Headline

Thousands Protest In Tel Aviv Against Israeli Govt Move To Expand Gaza War

Published

2 months ago

August 9, 2025

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Thousands took to the streets in Tel Aviv on Saturday to call for an end to the war in Gaza, a day after the Israeli government vowed to expand the conflict and capture Gaza City.

Demonstrators waved signs and held up pictures of hostages still being held in the Palestinian territory as they called on the government to secure their release.

AFP journalists at the rally estimated the number of attendees to be in the tens of thousands, while a group representing the families of hostages said as many as 100,000 people participated.

Authorities did not provide an official estimate for the size of the crowd, though it dwarfed the ones at other recent anti-war rallies.

“We will end with a direct message to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: if you invade parts of Gaza and the hostages are murdered, we will pursue you in the town squares, in election campaigns and at every time and place,” Shahar Mor Zahiro, the relative of a slain hostage, told AFP.

On Friday, Netanyahu’s security cabinet greenlighted plans for a major operation to seize Gaza City, triggering a wave of domestic and international criticism.

Foreign powers, including some of Israel’s allies, have been pushing for a negotiated ceasefire to secure the hostages’ return and help alleviate a humanitarian crisis in the Strip.

Despite the backlash and rumours of dissent from Israeli military top brass, Netanyahu has remained defiant over the decision.

In a post on social media late Friday, Netanyahu said “we are not going to occupy Gaza — we are going to free Gaza from Hamas”.

The premier has faced regular protests over the course of 22 months of war, with many rallies calling for the government to strike a deal after past truces saw hostages exchanged for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli custody.

Out of 251 hostages captured during Hamas’s 2023 attack, 49 are still being held in Gaza, including 27 the military says are dead.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) on Saturday lambasted Israel’s plan to expand its operations in Gaza.

According to a statement carried by the official Palestinian news agency Wafa, PA president Mahmud Abbas said the plan “constitutes a new crime”, and stressed “the urgent need to take action to stop it immediately”.

He also emphasised “the importance of enabling the State of Palestine to assume its full responsibilities in the Gaza Strip”.

In the same meeting that approved the Gaza City plan, the security cabinet adopted a set of principles for ending the war in Gaza that included establishing a new “administration that is neither Hamas nor the Palestinian Authority”.

The PA, conceived as a first step towards a Palestinian state, exercises limited administration over parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank, but does not have a presence in Hamas-run Gaza.

Gaza’s civil defence agency said at least 37 people were killed by Israeli fire across the territory on Saturday, including 30 civilians who were waiting to collect aid.

Israel’s offensive has killed more than 61,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s health ministry, figures the United Nations says are reliable.

Hamas’s 2023 attack on Israel — which triggered the war — resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

AFP

Headline

UK Nursery Worker Jailed For Abusing 21 Babies

Published

20 hours ago

September 26, 2025

Editor

A judge on Friday jailed a nursery worker for eight years for a string of “gratuitous” and “sadistic” attacks on babies.

In one incident, Londoner Roksana Lecka, 22, kicked a little boy in the face several times.

Lecka, who blamed cannabis for her crimes, admitted seven counts of cruelty to a person under the age of 16 and was convicted after a trial of another 14 counts.

Sentencing her for attacks on 21 babies, Judge Sarah Plaschkes said she had committed “multiple acts of gratuitous violence” at two London nurseries where she worked.

“You pinched, slapped, punched, smacked and kicked them. You pulled their ears, hair and their toes. You toppled children headfirst into cots,” she said.

“Often the child would be quietly and happily minding its own business before you deliberately inflicted pain… Your criminal conduct can properly be characterised as sadistic,” she added.

Lecka’s cruelty was revealed in June 2024 after she was seen pinching a number of children.
Police were called in and found multiple incidents recorded on the nursery CCTV.

Victim impact statements submitted to London’s Kingston Crown Court from parents of Lecka’s victims told how they were left heartbroken and guilt-stricken by the attacks.

“These children were so innocent and vulnerable,” one mother told the court.

“They couldn’t speak, they couldn’t defend themselves and they couldn’t tell us as parents that something had happened to them,” she added.

“They were totally helpless and Roksana preyed upon them.”

The hearing was told that she had apologised to the parents in a letter to the court in which she said cannabis had turned her into a different person.

She had been addicted to the drug around the time of the offences, but had not told the nursery.
She was found not guilty of three further counts of child cruelty.

Headline

Italy Fines Six Oil Firms $1bn Fine For Restricting Competition

Published

23 hours ago

September 26, 2025

Editor

Italy’s antitrust regulator said Friday it has slapped Italian energy giant Eni and five other companies with fines totalling more than 936 million euros ($1.1 billion) for “restricting competition” in the sale of fuel.

The authority said in a statement that Eni, Esso, Ip, Q8, Saras and Tamoil “coordinated to set the value of the bio component factored into fuel prices”, which tripled between 2019 and 2023.

A probe following a whistleblower’s complaint revealed that “the companies implemented parallel price increases — largely coinciding — which were driven by direct or indirect information exchanges among them”, the authority said.

“The cartel began on 1 January 2020 and continued until 30 June 2023,” it added.

AFP

Headline

Trump Signs Order For TikTok’s Sale, Valued At $14bn

Published

1 day ago

September 26, 2025

Editor

United States President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order declaring that his plan is to sell TikTok’s US operations to American and global investors.

As reported by Reuters on Friday, the order requires companies bidding for TikTok to meet the national-security requirements of the 2024 law that otherwise would ban the app unless its Chinese owners divest.

Speaking to reporters at an Oval Office briefing on Thursday, Vice President James Vance said the newly created US entity would be “valued around $14 billion.

“We actually think this is a good deal for investors, but they will make a determination about what they want to invest and what they think is the proper value,” he said.

The White House on Thursday pushed back the law’s enforcement date to January 20 to allow time for the transaction, investor commitments, and negotiations with Chinese authorities.

The publication of the executive order shows Trump is making progress on the sale of TikTok’s US assets.

However, details remain to be worked out, including how the U.S. company would handle TikTok’s most valuable asset: its recommendation algorithm.

“There was some resistance on the Chinese side, but the fundamental thing that we wanted to accomplish is that we wanted to keep TikTok operating, but we also wanted to make sure that we protected Americans’ data privacy as required by law,” Vance said.

According to Reuters, Trump’s order says the algorithm will be retrained and monitored by the U.S. company’s security partners, and operation of the algorithm will be under the control of the new joint venture.

Trump said Chinese President Xi Jinping had indicated approval of the plans. “I spoke with President Xi,” Trump said. “We had a good talk, I told him what we were doing, and he said go ahead with it.”

Chinese embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. TikTok did not immediately comment on Trump’s action.

Trump has credited TikTok, which has 170 million U.S. users, with helping him win reelection last year. Trump has 15 million followers on his personal TikTok account. The White House also launched an official TikTok account last month.

“This is going to be American-operated all the way,” Trump said.

He said that Michael Dell, the founder, chairman and CEO of Dell Technologies; Rupert Murdoch, the chairman emeritus of Fox News owner Fox Corp, and newspaper publisher News Corp, and “probably four or five absolutely world-class investors” would be part of the deal.