Officials from the US, Ukraine, and national security advisers from France, UK and Germany to hold talks in Geneva today to discuss plan to end the war.
Published On 23 Nov 202523 Nov 2025
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Russian forces continue to report advances in eastern Ukraine while the United States ramps up intensive diplomatic pressure on Kyiv and its European allies to accede to its proposed 28-point plan, which heavily leans towards the Kremlin’s demands, by Thursday.
The Russian Ministry of Defence announced on Saturday that its soldiers “liberated” the settlement of Zvanivka in Donetsk region’s Bakhmut, allegedly inflicting “significant losses” on Ukrainian forces.
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It also released footage of air attacks and FPV drone attacks on Ukrainian positions in the Zaporizhia region, where Russian forces have been getting closer to the strategic town of Huliaipole using glide bombs and tactical ground incursions.
The Defence Ministry claimed that the Novoe Zaporozhye area was taken under Russian control, including a “major enemy defence node” covering an area of more than 14sq km (5sq miles).
This would add to a growing number of villages in the southeastern Ukrainian region that have been captured by Russian troops since September as they try to push back the Ukrainian military and strike energy infrastructure with another punishing winter of war approaching.
Ukrainian soldiers are also under intense attacks in the Pokrovsk area, where the fighting is believed to be fierce as the Russian military command redeploys forces to strengthen its offensive.
Regional Ukrainian authorities have reported at least one civilian death and 13 injuries over the past day as a result of Russian air attacks. The fatal strike took place in Donetsk, Governor Vadym Filashkin said.
Ukraine’s air force said Russian troops launched one Iskander-M ballistic missile from annexed Crimea and 104 drones from several areas towards multiple Ukrainian regions overnight into Saturday, of which 89 drones were downed. Most of the drones were of Iranian design, it added.
Ukrainian media said the Yany Kapu electric substation in northern Crimea was targeted by drones overnight, with footage circulating on social media showing explosions and strikes. The Russian Defence Ministry said its air force shot down six fixed-wing Ukrainian drones over Crimea early on Saturday, without confirming any hits on the ground.
Ukraine’s allies have not been cheering the plan put forward by the administration of US President Donald Trump without consulting them, despite an ominous Thursday deadline set by Washington approaching.
The unilateral US plan to end the war in Ukraine “is a basis which will require additional work”, Western leaders gathered in South Africa for a G20 summit said on Saturday.
“We are clear on the principle that borders must not be changed by force,” said the leaders of key European countries, as well as Canada and Japan, in a joint statement.
“We are also concerned by the proposed limitations on Ukraine’s armed forces, which would leave Ukraine vulnerable to future attack,” they said, adding that any implementing elements of the plan linked with the 27-member bloc and NATO would have to be undertaken with the consent of member states.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said Russia’s war could only be ended with Ukraine’s “unconditional consent”.
“Wars cannot be ended by major powers over the heads of the countries affected,” he said on the sidelines of the summit.
Ukraine and its allies continue to emphasise the need for a “just and lasting peace”, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy saying on Saturday that real peace is based on guaranteed security and justice that secures sovereignty and territorial integrity.
But Zelenskyy approved a Ukrainian delegation to launch talks with US counterparts in Switzerland on ways of ending the war, and appointed his top aide Andriy Yermak to lead it.
Ukraine’s Security Council secretary, Rustem Umerov, who is on the negotiating team, confirmed in a post on Telegram that consultations will begin over “possible parameters” of a future deal.
“Ukraine approaches this process with a clear understanding of its interests,” he said, thanking the Trump administration for its mediation.
Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said in an interview with the state-owned International Affairs magazine, published on Saturday, that he would not rule out the possibility of another meeting between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has backed the US proposal.
“The search for a way forward continues,” he said, adding that Moscow and Washington continue to keep channels for dialogue open despite the lack of an agreement during a Trump-Putin meeting in August, and the indefinite suspension of another planned round in Budapest.
Putin has refused to engage in a summit that includes Zelenskyy and will be even less likely to now, given he believes Russia has the upper hand on the battlefield and the ear of the US on the diplomatic front.
Here are the key events from day 1,367 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Published On 22 Nov 202522 Nov 2025
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Here is how things stand on Saturday, November 22:
More details are emerging from a 28-point peace plan backed by United States President Donald Trump aimed at ending Russia’s four-year war on Ukraine, with several media outlets and officials confirming that the plan, which has yet to be officially published, appears to favour Russia.
Details of the plan also come after US ambassador to the United Nations, Mike Waltz, told the UN Security Council on Thursday afternoon that the US had offered “generous terms for Russia, including sanctions relief”.
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“The United States has invested at the highest levels, the president of the United States personally, to end this war,” Waltz told the council.
The AFP news agency reported on Friday that the plan, which the US views as a “working document”, says that “Crimea, Lugansk [Luhansk] and Donetsk will be recognised as de facto Russian, including by the United States”.
This corresponds with an earlier report from US media outlet Axios.
The Associated Press (AP) news agency also reported on Friday that the plan would require Ukraine to surrender the Donbas, which includes the Luhansk and Donetsk regions that Ukraine currently partly holds.
Under the draft, Moscow would hold all the eastern Donbas region, even though approximately 14 percent still remains in Ukrainian hands, AP reported.
AFP and AP also confirmed Axios’s earlier report that the plan would require Ukraine to limit the size of its military.
According to AFP, the plan specifically says that the army would be limited to 600,000 personnel. Ukraine is estimated to currently have just under 900,000 active duty military staff.
Ukrainian member of parliament Oleksiy Goncharenko shared a document showing what appeared to be the full 28-point peace plan with his 223,000 followers on the Telegram messaging app, late on Thursday, Ukraine time.
Russia’s state TASS news agency also reported on details included in the document shared by Goncharenko, saying it “purportedly represents a Ukrainian translation of 28 points of the new American plan for a peace settlement in Ukraine”.
New details included in the document shared by Goncharenko include that “Ukraine has the right to EU [European Union] membership” and that the “United States will work with Ukraine to jointly restore, develop, modernise, and operate Ukraine’s gas infrastructure, including pipelines and storage facilities”.
The document also states that Ukraine’s “Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant will be commissioned under [UN nuclear agency] IAEA supervision, and the electricity generated will be shared equally between Russia and Ukraine in a 50:50 ratio”.
The text of the document shared by Goncharenko also states that “Ukrainian forces withdraw from the part of the Donetsk region that they currently control, and this withdrawal zone will be considered a neutral demilitarised buffer zone”.
Handing over territory to Russia would be deeply unpopular in Ukraine and would also be illegal under Ukraine’s constitution. Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has repeatedly ruled out such a possibility.
The AFP news agency also reported that, according to the plan, European fighter jets would be based in Poland specifically to protect Ukraine.
However, Kyiv would have to concede that no NATO troops would be stationed in Ukraine and that it would agree never to join the military alliance.
