Politics
Qatar Demands Justice for Netanyahu After Israeli Strikes in Doha
Qatar’s Prime Minister on Wednesday condemned an unprecedented Israeli strike in Doha targeting Hamas, saying it has destroyed hopes for the release of Gaza hostages. He called for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to be “brought to justice,” criticizing the attack as a severe escalation in the ongoing conflict.
His comments came a day after deadly strikes targeted Hamas leaders in Qatar — a US ally — a first in the oil-rich Gulf that rattled a region long shielded from conflict.
“I think that what Netanyahu has done yesterday, he just killed any hope for those hostages,” Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani told CNN.
Doha is “reassessing everything” around their involvement in future ceasefire talks and discussing next steps with Washington, he added in comments cited in CNN’s live blog after an interview with the broadcaster.
The attack, just three months after Iran launched a retaliatory strike on a US airbase in Qatar, also cast serious doubt on Qatar-mediated Gaza ceasefire talks and undermined security reassurances to the Gulf from key ally Washington.
Earlier Wednesday, Defence Minister Israel Katz vowed that Israel would “act against its enemies anywhere” while Netanyahu urged Qatar to expel Hamas officials or hold them to account, “because if you don’t, we will”.
Qatar has hosted Hamas’s political bureau since 2012 with Washington’s blessing, and has been a key mediator in Gaza talks alongside Egypt and the United States.
Israel’s military said it struck Huthi targets in Yemen on Wednesday, including in the capital Sanaa, killing 35 people according to the rebels.
Palestinian militant group Hamas said six people were killed in Tuesday’s strikes in Qatar, but its senior leaders had survived, affirming “the enemy’s failure to assassinate our brothers in the negotiating delegation”.
The White House said Trump did not agree with Israel’s decision to take military action.
Trump said he was not notified in advance and when he heard, asked his envoy Steve Witkoff to warn Qatar immediately — but the attack had already started.
Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, sought to justify the decision, telling an Israeli radio station: “It was not an attack on Qatar; it was an attack on Hamas.”
– ‘Shaken conscience of world’ –
Hamas political bureau member Hossam Badran said Israel “represents a real danger to the security and stability of the region”.
“It is in an open war with everyone, not just with the Palestinian people,” he said.
In Gaza City on Wednesday, the Israeli military destroyed another high-rise building as it intensified its assault on the territory’s largest urban centre, despite mounting calls to end its campaign.
The military issued an evacuation warning to those living in and around the Tiba 2 tower, before later saying it had “struck a high-rise building that was used by the Hamas terrorist organisation”.
AFP images showed huge plumes of smoke billowing into the sky as the residential tower in western Gaza City crashed to the ground.
In the aftermath, young girls rushed to pick dust-covered dough out of the rubble.
Siham Abu al-Foul told AFP she couldn’t take anything with her when the army issued the evacuation orders.
“They brought down the tower and we came running and there was nothing left… Everything we fixed in two years was gone in a minute.”
The Israeli military said it had struck 360 targets since Friday and vowed that it would “increase the pace of targeted strikes” in the Gaza City area in the coming days.
The Gaza war has created catastrophic humanitarian conditions for the population of more than two million, with the United Nations last month declaring a famine in Gaza City and its surroundings.
EU chief Ursula von der Leyen said she would push to sanction “extremist” Israeli ministers and curb trade ties over the dire situation.
“What is happening in Gaza has shaken the conscience of the world,” she said.
– ‘Not thrilled’ –
Israel’s targeting of Hamas leaders in Qatar sparked international condemnation.
Trump said he was not notified in advance of the Israeli strikes and was “not thrilled about the whole situation”.
“I view Qatar as a strong Ally and friend of the U.S., and feel very badly about the location of the attack,” he said in a social media post, adding Hamas’s elimination was still a “worthy goal”.
Canada said it was reassessing its relationship with Israel following the Doha strikes.
Hamas’s October 2023 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.
Of the 251 hostages seized during the assault, 47 remain in Gaza, including 25 the Israeli military says are dead.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 64,656 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to figures from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza that the UN considers reliable.
A suicide bomber targeted a police patrol in Aleppo, killing one person and wounding two members of the security forces, a Syrian government spokesperson said on Wednesday.
“The person who detonated an explosive belt within the patrol in Aleppo is believed to have an ideological or organisational background linked to Islamic State [Daesh],” Interior Ministry spokesperson Nour al-Din al-Baba told state-owned news agency Al Ekhbariya, adding that investigations were ongoing to determine the attacker’s identity.
The attacker detonated himself while being searched by the patrol after arousing suspicion, Ekhbariya TV reported, citing a security source.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attack.
Earlier this month, two US Army soldiers and a civilian interpreter were killed in Syria by a suspected Daesh attacker who targeted a convoy of American and Syrian forces before being shot dead.
- Jamaat-e-Islami says party held talks with other groups.
- JI chief says anti-corruption must be shared agenda.
- Rahman says party will decide who will be its PM candidate.
DHAKA: Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), once-banned Bangladeshi party, poised for its strongest electoral showing in February’s parliamentary vote, is open to joining a unity government and has held talks with several parties, its chief told Reuters on Wednesday.
Opinion polls suggest that JI will finish a close second to the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) in the first election it has contested in nearly 17 years, as it marks a return to mainstream politics in the predominantly Muslim nation of 175 million.
JI last held power between 2001 and 2006 as a junior coalition partner with the BNP and is open to working with it again.
