Category World News

Aid organizations warn that Israeli restrictions prevent people from getting lifesaving shelter assistance in Gaza as a result of winter storms, which are worsening the conditions for hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians there.

The UN claims to have tents, blankets, and other essential supplies on hand for Gaza, but Israeli authorities continue to obstruct or impede entry through border crossings.

A war-damaged family home’s roof collapsed in Gaza City’s Shati refugee camp on Wednesday, according to rescue workers. Two children and two Palestinians were among the six survivors who were still alive.

A two-week-old Palestinian infant froze to death, according to the Gaza-based ministry of health, highlighting the dangers young and elderly people who live in subpar shelters face.

Shelters and personal belongings were damaged or destroyed throughout the territory, according to a spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

“In Gaza, about 30 000 children have been affected by the disruption. According to Farhan Haq, urgent repairs are required to allow these activities to resume without delay.

What we are currently experiencing in the Gaza Strip is a true humanitarian catastrophe, according to a statement from the Palestinian Civil Defense in Gaza.

talks on ending the hostilities and access to aid

Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani and Marco Rubio, the prime minister of Qatar, met in Washington, DC to discuss efforts to stabilize the fragile ceasefire in Gaza.

Qatari officials said the discussions focused on Qatar’s role as a mediator, the urgent need for aid to enter Gaza, and moving forward with US-backed negotiations to end Israel’s genocidal war against the Palestinians in Gaza.

Sheikh Mohammed emphasized that humanitarian aid should be “unconditionally” allowed into Gaza, according to Al Jazeera’s Alan Fisher, who was based in Washington.

He stated that all aid must be provided to Gaza without condition, making clear that a number of aid organizations have stated that Israel is preventing millions of people from receiving aid there, according to Fisher.

After the war, the Qatari prime minister suggested that an international stabilization force could be stationed in Gaza, arguing that it should act impartially.

Over the past few weeks, there has been much discussion in the US about how this force will contribute to Hamas’ disarmament, according to Fisher.

Sheikh Mohammed also urged quick completion of the ceasefire agreement’s second phase.

He claimed that the second phase of the ceasefire agreement should be moved quickly. US officials were also anticipating announcing early in the new year which nations would send troops to a stabilization force.

Israeli attacks continue.

According to medical sources, at least 11 Palestinians were seriously injured in Israeli attacks in central Gaza City despite the ceasefire.

After a mortar shell fired close to Gaza’s alleged yellow line “missed its target,” the Israeli army announced it was looking into the incident.

Israeli artillery was shelling the southern city of Khan Younis, according to Al Jazeera journalists in Gaza. According to medical sources, two people were also injured by Israeli gunfire in Gaza City’s Tuffah neighborhood.

Israeli troops shot and wounded a man in his 20s in the foot in Qalqilya, according to Palestinian news agency Wafa, in the occupied West Bank, where Israeli military and settler attacks have recently escalated. He was taken to a hospital, where he is said to be stable.

California regulators are threatening to suspend Tesla’s licence to sell its electric cars in the state early next year unless the car maker tones down its marketing tactics for its self-driving features after a judge concluded that the Elon Musk-led company has been misleading consumers about the technology’s capabilities.

The potential 30-day blackout of Tesla’s sales in California in the United States is the primary punishment being recommended to the state’s Department of Motor Vehicles in a decision released late on Tuesday.

The ruling by Administrative Law Judge Juliet Cox determined that Tesla had for years engaged in deceptive marketing practices by using the terms “Autopilot” and “Full Self-Driving” to promote the autonomous technology available in many of its cars.

After presiding over five days of hearings held in Oakland, California, in July, Cox also recommended suspending Tesla’s licence to manufacture cars at its plant in Fremont, California. But California regulators will not impose that part of the judge’s proposed penalty.

Tesla will have a 90-day window to make changes that more clearly convey the limits of its self-driving technology to avoid having its California sales licence suspended.

After California regulators filed its action against Tesla in 2023, the Austin, Texas-based company already made one significant change by putting in wording that made it clear its Full Self-Driving package still required supervision by a human driver while it is deployed.

“Tesla can take simple steps to pause this decision and permanently resolve this issue – steps autonomous vehicle companies and other automakers have been able to achieve”, said Steve Gordon, the director of the California Department of Motor Vehicles.

In a post on Musk’s X service, Tesla brushed off the decision as regulatory overkill.

“This was a ‘ consumer protection ‘ order about the use of the term ‘ Autopilot ‘ in a case where not one single customer came forward to say there’s a problem. Sales in California will continue uninterrupted”, the company said.

The car maker has already been plagued by a global downturn in demand that began with a backlash to Musk’s high-profile role overseeing cuts in the US government budget via the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) that President Donald Trump created.

Politics apart, increased competition and an older lineup of vehicles also weighed on Tesla sales, although the company did revamp its Model Y, the world’s bestselling vehicle, and unveil less-expensive versions of the Model Y and Model X.

Although Musk left Washington after a falling out with Trump, Tesla’s sales have continued to slide and have decreased by 9 percent from 2024 through the first nine months of this year.

Bumper stock

Despite the slump and the threatened sales suspension in California, Tesla’s stock price touched an all-time high of $495.28 during Wednesday’s early trading before backtracking later to fall below $470. Despite that reversal, Tesla’s shares are still worth slightly more than they were before Musk’s ill-fated stint in the Trump administration – a “somewhat successful” assignment he recently said he wouldn’t take on again.

