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Worldnews

Israel Bombs Gaza Cafe, School And Aid Hubs, Killing 95 Palestinians

Israeli navy struck a seaside cafe in Gaza City killing at least 39 people, including journalist Ismail Abu Hatab. Israeli forces have bombed a cafe, a school and food distribution sites in the Gaza Strip, killing at least 95 Palestinians, and attacked a hospital, wounding several more people. At least 62 of the victims of Monday’s attacks were in Gaza City and the north of the territory. The figure includes 39 people who were killed in an Israeli strike on a seaside cafe, Al-Baqa cafeteria, in northern Gaza City. Dozens more were wounded. Among the dead was Journalist Ismail Abu Hatab, as well as women and children who had gathered at the cafe. One witness said Israeli fighter jets carried out the strike. “We found people torn apart,” said Yahya Sharif. “This place wasn’t affliated with anyone, no politics and not military association whatsoever. It was packed with people including children for a birthday party.” The bombing flattened the cafe and left a huge crater in the ground. Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud, reporting from Gaza City, said the attack on the cafe occurred “without any warning”. “This area serves as a refuge for many traumatised and displaced people, offering some relief from the oppressive heat of the tents. The bloodstains are still everywhere given the intensity of the explosion. Some of the bodies and pieces of flesh were collected from the flood of this place,” he added. Also on Monday, Israeli forces bombed the Yafa school in Gaza City that was sheltering hundreds of displaced Palestinians. Hamada Abu Jaradeh, who fled ahead of the attack, said displaced Palestinians received a five minute warning to evacuate. “We don’t know what to do and where to go. We have been let down by the entire world for more than 630 days. Death is with us and around us every day,” Abu Jaradeh said. In central Gaza, Israeli forces also attacked the courtyard of Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir el-Balah, where thousands of families had sought shelter. Videos circulating online and verified by Al Jazeera showed chaos at the hospital, with people fleeing for safety as tents sheltering displaced families appeared damaged by the attack. Al Jazeera’s Tareq Abu Azzoum, reporting from the scene of the hospital attack, said the army did not issue “any warnings” before the “huge explosion”. “The site of the attack is about 10 metres [33ft] from our broadcast point. This is not the first time the hospital’s courtyard has been attacked. At least 10 times, this facility has been squarely targeted by Israeli forces,” Abu Azzoum said. “It’s a staggering concentration of attacks on medical facilities, adding further burden on barely functioning hospitals.” In a statement, Gaza’s Government Media Office decried the attack by Israel, calling it a “systematic crime” against the Palestinian enclave’s health system. “Its warplanes bombed a tent for the displaced inside the walls of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, resulting in injuries at the site of the bombing, material damage, and directly threatening the lives of dozens of patients,” it said. Israel has repeatedly targeted dozens of hospitals during its 22-month war on Gaza. Human rights groups and United Nations-backed experts have accused Israel of systematically destroying the enclave’s healthcare system. In southern Gaza, an Israel air attack killed least 15 Palestinians waving for food at aid distribution hubs run by the controversial United States- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) in Khan Younis, according to sources at Nasser Medical Complex. Fifty people were also wounded in the attack. They are the latest victims in a wave of daily carnage at these sites that have killed nearly 600 Palestinians since GHF took over limited aid deliveries in Gaza in late May amid a crippling Israeli blockade. The Israeli military acknowledged on Monday that Palestinian civilians were harmed at the aid distribution centres, saying that instructions had been issued to forces following “lessons learned” and firing incidents were under review. This follows the Israeli news outlet, Haaretz, reporting that soldiers operating near the aid sites in Gaza have been deliberately firing upon Palestinians. According to the Haaretz report, which quoted unnamed Israeli soldiers, troops were told to fire at the crowds of Palestinians and use unnecessary lethal force against people who appeared to pose no threat. Israeli forces are also carrying out home demolitions in Khan Younis, raising fears of a new ground invasion. The Israeli military, meanwhile, has issued more forced evacuation threats to Palestinians in large districts in the northern Gaza Strip, where Israeli forces had operated before and left behind wide-scale destruction, forcing a new wave of displacement. “Explosions never stopped; they bombed schools and homes. It felt like earthquakes,” said Salah, 60, a father of five children, from Gaza City. “In the news, we hear a ceasefire is near. On the ground, we see death and we hear explosions.” Israeli tanks pushed into the eastern areas of Zeitoun suburb in Gaza City and shelled several areas in the north, while aircraft bombed at least four schools after ordering hundreds of families sheltering inside to leave, residents said. Gaza’s health authorities said at least 10 people were killed in attacks on Zeitoun and at least 13 were killed southwest of Gaza City. More than 80 percent of Gaza is now an Israeli-militarised zone or under forced displacement orders, according to the United Nations. The attacks come as Israeli officials, including Israel’s Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, were due in Washington, DC for a new ceasefire push by the administration of US President Donald Trump. Key mediator Qatar has confirmed that there are serious US intentions to push for a return to negotiations, but there are complications, according to a Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesman. The spokesman said that it has become difficult to accept the continued human losses in the Gaza Strip, warning that the continued link between the humanitarian and military aspects in Gaza cannot be accepted. The talks in the White House are also expected to cover Iran, and possible wider regional diplomatic deals. In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet was expected to convene to discuss the next steps in Gaza. On Friday, Israel’s military chief said the present ground operation was close to having achieved its goals, and on Sunday, Netanyahu claimed new opportunities had opened up for recovering the captives, 20 of whom are believed to still be alive. Palestinian and Egyptian sources with knowledge of the latest ceasefire efforts also said that mediators Qatar and Egypt have stepped up their contacts with the two sides, but that no date has been set yet for a new round of truce talks. Meanwhile, senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan said in a statement on Monday that there has been no news from Israel regarding a ceasefire for four weeks. “We are determined to seek a ceasefire that will save our people, and we are working with mediators to open the crossings,” Hamdan said. Follow Al Jazeera English:...

