
The Golan: A Battle For Power
A battle over land, natural resources and wind energy in the occupied Golan Heights – a microcosm of the wider Arab-Israeli conflict.
This documentary is about a group of Syrian fruit farmers taking on an Israeli energy company over the right to build wind turbines on land they've been farming for several centuries.
The farmers are Syrian Druze from the northern Golan, which has been illegally occupied by Israel since the June 1967 War.
The Druze object to what they see as a social and environmental threat to their community – and what they also see as an Israeli attempt to build permanent infrastructure on illegally occupied land, in violation of international law.
This is a powerful story in which global politics and a simple farming way of life collide, creating a standoff that resonates beyond the fruit orchards of the Golan Heights.
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Al Jazeera
4 hours ago
- Al Jazeera
Live: US blocks UN Gaza ceasefire resolution, Israel pounds southern Strip
Israel has continued to pound the Gaza Strip this morning, killing at least three people in Gaza City's Zeitoun and six in al-Mawasi, in south US vetoes a United Nations Security Council resolution calling for an immediate, unconditional, and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, the only country to do Gaza Humanitarian Foundation extends its closure for a second day, after hundreds of Palestinians were killed and wounded seeking aid at its distribution war on Gaza has killed at least 54,607 Palestinians and wounded 125,341, according to the Health estimated 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the Hamas-led attacks of October 7, 2023, and more than 200 were taken captive. Update: Date: 1m ago (06:05 GMT) Title: At least 12 killed in Gaza by Israel this morning Content: We are getting reports from our colleagues of an Israeli air strike on a house in the Zeitoun neighbourhood, south of Gaza City. A medical source at Ahli Hospital said at least three people were killed in the attack. In addition, at least six people were killed in south Gaza's al-Mawasi, when an Israeli drone attacked tents housing displaced people. We will continue to update you on all Israeli attacks on the Strip as the day moves forward. Update: Date: 3m ago (06:03 GMT) Title: A recap of recent developments Content: Update: Date: 6m ago (06:00 GMT) Title: Welcome to our live coverage Content: Thank you for joining our live coverage of Israel's war on Gaza, as well as its attacks on the occupied West Bank and the wider region. Follow this page for continuous updates and analyses of the latest developments. You can read about key events from Wednesday, June 4, here.


Al Jazeera
12 hours ago
- Al Jazeera
US vetoes UNSC ceasefire resolution as death, starvation consume Gaza
The United States has vetoed a United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolution that called for an immediate, unconditional, and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, as Israeli strikes across the enclave have killed nearly 100 Palestinians in the past 24 hours amid a crippling aid blockade. The US was the only country to vote against the measure on Wednesday while the 14 other members of the council voted in favour. The resolution also called for the release of Israeli captives held in Gaza, but Washington said it was a 'non-starter' because the ceasefire demand is not directly linked to the release of captives. In remarks before the start of the voting, Acting US Ambassador Dorothy Shea made her country's opposition to the resolution, put forward by 10 countries on the 15-member council, painfully clear, which she said 'should come as no surprise'. 'The United States has taken the very clear position since this conflict began that Israel has the right to defend itself, which includes defeating Hamas and ensuring they are never again in a position to threaten Israel,' she told the council. China's Ambassador Fu Cong said Israel's actions have 'crossed every red line' of international humanitarian law and seriously violated U.N. resolutions. 'Yet, due to the shielding by one country, these violations have not been stopped or held accountable.' Al Jazeera's senior political analyst Marwan Bishara noted that the US veto makes it 'so isolated'. 'Clearly there is a gathering storm … with so many countries' that are standing against the US at the UNSC. 'It's only the US that is trying to block this converging and rising current against Israel and what it's doing in Gaza … Israel is not defending itself in Gaza, Israel is defending its occupation and siege in Gaza,' Bishara added. Despite global demands for a truce, Israel has repeatedly rejected calls for an unconditional or permanent ceasefire, insisting Hamas cannot stay in power, nor in Gaza. It has expanded its military assault in Gaza, killing and wounding thousands more Palestinians and maintaining a brutal blockade on the enclave, only allowing a trickle of tightly-controlled aid in where a famine looms. At least 95 Palestinians have been killed on Wednesday and more than 440 injured, according to health officials in Gaza. Al Jazeera's Tareq Abu Azzoum, reporting from Deir el-Balah, said, 'There has been a clear surge of attacks.' He said there were relentless Israeli strikes there in central Gaza and throughout the territory. Meanwhile, Israel's military warned starving Palestinians against approaching roads to the US-backed aid distribution sites run by the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), saying the areas will be 'considered combat zones' while it halted aid for a whole day. That move came after Israeli forces opened fire at aid seekers several times, killing more than 100 Palestinians and injuring hundreds more since the GHF started operating on May 27. Witnesses said Israeli soldiers opened fire on crowds that massed before dawn to seek food on Tuesday. Images of starving Palestinians scrambling for paltry aid packages, herded in cage-like lines and then coming under fire have caused global outrage. The Israeli military admitted it shot at aid seekers on Tuesday, but claimed that they opened fire when 'suspects' deviated from a stipulated route. At a hospital in southern Gaza, the family of Reem al-Akhras, who was killed in Israel's mass shooting on Tuesday, mourned her death. 