https://arab.news/4hv3z
RAMALLAH, Palestinian Territories: Four Palestinian prisoners freed from an Israeli jail on Saturday as part of the ongoing truce in Gaza were transferred to hospital on arrival in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah, the Red Crescent said.
“Our teams are transferring four released (Palestinian) prisoners from the location of reception to the hospital,” the Palestine Red Crescent Society said in a statement following the sixth hostage-prisoner exchange between Hamas and Israel.
DUBAI: The UAE is stepping up its aid operation into Gaza ahead of Ramadan with cargo planes flying in hundreds of tonnes of essential supplies on Friday.
The airlift comes after five convoys delivering a wide range of humanitarian aid from the UAE reached the Palestinian territory this week, state news agency WAM reported.
The convoys crossing from Egypt into Gaza amounted to 73 trucks carrying more than 1,185 tonnes of aid, including food, tents and other essential supplies.
Israel’s devastating 15-month war on the territory has killed more than 48,000 Palestinians and displaced 90 percent of the population.
Since a ceasefire took effect last month, aid has surged into the territory.
On Friday, 257 tonnes of Ramadan food supplies were flown from the UAE, destined for Gaza as part of Operation Chivalrous Knight 3.
The supplies were flown from Fujairah as part of an effort between the Hamad bin Mohammed Al-Sharqi Foundation for Humanitarian Works and the Fujairah Charity Association, or FCA.
Saeed bin Mohammed Al-Raqbani, chairman of the FCA, said that the initiative aligned with the UAE’s leadership to “extend support to Palestinians and provide them with essential supplies.”
The UAE has delivered more than 37,300 tonnes of humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people as part of the operation.
RAMALLAH: The Palestinian foreign ministry condemned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to a West Bank refugee camp Friday, accusing him of “storming” the area amid an intense military operation in the northern occupied West Bank.
In a statement, the Foreign Affairs and Expatriates Ministry criticized the “storming by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu... into the northern occupied West Bank refugee camp of Tulkarem,” alleging he and a group of soldiers “broke into a house” to use as a command center.
RABAT: A Moroccan court overturned on Thursday a decision to deport a member of China’s Uyghur Muslim minority wanted by Beijing, ordering his release from prison, according to his lawyer.
Yidiresi Aishan has been detained in the North African kingdom since 2021, when he arrived in Casablanca from Turkiye with an Interpol arrest warrant against him though it was later rescinded.
That same year, Morocco agreed to extradite him to China, where he has been wanted by the authorities for alleged acts of terror.
A Rabat court “ruled in favor of his release, annulling the deportation order to China,” his lawyer, Miloud Kandil, told AFP.
He said his client, a father of three in his thirties, had left Morocco, without providing further details.
China accuses Aishan of “terrorist acts committed in 2017” belonging to a terrorist organization, allegations he denies.
In 2021, United Nations human rights experts urged Morocco to halt Aishan’s extradition, citing “the credible risk of grave violations of his human rights.”
Returning him to China could have exposed him to “arbitrary detention, enforced disappearance or torture,” the experts had said.
Beijing stands accused of detaining more than a million Uyghurs and other Muslims in its northwestern region, in a campaign that the United Nations has said may constitute “crimes against humanity.”
China vehemently denies the allegations, saying the policies have rooted out extremism in Xinjiang and brought about economic development.
Authorities have detained Uyghurs with overseas connections and confiscated their travel documents since a crackdown in the mid-2010s, according to researchers, campaigners and members of the Uyghur diaspora.
GAZA CITY/ RAMALLAH: Hamas’s armed wing confirmed it will hand over Saturday six hostages held alive in the Gaza Strip as part of the ongoing ceasefire deal with Israel.
The Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades said in a statement on Friday that the release would occur as planned.
Israeli campaign group the Hostages and Missing Families Forum published the names of the six hostages earlier this week, naming them as Eliya Cohen, Tal Shoham, Omer Shem Tov, Omer Wenkert, Hisham Al-Sayed and Avera Mengistu.
Meanwhile, Israel will free 602 inmates from jails on Saturday as part of a hostage-prisoner swap with Hamas, according to the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club advocacy group.
Among those released, 445 are individuals from Gaza who were arrested after Hamas’ October 7 attack that sparked the war, 60 are serving long sentences, 50 are serving life sentences, and 47 were re-arrested after a 2011 prisoner exchange, Amani Sarahneh, spokeswoman for the NGO, told AFP.
JUBA, South Sudan: South Sudan on Thursday announced the closure of all schools for two weeks due to an ongoing extreme heatwave that has caused some students to collapse.
This is the second time the country – which faces extreme effects from climate change, including flooding during the rainy season – has closed schools during a heatwave in February and March.
Deputy Education Minister Martin Tako Moi said Thursday “an average of 12 students had been collapsing in Juba city every day.”
Most schools in South Sudan have makeshift structures made with iron sheets and do not have electricity that could power cooling systems.
Environment Minister Josephine Napwon Cosmos on Thursday urged residents to stay indoors and drink water as temperatures were expected to rise as high as 42 degrees Celsius (107.6 degrees Fahrenheit).
Napwon proposed that government employees “work in shifts” to avoid heat strokes.
Education workers have urged the government to consider amending the school calendar so that schools close in February and resume in April when the temperatures decline.
Abraham Kuol Nyuon, the dean of the Graduate College at the University of Juba, told The Associated Press that the calendar should be localized based on the weather in the 10 states.
A civil society group, Integrity South Sudan, blamed the government for a lack of proper planning and contingency plans, saying that closing schools during heatwaves shows a “failure to prioritize the education of South Sudan’s children.”
The country’s health system is fragile due to political instability. Nearly 400,000 people were killed between 2013 and 2018 when a peace agreement was signed by President Salva Kiir and his rival-turned-deputy, Riek Machar.
South Sudan’s elections, scheduled for last year, were postponed for two years due to a lack of funds.
The country has been facing an economic crisis due to an interruption of oil exports after a major pipeline was raptured in neighboring war-torn Sudan. The pipeline was later repaired.
