Party Backed by Mumbai Terror Attacks Accused Hafiz Saeed Fields Candidates in Pakistan Elections
New Age Islam News Bureau
26 December 2023
Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks mastermind. File photo
| Photo Credit: REUTERS
-----
·
Party Backed by Mumbai Terror
Attacks Accused Hafiz Saeed Fields Candidates in Pakistan Elections
·
Muslims Are About 18% But Not
United and Sikhs Are 2 Per Cent, But United Under Sri Akal Takht Sahib: Akali
Dal Chief
·
CAIR Calls for Probe of Video
Showing Hundreds of Stripped Palestinians ‘Humiliated’ in
·
Captured Gaza Stadium
·
This Christmas, We Stand in
Solidarity with Palestinian Christians: Bangladesh FM
·
Christians In Gaza Limit
Christmas Celebrations to Religious Rites Only as Israeli Bombing Continues
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Pakistan
·
Pakistan’s Enemies Hell-Bent on
Creating Fissures Using Religious, Ethnic and Political Vulnerabilities: COAS
·
Sunni Tehreek joins hands with
TLP to contest Feb 8 elections
·
Pak, TTP were close to a deal,
claims Afghan FM
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India
·
Delhi HC Closes Proceedings in
Plea ‘Anticipating Action’ On 150-Year-Old Mosque at Sunehri Bagh Road
·
"If No India-Pak Talks,
Same Fate as Gaza, Palestine...": Farooq Abdullah
·
Kabul to Canada via Delhi:
Rescued by India, why Afghan Sikhs, Hindus were forced to move to Canada
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North America
·
Islamic Jihad Movement in
Palestine: Biden's Statement Further Evidence of Washington's Management of
Aggression Against Gaza
·
US retaliates after 3 American
service members injured by Kataib Hezbollah attack in Iraq
·
NYC pro-Palestinian protesters
attempt to put damper on Christmas while clashing with police: reports
----
South Asia
·
Afghans Marry in Mass Ceremony
in Bid to Cut Costs
·
Global Power Disputes Hinder UN
Success In Afghanistan: Ex-UK Ambassador
·
Muttaqi Discusses Bilateral
Relations, Refugees with Iran FM
·
Afghans Invest $150 Billion
Abroad: Azizi
·
Hanafi Meets Japan Envoy,
Ex-UNAMA Head, Discusses Kabul's Intl Relations
·
OCHA Seeks to Provide
Humanitarian Aid for 16 million People in Afghanistan this Winter
·
Islamic Emirate Fulfilled All
Its Commitments in Past Two Years: Mawlavi Kabir
----
Mideast
·
Gaza death toll nears 20,700
amid continuing Israeli onslaught
·
Israel PM Benjamin Netanyahu
says no peace until Hamas destroyed
·
Israel economy to shrink by two
percent due to displacement of workers amid Hamas war
·
Iran, Syria share stance on
need to end Israeli genocide in Gaza: Amir-Abdollahian
·
Israel’s assassination of IRGC
military advisor ‘blatant and shameless’ violation: Hezbollah
·
Raeisi: Israel will definitely
pay price for assassinating senior IRGC advisor
·
Israel says dead hostage’s car
links Gaza hospital to militants
·
Israel ‘intensifying’ Gaza
fighting as Hamas says strikes kill dozens
·
Israel ‘terrorizing’ Gaza
civilians over its military defeat: Hamas
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Africa
·
Pope Didn’t Approve Same-Sex
Marriage, says Catholic Archbishop of Abuja
·
Why Islamic cleric who
criticised Kwara governor was arrested – Police
·
People flee their homes after
attacks kill scores in central Nigeria
·
Kaduna Bombing: Tudun Biri
Christians, Muslims celebrate Christmas in Church
·
Provide lasting solution to
poverty in Nigeria, Islamic group urges Tinubu
·
Sudan in 'total panic' as
paramilitaries move South
-----
Europe
·
Pope Decries Gaza’s ‘Appalling
Harvest’ Of Civilian Deaths
·
From Gaza War To Protecting
Earth, All About King Charles' Christmas Message
·
Archbishop of Canterbury’s
Christmas sermon highlights children’s plight in Gaza
·
Irish member of European
Parliament calls von der Leyen 'Frau Genocide' over Gaza
----
Southeast Asia
·
Malay Civil Society
Organisations Plan Five-Day Picket in Front of US Embassy Calling for End to
Israel's Strike on Gaza
·
Religious preacher PU Azman
told to enter defence on charges of sexually violating a teen
·
Madani Government must resolve
politico-religious immigration faux pas – J.D. Lovrenciear
·
No special treatment accorded
to senior cop charged with murder of 17-year-old in Ipoh, says
·
Ayob Khan
·
More than 25,000 people seeking
shelter at 241 flood relief centres in East Coast states
·
Islamic Economy bill passage
may up RI's SGIE rank: observer
----
Arab World
·
Awqaf Ministry Holds Training
Courses For 2,000 Imams, Preachers
·
Yemeni Armed Forces towards
lifting aggression, siege on Gaza
·
Arab Charter on Human Rights
Committee discusses Saudi Arabia’s inaugural report
·
Hajj, Umrah forum to focus on
Pilgrim Experience Program
·
Saudi, Qatari interior
ministers meet in Riyadh
Compiled by
New Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://newageislam.com/islamic-world-news/mumbai-terror-accused-saeed-pakistan-election/d/131390
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Party Backed by Mumbai Terror Attacks
Accused Hafiz Saeed Fields Candidates in Pakistan Elections
Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks mastermind. File photo
| Photo Credit: REUTERS
-----
December 26, 2023
A new political front organisation of
the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks mastermind Hafiz Saeed has fielded candidates
for most of the national and provincial Assembly constituencies across Pakistan
for the February 8 general elections, saying it wants to make the country an
Islamic welfare state.
Saeed, the founder of Lashkar-e-Taiba,
has been in jail since 2019 after being convicted for several years in multiple
terror finance cases along with some other leaders of the banned
Jamaat-ud-Dawa.
The Pakistan Markazi Muslim League
(PMML) party — set up by Saeed — says it is a political party. The electoral
symbol for the PMML is ‘chair’. In a video message, PMML President Khalid
Masood Sindhu said that his party is contesting on most of the national and
provincial Assembly seats.
“We want to come to power not for
corruption but to serve the people and make Pakistan an Islamic welfare state,”
he said. Mr. Sindhu is a candidate for NA-130 Lahore, from which Pakistan
Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN) supremo and former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is
also contesting. Saeed’s son Talha Saeed is contesting from Lahore’s NA-127.
When contacted, Sindhu denied his party’s link with Saeed’s outfit.
Source: thehindu.com
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Muslims Are About 18% But Not United and
Sikhs Are 2 Per Cent, But United Under Sri Akal Takht Sahib: Akali Dal Chief
Sukhbir
Singh Badal
----
Chandigarh, 26.12.23
Shiromani Akali Dal chief Sukhbir Singh
Badal, in his sharpest attack on Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, said this
evening that he doesn't consider him a Sikh as he "does not know the
history of Sikhs".
"I do not consider him (Bhagwant
Mann) a Sikh. He wears a turban to show that he is a Sikh. He does not know the
history of Sikhs. We feel sad when we see him and hear his statements," he
said during a meeting with Sikh groups in Delhi.
He also drew a comparison between Muslim
and Sikh leaderships vis-a-vis their populations.
"The population of Muslims in the
country is about 18 per cent but they have no leadership because they are not
united. We are 2 per cent but we are united under Sri Akal Takht Sahib,"
he said.
Mr Badal also claimed the Punjab
government is being run by Delhi Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party chief
Arvind Kejriwal. "They (AAP) are looting Punjab and Arvind Kejriwal is the
Chief Minister of Punjab, not Bhagwant Mann," the Akali leader said.
The AAP stormed to power in Punjab with
a landslide victory in the 2022 state polls, bagging 92 seats in the 117-member
Assembly and trouncing the Congress that managed to win 18 seats.
The 61-year-old leader today met the
members of the Sikh Sangat of Sri Patna Sahib (Bihar) and Mumbai (Maharashtra)
at the party's Delhi State unit president S Paramjit Singh Sarna's residence.
He announced that "Shiromani Akali Dal will establish party units in all
States having Sikh population".
He urged the community to stay united:
"I appeal to all of you not to be divided and remain united...Shiromani
Akali Dal will establish party units in all the states..."
The meeting also witnessed veteran Akali
leader S Manjit Singh GK rejoining the Shiromani Akali Dal along with his
entire Jago party team. "I am sure this unity will not only strengthen the
Sikh community, but pave the way for resolution of all our pending
demands," said Mr Badal.
"This is part of a process to
effect Panthic unity in the Sikh quom. The community is facing various
challenges and the resolution of all can only be achieved we all get united
under the flag of the Panth - that of the Shiromani Akali Dal," he added.
Earlier this month, he had appealed to
dissident Akali leaders to shun their differences to come under one flag.
"Those who have 'Panthic' thinking,
who have Shiromani Akali Dal in their hearts and blood, Shiromani Akali Dal is
only one and those factions which want to divide, I want to tell them that
there is a strength in unity," he said while addressing a gathering at
gurdwara Shaheed Baba Gurbaksh Singh at the Akal Takht in Amritsar.
Source: ndtv.com
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https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/sukhbir-singh-badal-targets-bhagwant-mann-i-dont-consider-him-a-sikh-4740993
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CAIR Calls for Probe of Video Showing
Hundreds of Stripped Palestinians ‘Humiliated’ in Captured Gaza Stadium
Israeli
soldiers detain blindfolded Palestinian men [Mahmud Hams/AFP]
------
Ibrahim Hooper
December 25, 2023
The Council on American-Islamic
Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy
organization, today called for an international probe of online images showing
hundreds of Palestinians civilians including the disabled, women, the elderly,
and even a baby, most stripped to their underwear and paraded in a captured
Gaza stadium.
Under international humanitarian law,
all prisoners of war must be treated humanely. Humiliating and publishing
humiliating images of prisoners could be a violation of the Geneva Conventions,
which states prisoners of war “shall at all times be humanely treated and
protected, particularly against acts of violence, from insults and from public
curiosity.”
A number of Palestinians detained by
Israel have reported being tortured and abused. Israel has killed some 250
Palestinians in the past 24 hours.
The video, reportedly taken by an
Israeli photojournalist, does not offer details of the location or date of the
alleged war crime.
[NOTE: More than 110,000 Americans have
used CAIR’s action alert to contact their members of Congress and call for an
end to the violence and the renewal of U.S.-led efforts to end the occupation.
SEE: Urge Your Members of Congress to Address Root Cause of Mideast
Violence]
In a statement, CAIR National Executive
Director Nihad Awad said:
“There can be no justification for
seeking to humiliate hundreds of men, women, the disabled and elderly, and even
a baby, through this kind of disgusting public display. There must be an
international investigation of this incident and of the many other Israeli war
crimes in Gaza.”
NOTE: Israel often claims it strips
prisoner to reveal hidden weapons, but such disingenuous claims do not explain
why the detainees remain naked after no weapons are revealed.
Yesterday, CAIR condemned what it called
the latest “Israeli war crimes of the day” after media reports that Israel
killed at least 70 people in a strike on Gaza’s Maghazi refugee camp and
murdered a number of pregnant women.
On Saturday, CAIR called on Americans of
all backgrounds to demand that the Biden administration act to “end the
slaughter, starvation and ethnic cleansing” after reports that forces of the
far-right Israeli government massacred 76 members of an extended family in
Gaza, that Israeli-imposed famine is widespread and that bodies are decaying in
the streets and are being dug up by Israeli bulldozers.
Previously, CAIR called on the Biden
administration to stop sending what it called “genocide bombs” to the far-right
Israeli government after the New York Times revealed that U.S.-supplied
2,000-pound bombs were “routinely” used against Palestinian civilians in
so-called “safe areas” in Gaza.
CAIR said the Biden administration must
stop “justifying war crimes” the Israeli government has perpetrated against
hospitals after an investigation by the Washington Post debunked claims by the
Netanyahu government’s “evidence” that Gaza’s Al Shifa Hospital had to be
attacked because it was a military command center.
CAIR also called on the State Department
and FBI to investigate the shooting and detention of a 13-year-old
Palestinian-American boy by Israeli forces in the West Bank.
He noted CAIR said Israel’s new ethnic
cleansing order, the bulldozing of bodies in a Gaza cemetery and the forced
starvation of Palestinian children are the latest “Israeli car crimes of the
day.”
CAIR joined calls for a United Nations
investigation of the latest “Israeli war crime of the day” – allegations that
Israeli forces in Gaza carried our summary executions of unarmed Palestinian
men in front of their family members. Eyewitnesses are now coming forward to
confirm these allegations.
Israel has now killed more than 20,000
people in Gaza, mostly women and children, and including hundreds of UN
workers, journalists and medical personnel.
Earlier this week, CAIR condemned other
“war crimes of the day,” including the reported mass killing of a Palestinian
grandfather’s family in front of his eyes, vandalism of West Bank homes by
Israeli forces, the deaths and alleged torture of Palestinian detainees, and
more massacres in refugee camps and residential areas of Gaza.
Also this week, CAIR condemned a deadly
Israeli strikes on a Gaza maternity hospital and other medical facilities, the
killing of more than 100 people in a refugee camp and the killing of two
Christians seeking shelter in a besieged church.
Pope Francis condemned Israel’s killing
of two Christian women sheltering at a Catholic parish in Gaza, noting that
“unarmed civilians are targets for bombs and gunfire.”
At least 110 people were killed in
Israel’s bombing of Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp.
Over the weekend, CAIR called for United
Nations to investigate reports that Israeli forces in Gaza bulldozed medical
tents with injured Palestinians inside, allegedly burying civilians alive and
said that the Israeli military’s killing of three unarmed, shirtless Israelis
waving a white flag is further proof that Israeli troops are “wantonly killing
Palestinian civilians.”
Earlier today, CAIR said that the
Israeli military’s killing of three unarmed, shirtless Israelis waving a white
flag is further proof that Israeli troops are “wantonly killing Palestinian
civilians.”
CAIR recently called on the Biden
administration to respond to reports that Israel forces shot women, children
and babies “execution-style” after they sought refuge in a school in Gaza.
CAIR condemned the attempted
assassination of an Al Jazeera journalist (and the ultimate death of another)
by Israeli forces, the desecration of Gaza cemeteries by Israeli troops in
Gaza, and a deadly airstrike targeting a UN school in Gaza.
OTHER ISRAELI WAR CRIMES:
A new US intelligence assessment
concluded that nearly half of the air-to-ground munitions that Israel has used
in Gaza have been unguided, also known as “dumb bombs.” Unguided munitions are
typically less precise and can pose a greater threat to civilians.
CAIR condemned the Israeli government’s
celebration of IDF troops who took over and desecrated a mosque in the West
Bank as an “attack on Islam.”
CAIR said the far-right Israeli
government’s controlled demolition of a U.N. school in Gaza is “further
evidence of the ongoing campaign of ethnic cleansing.”
Video posted online shows a man,
reportedly with special needs, being detained by Israeli soldiers and then shot
at point-blank range.
CAIR condemned an Israeli attack on
another hospital in Gaza and said the Biden administration is actively
participating in Israel’s “ethnic cleansing and genocide of the Palestinian
people.”
CAIR condemned another “war crime of the
day” – the slaughter of at least 50 civilians in airstrikes on two UN-run
schools sheltering displaced Palestinians in Gaza.
CAIR recently called on the Biden
administration to address reporting that the U.S. supplied the Israeli
government with white phosphorus used in attacks on civilian areas.
The Israeli government’s extremist
leaders have declared that there are no innocent civilians in Gaza, justified
cutting off water, electricity and other basic necessities because Palestinians
are ‘human animals,’ embraced an ancient biblical verse about the mass
slaughter of an entire city from animals to infants, demanded a million
residents of northern Gaza leave their homes or face death, and announced that
the aim of the bombing in Gaza was destruction rather than accuracy.
CAIR said a new report by Heritage for
Peace detailing Israel’s ongoing destruction of Palestinian cultural sites
shows its desire to entirely “eliminate Palestinian existence.”
Washington, D.C., based CAIR questioned
whether Western leaders even regard Palestinians as “human” after more than 700
women, children and men were massacred by Israel within just the last 24
hours.
CAIR condemned the “Israeli war crime of
the day” after more than 100 men, women and children were killed in the bombing
of residential buildings hosting displaced families in Gaza’s Jabalia refugee
camp.
CAIR’s mission is to protect civil
rights, enhance understanding of Islam, promote justice, and empower American
Muslims.
Source: cair.com
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the full text of the original
https://www.cair.com/press_releases/cair-calls-for-probe-of-video-showing-hundreds-of-stripped-palestinians-humiliated-in-captured-gaza-stadium/
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This Christmas, We Stand in Solidarity
with Palestinian Christians: Bangladesh FM
Foreign
Minister AK Abdul Momen
-----
Dec 25, 2023
Terming Christmas a "time for
celebration", reflection, and unity, Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen said
today that the celebration serves as a reminder of the universal values of
love, compassion, and unity that bind people together.
