Category World News

The United States Department of State has backed plans to establish what it calls “alternative safe communities” (ASC) in Gaza, part of a US-Israeli plan that would appear to divide the Palestinian enclave into two.

A State Department spokesperson confirmed to Al Jazeera that it supported the ASC “approach”, saying it was “seen as the most effective way to achieve” the goal of “moving people into safe accommodations as quickly as possible”.

The ASC plan has emerged in recent weeks as part of wider discussions that would see Gaza split into a “green zone” controlled by Israel and a “red zone” controlled by the Palestinian group Hamas.

There has been little clarity over how the plan would work, and details appear to still be in flux, but the broad outline, according to reporting in The New York Times and other outlets, is that reconstruction in Gaza would take place only in areas controlled by Israel and not in those where Hamas still operates.

This means the areas where the majority of Gaza’s estimated 2.2 million residents still live, including Gaza City and central regions such as Deir el-Balah, would not see any reconstruction despite the desperate situation Palestinians there continue to live in.

“Addressing the immediate need for secure housing in Gaza [is our] central concern,” the State Department spokesperson said.

“US efforts are directed toward rebuilding in those parts of Gaza where the majority of the population currently resides,” the spokesperson added, although it was unclear if that meant that rebuilding would also occur in non-Israeli-controlled areas under the ASC plan or whether the US hoped that the majority of Gaza’s population would move to Israeli-controlled areas.

Some reports suggested that the ASCs would consist of compounds housing 20,000 or 25,000 people in container-sized units, such as those currently used in disaster relief. It is not currently clear how these compounds could be expanded to accommodate all Palestinians in Gaza.

“If they [the US and Israel] could establish a proper situation, people might move there, but it’s not feasible,” Hussein, a Palestinian from Gaza City, said of the US plans. “What are they going to establish, with what infrastructure? It would need water, electricity. It would take years.”

Who will pay?

Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza has killed more than 69,700 Palestinians. Now, more than a month after a ceasefire officially began in Gaza, there are still questions over what the next phase of the agreement will bring and when full-scale reconstruction will begin.

In the meantime, Israel continues to attack periodically, killing at least 347 people since the ceasefire began on October 10.

For those still alive, life is incredibly difficult. At least 1.9 million people in Gaza are displaced. Many of them have had to flee multiple times. Ninety-two percent of Gaza’s housing stock has been damaged or reduced to rubble, leaving hundreds of thousands of people living in tents, a particularly precarious situation as winter approaches.

The destruction of Gaza’s buildings has come as a result of Israeli air strikes and shelling as well as a systematic campaign to deliberately demolish vast swaths of the territory.

Officials quoted in The New York Times said the first ASC compound was still months away from completion. Israeli soldiers were expected to begin clearing an area around what remains of Rafah in the south this week. But that work could be delayed if tunnels, unexploded ordnance or human remains are encountered.

Two people involved in the project estimated that the cost for just the initial compound could reach tens of millions of dollars. Overall, the cost of reconstructing Gaza is expected to come to at least $70bn and take several decades. Where the funding for the reconstruction will come from is unclear.

Who will pay for the proposed ASCs is equally ambiguous. The administration of US President Donald Trump is reported to have ruled out funding their construction while Israeli politicians have yet to confirm their final position.

The US State Department spokesperson did not comment on the funding, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

Engineering a new Gaza

While few Palestinians currently live in Gaza’s Israeli-controlled zone, US hopes are understood to rest on the idea that development, security and presumably access to medical care and welfare would be enough to draw people from other areas of Gaza.

But complicating US ambitions is that access to the “green zone” is heavily restricted for Palestinians, a situation that is likely to continue going forward.

According to The New York Times, Israeli security services are likely to conduct background checks on Palestinians seeking shelter in the new compounds, giving Israel a veto over who will be allowed in.

The outlet added that European diplomats have expressed concern that the eventual criteria could exclude large numbers of Palestinians, including civil servants, such as police and medical staff, who have worked under Hamas’s 18-year administration of the enclave as well as their family members.

And aid agencies said the idea of providing aid only to people in certain areas to the exclusion of others goes against humanitarian principles.

