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  • Israel suffers record emigration wave, with almost 270,000 leaving since 2023

    Israel suffers record emigration wave, with almost 270,000 leaving since 2023

    A landmark new study conducted by Tel Aviv University researchers has uncovered an unprecedented surge in Israeli emigration, with nearly 270,000 citizens leaving the country between the start of 2023 and the end of 2025 — the highest three-year total recorded in the nation’s modern history.

    Drawing on official datasets compiled by Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics and other state agencies, the research found a consistent upward trend in long-term departures. More than 86,000 Israelis exited the country for stays of three months or longer in 2023, and that number climbed to over 90,000 in both 2024 and 2025. This puts the annual average of long-term departures at roughly 90,000, a sharp 50% increase from the pre-pandemic average of 60,000 departures per year recorded between 2010 and 2019.

    Unlike previous official emigration reports that only counted citizens who left for a full year or more to count as long-term emigrants, the Tel Aviv University study expands this definition to include anyone spending a minimum of three months outside Israeli borders. Study co-author Itai Ater explained to local outlet Haaretz that this adjusted methodology captures a far more accurate picture of the actual scope of outward migration. The study’s final counts also exclude recent immigrants from Ukraine and Russia who left Israel within three years of arriving, focusing only on long-term residents who had lived in the country for at least three years before their departure.

    Ater emphasized that while the current cumulative numbers do not yet pose an immediate threat to Israel’s national resilience, the steady upward trajectory demands urgent action. “In 2025, we again see deeply troubling numbers of Israelis who left the country for a significant period, adding to the emigration wave of 2023 and 2024,” he said. “But looking ahead, and unless there is a change, there is growing concern that emigration from Israel will increase to a level that endangers the country’s security and economy.”

    Compounding these concerns, earlier Tel Aviv University research has already confirmed that the emigration wave is disproportionately driven by highly skilled workers: a significant and worrying share of departures are doctors, PhD-holding researchers, engineers, university academics, and high-income professionals. While some skilled labor outflow has been observed in other developed economies, the institution notes that this brain drain carries unique risks for Israel. The country has limited natural resources, and its entire economic model is built around leveraging its skilled, innovation-focused workforce.

    The study’s authors warn that the current trend could soon trigger an irreversible domino effect. As more people leave, the incentive grows for friends, family members and professional networks to join them, creating a self-reinforcing cycle that becomes harder to break the longer it continues. “Once emigration numbers cross a certain threshold, reversing the trend will be extremely difficult, perhaps impossible,” the university stated in its release of the study findings.

    The release of the unprecedented data has sparked fierce cross-party criticism of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ruling government from Israeli lawmakers. Gilad Kariv, chair of the Knesset’s Committee for Immigration, Absorption and Diaspora Affairs and a member of the left-wing opposition Democrats party, took to social platform X to condemn the government’s inaction. “Israel is facing a tsunami of emigration, and the government is doing nothing about the issue,” Kariv wrote. He called the emigration wave a “strategic threat to Israel’s future” that is directly tied to the government’s policy agenda, specifically the controversial judicial overhaul launched in early 2023 that sparked months of mass nationwide protests.

    Centrist-right opposition lawmaker Meirav Cohen of the Together party also joined the criticism, drawing a pointed connection between the government’s policies toward Gaza and the growing outflow of Israeli citizens. “They declared they would carry out voluntary emigration from Gaza,” Cohen said on X, referencing the government’s widely criticized plan to encourage the expulsion of Palestinian residents from the Gaza Strip. “In the end, the October 7 government encouraged voluntary emigration from the State of Israel.”

    This report was originally framed by independent regional outlet Middle East Eye, which provides specialized, unfiltered coverage of the Middle East and North Africa region.

  • Gaza families bury 112 people recovered nearly three years after Israeli strikes

    Gaza families bury 112 people recovered nearly three years after Israeli strikes

    On a somber Tuesday in Gaza City, hundreds of mourning relatives gathered to lay to rest 112 members of two interconnected Palestinian clans, the Abu Shari’a and al-Hasayna families, who were killed in a devastating 2023 Israeli airstrike. Their remains, which lay trapped under collapsed concrete for nearly three years, were only recovered by civil defence teams last month, bringing an end to a years-long wait for closure that came paired with a devastating reawakening of grief.

    The airstrike that killed these family members targeted Gaza’s densely populated Sabra neighborhood in November 2023, and stands as one of the deadliest single attacks in the ongoing Israeli military campaign in Gaza. Israeli warplanes completely leveled an entire residential block where hundreds of clan members had gathered to shelter, killing more than 300 people in total – among them 44 children, 37 women, and more than 10 people living with disabilities. For months after the attack, most of the victims’ remains remained trapped under the rubble of the destroyed buildings, as Israeli restrictions blocked critical heavy rescue equipment from entering the besieged territory, halting all recovery efforts.

    It was not until July 14 that Palestinian Civil Defence crews were able to resume search operations at the site, working with limited, insufficient tools to extract remains from the rubble. The intense force of the Israeli bombs had scattered human remains across the site, turning the already painstaking work into an even more grueling challenge. After 17 days of nonstop work under extremely harsh conditions, crews recovered the 112 remains laid to rest this week. Even so, dozens more victims from the strike are still believed to be entombed in the debris, and thousands more across Gaza share the same fate.

