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  • Israeli settlements: What does the ICJ ruling require Britain and other states do?

    Israeli settlements: What does the ICJ ruling require Britain and other states do?

    On a historic Tuesday in the UK Parliament, Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband unveiled long-awaited measures aligning British government policy with a landmark 2024 legal ruling from the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the United Nations’ highest judicial body. In a speech marking a sharp break from decades of ambiguous British policy, Miliband explicitly declared Israel’s decades-long occupation of Palestinian territory illegal, announced sweeping new sanctions targeting Israeli settlements, and implemented a full ban on arms licenses and all exports that materially contribute to sustaining the occupation.

    Miliband further stated that the UK government has concluded Israeli settlers are perpetrating ethnic cleansing against Palestinian communities in the occupied West Bank, accusing the Israeli government of deliberately ignoring these widespread abuses and actively condoning the forced displacement of Palestinian people. “For a long time, the British government has correctly acknowledged that Israeli settlements are illegal under international law, but we have remained silent on the broader question of the legality of the entire occupation,” Miliband told lawmakers. “Today, I announce that the official view of the British Government is that the occupation is unlawful, because of Israel’s entrenchment of its control, its stated intention to extend permanent sovereignty over the territory, and its expansionist agenda pursued through illegal settlements.”

    Miliband’s announcement represents the clearest endorsement to date from the United Kingdom of the ICJ’s landmark July 19, 2024, advisory opinion. The ruling, requested by the UN General Assembly, formally confirmed the illegality of Israel’s decades-long occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem, ordered all Israeli settlers to withdraw from occupied Palestinian territory, and mandated that all governments take action to end any support that sustains Israel’s unlawful presence in the region.

    These findings have taken on renewed urgency in recent months as Israel accelerates settlement expansion, including advancing construction tenders for the controversial E1 project. British and international officials have repeatedly warned that the E1 development would split the occupied West Bank into disconnected fragments, eliminating any possibility of establishing a geographically contiguous and viable Palestinian state.

    The UK did not act alone: on the same day as Miliband’s announcement, 11 other nations—Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden—joined the UK in signing a joint international statement. The signatories confirmed their intention to introduce national restrictions on trade in goods produced in illegal Israeli settlements, or support European Union-wide restrictions, with many nations actively evaluating additional measures in line with their domestic legislative procedures.

    To contextualize the announcement, it is critical to revisit the full scope of the 2024 ICJ advisory opinion. Judges on the court concluded that Israel’s entire continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), not only its isolated settlements, violates international law on multiple overlapping grounds. The court ruled that Israel’s policy of transferring its own civilian population into the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and maintaining their presence there, directly violates the Fourth Geneva Convention’s explicit ban on an occupying power relocating its own citizens into occupied territory.

    Additional findings confirmed that Israel’s seizure of Palestinian land for settlement construction breaches customary international law, that its exploitation of Palestinian natural resources exceeds the legal limits allowed for occupying powers, and that extending Israeli domestic law to settlers in occupied territory has no legal justification. The court also found that Israel’s policies have enforced near-total separation between Palestinian and Israeli civilian populations, violating the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination’s ban on racial segregation and apartheid.

    When combined with state policies designed to push Palestinians to leave their land and widespread settler violence that Israel has systematically failed to prevent, the ICJ concluded these practices amount to de facto annexation of large swathes of the OPT. The court ordered Israel to end its unlawful occupation as rapidly as possible, halt all new settlement construction, withdraw all settlers from occupied territory, repeal all discriminatory legislation related to the occupation, and provide reparations for all harm caused to the Palestinian people.

    The ruling also mandated that all other countries must not recognize Israel’s occupation as legal, must not provide aid or assistance that helps sustain the occupation, and must avoid economic or trade activities that support illegal Israeli settlements. Most fundamentally, the court reaffirmed that the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination is an absolute, peremptory norm of international law, and that Israel’s occupation fundamentally violates this right by fragmenting Palestinian territory, forcing mass displacement of Palestinian communities to alter the territory’s demographic makeup, denying Palestinians permanent sovereignty over their own natural resources, and creating a system of economic dependence that undermines Palestinians’ ability to pursue independent social, economic and cultural development. The court emphasized that the 60-plus year duration of Israel’s policies significantly aggravates this violation.

    Notably, international law experts have flagged a key gap in Miliband’s parliamentary address. While Miliband mentioned the term “self-determination” twice, he did not connect it to the ICJ’s core finding that the occupation violates this fundamental right. Ralph Wilde, a professor of international law at University College London who represented the League of Arab States during the ICJ proceedings, noted in an interview with Middle East Eye (speaking in a personal capacity) that the omission is meaningful, because the right to Palestinian self-determination forms the foundational underpinning of the court’s entire ruling.

    “The core point of the ruling is that Israel should not be there at all. This is not Israel’s sovereign territory, and its presence is a direct violation of Palestinian self-determination,” Wilde explained. “It is incorrect to omit the most important finding, which is that this is a violation of Palestinian self-determination. That omission misleadingly frames the issue as narrower than the fundamental denial of Palestinian freedom itself—a denial that has persisted since 1967.”

