Video from Al Jazeera Mubasher showed the crew of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla Coalition’s Madleen in life jackets with their hands raised as the ship was about to be raided by Israeli forces. Communications with the vessel were cut shortly after.
Published On 9 Jun 20259 Jun 2025
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reports one dead and two others wounded in the Israeli attack on a vehicle.
The Israeli army has again bombed Syria, claiming it killed a Hamas member during an air strike in the south of the country, in the latest in its series of attacks on Syria in the wake of former President Bashar al-Assad’s ouster last December.
In a statement on Telegram on Sunday morning, the Israeli army said it had struck the alleged Hamas member in the Mazraat Beit Jin area.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that one person was killed and two others were wounded in the Israeli attack targeting a vehicle in the town near the United Nations-patrolled buffer zone.
Hamas has not yet commented on the death of the alleged member.
The observatory says Israel has carried out 61 attacks – 51 by air and 10 by ground – in Syria so far this year.
Two rockets launched from Syria targeted Israel earlier this week, a first since the fall of al-Assad.
Two groups claimed responsibility for the attack.
The first group, named the “Martyr Mohammed Deif Brigades”, is a little-known group named after the Hamas military commander who was killed last year. A second little-known group, the “Islamic Resistance Front in Syria”, called for action against Israel from southern Syria a few months ago.
Israel struck southern Syria shortly afterwards, with Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz saying that he was holding Syria “directly responsible”.
Syria’s Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani condemned Israel’s attacks and called them “coordinated provocations aimed at undermining Syria’s progress and stability”.
“These actions create an opening for outlawed groups to exploit the resulting chaos,” he said, adding, “Syria has made its intentions clear: we are not seeking war, but rather reconstruction”.
Syria and Israel had recently engaged in indirect talks to ease tensions, a significant development in relations between states that have been on opposite sides of conflicts in the Middle East for decades.
But Israel has relentlessly waged a campaign of aerial bombardment that has destroyed much of Syria’s military infrastructure. It has occupied the Syrian Golan Heights since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and taken more territory in the aftermath of al-Assad’s removal, citing lingering concerns over the country’s new government led by President Ahmed al-Sharaa, who it dismisses as a “jihadist.”
Syria’s new government has taken several major steps towards international acceptance after the United States and European Union lifted sanctions on the country last month, giving a nation devastated by nearly 14 years of civil war a lifeline to recovery.
The aid ship sailing towards Gaza has been named after the enclave’s first and only fisherwoman named Madleen Kulab.
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For months, Israel and its defenders have insisted that Hamas is stealing humanitarian aid. They used that claim to justify the starvation of two million people in Gaza – to bomb bakeries, block food convoys and shoot desperate Palestinians waiting in bread lines. We were told this was a war on Hamas and ordinary Palestinians were just caught in the middle.
Now we know the truth: Israel has been arming and protecting criminal gangs in Gaza that engage in stealing humanitarian aid and terrorising civilians. One group led by Yasser Abu Shabab, which is reportedly linked to extremist networks and has engaged in a variety of criminal activities, is directly receiving weapons from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government.
And Netanyahu is proudly admitting to it. “What’s wrong with that?” he said when confronted. “It saves the lives of [Israeli] soldiers.”
What’s wrong? Everything.
This isn’t just a tactical decision – it’s an admission of true intent. Israel never wanted to protect Palestinian civilians. It wants to break them. Starve them. Turn them against each other. Then blame them for the resulting chaos and suffering.
This strategy isn’t new. It’s colonialism 101: create anarchy, and then use it as proof that the colonised cannot govern themselves. In Gaza, Israel isn’t just trying to defeat Hamas. It’s trying to destroy any future in which Palestinians might govern their own society.
For months, Western media repeated the unverified claim that Hamas was stealing aid. No evidence was shown. The United Nations repeatedly said there was no proof. But it didn’t matter. The story served its purpose – it justified the blockade. It made starvation look like a security tactic. It made collective punishment look like policy.
Now the truth is out. The gangs terrorising aid routes were the ones Israel supported. The myth has collapsed. And yet where is the outrage?
Where are the stern statements from the governments of the United States and United Kingdom – the same ones who claimed to care about humanitarian delivery? Instead, we are getting silence. Or worse – a shrug.
Netanyahu’s open admission isn’t just arrogance. It’s confidence. He knows he can say the quiet part out loud. He knows Israel can violate international law, arm criminal gangs, bomb schools, starve civilians – and still be welcomed on the world stage. Still receive weapons. Still be praised as an “ally”.
This is what total impunity looks like.
And this is the cost of believing Israel’s PR machine – of letting it pose as a reluctant occupier, a humane military, a victim of circumstance. In truth, it’s a regime that doesn’t just tolerate war crimes – it engineers them, funds them and then uses them as propaganda.
It’s not just a war on Palestinian bodies, homes or even survival. It’s a war on the Palestinian dream – the dream of ever having a state, of building a future with dignity and self-determination.
For decades, Israel has systematically worked to prevent any form of cohesive Palestinian leadership. In the 1980s, it quietly encouraged the rise of Hamas as a religious and social counterweight to the secular Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO). The idea was simple: divide Palestinian politics, weaken the national movement and fragment any push for statehood.
Israeli officials believed that supporting Islamist organisations in the occupied West Bank and Gaza would create internal conflict among Palestinians – and it did. Tensions between Islamist and secular groups grew and resulted in clashes on university campuses and in the political arena.
Israel’s policy wasn’t driven by a misunderstanding. It was strategic. It knew that empowering rivals to the PLO would fracture Palestinian unity. The goal wasn’t peace – it was paralysis.
That same strategy continues today – not just in Gaza but in the occupied West Bank too. The Israeli government is actively dismantling the Palestinian Authority’s (PA’s) ability to function. It withholds tax revenues that make up the majority of the PA’s budget, bringing it to the brink of collapse.
It protects settler militias attacking Palestinian villages. It conducts daily military raids in PA-administered cities, humiliating its forces and making them look powerless. It blocks international diplomatic efforts by the PA while mocking its legitimacy.
And this policy doesn’t stop at the boundaries of the occupied territory. Inside Israel, Palestinian citizens face a similar tactic: intentional neglect, impoverishment and engineered chaos. Crime is left to spiral out of control in their communities while infrastructure and services are underfunded. Their economic potential is stifled – not by accident, but by design. It’s a quiet war on Palestinian identity itself: a strategy of erasure that aims to turn Palestinians into a silent, faceless minority stripped of rights, recognition and nationhood.
By engineering instability and then pointing to that instability as proof of failure, Israel writes the script and blames us for living it.
