials aimed at smoothing strained ties between the economic superpowers.

She begins a full day of...

Columbia Taking the stage at a South Carolina factory for his latest Bidenomics speech, Joe Biden gave the base of the apparently malfunctioning podium a light kick. The real kicking, he reserved for Republican critics of his economic plan.

Ahead of the 2024 election, Biden is seeking to turn the tables by stealing Republicans traditional talking points on the economy, boasting that he is now the pro-growth president with a multitude of newly opened manufacturing plants to prove his point.

He took that message Thursday to deep pro-Republican territory in Columbia, South Carolina, where he toured a factory churning out high-tech solar panel components.

Investment is working, and factories are being built, and jobs are being created in rural America, the heartland, all across America, in communities that have been left out and hollowed out, he said.

Biden seeks to win over voters from the working and middle class in those hollowed out communities, but he has a lot of work to do. Polls do not show the message has got through.

In fact, majorities of Americans tell pollsters that they trust former President Donald Trump more on the economy than Biden.

Biden suggested that he is more deserving of that trust, and he rattled off statistics to lay out what he gleefully calls Bidenomics.

Unemployment has remained consistently under four percent for the longest period in half a century, painful inflation rates from the aftermath of the Covid pandemic are slowly but steadily receding, and job creation is booming.

Crucially, Biden told workers at the plant, where solar firm Enphase Energy is collaborating with manufacturer Flex Ltd, none of this is happening by accident.

All the activity, he says, is fueled by historic government investment and incentive packages that he got passed against expectations through the nearly evenly split Congress earlier in his presidency.

For example, Enphase Energy and Flex Ltd are using tax incentives from Bidens mammoth Inflation Reduction Act to juice some $60 million in investments, including 600 new jobs in South Carolina.

And thats a blip in the bigger picture.

Since I took office, we have attracted a half a trillion dollars $497 billion in private investment in American manufacturing, both here and around the world.  Its historic, and its Bidenomics in action, Biden said.

Ribbing Republicans

The twist to Bidens message is that Republicans nearly all opposed his giant public spending plans and now hes coming back to rib them.

Mocking Republicans who tried to stop the bills yet seem more than happy to see the resulting investments reach their states, Biden said: All those members of Congress who voted against it sud...

Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) The Iraqi Minister of Foreign Affairs, Fuad Hussein, met on Wednesday with the Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs, Hakan Fidan, where they discussed bilateral cooperation and strategic coordination between the two countries regarding regional and international issues, according to a statement issued by the Iraqi Foreign Ministry.

The meeting between both ministers took place on the sidelines of their participation in the ministerial meetings of the Non-Aligned Movement held in Baku from July 56, 2023.

The two ministers discussed the latest developments in the security situation in the region and efforts to combat terrorism.

Hussein stressed the importance of coordination between Baghdad and Ankara regarding issues of common concern, as well as the need to ease tension in the region and strengthen security and stability.

The Iraqi Foreign Minister indicated that Iraq is preparing for the Baghdad Conference for Cooperation and Partnership in its third edition, which will be held soon in Baghdad.

The Baghdad Conference for Cooperation and Partnership is expected to address issues related to Iraqs neighboring countries and provide solutions aiming to maintain regional and international peace and security.

Both sides also talked about the issue of the Al-Hol refugee camp in Syria, the deportation of refugees, and the challenges related to this issue.

The post Iraq and Turkey discuss regional security, combating terrorism appeared first on Iraqi News.

Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) The Iraqi Security Media Cell (ISMC) mentioned in a statement on Thursday that Iraqi warplanes launched an air strike targeting ISIS terrorists in Diyala governorate, the Iraqi News Agency (INA) reported.

The air raid was carried out based on accurate intelligence information, according to the ISMC.

The statement elaborated that the Iraqi security forces, in cooperation with other Iraqi security agencies, continue to clamp down on remnants of ISIS terrorists.