Additional details reported by AP include that Russia would commit to making no future attacks on Ukraine, something the White House views as a concession by Moscow.
In addition, $100bn in frozen Russian assets would be dedicated to rebuilding Ukraine, AP reported.
Russia would also be re-admitted to the G8 group of nations and be integrated back into the global economy under the plan, according to AFP.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Thursday that both Ukrainians and Russians have had input into the plan, which she said US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and US special envoy Steve Witkoff have been quietly working on for a month.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said he’s willing to work with the United States on a plan to end Russia’s war on Ukraine, despite pushback from European allies who say that the US-backed plan heavily favours Russia.
Zelenskyy’s office on Thursday confirmed that he had received a draft of the plan, and that he would speak with US President Donald Trump in the coming days.
His office did not comment directly on the contents of the plan, which has not been published, but the Ukrainian leader had “outlined the fundamental principles that matter to our people”.
“In the coming days, the President of Ukraine expects to discuss with President Trump the existing diplomatic opportunities and the key points required to achieve peace,” Zelenskyy’s office said.
Several media outlets reported that the 28-point plan involves Ukraine ceding territory and weapons. Citing an unnamed US official with “direct knowledge”, Axios reported the plan would give Russia parts of eastern Ukraine that Moscow does not currently control, in exchange for a US security guarantee for Ukraine and Europe against future Russian aggression.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and US special envoy Steve Witkoff have been quietly working on the plan for a month, receiving input from both Ukrainians and Russians on terms that are acceptable to each side, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed on Thursday.
She declined to comment on details of the emerging proposal, but said Trump has been briefed on it and supports it.
“It is a good plan for both Russia and Ukraine, and we believe it should be acceptable to both sides. And we are working hard to get it done,” Leavitt said.
Zelenskyy confirmed later that he discussed the plan with US Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll in Kyiv.
“Our teams – Ukraine and the USA – will work on the points of the plan to end the war,” Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram without commenting directly on the plan. “We are ready for constructive, honest and prompt work.”
Russia appeared to play down any new US initiative.
“Consultations are not currently under way. There are contacts, of course, but there is no process that could be called consultations,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
While Zelenskyy has signalled he is willing to work with the Trump administration on a ceasefire, Kyiv’s European allies have expressed scepticism.
“Ukrainians want peace – a just peace that respects everyone’s sovereignty, a durable peace that can’t be called into question by future aggression,” French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said during a meeting of European Union foreign ministers in Brussels. “But peace cannot be a capitulation.”
EU foreign policy head Kaja Kallas said any peace proposal would need support from Europe and Ukraine to move forward, with Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski saying that Europe – whose security is “at stake” – expects to be consulted on any potential deal.
“I hope it’s not the victim that has restrictions on its ability to defend itself put on, but it’s the aggressor,” he said.
Zelenskyy is facing pressure to join the US-backed diplomatic initiative as Ukrainian troops continue to lose ground to Russian forces in the country’s east.
Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed in October that Russian forces had seized almost 5,000 square kilometres (1,930sq miles) of Ukraine this year.
On September 25, the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, independently assessed the real figure to be closer to 3,434sq km (1,325sq miles).
Russia’s General Staff said Thursday that Moscow’s forces had seized the northeastern Ukrainian city of Kupiansk and controlled large sections of the towns of Pokrovsk and Vovchansk – a claim Ukraine vigorously denied.
“The General Staff of Ukraine’s armed forces hereby announces that Kupiansk is under the control of Ukraine’s defence forces,” the Ukrainian General Staff said in a late evening bulletin.
“Also untrue are statements suggesting that 80 percent of Vovchansk in the Kharkiv region has been captured and 70 percent of the city of Pokrovsk.”
This week, a devastating Russian aerial assault on Ternopil in western Ukraine killed at least 26 people and wounded dozens more, Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko confirmed Thursday.
Zelenskyy said on Thursday that 22 people were still missing at the site of Wednesday’s attack on Ternopil when Moscow unleashed 476 drones and 48 missiles across Ukraine. The attack damaged energy infrastructure across seven Ukrainian regions, prompting nationwide restrictions on power consumption.
“Every brazen attack against ordinary life indicates that the pressure on Russia [to stop the war] is insufficient,” Zelenskyy said on Telegram.
The bombardment coincided with Zelenskyy’s visit to Turkiye aimed at reviving peace talks with Russia following his European diplomatic mission.
“We count on the strength of Turkish diplomacy, on [how] it’s understood in Moscow,” Zelenskyy said after his meeting on Wednesday with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Marjayoun district, Lebanon – In his southern Lebanese hometown of Hula, a few metres away from the border with Israel, Khairallah Yaacoub walks through his olive grove. Khairallah is harvesting the olives, even though there aren’t many this year.
The orchard, which once contained 200 olive trees and dozens of other fruit-bearing trees, is now largely destroyed. After a ceasefire was declared between Hezbollah and Israel in November 2024, ending a one-year war, the Israeli army entered the area, bulldozed the land, and uprooted trees across border areas, including Hula – 56,000 olive trees according to Lebanon’s Agriculture Minister Nizar Hani. Israeli officials have said that they plan to remain indefinitely in a “buffer zone” in the border region.
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Israeli forces are not currently stationed in what remains of Khairallah’s farm, but the grove is fully exposed to Israeli positions in Menora, on the other side of the border. That makes the olive farmer’s every movement visible to the Israeli army, and is why he has been so afraid to venture to his trees before today.
“This was the place where my brothers and I lived our lives,” said Khairallah, as he walked next to the olive trees that he said were more than 40 years old. “We spent long hours here ploughing, planting, and harvesting. But the [Israeli] occupation army has destroyed everything.”
Khairallah now has 10 olive trees left, but their yield is small for several reasons, most notably the lack of rainfall and the fact that he and his brothers had to abandon the orchard when war broke out between Hezbollah and Israel on October 8, 2023. Khairallah’s aim now is to begin the process of restoring and replanting his olive grove, the main source of livelihood for the 55-year-old and his four brothers.
The farm in Hula, which lies in the district of Marjayoun, once provided them with not just olives, but olive oil, and various other fruits. They also kept 20 cows on the land, all of which have died due to the war.
But with the presence of the Israelis nearby, getting things back to a semblance of what they once were is not easy, and involves taking a lot of risks.
“Last year, we couldn’t come to the grove and didn’t harvest the olives,” Khairallah said. “[Now,] the Israeli army might send me a warning through a drone or fire a stun grenade to scare me off, and if I don’t withdraw, I could be directly shelled.”
Like Khairallah, Hussein Daher is also a farmer in Marjayoun, but in the town of Blida, about five kilometres (3.1 miles) away from Hula.
Hussein owns several dunams of olive trees right on Lebanon’s border with Israel. Some of his olive trees, centuries old and inherited from his ancestors, were also uprooted. As for the ones still standing, Hussein has been unable to harvest them because of Israeli attacks.
