Katz says Israel to remain in Syria-Lebanon border area

“When you wake up in the morning in your palace in Damascus, look up at Mount Hermon and see the Israeli military.”

Defence Minister Israel Katz said on Tuesday that Israeli forces will continue occupying the Jabal al-Sheikh area (Mount Hermon) along the Syria-Lebanon border for “as long as there are threats” to “ensure our security”.

During a visit to the area, Katz said that the forces “look down on Damascus, 35 kilometres away; look down on the Bekaa Valley in Lebanon and Hezbollah’s stronghold; and, of course, watch over and protect the communities of the Golan Heights and the Galilee."

Israeli forces raid Unrwa centres serving 16,000 Palestinian refugees

Israeli forces have stormed Unrwa vocational centres in Qalandiya and Kufr Aqab that serve about 16,000 Palestinian refugees across the occupied West Bank.
The raids follow Israel’s assault on Unrwa’s headquarters in occupied East Jerusalem several months ago, when forces expelled staff and demolished sections of the building.
Israel could intensify its attacks on the UN agency before October’s elections as far-right ministers press to dismantle Unrwa and other organisations serving Palestinians.

Leader of Syria's Kurdish-led SDF announces dissolution as part of integration with Damascus

The leader of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, Mazloum Abdi, announced on Tuesday the dissolution of the armed militant group under a deal with the government. 

“Following the agreement with President al-Sharaa and the completion of the integration of our forces into units of the Syrian army, we announce today the end of the mission of the Syrian Democratic Forces,” said Abdi, speaking after a meeting with President Ahmed al-Sharaa in Damascus. 

The government and the group, which helped defeat the Islamic State with US backing and held parts of northern and eastern Syria, agreed in January to a phased integration of Kurdish fighters into the state.

Netanyahu vows to establish more settlements in the occupied West Bank

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to continue establishing settlements in the occupied West Bank despite mounting international pressure, while promising a major wave of Israeli immigration to the occupied Palestinian territory.

#BREAKING: The former Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladic, who led the genocide at Srebrenica and the years-long siege of Sarajevo, has died aged 84.

Serbia’s public broadcaster RTS announced his death, while his lawyer separately confirmed it to Reuters.

Known as the “Butcher of Bosnia”, Mladic commanded Bosnian Serb forces during their campaign to carve an ethnically homogeneous Serb territory from Bosnia and Herzegovina in the 1990s.

🔗 Read more: https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/ratko-mladic-architect-srebrenica-genocide-and-butcher-bosnia-dies-aged-84

'Camel of Hardships' artist Sliman Mansour laid to rest in West Bank

Palestinian visual artist Sliman Mansour was laid to rest in east Jerusalem on Thursday. Mourners gathered to pay tribute to the 79-year-old painter and sculptor, whose 1973 work Camel of Hardships, depicting an elderly porter carrying Jerusalem on his back, became a defining symbol of Palestinian identity.

Fellow artists remembered him as a towering influence who devoted his life to preserving Palestinian heritage through his art. Mohammed Saleh Khalil said Mansour's passing is "a great loss for Palestinian culture," adding that "this man devoted his entire life to preserving Palestinian identity".

‘They're so disgusting': Former US diplomat responds to Biden officials on Gaza

‘They’re so disgusting.’ 
Former US State Department official Hala Rharrit responds to the Biden officials now claiming they should have done more on Gaza. 

Rharrit resigned from the Biden administration in 2024 in protest over the Gaza genocide. 
She recently sat down with Mohamed Hashem on Real Talk.

Watch the episode early by joining Middle East Eye's YouTube membership: https://youtu.be/UEJdz49l2WE

Displaced children in Gaza banned from flying kites amid threats of Israeli strikes

Kites flown by Palestinian children in Gaza are now being cited by the Israeli military as justification for potential further strikes and displacement across the Strip.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said on Sunday that Hamas had been given three days to halt the kite launches, threatening a broad air assault and the evacuation of areas from which balloons, drones and paper kites are launched.

Israeli military sources reportedly acknowledged that the kites were being flown by Palestinian children, that no suspicious materials had been found on them and that they posed no danger to the public.
 
Despite this, an official on US President Donald Trump’s “Board of Peace” told AFP on Tuesday that “all militant activity in Gaza must stop, including the flying of kites”.

Israel's investigtion into Hind Rajab's murder 'not a step forward'

This week Israel has announced it opened a criminal investigation into the killing of Hind Rajab, marking the first time it has admitted its soldiers fired on the car carrying the 6-year-old girl and her family.
Hind's mother has rejected Israel’s probe and demanded an independent, international inquiry.

Jake Romm, the US representative and a legal advisor for the Hind Rajab Foundation, called the investigation "not a step forward" as it is already known who the killers are, and he describes the process as "turning a heinous murder into a mere administrative error".

Inside Taybeh: Families are leaving the last fully Christian town in the West Bank

Taybeh is the last town in the occupied West Bank where every resident is Christian. It's also under attack.

Settlers have set fire to a 1,500-year-old church, taken over farmland, and now surround the town from nearly every side. On 9 August, Israel declared it a closed military zone, cutting off the tourism families rely on.

