Gaza
Eight people, including a well-known journalist, were killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza today in the latest breaches of an ostensible ceasefire Tel Aviv agreed with Hamas last October. An attack on a passenger van in Gaza City left six people dead, medical officials and witnesses said, and a woman was killed in a strike on an apartment building in the city. Journalist Mohammed al-Najjar was killed by a drone in Khan Younis. Footage circulated on social media showing his three children crying over his body, which was shrouded because his head was missing. Several people were also wounded in separate attacks. Israel has killed more than 1,400 people, mostly civilians, since the purported ceasefire was declared. At the time of writing, Israeli strikes on the Palestinian enclave were ongoing.
More from Al Jazeera here.
Sudan
An American peace plan for Sudan could lead to the country being split between two competing governments, a top advisor to the country’s army-led government told Reuters. The proposal, put forward by U.S. Senior Advisor for Arab and African Affairs Massad Boulos, would include a 90-day ceasefire after which talks would begin to agree on an end to the war and restart a process to bring Sudan under civilian rule. “Our concern is that the approach Mr Boulos continues to advance appears to accommodate the militia’s continued existence and preserve a place for it in Sudan’s political future,” Amjad Farid, who advises army leader General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan on international affairs, said, referring to the Rapid Support Forces paramilitary group, which has been locked in a ruinous war with the Sudanese Armed Forces for more than three years.
More from Reuters here.
Iraq
Crowds of Iraqis celebrated today as U.S. troops pulled out of their final bases in the country, bringing Washington’s 12-year deployment to fight the ISIS armed group to an end. The withdrawal marked the “successful conclusion of the military mission that defeated ISIS in Iraq,” Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said. Iraqi forces, some of whom paraded in vehicles through the streets of Baghdad to welcome the departure, will now be fully responsible for the country’s security, while the U.S. will continue to carry out counter-ISIS operations in neighboring Syria. ISIS was defeated in 2017 and pushed out of all the territory it controlled, but it retains the ability to launch small hit-and-run attacks.
More from the National here.