Hussein described what he says was one such attack as he tried to reach one of his groves.
“An Israeli drone appeared above me. I raised my hands to indicate that I am a farmer, but it came closer again,” said Hussein. “I moved to another spot, and minutes later, it returned to the same place I had been standing and dropped a bomb; if I hadn’t moved, it would have killed me.”
The United Nations reported last month that Israeli attacks in Lebanon since the beginning of the ceasefire had killed more than 270 people.
The dangers mean that some farmers have still not returned. But many, like Hussein, have no choice. The farmer emphasised that olive harvest seasons were an economic lifeline to him and to most other farmers.
And they now have to attempt to recoup some of the losses they have had to sustain over the last two years.
According to an April study by the United Nations’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), 814 hectares (2,011 acres) of olive groves were destroyed, with losses in the sector alone estimated at $236m, a significant proportion of the total $586m losses in the wider agricultural sector.
“We used to produce hundreds of containers of olive oil; today, we produce nothing,” said Hussein, who has a family of eight to provide for. “Some farmers used to produce more than 200 containers of olive oil per season, worth roughly $20,000. These families depended on olive farming, honey production, and agriculture, but now everything was destroyed.”
The troubles facing the olive farmers have had a knock-on effect for the olive press owners who turn the harvested olives into Lebanon’s prized olive oil.
At one olive press in Aitaroun, also in southern Lebanon, the owner, Ahmad Ibrahim, told Al Jazeera that he had only produced one truckload of olive oil this year, compared with the 15 to 20 truckloads his presses make in a typical year.
“Some villages, like Yaroun, used to bring large quantities of olives, but this year none came,” Ahmad said. “The occupation destroyed vast areas of their orchards and prevented farmers from reaching the remaining ones by shooting at them and keeping them away.”
Ahmad, in his 70s and a father of five, established this olive press in 2001. He emphasised that the decline in agriculture, particularly olive cultivation in southern Lebanon, would significantly affect local communities.
Many of those areas are still scarred from the fighting, and the weapons used by Israel could still be affecting the olive trees and other crops being grown in southern Lebanon.
Hussein points to Israel’s alleged use of white phosphorus, a poisonous substance that burns whatever it lands on, saying the chemical has affected plant growth.
Experts have previously told Al Jazeera that Israel’s use of white phosphorus, which Israel says it uses to create smokescreens on battlefields, is part of the attempt to create a buffer zone along the border.
But if Lebanese farmers are going to push back against the buffer zone plan, and bring the border region alive again, they’ll need support from authorities both in Lebanon and internationally – support they say has not been forthcoming.
“Unfortunately, no one has compensated us, neither the Ministry of Agriculture nor anyone else,” said Khairallah, the farmer from Hula. “My losses aren’t just in the orchard that was bulldozed, but also in the farm and the house. My home, located in the middle of the town, was heavily damaged.”
The Lebanese government has said that it aims to support the districts affected by the war, and has backed NGO-led efforts to help farmers.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, Agriculture Minister Hani said that the government had begun to compensate farmers – up to $2,500 – and plant 200,000 olive seedlings. He also outlined restoration projects and the use of the country’s farmers registry to help the agricultural sector.
“Through the registry, farmers will be able to obtain loans, assistance, and social and health support,” Hani said. “Olives and olive oil are of great and fundamental value, and are a top priority for the Ministry of Agriculture.”
But Khairallah, Hussein, and Ahmad have yet to see that help from the government, indicating that it will take some time to scale up recovery operations.
That absence of support, Hussein said, will eventually force the farmers to pack up and leave, abandoning a tradition hundreds of years old.
“If a farmer does not plant, he cannot survive,” Hussein said. “Unfortunately, the government says it cannot help, while international organisations and donors, like the European Union and the World Bank, promised support, but we haven’t seen anything yet.”
Former Ukrainian officer Serhii Kuznietsov faces charges in Germany of collusion to cause an explosion, sabotage and destruction of infrastructure.
Published On 20 Nov 202520 Nov 2025
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Italy’s top court has approved the extradition to Germany of a Ukrainian man suspected of coordinating the sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines between Russia and Europe in 2022.
The suspect, Serhii Kuznietsov, 49, has denied being part of a cell of saboteurs accused of placing explosives on the underwater pipelines in the Baltic Sea, severing much of Russia’s gas transfers to Europe and prompting supply shortages on the continent.
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After Italy originally blocked Kuznietsov’s extradition last month over an issue with a German arrest warrant, Italy’s Supreme Court of Cassation approved the transfer on Wednesday.
Kuznietsov “will therefore be surrendered to Germany within the next few days”, his lawyer Nicola Canestrini said.
The suspect, a former officer in the Ukrainian military, has denied any role in the attack and has fought attempts to transfer him to Germany since he was detained on a European arrest warrant in the Italian town of Rimini, where he was vacationing with his family, in August.
“However great the disappointment, I remain confident in an acquittal after the full trial in Germany,” Canestrini said in a statement.
Last month, a court in Poland ruled against handing over another Ukrainian suspect wanted by Germany in connection with the pipeline explosions and ordered his immediate release from detention.
Kuznietsov faces charges in Germany of collusion to cause an explosion, sabotage and destruction of important structures.
German prosecutors said he used forged identity documents to charter a yacht that departed from the German city of Rostock to carry out the attack near the Danish island of Bornholm on September 26, 2022.
According to extradition documents, prosecutors said Kuznietsov organised and carried out the detonation of at least four bombs containing 14kg to 27kg (31lb to 62lb) of explosives at a depth of 70 to 80 metres (230ft to 263ft).
The explosions damaged both the Nord Stream 1 and the Nord Stream 2 pipelines so severely that no gas could be transported through them. In total, four ruptures were discovered in the pipelines after the attack.
Kuznietsov says he was a member of the Ukrainian armed forces and in Ukraine at the time of the incident, a claim his defence team has said would give him “functional immunity” under international law.
Earlier this month, members of the European Parliament (MEPs) sent a letter to Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni expressing concern about Kuznietsov’s extradition.
“The destruction of the pipelines dealt a significant blow to Russia’s war machine in its ongoing war of aggression against Ukraine,” the MEPs wrote.
“From the standpoint of international law, actions undertaken in defence against such aggression, including the neutralisation of the enemy’s military infrastructure, fall within the lawful conduct of a just war,” they wrote.
“We, therefore, urge the Italian government to suspend any steps toward extradition until the guarantees of functional immunity and state responsibility are thoroughly and independently assessed,” they added.
Kuznietsov, who faces up to 15 years in prison if found guilty by a German court, has been held in a high security jail in Italy since his arrest and at one point staged a hunger strike to protest against his prison conditions.
Six other suspects in the case remain at large.
