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Saudi Arabia strikes oil depots in Yemen and says missiles launched toward location of Saudi Aramco HQ

13 October 2026 at 13:26

Civilians warned to leave target area near Sana’a before attacks as conflict between Riyadh and Houthi forces escalates

Saudi Arabia has launched a series of strikes on a strategic oil depot on the outskirts of Yemen’s capital, Sana’a, while later on Tuesday it said it had intercepted missiles launched toward Dharan, location of the headquarters of the huge national energy company Saudi Aramco.

The attacks on both sides were a fresh escalation of the conflict between Riyadh and the Iran-backed Houthi forces. Before its offensive on Tuesday, a Saudi spokesperson warned civilians to leave the target area, in an apparent attempt to strike fear into the local population before the biggest attack so far on Houthi energy infrastructure.

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© Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

I was kidnapped and held hostage for 977 days. Could I forgive my captors?

13 October 2026 at 00:00

At first the idea of mercy was something that helped me through the ordeal. But would real forgiveness be a form of Stockholm syndrome?

I knew Mohamed Tahlil as a gentle pirate who oversaw a team of guards during the first months of my life as a hostage in 2012. I had travelled to Somalia to report on the outbreak of modern piracy off the coast. On the 10th day, along a dusty road near Galkayo, in the centre of the country, I was kidnapped by pirates. For the next two and a half years, I was a hostage.

I spent most of my time on a thin, sweat-soaked foam mattress on the floor of a dusty room. The dim concrete prison houses changed, but the filth and the circumstances didn’t. Sometimes my captors moved me into the Somali savannah – where we camped in the open and slept on the ground – and for a six-month stretch, I was held on a hijacked tuna vessel, where I joined 28 fishers from east Asia who had been captured about three weeks before I was placed on board. (They had captured me on land, but they were a pirate gang, organised to capture ships at sea.) In each location, pirate guards would sit around with AK-47s and listen to the radio, or else chew khat, a narcotic plant.

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© Illustration: Anaïs Mims/Getty

© Illustration: Anaïs Mims/Getty

© Illustration: Anaïs Mims/Getty

Saudi Arabia further suspends flights after latest deadly Houthi attack on airport

12 October 2026 at 11:42

Energy minister says ‘fear has no place in the Saudi lexicon’ as paramilitary group again breaches stretched defences

Saudi Arabia has been forced to suspend all flights to and from its main international airport in Riyadh until next Saturday after a further round of Houthi missile attacks caused more damage and left one person dead. Some airlines, including Gulf Air and Bahrain Air, had already said they were cancelling flights until next Saturday. More missiles were fired at Saudi Arabian cities by the Houthis on Monday, Saudi Arabian’s military spokesperson said.

The Gulf nation announced it was suspending flights from Riyadh, its second busiest airport, after Houthi missiles killed 13 people on Saturday and left more than 300 injured. Saudi state TV broadcast CCTV footage that showed passengers deluged in smoke and falling masonry as they queued at the airport terminal to board a plane just as the Houthi missile struck.

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© Photograph: Saudi Media Ministry/AP

© Photograph: Saudi Media Ministry/AP

© Photograph: Saudi Media Ministry/AP

Why are the Houthis attacking Saudi airports and how are the missiles getting through?

12 October 2026 at 09:41

Attacks by Iran-backed group come amid counteroffensive by Yemeni government supported by Riyadh

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© Composite: Saudi Ministry of Media/AFP/Getty Images; Saudi Ministry of Media/Reuters

© Composite: Saudi Ministry of Media/AFP/Getty Images; Saudi Ministry of Media/Reuters

© Composite: Saudi Ministry of Media/AFP/Getty Images; Saudi Ministry of Media/Reuters

Lebanon’s only church-bell maker on keeping a 300-year family tradition alive

12 October 2026 at 09:06

Naffah Naffah makes the bells in the mountains near Beirut. His sons will take over the foundry when he retires

The story of Lebanon’s last remaining church-bell maker begins with a rifle. In the 18th century, Youssef Gabriel, a local metalworker, was secretly making and equipping Arab revolutionaries with rifles to assist their revolt against the Ottoman empire, which controlled Lebanon at the time.

Then, one day, a Russian engineer came to the Lebanese town of Beit Chabab to make a church bell. Gabriel, intrigued, shadowed the man and picked up the process on sight.

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© Photograph: Gabriel Ferneini/The Guardian

© Photograph: Gabriel Ferneini/The Guardian

© Photograph: Gabriel Ferneini/The Guardian

NAZA: Netanyahu orders identification and prosecution of film’s interviewees

12 October 2026 at 08:59

Israeli PM calls for criminal investigation into soldiers and officers interviewed in Guardian-produced documentary

The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has ordered the country’s attorney general and the head of the Shin Bet security service to reveal the identities of soldiers and officers interviewed in the investigative documentary NAZA and prosecute them for causing “harm to Israel’s diplomatic and security interests”.