“We deliver aid where people are,” said Tamara Alrifai, the director of external relations for the United Nations Palestinian refugee agency, UNRWA. “We don’t provide services where we’d like people to be. That goes against the entire philosophy of aid and development.”

“This is about delivering the services people need to where the people are, not creating an artificial village and imposing what services you think people need onto them,” she said.

Division, partition and shrunken space

Arab and European officials as well as agencies such as Refugees International have expressed concern that the division of Gaza into red and green zones may pave the way to permanent partition. The idea has also drawn comparisons to the occupations of Baghdad and Kabul, where green zones became effective Western enclaves.

However, the suggestion of dividing Gaza is not entirely new. Speaking in April, Netanyahu spoke of plans to “divide up” Gaza by building a new Israel-controlled security corridor between Rafah and Khan Younis, suggesting Israel was preparing to separate the two cities.

As recently as September, far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich characterised Gaza as a “real estate bonanza”, telling an audience that he was already in negotiations with the Americans on how to divide up the enclave after the war.

Smotrich and other Israeli settler leaders have consistently called for Israel to create illegal settlements for Jewish Israelis in Gaza and essentially force the Palestinian population out in what would amount to ethnic cleansing.

“How can you divide it?” Yossi Mekelberg of Chatham House asked rhetorically. “You can’t squeeze 2 million people into a space even smaller than that which they’re already in.”

“Imposing an Israeli or American solution onto Gaza just isn’t going to work. If you’re going to even try to achieve something lasting, you need to begin with an understanding of Gaza’s history, culture and trauma,” Mekelberg added. “Palestinians need to be part of any settlement, or it’s never going to be stable.”

In Gaza, news of US and Israeli plans for the future of Palestinians is doing little to reassure a population battered and displaced after two years of Israeli assaults.

Washington, DC – Authorities in the United States have identified the two National Guard members shot in Washington, DC, in what the FBI is investigating as an act of “terrorism”.

US Attorney Jeanine Pirro on Thursday named 20-year-old Sarah Beckstrom and 24-year-old Andrew Wolfe as the West Virginia National Guard members who were shot a day earlier, just blocks from the White House.

She said both service members had gone through surgery and were in critical condition. They had been deployed to the US capital as part of what President Donald Trump has described as an anticrime initiative.

“A lone gunman opened fire without provocation, ambush style, armed with a .357 Smith & Wesson revolver,” Pirro told reporters at a news conference.

The attacker has been identified as Rahmanullah Lakanwal, a 29-year-old Afghan national who came to the US in 2021 shortly after the withdrawal of Western forces from Afghanistan.

Pirro said Lakanwal was a resident of Washington state and had driven across the country before the attack.

He has been charged with three counts of assault with intent to kill and possession of a firearm. He remains hospitalised after sustaining wounds that officials said did not appear to be life-threatening.

Pirro, a former Fox News host, added the charges could be upgraded if either of the National Guard members do not survive.

Kash Patel, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), said the attack was being investigated as “terrorism” and a search warrant has been executed at Lakanwal’s home.

Speaking earlier on Fox News, US Attorney General Pam Bondi said the wounded personnel were “fighting for their lives”.

“Everyone, pray today for these two soldiers, these two Guardsmen, the man and woman,” she said. “But if something happens – I will tell you right now, I will tell you early – we will do everything in our power to seek the death penalty against that man.”

The attack came at a time of heightened scrutiny over Trump’s decision to deploy the National Guard to Washington, DC, and other US cities.

Trump has said the deployment is needed to respond to high rates of crime in the US capital. Critics have decried the move as an incendiary show of force out of step with the needs of the federal district.

A judge last week ruled that Trump’s deployment of the National Guard was illegal but delayed enforcement of the decision until December 11.

After Thursday’s attack, the Trump administration quickly ordered 500 more National Guard soldiers to Washington, DC, adding to the nearly 2,200 military members already stationed there.

Revetting Afghans

In the wake of the attack, the Trump administration pledged to “re-examine every single alien who has entered our country from Afghanistan under [Former President Joe] Biden”.

