“The decision came after Al Jazeera continued to broadcast inflammatory material and reports that misled the public, sowed discord and interfered in Palestine’s internal affairs,” it said.
The Israeli occupying military had already closed the Al-Jazeera office in Ramallah, the headquarters of the autonomous authority, last September. The station’s teams and reporters continued to report from all parts of the West Bank. However, they no longer appeared as Al-Jazeera employees, but as freelance media professionals.
6:10 p.m.: According to Palestinian figures, the population of the Gaza Strip has shrunk by six percent since the war with Israel began almost 15 months ago. Around 45,500 Palestinians were killed during the period and another 11,000 were missing, the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) said, citing figures from the local health authority.
Around 100,000 Palestinians have left the coastal strip. The population of the Gaza Strip fell by around 160,000 to 2.1 million over the course of the war. Israel has “perpetrated a brutal aggression against the Gaza Strip, targeting all types of life there: people, buildings and vital infrastructure… entire families have been wiped from the registry. There are catastrophic human and material losses.” The Israeli Foreign Ministry, however, says the data is unreliable and exaggerated.
4:24 p.m.: According to Palestinian reports, 17 people were killed and others injured in new Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip. The Palestinian news agency Wafa reported that 15 people, including children, were killed in the bombardment of a residential building in northern Jabaliya. Two more people were killed when a building was shelled in Al-Bureij in the central part of the coastal strip. The information could not initially be independently verified.
An Israeli army spokesman said rockets had previously been fired from Al-Bureij into southern Israel. The military attacked a “terrorist in a building in the area from which the rockets were fired.”
12:27 p.m.: Saudi Arabia has set up a humanitarian airlift to Syria. The airlift was started by the Saudi Arabian Center for Humanitarian Aid and Rescue (KSrelief), the SPA news agency reported. It is intended to “mitigate the effects of the difficult conditions” that people in Syria are currently facing. To this end, among other things, food, emergency shelter and medical supplies should be brought to the conflict-affected country where militias overthrew ruler Bashar al-Assad a good three weeks ago.
11.12 a.m.: In Syria, the previous military chief of the Islamist HTS militia, Murhaf Abu Kasra, has been appointed the new defense minister. The state news agency Sana reports that the appointment of Abu Kasra was announced by the new Syrian leadership. The 41-year-old Abu Kasra had previously been promoted to general in the Syrian army. The agricultural scientist was at the head of the military wing of the HTS for five years.
Abu Kasra played an important role in the overthrow of long-time Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad. HTS fighters and allied militias had advanced from the north toward Damascus with surprising speed, ending Assad’s brutal rule on December 8.
Abu Kasra announced in an interview with the AFP news agency in mid-December that the HTS fighters would be integrated into the regular armed forces. He also emphasized that the new state power would also extend its control to the semi-autonomous Kurdish region in the northeast. He criticized Israel’s repeated attacks on Syrian territory.
1:52 p.m.: The French military has attacked positions of the terrorist organization “Islamic State” (IS) in Syria. Defense Minister Sébastian Lecornu announced this on the X platform. The minister spoke of “targeted air strikes” that were carried out last Sunday and attached a corresponding video.
The AFP news agency reports, citing the Ministry of Defense, that a total of two terrorist organization positions were attacked. The French Air Force used Rafale fighter jets and American Reaper drones.
1:39 p.m.: The Islamist-dominated interim government in Syria has given another woman an important official position. Muhsina al-Mahithaui has been appointed governor of Suwayda province in the south of the country, the Syrian news agency Sana reports. The member of the Druze community studied at the University of Damascus and previously ran a large bank in Suwayda province, where she also comes from.
Aiham al-Shufi, an activist in the region, described al-Mahithaui as one of the leading figures in the protests against the now overthrown government of ruler Bashar al-Assad. She was “one of the first women in the peaceful movement against the government in Suwaida province.” Despite harassment from the government, she did not let herself be dissuaded, al-Shufi told the German Press Agency. It is the third appointment of a woman to a senior official post in the interim government.
1:35 p.m.: The Islamist-dominated interim government in Syria has appointed a woman as managing director of the central bank for the first time. Maysaa Sabrine has previously held important positions in the bank, including the position of first deputy director, said the government led by the Islamist group Hajat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS).
In Syria and internationally, close attention is being paid to whether the transitional government respects the rights of women or, like the Taliban in Afghanistan, pushes them out of public life. Statements by HTS spokesman Obaida Arnaut that women are unsuitable for the position of defense minister or for roles in the judiciary due to their “biological nature” had increased concerns.
However, the central bank chief is already the second woman to hold a key position in the new government that took over the country after the fall of long-time ruler Bashar al-Assad. Earlier this month, Aisha al-Dibas was appointed head of the Office of Women’s Affairs.
10:26 a.m.: According to official figures, around 35,000 Syrian refugees have returned to their home country from Turkey since the overthrow of ruler Bashar al-Assad in Syria around three weeks ago. This means that as many Syrians have left the country since the beginning of December as usual in three months, Turkish Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya told the broadcaster n-tv.
In an international comparison, Turkey has taken in the most refugees from the civil war-torn Syria. According to Yerlikaya, there are currently around 2.9 million Syrian refugees still living in the country. Almost a third of these are children born in Türkiye. They do not receive Turkish citizenship, but have temporary protection status like their parents.
Syrians are exposed to a strong anti-refugee atmosphere in Turkey. The government and opposition want the majority of them to leave the country again.
9:58 a.m.: The Iran-backed Houthi militia in Yemen said they attacked Tel Aviv International Airport and Jerusalem in Israel. The militia’s military spokesman, Jahja Sari, said in a televised statement that they had attacked Ben Gurion airport and a power station in the Jerusalem area with ballistic missiles. In addition, a “major air attack” by the US military using drones and cruise missiles was repelled, said Sari.
Israel’s army said air defenses had intercepted a rocket fired from Yemen. Hundreds of thousands of people rushed to shelters shortly before midnight as sirens wailed in the coastal metropolis of Tel Aviv and other places in central Israel. It is said that the bullet was intercepted outside Israel’s borders. According to local media, rocket debris did not cause any major damage, but a large fragment struck a road in a town near Jerusalem.
