Middle-East
Netanyahu flies to Jordan for surprise meeting with king
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a surprise trip to Jordan on Tuesday to meet with King Abdullah II, his first visit since taking power at the helm of Israel's most right-wing and religiously conservative government in history.
The rare meeting between the leaders, who have long had a rocky relationship, comes as friction grows between the neighbors over Israel’s new ultranationalist government, which took office late last year. The talks centered around the status of a contested holy site in the Old City of Jerusalem sacred to both Jews and Muslims, Jordan's official statement suggested.
Jordan's royal court said the king urged Israel to respect the status quo at the sacred compound, which Muslims call the Noble Sanctuary and Jews call the Temple Mount.
Under an arrangement that has prevailed for decades under Jordan's custodianship, Jews and non-Muslims are permitted visits during certain hours but may not pray there. Religious nationalists, including members of Israel's new governing coalition, have increasingly visited the site and demanded equal prayer rights for Jews there, infuriating the Palestinians and Muslims around the world.
The compound — the third-holiest site in Islam — sits on a sprawling plateau also home to the iconic golden Dome of the Rock.
In Tuesday's meeting, King Abdullah II also pushed Israel to “stop its acts of violence” that are undermining hopes for an eventual peaceful settlement to the decadeslong Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the Jordanian government added, reaffirming support for a two-state solution. Israel's new coalition has vowed to expand Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank and even annex the territory — which would make a future independent Palestinian state unviable.
Netanyahu’s office said he discussed “regional issues” and security and economic cooperation with Jordan, a key regional ally. Jordan’s 1994 treaty normalizing ties with Israel produced a chilly-at-best peace between the countries. Netanyahu has repeatedly offered assurances that there has been no change in the status quo at the site.
The Jordanian government has already summoned the Israeli ambassador to Amman twice in the last month since Israel's new government took office — both times after an incident at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
Read more: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says military campaign is continuing full-force and will take time
Earlier this month, Israel’s new hard-line minister of national security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, made a provocative visit to the site, drawing condemnations from Jordan and across the Arab world. Jordan also protested to Israel after Israeli police briefly blocked the Jordanian ambassador from entering the Al-Aqsa Mosque, decrying the move as an unusual affront to Jordan's role as custodian.
The compound is administered by Jordanian religious authorities as part of an unofficial agreement after Israel captured east Jerusalem, along with the West Bank and Gaza, in the 1967 Mideast war. Israel is in charge of security at the site. Because of Jordan’s role and the site’s importance to Muslims around the world, whatever happens at the site has regional implications.
Building collapse in Syrian city of Aleppo leaves 10 dead
A building collapsed in a neighborhood in Syria’s northern city of Aleppo early Sunday, killing at least 10 people, including one child, Syrian state media reported.
The five-story building housing about 30 people in the Sheikh Maksoud neighborhood under the control of the U.S.-backed Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces collapsed overnight, according to the report. Water leakages had weakened the structure's foundation, it said.
Dozens of firefighters, first responders and residents covered in debris and dust were searching through the rubble for the remaining residents with drills and a bulldozer.
Read more: Attack kills 10 in Syria, Kurdish forces arrest 52 militants
Some relatives of the tenants waited anxiously nearby, while others mourned at the entrance of a nearby hospital as the bodies arrived in ambulances and on the back of trucks.
Hawar News, the news agency for the semiautonomous Kurdish areas in Syria, reported that seven people were killed and three were injured, two of them critically.
Many buildings in Aleppo were destroyed or damaged during Syria’s 11-year conflict, which has killed hundreds of thousands and displaced half the country’s pre-war population of 23 million.
Although the Syrian government under President Bashar Assad has retaken the city of Aleppo from armed opposition groups, Sheikh Maksoud is among some neighborhoods under the control of Kurdish forces.
Aleppo is Syria’s largest city and was once its commercial center.
