After nearly seven weeks in captivity, 13 hostages abducted by Hamas and other groups during the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel were released on Friday as part of a deal that paused the fighting in the Gaza Strip. The 13 — all women and children — were returned to Israel. Five other hostages had been […]
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When the cease-fire in Gaza took effect early Friday morning, Palestinians across the Gaza Strip prepared to go back to the homes they fled to see if they were still intact, to check on relatives left behind and in some cases, to finally bury their dead. The skies above the besieged territory were free of […]
Read More When the cease-fire in Gaza took effect early Friday morning, Palestinians across the Gaza Strip prepared to go back to the homes they fled to see if they were still intact, to check on relatives left behind and in some cases, to finally bury their dead. The skies above the besieged territory were free of […]
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The deal for a hostage release brought both hope and agony on Wednesday to families of captives held in Gaza. Uncertainty over the agreement — including over who would be among at least 50 hostages set to be released, and whether more would follow — was straining the emotions of relatives who have campaigned for […]
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Residents of the Gaza Strip greeted the news of a temporary cease-fire with mixed emotions on Wednesday, expressing hope for a respite in Israel’s relentless bombardment but concern that the brief pause did not mean an end to the war. “There’s a little bit of relief,” Ahmed Nassar, a 27-year-old taxi driver, said in a […]
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As Israel and Hamas engage in indirect negotiations over the release of some 240 hostages taken in the armed group’s attacks on Oct. 7, the outlines of a possible deal are taking shape, officials say, although stumbling blocks remain. After weeks of talks, facilitated in part by Qatar, President Biden’s deputy national security adviser, Jon […]
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More than five weeks ago, on Oct. 7, my brother-in-law Omri Miran was yanked away from his wife, my sister Lishay, and their two beautiful daughters, Roni and Alma, and kidnapped from his home in Kibbutz Nahal Oz. The four of them had been held captive together at gunpoint by Hamas terrorists and their accomplices […]
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After the Saudi and Iranian leaders finished their speeches, they left the main conference hall for a bilateral meeting. Prince Mohammed’s welcoming of Mr. Raisi amounted to a remarkable departure for the Saudi leader, who once bluntly warned Iran not to pursue expansionist policies in the region. “We won’t wait for the battle to be […]
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Pocked with airstrike craters and lined by Israeli tanks and the shells of what used to be buildings, Salah al-Din Road is the only way to leave the northern part of Gaza for the south, where Israel has told civilians to go “for their own safety.” As Israeli forces intensify a ground assault into northern […]
Read More Pocked with airstrike craters and lined by Israeli tanks and the shells of what used to be buildings, Salah al-Din Road is the only way to leave the northern part of Gaza for the south, where Israel has told civilians to go “for their own safety.” As Israeli forces intensify a ground assault into northern […]
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The day Hamas attacked Israel, I unexpectedly reunited with my best friend in Kyiv. Since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February last year, our paths had barely crossed. As a lecturer, researcher and volunteer, I went back and forth between Ukraine and Britain. My friend, meanwhile, traveled across Ukraine as a local producer for foreign journalists […]
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When American military planners launched a ground offensive against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria in 2016, they knew that the American public was weary of long wars in the Middle East, and that the operation would have to make do with very few Americans troops on the ground. So they relied on a […]
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Representative Rashida Tlaib, Democrat of Michigan and an outspoken voice for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war, released a video on Friday that accused President Biden of supporting the genocide of Palestinians. “Mr. President, the American people are not with you on this one,” Ms. Tlaib says in the video. “We will remember in 2024.” […]
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A Biden administration official said on Friday that efforts to get Americans and other foreign nationals out of Gaza, a process that finally began on Wednesday, had been held up by Hamas trying to get its own wounded fighters included among those to be escorted into Egypt through the Rafah gate. The explanation offered the […]
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Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, told his followers on Friday that the group’s battles with Israel along its northern border had tied up Israeli forces, giving a boost to Hamas in its fight with Israel in Gaza. People across the Middle East had been anticipating Mr. Nasrallah’s speech — his […]
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As people waited at the Rafah crossing on Thursday anticipating a second day of evacuations from Gaza into Egypt, the sound of an airstrike rattled the crowd, and a piece of shrapnel appeared to fall in the area. The blast was just another sign that for many, the trip to safety was one of the […]