More than 15 families have left Taybeh in just the last few months. Across the West Bank, over 200 Christian families have left since the Gaza war began. Dr Mitri Raheb, founder of Bethlehem's Dar al-Kalima University, has warned Christians could disappear from Palestine entirely by 2050.

We followed Nora, who left Taybeh years ago but couldn't go back this year, to understand what's pushing this ancient community to disappear.

The Israeli government has instructed its military to expel Palestinians from areas of the Gaza Strip where children are flying kites and releasing balloons, Israel’s Channel 13 reported on Thursday.

According to the report, Israeli defence minister Israel Katz told army chief Eyal Zamir and other senior military officials that “the ultimatum we issued following the launching of balloons and kites from the Gaza Strip towards Negev communities [in southern Israel] has expired”.

“Every launching of balloons and kites from Gaza towards southern communities will be met with a severe response,” Katz said during a meeting with the military’s top command.

From Israel’s perspective, Katz reportedly said, “every launch is an act of terrorism”, referring to kites and balloons that the Israeli army itself deemed a week ago to pose no danger to Israeli civilians.

🔗 https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-orders-gaza-expulsions-over-kites-flown-children

Palestinians in Gaza continue to face severe food insecurity, according to the latest figures released by the United Nations.

Around one in five families in the besieged Palestinian enclave are eating only one meal per day. Around half of the families in Gaza completely ran out of food at least once in the past month, according to the report published on Thursday.

Despite the ceasefire reached between Hamas and Israel in October 2025, Israel has failed to meet its obligations to increase the flow of aid into Gaza, perpetuating the humanitarian crisis it created.

Two-thirds of the population - around 1.4 million people - are  facing crisis or worse levels of acute food insecurity, according to the World Food Programme (WFP).

Tens of thousands of children suffered malnutrition during Israel’s siege on Gaza, which began in October 2023.

Israeli forces push and threaten journalists during settler incursion into Hebron

Videos posted on social media show Israeli forces pushing and threatening journalists as Israeli settlers stormed the Old City of Hebron.

‘I’m responsible for this’: Ben Gvir boasts about harsh Palestinian prison conditions

Israel's far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir boasts of worsening conditions for Palestinian prisoners during a visit to female inmates, after one prisoner tells him they lack basic necessities.

"I'm glad we lowered these conditions to the bare minimum," Ben Gvir said.

Netanyahu says Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a Channel 14 interview that Israel is the nation-state of the Jewish people, adding that while others have rights, that identity comes first.

His remarks have caused uproar, with critics saying they imply a lesser status for non-Jewish citizens and have sparked debate over Israel’s national identity and the rights of non-Jews.

Iran strikes military bases in response to US attack

Iran has struck US infrastructure in Jordan and a UAE military base in retaliation of American strikes on Monday morning on the country's Larak island, which killed Iranian civilians and military personnel.

Tehran shared footage of strikes against the King Hussein and al-Azraq US military bases in Jordan and said it struck the UAE's Al Minhad Air Base, a claim Abu Dhabi has denied.

The US CentCom announced early on Monday that it struck Iran for it posing an "imminent threat" to the Strait of Hormuz. Reports have meanwhile emerged on Pete Hegseth, the US defence chief, receiving warnings against continuing the war on Iran on behalf of US senior military officials, according to the Washington Post.

Can Syria reintegrate its Druze population?

The Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF, announced its dissolution last week in a landmark decision for the country's Kurdish-led paramilitary.

The announcement was hailed as a step forward in Syria's reintegration following over a decade of civil war.

Yet the news was overshadowed by reports of clashes among militias in Suwayda, where the country's Druze population is still reeling from massacres by government-aligned forces last year.

So, can Suwayda be reintegrated into the Syrian state? And what would that look like?

Former Israeli PM Bennett says American students associate Israel with genocide

Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said during a podcast interview that, just as Italy is associated with "spaghetti and pasta", Israel is now associated with "genocide and baby killers" in the US.

He made these comments in trying to prove the point that Israel must further work on its public image to regain appreciation, especially in American universities, which he says have been "infiltrated" by pro-Palestinian agents.

‘A soul was snatched from me’: Gaza crisis pushes increase in miscarriages

“I was really upset about the baby, to be honest. I mean, it’s not easy, it’s like a soul was snatched from me.”

Enaam Abou Fasaifi, 38, is one of nearly 4,000 miscarriage cases recorded by Gaza’s health ministry in the first half of 2026.

Medical workers and doctors are warning that the increasing number of miscarriages - which has tripled between January and June compared with the previous six months - is a result of declining sexual and reproductive health conditions in the strip as well as poor nutrition and severe anemia among pregnant women.

Israeli settlers assaults journalists in the occupied West Bank

Footage circulating online shows an Israeli settler assaulting and filming two journalists as they tried to cover the demolitions of Palestinian homes in the occupied West Bank town of Birzeit. 

The occupied West Bank has seen record levels in violent attacks by illegal settlers protected by the Israeli army and emboldened by Israel’s far-right government.