"It brings together people of
diverse backgrounds in the spirit of love and understanding. In extending our
heartfelt wishes to the Christian community around the world, we are reminded
of the significance of peace and compassion during this festive season,"
he said in a message.
In recognising the significance of this
occasion, Momen said the poignant reality faced by Christians in Palestine
cannot be ignored.
The West Bank, Jerusalem, and Gaza are
home to an estimated 50,000 Christian Palestinians, as noted in the US State
Department's international religious freedom report for 2022.
"This Christmas, we stand in
solidarity with the Palestinian Christians, acknowledging the unique challenges
they navigate. Our thoughts are with them during this season, and we extend our
deepest sympathies," Momen said.
"As we commemorate the birth of
Jesus Christ, let us draw inspiration from his teachings of love and
compassion. May the spirit of Christmas guide us towards a world where
understanding and unity prevail," he said.
"In the face of adversity, may the
light of hope illuminate our path and encourage positive change. May the spirit
of Christmas inspire us to reach out to those in need, extend a helping hand,
and sow the seeds of hope," Momen mentioned.
"As we embrace the festive season,
characterised by joy and goodwill, it is my privilege to convey our sincere
wishes for a Merry Christmas to the Christian community worldwide. Wishing you
and your loved ones a Christmas filled with joy, peace, and goodwill," the
foreign minister said.
Source: thedailystar.net
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https://www.thedailystar.net/news/bangladesh/news/christmas-we-stand-solidarity-palestinian-christians-momen-3502736
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Christians In Gaza Limit Christmas Celebrations
To Religious Rites Only As Israeli Bombing Continues
Photo: aa.com
-----
Mustafa Haboush
25.12.2023
Christians in the Gaza Strip attended
midnight mass, a special religious service held at midnight on Christmas eve,
at the Church of the Holy Family in the Latin Convent complex in the enclave's
center to commemorate the birth of Christ.
Christmas is observed annually on Dec.
25 by Western churches and Jan. 7 by Eastern churches.
However, this year's Christmas is marred
by intense Israeli bombing, making midnight mass one of the most violent nights
of Israel's war on the Gaza Strip.
Since Oct. 7, the Israeli army has been
waging a fierce war on the Gaza Strip, which, as of Sunday evening, has left
about 20,424 Palestinians killed and 54,36 others wounded, most of them
children and women, in addition to the massive destruction of infrastructure
and an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe.
Antoine Ayad, one of the participants in
the special religious service, told Anadolu that the Christmas celebration this
year is "limited to religious rituals only."
"Christmas is a joyous occasion for
us, but this year is different. We are facing the worst humanitarian disaster,
and we have martyrs, wounded, and church destruction as a result of Israeli
(occupied) forces," he added.
"We lost martyrs in the church
sanctuary after the Israeli army bombed the Church of St. Porphyrus in the
Zaytoun neighborhood about two months ago," he explained.
"Sorrow fills our hearts, and we
urge the world to help us overcome the horrors of this war,'' he appealed.
Every year at this time, Palestinians in
Gaza City set up a Christmas tree in the Square of the Unknown Soldier, hanging
decorations, decorating churches, and distributing sweets.
But not this year as the Christmas tree
is missing from squares and roads of Gaza, which are destroyed by the Israeli
military.
The most famous church of St. Porphyrus
in Gaza was also partially destroyed by an earlier Israeli bombing, and there
are no other festive rituals on this holiday.
The previous night, Christmas eve, saw
the most intense Israeli airstrikes and shelling across the Gaza Strip, killing
and injuring scores of people.
In his Christmas message, Palestinian
President Mahmoud Abbas said late Sunday night, "The birth of Jesus Christ
comes this year, and the city of birth, Bethlehem, is experiencing a sadness
that it has not seen before this day. The occupation forces oppress and kill
Palestinian children, snatching their innocent smiles.
"The faces of the living among
them, as none of our people, women, men, and the elderly, are spared from this
killing, terrorism, attempts at forced displacement, and the destruction of
thousands of homes, which reminds us of what happened in the Nakba of
1948."
He added: "I say to our people and
to our families who take refuge in the church in Gaza, and who are not spared
from the barbarity of the Israeli aggression, and to all the people of Gaza,
that your torments, and the torments of our people at home and abroad, will not
be in vain, and that the sun of freedom and an independent state with East
Jerusalem as its capital is coming."
He remarked, "Inevitably, it is
just around the corner."
Around 1,000 Christians live in Gaza out
of a total population of over two million people.
The Israeli onslaught has left Gaza in
ruins, with half of the coastal territory's housing damaged or destroyed and
over two million people displaced within the densely populated enclave amid
shortages of food and clean water.
Palestinian Christians have decided to
limit their Christmas celebrations to religious rituals amid the Israeli war on
Gaza.
Source: aa.com.tr
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https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/christians-in-gaza-limit-christmas-celebrations-to-religious-rites-only-as-israeli-bombing-continues/3092004
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Pakistan
Pakistan’s enemies hell-bent on creating fissures using religious, ethnic and political vulnerabilities: COAS
December 25, 2023
Chief of Army Staff (COAS) Gen Asim
Munir on Monday said Pakistan’s enemies were “hell-bent towards creating
fissures using religious, ethnic and political vulnerabilities”.
“We have to stand together and united to
rise as a resolute and strong nation,” he said as he joined the Christian
community at Christ Church, Rawalpindi for Christmas celebrations, according to
the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR).
The ISPR said the army chief was
welcomed by the congregation who thanked him for attending the celebrations,
adding that Gen Munir also wished a Merry Christmas to the entire Christian
community.
“COAS expressed reverence for religious
community and stressed upon the need for promoting greater interfaith harmony
in society in order to follow Quaid-i-Azam’s true vision of a united and
progressive Pakistan,” it added.
“Islam teaches us the lesson of peace,
friendship and encourages interfaith harmony which is the need of the hour,”
the army chief was quoted as saying.
The COAS also stressed “the importance
of having the correct perspective, truth and knowledge-based opinions about
national issues rather than following rhetoric and propaganda, to address
complex challenges and issues”.
It further said Gen Munir paid tribute
to Quaid-i-Azam’s vision and leadership on his 147th birthday. The army chief
also quoted the founder of the country’s historical remarks during a speech on
August 11, 1947: “You are free. You are free to go to your temples. You are
free to go to your mosques or to any other places of worship in this State of
Pakistan.”
The ISPR said the army chief
acknowledged the “contributions and sacrifices made by the entire Christian
community of Pakistan in all fields and domains”.
Source: dawn.com
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https://www.dawn.com/news/1800646/pakistans-enemies-hell-bent-on-creating-fissures-using-religious-ethnic-and-political-vulnerabilities-coas
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Sunni Tehreek joins hands with TLP to
contest Feb 8 elections
December 26, 2023
KARACHI: In a major development, two
mainstream parties of Barelvi school of thought — the Tehreek Labbaik Pakistan
(TLP) and Pakistan Sunni Tehreek — on Monday joined hands to contest the Feb 8
general election from one platform.
Announcing the alliance at the TLP’s
Rizvi House headquarters, leaders of the two parties also appealed to other
parties of the same school of thought to join them to defeat what they called
“secular forces”.
According to the deal, the Sunni Tehreek
(ST) would contest on one National Assembly and two Sindh Assembly seats in
Karachi on TLP electoral symbol ‘Crane’.
“We are so thankful to the Almighty that
we [TLP and ST] have mutually and unconditionally agreed to contest the
upcoming elections together as one party in Karachi,” said TLP leader Mufti
Qasim Fakhri.
Crane will be the electoral symbol of ST
candidates, says Mufti Qasim
Accompanied by Sahibzada Bilal Abbass
Qadri of the ST, he said: “The ST will contest election on PS-91 & 93 and
NA-235.”
He said that the two parties sent a
message of harmony and unity to all religious segments of the country and they
both wanted more parties aligned with their school of thought should join the
alliance.
The TLP had claimed highest religious
votes in 2018 elections in Karachi, defeating the five-party alliance Muttahida
Majlis-i-Amal that many believed had fast depleting support of mainstream
parties of Barelvi school of thought.
Though the Sunni Tehreek has so far
failed to put any good show in the electoral politics, the party is known for
its influence in several neighbourhoods with fair strength of its
organisational structure.
Source: dawn.com
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https://www.dawn.com/news/1800709/sunni-tehreek-joins-hands-with-tlp-to-contest-feb-8-elections
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Pak, TTP were close to a deal, claims
Afghan FM
December 25, 2023
Kamran Yousaf
ISLAMABAD:Interim Afghan Foreign
Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi has claimed that most of the issues between Pakistan
and the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) had been sorted out and that
both were close to striking a deal but Islamabad backed out.
Muttaqi made these claims during a
conversation with Senator Mushahid Hussain Syed in Tehran on the sidelines of
the conference on Palestine hosted by Iran.
Mushahid, who represented Pakistan at
the conference, told The Express Tribune here on Monday on his return from
Tehran that he had a detailed informal discussion with Foreign Minister Muttaqi
over dinner.
"I didn’t represent the government
while talking to Mr Mutaqqi," he clarified, adding that the conversation
was based on my informal interaction with the Afghan foreign minister in
Tehran, whom he knew from his journalistic days when he was the information
minister.
The focus of the discussion was on the
current state of relationship between Pakistan and the Afghan Taliban on the
issue of the banned TTP, according to Mushahid.
The Afghan foreign minister told the
Pakistani politician that his country was keen to resolve all issues with
Islamabad through dialogue.
Muttaqi said after a series of meetings
between Pakistani officials and the TTP leadership, majority of the issues were
sorted out. Both sides were close to striking a deal brokered by the Afghan
Taliban, according to Muttaqi.
The only outstanding issue was the
merger of erstwhile Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata). The TTP wanted
the reversal of Fata merger. However, Muttaqi claimed Pakistan backed out of
the talks and hence the stalemate.
Pakistani officials, nevertheless,
blamed the TTP for using the talks to regroup.
Islamabad set clear conditions for the
TTP for any deal. Those include accepting the writ of the state, adhere to the
Constitution and law and complete disarmament. Pakistan termed the Fata merger
a redline.
Giving his sense of the interaction with
Muttaqi, Mushahid said some points were noteworthy.
Read: DI Khan attack: Taliban dismiss
Pakistan’s claim of Afghan involvement as ‘baseless’
"First, reflecting Afghan pysche,
Mr Mutaqqi made it clear that ‘Afghanistan instinctively reacts negatively to
pressure and rejects any intimidation or threats from anyone’."
He jokingly quoted an Afghan saying that
“Afghans react adversely to any pressure and you can’t force an Afghan to even
go to Paradise under pressure”!
"Secondly, based on my conversation
with Foreign Minister Mutaqqi, an important but disturbing takeaway is that
there seems to be an absence of any high-level channel of communication between
the top leadership in Islamabad & Kabul, hence serious issues get embroiled
in recriminations, blame game & finger pointing, which is a major failure
for relations amongst two close neighbours with shared interests,"
Mushahid noted.
"In other words, our most important
foreign policy relationship is now reduced to having a ‘dialogue of the deaf’!
As Mr Mutaqqi told me: ‘please don’t overreact on incidents or accidents, as
these do not emanate from any policy from our side, and suddenly these
accidents become a pretext for closure of the border, as cross-border trade
& commerce and human movement should be delinked from incidents or
accidents."
In a tweet, Mushahid wrote: "Great
meeting over dinner with Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi, he’s warm
& positive towards Pakistan & keen to settle contentious issues through
dialogue; however, in his soft, low-key style, he made it clear: ‘Afghan people
may be poor but they have pride & they don’t like being pressured or
threatened by anyone, as the USSR & USA discovered to their lasting
regret’!"
Source: tribune.com.pk
Please click the following URL to read
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https://tribune.com.pk/story/2451125/pak-ttp-were-close-to-a-deal-claims-afghan-fm
------
India
Delhi HC Closes Proceedings in Plea
‘Anticipating Action’ On 150-Year-Old Mosque atSunehri Bagh Road
December 26, 2023
The Delhi High Court has recently closed
proceedings in a plea moved by the Delhi Waqf Board in “anticipation of action”
proposed to be taken by the New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) on a
150-year-old mosque situated at the Sunehri Bagh Road roundabout.
On July 7, the court had in an interim
order directed that the status quo be maintained in respect of the mosque, and
the interim order had been extended from time to time.
On December 18, a single-judge bench of
Justice Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav in its order noted that the primary grievance
of the board at the time of filing of the petition was concerning the
conduction of a joint inspection in the absence of the board. The high court
said that pursuant to the July 7 interim order, a joint inspection was carried
out in the presence of the parties on July 12 at 3 pm and a report was also
prepared therein.
“Therefore, it is rightly submitted by
the learned counsel appearing on behalf of the parties that in terms of the
order passed by this court, certain deliberations had taken place between the
parties and even the inspection had been carried out in the presence of the
respective parties,” the order notes.
Senior counsel Sanjoy Ghose, appearing
for the petitioner, submitted at this stage that his client “apprehends” that
the respondents “may take action dehors (outside the scope) the legal position”
and sought that the board be protected from such an “arbitrary or illegal
action”.
On the other hand, Additional Solicitor
General (ASG) Chetan Sharma for the NDMC vehemently opposed these submissions
and on instructions, said, “There is no foundation laid by the petitioner to
apprehend that the respondents would act in contravention of the legal
position.” According to the ASG, the order notes that if respondents intend to
take any action, then they are “bound to follow the extant regulations and also
the applicable order with respect to the property in question”.
“Since the parties have largely agreed
on the aforesaid issues, therefore, at this stage, this court is not required
to adjudicate the prayer any more. The parties are directed to be bound by the
undertaking(s) recorded hereinabove,” the high court said while disposing of
the petition.
On August 14, the NDMC had informed the
high court that the issue with regard to the mosque had been referred to the
religious committee. In its response, the NDMC had said that during the joint
inspection on July 12, the observation and inputs of the officials from the
Delhi Traffic Police, Delhi Police, Muslim Special Branch/Tehsildar and Land
and Development Office were considered and after completion of the inspection,
a report of joint re-inspection was also prepared.
As per this report, it was jointly
observed by all members of the inspection team that “seeing the ground reality
of heavy volume of traffic and public, and also keeping in mind safety and
security of the public VIPs, and the safety and security of the Delhi Metro,
the whole area occupied by the religious structure and other activities may be
utilised for redesigning/re-engineering of traffic infrastructure for smooth
traffic movement and the above-mentioned structure is required to be
removed/relocated shifted somewhere else (outside of Lutyens’ Bungalow Zone
area) to some other location in Delhi with the help of authorities concerned.
The land is required to be allocated by the land-owning agency”.
The response further stated that on July
14, the NDMC wrote to the secretary of the Delhi government’s home department,
who is the chairman of the religious committee, sending the inspection report.
Source: indianexpress.com
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-----
"If No India-Pak Talks, Same Fate
As Gaza, Palestine...": Farooq Abdullah
December 26, 2023
Criticising the Narendra Modi government
for not talking to Pakistan to resolve disputes, National Conference leader
Farooq Abdullah today said that unless dialogue begins, "we may meet the
same fate as Gaza".
Speaking to reporters, the Srinagar MP
referred to former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's statement on
India-Pakistan relations that "we can change our friends but not our
neighbours".
"Prime Minister Modi also said that
war is not an option now and the matters should be resolved through dialogue.
Where is the dialogue? Nawaz Sharif is about to become the Prime Minister (of
Pakistan) and they are saying that we are ready to talk (to India), but what is
the reason why we are not ready to talk?" Mr Abdullah said.
"If we do not find a solution
through dialogue, we will meet the same fate as Gaza and Palestine, which are
being bombed by Israel," he said. The Hamas' October 7 attacks on Israel
and the brutal counterstrike that followed has claimed over 21,000 lives and
reduced large parts of Gaza to rubble.
The former Jammu and Kashmir Chief
Minister's remarks come against the backdrop of a series of unwelcome news from
the Union Territory over the past one week. During this period, five soldiers
were killed in an ambush in Poonch, a retired cop was shot dead inside a
Baramulla mosque and three civilians died after they were detained by troops
for questioning.
Senior BJP leader Dr Hina Shafi Bhat has
criticised the veteran leader's remarks, saying it is regrettable that a senior
leader from Jammu and Kashmir is still talking about talks with Pakistan.
"Farooq saab should learn now, this regime is not going to bow down before
Pakistan. We tried, they have backstabbed us again and again."
Earlier, Mr Abdullah trashed the ruling
BJP's claims of normalcy in Jammu and Kashmir since its special status was
revoked in 2019.
"Shouting normalcy or propagating
tourist arrivals as peace will not finish terrorism. They were claiming that
terrorism has finished with the abrogation of Article 370 (in 2019) but four
years down the line, terrorism is still there and will not finish till we try
to understand its root cause," Mr Abdullah said on Sunday.
"I regret the killing (of the
officer). Those who are claiming normalcy are silent... they tried to heal the
wounds in a superficial manner rather than addressing the root cause. The
commoners should understand that we are losing our soldiers, officers and
commoners," he said.