The statement also indicated that the Iraqi National Security Agency provided the Iraqi Air Force with accurate information about an important target, pointing out that the operation was carried out under the supervision of the Joint Operations Command.

Following the air strike that was carried out by Iraqi F-16 fighter jets, security forces searched the targeted site and found two dead bodies, a handgun and a hand grenade.

Iraq announced in late 2017 the liberation of all its territories from the grip of ISIS, but the authorities are constantly launching security operations to pursue remnants of the terrorist group that carry out attacks from time to time in the country.

The post Iraqi fighter jets destroy ISIS hideout in northeastern Iraq appeared first on Iraqi News.

Tamassit Sporting a white cap and apron, Rachid Ibersiene bustles around vats at his dairy in Algerias Atlas Mountains where he has brought the tradition of artisanal cheesemaking back from Switzerland.

We started with a butane gas bottle and stove, the cheesemonger said, alluding to the growth of his factory since it opened.

In a matter of 15 years, Ibersienes Tamgout cheese a blend of the Swiss Gruyere and Dutch Gouda styles has become a source of honour for the north African country.

Both Algerians and foreigners have taken a keen interest in the product, which has a unique taste as it draws on age-old European traditions but is made from Algerian milk.

We were inspired by Vacherin Fribourgeois, adapting the entire tradition to Algerian milk, which is different from Swiss milk, Ibersiene said, referring to a semi-hard Swiss cheese.

Algerian milk is less uniform and somewhat more organic because the farms are smaller and more diversified. In Switzerland, you dont find farmers with only two or three dairy cows.

Our cheese has a more nuanced taste, the 57-year-old added, describing it as typically Algerian.

Born to a working-class family in Algiers, Ibersiene studied petroleum engineering but struggled to find a job.

After moving to Italy, he tried his luck at filmmaking before relocating again to Switzerland, where he spent 16 years working as a computer consultant.

Thats where the idea of the cheese factory came from, he recalled.

To relax on weekends, I would go up to the mountain chalets in Gruyere where many cheesemakers are located.

Source of pride

In 2003, he moved to the area to learn the basics of Swiss cheese production.

Three years later, he returned home to set up his own dairy factory in Tamassit at the foot of Mount Tamgout from which his cheese takes its name.

Unable to secure financial backing, Ibersiene used his life savings to fund the project, which required 10 million dinars (over $73,000) in equipment.

Aided by five employees, Ibersiene spends his days inspecting the cellars where the wheels of cheese, which need to be regularly rubbed and turned, are stored.

The maturation period of Tamgout varies from one month to two years, depending on the taste of the customers, he said.

Our cheese is made from raw cows milk, without any food additives. It is untreated. We use natural lactic ferments.

He receives deliveries of up to 1,000 litres (265 gallons) of cows milk that produce nearly 50 kilograms (110 pounds) of cheese daily.

The factory began turning a profit in 2018.

Initially, Tamgout cheese featuring the slogan a Swiss idea, an Algerian c...

Colombo A Sri Lankan jail witnessed a rare moment of accord last year when both prisoners and guards clamoured to greet its newest inmate: the man who toppled the island nations president.

Student leader Wasantha Mudalige remains lionised by many for channelling public anger at an unprecedented economic crisis into a movement that shook the foundations of Sri Lankas political system.

At the height of last summers unrest, he helped spearhead a siege of government buildings in Colombo that saw once-loved premier Gotabaya Rajapaksa chased into a humiliating exile.

The 29-year-old, whose cherubic face belies his history of fierce confrontations with riot police, spent months behind bars on terror charges for his efforts.

We had a very warm welcome, Mudalige told AFP outside a court appearance in June, while recounting his arrival at jail alongside two confederates.

Even the prison guards were very supportive. They saw us as the heroes who got rid of Gota.

Mudalige said his incarceration was a necessary sacrifice in the unfinished battle to reform Sri Lankas political system.

