Category World News

Belfast, Northern Ireland — On New Year’s Eve, fireworks lit the city’s streets, and not just to celebrate.

Hundreds of people show their support for Palestine Action prisoners who are currently on hunger strikes. Their chants echoed earlier murals that not only depict the city but also reflect its troubled past.

Palestinian murals are next to Irish republican ones along the Falls Road. The Palestinian wall is now known as the International Wall, which was once a symbiotic canvas for global struggles. Refaat Alareer, a late Palestinian author who died in a 20-year Israeli airstrike, wrote poetry throughout the length of the book. Local artists have hand-painted Palestinian artists’ images.

New words have recently appeared on Belfast’s famed walls. The “who hunger for justice” is blessed. The four pro-Palestinian activists who are currently on a hunger strike in British prisons are now known as the city’s political conscience, their bodies deteriorating as the days pass.

A trade union activist who spoke at the protest, Patricia McKeown, a city activist, stated, “This is not a city that will ever accept any attempt to silence our voice, our right to protest, or our right to defend human rights.”

Why wouldn’t we back the statement that “these young people are being held unjustly and in ridiculous conditions” and that they have made the ultimate decision to express their opinions, especially regarding what is happening to Palestinians? she inquired.

Belfast is the target of a hunger strike.

As the health of four detainees continues to decline behind prison walls, the protest in Belfast is a part of a growing international movement. All of them are associated with Palestine Action, and according to campaigners, they could spend more than a year in jail before their cases are heard. Supporters claim that the hunger strike has only been used as a last resort as legal avenues are exhausted.

The members of Palestine Action are being detained for their alleged involvement in break-ins at an Oxfordshire Royal Air Force base and a United Kingdom subsidiary of Elbit Systems, where equipment was allegedly damaged, and at an Oxfordshire Royal Air Force base where two military aircraft were spray-painted with red paint. The prisoners contest the charges brought against them, including violent disorder and burglary.

The prisoners want a fair trial, the release of Palestine Action, and the end of what they call “interference with their mail and reading materials.” According to a contentious anti-terror law, Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s government in Britain banned Palestine Action in July.

Heba Muraisi is starving on day 61. Day 55 of Teuta Hoxha is complete. on day 54, Karna Ahmed. On day 41, Lewie Chiaramello. Ahmed and Hoxha have already been admitted to the hospital. The largest hunger strike in Britain since 1981, according to campaigners, was expressly inspired by the Irish hunger strikes.

In Northern Ireland, the Irish Republican Army and other republican prisoners demanded the restoration of their political status in 1981. During the strike, Bobby Sands, one of the ten men who were killed, was elected to the British parliament. Margaret Thatcher took a harsh public stance, but the government ultimately sought redress as the tide turned in the back of the house.

Martin Hurson, 29, passed away on the 46th day of a prisoner. Between days 59 and 61, other people passed away, including Joe McDonnell, Francis Hughes, Michael Devine, and Raymond McCreesh. Sands went on a hunger strike for 66 days before succumbing.

Sue Pentel, a Jew for Palestine Ireland member, vividly recalls that time.

She claimed, “I was here while the hunger strike was taking place.” I recall the callous brutality of the British government allowing ten hungers to end because I experienced them, as I marched, protested, met, and protested.

Bobby Sands’s words, “Our revenge will be the laughter of our children,” are true. And we raised our families here, and they are the same people from the newest generation who show solidarity with Palestine.

Some people will die if this persists.

Pat Sheehan, who is seated beneath a Bobby Sands mural, fears that history is getting near to repeating itself. Before the hunger strike was called off on October 3, 1981, he endured 55 days of it.

In theory, I would have been the last to die because I was the longest member of the hunger strike when it ended in 1981, he said.

He claimed that his liver was failing at that point. His vision was lost. He constantly vomited bile.

Sheehan said, “You’re entering the danger zone once you’ve had 40 days.” For those who have been on a hunger strike for more than 50 days, “the hunger strikers must be very weak now physically.”

According to the quote, “Mentally, the longer the hunger strike lasts, the more they will become mentally ill.”

