Month: April 2024

Mr Abbas, who runs parts of the occupied West Bank, said any attack could see Palestinians flee Gaza.

Israel has consistently vowed to carry out an offensive in Rafah.

US President Joe Biden “reiterated his clear position” on Rafah to Israel PM Benjamin Netanyahu in a call on Sunday.

The US has repeatedly said it cannot support a large-scale Israeli military operation in Rafah without seeing a credible plan to keep civilians out of harm’s way.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in the Saudi capital Riyadh earlier, Mr Abbas – whose Palestinian Authority is not present in Gaza, which has been under Hamas rule since 2007 – urged the US to intervene.

“We appeal to the United States of America to ask Israel to stop the Rafah operation because America is the only country capable of preventing Israel from committing this crime,” he said, adding that only a “small strike” on Rafah would force the Palestinian population to flee the Gaza strip.

“The biggest catastrophe in the Palestinian people’s history would then happen.”

More than half of Gaza’s population is in Rafah and conditions in the overcrowded southern city are already dire, with displaced people there telling the BBC there was a lack of food, water and medication.

While the White House did not elaborate on what specifically Mr Biden’s latest comments to Mr Netanyahu were regarding the planning offensive in Rafah, national security spokesman John Kirby told the ABC network that Israel had agreed to listen to US concerns and thoughts before going in.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has arrived in Riyadh where he will hold talks with Mr Abbas at the start of a new Middle East tour.

Meanwhile, the indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas over a potential ceasefire and the release of remaining hostages in Gaza, which have gained new momentum recently, have been further exposing divisions in Israel’s governing coalition.

War cabinet member and opposition figure Benny Gantz on Sunday said that the current government “would not have the right to continue to exist” if a reasonable deal to return the hostages was not accepted.

“Entering Rafah is important in the long struggle against Hamas. The return of our abductees, is urgent and of far greater importance,” Mr Gantz wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

The far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, however, said the government should resign if it accepted a deal in which the planned offensive in Rafah was cancelled.

Their comments come after Israel’s foreign minister said that the country could suspend the incursion, which Mr Netanyahu has said is the next step in its battle against Hamas, if there was a hostage deal.

The Israeli military said its chief Herzi Halevi had approved plans to continue the war, with Israeli media saying this referred to the Rafah operation.

Long-running talks mediated by Egypt and Qatar have largely stalled because of the gaps between the Israeli and Hamas positions, but on Sunday Hamas said it would send representatives to Cairo to give a response to the latest proposal.

US media have quoted unnamed Egyptian officials as saying the latest ceasefire proposal given to Hamas involved a several-week period of calm intended to lead to the end of the war, in return for the release of 20 hostages.

Hamas wants a permanent end to the war and withdrawal of all Israeli troops from Gaza, while Israel insists Hamas must be destroyed in Gaza and all hostages freed.

Egypt and other Arab states have previously said an influx of Palestinian refugees fleeing the war would be unacceptable because it would amount to the expulsion of Palestinians from their land.

Satellite pictures have shown new tent encampments being built near the Gaza coast, to the west of Rafah and the city of Khan Younis slightly further north, which has been left largely in ruins. Media reports say the tents are to accommodate people displaced from Rafah.

The current war began when Hamas attacked Israeli communities near Gaza, killing about 1,200 people, mainly civilians, and taking about 250 hostages. Some 133 hostages are believed still to be in Gaza, of whom about 30 are thought to be dead, after a brief truce in November saw some hostages released.

This week Hamas’s armed wing released two videos showing the first proof of life of three hostages since they were abducted last October.

Israel’s campaign of aerial bombardment and ground operations in Gaza since 7 October has killed 34,454 people, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run health ministry there.

Over the six months of war, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have entered and taken control of all of northern Gaza including Gaza City and most of central and southern Gaza including Khan Younis.

They have since withdrawn from almost all of those areas but troops remain stationed on a road Israel has built that separates northern and southern Gaza.

However, Palestinians displaced to southern Gaza – where the Israeli military told them to go for their own safety earlier in the war – have been unable to return to homes further north, a key demand Hamas is making in ceasefire talks, and Israel has given no indication when they will be allowed to.

