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Israel kills nine people in southern Lebanon despite ‘ceasefire’

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  Israeli attacks and threats on southern Lebanon escalate, as Lebanese government calls out Israel’s ceasefire violations. Israel’s attacks on southern Lebanon have killed at least nine people, according to the country’s National News Agency (NNA), despite a three-week extension to the United States-mediated “ceasefire” announced last week. In the municipality of Jebchit, three people were killed and seven wounded in an attack that destroyed a residential building. In the municipality of Toul, four people were killed and six wounded. While in the municipality of Harouf, two people were killed, and the attack also destroyed a house. Israeli forces have intensified their attacks in southern Lebanon over recent days, with artillery shelling reported in the towns of Zawtar al-Sharqiyah, Yohmor al-Shaqif, and Bayt al-Sayyad. In the past 24 hours alone, Israeli air attacks have killed more than 20 people, including two families, two Lebanese army soldiers, and three paramedics. More tha...
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Soaring fuel prices in Pakistan threaten economic and political crises

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  A huge increase in Pakistan’s fuel import bill from $300 to $800 billion is putting more pressure on the economy. The most serious fuel price shock to hit Pakistan in more than half a century threatens to unleash a flood of cascading crises that could batter all aspects of the economy and undermine the government of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif. Earlier this week, Sharif said Pakistan’s oil import bill had surged from $300 million before the conflict to $800 million now, which he said erased all the economic progress the country had made over the past two years. Analysts say the knock-on effects will be increasingly severe, impacting everything from agriculture and transport to the price of food and basic goods, worsening the plight of families already facing a cost-of-living crisis. “Conventional economics tells us that oil price hikes trigger a chain reaction across the economy,” economist Kamran Butt  told  the Dawn newspaper. “They increase transportation costs, pu...
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Federal court won't rehear Trump's appeal of E. Jean Carroll's $83 million defamation verdict against him

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  A federal appeals court Wednesday shot down President Donald Trump's request to rehear his appeal of  the $83 million defamation case  brought by writer E. Jean Carroll. In a split vote, a majority of the 12-member 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied Trump’s motion for a hearing by the full bench of judges, or an “en banc” hearing. The decision opens the way for Trump to ask the Supreme Court to hear his argument of presidential immunity. A federal jury decided in 2024 that Trump defamed Carroll when he disputed her accusation that he sexually abused her in a dressing room in the 1990s. A three-judge panel of the 2nd Circuit  first rejected an appeal  from Trump based on presidential immunity in September. In his second appeal, Trump's lawyers sought to replace the defendant with the United States and make another claim of presidential immunity, which the appeals court dismissed Wednesday. "The fact of the matter is that no other defendant would be permit...
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Bank of England holds rates as Iran war sends oil prices to new highs

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The Bank joins the Fed and Bank of Japan in sitting tight, as war in the Middle East drives oil prices higher and blows the spring rate-cut playbook apart. The Bank of England has held interest rates at 3.75% as the war in Iran and Tehran's effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz send oil prices to their highest level in four years. The decision on Thursday was widely expected, following the US Federal Reserve's move the day before to leave rates unchanged for the third consecutive meeting and a similar hold by Japan's central bank on Tuesday. Brent crude, the international benchmark, briefly surged above $126 (€108) a barrel during Thursday's session — its highest since the aftermath of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine — as traders bet the Strait of Hormuz will remain shut for the long term. Around a fifth of the world's crude passes through the waterway in peacetime. Before the war began on 28 February, financial markets had expected the Bank of Engla...
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Civilians or Hezbollah: Who did Israel hit on Lebanon’s ‘Black Wednesday’?

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  Israel says it targeted Hezbollah, but experts say the evidence proves otherwise. Beirut, Lebanon –  On April 8, Ahmad Hamdi, 22, was sitting on his couch at home in Beirut’s Tallet el Khayat neighbourhood, hours after Israel had launched more than  100 attacks in under 10 minutes  across Lebanon. Then he heard the “indescribable sound” of a rocket. Ahmad jumped off the couch as the glass in his building shattered around him before more rockets hit. Clouds of dust obscured the view from his apartment on the fourth floor. When they dispersed, he saw the building directly facing his had been reduced to a pile of rubble. He looked back at the couch he had been sitting on. At some point between the second and fourth explosion, shards of shrapnel had hit the couch exactly where his chest had been when the first rocket struck. “When you think of Tallet el Khayat, you feel it is safe and secure,” Ahmad told Al Jazeera. “No one would expect something like that would happen...
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