The administration also announced it was pausing all processing of “immigration requests relating to Afghan nationals”.

On Thursday, Trump administration officials continued to focus on the Biden administration’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, which was conducted after a deal struck by Trump and the Taliban during the Republican leader’s first term.

During the withdrawal, the Biden administration launched Operation Allies Welcome to quickly relocate Afghans to the US, including those who had worked alongside US forces and Western entities in Afghanistan for more than two decades.

About 77,000 Afghans came to the US under the programme.

On Thursday, John Ratcliffe, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), said in a statement that the attacker had worked with the agency “as a member of a partner force” in the southern Taliban stronghold of Kandahar before coming to the US.

The attack has sparked fear for Afghan evacuees in the US and those still seeking relocation from Afghanistan after many were already reeling from the Trump administration’s hardline restrictions on refugees and asylum seekers.

Many Afghans who worked with US and Western forces face threats of reprisals from the Taliban government.

In a statement, Shawn VanDiver, the president of the AfghanEvac humanitarian advocacy group, urged “the media, elected leaders and decision-makers and other people of influence not to demonize the Afghan community for the deranged choice this person made”.

Richard Bennett, the UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan, echoed that sentiment, saying the “entire Afghan community must not be punished due to the actions of one individual”.

One day after a military coup, military leaders in Guinea-Bissau, a small West African nation, have named a new leader.

General Horta Nta Na Man was named as the head of a one-year transitional government at about noon (12: 00 GMT) on Thursday. He defended the seizure of power in a statement, saying that Guinea-Bissau’s army had taken control in the face of threats to its stability.

On Wednesday, the military arrested President Umaro Sissoco Embalo just hours before the results of a tense presidential vote held over the weekend were due to be announced.

After Fernando Dias and Embalo, the incumbent, both won the election on Sunday. The military leaders, &nbsp, who appeared on national TV to make their announcement, said they were acting to stop attempts to “manipulate electoral results”.

Dias, the country’s electoral commissioner, and other top military figures, were also detained.

Wednesday’s military takeover is the latest in a string of coups across West Africa that have fractured the regional bloc, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), which is eager to crack down on military interventions and to instil democratic principles of government.

Despite what it described as an orderly and peaceful vote that its observers on Sunday, the bloc condemned the action in a joint statement with the African Union hours after the putsch.

Coastal Guinea-Bissau, wedged between Senegal and Guinea, has experienced nine coup attempts since its independence from Portugal in 1974, with the most recent failed attempt reported in late October.

In recent years, the nation has grown to be a major hub for drug trafficking between Latin America and Europe. Embalo’s critics have accused him of staging crises to stay in power.

What we know about the coup and what it means:

What transpired?

Signs of trouble began when gunfire rang out on Wednesday afternoon near the presidential palace in the capital, Bissau.

Shortly afterward, army officers announced on state television that they had taken control of the country in response to the “discovery of an ongoing plan” that they claimed was meant to “manipulate electoral results.”

Al Jazeera’s Nicolas Haque, reporting from nearby Senegal, said the army officer leading the coup, Brigadier General Denis N’Canha, had served as the head of the presidential guard before the takeover.

According to Haque, “the man supposed to protect the president himself has put him in jail,” adding that there appeared to be military tries to censor the internet.

N’Canha, on state TV, announced that officers had formed “the High Military Command for the Restoration of Order”.

The High Military Command, according to his statement, “decides to immediately remove the president of the republic and to suspend all of the republic’s institutions until new orders are issued.”

He claimed that the alleged plot to destabilise the country was being coordinated by “some national politicians with the participation of a well-known drug lord and domestic and foreign nationals”, without giving further details.

The soldiers added that the media coverage and the ongoing electoral process had been suspended. They also closed off the country’s land, sea and air borders and imposed a nighttime curfew.

The Associated Press reported that heavily armed, masked soldiers were operating at checkpoints and that the roads leading to the palace were closed off. A palace official told the AP that a group of armed men had attacked the building, leading to a gunfire exchange with presidential guards. Gunshots were also reported by officials close to the National Electoral Commission.

