International
A Jewish incursion into the Esplanade of the Mosques of Jerusalem incites the crisis in the Middle East
About 1,400 Jewish settlers broke into the Esplanade of the Mosques of Jerusalem on Tuesday morning, where the Al Aqsa mosque is located, the third most sacred place in Islam, stoking a regional conflict that threatens to destroy the negotiations for a ceasefire in Gaza.
Qatar, one of the main mediators, warned on Tuesday that the irruption of the settlers puts at risk the efforts being made to revive the negotiations, in question since the death of the former political leader of the Islamist group Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, in an attack in Tehran attributed to Israel.
Some of the settlers hoved flags of Israel and prayed in the place despite having it banned since, according to the status quo in force since 1967 – when Israel occupied East Jerusalem – the enclosure is reserved exclusively for the cult of Muslims, while Jews can only enter as visitors.
Also Jordan, which administers the place, and Egypt, another of the key negotiators for a truce in Gaza, condemned the episode.
The settlers, who entered the esplanade escorted by the Police and in an organized way, agreed in groups of 100, but the tensions with the Muslim faithful caused the Police to reduce the exportives to 50.
Its access was given on the occasion of the Jewish feast of Tisha b’Av, a solemn day of commemoration of the destruction of the First and Second Temples, 2,000 years ago.
The Israeli Minister of National Security, the far-right and settler Itamar Ben Gvir, was present in one of those groups. It is the third time that the minister has come to this place of worship on key dates to claim the right of Jews to pray in it, causing the anger of the Palestinian population.
“We have made significant progress in Israel’s sovereignty here. Our policy is to allow Jewish prayer,” Ben Gvir said from the place in a message on the social network X.
As is usually the case with the visits of the anti-Arab minister, the office of the Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, had to issue a statement to detach itself from his action.
“This morning’s event on the Temple Mount is an exception to the status quo,” the text states, reiterating that the Israeli policy on the sacred place “has not changed” and that there is no “private policy” of Ben Gvir about the place, since legislating on it “depends on the Government and its leader.”
The Esplanade of the Mosques is called by the Jews Temple Mount and is its most sacred place. The Grand Rabbinate of Israel prohibits Jews from praying in that place, and stipulates that their prayers be performed only on the adjacent Wailing Wall.
This happens in the middle of the diplomatic offensive to achieve a ceasefire agreement in Gaza that allows to alleviate the suffering of the almost two million Gazans who live between bombings and hunger, subjected to constant evacuation orders and with hardly any access to running water, electricity or basic medical services.
On Monday, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Italy asked Israel and Hamas to close the ceasefire agreement as soon as possible and urged Iran not to attack Israeli territory.
According to The Times of Israel, the Islamic republic may not carry out its retaliation for the death of the former political leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, in an attack in Tehran attributed to Israel, but only if the negotiations for a ceasefire are successful.
The country, however, would launch an attack with its allies (in particular the Shiite group Hizbulah) if it perceives that Israel is lengthening the process or if the negotiations fail, according to the media.
This Thursday is scheduled a meeting convened by the mediators to try to relaunch the negotiations, which were called into question after Haniyeh’s death.
The Islamist group has said that it will not attend the new appointment, and called for the implementation of what has already been agreed (the draft truce announced by the United States at the end of May) instead of continuing with the negotiations.
Almost 40,000 people have died and 92,240 have been injured in the Palestinian enclave since the beginning of the war, according to the latest figures from the Gazati Ministry of Health.
Meanwhile, Israeli attacks have left much of the territory uninhabitable and increasingly corner civilians, hundreds of thousands of whom are crowded in the increasingly small “humanitarian” area of Mawasi, west of Jan Yunis.
International
Australia asks the population to write down their flatulence to study intestinal health
An Australian government scientific agency asked the population of the oceanic country on Friday to make an exhaustive record of their flatulence, in order to better understand how the excessive expulsion of gases impacts intestinal health.
‘Chart your fart’ campaign (Register your fart)
Through the ‘Chart your fart’ campaign, researchers from the Australian scientific and industrial government agency (CSIRO) invited people over the age of 14 to keep track of their winds in a free cell phone app for at least three days.
These data, which include the amount and quality of flatulence, including attributes such as smell, volume, duration, persistence and detectability, will help create a graph of what can be a ‘normal’ wind in the different groups of Australians, according to a statement from CSIRO.
“The expulsion of gases is a natural fact and a sign that our digestive system is functioning as it should to expel the excess gas that is produced by breaking down and processing the food we eat,” explained Megan Rebuli, a nutrition expert who participates in CISRO’s research.
Excessive flatulence, according to 60%
The characteristics of the winds vary by the intake of “different foods, medical conditions or even the way we chew or swallow can influence the way our body processes excess gases, which translates into odors, frequencies or even different volumes,” said Rabuli.
