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Death toll from strong earthquakes that shook western Afghanistan rises to 2,000
Death toll from strong earthquakes that shook western Afghanistan rises to 2,000, says Taliban spokesman.
The United Nations gave a preliminary figure of 320 dead, but later said the figure was still being verified. Local authorities gave an estimate of 100 people killed and 500 injured, according to the same update from the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
The update also said 465 houses had been reported destroyed and a further 135 were damaged.
"Partners and local authorities anticipate the number of casualties to increase as search and rescue efforts continue amid reports that some people may be trapped under collapsed buildings," the U.N. said.
Disaster authority spokesperson Mohammad Abdullah Jan said four villages in the Zenda Jan district in Herat province bore the brunt of the quake and aftershocks.
The United States Geological Survey said the quake's epicenter was about 40 kilometers (25 miles) northwest of Herat city. It was followed by three very strong aftershocks, measuring magnitude 6.3, 5.9 and 5.5, as well as lesser shocks.
Read: Two earthquakes strike Nepal, sending tremors through the region
At least five strong tremors struck the city around noon, Herat city resident Abdul Shakor Samadi said.
"All people are out of their homes," Samadi said. "Houses, offices and shops are all empty and there are fears of more earthquakes. My family and I were inside our home, I felt the quake." His family began shouting and ran outside, afraid to return indoors.
The World Health Organization in Afghanistan said it dispatched 12 ambulance cars to Zenda Jan to evacuate casualties to hospitals.
"As deaths & casualties from the earthquake continue to be reported, teams are in hospitals assisting treatment of wounded & assessing additional needs," the U.N. agency said on X, formerly known as Twitter. "WHO-supported ambulances are transporting those affected, most of them women and children."
Telephone connections went down in Herat, making it hard to get details from affected areas. Videos on social media showed hundreds of people in the streets outside their homes and offices in Herat city.
Read: 5.4 magnitude earthquake jolts Bangladesh
Herat province borders Iran. The quake also was felt in the nearby Afghan provinces of Farah and Badghis, according to local media reports.
Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Taliban-appointed deputy prime minister for economic affairs, expressed his condolences to the dead and injured in Herat and Badghis.
The Taliban urged local organizations to reach earthquake-hit areas as soon as possible to help take the injured to hospital, provide shelter for the homeless, and deliver food to survivors. They said security agencies should use all their resources and facilities to rescue people trapped under debris.
"We ask our wealthy compatriots to give any possible cooperation and help to our afflicted brothers," the Taliban said on X.
Read: Can Earthquakes Really be Predicted?
In June 2022, a powerful earthquake struck a rugged, mountainous region of eastern Afghanistan, flattening stone and mud-brick homes. The quake was Afghanistan's deadliest in two decades, killing at least 1,000 people and injuring about 1,500.
Biden decries the 'unconscionable' Hamas attack and warns Israel's enemies not to exploit the crisis
President Joe Biden on Saturday decried the “unconscionable" assault by Hamas militants and his administration pledged to ensure Israel has “what it needs to defend itself” after the surprise attack that drew worldwide condemnation and anger from Israel's allies.
Biden said from the White House that he told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the United States “stands with the people of Israel in the face of these terrorist assaults. Israel has the right to defend itself and its people, full stop. There’s never a justification for terrorist attacks and my administration’s support for Israeli’s security is rock solid and unwavering.’’
The president also warned Israeli's enemies that "this is not a moment for any party hostile to Israel to exploit these attacks to seek advantage. The world is watching.”
Biden said he would keep in close touch with Netanyahu, and had called Jordan's King Abdullah II and members of Congress to discuss the situation.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken was at the White House for meetings and spoke to Israel's president and foreign minister, while Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke with Israel's defense minister. The Pentagon chief said the U.S. was committed to helping Israel to “protect civilians from indiscriminate violence and terrorism” and with its defense needs.
Hamas' unprecedented incursion, which Biden noted came not long after Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, was the deadliest attack in Israel in years and was threatening to spiral into a broader conflict. Israel retaliated with airstrikes in Gaza. “We are at war,” Netanyahu said.
Biden said the people of Israel were “under attack orchestrated by a terrorist organization" and that "in this moment of tragedy, I want to say to them and to the world and to terrorists everywhere, the United States stands with Israel. We will not ever fail to have their back. We’ll make sure that they have the help their citizens need and they can continue to defend themselves.”
Read: Hamas surprise attack out of Gaza stuns Israel and leaves hundreds dead in fighting, retaliation
He said ``the world has seen appalling images -- thousands of rockets in the space of hours raining down on Israel cities” and that Hamas had killed not just Israeli soldiers but also Israeli civilians – “in the street, in their homes, innocent people murdered and wounded, entire families taken hostage by Hamas just days after Israel marked the holiest of days in the Jewish calendar. It’s unconscionable.’’
