The US has issued sanctions against the UK-based direct action organisation Palestine Action, describing it as a “transnational terror group”.
The US Department of the Treasury labelled Palestine Action a specially designated global terrorist on Wednesday, which allows the US to freeze the assets of foreign individuals and entities.
The powers used to sanction the organisation in the US were introduced by President George W Bush shortly after the 9/11 attacks by al-Qaida on the twin towers in New York.
Announcing the sanctions on Palestine Action and two other organisations, the Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, said: “Far-left extremists, their fronts, and their enablers should be on notice: we will bring the full weight of our economic tools to bear. Political terrorism has no place in our society and we will continue to cut the financial lifelines of these groups until they are eliminated.”
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Itamar Ben Gvir, Israel’s national security minister, during a news conference at the Knesset in Jerusalem, Israel, on, 05 February , 2024 [Kobi Wolf/Bloomberg via Getty Images]
More incitement to violence from Israeli Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir exposes how colonial violence is aimed at the entire colonised population. Speaking on a podcast with former Israeli hostage Rom Braslavski, Ben Gvir said that Israeli forced should kill 30-40 Palestinians each night in Gaza.
Braslavski requested to act as executioner should Ben Gvir’s plan come to pass, to which the security minister replied, “I will turn the world upside down to make that happen. I promise you that I will do everything I can and turn the world upside down until it happens.”
As shocking as the comments are, both are the product of an enterprise that knows it can only sustain itself through ethnic cleansing.
In 2025, a poll by the Hebrew University Centre showed that 87 per cent of the Israeli government’s supporters perceived “no innocents’ in Gaza, while 64 per cent of Israelis held the same view.
Israel’s Channel 14 branded all Palestinians killed during the genocide as terrorists. Among settlers that normalise the killings of Palestinians, and which even glorifies those murdering them, Ben Gvir’s comments are unlikely to elicit any lingering shock. On the contrary, Ben Gvir’s wish for extrajudicial killings may well find willing participants. And while Gaza remains within reach of the Israeli military in terms of extrajudicial assassinations, the occupied West Bank faces both Israeli institutions and settlers.
Ben Gvir’s comments were aimed at Gaza, but Israel’s colonisation plans do not only include Gaza. The occupied West Bank, which faces daily violence from settlers, is much at risk from extrajudicial killings. In Ras al-Ain, south of Nablus, Israeli settlers besieged Palestinian families and cut off their electricity, water and food supplies. While attracting international attention, the UN as usual preferred to rely on its usual condemnations while Erika Guevara Ross, Amnesty International Senior Director for Research, Advocacy, Policy and Campaigns, described the siege as “an accelerating and well-documented pattern of coordinated and strategic settler terror, enabled, backed and funded by the State of Israel.” True, but what is being done with the information that is already mainstream knowledge to the rest of the world?
Likewise, Ben Gvir’s comments have not prompted a reckoning with world leaders or international institutions. Israel has already internalised such thinking – it thrives upon creating victims to sustain itself. The international community, supposedly a reference for human rights under the UN, does not seem to consider Ben Gvir’s threats dangerous enough. Even though Israel has a proven history of torturing and killing Palestinians.
Killing 30-40 Palestinians per night is not merely a fantasy. It has already been carried out by the Israeli military during the genocide; also exceeding that quota. Ben Gvir has also found someone willing to carry out the assassinations, even on a much larger scale. For Israel, as Ben Gvir again elucidated, Palestinians “are not worthy of life. They shouldn’t live. They’re not even people.”
If, according to Ben Gvir, killing Palestinians is killing non-people, then Israel is already completely absolved of culpability. This is the type of impunity the UN is harvesting for Israel.
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Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei holds a press conference at the ministry building in Tehran, Iran on August 18, 2025. [Ahmet Dursun – Anadolu Agency]
Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said on Monday that the 60-day deadline for talks with the US following the June 17 memorandum of understanding “lost its relevance” after what he called “flagrant” violations by Washington, Anadolu reports.
“There is no provision in the memorandum of understanding referring to a ‘60-day deadline’, and the Islamic Republic of Iran never formulates its policies under pressure, ultimatums or time limits,” Baqaei told reporters at a weekly news conference, as cited by the semi-official Tasnim news agency.
The memorandum instead envisaged a 60-day period for negotiations on two issues — “the lifting of sanctions” and “the nuclear issue” — which could have been extended if no agreement was reached, he added.
“Due to the flagrant and widespread violation of the memorandum of understanding by the United States, no dialogue was started just a few weeks after its signing,” Baqaei said.
“As a result, the discussion of the 60-day deadline completely lost its relevance,” he added.
