Category World News

Gaza City – Maysera al-Kafarna, a Palestinian woman in Gaza, sorts through blue baby overalls brought for the child she was supposed to have.

But her dreams of motherhood have been dashed by Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, which ravaged the enclave’s healthcare system that saves lives, as well as the fertility centres that plan them.

After years of trying, al-Kafarna and her husband turned to in-vitro fertilisation (IVF). Their embryos were frozen in a fertility centre, waiting for the war to end, but the clinic was attacked by Israel.

“We had four viable embryos stored there in the first months of the war. We were shocked to learn they had been destroyed when the clinic was attacked,” al-Kafarna told Al Jazeera.

“It was deeply painful. We felt like we had lost a part of ourselves. We were waiting for a chance to have our baby.”

Medical officials in Gaza say Israel has destroyed nine out of 10 fertility clinics in the territory. In addition, embryos that remain are still in danger, despite the ceasefire, due to fuel shortages and a lack of liquid nitrogen to keep them at the required temperature.

Rights advocates say Israel’s attacks on reproductive health in Gaza are a textbook implementation of genocidal policies, as defined by the United Nations.

Last year, UN investigators concluded that Israeli attacks on fertility clinics and maternity wards were part of Israel’s push to destroy the Palestinian people.

The 1948 UN Convention lists “imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group” as one of five acts it classified as genocidal.

In September 2024, a UN Commission of Inquiry found that Israel had engaged in four of the five acts during its war on Gaza, including efforts to prevent births.

“Attacks on healthcare facilities, including those offering sexual and reproductive healthcare and services, have affected about 545,000 women and girls who are of reproductive age in Gaza,” the UN investigators wrote in their report.

They specifically reviewed an Israeli attack on Al-Basma IVF clinic in Gaza City in December 2023 that destroyed thousands of embryos, sperm samples and other reproductive material.

“The commission found that the Israeli authorities knew that the medical centre was a fertility clinic and that they intended to destroy it,” the UN inquiry said.

“Therefore, the Commission concluded that the destruction of the Al-Basma IVF clinic was a measure intended to prevent births among Palestinians in Gaza.”

The Gaza Ministry of Health reported a 41 percent decrease in births in Gaza in the first half of 2025 compared with the previous three years.

Beyond the direct attacks on reproductive healthcare facilities, Israel’s blockade on medical supplies and food has further harmed newborns and birth rates.

“Inability to access medical care and proper nutrition harmed reproductive capacity by causing infertility, miscarriage, complications, and maternal death for women, as well as poor health outcomes for newborns,” a study by Physicians for Human Rights said.

Despite the dire conditions that persist, fertility doctor Abdel Nasser al-Kalhout said he hopes to resume his work as soon as conditions allow it.

A Russian air attack has killed two people in Kyiv region’s Bilohorodska community, and a drone attack killed another person in central Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region, according to local authorities.

The deadly attacks came overnight on Wednesday, just hours after a deadly drone attack on a commuter train in northeastern Ukraine’s Kharkiv – an incident denounced as “terrorism” by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Also on Wednesday, three people were injured in a Russian drone attack on port infrastructure in the southern region of Odesa, according to Governor Oleh Kiper.

In the capital, Kyiv, a 17-storey residential building was hit, causing minor damage to the roof and damaging windows on the upper floors, emergency services said.

Several residential buildings in Kyiv remain without power due to earlier Russian attacks on the country’s energy grid.

Russia attacked Ukraine overnight with an Iskander-M ballistic missile and 146 drones – 103 of them neutralised by air defences, Ukraine’s air force said.

On Tuesday night, five people were confirmed dead and several others injured after a Russian drone hit a passenger train near Kharkiv city, Al Jazeera’s Audrey Macalpine said, reporting from Kyiv.

“This attack has struck fears among Ukrainians,” Macalpine said, noting that the train was carrying about 100 passengers.

“With the country’s airspace closed, people rely heavily on trains as a means of moving around the country,” she said. “And this is a culmination of weeks of threats on the security of the train system.”

In a statement, Zelenskyy said the attack in Kharkiv undermined peace efforts and urged allies to step up pressure on Moscow to end the war.

“In any country, a drone strike on a civilian train would be viewed the same way – exclusively as terrorism,” Zelenskyy said on his Telegram channel.

“The Russians have significantly increased their ability to kill, their ability to terrorise,” he said, while rallying the international community to put more “pressure” on Moscow to halt its deadly offensive amid ongoing negotiations for a ceasefire.

“Russia must be held responsible for what it is doing,” Zelenskyy said.

The attacks that have left many Ukrainians without power in freezing winter temperatures come after Russian and Ukrainian negotiators met in the United Arab Emirates last week for United States-brokered talks aimed at ending the conflict.

