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ISRAEL’s military has carried out waves of air attacks in southern Lebanon, causing damage to several homes, according to Lebanese state media, as anger mounts over repeated Israeli violations of a ceasefire with Hezbollah agreed upon last year. Lebanon’s National News Agency reported late on Monday that Israeli jets targeted Mount Safi, the town of Jbaa, the Zefta Valley, and the area between Azza and Rumin Arki in “several waves”. There was no immediate report of casualties. The Israeli military, in a post on X, said it struck several sites linked to Hezbollah, including a special operations training compound used…

BRITAIN’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer launched a TikTok account on Monday despite the app being banned from government devices, as he attempts to connect to younger voters. A spokesman for his office said “security mitigations” were in place to operate the Prime Minister’s account. “Tiktok, follow me,” Starmer said in the first video posted on the account which showed him with his wife at the ceremony to switch on Downing Street’s Christmas lights. The second video showed Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky embracing Starmer outside his residence at 10 Downing Street, before they joined France’s President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor…

SUDAN’s air force has carried out bombings in which at least 1,700 civilians have died in attacks on residential neighbourhoods, markets, schools and camps for displaced people, according to an investigation into air raids in the country’s civil war. The Sudan Witness Project says it has compiled the largest known dataset of military airstrikes in the conflict, which began in April 2023. Its analysis indicates that the air force has used unguided bombs in populated areas. The data focuses on attacks by warplanes, which only the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) is capable of operating. Its rival, the paramilitary Rapid Support…

TWO senior military officials taken hostage during Sunday’s attempted coup in Benin have been freed, a government source has told the BBC. It remains unclear how they were released or if other hostages are still being held. Security forces are continuing a manhunt for those involved in the plot, who remain at large. A group of soldiers appeared on state TV early in the morning to announce they had taken over in the West African country, and gunfire was heard near the presidential residence. However, President Patrice Talon later announced that the situation was “totally under control”. Regional power Nigeria…

MUHAMMaD Salah plunged his future at Liverpool into serious doubt after claiming he had been made the fall guy for the Premier League champions’ disastrous form this season. In an explosive outburst, Salah spoke to reporters after being left on the bench for Saturday’s 3-3 draw at Leeds, dropping a bombshell accusation that his relationship with Reds manager Arne Slot is broken. It was the third consecutive game the Egyptian had been axed by Slot, who is struggling for solutions to a run of four wins in 15 games in all competitions for troubled Liverpool. AFP Sport looks at how…

AS Israel and Hamas prepare to move towards phase two of a United States-led blueprint to end Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, disagreements loom over the as-yet undefined role of an international stabilisation force in the besieged Palestinian enclave. Senior Hamas official Basem Naim said on Sunday that the US draft required “a lot of clarifications”. While the group was ready to discuss “freezing or storing” weapons during the ongoing truce, he said it would not accept that an international stabilisation force take charge of disarmament. “We are welcoming a [United Nations] force to be near the borders, supervising the…

GUNMEN in Guatemala killed a small-town mayor taking part in a Christmas parade, and wounded one of his bodyguards, officials said Sunday. Nelson Marroquin, 38, was shot Saturday in the town of Obero, 70 kilometers (40 miles) east of Guatemala City, the National Association of Municipalities said. President Bernardo Arevalo condemned the killing and ordered an investigation. Like many countries in Central America, Guatemala is in the throes of a gang violence epidemic. Its homicide rate — 17.7 per 100,000 people  is double the world average, according to the National Economic Research Center. In October, 20 members of the notorious…

BENIN’s President Patrice Talon says the government and armed forces have thwarted an attempted coup in the West African nation and promised to punish those responsible. Talon’s announcement, aired on state television on Sunday evening, came 12 hours after gunfire rang out in Cotonou, the country’s biggest city, and soldiers went on state television to claim they had removed Talon from power. The rapid mobilisation of forces loyal to the government “allowed us to thwart these adventurers”, Talon said in his remarks. “This treachery will not go unpunished.” The attempted coup was the latest threat to democratic rule in the…

SUDAN faces a “massive” humanitarian aid crisis, with millions of starving people being denied access to vital food supplies as fighting rages in the war-torn country, the World Food Programme (WFP) has warned. WFP Deputy Executive Director Carl Skau told Al Jazeera on Sunday that his organisation was assisting five million people across the nation, including two million in hard-to-reach areas, but it was not enough. “The needs are massive. We’re talking about 20 million people acutely food insecure, some six million in starvation,” he said. “It is a massive crisis, and what we’re able to do, which is important,…

A GROUP of military personnel in Benin on Sunday announced that they had ousted President Patrice Talon, who is due to step down next April after 10 years in power. Soldiers calling themselves the “Military Committee for Refoundation” (CMR), said on state television that they had met and decided that “Mr Patrice Talon is removed from office as president of the republic”. Talon’s whereabouts were unknown and the French Embassy said on X that “gunfire was reported at Camp Guezo” near the president’s official residence. It urged French citizens to remain indoors for security. Meanwhile, the presidency had said President…