The hostilities dealt a significant blow to U.S. efforts to expand the Arab-Israeli Abraham Accords normalization agreements, not only with Saudi Arabia, which has commanded most of the public attention, but also with smaller Arab states.
U.S. officials say they intend to press ahead but acknowledge efforts are unlikely to bear fruit while there is an active conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.
Blinken had been planning a trip to the Middle East, with stops in Israel and Saudi Arabia, later this month, but those plans are now on hold, according to multiple U.S. officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal administration deliberations.
In the immediate term, these officials said the U.S. would work Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, among Arab partners in the region, to try to deescalate the situation. But given the scale of the Hamas attacks and Israel's military response, the officials said they were not optimistic about any short-term solution.
Like Biden, who said the U.S. “unequivocally condemns this appalling assault,” many world leaders stressed that Israel has a right to defend itself and they pledged solidarity.
Read: ‘We’re at war’: Netanyahu tells Israel after Hamas attack kills at least 40
“We believe that order will be restored and the terrorists will be destroyed,” Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said in a post on his official Telegram channel. Zelenskyy, who is Jewish and had relatives who died in the Holocaust, said “Israel’s right to self-defense cannot be questioned."
European Commission President Ursula Von Der Leyen denounced the “senseless attack” by Hamas and said, “This violence is neither a political solution nor an act of bravery. It is purely terrorism.”
German Chancellor OIaf Scholz said his country stands beside Israel, a sentiment echoed by the Austrian chancellor, Karl Nehammer. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak tweeted that he was shocked by the attacks and that “Israel has an absolute right to defend itself.”
In Vienna, the Israeli flag was raised at the Austrian chancellor’s office and Foreign Ministry in a gesture of solidarity. "There is no excuse for terror,” Nehammer said in a post on X.
Mikhail Bogdanov, Russia’s deputy foreign minister and a former ambassador to Israel and Egypt, told the state Tass agency that Moscow was in touch with “all parties (of the conflict), including Arab countries” and urged “an immediate cease-fire and peace” between Hamas and Israel.
Bogdanov did not specify the Arab nations with which Russian diplomats were speaking.
Saudi Arabia called for an immediate halt to the fighting, urging both sides to protect civilians and exercise restraint.
“The kingdom recalls its repeated warnings of the dangers of the situation exploding as a result of the continued occupation, the Palestinian people being deprived of their legitimate rights and the repetition of system provocations against” them by Israel, a Saudi Foreign Ministry statement said.
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But in Iran, Israel’s regional archenemy, members of parliament opened their session Saturday by chanting “Death to Israel” and “Israel will be doomed, Palestine will be the conqueror.” Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said “today’s operation created a new page in the field of resistance and armed operation against occupiers,” the semiofficial ISNA news agency reported.
In Lebanon’s Palestinian refugee camps, hundreds took to the streets to celebrate the operation by Hamas. In the Bourj al-Barajneh camp south of Beirut, residents danced in the streets, while young men in the northern city of Tripoli distributed celebratory sweets to passersby in the streets.
In the Bekaa Valley, pro-Palestinian demonstrators blocked the roads. The country’s highest Sunni religious authority called for mosques to broadcast “God is great” over loudspeakers following afternoon prayers “in solidarity with our people in Palestine.”
Hamas surprise attack out of Gaza stuns Israel and leaves hundreds dead in fighting, retaliation
Backed by a barrage of rockets, Hamas militants stormed from the blockaded Gaza Strip into nearby Israeli towns, killing dozens and abducting others in an unprecedented surprise attack during a major Jewish holiday Saturday. A stunned Israel launched airstrikes in Gaza, with its prime minister saying the country is now at war with Hamas and vowing to inflict an “unprecedented price.”
In an assault of startling breadth, Hamas gunmen rolled into as many as 22 locations outside the Gaza Strip, including towns and other communities as far as 15 miles (24 kilometers) from the Gaza border. In some places they gunned down civilians and soldiers as Israel’s military scrambled to muster a response. Gunbattles continued well after nightfall, and militants held hostages in standoffs in two towns and occupied a police station in a third.
Israeli media, citing rescue service officials, said at least 250 people were killed and 1,500 wounded, making it the deadliest attack in Israel in decades. At least 232 people in the Gaza Strip were killed and 1,700 wounded in Israeli strikes, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. Hamas fighters took an unknown number of civilians and soldiers captive into Gaza.
The conflict threatened to escalate with Israel’s vows of retaliation. Previous conflicts between Israel and Gaza’s Hamas rulers brought widespread death and destruction in Gaza and days of rocket fire on Israeli towns. The situation is potentially more volatile now, with Israel’s far-right government stung by the security breach and with Palestinians in despair over a never-ending occupation in the West Bank and suffocating blockade of Gaza.
