Aid agencies decry ‘humanitarian catastrophe’ in Gaza as Jordan hosts emergency summit

• Israeli bombardment and closure of border crossings have compounded disaster, say aid workers 
• Dead Sea conference aims to bolster the international community’s collective, coordinated response

DUBAI: Eight months after the war in Gaza began, the Palestinian population is in the grips of an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe, deprived of sufficient food, water, shelter, sanitation and health services while under constant Israeli bombardment.

Israel’s military offensive has killed at least 36,654 Palestinians and injured 83,309 since Oct. 7, according to Gaza’s Ministry of Health. The UN’s World Food Programme describes the situation in northern Gaza as a “full-blown famine.”

In response to the deepening crisis, Jordan is hosting an emergency international conference today to assess the humanitarian response. The event, at the King Hussein bin Talal Convention Center near the Dead Sea, is co-hosted by Egypt and the UN.

Jordan’s Royal Court said the aim of the meeting is “to identify ways to bolster the international community’s response to the humanitarian catastrophe in the Gaza Strip” and seek “commitment for a collective coordinated response to address the humanitarian situation in Gaza.”

The crisis has dramatically worsened since the start of the Israeli ground offensive in Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah on May 6, Guillemette Thomas, the Medecins Sans Frontieres medical coordinator for Palestine, told Arab News.

She described conditions in Gaza as “catastrophic,” as she outlined the immense challenges international aid agencies face in distributing food, water, fuel and medical supplies to the population.

“Since the ground operations started, we’ve seen almost 1 million people leaving the area, and moving from one place to another with very few things, living already in dire conditions,” Thomas said.

The majority of the people who had been sheltering in Rafah, having already been displaced from elsewhere in Gaza, have now been forced to evacuate to Deir Al-Balah and Khan Younis, where there are no facilities in place to support them.

“Intensified hostilities and military operations in Rafah have so far forced the displacement of approximately 1 million people,” a UN spokesperson told Arab News. “This has deepened the humanitarian crisis and significantly destabilized humanitarian aid. 

“Less than 100,000 people are estimated to have remained in Rafah governorate. At present, there are no functioning hospitals and no functioning bakeries inside Rafah. According to UNICEF, nine of every ten children in Gaza are experiencing severe food poverty, surviving on two or fewer food groups per day. 

“Deir Al-Balah and Khan Younis, where almost a million people have fled, are very crowded; people face dire shortages of food, clean water, medical supplies and healthcare services. Partners are currently providing hot meals in the area. 

“In northern Gaza, aid, primarily food, that has arrived via the northern crossings since May 1 has provided some relief, but lack of access to clean water, nutritious foods, health care and sanitation continue to devastate the area.”

Gazan authorities have said about 3,500 children are at imminent risk of starvation because of severe shortages of milk, food, nutritional supplements and vaccines. Females are considered especially vulnerable.

“When it comes to women and girls, they are living in terrible conditions,” said Thomas. “There is no privacy, no hygiene and no access to basic necessities like showers or toilets.”

She said pregnant women are in an impossible situation, unable to give birth in humane conditions because of limited access to health facilities, which are overwhelmed by the scale of needs and a lack of supplies.

In the past eight months, at least 20,000 women have given birth in Gaza under extremely challenging conditions, said Dr. Hafeez ur Rahman of the nongovernmental organization Alkhidmat Foundation Pakistan.

“These newborn babies are also at high risk of malnutrition because their mothers do not intake enough nutrients in order to be able to feed them,” he told Arab News.

Rahman said most relief operations have been halted, including the provision of hot meals and clean drinking water, because of the ongoing fighting.

Thomas said she fears the closure last month of the Rafah border crossing, through which much of the aid provided to Gazans had been arriving via Egypt, and restrictions placed on aid trucks at the Kerem Shalom border crossing, could make matters even worse. Kerem Shalom, which had been closed for several weeks, recently reopened but strict Israeli security checks remain in place.