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Worldnews

Donald Trump Live: US Senate Votes On Amendments To Big, Beautiful Bill

Democrats have criticised Republican president’s revised budget for its cuts to social welfare spending and its tax benefits for the wealthy. Trump’s ‘big, beautiful’ but controversial bill faces crucial vote Follow Al Jazeera English:...

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Worldnews

Putin Confirms He Wants All Of Ukraine, As Europe Steps Up Military Aid

Trump made no pledge of assistance to Ukraine at last week’s NATO summit, but said he’d ‘try’ and sell it Patriot interceptors. Ukraine’s European allies pledged increased levels of military aid to Ukraine this year, making up for a United States aid freeze, as Russian President Vladimir Putin reaffirmed his ambition to absorb all of Ukraine into the Russian Federation. “At this moment, the Europeans and the Canadians have pledged, for this year, $35bn in military support to Ukraine,” said NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte ahead of the alliance’s annual summit, which took place in The Hague on Tuesday and Wednesday, June 24-25. “Last year, it was just over $50bn for the full year. Now, before we reach half year, it is already at $35bn. And there are even others saying it’s already close to $40bn,” he added. The increase in European aid partly made up for the absence of any military aid offers so far from the Trump administration. In April, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy offered to buy the US Patriot air defence systems Ukraine needs to fend off daily missile and drone attacks. The Trump administration made its first sale of weapons to Ukraine the following month, but only of F-16 aircraft parts. At The Hague this week, Zelenskyy said he discussed those Patriot systems with Trump. At a news conference on Wednesday, Trump said: “We’re going to see if we can make some available,” referring to interceptors for existing Patriot systems in Ukraine. “They’re very hard to get. We need them too, and we’ve been supplying them to Israel,” he said. Russia has made a ceasefire conditional on Ukraine’s allies stopping the flow of weapons to it and Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov repeated that condition on Saturday. On June 20, Vladimir Putin revealed that his ambition to annex all of Ukraine had not abated. “I have said many times that the Russian and Ukrainian people are one nation, in fact. In this sense, all of Ukraine is ours,” he declared at a media conference to mark the opening of the Saint Petersburg Economic Forum on Friday, June 20. “But you know we have an old parable, an old rule: wherever a Russian soldier steps, it is ours.” “Wherever a Russian soldier steps, he brings only death, destruction, and devastation,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said the next day. In a post on the Telegram messaging platform on June 21, Zelenskyy wrote that Putin had “spoken completely openly”. “Yes, he wants all of Ukraine,” he said. “He is also speaking about Belarus, the Baltic states, Moldova, the Caucasus, countries like Kazakhstan.” German army planners agreed about Putin’s expansionism, deeming Russia an “existential threat” in a new strategy paper 18 months in the making, leaked to Der Spiegel news magazine last week. Moscow was preparing its military leadership and defence industries “specifically to meet the requirements for a large-scale conflict against NATO by the end of this decade”, the paper said. “We in Germany ignored the warnings of our Baltic neighbours about Russia for too long. We have recognised this mistake,” said German chancellor Friedrich Merz on Tuesday, highlighting the reason for an about-turn from his two predecessors’ refusal to spend more on defence. “There is no going back from this realisation. We cannot expect the world around us to return to calmer times in the near future,” he added. Germany, along with other European NATO allies, agreed on Wednesday to raise defence spending to 5 percent of gross domestic product by 2035. It was a sign of the increasingly common threat perception from Russia, but also a big win for Trump, who had demanded that level of spending shortly after winning re-election as US president last year. Of that, 1.5 percent is for military-related spending like dual-purpose infrastructure, emergency healthcare, cybersecurity and civic resilience. Even Trump, who has previously expressed admiration for Putin, seemed to be souring on him. “I consider him a person that’s, I think, been misguided,” he said after a moment’s thought at his NATO news conference. “I’m very surprised actually. I thought we would have had that settled easy,” referring to the conflict in Ukraine. “Vladimir Putin really has to end that war,” he said. In the early weeks of his administration, Trump appeared to think it was up to Ukraine to end the war. Putin continued his ground war during the week of the NATO summit, launching approximately 200 assaults each day, according to Ukraine’s General Staff – a high average. Ukraine, itself, was fighting 695,000 Russian troops on its territory, said Zelenskyy on Saturday, with another 52,000 attempting to create a new front in Sumy, northeast Ukraine. “This week they advanced 200 metres towards Sumy, and we pushed them back 200–400 metres,” he said, a battle description typical of the stagnation Russian troops face along the thousand-kilometre front. Russia continued its campaign of demoralisation among Ukrainian civilians, sending drones and missiles into Ukraine’s