The National Conference president said
the Centre needs to find "the right perspective" to end bloodshed in
Jammu and Kashmir. "We are part of India, we were part of India and we
will remain part of India and if we have to end terrorism, we have to look for
ways rather than claiming normalcy or talking about tourism which is fragile
under the shadow of terrorism," he said.
The use of military or police is not
going to finish terrorism, he said, adding, "We have to go deeper and
address the root cause to finish it off."
"Terrorists attacked and martyred
our brave soldiers, and later three locals were tortured to death. This is
tragic as we are fighting against terrorism and not against our own people. If
we annoy our people, we will never win this war," he had said.
Earlier this year, Pakistan Prime
Minister Shehbaz Sharif had showed willingness to enter into dialogue with New
Delhi. He had said there is "nothing against anyone" and that
Islamabad is ready to talk to neighbours because "war is no more an
option".
In response, Ministry of External
Affairs spokesperson Arindam Bagchi had said India wants neighbourly ties with
Pakistan, but there should be an atmosphere free from terror and violence for
such ties.
"We have seen reports regarding the
comments by the Pakistan PM on this issue. India's clear and consistent
position is well known that we desire normal relations with all our
neighbouring countries including Pakistan. For this environment free of terror
and hostility is imperative," he had said.
Source: ndtv.com
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https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/farooq-abdullah-on-india-pakistan-dialogue-if-no-talks-we-will-meet-same-fate-as-gaza-palestine-4744435
-----
Kabul to Canada via Delhi: Rescued by
India, why Afghan Sikhs, Hindus were forced to move to Canada
Divya Goyal
December 26, 2023
“India was like our second home. We
never wanted to leave Delhi, but there was no employment, no means to survive”.
Gurnam Singh sums up the story of nearly 350 Sikhs, who were rescued by India
from Afghanistan when Taliban took over Kabul in August 2021 but who all have
now shifted to Canada in hope of a better future.
Now trying to learn English — fluency in
the language can open employment options in the North American country — Gurnam
Singh was the president Gurdwara Karte Parwan in Kabul. He was evacuated from
Kabul with five of his family members on August 14, 2022 after an attack on the
gurdwara on June 18 had killed two. He left for Canada in April 2023 and now
lives in Alberta.
Sawinder Singh (43), now working as an
Uber delivery partner in Surrey, moved to Canada in April 2022. “We had left
Afghanistan with a heavy heart. We were hopeful of getting settled in India but
things move really slow there,” says Sawinder Singh.
The Afghan Sikhs had to twice undergo
the pain of being uprooted — first from their homeland when the Taliban took
control of the country, and the second from India, the country that rescued
them but didn’t go much beyond that.
It was on August 22, 2021 that the first
batch of 24 Afghan Sikhs and Hindus had landed in Delhi in an Indian Air Force
(IAF) plane. Among 24 were Narinder Singh Khalsa and Anarkali Kaur Honaryar,
both members of the then Afghan Parliament and both representing the minority
community. Subsequently, at least 300 Afghan Sikhs and Hindus were safely
evacuated to Delhi in several batches in coordination with philanthropists,
religious organizations and NGOs.
The Afghan minorities were rescued by
India with the help of several organizations including Rajya Sabha member
Vikramjeet Sahney’s Sun Foundation, Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee
(SGPC), Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC), and Indian World
Forum among others.
Among the last to leave Aghanistan was
Ram Saran Bhasin, 70. “Our hearts could not agree to abandon our temples and
gurdwaras,” says Bhasin who is also president of the Afghan Hindu Sikh Minority
Council. Bhasin with his wife are currently putting up at a friend’s place in
Faridabad.
While Bhasin stayed back in India, most
of others have left for Canada. Reason: they were struggling to survive in
Delhi, with no jobs, no money to pay house rent, no means to educate their
children and no financial support from the Indian government.
US-based philanthropist Paramjit Singh
Bedi (72), who has been supporting Afghan minorities under the “My Family, My
Responsibility” programme, says at least 340 of them have moved to Canada with
their families after being rescued by India. “The Canadian government has given
them instant PR (permanent residency) under the special rehabilitation
programme for Afghan refugees and with the effort of Manmeet Singh Bhullar
Foundation. They are also getting monthly financial support for one year till
they get jobs. For how long could have they survived in Delhi with help from
gurdwaras or NGOs? India was the first to rescue them and issue visas but once
they landed in Delhi, it seems they were completely forgotten,” says Bedi,
adding the remaining nearly 360 other Afghan Sikh and Hindus will also move
soon.
Thousands of Afghan Sikh and Hindus
already living in Delhi since decades are still waiting for citizenship, he
says, adding, “we had no hope that these 700 would have got it anytime soon”.
In Canada, the community members are now
attending mandatory classes to learn basic English language skills and doing
part-time jobs.
From Alberta, Gurnam Singh says they
never wanted to leave Delhi as other community members, friends, relatives are
there but “those already living there since decades haven’t yet been granted
citizenship”.
Harinder Singh Khalsa, 45, who arrived
in Ontario in July this year, says those who moved to Canada are now settled in
different provinces “and trying to start new life”.
Those who still haven’t got Canadian
visa are struggling for survival in India.
Darshan Singh, 60, who after his return
from Kabul, is living with his son in Guru Nanakpura of Ludhiana, is
unemployed. “No one gives me a job here,” he says.
Baghi Singh, working as an autorickshaw
driver in Ludhiana after fleeing Taliban, says: “We had to leave our
established herbal medicines business in Kabul. I am also waiting for my
Canadian visa.”
Indian World Forum’s president Puneet
Singh Chandhok puts the onus of the Afghan Sikhs and Hindus moving to Canada on
Indian government. “Indian government failed to provide any financial
assistance or citizenship. This even as India was the first to rescue and them.
Despite our repeated pleas, they were not granted Indian nationality whereas
Canada has already given them the PR status,” says Chandhok.
Guljeet Singh, a senior Afghan Sikh
leader and president of Delhi-based Guru Nanak Sahib Trust, says that despite
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s promise to help persecuted minorities, the
process to grant nationality to Afghan Hindus and Sikhs was extremely slow.
“Some of our people living here since three decades also haven’t got
citizenship yet. We made multiple pleas to External Affairs Minister S
Jaishankar and PM Modi to grant nationality to all of them. Roughly, at least
8,000 previous applications for citizenship must be pending (with the Indian
government).”
Chabbol Singh, the coordinator for the
community in Delhi, says that prior to Taliban takeover in 2021, at least
25,000 Sikhs and Hindus were living in Delhi, Ludhiana and some other cities in
India. “There isn’t an exact number of how many are settled in other countries
such as Austria, Sweden, US, UK, Germany etc, but there were at least 2 lakh
Sikhs and Hindus in Afghanistan before exodus began decades back,” says Chabbol
Singh.
Sahney, whose NGO Sun Foundation
supports Afghan minorities, says they had rescued 256 Afghan Sikhs and Hindus
after the Taliban takeover in 2021 and provided them monetary support and other
help. “Their MPs were nowhere in picture for rehabilitation of community
members in Delhi or shifting them to Canada,” adds Sahney
Khalsa, who was a member of the lower
House in Afghanistan rejected the allegation “that I did not help my community”
members, but adds that “after we reached Delhi…the community never treated us
(him and Anarkali) as MPs and we were not made part of any discussions”. Khalsa
who moved to Canada in August 2022, hold its PR and lives in Surrey now,
however, claims that he is “still doing sewa for many families in Canada who
are facing issues in documentation”. He also claims that Taliban is “still in
touch with us and want us to return”.
Anarkali, who was the first woman
non-Muslim MP and a dentist turned human rights activist, is now in Paris,
studying languages. “I am not in position to talk anything more,” she told the
Indian Express.
Reached out for comments, a senior
official from the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), requesting anonymity,
said: “India rescued the persecuted minorities purely on humanitarian basis. We
cannot stop anyone from migrating to Canada or elsewhere. The applications for
citizenship are cleared by the Ministry of Home Affairs.”
The MHA is yet to respond to a detailed
questionnaire sent to it. MHA spokesperson Raj Kumar, ADG (media and
communication), said: “We have received the mail, which has been forwarded to
the branch concerned. We are yet to receive a response from them.”
BJP national secretary and former
president DSGMC, Manjinder Singh Sirsa brushed off the issue of Afghan Sikhs
and Hindus moving to Canada as “an overall trend in Sikh community to move to
the countries such as Canada, US, UK etc for better future”.
“Afghan Sikhs too left as they saw a
brighter future in Canada. Many applications of Afghan Sikhs and Hindus for
nationality are under process and are being cleared as per the procedure. Their
immediate rescue after the Taliban takeover was a big challenge and it was only
India which volunteered. Earlier also many Afghan minorities who had first
landed in India, later moved to other countries for better future.” says Sirsa.
Source: indianexpress.com
Please click the following URL to read
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https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/chandigarh/kabul-canada-delhi-india-afghan-sikh-forced-to-move-9082863/
-----
North America
Islamic Jihad Movement in
Palestine:Biden's Statement Further Evidence of Washington's Management of
Aggression Against Gaza
[26/December/2023]
GAZA December 26. 2023 (Saba) - The
Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine has said the statement of US President Joe
Biden that he did not request a ceasefire in his call with Zionist Prime
Minister Netanyahu as further evidence that the US administration is managing
the onslaught against the Palestinian people.
Al-Jihad added in a press statement on
Monday that this increases its firmness in responding to aggression and its
adherence to its position announced by its Secretary-General Ziad al-Nakhalah.
Jihad confirmed its continued response
to the massacres that the enemy is continuing to escalate against the people in
the West Bank and Gaza, the most recent of which were the successive massacres
in the Gaza Strip camps, especially Jabalia, al-Maghazi, al-Bureij,
al-Nuseirat, and al-Shati areas in addition to field executions in the West
Bank.
Jihad stressed that the Zionist entity’s
aggression will not achieve in the talks what it cannot achieve in the field.
Secretary-General of Islamic Jihad Ziad
al-Nakhalah said a few days ago that a delegation from his movement would head
to Cairo within days, “with a clear vision of stopping the aggression,
withdrawing enemy forces from the Gaza Strip, and rebuilding.”
He also explained that “the prisoner
exchange will take place through the principle of all for all in a political
process agreed upon by the Palestinian forces, led by the Hamas movement.”
Source: saba.ye
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https://www.saba.ye/en/news3291000.htm
----
US retaliates after 3 American service
members injured by Kataib Hezbollah attack in Iraq
December 25, 2023
Andrea Vacchiano
Three U.S. service members were injured
in Iraq on Christmas Day when Kataib Hezbollah terrorists attacked Erbil Air
Base, according to Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin.
Austin announced late on Monday night
that American forces "conducted necessary and proportionate strikes on
three facilities used by Kataib Hezbollah and affiliated groups in Iraq."
"These precision strikes are a
response to a series of attacks against U.S. personnel in Iraq and Syria by
Iranian-sponsored militias, including an attack by Iran-affiliated Kataib
Hezbollah and affiliated groups on Erbil Air Base earlier today, and intended
to disrupt and degrade capabilities of the Iran-aligned militia groups directly
responsible," Austin said in a press release.
"Today’s attack led to three
injuries to U.S. personnel, leaving one service member in critical
condition," the statement added. "My prayers are with the brave
Americans who were injured."
Source: foxnews.com
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https://www.foxnews.com/world/us-retaliates-three-american-service-members-injured-kataib-hezbollah-attack-iraq
----
NYC pro-Palestinian protesters attempt
to put damper on Christmas while clashing with police: reports
December 25, 2023
Greg Wehner
Hundreds of pro-Palestinian protesters
attempted to cancel Christmas in New York City on Monday, as they carried a
blood-covered mock Nativity scene across the Big Apple and chanted,
"Christmas is canceled here," according to reports.
Along with chanting the cancelation of
Christmas, protesters shouted, "Long live the intifada," and
"NYPD KKK, IDF they’re all the same," among other things.
The protesters mobbed Rockefeller Center
where the popular Christmas Tree and ice skating rink are located and where
people go to enjoy the holiday.
One of the signs being carried by a
protester read, "While Ur Shopping Bombs are Dropping," the New York
Post reported. Another read, "No Joy in Genocide," which was
splattered on top of a faux Nativity scene splattered with what appeared to be
fake blood and carried on the shoulders of demonstrators.
According to the New York Post, a few
scuffles broke out as night fell onto the city, including near St. Patrick’s
Cathedral on Fifth Avenue, sending cops rushing through the crowd.
Police later arrested people near Grand
Central Station and Union Square as clashes continued between protesters and
officers.
In one video posted on X, an officer is
seen holding his throat, and it is later revealed he was punched in the throat
by a protester.
A spokesperson for the NYPD told Fox
News Digital the investigation into Monday's protest was ongoing, adding that
several arrests had been made, and one officer sustained a shoulder injury.
Earlier in the day, pro-Palestinian
protesters gathered near the respective Virginia and Washington, D.C. homes of
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, two
of President Biden’s top foreign affairs advisors.
Last Week, pro-Palestinian protesters
marched through New York City and disrupted transportation at major hubs like
Penn Station, Grand Central Station and the Port Authority Bus Terminal.
Last month, anti-Israel activists
disrupted the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City by chanting and
singing "Palestine will be free," while others glued themselves to
the street along the parade route.
Israel vowed to wipe out Hamas after the
militant group launched its Oct. 7 surprise attack, in which at least 1,200
people died in Israel and around 240 were taken captive by militants back to
Gaza.
More than 17,700 Palestinians have been
killed since the war began, according to the Health Ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.
Source: foxnews.com
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https://www.foxnews.com/us/nyc-pro-palestinian-protesters-attempt-damper-christmas-clashing-police-reports
----
South Asia
Afghans marry in mass ceremony in bid to
cut costs
December 26, 2023
KABUL: Fifty couples married on Monday
in a joint ceremony in the Afghan capital -- a growing practice to reduce the
astronomical cost of traditional weddings in the impoverished country.
The couples were joined in matrimony in
one of the dozens of glitzy wedding halls that punctuate Kabul, but the
ceremony itself was somewhat austere.Since the return of the Taliban in August
2021 weddings have become low-key affairs, with dancing and music effectively
banned after authorities deemed such activities un-Islamic.
In front of the City Star wedding hall
near the airport, around a hundred turbaned men dressed in traditional shalwar
kameez chatted in groups -- not a single woman present.They decorated cars with
green ribbons and red plastic roses forming hearts to carry the newlyweds away.
Roohullah Rezayi, 18, due to leave with
his wife in a few hours, said he could not afford a solo wedding.“A traditional
wedding would have cost us at least 200,000 to 250,000 Afghanis ($2,800 to
$3,600), but this time it will be between 10,000 and 15,000 Afghanis,” he said.
The young man, a member of the Hazara
Shiite minority and from Ghor province, earns barely 350 Afghanis per day doing
odd jobs.“We invited 35 people from our two families, otherwise it would have
been 300 to 400,” said the groom, a plastic flower in the breast pocket of his
waistcoat worn over a white tunic.
Donations to each couple from the Selab
Foundation, who organised the event, are equivalent to $1,600 -- a huge amount
in one of the poorest countries in the world.They will also leave with a cake,
a kit containing toothpaste, shampoo and moisturiser, and a carpet, blanket and
a few household appliances to start married life.
Hundreds of male guests wrapped in
traditional patu shawls attended the ceremony in a large, chilly hall,
festooned with garlands.An official from the Ministry for the Promotion of
Virtue and Prevention of Vice gave a speech, and there were recitations from
the Holy Quran.
The brides-to-be were kept out of sight
in a separate wing, however, and journalists were prohibited from approaching
them.It was only after lunch that the women appeared, fully veiled.Larger, more
pricey weddings in Afghanistan can bring together more than 1,000 guests and
cost over $20,000.
For Monday’s mass wedding, 600 couples
applied.For some of the lucky chosen ones, it has been a long wait.“I’ve been
waiting for this day for three years,” said Samiullah Zamani, a 23-year-old
farmer from Kabul province.“I can’t wait to see her,” he said of his fiancee.
Source: thenews.com.pk
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https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/1141907-afghans-marry-in-mass-ceremony-in-bid-to-cut-costs
-----
Global power disputes hinder UN success
in Afghanistan: Ex-UK Ambassador
Fidel Rahmati
December 25, 2023
Nicholas Kay, the former British
ambassador to Afghanistan, spoke about the United Nations’ role in Afghanistan,
stating that disagreements among Security Council members have hindered the
UN’s effectiveness in Afghanistan, Gaza, and other countries. He mentioned that
the UN is unable to act without the support of major powers.
In an interview with Afghanistan
International published on Sunday, Kay emphasized the need for a more active
role for the UN in Afghanistan.
However, he acknowledged the difficulty
due to disagreements within the Security Council. He noted, “The UN continues
its role in helping millions in Afghanistan successfully, but politically, it
has been more challenging. Not only in Afghanistan but also in regions like
Gaza and Ukraine, the UN struggles to enact its political role. This is because
member countries, especially Security Council members like Russia and the U.S.,
do not agree.”
