UN Secretary-General António Guterres addresses the wreath-laying ceremony to commemorate the 23rd Anniversary of the bombing of the United Nations Headquarters in Baghdad. Credit: UN Photo/Mark Garten.

By Naureen Hossain
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 20 2026 (IPS)

World Humanitarian Day celebrates humanitarian workers and the life-saving services they provide under the most complex and often dangerous conditions.

This year, UN leaders are urging the international community to protect humanitarians working in conflict zones and to seek accountability for those who have been injured or killed in their line of duty.

In late 2008, the UN General Assembly designated August 19th as World Humanitarian Day, five years after the terrorist attack at the Canal Hotel in Baghdad, Iraq, where 22 UN staff members were killed, including the then Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello.

On Wednesday, UN Secretary-General António Guterres paid tribute to the fallen UN staffers on the 23rd anniversary of the terrorist attack, remarking that their legacy “lives on in every humanitarian worker delivering assistance amid conflict, disaster and despair”.

Guterres also noted that international humanitarian laws meant to protect civilians and humanitarian workers are being violated “with alarming frequency and impunity”.

According to the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), 2025 set a new record for violence against humanitarian workers, with 712 incidents recorded, in which 350 workers were killed, 322 were injured, 235 kidnapped, and 280 detained. This year alone there have been 136 major incidents, as reported in the Humanitarian Outcomes’ Aid Worker Security Database. It is only indicative of the growing number of incidents against humanitarian workers in recent years. This represents a jump from 300 reported attacks in 2022 to 471 in 2023 and then 634 incidents in 2024.

“Behind those grim numbers… are names. They are colleagues, they are our friends, they are families, and they are the best of us,” said Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator.

Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, briefs reporters for World Humanitarian Day. Credit: Naureen Hossain/IPS

Fletcher spoke to reporters virtually from Ukraine, where he is visiting affected areas of the country, including those subjected to drone attacks in recent days. He warned of their increasing use against civilians and infrastructure. Fletcher described seeing many drones during his visit, including an incident in which he and his team had to run for cover because they were in the vicinity.

Drones are increasingly prevalent in areas with ongoing crises, like Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan and Somalia. These weapons, which are controlled by humans but can also be directed by AI, have shaped the way civilians lead their lives and affected humanitarians carry out their work.

They create “a sense of collective anxiety” among civilians and aid workers. Yet, there seems to be little to no impunity for drone attacks or for those who carry out these attacks, who would likely be aware of what they are targeting. Drone technology is also getting cheaper and easier to access, putting them in more hands as parties to conflict experiment with their use.

Fletcher acknowledged that they can be used by aid workers for good, such as delivering vaccines or identifying survivors in emergencies. But otherwise, much of their use in the context of conflict has been “inhumane and reckless”.

“I’ve not been anywhere where drones are so much part of the conversation. Everyone – from the kids I met in shelters, civilians, humanitarians, and my colleagues – can tell the difference between the sound of a first-person-view drone and a fibre-optic drone and the medium-range drones or the loitering munitions, which are such a threat to our work,” Fletcher said.

Fletcher called for the international community, and chiefly Member States, to uphold international humanitarian law and to seek accountability toward the parties involved in conflict, including state actors. Member states can and should take stronger measures to conduct independent investigations.

Fletcher made repeated calls for increased dialogue and reflection on international humanitarian law, including how to protect humanitarian workers from emerging technologies like drones. It should be up to member states and the companies behind these technologies to make sure that it “does not outpace humanity” and it “does not outpace accountability”. He also called for engaging in dialogue with the companies involved in manufacturing and distributing drones so they understand the risks they’re creating.

For those that believe in the United Nations or in the spirit of global solidarity, they also believe that member states still have the will to uphold their responsibilities toward international humanitarian law. “If the world has become so transactional and selfish and inward-looking that member states are no longer able or prepared to do this work, then we really are in a grim dystopian reality,” Fletcher told Inter Press Service.

He added that the public can in turn hold their governments to account. “We need a public demand of their leaders that we manage these risks before it’s too late. And for so many of the people that I work with, my fallen colleagues, for so many of the people who we’re here to serve, it is already too late, I’m afraid.”

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Fawzia Koofi, former Deputy Speaker of the Afghan Parliament, says the country is experiencing gender apartheid.

By Ariel F. Dumont
ROME, Aug 20 2026 (IPS)

FIVE years after the Taliban returned to power, Fawzia Koofi, the former Deputy Speaker of the Afghan Parliament, denounces what she describes as “gender apartheid.”

Despite bans, terror, and the systematic erasure of women from society, Afghan women continue to resist through underground schools and online solidarity networks.

Koofi was also a member of the official delegation that represented the Afghan government during the 2020 peace negotiations with the Taliban in Doha, Qatar.

Since the fall of Kabul, she has been living in Europe after being evacuated from Afghanistan, where she continues to advocate for Afghan women and campaign for political alternatives to Taliban rule. Speaking with IPS, Koofi explains how the Taliban have systematically erased women from public life while describing the resilience and determination of Afghan women to continue resisting.

IPS: Three years after their return to power, the Taliban have gradually stripped women of all their rights. Today you describe the situation as genuine gender apartheid. How would you describe the condition of Afghan women?

Fawzia Koofi: Women have gradually lost their rights as the Taliban imposed increasingly restrictive measures through a series of decrees. In 2021, girls were banned from attending secondary school. Then, in 2022, women were barred from universities. In 2024, they were no longer allowed to study medicine, not even gynaecology.

Today, every field of education is closed to them. Compared with the first Taliban regime, the current restrictions are even harsher. Yet Afghan women continue to resist because they know education is essential, and their families understand that it is vital. They attend classes in clandestine home-based schools.

Most of these home schools are run by NGOs that pay teachers’ salaries and sometimes even cover students’ internet connection costs. They also provide online English and computer courses. These schools do not issue diplomas. Nevertheless, students receive an education that sometimes enables them to start an online business, pursue distance learning while remaining underground, or teach other young girls.

IPS: How do these underground schools operate, and how do women manage to escape repression?

Koofi: Officially, these schools do not exist; they are not registered. As a result, whenever the Taliban discover them, they can arrest the teachers, students, or those responsible for running them. That is exactly what happened to one of the networks I helped establish, for example, in Ghor Province, in central-western Afghanistan, and also in Badakhshan, in the country’s northeast. They raided the schools and arrested the staff. In other cases, however, they may be more lenient when members of their families attend these schools.

The curriculum focuses on science, computer skills, and English to help women and girls obtain scholarships, work online, or run online businesses. Some women who manage to build small businesses personally take charge of marketing in an effort to expand their activities. Unfortunately, without diplomas or accreditation, professional opportunities remain extremely limited for most women.

Many Afghan women living in exile devote a large part of their time to providing online education for women inside Afghanistan. We connect them with university students and try to teach them English or other languages. It is regrettable that Western governments repeatedly promise to defend women’s rights while failing to provide the funding or scholarships that would allow Afghan women to continue their studies abroad, return home one day, and help rebuild their country. The Taliban’s declared objective is to erase women from Afghan society in the name of Islamic morality.

IPS: Why do you use the term gender apartheid?

Koofi: Because, little by little, women have been completely erased from public life. Some women tell me that when they walk through the streets of Kabul and encounter Taliban officials or soldiers, they are often looked at as though they were criminals.

They are told: “You are not allowed to work or attend university, so why are you out in the street?”

That is precisely the principle of apartheid: separating a gender or a group of people on the basis of their sex, race, or religion and excluding them from society. That is exactly what the Taliban are doing.

The silence of the international community is deeply regrettable. Some governments occasionally condemn the Taliban system, but that is where it ends.

Even worse, they adopt the same kind of practices.

The United Kingdom, for instance, continues to say, “We support Afghan women,” while refusing to grant student visas for fear that applicants might later seek political asylum. It makes no sense. How many of them would actually do so? Two hundred students? In a situation where they can neither study nor work in their own country, it should not be considered a problem if they apply for asylum.

All these contradictions, together with the international community’s lack of action, only encourage and strengthen the Taliban, who interpret this as a form of recognition and legitimacy.

Many experts say that women are disappearing from public space in Afghanistan. Do you agree with that assessment?

Koofi: Imagine the reality faced by women living there today, who are not even allowed to leave their homes freely. Take humanitarian aid distribution as an example.

In many regions, aid distribution is controlled by the Taliban with the assistance of the local councils they have appointed. Beneficiaries are selected from among relatives or supporters.

Single women, such as war widows with dependent children, or women who lost their jobs under Taliban rule, are excluded from receiving aid. And when they protest, the local council members appointed by the Taliban report them, and they are arrested.

There have been cases of sexual violence in Taliban prisons.

The Taliban have locked down the entire system by systematically controlling the country and all its institutions. If local council members rebel or fail to cooperate sufficiently, they are simply replaced. That is how the system functions.

Yet women continue to resist and to protest in order to survive, although it is far from easy. Some open beauty salons or small shops inside their homes. A few television channels that have reached agreements with the Taliban and comply with censorship are still allowed to employ women, but they are required to wear face masks while on air. In effect, they have become spokespersons for the Taliban, who tightly control the news that they broadcast.

Are there still any spaces where women can enjoy some degree of freedom?

They are becoming increasingly rare. Last month in Herat, in western Afghanistan, the Taliban arrested more than 60 women who were not wearing the burqa but instead a large headscarf in keeping with local tradition. Their families and other women protested, and for once, men also took to the streets. The Taliban responded by opening fire. To them, human life has very little value. They arrest, imprison, torture, and kill.

On April 28, they arrested three members of my family as well as one of our gardeners. They then confiscated my house. My relatives were held in solitary confinement for a week and tortured. We managed to mobilise social media, and my family was eventually released. All this simply because I am able to speak to the media and communicate with the United Nations Assistance Mission in Kabul.

In most cases, however, families do not even know where their loved ones are being held. They can disappear for months. The media do not report these cases because they are controlled by the Taliban. This is the reality for everyone. Women continue to write and to protest through social media, each in their own way.

Do you feel that the world has forgotten Afghanistan and Afghan women?

Yes. The world paved the way for the Taliban’s return.

Let us remember the Doha Agreement signed between the Taliban and the United States, which says absolutely nothing about the condition of women or about human rights in general. A

ll of this encouraged the Taliban.

I took part in those negotiations, and the Taliban told me that women’s rights were not among the priorities of my American and European friends. Unfortunately, they were right.

Now the European Union has invited the Taliban to negotiate the return of Afghans living abroad irregularly or individuals considered to pose a security threat. This approach is rather strange and paradoxical because as long as conditions in Afghanistan do not improve, people will continue to want to leave.

Everyone living in the country wants to leave. I speak by telephone every day with Afghans, and every one of them tells me they want to leave. Without work, without education, and without freedom, there is no dignity.

It is absurd. The European Union is engaging with the Taliban, who will simply exploit these negotiations for their benefit.

The attention of Western countries, and indeed of the world as a whole, is focused on other major conflicts. I believe this is a mistake because, sooner or later, Afghanistan will become a rear base for several violent extremist groups.

The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), the Islamic State (ISIS), and Al-Qaeda remain highly active in the region. In fact, Al-Qaeda’s leader was killed only two kilometres from the Taliban presidential palace in July 2022.

To claim that the Taliban will effectively fight these groups while allowing them to govern the country is, in my view, sheer hypocrisy. The world must act before it is too late. We are not asking for NATO troops to return. Rather, we are asking governments not to encourage or support the Taliban.

Unfortunately, I have the feeling that human rights — and women’s rights in particular — are simply not considered a strategic issue or a priority. That is the reality.

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CIVICUS discusses the state of civic and humanitarian action in Gaza with Ibrahim Arandas, a Palestinian activist and project manager at SPARK Gaza, a civil society organisation that provides humanitarian and psychosocial support.

Ibrahim Arandas

What’s life like for people in Gaza now, and what needs are most urgent?

Today, life is defined by scarcity and uncertainty. Israel has turned Gaza into something far worse than a concentration camp. It has engineered a system designed not just to confine and suffocate an entire population, but to erode people’s lives day after day, generation by generation. This is not a simple military operation but deliberate, prolonged destruction, calibrated to keep people alive, but just enough to avoid global outrage while denying every basic condition of human dignity.

The psychological toll is enormous. Aid agencies report that anxiety and severe helplessness have become the norm rather than the exception, particularly among families who have lost their homes, routines and support networks. Our most urgent needs are clean water, healthcare, shelter and mental health support.

What has changed and what obstacles to humanitarian work remain?

When the ceasefire was announced, we thought it meant the end of the war and the suffering. Before the war, two million of us lived across Gaza. We have lost friends and family, and now live in just 36 per cent of the territory.

The hardest issue we face is reaching vulnerable people with the aid they need, including basic supplies, healthcare and mental health support. Patients need healthcare, but our teams cannot reach them. Israel makes movement between areas extremely hard, particularly during periods of escalation, when near-constant closures and limited crossings determine who enters and leaves Gaza.

This is a high-risk, complex environment and we have to stay adaptive to reach the sites and people who depend on us. Every movement implies high risk, but there’s no risk register.

How has your organisation’s work evolved?

We have grown. Gaza has lived through many wars, but we’d never faced conditions like these. In Gaza, you can’t plan a month or two ahead. Things collapse, and the plan has to be redesigned every day.

In our European Union-funded project, we had to constantly redesign how we deliver programming, shifting activities and timelines and sometimes moving sessions online, because access to project sites and young people can change from week to week depending on movement restrictions and security conditions.

We work under constant uncertainty, with internet and network cut-offs overnight and contact with front-line workers lost within an hour. From this, we learned and adapted existing global standards to our context. I developed and published a framework I call ‘adaptive conflict project management’, useful for working in conflict-affected areas like Gaza. It sets out how to build a risk plan, delegate to frontline workers rather than only leaders, divide projects across areas because movement is restricted and keep every worker feeling safe and supported.

How has civil society sustained the response and what support does it need?

Coordination has been essential. One of our few sources of resilience is local organising, combined with international partners who bring resources and access to global platforms like CIVICUS. The combination of local knowledge and international backing has kept civic and humanitarian work alive under the most difficult conditions.

As a frontline worker, what I believe is most needed is sustained access. It’s not just about the volume of aid, but about the ability to plan around consistent access to people and areas. We also need investment in local capacity, not only emergency relief, so Gaza’s civil society can lead the recovery rather than only respond to the crisis. We want to lead this recovery and think beyond emergency relief.

CIVICUS interviews a wide range of civil society activists, experts and leaders to gather diverse perspectives on civil society action and current issues for publication on its CIVICUS Lens platform. The views expressed in interviews are the interviewees’ and do not necessarily reflect those of CIVICUS. Publication does not imply endorsement of interviewees or the organisations they represent.

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SEE ALSO
Gaza: ceasefire an illusion CIVICUS Lens | Article 15.Mar.2026
Gaza: ‘Humanitarian aid matters for survival, but its dynamics diminish Palestinian agency’ CIVICUS Lens | Interview with Ali Abdel-Wahab 16.Feb.2026
‘Life in Gaza’s shelters is marked by deprivation – but also by the endurance of human dignity’ CIVICUS Lens | Anonymous interview 12.Aug.2025

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Peacekeepers from Italy serving with the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) on a foot patrol with the Lebanese Armed Forces along the Blue Line in south Lebanon. Credit: UN Photo/Pasqual Gorriz

By Oritro Karim
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 18 2026 (IPS)

Since the collapse of the ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon announced in June, the humanitarian situation in Lebanon has deteriorated sharply. Marked by high casualties, immense destruction to civilian infrastructure, and widespread displacement, access to essential services has become increasingly strained as the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) is scheduled to end its operations by the end of the year.

Over the course of the summer, UNIFIL has recorded a “near daily presence” of Israeli forces in Lebanese airspace and military activities on the ground. Between August 7 and 8, Israeli forces fired 455 projectiles into south Lebanon, alongside 97 breaches of Lebanese airspace. 229 of these projectiles hit Lebanon on August 8 alone, marking the highest single-day total since June 21.

According to UN Deputy Spokesperson for the Secretary-General, Farhan Haq, the majority of airspace violations involved drones, with smaller numbers attributed to helicopters and fighter jets. In recent weeks, peacekeepers noted a large presence of unguarded weapons, unexploded ordnance, and improvized explosive devices in their areas of operation.

On August 12, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) issued a flash update on the latest humanitarian developments in Lebanon. According to Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health, there have been at least 4,335 deaths and 12,277 injuries recorded as of August 10, including 355 deaths and 276 injuries since the June 19 ceasefire.

The escalation in bombardment has resulted in immense damage to critical infrastructure, agricultural land, and residential buildings. The August 5 demolition of a well and the August 7 fires at Chaqra and Wadi Saluki water stations in the Nabatieh Governorate have left Lebanese water systems increasingly strained. Furthermore, extensive fires from incendiary strikes have ravaged forests and farmlands in western Bekaa Governorate, resulting in significant losses in land and agricultural yields.

“Demolition of this type raises huge flags about compliance with international humanitarian law,” said UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk, describing the recent hostilities as a “wholesale destruction” of civilian homes. “I met yesterday a man who told me that he returned to his village in this zone … south of this so-called yellow line. The Israelis were there; they prevented him from going anywhere close to it, and he saw how the village was demolished.”

On August 5, approximately 130 families were newly displaced from Mansouri to Tyre, marking the first displacement order since July 11. OCHA states that approximately 352,793 people remain displaced across Lebanon, including 22,800 displaced civilians in 232 collective shelters, where they face persistent challenges accessing basic services.

In these shelters, limited fuel supply has resulted in the collapse of electricity and water systems, compounding health, hygiene, and safety risks. The vast majority of displaced families lack access to healthcare, medication, and protection services, while relying on cash assistance to survive.

Humanitarian organizations have expressed alarm over the impending conclusion of UNIFIL’s mandate at the end of the year, arriving at a time when lifesaving operations are most urgently needed. Human Rights Watch (HRW) noted that the U.S. and Lebanon strongly opposed extending the mandate. While there is broad support from the other members of the Council, any measures to extend the mandate or delay its termination are subject to a veto from the U.S.

