Middle East Press On: Turkey, Israeli Manipulation, Trump, Syria’s Homs, Netanyahu’s Strategy, Gaza, Yemen, Saudi Strike, Ansarallah Warns, Al-Aqsa Flood, New Age Islam's Selection, 14 July 2026
By New Age Islam Edit Desk
14 July 2026
From Berlin 1878 to Ankara 2026: Türkiye's return to center
Caucasus stands firm against Israeli manipulation
Trump’s “Memorandum of Surrender”: The art of the deal meets the fact of defeat
Veneer of normality developing in Syria’s Homs
Netanyahu’s real strategy for Gaza
Yemen Targets Abha Airport after Saudi Strike: Ansarallah Warns of Escalation
Why Did You Leave the Horse Alone? A Literary Reportage from Gaza
Two Years after Deif’s Assassination: Resistance Honors Architect of Al-Aqsa Flood
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From Berlin 1878 to Ankara 2026: Türkiye's return to center
BY ÜMIT NACI YORULMAZ
JUL 13, 2026
The Treaty of Berlin, signed on July 13, 1878, marked a major turning point in the European international system, testing the great powers' ability to manage crises through diplomatic negotiation rather than armed conflict. The Congress of Berlin also reflected the broader political context of an era in which the close relationship between heavy industry, technological advancement and military power was becoming increasingly apparent.
Today, the international security architecture is entering a new phase in which artificial intelligence, unmanned systems, integrated air defense networks, and cyber sovereignty are increasingly converging. This emerging integration of the defense industry, advanced technology, and state power can be described as the "Neo-Kruppist" paradigm. In this context, global power depends not only on processing raw materials or mass-producing conventional weapons but also on the capacity to develop cutting-edge technologies, secure critical supply chains, and rapidly mobilize industrial production infrastructure.
The Ankara NATO Leaders’ Summit, held on July 7-8, served as a concrete demonstration of this transformation. The procurement agreements announced in Ankara, the expansion of joint production capacity, the strengthening of institutional cooperation within the defense industry, and increased investment in artificial intelligence and unmanned systems collectively represent a clear declaration of the alliance’s determination to adapt to the demands of industrial mobilization in the emerging strategic environment.
In this context, I draw attention to two images separated by nearly a century and a half. The first is German painter Anton von Werner’s painting of the Berlin Congress in 1878. The second is the photo of leaders from the Ankara Summit.
This comparison is not an anachronistic contrivance but a deliberate methodological choice informed by Fernand Braudel’s concept of the longue durée (long-term perspective), which seeks to move beyond momentary fluctuations in historical events. Viewed through this lens, the sense of exclusion experienced by the Ottoman delegation at the Berlin Congress in 1878 and the central role assumed by Ankara in 2026 can be understood as distinct ruptures and transformations within the historical continuity of the same geopolitical current.
The Ottoman Empire, and later the Republic of Türkiye, has always occupied a central position in Eurasian geopolitics. Situated at the crossroads of three continents and commanding the Mediterranean and Black Sea basins as well as the principal East-West trade routes, the Ottoman Empire constituted a foundational pillar of the European balance of power. Consequently, its reduction during the 19th century to a passive object of the "Eastern Question" should not be regarded as a permanent characteristic of this geostrategically vital region but rather as a temporary interruption in a much longer historical trajectory.
1878 Berlin Congress
Following the 1877-1878 Russo-Ottoman War and the Treaty of San Stefano, the prospect of Russian influence extending through the Balkans to the warm-water seas became increasingly evident, while the Paris Settlement of 1856, which had guaranteed the Ottoman Empire’s territorial integrity, had effectively collapsed. Consequently, the Congress of Berlin was convened to limit Russia’s unilateral dominance, prevent a looming continental war, and reconstruct the European balance of power that had been undermined since the Crimean War.
Although the Congress succeeded in preventing direct conflict among the great powers in the short term, it failed to provide a lasting solution to the questions of borders, nationalism and minority rights in the Balkans. Instead, it merely bought time. This temporary respite created a strategic opportunity for Berlin to secure a stronger position in future struggles over the distribution of power. Germany capitalized on this opportunity not only through diplomacy but also by expanding its arms exports and military influence.
In the post-Congress period, the principal driver of German influence within Ottoman territory was the German arms industry, led by the Krupp family. The fact that a substantial portion of the Ottoman Army’s artillery inventory during the reign of Sultan Abdulhamid II was supplied by Krupp factories gave rise to a system of arms diplomacy, which can be described as "Kruppism," and was further reinforced through German military missions.
This model, in which arms sales, credit, military advisory missions, and political influence were closely intertwined, transformed the Berlin-Istanbul axis into a strategic partnership extending from the Baghdad Railway to the oil fields of the Middle East. It also laid the economic and military foundations for the alliance formed in 1914. Within this framework, arms were not merely instruments of war but also mechanisms of political dependence; the Ottoman Empire remained the recipient of military assistance and the object of strategic direction.
This new order, established in 1878, was also inscribed into the collective memory through Anton von Werner’s famous Congress of Berlin painting, commissioned by the Berlin Senate. In the composition, Werner places Chancellor Otto von Bismarck at its center as Europe’s "honest broker," while relegating the Ottoman delegation to the periphery of the canvas. He reinforces this visual hierarchy by positioning Marshal Mehmet Ali Pasha in isolation at the far right.
Born in Magdeburg as Karl Detroit, Mehmet Ali Pasha was a former Prussian who fled to Istanbul as a young man aboard a ship, converted to Islam, and rose to the rank of marshal in Ottoman service. He was later sent to Berlin as part of Sultan Abdülhamid II’s calculated diplomatic strategy.
Bismarck viewed the presence of a German-born convert, who had even adopted the name Mehmet Ali, at the negotiating table as a representative of the Ottoman Empire as a personal affront, and he made his discomfort evident throughout the congress. Werner, who was acutely aware of Bismarck’s sensitivities, relegated Mehmet Ali Pasha to the edge of the composition, depicting him in a solitary and melancholic posture. In doing so, the Pasha became a symbolic representation of both the hierarchy of power at the Berlin Congress and the diplomatic isolation of the Ottoman Empire.