Now free on bail, he said lingering economic woes have left Sri Lanka bristling with discontent, frustrated with its new president and ready for another revolt.

Although we got rid of Gota, we have not been able to win the system change that we demanded, Mudalige said.

We dont think the government can go on for long, he added. When you analyse the situation, there is no way the government can continue.

They had no alternative

As head of the Inter-University Students Federation (IUSF) at the time, Mudalige stood at the forefront of last years street protests.

Alongside him was a broad coalition of saffron-robed Buddhist monks, minority activists and ordinary citizens outraged by government corruption and mismanagement of the islands worsening economic tailspin.

They had no alternative but to take to the streets because they had no fuel, no food, no electricity people were dying in petrol queues, Mudalige said.

In July the IUSF and its allies laid siege to the Presidential Palace in Colombo. 

Rajapaksa, once lauded by the islands Sinhalese majority for helping crush a decades-long Tamil separatist insurgency, was forced to evacuate the residence through a secret backdoor and temporarily fled the country.

Protesters streamed through the compound, gaping at its opulent furnishings and frolicked in its pool in the revelry that followed.

Rajapaksas successor, Ranil Wickremesinghe, quickly sought to restore order by directing police to arrest the movements leaders.

Mudalige was caught in the dragnet the following month whe...

Shanghai Electric car giant Tesla is set to realise fully autonomous vehicles later this year, CEO Elon Musk said Thursday, in the billionaires latest forecast for the long-anticipated milestone.

In terms of where Tesla is at this stage, I think we are very close to achieving full self-driving without human supervision, Musk said via video link at the opening ceremony of an artificial intelligence conference in Shanghai.

This is only speculation, but I think well achieve full self-driving, maybe what you would call four or five, I think later this year, the billionaire added, referring to two of the most advanced levels of autonomous driving technology.

The mercurial entrepreneur and Twitter owner admitted that he had been wrong in previous predictions on this timeline, but added: I feel like were closer to it than we ever have been.

Musk has missed his own deadlines for a fully autonomous vehicle and Teslas driver-assistance technology has provoked regulatory probes in the United States.

China is the worlds biggest electric vehicle market and Tesla announced in April it would build a second massive factory in Shanghai.

His appearance at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai marks his latest effort to maintain close links to China, following a visit to the country in May.

Electric vehicles make up a quarter of car sales in China, the worlds largest car market, and dozens of new models from domestic and Western brands were unveiled in April at the countrys first auto show since Covid restrictions were lifted.

Tesla reported a drop in first-quarter earnings this year, with the company undertaking a series of price cuts in the face of competition from other automakers.

The post Musk predicts Tesla self-driving cars later this year appeared first on Iraqi News.

Hong Kong Markets fell again in most of Asia on Thursday as traders resigned themselves to more US interest rate hikes after minutes from the Federal Reserves June meeting showed officials felt more needed to be done to rein in inflation.

The notes added to worries about the global economic outlook after another round of depressed data out of China highlighted the tough work facing authorities as they try to kickstart growth after years of zero-Covid-induced pain.

Traders are also awaiting the release of key US jobs data over the next two days as well as Treasury Secretary Janet Yellens four-day visit to Beijing that aims to stabilise tense relations between the superpowers.

The Fed minutes showed policymakers were split on the decision to stand pat last month after 10 straight increases, surprising some commentators and dealing a blow to hopes the bank was nearing the end of its tightening cycle.

Some participants indicated that they favoured raising the target range for the federal funds rate 25 basis points at this meeting or that they could have supported such a proposal, they read. 

Those backing an increase cited a tight jobs market, stronger-than-expected economic activity and few signs that inflation was on the path to their two percent target. 

In the end, however, all 11 voting members on the policy committee supported the pause, though the minutes said almost all agreed more tightening will likely be needed this year.