The award-winning documentary, directed by the Oscar-winning film-makers Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor and produced by the Guardian, details Israel’s mass killing of civilians in Gaza. The film is in cinemas, including in the UK and the US, and will be shown in more than 50 countries.

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© Photograph: The Guardian

© Photograph: The Guardian

© Photograph: The Guardian

A Fidai Film review – Palestinian collage film transforms suppressed footage into works of art

12 October 2026 at 04:00

Using archive material of destroyed houses, terrorised children and dead bodies, Kamal Aljafari adds humanity to the reels by overlaying poems by Palestinian authors

In Arabic, “fidai” means someone willing to sacrifice themselves for the greater good. Borrowing this word, which is at times used in a military context, for his collage film, Palestinian film-maker Kamal Aljafari stages a potent uprising of images against the tide of propaganda and historical erasure. Much of the film draws on archive materials once housed in the Palestine Research Centre in Beirut. In 1982, during the Lebanese civil war, Israeli forces raided the centre and seized the archive. Most of these documents on Palestinian history – books, newspapers, audiovisual artefacts – are believed to still be in the hands of the Israeli army.

Obtained through clandestine means, the footage that resurfaces in Aljafari’s film bears the physical traces of political suppression. The images are scratched, grainy and pixelated, yet through the power of montage they evoke startling visual parallels that point to the relentless violence endured by Palestinians through the decades. Black-and-white film taken during the British mandate show soldiers patrolling the streets and inflicting violence upon the Indigenous population; similar acts then committed by Israeli forces. In place of a chronological order, the editing builds a sense of continuity through recurring images. Time and time again, we see torn-down houses, terrorised children and the bodies of Palestinians murdered by occupation forces.

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© Photograph: Courtesy of True Story

© Photograph: Courtesy of True Story

© Photograph: Courtesy of True Story

The Gulf has entered a new era of instability. If its leaders think they can rely on old alliances, they are wrong | Nesrine Malik

12 October 2026 at 02:00

The latest attack by Houthi rebels on Saudi Arabia may prove to be more calamitous for the region than the world imagines

On Saturday, Houthi rebels launched a shocking and deadly attack on Saudi Arabia’s capital city, Riyadh. At the time of writing, the missile strike on King Khalid international airport has killed at least 13 people and left 300 injured, marking a significant turn in a regional conflagration that is only getting more intense. It was the single most deadly attack on any Gulf country since the US and Israel launched their war on Iran in February. In Saudi Arabia, a country that is unaccustomed to such fatalities, the death toll is bewilderingly high and likely to prompt a bloody response.

Over the past year, the Gulf has entered a new era of instability that is not temporary and cannot be reversed. This may feel like an overstatement – casualties have been relatively low, after all, compared with Gaza and Iran – but the gradual erosion of peace and security in places such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE has changed the region more dramatically than its leaders would like to acknowledge.

Nesrine Malik is a Guardian columnist

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© Photograph: Yahya Arhab/EPA

© Photograph: Yahya Arhab/EPA

© Photograph: Yahya Arhab/EPA

Canelo Álvarez ‘fears nothing’ and will fight in Riyadh despite deadly attacks, Al-Sheikh says

11 October 2026 at 16:42
  • Álvarez vows to fight in Riyadh despite deadly strikes

  • Airport attacks leave at least 12 dead, hundreds hurt

  • Mexican seeks redemption after Crawford defeat

Canelo Álvarez intends to go ahead with his world title fight in Saudi Arabia later this month despite a series of deadly attacks on airports and other infrastructure in the kingdom, according to Turki al-Sheikh, the Saudi official who has become one of boxing’s most influential power brokers.

The Mexican superstar is slated to challenge the unbeaten Christian Mbilli for the WBC super-middleweight title in Riyadh on 31 October, three weeks after Saturday’s missile strike on the Saudi capital’s main international airport killed at least 12 people and wounded more than 300.

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© Photograph: Chris Unger/TKO Worldwide LLC/Zuffa LLC

© Photograph: Chris Unger/TKO Worldwide LLC/Zuffa LLC

© Photograph: Chris Unger/TKO Worldwide LLC/Zuffa LLC

Riyadh airport hit again after deadly Houthi missile attack, Saudi authorities say

11 October 2026 at 18:28

Unidentified projectile strikes King Khalid airport, killing one and injuring 11, as escalating attacks threaten to draw more countries into Yemen conflict

A projectile hit a passenger terminal at the airport in Riyadh on Sunday, the day after a deadly missile attack on the facility carried out by Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebel group killed 13 people.

