Yemen's Iran-backed Huthi rebels have emerged bruised but defiant from a blistering US bombing campaign, cementing their role as one of the Middle East's most powerful non-state actors after a truce with Washington.
US President Donald Trump said the rebels had "capitulated" after the intense, seven-week campaign that came in response to Huthi threats to renew attacks on Red Sea shipping over Israel's blockade on Gaza.
Paramilitary drone strikes targeting Sudan's wartime capital have sought to shatter the regular army's sense of security and open a dangerous new chapter in the war, experts say.
Since April 2023, the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) group has been at war with the army, which has lately recaptured some territory and dislodged the paramilitaries from the capital Khartoum.
The latter appeared to have the upper hand before Sunday, when drone strikes began blasting key infrastructure in Port Sudan, seat of the army-backed government on the Red Sea coast.
The Red Cross on Thursday denounced the human cost of the war raging in Gaza, slamming Israel's "unacceptable" full blockade on aid into the besieged and conflict-ravaged Palestinian territory.
Aid agencies have repeatedly warned of a growing humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, which they say has been exacerbated by an Israeli blockade on all aid since early March.
"It is unacceptable that humanitarian aid is not allowed into the Gaza Strip," Pierre Krahenbuhl, director general of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), told reporters in Geneva.
Lebanon said heavy Israeli strikes on the country's south on Thursday killed one person as the Israeli army said it struck Hezbollah "infrastructure", the latest raids despite a fragile ceasefire.
Israel has continued to launch regular strikes on its neighbour despite the November truce which sought to halt more than a year of hostilities with the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group including two months of full-blown war.
First responders in Gaza said Thursday that their operations were at a near standstill, more than two months into a full Israeli blockade that has left food and fuel in severe shortage.
Israel denies a humanitarian crisis is unfolding in the Gaza Strip, where it plans to expand military operations to force Hamas to free hostages held there since the Iran-backed group's unprecedented October 2023 attack.
"Seventy-five percent of our vehicles have stopped operating due to a lack of diesel fuel," the civil defence agency's spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.
The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees on Thursday decried an "assault on children" after Israel closed all six of its schools in annexed east Jerusalem, months after an Israeli ban on its activities took effect.
"Storming schools & forcing them shut is a blatant disregard of international law", UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini posted on X, describing the move as "An assault on children. An assault on education".
Dubai's Emirates Group, which includes the Middle East's biggest airline, announced on Thursday gross annual profit of $6.2 billion, its third record in three years.
The 18 percent rise in profit, based on strong customer demand, slimmed to $5.6 billion after the UAE's recently introduced corporate tax, which was applied for a full financial year for the first time.
"The Emirates Group has raised the bar to set new records for profit, revenue and cash assets," chairman Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum said in a statement.
Iraqi Mohammed Jalal lost 10 years of his life seeking asylum in Germany, without success. Instead of being granted refuge, he was sent back to the land he had fled.
He now faces the same challenges that drove him to leave the northern Kurdistan region of Iraq. More than a year has passed, and he is still without a job.
Jalal is just one of thousands of Iraqis and migrants from many other countries who have been forced out of Europe as it tightens its migration policies, driven by the rise of the extreme right.
US envoy Steve Witkoff briefed members of the UN Security Council on Wednesday about various topics, including Gaza, participants in the closed-door talks said.
The informal meeting in New York came a day after Witkoff was formally sworn in as President Donald Trump's special envoy for the Middle East.
At the swearing-in ceremony, Trump teased a "very, very big announcement" to come before his multi-nation visit to the Middle East next week, without providing details.
The Walt Disney Company announced plans Wednesday for a new theme park in the United Arab Emirates, highlighting the country's growing prominence as a global financial and entertainment hub.
The waterfront resort will be located on Abu Dhabi's Yas Island and developed in partnership with local firm Miral.
Disney stated that it aims to attract tourists from "the Middle East and Africa, India, Asia, Europe, and beyond."
The announcement comes ahead of US President Donald Trump's upcoming visit to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates next week.