New balance, new role
The fragile balance established in Berlin was soon undermined by the accelerating industrial arms race. Rather than resolving the imperial question, the Berlin settlement evolved into an arrangement that generated new disputes over borders and minority populations, ultimately collapsing with the outbreak of the Balkan Wars. This process culminated in World War I, a global reckoning that brought an end to the six-century-old Ottoman Empire and gave way to the emergence of the young Republic of Türkiye. During the interwar period, the Republic established its own security architecture and pursued a rational strategy of active neutrality throughout World War II.
In line with its geopolitical vision centered on peace and cooperation since the founding of the Republic, Türkiye made a historic strategic choice in response to the rising Soviet threat after World War II and joined NATO on Feb.18, 1952. This membership, which reshaped the longstanding regional balances of the 19th century through the Cold War framework of collective defense, became a cornerstone of Türkiye’s security policy. By securing a strong security guarantee through Article 5 of the Washington Treaty, Türkiye’s role within the alliance evolved alongside periodic disagreements and mutual dependencies. Through its contribution to safeguarding NATO’s southeastern flank throughout the Cold War and its active involvement in various crises, Türkiye emerged as a strategically significant ally within the alliance.
2026 Ankara summit
History does not repeat itself exactly; however, the international system may assign similar roles to different actors across different periods. In today’s fragmented world, the factor that distinguishes Türkiye is its position as one of the few actors capable of engaging simultaneously with competing power centers.
By complementing the Western ties provided by its NATO membership with a multifaceted diplomatic approach toward Moscow, Kyiv, the Islamic world, Turkic states and Africa, Ankara is emerging as an increasingly important hub for dialogue and negotiation.
The Russia-Ukraine talks, the Black Sea Grain Initiative, prisoner exchanges, the Ethiopia-Somalia Ankara Declaration, and the Astana process represent only a few concrete examples of this multichannel diplomacy. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s direct and cordial relationships with various leaders, along with his emphasis on crisis diplomacy, have strengthened the institutional impact of personal diplomacy within Turkish foreign policy.
Former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger’s observation that “As a professor, I tended to think of history as run by impersonal forces. But when you see it in practice, you see the difference personalities make” effectively illustrates the influence of personality and leadership in shaping diplomatic outcomes.
The domestically produced “Silvermoon” (Gümüşay) magnum revolvers, engraved with the names of the leaders and presented to them by President Erdoğan at the Ankara summit, provide a powerful example of this symbolism.
This gesture, which demonstrates that security commitments acquire meaning only when supported by industrial production capacity, may have generated debate and hesitation in some allied capitals regarding firearms legislation and diplomatic protocol. Nevertheless, when viewed through a longue durée perspective, the gift can be interpreted as a symbolic realpolitik message emphasizing Türkiye’s growing domestic defense production capabilities.
The factor that makes it meaningful to view Werner’s painting and the group photograph from the Ankara Summit through the same historical lens is precisely the profound transformation that Türkiye has undergone. This historical process, stretching from Berlin to Ankara, symbolizes not only the shift in global centers of power but also the manner in which Türkiye has redefined its geopolitical position.
Unlike the Ottoman delegation depicted on Werner’s canvas, representing a defeated empire whose territories were subject to division, and unlike the Türkiye that became dependent on Marshall Plan aid after World War II, today’s Türkiye is developing the capabilities to move beyond being merely an object of power politics. Through defense production, alliance membership, and multifaceted diplomacy, it is increasingly able to manage its international relations with greater strategic autonomy.
https://www.dailysabah.com/opinion/op-ed/from-berlin-1878-to-ankara-2026-turkiyes-return-to-center
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Caucasus stands firm against Israeli manipulation
BY AHMET TURAN
JUL 12, 2026
It is fitting to begin this article by recalling a sentence from my previous Daily Sabah column, which anticipated the logic of a self-fulfilling prophecy: “The next expected step from Pashinyan will be to confront the construct of the so-called Armenian genocide narrative.”
Our region is leaving behind a phase in which we have witnessed this very confrontation. What paved the way for it was Israel’s attempt to bring the so-called “Armenian genocide” issue back onto the agenda, resorting to various political ploys to overshadow the genocide it has been carrying out in Gaza.
Israeli conscience
The ministers of the genocidal Netanyahu government, which has brutally massacred more than 73,000 Palestinians in Gaza since Oct. 7, 2023, have been attempting to manufacture various artificial agendas to make the world forget the Palestinian question. One of these was Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar’s announcement that Israel had unanimously recognized the Ottoman Empire’s treatment of the Armenians as a so-called “genocide.”
This statement is particularly concerning not only for Türkiye but also for Armenia, the other direct party to the matter. That Israel, which is currently facing genocide proceedings before the International Court of Justice, claims to have “fulfilled a moral duty by recognizing a historical truth” is, to put it mildly, tragicomic.
The statement issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Türkiye reflected precisely this interpretation and did so with considerable prudence: “It lays bare the predicament in which Netanyahu and his accomplices find themselves, given the arrest warrants issued against them within the scope of the investigation conducted by the International Criminal Court into the crimes committed against the Palestinians.”
The fact that Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, who, particularly in recent months, has appeared genuinely willing to contribute to peace in the Caucasus through his realist turn in foreign policy, has all but ignored this stance by Tel Aviv lends the entire tragicomedy an air reminiscent of Bertolt Brecht’s remark: “I laugh off the things that fail to make me laugh.”
On the other hand, it should also be emphasized that Pashinyan’s realist transformation rests on strong popular support. Indeed, having reconsolidated his hold on power by winning nearly 50% of the vote in the election held roughly a month ago, it can be said that his stance has also found acceptance among the public.
Pashinyan’s response
The Yerevan government, which responded to Israel’s decision at the highest level by stating, “We see no need to respond,” has demonstrated a positive instinct in interpreting the regional dynamics, one of the tangible outcomes of the shuttle diplomacy Türkiye has pursued in recent months. The channels of dialogue that Ankara has patiently kept open have begun to resonate in Yerevan not merely at the level of rhetoric, but also in its responses during moments of crisis.
