GAZA — The Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, said Thursday that its fighters killed and wounded Israeli soldiers in an “ambush” in the northern Gaza Strip.

“Our fighters ambushed an Israeli army mechanized infantry company east of Jabalia camp,” which consisted of 12 vehicles and trucks loaded with soldiers, said the Al-Qassam Brigades in a press statement.

“We detonated explosive devices in the Israeli vehicles before our fighters finished off the soldiers from zero distance,” it said.

The statement added that the Hamas fighters targeted the soldiers who fled the ambush site towards a house with an anti-personnel bomb, killing and wounding them.

The northern Gaza Strip has been subjected to heavy Israeli air and artillery bombardment since Sunday, coinciding with the Israeli army’s announcement of a ground operation in Jabalia, northern Gaza, aimed at Hamas.

Meanwhile, Israeli army spokesperson Avichai Adraee said Thursday in a press statement that the army engaged in direct clashes with “terrorists” who were in the Jabalia area and had taken refuge in a building.

“The terrorists opened fire and threw a hand grenade at the soldiers, who returned fire and eliminated the two terrorists with shells,” Adraee said.

“During the operation, the division’s artillery units destroyed weapons depots, and during the combing operations, numerous weapons were found, including explosive devices, bombs, weapons and more,” he added.

The conflict in Gaza, sparked by a Hamas attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, has now entered its second year. Ongoing Israel’s military operations in Gaza have led to 42,065 Palestinian deaths, according to the latest figures released by health authorities in Gaza on Thursday.

XINHUA

BEIRUT — Six Lebanese soldiers were injured on Thursday in an Israeli drone raid on the Hosh al-Sayyed Ali area of the Syrian-Lebanese border, according to Lebanese military sources.

The military sources, who spoke anonymously, told Xinhua that “an Israeli drone fired two air-to-ground missiles at a short distance from a Lebanese army checkpoint at the Hosh al-Sayyed Ali crossing in eastern Lebanon,” leaving six soldiers with various injuries and causing damage to the checkpoint and nearby military vehicles.

Meanwhile, the official Lebanese National News Agency reported that “an enemy drone raided the border separating Lebanon and Syria in Hosh al-Sayyed Ali.”

So far there has been no Israeli comment on the drone attack.

The raid came about a week after an Israeli airstrike hit the Syria-Lebanon border known as the Jdeidat Yabous crossing in Syria and the Masnaa crossing in Lebanon, a key transit route used by tens of thousands of Lebanese refugees and Syrian citizens fleeing the Israeli assault in Lebanon.

The latest border attack occurred amid heightened tensions along the Syria-Lebanon border, as Israel continues its unprecedented, intensive air attack on Lebanon in an escalation with Hezbollah.

XINHUA

ISLAMABAD — Two policemen were killed and three others injured when militants attacked their vehicle in Pakistan’s northwest Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on Thursday morning, police sources said.

The incident happened at about 8:50 a.m. local time (0350 GMT) in the Tank district of the province, where unknown assailants opened fire on the vehicle before fleeing the scene, sources from the district police told Xinhua.

The vehicle was conducting routine patrols when it came under the attack, the sources added.

The injured policemen were rushed to a nearby hospital, where one of them is in critical condition.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack yet, and security forces have cordoned off the area for investigations.

XINHUA

GAZA — At least 22 civilians were killed and several others were injured on Thursday in an Israeli occupation bombing of a school housing displaced persons west of Rafah city.

WAFA correspondent reported, citing medical sources, that 22 people, including children and women, were killed, and several others were injured, some of them in critical condition, as a result of the occupation bombing of Rafidah School, which houses displaced persons.

A civilian was also killed and others were injured as a result of the occupation aircraft bombing a group of citizens in Saftawi area north of the Jalaa area northwest of Gaza City.

The occupation forces have continued their aggression on the Gaza Strip, by land, sea and air, since October 7, 2023, which resulted in the killing of 42,010 citizens and the injury of 97,720 others, the majority of whom are children and women, in an incomplete toll, as thousands of missing persons are still under the rubble.