In a televised address Saturday night, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who earlier declared Israel to be at war, said the military will use all of its strength to destroy Hamas’ capabilities. But he warned, “This war will take time. It will be difficult."
“All the places that Hamas hides in, operates from, we will turn them into ruins," he added. “Get out of there now," he told Gaza residents, who have no way to leave the tiny, overcrowded Mediterranean territory of 2.3 million people.
Israeli airstrikes in Gaza intensified after nightfall, flattening residential buildings in giant explosions, including a 14-story tower that held dozens of apartments as well as Hamas offices in central Gaza City. Israeli forces fired a warning just before.
Around 3 a.m., a loudspeaker atop a mosque in Gaza City blared a stark warning to residents of nearby apartment buildings: Evacuate immediately. Just minutes later, an Israeli airstrike reduced one five-story building to ashes.
Read: ‘We’re at war’: Netanyahu tells Israel after Hamas attack kills at least 40
After one Israeli strike, a Hamas rocket barrage hit four cities, including Tel Aviv and a nearby suburb. Throughout the day, Hamas fired more than 3,500 rockets, the Israeli military said.
The strength, sophistication and timing of the Saturday morning attack shocked Israelis. Hamas fighters used explosives to break through the border fence enclosing Gaza, then crossed with motorcycles, pickup trucks, paragliders and speed boats on the coast.
In some towns, civilians’ bodies lay where they had encountered advancing gunmen. At least nine people gunned down at a bus shelter in the town of Sderot were laid out on stretchers on the street, their bags still on the curb nearby. One woman, screaming, embraced the body of a family member sprawled under a sheet next to a toppled motorcycle.
In amateur video, hundreds of terrified young people who had been dancing at a rave fled for their lives after Hamas militants entered the area and began firing at them. Israeli media said dozens of people were killed.
Among the dead was Col. Jonathan Steinberg, a senior officer who commanded the Israeli military's Nahal Brigade, a prominent infantry unit.
The shadowy leader of Hamas’ military wing, Mohammed Deif, said the assault was in response to the 16-year blockade of Gaza, Israeli raids inside West Bank cities over the past year, violence at Al Aqsa — the disputed Jerusalem holy site sacred to Jews as the Temple Mount — increasing attacks by settlers on Palestinians and the growth of settlements.
“Enough is enough,” Deif, who does not appear in public, said in the recorded message. He said the attack was only the start of what he called “Operation Al-Aqsa Storm” and called on Palestinians from east Jerusalem to northern Israel to join the fight.
Read: Drone attack kills 80 and wounds 240 at a packed Syrian military graduation ceremony, official says
The Hamas incursion on Simchat Torah, a normally joyous day when Jews complete the annual cycle of reading the Torah scroll, revived painful memories of the 1973 Mideast war practically 50 years to the day, in which Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, aiming to take back Israeli-occupied territories.
Comparisons to one of the most traumatic moments in Israeli history sharpened criticism of Netanyahu and his far-right allies, who had campaigned on more aggressive action against threats from Gaza. Political commentators lambasted the government and military over its failure to anticipate what appeared to be a Hamas attack unseen in its level of planning and coordination.
Asked by reporters how Hamas had managed to catch the army off guard, Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, an Israeli army spokesman, replied, “That’s a good question.”
The abduction of Israeli civilians and soldiers also raised a particularly thorny issue for Israel, which has a history of making heavily lopsided exchanges to bring captive Israelis home. Israel is holding thousands of Palestinians in its prisons. Hecht confirmed that “substantial” number of Israelis were abducted Saturday.
Associated Press photos showed an elderly Israeli woman being brought into Gaza on a golf cart by Hamas gunmen and another woman squeezed between two fighters on a motorcycle. AP journalists saw four people taken from the kibbutz of Kfar Azza, including two women.
In Gaza, a black jeep pulled to a stop and, when the rear door opened, a young Israeli woman stumbled out, bleeding from the head and with her hands tied behind her back. A man waving a gun in the air grabbed her by the hair and pushed her into the vehicle’s back seat. Israeli TV reported that workers from Thailand and the Philippines were also among the captives.
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Netanyahu vowed that Hamas “will pay an unprecedented price.” A major question now was whether Israel will launch a ground assault into Gaza, a move that in the past has brought intensified casualties.
Israel’s military was bringing four divisions of troops as well as tanks to the Gaza border, joining 31 battalions already in the area, the spokesman Hagari said. And the Israeli military later released an Arabic-language video warning Gazans to leave their homes in targeted areas of the dense coastal enclave.