It was a little surprising given that the decision was sold as unanimous from Fed officials, said Lindsey Piegza, of Stifel Nicolaus & Co.

Its pretty clear that there was a divergence of opinions, with some officials pretty clearly giving some reluctance for a one-month pause.

And National Australia Banks Rodrigo Catril added: It seems that the hawks were persuaded to toe the line in exchange for the prospects of further tightening later in the year.

The minutes also show that this bias for further hikes is fuelled by an overriding concern over elevated price pressures and a tight labour market.

Others warned that a cut in borrowing costs, which had been keeping investor sentiment buoyed earlier in the year, was a long way off and officials would likely keep rates elevated for some time.

While growth remains healthy for now, the prospect of even more rate hikes has stoked worries that the Fed could tip the economy into recession, weighing on risk sentiment.

All three main indexes on Wall Street ended in the red as investors returned from the Independence Day holiday.

And Asia followed suit, extending losses from the previous day.

Hong Kong and Tokyo led the selling, with Sydney, Singapore, Seoul, Taipei and Manila also down. However, Shanghai, Wellington and Jakarta eked out gains.

Traders are now k...

Jerusalem Military group Kataib Hezbollah is holding an Israeli-Russian scholar who had been missing in Iraq for months, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed.

Elizabeth Tsurkov is still alive and we hold Iraq responsible for her safety and well-being, according to a statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus office.

According to the statement, Tsurkov had traveled to Iraq on her Russian passport at her own initiative pursuant to work on her doctorate and academic research on behalf of Princeton University in the US.

She had arrived in Baghdad at the beginning of December 2022, an anonymous Western diplomat stationed in Iraq told the AFP.

The Iraqi intelligence source claimed that Tsurkov was kidnapped while she was exiting a cafe in the Karrada district of the Iraqi capital.

The same source also provided AFP with a surveillance camera footage from inside the caf showing a young woman leaving with a male.

The post Israeli-Russian woman missing in Iraq appeared first on Iraqi News.

Washington US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is due to arrive in Beijing on Thursday, kicking off a high-level visit aimed at improving communication and stabilizing the tense relationship between the worlds top two economies.

Yellens trip through Sunday will be her first to China as treasury secretary, and comes just weeks after Secretary of State Antony Blinken paid a rare visit to the country.

While Yellen had previously expressed her intent to visit China, these plans were cast in doubt as tensions surged earlier this year after the United States said it detected a Chinese spy balloon and shot it down.

The latest travel plans will see her seek to expand lines of correspondence, avoid miscommunications and widen collaboration on issues like the global economy, climate change and debt distress, according to a Treasury official.

On such a trip which comes amid concerns over Chinas economic recovery and US interest rate hikes officials on both sides generally have a chance to speak about their countries growth outlooks as well.

The fact that shes spending four days in Beijing, given all of her other domestic and international pressures, underscores the importance she is attaching to this visit, Asia Society Policy Institute vice president Wendy Cutler told AFP.

While each side will have a long list of complaints to raise with the other, with little flexibility to adjust their policies, the visit could allow Yellen to lay groundwork for future collaboration, Cutler added.

Reframing relations

Yellens trip continues an effort by the United States to reframe US-China ties diplomatically and in other areas, said Lindsay Gorman, senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States.

Its about managing the new realm of strategic competition, she said, noting that Yellen has pointed to competition only so far as it implicates security and values like human rights.

The message-bearing could be the most important and most tangible piece of a potential Yellen trip, Gorman told AFP.

With technology export controls and competitive measures dominating the economic policy agenda now, I think theres a real role to explain and communicate what the purpose of these measures really is, she said.

Underscoring the challenges Yellen will face, the Wall Street Journal reported that the US administration is mulling restricting Chinese companies access to US cloud-computing services provided by companies like Amazon and Microsoft. 

Ahead of the trip, Beijing appears to have adopted reciprocal actions such as new export controls on metals key to semiconductor manufacturing, underscoring that a shift in relations could take time.