WAFA

TEHRAN — The Islamic resistance in Iraq says it has carried out fresh drone strike, targeting “a vital site” of the Zionist regime in the north of occupied Palestine.

In a statement, the umbrella group of Iraqi resistance factions said the attack in the early morning of Thursday was in support of the people of Palestine and Lebanon as well as in response to the crime of the usurping Zionist regime against civilians, including women, children and the elderly .

This is the second attack of Iraq’s Islamic Resistance on the occupied territories in the last few hours.

The group said its first drone operation hit a target in Umm Al-Rashrash port, also known as Eilat, in the south of the occupied territories. The city was also targeted by the group on October 8.

This resistance group emphasized that this operation took place in continuation of its approach in resisting the Zionist occupation and helping the Palestinian people and responding to the Zionist massacre of civilians.

In the past weeks and months, the Iraqi resistance has targeted several Israeli sensitive and important sites in Eilat, located in the south of occupied Palestine.

The group has vowed to press ahead with operations against Israeli targets with increasing intensity.

IRNA

GAZA — Two citizens were Thursday morning killed and others were injured when the occupation forces bombed a group of civilians in the center of Rafah city, south of the Gaza Strip.

In an unofficial tally, the number of slain Palestinians since the beginning of the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip on October 7th has risen to 42,010, and 97,720 injured.

WAFA

JERUSALEM — The United States urged its ally Israel to avoid Gaza-like military action in Lebanon, after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it could face “destruction” like the Palestinian territory.

Israel’s military chief, Herzi Halevi, vowed to keep bombing Hezbollah targets, a campaign that has killed more than 1,200 people since September 23, “without allowing them any respite or recovery.”

The comments came after a phone call between Netanyahu and US President Joe Biden, their first in seven weeks. The White House said Biden told Netanyahu to “minimize harm” to civilians in Lebanon, particularly in “densely populated areas of Beirut.”

“There should be no kind of military action in Lebanon that looks anything like Gaza and leaves a result anything like Gaza,” said State Department spokesman Matthew Miller.

Netanyahu said in a video address to the people of Lebanon on Tuesday: “You have an opportunity to save Lebanon before it falls into the abyss of a long war that will lead to destruction and suffering like we see in Gaza.”

He added: “Free your country from Hezbollah so that this war can end.”

Biden and Netanyahu’s call had been expected to focus on Israel’s response to last week’s missile barrage by Iran.

Iran fired about 200 missiles at Israel in what it said was retaliation for the killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh. Most were intercepted by Israel or its allies.

Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said: “Our attack on Iran will be deadly, precise and surprising. They will not understand what happened and how it happened.”

Biden has cautioned Israel against attempting to target Iran’s nuclear facilities, which would risk major retaliation, and opposes striking oil installations.

A Lebanese government source told AFP that Hezbollah had accepted a ceasefire with Israel on September 27, the day Israel killed Nasrallah.

But they said Israel’s response had torpedoed the plan, backed by Washington and its allies, and the Lebanese government had “had no contact with Hezbollah” since his death.

Hezbollah said its fighters were locked in clashes with Israeli troops in southern Lebanon, using rocket-propelled weapons to repel attempts to breach the border.

Two people were killed by suspected Hezbollah rocket fire in the northern Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona, while Israel intercepted two projectiles fired toward the coastal town of Caesarea, officials said.

Lebanon’s health ministry said at least four people were killed in an Israeli strike on a village southeast of Beirut, an area so far largely spared from Israeli bombing.

Lebanon’s state civil defense body said an Israeli strike killed five of its personnel in the southern village of Derdghaiya.

Israel has intensified air strikes on Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon since September 23, uprooting more than a million people, according to an AFP tally of official figures.

Its ground forces crossed into Lebanon on September 30 in response to Hezbollah rocket and artillery attacks over the past year that have forced tens of thousands of Israelis from their homes.