cities. Russian drones and missiles killed 30 civilians and injured 172 in Kyiv on June 19. “This morning I was at the scene of a Russian missile hitting a house in Kyiv,” said Zelenskyy. “An ordinary apartment building. The missile went through all the floors to the basement. Twenty-three people were killed by just one Russian strike.” “There was no military sense in this strike, it added absolutely nothing to Russia militarily,” he said. Overnight, Russia attacked Odesa, Kharkiv and their suburbs with more than 20 strike drones. At least 10 of the drones struck Odesa. A four-storey building engulfed in flames partly collapsed on top of rescue workers, injuring three firefighters. A drone attack on Kyiv killed at least seven people on Monday this week. “There were 352 drones in total, and 16 missiles,” said Zelenskyy, including “ballistics from North Korea”. A Russian drone strike on the Dnipropetrovsk region on Tuesday killed 20 people and injured nearly 300, according to the regional military administration. Ukraine, too, is focused on long-range weapons production. Five of its drones attacked the Shipunov Instrument Design Bureau in Tula on June 18 and 20. Shipunov is a key developer of high-precision weapons for the Russian armed forces, said Ukraine, and the strikes damaged the plant’s warehouses and administration building, causing it to halt production. “Thousands of drones have been launched toward Moscow in recent months,” revealed Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin last week, adding that air defences had shot almost all of them down. But Ukraine is constantly improving designs and increasing production. On Monday, the United Kingdom announced that Ukraine would be providing its drone manufacturers with “technology datasets from Ukraine’s front line” to improve the design of British-made drones that would be shipped to Ukraine. “Ukraine is the world leader in drone design and execution, with drone technology evolving, on average, every six weeks,” the announcement from Downing Street said. On the same day, Norway said it would invert that relationship, to produce surface drones in Ukraine using Norwegian technology. Zelenskyy said this Build with Ukraine programme, in which Ukraine and its allies share financing, technology and production capacity, would ultimately work for missile production in Ukraine as well. His goal is ambitious. “We want 0.25 percent of the GDP of a particular partner state to be allocated for our defence industry for domestic production next year,” he said. Among Ukraine’s projects is a domestically produced ballistic missile, the Sapsan, which can carry a 480kg warhead for a distance of 500km – enough to reach halfway to Moscow from Ukraine’s front line. Asked whether the Sapsan could reach Moscow, Zelenskyy’s office director, Andriy Yermak, told the UK’s Times newspaper: “Things are moving very well. I think we will be able to surprise our enemies on many occasions.” Ukraine’s ambition to join NATO and the European Union, leaving Russian orbit, is what triggered this war, and Russia has said that giving up both those clubs is a condition of peace. NATO first invited Ukraine to its 2008 Summit in Bucharest. But in February, US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said NATO membership for Ukraine was not a “realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement”, and a “final” ceasefire offer from the White House on April 17 included a ban on NATO membership for Ukraine. Despite this, on Wednesday, Rutte told Reuters: “The whole of NATO, including the United States, is totally committed to keep Ukraine in the fight.” Earlier this month, Rutte told a discussion at the Chatham House think tank in London that a political commitment to Ukraine’s future membership of NATO remained unchanged, even if it was not explicitly mentioned in the final communique of the NATO summit. “The irreversible path of Ukraine into NATO is there, and it is my assumption that it is still there after the summit,” Rutte said. If that gave Ukrainians renewed hope, this was perhaps dashed by the European Union’s inability last week to open new chapters in its own membership negotiations. That was because Slovakia decided to veto the move to do so in the European Council, the EU’s governing body. Slovakia also blocked an 18th sanctions package the EU was set to approve this week, because it would completely cut the EU off from Russian oil and gas imports. Slovakia and Hungary have argued they need Russian energy because they are landlocked. Their leaders, Robert Fico and Viktor Orban, have been the only EU leaders to visit Moscow during the war in Ukraine. Zelenskyy has openly accused Fico of benefiting personally from energy imports from Russia. In a week of disruptive politics from Bratislava, Slovakia also intimated it could leave NATO. “In these nonsensical times of arms buildup, when arms companies are rubbing their hands … neutrality would benefit Slovakia very much,” Fico told a media conference shown online on June 17. He pointed out that this would require parliamentary approval. Three days later, the independent Slovak newspaper Dennik N published an interview with Austria’s former defence minister, Werner Fasslabend, in which he said Slovakia’s departure from NATO might trigger Austria’s entry into the alliance. “If Slovakia were to withdraw from NATO, it would worsen the security situation for Austria as well. It would certainly spark a major debate about Austria’s NATO membership and possible NATO accession,” Fasslabend said. Follow Al Jazeera English:...