Indeed, Pashinyan’s principled statement that he “believes it is in Armenia’s interest not to become part of a process in which the so-called genocide card is used as a weapon” does not merely mark a turning point in Türkiye-Armenia relations.
The statement amounts to a declaration by the prime minister of Armenia himself that a narrative that had, for decades, served as a constitutive element of Armenian foreign-policy identity will no longer be allowed to be instrumentalized by third-party actors.
This development also constitutes a blow to what it portrays as Israel’s efforts to keep the states of the region locked in conflict in order to weaken Ankara’s influence in the Caucasus. Tel Aviv’s expectation was that this move would derail the Türkiye-Armenia normalization process and drag the region back into a spiral of tension. Yet Yerevan’s strategic silence thwarted that calculation from the very outset.
Baku’s stance
Another actor whose stance on this development was keenly awaited was Azerbaijan, the co-architect of the lasting peace being sought in the Caucasus. Baku occupies a delicate position in this equation, owing both to its strategic partnership with Türkiye, embodied in the motto “two states, one nation”, and to its energy and defense cooperation with Israel.
While Baku shares an approach similar to Yerevan’s on this matter, it chose to respond, stating that “reducing the issue to a political decision devoid of any legal or scholarly basis is unacceptable.”
In contrast to Yerevan’s strategic silence, Baku’s decision to adopt an explicit position can be read as a reflection of Azerbaijan’s determination to make its solidarity with Türkiye visible. The statement issued by the Azerbaijani Ministry of Foreign Affairs underscored that Israel’s decision deepens existing divisions and undermines efforts to establish lasting peace and stability in the region.
This move is all the more striking because it demonstrates that Baku places the regional peace architecture and its shared destiny with Ankara above all conjunctural calculations. Thus, Israel’s attempt to sow discord among the capitals of the region by instrumentalizing historical issues has been rendered ineffective in the face of both Yerevan’s composure and Baku’s open objection.
Test of will for peace
When assessed as a whole, this episode lays bare, in all its starkness, what Israel seeks to achieve: Tel Aviv is turning historical issues into political weapons in order to suppress the international repercussions of the alleged crimes against humanity committed in Gaza. Furthermore, not content with that, it is attempting to undermine the foundations of peace being built through arduous negotiations among Türkiye, Azerbaijan and Armenia. The aim is to turn the Caucasus back into a geography of tension and conflict, thereby both weakening Ankara’s growing influence in the region and diverting attention from the Gaza issue that remains at the center of the international agenda.
Yet this attempt at sedition has come to naught in the face of the prudent posture displayed by the region’s three actors. Ankara, reading the matter with diplomatic maturity, exposed Israel’s predicament before international public opinion; Yerevan, through its strategic silence, turned away the poisoned hand extended to it; and Baku, with its open objection, demonstrated that regional solidarity remains unshakable.
Here, as everywhere, the most powerful response to those who seek to sow discord through sedition has been precisely this trilateral harmony: the fact that three capitals with different sensitivities and distinct networks of relations responded to the same maneuver with the same common sense marks a turning point in the region’s diplomacy.
https://www.dailysabah.com/opinion/op-ed/caucasus-stands-firm-against-israeli-manipulation
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Trump’s “Memorandum of Surrender”: The art of the deal meets the fact of defeat
July 13, 2026
by Junaid S. Ahmad
Donald Trump is not negotiating with Iran. He is negotiating with the humiliation of having failed to break it.
Beneath the ceasefires, memoranda, podium theatrics and sanctimonious appeals to “stability” lies a fact Washington cannot admit: the United States entered this confrontation expecting submission and emerged confronting its own limits.
It wanted Iran isolated, disarmed and politically obedient. It wanted its deterrence shattered, its regional influence dismantled and its sovereignty reduced to a flag, an anthem and nothing more. It failed.
Iran endured the pressure, preserved its strategic leverage and forced the most powerful empire on earth to negotiate with the country it had promised to bring to its knees.
That is not an American victory. It is the management of an American defeat.
Real diplomacy begins when both sides recognize that the other possesses interests, rights, red lines and power. Trump’s version begins from imperial theology: Washington has interests; Israel has rights; everyone else has obligations.
American coercion is called deterrence. Israeli aggression is called self-defence. Iranian resistance is called escalation.
This is the fraud now being sold as peace in the Gulf: a ceasefire presented as capitulation, an interim agreement marketed as surrender and a renewed campaign of pressure repackaged as de-escalation.
For an empire addicted to command, the inability to compel surrender is defeat.
Trump’s response is therefore not to honor the agreement, but to hollow it out. Accept the document. Rewrite its meaning. Violate its logic. Impose new demands. Then accuse Iran of sabotaging peace. It is diplomacy by battering ram.
“Freedom of navigation” is merely the varnish.
The real demand is that Iran tolerate a hostile military order on its doorstep, surrender its principal strategic pressure point and accept that its sovereignty exists only when it is politically useless.
Iran may possess rights, provided it never exercises them. It may retain leverage, provided Washington decides when it may be used. It may remain sovereign, provided it behaves as a subordinate. This is not peace. It is coercion translated into diplomatic jargon.
The method is familiar: provoke, retaliate, moralize, escalate. Strangle the adversary economically. Threaten it militarily. Exhaust it politically. Then present concessions extracted under duress as the triumph of moderation.
In Lebanon, the American-Israeli project is to transform Israeli security doctrine into Lebanese national destiny: isolate Iran, constrain Hezbollah and call the resulting submission “sovereignty.”
In Syria, fragmentation remains useful because a sovereign, territorially coherent state would obstruct the endless manufacture of pressure points. A wounded country is easier to penetrate, divide and punish.
The region is never allowed to heal because its wounds remain profitable. Different countries. Different instruments. The same imperial objective: reverse the political reality produced by war and reconstruct the appearance of American-Israeli supremacy after its material limits have been exposed. Israel’s role is not secondary. It is central, relentless and poisonous.