“I believe that some of the hunger strikers will die inevitably if it continues,” she said.

Sheehan, who is currently serving as the MLA for Sinn Fein in West Belfast, claims that those who are involved in the Palestine Action hunger strike are political prisoners.

He claimed that Ireland is probably the only nation in Western Europe with almost total support for the Palestinian cause. “Because we have a similar history of colonization, genocide, and detention.”

“So there is a lot of empathy when Irish people see what’s happening in Gaza on their TV screens.”

Ireland’s position

That political action has a growing need for empathy. Israel joined South Africa’s legal fight against the international court of justice, alleging genocide in Gaza, a charge Israel denies. In 2024, Israel formally acknowledged the state of Palestine.

Ireland has boycotted the Eurovision Song Contest and requested that its national football team be expelled from international competition while the Irish government has also taken steps to enforcing a ban on the sale of Israeli bonds.

However, many campaigners contend that the government’s actions are insufficient. They contend that Ireland’s Shannon Airport is still a source of business for the Occupied Territories Bill, which attempts to ban trade with illegal Israeli settlements, and that it has been delayed since 2018.

The conflict in Gaza has dominated domestic politics in the northern region of Ireland, which is still a part of Britain.

Following fierce criticism from Irish republican, nationalist, left-wing, and unaligned political parties, Democratic Unionist Party education minister Paul Givan traveled to Jerusalem on a trip funded by the Israeli government, leading to a no-confidence vote.

Unionist councillors vehemently opposed Belfast City Hall’s decision to fly a Palestinian flag last month before it was ultimately approved.

Support for Israel has become ingrained in some loyalist and unionist organizations with a commitment to Britain, with Israeli flags flying in Belfast’s once-traditional loyalist areas as well.

The genocide in Gaza has been recast along the old fault lines of division because of its legacy of identity that is rooted in sectarian lines.

“Solidarity reaches Palestine”

Protesters in Belfast claim that their solidarity is grounded in humanity rather than national identity.

The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement’s 33-year-old Damien Quinn argued that Ireland’s history had always had a particular weight in the wake of hunger strikes.

“We are here to support the British hunger strikers today. But we are also present for the Palestinians, he said, “for those who are being brutally murdered every day.”

He claimed that Palestine Action “made it very clear that they have tried everything, including trying to lobby and sign petitions.”

“So it’s heartbreaking when I see how they are being treated in prison for fighting the genocide.”

The Belfast-based Palestinian Rita Aburahma, 25, is painfully familiar with the hunger strike.

She said, “My people don’t have the luxury of speaking up because they are in Palestine. Solidarity matters.”

“I think the hunger strikers are really brave; they have always been in the face of opposition.” How long has it taken the government to address them or take any action, in any way, worries me and many others.

If the government doesn’t take action against those people, nothing will save them. In some ways, it’s shocking, but not entirely unsurprising because the same government has been monitoring the genocide from beginning to end and never intervened.

Despite suffering astronomical casualties for a meager territorial gains this year, Russia managed to survive what Ukraine described as an information operation to stop peace talks and keep fighting.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov claimed that Ukraine was trying to assassinate Russian President Vladimir Putin at his 87-kilometer (kilometer) northeast of Moscow on Monday.

“The Kyiv regime used 91 long-range unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to attack the president of the Russian Federation’s Novgorod region, where they reportedly resided. The Russian Armed Forces’ air defense systems completely destroyed UAVs, according to Lavrov in a statement.

Putin wasn’t in residence at the time, he said.

Andrii Sybiha, Lavrov’s Ukrainian counterpart, swiftly refuted the assertion. Russia has not yet offered any conclusive proof of its accusations that Ukraine allegedly attacked Putin’s residence. And they won’t, either. since there isn’t. No such attack took place, according to Sybiha.

Two days later, Russia released images of drone debris lying in the snow, but they were unable to verify the drone’s location, manufacture, or time of downing.

According to the opposition outlet Sota, “Putin’s attack on Valdai’s residence is presumably a Kremlin fake.” Residents of Valdai, where Putin’s “Dinner” residence is located, informed Sota last night that they did not hear the air defense’s mission, which would have shot down 91 drones.