“The number of trucks that used to enter before the closure was about 150 trucks per day,” said Thomas. “This is the number of trucks entering Kerem Shalom per week, now.”

The World Food Programme said that ongoing attacks have blocked access to its main warehouse in Rafah, and the quantity of aid entering Gaza fell by 67 percent to a daily average of 58 trucks between May 7 and May 28. The UN previously reported that 500 aid trucks entered Gaza each day on average in the months before Oct. 7.

“The incursion into Rafah has further choked off aid entering Gaza,” the spokesperson for the UN told Arab News. “The closure of Rafah has also reduced fuel supplies, affecting trucks, hospitals, sewage systems, desalination operations and bakeries.

“We need meaningful reassurances that our convoys and our facilities are not targeted. This means ensuring that the movement of aid movements within Gaza, including through checkpoints, is predictable and expedited. 

“It also means all roads are operational because land routes are the most viable, effective and efficient aid delivery method for the passage of life-saving humanitarian assistance and fuel into Gaza.”

While Israeli officials have insisted there is no limit on the amount of aid that can enter Gaza, the UN has accused authorities of imposing “unlawful restrictions” on relief operations, including blocked land routes, communications blackouts and air strikes.

According to Thomas, the biggest challenges currently facing Medecins Sans Frontieres in Gaza are gaining access to the population and having the means to safely distribute the limited supplies of hygiene kits, medications and food.

“Insecurity in Kerem Shalom and around the border is making our work extremely difficult as it is difficult to get the supplies across the border safely, to reach the warehouse safely, and then to be distributed to the population,” she said.

Because supplies are so limited, food prices have surged. There has also been an increase in reports of looting of the few aid trucks permitted to enter in recent weeks.

“For many people, they are just totally desperate,” Thomas said. “They have no food, hey have nothing, and at some point you just need to survive and get food for your kids.”

Consider children's welfare in women's bail cases: SC Top court grants bail to woman accused in murder case

 

Consider children's welfare in women's bail cases: SC

Top court grants bail to woman accused in murder case

ISLAMABAD:

The Supreme Court has ruled that courts should consider the interests of a woman's children when adjudicating her bail application.

A division bench comprising Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar and Justice Athar Minallah granted bail to a woman accused in a murder case, referencing Section 497 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC). 

The section states that individuals accused of non-bailable offences may be released on bail unless there are reasonable grounds to believe they are guilty of an offence punishable by death, life imprisonment, or imprisonment for ten years. However, the first proviso of the section allows for the conditional release on bail of persons under sixteen, women, and those who are sick or infirm.

Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, authoring the order, highlighted the importance of the proviso as beneficial legislation, stressing that the court must first determine whether the bail petitioner falls under this proviso. 

The order said that, undoubtedly, the court has to first satisfy whether the bail petitioner is covered under the proviso or not. 

It said that many women implicated in cognisable offences are often poverty-stricken, illiterate, and responsible for young children. These children sometimes live with their mothers in prison, exposing them to significant risks.

"There are also many examples where the children are to live in prisons with the mothers. This ground reality also ought to be considered which would not only involve the interest of such accused women, but also the children who are not supposed to be exposed to prisons, where there shall always be a severe risk and peril of inheriting not only poverty but also criminality, during the incarceration of their mother,” the ruling stated.

It emphasised that the first proviso facilitates the court to conditionally release on bail an accused if he is under the age of 16 years or is a woman or is sick or infirm under the doctrine of welfare legislation, reinforced by way of the proviso which requires a purposive interpretation for extending the benefit of bail to the taxonomy of persons mentioned in it. 

The same is to be taken into consideration constructively and auspiciously depending upon the set of circumstances in each case, among other factors, including the satisfaction of the court that the bail petitioner does not have any criminal record or is not a habitual offender.