“We want to see a stable nation for at least five years. If the parties come together, we’ll run the government together,” JI Ameer (President) Shafiqur Rahman said in an interview at his office in a residential area in Dhaka, days after the party created a buzz by securing a tie-up with a Gen-Z party.
Anti-corruption plank
Rahman said anti-corruption must be a shared agenda for any unity government.
The prime minister will come from the party winning the most seats in the February 12 election, he added. If JI wins the most seats, the party will decide whether he himself would be a candidate, said Rahman.
The party’s resurgence follows the ousting of long-time prime minister Sheikh Hasina in a youth-led uprising in August 2024. Hasina, whose Awami League party is now barred from the election, was a fierce critic of JI, and during her tenure, several of its leaders were sentenced to death.
JI had been banned from elections since 2013 after a court ruled its charter violated the country’s secular constitution. An interim government led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus lifted all restrictions on the party in August 2024.
Ties with India and Pakistan
Rahman said Hasina’s continued stay in India after fleeing Dhaka was a concern, as ties between the two countries have hit their lowest point in decades since her downfall.
As New Delhi seeks to engage parties that could form the next government, Rahman confirmed meeting an Indian diplomat earlier this year after his bypass surgery.
Unlike diplomats from other countries who made open courtesy visits to him, the Indian official asked that the meeting remain confidential, Rahman said.
“Why? There are so many diplomats who visited me and it was made public. Where is the problem?” Rahman said. “So we must become open to all and open to each other. There is no alternative to develop our relationship.”
India’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Rahman’s statement about the meeting or any request for it to be confidential.
An Indian government source confirmed contacts with various parties, and India’s foreign minister visited Dhaka on Wednesday to offer condolences to the family of BNP chief and former prime minister Khaleda Zia, who died on Tuesday.
Asked about JI’s historical closeness to Pakistan, Rahman said: “We maintain relations in a balanced way with all. We are never interested in leaning toward any one country. Rather, we respect all and want balanced relations among nations.”
He said any government that includes JI would “not feel comfortable” with President Mohammed Shahabuddin, who was elected unopposed with the Awami League’s backing in 2023.
Shahabuddin, the ceremonial head of the country, himself told Reuters this month that he was willing to step down midway through his term.
Shahabuddin, in a telephone conversation with Reuters on Wednesday, declined to comment on Rahman’s position, saying he did not want to “complicate the matter further”.
- New York attorney general to perform Mamdani’s swearing-in.
- Ceremonial inauguration on Thursday outside New York City Hall.
- Block party organised to enable New Yorkers watch ceremony.
Zohran Mamdani, a young upstart of the US left, was readying on Wednesday to take over as New York mayor for a term sure to see him cross swords with President Donald Trump.
After the clocks strike midnight, bringing in 2026, Mamdani will take his oath of office at an abandoned subway stop, taking the helm of the United States’ largest city. He will be New York’s first Muslim mayor.
His office says the understated venue for the oath-taking reflects his commitment to working people, after the 34-year-old Democrat campaigned on promises to address the soaring cost of living.
But it remains to be seen if Mamdani — virtually unknown a year ago — can deliver on his ambitious agenda, which envisions rent freezes, universal childcare and free public buses.
Once an election is over, “symbolism only goes so far with voters. Results begin to matter a whole lot more,” New York University lecturer John Kane said.
What Trump does could be a decisive factor.
The Republican, himself a New Yorker, has repeatedly criticised Mamdani, but the pair held surprisingly cordial talks at the White House in November.
Lincoln Mitchell, a political analyst and professor at Columbia University, said that the meeting “couldn’t have gone better from Mamdani’s perspective.”
But he warned their relationship could quickly sour.
One flashpoint might be immigration raids as Trump wages an expanding crackdown on migrants across the United States.
Mamdani has vowed to protect immigrant communities.
Before the November vote, the president also threatened to slash federal funding for New York if it picked Mamdani, whom he called a “communist lunatic.”
The mayor-elect has said he believes Trump is a fascist.
Block party
Mamdani’s private swearing-in at midnight to start his four-year term will be performed by New York Attorney General Letitia James, who successfully prosecuted Trump for fraud.
A larger, ceremonial inauguration is scheduled for Thursday with speeches from left-wing allies Senator Bernie Sanders and Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Around 4,000 ticketed guests are expected to attend the event outside City Hall.
Mamdani’s team has also organised a block party that it says will enable tens of thousands of New Yorkers to watch the ceremony at streetside viewing areas along Broadway.
The new job comes with a change of address for Mamdani as he swaps his rent-controlled apartment in the borough of Queens for the luxurious mayor’s residence in Manhattan.
Some had wondered if he would move to the official mansion given his campaigning on affordability issues. Mamdani said he is doing so mainly for security reasons.
Born in Uganda to a family of Indian origin, Mamdani moved to New York at age seven and enjoyed an elite upbringing with only a relatively brief stint in politics, becoming a member of the New York State Assembly before being elected mayor.
Compensating for his inexperience, he is surrounding himself with seasoned aides recruited from past mayors’ offices and former US president Joe Biden’s administration.
Mamdani has also opened dialogue with business leaders, some of whom predicted a massive exodus of wealthy New Yorkers if he won. Real estate leaders have debunked those claims.
As a defender of Palestinian rights, he will have to reassure the Jewish community of his inclusive leadership.
Recently, one of his hires resigned after it was revealed she had posted antisemitic tweets years ago.
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