This is not just military policy – it’s narrative warfare. It’s about ensuring that the Palestinian people are forever seen not as a nation striving for freedom but as a threat to be contained.
Israel thrives on chaos because chaos discredits Palestinian agency. It allows Israel to say, “Look, they can’t govern themselves. They only understand violence. They need us.”
It’s not just brutal. It’s deeply calculated.
But Gaza and the West Bank are not a failed state. They are places that have been systematically denied the chance to become one.
Gaza is my home. It’s where I grew up. It’s where my family still clings to life. They deserve better – better than a colonial regime that bombs them, starves them and funds the very people stealing their food.
The world must stop treating Gaza and the West Bank as testing grounds for military doctrine, propaganda and geopolitical indifference. The people of Palestine are not a failed experiment. They are a besieged people, relentlessly denied sovereignty. And still, they try – to feed their children, bury their dead and remain human in the face of dehumanisation.
If Netanyahu’s government can admit to arming criminal gangs and still face no consequences, then the problem is not just Israel. It is us – the so-called international community that rewards cruelty and punishes survival.
What’s needed – urgently – are concrete actions to protect Palestinian lives and safeguard the right to Palestinian statehood before it is erased entirely. Threats to recognise a Palestinian state just won’t do.
If the world continues to look away, it’s not only Palestine that will be destroyed – it’s the very credibility of international law, human rights and every moral principle we claim to stand for.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
Intelligence Minister Khatib says Tehran having ‘thousands of documents’ will be an understatement.
Iranian Intelligence Minister Esmail Khatib has said sensitive Israeli documents related to its nuclear facilities, its relationship with the United States, Europe and other countries, as well as its defensive capabilities, will be unveiled soon.
Khatib told state TV on Sunday that the documents obtained by Tehran were a “treasure trove” capable of strengthening the nation’s offensive posture, but he did not provide any immediate evidence.
The Israeli government, which has never revealed details about its nuclear arsenal, said to comprise substantial atomic weapons, making it the only country in the Middle East with nuclear bombs, has not yet commented on the report of the leaked documents.
However, there have been arrests of Israelis allegedly spying for Tehran amid its war in Gaza. It was not clear if the materials were connected to a reported hacking of an Israeli nuclear research centre last year.
“The transfer of this treasure trove was time-consuming and required security measures. Naturally, the transfer methods will remain confidential, but the documents should be unveiled soon,” Khatib said.
He described the volume, saying, “Talking of thousands of documents would be an understatement.”
“The sheer volume of the materials and the need to securely transfer the entire shipment into the country necessitated a period of media silence,” state broadcaster IRIB reported, citing sources, and adding that the documents had reached “secure locations”.
The latest development comes as part of a broader campaign of covert operations that Iran and Israel have waged against each other for years.
While Tehran has accused Israel of assassinating its nuclear scientists, Israel has blamed Iran for supporting armed groups across the region that target its interests.
Iran and Israel exchanged limited strikes in April 2024 after Iran retaliated for Israel’s bombing of its embassy in Syria’s Damascus, but a war was avoided. The US recently told Israel to stand down on any plans to attack Iranian nuclear sites as negotiations between Washington and Tehran are ongoing.
There is also a sharp focus on Iran’s nuclear programme following a report last week by the United Nations nuclear watchdog that said Tehran had carried out secret nuclear activities. Iran will likely face censure this week from the Board of Governors at the International Atomic Energy Agency over these questions about its programme.
While Iran has denied wanting to create or have nuclear weapons, it has insisted that it intends to develop nuclear technology for peaceful, civilian purposes.
That is a key sticking point in the concurrent Iran-US indirect talks, several rounds of which have been held in Oman and Italy about a possible nuclear deal aimed at resolving a decades-long dispute over its nuclear ambitions.
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Wednesday that the current US proposal to abandon Iran’s uranium enrichment programme was “100 percent against our interests”.
“The rude and arrogant leaders of America repeatedly demand that we should not have a nuclear programme. Who are you to decide whether Iran should have enrichment?” he said, without mentioning stopping the ongoing talks.
Iran’s parliament speaker said on Sunday that the latest US proposal for a nuclear deal does not include the lifting of sanctions, state media reported, suggesting negotiations may have hit an impasse.
The decision to add 22 settlements to the occupied West Bank ignores international law and a landmark UN resolution.
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Israel’s war on Gaza rumbles on, even as international condemnation grows.
Hamas has expressed that it is ready for a deal to end the war, even offering to turn over the administration of Gaza to a technocratic government. United Nations Security Council members have overwhelmingly voted in favour of a ceasefire, a resolution blocked from passing only by a United States veto.
But Israel, led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, is adamant in its refusal of any agreement that does not include what it calls the “defeat of Hamas”, even if that means endangering the Israeli captives still held in Gaza.
“Hamas is already the weakest it’s ever been, and there’s nothing they can do that is remotely comparable to what Israel possesses,” writer and researcher on Israel-Palestine and founder of The Fire These Times podcast Elia Ayoub told Al Jazeera.
“There’s ample evidence by now that the only reason this genocide is ongoing is because Netanyahu wants it to continue. It’s clearly just an excuse to keep the war going.”
But why would Netanyahu want the war – which is Israel’s longest since 1948, and is causing economic crisis – to continue?
One answer is that the war provides a distraction from Netanyahu’s own problems.
Israel’s longest-serving prime minister has well-documented legal troubles; he is being tried for corruption.
And, aside from that, should a permanent ceasefire be realised, some analysts believe Israeli society will hold Netanyahu accountable for security shortcomings that led to October 7.
“He’s afraid once it’s done, eyes will rightfully turn to him over corruption and the failures of October 7,” Diana Buttu, a legal scholar and former adviser to the Palestine Liberation Organization, said.
And so, Netanyahu has two main tasks. The first is to prolong the war, allowing him to continue using it as an excuse to avoid accountability. The second is to prevent the breakup of his government, while somehow setting himself up for another successful election, which must happen before October 2026.
Netanyahu has been “reliant upon Hamas throughout the war”, Mairav Zonszein, an expert on Israel and Palestine for the International Crisis Group, told Al Jazeera.
“The far right and Netanyahu have consistently used Hamas as an excuse not to negotiate or plan for a day after,” she said.
The Israeli refusal to negotiate a final end to the war stands in stark contrast to Hamas’s willingness to hand over all captives held in Gaza.
Over the last 20 months, much of Hamas’s leadership has been killed. Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political leader, was assassinated in Tehran on July 31, and Yahya Sinwar, his successor, was killed in Gaza on October 16.
Israel is now claiming it killed Sinwar’s successor and younger brother, Mohammed, though Hamas has yet to confirm his death.