The spokesman claimed that the US sanctions have “no impact” on Iran, saying the main obstacle to resolving disputes between Tehran and Washington “is not a lack of mediators.”
“Countries such as Pakistan and Qatar are already playing a role in Iran-US relations,” Baqaei noted.
“It is also entirely natural for some European countries to express their views and indicate their readiness in bilateral contacts to offer their ‘good offices’,” he said. “But this does not mean that a new mediator has emerged or been accepted in the course of Iran-US relations.”
The Iranian spokesman said negotiations with Oman on a maritime transit in the Strait of Hormuz are continuing.
”Compilation of the maritime traffic route map with Oman has taken time due to the security complications caused by the actions of the US and the Israeli regime, the multiplicity of actors and the disruption of malicious currents,” he added.
Baqaei said a possible understanding following talks with Muscat would take the form of a package comprising a roadmap and a joint statement.
The spokesman said the fate of missing Iranian pilots remains on Tehran’s agenda.
“Diplomatic relations with Qatar do not conflict with the serious pursuit of the fate of the army pilots,” he said.
On March 2, Qatar’s Defense Ministry announced that it had shot down two Su-24 aircraft from Iran. Tehran said at the time that four pilots were killed when their aircraft were hit during attacks on a US base in Qatar. Iran also said the remains of one pilot had since been recovered, while the fate of the other three pilots remained unknown.
On Saturday, Qatar rejected Iranian accusations that the three pilots had been detained by Doha.
The US and Israel launched attacks on Iran on Feb. 28, with Tehran launching retaliatory strikes targeting countries hosting US military assets across the region.
Tehran and Washington agreed to a ceasefire in April and subsequently signed a memorandum of understanding in June aimed at ending their military conflict and reaching a lasting peace agreement.
The deal, however, collapsed last month, with Iran and the US exchanging attacks for nearly two weeks before US President Donald Trump abruptly halted the bombardment amid efforts to revive the agreement.
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Lebanese President Joseph Aoun at Baabda Presidential Place on November 30, 2025 in Beirut, Lebanon. [Stringer – Anadolu Agency]
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun called Monday for extending the mandate of the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), saying its presence serves stability in the country’s south, Anadolu reports.
“The UNIFIL presence in the south is important in many respects, and helps keep residents in their villages and towns, and strengthens stability in cooperation and coordination with the Lebanese army,” Aoun said during a meeting with a parliamentary delegation, as cited by a presidency statement.
“Our first option is to extend UNIFIL’s mandate,” he said. “If its mandate is not extended, the second option is to adopt a formula that ensures the continued presence of international forces in the south, within the required legal framework.”
Aoun said these forces will help support stability, in cooperation with the Lebanese army.
The Lebanese president said Israel rejects UNIFIL’s presence and “has been pressing in that direction for nearly a year.”
“Lebanon, meanwhile, continues to demand UNIFIL to stay,” he added.
“The basic idea is to achieve a breakthrough that ensures the continued international presence in the south, whether through extending UNIFIL’s mandate or through international forces that support it, in a way that preserves stability and strengthens the role of the state and the Lebanese army,” he said.
UNIFIL has been deployed since 1978 to monitor the ceasefire along the Lebanese-Israeli border and support the Lebanese Armed Forces in southern Lebanon. Its mandate is set to expire on Dec. 31, 2026.
It comes amid tensions along the Lebanese-Israeli border since Israel launched deadly attacks on Lebanon, killing more than 4,300 people, injuring over 12,300 and displacing more than 1 million
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A Palestinian child injured in the Israeli drone attack on Al Mawasi district targeting civilian tents is brought to Nasser Hospital for treatment in Khan Yunis, Gaza, Palestine on August 16, 2026. [Abed Rahim Khatib – Anadolu Agency]
One Palestinian was killed and several others were injured in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip on Sunday, marking further violations of a ceasefire agreement in effect since Oct. 10, 2025, medical sources said.
A Palestinian was killed and six others were injured when an Israeli drone struck a tent sheltering displaced people near Al-Aqsa University in the Al-Mawasi area west of Khan Younis, a medical source told Anadolu Agency.
In central Gaza, several Palestinians were injured when an Israeli strike targeted the roof of a house in the Nuseirat refugee camp, according to the material provided, another medical source said.
A child was also shot and injured by an Israeli quadcopter drone east of the Bureij refugee camp.
The attacks came as mediators continued efforts to complete the implementation of the ceasefire agreement.
The Israeli army launched an offensive in the Gaza Strip in October 2023 that has killed more than 73,000 Palestinians and wounded over 174,000 others, according to the material.
Despite the ceasefire, the Israeli army has continued attacks in the Palestinian enclave, killing at least 1,262 Palestinians and injuring more than 4,100 others since Oct. 10, 2025, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
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