Gaza | Pakistan

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday called for Hamas to be expelled from the region, a day after the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) endorsed United States President Donald Trump’s Gaza plan that offers the Palestinian group amnesty. Netanyahu publicly endorsed the plan during a White House visit in late September. However, his latest remarks appear to show that there are differences with the US on the path forward. Hamas has also objected to parts of the plan. Diplomats say privately that entrenched positions on both the Israeli and Hamas sides have made it difficult to advance the plan, which lacks specific timelines or enforcement mechanisms. Still, it has received strong international backing, including from the Arab and Muslim countries that worked on it. Netanyahu on Tuesday published a series of posts on X in response to the UN vote. In one post, he applauded Trump and in another wrote the Israeli government believes the plan would lead to peace and prosperity because it calls f...

Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador Asim Iftikhar Ahmad stressed on Monday the need for ending the occupation of Palestinian territories and paving the way for Palestinian statehood through a credible political process. “We believe that in order to break the cycle of violence, it is absolutely necessary to end the occupation, and to have a political horizon, open the pathway to the Palestinian State through a credible, time-bound political process firmly anchored in the relevant UN resolutions,” he said while speaking at the UN Security Council (UNSC) after it adopt a US-drafted resolution endorsing President Donald Trump’s plan to end the war in Gaza. The plan also authorises an International Stabilisation Force (ISF) for the Palestinian enclave. Thirteen UNSC members, including Pakistan, voted in favour of the resolution, while Russia and China abstained — notable given earlier signals that Moscow might veto the text. Israel and Hamas agreed last month to the first phase of Trump’s 20-p...

Pakistan has dispatched its 25th humanitarian consignment to Gaza—a 100-ton cargo—raising its total relief assistance to 2,427 tons, the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) confirmed on Tuesday.

The United Nations Security Council on Monday voted to adopt a US-drafted resolution endorsing President Donald Trump’s plan to end the war in Gaza and authorising an international stabilisation force for the Palestinian enclave. Israel and Hamas agreed last month to the first phase of Trump’s 20-point plan for Gaza — a ceasefire in their two-year war and a hostage-release deal — but the UN resolution is seen as vital to legitimising a transitional governance body and reassuring countries that are considering sending troops to Gaza. The text of the resolution says member states can take part in the Board of Peace, envisioned as a transitional authority that would oversee the reconstruction and economic recovery of Gaza. It also authorises the International Stabilisation Force (ISF), which would ensure a process of demilitarising Gaza, including by decommissioning weapons and destroying military infrastructure. Trump’s 20-point plan is included as an annexe to the resolution. Russia, which holds a veto on the ...

UNITED NATIONS: Senior UN diplomats are cautiously optimistic that China and Russia may abstain rather than veto a US-sponsored Security Council resolution to authorise an international stabilisation force (ISF) in Gaza — a key test of the UN’s ability to back a postceasefire vision for the enclave, according to diplomatic sources. The draft resolution is expected to come up for vote in the UN Security Council on Monday, and would take effect if it secures at least nine affirmative votes and avoids a veto from any of the five permanent members (the US, China, Russia, Britain and France). “China will not veto the resolution, but Russia’s position is uncertain, and key as well,” said one senior diplomat. Another added, “both China and Russia may abstain, but they will not use their veto.” The draft resolution, formally circulated by the US, would authorise a two-year mandate for a transitional body called the Board of Peace, chaired by President Donald Trump, as proposed in his 20-point Gaza plan. It would also...

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Jordan’s King Abdullah II on Saturday affirmed “zero-tolerance” for any displacement of Palestinians from the besieged Gaza Strip in the aftermath of the devastating military onslaught by Israel in the territory. The two countries were among the eight Muslim countries that worked with United States President Donald Trump’s administration on a plan to end Israel’s genocide and invasion in Gaza last month. They also joined other key Muslim and Arab states on Friday in expressing support for a US resolution that seeks to deploy an international stabilisation force in Gaza. The prime minister and Jordanian king held a bilateral meeting today at the PM House after the latter arrived in Pakistan for a two-day state visit. A statement issued from the Prime Minister’s Office on the meeting said: “On the issue of Palestine, both leaders acknowledged the unanimity of views and principled positions taken by Pakistan and Jordan regarding the post-war Gaza; zero-tolerance for any displace...