EMI Buendia scored with the last kick of the game as Aston Villa stunned Arsenal to move three points behind the Premier League leaders. Leandro Trossard’s sixth goal of the season looked to have earned a point for Arsenal after he cancelled out Matty Cash’s opener. But Buendia struck in the 95th minute as Unai Emery’s side moved into second in the table. Arsenal, who blew Bayern Munich and Tottenham away last month, suffered their first defeat in the league since losing 1-0 at Liverpool in August. Villa Park erupted after substitute Buendia scored to give Villa their seventh straight…

ISRAEL’s military has killed seven Palestinians, including two children, in Gaza and announced that it will allow the Rafah crossing to open exclusively for the exit of people from the war-torn territory. The killings on Wednesday mark the latest Israeli violations of a United States-brokered ceasefire in Gaza and came after the military accused Hamas fighters of attacking and wounding four of its soldiers in southern Rafah, near the enclave’s border with Egypt. The victims of Israel’s attacks included two Palestinians who were killed by Israeli gunfire in the Zeitoun neighbourhood of northern Gaza City and five who were killed…

AT least 23 people have been killed in the Indian state of Goa following a fire at a popular nightclub in the village of Arpora, according to officials and media reports. The blaze broke out at about midnight on Sunday when a gas cylinder exploded at the nightclub, the Press Trust of India reported, citing local police. Several tourists and kitchen workers were killed in the fire, according to Chief Minister Pramod Sawant. “Today is a very painful day for all of us in Goa. A major fire incident at Arpora has taken the lives of 23 people,” Sawant wrote…

THE death toll from an attack by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) on a kindergarten and other sites in the Sudanese state of South Kordofan has risen to at least 114 people, including 46 children, according to a local official. The executive director of Kalogi locality in told Al Jazeera on Saturday that at least 71 people were killed in an initial attack on Thursday. Sudan Doctors’ Network said in a statement late on Friday that paramedics reporting to the scene were targeted in “a second unexpected attack”. Two military sources in the government-aligned Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) also told…

AT least 11 people including a three-year-old child have been killed in a mass shooting at a hostel in South Africa. Fourteen others were wounded when gunmen stormed the venue in Saulsville township, west of the capital Pretoria, early on Saturday. At least three unknown gunmen began firing “randomly” at a group of people who were drinking, police spokesperson Brigadier Athlenda Mathe said. The motive of the shooting is unknown and no arrests have been made. It is the latest in a string of mass shootings that have rocked the crime-ridden country in recent years. The gunmen reportedly entered the…

HOLDERS Argentina and leading contenders Spain were handed kind draws for the 2026 World Cup in a star-studded ceremony on Friday, which saw US President Donald Trump receive FIFA’s new peace prize. The event in Washington started the final countdown to the tournament, six months out from the first-ever 48-team World Cup, with much-fancied France among those receiving a harder task. Lionel Messi’s Argentina will begin their defense of the trophy they won in Qatar in 2022 against Algeria, and will also face Austria and debutants Jordan in Group J. Heavily-fancied Spain, the European champions, will kick off their campaign…

ISRAEL has violated the United States-brokered Gaza ceasefire at least 497 times in 44 days, killing hundreds of Palestinians since the ceasefire came into effect on 10 October, according to the Gaza Government Media Office. Some 342 civilians have been killed in the attacks, with children, women and the elderly accounting for the majority of the victims. “We condemn in the strongest terms the continued serious and systematic violations of the ceasefire agreement by the Israeli occupation authorities,” the office said in a statement on Saturday. “These violations constitute a flagrant breach of international humanitarian law and the humanitarian protocol…

THE United States Supreme Court has agreed to decide the legality of President Donald Trump’s bid to end birthright citizenship, as the Republican administration continues its broad immigration crackdown. Following its announcement on Friday, the conservative-dominated court did not set a date for oral arguments in the blockbuster case, but it is likely to be early next year, with a ruling in June. Several lower courts have blocked as unconstitutional Trump’s attempt to put restrictions on the law that states that anyone born on US soil is automatically an American citizen. Trump signed an executive order on January 20, his…

FIGHTING has flared up again in the east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo between the M23 rebel group and government forces, a day after United States President Donald Trump hosted DRC and Rwanda leaders in Washington as they signed a peace deal aimed at ending decades-long conflict in the country. The warring sides blamed each other for Friday’s renewed fighting, with the M23 group saying in a statement that 23 people were killed and several others wounded in bombardments by the DRC’s army. M23 spokesperson Lawrence Kanyuka said in a post on X that Congolese forces and allies…

NAMIBIA’s proposals to lift the ban on the international trade in black and white rhino horns have been rejected at a key conservation meeting. The result of the voting at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites) earlier this week was adopted by the conference on Thursday in Samarkand, Uzbekistan. Namibia had also proposed overturning the ban on African savanna elephant ivory – this too was defeated. Eyebrows were raised about the rhino horn trade proposals mainly because Namibia pioneered the practice of cutting the horns off rhinos in 1989 so they no…