Middle East latest: Israel plans an extended occupation of Syrian buffer zone

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israeli troops will occupy a buffer zone inside Syria for the foreseeable future. Israel's recent capture of the buffer zone has sparked condemnation, with critics accusing Israel of violating the 1974 ceasefire and possibly exploiting the chaos in Syria for a land grab.

Netanyahu entered the buffer zone on Tuesday, making him the first sitting Israeli leader to set foot this far into Syria.

The Israeli advances in Syria come as its forces are still fighting the war in Gaza against the Palestinian militant group Hamas. Qatar, Egypt and the United States have renewed efforts to broker a ceasefire deal.

Israeli bombardment and offensives in Gaza have killed more than 45,000 Palestinians over the past 14 months, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. The ministry’s tally does not distinguish between combatants and civilians, but it says more than of half the dead were women and children.

Israel launched its campaign in retaliation for Hamas’ October 2023 attack on southern Israel in which militants killed some 1,200 people and abducted 250 others, around 100 of whom remain in captivity.

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Here's the latest:

Hamas says it's still possible to reach a ceasefire in Gaza

CAIRO — Hamas said Tuesday that the militant group believes it’s still possible to reach a Gaza ceasefire agreement and a hostage exchange deal that would end Israel’s 14-months war in the enclave.

The group said in a statement that such deal is still possible if Israel stops adding “new conditions” to the ceasefire proposal. A spokesperson with Hamas said he has no details about the alleged new conditions being referred to.

Still, Hamas lauded the “serious and positive” meditation efforts by Egypt and Qatar to reach a ceasefire.

Israeli defense minister Israel Katz said on X Tuesday morning that Israel wants to have “security control” over Gaza the same way it does in the West Bank after it dismantles Hamas’ military and government capabilities.

“We will not allow any terrorist organization against Israeli communities and Israeli citizens from Gaza. We will not allow a return to the reality of before October 7th,” he wrote on the social media platform.

Officials close to ceasefire negotiations previously said that Israel is interested in maintaining military presence along the Philadelphi corridor, a narrow buffer zone along Gaza's border with Egypt. Israeli officials also want to separate south Gaza from the north by maintaining military presence in Netzarim corridor.

Hamas rejected those demands and said that deploying Israeli troops at those corridors would be deemed as a military occupation of Gaza.

Syrians recover bodies apparently executed and dumped in mass graves under Assad

IZRAA, Syria — The remains of over 30 bodies were uncovered on Monday in southern Syria, with the number of bodies expected to increase. The mass grave was discovered just a week after the fall of Bashar Assad’s government.

Forensic teams worked alongside rebel fighters who now control the country, carefully handling bags of human remains as an excavator rumbled in the background, while relatives stood by.

Relatives said they initially had hopes they would find their loved ones in a prison. “But we didn’t find anyone and it broke our hearts. They were burned alive here after being doused in fuel,” said Mohammad Ghazaleh at the mass grave site near Izraa, north of the city of Daraa.

Some of the people whose remains were uncovered were executed by “shooting in the head, in the eye, or by burning,” said Moussa Al-Zouebi, head of Izraa’s health directorate, who was at the site.

The new authorities in Damascus have set up a hotline for reporting missing persons and secret detention sites.

International medical charity closes its emergency room in Gaza due to insecurity amid Israeli fire

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — The international charity Doctors Without Borders said Monday that insecurity from Israeli military actions forced it to close an emergency room in an area of southern Gaza crowded with displaced Palestinians.

The charity, known by the French acronym MSF, said “bombing and heavy shootings” near the homes of 12 team members kept them trapped indoors along with their families, and more than 30 others were trapped in the group's office.

“Tanks were invading the area where we live. It was terrifying," said a MSF staff member in Muwasi, according to a post by the group on X. "We were lying on the ground in our homes for hours and it seemed like the gun fire was coming directly towards us.”

The fighting forced MSF to stop treating wounded people who were arriving at the health clinic in Muwasi, a sprawling tent city on Gaza's coast that Israel designated a humanitarian safe zone but has repeatedly targeted.

The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Israel says imports from Asia-Pacific not significantly hurt by Houthi attacks on shipping

JERUSALEM — Israel’s Central Bank says imports from Asia and the Pacific have not been significantly impacted by Yemen’s Houthi rebel attacks in the Red Sea.

A study issued by the bank found that imports to Israel in general have decreased since the war in Gaza started in October 2023. But it said the decrease was not noticeably larger for imports from the Asia-Pacific, which reach Israel via the Red Sea.

The Houthis say their attacks on shipping won’t stop until there is a ceasefire in Gaza. The attacks, which began in November 2023, caused a drop in cargo traffic through the Red Sea and Suez Canal, a vital route connecting Asia and Europe. Shipping companies responded by rerouting much of the traffic to the longer and more costly voyage around Africa. Egypt has reported a 24% drop in its revenues from the canal.