Israel has kept troops in a UN-patrolled buffer zone in the Golan Heights since December’s ouster of Bashar al-Assad.
Syria has denounced a trip by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other senior officials to the country’s south, where they visited troops deployed to Syrian territory they’ve occupied for months.
Israel expanded its occupation of southern Syrian territory as the regime of former President Bashar al-Assad was overrun by rebel forces in December.
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“My government strongly condemns this provocative tour, which epitomises Israel’s ongoing aggression against Syria and its people,” Ibrahim Olabi, Syria’s ambassador to the United Nations, told the UN Security Council on Wednesday.
“We renew our call on the UN and this council to take firm and immediate action to halt these violations, ensure their non-reoccurrence, end the occupation and enforce relevant resolutions, particularly the 1974 disengagement agreement” that followed the 1973 Arab-Israeli War.
Since the overthrow of al-Assad, Israel has kept troops in a UN-patrolled buffer zone in the Golan Heights separating Israeli and Syrian forces.
UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric described Netanyahu and other senior Israeli officials’ “very public visit” as “concerning, to say the least”.
Dujarric noted that UN Resolution 2799, recently passed by the Security Council, “called for the full sovereignty, unity, independence, and territorial integrity of Syria”.
Israel has previously said the 1974 agreement has been void since al-Assad fled, and it has breached Syrian sovereignty with air strikes, ground infiltration operations, reconnaissance overflights, the establishment of checkpoints, and the arrest and disappearance of Syrian citizens.
Syria has not reciprocated the attacks.
During the Security Council meeting, Danny Danon, Israel’s ambassador to the UN, did not directly address Netanyahu’s visit but instead lectured Syria’s ambassador.
“Show us that Syria is moving away from extremism and radicalism, that the protection of Christians and Jews is not an afterthought but a priority. Show us that the militias are restrained and justice is real and the cycle of indiscriminate killings has ended,” Danon said.
Olabi responded: “The proving, Mr Ambassador, tends to be on your shoulders. You have struck Syria more than 1,000 times, and we have responded with requests for diplomacy … and responded with zero signs of aggression towards Israel. … We have engaged constructively. and we still await for you to do the same.”
Netanyahu was accompanied to Syrian territory by Foreign Minister Gideon Saar, Defence Minister Israel Katz, army Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir and the head of the Shin Bet security service, David Zini
Syria’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates condemned “in the strongest terms the illegal visit, … considering it a serious violation of Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity”.
This month, Israel’s army renewed its incursions into Syria, setting up a military checkpoint in the southern province of Quneitra.
In September, Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa said Israel had conducted more than 1,000 air strikes and more than 400 ground incursions in Syria since al-Assad was overthrown, describing the actions as “very dangerous”.
Reporting from the UN in New York, Al Jazeera’s Gabriel Elizondo noted Syria and Israel continue to negotiate a security pact that analysts said could be finalised before the end of the year.
“The testy exchange between the two ambassadors likely won’t derail that. But it does show how little trust there is between both countries – and how Netanyahu and his government continue to try to provoke Damascus,” Elizondo said.
“We’ve already started working on that.” US President Donald Trump said his administration is searching for a possible resolution to the war in Sudan. He added that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had raised the conflict in a conversation with him.
Published On 19 Nov 202519 Nov 2025
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Last week, 42 migrants were presumed to have drowned in the Mediterranean Sea after their dinghy set sail off the Libyan coast.
At least 29 of them were Sudanese refugees who fled the catastrophic civil war in their country between the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and the regular army known as the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF).
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Since erupting in April 2023, the Sudan war has caused the largest displacement crisis in the world.
Nearly 13 million people have been uprooted from their homes and more than four million have fled to neighbouring countries, such as Chad, Egypt and Libya.
According to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), more than 86,000 Sudanese nationals are registered as asylum seekers or refugees in Libya – a 60,000 uptick compared with before the war.
As more Sudanese attempt to reach Europe from Libya, this is everything you need to know about their plight.
From April 2023 to January 2024, the European Union Agency for Asylum (EUAA) registered nearly 10,000 asylum applications from Sudanese nationals across the European Union – nearly twice as high as the previous year.
While figures for 2025 have not yet been published, the growing number of Sudanese nationals arriving in Libya suggests that more people are aiming to reach Europe as their final destination.
“I hope to soon take the journey across the sea to Europe,” Hamid, a Sudanese refugee from Khartoum, told Al Jazeera from Libya, where he arrived earlier this year.
“Hopefully, God will make the journey safe,” he added with resignation.
Only a minority of the 10,000 Sudanese asylum seekers have been granted protection so far, with the rest either rejected or waiting for a ruling.
In general, life has not been easy for many young Sudanese men after reaching Europe.
Some EU states are using anti-smuggling laws to criminalise young men for steering the small and overcrowded boats that smugglers put them in.
In Greece, more than 200 Sudanese minors and young men between the ages of 15 and 21 are facing smuggling charges.
Some have already been convicted and sentenced to decades or life in prison, pushing their lawyers to appeal.
Migration experts have long explained that vulnerable youth often agree to “steer” boats in exchange for a discounted price from smugglers, who often charge thousands of dollars from destitute asylum seekers looking for safety.
The RSF, which has committed countless atrocities throughout the war, emerged from the nomadic “Arab” government-linked Popular Defence Forces, known as the Janjaweed militias, that spearheaded a brutal campaign in the far western region of Darfur at the turn of the millennium.
Those militias were later accused of carrying out countless war crimes and crimes against humanity against mainly sedentary “non-Arab” communities.
Many legal scholars and human rights groups believe the atrocities may have amounted to genocide.
Yet in 2013, Sudan’s then-President Omar al-Bashir repackaged many of the Popular Defence Forces militias into the RSF.
The RSF, looking to acquire international legitimacy, quickly portrayed itself as a possible partner in the EU’s mission to “manage migration” in the Sahel and the Horn of Africa.
In 2014, the EU announced that it was launching the “Khartoum Process”, an initiative that strengthened cooperation between the EU and East African nations to counter irregular migration.
About $200m was pumped into Sudan over the next five years for this purpose.
According to research carried out by Sudan expert Suliman Baldo in 2017, a portion of this money went to strengthening the judiciary and law enforcement and may have possibly been diverted towards the RSF.
The EU has long denied that it financed the RSF in any capacity.
When Sudan’s security forces – including the RSF – killed more than 120 pro-democracy protesters in the capital Khartoum on June 3, 2019, the EU suspended all migration cooperation.
At the time, Sudan expert Alex de Waal said the EU’s reaction was “basically an admission of guilt” that the RSF had benefitted politically and financially from the Khartoum Process.
Welcome back to another Oscar season!
I’m Matt Brennan, editor in chief of The Envelope, and each Wednesday from now until Jan. 7, I’ll be sending you a (digital) editor’s letter with some highlights from our Phase I issues.