The UN Security Council (UNSC) will vote on the US-sponsored draft resolution authorising an International Stabilisation Force (ISF) for Gaza on November 17 (Monday), diplomatic sources told Dawn on Saturday. The vote comes as Washington presses members to endorse US President Donald Trump’s Gaza plan, while Russia has formally placed a rival text before the UNSC, arguing that the American draft falls short of established international legal principles. Pakistan had joined other key Muslim and Arab states on Friday in expressing support for the US resolution. In a post on X, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the administration’s plan “is the best path to peace in the Middle East”, noting that the resolution “enjoys broad international and regional support”. “We are grateful to Qatar, Egypt, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Pakistan, Jordan, and Turkiye for their endorsement,” he wrote, adding that the Middle East has “never been this close to a real and lasting peace”. Soon after the US circulated its d...

The United States circulated a second revision of its draft resolution on Gaza at the UN Security Council (UNSC) on Thursday, even as Russia countered with its own text calling for the preservation of the current ceasefire and a renewed commitment to a two-state solution. Senior UN diplomats told Dawn that Washington placed “Revision 2” of its draft under a silence procedure until 6:30pm New York time on November 13, a step intended to indicate that the negotiation phase was nearly complete. Under this procedure, the absence of objections signifies consent. “But China and Russia broke the silence,” one diplomat said, noting that both delegations submitted formal objections shortly before the deadline. “Once silence is broken, other member states may also submit comments — and some did — although Pakistan did not,“ the diplomat added. Following the break, Russia swiftly distributed its own draft resolution to UNSC members. Breaking silence means, the US may now be forced to resume negotiations. Washington may ...

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is not planning to join the international stabilisation force for Gaza because it lacks a clear framework, a senior official said on Monday. “The UAE does not yet see a clear framework for the stability force, and under such circumstances will probably not participate in such a force,” Emirati presidential adviser Anwar Gargash told the Abu Dhabi Strategic Debate forum. The US-coordinated international force has been seen as likely to include troops from Egypt, Qatar and Turkiye, as well as the UAE. Last week, US President Donald Trump said he expected the force to be in Gaza “very soon”, as a fragile ceasefire holds following two years of war. The oil-rich UAE is one of the few Arab nations with official ties to Israel after signing the Abraham Accords during Trump’s first term in 2020.

• Hamas returns Israeli prisoner’s body; gets 15 Palestinians’ bodies in return • US coordinates Gaza aid flow but Israel maintains oversight, officials say JERUSALEM: Israeli forces continued to wage deadly assaults across the Palestinian territories and southern Lebanon on Saturday, in a series of air and artillery attacks that violated ceasefire agreements on both fronts. In the occupied West Bank, Israeli troops shot dead two 16-year-old boys, adding to the mounting number of Palestinian children killed by Israeli forces. The Palestinian health ministry in Ramallah identified the victims as Mohammed Abdullah Moham­med Ateem and Muhammad Rashad Fadl Qasim, both from the village of Judeira. The ministry said Israeli forces were withholding the boys’ bodies. The Israeli military acknowledged the killings, referring to the teenagers as individuals it had “eliminated” — a term frequently employed by Israeli authorities to obscure civilian deaths and dehumanise Palestinians. At the same time, in the besieged St...