The report released last week, by researchers Haggayi Etkes of the Bank of Israel and Nitzan Feldman, found that the value of worldwide maritime imports fell by about 35% in January compared to the period before Houthi attacks started in November 2023. But it found that the rate had recovered by May as shipping adjusted to the new routes.

It said imports from Asia to Mediterranean countries including Greece, Turkey, Italy, France and Spain were harder hit than Israel by the slowdown. It said that could be because Israel imports less from Asia than those countries. It did not provide figures on the amount of the drop in trade for Israel.

Turkey says developments in Syria shouldn't distract from the war in Gaza

ANKARA, Turkey — Turkey said developments in Syria should not divert attention away from what it described as the “genocide” being committed by Israel in Gaza.

A Turkish Foreign Ministry statement on Tuesday accused Israel of intensifying its attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure, including on school buildings and refugee camps and of using “starvation and infectious diseases as a weapon against the Palestinian people.”

“We reiterate our call for the necessary pressured to be exerted on Israel to ensure an immediate ceasefire agreement and uninterrupted humanitarian access to the region,” the ministry said.

Iran's leader says Hezbollah and ‘axis of resistance’ will not be eradicated

TEHRAN, Iran — Iran's supreme leader said Israel is wrong to believe it can eradicate Hezbollah in Lebanon or that an “axis of resistance” of Tehran's allies in the region was finished.

State TV quoted Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as saying during a recent meeting that “the Zionist regime, in its delusion, believes it is preparing itself through Syria to encircle and eradicate Hezbollah forces, but the one that will be eradicated is Israel.”

Khamenei also added that Israel and the United States “thought the issue of resistance was over. They are gravely mistaken.”

Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei said Iran will use every opportunity to mobilize the regional and international community to stop what he called Israeli aggression against neighboring countries like Syria, Yemen and others.

He also said that the Syrian people are the only ones who can decide on their country's future after the fall of President Bashar Assad, a Tehran ally. “Naturally, the regional countries should assist in this process without any destructive interference or any form of pressure and threats against the political actors in Syria.”

Baghaei urged regional countries to put pressure on the U.N. Security Council to stop Israel’s occupation in Syria and said, “Ultimately, the entire occupied Golan Heights of Syria must be liberated.”

Israeli troops have seized a border buffer zone, sparking condemnation, with critics accusing Israel of violating the 1974 ceasefire and possibly exploiting the chaos in Syria for a land grab. Israel captured the Golan Heights in the 1967 Mideast war and annexed it, though the international community except for the U.S. regards it as occupied.

EU head announces an additional 1 billion euros for Turkey to help Syrian refugees

ANKARA, Turkey — European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced on Tuesday an additional 1 billion euros for Turkey to help it support millions of Syrian refugees.

Speaking after a meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Turkish capital, von der Leyen said the funding would help with health care and education for refugees, as well as migration and border management, including voluntary returns of Syrian refugees. She said the funds could be adjusted to meet needs that may arise as the situation in Syria evolves.

Erdogan said both Turkey and the EU agree on the need to establish an inclusive government in Syria following the ouster of President Bashar Assad.

“We saw that we agree on the establishment of a participatory administration, especially on the preservation of Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” Erdogan said.

He reiterated Turkey’s strong opposition to the presence in Syria of the Islamic State group or of Syrian Kurdish militia that Ankara considers to be terrorists.

“We will absolutely not allow these organizations to grow. There is no place for either the IS or the PKK and its derivatives in the future of our region,” Erdogan said, in reference to Syrian Kurdish groups that are linked to the banned Kurdistan Workers’ Party, PKK, in Turkey.

Von der Leyen emphasized the need to stay alert against the “real” threat of the reemergence of IS in Syria. She acknowledged Turkey’s security concerns but said it was important to ensure that all minorities are safe, an apparent reference to Syrian Kurds.

The Turkish leader accused the international community of failing to provide adequate support to Syrians during the long civil war. “It is now possible to compensate for this. The way to do this is to support Syria’s construction and development efforts,” he said.

UN investigators want to to preserve evidence of atrocities in Syria

GENEVA — A U.N.-backed team investigating years of crimes in war-torn Syria says it has reached out to its new government and hopes to deploy to help gather and preserve evidence on the ground -- in hopes of bringing torturers, killers and other war criminals to justice one day.

Robert Petit, head of the international, impartial and independent mechanism on Syria, said its team has reason to believe that mass graves exist across Syria, but exhumation, DNA collection and tests for cause of death require “a lot of resources.”

He provided no further details about any such mass graves.

Petit said the government of former President Bashar Assad, who fled Syria on Dec. 8, didn’t cooperate with his team, and the change of authority offers a chance to establish the fates of “tens of thousands of people” who died and suffered under his rule.