    In the period following the ICJ’s 2024 ruling, settlement expansion has accelerated dramatically. By 2025, the annual rate of settlement growth hit its highest level since 2017, with an average of roughly 12,815 new housing units added each year. The total number of official Israeli settlements and unauthorized outposts grew from 141 in 2022 to approximately 210 by 2026. Israel has continued to advance the E1 project near Jerusalem, which would permanently break the territorial continuity of the West Bank and eliminate any realistic path to an independent Palestinian state.

    In September 2024, the UN General Assembly adopted resolution A/RES/ES-10/24 by a vote of 124 to 14, with 43 abstentions, translating the ICJ’s findings into binding, concrete demands. The resolution gave Israel a 12-month deadline, expiring in September 2025, to end its unlawful presence in the OPT, and required all UN member states to halt imports of settlement goods and stop transferring arms that could be used in the occupied territory. At the time, the UK abstained from the vote, arguing it did not dispute the ICJ’s core findings but claimed the resolution lacked “sufficient clarity” to advance a negotiated two-state settlement. The September 2025 deadline passed without any compliance from Israel.

    To date, most UN member states have failed to implement the ICJ ruling or meet the requirements of the General Assembly resolution. However, a growing bloc of European countries have begun taking incremental steps to fulfill their international legal obligations. Spain implemented a full ban on settlement goods imports in September 2025, Ireland enacted similar legislation in July 2026, and Belgium approved its own import ban that same month. The Netherlands adopted new restrictions on the import, purchase and sale of settlement goods, set to enter into force on September 22. Slovenia introduced restrictions in 2025, but its new government repealed the import ban in June 2026.

    Norway strengthened official business guidance after the 2024 ICJ ruling, advising domestic companies against engaging in activities that sustain Israel’s occupation, and opened a public consultation in June 2026 on draft legislation to restrict settlement imports, exports and relevant property and service transactions. With Tuesday’s announcement, the UK, France and Canada have now joined the group of nations pledging national restrictions on settlement goods trade, bringing the total number of countries backing new measures to 12.

  • Suspected spyware attacks target Turkish ministers’ phones

    Suspected spyware attacks target Turkish ministers’ phones

    Sources with direct knowledge of the incident have confirmed to Middle East Eye that technology giant Apple has pushed threat notifications to the personal and official iPhones of at least three senior Turkish government ministers, warning that the devices could be in the crosshairs of mercenary spyware operators.

    This latest round of alerts forms part of a broader global warning Apple issued last month, which reached an undisclosed number of iPhone users across 110 countries, with Turkey included among the affected regions. Multiple industry and government sources confirm the Turkish ministers’ notifications were part of this global batch of warnings.

    Cybersecurity observers have not flagged this development as unexpected: in 2021, multiple senior Turkish public officials were already identified as targets of suspected surveillance campaigns using Pegasus, the controversial spyware developed by Israeli cybersecurity firm NSO Group. That same year, Paris-based nonprofit journalism collective Forbidden Stories, in partnership with 16 global media organizations, published a groundbreaking investigation exposing that government clients of mercenary spyware firms had flagged more than 50,000 phone numbers across the globe as potential hacking targets starting from 2016.

    At this stage, investigators have not been able to confirm what strain of spyware was used in the 2024 attempted attacks, as a growing number of private surveillance companies now offer capabilities comparable to Pegasus for government clients.

    Despite the confirmed targeting attempts, a senior Turkish official speaking to Middle East Eye on condition of anonymity emphasized that the hacking attempts were ultimately unsuccessful. The official also declined to disclose the identities of the three ministers impacted by the attempted surveillance.

    The official explained that the ministers targeted in this campaign had long used devices pre-equipped with enhanced security protocols, alongside purpose-built encrypted communication applications designed to safeguard sensitive government information. Immediately following Apple’s official alert, Turkey’s newly created Presidency of Cyber Security launched a full forensic review of the ministers’ devices, replaced the compromised hardware, and rolled out additional layered security safeguards to block future threats, the official added.

    The official noted that sustained attempts to infiltrate the devices of politicians, ministers, prominent business leaders and other high-profile public figures have become a routine threat across the Middle East region. As a result, senior Turkish officials now operate under the persistent assumption that they may be targeted at any time. “There does not need to be a specific trigger for these attacks. We all have a responsibility to remain constantly vigilant,” the official stated.

    Cybersecurity experts have outlined a range of measures that public officials can adopt to harden their devices against surveillance. Back in 2021, for example, Turkish officials swapped out all their personal and official devices and changed their private phone numbers to eliminate any potential foothold that mercenary spyware could have exploited.

    For its part, Apple offers a specialized high-security tool called Lockdown Mode, built specifically to defend users against extremely sophisticated cyber attacks, including the category of threats known as zero-click exploits. These attacks are capable of compromising a smartphone without requiring any action from the user, such as clicking a malicious link, to trigger the breach. Pegasus, infamously, exploited an unpatched vulnerability in Apple’s iMessage platform to gain full access to all data stored on target iPhones.

    While sources based in Ankara say that a broad array of domestic and international political and economic interest groups could be behind the latest attempted attacks, definitively tracing the origin of these surveillance campaigns remains an enormous challenge. Many local analysts have pointed fingers at countries including Israel and Greece as potential actors, but it is important to note that Pegasus has been sold to dozens of national governments across the Middle East and broader region.