Additionally, Sota noted that drones attacking Valdai “necessarily cross a specially protected airspace with objects of the Strategic Missile Forces, East Kazakhstan region, military aviation, closed administrative units like Solnechny, Lake, etc.

“A drone can only fly to the Dinner residence by miracle,” Sota said.

Lavrov’s assertion also conflicted with a previous report from the Russian Ministry of Defense that only 41 drones had been downed in the Novgorod region between December 28 and December 29.

The Russian Defense Ministry later reported that “one more drone was shot down over Bryansk and one over Smolensk” flying in the direction of the Novgorod region,” according to a later update from the ministry.

Hundreds of kilometers away from Valdai, according to Ukraine observers, are Bryansk and Smolensk.

None of the typical forms of Ukrainian strikes, such as those made available in video, heat signatures, statements from local officials, or local media reports, were included in the alleged attack, according to the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW).

On social media, Rybinsk oil depot’s successful attack on December 31 was well documented. A week prior, there had been an attack on the Rostov refinery Novoshakhtinsk, as well as a number of other week-long strikes.

What actually occurred?

Following the announcement of the alleged attack, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with US President Donald Trump in Florida and promised that US forces would work with Ukraine’s security in the event of a Russian-Russian peace agreement.

For the first time in history, the US offered security guarantees, which appeared to give the impression that Polish Premier Donald Tusk was optimistic that the Ukrainian conflict would end sooner than 2026.

He stated at a cabinet meeting on Tuesday that “peace is on the horizon.”

The American declaration, for instance, of willingness to participate in security guarantees for Ukraine following a peace agreement, such as the presence of American troops along the Ukrainian border or along the Ukrainian-Russian border, is “the key result of recent days,” Tusk said.

The Coalition of the Willing, or “Ukraine’s allies,” were scheduled to meet in France three days later and in Kyiv on January 3.

When Lavrov said, “Russia’s negotiating position will be reviewed,” Lavrov’s statement added a pall to this optimism. Putin also gave the orders to continue securing the remaining unoccupied territory in the southern Ukrainian province of Zaporizhia on the same day. The region is ruled by Russia, which has three-quarters of the country.

Following his successful meeting with Trump, Zelenskyy claimed that Russia was “looking for a pretext” to escalate hostilities and avoid engaging in peace talks.

He wrote on social media that “Russia is at it again, using dangerous statements to undermine all accomplishments of our shared diplomatic efforts with President Trump’s team.”

Trump’s efforts for peace have been repeatedly undermined by Russia, who has refused to cede occupied territory to US and European forces on Ukrainian soil.

Trump’s assertions, however, came across as true.

I dislike it, I don’t like it. Trump told reporters on Monday that it was not good. It’s one thing to be offensive, but it’s another to attack his home. None of that is appropriate at this time. And President Putin just let me know about it. I felt a lot of anger for it.

Other US officials questioned their convictions. Matthew Whitaker, the US ambassador to NATO, said in an interview that “it’s unclear whether it actually happened. The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday that US intelligence had determined that Ukraine had not taken Vladimir Putin’s residence into its own hands.

The US president’s meeting with Zelenskyy appeared to be a climax to Moscow’s messaging.

Prior to and following Zelenskyy’s meeting with Trump, during which commander-in-chief Valery Gerasimov broadcast exaggerated claims of success, Putin held stage meetings with his General Staff on Saturday, December 27 and Monday.

In 2025, he claimed that Russian forces had seized 334 Ukrainian settlements and occupied 6, 640 square kilometers (2, 564 square miles) of Ukrainian territory. The ISW claimed to have “observed evidence indicating a Russian presence in 4 952 square kilometers (1912 square miles) and 245 settlements.”

Oleksandr Syrskii, the commander-in-chief of Ukraine, claimed that territory that constituted 0.8% of the country’s 603, 550 km2 (233, 032 miles) had been lost. almost 420, 000 Russians have died and are injured, according to the cost.