An unidentified projectile hit terminal 4 at King Khalid international airport, starting a fire, killing one person and injuring 11, according to Saudi civil aviation authorities. Air defences also intercepted a cruise missile in the vicinity of the airport. It was the latest of several attacks on the airport in the past week.

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© Photograph: Social Media/Reuters

© Photograph: Social Media/Reuters

© Photograph: Social Media/Reuters

At least 139 dead including children after migrant boat capsizes off Djibouti

11 October 2026 at 09:56

Eighty-four others still missing from vessel heading to Yemen with 305 people onboard, UN migration agency says

At least 139 people, including 15 children, have died after a boat carrying 305 migrants capsized off the coast of Djibouti, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said.

Another 84 people are still missing after the incident, which, according to survivors, happened near Guhere, north of the fishing town of Obock, during the night of 8-9 October when the boat was travelling from Djibouti to Yemen.

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© Photograph: Luis Tato/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Luis Tato/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Luis Tato/AFP/Getty Images

Middle East crisis live: Riyadh airport reportedly hit again, day after deadly attack that killed 12

11 October 2026 at 11:38

A Saudi-led coalition spokesperson said that a projectile hit a passenger terminal building, causing a fire

Some more Gulf reaction to Houthi’s deadly airport attack and continued threats to target Saudi airspace.

In a significant message, the United Arab Emirates has issued a statement in solidarity with Saudi Arabia – expressing support for “all measures aimed at safeguarding the kingdom’s security and stability”.

The UAE message is improtant given the major rupture in relations this year between the two oil-rich kingdoms, first sparked by lingering divisions in Yemen, and made worse by the Iran War and arguments over oil prices which led to the UAE quitting OPEC (currently led by the Saudis) after six decades of membership.

Saturday’s incident comes amid an escalation of missile strikes by Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis ⁠on the kingdom. The airport has already been attacked twice this ​week, leaving four people dead and ‌others wounded, and ‌badly damaging an aircraft.

The Houthis have repeatedly attacked Saudi airports, oil facilities and tankers after a truce in their long-running war with Yemen’s Riyadh-backed government unravelled in July.

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© Photograph: AP

© Photograph: AP

© Photograph: AP

Fixated on AI, the world has forgotten what is staring it in the face: nuclear annihilation | Simon Tisdall

11 October 2026 at 05:00

This is no scoffing matter. The accelerating proliferation of advanced nuclear weapons is bringing ‘end times’ closer by the day

Humankind has fearfully and sometimes joyfully anticipated the end of the world ever since it began. The Bible’s Book of Revelation speaks of “end times”, a period of tribulation, war, famine, plague, floods and environmental catastrophe that may seem a less absurd prospect today than perhaps it once did. Islam, too, posits a fateful day of judgment or day of reckoning. Christian evangelicals believe that, in the final rapture, a chosen few – the righteous or the “elect” – will be saved while sinners burn. It’s a minority view. Matthew’s gospel predicts most people will defy, ignore or ridicule warnings of imminent Armageddon. Peter, another of Jesus’s disciples, agreed: “In the last days, scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires.” Yet such worldly scepticism does not mean a universal cataclysm is less likely. It may make it more probable.

Donald Trump’s blanket denials of the dangers ostensibly posed by artificial intelligence, whose uncontrolled development is seen by some as the latest harbinger of apocalypse, could be interpreted as fulfilling Peter’s prophecy. This US president, the nearest thing the world has to a one-man doomsday machine, is a great one for scoffing and evil desires. In Robert Harris’s 2019 novel, The Second Sleep, a worried scientist lists half a dozen ways the world might end. They include devastating climate change, pandemic disease, a giant asteroid collision with Earth, or some other overwhelming calamity. Few heed the fictional scientist’s fears. In the event, what destroys him and almost everybody else is a disturbingly plausible cyber crash – a global digital and internet meltdown.

Simon Tisdall is a Guardian foreign affairs commentator

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© Photograph: KCNA VIA KNS/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: KCNA VIA KNS/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: KCNA VIA KNS/AFP/Getty Images

Thousands gather in London to express support for Palestinians after three years of ‘genocide’

10 October 2026 at 12:52

Twenty arrested in first march since Ed Miliband declared UK’s position was that Israel’s occupation of West Bank was unlawful

Thousands of people have gathered in central London to express their support for Palestinians after three years of “genocide” carried out against them by Israel.