    Complicating attribution efforts further, updating an iPhone’s iOS operating system can often erase residual forensic evidence of an attack. Even when traces of a breach remain, they often only lead investigators to an IP address tied to a specific country, which does not confirm the true origin or sponsor of the attack, as malicious actors frequently route their activity through third-party servers to cover their tracks.

  • What will Britain’s new sanctions on Israeli settlements actually target?

    What will Britain’s new sanctions on Israeli settlements actually target?

    On Tuesday, Britain’s new Labour government delivered a landmark shift in Middle East policy, as Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband unveiled the country’s most aggressive sanctions package to date targeting the infrastructure sustaining Israel’s illegal settlement expansion in the occupied Palestinian West Bank. The announcement followed months of behind-the-scenes preparations, triggered by Israel’s late August decision to tender construction for more than 1,200 new residential units in the strategic E1 corridor, a development widely deemed to cut off Palestinian access to East Jerusalem and kill any prospect of a contiguous Palestinian state.

    Addressing Members of Parliament, Miliband made an unprecedented public accusation: that systemic ethnic cleansing is ongoing in the occupied West Bank, a statement that marks a clear break from decades of muted diplomatic language by successive British governments. For generations, both Labour and Conservative administrations limited punitive measures to individual violent settlers, avoiding broad action targeting the entire settlement enterprise. This new package, however, directly attacks the economic and financial networks that enable settlement growth.

    Under the new measures, the UK will implement a full ban on all imports of goods produced in Israeli settlements located on illegally occupied Palestinian territory. Beyond goods restrictions, Miliband announced targeted action against any company or individual that provides construction, financial or other professional services to support settlement expansion, warning that violators “will face the full force of UK sanctions.” Advertisements promoting illegal settlements to UK consumers will also be prohibited entirely.

    On arms sales, the government is implementing what Miliband called a “double lock” framework. More than 30 existing arms licenses for equipment used by Israeli forces in Gaza, which were suspended shortly after the Labour government took office, will remain fully suspended. Going forward, all new license applications for arms or related exports that “materially contribute to the occupation” will be automatically rejected, and this ban will remain in place for as long as Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory continues.

    Miliband also expanded restrictions to the charitable sector, announcing new bans and limits on UK-based charities that actively promote settlement activity. For years, a number of British Jewish charities have fundraised for settlements and marketed settlement-built homes to UK buyers, with many benefiting from the UK’s Gift Aid tax program, which allows charities to reclaim tax on donations — effectively using British taxpayer money to subsidize activity that violates international law. In August, the UK Charity Commission opened a formal investigation following revelations that at least 32 charities registered in England and Wales had transferred more than £28 million to Israeli settlements, a probe that aligns with the government’s new regulatory push.

    The new sanctions have already drawn sharp condemnation from pro-Israel lobbying groups, and U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee publicly lashed out at the measures on Tuesday, threatening that Washington will take unspecified retaliatory action. Downing Street has sought to downplay broader ramifications, however, emphasizing that the new restrictions will not alter the UK’s long-standing overall trade, military and security partnership with Israel.

    Data underscores the potential impact of the new measures, particularly on the financial side. A 2024 report from the Don’t Buy into Occupation campaign found the UK was one of the largest global sources of financing for 58 companies active in the settlement economy, with UK financial institutions providing at least $49.3 billion in loans and underwriting services to these firms between January 2021 and August 2024. As a top global financial hub, the UK sits at the center of a sprawling web of investment, mortgages, insurance and construction services that settlements depend on to expand. When fully implemented, the service restrictions will require UK banks, pension funds and asset managers to divest from companies operating in settlements, and bar domestic financial institutions from offering the mortgage, insurance and other core services that sustain the settlement ecosystem.

    Economists note that while the measures target the settlement economy, their overall impact on total UK-Israel trade will be minor. Total bilateral trade between the two countries hit roughly £6 billion in 2025, and settlement-related activity makes up only a small share of that volume. Israel does not publish official data on the economic output of settlements, but a February 2025 study from the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) estimated that settlements in Area C of the West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem generated $53 billion in economic activity for Israel in 2024 alone, with cumulative output from 2000 to 2024 reaching $832.7 billion — more than $1 trillion when adjusted for inflation.

    Policy analysts say the core goals of the new sanctions are threefold: to shrink the settlement economy, raise the financial cost of activities that entrench Israel’s occupation, and increase the reputational risk for companies that do business in occupied Palestinian territories. The uncertainty created by the new rules is already expected to push some domestic and international companies to step back from settlement-related activity, as compliance and reputational concerns outweigh potential profits.

  • Houthis target Saudi Arabia following air strikes as Yemeni forces push towards Sanaa

    Houthis target Saudi Arabia following air strikes as Yemeni forces push towards Sanaa

    Eight years after a devastating regional war began in Yemen, a sweeping new military campaign has shattered the fragile truce that has held large-scale fighting at bay since 2022, raising fears of a wider regional conflagration. Forces aligned with Yemen’s internationally recognized government have launched a coordinated counteroffensive against the Houthi movement, with top military officials publicly vowing to retake the capital city of Sanaa, which Houthi fighters seized from government control in 2014.

