Despite many concerns about cargo bottlenecks as happened in the wake of the Covid pandemic, the blockade of the Bab al-Mandab Strait by the Houthis in western Yemen has not caused any great damage, according to a new Bank of Israel study by Haggayi Etkes and Nitzan Feldman of the School of Political Science … Read more
US President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming Middle East envoy has met the prime ministers of Qatar and Israel to kick-start Trump’s diplomatic push to reach a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal before he takes office on Jan. 20, a source briefed on the talks told Reuters on Wednesday. Steve Witkoff, the incoming envoy, traveled … Read more
Yasser Arafat passed away twenty years ago this month, on November 11, 2004, at 75 years old. Born in 1929 in Cairo, Arafat’s activism led to the founding of the Fatah movement in 1959, eventually becoming one of the major Palestinian factions that led to the formation of the Palestinian Authority in 1994. The … Read more
Kianoosh Sanjari, an Iranian journalist and activist, committed suicide on Wednesday at the age of 42, stressing before he died that he would be doing it to protest the Islamic Republic’s “dictatorship” and the incarceration of four Iranian political prisoners. It started early on Tuesday morning when Sanjari tweeted on his X/Twitter account: “I … Read more
More than 400 days since the October 7 attacks, Israel’s war with Hamas shows no signs of ending anytime soon, even as more than 100 hostages remain in Gaza. In conversation with The Media Line’s Felice Friedson, Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Lt. Col. (R) Peter Lerner said that Hamas’ military and governing capacities have … Read more
With the many soldiers, young families living near the Gaza border, and Nova music festival attendees killed on October 7, 2023, there is the impression that the victims of the Hamas massacre were almost all young. In fact, among the 1,200 people – mostly civilians – who were murdered, 13% were 65 years and … Read more
Professor Dr. Salman al-Dayah, a former dean of the Faculty of Sharia and Law at the Islamic University of Gaza, issued a fatwa against Hamas for their October 7 attacks, the BBC reported on Friday. Fatwa is an Islamic religious decree made by a recognized Islamic jurist, Faqih, as a response to a question … Read more
In the heart of Gaza, a grassroots initiative offers children the opportunity to learn and regain a sense of normalcy amid significant challenges. The makeshift classroom—a large, durable tent—hosts nearly 90 students aged 6 to 12, who come each day to study Arabic, English, and mathematics. For more stories from The Media Line go … Read more
“The Protocols of the Elders of Zion… is a leaked document whose authenticity has been disputed between those who say it is a true document and those who say it is a fake document.” Thus reads the first paragraph of Arabic Wikipedia’s entry of one of the most famous and vile blood libels of … Read more
Hamas is expected to reject any renewed effort to finalize a hostage agreement until such time as the war in Gaza ends, a security source told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday. “It’s very clear that the hostage deal will only happen” when the war comes to a close, the source said. Israel and the … Read more
