Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir visited Al-Aqsa compound in Jerusalem and called for “total victory” in Gaza and the destruction of Hamas in a video posted to X. It’s his 11th visit to the holy site, where Jewish prayer is banned.
Under the buzzing of Israeli drones and warplanes, Jihan Abu Mandeel watched her five young children play with toy animals in their tiny, makeshift tent in Deir Balah, Gaza. It was a brief moment of childhood amid Israel’s ongoing genocide in the besieged enclave.
United Nations experts and the International Association of Genocide Scholars have recognised the genocide, saying Israel has obliterated almost every source of life in Gaza, damaging or destroying 90 percent of buildings by razing hospitals, universities and entire neighbourhoods.
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Israel has killed at least 67,160 people and injured 169,000. Thousands of corpses remain uncounted, buried under the rubble along with the hopes and dreams of the living and the dead.
“I just want the bloodshed to end,” Abu Mandeel, 41, told Al Jazeera, holding the youngest of her four boys on her lap.
Civilians in Gaza are clinging to hope that a lasting truce is within reach as Hamas and Israel meet for indirect talks in Cairo, Egypt, to discuss a ceasefire proposal by United States President Donald Trump.
Israel has upended countless mediation efforts over the last two years, but Trump appears to be exerting greater pressure this time.
Yet, even if a sustainable ceasefire is reached, Palestinians in Gaza face the daunting task of rebuilding their homeland and communities.
The UN estimates that Gaza will require more than $50bn for reconstruction and that rebuilding the Strip to make it livable again could take at least 15 years.
This is assuming that Israel’s illegal siege does not pose major impediments to reconstruction, as it has after much briefer wars it waged on Gaza, according to a 2017 policy paper by the Brookings Institution.
Azmi Keshawi, an expert on and from Gaza currently based in Doha with the International Crisis Group, explained that any post-war scenario requires regional and international pressure on Israel to allow the entry of construction materials.
“Palestinians are capable of doing the utmost in order to regain their lives,” Keshawi told Al Jazeera.
“But simply having the will to rebuild is not enough… It doesn’t just depend on them,” he said.
While rebuilding is essential for the future of Gaza, there are also fears that the enclave will descend into lawlessness and conflict if Hamas gives up power, which is a clause in the Trump plan.
“One of the advantages of having Hamas [govern] Gaza is that they enforce security,” explained Yaser al-Banna, a journalist still reporting from Gaza.
Throughout the genocide, Israel has deliberately killed Gaza’s security forces and propped up notorious gangs who have stolen the little aid allowed into Gaza to resell it for maximum profit.
While the gangs are a problem now, Keshawi does not think they will last if Israel leaves Gaza, believing that Palestinian society will sideline these elements that most people see as traitors.
However, factional conflict – notably between Fatah and Hamas – could be a problem, he warns.
Fatah controls the internationally recognised Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank, while Hamas retains control of Gaza despite being heavily degraded from fighting Israel.
In 2006, tensions erupted between Fatah and Hamas shortly after the latter won an election to head the PA, an entity born out of the 1993 Oslo Peace Accords between then Palestinian and Israeli leaders.
The result stunned the US and European countries, which had designated Hamas as a “terrorist group” for refusing to recognise Israel or renounce armed resistance to end the occupation.
The US responded by backing Fatah to topple Hamas, leading to a brief civil war. By June 2007, Hamas had expelled Fatah from Gaza, solidifying a split in the Palestinian national movement.
The return of some exiled Fatah officials, backed by regional states and possibly Israel, could lead to score-settling against Hamas and its allies, said Keshawi.
“If Israel allows some of these people to return to Gaza … then they could go after people that supported Hamas,” he told Al Jazeera.
Those forced to stay in Gaza will have to wrestle with the internal trauma brought on by the devastating genocide. Few, if any, had a moment to process everything they’ve lost – family, friends, homes and a future – in Israel’s relentless onslaught.
In a survey conducted in 2022, before the genocide began on October 7, 2023, Save the Children found that four out of five children in Gaza reported living with depression, grief and fear.
The collective trauma inflicted on Palestinians from Gaza due to the genocide is unlike anything studied or seen in recent years, according to Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF.
Last year, an MSF psychiatrist, Ahmad Mahmoud al-Salem, treated children from Gaza at a clinic in Amman, Jordan.
He discovered that most suffered from vivid nightmares, depression and insomnia.
What Gaza’s children are experiencing now is unfathomable, Derek Summerfield, an honorary senior lecturer at London’s Institute of Psychiatry, told Al Jazeera.
He pointed out that there are at least 17,000 unaccompanied children in Gaza and that it’s unclear if they will ever experience a safe and stable environment.
“The future of these children doesn’t depend on their ability to overcome trauma because their trauma isn’t over,” he told Al Jazeera.
“It depends on what happens to the society around them. But their entire society is destroyed, and that’s why this is a genocide.”
Abu Mandeel just wants to provide her children with a semblance of a future, like all parents in Gaza.
Her school-age children have already missed two years of formal education due to the genocide, but the geography teacher says she is trying to give them some basic lessons so they don’t fall too far behind.
“I just want their future to be better than ours,” she said. “The constant killing makes me so afraid for my children.
“Honestly, I hope that I can get my children out of Gaza one day,” Abu Mandeel told Al Jazeera.