In Gaza, much of the population was thrown into darkness after nightfall as electrical supplies from Israel — which supplies almost all the territories’ power — were cut off. Netanyahu’s office said in a statement that Israel would stop supplying electricity, fuel and goods to Gaza.
Hamas said it had planned for a potentially long fight. “We are prepared for all options, including all-out war,” the deputy head of the Hamas political bureau, Saleh al-Arouri, told Al-Jazeera TV. “We are ready to do whatever is necessary for the dignity and freedom of our people.”
U.S. President Joe Biden said from the White House that he had spoken with Netanyahu to say the United States “stands with the people of Israel in the face of these terrorist assaults. Israel has the right to defend itself and its people, full stop."
Saudi Arabia, which has been in talks with the U.S. about normalizing relations with Israel, called on both sides to exercise restraint. The kingdom said it had repeatedly warned about the danger of “the situation exploding as a result of the continued occupation (and) the Palestinian people being deprived of their legitimate rights.”
Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group congratulated Hamas, praising the attack as a response to “Israeli crimes.” The group said its command in Lebanon was in contact with Hamas about the operation.
The attack comes at a time of historic division within Israel over Netanyahu’s proposal to overhaul the judiciary. Mass protests over the plan have sent hundreds of thousands of Israeli demonstrators into the streets and prompted hundreds of military reservists to avoid volunteer duty — turmoil that has raised fears over the military’s battlefield readiness.
It also comes at a time of mounting tensions between Israel and the Palestinians, with the peace process effectively dead for years. Over the past year, Israel’s far-right government has ramped up settlement construction in the occupied West Bank, Israeli settler violence has displaced hundreds of Palestinians there and tensions have flared around a flashpoint Jerusalem holy site.
Palestinians demonstrated in towns and cities around the West Bank on Saturday night. Palestinian health officials said Israeli fire killed five there, but gave few details.
‘We’re at war’: Netanyahu tells Israel after Hamas attack kills at least 40
The ruling Hamas militant group in the Gaza Strip carried out an unprecedented attack on Israel at daybreak Saturday, firing thousands of rockets as dozens of fighters infiltrated the heavily fortified border in several locations by air, land and sea, catching the country off guard on a major holiday.
Several hours after the invasion began, Hamas militants were still fighting gunbattles inside several Israeli communities in a surprising show of strength that shook the country. Israel’s national rescue service said at least 40 people have been killed and hundreds wounded, making it the deadliest attack in Israel in years.
At least 561 wounded people were being treated in Israeli hospitals, including at least 77 who were in critical condition, according to an Associated Press count based on public statements and calls to hospitals.
There was no official comment on casualties in Gaza, but AP reporters witnessed the funerals of 15 people who were killed and saw another eight bodies arrive at a local hospital. It was not immediately clear if they were fighters or civilians.
Social media was replete with videos of Hamas fighters parading what appeared to be stolen Israeli military vehicles through the streets and at least one dead Israeli soldier within Gaza being dragged and trampled by an angry crowd of Palestinians shouting “God is Greatest."
Videos released by Hamas appeared to show at least three Israelis captured alive. The military declined to give details about casualties or kidnappings as it continued to battle the infiltrators.
“We are at war,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a televised address, declaring a mass army mobilization. “Not an ‘operation,’ not a ‘round,’ but at war.”
“The enemy will pay an unprecedented price,” he added, promising that Israel would “return fire of a magnitude that the enemy has not known.”
At a meeting of top security officials later on Saturday, Netanyahu said the first priority was to “cleanse the area” of enemy infiltrators, then to “exact a huge price from the enemy," and to fortify other areas so that no other militant groups join the war.
The serious invasion on Simchat Torah, a normally joyous day when Jews complete the annual cycle of reading the Torah scroll, revived painful memories of the 1973 Mideast war practically 50 years to the day, in which Israel’s enemies launched a surprise attack on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.
Comparisons to one of the most traumatic moments in Israeli history sharpened criticism of Netanyahu and his far-right allies, who had campaigned on more aggressive action against threats from Gaza. Political commentators lambasted the government over its failure to anticipate what appeared to be a Hamas attack unseen in its level of planning and coordination.
The Israeli military struck targets in Gaza in response for some 2,500 rockets that sent air raid sirens wailing constantly as far north as Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, some 80 kilometers (50 miles) away. It said its forces were engaged in gunfights with Hamas militants who had infiltrated Israel in at least seven locations. The fighters had sneaked across the separation fence and even invaded Israel through the air with paragliders, the army said.
Israeli TV broadcast footage of explosions tearing through the Gaza-Israel border fence, followed by what appeared to be Palestinian gunmen riding into Israel on motorcycles. Gunmen also reportedly entered on pickup trucks.
It was not immediately clear what prompted Hamas to launch the attacks, which would have likely required months of planning.
