Israel retaliation kills 230 Palestinians after Hamas operation – Newstrends
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Israel retaliation kills 230 Palestinians after Hamas operation

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1 year ago

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Israel retaliation kills 230 Palestinians after Hamas operation

At least 232 people have been killed and 1,600 wounded in the Palestinian enclave of Gaza during Israel’s retaliation after a deadly multi-pronged attack by Hamas forces into Israel, the health ministry says.

The growing casualty toll on Saturday came after the Palestinian group running the Gaza Strip launched the largest attack on Israel in years, infiltrating areas in the south of the country following a barrage of thousands of rockets fired from the besieged territory.

Israel’s national rescue service said at least 250 people were killed and hundreds wounded, making it the deadliest attack in Israel in years. An unknown number of Israeli soldiers and civilians were also seized and taken into Gaza.

Hamas and Israel said late on Saturday that gun battles were raging in dozens of areas inside Israeli territory.

Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant warned Hamas it made a “grave mistake” in launching the attack, which began at 6:30am local time (03:30 GMT) and involved barrages of rockets fired from multiple locations in Gaza as well as fighters infiltrating Israel by land, sea and air.

“Citizens of Israel, we are at war. The enemy will pay an unprecedented price,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video message from military headquarters in Tel Aviv.

Israel’s military launched a series of air raids on Gaza in response to the attack. “Dozens of [Israeli military] fighter jets are currently striking a number of targets belonging to the Hamas terrorist organisation in the Gaza Strip,” it said.

Mohammed Deif, a senior Hamas military commander, said the rocket fire marked the start of “Operation Al-Aqsa Flood”, and he called on Palestinians everywhere to fight the Israeli occupation.

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“We’ve decided to say enough is enough,” Deif said as he urged all Palestinians to confront Israel. “This is the day of the greatest battle to end the last occupation on Earth,” he said in an audio message.

Israel’s military told Israelis living around the Gaza Strip to stay in their homes and warned Hamas would pay a “heavy price for its actions”.

Israeli media reported Palestinian fighters opened fire on passers-by in the town of Sderot, in southern Israel, and footage circulating on social media appeared to show uniformed Palestinians engaged in clashes.

Another video on social media appeared to show a burning Israeli tank surrounded by jubilant Palestinians.

Israeli warplanes started to pound locations in Gaza – in what the military called “Operation Iron Swords” – and Israeli soldiers were engaged in ground fighting in several locations around the besieged Palestinian enclave.

“Right now we’re fighting. We’re fighting in certain locations around the Gaza Strip… Our forces are now fighting on the ground,” Israel’s army spokesman Richard Hecht told reporters.

‘We haven’t seen this before’

Witnesses in Gaza heard loud explosions.

Enas Keshta, a resident of Rafah in southern Gaza, said Palestinians are looking at a “tough night” ahead as Israeli attacks on the blockaded enclave continue.

“The situation here in Gaza is not good at all. I can assure you that we are not ready, and we have a tough night waiting for us,” she told Al Jazeera. “No place is safe.”

Widespread shock and fear abounds in Gaza.

“We have been as surprised and frightened as the [occupation] since the operation began,” said Munir Nasser, a Gaza grocery vendor. “We haven’t seen footage of Palestinians breaching the occupied towns and villages beyond the barriers like this before.”

‘Dangerous precipice’

The outbreak of major fighting between Israeli forces and Palestinian fighters comes after weeks of growing tensions along Israel’s volatile border with Gaza, and months of deadly clashes in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

At least 247 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces so far this year, while 32 Israelis and two foreign nationals have been killed in previous Palestinian attacks.

Tor Wennesland, United Nations special coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, condemned “the multi-front assault against” Israeli towns and cities near Gaza, which he called “heinous attacks targeting civilians”.

“These events have resulted in horrific scenes of violence and many Israeli fatalities and injuries, with many believed to be kidnapped inside the Strip. These are heinous attacks targeting civilians and must stop immediately,” Wennesland said in a statement.

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“I am deeply concerned for the well-being of all civilians. I am in close contact with all concerned to urge maximum restraint and call on all sides to protect civilians,” he said.

“This is a dangerous precipice and I appeal to all to pull back from the brink.”

