Huge explosions were seen as Israeli air attacks hit a town in south Lebanon, killing at least one person and injuring at least seven. The strikes targeted a site that sold excavators and other heavy machinery.
A drone and artillery attack has killed at least 60 people at a displacement centre and university grounds where people had been seeking refuge, in the besieged Sudanese city of el-Fasher in North Darfur state, according to activists.
The El Fasher Resistance Committee said on Saturday that the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which has been at war with the Sudanese army, had carried out a “massacre” on the Dar al-Arqam displacement centre.
“Children, women and the elderly were killed in cold blood, and many were completely burned,” said the committee, as it called for an international intervention. “The situation has gone beyond disaster and genocide inside the city, and the world remains silent.”
The attack represents the latest in an intensifying pattern of strikes on civilian areas in the city, with the brutal civil war now well into its third year. The United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights documented at least 53 civilians killed between October 5-8 alone in attacks across el-Fasher locality, with women and children among the dead.
El-Fasher is the last major city held by the government-aligned Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) in the vast western Darfur region, and has faced intensified attacks from the paramilitary RSF since the army recaptured the capital, Khartoum, in March this year.
The RSF has been fighting SAF for control of the country since April 2023, when two generals leading both forces fell out. The war has triggered what humanitarian organisations have said is the world’s largest humanitarian emergency.
Tens of thousands of people have been killed, and millions have been externally and internally displaced due to the fighting.
Approximately 260,000 people remain trapped inside, but el-Fasher’s overall population has now shrunk by 62 percent from its pre-war level of 1.11 million to just 413,454 people, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
An individual in the city, who requested anonymity, told Al Jazeera that people had spent much of the day “living underground in shelters” built around their homes to avoid heavy shelling. “The situation is extremely bad,” he said.
“Generally, the RSF have relied on air strikes to force civilians out of the city so they can take it over,” said Mohamed Badawi, a human rights activist with the Uganda-based African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies, which monitors the conflict in Sudan.
Under the months-long blockade, el-Fasher faces catastrophic humanitarian conditions.
A UN Development Programme report published this week said: “El Fasher faces collapsed markets, a complete collapse of food availability and affordability, and no road access for aid, forcing residents to survive on animal feed and food waste”.
Satellite imagery analysed by the Yale Humanitarian Research Lab reveals a systematic campaign of destruction surrounding el-Fasher. Researchers documented widespread burning of villages and displacement camps in a 57-kilometre radius around the city, with evidence of ethnic targeting primarily affecting non-Arab communities.
Yale researchers identified a 57-kilometre earthen berm encircling el-Fasher that restricts civilian movement and humanitarian access.
Last week, El Fasher’s only functioning hospital, the Saudi Maternity Hospital, came under attack three times, killing six people, including a child.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO chief, called for the “immediate protection of health facilities”, whilst Hadja Lahbib, the EU crisis management commissioner, said the attacks were “mindless”.
Repeated attacks this month on Saudi Maternity Hospital, the only functional hospital in El Fasher, have led to 6 deaths and 12 injuries.
Such reprehensible attacks on health must stop.
Health care must always be protected in line with International Humanitarian Law.#Sudan pic.twitter.com/0F4Kg308ML
The International Committee of the Red Cross said health facilities across Sudan are routinely attacked and looted, with ambulances blocked at checkpoints or destroyed. In Khartoum, 70-80 percent of health facilities have closed or barely remain operational, according to the World Health Organization.
Kylian Mbappe will miss Monday’s qualifier in Iceland, where France could book their ticket to the 2026 World Cup, after taking another knock to his sore right ankle, the French team confirmed.
Already suffering from a “small niggle” in his right ankle from playing for Real Madrid, Mbappe took two knocks during Friday’s 3-0 World Cup qualifying win over Azerbaijan in Paris, where he opened the scoring but was substituted before the end of the match.
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The France captain’s absence adds to the long list of forwards unavailable for October’s World Cup qualifiers, which includes Ousmane Dembele, Desire Doue, Marcus Thuram and Bradley Barcola.
Mbappe “will not be able to play Monday against Iceland”, a French Football Federation (FFF) statement read.
After returning to the Clairefontaine training ground on Friday night, “the French team captain spoke with (coach) Didier Deschamps,” who “acknowledged his absence”.
Mbappe “has been released to his club (Real Madrid) and will not be replaced”, the FFF added.
The French superstar had already been rested for training with Les Bleus during the week with the same issue.
Mbappe scored on the stroke of half-time and was then struck by a tackle from Rustam Ahmedzade. He took another knock to the same ankle late in the game and was replaced by Florian Thauvin.
“He has a sore ankle and he took a knock there. He preferred to come off; the pain was quite significant,” Deschamps said after the French victory.