Militarily, analysts say, Hamas is estimated to have lost significant strength. It is still conducting some attacks, but fewer and further between than the ambushes it was able to carry out earlier in the war.
In a sign that Hamas perhaps understands that it is no longer in a position to rule Gaza, it has also offered to step down from the administration of the Palestinian territory, which it has controlled since 2006, and hand over to a technocratic government.
“The technocrat offer is not new,” Hamzé Attar, a Luxembourg-based defence analyst from Gaza, said.
“It was on the table since before the invasion of Rafah [which occurred on May 6, 2024]. They want Hamas to give up their arms and give up everything, and Hamas has responded by saying: ‘We’re stepping aside.’”
That has been firmly rejected by Israel, which has not endorsed any vision for post-war Gaza.
Instead, over the last nearly 20 months, Israel has killed more than 54,300 Palestinians and wounded more than 124,000 in Gaza, according to the territory’s Health Ministry.
In addition, Gaza is now “the hungriest place on Earth”, according to the UN, all its inhabitants at risk of famine after Israel strangled aid delivery throughout its war, then completely blocked it from March 2 until May 27.
Israel has also turned 70 percent of the enclave into no-go zones.
All the while, Israel’s bombing of Gaza continues.
Discounting the pretext of destroying Hamas and returning the captives, some analysts believe there is a deeper goal: pushing Palestinians out of Gaza.
“Neither Hamas nor the hostages are the targets,” Meron Rappaport, an editor at Local Call, a Hebrew-language news site, said.
“The goal is to push the people of Gaza into very few, small and closed areas where food will be delivered scarcely, hoping that the pressure on them will get them to ask to leave the Strip.”
“Israel is no longer fighting Hamas,” he added.
Netanyahu said in late May that Israel would control the entirety of Gaza by the end of its latest offensive, while many foreign officials and experts have warned either directly or implicitly that Israel’s actions amount to ethnically cleansing Gaza.
A recent report in Haaretz, the Israeli newspaper, cited 82 percent of Jewish Israelis supporting the expulsion of the people in Gaza.
To do so would have a historic impact, Buttu said, one that Netanyahu might feel he can portray as protecting Israel from a Palestinian state – something he has repeatedly promised to prevent.
“He recognises he will be the fall guy or the hero,” Buttu said. “If he is the one who ethnically cleanses Gaza, he becomes the hero.”
Until that happens, analysts believe, Palestinians will continue to die at the hands of the Israeli military. Hamas is the pretext and their willingness to negotiate or succumb is of secondary importance.
“Benjamin Netanyahu has no intention of ending this war,” Zonszein said. “It doesn’t matter what Hamas offers. They can offer to return all the hostages or give up governance.
“This war is going to continue until Netanyahu is forced to stop it, and that can only come from Trump.”
Additional reporting by Simon Speakman Cordall
Israeli raids across Gaza have killed at least 75 Palestinians, with rescuers scrambling to find dozens of bodies under the rubble after the bombing of a residential building in Gaza City described by the enclave’s civil defence as a “full-fledged massacre”.
Palestinian Civil Defence spokesperson Mahmoud Basel told Al Jazeera that the military gave “no warning, no alert” before Saturday’s strike on the house in the Sabra neighbourhood of Gaza City that left at least 16 people dead, including women and children.
“This is truly a full-fledged massacre … a building full of civilians,” said Basel, who added that approximately 85 people were believed to be trapped under the rubble.
“We woke up to the strikes, destruction, yelling, rocks hitting us,” said Hamed Keheel, a displaced Palestinian at the site, noting that the attack had taken place on the second day of the Eid al-Adha festival.
“This is the occupation,” he said. “Instead of waking up to cheer our children and dress them up to enjoy Eid, we wake up to carry women and children’s bodies from under rubble.”
Local resident Hassan Alkhor told Al Jazeera that the building belonged to the Abu Sharia family. “May God hold the Israeli forces and [Israeli Prime Minister] Netanyahu accountable,” he said.
The Israeli military said afterwards that it had killed Asaad Abu Sharia, the leader of the Mujahideen Brigades, who it claimed had participated in the October 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel in 2023, according to a report in the Times of Israel published Saturday.
Hamas confirmed the killing in a statement shared on Telegram, saying that Abu Sharia’s brother, Ahmed Abu Sharia, had also been assassinated in the attack, which it said was “part of a series of brutal massacres against civilians”.
Also on Saturday, Israeli forces killed at least eight Palestinians waiting near an aid distribution site run by the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) in southern Gaza’s Rafah, the latest in a series of deadly incidents around the group’s operations that have killed 118 people and left others missing in less than two weeks.
Gaza resident Samir Abu Hadid told the AFP news agency that thousands of people had gathered at the al-Alam roundabout near the aid site.
“As soon as some people tried to advance towards the aid centre, the Israeli [forces] opened fire from armoured vehicles stationed near the centre, firing into the air and then at civilians,” Abu Hadid said.
One woman told Al Jazeera her husband had been killed in the attack after going to the aid point to get “a handful of rice for our starving children”.
“He said he felt he was walking towards death, I begged him not to leave. He insisted to find anything to feed our children,” she said.
The GHF, a shadowy United States-backed private group engaged by Israel to distribute aid under the protection of its troops and security contractors, began operations in late May, replacing existing networks run by the United Nations and charities that have worked for decades.
Critics say the group does not abide by humanitarian principles of neutrality, claiming that its operations weaponise aid, serving Israel’s stated aims of ethnically cleansing large swaths of Gaza and controlling the entire enclave.
GHF said on Saturday that it was unable to distribute any humanitarian relief because Hamas issued “direct threats” against its operations. “These threats made it impossible to proceed today without putting innocent lives at risk,” it said in a statement. Hamas told the Reuters news agency that it had no knowledge of these “alleged threats”.
The United Nations, which has refused to cooperate with the GHF, has warned that most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is at risk of famine after an 11-week Israeli blockade, with the rate of young children suffering from acute malnutrition nearly tripling.
As Israel continued its attacks amid the looming famine, it emerged that health authorities had recorded more than 300 miscarriages over an 80-day period in the enclave.
Expectant mothers face an increased risk of miscarriage and premature births, with basic medical supplies such as iron supplements and prenatal vitamins impossible to obtain.
Brenda Kelly, a consultant obstetrician at Oxford University Hospital, told Al Jazeera that Gaza was “losing a future generation of children”, alluding to a “staggering rise” in stillbirths, miscarriages and pre-term births.
“What we’re seeing now is the direct fallout of Israel’s weaponising of hunger in Gaza – impacting babies’ growth and growth restriction is one of the leading causes of miscarriages and stillbirth,” she said.