For her part, the project director and CISRO scientist, Emily Brindal, explained that this citizen research will be “as good as the data we obtain,” by trusting that the population will contribute to this study on the health and well-being of citizens, despite the fact that some people feel embarrassed or uncomfortable by this body function.
According to a study on CSIRO’s intestinal health in 2021, more than 60% of Australians reported experiencing what they identified as excessive flatulence, and up to 43% said they experienced it most days.
International
Israel bombs Lebanon again after a wave of attacks with dozens of dead
The Israeli Army bombed Dahye on Friday, a suburb in southern Beirut considered a stronghold of the Shiite group Hezbula, after ordering residents to evacuate the area and among a wave of attacks in Lebanon that have caused at least 43 deaths in recent hours.
The bombings took place on Friday morning, according to the Lebanese media Al-Mayadeen, and for the moment it is clear whether they caused deaths or injuries.
Shortly before, the Arabic spokesman of the Israeli Army, Avichay Adraee, urged the neighbors of several buildings located in the Ghobeiry area to evacuate “immediately and stay away from them at a distance of no less than 500 meters.”
Air planes against Hezbulá command centers
The Israeli Army already bombed the Dahye, including two Civil Defense centers, last Wednesday and Thursday, also after requesting the evacuation of several buildings in the area.
The armed forces then claimed in a statement that they had destroyed nine weapons warehouses and command centers of the Shiite group “embedded” in civilian areas, an argument that Israel repeats to justify its attacks on civilian infrastructure in Gaza and Lebanon.
This Friday, their fighter jets attacked the command centers of the elite force of the Shiite group Hizbulá (Radwan) in the Nabatieh area, in southern Lebanon.
Among the targets attacked is a terrorist infrastructure site used by the elite force of Hezbullah “to carry out terrorist attacks against the State of Israel and our troops,” according to a military statement.
He also said that yesterday the troops attacked more than “120 terrorist targets” throughout the neighboring country, including weapons storage facilities, command centers and a large number of launchers, including some from which Hezbulah fired rockets towards Haifa and the area of Upper Galilee, in northern Israel.
Early this Friday, the Army also bombed south of Beirut, a bastion of the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbula known as the Dahye, after a wave of attacks in Lebanon that have left at least 43 dead in recent hours.
Shortly before the attacks, the Arabic spokesman for the Israeli Army, Avichay Adraee, urged the neighbors of several buildings located in the Ghobeiry area to “evacuately and stay away from them at a distance of no less than 500 meters.”
According to a military statement, these attacks against the capital were targeted at weapons warehouses, a command center and other unspecified infrastructures of Hizbulá.
On the other hand, the Army also detected about five projectiles fired from Lebanon towards the district of Haifa and Alta Galilee, which were intercepted or fell in the open air.
Likewise, the military note assured that last night Israeli planes attacked “several smuggling routes of the Syrian regime” on the Syrian-Lebanese border, allegedly used for the illegal introduction of weapons to Hezbulah.
Negotiations for a ceasefire
This crossfire is maintained while in recent hours reports have continued to arrive disseminated by Israeli and American media indicating that the ceasefire agreement in Lebanon could be closer.
This Thursday, the Israeli Foreign Minister, Gideon Saar, reiterated in a conversation he had with his French counterpart, Jean-Noël Barrot, that there is “a desire to achieve a ceasefire” in Lebanon to allow the more than 60,000 evacuees from the north to return to their homes, and that “progress” is being made in the negotiations.
Although, Saar also wanted to point out that an agreement is not enough if the international community does not guarantee that Lebanon “is returned to the Lebanese people instead of being controlled by the Iranian regime.”
In more than a year of conflict, at least 3,386 people have died in Lebanon and another 14,417 have been injured, including 220 minors and 658 women, according to the latest update from the Lebanese government, prior to these latest attacks.
Lebanon: “The US truce proposal is not acceptable”
The President of the Lebanese Parliament, Nabih Berri, confirmed on Friday that he has received a proposal from the United States for a truce between Israel and the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbulá, but indicated that “it is not acceptable” in its current terms.
“The US proposal includes a text that is not acceptable to Lebanon, which is the question of the formation of a committee to oversee the implementation of Resolution 1701 (which ended the war between Israel and Hezbula in 2006), which includes several Western countries,” he said in a written interview with the London-based Arab newspaper Al Sharq al Awsat.
Likewise, Berri – the main mediator figure in the truce, being the one in whom Hizbulá trusts for the negotiations – said that “the proposed alternative mechanism is currently being debated,” and that “the work is progressing, in an environment that is positive.”
“Americans and others know that it is unacceptable, and that it cannot even be discussed in principle, and that we cannot accept any violation of our sovereignty,” he said in reference to the “freedom of movement” of the Israeli Army in Lebanon.