'She went to bring us some food, and this is what happened to her,' her son Zain Zidan said through tears. Her husband, Mohamed Zidan, said 'every day unarmed people' are being killed. 'This is not humanitarian aid – it's a trap.' The new aid distribution process – currently from just three sites – has been widely criticised by rights groups and the UN, who say it does not adhere to humanitarian principles. They also say the aid model, which uses private US security and logistics workers, militarises aid. Ahead of the UNSC vote, UN aid chief Tom Fletcher again appealed for the UN and aid groups to be allowed to assist people in Gaza, stressing that they have a plan, supplies and experience. 'Open the crossings – all of them. Let in lifesaving aid at scale, from all directions. Lift the restrictions on what and how much aid we can bring in. Ensure our convoys aren't held up by delays and denials,' Fletcher said in a statement. The UN has long blamed Israel and lawlessness in the enclave for hindering the delivery of aid and its distribution in Gaza. Israel accuses Hamas of stealing aid, which the group vehemently denies, and the World Food Programme says there is no evidence to support that allegation. UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) spokesman James Elder, currently in Gaza, described the 'horrors' he witnessed within just 24 hours. Speaking from al-Mawasi, Elder told Al Jazeera that Gaza's hospitals and streets are filled with malnourished children. 'I'm seeing teenage boys in tears, showing me their ribs,' he said, noting that children were pleading for food. The UNSC has voted on 14 Gaza-related resolutions and approved four since the war began in October 2023. Wednesday's vote was the first since November 2024. Hamas is still holding 58 captives, a third of them believed to be alive, after most of the rest were released in previous short-lived ceasefire agreements or other deals. Israel's offensive has killed more than 54,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza's Health Ministry.


Al Jazeera
13 hours ago
- Al Jazeera
Syria to give IAEA access to suspected former nuclear sites: Report
Syria's new government has agreed to give inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) access to suspected former nuclear sites immediately, according to the agency's chief, as Damascus makes further inroads to rejoining the international fold. Rafael Grossi, the United Nations' nuclear watchdog's director-general, was speaking Wednesday to The Associated Press news agency in Damascus, where he met with President Ahmed al-Sharaa and other officials. The visit was a key part of the IAEA's efforts to restore access to sites associated with Syria's nuclear programme since the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad in December. The agency's aim is 'to bring total clarity over certain activities that took place in the past that were, in the judgement of the agency, probably related to nuclear weapons', Grossi said. He described the new government as 'committed to opening up to the world, to international cooperation' and said he is hopeful of finishing the inspection process within months. Grossi's visit also marks another step towards international acceptance of Syria's new government after the United States and European Union lifted sanctions on the country last month. Israel has taken an opposite approach to its Western allies, launching more than 200 air, drone or artillery attacks across Syria over the past six months, despite the two countries holding indirect talks in early May. An IAEA team visited some sites of interest last year. Syria under al-Assad is believed to have operated an extensive clandestine nuclear programme, which included an undeclared nuclear reactor built by North Korea in eastern Deir ez-Zor province. The IAEA described the reactor as being 'not configured to produce electricity' — raising the concern that Damascus sought a nuclear weapon there by producing weapons-grade plutonium. The reactor site only became public knowledge after Israel, the region's only nuclear power, launched air strikes in 2007, destroying the facility. Syria later levelled the site and never responded fully to the IAEA's questions. Grossi said inspectors plan to return to the reactor in Deir az Zor and three other related sites. Other sites under IAEA safeguards include a miniature neutron source reactor in Damascus and a facility in Homs that can process yellow-cake uranium. While there are no indications that there have been releases of radiation from the sites, Grossi said, the watchdog is concerned that 'enriched uranium can be lying somewhere and could be reused, could be smuggled, could be trafficked'. He said al-Sharaa had shown a 'very positive disposition to talk to us and to allow us to carry out the activities we need to'. Grossi revealed that the IAEA is also prepared to transfer equipment for nuclear medicine and help rebuild the radiotherapy, nuclear medicine and oncology infrastructure in a health system severely weakened by nearly 14 years of civil war. 'And the president has expressed to me he's interested in exploring, in the future, nuclear energy as well,' Grossi added. A number of other countries in the region, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Jordan, are pursuing nuclear energy in some form.