Israelis press on with protests against new government
Tens of thousands of Israelis gathered in Tel Aviv on Saturday night to protest plans by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s new government to overhaul the judicial system, measures that opponents say imperil the country's democratic fundamentals.
Israeli media, citing police, said some 100,000 people were out protesting.
The protest followed another demonstration last week that also drew tens of thousands in an early challenge to Netanyahu and his ultranationalist and ultra-Orthodox government — the most right-wing in Israeli history.
Read more: Israel troops kill 2 Palestinians during raid in occupied West Bank
The government says a power imbalance has given judges and government legal advisers too much sway over lawmaking and governance. Netanyahu has pledged to press on with the changes despite the opposition.
Protesters filled central streets in the seaside metropolis, raising Israeli flags and banners that read “Our Children will not Live in a Dictatorship” and “Israel, We Have A Problem.”
“This is a protest to defend the country,” said opposition leader and former Prime Minister Yair Lapid, who joined the protest. “People came here today to protect their democracy.”
“All generations are concerned. This is not a joke,” said Lior Student, a protester. "This is a complete redefinition of democracy.”
Other protests took place in the cities of Jerusalem, Haifa and Beersheba.
In addition to the protests, pressure has built up on Netanyahu’s government after the country’s attorney general asked Netanyahu to fire a key Cabinet ally following a Supreme Court ruling that disqualified him from holding a government post because of a conviction of tax offenses.
While Netanyahu was expected to heed the court ruling, it only deepened the rift in the country over the judicial system and the power of the courts.
Earlier this week, Netanyahu, who is on trial for corruption, vowed to continue with the judicial overhaul plans despite the protests. Opponents say the changes could help Netanyahu evade conviction in his corruption trial, or make the court case disappear altogether.
Read more: Over 90 nations express ‘deep concern’ at Israeli punitive measure against Palestinians
One protester said she thinks the judicial changes are meant to protect Netanyahu. “The aim is to save only one person and one only — this is Mr. Netanyahu, from his trial, and that’s why I’m here.”
On Friday, Netanyahu's coalition was put for a new test after a disagreement between Cabinet members over the dismantling of an unauthorized settlement outpost in the West Bank.
Defense Minister Yoav Galant, a member of Netanyahu's Likud party, ordered the removal of the outpost, upsetting a pro-settlement Cabinet member who had issued a directive to postpone the eviction pending further discussions.
Israel troops kill 2 Palestinians during raid in occupied West Bank
Israeli troops shot and killed two Palestinians during a military raid in the occupied West Bank early Thursday, Palestinian media reported, as Israeli-Palestinian violence continued to surge.
The official news agency Wafa identified the dead as Jawad Bawatqa, 58, and Adham Jabarin. They were shot in the Jenin refugee camp in northern West Bank.
Read more: UN to hold emergency meeting on Israeli visit to holy site
The Palestinian media said Bawatqa was a teacher, while the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade — an armed militia affiliated with Fatah, the secular political party that controls the Palestinian Authority — claimed Jabarin as a fighter.
The Israeli military said it had no immediate comment.
Palestinian media also reported that the Israeli forces arrested a local official of the militant group Islamic Jihad in Jenin.
Tensions have soared in the West Bank, where the Israeli military has been conducting near-nightly arrest raids since last spring, after a wave of Palestinian attacks against Israelis that killed 19 people. Another 10 Israelis were killed in a second string of attacks later last year.
Israel says the raids are meant to dismantle militant networks and thwart future attacks. The Palestinians see them as further entrenchment of Israel’s open-ended, 55-year occupation of lands they seek for their future state.
Read more: Over 90 nations express ‘deep concern’ at Israeli punitive measure against Palestinians
Thursday’s deaths put at 17 the number of Palestinians killed by the Israeli military in the West Bank since the beginning of 2023.
Nearly 150 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank and east Jerusalem in 2022, according to figures by the Israeli rights group B’Tselem, making it the deadliest year since 2004.