“Pulling the plug on UNIFIL without a robust international force in place would effectively abandon millions of Lebanese civilians to an uncertain and potentially disastrous fate,” said Louis Charbonneau, UN director at HRW. “UN missions may not be a lasting solution, but the peacekeepers are a crucial deterrent against attacks on civilians and human rights abuses.”

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Sailing container ship. Credit: Unsplash/Kinsey Wang

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 13 2026 (IPS)

Global goods trade reached approximately USD 13.7 trillion in the first half of 2026, up 12.5 percent from the same period in 2025, while services grew 10.5 percent, together adding USD 2 trillion to global trade. While these figures point to continued expansion, much of the increase reflects rising prices rather than stronger trade volumes.

According to UNCTAD’s Division on International Trade and Commodities, disruptions to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz have strained energy supplies, increased fuel costs, disrupted maritime logistics, and raised production costs across a wide range of industries. Prices for traded goods rose 3.6 percent year-on-year in the first quarter of 2026, accelerating to 5.1 percent in the second quarter. Although merchandise trade continues to expand, UNCTAD’s nowcast, its data and model-driven predictions of global trade over period growth, estimates that trade by value will grow by 4.2 percent in the third quarter of 2026 compared with the same period last year, suggesting that higher prices continue to account for a significant share of trade growth.

This inflation is driven by a roughly 160-day disruption of the Strait of Hormuz, where 25 percent of the seaborne oil trade, 20 percent of global liquefied Natural Gas (LNG), about one-third of global seaborne fertilizer trade, and significant petrochemical supply chains have been almost completely shut off from maritime trade flows. According to the Strait of Hormuz Tracker, roughly 7 ships have transited on August 7, 11.7 percent of traffic compared to normal pre-crisis levels: limiting daily throughput to 1.2 million compared to pre-levels of 10.3 million.

According to Freightos, the cost of a 40-foot equivalent unit (FEU) on a China/East Asia to North America East Coast voyage was roughly USD 9,100 in July, up from USD 4,300 in May. Similarly, on a China/East Asia to North America West Coast voyage it cost USD 7,550 in July, up from USD 2,828 in May.

This drastic price volatility for a FEU reflects the consequences of heightened fuel costs. Both the passages mentioned do not go near the Strait of Hormuz, both thousands of miles away. Yet, the effects of a disruption to the Strait cascade across global shipping. Logistics is the backbone behind every industry, with shipping a FEU becoming more expensive by more than double in multiple passages, the price of the items within those FEU also must rise in price to cover the costs.

The effects are particularly evident in East Asia, the world’s manufacturing hub and the center of the global semiconductor and artificial intelligence (AI) supply chain, where demand for AI infrastructure, digital technologies, and electric mobility continues to accelerate. According to UNCTAD, trade in critical minerals increased 38 percent during the first quarter of 2026 compared with a year earlier, and semiconductor trade rose 25 percent, batteries 15 percent, information and communication technology (ICT) products 14 percent, and electric vehicles 11 percent.

Yet despite being geographically distant from the Strait of Hormuz, semiconductor fabrication facilities in Taiwan and South Korea remain heavily dependent on reliable global shipping networks, affordable energy, and petrochemical inputs. As higher fuel prices increase the cost of transporting components between suppliers and manufacturers, and rising electricity, natural gas, and petrochemical prices raise production costs, the value of these high-tech exports continues to climb—even when the volume of goods traded grows far more slowly.

The Strait of Hormuz disruption demonstrates the interconnectedness of the global maritime system. A constriction in this strategic maritime chokepoint raises oil and LNG prices, increasing transportation and industrial energy costs, heightening manufacturing expenses, and ultimately raising the price of internationally traded goods. Consequently, manufacturers in East Asia, importers in North America, and consumers around the world all experience the effects of a disruption occurring thousands of miles away. As these costs accumulate across increasingly interconnected supply chains, the nominal value of global trade rises, even when underlying trade volumes and real economic output grow much more slowly, illustrating that higher trade values do not necessarily represent stronger economic performance.

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Should anyone be surprised that Israel has rebuffed Donald Trump? The unconditional support of the US and its Western allies for Israel has emboldened the rogue state. Thus, Israel continues its genocide against the Palestinians in defiance of international humanitarian law and the Genocide Convention, and despite the so-called ceasefire agreement under the Trump plan. This is the pay-back for protecting Netanyahu from his arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for committing war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Anis Chowdhury

The creation of Israel in the Palestinian land was a western project. The West ignored the fate of the Palestinians and granted impunity to Israel in the guise of Israel’s right to exist. The genocidal intent of the Zionists founders of Israel was well-known. It became an open fact in 1948 when 750,000 Palestinians were forcibly displaced and dispossessed to pave the way for the creation of the State of Israel. The Palestinians refer to this as “Nakba”, meaning catastrophe in Arabic.

Between 1947 and 1949 Zionist forces captured more than 78% of historic Palestine even though the State of Israel was supposed to get around 56% of the land under the United Nation’s plan. The Zionist forces ethnically cleansed and destroyed about 530 villages and cities, and killed about 15,000 Palestinians in a series of mass atrocities, and more than 70 massacres. In less than six months, from December 1947 to mid-May 1948, Zionist armed groups expelled about 440,000 Palestinians from 220 villages.

Since the establishment of Israel, the state has extended its systematic ethnic cleansing while the West looked the other way. Even though the Zionist project fulfilled its dream of creating “a Jewish homeland” in Palestine in 1948, the process of ethnic cleansing and displacement of Palestinians never stopped.

The West’s Frankenstein now dreams of a greater Israel from “the River to the Sea”. The Zionist Israel always finds excuses to scuttle any peace plan or ceasefire agreement. This time, Netanyahu rejected Trump’s so-called peace plan demanding that Hamas be “genuinely” disarmed first.

Trump says “the relationship is very good,” even as Netanyahu rejects Gaza peace plan. No surprise; Netanyahu’s predecessor, Ariel Sharon, former Prime Minister of Israel was reported to have said to his Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, “Don’t worry about American pressure; we control America”.

However, to be fair, Israeli sources denied that Sharon made any such comment. Nonetheless, Israel’s control over the US and its Western allies is visible to the naked eye.

The West has no clothes

The Western allies of the rogue State Israel give a lip service to the fate of the Palestinian in the guise of a so-called “Two-State solution” while takes no real actions against Israel’s continued expansion of settlement in the Occupied Palestinian Territory in defiance of the verdict of the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

On 19 July, 2024, the ICJ issued an advisory opinion declaring Israel’s continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory – including the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza – illegal under international law. The court demanded that the occupation must end as rapidly as possible.

Meanwhile rising settler violence, aided by the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) against the Palestinians continues unabated.

In arrogant defiance Israel’s parliament (the Knesset) voted 68 to 9 on July 18, 2024 to pass a resolution rejecting the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.

Yet, there is no protest from the US and its Western allies. Even the Western countries that symbolically recognised the State of Palestine remain silent as the Frankenstein tightened its grip on its creators.

They are loud in demanding Palestinian disarmament as condition for so-called peace while the rogue State of Israel defiantly reject the Palestinian’s right to have their own sovereign state and basic human rights.

If the Palestinians are asked to disarm then the rogue state must also be asked to rescind its bill rejecting the creation of an independent Palestine. It must also dismantle its illegal settlements in the Occupied Territory– including the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza as demanded by the ICJ.

Anis Chowdhury, Emeritus Professor, Western Sydney University (Australia). He held senior UN positions in Bangkok and New York and served as Special Assistant to the Chief Advisor for Finance (with the status and rank of State Minister) in the Professor Yunus-led Interim Government. E-mail: anis.z.chowdhury@gmail.com; a.chowdhury@westernsydney.edu.au

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Repeated climate shocks, mounting debt and low employment prospects put greater pressures on families in Afghanistan that were “struggling to get by”. Credit: UN Photo/Luke Powell

By Shuli Wong
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 11 2026 (IPS)

“Mainly, people tell me they’re exhausted. They’re exhausted from being poor, from being hungry, from repeated climate shocks, mounting debt, and the daily struggle to provide for their families,” Olga Cherevko, Spokesperson for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Afghanistan, told UN reporters on August 4.

Traveling across Afghanistan, from Bamyan and Herat, Paktia, Khost, and most recently Nuristan after the devastating flash floods, Ms. Cherevko describes a country hit by multiple overlapping crises. These crises have created a humanitarian crisis in which food insecurity, disasters, displacement, and dwindling aid have converged.

Last week, Nuristan was hit by devastating flash floods where families lost loved ones, livelihoods, everything they owned, along with homes and infrastructure. Humanitarians moved quickly to deliver food, water, shelter, healthcare, protection, and psychosocial support; however, “when these floods hit, many people were already struggling to get by,” Ms. Cherevko said. Afghanistan is extremely vulnerable to climate shocks. “Communities barely have time to recover from one disaster when another one strikes…each shock pushes already vulnerable families deeper into poverty.

To help combat the compounding humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, the 2026 humanitarian needs and response plan requested USD 1.71 billion to provide assistance to 17.5 million people in districts and communities facing the most acute and life-threatening conditions. However, the appeal has received only 26 percent of the required funding, creating a “very alarming” situation, “given the fact that we are seeing a lot of these indicators worsening, particularly malnutrition,” Ms. Cherevko warned. Afghanistan is encountering alarming rates of malnutrition, with OCHA’s nutrition partners noting that childhood wasting has worsened this year across three-quarters of the country.

These figures echo an alert from the World Food Programme (WFP) released last Tuesday. Nearly 14 million Afghans are facing acute hunger. However, funding cuts have resulted in only one in nine receiving WFP food assistance. Furthermore, 3.7 million children and 1.2 million pregnant and breastfeeding women are projected to be malnourished this year. In order to address the acute food needs across Afghanistan, WFP requires USD 900 million for emergency food assistance and nutrition programmes in 2026.

“We have not met needs in the first six months because we didn’t have money,” said John Aylieff, WFP Country Director for Afghanistan. “WFP still needs $500 million to address the acute food needs in the country.”

On top of the hunger crisis, restrictions on girls and women have compounded the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan. These restrictions shape “almost every aspect of daily life” and “with every new restriction, women are pushed even further out of public life…when people become invisible, they risk becoming dispensable,” said Ms. Cherevko. When humanitarian workers cannot reach girls and women and when women cannot work, or girls cannot go to school, “the consequences extend far beyond individuals,” Cherevko added, and that these consequences ultimately affect “the country’s ability to recover.”

The restrictions placed on women and girls also add a layer of complications for humanitarian workers to even reach those in need. Credit: UNHCR/Oxygen Empire Media

Violence and displacement further add to the crises. Since 2023, approximately 6 million Afghans have been forcibly expelled from neighboring countries like Pakistan and Iran. The returnees have increased the strain on Afghanistan’s fragile economy, and for the returnees, there are “simply not enough jobs to sustain them”, Mr. Aylieff said.

Ms. Cherevko emphasized how many of the returnees are “coming into a country that is completely new for them”, where there are also limited prospects for work. UNHCR estimates that almost 3.1 million Afghan refugees require international protection across the sub-region. For 2026, UNHCR has requested just over USD 450 million for its Afghanistan situation funding; however, similar to OCHA’s and the WFP’s appeals, funding is far from being met.

Despite the emphasis on the need for continued and increased funding, Ms. Cherevko stressed that “humanitarian assistance alone cannot resolve these challenges”. She called for investment in medium- and long-term solutions centering on jobs, education and poverty reduction, in addition to emergency humanitarian assistance. Having worked in Afghanistan for years, Ms. Cherevko has seen the Afghan people show “extraordinary resilience through endless hardship”. Yet, she noted that“resilience should never become a substitute for opportunity or an excuse for the world just to watch and expect people to endure indefinitely without the support they need”.

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Geography of the Makkah Defence Agreement, illustrating the strategic triangle formed by the capitals of the three signatory states—Ankara, Türkiye, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and Islamabad, Pakistan. Credit: Maximilian Malawista

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 11 2026 (IPS)

In Makkah, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Republic Türkiye, and the Islamic Republic of Pakistan agreed to the framework for a joint defence agreement where an attack on any of the three states shall be regarded as an attack against them all.

The agreement, signed on August 7, comes as Saudi Arabia is regularly attacked by Iranian strikes or proxies. Under the agreement, such attacks could fall within the pact’s collective defence provisions.

The Saudi Press Agency says “The agreement is intended to strengthen collective deterrence against any act of aggression, and stipulates that any armed attack against any one of the three states shall be regarded as an attack against them all. It further provides for the enhancement of all aspects of defense cooperation among the three states.”

Strategically, Saudi Arabia, Türkiye, and Pakistan form a triangle axis around Iran, with Türkiye and Pakistan both sharing land borders with Iran. This geographic positioning means any regional conflict involving Iran could potentially involve pressure from multiple directions, increasing the agreement’s deterrent value.

Iran, however, has played down concerns over the agreement. Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said Monday that Tehran sees no reason to be concerned, describing the pact as part of a broader shift toward greater regional self-reliance in security matters.

In the Strait of Hormuz, a framework is reportedly in its final stages to be signed as Iranian and Omani delegations finalize a proposed “temporary” commercial shipping agreement, aiming to allow traffic to resume flowing through the Strait.

“This understanding does not signify a full reopening of the Strait of Hormuz; rather, it represents a new model—distinct from the practice of the past sixty years—under which a significant portion of the shipping route will pass through Iran’s territorial waters,” said Kazem Gharibabadi, Deputy Foreign Minister for Legal and International Affairs of Iran.

The geographic location of the proposed shipping route has been agreed upon, meaning a significant portion of commercial shipping would pass through Iranian territorial waters under the new framework.

Gharibabadi also mentioned that whether Iran would collect transit fees from vessels passing through the Strait would depend on decisions by the country’s highest authorities and on the United States’ conduct.

Baghaei has said the talks with Oman are focused on establishing a route for safe passage of shipping, but stressed that such an agreement would be a necessary, rather than sufficient, condition for reopening the Strait. The talks between Iran and Oman have been ongoing for two months, while Pakistan and Qatar are continuing efforts to reduce tensions, according to Iranian state media.

As long as the U.S. naval blockade of Iran remains in place, and what Tehran describes as U.S. military aggression continues, Baghaei said, there would be no significant change in the status of the Strait.

If implemented, the agreement could represent one of the most significant changes to commercial navigation through the Strait of Hormuz in decades, shifting portions of international shipping into Iranian shipping lanes/territorial waters, potentially giving Tehran greater influence over one of the world’s busiest energy chokepoints.

These two developments together illustrate the competing dynamics unfolding in the Gulf. While Saudi Arabia, Türkiye, and Pakistan are strengthening collective military deterrence, Iran is simultaneously attempting to reshape how global shipping and navigation occurs through the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most strategically important maritime corridors.

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By Jan Lundius
ROME, Aug 10 2026 (IPS)

World News are more or less currently fully occupied with the U.S. – Iran debacle and to a lesser degree the Gaza genocide, the on-going war in Ukraine, and to an even lesser degree the one in Sudan.

When Trump and Netanyahu recently met it is likely that the situation on the West Bank was not even on the agenda. This is the reality of international high-level politics and press reporting. Too much cannot remain in focus and certain essentials are simply forgotten, or remain under-reported. Nevertheless, this fact doesn’t hinder unrest and glaring injustice from smouldering in some places, being on the verge of exploding at any time, with devastating results. The West Bank is such a place and strangely enough do the majority of Israelis and U.S. decision makers not appear to realize the presence of an enormous powder keg of suppressed frustration that could detonate at any moment. An astonishing reality particularly considering Israel’s bloody war on Gaza, which still has not come to an end after the death of approximately 72,600 Palestinians (of which 21,280 have been children) and 2,040 Israelis.

Since 1967, the West Bank has been under Israeli occupation, a circumstance rendered illegal under international law. This unresolved situation has made 2,748,000 Palestinians prisoners in their own land, while a rising number of 670,000 Israeli settlers have illegally occupied their territory, claiming their right to drive away or marginalize the Palestinians while adhering to a belief that a land that “belonged to them” two thousand years ago now can be used as defence for ethnic cleansing.

Settler actions against resident Palestinians are generally unchallenged by the occupying Israeli administration and are creating what has been called a “coercive environment”, which compels Palestinians to leave, often followed by the establishment of new settler outposts.

A 2026 Le Monde investigation noted that since 2020 Israeli courts have not given jail sentences to any Israeli settler found responsible for killing Palestinian civilians and in 2026 The Times of Israel documented that in recent years 99 percent of complaints made against Israeli soldiers by Palestinian civilians were closed without indictment. As of 20 July, this year, 18 Palestinians have died on the West Bank during attacks involving settlers. In the last three years, from 2023 to 2025, 1,244 Palestinians – including 268 children – have been killed on the West Bank.

Many disputes between settlers and permanent Palestinian residents concern water inequality. On the occupied West Bank, Israeli settlers consume on average about seven times more water than Palestinians, whose levels generally fall below the minimum of WHO recommendations for clean water access. This leads us to Omar Mwannes Yaghi, who together with two other scientists in 2025 was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. His life story reveals two aspects of Israeli treatment of Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied West Bank. First, the prejudiced attacks on an entire ethnic group during which individuals are mistreated and killed irrespective if they belong to a hostile, fighting force or not. As member of a Palestinian refugee family, a person like Yaghi could easily have been killed if he had been born in Gaza, instead of in a refugee camp in Jordania. Secondly, Yaghi proves the worth of an individual irrespective of his/her ethnic origin. In the future, the achievements of Omar Mwannes Yaghi might prove to be inconceivably much more important for the survival of humankind than those of a Netanyahu, or a Trump.

Omar Mwannes Yaghi was in 1965 born in a refugee camp outside of Amman, within an impoverished crowded household with many children, all living in a single room that also housed the family’s cows and goats. What in particular tormented them was their limited access to clean water.

As a young boy, who recently had learned to read and write, Omar happened to visit a library where he became fascinated by the coloured plates illustrating chemical bonds, an experience that made him decide to become a chemist. He did very well in school and already as a fifteen-year-old he received a royal grant making it possible for him to travel to the U.S. and study at Hudson Valley Community College, from which he graduated in 1983 with an Associate of Science in Mathematics and Science. Eventually, he ended up in Berkeley as a professor at the University of California.

