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Sudan names new military chief for conflict-hit Blue Nile

Sudan on Monday named a new military commander for troubled Blue Nile state, where recent bitter ethnic clashes over land have left at least 200 people dead and sparked angry demonstrations.

The new chief comes a day after eyewitnesses reported that crowds of thousands protested in front of army headquarters in the state capital Damazin, accusing the government of failing to protect them, with the local university suspending work.

Blue Nile is awash with guns and is still struggling to rebuild after decades of civil war, with over 300 people killed in recent months: this photograph from August shows the aftermath of an attack

Israeli TikTok star hopes to get out the youth vote

Ahead of Israel's elections, a 21-year-old TikTok star has tapped into the economic frustrations of the country's disaffected youth, hoping to channel her social media following into political power.

After her short videos clocked up hundreds of thousands of views, Hadar Muchtar has taken to the streets to campaign for her movement, Youth on Fire, or "Tzeirim Boarim" in Hebrew, ahead of the November 1 polls.

On a warm autumn evening in Jerusalem's central Mahane Yehuda market, Muchtar clutched a microphone and called out: "We don't have enough money to live here!"

Israeli social media star and leader of the Youth on Fire movement Hadar Muchtar

Will Bibi make a comeback in Israel's vote next week?

A week before Israel's fifth general election in less than four years, one question dominates: will the hawkish ex-prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu return to power?

Polls show he would likely need heavy backing from the country's rising extreme-right to form a government -- a scenario which, one expert warned, would spell "disaster" for Israel's democracy.

Netanyahu served as premier for a total of 15 years, a record in Israel's 74-year history, before he was ousted in June 2021 by a motley alliance of ideologically divided parties united only by their opposition to him.

Two girls pose for a selfie photo before a vehicle showing Israel's former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, ahead of November 1 general elections

Zara Israel faces boycott after boss linked to extreme-right

Spanish fashion giant Zara is facing boycott calls in Israel after the company's local franchise head hosted extreme-right leader Itamar Ben-Gvir for a campaign event.

Recent opinion polls suggest Ben-Gvir has been gaining strength ahead of the November 1 election, which could see his nationalist alliance emerge as the third-largest bloc in parliament.

His meeting with Joey Schwebel, chair of Zara's Israel franchisee Trimera, sparked a backlash after local media reported it last week, with some people burning Zara items and pushing for a boycott.

Itamar Ben-Gvir regularly turns up at hotspots in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and has become infamous for his anti-Arab rhetoric

Lebanon lawmakers fail to name president for fourth time

Lebanon's parliament failed Monday for a fourth time to elect a successor to President Michel Aoun, with lawmakers divided over a candidate opposed by the powerful Hezbollah movement.

Already governed by a caretaker cabinet, crisis-hit Lebanon is hurtling towards an imminent power vacuum, with just days before the current president's term finishes at the end of the month.

Parliament speaker Nabih Berri called for another vote on Thursday in the hope of overcoming long-running arguments.

Lebanon's parliament: lawmakers failed on Thursday to elect a president for a fourth time, with a week to go before the current president's term ends

HRW reports LGBTQ jail beatings before Qatar World Cup

Police in Qatar have arbitrarily detained and abused members of the LGBTQ community ahead of the World Cup next month, Human Rights Watch said in a report released on Monday.

The Gulf state, where homosexuality is illegal, strongly denied that anyone has been detained because of their sexual orientation and condemned the rights group's reporting.

HRW said it had "documented six cases of severe and repeated beatings and five cases of sexual harassment in police custody between 2019 and 2022".

The most recent case was in September, the US-based rights group said.

Qatar outlaws sex outside marriage and homosexual sex, which can be punished by up to seven years in prison

Moroccan rapper ElGrande Toto says sorry for cannabis comments

Star Moroccan rapper ElGrande Toto on Sunday apologised for causing offence through recent public statements in which he acknowledged using cannabis.

His original comments had sparked an outcry in the country.

"I offer my apologies to anyone offended by my words, starting with the authorities and my public," ElGrande Toto, whose real name is Taha Fahssi, told a packed press conference.

"We are not bad people. We rap, and rap isn't bad.

ElGrande Toto: "Rap is a particular language -- perhaps I did not make good use of it at the right time"

Israel to spend millions on Einstein museum

The Israeli government decided on Sunday to allocate millions of dollars for a museum to house the world's largest collection of Albert Einstein documents, the Hebrew University said.

It will be built on the university's Givat Ram campus in Jerusalem, with the government committing to approximately $6 million and the university raising another $12 million.

Einstein, one of the founding fathers of the Hebrew University, was a non-resident governor of the institution.

Lauded as one of the greatest theoretical physicists of all time, Einstein died in 1955 aged 76.

In this file photo from March 6, 2019, a woman checks Albert Einstein manuscripts at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem

Europe faces long-term pain from energy crisis: Shell CEO

Europe faces painful "industrial rationalisation" due to its energy crisis that risks political trouble, the head of Shell warned Sunday, as the oil giant joined a natural gas project in Qatar.

Shell chief executive Ben van Beurden agreed a deal for a 9.3 percent stake in Qatar Energy's North Field South project, that will play a major role in the Gulf state's effort to increase liquefied natural gas (LNG) production by 50 percent in the next five years.

Qatar's Minister of State for Energy Affairs and President and CEO of QatarEnergy Saad Sherida al-Kaabi (R) and Shell’s CEO Ben van Beurden hold a signing ceremony at QatarEnergy headquarters in Doha, on October 23

Palestinian militant killed in explosion in Nablus

A Palestinian militant was killed Sunday in an explosion in the occupied West Bank, police said, with Israel staying silent on allegations from fighters that it was behind his assassination.

Tamer al-Kilani was killed overnight in the Old City of Nablus in the northern West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry said.

A Palestinian police inspector told AFP that Kilani was killed in an explosion in Nablus, where the Lions' Den militant group has emerged in recent months.

Palestinians gather around a motorcycle, that was allegedly laden with explosives that killed Tamer al-Kilani