Live updates: Follow the latest news on Israel-Gaza
The Hamas attacks on Israel were a “failure of intelligence” and were possibly planned up to a year ago, a top US congressman said on Wednesday, following a classified briefing.
Members of Congress were briefed on the issue by State Department and intelligence officials including acting deputy secretary of state Victoria Nuland.
“We want to see this contained in Gaza. However, we're very concerned about the fidelity of our intelligence and the escalation of a conflict in the Middle East,” Republican Mike McCaul, chairman of the influential House Foreign Affairs Committee, told reporters after the classified discussion.
The death toll in Israel from the surprise Hamas attack has surpassed 1,200 and Israeli retaliatory strikes on Gaza have now killed at least 1,100, with the enclave under a strict blockade that has cut off supplies of fuel, food and water.
At least 22 US citizens are among the dead and 17 are missing, the White House said.
A Foreign Affairs Committee member told The National the panel is “working with the State Department on tracking Americans in need over in Israel” but declined to address questions about reports of Palestinian Americans struggling to leave Gaza.
Mr McCaul on Thursday called the Hamas attack a “failure of intelligence”.
“We're not quite sure how we missed it – we're not quite sure how Israel missed it,” he said.
He added that the US “knows that Egypt had warned the Israelis three days prior”, and that Hamas had planned the attack on Israel “perhaps as long as a year ago”.
Mr McCaul told reporters that Washington was concerned about regional escalation, including from Hezbollah in Lebanon and its “100,000 rockets that would overload the Iron Dome”.
That concern came as cross-border violence escalated into Lebanon, with Israeli shelling on Wednesday hitting southern towns in response to a rocket attack.
Hezbollah said it had fired precision missiles at an Israeli position in response to the killing of its members in an Israeli strike.
Congress is scrambling to respond to the Israel-Gaza war at a moment of historic chaos in the House, after Republicans last week ousted their own speaker, paralysing the congressional chamber.
Bipartisan members of Congress have nonetheless moved to shore up support for Israel despite uncertainty over their ability to act on legislation without a speaker.
Israel already receives the highest amount of US military aid.
Politicians on Tuesday introduced legislation to provide $2 billion in aid to Israel for Iron Dome resupply, which would add to the $3.3 billion already cleared.
Mr McCaul and the committee's top Democrat, Gregory Meeks, were joined by 390 of their colleagues in introducing a bipartisan resolution standing with Israel “as it defends itself against the barbaric war launched by Hamas and other terrorists and condemning Hamas’s brutal war against Israel”.
That resolution includes claims that “since October 7, 2023, Hamas is directly responsible for the deaths of hundreds of Palestinians, and the expansion of this war to other fronts by Hezbollah, Iran or others would create an even more devastating regional catastrophe”.
The chaos in the region has inspired both pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian demonstrations across the US.
The US historically has maintained a strong pro-Israel stance, avoiding harshly condemning its illegal occupation of Palestinian territories and playing down human rights abuses against Palestinians.
Some members of Congress, though, have moved the needle on that legacy.
Democrat Andre Carson said in a Tuesday statement that the latest escalation “painfully demonstrates the urgent need for just and lasting peace”.
“To achieve this, the US must rededicate ourselves and our resources to a real two-state solution, and call for the end of Israel's unfair, two-tiered rule over the Palestinian people.”
Mr Meeks told reporters that Washington “must keep innocent Palestinians in mind … they want nothing to do with Hamas”.
“Hamas is their enemy, too,” he said.
Israel announced a complete siege on densely populated Gaza this week – including blocking deliveries of food, water, electricity and fuel to residents, half of them children, while also engaging in an intense bombardment of the region and warning of a ground operation. On Wednesday, Gaza's power supply had started to run out.
Collective punishment is a war crime banned by the Geneva Conventions.
In response to the small but growing amount of support among Americans for the Palestinian cause as Gaza faces an escalating siege, Mr McCaul told reporters he “worries about narrative changing”.
“As we see, Israel going into Gaza to root out the terrorists … that the narrative is going to flip to that Israel is somehow the bully here and Hamas the victim,” he said.
He equated criticism of Israel to “a rise in anti-Semitism” and warned about potential “nay” votes on the bipartisan resolution.
“Watch who votes no on it – that will tell you who stands with whom,” said Mr McCaul.