The demonstrators, many wearing keffiyehs and holding Palestine flags, gathered on the Embankment at midday on Saturday. Some carried placards reading “End the genocide” and “Free Palestine” as they marched towards parliament. A bride and groom appeared to be among those in attendance and a two-minute silence was held to reflect on the lives lost in Gaza.

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© Photograph: Alberto Pezzali/AP

© Photograph: Alberto Pezzali/AP

© Photograph: Alberto Pezzali/AP

Twelve killed and hundreds injured in Houthi attack at Riyadh airport

Donald Trump evaluating whether US should join Saudi strikes against the Iran-backed Yemeni rebels

Yemen’s Houthis have launched a missile attack on Riyadh’s international airport in Saudi Arabia, killing at least 12 people and leaving hundreds wounded, the Saudi Civil Aviation Authority has said.

Operations at King Khalid international airport in Riyadh were suspended as ambulances rushed to the airport. More than 300 people were reported injured in the deadliest attack in any Gulf Arab country since the start of the Iran war.

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© Photograph: AP

© Photograph: AP

© Photograph: AP

In three years, Israel's war on Gaza hasn't just changed the Middle East, it's changed the world | Steve Bloomfield

10 October 2026 at 08:00

A whirlpool of violence has engulfed everywhere from Lebanon to Yemen. Meanwhile, the west has destroyed any political authority it once had

There was a world before 7 October, 2023, and now there is a world after. For Gaza, for Israel, for the wider Middle East, and for everyone else too. Not all hinge points in history are obvious at the time. Three years on from the day it began, and precisely one year since a supposed ceasefire was agreed, this one is now impossible to ignore.

The before-and-after pictures tell part of the story. An update to Google Maps, released last week, underscores just what three years of relentless Israeli military onslaught has done to Gaza. Satellite images show how entire towns have been reduced to rubble. Mosques and hospitals, visible three years ago, have now disappeared. Meanwhile the once-empty shoreline is now crammed with tents. This is what it looks like when an attempt has been made to destroy a people.

Steve Bloomfield is the former international editor of the Observer

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© Photograph: Tariq Mohammad/APAImages/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Tariq Mohammad/APAImages/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Tariq Mohammad/APAImages/Shutterstock

Flydubai co-pilot planned suicide attack on Israeli airport, UAE prosecutors say

Hammam al-Hammami is believed to have been targeting the passenger terminal at Ben Gurion airport near Tel Aviv

The co-pilot who tried to seize control of a passenger jet flying from Dubai to Tel Aviv last week was planning to launch a suicide attack targeting the passenger terminal at Israel’s international airport, prosecutors in the United Arab Emirates said on Friday.

Hammam al-Hammami attacked the plane’s Indian pilot with an emergency axe, but failed to prevent his badly injured colleague from opening the cockpit’s security door to allow passengers to overpower his assailant.

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© Photograph: Ammar Awad/Reuters

© Photograph: Ammar Awad/Reuters

© Photograph: Ammar Awad/Reuters

In the Shadows review – true tale of Ramla Ali’s remarkable rise through the boxing ranks is a knockout

9 October 2026 at 13:45

Jasmine Jobson goes the distance as the British-Somalian boxer battling pain from her past and her family’s disapproval in a heavyweight, tick-the-boxes production

The true-life success story of boxer Ramla Ali is confidently told in this capable picture from screenwriter Ursula Rani Sarma and documentary director Anthony Wonke, in his feature-film debut. Ali is the British-Somali boxer who escaped to the UK from the Somali civil war with her family as a refugee, and in 2021 became the first person to box for Somalia at Olympic Games. The boxing significance of her last name is actually not mentioned in the film – and I never noticed it until it flashed up in a kind of “fight card” intertitle before her first competitive bout.

She is fiercely played by Jasmine Jobson, from TV’s Top Boy; her supportive white Muslim-convert husband Richard – a hugely important figure in enabling Ramla to break away from her disapproving family and do as she wants – is played by Finn Cole, and her abusive trainer Clinton is Gershwyn Eustache Jr. This is a film that takes you through the classic boxing-movie scenes fluently enough: the nervous first appearance in the gym, the overbearing quasi-parental coach, the heartstopping fight debut. It was good to see the traditional closeup of post-fight sore fists in the ice-bucket. All in all, the film works better than Giant, the recent biopic of British-Yemeni boxer Prince Naseem, who is in fact briefly mentioned here.

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© Photograph: PR

© Photograph: PR

© Photograph: PR

Zionism, racism and the Green party in turmoil | Letters

9 October 2026 at 12:22

Readers respond to articles on the Green party’s motion

As ever, Jonathan Freedland is on the money in his article (The Green party’s anti-Zionism motion is yet another attempt to tell Jews how we should think, 3 October). As a non-religious Jew-ish Londoner, I am appalled at the passing of the motion to declare Zionism as a form of racism, and I am seriously considering leaving the Green party as a result.