The performance of Tesla’s stock against the backdrop of eroding auto sales reflects the increasing emphasis that investors are placing on Musk’s efforts to develop artificial intelligence technology to implant into humanoid robots and a fleet of self-driving Teslas that will operate as robotaxis across the US.

Tesla’s self-driving technology has been promising Musk’s robotaxi vision for years, but it has since failed to fulfill it. Tesla finally started testing the idea in Austin earlier this year, with a human driver driving the car to take over if something goes wrong. Tesla had begun testing its robotaxis without a safety monitor in the vehicle, according to Musk in the past few days.

Tesla’s critics are not the first to point fingers at California regulators for overstating the capabilities of its self-driving technology in a potentially dangerous way.

Even as the company released a 2020 video that purports to show one of its cars driving on its own, the company has steadfastly insisted that the information contained in the owner’s manual of its vehicle on its website makes it clear that its self-driving technology still needs human supervision.

The video, which Tesla cited as evidence in the decision to recommend the company’s suspension of its California sales license, remained on the company’s website for almost four years.

Tesla has been the target of a number of lawsuits, alleging that its misinterpretation of self-driving technology has lulled people into believing they have no security and caused fatal accidents.

UN warns 17 million people in Afghanistan face acute food insecurity.

Leaders in Latin America and the United Nations have voiced concerns about the spiralling tensions between the United States and Venezuela over the future of oil exports from the South American country.

The high-profile remarks on Wednesday come as Venezuela’s National Assembly convenes to discuss US President Donald Trump’s threat of a full blockade on oil tankers entering and exiting the country.

Petroleum is Venezuela’s top export and a pillar of its economy. Experts warn that, by threatening to sever Venezuela from its foreign oil markets, the US is attempting to destabilise the country’s economy and topple the leadership of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

Already, tensions between the US and Venezuela are at a high, with the Trump administration surging military assets to the Caribbean and Maduro responding with his own troop movements.

That has led figures like United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to press for calm in the region and a de-escalation.

Through UN spokesperson Farhan Haq, Guterres called on both countries to “honour their obligations under international law” and “safeguard peace in the region”.

Guterres also spoke with Maduro by telephone on Wednesday, repeating the need for both parties to respect international law.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, however, questioned whether the UN was taking enough precautions to prevent a full-scale conflict from erupting in the Americas.

“I call on the United Nations to fulfil its role. It has not been present. It must assume its role to prevent any bloodshed,” Sheinbaum said in her morning news conference on Wednesday.

She echoed Guterres’s appeal to find a “peaceful solution” to the tensions, adding: “We call for dialogue and peace, not intervention.”

The regional friction was also felt at a ministerial meeting in Brazil on Wednesday, where President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva spoke to the conflict.

“I am concerned about Latin America. I am concerned about President Trump’s attitudes toward Latin America, his threats. We are going to have to be very attentive to this issue,” Lula said.

The Brazilian leader shared that he had spoken to Trump about Venezuela and urged him to find a diplomatic solution.

“The power of words can be worth more than the power of weapons,” Lula said he told Trump. “It costs less and takes less time if you are willing to do it.”

He added that he had offered Brazil’s services as a mediator to facilitate communications with Venezuela. It shares a border with Venezuela to the north, and previously, in 2022, Lula restored Brazil’s relations with the Maduro government.

“I told Trump: ‘If you are interested in talking on good terms with Venezuela, we can contribute. Now, you have to be willing to talk. You have to have patience,’” Lula said.

The comments come on the heels of Trump’s latest threats on Tuesday.

On his online platform Truth Social, the US leader announced that he had designated Maduro’s government as a “foreign terrorist organisation” and would implement a “TOTAL AND COMPLETE BLOCKADE OF ALL SANCTIONED OIL TANKERS going into, and out of, Venezuela”.

“Venezuela is completely surrounded by the largest Armada ever assembled in the History of South America,” Trump wrote. “It will only get bigger, and the shock to them will be like nothing they have ever seen before.”

Already, Trump has offered a $50m bounty for any information that leads to Maduro’s arrest, and his administration has deployed approximately 15,000 troops to the Caribbean, along with military jets and ships, among them the USS Gerald Ford, the largest aircraft carrier in the world.

Last week, the Trump administration also seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela, claiming the vessel was sanctioned. The tanker’s oil, Trump said, would remain with the US.

Since his first term, Trump has led a “maximum pressure” campaign against the Maduro government, which has been accused of human rights abuses ranging from torture to the false imprisonment of political dissidents.

Last year, Maduro also claimed victory in a highly contested presidential election that critics called fraudulent — and that was followed by a deadly crackdown on protesters.

But critics have accused Trump of using his feud with Maduro as a pretext to expand his presidential powers and carry out controversial actions in the Caribbean region.

Since September 2, for instance, the Trump administration has bombed at least 25 boats and maritime vessels as part of an anti-drug campaign. An estimated 95 people have been killed in the attacks, which UN experts have likened to extrajudicial killings, in violation of international law.

Trump, however, has argued that the air strikes were necessary, blaming Maduro and other Latin American leaders for seeking to flood the US with drugs and criminals — allegations he has made with little to no proof.