Suicide bomber kills 12 at Sunni funeral in Iraq

September 23, 2013

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Baghdad, Sep 23: A suicide bomber struck a Sunni funeral in Baghdad on Sunday, killing at least 12 people, Iraqi officials said, a day after blasts targeting Shia mourners killed more than 70.

Major attacks have alternatively hit Sunnis, Shias, and then Sunnis again over the past three days.

Iraq was ravaged by bloody Sunni-Shia violence that peaked in 2006-2007 and killed thousands of people, and there are persistent fears of a return to all-out sectarian conflict.

The suicide bombing in the Dura area of south Baghdad hit a funeral tent for a Sunni man who had been shot dead three days before, and also wounded 46 people.

On Saturday, two bombings targeted people mourning a tribal sheikh in Sadr City, a Shia district of north Baghdad, killing at least 73 and wounding more than 200.

And on Friday, two bombs exploded in a Sunni mosque near Samarra, north of Baghdad, killing 18 and wounding 21.

The United Nations had warned against revenge attacks for the Sadr City bombings.

“Retaliation can only bring more violence and it is the responsibility of all leaders to take strong action not to let violence escalate further,” Gyorgy Busztin, the UN chief’s deputy special representative for Iraq, said in a statement.

“Attacks like these are perpetrated by a small minority of terrorists who wish to destabilise Iraq,” the British embassy said of the Sadr City blasts.

It called on “all political, religious and community leaders to unite against those who perpetrate these crimes”.

Mourners placed coffins containing the bodies of victims of the Sadr City bombings atop vehicles for transport to Najaf on Sunday for burial near the shrine of Imam Ali, one of the holiest sites in Shia Islam.

A bare metal frame was all that remained of a large funeral tent at the scene of the explosions. Debris including broken plastic furniture and bottles of water distributed to mourners littered the ground.

Eighteen more people died in other violence on Saturday, including 11 members of the security forces, and four people shot dead at a Baghdad alcohol shop.

It was the United Nations’ International Day of Peace, which calls for a “complete global cessation of hostilities for one day”.

In other violence on Sunday, attacks in Nineveh province in Iraq’s north killed two police and a soldier and wounded seven people.

And in the northern city of Kirkuk, a suicide bomber blew up a vehicle near the home of a Christian MP, wounding 47 people including three of the lawmaker’s children.

Violence in Iraq has reached a level this year not seen since 2008, a surge in unrest that authorities have so far failed to stem.

With the latest violence, more than 580 people have been killed this month and over 4,400 since the beginning of the year, according to AFP figures based on security and medical sources.

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News Network
November 26,2024

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The extremist Israeli finance minister has called for the occupation of the Gaza Strip and halving the population of the Palestinian territory that is reeling from almost 14 months of genocide.  

Bezalel Smotrich, who has a history of racist statements against Palestinians, made the controversial remarks during a conference of the Yesha Council settler group on Monday.

“We can occupy Gaza and thin the population by half within two years,” through encouraging the so-called “voluntary emigration," he said.

The racist minister also urged the Tel Aviv regime to use its favorable ties with the incoming administration of US President-elect Donald Trump to implement the plan.

“Occupying Gaza is not a dirty word,” he further claimed.

Once the success of the “voluntary emigration" is proven in the besieged Gaza Strip, it can be replicated in the occupied West Bank, he added.

Last month, Smotrich urged the full annexation of the West Bank and Gaza, asserting that Israel should unequivocally declare there would be no Palestinian state.

Israel launched its brutal Gaza onslaught on October 7, 2023, after the Palestinian Hamas resistance group carried out a historic operation against the usurping entity in retaliation for its intensified atrocities against the Palestinian people.

However, nearly 14 months into the offensive, the Tel Aviv regime has failed to achieve its declared objectives of finding captives held in Gaza and eliminating Hamas.

So far, the occupying regime has killed at least 44,235 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injured 104,638 others, in Gaza. 

It has been committing the war crimes of starvation and of intentionally directing attacks against the civilian population in the besieged territory.

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November 14,2024

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The UN special rapporteur for Palestine has slammed Israel’s parliament for passing a law authorizing the detention of Palestinian children, who are “tormented often beyond the breaking point” in Israeli custody.

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the rights situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, in a Thursday post on X, characterized the experiences of Palestinian minors in Israeli detention as extreme and often inhumane.

The UN expert highlighted the grave impact of this policy, noting that up to 700 Palestinian minors are taken into custody each year, a practice she described as part of an unlawful occupation that views these children as potential threats.

Albanese said Palestinian minors in Israeli custody are “tormented often beyond the breaking point” and that “generations of Palestinians will carry the scars and trauma from the Israeli mass incarceration system.”

She further criticized the international community for its inaction, suggesting that ongoing diplomatic efforts, which often rely on the idea of resuming negotiations for peace, have contributed to normalizing such human rights violations against Palestinian children and the broader population.

The comments by Albanese came in response to Israel’s parliament (Knesset) passing a law on November 7 that authorizes the detention of Palestinian children under the age of 14 for “terrorism or terrorist activities.”

Under the legislation, a temporary five-year measure, once the individuals turn 14, they will be transferred to adult prison to continue serving their sentences.

Additionally, the law allows for a three-year clause that enables courts to incarcerate minors in adult prisons for up to 10 days if they are considered dangerous. Courts have the authority to extend this duration if necessary, according to the Knesset.

The legislation underscores a shift in the treatment of minors and raises alarms among human rights advocates regarding the legal and ethical ramifications of detaining children and the conditions under which they may be held.

Thousands of Palestinians, including hundreds of children and women, are currently in Israeli jails—around one-third without charge or trial. Also, an unknown number are arbitrarily held following a wave of arrests in the wake of the regime's genocidal war on Gaza.

Since the onset of the Gaza war, the Israeli regime, under the supervision of extremist minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, has turned prisons and detention centers into “death chambers,” the ministry of detainees and ex-detainees’ affairs in Gaza says.

Violence, extreme hunger, humiliation, and other forms of abuse of Palestinian prisoners have been normalized across Israel’s jail system, reports indicate.

Over 270 Palestinian minors are being detained by Israeli authorities, in violation of UN resolutions and international treaties that forbid the incarceration of children, as reported by Palestinian rights organizations.

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News Network
November 27,2024

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Gaza health authorities say Israel’s military has "erased” over 1,400 Palestinian families in the besieged territory over the past year.

The Health Ministry said in a statement on Tuesday that the Israeli regime "completely erased about 1,410 families, numbering 5,444 people, from the civil registry during the same period.”

It said that there were 3,463 families with only one survivor, while 2,287 families had more than one survivor.

In northern Gaza, Israel’s warplanes have continued dropping bombs over Palestinian families, Palestinian news agency Wafa reported.

It said one airstrike hit a family home in Jabalia, causing numerous casualties on Tuesday.

According to Gaza's civil defense agency, at least seven people were killed and several others wounded in the attack.

Another person was killed in a strike on a house in nearby Beit Lahia, a town in northern Gaza, which has been declared “a disaster area" by the municipality due to "the Israeli war of extermination and siege, and it has no food, water, hospitals, doctors, services, or communications."

The health ministry said, “Israeli forces killed 14 people and injured 108 others in three massacres of families in the last 24 hours.”

“Many people are still trapped under the rubble and on the roads as rescuers are unable to reach them.”

International organizations and leaders believe that Israel’s genocidal war, now in its second year, is a deliberate attempt to destroy the population of Gaza.

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