    “We worked for 17 days to recover the bodies in extremely difficult conditions. In the end, we managed to recover the remains of 112 people,” Mahmoud Basal, spokesperson for the Palestinian Civil Defence in the Gaza Strip, told Middle East Eye. “Thousands of people are still buried beneath the rubble, while their families continue to grieve and plead for the means to recover them.”

    Among those killed in the strike were prominent community leaders, including Fathi Abu Shari’a, the clan’s respected elder mukhtar. After the first blast hit Abu Shari’a’s home, hundreds of surviving family members fled to the residence of Mofeed al-Hasayneh, a former Palestinian Authority minister of public works and housing who also held United States citizenship. The family believed the home would be spared from attack, with around 200 al-Hasayneh members gathering there for shelter – but the building was also hit by an Israeli bomb, killing everyone inside including al-Hasayneh.

    Mahmoud al-Hasayneh, a survivor of the attack who lost multiple extended family members in the strike, shared his family’s decades-long agony of waiting for recovery. Al-Hasayneh was not at the home when it was bombed, but his son was injured, and his brother, sister-in-law, their children, two of his sisters and their entire families, and dozens of other aunts, uncles, and cousins were killed. Many of the victims held dual citizenship from the United States, the United Kingdom, and Romania, he added, noting that Israeli forces did not spare women, children, or any civilian space in the attack.

    “Unfortunately, the Israelis respected neither children nor women, nor immunity, nor any house, nor any sanctity,” al-Hasayneh said. “They struck everyone here.”

    For relatives scattered across the globe, every step of the slow recovery process reopened deep trauma. “Every time a body was recovered, relatives abroad would call and cry. We opened a new wound,” al-Hasayneh said. “We pray that God will envelop them in His mercy and honour them. This is the greatest honour for the deceased: that they are helped in being buried.”

    For the families gathered for the mass funeral, where the remains were laid out in rows, each draped in a Palestinian flag, the moment carried conflicting, bittersweet emotion: relief at finally being able to lay their loved ones to rest, after nearly 1000 days of waiting, paired with a crushing return of the grief they felt when the massacre first occurred.

    “There is a feeling of both pain and joy,” said Amer Abu Shari’a, who lost multiple family members in the attack. “Joy because we will bury and honour these martyrs after three years. But the sorrow has returned, as if the massacre happened today.”

    The mass burial of the 112 clan members shines a light on the broader crisis of missing people across the Gaza Strip. Omar Nofal, head of Gaza’s government committee for missing persons, told reporters that around 6,000 people have been officially registered as missing since the war began, but the actual number is likely closer to 15,000 – all still trapped under rubble from thousands of destroyed buildings across the territory. According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, Israeli forces have killed more than 73,000 Palestinians in Gaza since October 2023, and wounded more than 170,000 others, with thousands more still unaccounted for under collapsed infrastructure.

  • Labour Friends of Israel defends major West Bank settlement blocs

    Labour Friends of Israel defends major West Bank settlement blocs

    A long-running pro-Israel lobbying group embedded within the UK Labour Party has ignited fierce internal and international debate after releasing a new policy report that argues against a national import ban on goods produced in Israeli settlements located in occupied Palestinian territory, a move that directly contradicts overwhelming grassroots support for such a ban within the party.

    Labour Friends of Israel (LFI), an influential lobby group that counts more than 70 sitting UK members of Parliament among its affiliate members (though it has not published a public roster of supporters for some time), published the 15-page policy briefing late last week under the title *Settlements and Solutions: A Guide to the Issues*. The document was reviewed in full by Middle East Eye ahead of its circulation to Labour lawmakers and senior party figures.

    Under international law, all Israeli settlements constructed in the West Bank and East Jerusalem – territories captured by Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War – are classified as illegal. This position was further cemented earlier this year when the United Nations’ highest judicial body, the International Court of Justice, issued an advisory opinion ruling that Israel’s ongoing occupation of Palestinian territory is unlawful as a whole, and required all UN member states to take active measures to end the occupation.

    Against this global legal consensus, LFI’s report takes a nuanced but controversial stance, acknowledging that most of the international community rejects Israel’s claim that settlements are legal under international law while pushing for a tiered approach to the issue. The document openly criticizes unauthorised Israeli settlement outposts – small, often rogue encampments built without formal approval from the Israeli government – and calls on the UK to pressure any future Israeli government to dismantle these outposts, halt all new settlement expansion outside of existing large, established settlement blocs, increase Palestinian access to construction permits in Area C (the 60 percent of the West Bank under full Israeli civil and military control), and expand territorially for Palestinian autonomous zones.

    This framework makes clear that LFI opposes any British objection to the large, established settlement blocs that house the vast majority of Israeli settlers in the West Bank. The report goes further, arguing that a full national ban on all settlement goods is unfeasible on both practical and political grounds. It claims a comprehensive boycott would not only impact Israeli businesses operating within settlement blocs, East Jerusalem and Jerusalem’s Old City, but would also inadvertently harm Israeli citizens living within Israel’s pre-1967 borders, effectively becoming a de facto boycott of the entire state of Israel.

