WORLD - The African Mirror

Oct

27

2023

Israeli troops raid Gaza as Arab nations condemn bombardment

WORLD

ISRAELI forces carried out their biggest Gaza ground attack overnight in their 20-day-old war with Hamas as anger grew in the Arab world over Israel's relentless bombardment of the besieged Palestinian territory. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had said Israeli troops were still preparing for a full ground invasion, while the U.S. and other countries urged Israel to delay, fearing it could ignite hostilities on other Middle East fronts. The U.N. agency providing aid to Palestinian civilians in Gaza said it may soon have to shut down operations if no fuel reaches the Hamas-ruled territory amid a desperate need for shelter,…

Oct

27

2023

By DANIEL TROTTA and JULIA HARTE

Police hunt for man linked to major mass shootings in Lewiston, Maine

WORLD

HUNDREDS of police searched the city of Lewiston and surrounding areas of Maine state for a man sought in connection with mass shootings at a bar and a bowling alley, as news outlets reported a death toll ranging from 16 to 22, with dozens more wounded. Officials said there were multiple casualties but declined to provide figures. State and local police identified Robert R. Card, 40, as a person of interest in the case after previously posting on Facebook photographs of a man wielding what appeared to be a semi-automatic rifle. The pictures from one of Wednesday's crime scenes showed…

Oct

27

2023

By SOO-HYANG CHOI

South Korean court upholds ban on gay sex within armed forces

WORLD

SOUTH Korea's constitutional court narrowly upheld a law banning same-sex relations within the armed forces, citing a possible risk to the military's combat readiness in a ruling criticised by activists as a setback for gay rights. Under the country's military criminal act, members of the armed forces face up to two years in prison for same-sex relationships. The law has been referred to the court and upheld by it four times since 2002. In Thursday's five-to-four ruling, the court said allowing same-sex relations could undermine discipline within the military and harm its combat capabilities. Rights groups have been urging the…

Oct

26

2023

By JANIS LAIZANS

Freed Israeli hostage says ‘I’ve been through hell’

WORLD

AN elderly Israeli hostage who was released by Hamas overnight said she had been beaten by militants when she was abducted and taken to Gaza on October 7, but was then treated well during her two-week captivity in the Palestinian enclave. Yocheved Lifshitz, 85, was one of two elderly women freed late on Monday, leaving around 220 hostages still in the hands of Hamas, including both of their husbands. "I've been through hell," Lifshitz told reporters, speaking in barely a whisper and seated in a wheelchair outside the Tel Aviv hospital where she was taken following her release. Looking frail, Lifshitz said…

Oct

26

2023

By FRANCOIS MURPHY

Anti-Black racism is rising in EU countries, led by Germany, study finds

WORLD

RACISM towards Black people is growing in Europe, with Germany, Austria and Finland showing the highest rates of discrimination and harassment, a survey of first- and second-generation Black immigrants in 13 EU countries published on Wednesday found. The European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA), which commissioned the survey and analyzed its findings in a report, said that in the space of six years since the previous study, the proportion of respondents who had felt racially discriminated against in the past 12 months had risen by 10 percentage points to 34%. In Austria and Germany, the proportion was 64% - almost twice…

Oct

26

2023

By JACK QUEEN and LUC COHEN

Donald Trump’s lawyer questions Michael Cohen’s credibility in civil fraud trial

WORLD

DONALD Trump's onetime lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen faced pointed questions about his credibility from a lawyer representing his ex-boss as he testified against the former U.S. president in a civil fraud trial over his family real estate company's business practices. Cohen, who came face-to-face with Trump for the first time in five years on Tuesday, is undergoing cross-examination for his second straight day of testimony in a Manhattan courtroom. Cohen testified on Tuesday that Trump "arbitrarily" inflated the value of the Trump Organization's real estate assets to secure favourable insurance premiums. Cohen said he doctored financial statements so the property values…

Oct

25

2023

By NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI and ARI RABINOVITCH

Gaza reports record 24-hour death toll from Israeli bombing

WORLD

THE Palestinian health ministry said that Israeli air strikes had killed more than 700 Palestinians in Hamas-run Gaza overnight, the highest 24-hour death toll in Israel's declared two-week-old total siege of the narrow strip. United Nations agencies pleaded "on our knees" on Tuesday for emergency aid to be allowed unrestricted into Gaza, saying more than 20 times current deliveries were needed to support the Palestinian population after two weeks of Israeli bombardment. The Israeli military said it had hit over 400 Hamas militant targets and killed dozens of its fighters overnight, but that it would take time to destroy Gaza's ruling Islamist…

Oct

25

2023

By The African Mirror

Kremlin says Putin is healthy, laughs off body double rumours

WORLD

THE Kremlin denied a report that President Vladimir Putin was ill and laughed off persistent rumours that he used body doubles to cover for him in public appearances. "Everything is fine with him, this is absolutely another fake," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said when asked about an unsourced report by a Russian Telegram channel, picked up by some Western media, that the president had suffered a serious health episode on Sunday evening. The spokesman laughed in response to a further question about body doubles and denied that Putin had any. "This belongs to the category of absurd information hoaxes that…

Oct

25

2023

By The African Mirror

One dead, four missing after freighters collide in North Sea

WORLD

ONE body has been recovered, two people have been rescued, and four are missing after two freighters collided in the North Sea off the coast of Germany, the maritime emergency authority said. The Verity, which the Central Command for Maritime Emergencies said had sunk, had been on its way from Bremen to the English town of Immingham with seven crew members on board. The Polesie was sailing from Hamburg to La Coruna in Spain. The four missing crew members may be alive and sheltering inside the vessel on the sea floor, a spokesperson said during a press conference later, adding…

Oct

24

2023

By NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI

Hamas says it releases two female captives for health reasons; source says they are elderly Israelis

WORLD

THE armed wing of the Palestinian Hamas militant group said that it had released two more female civilian captives on health grounds in response to Egyptian-Qatari mediation efforts, and a source told Reuters they were elderly Israelis. Abu Ubaida, spokesman for the armed wing, said in a statement on Telegram: "We decided to release them for humanitarian and poor health grounds." It named the two as Nurit Yitzhak and Yocheved Lifshitz. The armed wing released an American mother and daughter, Judith and Natalie Raanan, on Friday, nearly two weeks after Hamas gunmen carried out an October 7 cross-border assault, killing…