Earlier, the UN Security Council
convened a special session to assess the Secretary-General’s report on
Afghanistan. Despite attempts at coordination, a clear rift emerged between
Western countries China and Russia on managing relations with the Taliban.
While China and Russia advocated for engagement with the Taliban, Western
countries, led by the U.S., insisted on upholding human rights, especially
women’s and girls’ rights, as a condition for normalizing ties.
Mr. Kay, who served as the British
Ambassador to Kabul from 2017 to 2019 and was previously a NATO senior civilian
representative in Afghanistan, suggested that the UN could act as a mediator
among influential countries to reach a consensus on Afghanistan.
The former British ambassador supported
the UN’s active engagement with Taliban opposition groups. He mentioned that
the UN could help these opponents unite more cohesively within and outside
Afghanistan and facilitate their dialogue process with the Taliban.
However, Kay admitted that the UN’s role
in Afghanistan requires the support of the Security Council’s powers. He
referred to the Doha Agreement between the Taliban and the U.S., claiming that
the U.S. sidelined the UN and the previous Afghan government in this process.
The National Resistance Council, a
coalition of major anti-Taliban groups, responded to the UN Security Council
meeting last Wednesday by urging the UN to compel the Taliban to accept the
“demands of the Afghan people.” The Taliban has rejected negotiations over
forming an inclusive government with the participation of other political
groups, considering such discussions as interference in internal affairs.
Source: khaama.com
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https://www.khaama.com/global-power-disputes-hinder-un-success-in-afghanistan-ex-uk-ambassador/
-----
Muttaqi Discusses Bilateral Relations,
Refugees with Iran FM
Mitra Majeed
December 25, 2023
The acting foreign minister of the
Islamic Emirate, Amir Khan Muttaqi, met with Iran's foreign minister, Hossein
Amir Abdollahian, to discuss the diplomatic ties between the two countries, the
situation and problems of Afghan prisoners and refugees, and the Islamic
Emirate's stance on the Palestine issue.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs' deputy
spokesperson, Hafiz Zia Ahmad Takal, said on X that Abdollahian praised the
"positive stance of the Islamic Emirate regarding the issue of
Palestine."
Takal added that Muttaqi emphasized
effective measures to strengthen political, economic, commercial and transit
relations between Afghanistan and Iran.
Meanwhile, in a video released on the X
page of the Foreign Ministry’s Spokesman, Abdul Qahar Balkhi, Muttaqi, stressed
the importance of economic and diplomatic relations with Iran.
“The Consulates and Embassies are
active. We have political relations and the economic relations are also
improving. The two countries are trying to see how to make progress in various
fields,” he said.
“Afghanistan in the current situation
needs regional and global support and engagement. The visits by Muttaqi as the
acting Foreign Minister of Afghanistan can be effective in improving relations
and trust with the international community,” said Najeeb Rahman Shamal, a
political analyst.
Muttaqi also talked about the efforts of
the Islamic Emirate to provide the grounds for the return of Afghan refugees
from Iran.
"The security is provided [in
Afghanistan] and we are trying to improve the economic situation as well, so
the refugees find jobs. We thank the countries who hosted many refugees. We ask
them to let them return gradually and safely to the country,” he said.
"The Afghan refugees in all
countries specifically in Pakistan and Iran are facing harassment, so these
meetings could be effective to prevent thier deportation and harassment,"
said Shams Rahman Ahmadzai, a political analyst.
The acting foreign minister on his visit
to Tehran once again called for support to the people of Palestine.
Muttaqi arrived in Iran to attend a
conference convened by Iran in support of Palestine.
Source: tolonews.com
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-----
Afghans Invest $150 Billion Abroad:
Azizi
Bibi Amina Hakimi
December 25, 2023
The acting Ministry of Industry and
Commerce (MoIC), Nooruddin Azizi, said that Afghan investors have invested
approximately $150 billion in countries like UAE, Turkey and Pakistan.
In a TOLOnews debate, Azizi vowed that
the Islamic Emirate is making all-out efforts to bring facilities for
investors.
The acting minister said that only in
Turkey, Afghan investors invested nearly $95 billion.
“The Afghans have made major investments
in Iran. Based on unconfirmed statistics, the Afghans invested around $3
billion in Pakistan. Based on accurate statistics, $55 billion has been
invested in the UAE,” he said.
The Islamic Emirate’s officials have
repeatedly made statements about increasing exports and imports as well as the
level of investment in the country.
Meanwhile, the head of the Afghan
business council in the UAE, Haji Obaidullah Sader Khail, said that the
investors should be provided with further facilities in a bid to be encouraged
for investment in Afghanistan.
“The trader does not want anything from
the government but security, which is very good now- also there should be no
corruption which is reduced now. But the trader should have banking facilities
to transfer its money,” Sader Khail said.
“There is potential for investment
inside Afghanistan. There is work capacity in Afghanistan. We hope further
facilities will be provided, so the investments of the Afghans will be
attracted in Afghanistan,” said Sakhi Ahmad Payman, deputy head of Afghanistan
Chamber of Industry and Mines.
Earlier, the Ministry of Mines and
Petroleum (MoMP) said that the national and foreign investors have made
contracts for investment of more than $7 billion since the Islamic Emirate came
to power.
Source: tolonews.com
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------
Hanafi Meets Japan Envoy, Ex-UNAMA Head,
Discusses Kabul's Intl Relations
December 25, 2023
The Deputy PM for Administrative
Affairs, Abdul Salam Hanafi, in a meeting with Tadamichi Yamamoto, the former
head of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), and Takayoshi
Kuromiya, the Japanese ambassador in Kabul, discussed the normalization of the
country’s interaction with the world, prevention of drug cultivation and public
amnesty.
Hanafi in the meeting said that the
Islamic Emirate wants to have good relations with the countries of the world.
Hasan Haqyar, general head of the press
of the political vice-president of the PM's office said: "In this meeting,
there was a discussion and exchange of views about strengthening the security
of Afghanistan, strengthening the relations between Afghanistan and Japan, drug
cultivation and trade, and the recognition of Afghanistan and humanitarian
aid."
In this meeting, Tadamichi Yamamoto said
that Afghanistan's interaction with the world is in both their interests and
that Japan is ready to cooperate in this regard.
"Not only Japan but also many
countries are interested and are trying and have come to the conclusion that it
is in the interest of the parties to recognize the Islamic Emirate and this is
the right of the Afghan people and the Afghan government that they should
pay," said Sayed Hashem Balkhi, a political expert.
"If they make sure that Afghanistan
accepts some of the world's conditions, they can play a positive role in the
United Nations and in the world for the benefit of Afghanistan, especially in
the collection of aid to the Afghan nation," said Aziz Maarej, an
international relations expert.
Meanwhile, the Islamic Emirate said that
although the other countries did not recognize the Islamic Emirate, the Islamic
Emirate will continue its good diplomatic and commercial relations with the
world.
The spokesman of the Islamic Emirate,
Zabihullah Mujahid, added that interaction with neighboring countries and the
world is important for the caretaker government.
The spokesman of the Islamic Emirate,
Zabihullah Mujahid, said: "It is natural that the countries have not yet
announced the recognition of the Islamic Emirate, but we interact with the
Islamic Republic of Iran and other neighboring countries and we have good
relations with all countries, especially the countries of the region, they are
important to us. We also value relations and move forward together in two
dimensions, both the diplomatic dimension and the commercial and economic
dimension."
Officials of other countries are meeting
with the Islamic Emirate while no country has recognized the Islamic Emirate so
far.
Source: tolonews.com
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------
OCHA Seeks to Provide Humanitarian Aid
for 16 Million People in Afghanistan this Winter
2023-12-25
KABUL (BNA): Alhaj Mullah Mohammad Abbas
Akhund, Acting Minister of State Disaster Management, in a meeting with
Mohammad Zaid Khater, the deputy coordinator of UN humanitarian aid in
Afghanistan discussed the UN organization’s action plan for the next year and
providing winter aid for needy.
According to the Ministry, in 2024,
Afghanistan needs humanitarian assistance for 23.8 million people, more than
half of the country’s population, requiring $3.06 billion for management. The
UN prioritizes assistance based on the needs of vulnerable populations in
different zones.
Khater mentioned that OCHA aims to
distribute winter aid, including food, winter clothes, blankets, fuel, and
health aid, to 16 million needy people.
Additionally, the Ministry emphasized
the importance of providing permanent shelter for returnees and those affected
by disasters, alongside food and non-food assistance.
The Ministry shared a survey list,
focusing on identifying vulnerable areas for targeted aid and disaster
management.
A copy of this list was handed to the
UN’s Deputy Humanitarian Coordinator for further study and utilization in their
aid and disaster management efforts, according to the Ministry.’
Source: bakhtarnews.af
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-----
Islamic Emirate Fulfilled All Its
Commitments in Past Two Years: Mawlavi Kabir
2023-12-25
KABUL (BNA): Mawlavi Abdul Kabir, the
Deputy Prime Minister for Political Affairs has stated that the Islamic Emirate
fulfilled all its commitments in the past two years and is seeking positive
interaction with the world.
According to a statement released by
this office, Mawlavi Kabir stated his views during a meeting with Zarghun Shah
Shinwari, a journalist, and some Afghan authors and politicians residing
abroad.
Deputy PM Kabir mentioned basic work and
progress in Afghanistan over the past two years, emphasizing ongoing efforts
for economic strengthening and general well-being.
He added that the Islamic Emirate
welcomes the opinions and suggestions of all Afghans, mainly scholars, author,
and experts.
Zarghun Shah Shinwari also stated that
with the arrival of the Islamic Emirate, the country has seen a decline in
insecurity, extortion, corruption, aggression, and injustice.
He noted the significant difference
between the actual conditions in Afghanistan and what people hear from social
networks and media in foreign countries.
Consequently, efforts are being made to
facilitate interaction, relationships, and collaboration between Afghan
expatriates, experts, writers, and scientists with the Islamic Emirate.
Source: bakhtarnews.af
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-----
Mideast
Gaza death toll nears 20,700 amid
continuing Israeli onslaught
Abdelsalam Fayez
25.12.2023
The Palestinian death toll from ongoing
Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip has surged to 20,674, the Health Ministry in
the territory said Monday.
Ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra also
said that 54,536 people had been injured in the months-long offensive.
Israel continues to bombard the Gaza
Strip from the air and land in retaliation for an Oct. 7 cross-border attack by
the Palestinian resistance group Hamas.
Around 1,200 Israelis are believed to
have been killed in the Hamas attack.
The Israeli onslaught has left Gaza in
ruins, with half of the coastal territory's housing damaged or destroyed and
nearly 2 million people displaced within the densely populated enclave, with
shortages of food and clean water endemic.
Source: aa.com.tr
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-----
Israel PM Benjamin Netanyahu says no
peace until Hamas destroyed
Dec 26, 2023
The declarations came as the WHO on
Monday reported "harrowing" accounts of entire families killed from
Christmas Eve strikes on a refugee camp in Gaza.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu has insisted peace can only be achieved in Gaza if Hamas is
destroyed, the territory demilitarised and Palestinian society
"deradicalised", after warning the war is set to intensify.
The declarations came as the World
Health Organization on Monday reported "harrowing" accounts of entire
families killed from Christmas Eve strikes on a refugee camp in Gaza.
Relentless Israeli strikes have
devastated the Palestinian territory and the conflict has heightened tensions
across the Middle East, with global pressure for a ceasefire mounting.
But in an op-ed published in the Wall
Street Journal on Monday night, Netanyahu vowed to stay the course.
"Hamas must be destroyed, Gaza must
be demilitarised, and Palestinian society must be deradicalised. These are the
three prerequisites for peace between Israel and its Palestinian neighbours in
Gaza," Netanyahu said.
He said demilitarisation "will
require establishing a temporary security zone on the perimeter" of the
territory.
"For the foreseeable future Israel
will have to retain overriding security responsibility over Gaza," he
said.
Earlier on Monday Netanyahu visited
Gaza, telling a meeting of his Likud party after his return: "We're not
stopping".
"We're intensifying the fighting in
the coming days," he said, according to a party statement.
- 'Harrowing accounts' -
The war in Gaza erupted when Palestinian
militants broke through the militarised border and attacked southern Israel on
October 7, killing about 1,140 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP
tally based on Israeli figures.
Fighters also seized about 250 hostages,
Israel says.
Israel vowed to crush Hamas in response,
and launched a retaliatory military campaign including extensive aerial
bombardment and a siege of the territory. The campaign has killed at least
20,674 people, mostly women and children, according to Gaza's Hamas-run health
ministry.
On Monday, some residents of Al-Maghazi
refugee camp returned to the ruins of their homes after strikes the previous
day that Gaza's health ministry said killed at least 70 people. AFP was unable
to independently verify that toll.
Zeyad Awad said there was no evacuation
warning before the strikes.
"What should we do? We are
civilians, living peacefully and wanting only safety and security," he
said.
"Yet we are suddenly struck by
Israeli warplanes without any warning."
WHO staff visited a hospital treating
victims of the Al-Maghazi strikes.
The "team heard harrowing accounts
shared by health workers and victims", the UN health agency's chief Tedros
Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on social media.
"One child had lost their whole
family in the strike on the camp. A nurse at the hospital suffered the same
loss," he added.
Sean Casey, a WHO emergency medical
teams coordinator who joined the mission to the hospital, described the fate of
a nine-year-old being treated who was expected to die.
"He was crossing the street in
front of the shelter where his family is staying and the building beside him
blew up," he said.
The Israeli army said it was
"reviewing the incident", adding it was "committed to
international law including taking feasible steps to minimise harm to
civilians".
- 'Real hunger' -
Vast areas of Gaza lie in ruins and its
2.4 million people are enduring dire shortages of water, food, fuel and
medicine, alleviated only by the limited arrival of aid trucks.
Grasping empty containers, dozens of
Gazans waited on a street in Rafah, in southern Gaza, for food to be
distributed.
"Now there is real hunger. My
children are dying of hunger," said one of them, Nour Ismail.
An estimated 1.9 million Gazans have
been displaced, according to the UN, many fleeing south and crowded into
shelters or makeshift tents in the winter cold.
"A humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza
is the only way forward," said the head of the UN refugee agency, Filippo
Grandi.
In Monday's Likud meeting, Netanyahu
said he was ready to support the voluntary migration of civilians out of the
Gaza Strip, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported.
He reportedly told party members
"our problem is not whether to allow an exit, but that there will be
countries that are willing to absorb an exit".
Hamas rejected any discussion of such a
plan as "absurd".
Palestinians "refuse to be deported
and displaced. There can't be exile and there is no other choice than to remain
on our land", it said in a statement.
- 'Free our hostages' -
Netanyahu also addressed parliament on
Monday during a special session about the 129 hostages Israel says remain in
Gaza. He was booed by families awaiting their loved ones' return after 80 days
in captivity.
"Now! Now!" relatives chanted
as Netanyahu said Israeli forces needed "more time" to increase
military pressure on Hamas, which he argued would help to secure the captives'
release.
The number of Israeli soldiers killed in
Gaza has risen to 158, with an army spokesman announcing two more deaths early
Tuesday morning.
Meanwhile, fears of regional escalation
only increased Monday.
Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps
said an Israeli air strike in Syria had killed Razi Moussavi, who state media
described as "one of the most experienced advisers" of the military
force's foreign arm.
There was no immediate comment from
Israel, which has intensified strikes on targets in Syria since the
Israel-Hamas war began.
Yemen's Huthi rebels, also Iran-backed,
have fired at cargo vessels in the Red Sea, leading the United States to build
a naval taskforce to deter the missile and drone strikes.
Source: hindustantimes.com
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-----
Israel economy to shrink by two percent
due to displacement of workers amid Hamas war
26.12.23
Rachel Abrams
The Israeli economy is expected to
shrink by 2 per cent this quarter, according to a leading research centre, with
hundreds of thousands of workers displaced by the war with Hamas or called up
as reservists.
About 20 per cent of the Israeli
workforce was missing from the labour market in October, up from 3 per cent
before the fighting began, according to a report from the Taub centre for
Social Policy Studies, a non-partisan think tank in Israel.
The spike in unemployment reflects the
fact that about 900,000 people were called up to fight, stayed home to take
care of children because schools had closed, evacuated from towns near the
borders with Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, or couldn’t work because of physical
damage to their industries.
Since October, some students have been
able to return to school, and some displaced Israelis have been able to work
remotely. Still, the economic implications for such a large disruption could be
significant, especially with no end to the war in sight.
Projections for growth next year are
lower than previously estimated, but the ranges vary, with some analysts saying
that the economy could grow by only 0.5 per cent. The Bank of Israel has given
probably the most optimistic projection of 2 per cent, citing Israel’s
quicker-than-expected recovery from previous wars and from the Covid-19
pandemic.
“The wide range of projections that we
are seeing comes from some of the different assumptions about how long and how
intense the fighting will be,” said Karnit Flug, vice-president of research at
the Israel Democracy Institute and a former governor of the Bank of Israel.