But over the past year Israel's far-right government has ramped up settlement construction in the occupied West Bank, Israeli settler violence has displaced hundreds of Palestinians there, and tensions have flared around a flashpoint Jerusalem holy site.
The shadowy leader of Hamas’ military wing, Mohammed Deif, announced the start of what he called “Operation Al-Aqsa Storm." The Al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem is the third holiest site in Islam, and is located on the holiest site for Jews, who refer to it as the Temple Mount.
“Enough is enough,” Deif, who does not appear in public, said in the recorded message, as he called on Palestinians from east Jerusalem to northern Israel to join the fight. “Today the people are regaining their revolution."
In a televised address, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant warned that Hamas had made “a grave mistake” and promised that “the state of Israel will win this war."
Western nations condemned the incursion and reiterated their support for Israel, while others called for restraint on both sides.
“The U.S. unequivocally condemns the unprovoked attacks by Hamas terrorists against Israeli civilians,” said Adrienne Watson, spokeswoman for the U.S. National Security Council. “We stand firmly with the government and people of Israel and extend our condolences for the Israeli lives lost in these attacks.”
Watson said Jake Sullivan, the national security adviser, has spoken with his Israeli counterpart, Tzachi Hanegbi.
Saudi Arabia, which has been in talks with the U.S. about normalizing relations with Israel, released a statement calling on both sides to exercise restraint. The kingdom said it had repeatedly warned about “ the dangers of the situation exploding as a result of the continued occupation (and) the Palestinian people being deprived of their legitimate rights.”
The attack comes at a time of historic division within Israel over Netanyahu's proposal to overhaul the judiciary. Mass protests over the plan have sent hundreds thousands of Israeli demonstrators into the streets and prompted hundreds of military reservists to avoid volunteer duty — turmoil that has raised fears over the military’s battlefield readiness and raised concerns about its deterrence over its enemies.
The infiltration of fighters into southern Israel marked a major escalation by Hamas that forced millions of Israelis to hunker down in safe rooms. Cities and towns emptied as the military closed roads near Gaza. Israel's rescue service and the Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza appealed to the public to donate blood.
“We understand that this is something big,” Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, an Israeli army spokesman, told reporters. He said the Israeli military had called up the army reserves.
Hecht declined to comment on how Hamas had managed to catch the army off guard. “That’s a good question,” he said.
Ismail Haniyeh, the exiled leader of Hamas, said that Palestinian fighters were “engaged in these historic moments in a heroic operation" to defend the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem and the thousands of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
In the kibbutz of Nahal Oz, just 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) from the Gaza Strip, terrified residents who were huddled indoors said they could hear constant gunfire echoing off the buildings as firefights continued even hours after the initial attack.
“With rockets we somehow feel safer, knowing that we have the Iron Dome (missile defense system) and our safe rooms. But knowing that terrorists are walking around communities is a different kind of fear,” said Mirjam Reijnen, a 42-year-old volunteer firefighter and mother of three in Nahal Oz.
Israel has built a massive fence along the Gaza border meant to prevent infiltrations. It goes deep underground and is equipped with cameras, high-tech sensors and sensitive listening technology.
The escalation comes after weeks of heightened tensions along Israel’s volatile border with Gaza, and heavy fighting in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
Saturday's wide-ranging assault threatened to undermine Netanyahu’s reputation as a security expert who would do anything to protect Israel. It also raised questions about the cohesion of a security apparatus crucial to the stability of a country locked in low-intensity conflicts on multiple fronts and facing threats from Lebanon's Hezbollah militant group.
Hezbollah congratulated Hamas on Friday, praising the attack as a response to “Israeli crimes” and saying the militants had “divine backing." The group said its command in Lebanon was in contact with Hamas about the operation.
Israel has maintained a blockade over Gaza since Hamas seized control of the territory in 2007. The bitter enemies have fought four wars since then. There have also been numerous rounds of smaller fighting between Israel and Hamas and other smaller militant groups based in Gaza.
The blockade, which restricts the movement of people and goods in and out of Gaza, has devastated the territory's economy. Israel says the blockade is needed to keep militant groups from building up their arsenals. The Palestinians say the closure amounts to collective punishment.
The rocket fire comes during a period of heavy fighting in the West Bank, where nearly 200 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli military raids this year. In the volatile northern West Bank, scores of militants and residents poured into the streets in celebration at the news of the rocket barrages.
Israel says the raids are aimed at militants, but stone-throwing protesters and people uninvolved in the violence have also been killed. Palestinian attacks on Israeli targets have killed over 30 people.
The tensions have also spread to Gaza, where Hamas-linked activists held violent demonstrations along the Israeli border in recent weeks. Those demonstrations were halted in late September after international mediation.