Israel says most of the dead were militants. But Palestinian stone-throwers, youths protesting the incursions and others not involved in confrontations also have been killed.
Yemen rebels, Saudis in back-channel talks to maintain truce
Amid Yemen’s longest-ever pause in fighting — more than nine months — Saudi Arabia and its rival, the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels, have revived back-channel talks, hoping to strengthen the informal cease-fire and lay out a path for a negotiated end to the long civil war, according to Yemeni, Saudi and U.N. officials.
The quiet is fragile, with no formal cease-fire in place since a U.N.-brokered truce ended in October. It has been shaken by Houthi attacks on oil facilities and fiery rhetoric from Yemen's internationally recognized government, allied with Saudi Arabia, which complains it has so far been left out of the talks. Lack of progress could lead to a breakdown and a renewal of all-out fighting.
But all sides appear to be looking for a solution after eight years of a war that has killed more than 150,000 people, fragmented Yemen and driven the Arab world’s poorest country into collapse and near starvation in one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. Saudi Arabia restarted indirect exchanges with the Houthis in September, when it became clear the U.N.-brokered truce wouldn’t be renewed. Oman has been acting as intermediary.
“It’s an opportunity to end the war,” a U.N. official said, “if they negotiate in good faith and the talks include other Yemeni actors.” Like other officials, the U.N. official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the fragility of the talks.
Read more: Yemen official says Houthi rebel missile hits city, kills 14
A Saudi diplomat said his country has asked China and Russia to exert pressure on Iran and the Houthis to avoid escalations. Iran, which has been regularly briefed on the talks by the Houthis and the Omanis, has so far supported the undeclared truce, the diplomat said.
Yemen’s war began when the Houthis descended from their strongholds in northern Yemen and seized the capital of Sanaa in 2014, forcing the internationally recognized government to flee to the south then into exile in Saudi Arabia.
Saudi Arabia entered the war in 2015, heading a military collation with the United Arab Emirates and other Arab nations. The coalition, which was supported by the United States, carried out a destructive bombardment campaign and backs government forces and militias in the south. The conflict became a proxy war between regional foes Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Neither side has made territorial gains for years. The Houthis maintain their grip over the north, Sanaa, and much of the heavily populated west. The government and militias hold the south and east, including the key central areas with most of Yemen’s oil reserves.
The war has bled beyond Yemen’s borders, with the Houthis attacking Saudi Arabia and the UAE with ballistic missiles and explosive-laden drones. The rebels also attacked vessels in the Red Sea. They used weapons from the stockpiles they seized in Sanaa and weapons supplied by Iran, according to independent and U.N. experts and Western nations.
Saudi Arabia and the Houthis have held indirect negotiations in the past, mainly for prisoner swaps or sporadic cease-fires.
Read more: Dhaka welcomes latest peace move in conflict-torn Yemen
The most ambitious talks, in 2019, helped stop a government’s advance on the Houthi-held port of Hodeida on the Red Sea. But Saudi officials accused the rebels of using an undeclared truce to make territorial gains and advance on the prized, government-held city of Marib. A monthslong battle for Marib ensued, in which the Houthis suffered huge casualties and were eventually repelled in late 2021.
The U.N. brokered a more formal truce that began in April 2022 and was extended twice. It ran out in October. Houthi attacks on oil facilities in government-controlled areas have been the most significant disruption in recent months — but so far, the warring sides have not resumed full-fledged fighting.
“An escalation would be costly on all fronts,” a Yemeni government official said. Still, “all are building up for the next round (of war) if U.N. efforts and the Saudi-Houthi talks collapse.”
One problem is that past attempts at resolution have been hampered by the conflicting interests of the powers involved in the war — Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Iran, said Abdel-Bari Taher, a Yemeni commentator and former Journalists' Union head.
“These talks won’t lead to concrete conclusions if they don’t include all Yemeni parties in the process,” Taher said.