• Muslim diplomats parsing US resolution carefully, expect it to ‘evolve’ • Azerbaijan will only send peacekeepers ‘if fighting stops’ WASHINGTON: President Don­ald Trump said on Thursday that he expects a US-coordinated International Stabilisation Force (ISF) to be on the ground in Gaza “very soon”. The multinational force — likely to include troops from Mus­lim countries such as Egypt, Qat­ar, Turkiye, etc — is part of Trump’s post-war governance plan for Gaza. The plan helped lead to a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas on October 10, but the humanitarian crisis in Gaza has not abated. “It’s going to be very soon. And Gaza is working out very well,” Trump said at a White House fun­ction with Central Asian leaders. “You haven’t been hearing too much about problems, and I’ll tell you, we’ve had countries that have volunteered if there’s a problem with Hamas.” The force is supposed to train and support vetted Palestinian police in the Gaza Strip, with backing from Egypt and Jordan. It also will be tas...

The United States gathered intelligence last year that Israel’s military lawyers warned there was evidence that could support war crimes charges against Tel Aviv for its military operations in Gaza reliant on American-supplied weapons, five former US officials said. The previously unreported intelligence, described by the former officials as among the most startling shared with top US policymakers during the war, pointed to doubts within the Israeli military about the legality of its tactics that contrasted sharply with Israel’s public stance defending its actions. Two of the former US officials said the material was not broadly circulated within the government until late in the Biden administration, when it was disseminated more widely ahead of a congressional briefing in December 2024. The intelligence deepened concerns in Washington over Israel’s conduct in a war it said was necessary to eliminate Hamas fighters embedded in civilian infrastructure. There were concerns Israel was intentionally targeting civ...

The United Nations Security Council on Thursday will start negotiations on a US-drafted resolution to endorse President Donald Trump’s Gaza peace plan, said a senior US government official, and authorise a two-year mandate for a transitional governance body and international stabilisation force. The United States formally circulated the draft resolution to the 15 council members late on Wednesday and has said it has regional support from Egypt, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkiye and the United Arab Emirates for the text. “The message is: if the region is with us on this and the region is with us on how this resolution is constructed, then we believe that the council should be as well,” the senior US government official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters. People gather and shop at a local market in Nuseirat, the central Gaza Strip on October 28. — Reuters/File A council resolution needs at least nine votes in favour and no vetoes by Russia, China, France, Britain or the United States to be adopted. Wh...

Gaza’s Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Yunis on Wednesday said it had received the bodies of 15 Palestinian prisoners under the US-brokered ceasefire exchange deal. “The tenth batch of the bodies of Palestinian martyrs has arrived at Nasser Medical Complex in the Gaza Strip, numbering 15 martyrs,” the hospital said in a statement, noting that 285 bodies were received under the agreement in total. They were returned in exchange for the latest hostage body handed back from Gaza on Tuesday, that of Israeli-American soldier Itay Chen. Under the terms of the US-brokered agreement in effect since October 10, Israel returns 15 bodies of Palestinians for every body it receives of an Israeli hostage who had been held in Gaza. At the start of the truce, Hamas held 48 hostages in Gaza — 20 alive and 28 deceased. The militants have since released all the surviving captives, as well as 21 of the deceased’s remains. Israel has accused Hamas of dragging its feet in returning the bodies of deceased hostages, whi...

The United States is seeking approval from the United Nations for the establishment of an International Security Force (ISF) in Gaza with a mandate of at least two years, Axios reported on Tuesday. According to the report, the US sent several UN Security Council (UNSC) members a draft resolution yesterday outlining the establishment of its proposed security force to maintain security in the Palestinian enclave. Axios, which obtained a copy of the draft, said that the resolution was designated “sensitive but unclassified”. It reported that the resolution would give the US and other participating countries a broad mandate to deploy security forces to govern Gaza until the end of 2027, and allowed the possibility of extensions beyond that time. The force would be established “in consultation with the Gaza ‘Board of Peace’”, to be chaired by US President Donald Trump, the publication reported. The Board of Peace is also to remain in place “at least through the end of 2027”. However, a US official told Axios that ...

