Middle East

World News

A very different Ramadan in Gaza

5:58pm March 15, 2024

by Aya Batrawy

The religious traditions and cultural hallmarks of Ramadan are impossible to observe in Gaza this year, where people are starving, displaced from their homes, mourning their dead and under threat of continued airstrikes.

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How the UN is recruiting locals in Gaza to secure food aid to a starving population

5:58pm March 15, 2024

by Daniel Estrin

The UN is recruiting the heads of major clans in Gaza to secure food aid to a starving population. The role these families could play now could also lay the ground for who runs Gaza after the war.

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Palestinian journalists stage a protest to draw attention to Palestinian members of the media killed while covering the war in the Gaza Strip on Jan. 15, in Rafah, Gaza.

World News

In Gaza, Palestinian journalists are documenting a war they're also trying to survive

9:21am March 15, 2024

by D. Parvaz

Israel — with rare exceptions — has prevented foreign journalists from entering Gaza. As such, Palestinian reporters remain the world's eyes and ears on the ground, and they do so at great peril.

Aid groups say land deliveries should be a priority over airdrops, maritime corridors

5:17am March 15, 2024

NPR's Leila Fadel speaks with Charlotte Slente, secretary general of the Danish Refugee Council, about getting ground-based humanitarian aid into Gaza.

Israel's war on Gaza has caused a large increase in population density in Rafah, as shown in these comparison graphics. Pre-war, there were 17 people per acre. Now, there are an estimated 63-88 people per acre.

World News

War has forced half of Gaza into Rafah. Palestinians there are at a breaking point

5:01am March 15, 2024

Five months into the war, about half of Gaza's population has been squeezed into Rafah. The governorate was crowded before the war, but mass displacement has made it the site of a spiraling crisis.

A large sign calling for a cease-fire in Gaza hangs from a building in Dublin on Feb. 12.

World News

Why Ireland is one of the most pro-Palestinian nations in the world

8:52pm March 14, 2024

One of the most pro-Palestinian nations in the world is not an Arab or Muslim country. It's not even in the Middle East. Polls show Ireland has some of the highest support for the Palestinians.

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Palestinian boy killed by police in East Jerusalem

5:14pm March 14, 2024

by Fatma Tanis

A 12-year-old East Jerusalem Palestinian boy playing with fireworks was shot and killed by an Israeli border police officer. Israel's attorney general has launched an investigation.

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Open Arms members carry humanitarian aid for Gaza in a joint mission between NGOs Open Arms and World Central Kitchen at a port of Larnaca, Cyprus, March 9.

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An aid ship is en route to Gaza, in a test of a sea corridor for the war-torn enclave

3:28pm March 14, 2024

by Jane Arraf

A humanitarian ship is piloting a new sea route to bring food to Gaza to help avert famine after five months of war and Israeli restrictions on aid.

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What's the SXSW festival have to do with U.S. support of Israel's war in Gaza?

5:15am March 14, 2024

by Andrew Weber

More than 60 musicians are boycotting the South by Southwest music festival underway in Austin, Texas, over the event's partnership with the U.S. Army and big defense contractors.

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A medieval object with Arabic and Hebrew writings shows the collaboration of its time

5:58pm March 13, 2024

by Ari Daniel

Scientists identified an 11th-century astrolabe with Arabic inscriptions and Hebrew writings, highlighting a period when Muslims ruled in present-day Spain and scholarship and idea-sharing flourished.

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