    Backed by air support from the Saudi-led coalition that has supported the Yemeni government since 2015, pro-government forces have opened intensive ground battles across three key governorates: Taiz, al-Bayda, and al-Jawf. Al-Jawf holds particular strategic importance, as it serves as a critical geographic gateway for any advance on Sanaa. Government military operations include ground pushes toward the al-Labanat mountain range in al-Jawf, heavy rocket bombardments of Houthi positions in Yatma, and incremental advances into the Dhi Na’im district of al-Bayda. According to government spokesman Majid al-Nuzaili, the overarching goal of the campaign is to fully liberate Yemen from Houthi control and restore Sanaa as an inclusive national capital for all Yemenis. Deputy Defence Minister Major General Samir al-Sabri confirmed the government’s formal decision to retake Sanaa in an interview with Yemeni state television.

    Houthi officials have rejected the government advance, claiming their forces have successfully repelled the attack on al-Labanat and inflicted heavy casualties on pro-government fighters, with dozens killed or wounded. Houthi sources added that the group used ballistic missiles to target incoming government reinforcements in al-Jawf. The Houthi-affiliated Saba News Agency also reported that a recent Saudi airstrike on a prison in Al-Hazm, northern Yemen, killed seven people, including one child who was visiting an incarcerated relative at the facility. Local Yemeni media has additionally reported intensive air raids targeting Houthi positions west of Taiz, confirming the sharp escalation of violence across multiple frontlines.

    The renewed fighting has already spilled across Yemen’s northern border into Saudi Arabia, triggering retaliatory threats from Riyadh. Houthi attacks on southern Saudi provinces have wounded at least 73 civilians, among them women and children. The Saudi Energy Ministry confirmed that the strikes also hit multiple energy infrastructure facilities in the kingdom’s southern region early Tuesday, wounding several citizens and residents, sparking multiple wildfires, and forcing temporary suspension of some energy operations. Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan bin Abdullah Al Saud condemned the cross-border attacks as a reckless and dangerous escalation, accusing the Houthis of attempting to export their internal conflict to the kingdom and its Yemeni government partners. He called the Houthi actions selfish, but added that diplomatic pathways to resolve the conflict remain open: “The road to diplomacy is not closed. Saudi Arabia will always support diplomatic solutions, but the kingdom will never hesitate to defend itself and its interests.”

    Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree hit back, claiming that Saudi Arabia has launched 121 separate airstrikes across five Yemeni governorates: Marib, al-Bayda, Hodeidah, Taiz, and al-Jawf. He warned that the Houthi movement would respond to the coalition airstrikes with even more powerful and expansive strikes in the future. The group has already announced plans to blockade Saudi commercial and military shipping in the Red Sea and the strategic Bab al-Mandeb strait, a move that comes as Iran has also restricted shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, amplifying regional tensions against the backdrop of ongoing conflict between Iran, Israel, and the United States.

    This current escalation marks the most severe breakdown of violence since the United Nations-brokered truce paused large-scale hostilities across Yemen in 2022. The original conflict began in 2014, when Houthi fighters seized Sanaa and pushed out the internationally recognized government, prompting a Saudi-led military intervention to restore the government in 2015. The human cost of the latest flare-up has already been steep: the World Health Organization reports that at least 728 people have been killed or wounded across Yemen since August 23, with the majority of casualties concentrated in Taiz and along Yemen’s western coastline. Multiple humanitarian and local sources also confirm that more than 21,000 people have been displaced from their homes in Taiz alone since last Thursday.

    Regional analysts warn that the current fighting is not an isolated Yemeni conflict, but rather a symptom of broader power struggles reshaping the Middle East. “This is not a war that is purely Yemeni. This is part of a struggle for dominance in the region,” explained Nabeel Khoury, a former U.S. diplomat and former chief of mission in Yemen. Al Jazeera has also warned that the ongoing escalation across multiple Yemeni provinces could lead to a full-scale expansion of the country’s decade-long war, threatening to draw in more regional powers and deepen one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.

  • Israeli journalist says Palestinians face threat of expulsion from the river to the sea

    Israeli journalist says Palestinians face threat of expulsion from the river to the sea

    Decades of reporting on the Israeli occupation have given veteran Israeli journalist Amira Hass a front-row seat to shifting political tides and escalating pressure on Palestinian communities. Now, the Haaretz correspondent, whose parents survived the Holocaust and who has lived in Palestinian territories since 1993, is sounding an urgent alarm: Palestinians across Gaza, the occupied West Bank, and even those holding Israeli citizenship face an accelerating risk of mass forced displacement from their homeland.

    In an exclusive interview with Middle East Eye, Hass explained that the threat of mass displacement is not speculative prophecy, but a grounded warning rooted in decades of observation of Israeli state policy. Over recent years, she argues, Israel has built a robust, interconnected infrastructure of ideological, political, economic, and military power that is fully capable of facilitating large-scale expulsion.

    Hass, who recently published a column arguing Israel’s end goal is the erasure of Palestinians rather than diplomatic negotiation for a sovereign Palestinian state, traces the current crisis to a long-running institutional shift that has outlasted multiple Israeli governments. What was once a fringe goal has become completely normalized across nearly the entire Israeli political spectrum, she says, and has now been codified into state institutions. Far-right and religious-nationalist factions, once on the margins of Israeli politics, have emerged as the most powerful political actors in the country, setting the policy agenda for the government and state bureaucracy.

