International

Israeli attack on school in Gaza kills at least 15 people

Published

4 months ago

August 4, 2024

Israeli attack on school in Gaza kills at least 15 people

At least 15 people have been killed in Israeli air raids on a school sheltering displaced Palestinians in central Gaza, Gaza’s Government Media Office said.

Many others were injured in the attack on the Hamama school in the Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood in Gaza City, the official Palestinian news agency Wafa reported on Saturday.

Reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza on Saturday, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud said that at least three bombs were dropped on the school as rescuers and volunteers inside the facility were trying to help people escape from under the rubble.

“Those three bombs destroyed the facility completely. This is the tactic that the Israeli military has widely used in the past. The military drops a bomb that partially destroys facilities, namely evacuation centres, killing a number of people, and then within a few minutes, it drops other bombs,” he said.

The Israeli military said the school was being used as a command centre for Hamas, the Palestinian group that governs Gaza, to hide fighters and manufacture weapons.

Hamas has denied Israeli accusations that it operates from civilian facilities such as schools and hospitals.

The group condemned the Israeli attacks on the school and said in a statement that “the occupation army uses lies as a pretext to target defenseless civilians in Gaza.”

In footage verified by Al Jazeera, victims of the Israeli attacks were seen arriving at al-Ahli Hospital.

Among the wounded were children, some of whom appeared to be unconscious, as medical staff desperately tried to treat them.

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The scenes at the hospital were chaotic, with some of the wounded lying on the floors as grieving Palestinians lined the corridors.

According to the testimony of one of the wounded, the raids were carried out without warning.

Earlier on Saturday, Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip killed six people in a house in the southern area of Rafah and two others in Gaza City, Gaza health officials said.

The Israeli army said its forces had struck fighters and destroyed Hamas infrastructure in Rafah and elsewhere in the attacks.

In the occupied West Bank, two Israeli attacks killed nine fighters, including a local Hamas commander on Saturday, Hamas said.

A Hamas statement added that one of those killed was a commander of its Tulkarem brigades, while its ally Islamic Jihad said four of the men who died in the raids were its fighters.

The latest attacks came as a high-level Israeli delegation made a brief visit to Cairo on Saturday in an attempt to resume Gaza ceasefire negotiations, Egyptian airport authority sources said.

The delegation returned to Israel hours later, Israeli media said.

Chances of a breakthrough appear low as regional tension has soared following the assassination of Hamas’s leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on Wednesday, a day after an Israeli strike in Beirut killed Fuad Shukr, a top military commander from Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, a Hamas ally.

Haniyeh’s death was one in a series of killings of senior Hamas figures as the Gaza war nears its eleventh month, and it fuelled concern that the conflict in Gaza was turning into a wider Middle East war.

Hamas and Iran have both accused Israel of carrying out the assassination of Haniyeh and have pledged to retaliate. Israel has neither claimed nor denied responsibility for the death.

Israeli attack on school in Gaza kills at least 15 people

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

International

Israeli strikes pound central Beirut, suburbs

Published

13 hours ago

November 26, 2024

Trends Admin

Israeli strikes pound central Beirut, suburbs

BEIRUT: Israeli strikes pounded a densely-populated part of the Lebanese capital and its southern suburbs on Tuesday, hours ahead of an anticipated announcement of a ceasefire ending hostilities between Israel and Lebanese armed group Hezbollah.

A strike on Beirut hit the Noueiri district with no evacuation warning and killed at least one person, Lebanon’s health ministry said in a preliminary toll.

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Minutes later, at least 10 Israeli strikes hit Beirut’s southern suburbs. They began approximately 30 minutes after the Israeli military issued evacuation orders for 20 locations in the area, the largest such warning yet.

As the strikes were under way, Israel’s military spokesperson Avichay Adraee said the air force was conducting a “widespread attack” on Hezbollah targets across the city.