Omar Yaghi is best known for his work in the field of molecular “weaving”, part of what has become known as reticular chemistry, which assembles molecular building blocks to create crystalline, large, strong bonded, and porous, metal-organic frameworks called MOFs. Such MOFs can be used to create clean energy technologies, including hydrogen and methane storage, carbon dioxide capture (that might contribute to the mitigation of climate change), and the harvesting of water from desert air, thus reducing the world’s ever-increasing thirst for clean water.

In July 2026, Omar Yaghi left the U.S. to lead an artificial intelligence and material science research institute at Tsinghua University in Beijing. One important reason for this was the increasingly insecure federal funding to research in the U.S., combined with expanding international recruitment initiatives by China.

Omar Mwannes Yaghis’ life story proves the fact that every human life matters and that a poor refugee child can grow up to become a person whose research might contribute to save the entire world from disaster and improve the wellbeing of us all. Furthermore, it highlights the extreme importance of funding and providing unbiased, international, basic and advanced research. It also proves that Palestinians, particularly children, ought to be treated with dignity and respect, deserving a place to live in peace and prosperity, with access to education, which great value has been proven by the Nobel Laureate Omar Mwannes Yaghis.

Main sources: Mandraud, Isabelle (2026) “En Cisjordanie, l’impunité absolue des colons israéliens ayant commis des crimes,” Le Monde, 17 avril. Sharon, Jeremy (2026) “Less than 1% of complaints against soldiers in West Bank lead to charges, data shows,” Time of Israel, 27 January. Yaghi, Omar (2019) Harvesting Water from Desert Air: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOOVBKWRLxk, and (2018) Reticular Chemistry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OS_VI-8sMF0

This is part 1 of an analysis of the connection between youth movements and political change; part 2 will analyze how youth-led revolutions have changed political scenarios globally.

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Credit: White House/Getty images

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 7 2026 (IPS)

The highly- unpredictable five-month-old US-Iran war has been plagued by on-again, off-again peace agreements — with such monotonous regularity– the conflict seems never ending. But according to several news reports, the US faces a new threat– it may soon run out of key weapons systems.

According to a CNN report, August 5, the US military has used up nearly 80% of its interceptors for a key missile defense system, leaving stockpiles “dangerously low” as mediators work to revive talks between Washington and Tehran.

“Gulf allies are also worried that dwindling US air defense stockpiles could leave them more vulnerable if President Donald Trump escalates the ongoing conflict. Several of those countries rely on US air defense systems and acknowledge the shortage could hinder their ability to intercept Iranian missile and drone attacks.”

Meanwhile the New York Times of August 4 provided a more detailed breakdown, including the US deployment of 1,200 Patriot missiles (out of a military inventory of 2,330) and more than 1,000 Tomahawk missiles, out of 3,000. The US has also deployed more than 1,100 Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles out of 4,400 and 190 to 290 Terminal High Altitude Defense or THAAD missiles out of 300, among others

At a Camp David summit last weekend, according to one report, President Trump demanded answers from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth over “extreme munitions shortages”

But as reports of dwindling arms stockpiles continued to spread widely, President Trump publicly denied the possible shortfall. “We have massive amounts of arms”, he wrote on Truth Social. “Additionally, large amounts are being manufactured and shipped to the U.S. as needed. Defense companies are building the largest number of plants and factories in our country’s history.”

Professor Simon Adams, Academic Chair of Human Rights, School of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences at Murdoch University, Australia told Inter Press Service (IPS):, “Trump’s war of choice against Iran has not only impacted weapons stockpiles, it has depleted the ability of some politicians in Washington DC to see people and places on a map as more than targets and annoyances that can impact petrol prices.

Iran is a country of 90 million people and not just the Strait of Hormuz. From the 120 schoolgirls who were killed in an airstrike in Minab to the latest civilian casualties, too many innocent people have died. No more blood should be spilled.

Ongoing threats by President Trump to bomb Iran into the Stone Age and annihilate Iranian civilization constitute an open threat to commit war crimes, he said.

Meanwhile Iran’s rulers continue to publicly hang protesters and deny Iranians their fundamental human rights, said Adams, former President and CEO of the Center for Victims of Torture – a leading international human rights and humanitarian NGO.

The only people who are ‘winning’ this senseless war are weapons manufacturers, oil companies and supporters of theocracy and authoritarianism in both Iran and the United States, declared Adams.

Meanwhile some of the agreements that fell by the wayside include:

• April 2026: An initial short-term, two-week ceasefire was brokered by Pakistan, which was later extended indefinitely before breaking down into intermittent fighting.
• June 15, 2026: President Trump and Iranian officials announced that a framework for an interim peace deal and memorandum of understanding (MOU) had been reached to end hostilities and reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
• June 17, 2026: The two nations formally signed the agreement—often referred to as the Islamabad Memorandum—establishing an expanded ceasefire and kicking off a 60-day window to negotiate a final, comprehensive peace treaty.

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IInternational experts have reported a uptick of human rights violations committed in Iran, notably arbitrary executions of protestors since January 2026. Credit: Amir Sarabadani/Wikimedia Commons

By Oritro Karim
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 3 2026 (IPS)

Over the past several weeks, the humanitarian landscape in the Middle East has deteriorated significantly, exacerbated by escalating security concerns and serious human rights violations. In late July, the United Nations (UN) highlighted a sharp uptick in hostilities between the United States and Iran, alongside growing concerns over wider regional instability.

On July 30, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) warned that the “humanitarian consequences of the Middle East escalation are worsening by the day.” The conflict between the United States and Iran has grown increasingly volatile over recent months, with both parties intermittently resuming bombardment following the breakdown of the April ceasefire.

On July 28, Iranian forces attempted a series of ballistic missile attacks targeting U.S. bases in Jordan and vessels in the Strait of Hormuz. This prompted an immediate military response from the U.S. military, with defense officials confirming that it had completed a “heavy wave” of airstrikes targeting numerous bases affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

This recent wave of airstrikes in Iran affected numerous provinces—including Hormozgan, Bushehr, Fars, and Khuzestan—notably impacting the country’s primary oil-producing region. According to the Iranian Ministry of Health, at least 60 civilian deaths and 670 injuries have been recorded over the past month alone. On July 30, a strike in Qeshm in Hormozgan province hit a residential building, killing three civilians, including a two-year-old child.

This conflict has severely disrupted global shipping and oil production, driving a considerable increase in domestic gasoline prices in the U.S. and compounding Iran’s economic collapse. On July 29, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres expressed concern about the risk of a broader regional conflict if effective diplomacy is not established soon.

Deputy Spokesperson for the Secretary-General, Farhan Haq, told reporters that current developments are “not positive”, noting that Guterres is hoping for an immediate cessation of hostilities. “The Secretary-General has been worried for some time that if the parties do not return to negotiations, you could have a widening of the conflict, and that seems to be what has been happening in recent hours,” said Haq at a press briefing at the UN Headquarters.

“These are not positive developments, and he wants to make sure that the parties can cease fighting and again return to the diplomatic efforts, including the mediation efforts being pressed forward by Pakistan, Qatar and others…Having more parties involved in the fighting, having the fighting spread to a larger number of countries, all of these are adverse developments and could get us into a much worse situation even than before.”

Following discussions with regional allies, U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters on August 1 that he had halted planned military strikes against Iran as negotiations toward a de-escalation of hostilities are scheduled to pick up on August 3. Contingent on both sides “rapidly” securing a deal, Trump told reporters that these plans include frameworks for the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, which would allow for the immediate decongestion of stalled global cargo traffic and the resumption of commercial oil shipments.

In response, Iranian officials confirmed that Tehran did not ask the U.S. to halt these strikes, stating that Iran remains “on high alert and ready for any eventuality.” As of August 3, no new negotiations were held between the U.S. and Iran. Esmail Baghaie, the spokesperson for Iran’s foreign ministry, has said that there are no plans to send an Iranian delegation, nor to receive any delegations, however diplomatic engagement is ongoing.

Although the Strait of Hormuz is currently closed, Jordan and Egypt remain critical lifelines for humanitarian aid deliveries and medical evacuations for struggling Iranian communities.

Furthermore, Iran continues to grapple with a sharp rise in human rights violations recorded over the course of 2026. Since March 19, the Center for Human Rights in Iran recorded the executions of at least 46 civilians on politically motivated charges. Reflecting a considerable surge in the use of the death penalty to repress civilian dissent, at least 23 of those convicted were protestors arrested during the protests in January.

On July 23, the UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Iran urged Iranian authorities to halt all executions and establish frameworks on the use of the death penalty in accordance with international humanitarian law. The Mission condemned the arbitrary executions of two young protestors, 18-year-old Erfan Esfandiari and 23-year-old Mohammad Mohammadi on July 19.

In the wake of these executions, Iranian authorities proceeded to publicly execute protestors Amir Hossein Safari and Abolfazl Sepahi following what Amnesty International described as a “grossly unfair mass trail involving dozens of defendants.” Ten additional Iranian men now face an imminent threat of arbitrary execution over their involvement in the January demonstrations, with the Mission calling for an immediate halt to these executions.

“The Iranian authorities are unleashing a horrifying wave of executions and death sentences to punish and suppress dissent and project an image of strength and absolute control in the wake of the January popular uprising and amid ongoing attacks by US and Israeli forces,” said Heba Morayef, Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa at Amnesty International.

“The muted response from the international community emboldens the Iranian authorities to continue their deadly rampage. UN member states must take urgent coordinated diplomatic action to press the Iranian authorities to halt further executions. They must place Iran’s human rights and impunity crisis high on their agenda, support the creation of an independent international justice mechanism for Iran and urge the UN Security Council to refer the situation in Iran to the International Criminal Court.”

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Galala city, Egypt, the southern exit to the Suez Canal. Credit: Unsplash/M abnodey

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 3 2026 (IPS)

As the United States and Iran continue to escalate with military strikes across both fronts, the conflict took a new turn with Saudi Arabia becoming militarily involved on July 29, following coordinated airstrikes with U.S. Central Command according to the Saudi Ministry of Defence.

These strikes were carried out under what the Kingdom says was its right to self-defense, recognized under Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, with the Saudi armed forces coordinating with U.S. Central Command to target Iranian-backed proxies operating from Iraqi territory, after interception of several UAVs which were attempting to target oil facilities in Eastern and Riyadh regions. The Kingdom reiterated that it does not seek escalation but will respond decisively to any aggression directed against it, according to the Saudi Press Agency (SPA).

On Saturday, August 1, U.S. President Donald Trump announced on his platform, Truth Social, that Iran and other Middle Eastern Countries have asked the U.S. to “hold off any attack in that the perimeters of a deal has been agreed to.” Trump added that “This would include the Immediate, Complete, and Total OPENING OF THE HORMUZ STRAIT, and an end to Iran’s nuclear threat.” Following this, the U.S. has canceled a planned attack on Iran, but Tehran still has not claimed that these talks are ongoing, let alone any measure of mediation. The cancellation of the planned attack, however, does not mean U.S. military operations have ceased.

On Sunday, August 2, The Saudi Press Agency reported that HRH Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman spoke by phone with U.S. President Trump and “stressed the need to prioritize dialogue to reduce escalation and the importance of making every possible effort to achieve calm that paves the way for diplomatic solutions” in order to preserve both regional and international security. Prior to these latest updates, Washington has maintained that the U.S. and Iran were already engaged in what was described as “very friendly negotiations” following a pause in military strikes. However, Tehran had publicly denied holding direct talks with Washington. According to Axios, Oman is leading the mediation effort, with Qatar, Pakistan and Egypt involved alongside Washington envoys.

Last week on July 30, Saudi Arabia announced a multinational Red Sea maritime defense alliance, seeking the support of over 50 countries and organizations. Thirteen countries other than Saudi Arabia have already signed on, including Türkiye, Pakistan, Egypt, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, Nigeria, Jordan, Bangladesh, Yemen, Djibouti and Somalia. Other participating countries have also expressed support and are in the process of completing their internal procedures and approvals to join the declaration.

The declaration remains open to other interested parties. The Gulf states of the United Arab Emirates and Oman have not yet signed, despite having similar security objectives. Representatives from 43 of the 51 countries and organizations invited to join the alliance attended a meeting on Thursday in Riyadh, the headquarters of the operation.

The initiative effectively places Saudi Arabia at the center of multinational maritime security in the Red Sea at a time when U.S. naval resources are increasingly divided between deterring Iran in the Gulf and protecting commercial shipping.

The Saudi Defence Ministry noted that the EU already has a naval protection mission in the Red Sea, with a delegation from the European Union being present at the meeting. Saudi Defence Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman also held a meeting with President Trump and Vice President JD Vance on Wednesday, however he reportedly told Washington that the Kingdom was opposed to further escalation of the wider U.S.-Israel war, and its objective is to “defend itself”.

The Kingdom reportedly told Washington that it can manage the situation with the Houthis in Yemen itself, and does not need the U.S. to get involved.

Why is the Red Sea so crucial?

The Red Sea forms part of the maritime corridor leading to the Suez Canal, through which around 15 percent of global maritime trade moves. When security in the Strait cannot be guaranteed, shipping carriers are rerouted around the Cape of Good Hope to avoid sailing through an active military zone, where cargo is at risk and war-risk insurance premiums can increase significantly.

Beginning in 2023, Houthi attacks on commercial vessels similarly targeted carriers in the Red Sea, which reduced container tonnage moving through the Suez Canal by 82 percent, and increased booking a voyage on short notice from Shanghai to Europe by 256 percent.

The Houthis demonstrated in that conflict that they did not need to strike every ship in order to create an incentive to avoid the Strait. However, when carriers chose to avoid the Strait, major consequences arose, significantly increasing the cost of every ton of cargo.

Rerouting around the Cape of Good Hope can add roughly 3,000 to 3,500 nautical miles, approximately seven to 10 days in additional sailing time, for a Europe to Singapore voyage. For some routes, consequences are substantially greater. A tanker carrying Saudi crude from Yanbu to Taiwan that avoids the Bab el-Mandeb Strait could extend the voyage from 19 to 48 days, adding roughly USD 2.5 million in cost, according to a Reuters analysis based on Kpler and LSEG data.

All of this is compounded by the severe disruption of the Strait of Hormuz, where on Aug 2, only 19 ships transited in 24 hours, representing only 31 percent of pre-conflict traffic, which has limited deadweight tonnage throughput (DWT) to 3.2 million of the 10.3 million pre-conflict average. However, this is an increase from Friday, August 1, where only 10 transits were recorded in 24 hours, marking only 11.4 percent of transits and 1.2 million DWT compared to pre-conflict levels.

Before the conflict, 25 percent of global seaborne oil trade moved through the Strait, alongside 29 percent of global liquefied natural gas trade, 38 percent of liquefied petroleum gas trade, 19 percent of crude oil trade, 19 percent of refined petroleum products trade, and 13 percent of chemical trade. Together, severe disruption of the Strait of Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb would simultaneously constrain Gulf energy exports and render the shortest maritime route connecting Asia and Europe increasingly untenable for commercial shipping.

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Images of the Pentagon, Washington DC. Credit: Kevin Doyle / Unsplash

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 31 2026 (IPS)

An age-old axiom in Statistics reads : Figures Cannot Lie, But Liars Can Figure.

And more so, in military conflicts, including the five-month-old US-Iran war, where casualty figures are difficult to track down because of lack of transparency and false accounting.

According to CNN, the Pentagon updated its war casualty database last week, recording more than 140 additionally wounded, and restoring the four soldiers killed due to Iranian strikes amid questions about a lack of transparency over the war’s toll.

The Pentagon drew scrutiny from media outlets and lawmakers last week when the number of US troops killed and wounded decreased in the Defense Casualty Analysis System, or DCAS, as Iranian attacks continued. CNN observed fluctuating casualty totals when monitoring the site on a minute-by-minute basis last week.

Pentagon updates Iran war casualty count to 624, restoring 4 deaths to tally, CNN’s Davis Winkie reports on why casualty numbers decreased & were later revised.

The Iranian government, not surprisingly, hasn’t provided any casualty figures at all.

In a bygone era, the United States reportedly suffered 58,281 military deaths in the Vietnam War and 2,459 military deaths during the war in Afghanistan.

The exact breakdown of total casualties—including deaths and those wounded in action (WIA)—differs significantly between the two conflicts:

Stephen Zunes, a professor of Politics at the University of San Francisco specializing in Middle Eastern politics, told Inter Press Service (IPS) many thousands of Iranians, Lebanese, and others have been killed as a result of the U.S. war on Iran but Americans–as in previous wars–tend to focus on U.S. casualties. Though they have thankfully been limited, the eighteen fatalities and more than 600 wounded–some of them seriously–have become a major focus of war opponents.

Trump has tried to downplay and manipulate these figures by comparing the casualties with other U.S. wars which included significant ground operations, claiming without evidence that the dead soldiers strongly supported the war, and undercounting those wounded by initially only listing those with severe injuries, said Zunes.

More recently, he pointed out, the administration was caught placing those killed and wounded, subsequent to the collapse of the Memorandum of Understanding with Iran, in a separate category than those killed and wounded during the first phase of the war, thereby lessening the overall total.

“Such efforts are only strengthening antiwar sentiment in Washington and elsewhere, adding to the upset by veterans and others over Trump’s draft dodging during the Vietnam War and his insults of those who fought in unpopular conflicts, including war heroes”.

During his 2016 campaign against Hillary Clinton, and to a somewhat lesser extent in his 2024 campaign against Kamala Harris, he portrayed himself as the antiwar candidate who opposed Democrats’ “forever wars” and who as a president would “bring our troops home.” As U.S. casualties in the Middle East mount, his credibility will only be eroded further, declared Zunes.

Meanwhile, a group of Democratic Senators sent a letter last week to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth requesting a “comprehensive accounting” about the number of service members wounded or killed.”

The Senators wrote: “First, we wish to honor the service members who have lost their lives in Operation Epic Fury and extend our deepest condolences to their families. We thank all those who continue to serve in harm’s way. Their sacrifice is why we write to express our concern regarding the Department of Defense’s (DoD or the Department) public reporting and statements on U.S. military casualties associated with Operation Epic Fury.