As of Sunday, 191,666 people in Israel
had filed for unemployment benefits since the war began, with the vast majority
saying they experienced a forced unpaid leave, according to the Taub centre.
Some 360,000 reservists were authorised
for duty in October, the largest mobilisation since the Arab-Israeli war of
1973, also known as the Yom Kippur War, when 400,000 reservists were tapped to
fight off a surprise attack from Egypt and Syria. The actual number of
reservists called up for duty this time was between 200,000 and 300,000.
Source: telegraphindia.com
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------
Iran, Syria share stance on need to end
Israeli genocide in Gaza: Amir-Abdollahian
25 December 2023
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein
Amir-Abdollahian says Iran and Syria have a common stance on the necessity of
putting an immediate end to Israel's war crimes and genocide in Gaza.
In a Monday meeting with Syrian Foreign
Minister Faisal Mekdad, who is in Iran to attend Tehran International
Conference on Palestine, Amir-Abdollahian hailed Damascus' firm stance on the
ongoing developments in Gaza and Palestine.
He said Iran and Syria are supporting
each other in dealing with regional issues.
Israel waged the war on Gaza on October
7 after the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas carried out Operation Al-Aqsa
Storm against the occupying entity in response to the Israeli regime’s
decades-long campaign of death and destruction in Palestine.
The Israeli aggression has so far killed
at least 20,674 Palestinians, most of them women and children. Another 54,536
individuals have been wounded while many bodies remain trapped under rubble.
The Tel Aviv regime has imposed a
“complete siege” on the territory, cutting off fuel, electricity, food and
water to the more than two million Palestinians living there.
Amir-Abdollahian also hailed the
promotion of security and stability in Syria and voiced Iran's support for the
expansion of the Arab country's sovereignty all over the territory.
The Iranian president slammed the
support of the so-called advocates of human rights for the Israeli crimes
against Palestinians.
The Syrian foreign minister, for his
part, commended Iran's hosting of the international conference on Palestine and
said his country fully endorses Iranian President Ebrahim Raeisi's view with
regard to the Palestinian issue.
The Palestinian people's victory is in
fact the triumph of the Arab and Muslim nations, he said.
Source: presstv.ir
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-----
Israel’s assassination of IRGC military
advisor ‘blatant and shameless’ violation: Hezbollah
25 December 2023
Lebanon's Hezbollah resistance movement
has condemned in the strongest terms the Israeli regime's assassination of a
senior Iranian military advisor in Syria, describing it as a blatant violation.
"We consider the assassination of
Brigadier General Seyyed Razi Mousavi in Syria to be a flagrant and shameless
violation, which is off limits," Hezbollah said in a statement on Monday.
The senior IRGC commander was martyred
in a missile attack by the Israeli regime in the Sayyeda Zeinab neighborhood of
Damascus earlier in the day.
Hezbollah added that Mousavi
"dedicated decades of his honorable life to support the Islamic resistance
in Lebanon and tirelessly helped the resistance and its fighters."
The movement then described the martyred
Iranian commander as "comrade in arms" of the former commander of the
Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC)’s Quds Force Lieutenant General Qassem
Soleimani, who was assassinated by the United States' terrorist forces in Iraq
four years ago.
The movement concluded its statement by
extending its condolences to Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed
Ali Khamenei, the IRGC, Mousavi's family and the Iranian nation.
The Gaza Strip-based Palestinian Islamic
Jihad also strongly condemned "the cowardly assassination" of the
Iranian commander by the Israeli regime, calling Mousavi "one of the most
prominent commanders" of the IRGC.
“Tel Aviv must await hard countdown”
Iran's Foreign Minister Hossein
Amir-Abdollahian also expressed his condolences to Mousavi’s family as well as
the Iranian and Syrian nations on the occasion of his martyrdom.
In a post on X social media platform,
Iran's top diplomat said, “This honorable martyr fought bravely against
terrorists for many years alongside Martyr Hajj Qassem Soleiman to ensure
security of Iran and the [West Asia] region.”
“Tel Aviv must await a hard countdown,”
Iran's foreign minister added.
Mousavi was martyred while serving as
part of Iran's military advisory mission in Syria.
The mission was the first to rush to
Syria's assistance in 2014, when the Arab country found itself in the grip of
the US-created and Israeli-supported Daesh Takfiri terrorist group.
Led by General Soleimani, the mission
played an instrumental role in Damascus' successful counterterrorism push that
ultimately defeated the terror outfit in late 2017.
Earlier on Monday, Iranian President
Ebrahim Raeisi vowed that the Israeli regime would definitely pay the price for
its criminal act of killing the senior military advisor.
The Iranian president says the Israeli
regime will definitely pay the price for the killing of a senior IRGC commander
in Syria.
Raeisi said the vicious act of
assassinating the IRGC commander was yet another sign of the usurping Zionist
regime's desperation.
Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser
Kan'ani also strongly condemned Israel's terrorist measure, saying the vicious
and cowardly act was another indication of the terrorist nature of the regime.
Source: presstv.ir
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-----
Raeisi: Israel will definitely pay price
for assassinating senior IRGC advisor
25 December 2023
Iranian President Ebrahim Raeisi says
the Israeli regime will definitely pay the price for its criminal act of
killing a senior military advisor of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC)
in Syria.
In a message on Monday, Raeisi said the
vicious act of assassinating the IRGC military advisor in a missile attack in
Syria was yet another sign of the usurping Zionist regime's desperation.
Seyyed Razi Mousavi, who was serving as
a military advisor in Syria, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in the Sayyeda
Zeinab neighborhood of the Syrian capital of Damascus earlier on Monday.
The president extended his condolences
to Mousavi's bereaved family, his fellow comrades in the IRGC and the Iranian
nation over his assassination.
He added that the brave military advisor
who was one of the companions of Iran's top anti-terror commander Lieutenant
General Qassem Soleimani was killed while "safeguarding lofty Islamic
values."
General Soleimani, commander of the Quds
Force of the IRGC, and his Iraqi trenchmate Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the
second-in-command of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), were martyred
along with their companions in a US drone strike on January 3, 2020.
Iran maintains an advisory mission in
Syria at the request of Damascus with the aim of helping the war-torn Arab
country get rid of the foreign-backed militants who have been fighting the
democratically-elected Syrian government since 2011.
Earlier in December, Israel killed two
IRGC military advisors -- Mohammad Ali AtaeeShoorcheh and Panah Taqizadeh -- in
an attack in Syria.
Iran maintains an advisory mission in
Syria at the request of Damascus.
The IRGC announced in a statement that
the two officers were martyred against the backdrop of the relentless savagery
of the “fake and child-killing” Israeli regime in Gaza.
Assassination exposes Israel's terrorist
nature: Foreign Ministry spokesman
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman
Nasser Kan'ani strongly condemned the Israeli regime's terrorist measure to
assassinate the IRGC advisor in Damascus.
He said the vicious and cowardly act was
another indication of the terrorist nature of the Israeli regime.
"Since its sinister existence, the
Zionist regime has committed various kinds of crimes by repeatedly and
continuously violating international regulations and norms, and today it has
also committed a cowardly and aggressive terrorist act," the spokesperson
added.
Kan'ani emphasized that Iran reserves
the right to adopt necessary strategies and give a response to the move in due
time and place.
Source: presstv.ir
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-----
Israel says dead hostage’s car links
Gaza hospital to militants
December 26, 2023
JERUSALEM: Israel’s military on Monday
claimed new evidence linking a north Gaza hospital to hostages seized by
militants, saying it found the car of a captive mistakenly killed by troops
inside the facility.
A Toyota Corolla with an Israeli license
plate belonging to the family of Samer El-Talalqa has been found inside the
Indonesian hospital, the army said.
Talalqa was among three hostages that
the Israeli army said troops shot dead earlier this month, mistakenly
identifying them as a threat.
“RPG (rocket-propelled grenade) remnants
and bloodstains were found in the vehicle, which were identified as belonging
to another hostage,” the army statement said without elaborating.
“The finding of the vehicle directly
links the hospital to the brutal events of October 7.”
AFP could not independently confirm the
claim, and there was no immediate comment from the Indonesian-funded facility
in Beit Lahia.
On October 7, Hamas militants smashed
through the highly militarised Gaza border to launch unprecedented attacks
across southern Israel, leaving around 1,140 people dead, most of them
civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.
The Palestinian militants also abducted
around 250 people, 129 of whom Israel says remain in Gaza.
Israel launched a retaliatory military
campaign in Gaza, killing at least 20,674 people, mostly women and children,
according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.
Israel has come under scathing
international criticism for targeting hospitals in the Gaza Strip, which it has
repeatedly accused of being used by Hamas militants for military purposes.
Hamas denies the Israeli accusations
that hospitals and other civilian infrastructure are being used by its
operatives.
In early November, Indonesia denied an
Israeli claim that the hospital in Beit Lahia sits atop a network of Hamas
tunnels.
Source: arabnews.com
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https://www.arabnews.com/node/2431926/middle-east
-----
Israel ‘intensifying’ Gaza fighting as
Hamas says strikes kill dozens
December 26, 2023
GAZA STRIP, Palestinian Territories:
Israel on Monday said it was “intensifying the fighting” against Hamas in Gaza,
where relentless strikes across the Palestinian territory exacerbated the dire
conditions for civilians in the war’s 12th week.
The conflict has heightened tensions
across the Middle East where Iran — which supports Hamas — on Monday accused
Israel of killing a senior Revolutionary Guards general in Syria and vowed
revenge.
Pope Francis decried the “desperate
humanitarian situation” in Gaza. During his traditional Christmas message he
called for an immediate cease-fire and the freeing of hostages.
As war raged, festivities in Bethlehem,
which Christians consider to be the birthplace of Jesus Christ, were
effectively scrapped in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. The city’s usually
vibrant streets had only a handful of worshippers and tourists.
The war erupted when Palestinian
militants broke through Gaza’s militarised border and attacked southern Israel
on October 7, killing about 1,140 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP
tally based on Israeli figures.
Militants also seized about 250
hostages, Israel says.
Israel vowed to crush Hamas and launched
a retaliatory military campaign in Gaza, including extensive aerial bombardment
and siege. The campaign has killed at least 20,674 people, mostly women and
children, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.
Four major Israeli strikes since Sunday
killed more than 100 people, the ministry said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu vowed on Monday after visiting Gaza, “We’re not stopping,” according
to a statement from his Likud party.
“We’re intensifying the fighting in the
coming days,” he told party members.
Palestinian militants launched rockets
toward Israel during the day, most of which were intercepted by Israeli air
defenses.
In Gaza, the health ministry said an
Israeli air strike killed at least 70 people on Christmas Eve at the Al-Maghazi
refugee camp.
AFP was unable to independently verify
the toll.
Rows of victims’ bodies, shrouded in
white bags, lined the ground at Al-Aqsa hospital in Deir Al-Balah, central
Gaza, ahead of a mass funeral.
The army said it was “reviewing the
incident,” adding it was “committed to international law including taking
feasible steps to minimize harm to civilians.”
Israel has been under increasing
pressure from its allies to protect civilians during its military campaign.
Speaking with Netanyahu on Saturday, US
President Joe Biden “emphasised the critical need” for such protection, the
White House said.
Zeyad Awad, a resident of Al-Maghazi,
said there was no evacuation warning before the strike that caused “extensive,
enormous destruction and panic in the hearts of my children.”
The health ministry said 10 members of
one family were killed in an Israeli strike in Jabalia camp, northern Gaza, and
18 people died in an overnight bombardment of Khan Yunis in the south.
Monday brought no respite, with the army
saying it continued ground, air and sea operations and struck several Hamas
targets, including commanders.
Before dawn, an Israeli strike
“targeting a house” in central Gaza’s Al-Zuwaida area, near Al-Mughazi, killed
at least 12 people, mostly women and children, the Gaza health ministry said.
Vast areas of Gaza lie in ruins and its
2.4 million people are enduring dire shortages of water, food, fuel and
medicine, alleviated only by the limited arrival of aid trucks.
Grasping empty containers, dozens of
Gazans waited on a street in Rafah, in southern Gaza, for food to be
distributed.
“Now there is real hunger. My children
are dying of hunger,” said one of them, Nour Ismail.
An estimated 1.9 million Gazans have
been displaced, according to the UN, many fleeing south and crowded into
shelters or makeshift tents in the winter cold.
“A humanitarian cease-fire in Gaza is
the only way forward,” said the head of the UN refugee agency, Filippo Grandi.
The World Health Organization said it
led missions to barely functioning hospitals in northern Gaza at the weekend.
It described growing desperation and starving people stripping an aid truck of
supplies.
“Everyone we speak to is hungry,” said
Sean Casey, a WHO emergency coordinator, warning of a “risk of famine.”
Israel lashed out at the UN on Monday
over its response to the war. Foreign Minister Eli Cohen accused the world body
of “hypocrisy” and said its chief Antonio Guterres “legitimized war crimes.”
“We will stop working with those who
cooperate with the Hamas terrorist organization’s propaganda,” Cohen said on X,
adding his ministry would not extend one UN employee’s entry visa, and would
refuse entry for another.
Netanyahu addressed parliament on Monday
during a special session about the 129 hostages Israel says remain in Gaza. He
was booed by families awaiting their loved ones’ return after 80 days in
captivity.
“Now! Now!” relatives chanted as
Netanyahu said Israeli forces needed “more time” to increase military pressure
on Hamas, which he argued would help to secure the captives’ release.
Later, protesters gathered near the
defense ministry headquarters in central Tel Aviv ahead of a war cabinet
meeting, holding posters demanding: “Free our hostages now — at any cost!“
The premier on Sunday said the war was
exacting a “very heavy price” on Israel’s military, 156 of whose soldiers have
been killed in Gaza.
Fears of regional escalation only
increased Monday.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps
said an Israeli air strike in Syria had killed Razi Moussavi, who state media
described as “one of the most experienced advisers” of the military force’s
foreign arm.
There was no immediate comment from
Israel, which has intensified strikes on targets in Syria since the
Israel-Hamas war began.
Lebanon’s powerful Hezbollah movement
said in a statement: “We consider this assassination a flagrant attack that
crosses the limits.” The group added that Moussavi had supported it for
decades.
Cross-border fire has erupted almost
daily between Israel and Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon.
Yemen’s Houthi rebels, also Iran-backed,
have fired at cargo vessels in the Red Sea, leading the United States to build
a naval taskforce to deter the missile and drone strikes.
And in Iraq, where attacks against
Israel-allied US forces have surged, a drone strike on Monday targeted a
military base used by US and anti-jihadist coalition forces, according to US
and Iraqi officials.
Source: arabnews.com
Please click the following URL to read
the full text of the original
https://www.arabnews.com/node/2431906/middle-east
-----
Israel ‘terrorizing’ Gaza civilians over
its military defeat: Hamas
Mustafa Haboush
25.12.2023
Palestinian group Hamas on Monday
accused Israel of terrorizing civilians in the Gaza Strip over its military
defeat in the enclave.
The accusation came shortly after at
least 70 Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes on Al-Maghazi refugee
camp in the central Gaza Strip, according to health authorities.
“Whenever the Nazi army is defeated in
front of the heroes of the resistance, it practices its terrorism against
defenseless civilians with the help of [US President Joe] Biden,” senior Hamas
member Izzat al-Rishq said in a statement.
Israel has pounded the Gaza Strip since
a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7, killing at
least 20,424 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injuring 54,036
others, according to local health authorities.
Around 1,200 Israelis are believed to
have been killed in the Hamas attack.
The Israeli onslaught has left Gaza in
ruins, with half of the coastal territory's housing damaged or destroyed and
nearly 2 million people displaced within the densely-populated enclave amid
shortages of food and clean water.
Source: aa.com.tr
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the full text of the original
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/israel-terrorizing-gaza-civilians-over-its-military-defeat-hamas/3092019
----
Africa
Pope Didn’t Approve Same-Sex Marriage,
says Catholic Archbishop of Abuja
26th December 2023
The Catholic Archbishop of Abuja,
Ignatius Kaigama, says media reports claiming that the Catholic Pontiff, Pope
Francis, had approved blessings for same-sex couples, were untrue.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that
Kaigama made the clarification in his homily during the Christmas Mass he
conducted at Our Lady Queen of Nigeria Catholic Pro-Cathedral in Abuja.
According to Kaigama, the viral report
is a mischievous disinformation, which is part of a deliberately orchestrated
falsehood by the enemies of the Catholic Church in order to cause confusion
among its members.
“For the avoidance of doubt, the Pope
did not, and will never approve blessings for any intending same-sex couples
because the position of the Church on this is very clear and has not changed.
“I am the representative of the Pope
here, so if there’s any such approval or directive, I’ll be the first to know
and relay the message to the brethren.
“The media reports on this issue is the
handiwork of the enemies of the Church, who have been busy spending millions of
dollars to bring down the Church, but to no avail because they cannot succeed,”
he stated.
He urged Christians not to despair or
allow their faith to be shaken by the wanton attacks against the Church by its
enemies, adding that evil can never prevail over good, just as darkness cannot
overcome light.