He also denied that the proposal includes “the deployment of NATO or other forces” in the country.
Regarding the possible arrival of the envoy of the administration of US President Joe Biden, Amos Hochstein, pointed out that his visit to Beirut “depends on the development and progress of the negotiations,” without giving further details.
A French blue helmet dies in a traffic accident
A French blue helmet died this Friday in a traffic accident while traveling in a convoy to the headquarters of the UN mission in Lebanon (UNFIN) in Naqoura, in the south of the country.
According to a brief statement from the FINUL, which does not give details about the circumstances of the accident, three other Gallic members of the peacekeeping forces “suffered minor injuries.”
“This morning, a FINUL convoy heading to the FINUL headquarters in Naqoura was involved in a traffic accident on the coastal road, near the village of Shama,” the note says.
The victims were cared for by the staff of the peace mission and the Red Cross at the scene, according to the FINUL, who conveyed their condolences to the family of the deceased blue helmet and expressed their wishes that the injured recover soon.
International
Latin America will once again be in the sights of the United States with Rubio at the head of diplomacy
Marco Rubio, of Cuban origin and first Hispanic appointed as US Secretary of State, promises to redirect Washington’s attention to Latin America under a second term of Donald Trump, at a critical moment marked by the immigration issue and Chinese investments in the region.
The great campaign promise of the president-elect is to carry out the largest deportation in the history of the country, which anticipates that “Latin America will have the most central role in US foreign policy of the last 30 years,” says Brian Winter, expert of the Americas Society organization.
Latin America waiting for US actions.
At the head of US diplomacy, Rubio “will bring enormous attention to a region that the United States has overlooked on many occasions,” adds Henry Ziemer, of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
Considered a ‘hawk’ in foreign policy, this Florida senator born in Miami 53 years ago has distinguished himself for being a supporter of the hard line with China and Iran, as well as a strong defender of Israel.
He has also paid great attention to Latin America, being a strong supporter of US sanctions on Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua, as well as being critical of the left-wing governments of Mexico and Colombia, and a supporter of Javier Milei’s Argentina.
“Rubio sees the region with a strong ideological spectrum: he divides it between left and right leaders, between rivals and friends,” Winter explains.
The unknown of Venezuela or the end of “Florida politics”
One of the unknowns that Trump’s team has not cleared is the policy it will maintain towards Venezuela, after the president, Nicolás Maduro, proclaimed his re-election in elections questioned by the international community.
During his first term, from 2017 to 2021, the Republican chose to apply maximum pressure on the Caribbean country with sanctions to overthrow Maduro, but the president is still in power and the crisis in the country has caused thousands of Venezuelans to migrate to the United States.
The main reason for the insistence on Venezuela was not so much a desire for interventionism but a desire to win votes in the key state of Florida, with an important population of Cuban and Venezuelan voters, Michael Shifter, former director of the Inter-American Dialogue analysis center, tells EFE.
US in search of accelerating deportations to Latin America
With the electorate in the state already solidly republican, Trump does not have that incentive now. On the contrary, the future president could try to “give in to Maduro and perhaps recognize him to reach an agreement on migration and give business opportunities to his friends” in the country with the largest oil reserves in the world.
The truth is that in order to deport Venezuelan migrants, against whom Trump has led a stigmatization campaign and promised mass deportations, the United States needs to reach an agreement with Venezuela, a country with which it has no diplomatic relations.
Joe Biden’s Administration resumed deportation flights after a brief pause in the oil sanctions imposed on the country.
According to Adam Isacson, an expert at the Washington Office for Latin America (WOLA) center, the other option to accelerate deportations would be to pressure Mexico, and other countries such as Colombia, to accept Venezuelan migrants.
Mexico and the review of the T-MEC
What seems very clear is that “Mexico will be at the forefront of the policies of the second Trump Administration in terms of both migration and the economy,” Ziemer highlights.
Washington is increasingly concerned about Chinese investments in strategic industries such as electric vehicles in Latin America and especially in Mexico, a country with which the United States has the T-MEC free trade agreement.
Trump himself said in the campaign that he wanted to open the T-MEC review process in 2026 and Rubio has been one of the legislators who has positioned himself most in favor of countering Chinese operations in the region.
The Republican, who already threatened Mexico with tariffs in his first term to force greater control of migratory flows, will use this letter again in trade negotiations.
“I don’t think the break of the agreement is the most likely way, but it is possible. Companies are underestimating it,” warns Winter.
Australia asks the population to write down their flatulence to study intestinal health
Israel bombs Lebanon again after a wave of attacks with dozens of dead
Latin America will once again be in the sights of the United States with Rubio at the head of diplomacy
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