Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh is killed in Iran by an alleged Israeli strike, threatening escalation
BEIRUT (AP) — Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was killed by a predawn airstrike in the Iranian capital Wednesday, Iran and the militant group said, blaming Israel for a shock assassination that risks escalating the conflict even as the U.S. and other nations were scrambling to prevent an all-out regional war. There was no immediate comment from Israel, which has vowed to kill Haniyeh and other Hamas leaders over the group’s Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel. The strike came just after Haniyeh had attended the inauguration of Iran’s new president in Tehran, Iran said. The dramatic predawn killing of Hamas’s top political leader threatened to reverberate on multiple fronts.
UN report says Palestinians detained by Israeli authorities since Oct. 7 faced torture, mistreatment
GENEVA (AP) — The U.N. human rights office issued a report Wednesday saying Palestinians detained by Israeli authorities since the Oct. 7 attacks faced waterboarding, sleep deprivation, electric shocks, the release of dogs, and other forms of torture and mistreatment. The report said Israel’s prison service held more than 9,400 “security detainees” as of the end of June, and some have been held in secret without access to lawyers or respect for their legal rights. A summary of the report, based on interviews with former detainees and other sources, decried a “staggering” number of detainees — including men, women, children, journalists and human rights defenders — and said such practices raise concerns about arbitrary detention.
Harris is calibrating her policy pitch for going to battle with Trump
WASHINGTON (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris is facing the delicate task of calibrating her policy pitch to American voters, a standard task for any White House hopeful but one that comes with additional challenges this year. First, Harris is running for president while serving under President Joe Biden, meaning she’s linked to anything that happened — or will happen — on his watch. She inherits accomplishments like limiting the cost of insulin but also the administration’s struggle to prevent illegal border crossings. Second, Harris has baggage from her own failed campaign for president before she became Biden’s running mate four years ago.
First interest rate cut in 4 years likely on the horizon as the Federal Reserve meets
WASHINGTON (AP) — With the end of their two-year fight against inflation in sight, Federal Reserve officials are likely Wednesday to set the stage for the first cut to their key interest rate in four years, a major shift in policy that could eventually lower borrowing costs for U.S. consumers and businesses. Inflation has been falling steadily closer to the Fed’s 2% target for the past several months. And the job market has cooled, with the unemployment rate rising about a half-point this year to 4.1%. Fed officials have said that they are seeking to balance the need to keep rates high enough to control inflation without keeping them too high for too long and causing a recession.
How Hungary’s Orbán uses control of the media to escape scrutiny and keep the public in the dark
BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) — In the months leading up to elections for the European Parliament, Hungarians were warned that casting a ballot against Prime Minister Viktor Orbán would be a vote for all-out war. The right-wing Fidesz party cast the June 9 election as an existential struggle, one that could preserve peace in Europe if Orbán won — or fuel widespread instability if he didn’t. To sell that bold claim, Orbán used a sprawling pro-government media empire that’s dominated the country’s political discourse for more than a decade. The tactic worked, as it has since Orbán returned to power in 2010, and his party came first in the elections — though not by the margins it was used to.
Israel carries out rare strike on Beirut that it says killed Hezbollah commander
BEIRUT (AP) — Israel on Tuesday carried out a rare strike on Beirut, which it said killed a top Hezbollah commander who was allegedly behind a weekend rocket attack that killed 12 young people in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights. The strike in the Lebanese capital killed at least one woman and two children and wounded dozens of people. Hezbollah did not immediately confirm the commander’s death. The strike came amid escalating hostilities with the Lebanese militant group. An Israeli official said the target was Fouad Shukur, a top Hezbollah military commander whom the U.S. blames for planning and launching the deadly 1983 Marine bombing in the Lebanese capital.
From August, migrants seeking refuge in Italy could be taken to Albania pending asylum decisions
GJADER, Albania (AP) — Migrants rescued at sea while attempting to reach Italy may see themselves transported to Albania beginning next month while their asylum claims are processed, under a controversial deal in which the small Balkan country will host thousands of asylum-seekers on Italy’s behalf. Speaking during a visit to Albania in June, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said the two centers designed to shelter the migrants would be ready to host the first 1,000 people by Aug. 1. But with that day at hand, intensive construction is still underway in one of them, casting doubt on whether it will be entirely ready in time.
She became a mother after Islamic State captivity. A decade on, Yazidi community shuns her children
DOHUK, Iraq (AP) — The day they came to take her children, the young mother bundled them up against the cold. She asked her nearly 6-year-old son to take care of his younger sister. “Don’t let anyone hit her,” she told the boy. “OK, Mama,” she remembers him replying. Much else was left unsaid. Then, as the car carried her boy and girl away to a life without her in a children’s home in Syria, a country she knew she would soon leave, the woman wept. Nearly a decade ago, K, the mother, had been a child herself, about 13, when she and her family were captured in Iraq by militants from the Islamic State group.
Rescuers search through mud and debris as deaths rise to 151 in landslides in southern India
NEW DELHI (AP) — Hundreds of rescue workers searched through mud and debris Wednesday from multiple landslides that have killed at least 151 people in southern India, police said. The multiple landslides occurred after torrential rains triggered torrents of mud and water that swept through tea estates and villages. Another 186 people were injured by the landslides that hit hilly areas in Kerala state’s Wayanad district early Tuesday, flattening houses, uprooting trees and destroying bridges, said police officer Aijaz, who uses one name. P.M Manoj, a spokesman for the state’s top elected official, said that 187 people were unaccounted for. Seventy-seven bodies have been identified so far and mostly handed to their relatives, he added, More than a dozen bodies were found overnight, Aijaz said, as over 300 rescuers worked to pull out people stuck under mud and debris, but blocked roads and unstable terrain hampered their efforts.
Carter Center unable to verify Venezuela election results, blasts officials for lack of transparency
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — The Carter Center said it was unable to verify the results of Venezuela’s presidential election, blaming authorities for a “complete lack of transparency” in declaring Nicolas Maduro the winner without providing any individual polling tallies. The statement Tuesday night by the Atlanta-based group is perhaps the harshest rebuke yet of Venezuela’s chaotic election process because it comes from one of just a handful of outside groups invited by the Maduro government to observe the vote. “The electoral authority’s failure to announce disaggregated results by polling station constitutes a serious breach of electoral principles,” the Carter Center said.
Most Popular
Comments / 0