Israel’s military said Wednesday its troops “eliminated terrorists during close-quarter encounters and in aerial strikes” over the previous 24 hours, adding “100 Hezbollah terror targets were destroyed.”

Israeli operations have expanded from border areas in the interior to the southern section of Lebanon’s Mediterranean coast.

According to a toll from the Israeli army on Wednesday, 13 of its soldiers have died since ground operations inside Lebanon began.

Syrian state media reported an Israeli attack Thursday on the central provinces of Homs and Hama.

Off the coast of Yemen, a ship was struck and damaged by an “unknown projectile,” a British maritime agency said, following months of attacks by Hezbollah and Hamas allies, the Houthis.

Israel expanded an ongoing military operation around Jabalia in northern Gaza, where about 400,000 people are trapped, according to Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

Lazzarini said on X there was “no end to hell” in the area and that “recent evacuation orders from the Israeli authorities are forcing people to flee again & again.”

The army surrounded Jabalia and its refugee camp at the weekend and shelled it on Wednesday, preventing the delivery of aid, Gaza’s civil defense agency said.

Washington said it was “incredibly concerned” about the humanitarian situation in north Gaza as Israel tightens its siege.

“We have been making clear to the government of Israel that they have an obligation under international humanitarian law to allow food and water and other needed humanitarian assistance to make it into all parts of Gaza,” said the State Department’s Miller.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 42,010 people in Gaza, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry that the United Nations has described as reliable.

Israeli police said at least six people were wounded Wednesday, some seriously, in a stabbing rampage in the central Israeli town of Hadera.

In the occupied West Bank, Israeli border police killed at least four Palestinians in the northern city of Nablus, Palestinian health authorities and Israeli security forces said.

In Beirut, many people are sleeping out in the streets after Israeli air strikes.

Ahmad, a 77-year-old who did not want to give his family name for fear of reprisals, said he had a message for Hezbollah.

“If you can’t continue to fight, announce you are withdrawing and that you have lost. There is no shame in losing,” he said.

But Raed Ayyash, a displaced man from the south of the country, said he hoped Hezbollah would keep fighting.

“We hope for victory, and we will never give up.”

AN-AFP

SYDNEY — A pilot who was killed when he crashed a helicopter into an Australian hotel during an unauthorized flight was under the influence of alcohol at the time, an investigation has found.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) on Thursday finalized its investigation into the crash in the early hours of Aug. 12, concluding that 23-year-old pilot Blake Wilson took the helicopter from an airport hangar for an unnecessary and unauthorized flight while affected by alcohol.

Wilson died when the Robinson R44 helicopter crashed into the roof of a hotel in the far northeastern city of Cairns at approximately 2 a.m. local time on Aug. 12. The crash triggered the evacuation of about 400 hotel guests.

The ATSB found that Wilson, a ground staff employee of the charter company that owned the helicopter, did not have the appropriate experience or licenses for the flight.

“The pilot did not hold the appropriate endorsements to fly at night, did not have any experience flying the R44 at night, and they conducted the flight well below the 1,000-foot minimum height for flight over built-up areas,” ATSB Chief Commissioner Angus Mitchell said in a statement on Thursday.

He said that the final report provides assurances to the Cairns community and the aviation industry that there are unlikely to be broader transport safety issues that need to be addressed to reduce the risk of future similar incidents.

According to the report, Wilson was socializing and drinking alcohol with friends at various venues in Cairns on the night of Aug. 11. He returned to his apartment at 11 p.m. local time before driving to his employer Nautilus Aviation’s hangar at Cairns airport at 1 a.m. on Aug. 12.

CCTV footage showed the helicopter taking off after 1:30 a.m., flying low over the Cairns central business district, the marina and Wilson’s apartment building for 20 minutes before crashing.

The investigation found the helicopter was inverted when it hit the hotel. Parts of the rotor blade were found in hotel rooms, with debris strewn across the hotel grounds and street.

No evidence was found to explain Wilson’s intentions, and Mitchell said it was fortunate no hotel guests were seriously injured.