While I condemn the Israeli government’s actions against the Palestinian people, and I am not a Zionist myself, Zionism as defined by the motion is only one political interpretation and completely ignores ancient religious and cultural definitions held by many Jews who also condemn the current Israeli government.

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© Photograph: Gary Roberts/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images

© Photograph: Gary Roberts/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images

© Photograph: Gary Roberts/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images

How do human beings rationalize genocide? NAZA provides a chilling look | Omer Bartov

9 October 2026 at 05:00

It’s easier to blame brutes and sadists for extreme violence. But as we see in the documentary, modern genocides are fueled by people who are uncomfortably recognizable

Werner Best, a senior SS official and jurist who helped organize the Nazi death squads that murdered hundreds of thousands of Jews, is also known for his statement: “We must destroy the enemy without hating him.” He belonged to a younger generation of Nazi technocrats, who despised the foul-mouthed, beer-bellied, brown-shirted “old fighters” of the Nazi party in the 1920s, and believed in organizing genocide neatly and dispassionately. After the fall of the regime, Best escaped justice for the rest of his long life, dying peacefully in Germany in 1989. His chilling statement came to my mind while I was watching the film NAZA.

I grew up in Tel Aviv and have visited there often in recent years. That is why the interviews with 24 Israeli soldiers and intelligence officers, which make up this documentary, felt strangely familiar. The conversations are conducted at night on rooftops, and the camera scans the cityscape, lingering on apartment windows as their inhabitants watch TV and make dinner. The landscape was intimately recognizable, and I felt a natural affinity with those people living their lives. I also recognized the way the interviewees talked – their speech patterns and choice of words. They reminded me of my son, who served more than a decade ago in the intelligence unit many of them might have belonged to.

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© Photograph: NAZA/The Guardian

© Photograph: NAZA/The Guardian

© Photograph: NAZA/The Guardian

‘Self-imposed irrelevance’: why the EU is failing to act on growing public criticism of Israel

9 October 2026 at 05:00

While Israel’s actions against Palestinians intensify public anger, the bloc remains paralysed along familiar fault lines

When the British government announced sweeping sanctions on trade with illegal Israeli settlements and condemned “ethnic cleansing” in the West Bank by state-backed “settler terrorists”, some EU diplomats hoped this dramatic shift in UK government policy towards Israel would have a galvanising effect on the rest of Europe. So far, it has not.

Although France and Canada joined the UK in pledging to ban goods from illegal settlements and impose sanctions on “those who facilitate them or profit from them”, there has not yet been a wider ripple effect.

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© Photograph: snapshot-photography/F Boillot/Shutterstock

© Photograph: snapshot-photography/F Boillot/Shutterstock

© Photograph: snapshot-photography/F Boillot/Shutterstock

Egyptian journalists plan weekend protest over detention of six colleagues

9 October 2026 at 00:00

Matsadaash staff allege torture and forced confessions after being held on charges of working for Muslim Brotherhood

Egyptian journalists are planning a new protest in Cairo this weekend after six colleagues were charged with terrorism offences amid allegations they had been tortured in police detention.

Last week, Egyptian authorities arrested the journalists, from the independent factchecking and investigative platform Matsadaash, accusing them in a statement of being unlicensed and producing false news on behalf of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.

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© Photograph: Amr Nabil/AP

© Photograph: Amr Nabil/AP

© Photograph: Amr Nabil/AP

Three Saudis killed in Riyadh airport attack claimed by Houthis

9 October 2026 at 05:47

Attack is deadliest in kingdom since it launched major military offensive with allies against Houthis in Yemen

Three Saudi citizens have been killed and several other people were wounded in attacks targeting Riyadh ⁠airport for which Yemen’s Houthis claimed responsibility, Saudi officials have said.

The attack late on Thursday was the deadliest in Saudi Arabia since the kingdom and allied forces in neighbouring Yemen launched a major military offensive last weekend against the Iran-backed Houthis.

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© Photograph: Social Media/Reuters

© Photograph: Social Media/Reuters

© Photograph: Social Media/Reuters

Israel promotes film that mimics NAZA documentary

8 October 2026 at 13:52

Embassies post links to hastily produced online film echoing style of real Guardian documentary about mass killings of Gaza civilians

The Israeli government is promoting an online film project that mimics the style of NAZA, the award-winning documentary that details Israel’s mass killings of civilians in Gaza, in an attempt to counter the real film’s findings.

The real documentary, directed by the Oscar-winning film-makers Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, and produced by the Guardian, is in cinemas and will be shown in more than 50 countries.