Meanwhile, deadly Israeli bombardment has continued across Gaza, including in Rafah, with the Israeli military saying it has been striking launch sites for projectiles.

Tens of thousands of residents were left without power following separate storms that began on Friday.

Four of the deaths happened in Oklahoma, where a state of emergency has been declared in a dozen counties.

A fifth person died from their injuries in Iowa after a separate storm system hit the Midwest, local media reported.

The National Weather Service (NWS) said a preliminary investigation had confirmed some of Saturday’s tornadoes had gusts of above 136 miles (218km) an hour.

The storms – which swept from Texas to Missouri – also saw up to seven inches (18cm) of rain fall in some places within hours, the AFP news agency reported.

The town of Sulphur, in eastern Oklahoma, was hit particularly hard. Video of the aftermath showed flattened homes and overturned vehicles.

According to the Oklahoma State Department of Health, around 100 injuries were reported.

The towns of Holdenville and Marietta were also badly damaged.

The speaker of the Oklahoma state House of Representatives, Charles McCall, insisted that the affected areas would recover.

“We will rise, we’ll clean up, we’ll rebuild and we’ll move forward,” he told a news conference in Sulphur on Sunday.

The state’s Governor, Kevin Stitt, also visited the town and said the damage there was the worst he had seen in his six years in office.

“You just can’t believe the destruction,” he said.

“It seems like every business downtown has been destroyed.”

The White House said US President Joe Biden had spoken with Mr Stitt and offered the federal government’s full support.

It comes after a separate weather system brought more than 70 tornadoes to the Midwestern states of Nebraska and Iowa on Friday.

Most happened around the city of Omaha, where one resident described his ordeal.

“Saw this big tornado coming and just had to cover with the kids and wife as fast as we could,” Brent Richardson told the Associated Press.

“Loudest freight train you’ve ever heard in your life coming right through your house.”

“Utter destruction, just chaos. A neighbourhood that’s trying to band together to help people out and you have some people trapped in houses that we’re trying to get out and there’s houses that aren’t standing any more.”

Nebraska’s governor issued emergency declarations for three counties on Sunday, making them also eligible for extra funding towards rescue and recovery operations.

Further severe weather has been forecast.

“The threat of tornadoes appears to be lower, but instances of damaging winds and hail are still expected, especially across north-eastern Texas, northern Louisiana, Arkansas and southern Missouri,” meteorologist Brandon Buckingham from the commercial forecaster AccuWeather reported.

Humza Yousaf is considering quitting as Scotland’s first minister rather than face two confidence votes, B

A source close to Mr Yousaf said that resignation was now an option but a final decision had not yet been taken.

“The clock has been ticking ever downwards,

Mr Yousaf has faced a fight for survival as first minister after abruptly ending the SNP’s power-sharing deal with the Scottish Greens last Thursday.

He is understood to have ruled out a deal with Alex Salmond’s Alba party, and his prospect of surviving a vote of no confidence in his leadership is now dependent on the Scottish Greens.

He needs the support of at least one member of the opposition at Holyrood to survive the vote, which could take place as early as Wednesday.

The parliamentary bureau, made up of the presiding officer and MSPs from the main parties, will decide this week when the vote takes place and normally gives two days notice.

Jettisoning the deal with the Greens, known as the Bute House Agreement, provoked a furious reaction from his former partners in government.

He now faces two motions of no-confidence this week, one tabled by the Scottish Conservatives in his own leadership as first minister and another from Scottish Labour which would force his entire government to resign.

The Greens are due to meet later on Monday but have repeatedly ruled out supporting him in the personal vote.

The Scottish Conservatives, Labour and the Liberal Democrats have already said they will vote against him.

If nothing changes, that leaves the first minister facing a choice of defeat in a confidence vote or resignation in advance.

The SNP has 63 MSPs in the 129 seat parliament, so if the seven Green MSPs vote against him, he is reliant on support from the sole Alba party MSP Ash Regan to continue in his role.