But Yellen may be best positioned to build bridges with China on shared global...

Miami Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo has had surgery on his left knee, the team confirmed Wednesday, leaving the basketball stars participation for Greece in Augusts FIBA World Cup in doubt.

He had a routine surgery on his left knee, and it went great, Bucks head coach Adrian Griffin said on Wednesday.

Everything went as planned, and we expect him back ready to go in training camp, he added.

The Bucks are expected to begin their camp in early- to mid-September with the World Cup starting on August 25 and running until September 10.

The Athletic cited a league source as saying that Antetokounmpos availability for Greece is in question after what it described as surgery to clean up loose cartilage in his left knee.

The two-time NBA Most Valuable Player suffered a back injury during game one of the Buckss first-round playoff series against the Miami Heat and did not return until game four. The Bucks, the number one seed in the East, were upset in five by Miami in the best-of-seven series.

The World Cup will be held in the Philippines, Japan and Indonesia.

Greece has been drawn in group C with the United States, New Zealand and Jordan.

Losing Antetokounmpo would be a huge blow to Greeces hopes in the tournament.

He was top scorer in last years EuroBasket tournament, averaging 29.3 points although his team went out in the round-of-16 to the Czech Republic.

Antetokounmpo was part of the Greece team at the 2019 World Cup which failed to get out of the group stage.

The 28-year-olds older brother and Bucks team-mate Thanasis, is also part of the Greece squad along with his younger brother Kostas, who plays for Greek club Panathinaikos.

The post Giannis undergoes surgery, FIBA World Cup in doubt appeared first on Iraqi News.

Washington Facebook behemoth Meta officially will launch Threads, its text-based rival to Twitter, on Wednesday but its release in Europe has been delayed over regulatory concerns.

Threads will be the biggest rival yet to Elon Musk-owned Twitter, which has seen a series of potential competitors emerge but not yet replace one of social medias most iconic companies, despite its epic struggles.

A holding web page said the launch of Mark Zuckerbergs Threads was advanced to 7:00 pm Eastern time (2300 GMT) after it was initailly planned for 1400 GMT on Thursday.

The app will be introduced as a spin-off of Instagram, giving it a built-in audience of more than two billion users and thus sparing it the challenge of starting from scratch.

Its as simple as that: if an Instagram user with a large number of followers such as Kardashian or a Bieber or a Messi begins posting on Threads regularly, a new platform could quickly thrive, strategic financial analyst Brian Wieser said on Substack.

Zuckerberg is widely understood to be taking advantage of Musks chaotic ownership of Twitter to push out the new product, which the company hopes will become the new communication channel for celebrities, companies and politicians.

The two men are known to be bitter rivals and have even offered to meet each other in a fighting cage to wrestle it out.

This came after a Meta executive reportedly told employees that Threads would be like Twitter, but sanely run.

Under Musk, Twitter has seen content moderation reduced to a minimum with glitches and rash decisions tarnishing the sites reputation with celebrities and major advertisers, many of whom have fled.

Musk hired advertising executive Linda Yaccarino to steady the ship, but she has not been spared his whimsy.

The Tesla tycoon said last week that he was cutting access to Twitter in what he called an temporary measure to ward off AI companies from scraping the site to train their technology.

Musk then angered Twitters most devoted aficionados by declaring that access to its TweetDeck product which allows users to view a fast flow of tweets at once would be for paying customers only.

Quality, not quantity

Threads owner Meta has its legion of critics too, especially in Europe, and despite Instagrams massive user base, they could slow the sites development.

The company formerly known as Facebook is criticized mainly for its handling of personal data its quintessential bloodline for targeted ads that help it rake in billions of dollars every quarter in profits.

According to a source close to the matter, regulatory concerns will delay the launch of Threads in the European Union, where Meta will be subject to a new law called the Digital Markets Act (DMA), which se...