Our first issue of the 2025-2026 campaign features stories on documentaries, films about the Palestinian experience and “Marty Supreme’s” Odessa A’zion.
(Illustration by Daniel Stolle / For The Times)
I won’t pretend to be Nostradamus when it comes to Hollywood’s top awards — my Gold Derby Emmys ballot didn’t even crack the top 1,000 — but most anyone who ran into me at this year’s Sundance Film Festival heard at least one bold prediction that turned out to be correct: 2025 has been a sterling year for documentaries.
With journalists under attack in the U.S., Ukraine, Gaza and beyond, the form’s close connection to reportage has never felt more urgent, at least not to me. In the contraband prison images of “The Alabama Solution,” the body camera footage of “The Perfect Neighbor,” the conflict coverage of “2000 Meters to Andriivka” and “Love + War,” the portraiture of “Cover-Up” and much more besides, the year’s finest documentaries — no, the year’s finest films — manage to unearth new ways of seeing our society’s most pressing issues, often with more precision and subtlety than scripted films much longer (and costlier) in the making.
To that end, this week Steve Dollar asks the filmmakers behind five of the year’s many worthy nonfiction films — “Apocalypse in the Tropics,” “Folktales,” “Predators,” “Seeds” and “The Tale of Silyan” — to share what images became the keystone of their latest projects.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
I can confirm Tim Grierson’s reporting that Odessa A’zion is a hugger: I received several myself from the “Marty Supreme” and “I Love L.A.” performer when she stopped by The Times newsroom recently for an Envelope digital cover shoot, her own 16mm still camera in hand.
As Grierson notes of the actor, A’zion “doesn’t behave like a rising star” — and she’s not particularly comfortable with the label, either.
“A’zion has heard those predictions before, so she’s wary about being anointed the next big thing,” he writes. “After all, she remembers all the auditions that went nowhere. She remembers being behind on her rent. She remembers almost being evicted. She remembers getting fired from gigs. Simply being cast in a Josh Safdie film doesn’t make those old wounds disappear. ‘To all of a sudden be like, “OK, I’m done [worrying about my career]!” — I don’t see that feeling coming anytime soon.’”
A scene from “All That’s Left of You.”
(Watermelon Pictures)
Palestinian stories are no stranger to awards season. But this year, as Gregory Ellwood writes, a trio of films from female directors — each submitted by a different country and each set in a different time period — make for a particularly remarkable confluence.
“In a way, the movie lived what most Palestinians live: war, exile, fleeing,” “All That’s Left of You” filmmaker Cherien Dabis told Ellwood of her film having to shift production after the outbreak of the Israel-Gaza war. “All of the uncertainty, the financial and logistical crisis of it all. I think that what really grounded me during that time was just knowing that the movie was more relevant than ever, and that it had to get done.”
Read more on “All That’s Left of You,” “Palestine 36” and “The Voice of Hind Rajab.”
Diplomatic dispute deepens between Tokyo and Beijing over Taiwan remarks by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.
China will again ban all imports of Japanese seafood as a diplomatic dispute between the two countries escalates, Japanese media report.
Japanese public broadcaster NHK and Kyodo News agency said on Wednesday that the seafood ban follows after China earlier this month lifted import restrictions on Japanese marine products, which were imposed by Beijing in 2023 after the release of treated radioactive water from Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear plant into the sea.
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Kyodo News, referencing sources with knowledge of the matter, said China has told Japan that the reimposition of the ban was due to the need for further monitoring of the water from Fukushima released into the Pacific Ocean.
But the ban comes amid a deepening crisis in relations between Beijing and Tokyo over remarks by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi. The premier told parliament on November 7 that a Chinese attack on Taiwan, which threatened Japan’s survival, was one of the few cases that could trigger a military response from Tokyo.
Takaichi’s comments were met with a wave of criticism by Chinese officials and state media, prompting Japan to warn its citizens in China to take safety precautions and avoid crowded places.
In a post on X following Takaichi’s comments, the Chinese consul general in Osaka, Xue Jian, threatened to “cut off that dirty neck”, apparently referring to the Japanese prime minister. Tokyo said it had summoned the Chinese ambassador over the now-deleted social media post.
Beijing has also advised Chinese citizens to avoid travelling to Japan and demanded that Takaichi retract her remarks, though Tokyo said they were in line with the government’s position.
Seeking to defuse the row, Masaaki Kanai, Japan’s top official in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for the Asia Pacific region, held talks on Tuesday in Beijing with his Chinese counterpart, Liu Jinsong.
“During the consultations, China once again lodged a strong protest with Japan” over “Takaichi’s erroneous remarks”, Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Mao Ning said.
“Takaichi’s fallacies seriously violate international law and the basic norms governing international relations”, Mao said, adding the Japanese premier’s comments “fundamentally damage the political foundation of China-Japan relations”.
Al Jazeera’s Katrina Yu, reporting from Beijing, said the visit by Kanai to Beijing was seen as an effort by Tokyo to de-escalate tensions and communicate to China that Japan’s stance on independently-ruled Taiwan, which Beijing claims as its own territory, has not changed despite Takaichi’s remarks.
“It seems there were no concrete outcomes, but what we have seen, though, is some footage following the meeting of these two diplomats parting ways, and I think it really speaks for itself. We have very cold body language from both of these diplomats,” Yu said.
“Liu Jinsong had his hands in his pockets, refusing to shake hands with the Japanese senior diplomat,” Yu said, adding that the Chinese official said afterwards that he was “very dissatisfied” with the meeting.
Liu Jinsong, director-general of the Department of Asian Affairs of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, met with Masaaki Kanai, director-general of the Japanese Foreign Ministry’s Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau, on Tuesday.
Following the meeting, Masaaki Kanai has left the Chinese… pic.twitter.com/rdAy2YJruQ
— China News 中国新闻网 (@Echinanews) November 18, 2025
Before the most recent seafood ban, China accounted for more than one-fifth of Japan’s seafood exports, according to official data.
The dispute has also engulfed other areas of China-Japan relations, with China Film News, which is supervised by the state-backed China Film Administration, announcing that the release of two imported Japanese movies would be postponed amid the dispute.
The two movies were originally expected to be released on December 6 and November 22, respectively, according to review site Douban.
Here are the key events from day 1,364 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
By Al Jazeera and News Agencies
Published On 19 Nov 202519 Nov 2025
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Here is how things stand on Wednesday, November 19:
When US President Donald Trump declared that South Africa “should not even be” in the G20 and then took to Truth Social on November 7 to announce that no American official would attend this year’s summit in Johannesburg on account of a so-called “genocide” of white farmers in the country, I was not surprised. His outburst was not an exception but the latest expression of a long Western tradition of disciplining African sovereignty. Western leaders have long tried to shut down African agency through mischaracterisations, from branding Congolese nationalist Patrice Lumumba a “Soviet puppet” to calling anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela a “terrorist”, and Trump’s assault on South Africa falls squarely into that pattern.