Its political machinery in Washington treats any durable Iranian power as an intolerable violation of the regional hierarchy. It does not seek security in any reciprocal sense. It seeks permanent superiority: Iran contained, Lebanon vulnerable, Syria fractured and the Gulf militarized without end.
Restraint may occasionally serve American interests. Permanent confrontation serves the Israeli project.
Trump is the ideal salesman for this arrangement because his greatest political talent is not victory, but the theatrical conversion of failure into triumph.
He needs a camera, a slogan and a captive press corps. If the battlefield will not produce surrender, the press conference must counterfeit it. A document is signed. Trump declares victory. The media repeats the phrase. The coercion resumes. The performance becomes the policy.
But Iran has already achieved what Washington was determined to prevent: it survived, preserved deterrence and forced the empire to confront the limits of its power.
That is a strategic victory. Not because Iran escaped damage. Not because the confrontation was costless. But because the central American objective — submission — was denied.
Iran did not merely resist an attack. It exposed the distance between imperial spectacle and imperial capacity. It demonstrated that the United States and Israel can devastate, sanction and threaten, but cannot automatically dictate the political outcome. That is the defeat Trump is trying to disguise.
Tehran must therefore treat any agreement not as a gift from Washington, but as a battlefield whose terms remain contested. An agreement that binds only Iran while leaving the United States free to reinterpret, pressure and punish is not diplomacy. It is an ultimatum disguised as diplomacy.
Restraint without reciprocity is not prudence. It is permission. Permission to rewrite the terms. Permission to escalate without cost. Permission to demand surrender after promising peace.
The central question is not whether Trump can stage another ceremony. It is whether the United States can tear up every agreement that fails to produce obedience.
Peace cannot be built on coerced submission and renamed stability. Victory cannot be manufactured at a podium while the balance of power says otherwise.
Trump wants Iran to surrender the leverage that defeated his strategy so he can announce that he won. Iran’s task is to deny him the fiction. To preserve its rights, consolidate its gains and make clear that the empire’s declaration is not reality. It is merely an empire issuing orders to history — and discovering, once again, that history does not obey.
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260713-trumps-memorandum-of-surrender-the-art-of-the-deal-meets-the-fact-of-defeat/
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Veneer of normality developing in Syria’s Homs
CHRIS DOYLE
July 13, 2026
Syria has rarely featured in the news of late. Perhaps that is a relief. Syrians joke that, during the US-Israeli war on Iran, Syria was once again one of the safer areas in the Middle East. Visitors to Damascus have increased, including President Emmanuel Macron of France. Yet the warnings are there, as two small bombs in the heart of the capital showed.
Yet to understand the ebb and flow, the highs and lows of Syria in 2026, more must head out of Damascus. Capital bias is a frequent factor in postwar situations but it does warp a proper understanding of the situation. The center of Damascus escaped the worst of the war and has benefited from a mild revival since 2024. Diplomats and journalists, however, are travel shy. They should not be.
Syria’s third city, Homs, offers a compelling tutorial in post-Assad dynamics. At a personal level, it is the home city of my wife’s family, which has provided me with privileged insights for a non-Syrian.
Homs was, in the early years of the revolution against the Assad regime, the epicenter of opposition, the capital of the revolution. It paid a heavy price for this, as a visit to the expanded Muslim cemetery to the north of the city reveals.
As in Damascus, the center of the city wears a fake normality. Motorbikes zoom around you like a swarm of angry hornets but, for the most part, life seems superficially normal. The iconic clock tower is at the core. Everyone remembers the protests there and the infamous clock tower massacre. Only minutes after passing this sight, I was chatting with a Syrian woman who lost three male members of her family in that atrocity. “Everyone here has had family members killed, arrested or disappeared. None of us were untouched,” she said.
But cross into Khalidiya, just north of the old city, and destruction on a ferocious scale hits you. Skeletal corpses of buildings have you questioning your assumptions about gravity. How do they still stand? A row of shops at ground level conduct normal trade, yet all the floors above them are mangled steel and concrete. At what point will it all come tumbling down?
Most of Homs can see the Gardenia Towers or, as they have come to be known in the city, “the death towers.” These were unfinished building sites in 2011 but, for the regime’s forces, they had a macabre function. From there, they could lob shells down into the city and snipe passers-by at will. What happened to these soldiers? How can they live with themselves?
On the main road out west, a series of homes have just been demolished. It was Hezbollah that built these without permits. They will now make way for a redevelopment of the area of Al-Waer. The Lebanese group did so much to destroy Al-Waer, which endured one of the most inhuman sieges in the war years.
Yet, as much as the city has been physically reshaped, it has also been reshaped demographically. Having travelled there since 1990, I had known it as a peaceful city, one where different communities coexisted. The largest Christmas tree in the Middle East decorated its center. Muslims would celebrate Christian feast days and vice versa.
This has been upended. Many fled the city, typically to Lebanon. Some have returned but many are not prepared to do so yet. In their place, I hear that many have come from Idlib in the northwest and are looking to stay. Where once everyone knew and trusted their neighbors, a miasma of distrust now pervades the city.
Homs has two Alawi areas. They have faced struggles even after the departure of the Assad regime. These areas are surrounded by security checkpoints and frequent security operations. Suspicion remains on all sides.
It is a mixed picture. The green shoots of recovery are slowly emerging but it is a long and challenging road ahead. Electricity is not yet plentiful but there has been a massive improvement on the one to two hours a day of a few years ago. Fuel is available most days. The major refinery at Homs is again belching out fumes, with long queues of tankers at the ready. Some of that fuel is again coming from Syria’s oil fields to the east. Expatriate Syrians are slowly coming back to visit families this summer, no doubt bringing a small injection of funds.
Yet it remains a cash economy. Syrians have to carry thick wads of cash to pay for necessities. Credit cards are forbidden, at least until US sanctions are fully lifted. Unemployment remains high, though several sectors of the economy are picking up. The rains this year have been decent, so many are returning to work in the agricultural sector, which, in the years of civil strife, had been largely abandoned.
