Israel / Middle East - Page 363

Between 1914 and 1923, during and after World War I, hundreds of thousands of Armenians living in Turkey were systematically rounded up and murdered. Thousands more were forced to flee their homes. Some estimates put the death toll at more than 1.5 million.

Pope Francis has written a personal letter to Syrian President Bashar Hafez al-Assad expressing his “deep concern over the humanitarian crisis in Syria, and especially for the tragic situation of the civilian population in Idlib,” according to papal spokesman Matteo Bruni.

Europe must rediscover its Christian heritage and not be afraid of promoting openly Christian values, said Iraqi Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako in an interview this week.

TEL AVIV – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday met with a delegation of journalists from Arab countries, including a well-known Saudi blogger who was attacked by Palestinians in Jerusalem the day before. 

Israel would be making a catastrophic error were Ron Dermer to be replaced after September — especially because of a technicality in Israeli election law.

The Iranian regime warned Brazil on Tuesday that it may suffer economic “consequences” after state-run oil company Petrobras refused to refuel two Iranian ships stranded off the South American coast.

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif traveled to Latin America this week to meet with left-wing leaders in Bolivia, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, seeking to bolster diplomatic relations amid increasing isolation from the international community.

Iran’s main media outlets could not get enough of new British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Wednesday, delivering saturation coverage of the man they claim is a new incarnation of U.S. President Donald Trump.

A large British-flagged tanker has transited the Strait of Hormuz accompanied by a Royal Navy frigate in the first such passage since Iran seized a U.K.-flagged vessel last week.

Benjamin Netanyahu became Israel’s longest-serving prime minister on Friday, and he is favored to win the next elections in September. But the Trump administration is concerned that his political future may not be secure.

TEL AVIV – Israeli commuters on the Tel Aviv highway were greeted on Monday by a giant billboard of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in a pair of Speedos, wearing a lei and carrying a suitcase full of cash. 

Israel hit a strategic area in southern Syria where Western intelligence sources previously said Iranian-backed militias are known to be based, Syrian official news agency SANA reported overnight Tuesday.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) suggested Tuesday that a non-binding resolution opposing boycotts of Israel would “force” critics of the Jewish state to commit acts of terror.

Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) said on the House floor on Tuesday that the BDS movement against Israel is like boycotting Nazi Germany.

Brigadier General Ali Fadavi, a deputy commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), said in a speech on Tuesday that his organization is stronger than ever after the U.S. government designated it a foreign terrorist organization.

Turkish officials in Beijing reportedly refuted remarks Chinese state media attributed to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at a recent meeting, claiming he had not said people in Xinjiang “live happily,” the South China Morning Post reported Monday.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez retweeted fake news about Israel’s ongoing demolition of several illegal Palestinian-owned buildings in eastern Jerusalem, claiming Israel was attacking Palestinians “just because of who [they] are.”

President Donald Trump thrilled young activists on Tuesday, denouncing the leftist “squad” of young Democrats promoting socialist policies.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced on Tuesday that sanctions will be imposed on China’s Zhuhai Zhenrong Company and chief executive Youmin Li for purchasing Iranian oil in defiance of U.S. sanctions.

TEL AVIV – A well-known Saudi blogger who is in Israel at the behest of its Foreign Ministry was attacked, cursed and spat on by Palestinians during a visit to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City on Monday.

TEL AVIV – Former NBA star Lamar Odom visited the New York burial site of the seventh Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, along with his two children. 

NEW YORK — Disgraced former FBI Director James Comey has been making the media rounds peddling a list of “questions” that he compiled and published on the Lawfare blog in a posting titled, “What I Would Ask Robert Mueller.”

Professional U.S. seabed explorers and the French navy have located a submarine that’s been missing for more than 50 years, ending decades of pain for bereaved families after the vessel was lost along with its 52-man crew.

Iran is equipped with sophisticated, long range intercontinental drones now being used to monitor U.S. shipping in the Indian Ocean, Iranian Navy Commander Rear Admiral Hossein Khanzadi claimed on Tuesday.

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan addressed a crowd of some 30,000 Pakistani-Americans in Washington, D.C. on Sunday, promising that under his administration a “new Pakistan” is “being created in front of your eyes.”

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said on Sunday that Iran’s arguments for seizing a British-flagged oil tanker on Friday are “much more right than those of Gibraltar and London, who are indulging in piracy.”

“I think Iran doesn’t know where they are. I’ve been watching and reading a lot of reports. They are a very mixed-up country,” he said. “They don’t know whether they are coming or going. They have problems economically. Their country is in turmoil.”

“We’ve been there 19 years in Afghanistan. It’s ridiculous,” Trump said. 

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro told reporters Sunday that he is “aligned to the policies” of the United States on Iran and that his government had not discussed its decision not to sell fuel to two Iranian tankers stuck in the country without discussing it with Washington.

“The U.S. hostile measures against Iran are economic terrorism and Tehran will in no way hold talks with terrorists,” Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif declared from Venezuela on Sunday.

Junior defence minister Tobias Ellwood has called on the next Prime Minister of the United Kingdom to recognise the poor state of the Royal Navy when they take power, in comments that follow a British owned tanker being seized by Iranian gunboats in the Straits of Hormuz. 

The United States reportedly offered to organise a joint naval security operation to protect British shipping in the Persian Gulf, but Theresa May turned it down because she “didn’t want to upset the Iranians” or the EU.

“Slaughter the Jews” was spray painted on the Kotel HaKatan, or “little Western Wall,” a section of the Western Wall located in the Muslim Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem.

TEL AVIV – A senior Likud minister on Sunday boasted that Israel is the only country in the world that has been “killing Iranians.”

TEL AVIV – President Donald Trump on Sunday congratulated Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for David Ben-Gurion as Israel’s longest-serving prime minister.

TEL AVIV – Hamas deputy chief Saleh al-Arouri said in Tehran on Sunday that Hamas and Iran are on “the same path” in fighting Israel, Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency reported.