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Israel confirms its forces are in central Rafah in expanding offensive in the southern Gaza city

By: Julia Frankel

ERUSALEM (AP) — The Israeli military confirmed Friday that its forces are operating in central parts of Rafah in its expanding offensive in the southern Gaza city.

Israel launched its ground assault into the city on May 6, triggering an exodus of around 1 million Palestinians out of the city and throwing UN humanitarian operations based in the area into turmoil. Still, U.S. President Joe Biden has said Israel has not crossed the “red lines” of a full-fledged invasion that he has urged them against.

Friday’s statement by the Israeli military suggested its forces have been operating in most parts of the city. For its first weeks, the Israeli assault focused on Rafah’s eastern districts and in areas close to the border with Egypt. Israeli troops seized the Rafah crossing into Egypt on the first day of the offensive and have since claimed control over the Philadelphi Corridor, a road running the length of the Gaza-Egypt border on the Gazan side.

Earlier this week, Israeli troops also moved into Rafah’s western district of Tel al-Sultan, where heavy clashes with Hamas fighters have been reported by witnesses. 

In its statement Friday, the military said its troops in central Rafah had uncovered Hamas rocket launchers and tunnels and dismantled a weapons storage city of the group. It did not specify where in central Rafah the operations were taking place, but previous statements and witness reports have pointed to raids in the Shaboura refugee camp and other sites near the city centre.

Israel has said an offensive in Rafah is vital to uprooting Hamas fighters in its military’s campaign to destroy the group after its Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel. 

Palestinians who fled the city have scattered around southern and central Gaza, most of them living in squalid tent camps. Up to around 300,000 people are believed to remain in the area, some of them still in the central urban parts of the city, a UN official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.


Russia, Ukraine exchange POWs for the first time in months. Bodies of fallen also swapped

By: Hanna Arhirova

SUMY REGION, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine and Russia exchanged prisoners of war on Friday, each sending back 75 POWs in the first such swap in the past three months, officials said. A few hours earlier and at the same location, the two sides also handed over bodies of their fallen soldiers.

The Ukrainian POWs, including four civilians, were returned on several buses that drove into the northern Sumy region. As they disembarked, they shouted joyfully and called their families to tell them they were home. Some knelt and kissed the ground while many wrapped themselves in yellow-blue flags and hugged one another, breaking into tears. Many appeared emaciated and poorly dressed.

The exchange was the fourth prisoner swap this year and the 52nd since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. It included a total of 150 POWs and the United Arab Emirates helped negotiate this latest exchange, the Foreign Ministry in Kyiv said. 

The two sides have traded blame for what they say is a slowdown in the swaps. 

Ukraine has in the past urged Russia to swap “all for all” and rallies calling for the release of POWs take place across Ukraine weekly. A Ukrainian official at the headquarters coordinating the exchanges, Vitalii Matviienko said that “Ukraine is always ready.” 

Tatyana Moskalkova, Russia’s human rights ombudsperson, said earlier this week that Kyiv was making “new artificial demands,” without elaborating. 

Among those who were returned home to Ukraine on Friday was Roman Onyschuk, an IT worker who joined Ukrainian forces as a volunteer at the start of the Russian invasion. He was captured in March 2022 in the Kharkiv region. 

“I just want to hear my wife’s voice, my son’s voice. I missed his three birthdays,” he said. In the more than 800 days he spent in captivity, he never communicated with his family and he doesn’t know what city they are in now, he said.

“It’s a little bit overwhelming,” Onyschuk added.

With the exchanges, including Friday’s, Ukraine has gotten back a total of 3,210 members of the Ukrainian military and civilians since the outbreak of the war, according to Ukraine’s Coordination Headquarters for Treatment of POWs. 

Neither Ukraine nor Russia disclose how many POWs there are in all.


Houthi rebels say at least 16 killed and 42 others wounded in joint U.S.-British airstrikes in Yemen

By: Jon Gambrell And Lolita C. Baldor

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Joint British-U.S. airstrikes targeting Yemen’s Houthi rebels killed at least 16 people and wounded 42 others, the rebels said Friday, the highest publicly acknowledged death toll from the multiple rounds of strikes carried out over the rebels’ attacks on shipping. 

Three U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity to describe a then-ongoing attack, described the strikes Thursday as hitting a wide range of underground facilities, missile launchers, command and control sites, a Houthi vessel and other facilities. They called it a response to a recent surge in attacks by the Iran-backed militia group on ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden over the Israel-Hamas war. 

The U.S. F/A-18 fighter jets involved in the strikes took off from the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft carrier in the Red Sea, officials said. Other U.S. warships in the region also participated.

But the Houthis focused Friday morning on a strike they said struck a building housing Hodeida Radio and civilian homes in the port city on the Red Sea. Their Al Masirah satellite news channel aired images of one bloodied man being carried down stairs and others in the hospital, receiving aid. It said all the dead and nearly all the wounded from the strikes came from there.

The Houthis described all those killed and hurt in Hodeida as civilians, something The Associated Press couldn’t immediately confirm. 

Other strikes hit outside of Sanaa near its airport, and communication equipment in Taiz, the broadcaster said. Little other information was released on those sites — likely signaling that Houthi military sites had been struck. One person was wounded in Sanaa.

“We confirm this brutal aggression against Yemen as punishment for its position in support of Gaza, in support of Israel to continue its crimes of genocide against the wounded, besieged and steadfast Gaza Strip,” Houthi spokesman Mohammed Abdulsalam posted on X. 