Many want to be positive. We saw wedding parties. At one point, nobody celebrated anything. Crowds hover around giant screens to watch the World Cup. Cafes buzz. A veneer of normality is a start, even if it has shaky and vulnerable foundations.
https://www.arabnews.com/node/2650759
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Netanyahu’s real strategy for Gaza
DR. RAMZY BAROUD
July 13, 2026
Here is the bottom line: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has no intention of ordering an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, either before his country’s general election — likely to be held in October — or after. Conceding an inch from the roughly 70 percent of the territory his army currently occupies would be considered a weakness by most Israeli voters and would result in an open revolt within his extremist coalition.
He has made his intentions clear time and again. Recent statements by Israel’s political leadership have only reinforced that reality, with officials insisting that Tel Aviv must maintain indefinite military dominance over the Strip and explicitly rejecting any framework that requires a full withdrawal of troops. To Netanyahu, the military footprint in Gaza is a permanent fixture, not a temporary bargaining chip.
Some may argue that Netanyahu’s statements are merely political fodder aimed at prolonging his career and avoiding the disastrous outcomes awaiting him — in terms of state investigations and court trials — should he be ejected from power. However, his extremist policies, outlined throughout his entire career at the helm of Israeli politics, say otherwise. There has never been a period in Netanyahu’s history in which he showed a genuine willingness to compromise or engage in an authentic political process with the Palestinians.
This reduces the Washington-led Board of Peace and its subsequent administrative bodies to near irrelevance. These entities — including the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza and a multinational International Stabilization Force — were supposedly assembled with the sole aim of managing a transitional phase, delivering humanitarian aid and deploying a peacekeeping buffer to facilitate a gradual Israeli military withdrawal.
It seems that two separate, irreconcilable tracks are taking shape. One is the Israeli track of continued war, entrenched military occupation and prolonged genocide. The other is an international track, firmly controlled by the US, aimed largely at finding alternative ways to manage Gaza on behalf of Israel.
Yet, even with its obvious limitations, the Gaza plan promises a phased Israeli military repositioning, a sustainable ceasefire, a massive influx of reconstruction aid and the gradual handover of civil administration to a nonfactional Palestinian authority. Little of that has been delivered. While the US and international envoys claim the ceasefire hinges on Hams’ disarmament, Israel has used the diplomatic deadlock to advance its troops further into the Strip. Aid remains choked at the borders and the promised reconstruction has not begun.
Indirect talks are ongoing in Cairo, though it seems that only Palestinians are being held accountable or are expected to make heavy concessions. Moreover, after 19 years of Hamas governing Gaza, the movement announced last week that it had officially dissolved the emergency committee that was administering the Strip. The movement declared its full readiness to transfer governance to the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza.
On paper, this suggests that a political transition is finally underway. In reality, no such transition is taking place.
Israel is preventing this technocratic government from assuming any real duties. Rather than facilitating a civil handover, the Israeli Cabinet has dismissed the transition. Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar labeled the move a “trick,” arguing that a technocratic administration would merely be responsible for municipal tasks like garbage collection, while allowing resistance networks to persist.
Instead, Israel’s military strategy continues to fuel conditions that undermine any possibility of stabilizing the devastated Strip. Its objective is not merely to reject an alternative Palestinian administration but to ensure that no functioning Palestinian governing authority can emerge at all. By doing so, Tel Aviv wants to create a permanent governance vacuum, sowing further chaos and fragmentation.
If no alternative Palestinian political body is permitted to stabilize Gaza, the default collapse will inevitably force local factions to reassert control over daily survival, thus giving Israel the continued pretense to exact more punishment on a helpless population.
Following Hamas’ political move, Israel responded with its standard currency: immediate violence. This was starkly illustrated last Thursday, when Israeli forces carried out a targeted airstrike on a vehicle in Gaza City in a failed attempt to assassinate Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem. This attack sent a clear message that Israel has no intention of respecting political transformations or ceasefires.
While no houses are being built, no schools are being constructed and no hospitals are being revived, the only numbers that keep growing are those of the dead and wounded. The human cost has reached unfathomable proportions: the Palestinian death toll in Gaza has surpassed 73,000, with the number of wounded exceeding 173,200. Tragically, these numbers continue to climb daily: more than 1,098 Palestinians have been killed since the so-called ceasefire framework was initially agreed, proving that the truce exists only in media rhetoric, not on the ground.
This leaves us with a single, inescapable conclusion: the political track aimed at reconstructing Gaza and ending the Israeli military presence has little bearing on the grim realities unfolding on the ground.
The only way out is a stronger, more independent international will that wrestles the future of Gaza from the grip of Netanyahu, translating political agreements into immediate humanitarian outcomes and a definitive end to the Israeli occupation.
Until Israel is compelled to relinquish its military control over Gaza, every new committee, reconstruction mechanism or diplomatic initiative risks becoming little more than political theater.
https://www.arabnews.com/node/2650758
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Yemen Targets Abha Airport after Saudi Strike: Ansarallah Warns of Escalation
July 14, 2026
Key Developments
Yemen’s Armed Forces ‘struck Abha International Airport with ballistic missiles and drones’ in response to Saudi airstrikes.
Brigadier General Yahya Saree warned airlines to avoid Saudi airspace until the blockade on Sanaa International Airport ends.
Thousands of Yemenis rallied in Sanaa, while military media released footage identifying strategic Saudi infrastructure as potential future targets.
Retaliatory Strike Follows Saudi Attack on Sanaa Airport
The Yemeni Armed Forces, affiliated with the Ansarallah movement, announced on Monday that they had carried out a retaliatory military operation against Saudi Arabia after Saudi warplanes targeted Sanaa International Airport earlier in the day.
In a televised statement, Ansarallah military spokesman Brigadier General Yahya Saree said Yemeni forces launched several ballistic missiles and drones at Abha International Airport in southwestern Saudi Arabia, describing the operation as a direct response to the Saudi aggression against Yemen’s main civilian airport.
Saree said the military operation had achieved its intended objectives, adding that Yemeni forces also engaged Saudi coalition aircraft involved in the strikes on Sanaa.