Speaking on insecurity across the
country, Kaigama urged Christians to remain steadfast in their faith and
prayers, stressing that before long, the challenge would become a thing of the
past.
The cleric called on the perpetrators of
crime, especially the incessant kidnapping of Catholic priests across the
country, to desist from such, so as to avoid the wrath of God.
He also prayed for Nigeria and its
leaders to succeed and urged the Federal Government to step up security
measures to stem the tide of criminality in the country and rein in the
outlaws.
Kaigama said that Christmas signified a
season of peace, love, care, change and new birth in the lives of all
Christians, who must endeavour to emulate Christ by observing the above
principles.
Source: punchng.com
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https://punchng.com/pope-didnt-approve-same-sex-marriage-says-kaigama/
------
Why Islamic cleric who criticised Kwara
governor was arrested – Police
Oluyemi Ogunseyin
25 December 2023
The Kwara State Police Command has
clarified a report about the arrest of an elderly resident identified as Alhaji
Abdulganiyu Babaimole for criticising Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq over the
‘poorly constructed’ Tanke Flyover Bridge.
The Kwara Police spokesperson, Toun
Ejire-Adeyemi, in a statement to said it wishes to clarify a report by Sahara
Reporters’ December 23, 2023 that a team of police officers led by the
Officer-in-Charge (OC) of Surveillance, CSP Mustapha Olayemi arrested
Babaimole.
“Contrary to the report by Sahara
Reporters regarding the misinformation in circulation as regards the sequence
of arrest of one Alhaji Abdulganiyu Babaimole, Kwara State Command has decided
to put the records straight,” Ejire-Adeyemi said.
“The fact remains that Babaimole was not
arrested at the mosque at 5:30 PM as stated in the report.
“Rather, he was apprehended at his
residence having returned from the mosque at about 16:20 hours on Friday,
22-12-2023 after observing the Jumat and Sunnah Mu’akkadah prayers.”
According to Ejire-Adeyemi, two unarmed
detectives of the Kwara Police Command were deployed to invite Alhaji Babaimole
for an interview based on the petition written against him.
She said the detectives met the subject
at his residence in the Pakata area of Ilorin where he attends to people being
an Islamic cleric.
Ejire-Adeyemi added that this
clarification is crucial as it corrects the misinformation regarding the timing
and location of Babaimole’s arrest.
She said the report that it occurred at
his residence, having returned from the mosque at about 4:20pm of the same day
and not during the time of worship was incorrect.
The Kwara Police spokeswoman stressed
that accuracy in reporting is very vital, especially on sensitive matters such
as this so as to avoid misconceptions or incorrect assumptions.
Ejire-Adeyemi explained that Babaimole
actually warmly welcomed the detectives whom he mistook for his clients.
She said the detectives further
identified themselves showing their warrant cards and Babaimole requested to
take his cap from his room while he also informed a member of the family about
his invitation to the police station.
“Thereafter, the subject voluntarily
followed the police detectives. The narration of Sahara reporters on this
matter is false and unfounded,” Ejire-Adeyemi stated.
“It is an act of disinformation and
mischief aimed to sabotage the efforts of the Command in maintaining peace and
harmony in the state especially in this yuletide.
“Consequently, the kwara state command
urges everyone to disregard this disinformation of Sahara reporters as it is
false and misleading.”
Source: guardian.ng
Please click the following URL to read
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https://guardian.ng/news/why-islamic-cleric-who-criticised-kwara-governor-was-arrested-police/
-----
People flee their homes after attacks
kill scores in central Nigeria
26th December 2023
At least 160 people were killed in
attacks by armed groups between Saturday evening and Monday in several villages
in Plateau State, central Nigeria, local authorities announced on Monday.
"The hostilities that broke out on
Saturday were continuing on Monday morning," Monday Kassah, the chairman
of the Bokkos government council, a constituency located in this region that
has been plagued by religious and ethnic tensions for several years, told AFP.
"At least 113 bodies have been
found", he added, whereas the death toll given by the army on Sunday
evening was 16.
And "more than 300 people"
were wounded and transferred to hospitals in Bokkos, Jos and Barkin Ladi, said
Monday Kassah.
Armed groups, locally referred to as
"bandits", attacked "no less than 20 villages" between
Saturday evening and Monday morning, he added, stressing that "the attacks
were well coordinated".
In addition to the 113 dead in the
Bokkos constituency, "at least 50 people were killed" in four
villages in the neighboring Barkin Ladi constituency, according to Dickson
Chollom, a member of the local assembly.
"We will not succumb to the methods
of these merchants of death; we are united in our desire for peace and
justice", he told AFP.
On Sunday, Plateau State Governor Caleb
Mutfwang described the armed action as "barbaric, brutal and
unjustified".
"Proactive measures will be taken
by the government to curb the ongoing attacks on innocent citizens", said
Gyang Bere, the governor's spokesman.
Gunfire could still be heard late Sunday
afternoon, according to a local source.
The NGO Amnesty International reacted to
the violence on its X account, judging that "the Nigerian authorities have
consistently failed in their attempts to put an end to these frequent attacks
in Plateau State".
The populations of north-western and
central Nigeria live in terror of attacks by jihadist groups and criminal gangs
who pillage villages and kill or kidnap their inhabitants.
Source: africanews.com
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https://www.africanews.com/2023/12/26/people-flee-their-homes-after-attacks-kill-scores-in-central-nigeria/
-----
Kaduna Bombing: Tudun Biri Christians,
Muslims celebrate Christmas in Church
December 26, 2023
Grieving survivors, relatives and
residents of Tudun Biri community, Kaduna, where a military error bombing
killed over 100, have found solace in Church on Christmas day.
Both Muslims and Christians of Tudun
Biri, Igabi LGA of Kaduna State, on Monday, joined the world to celebrate
Christmas with a thanksgiving church service, Channels TV reported.
Recall that on Tuesday, December 5, the
villagers were celebrating a Muslim festival when a combat drone operated by
the Nigerian Army dropped a bomb on them.
Survivors narrated the terrifying
incident. Read one of the survivors’ story HERE.
The Defence Headquarters has since
opened an investigation into the accidental bombing of Tudun Biri community in
Kaduna.
Christmas in Church
Kaduna Bombing
However, as the world marked Christmas
yesterday, the residents — Christians and Muslims — gathered in Church.
The Christian residents of the community
were joined by their Muslim neighbours in the church service.
They thanked God for being alive to
witness Christmas despite the tragedy of losing their loved ones in the Kaduna
bombing.
Governor Uba Sani was represented at the
service by his Commissioner for Internal Security and Home Affairs, Samuel
Aruwan.
Also, Sani used the occasion to
commiserate with the people of Tudun Biri over the tragic incident.
Source: vanguardngr.com
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https://www.vanguardngr.com/2023/12/kaduna-bombing-tudun-biri-christians-muslims-celebrate-christmas-in-church/
------
Provide lasting solution to poverty in
Nigeria, Islamic group urges Tinubu
December 26, 2023
An Association of Muslim Men in
Business, The Companion, has appealed to President Bola Tinubu to urgently find
a lasting solution to hunger and poverty in the nation.
The National Ameer of ‘The Companion’,
Engr. Kamil Olalekan, made the appeal on Sunday while declaring open 2023 Dawah
Holiday Programme (DPH), held at the NYSC Orientation Camp, Ede, Osun State.
Engr. Olalekan urged the government to
do everything within its reach and checkmate the astronomical increase in
prices of goods and services.
He stressed the need to review salaries
to reflect the inflationary rate, just as he implored them on prompt payment of
salary.
“I hereby call on the government to put
more efforts and implement policies that will not only reduce hunger and
poverty in the land but also checkmate astronomical increase in prices of goods
and services.
“The spending on social investment must
be increased substantially in 2024 to include free feeding for extremely poor
and vulnerable citizens for six months. Salaries must also not only be paid
promptly, they should be reviewed to reflect the inflationary rate”.
While urging the children and youth to
be moderate in spending considering the current economic reality, the national
Ameer of the Companion said children must be contented with whatever their
parents were able to provide them.
He said: “I wish to reiterate that this
year DHP is holding at a time when Nigeria economy is facing multiple challenge
and virtually all citizens are affected in one way of the other.
“The removal of oil subsidy and
devaluation of the naira has increased the hardship faced by the Nigerians.
This period therefore, calls for frugal spending and complete avoidance of
waste in line with the teachings of Islam.”
Reacting on the removal of universities
and tertiary institutions from the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information
System (IPPIS), Engr. Olalekan described the decision of the president as a
right step in the right direction.
He, however, urged management of
tertiary institutions to reciprocate the gesture with prudent and financial
management.
The Guest Lecturer, Engr. Taofeeq
Adekunle Abdul-Hameed, urged Muslim Ummah to be humble with whatever blessings
Allah has bestowed upon them.
Abdul-Hameed, the pioneer Rector,
Federal Polytechnic, Ayede, Ogbomoso, also charged Nigerian youth to make use
of social media in a positive way.
Source: championnews.com.ng
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https://championnews.com.ng/provide-lasting-solution-to-poverty-in-nigeria-islamic-group-urges-tinubu/
----
Sudan in 'total panic' as paramilitaries
move South
25 December 2023
"The Rapid Support Forces (RSF)
have looted everything: cars, lorries and tractors," laments a resident of
a village in the state of al-Jazira, speaking on condition of anonymity for
fear of reprisals from the paramilitaries as they push southwards in war-torn
Sudan.
The villagers of al-Jazira hold their
breath every time they hear the roar of a car or motorbike engine, so fearful
are they of the dreaded RSF paramilitaries.
"On Saturday, seven individuals
armed with machine guns and wearing FSR uniforms knocked on my door",
Abdine told AFP, declining to reveal his surname for security reasons.
They asked him about the car parked in
his garage before "taking it away with their weapons pointed at us",
said a distressed resident of Hasaheisa, a town 50 kilometres north of the
capital of Al-Jazeera, Wad Madani.
The bloody war that has pitted the
Sudanese army against the RSF paramilitaries in Khartoum for the past eight
months has forced half a million people to seek refuge further south, in this
agricultural state that was until recently spared the violence.
Recently, however, the paramilitaries,
who control most of the capital, have been advancing along the motorway linking
the capital to Wad Madani, taking village after village and terrorising its
inhabitants.
On 15 December, they attacked Wad
Madani, forcing more than 300,000 people to flee again, within the state of
Al-Jazira but also towards the neighbouring states of Sennar and Gedaref,
according to the UN.
Since then, the paramilitaries have
continued their relentless descent southwards.
On Saturday, they were spotted "15
kilometres north of Sennar", 140 kilometres south of Wad Madani, witnesses
told AFP.
- Looted markets and indiscriminate fire
-
"Army planes bombed Rapid Support
Forces gatherings to the north of the town, causing panic among
residents", other witnesses reported.Since the surprise start of the
conflict on 15 April, the army led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhane has mainly
played its air trump card: it is the only army with fighter jets.General
Mohamed Hamdan Daglo's FSR, on the other hand, favours mobile troops perched on
pick-ups.
Everywhere they go, women and girls are
afraid of being subjected to "sexual violence, a recurring threat" in
Sudan, according to the NGO Save the Children.
On the Hasaheisa market, the doors of
the stalls were open and the goods that the looters were not interested in were
spread out on the ground, an AFP journalist observed.
"Have the RSF come to fight us, the
citizens, or have they come to fight the army?" 42-year-old Omar Hussein
asked AFP, as shops and vehicles belonging to his family were looted or
destroyed.
At another market, Tamboul, halfway
between Khartoum and Wad Madani, paramilitaries charged into the market firing
indiscriminately, witnesses reported.
- Every room searched" - According
to the UN, 12,000 people have died as a result of the conflict, a figure that
is surely greatly underestimated given the extent to which whole swathes of the
country have been cut off from the rest of the world.
It has also displaced 7.1 million
people, including 1.5 million in neighbouring countries, said Stéphane
Dujarric, spokesman for the UN Secretary-General, on Thursday, describing it as
"the world's largest displacement crisis".
On Friday, the United Nations Security
Council expressed "concern" at the intensification of violence in
Sudan, while "strongly condemning" attacks against civilians and the
extension of the conflict "to areas hosting large populations of displaced
persons".
Since the start of the war, the two
rival camps have accused each other of attacking civilians.
So, says Rabab, who has also hidden her
surname, when the paramilitaries "fired bullets in front of the house
before entering, we all panicked".
"They only left after searching
every room," she told AFP.
Al-Tayeb, a resident of a village near
Hasaheisa, was surprised when the paramilitaries asked him "a strange
question: they wanted to know how I had obtained the money to build my house,
which I inherited from my father which was built 35 years ago".
An answer that, in any case, will matter
little to the fighters. On Saturday, eight people were shot dead by the RSF in
the village of Artadhwa because they opposed looting, witnesses told AFP.
Source: africanews.com
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https://www.africanews.com/2023/12/25/sudan-in-total-panic-as-paramilitaries-move-south/
----
Europe
Pope decries Gaza’s ‘appalling harvest’
of civilian deaths
2023-12-26
VATICAN CITY: Pope Francis said in his
Christmas message on Monday that children dying in wars, including in Gaza, are
the “little Jesuses of today” and that Israeli strikes there were reaping an
“appalling harvest” of innocent civilians.
In his Christmas Day “Urbi et Orbi” (to
the city and world) address, Francis also called the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by
Hamas “abominable” and again appealed for the release of around 100 hostages
still being held in Gaza.
Speaking from the central balcony of St.
Peter’s Basilica to thousands of people in the square below, he took another
swipe at the armaments industry, saying it ultimately controlled the
“puppet-strings of war”.
Pope deplores ‘desperate humanitarian
situation’ in Gaza
The 87-year-old Francis, celebrating the
11th Christmas of his pontificate, called for an end to conflicts, political,
social or military, in places including Ukraine, Syria, Yemen, Lebanon, Armenia
and Azerbaijan, and he defended the rights of migrants around the world.
“How many innocents are being
slaughtered in our world! In their mothers’ wombs, in odysseys undertaken in
desperation and in search of hope, in the lives of all those little ones whose
childhood has been devastated by war. They are the little Jesuses of today,” he
said.
He gave particular attention to the Holy
Land, including Gaza, where, according to Palestinian health officials, Israeli
air strikes killed at least 78 people in one of the besieged enclave’s
deadliest nights of Israel’s 11-week-old battle with Hamas.
“May it (peace) come in Israel and
Palestine, where war is devastating the lives of those peoples. I embrace them
all, particularly the Christian communities of Gaza and the entire Holy Land,”
Francis said.
Speaking from the same balcony where he
first appeared to the world on the night of his election on March 13, 2013, he
said his “heart grieves for the victims of the abominable attack of 7 October”
and again called for the release of hostages.
‘APPALLING HARVEST’
“I plead for an end to the military
operations with their appalling harvest of innocent civilian victims, and call
for a solution to the desperate humanitarian situation by an opening to the
provision of humanitarian aid,” he said.
Last week, a UN-backed body said in a
report that the entire 2.3 million population of Gaza was facing crisis levels
of hunger and that the risk of famine was increasing every day.
The Vatican, which has diplomatic
relations with both Israel and the Palestinian Authority, believes a two-state
solution is the only answer to the long-running conflict. Francis called for
“persevering dialogue between the parties, sustained by strong political will
and the support of the international community”.
Dedicating an entire paragraph of his
message to the weapons trade, Francis said: “And how can we even speak of
peace, when arms production, sales and trade are on the rise?” He called for
more investigation of the armaments trade.
“It should be talked about and written
about, so as to bring to light the interests and the profits that move the
puppet-strings of war,” he said.
Source: brecorder.com
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https://www.brecorder.com/news/40280515/pope-decries-gazas-appalling-harvest-of-civilian-deaths
-----
From Gaza War To Protecting Earth, All
About King Charles' Christmas Message
December 25, 2023
London: Britain's King Charles called on
people on Monday to help those less fortunate during a time of economic
hardship and global conflict, using his Christmas Day message to emphasise the
importance of kindness, compassion and care for the environment.
In his second Christmas message since
becoming king, Charles also paid tribute to volunteers, charity workers and
people working over the holidays in roles caring for others.
"This is all the more important at
a time of real hardship for many, when we need to build on existing ways to
support others less fortunate than ourselves," the 75-year-old monarch
said.
In a first for the tradition of royal
seasonal messages that dates back to a radio speech by his great-grandfather
George V in 1932, Charles delivered his message beside a living Christmas tree
that Buckingham Palace said would be replanted.
In a further nod to Charles' decades of
work on environmental issues, the tree contained natural and sustainable
decorations including pine cones and paper.
"We care for the Earth for the sake
of our children's children," Charles said, speaking from the Centre Room
at the palace, which opens onto the famous balcony where the royal family
appears to the public on special occasions.
"During my lifetime I have been so
pleased to see a growing awareness of how we must protect the Earth and our
natural world as the one home which we all share," said Charles, who
became king on the death of his mother Queen Elizabeth in September 2022.
Alluding partly to the 11-week-old war
raging in Gaza, Charles added: "At a time of increasingly tragic conflict
around the world, I pray that we can also do all in our power to protect each
other."
