Category World News

Damascus, Syria – On the morning of December 5, 2025, a taxi drove me across the Lebanon-Syria border. This time was different from my first trip across, in the early hours of December 9, 2024, just a day after Bashar al-Assad fled Syria for Moscow.

On that day, Syrian Army military vehicles were abandoned on the side of the highway to Damascus. Also abandoned, scattered along the highway’s shoulders, were the uniforms of the men who had once driven them.

A year later, they’re all gone. So, too, are the defaced portraits of Bashar and his father Hafez, who ruled the country from 1971 until last year. And gone is a sign I’d photographed a year earlier that read “Assad’s Syria welcomes you”.

A young Palestinian man has died while being held in captivity by Israeli authorities, according to the Palestinian Authority, as Israeli military and settler violence across the occupied West Bank reaches levels unseen in decades, and its genocidal war on Gaza continues unabated.

Abdul Rahman al-Sabateen, 21, from Husan near Bethlehem, died at a Jerusalem medical facility on Tuesday night after being arrested by Israeli soldiers in late June, the PA said in a statement.

His family reported seeing no signs of illness when they last visited him during a court appearance on November 25.

The death comes as Israeli forces arrested more than 100 Palestinians in dawn raids across the West Bank on Wednesday, the Palestinian Prisoners’ Media Office said.

The sweeps targeted cities including Nablus, where approximately 30 people were detained, and Silwad, where another 24 were taken into custody. Witnesses told the Wafa news agency that soldiers entered homes, confiscating belongings and jewellery during the operations.

Al-Sabateen’s death brings to at least 94 the number of Palestinians who have died in Israeli detention since October 2023, according to Physicians for Human Rights – Israel, which has documented what it describes as “systematic torture” in both military and prison facilities.

The organisation’s recent report details cases involving beatings, medical neglect and deliberate starvation.

The United Nations human rights office has separately confirmed at least 75 deaths during the same period, saying that Israeli authorities have “deliberately imposed conditions of detention that amount to torture or other forms of ill-treatment”.

Israeli forces have killed more than 1,000 Palestinians in the West Bank since the start of the war in Gaza, while settler attacks, often with the military’s backing, have surged dramatically and with impunity.

More than 700 Palestinians have been injured by Israeli settlers so far this year, double the total for all of 2024, according to UN data. October alone saw 264 such attacks, the highest monthly figure since tracking began in 2006.

The violence has coincided with an aggressive illegal settlement expansion drive. On Wednesday, Israeli authorities approved 764 new housing units in three West Bank settlements, a move Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich – who openly rejects a two-state solution – described as a continuation of “the revolution”.

Far-right ministers in Israel have been pushing for the total annexation of the occupied territory, a move the United States, European, and Arab and Muslim nations all oppose.

Wasel Abu Yousef, a member of the PLO Executive Committee, told Reuters that “the settlements are illegal” and run counter to “all the resolutions of international legitimacy”.

Smotrich announced approval for 764 new housing units on Wednesday, part of what Israeli media describes as a 2.7 billion-shekel ($836m) five-year plan to entrench Israeli control over the territory.

Since late 2022, more than 51,000 settlement units have been authorised.

Human Rights Watch reported last month that Israeli forces forcibly displaced 32,000 Palestinians from three refugee camps earlier this year, operations the organisation characterised as war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Omar Shakir, Human Rights Watch’s Israel and Palestine director, called it the “second largest – after Gaza – displacement of Palestinians since 1967,” likening it to a second Nakba, when more than 700,000 Palestinians were displaced during Israel’s founding in 1948.

A psychologist working with Doctors Without Borders and speaking anonymously in Hebron described the mounting psychological toll on Palestinians on Wednesday, saying they are “preparing themselves for loss” rather than planning for the future.

The mental health worker said patients commonly express the thought: “They started in Gaza, then moved to the north of the West Bank – now it’s just a matter of time until it’s our turn.”

The Wafa news agency reported that around 190 settlers, accompanied by Israeli forces, forcefully entered the courtyard of Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem on Wednesday, part of a pattern of increasingly frequent incursions in recent months, some of which far-right Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has personally joined.

