‘War and a strike are two different things': Expert on U.S. involvement in Israel-Iran conflict
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CTV News
5 hours ago
- CTV News
Druze demand self determination in largest protest held since deadly clashes in Syria
Residents walk past a burned-out military vehicle after sectarian clashes in the Druze-majority town of Sweida, Syria, on Friday, July 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Omar Sanadiki) BEIRUT — Hundreds of people demonstrated in Syria's southern city of Sweida and elsewhere on Saturday to demand the right to self determination for the Druze minority, in the largest protests to take place since deadly clashes in the area last month. Some of the protesters waved Israeli flags to thank Israel for intervening on their side during heavy clashes in mid-July between militias of the Druze minority and armed tribal groups and government forces. Saturday's demonstration comes as Syria grapples with deep ethnic and religious divisions following the collapse of the Assad family rule last December. The transition has proven fragile, with renewed violence erupting in March along the coast and in July in Sweida, a city with a significant Druze population, highlighting the continued threat to peace after years of civil war. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Syrian war monitor, said the protesters expressed their rejection of the interim central government in Damascus and demanded that those responsible for atrocities against Druze be brought to justice. The Observatory said some of the protesters called on Israel to intervene to support their demand of self determination. Rayyan Maarouf, who heads the activist media collective Suwayda 24, said Saturday's demonstration in Sweida was the largest since last months's clashes, and that there were similar gatherings in areas including the nearby towns of Shahba and Salkhad. He added that this is the first time people protested under the slogan of self determination. 'This is an unprecedented change for the Druze in Syria,' Maarouf told The Associated Press. Clashes erupted on July 13 between Druze militias and local Sunni Muslim Bedouin tribes in Sweida. Government forces then intervened, nominally to restore order, but ended up essentially siding with the Bedouins against the Druze. Israel intervened in defence of the Druze, launching dozens of airstrikes on convoys of government fighters and even striking the Syrian Defense Ministry headquarters in central Damascus. Atrocities were committed during the clashes that left hundreds of people dead. The new interim government set up a committee last month tasked with investigating attacks on civilians in the sectarian violence in the country's south. It is supposed to issue a report within three months. The Druze religious sect began as a 10th-century offshoot of Ismailism, a branch of Shiite Islam. Over half of the roughly 1 million Druze worldwide live in Syria. Most other Druze live in Lebanon and Israel, including in the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Mideast War and annexed in 1981. The Associated Press
CTV News
8 hours ago
- CTV News
Military airstrike on gem mining town kills at least 21 in Myanmar
BANGKOK — An airstrike by Myanmar's military on the town of Mogok, the center of the Southeast Asian country's lucrative gem-mining industry, has killed at least 21 people including a pregnant woman, an armed opposition group, local residents and Myanmar's online media said Saturday. The incident was the latest in a series of frequent and deadly military airstrikes, often causing civilian casualties, that have intensified in a bid to reclaim territory from resistance groups amid the ongoing civil war that erupted after the army seized power in February 2021. The attack occurred Thursday at 8:30 p.m. in Shwegu ward in Mogok township, about 115 kilometres (70 miles) northeast of Mandalay, the country's second-largest city, said Lway Yay Oo, a spokesperson for the the Ta'ang National Liberation Army. The TNLA is one of the powerful ethnic militias fighting against the army near the Chinese border. 'About 21 civilians were killed. Seven others were injured. Homes and Buddhist monastery buildings were also damaged,' Lway Yay Oo said. Mogok, the ruby-mining center in the upper Mandalay region, was seized in July 2024 by the TNLA, a member of an alliance of ethnic militias that seized a large swath of territory in northeastern Myanmar in an offensive that began in late 2023. The group's statement released Friday night on its Telegram social media channel said 16 women were among the victims killed in the airstrike that appeared to target a Buddhist monastery in Mogok's Shwegu ward. It said 15 houses were also damaged when a jet fighter dropped a bomb. Two Mogok residents told The Associated Press on Saturday that the death toll had risen to nearly 30, though the exact casualties could not be independently confirmed. The residents, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were afraid of being arrested by the military, said the death toll was high because one of the bombed houses had been hosting visitors to the pregnant woman. Independent online media, including Myanmar Now and Democratic Voice of Burma, released pictures and videos said to be of debris in the aftermath of the airstrike. The military did not comment on the incident in Mogok. In the past, the army has said it only attacks legitimate targets of war, accusing the resistance forces of being terrorists. Myanmar has been in