    Such a move, the report argues, would be perceived by the UK’s Jewish community as evidence that the Labour government is disproportionately targeting Israel for punitive action, deepening existing divides within the country over the government’s Middle East policy.

    The LFI briefing comes at a critical juncture for UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s new Labour government, which widespread Whitehall sources confirm is actively considering implementing an import ban on settlement goods once Parliament reconvenes following its current recess. Burnham has publicly stated he is reviewing “further measures to deter unacceptable violence” in the occupied West Bank, where extremist settler attacks on Palestinian communities have spiked dramatically over the past two years.

    Multiple senior figures within Burnham’s cabinet have documented ties to LFI. Current Defence Secretary Wes Streeting, who has previously stated he has been a supporter of LFI for more than 20 years in leaked text messages to former disgraced UK ambassador to the US Peter Mandelson, has nevertheless broken with the lobby group’s latest position, endorsing sanctions on Israel and publicly accusing the country of committing war crimes in Gaza. Business and Trade Secretary Jonathan Reynolds, another senior Labour figure, previously served as a vice-chair of LFI.

    It is worth noting that when Labour was the official opposition, the party publicly called for a ban on settlement goods. In June 2020, then-shadow foreign secretary Lisa Nandy argued that implementing such a ban would require political courage that sitting Conservative ministers had so far refused to demonstrate.

    The push for import restrictions on settlement goods is gaining traction across Europe. France and Sweden recently tabled a joint proposal calling on the European Union to implement strict new import controls on goods produced in Israeli settlements, while the Netherlands officially implemented a national ban on trade in these goods just last month.

    Domestically, LFI’s position puts it sharply at odds with the vast majority of the Labour Party’s own grassroots membership. Polling conducted earlier this year found that 87 percent of registered Labour members support a national ban on trade with Israeli settlements, with just 6 percent opposing the measure.

    In its report, LFI does condemn the current Israeli administration led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which took office in January 2023 and has dramatically accelerated settlement expansion beyond the established blocs while failing to crack down on violent extremist settlers. The group also argues that there is a long-standing international consensus, previously accepted by both Israeli and Palestinian negotiating teams, that the major settlement blocs will remain under Israeli control as part of any final two-state peace agreement, via a land swap arrangement that would exchange Israeli territory for the occupied land held by the blocs.

  • Board of Peace caves to Netanyahu and rewrites Israeli withdrawal terms from Gaza

    Board of Peace caves to Netanyahu and rewrites Israeli withdrawal terms from Gaza

    In a significant policy shift following high-stakes talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the US-backed Board of Peace has toughened conditions for any Israeli military pullback from Gaza, abandoning a previously proposed phased approach to the conflict. The body now explicitly ties any Israeli withdrawal of forces beyond the Yellow Line — the de facto demarcation splitting Gaza into Israeli- and Palestinian-controlled zones — to the full and complete disarmament of Hamas, covering all light weapons, heavy armaments and underground tunnel networks.

    The new position marks a sharp departure from the framework the board outlined just one week prior. Last week, board officials put forward a incremental plan that would have paired partial, step-by-step Israeli withdrawals back to the Yellow Line with gradual Hamas disarmament, matching comments from the board’s high representative Nickolay Mladenov, who said withdrawals and disarmament must “move in lockstep.” Initially, in Monday’s post-meeting statement, the body referenced a “full withdrawal of the IDF,” which kept open the door for earlier partial pullbacks. But within minutes, officials removed the word “full,” bringing the board’s stance directly in line with Netanyahu’s long-held demand that Israeli forces remain in Gaza until Hamas is fully disarmed.

    The Yellow Line was originally drawn up after a controversial ceasefire agreement in October 2025. In the time since that truce, Israel has expanded its territorial control in the enclave, now holding more than 60 percent of Gaza, with Netanyahu publicly stating the goal of extending Israeli control to roughly 70 percent of the strip.

    This policy reversal has already introduced new uncertainty to mediation efforts. Hamas had previously accepted the original phased sequencing of withdrawals and disarmament, and analysts warn the board’s retreat from its earlier position risks unraveling the fragile preliminary agreement, while rewarding Israel’s ongoing refusal to halt military strikes or begin pullbacks. According to Israeli outlet Israel Hayom, Netanyahu made his government’s position clear during talks with Mladenov: Israel will not end its offensive in Gaza, nor will it withdraw forces to the Yellow Line ahead of full Hamas disarmament.

    Additional Israeli demands have further complicated negotiations. Israeli officials have sought formal assurances that even after Hamas completes disarmament, Israel will retain the right to carry out military strikes inside Gaza. The Israeli government also rejected Turkish and Qatari participation in a proposed international monitoring committee charged with overseeing disarmament, and demanded that all seized Hamas weapons be destroyed rather than stored.

    Mladenov sought to temper expectations for quick progress following the contentious talks. “This is the start of the hard phase and I have never pretended otherwise,” he wrote on social platform X. “Not much of what we do now is dramatic. It is slow, grinding and technical work.”