Many actors involved in negotiations to end Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza and begin its reconstruction breathed a collective sigh of relief when it was announced that former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, one of the most polarising figures in international diplomacy, was removed from the proposed “board of peace”, tasked with overseeing the transitional phase in the Strip. The announcement came at a highly sensitive moment, just as negotiations entered their second phase, focused on the security and economic arrangements necessary for stabilising the Strip and launching reconstruction efforts.

United Nations Security Council Resolution 2803, adopted on November 17, 2025, and aligned with United States President Donald Trump’s Gaza peace proposal, granted an international mandate to form a transitional peace council (TPC), deploy a stabilisation force, and set a framework stretching until the end of 2027. In the midst of shaping this new transitional architecture, Blair’s anticipated role quickly emerged as a source of deep concern for many stakeholders.

Since the Trump administration began engaging in efforts to end the war, several plans have circulated. Yet the plan attributed to Blair appeared closest to Trump’s thinking and may have informed key elements of the vision he unveiled in late September. That alone reignited controversy: why would placing Blair in such a consequential position be viewed as a grave misstep?

Blair carries a heavy political legacy rooted in what many consider the most disastrous foreign policy decision of the 21st century: the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which he championed alongside then-US President George W Bush under the false pretext of weapons of mass destruction (as later confirmed by the United Kingdom’s Chilcot inquiry). The war devastated Iraq, fuelled sectarian conflict, opened the door to years of foreign intervention, and resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. For many across the region and beyond, Blair became a symbol of unaccountable power and catastrophic decision-making.

Within the Palestinian and Arab context, Blair’s record is even more troubling. As the Quartet’s special envoy to the Middle East peace process from 2007 to 2015, he was widely accused of reinforcing Israeli policies, enabling the entrenchment of the Gaza blockade, and allowing Israel to evade its obligations under peace frameworks. Although the Quartet’s mandate was to support negotiations, foster economic development, and prepare institutions for eventual statehood, none of these goals meaningfully advanced during Blair’s tenure. Meanwhile, illegal Israeli settlement expansion accelerated, and the occupation deepened.

Most consequential was the Quartet’s decision, following the 2006 Palestinian legislative elections, to impose sweeping political and economic sanctions on the new Hamas-led government. These conditions, which required Hamas to recognise Israel and renounce armed resistance before lifting the blockade, effectively triggered Gaza’s long-term isolation. The decision dealt a severe blow to Palestinian political cohesion and helped entrench the division whose consequences are still felt today.

During Blair’s years in office, Gaza endured four devastating Israeli assaults, including the 2008-09 Operation Cast Lead, one of the bloodiest military campaigns in the Strip’s history during his mandate. Yet Blair achieved no political breakthrough. Instead, British media investigations revealed serious conflicts of interest, suggesting that the former prime minister used his Quartet role to facilitate business deals benefitting companies linked to him, earning millions of pounds despite his lack of diplomatic achievements. Multiple reports indicated that he was not fully dedicated to his envoy responsibilities, devoting significant time to his private consultancy work and lucrative speaking engagements.

In 2011, Blair also openly opposed Palestine’s bid for full UN membership, calling it a move that was “deeply confrontational” and reportedly lobbied the UK government to withhold support.

Years later, in 2017, he admitted that he and other world leaders were wrong to impose an immediate boycott on Hamas after its electoral victory – an admission that came only after Gaza had suffered the long-term consequences of that policy.

For these reasons, Palestinians, Arab states, and numerous donor countries perceived Blair’s anticipated role in the proposed board for peace with profound scepticism. Given his political record, clear alignment with Israeli positions, and unresolved allegations of profiteering, Blair is seen not as an impartial stabiliser but as a liability capable of undermining the fragile trust necessary for any transitional process.

Removing him is therefore a step in the right direction, yet not sufficient on its own. The real test lies in determining whether his private consulting firm and affiliated networks are also excluded, or whether his departure is merely symbolic. If Blair exits in name only, while his institutional influence persists behind the scenes, then the risks to the peace process remain substantial.

In an exclusive interview with Al Jazeera, Hamas’ political leader outside Gaza, Khaled Meshaal, said that he told mediators that Palestinians must be given the chance to heal and recover from Israel’s genocide.