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© Photograph: NAZA/The Guardian

© Photograph: NAZA/The Guardian

© Photograph: NAZA/The Guardian

The Guardian view on Ethiopia’s return to conflict: civilian catastrophe and a spiralling regional polycrisis | Editorial

8 October 2026 at 13:49

The escalating violence reflects deep domestic rifts – but is fuelled by broader geopolitical power games

When the Nobel peace laureate is announced on Friday, the committee will be hoping that its choice ages better than 2019’s. Ethiopia’s prime minister, Abiy Ahmed, won the prize for ending the 20-year border conflict with neighbouring Eritrea – signing a peace agreement with President Isaias Afwerki. A year later, their new relationship facilitated a war with the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) that killed as many as 600,000 people, displaced millions more, led to atrocities by both sides, and pushed Tigrayans into famine.

Both sides bear responsibility for failing to properly implement the deal that ended that conflict in 2022, and the African Union and US did little to ensure that a piece of paper became a durable settlement. Now violence has resurged in northern Ethiopia, and old foes are forming bizarre new pacts. Last month, seven Ethiopian regional groups announced an “Alliance for Survival” to remove the federal government. Mr Abiy’s coalition is held together by his patronage, but so far may be faring better than his rivals, united solely by shared loathing of him and riven by deep disputes. The TPLF, which controls Tigray, has previously battled the Fano militia of Amhara, and their territorial dispute endures. Ethiopia accuses Eritrea – previously accused of atrocities against Tigrayan civilians – of backing the rebel alliance. Despite Asmara’s denials, there are multiple reports of Eritrean troops in Tigray.

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© Photograph: Obtained by REUTERS/Obtained by/Reuters

© Photograph: Obtained by REUTERS/Obtained by/Reuters

© Photograph: Obtained by REUTERS/Obtained by/Reuters

Israel’s downgrading of UK consulate aims to tighten its hold on Jerusalem

Consulate targeted in sanctions spat has unusual diplomatic status that clashes with Israel’s ambitions to fully annex the city

Israel’s attempt to close the British consulate general in Jerusalem was primarily designed to deter London from imposing sanctions on settlements in occupied Palestine. But it also served the current government’s ambitions to fully annex Jerusalem as a national capital, diplomatic and legal experts said.

The UK mission to the city has an unusual diplomatic status, which dates back to before the founding of the state of Israel, rooted in a vision of Jerusalem as a neutral enclave under international control.

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© Photograph: Abir Sultan/EPA

© Photograph: Abir Sultan/EPA

© Photograph: Abir Sultan/EPA

Not since 9/11 has the UK faced such a security crisis – and threat to our liberal principles | Gaby Hinsliff

8 October 2026 at 12:55

The combination of Iranian, Russian and Chinese aggression is deeply worrying: just how much more concerned about security should the country be?

The first time the window-rattling roar of a B-1 bomber woke me up this summer, I thought for one crazed second we were under attack. By the second time, I’d learned to recognise the sound of US planes taking off from their base at RAF Fairford for what it was: a reminder that although Britain wants no part in this war with Iran, we cannot quite escape the consequences.

We’ll feel them at the petrol pump, or in the supermarket this autumn, or in this winter’s heating bills. But living under the flight path adds an extra edge to it. The skies finally fell silent last week, but only because the bombers have been hastily summoned home after an alleged terrorist plot to attack Fairford, in which (according to the prime minister) there are “strong indications that Iran played a part”. If Fairford is now a target of war, did that threat disappear when the Americans did? Nobody knows.

Gaby Hinsliff is a Guardian columnist

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

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© Illustration: Nate Kitch/The Guardian

© Illustration: Nate Kitch/The Guardian

© Illustration: Nate Kitch/The Guardian

Florida judge allows lawsuit against Shah of Iran’s alleged ‘chief torturer’ to move forward

8 October 2026 at 12:00

Parviz Sabeti denies allegations he led Savak intelligence agency under shah and directed torture of thousands

The alleged “chief torturer” for the deposed Shah of Iran is a step closer to trial for human rights abuses after a Florida federal judge rejected his demand to halt a lawsuit brought by three former political prisoners.

Parviz Sabeti, who was reported last year to have lived in a quiet upscale central Florida community, is accused of being the former head of Savak, the shah’s secret police and intelligence agency. The plaintiffs say they discovered his whereabouts only after a photo of Sabeti at a 2023 protest against the Iranian government was posted on social media by his daughter.

