Category World News

Thousands of Palestinian prisoners – most of them detained without charge – have been released from Israeli jails as part of the Gaza ceasefire deal.

Reunions saw a mix of joy and sadness after people heard about the conditions and mistreatment their loved ones endured.

Hundreds more were forced into exile by Israel.

And the majority return to rubble in Gaza, and others risk being arrested again in the occupied West Bank.

So, is it possible for former Palestinian prisoners to embrace freedom with life under occupation and the scars of Israeli detention?

Presenter: Sami Zeidan

Guests:

Milena Ansari – Israel and Palestine Researcher at Human Rights Watch

Basil Farraj – Assistant Professor at Birzeit University, specialising in political prisoners and carceral violence

Gaza’s Ministry of Health says it has received the remains of 45 Palestinians who were held in Israeli custody via the International Committee of the Red Cross, bringing the total number of bodies returned to 90 as part of a United States-brokered ceasefire deal.

Medical teams are continuing to examine, document and prepare the bodies for delivery to families “in line with approved medical procedures and protocols”, the Health Ministry said in a statement on Wednesday.

Under a ceasefire deal backed by US President Donald Trump and aimed at ending the two-year Gaza war, Israel was to turn over the bodies of 15 Palestinians for every deceased Israeli returned. The remains of 45 people were returned on Monday.

Palestinians awaited information about the bodies that arrived at Nasser Hospital on Tuesday and Wednesday. The forensics team described disturbing conditions, bearing signs of physical abuse.

Some of the Palestinian bodies were blindfolded and handcuffed, indicating “field executions” may have taken place, medical sources told Al Jazeera.

Israel is expected to hand over more bodies, though officials have not said how many are in its custody or how many will be returned. It remains unclear whether the bodies were dug up from cemeteries by the Israeli army during its ground offensive or if they belong to detainees who were killed during the Israeli assault. Throughout the war, Israel’s military has exhumed bodies as part of its search for the remains of captives.

As forensic teams examined the first remains returned, the Health Ministry on Wednesday released images of 32 unidentified bodies to help families recognise missing relatives.

Many appeared decomposed or burned. Some were missing limbs or teeth, while others were coated in sand and dust. Health officials have said Israeli restrictions on allowing DNA testing equipment into Gaza have often forced morgues to rely on physical features and clothing for identification.

The forensics team that received the bodies said some arrived still shackled or bearing signs of physical abuse.

“There are signs of torture and executions,” Sameh Hamad, a member of a commission tasked with receiving the bodies at Nasser Hospital, said.

The bodies belonged to men aged 25 to 70. Most had bands on their necks, including one who had a rope around his neck. Most of the bodies wore civilian clothing, but some were in uniforms, suggesting they were Palestinian fighters.

Hamad said the Red Cross provided names for only three of the dead, leaving many families uncertain of their relatives’ fate.

Israel’s war on Gaza has killed nearly 68,000 Palestinians since October 2023, according to the Health Ministry. Palestinian officials say the true toll could be far higher, with tens of thousands of bodies believed to be under the rubble.

Thousands more people are missing, according to the Red Cross and Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics.

Rasmiya Qudeih, 52, waited outside Nasser Hospital, hoping her son would be among the 45 bodies transferred from Israel on Wednesday.

He vanished on October 7, 2023, the day of the Hamas-led attack. She was told he was killed by an Israeli strike.

“God willing, he will be with the bodies,” she said.

The Health Ministry released a video showing medical workers examining the bodies, saying the remains would be returned to families or buried if left unidentified.

United States President Donald Trump says that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has pledged to stop buying oil from Russia, and Trump said he would next try to get China to do the same as Washington intensifies efforts to cut off Moscow’s energy revenues.

India and China are the two top buyers of Russian seaborne crude exports, taking advantage of the discounted prices Russia has been forced to accept after European buyers shunned purchases and the US and the European Union imposed sanctions on Moscow for its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Trump has recently targeted India for its Russian oil purchases, imposing tariffs on Indian exports to the US to discourage the country’s crude buying as he seeks to choke off Russia’s oil revenues and pressure Moscow to negotiate a peace deal with Ukraine.

“So I was not happy that India was buying oil, and he assured me today that they will not be buying oil from Russia,” Trump told reporters during a White House event.

“That’s a big step. Now we’re going to get China to do the same thing.”

The Indian embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to emailed questions about whether Modi had made such a commitment to Trump.

Russia is India’s top oil supplier. Moscow exported 1.62 million barrels per day to India in September, roughly one-third of the country’s oil imports. For months, Modi resisted US pressure, with Indian officials defending the purchases as vital to national energy security.