    Hours after the meeting concluded, violence continued on the ground: an Israeli air strike targeting the Sheikh Ajlin neighborhood of Gaza City killed two Palestinian civilians, underscoring the ongoing human cost of stalled diplomacy.

  • Trump insists Iran talks under way, warns Tehran’s ‘last chance’ to secure deal

    Trump insists Iran talks under way, warns Tehran’s ‘last chance’ to secure deal

    Tensions across the Middle East have escalated sharply this week, with overlapping diplomatic efforts, conflicting claims about dialogue between the United States and Iran, and rising violence threatening stability across key waterways and border regions. In a public statement, former US President Donald Trump announced that direct negotiations between Washington and Tehran are currently underway, adding a stark warning that this latest diplomatic push represents Tehran’s “last chance” to reach a binding agreement to de-escalate the ongoing conflict between the two nations.

    Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei quickly pushed back against Trump’s claim, flatly denying that any direct talks with US officials are in progress or that any future meetings have been scheduled. Currently, discussions focused on security and governance of the strategically critical Strait of Hormuz remain facilitated through Omani mediation, Baghaei confirmed. Undisclosed sources speaking to Anadolu Agency note that negotiators from Pakistan and Qatar are also working behind the scenes to lock in a mutually acceptable date and location for a potential direct meeting between Iranian and US delegations. Last week, Pakistan formally extended an urgent invitation to Iranian negotiators to travel to Islamabad, a move widely interpreted as an effort to restart Iran-US talks that have stalled for weeks. Pakistan’s Deputy Foreign Minister Mohammed Ishaq Dar extended the invitation directly to Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi during a recent phone call, urging Araghchi to visit “at his earliest convenience.”

    The simmering confrontation took a harder turn as senior Iranian military advisor Mohsen Rezaei, who serves as a top aide to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, issued a stark warning to US military forces in the region. Rezaei cautioned that American naval vessels and deployed troops will “face serious risks and casualties” if Washington continues its naval blockade of Iranian commercial ports. In a public post on the social platform X, Rezaei emphasized that “The U.S. must change its behavior — or we will not tolerate this. We will never permit the opening of a second corridor in the Strait of Hormuz.”

    Despite the public disputes over negotiations, anonymous Iranian and US officials told The New York Times that Iran and Oman are in the final stages of finalizing a draft agreement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to unimpeded commercial shipping, a deal that would grant Tehran near-total control over the contested strategic waterway, through which roughly 20% of the world’s daily oil shipments pass.

    Tensions along the waterway spilled into violence this week, Reuters reported Tuesday. A Liberian-flagged commercial vessel was hit by an unclaimed projectile while transiting the Strait near the Omani coastline. Maritime industry sources confirm that the entire crew abandoned the damaged ship, and at least one sailor remains missing following the incident.

    In a separate development, Rezaei also confirmed this week that Iran had scrapped a pre-planned retaliatory strike against three locations in Ukraine, after Kyiv issued a formal apology for a recent Ukrainian attack on an Iranian commercial vessel. Speaking to Iranian state television, Rezaei explained that Iran’s armed forces had completed all military preparations for the strikes before the operation was called off following the apology.

    The five-month-long open conflict between the US and Iran has already generated unexpected financial windfalls for major global energy firms, as skyrocketing oil and gas prices have driven a sharp surge in corporate profits. British energy giant BP reported that its most recent quarterly profits have more than doubled compared to the previous year. UK-based rival Shell confirmed its net profit also doubled to nearly $10 billion in the three months ending in June, while Saudi state oil giant Aramco recorded a 44% rise in net profits over the same period.

    In a separate hotspot along the Israel-Lebanon border, the seventh round of US-brokered negotiations between Israeli and Lebanese delegations kicked off this week in Rome. The three-day talks are focused on addressing ongoing Israeli violations of a conditional ceasefire agreement reached between the two sides in April, including unapproved Israeli land-clearing operations, explosions targeting civilian infrastructure, and the demolition of residential homes in southern Lebanon.

    A senior Lebanese official speaking to Anadolu Agency outlined the Lebanese delegation’s core proposal: the talks will focus on establishing new designated pilot zones for Israeli military withdrawal, with the second phase of withdrawal covering either Bint Jbeil or Khiam, both located south of the Litani River in southern Lebanon.

    Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem publicly rejected the negotiations in a televised address Monday, arguing that the talks will bring “nothing but shame, humiliation, and successive compromises” for Lebanon. Qassem also criticized Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, claiming Aoun “has not acted as an arbiter, nor as a unifying figure, but has become biased and divisive, which is incompatible with his role and with Lebanon’s strength.”

    The resumption of diplomatic talks comes as Israeli forces continue to carry out attacks and home demolitions in multiple southern Lebanese towns. The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) issued a formal update Monday confirming that peacekeepers continue to record “daily Israeli violations of Lebanon’s airspace, roadblocks and activities in its territorial waters.” Between Thursday and Sunday alone, UNIFIL documented 125 separate Israeli air violations, with total combined overflight time exceeding 418 hours. “Peacekeepers also report extensive military activity on the ground in south Lebanon, including significant engineering works and active troop movements,” a UN deputy spokesperson confirmed.