The next round is expected to take place on February 1, according to Zelenskyy.

Ukraine is asking partners, particularly the US, for strong security guarantees in the event of a peace deal that would prevent Russia from attacking again.

More than 70,000 people, mostly women and children, have fled from Tirah, a remote region in northwestern Pakistan bordering Afghanistan, as fears grow of an imminent military offensive against the Pakistan Taliban, according to local residents and officials.

Pakistan’s Defence Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif has contradicted claims made by locals and provincial authorities, insisting no military operation is occurring or planned in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province town.

During an Islamabad news conference, he attributed the mass migration to harsh weather conditions rather than military actions, despite residents fleeing for weeks over fears of an impending army operation.

The exodus began after mosque announcements in December last year urged residents to vacate Tirah by January 23 to avoid possible conflict. This follows Pakistan’s August military campaign against Taliban forces in the northwestern Bajaur district, which displaced hundreds of thousands.

Shafi Jan, a provincial government spokesman, blamed federal authorities via social media for the displaced people’s hardships, accusing the Islamabad government of changing its position regarding military operations.

Meanwhile, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Sohail Afridi, from imprisoned former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s party, has opposed military intervention and pledged to prevent a full-scale operation in Tirah.

Military officials maintain they will continue targeted intelligence operations against Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). They claim many TTP fighters have found refuge in Afghanistan since the Afghan Taliban’s 2021 return to power, with hundreds crossing into Tirah and using residents as human shields during raids.

Nearly half of population

Local government administrator Talha Rafiq Alam reported that approximately 10,000 families – about 70,000 people – from Tirah’s 150,000 population have registered as displaced. The registration deadline has been extended from January 23 to February 5, with assurances that residents can return once security improves.

Zar Badshah, 35, who fled with his family, said mortar explosions in villages recently killed one woman and injured four children in his community. “Community elders told us to leave. They instructed us to evacuate to safer places,” he said.

At a Bara government school, hundreds waited in registration lines for government assistance, many complaining about slow processing. Narendra Singh, 27, explained that members of the Sikh minority also fled Tirah due to food shortages worsened by heavy snowfall and security concerns.

Oxfam says it will not disclose the personal details of its Palestinian staff to Israel, citing its army’s deadly attacks in Gaza that have killed hundreds of aid workers.

As part of a crackdown on NGOs providing life-saving aid to Palestinians, Israel last year demanded that some of the world’s best-known charities working in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem hand over detailed information about their Palestinian and international staff, operations and funding.

On January 1, Israel withdrew the licences of 37 aid groups, including the Norwegian Refugee Council, International Rescue Committee and Oxfam, saying they failed to adhere to the new “security and transparency standards”.

But Oxfam has said it will not share data about its Palestinian employees.

“We will not transfer sensitive personal data to a party to the conflict since this would breach humanitarian principles, duty of care and data protection obligations,” an Oxfam spokesperson told Al Jazeera. “More than 500 humanitarian workers have been killed since October 7, 2023.”

“We call on the government of Israel to immediately halt deregistration proceedings and lift measures obstructing humanitarian assistance,” the spokesperson said. “We urge donor governments to use all available leverage to secure the suspension and reversal of these actions.”

According to rules set out by Israel’s Ministry for Diaspora Affairs, the information to be handed over includes passport copies, resumes and names of family members, including children. It said it would reject organisations it suspected of inciting racism, denying the state of Israel’s existence or the holocaust. It would also ban those it deems as supporting “an armed struggle by an enemy state or a terrorist organisation against the State of Israel”.

Israel says 23 organisations have agreed to the new registration rules. The others are understood to have refused or are weighing their decisions.

The Palestinian NGOs Network (PNGO) condemned the organisations that have adhered to Israel’s demands.

“PNGO underscores the grave risks inherent in this measure, which constitutes a clear violation of the principles of international humanitarian law and established humanitarian work standards,” it said, adding that complying with Israel’s order poses a “direct threat” to the safety and security of local staff.

On Saturday, Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, said it was prepared to share a “defined list of Palestinian and international staff names, subject to clear parameters with staff safety at its core” to Israel, while acknowledging that the demands were “unreasonable”.

MSF’s decision was condemned by some doctors, activists and campaigners, saying it could endanger Palestinians, given Israel has targeted aid workers throughout the genocide in Gaza.

A former MSF employee, requesting anonymity, told Al Jazeera, “It is extremely concerning … that MSF would make a decision like this.

“MSF faces profoundly difficult decisions – concede to the demands of a genocidal regime, or refuse and face complete expulsion and an abrupt end to all health activities in the coming weeks. But what is humanitarianism under genocide? There must be alternatives – alternatives that demand a much bolder and more disruptive approach to humanitarianism amid such brutal political decline.”