XINHUA

PUTRAJAYA — Dua pengikut ‘Tuhan Harun’ yang membunuh Ketua Penolong Pengarah Bahagian Penguatkuasa Jabatan Agama Islam Pahang (JAIP) pada 2013 terlepas daripada tali gantung selepas Mahkamah Persekutuan hari ini menggantikan hukuman itu kepada penjara 40 tahun.

Permohonan Sumustapha Suradi, 50, dan Shamsinar Abdul Halim, 47, untuk semakan semula hukuman mati di bawah Akta Semakan Hukuman Mati dan Pemenjaraan Sepanjang Hayat (Bidang Kuasa Sementara Mahkamah Persekutuan) 2023 dibenarkan oleh panel tiga hakim diketuai Ketua Hakim Negara Tun Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat.

Dalam keputusan sebulat suara itu, Tengku Maimun bersidang bersama Presiden Mahkamah Rayuan Tan Sri Abang Iskandar Abang Hashim dan Hakim Mahkamah Persekutuan Datuk Nordin Hassan mengetepikan hukuman mati dan menggantikannya dengan penjara 40 tahun.

Beliau memerintahkan Shamsinar dikenakan 12 sebatan dan menjalani hukuman penjara bermula dari tarikh tangkap iaitu pada 22 Februari 2014 manakala Sumustapha hukuman pemenjaraan bermula 27 November 2013.

Kedua-dua lelaki itu membuat permohonan semakan hukuman mati itu susulan penguatkuasaan Akta Pemansuhan Hukuman Mati Mandatori 2023 pada 4 Julai tahun lalu.

Di bawah undang-undang baharu itu, hakim mempunyai kuasa budi bicara untuk mengenakan sama ada hukuman mati atau pemenjaraan bagi tempoh tidak kurang 30 tahun dan sehingga 40 tahun.

Jika hukuman mati tidak dikenakan, pesalah lelaki berusia di bawah 50 tahun berdepan sebatan minimum sebanyak 12 kali.

Sebelum ini, Sumustapha dan Shamsinar dijatuhi hukuman mati oleh Mahkamah Tinggi Kuantan, Pahang pada 2016 selepas mereka didapati bersalah pada 2016 membunuh Ketua Penolong Pengarah Bahagian Penguatkuasa JAIP, Ahmad Raffli Abd Malek.

Ahmad Raffli, 49, ditembak di hadapan rumahnya di Bandar Indera Mahkota, Kuantan, pada 10 November 2013.

Kedua-dua mereka gagal selepas Mahkamah Rayuan menolak rayuan mereka pada 8 Februari 2018.

Ketua kumpulan ajaran sesat itu, Harun Mat Saat atau lebih dikenali sebagai “Tuhan Harun’, juga didakwa kerana bersubahat dalam pembunuhan itu.

Bagaimanapun, tuduhan ke atasnya digugurkan pada 26 Ogos 2016 selepas dia meninggal dunia di Hospital Tengku Ampuan Afzan, Kuantan pada 16 Ogos 2016 akibat masalah pernafasan.

Pada 29 November 2018, Mahkamah Persekutuan menolak rayuan akhir Sumustapha dan Shamsinar dan mengekalkan sabitan serta hukuman mati.

Ketika itu, Ketua Hakim Negara Tan Sri Richard Malanjum yang mengetuai barisan lima hakim memutuskan bahawa rayuan kedua-dua mereka tidak mempunyai merit.

BH ONLINE

DAMASCUS — Israeli attacks targeted the industrial city of Hasyaa in the countryside of Homs province and other unidentified sites in the central province of Hama early morning Thursday, according to Syrian state television.

Initial reports showed the strike hit a car manufacturing plant within the industrial zone in Homs countryside, and the extent of damage was not immediately clear.

In a separate incident, an Israeli attack hit the town of Maarin in the central province of Hama, causing a fire, Syrian state media reported.

There were no immediate reports of casualties from the attacks.

The attacks are the latest in a series of Israeli military actions in Syria.