Hundreds of people fled on foot and in vehicles, seeking shelter as shots rang out, the AFP news agency reported.

Who has been arrested and where are they now?

President Embalo claimed that he had been arrested in his office at around 1 p.m., in a “coup” led by N’Canha, the head of the presidential military office, according to French news outlet Jeune Afrique. Embalo stated that he had not been subjected to violence. Additionally, the president stated in a phone call to French television station France 24: “I have been deposed.

Military officials have not provided any information about where the president is being held.

According to Embalo, the army’s chief of staff, General Biague Na Ntam, his deputy, General Mamadou Toure, and its minister of interior, Botche Cande, are all being detained at the army headquarters.

Reuters, quoting anonymous sources, reported that opposition candidate Dias of the Party for Social Renewal, as well as Domingos Simoes Pereira, former prime minister and the head of the main opposition PAIGC (African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde), had been arrested.

Pereira and Dias’ arrests were confirmed by PAIGC in a Facebook statement on Wednesday, along with the announcement that Octavio Lopes, a lawyer, was also being detained. Pereira had been preparing to stand as the main opposition candidate in the election, but his PAIGC party was barred after the electoral commission said it had failed to submit its application on time. Pereira endorsed the obscure Dias in the election afterward.

Was Embalo facing a legitimacy crisis?

Yes, Embalo, 53, had a legitimacy crisis in the months leading up to the coup and his position has been hampered by political infighting. The former army general was first elected in 2019, backed by a coalition of parties known as Madem G15, which had separated from the then-ruling PAIGC party.

In the decades that followed, PAIGC, which declared its independence from Portugal in 1974, has ruled the country.

However, after Embalo was sworn in, in February 2020, the opposition challenged his victory and the Supreme Court did not recognise him as president until September 2020.

In February and December of this year, the president was the target of what he termed “tried coups,” which included arrests of military personnel.

Embalo’s critics, however, have accused him of fabricating crises in order to crack down on dissent. For instance, Embalo ordered the dissolution of the opposition-controlled parliament following the December 2023 coup attempt, which started as a clash between an army unit and the presidential guard. Parliament has not reconvened since, and Embalo has ruled through decrees.

In the midst of unrest with opposition groups, President Embalo announced in March that he would run for office once more.

He said he aimed to make history in the turbulent country by being the first leader in 30 years to secure a second consecutive term. However, opposition groups claimed that he had delayed elections until November because his term had originally expired in February 2025 and that they did not recognize his presidency. A Supreme Court ruling said Embalo’s term ended in September.

After the party was denied the opportunity to vote on a technicality in October, PAIGC also accused Embalo of using force. It was the first time in the country’s history that the former governing party had been excluded from elections.

What was the outcome of the election?

In the lead-up to Sunday’s tightly contested elections, Embalo campaigned on stability while the Pereira-backed Dias campaigned on change. Votes were thwarted despite accusations of corruption and hate speech from both sides, but they were unaffected.

On Tuesday, however, both Embalo and Dias declared victory in the elections.

Following the coup, PAIGC claimed that the military intervention was meant to prevent Dias’ victory from the electoral authority.

PAIGC “considers this fact as manoeuvres to disrupt the electoral process, which was already in the final stage of dissemination of provisional results”, the party said. It urged the electoral commission to publish the election results, which “award Dr. Fernando Dias da Costa with a significant victory and guaranteed him victory right away.”

On Wednesday, the Bissau-Guinean civil society coalition, Frente Popular or Popular Front, also accused Embalo and the army of staging a “simulated coup” to block the release of election results.

The organization stated in a statement on Wednesday that “this maneuver aims to prevent the publication of the election results scheduled for tomorrow, November 27.” It claimed Embalo’s statements to international media were proof of this.

The group claimed that the deposed president intended to hold new elections in which he intended to run once more after naming a new president and interim prime minister.

Was Embalo’s administration resolute?

Beverly Ochieng, West Africa analyst at the intelligence firm Control Risks, told Al Jazeera that the constant infighting had made Embalo’s government vulnerable.