We formally request a comprehensive accounting of the number of service members who have been killed, wounded, or injured in support of the operation. The American people, Congress, service members, and their families are entitled to a full and accurate accounting of the human costs of war. The information currently available to the public suggests that the Department has not consistently provided timely and comprehensive public casualty reporting throughout the conflict.

The Pentagon’s Defense Casualty Analysis System (DCAS), which the Department has described as being “regularly updated,” has reported inconsistent casualty figures, raising additional questions about the transparency and reliability of the Department’s public reporting and statement.”

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In Jabalia, north of the Gaza Strip, children received polio vaccines as part of the vaccination campaign conducted by UNICEF and its partners in 2025. Credit: UNICEF/Mohammed Nateel

By Shuli Wong
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 27 2026 (IPS)

On Monday July 20, a team from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) visited two displacement sites in Gaza where they found two family tents decimated by domestic fires. This incident is indicative of the increasing frequency of domestic fires in Gaza.

Families are resorting to burning waste, cardboard, and trash to help prepare meals following the ban on gas cylinders and cooking stoves from entering Gaza since October 2023. While cooking gas is available, it is only offered in limited quantities and at extremely high prices.

The domestic fire risk in Gaza is situated within a larger, much more dire humanitarian access crisis, as documented in UNICEF’s Humanitarian Situation Update Mid-Year Review. Access restrictions and operational constraints continue to disrupt humanitarian delivery, with only 44 percent of aid trucks from Egypt able to offload between May and June. Severe restrictions remain in place for the entry of fuel, spare parts, and essential materials, which have driven system failures across health and water services. Across the Gaza Strip, an estimated 82 percent of families are water insecure, and nearly 90 percent of water and sanitation infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed.

Violence against civilians has also intensified across Gaza. The UN Human Rights Office reported that Israeli forces killed at least 57 people, including women and children, between July 13th and July 20th.

UN Spokesperson to the Secretary-General Stéphane Dujarric also detailed the aftermath of an Israeli drone strike on July 17th west of the Nuseirat refugee camp, in which seven people were reportedly killed and others injured as the strike coincided with mourners leaving a nearby funeral prayer.

On July 15th, a teacher was injured after being shot by Israeli forces while she was working at a temporary learning space west of Khan Younis. Since the start of 2026, OCHA has reported 26 education-related incidents. These findings echo their Humanitarian Situation Report from July 16th, in which 84 schools are under pending demolition or stop-work orders.

Despite operational constraints and security risks, humanitarian organizations have been working to restore and expand access to education after more than two years of disruption. At the beginning of 2026, UN partners helped 435,000 pre-primary and school-aged children, including 9,300 children with disabilities, access structured learning at 610 temporary learning spaces. Furthermore, 344,000 children received learning materials and 11,000 teachers were supported. UNICEF’s Mid-Year Review reported helping 266,000 children access formal and non-formal education opportunities, which has helped provide children with a sense of normalcy amid the ongoing upheaval and crisis.

Since the ceasefire was reached last October, there have been some improvements and gains in food security and nutrition levels, thanks to expanded humanitarian food, nutrition and agricultural assistance. But those gains are still fragile. UNICEF, the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and the World Food Programme warned that families are struggling to meet basic needs, and these gains will be reversed without continuous humanitarian aid, funding and investment in recovery in the Gaza Strip. As of now, only one crossing, the Kerem Shalom/Abu Salem crossing in the south of Gaza, remains open for humanitarian assistance. The latest analysis on food security shows that an estimated 1.4 million people, or 67 percent of Gaza’s population, are experiencing crisis or worse levels of food insecurity.

Health and infrastructure remain heavily strained across the Gaza Strip. On July 20th, the Deputy Humanitarian Coordinator Susanne Tkalec met with leadership members of the Emirati Hospital in Rafah to determine solutions to strengthen the medical waste management systems in Gaza amid ongoing health and sanitation system stress.

Despite hospitals being explicitly protected under international humanitarian law, “healthcare workers, patients, ambulances, and hospitals have all been targeted,” said Dr. Javid Abdelmoneim, International President of Médecins Sans Frontières. Dr. Abdelmoneim went on to explain that “whether through direct violence, dismantling the healthcare system or obstructuring humanitarian assistance, inducing famine, weaponising water, causing higher levels of prematurity and mortality among infants and high levels of miscarriage, or denying care… it’s clear: the number one health issue in Palestine is Israel’s occupation.”

Shelter needs across Gaza remain outmatched by supply. In the first ten days of July, UN humanitarian partners provided 2,300 households with bedding items, tarpaulins and tents, and 13,000 families received kitchen sets. However, access to cooking fuel is still severely limited, as noted by the domestic fires. In addition, the supply stockpiles themselves are severely limited, with less than 1,000 tents currently available and only enough essential household supplies to support 7,000 families.

Across the occupied Palestinian territory, UN agencies continue to warn that violence, funding gaps, and access restrictions have created an unprecedented need that continues to outpace what can be delivered in terms of water, healthcare, education, and shelter.

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A view of Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia. Credit: Unsplash/Ekrem Osmanoglu

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 27 2026 (IPS)

On Wednesday, July 22, the U.S. Secretary of Energy, Chris Wright, and Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Energy, HRH Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman bin Abdulaziz signed a civilian nuclear cooperation agreement, best known as a 123 agreement, as well as an accompanying bilateral safeguards agreement, according to the U.S. Department of Energy and the Saudi Ministry of Energy.

While the agreement was expected to be submitted to Congress for review, President Donald Trump has conditioned U.S. nuclear cooperation on Riyadh, normalizing relations with Israel in order to receive U.S. nuclear technology. A condition that appears difficult to satisfy given the Kingdom’s hardline stance that it will not normalize relations with Israel until a Palestinian state is established with East Jerusalem as its capital, according to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s de facto leader.

Washington mentions that these two agreements “lay the legal foundation for a decades-long, multi-billion-dollar partnership that advances several priority economic and strategic objectives, including nuclear nonproliferation.” The agreement has a 30-year term.

The 123 agreement, named after Section 123 of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 – a U.S. federal law – provides the legal framework for long-term civilian nuclear cooperation between the United States and partner countries. The 123 agreement is mandatory before any significant exports of U.S.-origin nuclear material, such as nuclear reactors, nuclear fuel, and other major components can go to any partner.

Saudi Arabia’s nuclear agreement with the U.S. is more than an energy deal. It has the potential to reshape the Kingdom’s relationship with oil, and its geopolitical role in building the Middle East’s next-generation clean-energy infrastructure.

The advent of nuclear energy could also free up the amount of hydrocarbons Saudi Arabia can export. The Kingdom produced 22,744,529.0 TJ of oil and oil products in 2023, having consumed 6.4 million TJ domestically, equivalent to approximately 28 percent of its production. The Kingdom also produced 3,640,348.0 TJ of natural gas, having consumed all of its domestically produced natural gas that year. For reference, 3,600 TJ is equal to 1 TWh.

Expressed in barrels of oil equivalent (boe), Saudi Arabia produced the energy equivalent to 3.72 billion barrels of oil, in oil and oil products in 2023, consuming 1.05 billion barrels of that oil. This indicates that roughly 72 percent of the Kingdom’s oil and oil products, measured in energy terms, are not domestically consumed, leaving a substantial share available for exports and other uses. Saudi Arabia is the world’s second to third largest exporter of oil, producing 11 percent of global demand.

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), transport accounts for roughly 30 percent of Saudi Arabia’s final energy consumption, followed by non-energy uses (29.7 percent), industry (19.9 percent), and commercial and public services (11 percent).

Although the pace at which Saudi Arabia can transition away from fossil fuels remains uncertain, nuclear power could gradually reduce domestic oil consumption, freeing up oil for export. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), a reactor can take about five or more years to be built after licensing and regulatory approvals are already completed.

Saudi Arabia’s first nuclear plant is expected to consist of two reactors, each producing around 1.4 GW, bringing the plant to a total capacity of 2.8 GW (2,800 MW). Assuming a 90 percent capacity factor, annual energy generation will be 22.1 TWh per year, nearly five percent of Saudi Arabia’s 431.9 TWh electricity generation.

Although Saudi Arabia’s first nuclear plant would account for only about 5 percent of the Kingdom’s current electricity generation, it would represent an important step toward reducing domestic hydrocarbon consumption in support of the country’s national strategy, Vision 2030.

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Satellite image of the Red Sea, the Bab el-Mandeb strait being at the bottom right opening. Credit: Wikimedia/NASA

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 24 2026 (IPS)

With regional friction between Iran and the Gulf monarchies escalating, Houthi leadership in Yemen has proclaimed a total maritime blockade against all vessels linked to Saudi shipping. While this declaration does not constitute a verified military obstruction of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, it significantly heightens the risk of volatility at the Red Sea’s southern gateway, potentially severing the primary arterial link to the Suez Canal.

The embargo is already being framed as more than a simple ban on Saudi-flagged vessels. In messages sent to shipping companies navigating the Strait, the Houthis warned against any activities at Saudi ports, including by non-Saudi-flagged ships, saying that vessels could be targeted “in any location.” This is significant as Saudi Arabia’s maritime infrastructure managed 331 million tonnes of freight in 2024—a volume roughly equal to 12 million fully laden 20-foot containers.

Within days of these threats being made, five ships have been recorded turning around after heading towards the Bab el-Mandeb passage. Among these ships, the Xin Long Yang, a VLCC loaded at Yanbu and bound for Qinzhou, China, carrying 2 million barrels of Saudi crude, initially reversed north towards the Suez Canal. The vessel later reversed course again, choosing to resume its original route heading south towards Bab el-Mandeb.

Additionally, Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said that two Saudi oil tankers, named Encelia and Layla, were targeted for their “violation of the blockade decision issued by the armed forces.”

Jeddah Islamic Port, the Kingdom’s principal commercial gateway on the Red Sea, received 3,805 vessel calls in 2024, more than any other Saudi port. Yanbu has become Saudi Arabia’s critical Red Sea oil-export network, where crude is moved from eastern fields using the East–West pipeline before being loaded onto tankers. With the Strait of Hormuz severely disrupted, the Red Sea corridor is no longer simply an alternative route: it is Saudi Arabia’s critical remaining maritime outlet to Asian markets.

Saudi Arabia’s Yanbu port was loading approximately 4 million b/d in mid-July, close to 4 percent of daily global oil demand. Disruptions at Bab el-Mandeb would also affect the Suez Canal, which carried approximately 22 percent of global seaborne container trade in 2023 and acts as the link between European and Asian markets. Of the cargo which transits through Bab el-Mandeb, 3.97 million b/d of crude passed through its gates in March, according to Kpler.

If the Houthis can continue to enforce their threat and create enough uncertainty, even selective attacks on some vessels can increase wartime insurance costs and undermine security guarantees, which could push carriers to reroute around the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa.

Credit: Maximilian Malawista

For an Asia–Europe container voyage, rerouting around the Cape of Good Hope can add roughly 3,000 to 3,500 nautical miles and approximately seven to ten days of sailing time. This also increases the cost of the voyage, heightening fuel costs, requiring more vessel capacity to maintain scheduled services, and exposing cargo to higher insurance premiums. The World Bank has estimated that the additional fuel bill alone could reach USD 1 million for a round trip. Analysis by the OECD put the wider cost increase at USD 1.7 million for a medium-sized container ship on an Asia–Europe round trip—roughly an increase of USD 272, or 19 percent, for one standard 40-foot container.

In late 2023, similar Houthi threats, which led to selective attacks against commercial vessels, led major carriers to avoid the Red Sea passage and use the alternative route around the Cape of Good Hope. In just three months, by mid-February 2024, UNCTAD had recorded 586 container vessels taking the longer route around Africa, while container tonnage moving through the Suez Canal had simultaneously fallen 82 percent. Spot rates—the price of booking a container on short notice—also rose by 256 percent during the same period on voyages from Shanghai to Europe.

The Suez Canal in Egypt. Credit: Unsplash/Samuel Hanna

For Yemen, the consequences could be especially severe. The country relies on imports for more than 90 percent of its staple foods, including about 90 percent of its wheat and all of its rice requirements. Much of that supply enters through the ports of Aden and Hodeidah. The World Food Programme estimates that 18.2 million people in Yemen require humanitarian aid, being in dire need of humanitarian assistance and protection services.

Even considering that the Houthis formally exempt humanitarian cargo from the embargo, an escalation of insecurity can delay vessels and raise freight and insurance costs, deterring commercial shipping lines from calling at Yemeni ports. Humanitarian aid will not be nearly enough to replace the normal commercial flow of food and fuel, which affects Yemeni civilians first, who are already facing hunger and economic collapse.

The central question is not whether the Houthis can permanently seal Bab el-Mandeb. It is whether they can make the route risky enough that insurers, carriers, and oil traders abandon it themselves.

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Amir Saeid Iravani, Permanent Representative of Iran to the United Nations, addresses the Security Council high-level debate on the safety of global waterways, amid growing concerns over threats to shipping and freedom of navigation, held on April 27, 2026. Credit: UN Photo/Mark Garten

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 23 2026 (IPS)

Prior to the latest round of hostilities between the United States and Iran, freight traffic had been increasing in the Strait of Hormuz, and negotiations were underway for a new agreement to fully restore trade through this channel.

According to UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD), energy markets were likely to bounce back to normal pre-conflict levels faster than that of food, public finance, and transport, leaving many vulnerable economies worse off. UNCTAD research shows a change from about 125 daily ship transits through the Strait of Hormuz in 2026, January 1st through February 27th, to a drop of around 10 daily transits from February 28th through June 14th during the conflict, marking a 92 percent decrease in overall transit ability.

According to UNCTAD and the Strait of Hormuz monitor, levels on June 2nd recorded around 40 ship transits, with an average of 60 through the days after signing the MOU (The Memorandum of Understanding signed by both US and Iranian delegations). This represents roughly half of pre-conflict transit levels.

Source: Author’s visualizations using data from Strait of Hormuz Trade Tracker (WTO)
Note: Daily outbound shipments represent AIS-traceable crude oil tanker departures from the Strait of Hormuz to destinations outside the Persian Gulf. Additionally, this graph is roughly similar to overall shipments of LNG, fertilizer, and Agricultural products through the same period.

Following the closure of the Strait, the daily price of crude oil jumped to USD 120 per barrel, then averaged around USD 100 per barrel throughout the conflict. The daily price of crude oil fell to USD 70 per barrel upon the signing of the MOU, roughly returning to pre-conflict levels. However, following the latest escalations and the breaking of the MOU, crude prices have risen again to approximately USD 100, indicating that agreements to cease conflicts can quickly bring prices down significantly, if agreed to once more.

On the contrary, the IGC Grains and Oilseeds Freight index (GOFI), indicates a slow decrease of the heightened costs of transporting both grains and oilseeds by sea (e.g., Wheat, Corn, Barley, Sorghum, Soybeans, Rapeseed (canola), Sunflower seed), across 68 key exporting origins in the regions of the United States, The European Union, Canada, the Black Sea region, Brazil, Australia, and Argentina.

Source: Author’s visualizations using data from the International Grains Council (IGC).
Note: The index is normalized so that 100 represents the average grain and oilseed freight rate on January 1, 2013. During the conflict, the index rose to approximately 190, representing a 90 percent increase relative to the base value and a 30 percent increase from the beginning of the conflict on February 28, 2026.

As a result of the heightened price of grains and oilseeds, among other agriculture components, UNCTAD says, “Past input price shocks remain a risk to future food security,” laying out the cycle in which costs can amount:

1. Traffic through the strait was disrupted.
2. Limited freight traffic constricts the availability and raises the cost of oil, gas and nitrogenous fertilizer.
3. A decrease in energy exports creates higher energy prices, increasing transport and shipping costs.
4. Further fuel inflation slows down the global economy.
5. Agricultural production costs increase.
6. Food production may be affected by the increased cost of agricultural components such as fertilizer, pushing domestic food prices further up.
7. Vulnerable populations may face greater food insecurity and hunger, as a result of the heightened cost of importing food, and domestic agriculture production.

This process has exposed 61 vulnerable economies to dual impact of higher oil and cereal import prices. (e.g., wheat, rice, corn, barley, oats, sorghum, millet, rye) These countries consist of 35 least developed countries and 26 small island states, with seven of those countries being both least developed and small island developing states.

According to UNCTAD, the pressure is “sharpest for economies that rely heavily on imported fuel”, citing an example in Cabo Verde where net imports of oil and petroleum products averaged 24.6 percent of GDP within recent years. This dependence on fuel imports means that those extra costs can quickly make food prices, electricity, transport, and public finances more expensive.

Source: Author’s visualizations using data from UNCTADStat.
Notes: Orange countries are small island states, and blue countries are least developed countries (LDCs).

Yemen was also cited to be at high risk, with analysis showing that net imports of cereal and cereal products averaged 10.8 percent of GDP. For countries like Yemen dealing with conflict, hyperinflation, debt pressure, and limited public financing, a higher import bill for grain compounds an already declining situation.

Source: Author’s visualizations using data from UNCTADStat.
Notes: Orange countries are small island states, and blue countries are least developed countries (LDCs).

UNCTAD analysis indicates that a real increase of food cost by just 5 percent is associated with a higher risk of child wasting (a life-threatening form of acute malnutrition), especially among poor children and children living in rural landless households.

While restoring full trade through the strait is a necessary step to recovery, this will not undo the aftermath that higher import bills, delayed shipments, and higher priced food and energy have on the global economy, especially vulnerable economies.

“The policy task is therefore broader than reopening a route. Vulnerable economies need support to manage higher import bills, protect households from food and fuel shocks, and invest in systems that reduce exposure before the next disruption hits household budgets,” said UNCTAD, indicating the importance for vulnerable economies to develop supply chain resilience, sustainable systems, and have less reliance on concentrated international trade for vital goods such as food and energy, among financial support from the international system.

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Map of the Strait of Hormuz. Credit: Wikimedia/Goran_tek-en

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 17 2026 (IPS)

A continuation of hostilities within the Strait of Hormuz is once again threatening one of the world’s most critical supply chain arteries, posing another wave of disruption which could choke the global energy, shipping and commodity markets. With roughly a quarter of global seaborne oil trade transiting through the Strait, alongside significant flows of liquefied natural gas and fertilizers, further constraints on commercial traffic could send new cost pressures cascading through supply chains that have yet to absorb the full effects of the earlier conflict.