Israel-Gaza war latest – in pictures
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
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U19 World Cup in South Africa
Group A: India, Japan, New Zealand, Sri Lanka
Group B: Australia, England, Nigeria, West Indies
Group C: Bangladesh, Pakistan, Scotland, Zimbabwe
Group D: Afghanistan, Canada, South Africa, UAE
UAE fixtures
Saturday, January 18, v Canada
Wednesday, January 22, v Afghanistan
Saturday, January 25, v South Africa
UAE squad
Aryan Lakra (captain), Vriitya Aravind, Deshan Chethyia, Mohammed Farazuddin, Jonathan Figy, Osama Hassan, Karthik Meiyappan, Rishabh Mukherjee, Ali Naseer, Wasi Shah, Alishan Sharafu, Sanchit Sharma, Kai Smith, Akasha Tahir, Ansh Tandon
At a glance
Fixtures All matches start at 9.30am, at ICC Academy, Dubai. Admission is free
Thursday UAE v Ireland; Saturday UAE v Ireland; Jan 21 UAE v Scotland; Jan 23 UAE v Scotland
UAE squad Rohan Mustafa (c), Ashfaq Ahmed, Ghulam Shabber, Rameez Shahzad, Mohammed Boota, Mohammed Usman, Adnan Mufti, Shaiman Anwar, Ahmed Raza, Imran Haider, Qadeer Ahmed, Mohammed Naveed, Amir Hayat, Zahoor Khan
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Director: Saeed Roustaee
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Rating: 4/5
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More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
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Name: Qyubic
Started: October 2023
Founder: Namrata Raina
Based: Dubai
Sector: E-commerce
Current number of staff: 10
Investment stage: Pre-seed
Initial investment: Undisclosed
Getting there
The flights
Emirates and Etihad fly to Johannesburg or Cape Town daily. Flights cost from about Dh3,325, with a flying time of 8hours and 15 minutes. From there, fly South African Airlines or Air Namibia to Namibia’s Windhoek Hosea Kutako International Airport, for about Dh850. Flying time is 2 hours.
The stay
Wilderness Little Kulala offers stays from £460 (Dh2,135) per person, per night. It is one of seven Wilderness Safari lodges in Namibia; www.wilderness-safaris.com.
Skeleton Coast Safaris’ four-day adventure involves joining a very small group in a private plane, flying to some of the remotest areas in the world, with each night spent at a different camp. It costs from US$8,335.30 (Dh30,611); www.skeletoncoastsafaris.com
Three ways to boost your credit score
Marwan Lutfi says the core fundamentals that drive better payment behaviour and can improve your credit score are:
1. Make sure you make your payments on time;
2. Limit the number of products you borrow on: the more loans and credit cards you have, the more it will affect your credit score;
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Engine: Duel electric motors
Power: 659hp
Torque: 1075Nm
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Price: On request
City's slump
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D - C Palace, 2-2
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WHAT IS A BLACK HOLE?
1. Black holes are objects whose gravity is so strong not even light can escape their pull
2. They can be created when massive stars collapse under their own weight
3. Large black holes can also be formed when smaller ones collide and merge
4. The biggest black holes lurk at the centre of many galaxies, including our own
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
What are NFTs?
Are non-fungible tokens a currency, asset, or a licensing instrument? Arnab Das, global market strategist EMEA at Invesco, says they are mix of all of three.
You can buy, hold and use NFTs just like US dollars and Bitcoins. “They can appreciate in value and even produce cash flows.”
However, while money is fungible, NFTs are not. “One Bitcoin, dollar, euro or dirham is largely indistinguishable from the next. Nothing ties a dollar bill to a particular owner, for example. Nor does it tie you to to any goods, services or assets you bought with that currency. In contrast, NFTs confer specific ownership,” Mr Das says.
This makes NFTs closer to a piece of intellectual property such as a work of art or licence, as you can claim royalties or profit by exchanging it at a higher value later, Mr Das says. “They could provide a sustainable income stream.”
This income will depend on future demand and use, which makes NFTs difficult to value. “However, there is a credible use case for many forms of intellectual property, notably art, songs, videos,” Mr Das says.
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Investment stage: Series A
Investors: Core42
Current number of staff: 47
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Ferrari 12Cilindri specs
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Power: 819hp
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Price: From Dh1,700,000
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- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
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Yemen's Bahais and the charges they often face
The Baha'i faith was made known in Yemen in the 19th century, first introduced by an Iranian man named Ali Muhammad Al Shirazi, considered the Herald of the Baha'i faith in 1844.
The Baha'i faith has had a growing number of followers in recent years despite persecution in Yemen and Iran.
Today, some 2,000 Baha'is reside in Yemen, according to Insaf.
"The 24 defendants represented by the House of Justice, which has intelligence outfits from the uS and the UK working to carry out an espionage scheme in Yemen under the guise of religion.. aimed to impant and found the Bahai sect on Yemeni soil by bringing foreign Bahais from abroad and homing them in Yemen," the charge sheet said.
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Liverpool 4-1 Shrewsbury
Liverpool
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Founder: Ahmed Wadi
Launched: 2016
Employees: 76
Financing stage: Series A ($4 million)
Investors: Partech, Sawari Ventures, 500 Startups, Dubai Angel Investors, Phoenician Fund
The specs
BMW M8 Competition Coupe
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Power 625hp at 6,000rpm
Torque 750Nm from 1,800-5,800rpm
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Acceleration 0-100kph in 3.2 sec
Top speed 305kph
Fuel economy, combined 10.6L / 100km
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About Okadoc
Date started: Okadoc, 2018
Founder/CEO: Fodhil Benturquia
Based: Dubai, UAE
Sector: Healthcare
Size: (employees/revenue) 40 staff; undisclosed revenues recording “double-digit” monthly growth
Funding stage: Series B fundraising round to conclude in February
Investors: Undisclosed
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Joe Root (captain), Moeen Ali, Jimmy Anderson, Jofra Archer, Jonny Bairstow, Stuart Broad, Rory Burns, Jos Buttler, Sam Curran, Joe Denly, Jason Roy, Ben Stokes, Olly Stone, Chris Woakes.
MATCH INFO
New Zealand 176-8 (20 ovs)
England 155 (19.5 ovs)
New Zealand win by 21 runs
