Live: Lawyers present genocide risk case against Israel at ICJ

A group of Republican senators, led by Ted Cruz, is pushing forward a bill that targets the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (Unrwa), aiming to strip it of legal immunity in the United States.

Unrwa provides education, healthcare, and humanitarian aid to millions of Palestinian refugees across the Middle East who have been forecefully displaced by Israel since 1948. 

The legislation, dubbed the “Limiting Immunity for Assisting Backers of Lethal Extremism (LIABLE) Act”, would allow American citizens to file lawsuits against Unrwa in US courts.

Cruz without providing any evidence repeated Israeli propogandand saying that Unrwa “officials have for decades knowingly provided support to Hamas terrorists, including salaries and materials. That support facilitated Hamas's terrorist attack on October 7th, which was the worst one-day massacre of Jews since the Holocaust and included the murder and kidnapping of dozens of Americans. Those victims and their families deserve the ability to hold Unrwa accountable, and the LIABLE Act would give them that opportunity."

Right now, Unrwa and similar agencies are shielded by the International Organization Immunities Act (IOIA), which offers protections similar to those granted to foreign states under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA).

A second Palestinian student at Columbia University was picked up and placed into detention by immigration agents on Monday during his naturalisation ceremony.

Mohsen Mahdawi, a green card holder who moved from the occupied West Bank to the US ten years ago, was at the US immigration services offices in Colchester, Vermont, when he was detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, The Intercept reported.

Mahdawi is being targeted for his pro-Palestine activism on campus despite the fact that he has not been active since the spring of 2024.

On Monday, Mahdawi's lawyers filed a habeas corpus petition challenging the legality of his detention. They say the government has violated his statutory and due process rights by punishing him for speech related to Israel and Palestine.

Read more: Palestinian Columbia University student detained by ICE during citizenship ceremony

The Pentagon has confirmed that Washington greenlit a new $180 million arms deal with Israel—this time involving engines for military vehicles.

In a statement, the Defence Security Cooperation Agency said: “The United States is committed to the security of Israel, and it is vital to US national interests to assist Israel to develop and maintain a strong and ready self-defence capability.”

They added, “This proposed sale is consistent with those objectives.”

This latest move comes as Israel continues to face accusations from UN experts and human rights organisations of committing genocide in Gaza.

Following three years in Israeli detention, Palestinian prisoner Musab Qatawi faced one final ordeal before being released on Thursday.

Israeli prison guards shoved his head into a rubbish bin and shaved part of his hair, drawing the Star of David on to his head.

In an interview with Middle East Eye in his hometown of Qalqilya, in the occupied West Bank, Qatawi said he was released in the same batch as Ahmad Manasra, who spent a decade behind bars after being arrested at the age of 13 and suffered a similar treatment before his release.

“They gathered us after dawn, counted us and took us,” Qatawi said.

“At that moment, I found Ahmad Manasra among the people. We reached the Ramon area. They took our pictures, had us sign papers," he added.

Read more: Israeli prison releases Palestinian with Star of David shaved on to his head

Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri has slammed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s latest ceasefire conditions, calling them nothing more than a “surrender agreement”.

Abu Zuhri told Al Jazeera Mubasher that Netanyahu’s insistence on disarming Hamas is a non-starter:
“When Netanyahu conditions [the ceasefire] on disarming Hamas, he knows that Hamas links its honour to its arms and that this is an impossible demand,” he said.

He described the disarmament condition as a “wakeful dream” and accused Netanyahu of deliberately sabotaging any chance of a truce: “He is imposing these impossible demands to fail any effort to reach a ceasefire agreement.”

Despite this, Abu Zuhri insisted Hamas remains committed to talks and has shown flexibility, but accused Netanyahu of dragging out the war to escalate destruction in Gaza.

A senior Hamas figure said on Monday that a delegation is heading to Qatar soon for another round of indirect talks with Israel aimed at securing a ceasefire in Gaza.

This comes as Gaza’s Health Ministry confirmed 38 more deaths in the past 24 hours, reported the Associated Press.

Recent discussions in Cairo focused on possible terms for a truce, including a proposal that would see Hamas release between eight and ten hostages.But the big sticking point is whether any deal would actually bring the war to a full stop.

The Qatar meetings are expected to take place either later this week or early next, according to the Hamas official, who requested anonymity due to the sensitivity of the talks, speaking to AP.

Israeli and Qatari officials have yet to comment.

The Houthi group on Monday "denounced" Israeli actions at Al-Aqsa Mosque, alongside fresh raids and arrests in Jenin refugee camp, in the occupied West Bank.

“We denounce the enemy’s bulldozing and burning of homes in Jenin camp and forcing thousands to flee,” the group said via its Al Masirah TV channel.The Houthis condemned Israel of systematically dismantling Gaza’s health sector, describing the assault as “deliberate” and labelling it “a blatant act of mass murder and a violation of international law”.

The group also urged global powers to step in and stop what it described as an ongoing “genocide” in Gaza.