The legislature, judiciary, and various government institutions have been declared nonoperable or operating at capacity during Embalo’s presidency, she said.

Political infighting and the banning of PAIGC “likely contributed to a military intervention – even though there is a school of thought that this may have been staged to play up vulnerabilities against Embalo”, Ochieng added.

According to political analyst Ryan Cummings, Embalo’s past actions gave evidence of a fake coup that could result in his reinstatement by the military administration. But, he added, it is also “highly plausible” the military acted alone to avoid a deadlock in a country where 70 percent of the 1.6 million population is poor.

There are growing concerns that Guinea-Bissau’s long-standing conflicts with Embalo and the opposition have caused the country to fall into a political impasse, he said.

Is there a link to the drug trade?

How much does the coup have to do with the nation’s rising reputation as a hub for drugs? The military coup leaders claim there was an effort to “manipulate” the election by “national leaders” working with drug cartels, but have not provided any evidence.

Guinea-Bissau was first warned by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) in 2008 that it was in danger of degenerating into a “narco state.” Since then, major drug busts in the country continue to cement it as a drug-trafficking hub, with dealers found by investigators to be working with help from the military.

Bissau-Guinean, Colombian, Mexican, and Portuguese nationals were detained and given sentences of 16 years in prison following a significant drug operation spearheaded by local security forces and supported by the UNODC.

A 2020 report by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime warned that the drug trade could increase under the newly elected Embalo because key figures in the military had backed his presidency. Embalo and the drug trade were not directly linked, according to the report.

Ex-navy chief Jose Bubo Na Tchuto was arrested off the country’s coast by US forces and sentenced in October 2016 to four years in prison by a Manhattan court for conspiring to import drugs into the United States. He was the highest-ranking official in the government to receive a drug trafficking sentence.

“The drug cartels ‘ influence is depending on the lack of the legitimacy (of the government)”, political analyst Aly Fary Ndiaye told Al Jazeera. They will be more likely to support or fund those who are in the army in order to open their eyes and help them grow their business if, for instance, we have a military coup.

Election observers from the AU and ECOWAS were still in Bissau when Wednesday’s coup occurred, including former Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan and former Mozambican president Filipe Nyusi. The country appears to be oblivious to the delegation’s current situation.

In a joint AU-ECOWAS statement signed by the former leaders, the blocs condemned the coup and called for the electoral process to be resumed. After the delegation had spoken with them, both candidates, according to the statement, had agreed to accept the results of the vote.

“We deplore this blatant attempt to disrupt the democratic process and the gains that have been achieved thus far”, the statement read. We are concerned about the arrests of senior officials, including those in charge of the electoral process. In this regard, we urge the armed forces to immediately release the detained officials to allow the country’s electoral process to proceed to its conclusion”.

During Embalo’s “political overreach,” including when he unilaterally disbanded parliament, analyst Ochieng claimed that ECOWAS was not vocal enough. The bloc, she said, is struggling to instil respect for democratic practices and public institutions because it fails to proactively uphold strict democratic standards, something the militaries are exploiting.

The coup has been criticized by the governments of Ghana and Nigeria. Portugal and Qatar have also called for a resumption of the electoral process.

According to Stephane Dujarric, his representative, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, “appeals to all national stakeholders in Guinea-Bissau to exercise restraint and respect the rule of law.”

What happens next?

After swearing in General Horta Nta Na Man for a 12-month transitional period, the military made the announcement on Thursday that borders would be reopened. Not much is known yet about the military leader.

Despite a report from French radio station RFI, PAIGC called for a rally in front of the Ministry of the Interior and that Bissau was still being heavily patrolled by security forces on Thursday.

The calm, though, belies what is likely to be a period of political uncertainty ahead, whether Embalo is reinstated or not, analysts say. Embalo’s return may support conspiracy theories and stoke violent protests among opposition candidates, who are unlikely to support military rule.

Meanwhile, the African Union and ECOWAS will likely pressure the military to return to democratic rule as soon as possible, Cummings said. Both countries have previously suspended and sanctioned coup-bred nations before resuming them once elections are established.