    “This process didn’t start with this current government, or even the one before it. It’s been built up incrementally over decades,” Hass explained. “Today, these far-right forces believe the moment is right to move beyond the old framework of fragmented Palestinian enclaves, what she described as the ‘Bantustan’ model that emerged from the Oslo Accords, to a new phase: seizing additional land and pushing more Palestinians out entirely, erasing their presence from the region entirely.

    Open calls for expulsion from Israeli officials have become increasingly common in the past three years, particularly targeting Gaza’s population. Just last week, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz publicly confirmed the Israeli government is waiting for U.S. approval to forcibly expel Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, stating there is “no real solution for Gaza in the end without this migration.” Katz added that Israeli authorities are already “organised and prepared to get them out by sea, by air, by every way possible.”

    In the occupied West Bank, Hass documented widespread suffering, saying Palestinian communities face “unprecedented despair, fear and helplessness” amid growing settler violence and state-enabled restrictions. Small groups of armed settlers, she reported, are able to paralyze entire Palestinian villages with near-total impunity, while Israeli soldiers often block Palestinians from coming to their neighbors’ aid. During her visits to affected communities, Hass met a Palestinian family whose home had been attacked by settlers months earlier and was now ringed by fencing and metal barriers, leaving them unable to access fruit trees just meters from their front door. In the village of Beit Ummar, she said settlers have already uprooted all 1,000 trees in a Palestinian-owned vineyard.

    Beyond violence, systemic restrictions including permanent checkpoints, movement limits, and routine home demolitions have cut Palestinians off from agricultural land, grazing areas, and basic community services. Hass notes that settler influence over the Israeli Civil Administration, which governs civilian life in the occupied West Bank, has grown dramatically in recent years, tying these punitive measures directly to national government policy. Compounding this crisis, she added, is the absence of effective Palestinian leadership to coordinate a response, leaving individual communities isolated and vulnerable.

    The threat of displacement does not end at the Green Line, Hass stressed: it also extends to Palestinian citizens of Israel, who make up roughly 20 percent of the country’s population. Far-right Israeli factions increasingly frame their presence in the country as a problem, she said, and the state has employed a strategy of making daily life increasingly unbearable to push those with the means to leave to emigrate voluntarily.

    “There is a very thin line between forced expulsion and voluntary emigration when people have been pushed to the breaking point,” Hass explained. “When life becomes so unbearable that people feel they cannot stay any longer, those who are able to leave will choose to do so. That is exactly the outcome Israeli policy is designed to produce.”

    Across all areas where Palestinians live between the Jordan River and Mediterranean, Hass argues the Israeli state uses overlapping, coordinated tactics to pressure communities into leaving: economic strangulation, state tolerance of armed violence, and failure to intervene against actors that undermine Palestinian safety and security. In Gaza, she said the Israeli state supports armed militias that terrorize civilian populations; in the West Bank, armed settlers are allowed to attack Palestinian communities with near-total impunity; and inside Israel itself, deadly organized crime in Palestinian communities has surged, with almost no state intervention to curb the violence.

    “Israel pampers militias in Gaza and allows crime organisations in Israel proper to kill Palestinians every day,” Hass said.

    Beyond her criticism of Israeli policy, Hass also condemned the international community for its failure to take decisive, meaningful action to stop the escalating crisis. She says foreign governments have repeatedly found new excuses to delay meaningful intervention, enabling the expansion of displacement policies. Closing the interview, she reiterated the gravity of her warning, saying, “I am very afraid about what the Israeli state is capable of doing now.”

  • France and Canada to follow UK in announcing sanctions on Israeli settlements

    France and Canada to follow UK in announcing sanctions on Israeli settlements

    Multiple senior Whitehall sources have confirmed to Middle East Eye that the United Kingdom is set to formally announce a ban on imports of goods produced in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories on Tuesday, with key allies France and Canada poised to join the coordinated diplomatic action.

    This joint initiative marks a defining shift in international policy toward Israel’s ongoing settlement expansion, a move that will significantly deepen the Israeli government’s diplomatic isolation globally while delivering a landmark policy win for UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s administration, which took office in July this year.

    Downing Street’s decision to move forward with the import ban has already put it at odds with the United States, a rare public rift between close transatlantic allies. Washington has privately pressured the British government to abandon the measures, but Burnham’s administration has pressed ahead regardless, defying US objections.

    While the policy commands broad public support across Britain, it has drawn fierce pushback from domestic opposition groups. Reform UK, the country’s leading right-wing opposition party, has already levelled accusations that the Burnham government is anti-Semitic over the planned measures.

    The expected participation of France and Canada is widely expected to strengthen the UK’s position, amplify international pressure on the Netanyahu government to halt its settlement expansion, and make the coordinated diplomatic action far more impactful than a unilateral British move. The joint action by three long-standing US allies is also being interpreted as a clear, public rebuke of Washington’s current pro-Israel policy in the Middle East.

    UK Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband is scheduled to lay out the full details of the new settlement goods ban and a broader package of measures targeting Israeli settlement activity during an address to the UK Parliament on Tuesday afternoon. A senior Labour Party source, speaking on condition of anonymity on Monday, confirmed that the prime minister and foreign secretary will use the announcement to lay out a “comprehensive reset” of the British government’s approach to the Israel-Palestine conflict.