Severe malnutrition among pregnant women is compounded by severe stress and psychological trauma, as well as repeated displacement and a lack of safe shelter, she said.
Those babies that do survive face heightened health risks. “We know that famine experienced in-utero has lifelong consequences for children who then go into adulthood with much higher risks of cardiovascular disease and diabetes, as well as mental health disorders,” she said.
Thousands of Israeli protesters in Tel Aviv have again called for the return of captives held in Gaza and an immediate ceasefire, while hundreds of thousands of pro-Palestine supporters gathered in Rome denouncing the Italian government’s “complicity” in the war.
Captive families and antigovernment protesters gathered in front of Israel’s army headquarters on Saturday, several hours after Thailand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs reported that Israeli forces had recovered the body of a Thai captive.
In a statement, the Israeli army said on Saturday morning that the body of Nattapong Pinta was retrieved from the Rafah area in southern Gaza after he was taken captive during Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum wrote on X that it “bows its head in sorrow over the murder of Nattapong Pinta”.
“The time is running out for all 55 hostages. We must bring them all home, Now!,” the group wrote on X.
The spokesperson of Hamas’s armed wing, the Qassam Brigades, Abu Obeida, warned that an Israeli captive, Matan Zangauker, is being held in an area targeted by the Israeli army.
He warned that if Zangauker were killed during an attempt to free him, the Israeli military would be responsible.
The captive’s mother, Einav Zangauker, speaking at the Tel Aviv protest, criticised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for neglecting those being held in Gaza.
“The military pressure is closing in on [my son] and is placing him in immediate danger. The decision to expand the ground operation comes at the cost of Matan’s life and the lives of all the hostages,” she said.
“[Netanyahu] continues to sacrifice the hostages. He is using the [Israeli military] not to protect Israel’s security, but to continue the war and protect his government.”
Police prevented activists from the NGO, Looking the Occupation in the Eye, from reaching the protest area in Tel Aviv, according to reports in the Israeli media. The activists were reportedly carrying placards protesting against Israeli war crimes and ethnic cleansing in Gaza.
אלימות מצד המשטרה, דחיפות וצעקות לעבר מפגינים הנושאים שלטים הקוראים להפסקת המלחמה.
07.06.2025 תל אביב 🎥אריק סגל pic.twitter.com/2vJ3lFkXDl
— אלימות ישראל (@Alimut_Israel) June 7, 2025
Translation: Police pushing and shouting at protesters carrying signs calling for an end to the war.
During the Hamas attack, which killed 1,139 people in southern Israel, the group abducted 251 people; following a series of prisoner-for-captive exchanges with the Israeli government, the group are currently holding 55 captives in Gaza, a number of whom are dead.
Israel’s war on Gaza has now killed at least 54,772 Palestinians and injured 125,834 others, Gaza’s Health Ministry reported.
In the meantime, across Europe, pro-Palestine demonstrators called for an end to the Israeli genocidal assault in Gaza.
In Rome, hundreds of thousands of people marched through the city in a protest called by opposition parties slamming the government’s “complicity” in the war.
The leader of the main opposition Democratic Party, Elly Schlein, called the turnout “an enormous popular response” in opposition to Israel’s actions in the besieged and bombarded enclave.
The demonstration was “to say enough to the massacre of Palestinians, to say enough to the crimes of Netanyahu’s far-right government” and to show the world “another Italy”, Schlein told reporters.
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has come under increasing pressure to take a stronger stance on the war in Gaza as she has backed Israel and Netanyahu throughout, while admitting difficult conversations with the Israeli leader of late.
In the British capital, London, antigovernment demonstrators held placards demanding “Cut war, not welfare.”
Speaking at the Whitehall rally, former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn said with the “abominable, deliberate starvation of children in Gaza and the genocide that’s inflicted against the Palestinian people”, a world of “peace” was needed.
“We need a world of peace that will come through the vision of peace, the vision of disarmament and the vision of actually challenging the causes of war, which leads to the desperation and the refugee flows of today,” he said.
Pro-Palestine protests were also held Saturday in Denmark, Sweden, and Germany, where demonstrators raised banners calling for an end to the Israeli genocide against Palestinians.
Saad bin Atef al-Awlaki, who is wanted by the US, challenges Houthi dominance of Arab and Muslim world’s resistance movement.
The leader of al-Qaeda’s Yemen branch has targeted US President Donald Trump and tech billionaire Elon Musk over United States backing for Israel’s ongoing war on the Gaza Strip and its besieged Palestinian population.
“There are no red lines after what happened and is happening to our people in Gaza,” said Saad bin Atef al-Awlaki in a half-hour video message that was spread online Saturday by supporters of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), the Yemeni branch of the armed group.
“Reciprocity is legitimate,” he said.
Al-Awlaki’s video message also included calls for so-called lone wolves to assassinate leaders in Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf Arab states over the war, which has decimated Gaza, killing at least 54,772 Palestinians over the past 20 months.
The message featured images of Trump and Musk, US Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth, as well as logos of Musk’s businesses – including electric carmaker Tesla.
Born in 2009 from the merger of al-Qaeda’s Yemeni and Saudi factions, AQAP is completely distinct from Yemen’s Houthi rebel group, which controls most of the country and agreed to a ceasefire with the US earlier this month.
AQAP grew and developed amid the chaos of Yemen’s war, which has pitted the Houthis against a Saudi-led coalition backing the government since 2015.
Al-Awlaki became the group’s leader in 2024, replacing predecessor Khalid Batarfi, who died that year.
He already has a $6m US bounty on his head, having, as Washington puts it, “publicly called for attacks against the United States and its allies”.
Though believed to be weakened in recent years due to infighting and suspected US drone strikes killing its leaders, the group had been considered the most dangerous branch of al-Qaeda still operating since the US killing of founder Osama bin Laden in 2011.
United Nations experts estimate AQAP has between 3,000 and 4,000 active fighters and passive members, claiming that it raises money by robbing banks and money exchange shops, as well as by smuggling weapons, counterfeiting currencies and conducting ransom operations.
The Houthis have previously denied working with AQAP, though the latter’s targeting of the Houthis has dropped in recent years, while its fighters keep attacking the Saudi-led coalition forces.
Now, with its focus on Israel’s war on Gaza, AQAP appears to be following the lead of the Houthi group, which has launched missile attacks on Israel and targeted commercial vessels moving through the Red Sea in solidarity with Palestinians under Israeli fire.
“As the Houthis gain popularity as leaders of the ‘Arab and Muslim world’s resistance’ against Israel, al-Awlaki seeks to challenge their dominance by presenting himself as equally concerned about the situation in Gaza,” said Mohammed al-Basha, a Yemen expert with the Basha Report risk advisory firm.