The Houthis’ chief negotiator, Mohammed Abdul-Salam, said visits to Sanaa by Omani officials show the Houthis’ seriousness. The most recent visit ended Sunday.
“There is give and take with other parties,” he said, in an apparent reference to Saudi Arabia.
The kingdom has developed a phased roadmap for a settlement, which has been backed by the U.S. and the United Nations, said the U.N. official. In it, the coalition makes a number of key promises, including to further reopen the airport in Sanaa and ease a blockade on Hodeida, the official said.
The Houthis demand the coalition pay salaries of all state employees — including the military — from oil and gas revenues, as well as open all airports and ports under Houthi control. A Houthi official involved in the deliberations said the Saudis had promised to pay the salaries.
The Saudi diplomat, however, said paying military salaries is conditioned on the Houthis accepting security guarantees, including a buffer zone with Houthi-held areas along the Yemeni-Saudi border. The Houthis also should lift their blockade on Taiz, Yemen's third largest city, he said.
The Saudis also want the Houthis to commit to joining official talks with other Yemeni stakeholders, the diplomat said.
The Houthi official said his side has not accepted parts of the Saudi proposal, particularly the security guarantees, and refuses the resumption of oil exports from government-held areas without paying the salaries. The Houthis proposed a distribution of oil revenues according to a pre-war budget, the official said. That means Houthi-held areas receive up to 80% of the revenues since they are the most populated, according to the official.
The Saudi diplomat said both sides were working with Omani officials to develop the proposal to be “more satisfactory for all sides,” including other Yemeni parties.
All of this has left the internationally recognized government without a voice, a Yemeni government official said. He said the government’s presidential council worries Saudi Arabia “might give unacceptable concessions” to reach a deal.
But the Yemen anti-Houthi alliance remains riven with internal divisions so there is little room to maneuver.
“We have no option but to wait and see the conclusion of these negotiations,” the official said.
Over 90 nations express ‘deep concern’ at Israeli punitive measure against Palestinians
More than 90 countries have expressed “deep concern” at Israel’s punitive measures against the Palestinian people, leadership and civil society following a U.N. request for an advisory opinion by the International Court of Justice on the legality of Israeli policies in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem.
In a statement released Monday by the Palestinians, the signatories called for a reversal of the Israeli measures, saying regardless of their position on the General Assembly’s resolution, “we reject punitive measures in response to a request for an advisory opinion by the International Court of Justice.”
The 193-member General Assembly voted 87-26 with 53 abstentions on Dec. 30 in favor of the resolution which was promoted by the Palestinians and opposed vehemently by Israel. Even though rulings by the International Court of Justice are not legally binding, they can be influential on world opinion.
Israel’s new hard-line government responded on Jan. 6, approving steps to penalize the Palestinians in retaliation. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a meeting of his Cabinet two days later that the measures against the Palestinians were aimed at what he called “an extreme anti-Israel” step at the United Nations.
Read more: Thousands of Israelis rally against Netanyahu government
The government’s Security Cabinet decided to withhold $39 million from the Palestinian Authority and transferring the funds instead to a compensation program for the families of Israeli victims of Palestinian militant attacks.
It also decided to deduct the amount of revenue Israel typically transfers to the cash-strapped Palestinian Authority by a sum equal to the amount paid last year to families of Palestinian prisoners and those killed in the conflict, including militants implicated in attacks against Israelis. The Palestinian leadership describes the payments as necessary social welfare, while Israel says the so-called Martyrs’ Fund incentivizes violence.
The Security Cabinet also targeted Palestinian officials directly, saying it would deny benefits to “VIPs who are leading the political and legal war against Israel.” The first Palestinian affected was Foreign Minister Riad Malki who said in a statement on Jan. 8 that he was returning from the Brazilian president’s inauguration when he was informed that Israel rescinded his VIP travel permit, which allows top Palestinian officials to travel more easily in and out of the occupied West Bank than ordinary Palestinians.