More than 1.2 million Russian casualties, according to the General Staff of Ukraine, were caused by more than 78,000 artillery systems, 781 aircraft, and nearly 4, 000 missiles, or almost 11,500 tanks and 24 000 armored fighting vehicles.

By the end of 2025, Russian forces had been attempting to occupy Donetsk, a town in eastern Ukraine, for five months. Despite claiming to have taken control of Hulyaipole in the southern Zaporizhia region, they still held 55% of the area. Despite claiming to have seized that area, even Russian military reporters acknowledged that Russian forces were being stifled out of Kupiansk in the northern Kharkiv region.

One Kremlin-friendly outlet cited “systematic exaggeration of successes” as the reason “reserves that were “not needed” for the capture and clearing of Kupiansk were redeployed to other areas due to inaccurate reports on the situation to higher authorities.

Russia’s attacks on Ukrainian cities were documented, but it was still unclear whether they had targeted Valdai. Russia launched 33 missiles and just over 1, 000 drones at Ukraine’s cities during its final week of the year. The Air Force of Ukraine reported that it had intercepted 30 of the missiles and 86 percent of the drones.

Investigators are frantically looking for the cause of a devastating fire that ripped through a bar in Crans-Montana, a Swiss Alps town, on January 1st, 2018.

After the devastating earthquake that occurred in the early hours of 2026, killing about 40 people and injuring about 115 others, many of whom were seriously, relatives and friends have been searching for their loved ones.

Some of their locations are still visible here, Valais, a teenager who was present at the party, nodded as they entered the bar, which is now enclosed by opaque white tarpaulins and a wall of temporary barriers.

Another user, Eleonore, said, “We took a lot of photos and] we uploaded them to Instagram, Facebook, and every social network we could find them.”

“There is nothing, though. No response . The parents were called. Nothing . Even the parents are unaware, she continued.

Police have begun the laborious process of identifying the victims, but some of the bodies have already been badly burned, according to officials, which could take days or even weeks.

Mayor of Crans-Montana Nicolas Feraud stated at a press conference on Thursday evening that the first priority is to give names to all the bodies. He claimed that this could take several days.

The canton of Valais’s head of government Mathias Reynard claimed experts were using DNA and dental samples for the task.

Because the information is so devastating and sensitive, no one can tell the families until they are 100% certain, he said, “all this work needs to be done.”

Witnesses described scenes of panic and chaos as people attempted to break through the windows and pouring into the street with burns.

Police have not yet determined how many people are still missing from the bar’s exact number when it started to burn.

According to the Crans-Montana website, Le Constellation had a capacity of 300 people and added 40 more guests on its terrace. The border with Bern, the capital of Switzerland, is about 200 kilometers south.

According to Swiss media, more than 30 victims were transported to hospitals in Zurich and Lausanne, and six were to Geneva.

No official list of the people who went missing or how many people worked at Le Constellation that night is available.

According to information from Swiss authorities, 47 people have died in Italy, up from 40, according to Swiss officials.

Italy’s ambassador to Switzerland, Gian Lorenzo Cornado, announced that some of its citizens are missing and that Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani will travel to Crans-Montana on Friday.

Five of the 112 injured have now been identified, according to Cornado. He continued, adding that 13 Italians have been taken into care. Six are still missing. He claimed that three Italians would be repatriated on Thursday and three more would follow on Friday.

Eight others remained unaccounted for, according to the French foreign ministry, who included nine French nationals among the injured.

The apocalypse is a movie.

The fire was described as “a calamity of unprecedented, terrifying proportions” by Swiss President Guy Parmelin, who took over on Thursday. Flags will be flown at half-staff for five days.

On Thursday at Le Constellation, a bar popular with young tourists, the fire started at around 11:30 am (00:30 GMT).

We initially believed it to be a small fire, but when we arrived, it turned out to be war,” according to Mathys of Chermignon-d’en-Bas, the neighbor. The apocalypse is the only word I can use to describe it, according to the author.

Authorities have stated that the tragedy was not an attack, and that they have only speculated on the cause.

Beatrice Pilloud, the canton’s chief prosecutor, said that the bar had the necessary number of exits and met safety standards.

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