‘On the verge of great victory’

In a statement posted on the Telegram messaging app, Hamas called on “the resistance fighters in the West Bank” as well as “our Arab and Islamic nations” to join the fight.

Saleh al-Arouri, an exiled Hamas leader, said “Operation Al-Aqsa Flood” was a response “to the crimes of the occupation” and Palestinian fighters were defending their sacred site in occupied East Jerusalem.

Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement, which was founded in 1982 to fight the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon, said in a statement it was following the events in Gaza closely and was in “direct contact with the leadership of the Palestinian resistance”.

Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas, told fellow Arab countries that Israel cannot provide protection despite recent diplomatic rapprochements.

“We say to all countries, including our Arab brothers, that this entity, which cannot protect itself in the face of resistors, cannot provide you with any protection,” he said. “All the normalisation agreements that you signed with that entity cannot resolve this [Palestinian] conflict.”

In a speech broadcast on Hamas-run Al-Aqsa television, Haniyeh added: “We are on the verge of a great victory and a clear conquest on the Gaza front. Enough is enough, the cycle of intifadas [uprisings] and revolutions in the battle to liberate our land and our prisoners languishing in occupation [Israeli] prisons must be completed.”

aljazeera

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Democrats drag Trump to court over election overhaul order

Published

13 hours ago

on

April 1, 2025

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U.S President Donald Trump

Democrats drag Trump to court over election overhaul order

The Democratic Party has sued the Trump administration over an attempt to impose sweeping changes on the election systems, including requiring citizenship proof to register to vote and limiting mail-in ballot counting.

In a lawsuit filed Monday, the Democratic Party asked a federal court to block the executive order, which prevents states from counting mail-in ballots that arrive after election day. The president’s directive also requires proof of citizenship to be presented — through documents such as a passport — when registering to vote.

“The President does not get to dictate the rules of our elections,” said the lawsuit filed in Washington by the Democratic National Committee, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and others.

“The Executive Order seeks to impose radical changes on how Americans register to vote, cast a ballot, and participate in our democracy—all of which threaten to disenfranchise lawful voters and none of which is legal,” it added.

After signing the March 25 order, called “Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections”, US President Donald Trump described it as “the farthest-reaching executive action taken” to secure US elections.

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Trump, who does not acknowledge his defeat in the 2020 presidential election, has long questioned the integrity of the US electoral system. He has repeatedly and baselessly amplified conspiracy theories about massive election fraud in the United States, particularly involving absentee voting.

Legal scholars swiftly denounced Trump’s election order as an abuse of presidential power that could prevent millions of eligible voters from casting ballots.

Advocacy groups led by the Campaign Legal Center and State Democracy Defenders Fund filed a separate lawsuit on Monday against the same executive order.

“The president’s executive order is an unlawful action that threatens to uproot our tried-and-tested election systems and silence potentially millions of Americans,” Danielle Lang of the Campaign Legal Center said in a statement.

“It is simply not within the president’s authority to set election rules by executive decree, especially when they would restrict access to voting in this way.”

Democrats drag Trump to court over election overhaul order

AFP

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Iran warns US against attack, threatens with nuclear weapon

Published

20 hours ago

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April 1, 2025

By

Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei

Iran warns US against attack, threatens with nuclear weapon

Iran would have no alternative but to acquire a nuclear weapon if attacked by the United States or its allies, an adviser to the country’s supreme leader warned on Monday, following a threat by Donald Trump.

The comments came hours after the supreme leader himself, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, had promised to hit back if the US president made good on his threat to bomb the Islamic republic if it did not agree to a deal to curb its nuclear programme.

“We are not moving towards (nuclear) weapons, but if you do something wrong in the Iranian nuclear issue, you will force Iran to move towards that because it has to defend itself,” Khamenei’s adviser Ali Larijani said in an interview with state TV.

“Iran does not want to do this, but… (it) will have no choice,” he added.

“If at some point you (the US) move towards bombing by yourself or through Israel, you will force Iran to make a different decision.”

In an interview on Saturday, Trump had said “there will be bombing” if Iran did not agree to a new nuclear deal, according to NBC News, which said he also threatened to punish Tehran with what he called “secondary tariffs”.