Charles, who holds the title of
"Defender of the Faith" in his role as the Supreme Governor of the
Church of England, said the Christian teaching of doing good to others
represented universal values and seemed more relevant now than ever.
Source: ndtv.com
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https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/uk-christmas-king-charles-iii-from-gaza-war-to-protecting-earth-all-about-king-charles-christmas-message-4741511#pfrom=home-ndtvworld_uk
-----
Archbishop of Canterbury’s Christmas
sermon highlights children’s plight in Gaza
December 25, 2023
LONDON: The Archbishop of Canterbury
spoke about the impact of the Israel-Hamas war on children in his Christmas Day
sermon, the BBC reported on Monday.
“This year, the skies of Bethlehem are
full of fear rather than angels and glory,” Justin Welby said during a service
at Canterbury Cathedral.
He drew parallels between the hardships
faced by children in the region today and the turbulent times of Jesus’ birth.
“Today a crying child is in a manger
somewhere in the world, nobody willing or able to help his parents, or her
parents, who so desperately need shelter,” Welby said. “Or perhaps lying in an
incubator, in a hospital low on electricity, like the Anglican Al-Ahli hospital
in Gaza, surrounded by suffering and death.
“Or maybe the newborn lies in a house
that still bears the marks of the horrors of Oct. 7, with family members
killed, and a mother who counted her life as lost.”
The archbishop highlighted the
importance of service over dominance in addressing global challenges such as
climate change, terrorism, economic disparity, antisemitism, Islamophobia and racism.
God “confronts our cruelty with his
compassion” and “responds to our selfishness with service,” Welby said.
He shared his experience of visiting a
US church that collects guns off the streets and mentioned wearing a cross made
from a melted-down automatic rifle, symbolizing hope and life.
“The angels cry, they cry out for peace
— and let our voices join with theirs in prayer for such peace; for a cessation
of violence, for the relief of such suffering, and for the release of
hostages,” Welby said.
Earlier in October, the archbishop spent
four days in Jerusalem to show solidarity “with the Christian community in the
Holy Land” after Israel reportedly bombed the Anglican-run Al-Ahli hospital in
Gaza.
Palestinian Christians had slammed his
remarks on the Israel-Hamas war, accusing him of “relegating” their plight
behind “British domestic political and ecumenical considerations.” Source: arabnews.com
Please click the following URL to read
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https://www.arabnews.com/node/2431736/world
------
Irish member of European Parliament
calls von der Leyen 'Frau Genocide' over Gaza
Burak Bir
25.12.2023
Irish Member of the European Parliament
Clare Daly has once again criticized the European Commission President Ursula
von der Leyen over her stance on relentless Israeli attacks on Gaza, calling
her "Frau Genocide."
Daly's speech at the European Parliament
went viral on Monday after she accused von der Leyen of overriding the foreign
policies to "cheerlead a brutal apartheid regime."
She said von der Leyen "elevated to
power without a single vote from the citizens who has spent the last two months
swooping in and overriding the foreign policies of elected governments all to
cheerlead a brutal apartheid regime that she calls a ‘vibrant democracy’ as a
pulverizers a city of children."
"Well, my God with defenders of
democracy like that, I think I speak for many, many citizens of Europe when I
say ‘Nein Danke!’ No, Thanks, Frau Genocide," she added.
Last month, she criticized von der Leyen
for not calling for a truce in Gaza, saying that "it's not just Israel's
genocide," but Europe's too.
Von der Leyen has been criticized for
her unconditional support to Israel and hesitance to call for restraint in
Gaza.
Israel has pounded the Gaza Strip since
a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7, killing at
least 20,424 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injuring 54,036
others, according to local health authorities.
Around 1,200 Israelis are believed to
have been killed in the Hamas attack.
The Israeli onslaught has left Gaza in
ruins, with half of the coastal territory's housing damaged or destroyed and
nearly 2 million people displaced within the densely-populated enclave amid
shortages of food, clean water and medicines.
Source: aa.com.tr
Please click the following URL to read
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https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/irish-member-of-european-parliament-calls-von-der-leyen-frau-genocide-over-gaza/3092044
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Southeast Asia
Malay Civil Society Organisations Plan
Five-Day Picket in Front of US Embassy Calling for End to Israel's Strike on
Gaza
By Muhammad Yusry
26 Dec 2023
KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 26 — With the Gaza
ceasefire failing to hold, a coalition of nearly 50 civil society organisations
and political parties will host a five-day picket in front of the United States
Embassy here from tonight until New Year’s Eve.
Called “Kepung Demi Palestin” — Malay
for “siege for the sake of Palestine” — the coalition said the peaceful event
aims to pressure the superpower ally of Israel to call for the end of the
disproportionate backlash against Hamas’ surprise attack.
“Despite the continuous demand for
ceasefire in Gaza, Israel continues to inflict this genocide on the
Palestinians. The US is one of the largest supporters, one of the main culprits
behind it.
“They even blocked the resolution for a
ceasefire. They repeatedly use their veto power to sabotage any efforts to
achieve peace in Palestine,” the spokesman of the coalition Chua Tian Chang
told Malay Mail in a recent interview.
Also known as Tian Chua, the activist
and former PKR vice-president said the gathering aims to remind the public of
the current situation in Palestine where a humanitarian crisis is happening.
“Innocent children have been killed. The
number of dead and starving casualties is increasing in Gaza. About 20,057
people have died in Gaza as a result of Israeli attacks. More than two million
Palestinians in Gaza are in a food crisis or worse, 576,600 people are in a
catastrophic famine.
“That is what the people in Gaza are
facing right now. The siege is to get the public’s attention and remind them a
humanitarian crisis is ongoing right now,” Chua said.
The coalition represented by
SekretariatSolidaritiPalestin includes groups such as the Malaysia Consultative
Council of Islamic Organisations (Mapim), Malaysian Women’s Coalition for
Al-Quds and Palestine, BDS Movement Malaysia, Viva Palestina Malaysia, Bersih,
Suara Rakyat Malaysia (Suaram), and several student groups.
The political parties which have
expressed their support include the Malaysian United Democratic Alliance
(Muda), the Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM), Parti PejuangTanahair, and the
youth wings of Pakatan Harapan (PH) components PKR, DAP and Parti Amanah
Negara, and the corresponding wings of Perikatan Nasional (PN) components PAS
and Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia.
Chua said the coalition is demanding
four things: The end to the arbitrary killings of Palestinians; an immediate,
permanent and unconditional truce; addressing the immediate needs of civilians
in Gaza for both aid and protection; and the recognition of the right of the
Palestinian people to a sovereign state.
He assured the public that the event
would not pose any disturbance to the public and the flow of traffic around the
US Embassy, adding that both the police and the Home Ministry have been
notified.
“We will stage a siege in the vicinity
of the embassy building. There will be no marching or any attempt to go inside
the embassy. It won’t disrupt the traffic and the public. There will be no
conflict or challenge to the law.
“It is just to remind everyone what is
happening in Gaza. Our action is in line with the Malaysian government’s view
on this issue where we demand ceasefire and humanitarian aid. The government is
constantly pushing for it and we are calling for it too,” he said.
In October, the government had backed a
Palestine solidarity rally held in Axiata Arena in Bukit Jalil with Prime
Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim also making an appearance.
Chua said the public is welcome to join
the event, starting with a gathering at the mosque in the Tabung Haji Building
at 10pm tonight where speeches and forums will be held.
“There’s no demand for the public to
stay with us six days straight. You can come in on the second day, and go home
to have some rest and come back to join us. You want to sleep with us there or
not is entirely up to you. There’s no pressure. It is on a rotation basis.
“Those who wish to come, bring equipment
such as tents, sleeping bags, umbrellas, and the Malaysian and Palestine flags
with you. You can bring your own banner in calling for a ceasefire. And we do
need people to donate food and mineral water for the attendees,” he said.
Chua called for all Malaysians
regardless of race, religion and colour, as well as those who are in solidarity
with the Palestinians, in the spirit of humanity to come together in this
action.
“We will set up tents and stay in them
throughout the pickets, we will hold solidarity events every night, and install
flags and symbols of the struggle of the Palestinian people. We are also
planning a ‘mega ceramah’ to be held as a grand finale on the last day as a
closing event.
“The picket will be something new to
Malaysians but it is how they have done it in other countries. It is time for
Malaysians to do pickets to put pressure on the US,” he said.
Earlier this month, the United States
Chargé d’Affaires Manu Bhalla told Malay Mail that while the two countries’
policies on the Palestine-Israel conflict are different, there are still many
other areas of commonalities between both of them over the conflict.
The US deputy chief of mission to
Malaysia said his country also shared the same concerns regarding the conflict,
such as respect for the rights of Palestine civilians, the high number of
Palestinians that have been killed, and a need for adherence to international
humanitarian laws.
Source: malaymail.com
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https://www.malaymail.com/news/malaysia/2023/12/26/kepung-demi-palestin-civil-societies-plan-five-day-picket-in-front-of-us-embassy-calling-for-end-to-israels-strike-on-gaza/109196
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Religious preacher PU Azman told to
enter defence on charges of sexually violating a teen
26 Dec 2023
THE Klang Sessions Court has ordered
religious preacher Azman Syah Alias, popularly known by his moniker PU Azman,
to enter his defence on two charges of sexual assault against a teenage boy
last year.
Judge Syafeera Mohd Said in her ruling
said that the prosecution had succeeded in proving a prima facie case against
the accused, who is 42.
Syafeera in giving the decision said
that the court gave three options for Azman during defence proceedings set on
January 12.
"The accused is given the choice of
either testifying under oath from the witness stand, give unsworn testimony
from the dock, or remain silent,” she said.
"If you testify under oath from the
witness stand, you need to be prepared to be questioned by the public
prosecutor.
“If the testimony by the accused is not
under oath, it would not be strong enough because it cannot be challenged by
the prosecutor and you will not be cross-examined.”
If he chose the third option to remain
silent, the court would have to go ahead and convict him.
Lawyer Mohamad Zahid Ahmad who
represented Azman then told the judge that he chose to testify under oath.
Deputy public prosecutor Nur’ Ayuni
Jamri appeared for the prosecution.
Azman, who is also known as Cik Man, is
charged with two counts of committing physical sexual assault on a 17-year-old
boy at a homestay in Kampung Sungai Udang, here, at 12.15am and 1am on February
20 and June 29 last year.
The charges are framed under Section
14(a) of the Sexual Offences Against Children Act 2017 which provides
imprisonment not exceeding 20 years and whipping, upon conviction.
Azman is also facing nine more charges
related to sexual crimes he allegedly committed against teenage boys.
These comprise five charges in the
Seremban Sessions Court, two cases in the Shah Alam Sessions Court and one case
each in the Klang Magistrate's Court and the Ampang Sessions Court.
Dressed in a loose grey shirt and black
skull cap, Azman appeared calm as he later walked accompanied by his lawyer to
an MPV that was awaiting him.
The preacher smiled and waved to press
photographers who called him before entering the vehicle. – The Vibes, December
26, 2023
Source: thevibes.com
Please click the following URL to read
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https://www.thevibes.com/articles/news/100472/religious-preacher-pu-azman-told-to-enter-defence-on-charges-of-sexually-violating-a-teen
-----
Madani Government must resolve
politico-religious immigration faux pas – J.D. Lovrenciear
26 Dec 2023
THE authorities certainly owe senior
citizens an explanation. The Madani Government which extols care and compassion
as pillars for nationhood should act decisively and convincingly.
The case in question refers to a news
published by The Vibes, ‘Residents of Catholic home surmount loneliness, old
age with poignant Christmas celebration,’ yesterday.
The universally acclaimed Little Sisters
of the Poor, an order of Catholic nuns who provide care for the elderly poor in
over 30 countries worldwide, has been struggling with human capital deprivation
here in Penang at its elderly caregiving home in Batu Lanchang.
According to the news report, the
average age of the residents here is 70. The oldest is 93 and has lived at the
home for the past 33 years.
The Catholic Church is unable to bring
in for the 64 inhouse residents of the Little Sisters of the Poor in Penang the
much-needed foreign Catholic nuns who are specially trained and have dedicated
their life to care for the elderly poor.
"The nuns at this Catholic
institution in Penang are now down to less than ten. One of them is 103 years
old, and several others are also ageing,” reveals the news portal.
A Google search further reveals that
this frustrating handicap raining down on the caregiving facility is not new.
While the Catholic Church in Malaysia
may meekly state the problem as "technical hiccups with the immigration
authorities in bringing foreign nuns", netizens and concerned communities
are left wondering, and in all likelihood even speculating, whether there is
more than meets the eye as to why such a problem persists.
Nuns evidently denied entry
In a country where we have no problems
in allowing 2.2 million migrant workers to come, stay and work to build our
economy (not forgetting another 1.2 to 3.5 million undocumented migrants), why
are the desperately needed dozen or less foreign nuns being denied entry with
ease?
Malaysia is one of the largest
migrant-receiving countries in Southeast Asia and yet the home for the elderly
poor is facing "technical hiccups with the immigration authorities in
bringing (in) foreign nuns".
Previous news reports (FMT and
Malaysiakini) that can be sourced on the Internet state that the foreign nuns
who work for free need to constantly renew their work or visitor visas.
What is evident is that the trained,
qualified, and dedicated caregiver nuns are even denied entry into the country.
In fact, Christopher Kushi, the legal
adviser to Roman Catholic cardinal Rev Datuk Seri Sebastian Francis, is
"hoping that the authorities can help the home to allow the entry of
foreign nuns".
The question is: would not the services
of these un-salaried nuns be invaluable, given the fact that Malaysia is on the
way to becoming an ageing nation by 2030?
Twenty-nine countries pose no problem,
but in Malaysia the nuns are putting up with an imposed handicap to give care.
We approve untrained, unskilled labour
force by the millions. We readily approve foreign brains hired to work here.
But the handful of dedicated women from
the order of the Catholic mission who are specially trained and dedicated to
handle the plight of the aged, particularly those who do not have families or
friends to care for them, cannot get work or entry visas easily.
The Catholic mission that runs a mere
two free homes for the aged and the destitute in Kuala Lumpur and Penang has
appealed to the government to consider giving longer visas to its caretaker
nuns and to reduce the red tape in getting them.
Seeming agenda at work
Let us backtrack to the past records.
The nuns received ten-year visas in the 1990s. But this practice was slowly
reduced to five years and then three years.
The question is why?
It seems that getting long-term visas
under the ‘religious’ category is denied by immigration, citing
"many" reasons.
This problem in allowing a dozen or two
religious nuns to provide the free, dedicated and highly skilled caregiving
jeopardises about 165 citizens in the country.
The fact is the French mission that
manages the two homes are not even asking for taxpayers' budget allocations
from the government, but solely rely on donations and alms from churchgoers to
carry out their caregiving obligations and activities.
Currently, it has four nuns from
Singapore, Sri Lanka, and South Korea.
The chief caretaker of the Penang home,
a Samoan-Australian, was forced to retire as there were issues with her visa.
Obviously, this problem is not a new
issue. Historic data indicates there has been a seeming agenda at work.
What then is this plot is what netizens
and Christians are asking.
Appeals after appeals to various
ministries and including prime ministers in the past have been met with
silence.
As we witness the Madani powered
leadership plough ahead in wanting to make care and compassion the stronger
pillars in reconstructing the values in nationhood, will it provide meaningful
change and facilitate various religious communities like the Little Sisters of
the Poor to carry out their social obligations with ease?
Hopefully as we enter the new year of
2024, we will see immigration resets that can add value, especially in this
area of providing free, value-centric, and meaningful service in a nation that
is reeling fast towards becoming an ageing population six years from now.
As one Paul Arokiasamy wrote (Letter to
Editor, Malaysiakini, September 2019), when 'Malaysia My Second Home' can be
promoted vigorously and visas granted with ease, why the policy faux pas when
it comes to granting a dozen or less long-stay visas for these nuns who fulfil
voluntary social service without taking a single sen as salary or perks? -- The Vibes, December 26, 2023
Source: thevibes.com
Please click the following URL to read
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https://www.thevibes.com/articles/opinion/100473/madani-government-must-resolve-politico-religious-immigration-faux-pas-jd-lovrenciear
------
No special treatment accorded to senior
cop charged with murder of 17-year-old in Ipoh, says Ayob Khan
IyliaMarsya Iskandar
December 26, 2023
KUALA LUMPUR: There is no special
treatment accorded to Mohd Nazri Abdul Razak, who was charged with the murder
of a 17-year-old student in Ipoh earlier this month.
Responding to the allegedly extra
policemen seen on the day he was brought to court, Deputy Inspector-General of
Police Datuk Seri Ayob Khan MydinPitchay said it was because the case was of
interest.
"There is no difference of
treatment (given to Mohd Nazri).
"It is a case of interest so we
have to check if there are elements of disturbance or threats," he said in
a special press conference at Bukit Aman, here, today.
On Dec 18, the New Straits Times
reported that members of the media were left bewildered by the allegedly
special treatment accorded to Mohd Nazri who is also a senior police officer.