    Since Israel renewed its large-scale military assault on Lebanon on March 2, official counts place the Lebanese death toll at over 4,300 people, with an additional 12,200 people wounded in the ongoing hostilities.

  • US-Saudi strikes test Iraq’s balancing act between Riyadh and Tehran

    US-Saudi strikes test Iraq’s balancing act between Riyadh and Tehran

    Last week’s unprecedented joint military operation by the United States and Saudi Arabia against Iran-aligned militias based in Iraq has done far more than stoke fears of imminent retaliation. It has laid bare the deep fragility of Baghdad’s years-long balancing act, which has sought to nurture warmer ties with both Riyadh and Washington while keeping powerful Tehran-aligned armed factions in check — a delicate compromise that may now force Iraq to make hard choices its leaders have long evaded.

    According to Iraqi and Iranian media reports, the strikes hit multiple bases belonging to Iraq’s Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF) on July 29, leaving at least 20 PMF fighters dead alongside four military advisers from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The operation marks the first time Saudi Arabia has openly participated in coordinated military strikes alongside the U.S., and was framed as retaliation for recent drone attacks on Saudi oil infrastructure that were launched from Iraqi territory.

    What is most notable, however, is that neither Riyadh nor the targeted Iran-linked militias appear to be seeking a prolonged, large-scale military confrontation at this stage. The Saudi foreign ministry characterized the joint action as an act of legitimate self-defense, while noting that further strikes would only occur if additional attacks against Saudi territory are carried out. For Riyadh, the priority remains addressing ongoing Houthi threats to its oil facilities and maritime trade routes from Yemen, and the kingdom has little interest in opening a new active front against Iran-aligned groups in Iraq.

    Regional analysts broadly agree that the primary goal of the strikes was to reestablish deterrence against Tehran and its Iraqi proxies, rather than spark a full-blown conflict. “The strikes were targeted at specific militia sites linked directly to drone attacks on Saudi oil facilities, to deter these groups,” explained Dr. Hesham Alghannam, a Riyadh-based scholar with the Carnegie Middle East program, in an interview with Middle East Eye. “But killing Iranian military advisers alongside militia fighters was not accidental. This was a message to Tehran that Saudi Arabia holds Iran responsible for what its personnel direct from Iraqi soil, regardless of which formation pulls the trigger.”

    A similar restrained posture can be seen on the side of the Iran-aligned militias. The Islamic Resistance in Iraq (IRI), an umbrella coalition that includes the PMF, has publicly vowed retaliation for the strikes, but its rhetoric toward Saudi Arabia has been far more tempered than its sharp hostility toward the United States. In a July 29 statement posted to its official Telegram channel, the group emphasized that its “response to the American enemy is inevitable,” while only noting that it may target Saudi Arabia “if circumstances require.”

    The IRI has given Iraq’s central government an August 7 deadline to respond to the joint strikes, but analysts argue this timeline and accompanying threats are aimed more at influencing Baghdad’s domestic policy than setting the stage for immediate military escalation. Multiple IRI-affiliated factions, including Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba and Saraya Awliya al-Dam, have already called on Baghdad to cut diplomatic ties with Saudi Arabia, indicating the pressure is intended to shape Iraq’s broader regional alignment rather than trigger immediate conflict.

    Mustafa Alsaray, research director at the Al-Bayan Centre for Research and Planning, pointed out that armed factions in Iraq rarely publicize deadlines for retaliation, instead relying on surprise attacks. “When they set such deadlines, they intend to send a message and achieve something, perhaps politically or in terms of security,” he told Middle East Eye. A second possibility, he added, is that the militias are holding off on any retaliation to coordinate their response with Tehran, amid shifting currents in ongoing U.S.-Iran tensions.

    In recent days, U.S.-Iran relations have shown tentative signs of de-escalation: former U.S. President Donald Trump confirmed that direct negotiations with Tehran are ongoing, though he also warned the latest talks represent Iran’s “last chance” to reach a new nuclear and security deal. A renewed breakdown in those talks could prompt Iran-aligned militias to launch new attacks against Saudi Arabia, and potentially even Jordan or other Gulf Arab states, observers warn.

    Beyond regional tensions, the strikes come at an extraordinarily sensitive juncture for Iraq’s domestic politics and security agenda. Baghdad is currently working to bring all weapons held by non-state armed groups under formal state control, advance integration of the PMF (which is technically part of Iraq’s official security apparatus but hosts highly autonomous Iran-aligned factions), and implement a national disarmament plan with a September 30 compliance deadline for all armed groups.

    The joint U.S.-Saudi strikes, and Baghdad’s widespread public perception as unable or unwilling to prevent the attacks on PMF bases, have already hardened resistance to the disarmament push among hardline factions. Abu Hussein al-Hamidawi, secretary general of Kataeb Hezbollah, confirmed that the attacks have “reinforced the group’s commitment to retaining and developing its weapons.” To build popular support for their position, the IRI has explicitly tied the strikes to Baghdad’s disarmament initiative, challenging the government that has “called for the Resistance’s disarmament” to prove it can defend Iraqi territory.