Adrien Rabiot and the substitute Thauvin were also on the scoresheet as Deschamps’s men remain unbeaten after three games and top of Group D.
Israeli air attacks on a southern Lebanese village have killed one person and wounded seven others, temporarily severing a key route connecting Beirut to the country’s south, in the latest near-daily violation by Israel of the November 2024 ceasefire it signed with Hezbollah.
The strikes hit Msayleh village in the early hours of Saturday morning, targeting a site that sold heavy machinery and destroying numerous vehicles.
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A Syrian national was killed and seven others were wounded when a passing vegetable truck was caught in the attack, the Lebanese Ministry of Public Health said.
Separately, Israeli drones were reported flying over the capital, Beirut, and southern suburbs since early on Saturday, according to Lebanon’s National News Agency.
Lebanon’s President Joseph Aoun condemned the attack, describing it as an assault on civilian infrastructure. “Once again, southern Lebanon is under fire from a blatant Israeli aggression against civilian facilities, without any justification or pretext,” he said, adding that the strike was particularly alarming given it came after the Gaza ceasefire agreement.
Israel’s military said the strike targeted equipment intended to rebuild infrastructure for Hezbollah. The Israeli military has claimed that such operations are necessary to prevent Hezbollah from restoring its military capabilities.
The United Nations human rights chief, Volker Turk, said at the start of October that Israeli strikes had killed 103 verified civilians in Lebanon since the ceasefire took effect.
Israeli forces remain stationed at several positions inside Lebanese territory.
The incident marks the latest in an almost daily pattern of Israeli strikes on Lebanese territory since the United States brokered a ceasefire. Days earlier, Israeli drone strikes killed two men it claimed were Hezbollah operatives.
Lebanese authorities said on Friday they had foiled an Israeli plot to carry out bombings and assassinations at a commemoration for late former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was assassinated by Israel, arresting several suspects.
Hezbollah has rejected mounting pressure to disarm. Speaking at the tomb of Hassan Nasrallah, current secretary-general Naim Qassem told thousands of supporters that Hezbollah would never relinquish its weapons.
US special envoy Tom Barrack told Al Jazeera last month that convincing Hezbollah to disarm “is the job of the Lebanese government”, though he acknowledged the group’s legitimacy as a political party complicates the issue.
The Lebanese government, under intense US and Israeli pressure, tasked the army in early September with preparing a plan to disarm the group.
The original war killed at least 4,000 people in Lebanon and caused an estimated $11bn in damage. In Israel, 127 people died, including 80 soldiers. Fighting erupted when Hezbollah began launching rockets into northern Israel on October 8, 2023, one day after a Hamas-led assault on southern Israel triggered the war in Gaza.
Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud and Ibrahim al Khalili followed Palestinians making their way back to northern Gaza after a ceasefire deal was announced.
Guatemala has received its first deportation flight from the United States carrying both Guatemalan and foreign immigrants, the country’s migration authority confirmed, as President Donald Trump’s administration pursues its hardline anti-immigration crackdown.
The flight arrived on Friday, bringing three Hondurans and 56 Guatemalan nationals, according to Guatemala’s IGM migration agency. The Honduran passengers were taken to a migration centre before being transferred to their home country.
The Guatemalan government has said it remains open to receiving citizens from neighbouring Central American nations deported by the US as it seeks to strengthen ties with the Trump administration.
Earlier this year, President Bernardo Arevalo’s government agreed to increase the number of deportation flights it would receive following a visit from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Arevalo has also indicated that Guatemala is prepared to take in some non-citizens deported from the US.
This is not the first time Guatemala has received deportation flights from the US, with Guatemalan nationals being sent back as early as January under the latest Trump administration.
Last month, a US judge ordered the Trump administration to refrain from deporting Guatemalan unaccompanied migrant children with active immigration cases while a legal challenge plays out. The children, who had arrived alone, remain in federal custody while their asylum claims are reviewed.
Arevalo criticised the ruling, saying he would continue working to repatriate the children through a pilot programme discussed with Trump.
White House immigration adviser Stephen Miller condemned the judge’s decision, as the Trump administration moves forward with its broader deportation campaign.
Under the previous Joe Biden administration, the Central American country handled about 14 flights a day. According to the Reuters news agency, nearly 66,000 Guatemalans were deported from the US during fiscal year 2024 – the highest figure recorded in recent years.
Trump has made curbing migration a key priority of his second term. His administration has pressed Central American and Caribbean nations to cooperate with US deportation efforts.
In December, Trump had approached several Caribbean governments, including those of the Bahamas, Grenada, and the Turks and Caicos Islands, to accept migrants from third countries, though the island leaders rejected the proposal.