Israeli strikes pound central Beirut, suburbs

ARAB NEWS

International

Over $100m wasted, Trump mocks Democrats for targeting him

Published

14 hours ago

November 26, 2024

Trends Admin

President-elect Donald Trump

Over $100m wasted, Trump mocks Democrats for targeting him

Former U.S. President Donald Trump has fiercely criticised the legal cases brought against him, calling them “empty and lawless”.

He accused Democrats of weaponising the judicial system to target him as a political opponent.

In a strongly worded statement, Trump alleged that over $100 million in taxpayer money had been wasted in what he described as a politically driven effort to undermine his influence.

“Nothing like this has ever happened in our Country before,” he said, pointing to high-profile prosecutors, including Georgia’s Fani Willis and New York Attorney General Letitia James, as key figures in what he called a “political hijacking.”

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Trump also accused Willis of colluding with Nathan Wade, whom he described as “her lover” and lacking the experience to handle such cases.

He claimed Wade was paid “millions,” allegedly enabling lavish trips and cruises.

Letitia James, who is pursuing a civil fraud case against Trump, was also criticised.

Over $100m wasted, Trump mocks Democrats for targeting him

International

US-based Nigerians get 30-year sentence over $3.5m romance scam

Published

14 hours ago

November 26, 2024

Trends Admin

US-based Nigerians get 30-year sentence over $3.5m romance scam

A United States federal jury sentenced two Nigerians, Anthony Ibekie and Samuel Aniukwu, to 30 years in prison for scamming certain US citizens $3,500,000.

This was mentioned in a news statement made public on the US Department of Justice website on Monday.

According to the statement, the Nigerians, Ibekie and Aniukwu mislead their victims by informing them that they had received big inheritances that required payment to claim.

The couple would then ask their victims to transfer money, promising to refund them after the inheritances were claimed.

It also stated that the duo carried out romance scams by establishing romantic relationships with their victims and demanding them to send money after they had built trust in their victims.

It read, “An undercover law enforcement investigation has resulted in federal prison sentences for two Nigerian nationals residing in the Chicago suburbs who conducted online inheritance scams and other fraud schemes.

“Using aliases, Anthony Emeka Ibekie and Samuel Aniukwu communicated with victims throughout the United States, convincing them they had received substantial inheritances and needed to send money to individuals associated with the defendants in order to claim it.

“In addition to the inheritance scam, the pair carried out an online romance scam that involved communicating with victims via social media and dating websites, building trust with the victims through a purported online romance, and convincing them to send money to a predetermined recipient. Aniukwu and Ibekie also orchestrated a ‘business email compromise’ scam that targeted corporate email accounts.

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“The fraud schemes were uncovered by a covert law enforcement investigation. The scams resulted in losses to victims of at least $3.5 million.”

According to the statement, after being arraigned on 14 charges, the duo pleaded guilty to their different alterations.

Following their guilty pleas, Ibekie was sentenced to 20 years in prison on Thursday, and Aniukwu was sentenced to 10 years in prison on November 8.

The statement continued, “A federal jury earlier this year convicted Ibekie, 59, of Oswego, Illinois, on all 14 counts of wire fraud, mail fraud, money laundering, making false statements to a bank, and passport fraud. U.S. District Judge Steven C. Seeger on Thursday sentenced Ibekie to 20 years in federal prison.

“Aniukwu, 50, of Romeoville, Illinois, pleaded guilty last year to wire fraud and money laundering charges. Judge Seeger on Nov. 8, 2024, sentenced Aniukwu to 10 years in prison.”

Meanwhile, Jennifer Gosha, an accomplice of the Nigerians and a US citizen, is expected to be sentenced on December 18 after pleading guilty.

“A third defendant, Jennifer Gosha, 52, a U.S. citizen from Oak Park, Ill., pleaded guilty earlier this year to charges of wire fraud and making false statements to a federal agent. Gosha is scheduled to be sentenced by Judge Seeger on December 18, 2024,” the statement concluded.