    As resistance to disarmament grows, the economic stakes of Iraq’s stalled security reforms are becoming impossible to ignore. During Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi’s official visit to Washington in mid-July, his government signed 48 new trade and investment partnerships with U.S. companies. But U.S. officials have made clear that deeper economic cooperation and larger investments will depend on Baghdad’s ability to rein in or disarm militias that have carried out dozens of attacks on U.S. military and diplomatic targets in recent months, a string of assaults the IRI claimed responsibility for during the U.S.-Israel conflict with Iran.

    Saudi Arabia is expected to adopt a similar posture on investment in Iraq. Zaidi has repeatedly framed closer economic partnership with Riyadh as a core priority for his government, but failure to control Iran-aligned militias could derail those plans completely. “September 30 is the real test. If the disarmament process fails – on the same day U.S. forces are set to withdraw from Iraq – Riyadh and even Abu Dhabi will quietly conclude that Baghdad cannot deliver, and their willingness to invest in Iraq will be reconsidered accordingly,” Alghannam noted.

    For Iraq, the aftermath of the joint strikes has turned a long-simmering internal tension into an unavoidable test: can Baghdad deliver on its security reforms, preserve its fledgling ties with Gulf Arab states, and avoid being dragged into a wider regional conflict that its war-weary population can ill afford?

  • How Morocco’s Gaza deployment is reshaping its ties with Israel

    How Morocco’s Gaza deployment is reshaping its ties with Israel

    In a groundbreaking move that makes it the first Arab and African nation to join the deployment, Morocco formalized its participation in the controversial International Stabilisation Force (ISF) for Palestine in mid-July, tying its involvement to former U.S. President Donald Trump’s divisive Gaza peace plan and the equally disputed Board of Peace (BoP) created to oversee the initiative.

    The signing ceremony was held in Rabat on July 15, with top Moroccan and international figures in attendance: Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita, BoP Director General Nickolay Mladenov, senior Royal Armed Forces defense officials, and ISF Commander Jasper Jeffers. The deployment follows a direct order from King Mohammed VI, who serves as the Supreme Commander and Chief of General Staff of the Royal Armed Forces, as well as chairman of the Al-Quds Committee. Initial plans called for 500 Moroccan military personnel to be stationed at a refugee camp in Rafah, the southern Gaza city, but that number has since been cut to 200 troops according to Al Jazeera reporting. The force is set to operate in direct collaboration with the Israeli military.

    Shortly after Morocco signed the participation agreement, Hamas unveiled a conditional disarmament proposal aligned with Trump’s Gaza framework. However, Israel has failed to uphold its end of the broader agreement, showing no indication of withdrawing from the Palestinian territories it has occupied illegally for decades. Instead of committing to a withdrawal timeline, far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has pushed forward a proposal to expand illegal Israeli settlements into the Gaza Strip.

    In an official statement from Morocco’s National Defence Administration, the kingdom framed its contribution as a demonstration of unwavering commitment to cross-border peace, global cooperation, and regional stability. The statement added that the move is consistent with Morocco’s status as a founding member of the BoP.

    Said Saddiki, an international relations professor at Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah University in Fez, explained the strategic benefits Rabat stands to gain from the deployment. He noted that joining the ISF gives Morocco a chance to reclaim a high-profile diplomatic role in the Palestinian issue, complementing the decades-long work it has carried out through the Al-Quds Committee and the Bayt Mal Al-Quds Agency. While independent analysis from the Council on Foreign Relations confirms the ISF is intended to act as Gaza’s primary security force, eventually replacing the Israeli military, Moroccan officials have heavily centered public narrative around a planned field hospital the kingdom will establish as part of its ISF mission.

    That field hospital framing is nothing more than political spin, according to Saadia, a leading Moroccan member of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement and an organizer for the most recent Global Sumud flotilla. Speaking to Middle East Eye, Saadia argued that while Morocco may claim to support Palestinian interests, its involvement ultimately benefits Israel far more — pointing to the kingdom’s existing role in arms shipments to the Zionist entity as evidence. Saddiki pushed back on that criticism, framing the field hospital as first and foremost a humanitarian undertaking rather than a military one. He acknowledged that Morocco maintains warm diplomatic relations with both Palestinian and Israeli leadership, but emphasized that the current tense regional climate leaves little room for any Arab state to serve as an effective mediator. As such, he said, Morocco is far more likely to contribute through humanitarian aid and diplomatic outreach than through active negotiation. To date, Morocco’s Ministry of Defence has not released any detailed public breakdown of the specific role its troops will fill as part of the ISF deployment.

    Saadia offered a far more skeptical take on the kingdom’s unstated goals. Beyond the humanitarian framing, she suggested Morocco’s role could include disarming Hamas resistance factions and even overseeing a new wave of American and Israeli colonization of the Gaza Strip. Saddiki countered that Morocco’s participation does not represent a strategic alliance against any party, nor does it come at the cost of the Palestinian cause. He added that domestically, the Moroccan government has worked to balance its foreign policy choices with widespread public support for Palestine, while noting that pro-Palestinian and anti-normalization movements have remained steadily active across the country since October 2023.