Pakistan and other Muslim countries on Monday slammed Israeli violations of the fragile Gaza ceasefire and demanded the immediate withdrawal of Israeli forces from the occupied territory, according to the Foreign Office (FO). Hamas and Israel signed a ceasefire agreement on October 9, agreeing to free the Israeli captives in exchange for Palestinian prisoners, in the first phase of United States President Donald Trump’s initiative to end the Israeli onslaught in Gaza. Pakistan was one of the eight Arab and Muslim countries to work with Trump on the plan. Despite occasional flare-ups, the fragile truce has been holding in Gaza. The truce, which left thorny issues like the disarmament of Hamas and a timeline for Israeli withdrawal from Gaza unresolved, has been tested by unilateral Israeli bombardment since coming into force. The foreign ministers of Turkiye, the United Arab Emirates, Indonesia, Qatar, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan — the same countries that met with Trump on Sept 23 on the sidelines of the...

Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Ishaq Dar will depart for Istanbul tomorrow to attend the Coordination Meeting of Arab-Islamic Foreign Ministers, where the Gaza ceasefire deal will be discussed, the Foreign Office (FO) said on Sunday. “At the invitation of the Turkish foreign minister, the Deputy Prime Minister/ Foreign Minister Senator Mohammad Ishaq Dar will undertake a one-day visit to Istanbul on November 3, 2025 to attend the Coordination Meeting of Arab-Islamic Foreign Ministers,” the FO statement said. “It may be recalled that Pakistan, along with seven other Arab-Islamic countries, has remained engaged with the peace initiative that led to the signing of the Gaza Peace Agreement in Sharm El-Sheikh,” the statement added. Hamas and Israel signed a ceasefire agreement on October 9, agreeing to free the Israeli captives in exchange for Palestinian prisoners, in the first phase of United States President Donald Trump’s initiative to end the Israeli onslaught in Gaza. Pakistan was one of the eigh...

Jordan and Germany said on Saturday that an international force expected to support a future Palestinian police in Gaza under US President Donald Trump’s post-war governance plan should have a UN mandate. Under the US-brokered ceasefire between Hamas and Israel, a coalition of mainly Arab and Muslim nations is expected to deploy forces in the Palestinian territory. The so-called international stabilisation force is supposed to train and support vetted Palestinian police in the Strip, with backing from Egypt and Jordan, as well as secure border areas and prevent weapons smuggling to Hamas. “We all agree that in order for that stabilisation force to be able to be effective in getting the job done, it has to have a Security Council mandate,” Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said. Jordan, however, will not be sending its own forces to the Strip. “We’re too close to the issue and we cannot deploy troops in Gaza,” Safadi said, adding his country was nonetheless ready to cooperate with the international force...

The Israeli military attacked the Gaza Strip for a fourth day on Friday, killing three people, Palestinian health authorities said, in another test of a fragile ceasefire agreement. Residents reported Israeli shelling and gunfire in northern Gaza on Friday, as Israel continued to bombard areas of the enclave despite saying that it remains committed to a ceasefire brokered by United States President Donald Trump. The Israeli military did not immediately reply to a Reuters request for comment. Another Palestinian died of wounds sustained from previous Israeli shelling, the Palestinian WAFA news agency reported. The US-brokered ceasefire, which left thorny issues like the disarmament of Hamas and a timeline for Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip unresolved, has been tested by periodic outbreaks of violence since it came into place three weeks ago. Between Tuesday and Wednesday, Israel retaliated for the death of an Israeli soldier with bombardments that Gaza health authorities said killed 104 people. More bo...

The information ministry on Friday denied “unverified or politically charged claims” by an Indian news channel about Pakistan preparing to dispatch 20,000 troops to Gaza and the country removing the clause from its passports that makes it invalid for travel to Israel. Indian news outlet Republic TV had made the allegations, specifying the number of soldiers Pakistan was planning to send to Gaza “under the supervision of Western countries and Israel.” The channel, according to a statement by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, had also “ridiculously claimed that Pakistan had also removed the ‘Not valid for Israel’ clause from the passport.” In a statement on X, the information ministry referred to a press release by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Mofa), reiterating that “Pakistan’s stance on Israel remains unchanged, that is, Islamabad does not recognise Israel, and no military cooperation or engagement exists or is under discussion”. Moreover, the ministry clarified that the passport clause remain...