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Abhishek Bachchan Breaks His Silence On Separation Rumors.

For more than a year now, Abhishek Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan’s relationship has been under the scanner, with constant whispers about their alleged separation dominating social media chatter and gossip columns. Though they enjoy international popularity and a glorious reputation in Indian films, the couple has elected to maintain silence so far. During recent promotions for his new ZEE5 movie Kaalidhar Laapata, Abhishek Bachchan finally broke his silence over the relentless gossip and shared an honest opinion regarding online hate, media hyperbole, and the psychological cost such hateful negativity can have on family lives. Abhishek Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai, two of Bollywood’s most renowned personalities, have had a close relationship since their marriage in 2007. From acting together in romantic successes such as Guru, Dhoom 2, Dhaai Akshar Prem Ke, and Kuch Naa Kaho to handling their personal and public lives with grace, the couple has been admired for a long time. They are proud parents to 13-year-old daughter Aaradhya Bachchan as well. Even though they live a relatively low-key life, the couple has frequently found themselves on the receiving end of aggressive media speculation. Speaking to Etimes, Abhishek discussed how there has been a rise in digital gossip and online negativity. “Previously, things that were said about me didn’t affect me. Today, I have a family, and it’s very upsetting,” he shared. He explained that even if he clarifies a rumor, it gets twisted. “Because negative news sells,” he said. For him, the focus is no longer on himself but on the emotional impact it can have on the people closest to him. Abhishek also talked about how trolling has become a disturbing trend. He recalled a particularly harsh comment left on one of his social media posts. His friend Sikandar Kher was so angry that he posted Abhishek’s address online, daring the troll to say it in person. “It’s so convenient to sit anonymously behind a computer screen and write the nastiest things,” he said. “You’re hurting someone. No matter how thick-skinned they are, it affects them.” Taking a strong stand, Abhishek added, “If you’re going to say it on the internet, I dare you to come say it to me on my face.” He explained that if someone has the courage to speak directly, he’ll at least respect their honesty. “But that never happens,” he said, pointing out how easy it is for people to attack someone they don’t really know from behind a screen. Abhishek emphasized how his perspective has changed since becoming a husband and a father. “When I was single, I could ignore things. But now I have people I love and protect,” he said. He reminded readers that celebrities are human too, and rumors can deeply affect their families, even if they remain quiet. Despite all the speculation, Abhishek remains focused on his work. His upcoming film Kaalidhar Laapata will release on ZEE5 on July 4. Directed by Madhumita, the movie also stars Zeeshan Ayyub and Daivik Bhagela. Abhishek is known for taking on unique, performance-driven roles, and this project is expected to be another strong addition to his filmography. In a world that thrives on gossip, Abhishek Bachchan’s response stands out. Rather than reacting emotionally or getting into online debates, he’s taken a calm but firm approach. His message is clear: say what you want, but have the courage to say it to his face. And more importantly, think about the impact your words may have on real lives behind the screen.