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© Photograph: Alamy

© Photograph: Alamy

© Photograph: Alamy

Oil prices jump 5% on Middle East tensions and US hurricane threat

8 October 2026 at 07:11

Global bond market sell-off continues and stocks fall amid reports White House has asked to see options for more strikes against Iran

Oil prices have risen sharply amid fears about escalating tensions in the Middle East and a squeeze on production from the threat of a hurricane off the US coast.

Brent crude, the international benchmark, rose by 5% to $105.3 a barrel on Thursday, triggering a wave of selling in the global bond and stock markets.

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© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty

© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty

© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty

British consulate in East Jerusalem will stay open as UK mission, says Ed Miliband

8 October 2026 at 03:17

Foreign secretary says former consulate general will remain independent, operational ⁠and serving Palestinian people

The foreign secretary, ⁠Ed Miliband, has said Britain’s consulate general ⁠building in ⁠East Jerusalem ​will not be closing but will ⁠be known as a UK mission, remaining independent, operational ⁠and serving Palestinian people.

Israel had ​ordered the ‌British consulate ‌in East Jerusalem to close ‌on Thursday over the UK’s plans to impose sanctions on settlements in the West Bank.

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© Photograph: Ammar Awad/Reuters

© Photograph: Ammar Awad/Reuters

© Photograph: Ammar Awad/Reuters

‘Neither war nor peace’: Palestinians in Gaza on existing amid disease, despair and ruins

People tell of lives changed beyond recognition after the 7 October attacks by Hamas three years ago and the subsequent Israeli offensive


Ahmed Ishtaiwi has six chairs. They are cheap and plastic and battered, but they are among the 43-year-old driver and mechanic’s most valuable possessions.

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© Photograph: Ali Jadallah/Anadolu/Getty Images

© Photograph: Ali Jadallah/Anadolu/Getty Images

© Photograph: Ali Jadallah/Anadolu/Getty Images

The US has backed Libya’s Haftar clan. The UK should not make the same mistake | Letters

7 October 2026 at 13:00

Steven Kay says Britain should act independently and in a role consistent with its status as a member of the UN security council

Patrick Wintour’s report (Libyan unity talks upended as warlord’s son linked to drone attacks on fuel facilities, 3 October) should not surprise anyone concerned with the attempts to end conflict and seek the unification of Libya. Saddam Haftar, like his father, Khalifa, has been backed by the US to support its aims and ambitions in Libya. There is no logic, if democratic elections are the goal, to be backing a member of the Haftar clan for any role in the future of Libya.

The Libyan population want nothing more than peace, security and to use constructively the wealth that could be generated from their extensive natural resources for the improvement of their society. Instead, their resources are being dissipated in corruption and conflict, a state of affairs that benefits only the warmongers.

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© Photograph: Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images

Flydubai attack investigation widens as alleged hijacker’s training in New Zealand scrutinised

Hamam al-Hammami spent 175 days in New Zealand until May 2019, as Australian Jewish group calls for full investigation into his time in Melbourne

New Zealand authorities have launched their own investigation into the flydubai co-pilot who allegedly tried to hijack an Israel-bound plane, after police confirmed he underwent flight training there about a year after he abandoned a degree in Australia.

Disaster was narrowly averted on 30 September when passengers and crew intervened to stop the alleged attempt of the co-pilot, Hamam al-Hammami, 29, to take control of a flight to Tel Aviv with 182 people onboard.

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© Photograph: Abir Sultan/EPA

© Photograph: Abir Sultan/EPA

© Photograph: Abir Sultan/EPA

I was tortured because I’m a Somali woman who dared to speak out | Sadia Moalim Ali

7 October 2026 at 01:00

I was sentenced to three years in jail for insulting government institutions. Now I am free, I will carry on fighting for the women I met in prison

‘Why don’t you just drive your tuk-tuk and do your work?” the judge asked me after videos from my social media accounts were shown during my court hearing. I had spoken on TikTok and Facebook about issues in Somalia that concerned me: forced evictions in the capital, Mogadishu, high fuel prices and nepotism in government.

I had described how, when I applied for work in hospitals and government departments, I was told on three occasions that I’d have to give a sexual favour in return.

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© Photograph: Handout

© Photograph: Handout

© Photograph: Handout

Zack Polanski had the chance to show real leadership. He blew it | Rafael Behr

7 October 2026 at 00:00

A toxic debate over anti-Zionism leaves the Green leader looking like a passenger in the movement that carried him to the top

When Donald Trump calls someone a socialist he is not using the word in the same way that, say, Zohran Mamdani does. The mayor of New York espouses democratic socialism as a mission of equitable distribution of wealth and opportunity. The US president says socialism only pretends to be democratic “because it sounds so nice”; that “it’s really communism you’re talking about” and that people such as Mamdani pose “the biggest threat to our nation … since its founding”.