turmoil since the army seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021. After peaceful demonstrations were put down with lethal force, many opponents of military rule took up arms, and large parts of the country are now embroiled in conflict. The military government has stepped up airstrikes against the armed pro-democracy People's Defense Force and ethnic militias that have been fighting for greater autonomy for decades. The resistance forces have no defense against air attacks. The TNLA's statement said that another 17 people including two Buddhist monks had been killed and 20 others were injured in the first two weeks of August by airstrikes in areas controlled by the group. About 16 people, mostly truck drivers, were killed in airstrikes last Monday on a convoy of trucks that were parked on the road due to heavy fighting near the town of Sagaing in central Myanmar, according to independent Myanmar media reports. Opponents and independent analysts estimate the army now controls less than half the country while maintaining a tenacious grip on much of central Myanmar, including the capital, Naypyidaw. It has accelerated counter-offensives ahead of the election it has promised to hold at the end of this year in order to retake areas controlled by opposition forces. Critics say the elections won't be democratic because there is no free media and most leaders of Suu Kyi's party have been arrested. The plan is widely seen as an attempt to legitimize and maintain the military's rule. Several opposition groups have said they would seek to derail the election. Grant Peck, The Associated Press
CTV News
11 hours ago
- CTV News
In their words: Israeli leaders support the mass relocation of Palestinians from Gaza
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends the U.S. Independence Day reception, known as the annual "Fourth of July" celebration, hosted by Newsmax, in Jerusalem on Wednesday, Aug. 13, 2025. (Ronen Zvulun/Pool Photo via AP) U.S. President Donald Trump has said little about his idea of relocating many of the Gaza Strip's two million Palestinians to other countries since he stunned the world by announcing it in February. But Israel's leaders have run with it, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at one point listed it as a condition for ending the 22-month war sparked by Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023, attack. He and other Israeli officials present it as a humanitarian measure allowing Palestinians to flee war and hardship, and say it should be voluntary. Israel has been in talks with African countries — many of which are themselves wracked by war and at risk of famine — about taking Palestinians in. Palestinians say there would be nothing voluntary about leaving part of their homeland with no guarantee of return after an occupying power has rendered much of it uninhabitable. Rights groups and much of the international community say it would amount to forcible expulsion in violation of international law. The issue is likely to take on greater urgency as Israel widens its military campaign to the last parts of Gaza that it hasn't taken over and largely flattened, and as large numbers of Palestinians flee once again. 'This is our land, there is no other place for us to go,' said Ismail Zaydah, whose family has remained in Gaza City throughout the war, even after much of their neighborhood and part of their home was destroyed. 'We are not surrendering,' he said. 'We were born here, and here we die.' Here's what Israel's leaders have said, in their own words. Defense Minister Israel Katz, in a Feb. 6 post on X 'I have instructed the (Israeli military) to prepare a plan that will allow any resident of Gaza who wishes to leave to do so, to any country willing to receive them. ... The plan will include exit options via land crossings, as well as special arrangements for departure by sea and air.' Netanyahu, addressing a Cabinet meeting on March 30 'Hamas will lay down its weapons. Its leaders will be allowed to leave. We will see to the general security in the Gaza Strip and will allow the realization of the Trump plan for voluntary migration. This is the plan. We are not hiding this and are ready to discuss it at any time.' Netanyahu, in a public address May 21 Israel will create 'a sterile zone in the southern Strip to which the civilian population will be evacuated from the combat areas, for the purpose of defending it. In this zone, which will be Hamas-free, the residents of Gaza will receive full humanitarian assistance.' 'I am ready to end the war — according to clear conditions that will ensure the security of Israel. All of the hostages will return home. Hamas will lay down its weapons, leave power, its leadership, whoever is left, will be exiled from the Strip, Gaza will be completely demilitarized, and we will carry out the Trump plan, which is so correct and so revolutionary, and it says something simple: The residents of Gaza who wish to leave — will be able to leave.' Netanyahu, in an interview with Israeli media on Aug. 12 'I think that the right thing to do, even according to the laws of war as I know them, is to allow the population to leave, and then you go in with all your might against the enemy who remains there.' 'Give them the opportunity to leave! First, from combat zones, and also from the Strip if they want. We will allow this, first of all inside Gaza during the fighting, and we will also allow them to leave Gaza. We are not pushing them out but allowing them to leave.' Joseph Krauss, The Associated Press