Unlike the initial disruption, this latest escalation is hitting an already elevated and damaged cost base. U.S. President Donald Trump had proposed a 20 percent charge on cargo transiting the Strait, a plan he abandoned on July 14th after pressure from Gulf allies. At a current crude oil price of roughly USD 85 per barrel, a 20 percent levy on all cargo would amount to an additional USD 17 per barrel, around 17 times Iran’s previously proposed USD 1 per barrel toll.

Yet, the larger challenge remains whether an assurance of safety through the Strait can really be guaranteed. While Washington has promised to safeguard commercial vessels attempting to transit, multiple vessels have been struck by Iranian forces, including the UAE-flagged supertankers Mombasa and Al Bahiyah on July 12th. Both vessels have a capacity of roughly 2 million barrels of oil, placing the potential value of a full cargo at roughly USD 171 million before insurance, maintenance and transit costs are considered.

If continued attacks deter vessels from transiting the Strait, constrained oil flows could combine with increased insurance premiums and higher transport costs, pushing additional expenses through global supply chains and eventually onto consumers.

These effects are already visible when examining vessel movements. On July 15th, a total of five transits were recorded, three inbound and two outbound, with one of those ships being Iranian-flagged outbound. Daily throughput in deadweight tonnage (DWT) stood at 130,311 DWT, or just 1.27 percent of the 10.3 million DWT pre-conflict daily average. Meanwhile, approximately 450 vessels remain waiting to transit the Strait, including 120 tankers, 180 bulk carriers and 150 other vessels.

War risk premiums, the additional fees charged to insure vessels operating within conflict zones, have skyrocketed from a 0.15 percent pre-conflict rate to 5 percent, a more than 33-fold increase. Very large crude carriers (VLCCs) can be valued from USD 130 million to more than USD 170 million, meaning a five percent premium could add an additional cost of USD 6.5 million to USD 8.75 million per voyage. For a VLCC carrying 2 million barrels, that would amount to roughly USD 7.5 million, compared with approximately USD 2.225 million under Iran’s proposed USD 1-per-barrel toll combined with pre-conflict war-risk premiums.

However, the compounding effects extend beyond oil. Data from the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Strait of Hormuz Trade Tracker shows that while crude oil shipments had begun to recover marginally, liquefied natural gas (LNG) and fertilizer-related shipments remain at a virtual standstill, with zero outbound shipments currently recorded. Renewed escalations risk further restricting already depressed commodity flows, with approximately one-third of the world’s seaborne fertilizer trade and one-fifth of global LNG transiting through the Strait.

Using a volume index in which 100 represents average volume levels, the WTO recorded a volume index of 25.69 for LNG on July 5th, following nearly four months in which shipments were recorded on only four other days. Fertilizer-related shipments showed greater resilience, recording a volume index of 97.62 on June 23rd. However, no further fertilizer-related shipments have been recorded, leaving the trade flow at a standstill for more than three weeks.

These restrictions could be particularly damaging for energy- and food-importing economies, notably developing countries that spend significant shares of national income on essential imports of energy and food. Simultaneous increases in fuel, transportation, and agricultural inputs risk creating a broader inflationary shock. Higher fertilizer costs can increase agricultural production costs, while elevated energy and shipping expenses raise the cost of transporting goods from exporters to importers, leaving consumers exposed to several layers of the same disruption.

The disruption has also carried a significant human cost. The International Maritime Organization (IMO) has warned against continued commercial transit through the Strait, with IMO Secretary-General Arsenio Dominguez urging shipowners, operators, and flag States, along with all relevant authorities to “avoid exposing seafarers to unnecessary danger by transiting the Strait.” At the same time, the United States has announced that it will resume a naval blockade targeting vessels transiting to and from Iranian ports. Iran, meanwhile, has framed its control over the Strait as a national security issue and has threatened that it will remain closed “until the end of America’s evils.”

At its 137th session, the IMO Council reaffirmed that the right of transit through straits used for international navigation “should not be threatened, impeded, denied, hampered, impaired or suspended,” reiterating that any measures taken by coastal states to regulate traffic in vital shipping lanes should be done in accordance with IMO regulations under the International Convention on the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS). The Council also stated that traffic through the Strait must “remain free of any tolls and charges, in accordance with international law, including the IMO Convention.”

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk warned that “Reports on the closure of the Strait of Hormuz are very alarming for their impact on human rights far beyond the region,” describing the Strait as “a vital lifeline on which millions are reliant.”

The dangers are also being borne directly by seafarers trapped in the Persian Gulf. Of approximately 20,000 seafarers stranded by the crisis, around 11,000 have been evacuated through an IMO-supported initiative. However, evacuation operations have reportedly been paused since June 25, leaving thousands still stranded.

The economic consequences of the initial disruption were already substantial before this latest escalation. According to the World Bank, global energy prices rose by 24 percent following the conflict’s onset, with fertilizer prices projected to rise by more than 30 percent in 2026. Renewed hostilities in the Strait now threaten to compound these pressures, demonstrating how insecurity within a narrow stretch of water can transmit costs across global supply chains, from ships at sea to businesses, households and economies around the world.

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A cargo vessel docked at a port facility. Credit: UNCTAD

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 16 2026 (IPS)

The full economic impact of the disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz may not become clear until the second half of 2026, warns the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).

Prior to the closure, an average of 129 maritime vessels transited daily through the strait, carrying approximately 34 percent of globally traded crude oil and 20 percent of the world’s liquefied natural gas (LNG). Asia is by far the largest importer of Gulf crude and oil products, receiving 91 percent of Gulf crude and petroleum products or roughly 16.5 million barrels per day.

Daily oil exports through the Strait of Hormuz by destination, million barrels per day (mb/d). Credit: Maximilian Malawista (Data: IEA)

While much of the global economy appears to be absorbing the shock rather decently, UNCTAD warned that the broader consequences of the Strait of Hormuz disruption have yet to fully materialize.

“I should qualify that the full picture on Hormuz disruptions should become clearer in the second half of 2026, once the higher costs have been fully absorbed through value chains, the broader macroeconomy, and financial conditions.” UNCTADS’s Head of Macroeconomic and Development Policies, Anastasia Nesveailtova, told Inter Press Service.

Oil prices in recent months have reached an amount higher than USD 100 per barrel, up from roughly USD 60 per barrel last June. While the immediate effects have been largely visible in the energy markets, economists note that secondary shocks often take months to fully solidify through the broader global economy.

Higher fuel costs increase expenses for agricultural producers, shipping companies, and manufacturers, all which are heavily reliant on energy intensive operations. As businesses begin to absorb these costs, they are often felt later by the consumer as it takes time for the full supply chain costs to trickle down.

UNCTAD warned about these secondary effects as early as March this year, noting that “Freight rates for oil tankers and war risk insurance premiums are surging, while marine fuel costs are also rising, increasing shipping costs across supply chains.”

Credit: Maximilian Malawista (Data: UNCTAD)

Beyond transport costs, the disruption also threatens global agricultural supply chains. UNCTAD notes that “Around one-third of global seaborne fertilizer trade (about 16 million tonnes) passes through the strait,” raising concerns that prolonged disruption of the strait could increase agricultural production costs by limiting access to fertilizer.

Several countries that rely heavily on fertilizer imports from the Persian Gulf are also major agricultural producers and exporters. According to UNCTAD, Australia for example sources 32 percent of its seaborne fertilizer imports from the Gulf. According to the World Trade Organization (WTO), Australia is among the world’s largest agricultural exporters, accounting for 12.8 percent of global agricultural exports, making it a top five exporter.

Likely as a result of fertilizer being a critical input to agricultural production, a decrease in supply of fertilizer signals an increase in price, meaning growing food becomes more costly. These effects also reach other exporters such as Pakistan, Thailand and New Zealand, but largely will affect them less than the secondary result of a supply constriction which raises regional food prices for vulnerable countries.

UNCTAD records that Sudan receives 54 percent of its fertilizer through seaborne imports from the Gulf, along with the United Republic of Tanzania, Somalia, and Mozambique also receiving large percentages from the region. Sudan and Somalia in particular are currently in a humanitarian food insecurity crisis, with parts of Mozambique also continuing to experience food security pressures.

The economic consequences of the Strait of Hormuz’s disruption may therefore extend far beyond just energy markets, reaching consumers worldwide through higher transportation, agricultural and supply chain expenses.

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Aerial view of the Port of Dubai Emirate located in Jebel Ali district, Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Credit: WikiMedia/Imre Solt

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 14 2026 (IPS)

Despite the importance of international trade as an engine for economic growth and development, only fourteen of the twenty-two Arab states are members of the World Trade Organization (WTO). The remaining Arab states risk missing out on opportunities for greater integration into the global economy and the multilateral trading system facilitated by the WTO.

A new joint study produced by the WTO, the Arab Monetary Fund, the Islamic Development Bank, and the Islamic Centre for Development of Trade examines the benefits of WTO membership, the barriers facing Arab states seeking accession and the economic characteristics which define the region.

According to the publication, WTO membership has “facilitated and secured significant export opportunities in the markets of other WTO members,” while also developing “competitive market conditions and a business-friendly environment.” Membership can create the predictability and stability needed to attract foreign direct investment, while encouraging economic diversification and supporting regulatory reform.

The potential benefits of WTO membership can also be reflected by logistics performance of Arab economies. According to the World Bank’s 2023 Logistics Performance Index, Arab members of the WTO generally outperform non-member economies across infrastructure, international shipments, logistics competence, and other logistics related sectors.

The Index recorded that Arab WTO members had an average logistics score of 3.17 compared to an average of 2.25 among non-member states. The United Arab Emirates (UAE) ranked the highest among Arab economies with a score of 4.0. In contrast, non-member states such as Somalia and Libya received scores of 2.0 and 1.9.

Source: Author’s visualizations using data from International Logistics Performance Index (LPI) 2023, World Bank Group

Despite the potential benefits of WTO membership, WTO accession has proven to be a lengthy process for Arab states. Seven countries seeking membership — Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, and Syria — have been engaged in accession processes for an average of 18 or more years, with negotiations for some countries remaining inactive for extended periods.

The report attributed these delays to a combination of institutional challenges, political instability and economic turmoil. Political instability and conflict have especially disrupted investment and infrastructure which has halted much needed development across parts of the region, while weak regulatory frameworks have complicated efforts to align national policies with WTO requirements.

For accession to occur, it requires extensive legal and institutional reforms, coordination among regulatory agencies and ministries, and sustained political commitment throughout the years of negotiations. The report identifies the history of centrally planned economies as one of the defining characteristics which has complicated accession for some Arab states.

“An inevitable consequence of this history was the limited experience gained in regulating and governing a competitive private sector-led economy.” the report states. “A transformation from a centrally planned economy to a market economy model normally requires a fundamental shift in the government’s role from being a producer to becoming a regulator.”

These challenges are further complicated by the considerable economic differences among the Arab economies seeking integration within the global trading system.

Dependence on oil and gas for exports remains particularly significant. In 2020, 97 percent of Iraq’s total exports and 95 percent of both Algeria and Libya’s exports were fuel, all three of which are seeking WTO membership. The report argues that this dependence leaves economies vulnerable to fluctuations in global commodity markets and calls for greater economic diversification.

Economic disparities in the region can also be seen through merchandise trade composition. During 2022, Saudi Arabia had recorded a merchandise trade surplus of USD 221.3 billion, followed by the UAE at USD 112.3 billion and Qatar at USD 97.5 billion. Egypt on the other hand recorded a USD 37 billion trade deficit, while Morocco and Lebanon recorded deficits of USD 30.3 billion and USD 15.1 billion, reflecting their respective trade.

These trade compositions highlight the vastly different economic characteristics between Arab states and how they partake in the global trading system. Several of the region’s largest commodity exporters depend heavily on oil and gas, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait, Iraq, Algeria, and Libya. Other Arab economies such as Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, Morocco, and Lebanon, have smaller hydrocarbon sectors and greater dependence on imported goods.

These structural differences alongside varying levels of political stability and institutional capacity, mean that strategies for greater integration into the global trade system cannot be uniform. The report argues that WTO accession strategies must instead be tailored to individual economic and institutional circumstances of each country.

Although the Arab states might differ in how they trade, trade remains central to the region’s economic engine, accounting for 87 percent of GDP across the Arab economies in 2023. Intra-Arab trade on the other hand only accounted only for 9.9 percent of total exports, while intra-Arab imports represented 12.1 percent of total imports during the same period.

International organizations have sought to address some of the barriers facing countries seeking WTO membership. In Iraq, the European Union (EU) funded “strengthening the Agriculture and Agri-Food Value Chain and Improving Trade Policy project” (SAAVI) which has provided aid to Iraq’s WTO accession. SAAVI aims to align Iraq’s trade policies and international standards with the WTO framework through technical assistance, capacity building, and advisory services.

The report argues that greater involvement in the multilateral trading system can greatly support economic diversification and further integrate Arab economies into global value and supply chains. Especially when looking at the model of the gulf countries, where vital energy, petrochemicals, and metals have become nonnegotiable parts of the international trade system. However the report indicated that WTO membership alone cannot guarantee these outcomes. For the seven Arab states seeking accession, strengthening regulatory institutions, improving coordination across government agencies and maintaining sustained political commitment will be critical to advancing accession processes that have already lasted an average of more than 18 years.

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For most individuals, the process of peace starts with the signing of a ceasefire or an agreement among politicians. However, those who live in regions experiencing violence understand that peace is made long before politicians meet at the negotiating table. Peace is created among communities by people who work everyday to ensure that no violence takes place, and that disputes are sorted out.

Muna Luqman, Yemeni peacebuilding advisor and humanitarian leader.

Speaking to IPS Inter Press Service, Yemeni peacebuilding advisor and humanitarian leader Muna Luqman challenged conventional thinking about who builds peace and where peacebuilding truly begins, “Communities never wait until peace happens,” Luqman said. “They’re working to protect peace on a daily basis.”

Based on her extensive experience working in Yemen for more than 15 years, Luqman explained how local communities, especially women, resolve disputes, provide crucial services, negotiate humanitarian assistance and create dialogical spaces way ahead of any intervention of international organizations.

Luqman is the founder and chairperson of Food for Humanity, has seen first-hand the changes conflict brings about in society. While living through the Yemeni civil war, she faced airstrikes and negotiated the evacuation of civilians caught up in the war zone. These experiences led her to realize that humanitarian response alone is inadequate.

“If we only respond to the consequences of conflict without addressing its causes, we will always be a step behind,” she reflected. Her experience also exposed one of the greatest challenges facing local peacebuilders and that is of recognition.

“We thought we would be the first to be supported,” she said, referring to local organisations that led humanitarian responses before international actors arrived. “But we found out that it was a long process.”

According to a report by UN Women, around 676 million lived within 50 kilometers of deadly conflict in 2024 – the highest figure since the 1990s. Sima Bahous, Executive Director of UN Women, said, “Women and girls are being killed in record numbers, shut out of peace tables, and left unprotected as wars multiply. Women do not need more promises, they need power, protection, and equal participation.”

Data collected by the United Nations from 2020-2024 found that, “Women’s representation as negotiators, mediators and signatories in peace processes is far below the target set by the UN. In 2024, women made up only seven percent of negotiators on average worldwide, and nearly nine out of ten negotiation tracks included no women negotiators”. The report stated, women were slightly more represented in mediation roles, averaging 14 percent but still, two-thirds of mediation efforts did not include women.

The discrepancy for Luqman pointed to an underlying problem in international peacebuilding. While local groups responded immediately to communities in need, other institutions were bound by mandates, funding, and procedures. It becomes evident, she says, why true inclusion in peacebuilding should be more than merely symbolic in nature.

True inclusion requires recognizing women not as mere recipients of help or observers of processes, but as active participants in negotiating, mediating, and taking crucial decisions. It is proven that peace treaties are much more sustainable in those cases where women are actively involved in the negotiation process. Women broaden the agenda from purely political aspects like political power-sharing to such crucial areas as justice, education, health care, livelihoods, displacement, and community reconciliation.

Luqman believes that local women possess a unique understanding of these realities because they remain deeply embedded within their communities. “Women mediators are willing to prevent disagreements before they become violence,” she explained. She has witnessed women in Yemen securing the release of prisoners, organizing their communities to rebuild schools and water supplies, and preventing children from joining armed groups. This is often done discreetly, outside the limelight of the international community.

“The strength of women peacebuilders is their ability to mobilize their communities,” she said. However, it is precisely these women who find themselves in extraordinary circumstances. They are threatened, intimidated, forced to flee, and often lack funds despite helping others. Protecting women peacebuilders must be a priority on the global agenda, Luqman asserts.

“They do this work while they are facing either lack of funding or no funding at all. They remain resilient, they remain vulnerable at the same time, and they remain under threats.”

She believes that the international community needs to go beyond recognizing the contribution of women and work to provide financial support to women-led organizations that are trusted and credible within the local communities.

While serving as the United Nations National Coordinator on Inclusion in the Peace Process of Yemen, Luqman developed an approach that would allow local people to speak up. The initiative did not consider participation just as a formal aspect but actually aimed to bring in the community perspective. “It wasn’t symbolic participation,” she told me. “We really took that analysis and used it in our system.” This is because peace processes cannot be made by the political elite only; they need to be inclusive of communities that have been experiencing conflict.

In Luqman’s opinion, local governance, climate challenges, livelihoods, transitional justice, and building trust are not marginal questions but rather central factors in avoiding further outbreaks of violence.

Luqman insists on the need for peacebuilding to involve listening: “Sometimes listening to the people themselves and giving them a space is in itself a peace process.”

In the context of rising complexity of conflicts, the importance of inclusion into peace processes has never been so urgent. Women’s involvement in the processes cannot be considered as some kind of equality issue or simply as an obligation under international mechanisms.

On the contrary, it is strategically necessary based on experience and community trust. The message from Luqman to policymakers is obvious: local women peacebuilders are not marginal figures in peacebuilding but its cornerstone. “The local women peacebuilders are the structure and the backbone of these societies,” Luqman said. “They are valuable. They should be treated as valuable assets. They should be supported and protected.” Constructing sustainable peace is not possible only through negotiations of the parties involved in armed conflict but also through investing in people who have done so many years of keeping communities together despite the situation being unrecognizable.