According to the spokesman, Saudi warplanes launched multiple airstrikes on Sanaa International Airport at approximately 1:54 PM local time in an attempt to halt humanitarian flights transporting patients and stranded civilians.
He accused Saudi Arabia of deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure and attempting to reinforce the blockade imposed on Yemen.
Warning to Saudi Arabia and International Airlines
Saree said Saudi Arabia bears full responsibility for the consequences of its latest military action.
He argued that the attack on Sanaa International Airport marked a dangerous escalation and warned that Yemen would continue taking military measures until the blockade was lifted.
The spokesman also issued a warning to international airlines, urging them to avoid Saudi airspace.
He said civilian carriers should suspend flights over Saudi Arabia until restrictions on Sanaa International Airport are removed, emphasizing that the warning should be taken seriously.
Saree reaffirmed that Yemen’s Armed Forces remain committed to ending the blockade and confronting what he described as ongoing aggression against the country.
Thanks to Iran, Support Demonstrations
The Yemeni military spokesman thanked the Islamic Republic of Iran for what he described as its assistance in helping break the blockade on Sanaa International Airport through humanitarian flights carrying patients and civilians.
He also praised mass demonstrations held in Sanaa and other parts of Yemen, saying they reflected broad public support for the country’s military response and determination to end the blockade.
Thousands of people gathered in Al-Sabeen Square in the Yemeni capital, condemning the Saudi attack on Sanaa International Airport and expressing support for the Armed Forces following the retaliatory strike on Abha.
Demonstrators also voiced appreciation for Iran’s role in facilitating humanitarian flights to and from Sanaa despite ongoing restrictions.
Strategic Saudi Infrastructure Identified
Separately, Yemeni Military Media released a video entitled ‘The Response Is Coming,’ highlighting a number of strategic Saudi airports, ports and energy facilities.
The footage identified King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh, King Abdulaziz International Airport in Jeddah, King Fahd International Airport in Dammam, Jazan Port, Jeddah Islamic Port, King Fahd Industrial Port and the Ras Tanura oil refinery and export complex.
While the video did not explicitly state that each facility would be targeted, it presented them as strategic locations within the reach of Yemen’s missile and drone capabilities.
The release of the footage was widely interpreted as a warning that continued attacks on Yemeni civilian infrastructure could expose key Saudi economic and transportation facilities to future military operations.
https://www.palestinechronicle.com/yemen-targets-abha-airport-after-saudi-strike-ansarallah-warns-of-escalation/
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Why Did You Leave the Horse Alone? A Literary Reportage from Gaza
July 14, 2026
By Hani al-Salmy
In times of war, people do not leave their homes the way they leave for a picnic or a business trip. They depart carrying a shared illusion that their absence will be brief. Some lock the front door and slip the key into their pocket like a talisman promising return. Others leave cups of tea still warm on the table, their steam rising like suspended hope. Children’s toys remain asleep on their beds, certain that the laughter of their owners will return before sunset.
But war is a ravenous creature. It keeps no appointments and grants no walls the chance to bid farewell to those who built their lives within them.
After years of displacement and wandering, the old question—”Where do you live?”—no longer matters. It has been replaced by a sharper, more haunting one:
“What did you leave behind?”
What precious thing remained there, guarding your memories, becoming the invisible nail that pierces your heart each time you close your eyes?
In this literary reportage, we meet people whose souls never truly left the places they fled. Men, women, children, and elders speak of the dearest things they were forced to abandon, until it seems that the abandoned objects are the ones still inhabiting them—not the other way around.
Ahmed Abu Ouda, 9
Al-Shati Refugee Camp, Gaza
When Childhood Becomes a Tin Toy Car
“I did not leave my toy behind. I left the child I used to be.”
I did not leave behind a plastic toy. I left my entire childhood nailed to the small room that overlooked our lemon tree—the tree whose morning shadow gently reached my bed at sunrise.
My little red toy car always stood proudly beneath the bed. Every night before I fell asleep, I whispered to its tiny rubber wheels, “Tomorrow we’ll race again, all the way to the end of the hallway.”
Then came the day we fled.
Panic swallowed every corner of the house. I crawled beneath the bed searching for my car while darkness and explosions filled the room. My mother was crying as she hurriedly dressed my baby sister, putting her shoes on the wrong feet. My father shouted in a voice I had never heard before that the shells were getting closer and that we had to leave immediately.
I ran toward the door. My body moved forward, but my heart kept turning back. Again and again, I looked behind me, waiting for a miracle—as though my little car might understand what was happening, roll after me on its own, and leap into the pocket of the raincoat I was wearing.
In the displacement camp, I tried to outsmart loss. I fashioned another car from an empty tin can and a piece of wire. It could roll, but it was silent. It did not know the sound of our tiled floor. It carried none of the scent of my mother calling me in for lunch while I was still playing outside.
Today, when I look at my hands, roughened by cold and hardship, I realize that I did not leave behind a toy. I left behind the child I once was. Since that day, I have been living in the body of a nine-year-old, carrying the weariness of an old man.
Layan al-Masri, 11
Deir Al-Balah Refugee Camp
“Ward”: A Doll Frozen in Time
“War does not steal objects alone. It steals our ability to believe that beautiful things can last.”
My bed stood in the brightest corner of the room, beside the window where the first thread of morning sunlight gently touched the face of my cloth doll. Every day, she sat patiently on my pillow, as though waiting for me to comb her soft yellow yarn hair before I put on my school uniform and hurried off to class.
I called her Ward—Rose.
She was never just a doll. She was the keeper of my secrets. I told her about my friends, about the teacher who praised my handwriting, and about the flowered dress my father had promised to buy me for Eid.
When the bombing began to shake our neighborhood, my mother hurriedly packed a small bag of clothes and whispered, trying to sound calm, “We’ll be back in a few days. This nightmare will soon be over.”
So I left Ward sleeping peacefully beneath her blanket. I didn’t want her to get dirty on the road.
Days became months. Seasons passed. I grew older in displacement camps where childhood disappeared too quickly. Yet my doll remained there, forever imprisoned in the age I left behind.