A move by India to stop imports would signal a major shift by one of Moscow’s top energy customers and could reshape the calculus for other nations still importing Russian crude. Trump wants to leverage bilateral relationships to enforce economic isolation on Russia, rather than relying solely on multilateral sanctions.

During his comments to reporters, Trump added that India could not “immediately” halt shipments, calling it “a little bit of a process, but that process will be over soon”.

A woman who says she was abused by the late financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein has sued Bank of America and the Bank of New York Mellon (BNY), alleging the banks knowingly provided financial services that enabled Epstein’s sex-trafficking operation for years.

Bank of America, the second-largest bank in the United States, declined to comment on the allegations. BNY did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The woman, referred to in court papers on Wednesday as Jane Doe, is seeking an unspecified amount of damages from both banks.

She is represented by law firms Boies Schiller and Edwards Henderson, who previously secured settlements of $75m and $290m with Deutsche Bank and JPMorgan, respectively, over their alleged financial ties to Epstein.

Neither Deutsche Bank nor JPMorgan admitted wrongdoing in agreeing to settle.

Congress probes Epstein case

Epstein died by suicide in 2019 in jail while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges. The circumstances of his death, as well as his social relationships with wealthy and powerful individuals, have fuelled theories that others were involved in his crimes.

His case has become a political headache for President Donald Trump’s administration.

After pledging during the 2024 campaign to release files from the Department of Justice’s investigation into Epstein, the administration reversed course this year, prompting an outcry from Trump’s conservative base and members of Congress.

The House Oversight Committee is now investigating the Epstein case.

In both lawsuits, Jane Doe said she met Epstein in 2011 while she was living in Russia. She said she became financially dependent on Epstein, who raped her, forcibly touched her and forced her to engage in sex acts with other women at least 100 times between 2011 and 2019.

“As Congress works toward unraveling how Jeffrey Epstein was able to orchestrate his criminal sex trafficking enterprise for decades without detection, we are taking another important step forward toward justice for survivors,” Sigrid McCawley, a lawyer for Jane Doe, said in a statement.

Plaintiff says Epstein paid her rent

Jane Doe said she opened a Bank of America account in 2013 at the direction of Richard Kahn, Epstein’s former accountant, and that Kahn regularly sent her money for rent through the account.

Lawyers for Kahn did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Doe said that, in 2015, Kahn’s assistant told her Epstein was adding her to the payroll for a “sham company” and that she would receive funds through her Bank of America account. She said she did not know the purpose of those payments.

Her lawyers wrote that those transactions should have raised red flags for Bank of America. Epstein had pleaded guilty to state-level prostitution charges in Florida in 2008 as part of an arrangement that allowed him to avoid federal prosecution.

The lawsuit against BNY said the bank gave a line of credit to MC2, a modelling agency that Epstein and French model scout Jean-Luc Brunel used to traffic victims, according to the lawsuit.

In total, BNY processed $378m in payments to women trafficked by Epstein, the lawsuit said.

Brunel was arrested in December 2020 and was found dead in jail in 2022, according to Parisian prosecutors.

Canada has threatened legal action against carmaker Stellantis NV over what Ottawa says is the company’s unacceptable plan to shift production of one model to a United States plant.

On Wednesday, Minister of Industry Melanie Joly sent a letter to Stellantis CEO Antonio Filosa noting that the company had agreed to maintain its Canadian presence in exchange for substantial financial support.

“Anything short of fulfilling that commitment will be considered a default under our agreement,” she said. If Stellantis did not live up to its commitment, Canada would “exercise all options, including legal”, she said.

Stellantis announced a $13bn investment in the US on Tuesday, a move that it said would bring five new models to the market. As part of the plan, production of the Jeep Compass will move to the US state of Illinois from a facility in Brampton in the Canadian province of Ontario.

A copy of the letter was made available to the Reuters news agency. The existence of the letter was first reported by Bloomberg.

Stellantis had paused retooling of the Brampton plant in February, shortly after US President Donald Trump announced tariffs against Canadian goods, upending the highly integrated North American auto industry.

In a statement on Tuesday night, Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney said Ottawa had made clear it expected Stellantis to fulfil the undertakings it had made to the workers at the plant.

“We are working with the company to develop the right measures to protect Stellantis employees,” he said.

Ontario is Canada’s industrial heartland and accounts for about 40 percent of its national gross domestic product (GDP).

“I have spoken with Stellantis to stress my disappointment with their decision,” Ontario Premier Doug Ford said on social media on Wednesday.

Stellantis spokesperson LouAnn Gosselin said the company was investing in Canada and noted plans to add a third shift to a plant in Windsor, Ontario.