“For a national security and foreign policy community increasingly disengaged from Yemen, this video is a clear reminder: Yemen still matters,” he said.
The Rukban displacement camp, which opened and was cut off in the height of the civil war in 2014, housed thousands of people.
The notorious Rukban displacement camp in the Syrian desert, a dark emblem of the country’s civil war, has closed, with the last remaining families returning to their hometowns.
Syrian Information Minister Hamza al-Mustafa said on Saturday on X that with the dismantlement of the camp, “a tragic and sorrowful chapter of displacement stories created by the bygone regime’s war machine comes to a close”.
“Rukban was not just a camp, it was the triangle of death that bore witness to the cruelty of siege and starvation, where the regime left people to face their painful fate in the barren desert,” he added.
The camp, established in 2014 at the height of the country’s ruinous civil war, was built in a deconfliction zone controlled by the United States-led coalition forces fighting against ISIL (ISIS).
The camp was used to house those fleeing ISIL fighters and bombardment by the then-government of President Bashar al-Assad, seeking refuge and hoping to eventually cross the border into Jordan.
But al-Assad’s regime rarely allowed aid to enter the camp as neighbouring countries also blocked access to the area, rendering Rukban isolated for years under a punishing siege.
About 8,000 people lived in the camp, staying in mud-brick houses with food and basic goods smuggled in at high prices.
But after al-Assad was toppled following a lightning offensive led by the current president of Syria’s interim government, Ahmed al-Sharaa, in December, families began leaving the camp and returning home.
Al-Sharaa has promised to unite Syria following the fall of al-Assad and rebuild the country at home and rejoin the international fold abroad.
Last month, al-Sharaa met with world leaders, including United States President Donald Trump, who announced that sanctions on Syria would be removed in a decision that would allow the country a “chance at greatness”. The European Union followed suit and also lifted sanctions. Both moves have given Syria a critical lifeline to economic recovery after nearly 14 years of war and economic devastation.
Yasmine al-Salah, who returned to her home after nine years of displacement in the Rukban camp and marked the Muslim celebration of Eid al-Adha, told The Associated Press news agency on Friday that her feelings are a “happiness that cannot be described”.
“Even though our house is destroyed, and we have no money, and we are hungry, and we have debts, and my husband is old and can’t work, and I have kids – still, it’s a castle in my eyes,” al-Salah said.
Her home in the town of al-Qaryatan in the eastern part of the Homs province was damaged during the war.
Syrian Minister for Emergency Situations and Disasters Raed al-Saleh said on X said the camp’s closure marks “the end of one of the harshest humanitarian tragedies faced by our displaced people”.
“We hope this step marks the beginning of a path that ends the suffering of the remaining camps and returns their residents to their homes with dignity and safety,” he added.
According to the International Organization for Migration, 1.87 million Syrians have returned to their homes since al-Assad’s fall.
Another tortured round of Gaza ceasefire negotiations, another set of headlines laying the blame solely on Hamas.
Throughout the various ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas, western news outlets have repeatedly blamed their failure on Hamas. This week, we hear a perspective that rarely features in the coverage – the group’s own – on the negotiations and the media narratives that surround them.
Contributors:
Tahani Mustafa – Senior Palestine Analyst, International Crisis Group
Basem Naim – Politburo member, Hamas
Julie Norman – Associate Professor, University College London
Abdaljawad Omar – Lecturer, Birzeit University
Ukrainian drone strikes on multiple Russian airfields have further escalated the conflict, as peace talks come up short. Tariq Nafi reports on the messaging on the airwaves both sides of the border.
After decades of increased connectivity, screen time and addictive algorithms, more and more young people are logging off.
The Listening Post’s Ryan Kohls looks at the community-based movements reevaluating their relationships with digital technology.
Featuring:
Monique Golay – Barcelona Chapter Leader, Offline Club
Hussein Kesvani – Technology and culture journalist
Adele Walton – Author, Logging Off
Medical sources say eight killed in a shooting incident near an aid distribution site west of Rafah in southern Gaza.
Israeli attacks have killed at least 34 Palestinians across Gaza, medical sources told Al Jazeera, as a key hospital in the south of the besieged enclave said it was inaccessible amid ongoing Israeli military operations.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said on Saturday that al-Amal Hospital in Khan Younis was “no longer accessible” after Israeli forces designated the surrounding area a “dangerous combat zone” and ordered evacuations.
“There are many patients and medical staff in the hospital,” the group said in a statement, urging international organisations to intervene, provide protection for medical sites, and open safe corridors for aid and medical supplies.
The plea comes as medical sources told Al Jazeera that 34 people were killed in Israeli attacks on Saturday, including eight who were killed in a shooting incident near an aid distribution site west of Rafah in southern Gaza.
Palestinians in Gaza have gathered at al-Alam roundabout near Rafah almost daily since late May to collect humanitarian aid, at a centre about 1km (0.6 miles) away, operated by the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
Samir Abu Hadid, who was there early Saturday, told the AFP news agency that thousands of people had gathered near the roundabout.
“As soon as some people tried to advance towards the aid centre, the Israeli occupation forces opened fire from armoured vehicles stationed near the centre, firing into the air and then at civilians,” Abu Hadid said.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.
The GHF had said on Friday that its aid centres would remain closed until further notice due to security concerns, just days after several deadly incidents near its aid hubs.
“Operations at our distribution points have been paused until further notice,” a spokesperson for the GHF said on Friday, despite warnings from humanitarian agencies that the territory is on the brink of famine.
Israel last month partially lifted a total blockade on humanitarian supplies entering Gaza that had been in effect since March 2, but rights groups and the United Nations have warned that only a trickle of aid has been allowed into the territory.
The UN, which has refused to cooperate with the GHF over neutrality concerns, has warned that Gaza’s entire population of more than two million people was at risk of starvation.
In Israel, Defense Minister Israel Katz announced that the military had recovered the remains of Thai national Nattapong Pinta from Rafah, southern Gaza.
Pinta, an agricultural worker, was seized during the Hamas-led assault on October 7, 2023, from Kibbutz Nir Oz. Israeli officials said he had been held by the Mujahideen Brigades, a Palestinian armed group.
His remains were found alongside those of two Israeli American captives retrieved earlier in the week. Pinta’s family in Thailand has been notified.
Since the mid-1960s, Israel has received significant military and diplomatic support from successive administrations in the United States. But never has it enjoyed such unconditional support as it has in the past eight years – under the first and second administrations of President Donald Trump and the administration of President Joe Biden. As a result, Israel has started openly pursuing its greatest Zionist dream: expanding state borders to achieve Greater Israel and accelerating the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people from their homeland.