The statement released Monday was signed by representatives of Arab nations and the 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation and 37 other countries — 27 of them from Europe, including Germany, France and Italy, as well as Japan, South Korea, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa.
Read more: Palestinians say Israeli troops kill man in West Bank
Palestinian U.N. Ambassador Riyad Mansour welcomed the statement of support, telling The Associated Press that “we exercised our democratic rights to go to the General Assembly in a peaceful way, a legal way, and put a question to the ICJ to seek an advisory opinion.”
“What is amazing about that statement,” he said, is that it was signed by some countries that abstained or voted against the resolution referring the question to the court.
“But to punish people for going to the General Assembly in an adoption of a resolution is something else,” Mansour said. “That’s why they stood with us and opposed this policy of the Israeli government, and they are demanding a reversal of this decision.”
He predicted more countries will support the statement when the Security Council holds its monthly meeting on the Middle East focusing on the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict on Jan. 18.
Thousands of Israelis rally against Netanyahu government
Tens of thousands of Israelis gathered in central Tel Aviv on Saturday night to protest plans by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's new government to overhaul the legal system and weaken the Supreme Court — a step that critics say will destroy the country's democratic system of checks and balances.
The protest presented an early challenge to Netanyahu and his ultranationalist national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, who has ordered police to take tough action if protesters block roads or display Palestinian flags.
Read more: Palestinian man succumbs to wounds in Israeli West Bank raid
Israeli media, citing police, said the crowd at Tel Aviv's Habima Square swelled to at least 80,000 people, despite cool, rainy weather. Protesters, many covered by umbrellas, held Israeli flags and signs saying “Criminal Government," “The End of Democracy” and other slogans.
“They are trying to destroy the checks and balances of the Israeli democracy. This will not work,” said Asaf Steinberg, a protester from the Tel Aviv suburb of Herzliya. “And we will fight until the very last minute to save the Israeli democracy.”
No major unrest was reported, though Israeli media said small crowds scuffled with police as they tried to block a Tel Aviv highway.
Netanyahu, who is on trial for corruption charges, has made overhauling the country’s legal system a centerpiece of his agenda.
In office for just over two weeks, his government, which is comprised by ultra-Orthodox and far-right nationalist parties, has launched proposals to weaken the Supreme Court by giving parliament the power to overturn court decisions with a simple majority vote. It also wants to give parliament control over the appointment of judges and reduce the independence of legal advisers.
Read more: Israel's outgoing army chief rebukes far-right government
Netanyahu's justice minister says unelected judges have too much power. But opponents to the plans say the proposed changes will rob the judiciary of its independence and undermine Israeli democracy. Israeli opposition leaders, former attorney generals and the president of Israel's Supreme Court have all spoken out against the plan.
The legal changes could help Netanyahu, who is on trial for corruption, evade conviction, or even make his trial disappear entirely. Since being indicted in 2019, Netanyahu has said the justice system is biased against him.
Police beefed up their presence ahead of the march. Israeli media quoted police as saying officers had been instructed to be “very sensitive” and allow the protest to proceed peacefully. But they also vowed a tough response to any vandalism or violent behavior.
Smaller protests also took place in the cities of Jerusalem and Haifa.
Palestinian man succumbs to wounds in Israeli West Bank raid
Palestinian medics said a man died early Saturday after he was critically wounded by Israeli gunfire during a military raid in the occupied West Bank nearly two weeks earlier.
Yazan al-Jaabari, 19, died from wounds he sustained on Jan. 2, Ibn Sina hospital in the southern town of Jenin said.
Al-Jaabari was injured when Israeli troops stormed Kafr Dan village to demolish the homes of two Palestinian gunmen who killed an Israeli soldier during a firefight in September. Two Palestinians, including a gunman, were killed during confrontations with Israeli forces that day.
The death of al-Jaabari raises to 10 the number of Palestinians killed during Israeli raids in the West Bank since the beginning of the year.