On cold nights, I imagine her covered with dust and ash, or perhaps still sitting on my pillow with her eyes open, faithfully watching the door, believing that one day I will unlock it and come home.
War taught me a lesson far too early. It did not take away a cloth doll stuffed with cotton. It stole something far greater—the innocent certainty that beautiful things can remain where we leave them, untouched by absence and untouched by fire.
Um Mohamed Abu Zeid, 74
Jabaliya Refugee Camp
A Lifetime Confined Within Wood
“I left no glittering gold behind.”
I left no glittering gold behind, for we sold it piece by piece years ago to educate our sons, marry off our daughters, and build walls to shelter them. Nor did I leave luxurious furniture to weep over, for whatever is crafted from wood, time can fashion anew.
But what tears at my heart whenever I close my eyes is that I left behind a small wooden box—antique in appearance, inherited from my mother like a sacred trust passed down through generations.
That box held within it an entire geography of our souls: old black-and-white photographs of faces that have long departed us; letters woven with the language of longing, written to me by my husband during the years of our youth, before our marriage; the birth certificate of my firstborn son, my deed of passage into motherhood; and a soft lock of hair I kept from the day my first granddaughter entered this world with her first cry.
I used to open this box during holidays and family gatherings, like someone opening a cabinet of wonders, telling the children gathered around me the story behind every paper and the secret held within every small keepsake.
When the shells of displacement rained down upon us, it never occurred to me to carry it. We were gripped by the illusion that we would return in only a few days.
Now, amid the dust of exile, I feel that my entire life—with all its joys and sorrows—remains confined within that small wooden box. It is as though my memory itself was uprooted from my body and chose to dwell there instead.
I live far from it.
And it lives as a stranger to me.
Hani Al-Salmi, 48
Khan Yunis Refugee Camp
The Ink of a Life Left Between Shelves
“I left my library behind.”
Those shelves stretching across the walls were never merely wood supporting paper and ink. They were my autobiography, written without my ever intending to write it.
In the margin of every book, there is a note I penciled down in a moment of revelation. Between the pages sleeps a dried rose I once picked from an old garden, or a newspaper clipping preserving a story that inspired me, or the first seed of an idea for a novel that came to me unexpectedly one night and has yet to be completed.
There, between those covers, I left secret manuscripts that never saw the light, letters filled with affection from readers who crossed my path, dedications written by writers and friends I cherished, and photographs of me smiling after book-signing ceremonies that now seem to belong to another lifetime.
When the hour of forced departure arrived, I carried nothing but a small, meager bag. Saving one’s soul in a homeland consumed by fire was far heavier than carrying paper.
But ever since that terrible day, I have felt that a part of my language, and of the way I understood the world itself, remained crucified there between those shelves—shelves that understood me and recognized the contours of my anxieties better than I knew them myself.
War, in all its brutality, does not merely burn paper and books. It strives to burn the collective and individual memory written upon them.
Yet my only consolation is this: words born from blood do not die. They know how to survive. They know how to be born again in the heart of their author.
Noor Khalil, 23
Rafah Refugee Camp
The Wedding Dress and the Scent of Beginnings
“Barely four months after my wedding, I left behind a life that had barely begun.”
Barely four months had passed since my marriage. I was still arranging the details of our little home with the innocent excitement of a child painting her first masterpiece, as though an entire lifetime stood waiting for us just beyond the front door.
I chose the curtains with great care so they would soften the morning light. I planted a jasmine sapling on the balcony so our home would breathe its fragrance. I hung my white wedding dress inside a wooden wardrobe that still carried the scent of new beginnings.
One evening, I whispered to my husband that I would keep the dress untouched until the day our future daughter would see it.
When the bombardment shattered our quiet life, there was no time to think about the dress or the furniture we had chosen piece by piece.
In the darkness and panic, I searched for only one thing:
My husband’s hand.
Fear drove us toward the unknown, and our home remained behind us, locked like a story interrupted before it could reach its ending—a poem whose final verse was never written.
What returns to me in dreams is not the dress itself, nor the furniture that may now lie beneath the rubble.
It is the scent of those first beginnings.
The fragrance that filled every room and made me believe I was finally safe.
Now I understand that this cursed war did not merely postpone our lives.
It suspended our honeymoon, our hopes, and our most tender dreams between two unfamiliar walls in a displacement camp—walls that do not know our names, and that cannot tell us whether our home still stands guarding our memories, or whether it has already become dust.
Youssef Abu Shanab, 26
Al-Shati Refugee Camp
The Possibility Buried Behind a Window
“War buries not only people, but also the lives they might have lived.”
She was not my beloved in the usual sense of the word. Nor was I her secret admirer writing love poems beneath the light of a lamp.
We simply exchanged quiet morning greetings—brief moments filled with awkwardness—as though the narrow alley between our houses understood, without either of us speaking, that a story waited there, patiently postponing itself until one of us found the courage to begin it.
Every morning she stepped onto her balcony to sprinkle water over the jasmine flowers. Every morning I found another excuse to open my own window a few minutes earlier than necessary, pretending to admire the sky while stealing a glance at the face that had somehow become my definition of reassurance.
I never wrote her a letter. I never touched her hand. But I memorized the exact hour she appeared each morning with greater precision than I ever memorized the days of the week.
On the terrible morning of displacement, her balcony stood empty. The jasmine swayed beneath the weight of smoke.
I left with my family, driven by fear and by the sound of screams.
To this day, I do not know whether she fled before I did or remained behind beneath the roof of the house where I first learned what silent love looked like. What I left behind was never merely the walls of my home.
I left behind the one possibility that might have changed the course of my life—the possibility that one day I might become her husband, and the father of children who carried something of her face.
War does not kill lovers with bombs alone.
Its cruelest crime is that it kills the tender stories life never had the chance to begin.
Samer Al-Attar, 45
Deir Al-Balah
The Classroom That Still Waits
“I did not leave behind a school. I left behind forty waiting seats.”
Before taking my final step across the threshold, I quietly closed the classroom door, just as I had done at the end of every ordinary school day.