XINHUA

TEHRAN — The Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah has launched more than 200 rockets at various areas in the northern occupied territories, including occupied Safed, the Galilee, and the Golan.

Zionist sources reported on Wednesday that Hezbollah fired over 200 rockets towards northern occupied territories and the occupied Golan, as reported by the Palestinian Samaa news agency.

The Galilee region, the southern Golan Heights, the Galilee panhandle, and the occupied city of Safed in occupied Palestine experienced the most rocket attacks by Hezbollah.

The Zionist regime’s media also reported that a Hezbollah rocket hit a building in the city of Safed, injuring one person.

A military source on the Zionist regime’s Army Radio described Hezbollah’s rocket attacks on the city of Safed as the most severe since the beginning of the war against the Gaza Strip.

Earlier, reports from the Zionist media indicated that sirens were sounded in Netiv HaAsara, Yad Mordechai in the Gaza Strip, and al-Mutla as well as Al-Mshayrfe in the eastern part of the Lebanese-Palestinian border.

At the same time, an attack on northern Haifa resulted in the injury of at least four people, with one in critical condition.

The Zionist regime’s media reported this morning that at least 10 rockets were fired by Hezbollah.

They added that the attacks were followed by sirens sounding from the Haifa area to the Caesarea area in the northern occupied territories.

Lebanese Hezbollah rockets hit the town of Kiryat Ata in Haifa in the north of the occupied territories, causing a power outage in the settlement.

Additionally, the Zionist media reported that Hezbollah fired missiles at the Leviathan gas extraction platform of the Zionist regime.

Since September 23, Israel has expanded its genocidal military actions, which initially targeted Gaza, to encompass various regions in Lebanon, including the capital, Beirut.

These attacks have involved unprecedented airstrikes characterized by extreme violence and intensity. Moreover, ground incursions into southern Lebanon have been reported. These attacks disregard international warnings and UN resolutions.

In response, Hezbollah has retaliated by launching multiple attacks against the Israeli positions in the northern occupied territories. In the past few days, Hezbollah has fired hundreds of rockets, targeting key Israeli positions.

IRNA, Oct 9, 2024

BAGHDAD — The Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a Shiite militia group, on Wednesday night claimed responsibility for a drone attack on a “vital” site in Eilat, Israel’s southern port city.

The group said in a statement that the attack was conducted “in solidarity with the people of Palestine and Lebanon,” pledging to continue targeting “the enemy’s strongholds.”

The statement did not provide further details about the targeted site or report any casualties.

Earlier in the day, the Iraqi militant group claimed responsibility for four drone attacks on four “vital” sites in Israel.

Since the outbreak of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the Gaza Strip on Oct. 7, 2023, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq has repeatedly attacked Israeli and U.S. positions in the region, expressing support for Palestinians in Gaza.

The militia has stepped up its attacks as Israel has intensified strikes against Hezbollah across Lebanon.

XINHUA

NEW YORK — A Turkish Airlines plane made an emergency landing in New York City airport early Wednesday morning after the pilot died in the air, authorities said.

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration confirmed in a statement that the plane landed safely at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York around 6 a.m. local time on Wednesday after one of the pilots suffered a medical emergency.

Yahya ÜSTÜN, Senior Vice President Media Relations at Turkish Airlines, wrote on X that Ilcehin Pehlivan, the Captain Pilot of the company’s Airbus 350, operating the Seattle-Istanbul flight TK204, fainted during the flight.

Another pilot and a co-pilot made an emergency landing in New York after medical intervention to Pehlivan on the plane was ineffective. Pehlivan, 59, died before landing.

Pehlivan, who had been working at Turkish Airlines since 2007, had periodic health examination in March of this year, and no health problems were detected that would prevent him from working, according to ÜSTÜN.

The flight took off from Seattle-Tacoma International Airport at 7:02 p.m. local time on Tuesday, according to the tracking service FlightAware.

XINHUA

A Russian ballistic missile attack on Wednesday on the port infrastructure of Ukraine’s southern Odesa region killed six people and injured eight, Odesa Regional Governor Oleh Kiper said.