The court said that the purpose of bail is to ensure the attendance of the accused at the trial court, but neither is it punitive nor preventative. Likewise, there is no inevitable or unalterable principle for extending the facility of bail, but the facts and circumstances of each case dominate and command the exercise of judicial discretion. 

Moreover, it elaborated, that it is a well-settled exposition of law that there is no hard and fast rule to regulate the exercise of the discretion for the grant of bail except that the discretion should be exercised judiciously.

In the same breath, the turn of phrase “further inquiry” reckons the tentative assessment which may create doubt with respect to the involvement of the accused in the crime. The doctrine of “further inquiry” denotes a notional and exploratory assessment that may create doubt regarding the involvement of the accused in the crime. 

Whereas, the expression “reasonable grounds” refers to grounds which may be legally tenable, admissible in evidence, and appealing to a reasonable judicial mind as opposed to being whimsical, arbitrary, or presumptuous, the ruling explained 

The order further said that the prosecution is duty bound to demonstrate that it is in possession of sufficient material or evidence, constituting “reasonable grounds” that the accused had committed an offence falling within the prohibitory limb of Section 497, CrPC.

Read Imran relents, agrees to negotiate with rivals – thanks to SC

As for achieving bail, the accused has to show that the evidence or material collected by the prosecution or the plea taken by the defence visibly created a reasonable doubt or suspicion in the prosecution case.

The rule of consistency, or in other words, the doctrine of parity in criminal cases, including bail matters, recapitulates that where the incriminated and ascribed role to the accused is one and the same as that of the co-accused then the benefit extended to one accused should be extended to the co-accused also, on the principle that like cases should be treated alike, but after accurate evaluation and assessment of the co-offenders’ role in the commission of the alleged offence. 

While applying the doctrine of parity in bail matters, the Court is obligated to concentrate on the constituents of the role assigned to the accused and then decide whether a case for the grant of bail on the standard of parity or rule of consistency is made out or not.

The court noted that in the case at hand, the petitioner has not been attributed any direct role in firing but she is allegedly a mastermind, who hatched the criminal conspiracy for the murder of her husband with other co-accused; she also abetted the offence allegedly; she acted with common intention in concert with other accused persons, etc. 

However, the top court noted, it is a ground reality that the FIR was lodged against unknown persons, all the accused persons were implicated through supplementary statements of the complainant recorded one by one in different phases, and all the accused persons who were part of the criminal conspiracy, including the main accused who fired upon the deceased, have been granted bail.

Therefore, at this stage, there appear no reasonable grounds for believing that the petitioner is guilty of the offence jotted down in the FIR, and in our tentative assessment, the petitioner has not only made out a case of further inquiry but is also entitled to be enlarged on bail in view of the rule of consistency coupled with the benefit of the first proviso of Section 497, CrPC.

 

Revealed: What facilities does Imran Khan enjoy at Adiala jail?

Govt responds to PTI founder's claims of being kept in solitary confinement

ISLAMABAD: In a bid to set the record straight, the federal government Thursday submitted the details of the facilities being provided to Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) founder Imran Khan in Adiala Jail.

The PTI founder, who has been incarcerated at Adiala jail, told the Supreme Court during a hearing of the NAB law amendments case that he was being kept in solitary confinement.

They (jail authorities) do not let me meet my legal team. I am being kept in solitary confinement here. I neither have any material nor a library to prepare for the case," Khan had informed Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa during the hearing.

The government said that during the hearing on May 30, Khan, who had joined the hearing via video link claimed that "his legal team was being denied access to him and that he was being kept in solitary confinement".

The pictures shared with the court showed that the PTI founder was provided with several facilities that a common prisoner cannot imagine since he's a former prime minister.

Khan has an exercise bike and stretching belt for physical fitness, books, a separate kitchen, a special menu, an exclusive gallery for a walk, LED, a room cooler, and a study table.

In the detailed document submitted to the court, the government not only provided photos of all the facilities, but also names of all the people who have visited him so far.

