BEIRUT: Turkey-backed Syrian rebels seized a number of villages and towns from Kurdish-led forces in northern Syria on Sunday amid Turkish airstrikes and shelling that killed at least 35 people, mostly civilians, according to rebels and a monitoring group.
Turkey sent tanks across the border to help Syrian rebels drive the Daesh group out of the frontier town of Jarablus last week in a dramatic escalation of its involvement in the Syrian civil war.
The operation, labeled Euphrates Shield, is also aimed at pushing back US-allied Kurdish forces. The fighting pits a NATO ally against a US-backed proxy that is the most effective ground force battling IS in Syria.
Turkey’s military said its warplanes killed 25 Kurdish “terrorists” and destroyed five buildings used by the fighters in response to attacks on advancing Turkish-backed rebels in the Jarablus area.
A Turkish soldier was killed by a Kurdish rocket attack late Saturday, the first such fatality in the offensive, now in its fifth day.
Various factions of the Turkey-backed Syrian rebels said Sunday they had seized at least four villages and one town from Kurdish-led forces south of Jarablus. One of the villages to change hands was Amarneh, where clashes had been fiercest. Rebels posted pictures from inside the village.
Ankara is deeply suspicious of the Syrian Kurdish militia that dominates the US-backed Syria Democratic Forces, viewing it as an extension of the Kurdish insurgency raging in southeastern Turkey. Turkish leaders have vowed to drive both IS and the Kurdish People’s Protection Units, or YPG, away from the border.
The SDF crossed the Euphrates River and drove Daesh out of Manbij, a key supply hub just south of Jarablus, earlier this month. Both Turkey and the United States have ordered the YPG to withdraw to the east bank of the river. YPG leaders say they have, but their units play an advisory role to the SDF and it is not clear if any of their forces remain west of the Euphrates.
Turkey is part of the US-led coalition fighting Daesh, but the airstrikes that began Saturday marked the first time it has targeted Kurdish-led forces in Syria.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the bombing killed at least 20 civilians and four Kurdish-led fighters in Beir Khoussa, a village about nine miles (15 kilometers) south of Jarablus, and another 15 in a village to the west.
ANHA, the news agency of the Kurdish semi-autonomous areas, said Beir Khoussa has “reportedly lost all its residents.”
SDF spokesman Shervan Darwish said the airstrikes and shelling started overnight and continued Sunday along the front line, killing many civilians in Beir Khoussa and nearby areas. He said the bombing also targeted Amarneh village. He said 50 Turkish tanks were taking part in the offensive.
Syrian state news agency SANA reported that 20 civilians were killed and 50 wounded in Turkish artillery shelling and airstrikes, calling it Turkish “encroachment” on Syrian sovereignty under the pretext of fighting Daesh. Turkey is a leading backer of the rebels fighting to overthrow Syrian President Bashar Assad. But both Ankara and Damascus share concerns over Kurdish ambitions for autonomy.
An Associated Press reporter in the Turkish border town of Karkamis spotted at least three Turkish jets flying into Syria amid heavy Turkish shelling from inside Syrian territory on Sunday morning.
Also Sunday, government warplanes renewed their air campaign against the besieged neighborhood of Al-Waer in the central city of Homs. An activist in the neighborhood Bebars Al-Talawy said at least a dozen airstrikes were launched Sunday, killing one person.
The neighborhood came under a grueling airstrike campaign a day earlier, including incendiary bombs that left two children, a brother and sister, badly charred. Images of other children shaking as doctors tried to treat them for the burns were posted on social media sites. The district’s hospital was bombed and made non-operational earlier this month.
Human Rights Watch announced recently that it had documented the use of incendiary weapons, which burn their victims and start fires, in at least 18 different instances between June and August in rebel-held areas. The group blamed the Russian and Syrian joint military operations room for the use of such weapons in violation of international law.
The neighborhood, home to nearly 75,000 people, has been under siege since March and has been one area that UN agencies have reported difficult to access. An aid convoy reached the area on Aug.25.
According to local residents, the escalation follows recent threats by soldiers at checkpoints that the government’s patience was running out with the district, the last rebel holdout in the city.
It also comes after the evacuation of Daraya, a Damascus suburb, following a deal struck with the government after a grueling bombing campaign and a tight siege.
The Homs Local Council appealed to the UN envoy to Syria to negotiate a truce for Al-Waer, condemning the government’s “siege policy” that aims to force residents and local fighters to surrender.
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Associated Press writer Zeynep Bilginsoy in Istanbul and Mucahit Ceylan in Karkamis, Turkey contributed to this report.