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On Oct. 25, Professor Nurit Peled-Elhanan, a lecturer at a college in Jerusalem, participated in a discussion in a faculty WhatsApp group about the horrific events of Oct. 7. In response to another lecturer’s message, she wrote that “the massacre,” referring to the actions of Hamas, reminded her of something the French philosopher and playwright […]
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In his book showcasing images of life as war raged in Syria, Mr. Katan recounts capturing the video of the boy, Mahmoud, whose older sisters, Asma’a and Nadima, were missing after the airstrike. Asma’a was subsequently confirmed dead. A brother, Muhammad, was carrying a baby sibling, Bayan, whom Mr. Katan likened to a rose because […]
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The initial photographs of the Hamas-Israeli war arrived, as if out of nowhere, like a kick to the chest. How could this mutual slaughter be happening, so suddenly, and on this scale? I thought of the American poet Walt Whitman’s stuttering shocked reaction to America’s Civil War. “The dead, the dead, the dead,” he keened, […]
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Andrew Higgins contributed reporting. Special thanks to Alina Lobzina, Ivan Nechepurenko, and Nyree Abrahamian. The Daily is made by Rachel Quester, Lynsea Garrison, Clare Toeniskoetter, Paige Cowett, Michael Simon Johnson, Brad Fisher, Chris Wood, Jessica Cheung, Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh Young, Lisa Chow, Eric Krupke, Marc Georges, Luke Vander Ploeg, M.J. Davis Lin, Dan Powell, […]
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For more than four decades, Iran’s rulers have pledged to destroy Israel. The supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, rarely appears in public without wearing a black-and-white checkered Palestinian kaffiyeh. Iranian military commanders gloat over training and arming groups across the region that are enemies of Israel, including Hezbollah and Hamas. And when Hamas conducted the […]
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Raja Abdulrahim and Patrick Kingsley contributed reporting. The Daily is made by Rachel Quester, Lynsea Garrison, Clare Toeniskoetter, Paige Cowett, Michael Simon Johnson, Brad Fisher, Chris Wood, Jessica Cheung, Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh Young, Lisa Chow, Eric Krupke, Marc Georges, Luke Vander Ploeg, M.J. Davis Lin, Dan Powell, Sydney Harper, Mike Benoist, Liz O. Baylen, […]
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“Those who were killed and had someone to bury them are the lucky ones. Who knows if anyone will bury us,” he said. “These feelings reflect the state of fear and defeat and despair caused by Israel’s barbaric airstrikes.” On Oct. 13, Israel warned more than a million Palestinians to evacuate their homes in northern […]
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“Those who were killed and had someone to bury them are the lucky ones. Who knows if anyone will bury us,” he said. “These feelings reflect the state of fear and defeat and despair caused by Israel’s barbaric airstrikes.” On Oct. 13, Israel warned more than a million Palestinians to evacuate their homes in northern […]
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In 2014, a new state was formed in the heart of the Middle East. It had a capital, a government, an army and almost 12 million subjects — a larger population than Jordan or Israel. It also had a commitment to butchery, savagery and fanatical violence that quickly earned it the enmity of the entire […]
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For my part, I’m skeptical that either the invasion or the handover would go well, partly because I’ve observed so many military operations that started optimistically and ended as bloody quagmires. But Barak also made another important point: Israel will now finally end Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s policy of bolstering Hamas. What? Israel supported Hamas? […]
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The American strikes on two Iranian military munitions stockpiles in Syria on Friday were carefully designed, President Biden’s aides said, to send two distinct messages to Tehran. The first was that if the attacks on American forces by Iranian proxies escalate, it would force the United States into the kind of overt military confrontation with […]
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An invasion could also fuel unrest in neighboring countries and could be particularly destabilizing for governments already struggling to contain discontent over economic pain or political repression, such as Bahrain, Egypt and Jordan. Iran has long backed Hamas, and Iran-backed regional militias hostile to Israel have threatened to open new fronts in the war, depending […]
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The Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza has released a list of 6,747 people it said had been killed in Israel’s relentless bombardment of the Palestinian territory in retaliation for the Hamas-led raid on Oct. 7 that killed more than 1,400 people in Israel. The release of the document on Thursday evening served as a sharp […]
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No one understands terrorism more viscerally than Maoz Inon: His 78-year-old father and 75-year-old mother were among those massacred by Hamas this month in southern Israel. He mourns his parents, and he despairs for old friends who have been kidnapped by Hamas. Yet he also fears that the unbearable losses his family endured are now […]
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As well as attempting to collapse the tunnel network, the Israeli Air Force may also be trying to destroy aboveground structures, from which Hamas snipers could ambush advancing Israeli columns, said Relik Shafir, a retired Israeli Air Force general. “Let’s say you’re a foot soldier and you want to get to a strategic point,” Mr. […]
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