Although the Israeli state may appear more powerful than ever and overly confident that it will achieve regional dominance, its current position paradoxically reflects a strategic failure.
The reality is that after nearly eight decades of existence, Israel has failed to achieve legitimacy in the eyes of the region’s peoples and lasting security for itself. Its present resurgence will secure neither. And that is because its foreign, domestic and military policies are based on a settler-colonial logic which makes them untenable in the long run.
Since its founding in 1948, Israel has sought to convince the world and its Jewish citizens that it was created “on a land without a people”. While this narrative has successfully caught on – particularly among the younger generations of Israelis – the forefathers of the Israeli state openly spoke about “colonisation” and settling a land with a hostile native population.
Theodor Herzl, considered the father of modern Zionism, planned to reach out to well-known British colonialist Cecil Rhodes, who led the British colonisation of Southern Africa, for advice on and approval of his plan to colonise Palestine.
Vladimir Jabotinsky, a revisionist Zionist who founded the far-right Zionist group Betar in Latvia, strategised in his writings on ways to address native resistance. In his 1923 essay The Iron Wall, he wrote:
“Every native population in the world resists colonists as long as it has the slightest hope of being able to rid itself of the danger of being colonised. That is what the Arabs in Palestine are doing.”
This settler-colonial mentality played a central role in shaping the domestic, foreign and military policies of the newly founded Israel. Today, almost 80 years after the creation of the Israeli state, expansionism and aggressive military posturing continue to define the Israeli regional strategy.
Despite official rhetoric about seeking peace and normalisation of relations in the region, the Israeli aspiration to achieve a Greater Israel – one that includes not only occupied Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem, but also parts of modern-day Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan – persists.
That has been apparent in public discourse and government actions. Settler activists have openly talked about an Israel stretching from the Nile to the Euphrates river. Government advisers have penned articles about “reconquering Sinai”, “dismembering Egypt” and precipitating the “dissolution of Jordan”. Prime ministers have stood in front of the United Nations General Assembly, holding maps of Greater Israel.
The idea of Greater Israel has been widely accepted across the Zionist political spectrum, both on the right and on the left. The primary differences have been in how and when to advance this vision, and whether it requires the expulsion of Palestinians or their segregation.
Expansionist policies have been applied under all Israeli governments – from those led by left-wing Mapai Labor to those led by right-wing Likud. Since the 1949 armistice, Israel has occupied the West Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem, the Golan Heights, Sinai (twice), southern Lebanon (twice) and now most recently, more parts of southern Syria.
Meanwhile, its colonisation of the occupied Palestinian territories has proceeded at an accelerated pace. The number of Jewish colonial settlers in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, was approximately 250,000 in 1993; by October 7, 2023, this number had risen to 503,732 in the West Bank and 233,600 in East Jerusalem.
Settlements in Gaza were dismantled in 2005, but plans are being made for recolonisation, as the current Israeli government eyes the full ethnic cleansing of the strip.
Today, there is no major political force in Israel that looks beyond the direct application of naked military power to maintain and protect colonisation activities. This mindset is not limited to politicians but is also a widespread conviction among the Israeli public.
A June 2024 survey found that 70 percent of Jewish Israelis think settlements either help national security or do not interfere with it; a March 2025 poll showed that 82 percent of Jewish Israelis support the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza.
The settler-colonial mindset at the core of the Israeli state has precluded the emergence of a genuine drive for peace. As a result, successive Israeli governments have continued to pursue war, colonisation and expansion, even when seemingly embracing peace talks.
In the 1990s, Israel had the opportunity to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict by withdrawing from the territories occupied in 1967 and accepting the creation of an independent Palestinian state. Instead, it used the negotiations as a smokescreen to advance settler-colonial policies.
Even leaders like Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was hailed as a peacemaker and assassinated for it by a Jewish extremist, did not really envision Israelis and Palestinians living side by side. Under his government and during the peace negotiations, the expansion of Jewish settlements continued at a steady pace, while plans for a segregation wall on occupied Palestinian land were pushed forward.
Meanwhile, Rabin and other Israeli leaders involved in the peace negotiations focused primarily on normalising Israel’s existence as it was, without addressing the root causes of the conflict. They sought to pacify Palestinian resistance, rather than establish durable peace.
The absence of a peace camp is not only at the leadership level but also at the societal one. While the Israeli society has active movements for social causes, settlers’ coalitions, and now a movement pushing for continuing the prisoner exchanges with Hamas, it lacks a genuine grassroots peace movement that recognises Palestinian rights.
This is in sharp contrast to other settler-colonial societies, in which there was a push from within to end colonialism. During the French colonisation of Algeria, for example, an anti-colonial movement within France openly supported the Algerian armed resistance. During the apartheid era in South Africa, white activists joined the anti-apartheid struggle and helped sway domestic attitudes.
In Israel, Jewish supporters of Palestinian rights are so few that they are easily ostracised and marginalised, facing death threats and often feeling compelled to leave the country.
The absence of a genuine peace camp reflects the inherent flaw of settler-colonial Israel. It has no coherent political strategy to address broader issues, such as coexistence in the region, which requires acknowledging the interests of others, especially the national rights of the Palestinian people. This makes the settler colony incapable of peace.
Historically, settler-colonies have always had to rely on outside support to sustain themselves. Israel is no different. For decades, it has enjoyed far-reaching support from Western Europe and the United States, which have provided it with a significant strategic edge.
But this Israeli reliance on Western backing also poses a long-term strategic threat. It makes the country dependent and unable to function like a normal sovereign nation.
Other countries in the region will continue to exist even if they lose support from their Western allies, with only their regimes potentially changing. But that is not the case for Israel.
This unlimited and extravagant support for Israel, aimed at maintaining its dominance as the primary regional power, is likely to backfire.
The growing imbalance of power is generating pressure not only on antagonist countries like Iran, but on other regional players such as Turkiye, Saudi Arabia and Egypt. They increasingly feel that the Western push to defend Israeli interests is infringing on their own.
This situation is likely to push them to increasingly seek alliances beyond the Western bloc to counterbalance this influence. China offers a viable alternative, as it is not a strategic ally of Israel.
A gradual opening to China can shift the political dynamics of the region in the coming years, beyond the capacity of Israel and its allies to control them. That will certainly undermine the Israeli plans to establish regional hegemony.
But Israel faces not only the risk that Western dominance could be challenged from the East, but also that Western societies could pressure their governments to stop backing it.
The Israeli genocidal policies, especially since October 7, 2023, have spurred a profound shift in public opinion across the world, including in Europe and North America.
Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, its prime minister has an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court and Israeli soldiers are facing charges in many countries around the world.
As a result, the Israeli state has notably lost support among those on the left and centre of the political spectrum in the West.