The students’ notebooks still lay scattered across their desks. White chalk dust lingered along the edges of the blackboard, preserving the remnants of an unfinished lesson about the tools needed to build the future.
The sirens arrived before the school bell ever could. I knew the names of all forty of my students by heart. I knew whose voice trembled when reading aloud, who loved books, who was too shy to raise a hand. And who needed a word of kindness far more than another perfect mark in the grade book.
When displacement swept us away, I felt something inside me tear apart.
It was as though I had abandoned forty orphaned seats, still faithfully waiting for the children who would never return to claim them.
Today, I do not miss the building of stone and concrete. I ache instead for the echo of children’s laughter filling those narrow hallways and breathing life into the walls.
War does not destroy schools with shells alone. It destroys, inside every child, the long and fragile years needed to believe that tomorrow is worth preparing for—and that the future is something still worth learning.
Fouad al-Masri, 53
Khan Younis Refugee Camp
The Birds I Set Free
“Sometimes the greatest act of love is opening the cage.”
For more than twenty years, I raised rare and colorful birds. Some were gifts from dear friends, wrapped in affection. Others I bought only after months of saving from my daily earnings.
I knew every voice among them. Even blindfolded, I could have recognized each bird by its song.
Every morning, they welcomed the sunrise before I did.
Their chorus filled the house so completely that it seemed the dawn itself took its cue from their singing. On the day displacement reached our neighborhood, I did not hesitate.
I opened every cage.
There was no way I could carry them with me through the chaos, and I could not bear the thought of them dying slowly from hunger or burning alive behind iron bars.
I stood there, caught between tears and wonder, watching them disappear into the gray sky. I did not know whether they would survive in freedom or perish beneath falling shrapnel.
For years, I comforted myself with the old saying that birds were created to fly free. Yet my heart has remained tied to those disappearing wings ever since.
Today, whenever I hear the song of a passing bird outside the refugee camp, my heart begins to flutter.
And I still ask myself, with the innocence of a child:
Could this be one of mine?
https://www.palestinechronicle.com/why-did-you-leave-the-horse-alone-a-literary-reportage-from-gaza/
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Two Years after Deif’s Assassination: Resistance Honors Architect of Al-Aqsa Flood
July 13, 2026
Hamas Marks Second Anniversary
The Palestinian Resistance Movement Hamas commemorated on Monday the second anniversary of the assassination of Mohammed al-Deif, the longtime commander of its military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, describing him as one of the most influential figures in the history of the Palestinian resistance.
Although Deif was killed in an Israeli airstrike on July 13, 2024, Hamas did not officially announce his death until January 30, 2025, stating at the time that the delay was related to security and military considerations.
In a statement marking the anniversary, Hamas described Deif as an “exemplary and unparalleled” leader who devoted his life to the Palestinian cause and played a defining role in developing the movement’s military capabilities over four decades.
The movement said his legacy continues to inspire Palestinian resistance fighters despite his death, describing his assassination as a loss that had strengthened rather than diminished the movement’s determination.
From Refugee Camp to Al-Qassam Commander
Mohammed Diab Ibrahim al-Masri, widely known by his nom de guerre Mohammed Deif, was born in 1965 to a Palestinian refugee family in Khan Yunis after his family was displaced during the 1948 Nakba.
While studying science at the Islamic University of Gaza, he became active in student, religious and charitable work before joining Hamas during the First Intifada in 1989.
Israeli occupation forces arrested him that same year, holding him for approximately 18 months without trial.
Following his release, Deif became increasingly involved in the military organization of the Al-Qassam Brigades. During the 1990s, he helped establish Hamas’ military infrastructure in the occupied West Bank before returning to Gaza.
In 2002, following the assassination of Salah Shehadeh, Deif assumed command of the Al-Qassam Brigades, a position he held for more than two decades.
Under his leadership, Hamas significantly expanded its military organization, developing command structures, weapons production and operational capabilities that became central to the movement’s strategy.
A Figure Shrouded in Secrecy
Throughout his years in command, Deif maintained an exceptionally low public profile.
Only a handful of images of him ever emerged publicly, and for many years he appeared only through audio messages or heavily obscured video recordings, earning him a reputation as one of the most elusive figures in the Palestinian resistance.
Israeli intelligence repeatedly identified him as one of its highest-priority targets.
Between 2001 and 2014, Israel carried out multiple assassination attempts against him.
Several of those attacks left him seriously wounded, including injuries that reportedly affected his vision and mobility.
One of the most devastating attempts occurred during Israel’s 2014 military offensive on Gaza, when an airstrike killed his wife and two of his children. His extended family also suffered heavy losses during Israel’s war on Gaza following October 2023.
Associated with Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa Flood
Deif became closely associated with the defense of Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa Mosque.
His public warnings during the Sheikh Jarrah crisis in 2021, when Palestinian families faced forced displacement from the occupied East Jerusalem neighborhood, elevated his profile beyond Gaza and made him a symbol for many Palestinians participating in protests across historic Palestine.
His most widely known public appearance came on October 7, 2023, when an audio message announced the launch of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.
In that address, Deif stated that the operation was intended as a response to years of Israeli occupation, attacks on Al-Aqsa Mosque, settlement expansion and violations of Palestinian rights.
The speech became one of the defining moments of the conflict that followed.
Hamas Says His Legacy Endures
In Monday’s statement, Hamas credited Deif with transforming the Al-Qassam Brigades from a relatively small armed organization into a disciplined and organized military force.
The movement portrayed him as the principal architect of its military doctrine, saying his strategic planning shaped many of its operations over the past two decades.
Hamas also stated that Deif became “a nightmare” for Israel’s security establishment because of his ability to evade repeated assassination attempts while overseeing the continued development of the Brigades.
The statement concluded that his death would not mark the end of his influence, asserting that his legacy would continue to guide the resistance.
It described his blood and sacrifices as “fuel” for the ongoing struggle, while expressing confidence that future generations would continue what it characterized as the path he helped build.
https://www.palestinechronicle.com/two-years-after-deifs-assassination-resistance-recalls-architect-of-al-aqsa-flood/
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