    Middle East Eye first reported in August that Burnham’s government had made the decision to implement a settlement goods ban. Senior Whitehall sources have clarified that Tuesday’s announcement is only the opening step of this new foreign policy framework, with additional measures expected to be rolled out in the coming months.

    Since taking office in July, Burnham has not held any official talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Downing Street confirmed Monday that Burnham briefed US President Donald Trump on the planned sanctions during a call held Monday afternoon, despite Trump administration’s private lobbying against the move.

    The announcement comes at a critical juncture for the occupied West Bank. Israel’s newly advanced E1 settlement project, located east of Jerusalem, threatens to physically split the West Bank into two disconnected parts, destroying any remaining prospects for a contiguous Palestinian state as part of a two-state solution. Analysts note that this coordinated international ban on settlement goods could carry substantial political and economic weight at this pivotal moment, sending a clear message that the international community will not tolerate unilateral changes to the status quo.

  • At least 1,360 doctors leave Israel since 2023 in healthcare brain drain

    At least 1,360 doctors leave Israel since 2023 in healthcare brain drain

    A groundbreaking new academic study has revealed that more than 1,360 doctors have departed Israel for extended stays abroad since the start of 2023, a brain drain that researchers warn poses severe, long-term risks to the country’s domestic healthcare system.

    The study, led by researchers at Israeli academic institutions, tracks physician departures of 12 months or longer projected across the three-year period from 2023 to 2025. Data compiled by the team shows 416 doctors left the country in 2023, followed by 530 departures in 2024, with an initial projected estimate of 419 additional departures in 2025. Combined, the total number of exiting doctors is large enough to staff an entire full-sized hospital, according to the research.

    Itai Ater, one of the lead professors behind the study, noted that Israel has been losing some of its most skilled medical professionals since 2023, the year Israel launched its large-scale military campaign in the Gaza Strip. Ater emphasized that the loss of nearly 1,400 physicians has direct, tangible consequences for Israeli patients, stating: “All of us have family members waiting for surgery or other medical care. The departure of nearly 1,400 doctors translates directly into longer wait times, less effective medical care, and ultimately severe harm to our quality of life.”

    The report also found that the exit rate is disproportionately high among specialized medical fields, including paediatrics, ophthalmology, dermatology, and otolaryngology (ear, nose and throat care). While the study did not draw an explicit causal connection between the ongoing political and military instability in the region and the growing wave of physician departures, Ater warned that the exodus is already causing measurable harm to Israel’s social and medical infrastructure.

    “If this trend continues, heaven forbid, there is growing concern of irreversible damage to Israel’s resilience,” Ater added.

    The mass departure of Israeli doctors comes amid a broader crisis for healthcare across the region. The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics has confirmed that at least 1,701 Palestinian health workers have been killed in Israeli military attacks across Gaza between October 2023 and October 2025, devastating the enclave’s already fragile healthcare system.

    Internationally, the conflict has also sparked growing professional backlash against Israeli medical institutions. In June 2025, more than 1,150 global health professionals and healthcare organizations signed an open petition calling for a formal boycott of the Israeli Medical Association (IMA), accusing the body of failing to uphold core international medical ethics amid the war in Gaza. The petition also demands that the IMA be suspended from membership in the World Medical Association (WMA), the global governing body for national medical associations.

    This reporting is published by Middle East Eye, an independent media outlet focused on original coverage and analysis of the Middle East, North Africa, and surrounding global regions.

  • Hungary beats Japan 84-63 to set up quarterfinal against US at women’s FIBA World Cup

    Hungary beats Japan 84-63 to set up quarterfinal against US at women’s FIBA World Cup

    BERLIN – The 2026 FIBA Women’s World Cup saw Hungary book its place in the tournament’s quarterfinal round on Tuesday, powered by a dominant 84-63 victory over Japan that set up a highly anticipated matchup against four-time defending champions the United States.

    Reka Lelik led all scorers in the fixture with an impressive 23-point haul, while forward Virág Takács-Kiss delivered a strong supporting performance to add 17 points to Hungary’s total. The win sees Hungary advance to the final eight, where they will face the unbeaten American side in the last quarterfinal fixture scheduled for Thursday.

    However, the contest was marred by a traumatic on-court incident just before halftime, when Japan starting shooting guard Saki Hayashi suffered a severe injury after an awkward fall. The player was carried off the court with what appeared to be a broken right arm, casting a shadow over the result.

    Later on Wednesday, host nation Germany will step onto the court at Berlin Arena to face South Korea, with the winner claiming the final quarterfinal spot and a matchup against Belgium.

    The German side, backed by thunderous home crowd support throughout the group stage, has shown steady momentum after a rocky opening to the tournament. The hosts suffered a lopsided 30-point defeat to Spain in their first group match, but have since bounced back in impressive form: they secured a 16-point 74-58 win over Japan, followed by a comfortable 25-point victory over Mali that ended 83-58.

    German wing Frieda Bühner has emerged as her team’s breakout performer of the group stage, notching 19 points in the win over Japan before following that up with a 21-point outing against Mali. She is widely expected to be the key matchup against South Korea’s star forward Park Ji-hyun when the two sides tip off.