United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer has arrived in India with a sprawling delegation of leading British CEOs, entrepreneurs and university vice-chancellors on a visit his government says is intended to “turbocharge” trade between the countries.
The two-day trade mission to India, which began in Mumbai on Wednesday, is intended to promote trade and business opportunities between India and the UK – the world’s fifth and sixth largest economies, respectively – as both countries seek to realign their trading relationships in the wake of stiff tariffs imposed by United States President Donald Trump’s administration.
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In August, the US slapped 50 percent tariffs on goods from India in response to New Delhi’s trade with Russia, specifically its vast consumption of Russian oil, while the UK, which secured a trade deal with Washington in May, has also been hit with tariffs, albeit at a much lower rate.
Announcing the visit, Starmer said the mission was intended to build on a recent landmark trade deal.
“We signed a major trade deal with India in July – the best secured by any country – but the story doesn’t stop there,” he said in a statement.
“It’s not just a piece of paper, it’s a launchpad for growth. With India set to be the third biggest economy in the world by 2028, and trade with them about to become quicker and cheaper, the opportunities waiting to be seized are unparalleled.”
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is due to meet Starmer on Thursday before the leaders address a fintech conference in Mumbai, welcomed his UK counterpart in a statement, adding that he hoped to bolster their “shared vision of a stronger, mutually prosperous future”.
Trade between the countries is worth $54.8bn and supports more than 600,000 jobs across both countries, the AFP news agency reported.
Under the new deal, India will slash tariffs on British goods such as whisky, cosmetics and medical devices while the UK will cut duties on clothing, footwear and food products, including frozen prawns, from India.
The UK government said in a statement that under current projections, the new trade deal would increase the UK’s gross domestic product by 4.8 billion pounds ($6.4bn) each year and increase UK exports to India nearly 60 percent.
Starmer told the delegation that opportunities were “already opening up”, trade was rising sharply as a result of the deal and its members should build on the momentum.
After a visit to the Yash Raj Film studio on Wednesday, Starmer announced that three Bollywood films would be made in the UK from next year.
“Bollywood is back in Britain, and it’s bringing jobs, investment and opportunity, all while showcasing the UK as a world-class destination for global filmmaking,” he said.
Starmer also visited a new English Premier League community programme where he met aspiring young Indian footballers and coaches, highlighting the British football league’s popularity among Indian fans.
US Attorney General Pam Bondi faced heated questioning in the Senate over the Jeffrey Epstein case and allegations of ‘weaponising’ the Justice Department. Bondi defended her record, denying political bias and pointing to Democrats’ own links to Epstein.
Cristiano Ronaldo has become the first footballer to reach billionaire status, according to the latest Bloomberg Billionaires Index, which has valued the Portugal great’s net worth at an estimated $1.4bn.
The 40-year-old striker’s financial ascent comes after he signed a new contract with the Saudi Arabian side Al-Nassr in June reportedly worth more than $400m.
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Bloomberg said Ronaldo earned more than $550m in salary from 2002 to 2023, supplemented by a decade-long Nike deal worth nearly $18m annually and lucrative endorsements with Armani, Castrol and others that added more than $175m to his fortune.
Ronaldo’s move to Al-Nassr from Manchester United in 2023 had already made him the highest paid player in football history with an annual salary of 177 million pounds ($237.52m) plus bonuses and a reported 15 percent share in his Saudi club.
Argentina and Inter Miami forward Lionel Messi has earned more than $600m in pre-tax salary during his career.
Ronaldo’s billionaire status places him among a rare group of athletes that includes basketball greats Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and LeBron James; golfer Tiger Woods; and tennis player Roger Federer.
Ronaldo suggested he is not considering retirement any time soon.
“I still have a passion for this,” he said at the Portugal Football Globes gala on Tuesday. “My family says it’s time to quit, and they ask me why I want to score 1,000 goals if I’ve already scored 900-something. But I don’t think that way inside.
“I’m still producing good things. I’m helping my club and the national team. Why not continue? I am sure that when I finish, I will leave full because I gave everything of myself. I know I don’t have many years left to play, but the few I have left, I have to enjoy them to the fullest.”
Two brothers from an Italian football hooligan group, Lazio’s Irriducibili, have been arrested and accused of trying to illegally obtain public works contracts for next year’s Winter Olympics, Italian prosecutors say.
The men, originally from Rome, sought to profit from the Olympics after establishing Mafia-style control over drug dealing and nightlife activities in the Alpine resort of Cortina, Venice prosecutors said in a statement.
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The resort in northern Italy is cohosting the February 6-22 Winter Games with Milan.
The arrested men are accused of posing as high-level members of Rome’s criminal underworld, vaunting their friendship with the late leader of the Irriducibili Fabrizio Piscitelli, who was shot in a Rome park in 2019.
“Irriducibili” roughly translates as “diehards”.
The brothers terrorised business rivals in Cortina, prosecutors charged, mentioning the case of a nightlife events organiser who was dragged into the woods, beaten and held at gunpoint.
A man who owed them drug money was locked in a car boot and threatened with death, and two “unauthorised” drug dealers were also beaten up.
In 2022, the pair approached a member of Cortina’s city government, offering electoral support, which the politician did not accept. They later used a threatening message to ask to be given Olympic contracts, prosecutors said.
The brothers, one of whom was put in pre-trial detention while the other is under house arrest, are accused of extortion aggravated by Mafia-style methods. Five more suspects face the same charges but were not arrested.