Drone attack kills 80 and wounds 240 at a packed Syrian military graduation ceremony, official says
A drone attack hit a crowded military graduation ceremony Thursday in the Syrian city of Homs, killing 80 people and wounding 240, the health minister said, in one of the deadliest recent attacks on an army that’s been fighting a civil war for more than a decade.
The strike killed civilians, including six children, as well as military personnel, and there were concerns the death toll could rise as many of the wounded were in serious condition, Health Minister Hassan al-Ghabash said.
Syria’s military said in an earlier statement that drones laden with explosives targeted the ceremony packed with young officers and their families as it was wrapping up. Without naming any particular group, the military accused insurgents “backed by known international forces” of the attack and said “it will respond with full force and decisiveness to these terrorist organizations, wherever they exist.”
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack as Syria endures its 13th year of conflict.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres “expressed deep concern” about the drone attack in Homs as well as reports of retaliatory shelling in northwest Syria, his spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said. Guterres condemned all violence and called for a nationwide cease-fire, the spokesperson added.
The military did not provide any casualty numbers, but Syria's state television said the government announced a three-day state of mourning starting Friday. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, and the pro-government Sham FM radio station reported the strikes earlier.
Read: Overnight drone attack on Moscow injures 1, temporarily closes airport for traffic
Syria's crisis started with peaceful protests against President Bashar Assad’s government in March 2011 but quickly morphed into a full-blown civil war after the government’s brutal crackdown on the protesters. The tide turned in Assad’s favor against rebel groups in 2015, when Russia provided key military backing to Syria, as well as Iran and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
So far, the war has killed half a million people, wounded hundreds of thousands and destroyed many parts of the country. It has displaced half of Syria’s prewar population of 23 million, including more than 5 million who are refugees outside Syria.
Although most Arab governments have restored ties with the government in Damascus, Syria remains divided, with a northwest enclave under the control of al-Qaida-linked militants from the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group and Turkish-backed opposition fighters. The country’s northeast is under control of U.S.-backed Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces.
The city of Homs is deep in government-held territory, far from front lines where government and rebel forces routinely skirmish.
After the drone attack, Syrian government forces shelled villages in Idlib province, in the northwest. At least 10 civilians were wounded in the towns of Al-Nayrab and Sarmin east of Idlib city, according to opposition-held northwestern Syria’s civil defense organization known as the White Helmets. Government forces continue to shell other areas in the enclave.
The Syrian army shelled another village in the region earlier Thursday before the drone attack over Homs, killing at least five civilians, activists and emergency workers said. The shelling hit a family house on the outskirts of the the village of Kafr Nouran in western Aleppo province, according to the White Helmets.
Read: Russia launched 'largest drone attack' on Ukrainian capital before Kyiv Day; 1 killed
A woman and four of her children were killed, according to the Observatory. Nine other members of the family were wounded, it said.
The vast majority of around 4.1 million people residing in northwestern Syria live in poverty, relying on humanitarian aid to survive. Many of them are Syrians, internally displaced by the war from other parts of the country.
In northeastern Syria, local authorities said Turkish drone attacks struck Hassakeh and Qamishli provinces Thursday, hitting oil production facilities, electrical substations and a dam. A statement from the local Kurdish authorities said six members of their security forces and five civilians were killed.
Read: Russia fights alleged incursion from Ukraine for 2nd day, reports more drone attacks
Meanwhile, three U.S. officials told The Associated Press that a U.S. F-16 fighter jet shot down a Turkish drone Thursday that came too close to their positions in Hassakeh after it had been dropping bombs in nearby areas. The U.S. has about 900 troops in Syria conducting missions to counter Islamic State group militants.
Turkey didn't immediately comment on the strikes but Ankara said the main Syrian Kurdish militia is allied with Turkey’s outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, which has led an insurgency against Turkey since 1984 that has killed tens of thousands of people. Ankara has declared the PKK a terrorist group.
Read more: Russia says it foiled an alleged drone attack on Kremlin
Syrian Kurdish forces were a major U.S. ally in the war against the militant Islamic State group, which was defeated in Syria in March 2019.
Turkey strikes Kurdish militants in Iraq again after warning of retaliation for a bombing in Ankara
Turkish warplanes launched a new round of airstrikes against Kurdish militant targets in Iraq on Wednesday hours after the foreign minister warned that Turkey would hit the militant group's positions in Syria and Iraq in retaliation for a suicide bombing in Ankara earlier this week.
The outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, claimed responsibility for Sunday's attack outside the Interior Ministry in Ankara in which one attacker blew himself up and another would-be bomber was killed in a shootout with police. Two police were wounded in the attack.
The Turkish jets targeted 22 suspected PKK positions in northern Iraq on Wednesday, destroying caves, shelters and depots used by the militants, the Turkish defense ministry said. The PKK maintains bases in the region, where its leadership has a foothold.