Sania Farooqui is an independent journalist and host of The Peace Brief, a platform dedicated to amplifying the voices of women in peacebuilding and human rights.

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Satellite image of the Strait of Hormuz. Credit WikiMedia

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 10 2026 (IPS)

Renewed attacks on commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz have intensified concerns over global energy markets along with supply chain disruptions, as the United Nations calls for an end to escalating hostilities within the Persian Gulf.

According to the International Maritime Organization (IMO), three merchant vessels were reportedly struck amid new attacks, prompting IMO Secretary-General Arsenio Dominguez to condemn the violence and urge “maximum restraint and de-escalation”.

“No seafarer should have to risk their life simply for doing their job,” Dominguez said, warning flag states, ship owners and operators against exposing their crews to unnecessary danger by transiting through the Strait.”

Approximately 6,000 seafarers still remain stranded aboard hundreds of vessels. The Strait used to handle around 130 transits daily, now seeing around 30 transits as of July 10th daily, according to the Strait of Hormuz Tracker.

The disruptions have lasted more than 100 days, placing continuous pressure on global energy markets and countries dependent on imports from the Gulf. The UN Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) warned that market volatility, elevated prices, and localized supply disruptions could continue for months.

“We can expect prices and price volatility to remain high and supply disruptions – especially in local markets – to continue for the months ahead,” said UNECE’s Dario Liguti, Director of Energy, Housing & Land Management Division (UNECE).

Liguti mentioned that although a global shortage of fuel and fertilizers have been avoided, the effects of this year’s disruption will still be felt “even if the situation normalizes rapidly”. Liguti also stressed that strategic oil reserves are at their lowest levels in decades.

For global supply chains, continued instability could increase transportation and insurance costs, along with complicating shipping schedules and further extending shipping delays. The Strait of Hormuz Tracker records a war-risk premium increase of 53.3 times normal rates, jumping from 0.15 percent to 8 percent. Currently 120 tankers, 90 bulk carriers, and 90 other ships are waiting to transit, raising production and transportation costs across industries, extending its damage far beyond countries directly dependent on Gulf energy exports.

The latest attacks come as diplomatic efforts to end the conflict have struggled to gain traction. Responding to renewed hostilities in the Strait, during a UN press briefing the Secretary-General’s Spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric called for an immediate return to negotiations.

“This tit-for-tat needs to stop,” Dujarric said. “A return to diplomacy is urgently needed for the sake of stability in the region, for the sake of global stability.”

The renewed violence has also raised questions over the future of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) intended to put a cease on the conflict for at least sixty days. Accord Referring to the agreement, U.S. President Donald Trump said “As far as I’m concerned, it’s over.”

UN Secretary-General António Guterres has reiterated the UN’s readiness to aid diplomatic efforts. His personal envoy to the conflict in the Middle East, Jean Arnault, remains in contact with relevant parties, while the IMO continues to address maritime security within the Strait.

As the attacks continue, and diplomatic efforts remain uncertain, prolonged disruptions to one of the world’s most strategic waterways risks further destabilizing energy markets and global supply chains, which have faced months of disruptions. Continued instability will only worsen the effect, as Liguti reiterates

“If the instability does continue, we should get ready for another rise in prices and a larger-scale raw material shortage”.

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Reef fish and corals. Credit: UNDP

By James Alix Michel
VICTORIA, Seychelles, Jul 3 2026 (IPS)

In just the first half of this year, Abu Dhabi’s Environment Agency has cultivated 302,415 new coral colonies, bringing the total under the Abu Dhabi Coral Gardens Project to around 1.8 million – a scale of restoration that demands global attention.

Abu Dhabi’s coral project is more than a good news story – it is a glimpse of the future we urgently need.

For decades, I have argued that ocean protection, climate stability and human prosperity are inseparable. I have seen what happens when we ignore this truth: coral reefs bleaching, fisheries collapsing, coastlines exposed, communities losing both livelihoods and hope. That is why what Abu Dhabi is doing today with its coral restoration work speaks directly to my convictions about ocean health, climate resilience and the regenerative blue economy.

This is not a symbolic gesture. Through the Abu Dhabi Coral Gardens Project, the Environment Agency – Abu Dhabi (EAD) is building one of the largest coral reef restoration initiatives in the Middle East. Scientists cultivate fragments of heat resilient corals in nurseries, then carefully transplant them onto degraded reefs and artificial structures across the emirate’s coastal and offshore waters. Colony by colony, reef by reef, damaged seabeds are being transformed into living “coral gardens” capable of supporting fish, restoring biodiversity and strengthening coastal protection.

Coral as an investment, not a charity case

When a government decides to cultivate millions of coral colonies and restore vast areas of degraded reef, it is making a strategic economic choice, not simply ticking an environmental box. Coral reefs are infrastructure – natural infrastructure. They protect coasts from storms and erosion, underpin tourism and recreation, support fisheries, and safeguard cultures that have lived with and from the sea for generations.

President James Michel with His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan

Abu Dhabi’s decision to expand coral restoration at scale shows a clear understanding: it is cheaper and wiser to invest in living systems now than to pay later for disaster response, coastal damage and social instability.

This is the kind of thinking I have long argued for – treating the ocean not as a dumping ground, but as the foundation of long term resilience and prosperity.

A city of the future

What impresses me most is that coral restoration in Abu Dhabi is not happening in isolation. It sits alongside major investments in renewable energy, digital infrastructure and urban greening. Abu Dhabi is using its fossil fuel wealth to prepare for a post oil future – and that is no small shift.

Across the emirate, we see large scale solar projects harnessing the desert sun, new low carbon infrastructure, and modern digital networks designed for a smarter, cleaner economy. We see mangrove forests being expanded along the coast, seagrass meadows protected, and the city itself being “greened” to make it more liveable as temperatures rise. Abu Dhabi is becoming a prototype of the “city of the future”: one that understands that climate resilience, nature restoration and clean technology are central to development, not optional add ons.

Too many wealthy states still pour money into wars, arms and short term political games, even as their people face heatwaves, floods and collapsing ecosystems. Abu Dhabi may have its shortcomings – all countries have – but it has a vision and is putting serious capital into the pillars of a different future: clean energy, climate resilience, nature based solutions and large scale coral and mangrove restoration. For a resource rich economy, this is a profound shift in mindset.

This is what I mean by a regenerative blue economy: one that restores nature as it develops, rather than consuming it to exhaustion.

Corals on the frontline of climate change

Let us be clear: coral reefs are on the frontline of climate breakdown. In my own region, the Indian Ocean, we have watched reefs bleach and die as waters warm. The Gulf has suffered the same fate. When a place like Abu Dhabi deliberately farms corals that can better withstand heat, it is not clinging to the past – it is trying to give the future a fighting chance.

Instead of simply lamenting the loss of reefs, Abu Dhabi is experimenting, innovating and acting. It is accepting that the climate is already changing, and that we must adapt with intelligence rather than despair.

By focusing on more heat tolerant coral colonies, the project is quietly advancing a new frontier of climate adaptation: learning how to work with nature’s own resilience, rather than against it. If successful, lessons from the Abu Dhabi Coral Gardens could inform restoration efforts in many other warming seas.

Mangroves, greening and clean infrastructure

Coral nurseries alone are not enough, and Abu Dhabi knows this. The drive to expand mangrove forests, protect seagrass and green the city is part of the same story: recognising that nature is our strongest ally in storing carbon, calming storms and cooling our cities.

Alongside nature based solutions, the emirate is directing significant investment into clean infrastructure: solar farms, energy efficient grids, and other low carbon projects that will gradually reduce dependence on fossil fuels.

Importantly, some of this effort is outward looking, supporting clean energy initiatives in vulnerable countries, including small island states such as Seychelles. When a wealthy state backs solar panels, wind turbines and resilient infrastructure in nations on the frontlines of climate change, it does more than tick a development box – it helps anchor a fairer, more stable world.

I have long argued that a healthy ocean is our first line of defence against climate change.

When you connect coral restoration, mangrove expansion and renewable energy under one vision, you start to see what real climate leadership looks like. It is not just about speeches at summits; it is about decisions on land use, budgets, technology and national priorities. It is about accepting that the only truly secure societies in the twenty first century will be those that learn to live within planetary boundaries.

A message to wealthy nations

This is where my opinion becomes blunt.

If you are a wealthy country today and you are not using your resources to restore ecosystems, decarbonise your economy and support those most vulnerable to climate impacts, then you are failing your citizens and the world. It is that simple.

Abu Dhabi shows that another path is possible. You can be an energy producer and still invest heavily in renewables. You can be a global city and still prioritise mangroves and coral reefs. You can be rich and choose to fund regeneration rather than destruction.

So when I look at this coral project, I see more than a local environmental initiative. I see a challenge to the complacency of other rich nations that prefer to invest in weapons and fossil infrastructure rather than in the living systems that sustain us all. It exposes a stark moral choice: spend on the machinery of war and planetary destabilisation, or spend on the stability and dignity that come from a thriving natural world.

Why this matters to me

As someone who has spent much of his life fighting for ocean protection, I cannot simply observe this from a distance. I feel a deep sense of responsibility – and, frankly, urgency. We are fast approaching the limits of what the ocean can absorb. We are already seeing climate impacts that once belonged to scientific warnings, not daily news.

Yet Abu Dhabi’s coral work gives me a measure of hope. It confirms that when visionary leadership, political will, financial capacity and scientific knowledge align, we can still repair, restore and reimagine our relationship with the ocean. It shows that a city built on hydrocarbons can choose to become a champion of coral, mangroves and clean energy instead of doubling down on the old model.

My vision has always been that countries, especially those with resources, should use their wealth to heal rather than harm: to farm corals instead of conflict, to grow mangroves instead of militaries, to build renewable capacity instead of new fossil dependencies.

Abu Dhabi is working towards the embodiment of that vision and it deserves recognition.

If more wealthy states chose this path, the global story on climate and ocean health would look very different – and future generations might say that, when it truly mattered, some leaders chose to use their power and their wealth to restore the ocean that makes life on Earth possible.

James Alix Michel, former President of Seychelles and Founder, James Michel Foundation

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U.S. and Israeli army officers talk in front a US Patriot missile defense system. Credit: Jack Guez/Getty Images Source: Council on Foreign Relations

By Alon Ben-Meir
NEW YORK, Jul 3 2026 (IPS)

For a generation, no foreign leader bet more heavily on a single American president than Benjamin Netanyahu bet on Donald Trump. Trump moved the US embassy to Jerusalem, tore up the 2015 nuclear accord with Iran, recognized Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, and in February 2026 joined Israel in the opening strikes of a war against Iran that Netanyahu had spent three decades urging Washington to wage.

The partnership looked unbreakable. It was, in fact, conditional—and the condition was that their interests never diverge. In June 2026 they diverged completely, and the rupture has exposed a truth Netanyahu has spent his career denying: when Israeli security and the prime minister’s political survival point in opposite directions, he chooses himself.

The break came over a single document. On June 17, Trump signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Iran—the Islamabad Memorandum, brokered by Pakistan—formally ending the war he had pushed to start. The 14-point framework in the memorandum declares a permanent halt to hostilities on all fronts, including Lebanon, reopens the Strait of Hormuz, lifts the U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports, and waives sanctions on Iran’s oil exports. It also commits the United States and regional partners to assemble a $300 billion reconstruction fund and to negotiate the gradual release of Iran’s frozen assets worldwide.

What it does not do is what Israel went to war to achieve. The framework deferred the negotiation over Iran’s nuclear program to a later date, and it says nothing about Iran’s ballistic missiles or its regional proxies. Essentially, Trump wanted a short war that would compel Iran to come to the negotiating table. Netanyahu, on the other hand, wanted Iran permanently broken as a regional power. Those two visions could coexist while the fighting continued, but could not survive peace.

Thus, Netanyahu set out to wreck it. Israel’s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich branded the agreement bad for Israel and for the free world. National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir declared that Trump’s deal “does not bind us” and that Israel “is not subject to the United States.” And Israeli jets kept hitting Lebanon. On June 14, with the signing supposedly hours away, Israel struck Beirut. Trump erupted publicly, then telephoned Netanyahu.

The call was not diplomatic. In a telephone call by Trump to Netanyahu, he said, ”Bibi, you better be careful, or you will be on your own very soon.” In a subsequent call with Netanyahu, there was an even angrier exchange: Trump called the Israeli leader “crazy,” accused him of ingratitude, and—according to US officials briefed on the call—reminded him bluntly: “You’d be in prison if it weren’t for me.”

That last line is the key to everything. Netanyahu has one political lifeline left: the war. As long as Israel is fighting, there will be no elections; as long as there are no elections, he stays in office, and as long as he stays in office, he can postpone the corruption trials, waiting for the moment he loses power. For Netanyahu, peace is not merely inconvenient—it is politically existential.

The US intelligence community reportedly warned the White House that Netanyahu was actively working to blow up Trump’s Iran deal, and analysts said plainly that Trump would have to play the middle man against his own ally. The man who lobbied for the war had become the chief obstacle to the peace.

Then came the moment the world was meant to absorb. On June 18, Vice President JD Vance stood at a White House podium and delivered a rebuke unlike any an American administration has aimed at Israel in living memory. “Donald J. Trump is the only head of state in the entire world who is sympathetic to the nation of Israel at this moment in time,” he said. “If I was in the cabinet of the Israeli government, I might not be attacking the only powerful ally I have left.”

Then the reminder that doubled as a threat: “Over the last three months, two-thirds of the defensive weapons that have protected your homeland have been built by American hands and paid for by American tax dollars.” Anyone in Israel who thinks their problem is Trump, Vance added, needs to “wake up and smell the reality.” He was basically warning Israel and reminding it who arms its skies to protect the peace deal with Iran.

The warning has not been heeded, and the cost is mounting. The first round of US-Iran technical talks was set for Switzerland’s Birkenstock resort on June 19. The night before, Israeli airstrikes across southern Lebanon killed 47 people, by the Lebanese health ministry’s count, and wounded scores more. Iran demanded a guarantee that the fighting would stop before it would sit down. Vance canceled his trip; the talks collapsed.

On June 20, Iran announced it was closing the Strait of Hormuz again, citing Israel’s strikes as a violation of the agreement. Vance worked to salvage the deal; Smotrich went public: Israel will stay in southern Lebanon “for as many years as necessary,” until Hezbollah disarms, and will not withdraw—adding that the prime minister agrees. It was a statement engineered to sabotage a peace Israel’s closest patron was risking its credibility to build.

This is the heart of the matter, and it is the part Netanyahu, Smotrich, and Ben Gvir refuse to grasp: Israel is almost wholly dependent on the United States—financially, militarily, and diplomatically. Washington is the shield that absorbs global outrage, vetoes resolutions, and replenishes arsenals. Openly defying a deal Trump personally signed is not bold statecraft. It is a slap in the face of the one ally Israel cannot afford to lose, delivered by a government that has confused its own survival with the nation’s.

The damage will outlast this episode. America’s interest now is a stable region, open shipping lanes, and a managed diplomacy with Iran rather than perpetual war. Netanyahu’s interest is the war itself. Those are not tactical differences to be smoothed over; they are structurally opposed, and they will keep colliding for as long as Netanyahu is in power.

The relationship that defined Israeli security for decades has been quietly inverted—the enemy has become the deal partner, and the indispensable ally has become the liability. It will not be repaired by reassurances or photo opportunities. It will be repaired only when Israel has a leader whose political life does not depend on keeping the country at war.

Until then, the rupture is not a crisis to be weathered. It is the new baseline. Netanyahu’s arrogance (chutzpah) will finally come back to haunt him.

Dr Alon Ben-Meir is President of the Institute for Humanitarian Conflict Resolution

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The report - Military Escalation in the Middle East: Cushioning the Global Shock – reveals that low- and middle-income countries have partially protected their populations from soaring oil prices through fossil fuel subsidies, price caps, tax rebates and demand-management measures. Credit: UNDP

By UN Development Programme
NEW YORK, Jul 1 2026 (IPS)

Developing countries’ efforts to tackle the ongoing effects of conflict in the Middle East carry a high price that leaves little room for critical investments in education, health and other development priorities, according to a new report by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) released today.

The report – Military Escalation in the Middle East: Cushioning the Global Shock – reveals that low- and middle-income countries have partially protected their populations from soaring oil prices through fossil fuel subsidies, price caps, tax rebates and demand-management measures.

Fossil fuel subsidies, which had been on a downward trend globally, are on track to reach US$1.1 trillion in 2026 – US$ 410 billion more than in 2025, assuming the current average oil price settles at US$88.6 per barrel.

This projection climbs to as much as US$1.43 trillion in a ‘severe’ scenario where oil prices climb to an average of US$110 per barrel.

The UNDP report warns that while fossil fuel subsidies provide temporary relief, they ultimately undermine climate and development goals, locking countries into high-carbon pathways and limiting future investment.

“The global spillover of the Middle East conflict is profound and potentially long-lasting. Developing countries, many already struggling with debt, have temporarily managed to protect people from the worst of the energy shock,” said UNDP Administrator Alexander De Croo. “These countries are doing everything they can, but there is a hidden cost. To deal with today’s crisis, governments are postponing tomorrow’s investments. Money that should be building schools, hospitals, and clean energy systems is being used simply to keep economies afloat. Without international support, these countries won’t escape the shock. They are absorbing it at the expense of future growth.”

Close to half of the world’s poorest countries are already either ‘in’ or at ‘high risk’ of debt distress, and debt continues to crowd out development spending at an increasing rate, according to the report.

This year, it is estimated that the median developing economy will spend 9.53 percent of total government revenue on interest payments alone – double the share of a decade ago and the highest level seen in 25 years.

Averaged over the three-year period 2024 to 2026, 55 developing economies are estimated to pay more than 10 percent of revenue in interest payments, compared to 32 countries a decade ago.