Syrian rebels advance on Kurds as Turkish strikes kill 35
Syrian rebels advance on Kurds as Turkish strikes kill 35
Palestinian truckers fear for safety after aid convoy for Gaza wrecked
“Yesterday there was coordination for 70 trucks of aid to go the Gaza Strip,” said Waseem Al-Jabari, Head of the Hebron Food Trade Association
HEBRON, West Bank: Palestinian hauliers said on Tuesday they feared for the security of aid convoys to Gaza, a day after Israeli protesters wrecked trucks carrying humanitarian supplies bound for the enclave, which is facing a severe hunger crisis.
Footage circulated on social media showed at least one burning truck while other images showed trucks wrecked and stripped of their loads, which lay strewn over the road near Tarqumiya checkpoint outside Hebron in the occupied West Bank.
“Yesterday there was coordination for 70 trucks of aid to go the Gaza Strip,” said Waseem Al-Jabari, Head of the Hebron Food Trade Association.
“While the trucks were uploaded with products at the crossing settlers attacked the trucks and they destroyed the products and set fire in trucks,” he said, saying Israeli soldiers had stood by as the attack took place.
Monday’s incident was claimed by a group calling itself Order 9, which said it had acted to stop supplies reaching Hamas and accusing the Israeli government of giving “gifts” to the Islamist group.
No comment was available from the Israeli military. The Israeli police said the incident, in which a number of people were arrested, was being investigated.
The violent protest drew condemnation from Washington, which has urged Israel to step up deliveries of aid into Gaza to alleviate a growing humanitarian crisis in the enclave, seven months since the start of the war.
British Foreign Minister David Cameron also condemned the “appalling” incident, saying Israel must call the attackers to account.
Palestinians and human rights groups have long accused the Israeli military and police of deliberately failing to intervene when settlers attack Palestinians in the West Bank.
Adel Amer, a member of the West Bank-based hauliers’ union, said around 15 trucks had been damaged by Israeli protesters who beat some drivers and caused about $2 million worth of damage.
“The drivers are now refusing to take goods to Gaza because they’re afraid,” he said. “It’s a disaster here because of the settlers.”
Even when the military was present, the convoys were still at risk, he said. “The army says we cannot do anything to the settlers.”
EU ‘concerned’ by Tunisia arrests
- Tunisian authorities ordered Sunday the arrest of two political commentators over critical comments
- Lawyer Sonia Dahmani was arrested late Saturday after criticizing the state of Tunisia on television
BRUSSELS: The European Union on Tuesday expressed concern over a string of arrests of civil society figures in Tunisia.
Tunisian lawyers on Monday protested and launched a nationwide strike over the arrest of a lawyer and political commentator in a weekend police raid.
Tunisian authorities ordered Sunday the arrest of two political commentators over critical comments, a day after security forces stormed the bar association and took a third pundit into custody.
Lawyer Sonia Dahmani was arrested late Saturday after criticizing the state of Tunisia on television.
“The European Union has followed with concern recent developments in Tunisia, in particular the concomitant arrests of several civil society figures, journalists and political actors,” an EU spokeswoman said.
“Freedoms of expression and association, as well as the independence of the judiciary, are guaranteed by the Tunisian Constitution and constitute the basis of our partnership.”
The clampdown is the latest sign of the authorities tightening control over the country since President Kais Saied began ruling by decree after a sweeping power grab in 2021.
Concern over the situation in Tunisia did not prevent the EU last year from inking a major cooperation deal with the North African state aimed at curbing the flow of migrants across the Mediterranean.
Criminal gangs, profiteers thrive in Gaza as cash shortage worsens misery
- After more than 7 months of Israeli bombardment, just a handful of ATMs remain operational in the strip, most of the them in the southern city of Rafah
- Now residents say Israel’s offensive in Rafah has dried up supplies again and stoked prices
CAIRO/GENEVA/BERLIN: A shortage of banknotes is gripping Gaza, fueling criminal gangs and profiteering, after Israel has blocked imports of cash and most banks in the enclave have been damaged or destroyed during the war, according to residents, aid workers and banking sources.
After more than 7 months of Israeli bombardment, just a handful of ATMs remain operational in the strip, most of the them in the southern city of Rafah, where some 1.4 million Palestinians are sheltering. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has ordered civilians to evacuate parts of the southern city, sparking fears of a looming offensive. Its tanks entered residential districts there on Tuesday.
Supplies of basic goods had returned to some markets in April and early May for the first time in months after Israel ceded to international pressure to let in more aid trucks amid famine warnings.
But residents and aid workers say that many people haven’t had the cash to purchase them. Now residents say Israel’s offensive in Rafah has dried up supplies again and stoked prices.
