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US warns Israel to boost humanitarian aid into Gaza or risk losing weapons funding

The Biden administration has warned Israel that it must increase the amount of humanitarian aid it is allowing into Gaza within the next 30 days or it could risk losing access to U.S. weapons funding.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin warned their Israeli counterparts in a letter dated Sunday that the changes must occur. The letter, which restates U.S. policy toward humanitarian aid and arms transfers, was sent amid deteriorating conditions in northern Gaza and an Israeli airstrike on a hospital tent site in central Gaza that killed at least four people and burned others.

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Qatar's ruler says nation to vote on abandoning legislative elections after just one poll

Qatar's ruling emir said Tuesday his small, energy-rich nation will hold a referendum on ending a short-lived experiment in electing members of the country's advisory Shura Council.

Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani offered no immediate timeline for the referendum in an annual address to the Shura Council, which drafts laws, approves state budgets, debates major issues and provides advice to the ruler. The body does not have sway over matters of defense, security and the economy.

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Turkey urges 'sanctions' against Israel over Gaza bloodshed

Turkey's foreign minister on Tuesday called for sanctions against Israel, urging the international community to cut all support over the conflict in the Middle East.

"We have reached the limit of words, diplomacy and international politics.. We must start with sanctions," Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told ruling party delegates at a meeting about Palestine, adding: "Israel needs to be boycotted."

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Police officer killed and 4 wounded in shooting in central Israel

Israeli police said one officer was killed and four civilians were wounded in a shooting Tuesday on a highway in central Israel.

Police did not immediately provide the identity of the shooter, but police spokeswoman, Mirit Ben Mayor, said that it was a militant attack.

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A team of US troops supporting missile defense system arrives in Israel

A team of American troops supporting a missile defense system in Israel has arrived in the country, the U.S. military said.

A statement from Pentagon press secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder announced the team’s arrival in Israel on Monday. They’ll operate a Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense battery there to defend against ballistic missile attacks from Iran. Tehran has launched two missile attacks on Israel as the wars in Gaza and Lebanon rage.

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Qatar emir says Israel implementing 'pre-existing plans' in Lebanon, W. Bank

Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani on Tuesday accused Israel of choosing to expand the conflict in the Middle East to implement "pre-existing plans" for the occupied West Bank and Lebanon.

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Israel says to act against Iran based on 'national interest'

Israel will take into consideration the United States’s opinion but will act against an Iranian missile attack based on its own "national interests,"0 the prime minister’s office said Tuesday.

"We listen to the opinions of the United States, but we will make our final decisions based on our national interest," Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.

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Iran's Qaani shown on state TV after mystery over his fate

The head of the expeditionary arm of Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard has appeared in television footage aired Tuesday by Iranian state television.

Rumors circulated for weeks over Gen. Esmail Qaani’s status in the time since an Israeli airstrike that killed Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut in late September. But Qaani, the head of the Quds Force, was seen in a black bomber jacket, wiping away tears at an event early Tuesday morning at Tehran’s Mehrabad International Airport.

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China's FM tells Israeli counterpart 'humanitarian disasters' in Gaza must end

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Monday told his Israeli counterpart that "humanitarian disasters" in Gaza should end, state media said.

"Humanitarian disasters in Gaza should not continue and...countering violence with violence cannot truly address the legitimate concerns of all parties," Wang told Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz during a phone call, the official Xinhua news agency said.

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Iran slams US obstruction of Security Council on Gaza, Lebanon

Iran's foreign minister Abbas Araghchi slammed as "a disaster" on Monday what he called U.S. obstruction of the United Nations Security Council in relation to the wars in Lebanon and Gaza.

In a phone call with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, Araghchi welcomed efforts by China, a permanent member of the council, to "stop the warmongering and the crimes of the Zionist regime (Israel)" in Gaza and Lebanon and described the "inaction of the U.N. Security Council due to the obstruction of the United States as a disaster".

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