“No country should have to sacrifice its future development to manage a crisis it did not create,” said De Croo. “First, we must unlock multilateral liquidity in ways that are easy to access for low and middle-income countries. Second, we must accelerate investment in renewable energy. Every clean energy investment reduces exposure to future shocks. The crisis has made one thing clear: energy security and the energy transition are no longer separate agendas. They are one and the same.”

The report is being launched in the context of the Hamburg Sustainability Conference (HSC) taking place this week. The HSC is an annual high-level meeting that aims to foster new partnerships and collective action by global policymakers, private sector leaders, academia experts, and civil society representatives. The annual event is a joint initiative of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg and the Michael Otto Foundation.

Full report
The full report is available online at https://www.undp.org/publications/military-escalation-middle-east-cushioning-global-shock

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Excerpt:

Tehran, Iran before the conflict began. Credit: Unsplash/Mohammad Takhsh

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 1 2026 (IPS)

The on-again, off-again US-Iran peace negotiations, which have been disparaged by Israeli leaders, have resulted in a rare rift between the US and Israel, a Middle East ally which has had America’s unwavering “iron clad” support since its creation in 1948.

The cracks were visible – all the way from Tel Aviv to Washington DC. But is this for real or just a passing family squabble?

US Vice President J.D. Vance, who has been leading the negotiations in Geneva, lambasted the Israelis last week for their very personal attack on President Donald Trump.

“Donald Trump is the only head of state in the entire world who is sympathetic to the nation of Israel at this moment in time, and he happens to be the head of state of the world’s superpower,” he said, speaking to reporters at the White House.

Vance said ” two thirds of the weapons that protected Israel were American-made and paid for by US tax dollars.”

“If I was in the cabinet of the Israeli government, I might not be attacking the only powerful ally that i have anywhere left in the entire world,” he warned.

Dr Ramzy Baroud, Palestinian author and editor of the Palestine Chronicle, told Inter Press Service “while Vice President J.D. Vance’s comments may suggest that there is some divergence between the United States and Israel, we should be cautious not to read too much into them or assume that they signal a fundamental shift in US policy”.

First, this is not the first time that criticism of Israel has emerged from a US administration, even from officials widely regarded as strong supporters of Israel, he pointed out. Similar disagreements have surfaced before without leading to any meaningful change in American policy.

Second, there have been credible reports indicating that, during the Biden administration, the appearance of tension between President Biden and Prime Minister Netanyahu was often overstated and did not reflect the reality of continued US support for the genocide in Gaza.

Despite public disagreements, American military, financial, and diplomatic backing remained largely unchanged, he said.

Similarly, recent attempts to portray a rift between President Trump and Netanyahu—whether genuine or exaggerated—have so far had little impact on US support for Israel.

In fact, only days after Vice President Vance’s remarks, the United States carried out another strike against Iran, in line with objectives long advocated by the Netanyahu government, said Dr Baroud.

At the same time, Washington is actively advancing a broader scheme in Lebanon aimed at achieving politically what Israel failed to achieve militarily: weakening the Resistance, restructuring Lebanon’s political and security landscape in Israel’s favor, all while continuing to ignore the ongoing genocide in Gaza, declared Dr Baroud..

Meanwhile, according to a Fact Sheet from the US State Department “steadfast support for Israel’s security has been a cornerstone of American foreign policy for every U.S. Administration since the presidency of Harry S. Truman”.

“Since Israel’s founding in 1948, the United States has provided Israel with over $130 billion in bilateral assistance focused on addressing new and complex security threats, bridging Israel’s capability gaps through security assistance and cooperation, increasing interoperability through joint exercises, and helping Israel maintain its Qualitative Military Edge (QME).”

This assistance has helped transform the Israel Defense Forces into one of the world’s most capable, effective militaries and turned the Israeli military industry and technology sector into one of the largest exporters of military capabilities worldwide.

Since 1983, the United States and Israel have met regularly via the Joint Political-Military Group (JPMG) to promote shared policies, address common threats and concerns, and identify new areas for security cooperation.

The 48th JPMG, held in October 2022 reaffirmed the ironclad strategic partnership between the United States and Israel, underscoring a mutual commitment to advance collaboration in support of regional security and reinforce the historic achievements of recent normalization under the Abraham Accords.

Israel is the leading global recipient of Title 22 U.S. security assistance under the Foreign Military Financing (FMF) program. This has been formalized by a 10-year (2019-2028) Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). Consistent with the MOU, the United States annually provides $3.3 billion in FMF and $500 million for cooperative programs for missile defense.

Since Elaborating further, FY 2009, the United States has provided Israel with $3.4 billion in funding for missile defense, including $1.3 billion for Iron Dome support starting in FY 2011. Through FMF, the United States provides Israel with access to some of the most advanced military equipment in the world, including the F-35 Lightning.

Israel is also eligible for Cash Flow Financing and is authorized to use its annual FMF allocation to procure defense articles, services, and training through the Foreign Military Sales (FMS) system, Direct Commercial Contract agreements – which are FMF-funded Direct Commercial Sales procurements – and through Off Shore Procurement (OSP). Via OSP the current MOU allows Israel to spend a portion of its FMF on Israeli-origin rather than U.S.-origin defense articles. This was 25 percent in FY 2019 but is set to phase-out and decrease to zero in FY 2028.

Elaborating further, Dr Baroud said It is important to note any signs of disagreement between Washington and Tel Aviv. However, political rhetoric is ultimately meaningless unless it is accompanied by tangible changes on the ground.

Israel remains the largest recipient of US military and financial assistance anywhere in the world, even as it carries out the genocide in Gaza.

As long as this fundamental equation remains unchanged, any supposed disagreements or personal feuds between the two governments amount to little more than empty words, he declared.

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(L-R) Horacio (Luis) Carvalho, CEO of Climate Change Ventures, and Faraz Khan, MBE, at London Climate Action Week. Carvalho's firm advises on carbon mitigation and green investment projects. They signed an MOU to develop markets with Brazilian CPR Verde (green rural product certificate), a Brazilian financial credit instrument used to fund environmental preservation, forestry conservation, and carbon sequestration. The markets they are eyeing will be Saudi Arabia, Africa and Pakistan. Credit: Faraz Khan

By Zofeen Ebrahim
LONDON & KARACHI, Pakistan, Jun 26 2026 (IPS)

The 30 COP gatherings may not have done what three months of US-Israeli war against Iran did: expose the world’s vulnerability to fossil fuels.

As the world faced its biggest energy shock in a decade, the case for investing in clean energy suddenly became far more compelling.

As an intense heatwave grips Europe, with London’s Met Office issuing a “risk to life” warning and the closure of shops, offices and schools alongside disruptions to transport during the London Climate Action Week (LCAW), calls for this shift are gaining even greater momentum.

New Sense of Urgency

“The sentiment is palpable among policymakers, investors and business leaders,” conceded Faraz Khan, MBE.

A Pakistani entrepreneur and co-founder and partner of Pakistan-based Sustainadility, a technology, data and advisory firm, with over 25 years of experience in multi-stakeholder investments and in drafting environmental, sustainability and governance frameworks, is among those gathered to discuss the future of climate finance and the energy transition.

Speaking to IPS by phone on the sidelines of LCAW which closes on June 28, Khan stressed the urgency of transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy, saying the shift would not be possible without investors and businesses.

Khan described the mood at LCAW, as “optimistic” tempered by caution. He also welcomed the attention Pakistan was getting. “Our country was lauded for its efforts in brokering the peace deal,” referring to the Islamabad Memorandum between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran.

From Rule-Making to Seeking Investment

Comparing the two events, he said the annual Bonn climate talks, held from June 8 to 18, focused on diplomatic negotiations and climate rule-making, while LCAW, also an annual event held since 2019, centres on mobilising private investment in sustainability and ESG and scaling these initiatives commercially.

“LCAW is more business- and private sector-orientated,” said Khan, who is also the founder and director of  SeedVentures, a Pakistan-based social impact organisation and impact investor.

Still, he said: “There are two sides to the coin. On the one hand, the US-Iran peace deal and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz have shown the world that oil remains crucial for the world to exist; but, on the other, many countries recognise that dependence on fossil fuels is not in their national interest and even poses a national security risk.”

Geopolitical conflicts have exposed the vulnerabilities associated with oil production, trade and transportation, which is why investment in alternative energy is expected to accelerate.

At a COP31 presidential meeting with the private sector at LCAW, which Khan attended, the conversation revolved around the circular economy, electrification and climate finance with some of the biggest names in the global climate community, including BlackRock, the World Bank, UNIDO, the IFC and several trade organisations.

“It was a gathering of the who’s who of the climate world,” Khan said with a laugh. “Even we made the cut.”

What was missing, however, Khan said, were women in decision-making roles. He was, however, impressed by those in the Turkish COP team, praising their intellectual rigour and commanding presence in the room, which he found to be “truly impressive”.

Beyond the composition of the meetings, Khan said the discussions themselves reflected a growing determination to move beyond rhetoric.

There was a strong sense in the room that a new precedent was about to be set by shifting the focus from negotiations to implementation, investment and action.

“Governments can create an enabling environment and UN frameworks can provide the rules, but ultimately it is investors, bankable projects and big businesses that will drive change,” he said.

While the Bonn climate talks focused on regulatory frameworks, LCAW’s focus is on climate finance and transactions, he noted. “And at Antalya, where the COP31 will be held this November, it will be about putting money where our mouths are—deploying capital into bankable projects and creating collaborative investment vehicles to scale climate action,” said Khan.

Private Sector Takes Centre Stage

He also observed that China was frequently cited as a global leader in clean energy investment.

“Across the various meetings, I sensed a strong and growing appetite for investment in renewable energy, and I believe this momentum will only accelerate,” he said.

Large businesses and institutions, he added, would be critical to delivering a just transition because their extensive operations and community links give them the reach needed to drive meaningful change.

The emphasis on electrification and reducing dependence on fossil fuels was echoed by Türkiye’s COP31 leadership.

Earlier this month, speaking to The Guardian on the sidelines of the climate talks in Bonn, Murat Kurum, Türkiye’s environment minister, said the 35% target would be “one of the defining priorities” of the COP31 presidency.

“By electrifying daily life, from transport to buildings and industry, we can protect families and businesses from volatile energy markets,” he told the media outlet.

Khan believed Pakistan has an opportunity to position itself at the forefront of this transition.

While Pakistan is frequently showcased as a victim of climate disasters, despite contributing less than 1% of global greenhouse gas emissions, Khan said the global focus on solar should also shine a light on the country’s “silent solar revolution”, which has transformed its investment landscape.

“Pakistan has become a global example of how solar adoption can evolve rapidly, opening up substantial investment opportunities in solar manufacturing and battery production,” he said, adding that modernising the grid and scaling up utility-scale energy storage have become increasingly urgent.

Investing in Nature

Beyond renewable energy, Khan saw significant opportunities in nature-based investments.

Khan said Pakistan’s rich biodiversity—from mangroves and forests to wetlands, rangelands and mountain ecosystems—offers enormous investment potential, with private capital capable of both restoring and protecting these natural assets.

Agriculture accounts for a large share of Pakistan’s economy and is a major driver of biodiversity loss. He said private businesses could invest in regenerative agriculture, agroforestry and sustainable rice and cotton production, either to meet sustainability goals or as part of emerging biodiversity credit markets.

“Just as there are carbon credits, there are biodiversity credits, and these are directly linked to food security and agriculture,” Khan said. Given agriculture’s central role in Pakistan’s economy, he argued that the country holds enormous potential for biodiversity credits. “I think this is going to be truly phenomenal because it presents enormous investment opportunities,” he said.

But realising this potential will depend on Pakistan’s ability to attract sustained private investment.

Investment Challenges

Sadly, there are few takers.

Khan said Pakistan’s high sovereign risk remains the biggest obstacle to attracting international climate investment at scale, although recent policy reforms, including the Pakistan Green Taxonomy, green banking guidelines and ESG standards, have improved investor confidence.

He also pointed to a shortage of bankable projects, with many failing to attract global investors despite their strong fundamentals. Still, he said, the investment potential remains enormous.

Yet time may be of the essence.

If the recent turmoil in the Middle East exposed the world’s vulnerability to fossil fuels, Khan believes it also underscored the urgency of accelerating the clean energy transition. For Pakistan, he said, the opportunity is immense—but only if the country can create the conditions needed to attract the investment required to realise it.

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The German government, along with a number of other countries, are currently organising flights to evacuate travellers and influencers stranded in the Gulf states. For many citizens of other nationalities, however, there is no such assistance. They remain stuck in precarious situations, marked by exploitation and insecurity.

Robin Frisch

A system based on exploitation

The fact that these migrant workers cannot be evacuated is due to structural reasons. In the Gulf monarchies, the kafala system binds migrant workers to a kafil, or sponsor. This modern form of servitude gives employers virtually unlimited control over their workforce. The Gulf model only functions because workers are permanently kept in temporary employment. They are imported, but not integrated. Their rights remain limited, social security is minimal and political participation not permitted. This arrangement is not a shortcoming but a prerequisite for maximum flexibility and low costs.

The fact that the Gulf states’ economic model is reaching its limits is also increasingly the subject of current debate. In a much-discussed New York Times essay, Richard Florida explains that the economic model in Dubai and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is actually exacerbating the crisis. His question – ‘Could this be the end of Dubai?’ – can certainly be answered in the affirmative, at least from a social perspective. The Gulf states have all failed to provide a social safety net for their millions of workers. The mere import of workers, and complete absence of integration or social security, signal the end of the Dubai model. For decades, the Gulf states have profited from permanently keeping their workers in temporary employment. This model may be economically efficient, but it is structurally vulnerable.

The current war is acting as a stress test for this system. And it has shown that there are no institutional mechanisms in place to protect migrant workers. While citizens are being evacuated, millions of migrant workers are left behind. While supply chains are being secured, there remains a lack of the most basic protection for those who keep those chains running. Nobody is taking responsibility — it is just being passed from pillar to post, between countries of origin, employers and governments.

An International Labour Organization (ILO) study showed that social security, if it exists at all, only ever applies to formal employment contracts. In almost all the Gulf states, these regulations place the burden on the employee. Health insurance is mandatory and must be purchased privately. Not one Gulf state has a functioning system of unemployment insurance. Saudi Arabia is the only state that provides social security coverage for workers from certain countries of origin. This model of temporary migration appears to be so successful that even the current crisis will not change it. It is not in the interests of the Gulf states to provide social security as they derive no benefit from it themselves.

Not a single Gulf country has ratified the landmark ILO Convention 189 on decent work for domestic workers, though Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE have at least made slight improvements to their national legislation and acknowledge the problems. In Kuwait, Bahrain and Oman, union activity is not strictly prohibited, and trade unions are working to better integrate migrant workers. However, the crisis caused by the war is now so dire that the extent to which the situation has improved for domestic workers seems of secondary importance. Whether through trade unions, government measures or employer obligations, what matters is that the situation for migrant workers in the Gulf states is fundamentally improved. Reforms will achieve little. It is time for systemic change.

Developing a social safety net

The executive secretary of the Arab Trade Union Confederation, Hind Benammar, has criticised the kafala system, but at the same time advocates for channels of communication to be opened with Saudi Arabia. Such diplomatic efforts are important now as they can help initiate reforms and resolve conflicts between governments. But the fundamental problem remains: How can working conditions be improved in the long term, and what form might an effective social security net take?

The victims of Iranian attacks in Dubai and the UAE were almost all migrant workers. In Dubai, there were even alarming social media posts about labour migrants being imprisoned. The strict internet censorship in these countries complicates the situation, as members of migrant communities are often unable to openly discuss the conditions on the ground. The fact that in this situation, it is the migrant networks – not governments – that are picking up the slack is not a sign of resilience but systematic failure.

One of the few organisations that are actually helping migrant workers at the moment is the International Domestic Workers Federation (IDWF). The IDWF organises emergency accommodation and coordinates aid, thereby effectively replacing government safety nets. Social security only exists where it is improvised. The millions of jobs as cleaners, nannies and nurses are primarily carried out by women. Domestic workers are often not even allowed to leave their workplaces, let alone move freely in public spaces. The social isolation of these workers is reminiscent of the pandemic. Here, too, they had nobody to rely on except for their own communities.

When governments, employers and insurances fail to provide assistance, communities must step into the breach. The IDWF approaches the embassies of workers’ countries of origin, calls for repatriation flights to be organised and provides its members with individual-level safeguards. They make contact with domestic workers through community leaders. These individuals, who together play a role similar to that of a works council, provide information about the situation, offer support in emergencies and organise training sessions on issues such as mental health, which is becoming increasingly important in light of the severe social isolation. In some of the Gulf states, this work has been criminalised, and several community leaders have even been detained. For domestic workers, but also for those in the construction and transportation sectors, this is a matter of sheer survival. For the most part, however, the Gulf states have no established trade union tradition. In the Gulf monarchies, policy-making is controlled by a handful of powerful men.

Over the last few years, Qatar and Saudi Arabia have sought to make financial contributions to the ILO. But the Gulf states will not be able to simply buy themselves a clean slate. Ambet Yuson, general secretary of the six-million-member Building and Wood Workers’ International (BWI), has condemned the fact that Saudi Arabia’s reforms by no means signify an abolition of the kafala system, claiming they are in fact little more than rebranding. In Saudi Arabia, stadiums for the 2034 World Cup are currently being built, but the construction sector also lacks a basic social safety net. It would be disastrous if the mistakes made in Qatar were to be repeated here. There, too, the kafala system resulted in exploitation, as any worker who lost their job found it nigh on impossible to switch to a new sponsor. Recruitment practices and indebtedness in the home country further exacerbate this dependence.

Thus, the war has not only exposed a crisis — it has marked a boundary. A model that consistently shifts risks onto legally marginalised workers will only remain stable provided no shocks occur. As soon as they do, it becomes clear that there is no social security because uncertainty is an inherent part of the system. The Gulf crisis shows just how important it is to develop the social safety net that the trade unions are advocating for. The much-discussed question of reforms does not go far enough. The real problem is structural. Yet this does not automatically result in systemic change. On the contrary: reactions so far suggest that the cost of the crisis will, in fact, continue to be shifted onto migrant workers.

Change will therefore not come from the Gulf states alone. Here, external and transnational levers are crucial. Countries of origin must enforce stronger protection mechanisms and binding social security agreements; international organisations such as the ILO must strengthen minimum standards; and European countries must take responsibility, for instance by regulating recruitment practices, supply chains and labour standards.