The Houthis said, “Yemen will never retreat from supporting Palestine, pledging to fulfil religious, moral and humanitarian duties regardless of consequences.”

A Palestinian student at Columbia University was arrested in Vermont by US federal agents - right in the middle of a meeting that was supposed to finalise his path to American citizenship.

Mohsen Mahdawi, a green card holder originally from a refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, has been active on campus in supporting Palestinian rights.

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement have now begun the process to deport him to the occupied West Bank.

A legal team representing Mahdawi submitted a habeas corpus petition on Monday, pushing back against what they argue is an unlawful detention.

They say the Trump administration is punishing Mahdawi for his views on Palestine and Israel - views that, they say, fall squarely within his right to free expression.

Israeli officials, flanked by security forces, raided six schools run by the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (Unrwa) in occupied East Jerusalem last week and handed 30-day closure orders to staff.

The order was issued by the Israeli Ministry of Education, which claimed the schools were operating without licences.

This means around 800 children will receive no education, only weeks before the end of the school year. Instead, they will be set adrift in the East Jerusalem school system, which is already plagued by classroom shortages and funding cuts. 

Since the 1950s, Unrwa has run schools and medical clinics in East Jerusalem, which Israel seized during the Arab-Israeli war of 1967.

The agency is now the second biggest provider of education in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) after the Palestinian Authority (PA), operating 96 schools in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and serving nearly 50,000 students from the first to the ninth grades.

Read more: How Unrwa school closures could damage the education of hundreds of Palestinian children

A young Palestinian lost his life at the hands of Israeli forces on Monday.

Nineteen-year-old Malek Ali al-Hattab succumbed to his injuries after being shot in the stomach by Israeli troops during a pre-dawn raid on the Jalazone refugee camp, just north of Ramallah, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.

The ministry confirmed al-Hattab had been hit with live fire. Two more young Palestinians were also wounded - one struck in the knee, the other in the hand.

The elite university has told the Trump administration it won’t bow to political pressure, even as its federal funding is threatened.

The clash erupted after the administration demanded sweeping changes to Harvard’s internal policies—from rules around pro-Palestine campus protests to diversity and inclusion programmes - or risk losing funding.

“No government - regardless of which party is in power - should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue,” said President Alan Garber in a message to students and staff.

The university’s lawyers doubled down in a formal letter to Washington, accusing the federal government of trampling on long-standing academic freedoms and attempting to override protections enshrined in the First Amendment.

The move comes just days after Columbia University, under similar pressure, agreed to make changes demanded by the Trump administration in a bid to recover $400m in frozen funds. That gamble backfired. Not only was the money withheld, but the administration slashed more funding.

Harvard University, like several other educational institutions in the US, has been a key site for pro-Palestinian protesters since Israel's war on Gaza began in October 2023.

At least 13 Palestinians have been killed in fresh Israeli air raids since sunrise, according to medical officials speaking to Al Jazeera on Monday.

A senior Hamas official speaking to Al Jazeera Arabic revealed that Egypt presented the group with a fresh ceasefire proposal.

The plan allegedly included a direct clause calling for Palestinian resistance groups to lay down their weapons before any deal could be struck with Israel.

“Our negotiating delegation was surprised that the proposal Egypt conveyed included an explicit text regarding the disarmament of the resistance,” the official said. “Egypt informed us that there will be no agreement to stop the war without negotiating the disarmament of the resistance.”

According to the official, the group’s position hasn’t budged - no ceasefire without a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and an end to the war. “Hamas’s weapons were not subject to discussion,” the official said.

Israel, meanwhile, is saying that they will not end the onslaught in Gaza until Hamas is “defeated”.

In the 1950s, the United States launched a sweeping campaign to root out alleged communists from public life. Careers were destroyed, lives were upended and a culture of fear permeated the political and academic landscape.

That era, McCarthyism, is remembered today as a dark and shameful chapter in American history. 

We are now living through its echo. But this time, it comes under a different banner. This is the era of Zio-McCarthyism, a new political purge targeting anyone who dares to oppose the atrocities committed by the Israeli state or express solidarity with the Palestinian people.

And just like the original, this one will not stop at its initial targets.

In recent months, we’ve seen a disturbing escalation. Pro-Palestinian activists are being detained, surveilled, deported and smeared for little more than exercising their constitutional rights.

Read more:  US: Zio-McCarthyism, a 21st century political purge that has dangerous overtones

At least seven people were killed and nearly 30 others wounded in a fresh wave of US air strikes near Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, according to the Houthis, who made the announcement on Monday.

The strikes reportedly pummelled areas under Houthi control overnight - as part of Washington’s ongoing campaign to punish the group for attacks on Israel-linked commercial ships in the Red Sea, in what the group says is solidarity with the people of Gaza.

The Houthis also said they’d shot down another American MQ-9 Reaper drone, a sophisticated piece of hardware that’s become a familiar sight in the skies over Yemen.

Since President Donald Trump authorised this latest bombing spree as part of the response to Houthi attacks linked to the Israel-Gaza war, the death toll has climbed to more than 120, according to figures from the Yemeni Health Ministry