As Africa pushes for a stronger voice in global governance, the Trump administration has intensified efforts to isolate Pretoria. South Africa’s growing diplomatic assertiveness, from BRICS expansion to climate finance negotiations, has challenged conservative assumptions that global leadership belongs exclusively to the West.
On February 7, Trump signed an executive order halting US aid to South Africa. He alleged that the government’s land expropriation policy discriminates against white farmers and amounts to uncompensated confiscation. Nothing could be further from the truth. South African law permits expropriation only through due process and compensation, with limited exceptions set out in the Constitution. Trump’s claims ignore this legal reality, revealing a deliberate preference for distortion over fact.
Soon after, the administration amplified its rollout of a refugee admissions policy that privileged Afrikaners, citing once again discredited claims of government persecution. What is clear is that Washington has deliberately heightened tensions with Pretoria, searching for any pretext to cast South Africa as an adversary. This selective compassion, extended only to white South Africans, exposes a racialised hierarchy of concern that has long shaped conservative engagement with the continent.
Yet, for months, South African officials have firmly rejected these claims, pointing to judicial rulings, official statistics, and constitutional safeguards that show no evidence of systematic persecution, let alone a “genocide” of white farmers. Indeed, as independent experts repeatedly confirmed, there is no credible evidence whatsoever to support the claim that white farmers in South Africa are being systematically targeted as part of a campaign of genocide. Their rebuttals highlight a basic imbalance: Pretoria is operating through verifiable data and institutional process, while Washington relies on exaggeration and ideological grievance.
At the same time, as host of this year’s G20 Summit, Pretoria is using the platform to champion a more cooperative and equitable global order. For South Africa, chairing the G20 is not only symbolic, but strategic, an attempt to expand the influence of countries long excluded from shaping the rules of global governance.
Trump’s G20 boycott embodies a transnational crusade shaped by Christian righteousness. Trump’s rhetoric reduces South Africa to a moral backdrop for American authority rather than recognising it as a sovereign partner with legitimate aspirations. The boycott also mirrors a wider effort to discredit multilateral institutions that dilute American exceptionalism.
This stance is rooted in a long evangelical-imperial tradition, one that fused theology with empire and cast Western dominance as divinely sanctioned. The belief that Africa required Western moral rescue emerged in the nineteenth century, when European missionaries declared it a Christian duty to civilise and redeem the continent. The wording has changed, but the logic endures, recasting African political agency as a civilisational error rather than a legitimate expression of sovereignty. This moralised paternalism did not disappear with decolonisation. It simply adapted, resurfacing whenever African nations assert themselves on the world stage.
American evangelical and conservative Christian networks wield significant influence inside the Republican Party. Their political and media ecosystem, featuring Fox News and the Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN), routinely frames multilateral institutions, global aid, and international law as subordinate to American sovereignty and Christian civilisation. These networks shape not only rhetoric but policy, turning fringe narratives into foreign policy priorities.
They also amplify unproven claims of Christian persecution abroad, particularly in countries such as Nigeria and Ethiopia, to legitimise American political and military interference. Trump’s fixation with South Africa follows the same script: a fabricated crisis crafted to thrill, galvanise, and reassure a conservative Christian base. South Africa becomes another stage for this performance.
In this distorted narrative, South Africa is not a constitutional democracy acting through strong, independent courts and institutions. Instead, Africa’s most developed country is stripped of its standing and portrayed as a flawed civilisation in need of Western correction. For conservative Christian nationalists, African decision-making is not autonomous agency but a supervised privilege granted only when African decisions align with Western priorities.
By casting South Africa as illegitimate in the G20, invoking false claims of genocide and land seizures, and penalising Pretoria’s ICJ case with aid cuts, Trump asserts that only the West can define global legitimacy and moral authority, a worldview anchored in Christian-nationalist authority. Trump’s crusade is punishment, not principle, and it seeks to deter African autonomy itself.
On many occasions, I have walked the streets of Alexandra, a Johannesburg township shaped by apartheid’s spatial design, where inequality remains brutally vivid. Alexandra squeezes more than one million residents into barely 800 hectares (about 2,000 acres). A significant portion of its informal housing sits on the floodplain of the Jukskei River, where settlements crowd narrow pathways and fragile infrastructure. Here, the consequences of structural inequality are unmistakable, yet they vanish entirely within Trump’s constructed crisis.
These communities sit only a few kilometres from Sandton, a spacious, leafy, and affluent suburb that is home to some of the country’s most expensive properties. The vast and entrenched gulf between these adjacent lands is essentially a living symbol of the profound inequality Trump is willing to overlook and legitimise as a global norm, built on selective moral outrage and racialised indifference.
In Alexandra, the struggle for dignity, equality, and inclusion is not a religious American fantasy, but a practical quest for the rights that apartheid and wider global injustice sought to deny. Their struggle mirrors the wider global fight against structures that concentrate wealth and power in a few hands. They, too, deserve better.
This is the human condition Trump’s pseudo-morality refuses to acknowledge. This is why South Africa’s global leadership matters.
Earlier this year, South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa commissioned a landmark G20 Global Inequality Report, chaired by Nobel-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz. It found that the world’s richest 1 percent have captured more than 40 percent of new wealth since 2000 and that more than 80 percent of humanity now lives in conditions the World Bank classifies as high inequality.
The Johannesburg G20 Summit seeks to reform multilateral development banks, such as the World Bank, to confront a global financial system that sidelines developing countries and perpetuates economic injustice. While South Africa turns to recognised multilateral tools such as the ICJ and G20 reform, the US has moved in the opposite direction.
Under Trump, Washington has sanctioned the International Criminal Court, abandoned key UN bodies, and rejected scrutiny from UN human rights experts, reflecting a Christian-nationalist doctrine that treats American power as inherently absolute and answerable to no one.
South Africa offers an alternative vision rooted in global cooperation, shared responsibility, equality, and adherence to international law, a vision that unsettles those invested in unilateral power. The US recasts decolonisation as sin, African equality as disruption, and American dominance as divinely ordained. Trump’s attacks reveal how deeply this worldview still shapes American foreign policy.
Yet the world has moved beyond colonial binaries. African self-determination can no longer be framed as immoral. Human rights are universal, and dignity belongs to us all.
The views expressed in this article are the authors’ own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial policy.
Hamas says a UN Security Council resolution backing Trump’s Gaza plan fails to meet the political and humanitarian demands of Palestinians.
Published On 18 Nov 202518 Nov 2025
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Here are the key events from day 1,363 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Published On 18 Nov 202518 Nov 2025
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Here is how things stand on Tuesday, November 18:
Syria’s Asaad al-Shaibani meets with Chinese counterpart Wang Yi as Damascus pushes to bolster international ties.
Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani has pledged to deepen collaboration on “counterterrorism” with China on his first visit to Beijing since the toppling of former President Bashar al-Assad last year.
Al-Shaibani and Chinese counterpart Wang Yi agreed on Monday that they would work together on combating “terrorism” and on security matters, with the top Syrian diplomat promising that Damascus would not allow its territory to be used for any actions against Chinese interests, according to Syrian state news agency SANA.
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China, a former backer of al-Assad, said that it hoped Syria would take “effective measures” to fulfil its commitment, “thereby removing security obstacles to the stable development of China-Syria relations”, according to a Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement.
The fate of the Uighur fighters who had gone to Syria after war erupted in 2011 to fight al-Assad’s forces, with many joining the Uighur-dominated Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP) based in Idlib province, was expected to be on al-Shaibani’s agenda in Beijing.
A source from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates in Damascus denied a report by news agency AFP that cited unidentified sources as saying the Syrian government planned to hand over 400 fighters who had fled persecution in China “in batches”.
The “report regarding the Syrian government’s intention to hand over fighters to China is without foundation”, said the source in a brief statement to SANA.
During the meeting in Beijing, al-Shaibani also gave his country’s support for the one China principle, establishing formal diplomatic ties with the Chinese government, rather than with Taiwan, as the sole legal representative of the territory.
Wang, for his part, stated that China viewed the Golan Heights as Syrian territory. Israel occupied a portion of the territory in 1967 and subsequently annexed it in violation of international law.
Since al-Assad’s fall in December 2024, Israel has been expanding its occupation into southern Syria, including a United Nations-monitored buffer zone established by a 1974 ceasefire agreement.
On Monday, Damascus and Beijing expressed interest in expanding collaboration on economic development, Syria’s reconstruction, and raising living standards, highlighting the role of the China-Arab Cooperation Forum as a basis for bilateral collaboration, said SANA.
Al-Shaibani’s visit to China comes as Damascus pushes to rebuild its diplomatic ties around the world, with some stunning successes, including securing sanction relief from the West and major Gulf investments, giving the country a much-needed economic lifeline.
Earlier this month, President Ahmed al-Sharaa became the first-ever Syrian leader to visit the White House since the country’s independence in 1946. Syria also joined a US-led international coalition to fight ISIL (ISIS).
In October, al-Sharaa told Russia’s President Vladimir Putin during a visit to Moscow that he sought to “restore and redefine ties” between the two countries.
However, there was no mention after that meeting of whether Moscow would hand over al-Assad, who fled to Russia after his government fell due to an offensive by armed opposition groups led by al-Sharaa.
Since the collapse of the al-Assad government, Russia has retained a presence at its air and naval bases on the Syrian coast. Moscow was one of al-Assad’s top backers and provided air support for government forces during the war.
But al-Shraa’s government appears to be prepared to forge relations with allies of the former regime, as highlighted by al-Shaibani’s talks in Beijing on Monday.
More than 288,000 families in Gaza are enduring a shelter crisis as Israeli restrictions on humanitarian supplies worsen conditions for Palestinians displaced by the war, the territory’s Government Media Office says.
Local authorities said in a statement on Monday that heavy rainfall over recent days submerged tens of thousands of makeshift tents across Gaza, leaving Palestinians suffering under conditions that “no society can endure”.
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The Government Media Office warned that Palestinians are facing “the most dangerous humanitarian disaster” since the war began with Israel “deliberately deepening the catastrophe” through its blockade of essential shelter materials.
“We strongly condemn this ongoing crime committed by the [Israeli] occupation against civilians,” it said.
“We hold the occupation fully responsible for the suffering of hundreds of thousands of displaced people who are facing the harshness of winter without safe shelter or basic services, and for its catastrophic crime of insisting on completely closing the crossings and preventing the entry of shelter supplies.”
The flooding began on Thursday when the first winter storm hit Gaza. The United Nations confirmed more than 13,000 households were affected within hours.
Conditions deteriorated over the following days as the rain continued, overwhelming the worn tents that have housed displaced families for nearly two years.
Many displacement camps sit at lower elevations than surrounding areas. Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud reported on Monday that “some areas are completely submerged” after water rushed in from all sides.
Gaza authorities said the enclave requires 300,000 tents and mobile homes to provide basic shelter, a figure they have “clearly stated” for months.
However, Israel has prevented their entry despite a ceasefire that came into effect on October 10.
More than 80 percent of buildings across Gaza have been damaged or destroyed during the war, according to UN figures, forcing massive displacement.
Rights experts have said Israel’s campaign that turned most of Gaza into rubble amounts to genocide. Actions that constitute a genocide, according to the United Nations, include “deliberately inflicting on [a] group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part”.
On Monday, the Government Media Office accused Israel of “continuing its policy of restriction and preventing the entry of tents, tarps and plastic covers” while keeping border crossings closed and “reneging on implementing the humanitarian protocol” it signed as part of the ceasefire.
COGAT, the Israeli military agency responsible for coordinating aid deliveries to Gaza, has repeatedly rejected allegations that it is restricting humanitarian supplies.
But Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), described the situation last week as “misery on top of misery” and warned that Gaza’s fragile shelters “quickly flood, soaking people’s belongings”.
UNRWA said it has enough supplies waiting in Jordan and Egypt to fill 6,000 trucks, including food to sustain Gaza’s entire population for three months. Yet Israeli restrictions mean only about half the required 500 to 600 aid trucks a day are entering the territory.
UNRWA has also said it cannot bring pens and notebooks into the territory under import rules imposed by Israeli authorities.
Aid groups warned in early November that about 260,000 Palestinian families, totalling nearly 1.5 million people, faced vulnerability as winter approached.
Natalie Boucly, a senior UNRWA official, said Israel is breaching international humanitarian law by maintaining restrictions. Boucly cited the Fourth Geneva Convention and a recent International Court of Justice ruling that found Israel must ensure Palestinians have “essential supplies of daily life”.
British Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said during a visit to aid warehouses in Jordan this month that Israel has “no excuse” for delaying humanitarian supplies.
Professor Mukesh Kapila of the University of Manchester said the restrictions represent deliberate strategy rather than logistical problems.
“Accessing Gaza is one of the easiest regions where a humanitarian crisis is happening, so this is entirely a political act,” he told Al Jazeera.
“It is a deliberate Israeli strategy to keep up pressure on Hamas on the hostages and possibly disarmament, but it is compounding human suffering in Gaza.”
The Government Media Office statement called on United States President Donald Trump and mediator countries to the ceasefire to “take serious and immediate action to force the occupation to comply with what it signed” in the truce and humanitarian protocol.
According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, at least 266 people have been killed since the truce began with Israeli forces carrying out strikes almost daily even in areas where troops were supposed to withdraw.
Israeli authorities have been systematically abusing Palestinian prisoners with impunity, according to PHRI.