    Even as the Moroccan state has openly deepened ties with Israel, many ordinary citizens have warned that any normalization agreement with the country amounts to complicity in the ongoing genocide of Palestinian people in Gaza and the occupied West Bank. Younes, a key leader of Morocco’s pro-Palestinian protest movement and a veteran organizer of the past two Global Sumud flotillas, told Middle East Eye that joining the ISF amounts to full complicity in genocide. The activist added that entering Gaza alongside Israeli forces to impose a one-sided peace and force Palestinians to surrender and disarm is a grave injustice that the Moroccan public will never accept.

    Both Trump’s peace plan and the BoP have been widely condemned by grassroots activists and sovereign nations alike for violating core principles of international law. Younes argued that no genuine peace initiative can come from negotiations with Israel, noting that the country has long operated with impunity to expand its control over Palestinian land. Shams, a Rabat-based activist who requested to use a pseudonym, described Morocco’s involvement as deeply disheartening and disappointing, though she added that the decision did not come as a surprise. Shams noted that widespread opposition to normalization runs deep, particularly among younger Moroccans: “I cannot speak for all Gen Z Moroccans, but I would say that most are opposed to the Moroccan military support joining the ISF.”

    Data from the 2025 Arab Index, published earlier this year by the Arab Center Washington DC, backs up that claim: the survey found that 89 percent of Moroccans oppose recognizing Israel, with just 6 percent in favor of normalization.

    A Moroccan journalist who requested anonymity explained that the Moroccan state frames normalization as a strategic tool: the kingdom supports a two-state solution and cooperates with Israel in exchange for diplomatic and political backing from the United States. But the journalist added that public trust in the government’s approach is eroding fast, as the gap between official rhetoric and on-the-ground reality widens. With Israel continuing to expand illegal settlements on occupied Palestinian land, the prospect of a two-state solution grows more distant by the day.

    For Shams, the addition of Moroccan military forces to the ISF will not bring peace to Gaza. “I don’t think military intervention is going to facilitate peace when the oppressor has been destroying and bombing and blockading and [committing] genocide for decades on end,” she said. She added that the U.S. and Israel will only continue to destabilize Gaza, kill Palestinian civilians, and destroy the lives of millions.

    Morocco is the only North African and Arab nation contributing military troops to the ISF, joining a small coalition that includes Kosovo, Albania, Kazakhstan, Indonesia, and most recently Uganda. Neighboring Egypt has limited its involvement to training and logistical support, choosing not to deploy frontline forces. This unique position has triggered intense anger among Moroccan pro-Palestinian activists, with Younes expressing frustration over the rapid pace of normalization across the country’s public and private sectors. “Zionists in Morocco successfully penetrated every single sector within a short period,” he explained. “What we gather as voluntary efforts and popular mobilisation to face this cancer during the past years isn’t enough.” Acknowledging the gravity of his assessment, he added that Moroccan authorities have continued to push forward with normalization even as grassroots opposition grows, meaning activists must adapt their strategies and pursue new approaches to challenge the trend.

    Despite growing pressure from state authorities, Morocco’s pro-Palestinian movement remains defiant. Saadia argued that governments joining the ISF are operating under a dangerous delusion, wrongly believing that alignment with the American-Israeli axis will bring them greater security and protection. Pointing to the recent escalation of conflict between the U.S.-Israeli bloc and Iran, she noted that the U.S. only prioritizes Israel’s security, with no regard for the interests of other partner nations.

    (Names of interviewees have been changed to protect them from retaliation)

  • Afghanistan’s child deaths are rising as food distributions face cuts, UN says

    Afghanistan’s child deaths are rising as food distributions face cuts, UN says

    The United Nations World Food Program (WFP) issued a stark alert on Tuesday, announcing that child malnutrition has reached catastrophic, critical levels across 12 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces — one third of the entire country — and the crisis is poised to deteriorate rapidly as crippling funding gaps force widespread cuts to life-saving food distributions and nutritional support.

  • A titanic throwback tour: The All Blacks’ 6-week South Africa trek with a Baltimore finale

    A titanic throwback tour: The All Blacks’ 6-week South Africa trek with a Baltimore finale

    For over a century, the question of global rugby supremacy has almost always come down to a clash between two titans: South Africa’s Springboks and New Zealand’s All Blacks. Both nations, former outposts of the British Empire, took the game invented in England, redefined it, and used the sport as a foundation to build their national identities and carve out respected standing on the world’s sporting stage.

    The first formal meeting between the two sides came in 1921, when the Springboks crossed the world by steamship to face the All Blacks on their home turf. From that moment until the dawn of professional rugby 75 years later, cross-hemisphere tours between the two nations were legendary events: drawn out in length, fiercely competitive, steeped in fan fervor, and often mired in high-stakes controversy.

    This year marks three decades since the last traditional long-format tour between the two rivals, and the All Blacks have returned to South African soil to kick off an eight-match, six-week tour, opening the campaign this Friday in Cape Town. In a departure from tradition, the fourth and final test match will be played across the Atlantic at M&T Bank Stadium, the home of the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens, a move organized for global marketing and outreach purposes.

    When the tour was first announced, Springboks captain Siya Kolisi noted that this format of cross-border tour is something most current players only ever heard about from older generations of the sport. “To experience this for the first time … is unbelievable for us as a group,” Kolisi said. That inexperience is no coincidence: two-thirds of the total 88 players across both national squads were not even born when the last traditional tour took place in 1996. Kolisi was just five years old at the time, while All Blacks captain Ardie Savea was only two. Still, every member of both squads understands the heavy weight of history behind this rivalry.

