Executions in Iran rose alarmingly by 25% last year and surged after hardline cleric Ebrahim Raisi was elected president, two campaign groups say. At least 333 people were put to death, according to Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) and France’s Together Against the Death Penalty (ECPM). The number of executions for drug-related offences […]
By Yolande Knell BBC Middle East correspondent Human rights groups have criticised an Egyptian court for jailing two popular singers over a video they made with a Brazilian belly dancer. In the clip, they are seen lip-synching and smiling as the dancer, in a long dress and jacket, performs her moves. The video […]
The number of anti-Semitic incidents around the world dramatically increased last year, a study by Tel Aviv University has found. The report identifies the US, Canada, the UK, Germany and Australia as among countries where there was a sharp rise. This was fuelled by radical left- and right-wing political movements and incitement on […]
By Yolande Knell BBC News, Jerusalem Waving or wearing Israeli flags, hundreds of right-wing nationalist marchers shouted angrily by the wall of Jerusalem’s Old City as Israeli police blocked them from heading to the main gate to the Muslim Quarter. As we waited to see exactly what would happen, so was Israel’s prime minister. A […]
An Egyptian TikTok star has been sentenced to three years in prison after a court convicted her of human trafficking at retrial. Haneen Hossam, who is in her early 20s, was accused of exploiting girls for money through video-sharing platforms. She denied the charge, which was linked to an invitation to her followers to get […]
The tomb where the biblical figure Joseph is said to be buried has been vandalised by Palestinians amid spiralling tensions with Israel. The site in Nablus, in the occupied West Bank, was attacked in what Israel’s prime minister called a “frenzy of destruction”. There has been a spate of Israeli and Palestinian deaths in recent […]
Yemen crisis Yemen’s president has sacked his deputy and transferred power to a leadership council in a major shake-up of the Saudi-backed coalition fighting Houthi rebels in the country’s civil war. Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi announced that the eight-member council would be led by former minister Rashad al-Alimi. He tasked it with negotiating with the […]
Prince Hamzah bin Hussein, the former heir to the throne of Jordan, has said he is renouncing his title of prince. Prince Hamzah said his “personal convictions” were not in line with the “modern methods of our institutions”. The prince is the fourth son of the late King Hussein and the younger half-brother of the […]
Yemen crisis A two-month truce has been agreed by warring parties in Yemen, the UN says. It is the first nationwide truce agreed since 2016 in a war which has killed nearly 400,000 people, according to UN estimates. About 60% died from hunger, lack of healthcare and unsafe water. The deal between the Saudi-led […]
Three Palestinian militants have been killed in a gun battle with Israeli security forces near Jenin in the occupied West Bank, Israeli police say. A statement said the Palestinians were on their way to carry out an attack in a car on Friday night and that they fired on a counter-terrorism unit that was trying […]