The number of Palestinians that have died in Israeli detention facilities has surged amid the war in Gaza, according to a report issued by a human rights group.
At least 94 Palestinian deaths have been documented since October 2023, the report published on Monday by Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI) said.
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The report is just the latest accusation regarding Israel’s jails, in which critics say thousands of Palestinians taken from Gaza and the occupied West Bank are routinely abused.
The nonprofit organisation expressed “grave concerns that the actual number of Palestinians who have died in Israeli custody is significantly higher, particularly among those detained from Gaza”.
It said Israeli authorities have consistently failed to hold those responsible for the deaths to account.
Of the 94 deaths that the report documents, 68 were from the Gaza Strip, while 26 were from the West Bank or held Israeli citizenship.
Israeli military prisons were responsible for at least 52 of the deaths. The remaining 42 were documented in facilities run by the Israel Prison Service (IPS).
Amid the war, Israeli soldiers have detained thousands of people from across Gaza. PHRI’s report asserts that they are now effectively “disappeared”.
The Israeli authorities have stopped sharing detainee information with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and barred all access to detention sites.
PHRI called those moves a “direct breach of both international and domestic law”.
Israel also refuses to acknowledge that it is holding many Palestinian prisoners, or that some have died in custody, leaving families in the dark for prolonged periods.
Some families found out about the death of their loved ones from Israeli media reports.
PHRI pointed at the case of Dr Hussam Abu Safia, the renowned director of the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza, for whom Israeli authorities claimed for days that they had “no indication of the individual’s arrest or detention”.
Israel continues to hold the doctor, who was taken from the hospital in December, despite an international outcry. His lawyer asserts that he has been subjected to torture and humiliation.
Deaths of Palestinians in Israeli custody have been recorded in almost all major IPS facilities, including Ktzi’ot Prison, Megiddo, Nitzan and Ofer, as well as military camps and bases, including the notorious Sde Teiman, the report says.
Physical violence, including bruising, rib fractures, internal organ damage and intracranial haemorrhage, has been a leading cause of death, followed by chronic medical neglect or denial and severe malnutrition.
“Given the grave conditions faced by Palestinians in Israeli incarceration facilities, and in light of Israel’s policies of enforced disappearance, systematic killing, and institutionalized cover-ups, PHRI calls for an independent international investigation into the deaths of Palestinians in Israeli custody,” the NGO said.
The Palestinian experience has been a mainstay of global cinema for decades. Despite countless obstacles, the Palestinian Ministry of Culture has submitted 18 titles for the international feature Oscar since 2003, earning nominations in 2006 and 2014. But this year, at a pivotal moment in its history, three films from acclaimed female filmmakers, each set in war-torn Gaza, are up for Oscar consideration: Annemarie Jacir’s Palestinian entry, “Palestine 36,” Cherien Dabis’ “All That’s Left of You,” representing Jordan, and Kaouther Ben Hania’s “The Voice of Hind Rajab,” selected by Tunisia. It’s a remarkable field, one that Jacir believes is more a coincidence than a reflection of the political climate.
“I think that there’s so many Palestinian filmmakers and people have been doing a lot of work for a long time,” Jacir says. “I remember when I made my last film, there were three films shooting at the same time.”
From the outbreak of the Arab revolt in 1936 to the generational trauma of the capture of Jaffa during the Arab-Israeli 1948 war to the current Israel-Hamas war, each film has a distinct and important story to tell. Notably, both “Palestine 36” and “All That’s Left of You” were scheduled to begin production in Palestine just days after Israel began an aerial assault in October 2023 in response to the Hamas-led attack Oct. 7.
After struggling just to get the movie off the ground, Jacir says the real-time events made it difficult to “keep going emotionally, mentally, financially.”
“Nothing was clear,” she says. “We just didn’t know if we would really be able to shoot, if we would be able to start something, if we would be able to finish … We were just making it up as we went along and hoping for the best. It’s sort of a mix of, I would say, stubbornness and perhaps stupidity.”
Saleh Bakri and Cherien Dabis in “All That’s Left of You.”
(Watermelon Pictures)
Concurrently, Dabis had been prepping with a Palestinian crew for five months with the intention of shooting the entire project there, only to be forced to make the “devastating” decision to shift production to Jordan, Greece and Cyprus. (Hopes of eventually returning were dashed.)
“In a way, the movie lived what most Palestinians live: war, exile, fleeing,” she says. “All of the uncertainty, the financial and logistical crisis of it all. I think that what really grounded me during that time was just knowing that the movie was more relevant than ever, and that it had to get done.”
The stark reality of the civilians under constant fire, and in a much worse position than Jacir, motivated her team to continue with “Palestine 36.” She bluntly observes, “We had no right not to, you know what I mean? It’s like we are the privileged ones, actually. We’re not in Gaza. It didn’t feel like it was an option for any of us to stop because they weren’t stopping and it was like, ‘Well, we do it for them too.’”
Depicting the humanity of the Palestinian people, who have suffered mightily under the current occupation, is one reason why Ben Hania felt such urgency in bringing the harrowing final hours of 6-year-old Palestinian girl Hind Rajab to the screen less than a year and a half after her death under Israeli fire.
Dhafer L’Abidine and Yasmine Al Massri in “Palestine 36.”
(Watermelon Pictures)
“There was something about silencing their voices [that] was completely abhorrent for me, and I know that cinema is the place for empathy and the place where you can put face and raise the voice,” Ben Hania says. “So, for me it was part of saying, ‘Stop this dehumanization of Palestinian victims.’ You see the pain in this movie, you can feel the sense of what is happening.”
Despite critical accolades and, in the case of “Voice,” a record standing ovation at the Venice Film Festival, none of these submissions were able to secure major distributors in the U.S. “Voice of Hind Rajab” is being released by relatively new player Willa, while both “Palestine 36” and “All That’s Left of You” are set for release by Watermelon Pictures, traditionally a production entity. (Oscar-winning documentary “No Other Land” was self-released in cinemas and, last month, on streaming platforms.) Ben Hania says that is nothing new: Films about Palestine simply don’t reach U.S. audiences.
“I’m frustrated because as a filmmaker, when you do a movie, you want everybody to see it, especially this one,” Ben Hania says. “So, I mean, yeah, it’s a huge frustration, but I can’t put a gun [to a] distributor and tell them, ‘Distribute my movie.’ When you do movies, you have several obstacles, and this is one of them.”
Despite the hurdles, Jacir says she has never had so many people want to know the historical background behind one of her movies.
“People are curious,” Jacir says. “Before people used to say, ‘Oh, it’s very complicated and let’s leave it. I don’t want to know because it’s too complicated.’ I don’t think people are like that anymore. I don’t think the new generation is like that anymore. I think people really want to know, and they want to see these stories and they’ll make their own judgments and thoughts, and they’ll have their own feelings about it.”