It was the Turkish air force's third airstrike against suspected Kurdish militant sites in northern Iraq following the attack, which came as parliament prepared to reopen after a long summer recess. Meanwhile, dozens of people suspected of links to the PKK have been detained in a series of raids across Turkey.
Ankara said a large number of PKK militants were “neutralized” in the strikes.
There was no immediate comment from Kurdish officials in Iraq.
Read: Syria says Israeli airstrikes in an eastern province wounded 2 soldiers
Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told a news conference that Turkish intelligence officials have established that the two assailants arrived from Syria, where they had been trained. He said Turkey would now target facilities in Syria and Iraq belonging to the PKK, or its affiliated Kurdish militia group in Syria, which is known as People's Defense Units, or YPG.
“From now on, all infrastructure, superstructure and energy facilities belonging to the PKK or the YPG in Iraq and Syria are legitimate targets of our security forces, armed forces and intelligence elements,” Fidan said. “Our armed forces’ response to this terrorist attack will be extremely clear and they will regret committing such an act."
A Syrian Kurdish commander denied on Wednesday that the Ankara attackers were trained in Syria or crossed into Turkey from Syria.
Mazloum Abdi, the commander of the U.S.-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Force that controls large parts of northeastern Syria tweeted that those who carried out the attack in Ankara “did not pass through our territories.”
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The Syrian Kurdish-led force is a coalition of several factions, including the YPG.
“We are not a side in the internal conflict in Turkey,” Abdi wrote. He added that Turkey is looking “for a pretext to legitimatize its continuous attacks on our region and to launch a new aggression and this is raising our concerns.”
Abdi, who is wanted by Turkey on terrorism charges, said that targeting the infrastructure and economic targets in northeast Syria and cities “is considered a war crime.”
Fidan later joined a previously unannounced security meeting with Turkey's interior minister, defense minister, top military commander and intelligence chief, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported.
Iraqi Defense Minister Thabet Muhammad Al-Abbasi was scheduled to visit Turkey on Thursday, the agency also reported.
The PKK has led a decades-long insurgency in Turkey and is considered a terror organization by the United States and the European Union. Tens of thousands of people have died since the start of the conflict in 1984.
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Meanwhile, Turkish intelligence agents killed a wanted Kurdish militant in an operation in Syria, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported Wednesday.
The militant, identified as Nabo Kele Hayri, who also went by Mazlum Afrin, was wanted for his alleged role in planning an attack last year on Istanbul’s main pedestrian street, Istiklal. The attack killed six people.
Syria says Israeli airstrikes in an eastern province wounded 2 soldiers
Syrian state media said Tuesday that the Israeli military carried out airstrikes in a strategic eastern province wounding two soldiers and causing material damage. There was no comment from Israel on the reported strikes.
Syria’s state news agency, SANA, quoted an unnamed military official as saying the airstrikes late Monday targeted military positions in Deir el-Zour.
The eastern Deir el-Zour province that borders Iraq contains oil fields and has been a strategic province throughout Syria’s conflict, now in its 13th year. Iran-backed militia groups and Syrian forces control the area and have often been the target of Israeli war planes in previous strikes.
Britain-based opposition war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and activist collective Deir Ezzor 24 said the airstrike targeted positions in the Boukamal region along the Iraqi border, a stronghold for Iran-backed militia groups. Both said they could not identify the source of the airstrike.
Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes on targets inside government-controlled parts of war-torn Syria in recent years, including attacks on the airports in the capital of Damascus, but it rarely acknowledges or discusses the operations. The strikes often target Syrian forces or Iranian-backed groups.
Suicide bomber detonates a device in front of Turkish Interior Ministry
A suicide bomber detonated an explosive device in the heart of the Turkish capital, Ankara, on Sunday.
A second assailant was killed in a shootout with police, the interior minister said.
The attack occurred hours before Parliament was set to reopen after its three-month summer recess with an address by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
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Two police officers were slightly injured during the attack near an entrance to the Ministry of Interior Affairs, minister Ali Yerlikaya said on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. The assailants arrived at the scene inside a light commercial vehicle.
"Our heroic police officers, through their intuition, resisted the terrorists as soon as they got out of the vehicle," Yerlikaya later told reporters. "One of them blew himself up while the other one was shot in the head before he had a chance to blow himself up."
"Our fight against terrorism, their collaborators, the (drug) dealers, gangs and organized crime organizations will continue with determination," he said.
The minister did not say who was behind the attack and there was no immediate claim of responsibility. Kurdish and far-left militant groups as well as the Islamic State group have carried out deadly attacks throughout the country in the past.