Trump’s language represented a sharpening of his rhetoric, though it was not clear whether he was threatening bombing by US planes alone or perhaps in an operation coordinated with another country, possibly Iran’s nemesis Israel.

“They threaten to do mischief,” Khamenei said of the remarks during a speech on Eid al-Fitr, the holiday marking the end of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.

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“If it is carried out, they will definitely receive a strong counterattack.”

Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei, in a post on X, said the threat was “a shocking affront to the very essence of international peace and security”.

Baqaei warned of unspecified “consequences” should the United States choose a path of “violence”.

– ‘Glass room’ –

A statement on Monday also said the foreign ministry summoned the charge d’affaires of the Swiss embassy, which represents Washington’s interests in Iran, “following the threats by the US president”.

“The Americans have at least 10 bases in the region around Iran, and they have 50,000 troops,” warned General Amirali Hajizadeh, commander of the aerospace force of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

“Someone who is in a glass room shouldn’t throw stones at anyone,” the man in charge of Iran’s ballistic missile programme threatened on state television Monday.

Since taking office in January, Trump has reinstated his “maximum pressure” policy, which in his first term saw the United States withdraw from a landmark agreement on Iran’s nuclear programme and reimpose sanctions on Tehran.

Western countries including the United States have long accused Iran of pursuing a nuclear weapon, which Tehran has denied, insisting its enrichment activities were solely for peaceful purposes.

The 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers required Iran to limit its nuclear ambitions in exchange for sanctions relief.

– ‘Indirect’ channel –

On March 7, Trump said he had written to Khamenei to call for nuclear negotiations and warn of possible military action if Tehran refused.

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The letter was delivered to Tehran on March 12 by UAE presidential adviser Anwar Gargash, Iranian news agency Fars reported at the time.

On Thursday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said the country had delivered a response via intermediary Oman, without detailing its content.

Araghchi said Iran would not engage in direct talks “under maximum pressure and the threat of military action”.

In his remarks, however, the minister left open the door for “indirect negotiations”.

According to NBC, Trump also said US and Iranian officials were “talking,” but he did not give details.

President Masoud Pezeshkian on Sunday said Khamenei, who as supreme leader has the final say in major state policies, had permitted indirect talks.

Oman has served as an intermediary in the past, in the absence of US-Iranian diplomatic relations severed after the 1979 Islamic revolution.

On Monday, Araghchi said the United States had received Iran’s letter.

“We have been informed by our friends in Oman that the letter has reached its destination and has been read.”

Beyond its nuclear programme, the West also accuses Iran of using proxy forces to expand its influence in the region, a charge Tehran rejects.

“There is only one proxy force in this region, and that is the corrupt usurper Zionist regime,” Khamenei said, calling for Israel to be “eradicated”.

Iran warns US against attack, threatens with nuclear weapon

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‘Bitcoin could replace U.S. Dollar as global currency’

Published

1 day ago

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March 31, 2025

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‘Bitcoin could replace U.S. Dollar as global currency’

BlackRock Chairman and CEO Larry Fink acknowledged in his 2025 annual letter that Bitcoin could challenge the U.S. dollar’s status as the global reserve currency.

“If the U.S. doesn’t get its debt under control, if deficits keep ballooning, America risks losing that position to digital assets like Bitcoin,” Fink wrote in BlackRock’s March 2025 letter.

The statement marks a significant shift from the head of the world’s largest asset manager, recognizing digital assets as potential alternatives to the dollar.

Throughout the letter, Fink mentioned Bitcoin seven times and the dollar eight times, signaling the growing relevance of digital currencies in financial discourse.

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BlackRock’s letter frames Bitcoin as both an innovation and a risk, warning that if investors view it as a more stable long-term store of value than the dollar, it could undermine U.S. financial primacy.

Fink stressed that “two things can be true at the same time,” referring to both innovation and risk in digital asset development.

Beyond Bitcoin, Fink positioned tokenization as a transformative force for capital markets, likening it to the shift from postal mail to email.

He argued that tokenized assets could bypass financial intermediaries and democratize access to investments through fractional ownership and improved voting systems.

BlackRock also highlighted India’s digital identity system as a model for secure transactions, with over 90% of Indians verifying smartphone transactions—a benchmark for future tokenized economies.

‘Bitcoin could replace U.S. Dollar as global currency’

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