Hundreds, sometimes thousands, of desperate people crowd outside ATMs, often waiting days for access. Armed gangs sometimes demand a fee to provide priority access, exploiting the absence of Palestinian police, three Western aid workers and seven residents told Reuters.
Abu Ahmed, 45, a resident of Rafah, said he had waited for as long as seven days and became so frustrated that he turned for help to gang members, who are sometimes armed with knives and guns.
“I paid 300 shekels ($80) of my salary to one of them for accessing the ATM and getting my cash,” said Abu Ahmed, who asked that his last name not be used for fear of reprisals. He earns 3,500 shekels per month as a public servant.
The three Western aid workers described the gangs as improvised groups that have sprung up across the Strip up as desperation has grown.
As of May 13, only 5 branches and 7 ATMs remain operational in the strip, primarily in Rafah, according to the Palestine Economic Policy Research Institute, a non-profit organization headquartered in the West Bank. Before the war, Gaza had 56 bank branches and 91 ATMs.
The conflict erupted after an Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Palestinian Islamist militant group Hamas, in which some 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 taken hostage. Israel’s assault on Gaza, aimed at destroying Hamas and returning the hostages, has killed at least 35,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s health ministry.
The Palestinian economy runs on the Israeli shekel. Gaza’s financial system is almost completely dependent on Israel, which must approve major transfers and the movement of cash into the enclave, bankers said.
Israel has blocked cash imports to Gaza since the start of the war in October, according to the Palestine Monetary Authority (PMA) and the Association of Banks in Palestine (ABP), a non-profit based in the West Bank city of Ramallah.
Adnan Alfaleet, the Gaza district manager of Palestine Islamic Bank, which operates the biggest Islamic banking network in the Palestinian Territories, said his bank has no cash left in Gaza.
“We reached the point of complete lack of liquidity now. It can’t get worse,” he said.
The Israeli central bank did not respond to questions about whether transfers had been blocked. It said there were no Israeli banks in Gaza and shekels had circulated there in the past because of trade with and Palestinian workers in Israel.
COGAT, an Israeli Defense Ministry agency tasked with coordinating aid deliveries into the Palestinian territories, did not respond to Reuters’ questions.
POLICE KILLED
Ismail Al-Thawabta, the director of the Hamas-run government media office, said the Palestinian police were trying to protect ATM machines, despite coming under fire from Israeli forces.
A Hamas official, who declined to be named, said police were keeping a low profile and only making surprise raids or patrols at certain locations after officers had been targeted in Israeli strikes.
In February, the top US diplomat involved in humanitarian assistance to Gaza said Israeli forces had killed Palestinian police protecting a UN convoy.
The IDF did not respond to a request for comment on whether its forces have targeted police officers. Reuters could not determine how many police officers have been killed during the war.
Residents said some merchants are profiteering from the shortage. Some money exchange store owners, who can cash Western Union transfers, and even some pharmacists who have credit card machines, were charging heft commissions for access to money, according to two sources.
Azmi Radwan, a union representative of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA, said some merchants were charging its staff in Gaza City and the north commission of 20 percent or 30 percent to cash their salaries for them, in the absence of banks.
“This is very dangerous,” he said. “A quarter of the salary that is supposed to feed one’s children is going to these merchants.”
UNRWA employs roughly 13,000 people in Gaza.
Sometimes money changers, after deducting a fee, will then say there are no shekels available and make payments in dollars at an unfavorable exchange rate, according to resident Abu Muhey, who also asked not to be identified by his full name for security reasons.
STUCK IN VAULTS
Meanwhile, hundreds of millions of shekels are stranded inside bank vaults in northern Gaza due to a lack of armored vehicles and fear of looting, according to three UN and banking sources.
Bashar Odeh Yasin, director general of Association of Banks in Palestine (ABP), said the situation remains too unsafe for bank employees or international bodies to transfer the money.
“There’s a real problem in transferring cash from northern Gaza to the south and in bringing in cash from outside the Gaza Strip,” he said.
The number of bank notes in circulation has been further diminished by wear and tear as well as people taking them out when they leave, residents said.
Essential goods such as medicine remain chronically scarce in the enclave, which is also plagued by lengthy power shortages and lack of fuel.
The World Food Programme warned in April of the risk of famine in northern parts of Gaza. Israel this week opened a third crossing to allow more humanitarian aid into the north, but it has shut two checkpoints in the south, including the vital Rafah crossing into Egypt, halting aid deliveries there.
Monday saw fierce fighting in north and south Gaza. Efforts by Egyptian, Qatari and US mediators to secure a ceasefire have so far failed.
“There’s more food, which is provided, but there is definitely a lack of cash for people to buy it,” said Rik Peeperkorn, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) representative to the Palestinian territory.