Read more: Palestinian medics say death toll from Israeli airstrikes in Gaza City climbs to 33, deadliest attack in recent fighting
Israel ramped up its military raids last spring after a spate of Palestinian attacks against Israelis killed 19 people. Israel says the operations are meant to dismantle militant networks and thwart future attacks. The Palestinians see them as further entrenchment of Israel’s 55-year, open-ended occupation of land they seek for their future state.
The raids sharply escalated tensions and helped fuel another wave of Palestinian attacks in the fall that killed 10 Israelis. Nearly 150 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank and east Jerusalem in 2022, Israeli rights group B’Tselem reported, making last year the deadliest since 2004.
Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 Mideast war, along with the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, territories the Palestinians want for their future independent state. Israel has since settled 500,000 people in about 130 settlements across the West Bank, which the Palestinians and much of the international community view as an obstacle to peace.
Read more: Palestinian officials say house fire in Gaza Strip kills 21
Israeli military kills 3 Palestinians during raids in occupied West Bank
The Israeli military shot and killed three Palestinians during arrest raids in the occupied West Bank on Thursday, Palestinian health officials said, the latest bloodshed in months of rising violence between Israelis and Palestinians.
The military, which has been carrying out near-nightly raids in the territory since early last year, said soldiers who entered the Qalandia refugee camp before dawn were bombarded by rocks and cement blocks. In response, the military said troops opened fire at Palestinians throwing objects from rooftops. The Palestinian Health Ministry identified the man killed as Samir Aslan, 41.
Aslan's sister, Noura Aslan, said Israeli security forces broke into their house at 2:30 a.m. to arrest his 18-year-old son, Ramzi. As Ramzi was being hauled away, his father sprinted to the rooftop to see what was happening, she said. Within moments, an Israeli sniper shot him in the back.
Aslan's wife called an ambulance, but Noura said the army initially prevented medics from reaching the house. As Aslan was bleeding, his family dragged his body down the stairs and called for help. An ambulance picked him up some 20 minutes later, Noura said.
Read more: 4 Palestinians killed in flare-up as Israel counts votes
The Israeli army also raided the northern occupied West Bank on Thursday, entering the village of Qabatiya south of the flash point city of Jenin and surrounding a house in the town. The Palestinian Health Ministry reported that Israeli forces fatally shot 25-year-old Habib Kamil and 18-year-old Abdel Hadi Nazal.
The Israeli army said security forces entered Qabatiya to arrest Muhammad Alauna, a Palestinian suspected of planning militant attacks. The army said soldiers shot at a number of Palestinians during the raid, including a man who tried to flee the scene with Alauna, a gunman who fired at the forces from inside his car as well as a group of Palestinians throwing rocks at Israeli troops. It was not immediately clear what Kamil was doing when he was shot.
The deaths on Thursday bring the total number of Palestinians killed in the West Bank this year to nine, including two Palestinians killed Wednesday in separate incidents in the West Bank. One was killed during an Israeli military arrest raid in the territory’s north and another after stabbing and wounding an Israeli man in a southern settlement.
Israel ramped up its military raids last spring, after a spate of Palestinian attacks against Israelis killed 19 people. Israel says the operations are meant to dismantle militant networks and thwart future attacks. The Palestinians see them as further entrenchment of Israel's 55-year, open-ended occupation of land they seek for their future state.
The raids sharply escalated tensions and helped fuel another wave of Palestinian attacks in the fall that killed 10 Israelis. Nearly 150 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank and east Jerusalem in 2022, Israeli rights group B'Tselem reported, making last year the deadliest since 2004.
The heightened violence comes as Israel's new ultranationalist and ultra-Orthodox government — it's most right-wing ever — is charting its legislative agenda, one that is expected to take a tough line against the Palestinians and drive up settlement construction in the West Bank.
Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 Mideast war, along with the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, territories the Palestinians want for their future independent state. Israel has since settled 500,000 people in about 130 settlements across the West Bank, which the Palestinians and much of the international community view as an obstacle to peace.
Iran sentences Belgian aid worker to prison, lashes
Iran has sentenced a Belgian aid worker to a lengthy prison term and 74 lashes after convicting him of espionage in a closed-door trial, state media reported Tuesday.
The website of Iran’s judiciary said a Revolutionary Court sentenced 41-year-old Olivier Vandecasteele to 12.5 years in prison for espionage, 12.5 years for collaboration with hostile governments and 12.5 years for money laundering. He was also fined $1 million and sentenced to 2.5 years for currency smuggling.
Under Iranian law, Vandecasteele would be eligible for release after 12.5 years. The judiciary website said the verdicts can be appealed.
Iran has detained a number of foreigners and dual nationals over the years, accusing them of espionage or other state security offenses and sentencing them after secretive trials in which rights groups say they are denied due process.
Critics accuse Iran of using such prisoners as bargaining chips with the West, something Iranian officials deny. Vandecasteele's conviction comes after an Iranian diplomat in Belgium received a 20-year prison sentence in 2021 over masterminding a thwarted bomb attack against an exiled Iranian opposition group in France.
Iran has not released any details about the charges against Vandecasteele. It is unclear if they are related to anti-government protests that have convulsed Iran for months or a long-running shadow war with Israel and the U.S. marked by covert attacks on Iran's disputed nuclear program.
The nationwide protests began after the death in police custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who was detained for allegedly violating Iran's strict Islamic dress code. Rallying under the slogan “Women, life, freedom,” the protesters say they are fed up with decades of social and political repression. Iran has blamed the protests on foreign powers, without providing evidence.
Vandecasteele's family said last month that he has been detained in an Iranian prison for months and has been on a hunger strike. They said he was deprived of access to a lawyer of his choice and is suffering from serious health problems.
Belgium has urged its nationals to leave Iran, warning that they face the risk of arbitrary arrest or unfair trial.
“Iran has provided no official information regarding the charges against Olivier Vandecasteele or his trial,” Belgium's Foreign Minister Hadja Lahbib said in a statement. “We will summon the Iranian ambassador today, given the information that is circulating in the press.”
“Belgium continues to condemn this arbitrary detention and is doing everything possible to put an end to it and to improve the conditions of his detention,” she said.
The anti-government protests, which have continued for nearly four months with no sign of ending, are one of the biggest challenges to the Islamic Republic since the 1979 revolution that brought it to power.
At least 520 protesters have been killed and more than 19,300 people have been arrested, according to Human Rights Activists in Iran, a group that has been monitoring the unrest. Iranian authorities have not provided official figures on deaths or arrests.
Iran has executed four people after convicting them of charges linked to the protests, including attacks on security forces. They were convicted in Revolutionary Courts, which do not allow those on trial to pick their own lawyers or see the evidence against them.
London-based Amnesty International has said such trials bear “no resemblance to a meaningful judicial proceeding."
Norway and Denmark summoned Iranian ambassadors this week to protest the executions and Iran's handling of the demonstrations.
"What is happening in Iran is completely unacceptable and must stop," Norway’s Foreign Minister Anniken Huitfeldt said. “We have strongly condemned the executions. ... We have called on Iran to end the use of the death penalty and to respect human rights.”
In Denmark, Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen called the executions “completely unacceptable" and said the European Union should impose additional sanctions on Iran.
Separately on Tuesday, the state-run IRNA news agency said Iran’s intelligence ministry arrested six teams of operatives linked to Mossad, Israel's chief intelligence and secret-service agency.
Without providing evidence, the report said the spy teams planned to assassinate an unnamed high-ranking military official and had carried out several sabotage operations in the country’s big cities.
The report also said security forces identified 23 alleged members of these teams and had arrested 13 of them who were in the country.