The injured were all Ukrainian nationals, Kiper wrote on the Telegram messaging app. Four were in serious condition.

Deputy Prime Minister Oleksiy Kuleba said a Panamanian-flagged container ship, the Shui Spirit, sustained damage in the attack.

“An insidious enemy is trying to disrupt the work of the Ukrainian grain corridor, killing civilians and destroying infrastructure,” Kiper wrote in his post.

The attack on the port of Chornomorsk was the third in the region in the past four days.

Ukrainian officials said a Russian missile hit a Palau-flagged vessel in Odesa port on Monday, killing one Ukrainian national and injuring five foreign nationals.

And on Sunday, a Russian missile damaged a civilian Saint Kitts and Nevis-flagged vessel loaded with corn in the port of Pivdennyi.

Under a deal brokered by Turkey soon after Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, ships carrying cargoes from Ukrainian ports operated without impediment for about a year before Russia pulled out of the agreement.

Vessels have since been using an alternative route, hugging Ukraine’s southwestern Black Sea coast through Romanian waters and on to Turkey.

REUTERS

AL-MUKALLA — A Yemeni university professor and his family were killed in an airstrike by Israeli warplanes on the Syrian capital on Tuesday night, relatives and media reports said.

Dr. Shawqi Alawdi, his wife, and three daughters were at a building in Al-Mazzeh, Damascus, when it was hit by an Israeli airstrike, killing them all, including several others.

The Syrian news agency SANA said that the Israelis fired three missiles at a building in Damascus’s “densely populated” Al-Mazzeh neighborhood, killing seven people, including women and children, injuring 11 others, and causing property damage.

Alawdi teaches pharmacology at a private university in Syria and taught at Dhamar University’s Faculty of Medicine and Sanaa University in Yemen.

He moved to Syria four years ago and returns to Yemen every year during breaks, according to relatives, colleagues and students.

His Facebook profile shows that he studied clinical pharmacy at Ain Shams University in Egypt and earned a Ph.D. in pharmacology and toxicology from Cairo University.

Friends and students flooded his Facebook page with condolence and messages of sympathy after learning of his death.

Students in Syria and Yemen shared photos of Alawdi, while others sent condolences to his family in Yemen.

“Dr. Alawdi is composed, humble, and knowledgeable in his field. He has a unique teaching style in which he simplifies the difficult subjects he teaches,” Younes Al-Qadhi, a pharmacist in Sanaa and former student of Alawdi, told Arab News.

Mohammed Aslan, a pharmacist and Alawdi’s friend, described him as a leading expert in nanotechnology and an apolitical person.

“He was free of politics, sectarianism, and all other life pollutants. He was a pioneering scientist and one of the most important researchers in nanotechnology,” Aslan said on Facebook.

Meanwhile, the International Federation of Journalists urged the Houthi militia on Tuesday to release Yemeni journalists abducted for criticizing the Houthis and to stop harassing journalists.

According to the IFJ, the Houthis abducted Mohamed Al-Miyahi on Sept. 20 after raiding his home in Sanaa, two days after he criticized the Houthis.

They also abducted Fuad Al-Nahar, a member of the Yemeni Journalists’ Syndicate, in September as part of a crackdown on those who celebrated the 1962 revolution.

“Our colleague Mohamed Al-Miyahi is the latest abductee in a long list of journalists who must be immediately and unconditionally released. We call on the de facto authorities and other armed groups to stop hindering journalists’ work and release all unfairly detained journalists,” Anthony Bellanger, general secretary of the IFJ, said in a statement.

Since mid-September, the Houthis have abducted hundreds of people as part of a crackdown on Yemenis commemorating the 62nd anniversary of the 1962 revolution that overthrew the Zaidi Imamate in northern Yemen.

The Houthis abducted people who posted on social media encouraging the public to celebrate the revolution, accusing them of being “stooges” for the US and other foreign intelligence agencies to undermine security in areas under their control and pressure them to stop attacking ships.

AN- Oct 9, 2024