Many people were trading canned food or other aid for items they were missing, or selling them for cash, residents told Reuters.
Aya, a resident of Gaza City who was displaced first to Rafah and then central Gaza by Israeli operations, received ten blankets in aid packages. As her family already had some, she sold 8 of the blankets to buy her sisters and brothers chocolate and Nescafe, she said.
“Despite the misery, I tried to make them feel happy,” she said.
Norway aims to quadruple aid to Palestinians as famine looms
- “The urgent need of aid in Gaza is enormous after seven months of war,” Norway’s Minister of International Development, Anne Beathe Tvinnereim, said
- Norway intends to dedicate 0.98 percent of its gross national income to development aid this year
OSLO: The Norwegian government Tuesday proposed 1 billion kroner ($92.5 million) in aid to Palestinians this year as humanitarian agencies warn of a looming famine in the Gaza Strip.
Figures in the revised budget presented on Tuesday, show a roughly quadrupling of the 258 million kroner provided in the initial finance bill adopted last year.
“The urgent need of aid in Gaza is enormous after seven months of war,” Norway’s Minister of International Development, Anne Beathe Tvinnereim, said in a statement.
“The food situation in particular is critical and there is a risk of famine,” she added, criticizing “an entirely man-made crisis” and an equally “critical” situation in the West Bank.
According to the draft budget, Norway intends to dedicate 0.98 percent of its gross national income to development aid this year.
The figures are still subject to change because the center-left government, a minority in parliament, has to negotiate with other parties to get the texts adopted.
For his part, Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide again warned Israel against a large-scale military operation in Rafah, a city on the southern edge of the besieged Gaza Strip.
“It would be catastrophic for the population. Providing life-saving humanitarian support would become much more difficult and more dangerous,” Barth Eide said.
He added: “The more than 1 million who have sought refuge in Rafah have already fled multiple times from famine, death and horror. They are now being told to move again, but no place in Gaza is safe.”
As part of the response to the unprecedented Hamas attack on Israeli soil on October 7, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he is determined to launch an operation in Rafah, which he considers to be the last major stronghold of the militant organization.
Many in Rafah have been displaced multiple times during the war, and are now heading back north after Israeli forces called for the evacuation of the city’s eastern past.
On May 7, Israeli tanks and troops entered the city’s east sending desperate Palestinians to flee north.
According to the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), “almost 450,000” people have been displaced from Rafah since May 6.
UN says informed Israel of vehicle fatally hit in Gaza
- The employee killed was an Indian national, UN spokesman Rolando Gomez told a media briefing
- A second UN DSS staff member who was in the vehicle at the time was wounded in the attack
Geneva: The United Nations said Tuesday that it had informed the Israeli authorities of the movements of a vehicle carrying UN staff which was hit in southern Gaza, killing an Indian.
One UN security services member was killed and another wounded in the attack on Monday, the United Nations said, marking the first death of a UN international employee in the Palestinian territory since the war began more than seven months ago.
The employee killed was an Indian national, UN spokesman Rolando Gomez told a media briefing.
“We are deeply saddened by the loss of Col Waibhav Kale, working for the UN Department of Safety and Security in Gaza,” India’s mission to the UN in New York confirmed on X.
“Our deepest condolences are with the family during this difficult time.”
A second UN DSS staff member who was in the vehicle at the time was wounded in the attack, Gomez said, adding that the two had been traveling to the European Hospital in Rafah when their vehicle was hit.
“The UN informs Israeli authorities of the movement of all of our convoys. That has been the case in any theater of operation. This is a standard operating procedure,” said Gomez.
“This was the case yesterday (Monday) morning, so we have informed them. And it was a clearly marked UN vehicle.”
He added: “This is a sheer illustration that there’s really nowhere safe in Gaza at the moment.”
When asked about the attack, the Israeli military sent AFP a statement apparently drafted on Monday saying that the DSS had informed it of the hit.
“An initial inquiry conducted indicates that the vehicle was hit in an area declared an active combat zone,” the military said, maintaining that it had “not been made aware of the route of the vehicle.”
“The incident is under review,” it said, without attributing responsibility for the strike.
Gomez said UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had called for a full investigation.
“Of course we want accountability. This is the ultimate aim of this investigation. International humanitarian workers are not targets, so such attacks must end,” he said.
While Monday’s attack marked the first time a UN international employee has been killed in the Gaza war, a large number of local staff have been killed.
The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, alone has lost 188 of its 13,000 Gaza staff, according to UN figures.
“No one is safe in Gaza, including aid workers,” UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini said on X, formerly Twitter.
The bloodiest ever Gaza war broke out after Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of more than 1,170 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive against Hamas has killed at least 35,173 Palestinians in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.