    From their earliest matchups, Springbok-All Black contests have set the global standard for on-pitch intensity and tactical tension, balanced by deep mutual respect and reverence between the teams off the field. Historically, the Springboks dominated early series play, holding an undefeated record in away series against New Zealand between 1903 and 1956, including their only away series win in the country in 1937.

    However, the rivalry carried a painful off-field chapter for decades: New Zealand rugby officials bowed to pressure from South Africa’s apartheid government, barring Māori players from joining All Black tours of South Africa until 1970. For many All Black players, the chance to claim a series win in South Africa was the pinnacle of the sport, outweighing every other consideration. Colin Meads, widely hailed as the greatest All Black of the 20th century, got two shots at the prize in 1960 and 1970, and even played two full test matches in 1970 with a broken arm to pursue the win. In his autobiography, Meads summed up the allure of the rivalry: “If you’re ever going to play good rugby, you’ll play it in South Africa. There is always that feeling inside you, as an All Black, that THIS is what it has all been about, that THIS is South Africa and THESE are the players you most want to beat.”

    While the matches themselves were uncompromising during the apartheid era, widespread international and domestic protests against the tours from the 1970s onward sparked unprecedented division and social disruption across the sport. When apartheid was formally abolished in 1991, and South Africa was readmitted to international sporting competition, the first opponent the Springboks sought out was New Zealand.

    After apartheid ended, the All Blacks initially enjoyed overwhelming support from Black South African fans, but that backing shifted after Nelson Mandela publicly backed the Springboks during South Africa’s iconic 1995 World Cup hosting run, which ended with the Springboks lifting the trophy in an extra-time win over the All Blacks. The following year, the All Blacks returned to South Africa and finally secured their first ever series win on Springbok home soil. The enduring image from that 1996 tour remains captain Sean Fitzpatrick collapsing to the Pretoria turf in elation after the final whistle. Last week, Fitzpatrick and the rest of the 1996 squad met the current All Blacks team, passing the legacy forward, telling the current group this tour will be their greatest adventure, and success will come if they stay united.

    Heading into the 2026 tour, the history between the two sides remains perfectly deadlocked: each nation has hosted six tours, claimed four home series wins, and one away series win apiece. But the odds favor the Springboks heading into this year’s series, with the All Blacks entering the tournament as clear underdogs to the world’s top-ranked South African side.

    Springbok coach Rassie Erasmus has had eight years to build his squad for this series, cultivating unprecedented depth while leading the team to two consecutive Rugby Championship titles and an 11-test winning streak – the Springboks’ best run of form in 18 years. For Erasmus, this series is also a critical test to identify which players have the endurance to compete for a third straight World Cup title next year, when the tournament will be hosted in Australia. This week, the Springboks are wrapping up a final warm-up match against Argentina before facing the All Blacks.

    On the All Blacks side, head coach Dave Rennie has only been in charge since June, and has led the team through just three matches so far. He has already turned around domestic morale by shifting the team’s playing style to a more direct, high-tempo attack. Rennie has rested captain Ardie Savea for the opening tour matches, saving him for the test series, and is preparing his squad for matchups against four of South Africa’s top provincial sides: the Stormers, Sharks, Bulls, and Lions. Though these provincial sides have not played a competitive match in at least two months, and are missing their top players who are with the Springbok national squad, they still carry a traditional role on these tours: to wear down the visiting All Blacks and expose weaknesses before the test matches.

    True to the playful but fierce spirit of the rivalry, Cape Town Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis summed up the welcome for the All Blacks when the team landed last Friday: “Off the field we will be the perfect hosts and treat you like royalty, but on the field you can expect no mercy.”

  • Moment pilot caught with 70,000 ecstasy pills at Indonesian airport

    Moment pilot caught with 70,000 ecstasy pills at Indonesian airport

    In a major drug bust that has drawn regional attention to aviation security gaps, Indonesian customs officials have arrested a Malaysian commercial pilot at Jakarta’s main international airport after seizing roughly 26 kilograms (equivalent to four stone) of ecstasy concealed in the pilot’s checked luggage.

    The seizure, which totals 70,000 individual ecstasy pills, marks one of the larger drug intercepts involving a licensed aviation professional in Southeast Asia in recent years. Law enforcement sources confirmed that officers detected the illicit substances during routine baggage screening following the pilot’s arrival on an international inbound flight. Authorities have not yet publicly released details on the pilot’s intended route for the narcotics or whether additional co-conspirators are being sought in connection with the smuggling operation.

    The incident has reignited debates across Southeast Asia over vulnerabilities in global aviation supply chains and crew screening procedures. The region remains a key transit corridor for international drug trafficking networks, which have increasingly attempted to exploit the trusted status of aviation workers to move illicit substances across borders. Indonesian anti-narcotics officials have announced they will launch a full investigation into how the drugs were able to be brought through initial security checks before the pilot departed for Jakarta, and are working with Malaysian law enforcement to trace the origin of the seizure.