While it still manages to maintain backing in high-level European and American political and military circles, this support is becoming increasingly unreliable in the long term. This uncertainty is further aggravated by the rise of isolationism on the right in the US. If these trends continue, Israel may eventually run out of dependable supporters in the West and lose its financial and military advantage.
The limits of the Israeli settler-colonial state strategy are increasingly becoming clear. The continued use of settler-colonial policies, characterised by excessive violence, along with the pursuit of regional hegemony, is pushing Israel into an untenable position.
The Israeli leadership may be living in a fantasy world, thinking it can pull off a “New World” model on Palestine and exterminate its population to fully colonise it; or to declare itself officially an apartheid state, seeking to make Palestinian subjugation legal.
But in the historical and geopolitical context of the Middle East, neither of these fantasies is viable. Global pressure is coming to bear. The expulsion of the people of Gaza has been outright rejected.
The Palestinian people, like any other nation that has survived brutal colonisation, will not leave their country and disappear, nor will they accept life under a colonial apartheid regime.
Israeli leaders may do well to start imagining the very real possibility of sharing land and accepting equal rights, and start preparing the Israeli society for it.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
As Israeli attacks continue, Muslims in Gaza mark another Eid al-Adha with prayers among ruins.
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Israel warned ‘there will be no calm in Beirut’ after launching its largest attack on the Lebanese capital since the ceasefire.
The Israeli military will continue to bomb Lebanon if Hezbollah is not disarmed, Israel’s Defence Minister Israel Katz has warned, saying “there will be no calm in Beirut” and “no order or stability in Lebanon” unless Israel’s security is assured.
“Agreements must be honoured, and if you do not do what is required, we will continue to act, and with great force,” the Israeli minister said in a Friday statement.
Israel’s military launched a series of strikes targeting Beirut’s southern suburbs on Thursday night, sending huge numbers of residents fleeing their homes on the eve of the Muslim Eid al-Adha holiday after issuing a forced evacuation order an hour earlier.
Israel claimed, without providing evidence, that its latest attack was launched against Hezbollah “drone factories” in the Lebanese capital.
The Israeli military said Hezbollah was “operating to increase production of UAVs [drones] for the next war” with Israel in “blatant violation” of the terms of November’s ceasefire.
Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency reported that Israeli fighter jets had carried out about a dozen strikes in the attack. A Hezbollah statement said a preliminary assessment showed nine buildings had been destroyed, while dozens of others were damaged.
Hezbollah also denied there were drone production facilities in the targeted locations.
The Israeli attack was the fourth, and heaviest, carried out targeting Beirut’s southern suburbs – a Hezbollah stronghold – since the ceasefire ended hostilities on November 27.
Israel’s last attack on the Lebanese capital, in which it claimed to destroy “infrastructure where precision missiles” were being stored by Hezbollah, came in late April.
Across Lebanon, Israel has violated the ceasefire on a near-daily basis in the seven months since it was signed, according to the Lebanese government of President Joseph Aoun, Arab nations and human rights groups.
Aoun has appealed to the United States and France, guarantors of the November ceasefire, to rein in Israel’s attacks.
Speaking late on Thursday, Aoun voiced “firm condemnation of the Israeli aggression”, labelling the attacks a “flagrant violation of an international accord … on the eve of a sacred religious festival”.
On Friday, Ali Ammar, a Hezbollah lawmaker, urged “all Lebanese political forces … to translate their statements of condemnation into concrete action”, including diplomatic pressure.
In the months since the ceasefire, Israeli strikes in Lebanon have killed at least 190 people and wounded nearly 500 more, the Lebanese government said in April.
Under the ceasefire agreement, the Lebanese military has been tasked with disarming Hezbollah – a political party and paramilitary group once believed to be more heavily armed than the state.
But following Thursday’s attack, Lebanon’s army warned that such attacks are weakening its role in the ceasefire. It added that Israel rejected its proposal to inspect the alleged drone production sites in southern Beirut in order to prevent an air strike.
“The Israeli enemy violations of the deal and its refusal to respond to the committee is weakening the role of the committee and the army,” the military said in a statement.
It added that continued Israeli attacks could lead the army to freeze its cooperation with the monitoring committee “when it comes to searching posts” and dismantling Hezbollah infrastructure near the Israeli border in southern Lebanon.
The war between Israel and Hezbollah re-erupted in the wake of Israel’s war on Gaza in October 2023, as the Lebanese group launched cross-border attacks on northern Israel in solidarity with Hamas.
Subsequent Israeli attacks on Lebanon killed more than 4,000 people, including hundreds of civilians, before the ceasefire was signed. Hezbollah rocket fire in Israel killed a reported 87 Israeli military personnel and 46 civilians.
Muslims around the globe are celebrating Eid al-Adha, one of the biggest holidays in the Islamic calendar that commemorates sacrifice and submission to God.
The festival, running from June 6-9, honours the Prophet Ibrahim’s willingness to obey God’s command that he sacrifice his only son Ismail, ignoring the devil’s attempts to dissuade him from the act.
The devil appeared before Ibrahim three times, but the prophet responded by throwing stones, driving him away. As he was about to kill his son, God stayed his hand and spared his son, giving him a lamb to sacrifice instead.
The “Feast of Sacrifice” is traditionally marked by the slaughter of an animal, typically a goat, sheep, cow, bull or camel, with the meat shared among neighbours, family members and the poor.
The start of the event coincides with the final rites of the annual Hajj, the once-in-a-lifetime pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia, observed by adult Muslims.
In remembrance of Ibrahim’s resistance to Satan, pilgrims at Hajj participate in a symbolic “stoning of the devil” at the Jamarat complex in Mina, near Mecca.
The stoning ritual takes place at the three spots where it is said the devil tried to dissuade Ibrahim from obeying God, represented by three concrete walls.
Pilgrims collected their pebbles overnight on Thursday from Muzdalifah, an area located a few kilometres away from Arafat, a hill outside the city of Mecca with great spiritual significance.
On Friday, an estimated 1.6 million-plus pilgrims stoned the devil, throwing their pebbles at the concrete walls in Mina.
For some, the ritual marks a solemn moment – a complete submission to God. For others, it represents a victory over evil.
Officials say at least nine more Palestinians were killed trying to reach aid distribution sites in Rafah.
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Jordan is celebrating the qualification of its football team for a FIFA World Cup for the first time following a decisive 3-0 victory against Oman.
Huge celebrations erupted as fans drove their cars through Jordan’s capital Amman late on Thursday and into Friday, honking their horns and chanting victory while others waved the national flag in triumph.
“We are all with you!” and “It’s getting closer, heroes” read messages written into the night sky in a spectacular drone light show.