That would lead to a 64:64 tied vote in which case the presiding officer would be expected to vote to maintain the status quo.

The motion of no confidence in him personally is not binding but if he lost he would come under intense pressure to step down.

If he lost the government vote, MSPs would have 28 days to vote for a new first minister or automatically trigger a Scottish parliamentary election.

Alba, a rival pro-independence party led by former first minister Alex Salmond, has been outlining a list of demands that might persuade Ms Regan to support the first minister.

At an emergency meeting on Sunday, Alba’s governing body formally approved Ms Regan’s plan to pursue the issues of independence, “women’s rights” and the “restoration of competent government” in any negotiations.

Mr Salmond told BBC News he was also looking for a move away from “the culture wars” and a shift towards the “people’s priorities,” which he said were health, housing, transport, education and the economy.

He said he expected Ms Regan to hold talks with Mr Yousaf in the coming days.

But a deal with Mr Salmond’s party is opposed by many within the SNP, and could open up further internal divisions.

A source close to Mr Yousaf told the BBC on Sunday evening “there is going to be no deal,” with Alba.

The Scottish government has not confirmed a time for any meetings with opposition figures or even that they will definitely go ahead.

Two SNP MPs, Stewart McDonald and Pete Wishart, have come out publicly against the idea of a deal with Alba.

One senior SNP figure told BBC News it would be intolerable for any SNP leader to be beholden to Mr Salmond, whose estrangement from the party he twice led is a source of bitterness all round.

Even if he were to survive the vote of no confidence, Mr Yousaf’s authority would be badly weakened.

Liz Lloyd, who was chief of staff to Nicola Sturgeon when she was first minister, pointed out that while Mr Yousaf might himself survive on a tie, legislation including budgets “can’t pass without a majority” in the Scottish Parliament.

In other words, even if Mr Yousaf were able to continue in office with the support of his own MSPs plus Ms Regan, without votes from elsewhere in the chamber, he would struggle to govern.

The BBC has been told that there were talks between the SNP leadership and the Green leadership over the weekend but that they did not alter the Greens’ position.

Nor did the SNP’s former Westminster leader, Ian Blackford,

Co-leader Lorna Slater who, along with Patrick Harvie, was dismissed as a minister in Mr Yousaf’s government at a short and “pretty robust” meeting in the first minister’s official residence, Bute House, early on Thursday morning, told The Sunday Show on BBC Scotland that the first minister “has lost our confidence and lost our trust.”

She added: “I cannot imagine anything at this point that could change that position.”

The Greens are due to convene on Monday to decide whether or not to even accept Mr Yousaf’s invitation to a meeting.

They had been scheduled to meet next month to decide whether or not to continue in the power-sharing deal with the SNP after discontent among members about changes to gender healthcare and the abandonment of a key climate change target.

Some Greens have expressed concerns that the Scottish government is considering implementing the recommendations of the Cass review on English gender healthcare.

A critic of the Greens’ approach to that issue, and others, is Kate Forbes, the former finance secretary, a social conservative who came close to defeating Mr Yousaf in last year’s leadership contest and could run again if he stands down.

Ms Forbes insisted this week that she was backing Mr Yousaf but she has used similar language to Mr Salmond’s about “getting back to the people’s priorities,” such as creating wealth, improving education and fixing healthcare.

As the leadership election demonstrated, thousands of party members do not appear to be put off by her personal objection to gay marriage and opposition to abortion.

However, those positions are deeply unpopular within the progressive wing of the SNP and she might find it difficult to unite the party and to run a minority government, especially if she were dependent on the Greens for support.

Other names being floated as potential replacements for Mr Yousaf are Education Secretary Jenny Gilruth, Culture Secretary Angus Robertson, Health Secretary Neil Gray and Economy Secretary Màiri McAllan.

With the Greens apparently standing firm, and the SNP’s leadership’s reluctance to engage with Alba, Mr Yousaf may yet resign rather than endure the humiliation of losing a confidence vote.

One source close to the first minister said the end of his time in office appeared to be approaching and that, by sacking the Greens, he had gambled and lost.