    All eight quarterfinal ties are set to kick off on Thursday. Two remaining final eight spots will be decided in Wednesday’s knockout playoffs: the winner of the Italy-Australia fixture will face Spain, while the victor of the China-Puerto Rico match-up will go up against France.

  • Cheaper CAR-T therapy drawing global cancer patients to China

    Cheaper CAR-T therapy drawing global cancer patients to China

    At just 25 years old, New Zealand native Michael Walters had already exhausted multiple unsuccessful lymphoma treatment options in his home country. When an Australian hospital in Melbourne quoted him nearly $600,000 USD for the cutting-edge CAR-T cancer therapy, the cost was out of reach. Turning to a medical facility in Shanghai, Walters paid less than half that quoted price, and on August 18, he received the life-changing news: his cancer had entered complete remission.

    Chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy, better known as CAR-T, is a personalized immunotherapy that works by re-engineering a patient’s own immune T-cells to identify and attack malignant cancer cells. On the surface, Walters’ success story highlights a stark global pricing gap: CAR-T therapies in China typically cost between $150,000 and $230,000, compared to $550,000 to $850,000 for comparable treatments in the United States. But low prices are far from the full picture of the growing trend of cross-border medical travel for CAR-T treatment.

    As the director of the CAR-T program at MD Anderson, who has advised some international patients to pursue treatment in China, notes: China has not simply undercut global prices for CAR-T—it has scaled and industrialized the production of this personalized therapy far faster than many peer nations. Currently, nine CAR-T products have received full regulatory approval from Chinese authorities, more than any other country worldwide. Local supply chains are also tightly integrated: production laboratories are located within close proximity to major Shanghai hospitals, allowing engineered T-cells to be prepared and returned to patients for treatment in just days. For patients battling aggressive, fast-growing cancers, this reduced waiting time can make a life-or-death difference in treatment outcomes. Just this past June, Chinese regulators approved satri-cel, the world’s first CAR-T therapy indicated for a solid tumor, for use in treating certain advanced forms of stomach cancer.

    That said, the rapid growth of cross-border CAR-T travel to China raises important caveats that patients and clinicians must not overlook. Two key distinctions shape the safety and efficacy of this care: regulatory clarity and realistic statistical expectations.

    First, from a regulatory perspective, all hospitals offering cross-border treatment must clearly distinguish between three categories of care: treatment for an approved indication, off-label use of approved therapies, and participation in an experimental clinical trial. Patients must receive a transparent explanation of the available clinical evidence for their treatment, an independent assessment from a neutral specialist, and a detailed, credible aftercare plan before committing to travel for care.

    Second, from a statistical perspective, an early complete remission for individual patients like Walters is not definitive proof that one country’s cancer care system is universally superior. Patients who can afford to travel abroad and meet eligibility criteria for CAR-T are a self-selected, non-representative group. When small boutique hospitals report that most of their few dozen international patients are cancer-free post-treatment, this is not equivalent to data from a controlled clinical trial. It cannot confirm how long remission will last, or how Chinese CAR-T outcomes compare to alternative treatments available in other nations.

    Even for patients who achieve immediate remission, the treatment journey does not end after they leave the hospital. CAR-T is a living cell therapy, not a one-and-done medical procedure—it requires ongoing, coordinated care throughout a patient’s life. The therapy carries well-documented risks of severe inflammatory responses, neurological complications, and secondary infections. For many CAR-T products used to treat blood cancers, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration even mandates lifelong monitoring for secondary new cancers.

    For patients who return to their home countries after treatment in China, this ongoing care often breaks down. Many returning patients lack transferable, digitized treatment records that local clinicians can easily interpret, a reliable point of contact at the Shanghai treating hospital, or a pre-arranged plan for covering costs if complications arise. Without integrated cross-border systems for sharing treatment records and follow-up data, the treating institution never gains access to long-term outcome data, and patients are left without the support they need.

    The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention already recommends that patients arrange all follow-up care and financing before traveling abroad for medical treatment. Even with that guidance, local clinicians are often hesitant to take over care when treatment records, clinical responsibilities, and liability arrangements are unclear. It is critical to note that these gaps represent risks of fragmented cross-border care, not evidence that Chinese CAR-T treatment is inherently unsafe.

    The core challenge now is shifting the burden of logistics away from vulnerable sick patients and their families, and making proper pre-treatment preparation a binding obligation for the institutions offering cross-border care. A small, targeted network of cross-border hospital partnerships could pilot three practical reforms to address current gaps:

    First, before the CAR-T infusion is administered, the treating hospital, the patient, and a designated lead clinician at the patient’s home institution should sign a formal shared-care agreement. This agreement should explicitly outline which provider is responsible for reviewing routine test results, responding to urgent adverse events at key post-treatment milestones (30 days, 180 days, and five years, for example), and coordinating with the therapy manufacturer. This agreement should be paired with a standardized “treatment passport” that includes full details of the product used, its batch number, all pre-infusion medications, any acute complications experienced during treatment, and the full recommended monitoring schedule. This document should be shared with the patient’s home care team in a language accessible to emergency department clinicians before the patient returns home. When home countries lack specialized expertise in CAR-T management, the treating institution should help arrange specialized support rather than leaving the problem to patients and their families. Clarifying responsibilities ahead of treatment eliminates confusion when complications arise after care.