"...if this Court may deem appropriate and necessary, it may appoint a judicial officer in the form of a commission to verify the facts as submitted before this Court," it said.

"It is, therefore, respectfully prayed that the instant application be allowed and the additional documents be placed before this Court for the record," the government added.

Abdul Aleem Khan hails success of Pakistan-China business conference Highlights signing of 32 Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) in Shenzhen

 

Abdul Aleem Khan hails success of Pakistan-China business conference

Highlights signing of 32 Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) in Shenzhen

Minister for Privatization and Board of Investment, Abdul Aleem Khan on Wednesday hailed the fruitful outcome of the recent Pakistan-China Business Conference held in Shenzhen, China, emphasizing the significant strides made in bolstering bilateral trade relations between the two countries.

Speaking to the media in China, he expressed satisfaction over the robust participation of 500 Chinese and 100 Pakistani companies in the conference, deeming it as an encouraging sign for future collaborations.

He highlighted the signing of 32 Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) during the conference, noting that these agreements would serve to fortify Pak-China trade ties across various sectors including agriculture, fertilizer, IT, mobile, and pharmaceuticals.

The federal minister underscored the practical promotion of business-to-business activities through these agreements, affirming that such initiatives would facilitate direct exports from Pakistan to China and foster long-term partnerships between the two nations. He emphasized the importance of smooth communication in business dealings, emphasizing its role in nurturing trust and fostering cooperation.

He lauded the exceptional significance of the Pakistan-China Business Conference, noting its instrumental role in advancing the vision of cooperation between the two countries, particularly in the realm of economic development. He commended Prime Minister Imran Khan's commitment to enhancing cooperation with China, asserting that significant progress had been made in this regard.

Abdul Aleem Khan said that thirty two memorandum of understanding (MoUs) were signed at the Pakistan-China Business Forum held in Shenzhen, China which would help boost bilateral trade and investment relations between the two countries.

He mentioned that 500 Chinese companies and 100 companies from Pakistan participated in the forum. Additionally, successful bilateral negotiations were conducted with Chinese companies, said a press release received here today.

The minister highlighted that during the Prime Minister’s current visit to China, detailed discussions were held regarding the promotion of business activities between the two countries.

PCB Chairman Mohsin Naqvi Urges Fans to Fully Support Pakistan for the Entirety T20 World Cup

 

Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) Chairman Mohsin Naqvi has urged the nation to offer unwavering support to the national cricket team as they prepare for the 2024 T20 World Cup in the West Indies and the USA.

Speaking at a dinner held in honor of the team at Pakistan House in London, Naqvi emphasized the importance of unity and backing the players during this critical period.

“This is the time to support the team. I urge everyone to stop criticizing the team for the next four weeks. This team will win the World Cup for you,” Naqvi said during his address and subsequent media interaction.

“This is the time to support the team. I urge everyone to stop criticizing the team for the next four weeks. This team will win the World Cup for you,” Naqvi said during his address and subsequent media interaction.

Naqvi highlighted the immense talent within the squad, urging the nation to rally behind the players. “The Pakistani team comprises excellent players with immense talent. I request everyone to cease the criticism. Post-mortems begin after losing just one match, which is not right. The boys are eagerly waiting for the nation’s support. I am confident this very team will win the World Cup,” he stated.

He also encouraged the players to focus on their performance without the burden of external pressure. “I have encouraged the players to focus on their game without the pressure of winning or losing. Give your best effort. Winning and losing are in Allah’s hands. I see this team going very far in the World Cup,” Naqvi added.

Naqvi shared his plans to attend the World Cup, though his schedule is yet to be finalized. “If I get the time, I will go to watch the Pakistan-India match,” he concluded.

 

Azam Khan Removes All Posts From Social Media After Excessive Bullying

Pakistan’s wicketkeeper-batter Azam Khan has deleted all his photos and videos from his social media accounts amid criticism over his fitness following his defeat against England in the 4th T20I match where he dropped crucial catches.