Journalists, who had packed the Ipoh
magistrate's court compound since 7.30am to snap photos and videos of the
accused, were surprised when Mohd Nazri was not taken via the usual route taken
by those brought to court.
Photographers were taken aback by the
'extra layers' of police personnel at the courthouse, shielding Mohd Nazri away
from the press.
Policemen were seen actively filling up
the spaces usually taken by members of the media, blocking the paths used by
photographers to record visuals of the accused as they are led into court.
Mohd Nazri, 44, was charged in the Ipoh
magistrate's court with the murder of Muhammad Zaharif Affendi Muhd Zamrie, 17.
No plea was recorded from him after the
charge was read out before Magistrate S. Punitha as the case comes under the
jurisdiction of the High Court.
Mohd Nazri was charged with committing
murder at Jalan Taman Jati 1 near SMK Jati, Meru between 12.05pm and 12.40pm on
Dec 15.
Source: nst.com.my
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https://www.nst.com.my/news/crime-courts/2023/12/994225/no-special-treatment-accorded-senior-cop-charged-murder-17-year-old
-----
More than 25,000 people seeking shelter
at 241 flood relief centres in East Coast states
December 26, 2023
KUALA LUMPUR: The flood situation in the
East Coast states has taken a turn for the worse with thousands of residents
evacuated from their homes and seeking shelter at 241 flood relief centres.
The National Disaster Management Agency
(Nadma) in a statement said a total of 25,434 people from 7,388 families are
seeking shelter at 241 flood relief centres in Kelantan, Terengganu and Pahang.
In Kelantan, a total of 14,006 people
from 4,288 families are seeking shelter at 94 flood relief centres in eight
districts namely Gua Musang, Jeli, Kota Bharu, Kuala Krai, Machang, Pasir Mas,
Pasir Puteh and Tanah Merah.
In Terengganu, a total of 10,643 people
from 2,913 families are seeking shelter at 134 flood relief centres in seven
districts, namely Besut, Dungun, Hulu Terengganu, Kemaman, Kuala Terengganu,
Marang and Setiu.
In Pahang, a total of 785 people from
187 families are seeking shelter at 13 flood relief centres in three districts,
namely Lipis and Raub.
Meanwhile, in Selangor, a total of four
people from a family are seeking shelter at a flood relief centre in Kuala
Langat.
Source: nst.com.my
Please click the following URL to read
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https://www.nst.com.my/news/nation/2023/12/994274/more-25000-people-seeking-shelter-241-flood-relief-centres-east-coast
----
Islamic Economy bill passage may up RI's
SGIE rank: observer
25 Dec 2023
Jakarta (ANTARA) - The ratification of
the Islamic Economy Bill is one of the efforts that could help improve
Indonesia’s ranking in the State of the Global Islamic Economy (SGIE) report,
according to economic observer Izzudin Al Farras.
“To make Indonesia rank first in SGIE,
or to at least become a hub for global Islamic economy industry, six things
must be done; one of them is accelerating the ratification of the Islamic
Economy Bill,” he said when contacted here on Monday.
The SGIE has become a topic of
discussion among Indonesians ever since it was mentioned in the vice
presidential debate round on Friday (December 22, 2023).
Farras, who is also a researcher at the
Institute for Development of Economics and Finance (INDEF), said that SGIE is
one of the references for all countries to develop the Islamic economy because
it contains comparisons with other countries in the world.
As a country with the largest Muslim
population in the world, Indonesia has a great potential to rank first in the
SGIE report, he added.
This potential is reflected by the
government’s policy requiring halal certification for food and beverage
products sold in Indonesia, he said.
There is also potential for expansion of
halal cosmetic products, which not only reach women but also men.
He expounded that, in addition to
accelerating the bill’s ratification, some other steps to increase Indonesia’s
ranking in the SGIE report are creating a clear and comprehensive regulation on
the halal industry area as well as adding new Harmonized System (HS) codes for
halal products.
“What is also important is including the
issue of the halal economy into the research agenda of RPJPN (national
long-term development plan) and RPJMN (national medium-term development plan),”
he said.
The other things that are also important
are integrating the halal industry into the national research agenda and
preparing supporting infrastructure for halal certification.
Source: antaranews.com
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https://en.antaranews.com/news/301779/islamic-economy-bill-passage-may-up-ris-sgie-rank-observer
-----
Arab World
Awqaf Ministry holds training courses
for 2,000 Imams, preachers
26 Dec 2023 -
Doha, Qatar: The Department of Religious
Call (Da’wah) and Guidance at the Ministry of Awqaf and Islamic Affairs has
concluded courses of the “Paths and Lighthouses” programmmes for the year 2023,
which is organised and supervised by the Institute of Da’wah and Islamic
Sciences, and honoured 130 distinguished trainees from Imams, preachers,
muezzins, Sharia muftis, memorisers of the Holy Qur’an, and Ruqyahs (remedial
or healing invocation), who passed the courses.
The participants were honoured during a
ceremony held under the patronage of Minister of Awqaf and Islamic Affairs H E
Ghanem bin Shaheen bin Ghanem Al Ghanim.
Majed Ziyara spoke on behalf of the
participants of the courses and said, “Today we have turned a bright page of
hard work, perseverance, and diligence in seeking Islamic knowledge throughout
the year, and we all hope for the continuation of this development,
qualification, and acquisition of various scientific, legal, and administrative
skills.”
He thanked the Minister of Awqaf and
Islamic Affairs for his sponsorship of the scientific programmes and supporting
the rehabilitation and development programmes for all employees in the
Ministry. He also thanked all the teachers and trainers who presented these
programmes and scientific courses and made excellent efforts to convey the
messages.
Malallah Abdul Rahman Al Jaber, Director
of the Department of Da’wah and Religious Guidance, said the Institute of
Da’wah and Islamic Sciences held 73 courses, seminars and scientific meetings
this year, from which more than 2,000 trainees who hold Sharia jobs in the
Ministry benefited within the Pathways and Lighthouses programme, which aims to
develop cognitive, Sharia and administrative paths for them.
He congratulated the participants for
having this good and blessed path. “Congratulations to us and to you on these
scientific paths that leads to a Paradise as wide as the heavens and the
earth.”
Omar Al Ruwaili, Head of the Institute
for Da’wah and Islamic Sciences, explained that the courses organised by the
Institute throughout this year included: Five courses for memorisers, from
which about 400 Quranic teachers benefited. They included: a course on the art
of dealing with students and ways to make them love Qur’an reading to develop
the skill of memorisation, from which 33 teachers benefited in addition to a
course on methods of teaching the Qur’an, from which 122 teachers benefited.
Administrative path for teachers of the
Qur’an, in which 33 teachers participated; while 'Methods of Teaching the
Qur’an' benefited 122 teachers. The administrative track for teachers of the
Qur’an benefited 135 teachers, a course on Tajweed and methods for improving
performance benefited 74 teachers, and a course on the art of managing Quranic
circles for teachers of the Holy Qur’an benefited 45 teachers.
Courses for Imams included two courses
to qualify new Qatari Imams. Each course included three subjects in tajweed,
jurisprudence, and doctrine to develop the legal path, from which more than 560
new Qatari Imams benefited.
Courses for muezzins included a training
course for the new Qatari muezzin, which included tajweed, jurisprudence, and
doctrine to develop the legal path, benefiting about 303 new Qatari muezzins.
Courses for preachers included 'A modern
terminology course for Qatari preachers', in which seven Qatari preachers
participated; three lectures in participation with external parties benefited
278 preachers, in cooperation with the National Human Rights Committee; 10
courses in developing rhetorical skills in partnership with the Al Jazeera
Media Institute, from which 148 orators benefited; and 10 courses in developing
research and electronic graduation skills for preachers, from which 80
preachers benefited.
In addition, the following courses were
also organised: A course related to Haj, which was attended by 20 Haj guides;
and a forum and course for preachers working in the Guidance Department of the
Dawa Department, from which 48 preachers benefited.
The legal Ruqyah course benefited 14
certified legal Ruqyahs (remedial or healing invocation).
Sharia specialist course accredited by
the Ministry, from which 10 Ruqya remedial benefited. Two meetings were held
for the Ministry’s Sharia muftis. The first meeting was attended by 44 muftis,
and the second meeting was attended by 50 muftis.
Source: thepeninsulaqatar.com
Please click the following URL to read
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https://thepeninsulaqatar.com/article/26/12/2023/awqaf-ministry-holds-training-courses-for-2000-imams-preachers
-----
Yemeni Armed Forces towards lifting
aggression, siege on Gaza
[26/December/2023]
SANA'A December 26. 2023 (Saba)- The
Yemeni Armed Forces have completed the process of confirming that they will
continue to prevent the passage of ships heading to the usurping entity, of any
nationality, until the entry of the needs of the people of Gaza for food,
medicine, and oil derivatives.
The recent operation demonstrated a new
chapter in the growth of deterrence capabilities and the readiness of the
initiative by confirming the ability that the enemy knows the credibility of
its announcement since the first operation carried out by the Yemeni armed
forces, which now have an accurate vision for managing the course of the
battle.
Yemen's targeting of the Norwegian ship
means that the Yemeni front has reached the point of no return in terms of
establishing deterrence equations that will be of a different calibre, which
will result in expanding the base of Yemeni participation and supporting the
continuation and escalation of operations if the American-Zionist aggression
continues to commit more massacres against the Palestinian people.
It is clear, through the recent
operation of the Yemeni Armed Forces, that Yemen is the one that holds the
initiative, both military and economic, in the region extending from the
Arabian Sea to the Red Sea, which means that the Zionist enemy has become under
a state of siege.
In the face of this reality, the Zionist
website "Globus", which specializes in economic affairs, revealed
that the occupied port of Umm al-Rashrash had completely stopped operating as a
result of Yemeni threats.
According to the Zionist website, the
port authorities explained that Yemen’s threats affect all ships, whether those
passing to the Mediterranean Sea or arriving to Umm al-Rashrash (Eilat).
Zionist officials at the port confirmed
that almost no ships are visiting the port, indicating that the port intends to
remove workers from work and close the port gates due to lack of work.
In turn, Tzachi Hanegbi, head of the
so-called Zionist “National Security” Council, commented on the threats made by
Yemen in support of Gaza... revealing that the usurping entity is living under
a naval blockade.
Earlier, the former head of the Military
Intelligence Division in the enemy entity “Aman”, Tamir Hayman, said that the
threat to Yemen is “a problem for Zionist national security” and is “a very
serious threat at the strategic level to Zionist freedom of navigation.”
It has become clear that Yemen has
placed the Zionist entity in the net of Yemeni deterrence equations, and this
means that in the coming days, there will be a change in the Zionist discourse
towards the aggression against Gaza, which was confirmed the head of national
delegation, Muhammad Abdel Salam.
Abdel Salam said in a post on the “X”
platform: “In light of the operations in the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea, we
receive several communications and messages from active countries confirming
their support for the ceasefire in Gaza and their commitment to working to
bring humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people and that they are against the
expansion of the conflict.”
Abdul Salam added: "While we
encourage all positions demanding a ceasefire and the introduction of aid, we
stress the importance of translating these positions into reality, and Yemen's
position will remain continuous and steadfast alongside the Palestinian people
until the aggression stops and the siege."
He expressed his encouragement of all
positions calling for a ceasefire and aid entry, stressing the importance of
translating these positions into reality.
Abdel Salam concluded his speech by
stressing that Yemen's position is steadfast in supporting the Palestinian
people until the aggression stops and the siege on Gaza is lifted.
In this context, there is a part that
must be focused on, which is that the continuation of the Yemeni strikes
inaugurates the stage of seizing the initiative with deterrence equations at
high levels and establishing specific rules of engagement that are not only
related to military operations but also to economic and political warfare.
Consequently, the Yemeni armed forces
have proven to everyone that they are skilled at overturning equations in the
region at the appropriate time and that they are not concerned about American
or Zionist threats.
It can be said that Yemen now has the
leverage to lift the aggression and siege on Gaza, and it reaffirms its
commitment to the Palestinian cause and its affiliation to the resistance and
liberation camp in the region.
Source: saba.ye
Please click the following URL to read
the full text of the original
https://www.saba.ye/en/news3291003.htm
-----
Arab Charter on Human Rights Committee
discusses Saudi Arabia’s inaugural report
December 25, 2023
RIYADH: Hala bint Mazyad Al-Tuwaijri,
the president of the Saudi Human Rights Commission, led the Kingdom’s
delegation at the 22nd session of the Arab Charter on Human Rights Committee at
the Arab League, the Saudi Press Agency reported.
The agenda at the session, which is
taking place in Cairo over two days until Dec. 26, includes a review of Saudi
Arabia’s inaugural periodic human rights report.
Al-Tuwaijri spoke of Saudi Arabia’s
committed approach to human rights in her keynote address, outlining the
Kingdom’s foundational governance principles — justice, consultation, and
equality — and its endeavors in establishing a comprehensive legal and institutional
framework aimed at bolstering and safeguarding human rights.
Al-Tuwaijri underscored the significance
of Article 26 of the Basic Law of Governance, which mandates state protection
of human rights in alignment with Islamic law, including justice, equality,
family rights, property rights, social security, employment, cultural
engagement, education, health, environmental protection, personal safety and
freedom, privacy rights, judicial independence, and equitable access to
justice.
She further highlighted the substantial
human rights reforms enacted under the auspices of King Salman and Crown Prince
Mohammed bin Salman, which reflected a dynamic and forward-thinking political
commitment to the progression and protection of human rights.
Al-Tuwaijri added that since the
initiation of Vision 2030, Saudi Arabia had enacted over 100 legislative,
institutional, judicial, and procedural amendments regarding human rights.
She advocated for stronger collaboration
and integration within the Arab League to champion for human rights,
particularly the Palestinian cause, while expressing concern over the worsening
human rights conditions in Palestinian territories.
Arab League Assistant Secretary-General
Haifa Abu Ghazaleh commended Saudi Arabia’s advances in regard to human rights,
particularly noting the significant standard and institutional reforms.
Source: arabnews.com
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Hajj, Umrah forum to focus on Pilgrim
Experience Program
December 25, 2023
JEDDAH: The Kingdom is set to host the
third Hajj and Umrah Services Conference and Exhibition aimed at improving the
pilgrim experience at the Two Holy Mosques.
Organized by the Ministry of Hajj and
Umrah under the patronage of King Salman, the four-day event will take place
from Jan. 8-11 at the Jeddah Superdome, the Saudi Press Agency reported on
Monday.
It comes as part of the Pilgrim
Experience Program, a pillar of the Kingdom’s Vision 2030.
The conference will involve discussions
on pilgrim services, aiming to enhance the quality of pilgrimages while
enriching the religious and cultural experiences of visitors.
It will gather individuals interested in
the Hajj and Umrah sector from the Kingdom and around the world.
Visitors can discover initiatives,
products, services and projects, with the conference fostering collaboration,
addressing challenges, and promoting innovation and creativity.
The event will also encourage investment
in new solutions and technologies, as well as enhance skills to align with the
development of the Hajj and Umrah sector.
Companies, Hajj missions, parties,
service providers, entrepreneurs and officials will be able to showcase their
Hajj products and services, are are encouraged to build sustainable
partnerships that improve the pilgrim experience.
The forum aims to boost the
competitiveness of entities and companies in the Hajj and Umrah sector,
channeling capabilities to elevate service quality and options as part of the
Saudi government’s commitment to pilgrim welfare.
A range of discussion panels across
several sessions will cover key topics, including housing, logistics,
healthcare, transportation, technology, artificial intelligence, water and
energy solutions, all aimed at enhancing services for pilgrims and Umrah performers.
The ministry aims to create a
sustainable system for pilgrim experience development, leveraging ideas from
specialists across governmental and private sectors. This involves anticipating
future trends, fostering partnerships and initiatives, engaging innovators and
reviewing Saudi Arabia’s efforts to enhance pilgrim services.
Last year’s Hajj and Umrah conference
attracted more than 100,000 visitors, with 360 government and private entities
taking part. The event also resulted in the signing of more than 200 agreements
in the Hajj and Umrah sector.
Source: arabnews.com
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https://www.arabnews.com/node/2431746/saudi-arabia
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Saudi, Qatari interior ministers meet in
Riyadh
December 25, 2023
RIYADH: Qatar’s Interior Minister Sheikh
Khalifa bin Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani arrived in Riyadh on Monday for an
official visit.
He was received at King Khalid
International Airport by Saudi Interior Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Saud bin
Naif.
During the meeting at the ministry's
office in Riyadh, they discussed ways to enhance the existing security
cooperation between the ministries of interior of the two countries.
Undersecretary at the Ministry of
Interior Khalid bin Mohammed Al-Battal, and the Ambassador of Qatar to Saudi
Arabia Bandar bin Mohammed Al-Attiyah were also present at the reception.
Source: arabnews.com
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https://www.arabnews.com/node/2431741/saudi-arabia
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URL: https://newageislam.com/islamic-world-news/mumbai-terror-accused-saeed-pakistan-election/d/131390