Israel's ban on Doctors Without Borders' humanitarian operation in Gaza spells deeper catastrophe for the Palestinian territory's people, the head of the medical charity told AFP on Monday.

Israel announced on Sunday that it was terminating all the activities in Gaza and the West Bank by the organisation, known by its French acronym MSF, after it failed to provide a list of its Palestinian staff.

MSF slammed the move, which takes effect on March 1, as a "pretext" to obstruct aid.

KYIV, Feb 2 (Reuters) - President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday that it was realistic to achieve a dignified and lasting peace, ahead of the next round of peace talks with Russian and U.S. officials due this week in Abu Dhabi.

Speaking after discussions with his negotiating team, Zelenskiy said the Ukrainian delegation would also hold bilateral meetings with U.S. officials during the two days of talks in Abu Dhabi, which are due to start on Wednesday.

WASHINGTON, Feb 2 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff andIranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi plan to meet on Friday in Istanbul to discuss a possible nuclear deal and other issues, a U.S. official said on Monday.

"The president's been calling for them to make a deal. The meeting is to hear what they have to say," the official said.

PARIS, Feb 2 (Reuters) - The European Union said it rejected Iran's decision to consider as "terrorist groups" the armies of EU countries after the EU listed the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on the bloc's list of terrorist organisations.

"We reject the announcement of the listing of EU armies and the accusation of terrorism," said European Commission spokesperson Anouar El Anouni.

Mahsa, an Iranian exile, nervously twirled a strand of hair around her painted fingernails, chain smoking as she contemplated the chaos in her home country from across the border in Turkey.

Three years ago, the 30-year-old Tehran native fled for Van, in eastern Turkey, fed up with receiving threats and police summonses in the wake of the protests that shook Iran after the death of a young woman detained for breaking the Islamic republic's dress code.

Syrian government security personnel on Monday entered Hasakeh city, a stronghold of Kurdish forces, under an integration deal agreed with the Kurds last week, an AFP team reported.

The two sides reached a comprehensive agreement on Friday to gradually integrate the Kurds' military and civilian institutions into the state, after Kurdish forces ceded territory to advancing government troops in recent weeks following months of tensions and sporadic clashes.

GAZA, Feb 2 (Reuters) - Gaza's Rafah border, the only crossing connecting the besieged Palestinian enclave with Egypt, reopened on Monday for a limited number of travellers on foot after being sealed shut by Israel for nearly a year.

The crossing was seized by Israel in May 2024, in the early months of its war against Hamas militants. Its reopening comes as a relief to Palestinians who want to leave Gaza for medical care or those who want to return after fleeing the fighting.

Below are details about Rafah as well as the coastal enclave's crossings with Israel.

JERUSALEM, Feb 2 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump's senior envoy Steve Witkoff is expected to visit Israel for meetings with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel's military chief, two senior Israeli officials said on Monday.

The officials said Witkoff's visit to the country was expected to begin on Tuesday. It comes amid heightened regional tensions with Iran, and as the Trump administration presses ahead with its plan to end the Gaza war.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has ordered the start of nuclear talks with the United States, local media said, as his counterpart Donald Trump threatened "bad things" if no deal with the Islamic republic was struck.

Following the Iranian authorities' deadly response to anti-government protests that peaked last month, the US president has threatened military action and ordered the dispatch of an aircraft carrier group to the Middle East.

Feb 2 (Reuters) - A convoy of Syrian government security forces moved towards the Kurdish-controlled city of Hasakah in the northeast on Monday, Reuters witnesses said, deploying under a U.S.-backed ceasefire deal that foresees the Kurdish-run regions being merged with Damascus.

The deal, declared on Friday, has staved off further conflict between President Ahmed al-Sharaa's government and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which lost swathes of eastern and northern Syria to government troops in January.