Jordan sealed their place on the penultimate day of Asian qualifying for the 2026 tournament, which will be played in the United States, Mexico and Canada.
Ali Olwin netted a hat-trick as the 2023 Asian Cup runners-up to Qatar etched their name in the history books.
They secured their spot in the World Cup when South Korea defeated Iraq, also on Thursday, 2-0.
The royal court published pictures of King Abdullah II wearing a national team jersey as he watched the game from the embassy in London, where he was on a visit.
I wholeheartedly congratulate the sons and daughters of our dear people on our national football team’s qualification for the World Cup finals,” he wrote on social media platform X.
“This historic qualification is well-deserved by our team, which includes stars and cadres of whom we are proud.
“Special thanks go to our loyal fans who have been our support and encouragement.”
His Majesty King Abdullah watches the national football team’s World Cup qualifier match against Oman, at the Jordanian embassy in London, during a working visit to Europe
( Photos courtesy of Royal Court ) pic.twitter.com/CI4JMurjQu— The Jordan Times (@jordantimes) June 5, 2025
Sohad Idrissi, a 48-year-old housewife who watched the game with her siblings, beamed with pride as she told AFP that her side had played “a beautiful game and deserved to qualify for the World Cup”.
“Today the joy is two-fold: there is the joy of Eid al-Adha, and the joy of Nashama qualifying,” she said, using a nickname for the Jordanian team.
Fadi Qalanzi, a 21-year-old university student, called the win “a dream that is finally coming true”.
“Our team put on a beautiful performance, and they truly deserved to qualify,” he added.
Osama al-Shreeda, a 60-year-old retired civil servant, also called it a dream come true.
“I’ve been following Jordanian football since 1978, and a relative of mine used to play with the national team,” he said.
“It’s a great opportunity for our team and its players to be recognised globally,” he added, calling it an achievement not just for Jordan but for the wider Arab region.
“It was about time, this is a joy we’d been waiting for, for a long time,” said 55-year-old teacher Nashat Badr.
For Uzbekistan, a 0-0 draw against the United Arab Emirates was enough to take the second automatic qualification spot in Group A behind Iran.
With Asia now having eight guaranteed qualifiers – after just four for the 2022 edition in Qatar – Uzbekistan was a likely contender to step up.
While most of its team plays in the domestic league, it includes a few Europe-based stars like Roma forward Eldor Shomurodov and Manchester City defender Abdukodir Khusanov.
Jordan’s highest-profile player is winger Mousa Tamari at French club Rennes.
Palestine’s 2-0 win in Kuwait kept alive their hopes of reaching their first World Cup finals.
The victory, thanks to goals from Tamer Seyam and Wessam Abou Ali, means Palestine in fifth spot in Group B are one point outside the playoff qualification positions with one game to play.
A win in their final match in Amman, Jordan, against Oman, who hold fourth spot and are one point ahead of Palestine, on Tuesday will see them finish above their opponents.
Third and fourth positions in the three groups, in the third round of AFC qualifiers for the World Cup, progress to a fourth qualifying stage of playoffs.
The top two teams from each of the three six-team groups qualify automatically for next summer’s tournament, while the teams in fifth and sixth position are eliminated.
Indonesia, meantime, remain on course for a playoff finish, and only a second appearance at a World Cup finals, following their 1-0 win against China to hold fourth spot in Group C.
EU affirms its unwavering support for the ICC, denouncing US sanctions as a threat to judicial independence and justice.
The European Union “deeply regrets” the United States sanctions placed on four judges at the International Criminal Court (ICC), European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen has said.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Thursday announced sanctions on four judges whom the US accuses of taking “illegitimate and baseless actions” against the US and its allies.
Responding to the announcement on Friday, von der Leyen said the Hague-based court had the “full support” of the EU.
“The ICC holds perpetrators of the world’s gravest crimes to account & gives victims a voice,” von der Leyen said on X on Friday. “It must be free to act without pressure.”
United Nations Human Rights Chief Volker Turk said he was “profoundly disturbed” by the US decision.
“Attacks against judges for performance of their judicial functions, at national or international levels, run directly counter to respect for the rule of law and the equal protection of the law – values for which the US has long stood,” Turk said.
“Such attacks are deeply corrosive of good governance and the due administration of justice,” he added, calling for the sanctions to be withdrawn.
Antonio Costa, president of the European Council, which represents national governments of the 27 EU member states, also called the court “a cornerstone of international justice” and said its independence and integrity must be protected.
The Commission fully supports the @IntlCrimCourt & its officials.
The ICC holds perpetrators of the world’s gravest crimes to account & gives victims a voice.
It must be free to act without pressure.
We will always stand for global justice & the respect of international law.
— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) June 6, 2025
The US State Department said the sanctions were issued after the court made decisions to issue an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and a separate decision in 2020 to open an investigation into alleged war crimes by US troops in Afghanistan.
The four sanctioned judges include Solomy Balungi Bossa of Uganda, Luz del Carmen Ibanez Carranza of Peru, Reine Alapini-Gansou of Benin and Beti Hohler of Slovenia.
EU member Slovenia said it “rejects pressure on judicial institutions” and urged the EU to use its blocking statute.
“Due to the inclusion of a citizen of an EU member state on the sanctions list, Slovenia will propose the immediate activation of the blocking act,” Slovenia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a post on X.
The mechanism lets the EU ban European companies from complying with US sanctions that Brussels deems unlawful. The power has been used in the past to prevent Washington from banning European trade with Cuba and Iran.
Slovenia regrets the announced sanctions by the US🇺🇸 government against 4 judges of the @IntlCrimCourt , including a judge from #Slovenia. SI🇸🇮 rejects pressure on judicial institutions and influence on judicial operations, and courts must act in the interests of law and justice.… pic.twitter.com/xhwBj8XeMz
— MFEA Slovenia (@MZEZ_RS) June 5, 2025
The US sanctions mean the judges are added to a list of specially designated sanctioned individuals. Any US assets they have will be blocked and they are put on an automated screening service used not only by US banks but by many banks worldwide, making it very difficult for sanctioned people to hold or open bank accounts or transfer money.
This is not the first time the US has issued restrictions against an ICC official since Trump returned to office for a second term on January 20.
Shortly after taking office, Trump issued a broad executive order threatening anyone who participates in ICC investigations with sanctions. Critics warned that such sweeping language could pervert the course of justice, for example, by dissuading witnesses from coming forward with evidence.
But Trump argued that the 2024 arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant necessitated such measures.
He also claimed that the US and Israel were “thriving democracies” that “strictly adhere to the laws of war” and that the ICC’s investigations threatened military members with “harassment, abuse and possible arrest”.