    Second, all pricing for cross-border treatment should be fully transparent. Upfront quotations should break down all costs, including the therapy itself, inpatient hospitalization, potential intensive care needs, patient and family accommodation, and planned follow-up. Explicit terms for covering the cost of complication management should be included: this is not to guarantee a fixed, low price, but to make any exclusions clear before a patient commits to treatment. Where legally permitted, public and private insurance payers could pilot coverage agreements with vetted overseas CAR-T centers, requiring verifiable clinical evidence for the proposed treatment, confirmation of adequate facility standards, and pre-arranged funding for aftercare. Cross-border price comparisons should evaluate total treatment cost and long-term outcomes, not just rely on advertised base prices. Patients should never be pressured to travel abroad to cut payer costs, but they also should not be abandoned by their home care system if they choose to pursue this option.

    Third, global cell therapy registries should be opened to cross-border data sharing. Existing national registries for cell therapies provide a ready foundation for this work. With explicit patient consent and compliance with global data protection laws, participating hospitals should link data from treatments administered abroad to follow-up care in the patient’s home country, and report standardized outcomes including overall survival, cancer relapse, serious adverse events, and cases of lost follow-up—not just positive early remission results. This system would allow a hematologist in Maryland, for example, to access full verified data about a specific therapy batch administered in Shanghai, and outcomes from dozens of international patients would contribute to rigorous clinical evidence rather than just anecdotal success stories.

    None of these reforms require global harmonization of drug approvals, nor do they demand that any nation declare China’s CAR-T system superior or untrustworthy. They simply require acknowledging the new reality: patients are already moving across borders to access cutting-edge care far faster than global medical institutions have adapted to support them. A therapy is only as good as the long-term care and follow-up that accompanies it.

    China has the opportunity to set a global standard for responsible cross-border CAR-T care, and any other nation seeking to attract international medical travelers should be required to meet that same standard. The most meaningful metric to track progress is not how many foreign patients arrive in Shanghai on medical visas, but how many of those patients can be traced and have their long-term outcomes counted five years after treatment.

  • US officials threaten retaliation against UK over Israeli settlements sanctions

    US officials threaten retaliation against UK over Israeli settlements sanctions

    A sharp diplomatic clash has erupted between the United States and the United Kingdom after London unveiled plans to impose new trade restrictions on goods originating from illegal Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian territories, with senior American figures openly threatening retaliatory action against Britain.

    The first public rebuke came from Mike Huckabee, the sitting US Ambassador to Israel, who indicated in comments to the BBC on Tuesday morning that the Trump administration was prepared to hit back against the UK over the proposed policy. Huckabee framed the UK’s planned ban on settlement-produced goods as blatant bias against the Jewish community, calling it an act of discrimination. He also floated the idea that individual US states, most notably Florida, could launch their own independent trade measures against British businesses.

    This is not the first time Huckabee has lashed out at UK leadership over its stance on Israel. Over the preceding weekend, the ambassador already leveled accusations of “Jew hate” against British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband – who is Jewish himself – in response to Miliband’s public criticism of Israeli military operations in Gaza.

    Florida-based Republican Congressman Randy Fine doubled down on Huckabee’s threats just one day later, issuing a stark warning that British firms could be completely locked out of commercial activity across the state of Florida if the UK moves forward with the ban. Fine derided the UK’s policy as a “vanity project in support of Muslim terror”, and referenced an anti-boycott law he shepherded through the Florida Legislature during his tenure that would enable the state to penalize entities that comply with the UK’s restrictions. Under the existing law, any British company forced to adhere to the UK settlement ban would be prohibited from securing government contracts at both the state and local level in Florida. The restriction would also extend to all commercial operations in the state that require official government interaction – from operating permits to tax-related processes. Fine stressed that Florida ranks among the UK’s largest US trading partners, and warned that the policy could cost British stakeholders billions of dollars in lost economic activity. “Any company – or nation – that boycotts Israel is boycotted by Florida,” Fine emphasized in his statement.

    Behind closed doors, Washington has already made its opposition clear: multiple sources familiar with the matter confirm US officials privately pressed the British government to scrap the planned ban before it was formally introduced. UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham, for his part, personally briefed US President Donald Trump on his government’s proposal during a call on Monday afternoon, according to reports.

    The diplomatic row has also drawn sharp pushback from Israeli leadership, with far-right Israeli cabinet ministers Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich calling on Monday night for Jerusalem to retaliate against the UK by imposing its own sanctions and expelling the British ambassador – a demand that also brought the long-disputed Falkland Islands sovereignty issue into the fray. While both Argentina and the UK claim full sovereignty over the South Atlantic archipelago, an overwhelming majority of the Falklands’ 3,600 permanent residents endorse continued British rule. The dispute gained new traction just last week, when Trump publicly stated he would not support the UK militarily if Argentina launched an invasion to retake the islands. To date, Trump has not issued any public comment on the UK’s proposed settlement sanctions.

    Ed Miliband is scheduled to lay out the full details of the UK’s new Israel-related policy package in a address to parliament scheduled for Tuesday afternoon, leaving waiting for the next chapter of this unfolding international dispute.