“We are awaiting a response," from the rebels who now control Syria, he said. “And as soon as that response is forthcoming, we will deploy.”

A “monitoring cell” on the U.N.-backed team has collected recent images from social media, he said, while its sources on the ground have been able to collect new evidence and testimonies in the wake of Assad’s ouster.

The mechanism was created in 2016 by the U.N. General Assembly to collect, preserve, consolidate and analyze evidence of “serious crimes” committed in Syria since the civil war erupted in March 2011, Petit said. A U.N.-backed Commission of Inquiry is doing similar work.

EU plans to reopen its office in Damascus

BRUSSELS — The European Union plans to reopen its office in Damascus following “constructive first contacts” between an envoy and Syria’s new representatives, the bloc’s top diplomat said on Tuesday.

“We are ready to reopen our delegation, which is the European embassy, and we want this to be fully operational,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas told EU lawmakers.

A diplomat from Beirut was dispatched to Damascus on Monday for talks with representatives of the new leadership and civil society in Syria.

Kallas described it as “a very important step” that would allow for “really constructive engagement and to have the input and information from the ground as well.”

After talks in Turkey with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU also wants to “enhance our engagement in early recovery, including basic services like electricity and water and infrastructure.”

British diplomats meet leader of militant group that toppled Assad

LONDON — British diplomats have met the leader of the militant group that toppled Syrian leader Bashar Assad.

Photographs posted by the group on social media showed senior officials, including the U.K. special representative for Syria, Ann Snow, meeting Hayat Tahrir al-Sham leader Ahmad al-Sharaa, formerly known as Mohammed al-Golani, in Damascus on Monday.

Foreign Secretary David Lammy confirmed Monday that Britain had sent “a delegation of senior U.K. officials to Damascus this week for meetings with the new Syrian authorities and members of civil society groups.”

Britain, along with the U.S. and other countries, classifies HTS, a former al-Qaida affiliate, as a terrorist organization. U.K. officials have suggested they may reconsider that designation, but have not given a timeline. They say British officials can still talk to HST in the meantime.

In an interview with the Times of London newspaper, al-Sharaa urged the West to lift sanctions and said Israel should stop its strikes on Syria.

“We do not want any conflict whether with Israel or anyone else and we will not let Syria be used as a launchpad for attacks,” he was quoted as saying. “The Syrian people need a break, and the strikes must end and Israel has to pull back to its previous positions.”

An Israeli strike in Gaza kills at least 8 from same family, Palestinians say

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — An Israeli strike in Gaza killed at least eight people from the same family, most of them women and children, Palestinian medics said Tuesday.

The strike late Monday hit a house in Gaza City’s central neighborhood of Daraj, according to the Health Ministry’s ambulance and emergency service.

Rescuers recovered the bodies of eight people including two women and four children from under the rubble, it said. Among the dead were a father and his three children, and the children’s grandmother, according to a casualty list obtained by The Associated Press.

The Israeli army said the airstrike targeted a Hamas militant in a “terrorist infrastructure site” and claimed there were secondary explosions indicating the presence of weapons. The army said it had seen reports of wounded civilians and was “reviewing the incident.” Israel blames Hamas for civilian casualties, saying militants often operate in residential areas.

German diplomats will hold their first talks with the new Syrian government

BERLIN — Germany says its diplomats will hold their first talks on Tuesday with the new Syrian government installed by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, or HTS.

The Foreign Ministry in Berlin said the talks will center on an “inclusive transition process” in Syria and the protection of minorities. The German delegation also plans to sound out the possibility of a German diplomatic presence in Damascus, and will meet representatives of Christian communities among others.

The ministry said in a statement that “we know where HTS comes from and know its origins in al-Qaida ideology,” and said that Germany is watching the activities of the group and the interim government closely.

“As far as can be said at all at this point, they are acting prudently so far,” it added. “Like our international partners, we will measure them by their actions. Any cooperation requires that ethnic and religious minorities be protected and women’s rights respected.”

The U.S. has already said that its officials have been in direct contact with HTS.

Germany has been a leading destination for Syrian refugees over the past decade.

Mediation efforts in northern Syria fail to reach a permanent truce, US-backed force says

DAMASCUS, Syria — A U.S.-backed force in Syria says U.S.-led mediation efforts have failed to reach a permanent truce in Syria's north between the force's fighters and Turkish-backed gunmen.

The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces said the failure to end the fighting in the northern areas of Manbij and Kobani were unsuccessful due to Turkey’s unwillingness to accept key points.

“Despite U.S. efforts to stop the war, Turkey and its mercenary militias have continued to escalate over the last period,” the SDF said.

The failure of the mediation is expected to lead to a new round of fighting between the SDF and the Turkey-backed Syrian National Army in the areas of Kobani.