Lava spurts from Iceland volcano for second day

By: Marco Di Marco

GRINDAVIK, Iceland (AP) — Lava continued to spurt from a volcano in southwestern Iceland on Thursday but the activity had calmed significantly from when it erupted a day earlier. 

The eruption Wednesday was the fifth and most powerful since the volcanic system near Grindavik reawakened in December after 800 years, gushing record levels of lava as its fissure grew to 3.5 kilometres (2.1 miles) in length.

Volcanologist Dave McGarvie calculated that the amount of lava initially flowing from the crater could have buried the soccer pitch at Wembley Stadium in London under 15 metres (49 feet) of lava every minute.

“These jets of magma are reaching like 50 metres (165 feet), into the atmosphere,” said McGarvie, an honorary researcher at Lancaster University. “That just immediately strikes me as a powerful eruption. And that was my first impression … then some numbers came out, estimating how much was coming out per minute or per second and it was, ‘wow.’”

The activity once again threatened Grindavik, a coastal town of 3,800 people, and led to the evacuation of the popular Blue Lagoon geothermal spa, one of Iceland’s biggest tourist attractions.

Grindavik, which is about 50 kilometres (30 miles) southwest of Iceland’s capital, Reykjavik, has been threatened since a swarm of earthquakes in November forced an evacuation in advance of the initial Dec. 18 eruption. A subsequent eruption consumed several buildings.

Protective barriers outside Grindavik deflected the lava Wednesday but the evacuated town remained without electricity and two of the three roads into town were inundated with lava.


Minneapolis police officer dies in ambush that killed 2 others including suspected gunman

By: Steve Karnowksi And Mark Thiessen

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A Minneapolis police officer responding to a shooting call was ambushed and killed Thursday when he stopped to provide aid to a man who appeared to be a victim. That man instead wound up shooting the officer, authorities said.

The death of Officer Jamal Mitchell happened during a chaotic situation involving two crime scenes two blocks apart that left three people dead, two others hospitalized in critical condition and another officer and a firefighter with less serious injuries.

“I’ve seen the video, and he was ambushed,” Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension Superintendent Drew Evans said at an evening news conference. “I’m using the term for a reason.”

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said authorities are still investigating and asked people to “be patient with us as we do not know all of the facts yet. We want to make sure that the investigation is completed and we’re doing it the right way.”

Law enforcement provided a brief narrative of what transpired, starting when officers responded to a call of a double shooting at an apartment complex in the south Minneapolis neighbourhood of Whittier.

As Mitchell was about two blocks from the complex, he noticed individuals who were injured. He got out of his car to provide aid to one man, who wound up shooting the officer.

Another officer arrived and exchanged gunfire with the shooter, who died despite life-saving efforts on the part of officers, Minneapolis Assistant Police Chief Katie Blackwell said.

That officer had non-life-threatening wounds. Evans said another person, believed to be an innocent bystander, was shot and taken to a hospital in critical condition. The firefighter also was shot and injured.

When other officers went to the apartment, they found two people inside who had been shot. One was dead and the other was hospitalized in critical condition, Evans said.


North Korea leader Kim Jong Un supervised drills simulating preemptive attacks on South Korea

By: Hyung-jin Kim

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un supervised drills involving the firing of nuclear-capable multiple rocket launchers to show the country’s ability to carry out a preemptive attack on rival South Korea, state media reported Friday.

North Korea has simulated nuclear strikes on South Korea numerous times, but the latest drills came after animosities on the Korean Peninsula rose over North Korea’s recent failed spy satellite launch. 

The North’s official Korean Central News Agency reported that the rocket firing drills were meant to demonstrate North Korea’s resolve not to hesitate in launching a preemptive strike on South Korea if threatened. It cited Kim as saying that the drills “will serve as an occasion in clearly showing what consequences our rivals will face if they provoke us.”

Photos showed Kim watching from a distance as at least 18 projectiles were launched.

KCNA suggested the drills came as response to a South Korean aerial exercise performed hours before North Korea’s failed attempt to place its second spy satellite into orbit on Monday night. 

The launch attempt drew strong condemnation from South Korea, the U.S. and others because the U.N. bans any satellite launches by North Korea, viewing them as covers for testing missile technologies. North Korea reacted angrily, arguing that it has the sovereign right to launch satellites.


France raises preliminary terrorism charges against 18-year-old over plan to attack Olympic matches

PARIS (AP) — French authorities have handed preliminary terrorism charges to an 18-year-old accused of a plot targeting spectators attending Olympic soccer games.

The man is accused of planning a ‘’violent action’’ on behalf of the Islamic State group’s jihadist ideology, the national counterterrorism prosecutor’s office said in a statement Friday. The man, who was not identified, is being held in custody pending further investigation.

France’s security authorities have foiled a plan to attack soccer events during the upcoming Paris Olympics, the country’s interior minister said Friday. It was the first such thwarted plot targeting the Games, which start in eight weeks as France is on its highest threat alert level.

Gerald Darmanin said in a statement that members of the General Directorate of Internal Security made the arrest on May 22 on suspicion of  a plan to attack soccer events that will be held in the southern city of Saint-Etienne. 

According to the initial investigation, the man was preparing an attack targeting the Geoffroy-Guichard stadium in Saint-Etienne that will host several soccer matches during the Summer Games. The planned attack was to target spectators and police forces, the statement said. The suspect wanted to attack the Olympic events “to die and become a martyr,” the statement also said.

The Paris Olympics will run from July 26-Aug. 11. Soccer matches will take place in cities across France before the final in Paris’ Stade de France.

France is on its highest security alert ahead of the Paris Olympics and Paralympics, which are expected to draw millions of visitors. 

Associated Press

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