People who despise an idea, seeing it as the manifestation of everything wicked, cannot be expected to define it accurately. As with the radical right and socialism, so it is with the left and Zionism.

Rafael Behr is a Guardian columnist

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

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© Photograph: Neil Terry/Story Picture Agency

© Photograph: Neil Terry/Story Picture Agency

© Photograph: Neil Terry/Story Picture Agency

Yemen civil war: what sparked latest escalation and who is involved?

Conflict between UN-recognised government and Iran-backed Houthis has impacts far beyond country’s borders

Yemen has been plunged into a civil war that has extended to one of the world’s most vital maritime choke points and to Saudi Arabian oil sites.

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© Photograph: Yemen Giants Brigades Media Centre/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Yemen Giants Brigades Media Centre/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Yemen Giants Brigades Media Centre/AFP/Getty Images

Israeli settlers beat press photographer as soldiers watch in West Bank

Jaafar Ashtiyeh was covering violence against olive farmers when settlers set upon him with the butts of their rifles

Armed Israeli settlers beat a photographer in the presence of Israeli soldiers, hospitalising him, as he covered worsening settler violence against olive farmers in the occupied West Bank.

Jaafar Ashtiyeh, a 58-year-old veteran photographer for Agence France-Presse in Palestine, was assaulted by a group of settlers, who beat him with the butts of their rifles, despite him being marked as press. He was assaulted in view of about a dozen armed Israeli soldiers.

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© Photograph: John Wessels/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: John Wessels/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: John Wessels/AFP/Getty Images

‘All I want to do is cry’: trauma of 7 October survivors three years after the attacks

Israeli communities shattered by Hamas massacres are torn between rebuilding their lives and remembering lost friends and relatives

Keith Siegel spent many of his long hours in Hamas captivity in Gaza etching everything that happened after 7 October 2023 into his memory. For 484 days, he recited to himself every place he was held, the dates he was moved and every attack or humiliation he endured or witnessed.

He aimed to store intelligence that could help Israeli forces free other hostages if he was released, to keep track of time as the days slid by and be able to tell his family what happened to him. Now his body is free, but he cannot loosen those memories.

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© Photograph: Quique Kierszenbaum/The Guardian

© Photograph: Quique Kierszenbaum/The Guardian

© Photograph: Quique Kierszenbaum/The Guardian

The Guardian view on the Green party and Palestine: rejecting two states is no shortcut to peace | Editorial

6 October 2026 at 14:34

Zack Polanski must defend Palestinian freedom while reassuring Jewish members and showing that his party can handle disagreements

Last year, the UN general assembly endorsed the New York Declaration supporting two states in the Holy Land by 142 votes to 10. Those voting against included the US and Israel. The wider international diplomatic consensus rests on a 2002 UN security council resolution, which explicitly affirmed a two-state vision for Israel and Palestine. Saudi Arabia’s then crown prince said peace required “two equal parties” and could not survive “oppression and humiliation”. His words remain as relevant now as then.

The Green party has now rejected that two-state framework in favour of a one-state solution. The Guardian strongly disagrees with this move. Peace needs to acknowledge reality: the latest polls in Gaza and the West Bank suggest that a majority support a two-state formula based on the 1967 borders compared with just 10% who back a single democratic state with equal rights. The European Greens also disagree with the new direction of their English and Welsh sister party. The EU-wide representatives argue that the policy is incompatible with previously agreed positions. Europe’s Greens – which include the centrist German party – condemn “the genocide against Palestinians” and call for sanctions against Israel’s government.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

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© Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA

© Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA

© Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA

NGOs say Israel bombed a journalist and appeared to attack ambulances trying to aid her – explainer

Journalist Amal Khalil was killed in April in what colleagues described as a sustained attack by Israeli forces. Rescuers attempted to dig her out of the rubble of a building that had been targeted by Israeli forces, who had also prevented them from providing life-saving assistance.

Beirut-based Guardian correspondent Will Christou explains how investigations by Human Rights Watch (HRW), Amnesty International and Legal Agenda show that Israel deliberately and directly attacked Khalil and her colleague Zeinab Faraj, with apparent knowledge that they were journalists. The organisations called for the attacks to be investigated as war crimes, while HRW called for states to halt arms sales to Israel and put targeted sanctions on Israeli officials responsible for ongoing crimes.

Deliberately attacking journalists is a war crime. Israel has killed at least 15 journalists in Lebanon and 210 in Gaza since 2023, according to the UN human rights office.

Israel said it 'regrets any harm caused to journalists', and that they were killed 'as part of a series of events' during which two Hezbollah military operatives were killed

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© Photograph: Guardian

© Photograph: Guardian

© Photograph: Guardian

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