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Last year, a bomb blast in a bustling pedestrian street in Istanbul left six people dead, including two children. More than 80 others were wounded. Turkey blamed the attack on the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, as well as Syrian Kurdish groups affiliated with it.
Security camera footage on Sunday showed a vehicle stopping in front of the ministry, with a man exiting it and rushing toward the entrance of the building before blowing himself up. A second man is seen following him.
Earlier, television footage showed bomb squads working near a vehicle in the area, which is located near the Turkish Grand National Assembly and other government buildings. A rocket launcher could be seen lying near the vehicle.
Turkish authorities later imposed a temporary blackout on images from the scene.
Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc said an investigation has been launched into the "terror attack."
"These attacks will in no way hinder Turkey's fight against terrorism," he wrote on X. "Our fight against terrorism will continue with more determination."
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Police cordoned off access to the city center and increased security measures, warning citizens that they would be conducting controlled explosions of suspicious packages.
The two police officers were being treated in a hospital and were not in serious condition, Yerlikaya said.
Egypt, which has normalized ties with Turkey after a decade of tensions, condemned the attack. A terse statement from the Foreign Ministry offered Egypt's solidarity with Turkey.
The U.S. Embassy in Ankara and other foreign missions also issued messages condemning the attack.
Erdogan's speech will be closely watched for indications as to when Turkey's parliament may ratify Sweden's membership in NATO.
Stockholm applied for NATO membership alongside Finland following Russia's invasion of Ukraine last year. While Finland has since joined, Turkey blocked Sweden's membership in the military alliance, accusing it of being soft on groups that Turkey considers to be security threats. Only Turkey and Hungary are yet to ratify Swedish membership.
Iran says it successfully launches an imaging satellite into orbit amid tensions with the West
Iran claimed on Wednesday that it successfully launched an imaging satellite into space, a move that could further ratchet up tensions with Western nations that fear its space technology could be used to develop nuclear weapons.
Iran's Communication Minister Isa Zarepour said the Noor-3 satellite had been put in an orbit 450 kilometers (280 miles) above the Earth's surface, the state-run IRNA news agency reported.
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There was no immediate acknowledgment from Western officials of the launch or of the satellite being put into orbit. Iran has had a series of failed launches in recent years.
It was unclear when the launch took place. The U.S. military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Zarepour said the aerospace arm of Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, which has had success in launching satellites in the past, had carried out the most recent launch. Authorities did not immediately release images of the launch.
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The Guard operates its own space program and military infrastructure parallel to Iran’s regular armed forces and answers only to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. It launched its first satellite into space in April 2020.
The United States has alleged that Iran’s satellite launches defy a U.N. Security Council resolution and has called on Tehran to undertake no activity related to ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons.
The U.S. intelligence community’s 2022 threat assessment claims the development of satellite launch vehicles “shortens the timeline” for Iran to develop an intercontinental ballistic missile because it uses similar technology.
Iran has always denied seeking nuclear weapons, and says its space program, like its nuclear activities, is for purely civilian purposes. U.S. intelligence agencies and the International Atomic Energy Agency say Iran abandoned an organized military nuclear program in 2003.
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Over the past decade, Iran has sent several short-lived satellites into orbit and in 2013 launched a monkey into space. The program has seen recent troubles, however. There have been five failed launches in a row for the Simorgh program, another satellite-carrying rocket.
A fire at the Imam Khomeini Spaceport in February 2019 killed three researchers, authorities said at the time. A launchpad rocket explosion later that year drew the attention of former President Donald Trump.
Tensions are already high with Western nations over Iran's nuclear program, which has steadily advanced since Trump withdrew the U.S. from a 2015 nuclear agreement with world powers five years ago, restoring crippling sanctions on Iran.
Efforts to revive the agreement reached an impasse more than a year ago. Since then, the IAEA has said Iran has enough uranium enriched to near-weapons grade levels to build “several” nuclear weapons if it chooses to do so. Iran is also building a new underground nuclear facility that would likely be impervious to U.S. airstrikes.
Iran has expressed willingness to return to the 2015 nuclear deal, but says the U.S. should first ease the sanctions.
64 Palestinians killed in Libya's devastating floods
At least 64 Palestinians were killed, with 10 others still missing, in the deadly floods that hit eastern Libya, the Palestinian Foreign Ministry said on Sunday.
In a statement, Ahmad al-Deek, a political adviser at the ministry, said that "we are following the conditions of the Palestinian community in the affected areas in Libya to determine the extent of the suffering and the great damage that befell it."
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"We extended our deepest condolences to their (the victims') families and relatives, hoping that the missing persons would be found alive," al-Deek added.
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The devastating Mediterranean storm Daniel struck eastern Libya on Sept. 10, causing the worst flooding Libya has seen in decades, resulting in the loss of thousands of lives and extensive damage to the region's infrastructure.