Robin Frisch is the head of the regional trade union project in the MENA region and of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation’s office in Algeria.

Source: International Politics and Society, published by the Global and European Policy Unit of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Hiroshimastrasse 28, D-10785 Berlin.

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Distribution of emergency shelter supplies in Abyan, Yemen funded by the Yemen Humanitarian Fund (YHF). Credit: UN OCHA/Altawasul

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 10 2026 (IPS)

In Yemen, increasing funding constraints on humanitarian operations have put millions of civilians in dire need of life-saving assistance amid overlapping crises. Acute food insecurity is a persistent issue, as recent reports from the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) give a stark warning of conditions without urgent intervention.

According to the IPC Acute Food Insecurity Snapshot, one in two people within Government of Yemen (GoY) controlled areas are experiencing high levels of food insecurity, with percentages only expecting to rise or maintain as the conflict goes on. 3.6 million people are experiencing IPC phase 3 (crisis level), and 1.4 million people are experiencing even worse conditions at IPC Phase 4 (emergency). Such measures indicate “extreme coping strategies” where families are forced to sell their house, land, their last female animal, and beg due to the limited supply of food.

Food Insecurity Projection in Yemen | June – September 2026. Credit: IPC

As the crisis looms, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the World Food Programme (WFP), and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) have “jointly called on the international community to urgently scale up funding for humanitarian food assistance, nutrition services, health, agriculture and resilience programming.” according to the spokesperson for the Secretary General, Stéphane Dujarric.

The IPC projects that food supply conditions will only worsen through October and December 2026, with 1.8 million people being in phase 4, 3.6 million being in phase 3, and 3.2 million being in phase 2.

The ongoing conflict is driving heightened amounts of food insecurity due to intensifying macroeconomic pressures, making the local currency, the Yemeni Riyal, highly volatile due to “depleted reserves of halted oil exports”. Insecurity is also impacted by irregular salaries, limited labor opportunities, and a smaller and smaller household purchasing power each day.

Food Insecurity Projection in Yemen | October – December 2026. Credit: IPC

In April, the Houthis, which controls the northwest of Yemen and the capital of Sana’a, threatened to close the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, which connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden. In the event of this strait being closed, the entire red sea and the Suez Canal would virtually be unpassable other than a few exports / imports between Saudi Arabia’s western province, Egypt, Sudan, and Eritrea, which would likely still receive pressure at its ports. This would further increase food insecurity in Yemen, as humanitarian assistance is the only lifeline keeping Yemenis under famine levels. Without humanitarian assistance the situation would become increasingly lethal, making this call for action vital for the safety and vitality of Yemeni lives.

According to OCHA, at least USD 2.2 billion will be needed for assistance of twelve million people of the 22.3 million in need. Approximately 14.71 percent of such funding has been covered, leaving a funding gap of USD 1.8 billion. This is likely to become larger as the conflict becomes more costly, increasing food insecurity as the projections suggest.

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CIVICUS discusses the interception of the Global Sumud Flotilla on its mission to bring humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza with Musa Roshdy, a humanitarian activist who took part in the flotilla.

Musa Roshdy

What’s the Global Sumud Flotilla and why is it important?

The Global Sumud Flotilla was the second civilian maritime mission launched by a coalition of Palestinian solidarity organisations advocating for aid delivery to Palestinians in Gaza and the end of Israel’s illegal siege of Gaza. While it was the Global Sumud Flotilla’s second mission, this was the 39th sea-based attempt to break Israel’s illegal blockade. The Spring 2026 flotilla was organised in direct response to a call for aid put out by civil society organisations on the ground in Palestine.

On 15 April, we sailed from Barcelona with several hundred activists from dozens of countries including Brazil and Spain, determined to deliver aid to Palestinians facing severe deprivation. Our mission highlighted a crucial reality: if everyday civilians from all over the world can mobilise and get this close to establishing a humanitarian corridor, then governments can certainly do it. What’s missing is not ability or infrastructure, but political will. The flotilla represents civilian solidarity with Palestinians and a direct challenge to the illegal blockade. We were prepared for interception after Israel arrested the previous flotilla last year, but not for the scale of violence that followed.

How were you kidnapped?

I was kidnapped by the Israeli navy in the interception that occurred on 29 April, when we were sailing in international waters over 600 miles from occupied Palestine, off the coast of Crete. They attacked us in the middle of the night. We had little warning before military motorboats approached us at high speed. They pointed rifles at us and announced on a megaphone that they were the Israeli navy, they were boarding our vessel and we needed to go inside immediately or they would shoot us.

That night, the Israeli military stopped 22 of the 54 boats in the flotilla en route to Gaza. There’s no legal precedent for military action so far from Israel’s sea borders. We were in the European Union’s search-and-rescue zone, under Greek jurisdiction. But instead of protecting us, Greek coastguard ships observed Israel’s raid and then received us after we were tortured for two days.

Israel’s legal claims were absurd. They accused us of illegal entry into Israel when we were sailing to Gaza and were kidnapped en route. Most of the 180 activists were released in Greece, but two of us were abducted and brought before Ashkelon Magistrate’s Court in Israel on charges with no legal basis.

This violated fundamental principles of international law. You cannot take military action in international waters so far from your territory. You cannot abduct foreign nationals without due process. You cannot torture detainees. Yet all this happened.

Israel acts with impunity because the international community has failed to hold it accountable.

What did you endure in detention?

It was clear from the start they were trying to denigrate us for standing with Palestinians. I was forced onto my hands and knees and held in uncomfortable positions for hours. Soldiers stole my shoes, then stomped on my feet with their combat boots. I was left in just leggings and a tank top. We were held in makeshift prisons built from shipping containers. The soldiers deliberately manipulated the temperature, wetting the floor to freeze us at night, then forcing us outside under intense heat during the day. I experienced hypothermia both nights, as confirmed by a doctor who was imprisoned with me. When comrades tried to give me sweaters, soldiers took them away. At one point, a soldier pointed a rifle at my comrade and threatened to kill him for offering me a jacket in the cold.

Soldiers banged on containers and shone huge lights while we slept to keep us awake. They threw flashbangs and used force to drag people into solitary confinement. On the last day, they shot activists at point-blank range with rubber bullets. They took photographs and videos that showed us collecting our medications when they kidnapped us, but then denied us access to our medications once we were on the prison boat. Sixty-one people went on hunger strike. The food they provided, mostly bread, was insufficient to feed the rest of us, even with a third of us not eating. This cruelty is consistent with what Palestinians experience in Israeli detention, though what we experienced pales in comparison with the cruelty they face.

The Israeli military intended to deter the humanitarians sailing to deliver aid to the people of Gaza, but they were unsuccessful. People around the world recognise that Palestinians in Gaza still have an overwhelming need for aid, legal protection and solidarity. Many activists who were detained with me on 29 April set sail again a few weeks later on 14 May and were intercepted off Cyprus just days later on 18 and 19 May.

What must change internationally?

What governments must do is clear but consistently absent. They must condemn the kidnapping of their citizens. They must impose targeted sanctions against Israeli officials, not humanitarian activists. They must denormalise diplomatic relations with Israel. For instance, Croatia’s leader just refused to approve Israel’s new ambassador to Croatia due to Israel’s current policies.

The most fundamental step is an arms embargo. If we stop supplying weapons to Israel, it cannot do what it is doing. Last year, civil society in Belgium won a court case preventing the transit of military equipment to Israel. France recognises Palestine but still supplies weapons. Governments know these mechanisms exist but lack the political will to prioritise Palestinian lives over strategic interests.

Western states are also complicit in other ways. Some of our torturers had US accents. Another had a German accent. Western governments allow their citizens to join the Israeli military, which commits war crimes and kidnaps and tortures their nationals, then lets them return home without consequence.

Instead of holding Israel accountable, many western states are restricting the space for pro-Palestinian activism. In the UK, Palestine Action faced an absurd terrorism designation for blocking weapons manufacturing. In Germany, authorities banned the watermelon symbol as antisemitic.

On 19 May, as the Israeli military was kidnapping humanitarians in international waters, the United States Department of the Treasury sanctioned four leaders of the Global Sumud Flotilla, calling humanitarian aid delivery ‘pro-terror’, and blocking all access to financial institutions in the USA. The mechanism used by the USA to sanction humanitarian activists was recently deemed illegal by a federal judge when applied to Francesca Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories. It criminalises support for Palestine and conflates it with support for terrorism.

What lies ahead for activism for Palestinian rights?

Our detention and torture were intended as a deterrent, but they failed. In practice, they had the opposite effect. Frontline work exacts a real human cost and people need time to recharge. But activism will continue because Palestinians in Gaza are still facing genocide.

What this moment teaches is that rights exist because we enact them. When everyday people learn from Palestinian courage how to stand up, call atrocities atrocities, and demand basic decency and access to life itself, movements spread across borders. People will continue to pursue humanitarian work, join future flotillas and resist authoritarian restrictions on civic space. Tactics will adapt, new symbols will emerge – as when the watermelon was adopted because Palestinians couldn’t display their flag – but the work won’t stop.

Credit: D.V. Bakke

CIVICUS interviews a wide range of civil society activists, experts and leaders to gather diverse perspectives on civil society action and current issues for publication on its CIVICUS Lens platform. The views expressed in interviews are the interviewees’ and do not necessarily reflect those of CIVICUS. Publication does not imply endorsement of interviewees or the organisations they represent.

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Global Sumud Flotilla/Instagram
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Musa Roshdy/Instagram

SEE ALSO
USA: sanctions weaponised against human rights CIVICUS Lens 01.Jun.2026
Gaza: ceasefire an illusion CIVICUS Lens 16.Mar.2026
Palestine: ‘The EU cannot position itself as a defender of human rights while being one of Israel’s primary arms markets’ CIVICUS Lens | Interview with 7amleh 26.Mar.2026

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Picture alliance/abaca. Even the world’s strongest fleet is reaching its limits. Source: International Politics and Society, Brussels
 
The US failure in Iran exposes the limits of power. But it also shows a deeper loss of moral and leadership capital that may be harder to recover

By Dan Smith
STOCKHOLM, Sweden, Jun 4 2026 (IPS)

The outcome of the current Iran war is still in doubt, but one consequence is already becoming clear: it has weakened America’s capacity to project power. Many are asking who won. The more important question may be what the war has cost.

The Gulf’s geo-economic position means that this war, short and small by historic standards, will have long-lasting global effects. One of the most important concerns the future US capacity to project power. A quick look at the balance sheet helps identify how that may play out.

Gains and losses

The losses, of course, include the impact on nature, on the people of Iran and on the Gulf states. The poor in other regions will suffer as food insecurity rises. On the sidelines, Putin’s Russia has benefitted by being able to sell more oil, but its support for Iran will cost it friends and investment capital from the Gulf. Meanwhile, Ukraine has also benefitted because several Gulf states want its drones and technical support.

Of the main combatants, Israel gained some freedom of action in Gaza and Lebanon. But it is piling up problems for the future, just as it did when it escalated in Lebanon in the early 1980s. Iran has gained a kind of win by not losing while, conversely, the US loses by not winning. And this will have a serious impact on its capacity to project power in the coming years.

There are two aspects to this. One is material and concerns the ability to coerce; the other is non-material and concerns influence. The material aspect would be significant even if the war had been more successful.

The US struck over 13 000 targets in Iran in 39 days of fighting. It used up more than half its stealth cruise missiles. At current rates of production, replacing them will take five to six years. It used as many Tomahawk cruise missiles as it produced in 10 years and about two years’ worth of Patriot interceptor missiles.

The US still has huge capacity to use force, though it may have to use it differently.

Not surprisingly, some anxiety has been expressed that the US military capacity to respond to another crisis has been reduced. Equally unsurprisingly, top-level military leaders and civilian officials assure allies and adversaries alike that the US can still handle all contingencies and project its power at will.

The amount of weaponry used is emphasised by critics because they see that the US has gained nothing by it. But even if the victory the President has frequently proclaimed were real, the weapons would still have been used. If reduced weapon stockpiles cause a problem, it is a problem regardless of the war’s outcome.

Both the concern and the complacency are overstated. The US still has huge capacity to use force, though it may have to use it differently if the President sees a new need or opportunity for military action. It remains a military superpower, but one with thinner margins, more difficult trade-offs and less freedom to respond simultaneously to crises in different regions.

The non-material aspect is even more significant. Influence takes many forms — political, economic and cultural. One source of political influence is military superiority. States that are seen as overwhelmingly powerful often gain friends and persuade adversaries to give way. The Gulf war, however, has exposed the limits of that logic.

President Trump is not wrong when he praises US military prowess. But his boasts during the Iran War have only drawn attention to the tightly limited utility of all that force. Iran’s military capacity has been damaged, and the economy is in terrible condition, but the regime is still in power, with a harder line and tighter control. When the ceasefire started, it still had 70 per cent of its pre-war stock of missiles and has doubtless produced more by now.

The US is no closer than it was the day before the war to getting Iran’s enriched uranium out of the country. It can only do that with Iranian agreement, which will take time and require US concessions over sanctions. And whereas shipping moved freely through the Strait of Hormuz before the war, now it does not, and Iran has turned that into a bargaining chip.

Trapped again

The lesson is that superior force can knock things down and kill people, but does not necessarily give its holder the power to achieve objectives. The same lesson is unfolding in another theatre of operations: in the American campaign against drug traffickers, there have been over 60 attacks on small boats in the Caribbean and Pacific, killing more than 200 people. According to the latest studies, this has had no effect on the street price and availability of cocaine in US cities.

The problem in the Gulf is that Trump has taken his government into a hole from which it is hard to see a way out. We have encountered this before. It is a characteristic dilemma of a great power facing a resilient foe. Think not just Iran, but Ukraine. Think Vietnam.

In March 1968, at the height of the Vietnam War, as American opinion began turning decisively against it, Theodore Sorensen, President Kennedy’s former speechwriter, depicted the US predicament as being trapped in a six-sided box, which he described with three simple sentences: America’s military primacy could not produce victory, while its political primacy made withdrawal humiliating.

It could not impose its will on South Vietnam or break the will of North Vietnam. Escalation risked Chinese or Soviet intervention, while serious negotiation meant accepting the possibility of a Communist South Vietnam.

It is not hard to apply the underlying analysis to the US against Iran. Some translation is needed: the war is unwinnable but withdrawal is humiliating; no ally is giving meaningful help and the enemy is too stubborn; all-out escalation is unthinkable, while good-faith negotiation means acknowledging that the war was wrong from the outset.

Hedging against US unreliability will be part of Europe’s and other US allies’ long-term policies for years to come

The US never managed to break out of that box in Vietnam and will probably be unable to do so in the Gulf. This failure – there is no other word for it – is draining the US capacity for strategic leadership. Allies are faced with reckless behaviour, frequent disregard and contempt, demands to back actions on which they were not consulted and which they oppose, inconsistent and misleading statements, and a war without strategy, legality or ethics.

It is hard to see how the US will regain the moral capital and leadership capacity it has lost this year. More bluster will not do it. Nor will resuming the war or coming to an agreement that makes major concessions to Iran. And it is currently impossible to see why Iran would make concessions to the US.

The United States remains the most powerful military actor in the world. But even the world’s strongest military cannot automatically translate force into political success. The danger is that future leaders continue to believe otherwise.

A strategically astute president who does not casually abuse and threaten allies may emerge in the future. But if the US electorate can do it twice, it can do it a third time — if not with Trump, due to age and the constitution, then with Vance, Rubio, Hegseth or someone else.

Accordingly, hedging against US unreliability will be part of Europe’s and other US allies’ long-term policies for years to come, maybe forever. As they become less dependent on the US, they will also be less compliant. In a few years, the US can restore much of its material power. Its non-material power will grow back only slowly, if at all.

Therein lies the most serious risk: that Trump, or a future leader, continues to believe against all the evidence that force equates to power, and uses it destructively, desperately and pointlessly.

Dan Smith is a Senior Fellow at the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR) and conducts research on issues relating to peace, security and international politics, with a focus on the Middle East and North-East Asia.

Source: International Politics and Society, Brussels

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A street in Beirut, Lebanon, where civilian infrastructure has sustained significant damage. Credit: Pexels/Jo Kassis

By Maximilian Malawista
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 2 2026 (IPS)

Last week on May 28, the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) issued an evacuation order to Lebanese civilians ordering them to move north of the Zahrani River, approximately 25 miles from the Israeli border, and roughly 20 percent of the Lebanese territory. These new escalations bring the displaced population to more than 1.3 million people, including more than 300,000 of those people being children. 1.3 million people represents approximately 1/4th of the nation’s population of 5.3 million.

On Friday May 29th, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said the following regarding the current situation of displacement: “Just in the past 48 hours, renewed displacement orders by the Israeli Defence Forces have affected hundreds of thousands of people south of the Zahrani River, including in the cities of Tyre and Nabatieh. Collective shelters in Tyre and Saida in the South Governorate are reportedly full and can’t take in more people.”

On Friday May 22nd, the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) observed a continuation of Israeli military aggression along with Hezbollah attacks on Israeli force mission areas. In the following week, on Monday May 25th, the largest number of airspace violations at 91 occurrences, along with 399 firing incidents by the IDF were recorded. Additionally, on May 27th, 670 trajectories of projectiles were reported, making this the highest since the cessation of hostilities on April 17th. The IDF has also been attributed to separate incidents of firings on Saturday May 23rd and Sunday May 24th, at approximately 160 per day, with about 16 launches of projectiles by Hezbollah; along with large-scale engineering works, logistical traffic, and armored vehicle convoys through this escalation by the IDF.

Between May 21 and May 24, the World Health Organization (WHO) recorded 8 health workers killed and 45 injured, with 25 medical staff just on May 23rd being injured at the Hiram Hospital in the South governorate following airstrikes.

“We reiterate that attacks on health workers and health facilities are unacceptable. All parties to conflicts must immediately stop them and ensure protection for healthcare,” said Deputy Spokesperson for the Secretary-General, Farhan Haq.

As of March 2026, a flash appeal has been submitted by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), acting as a funding instrument to garner USD 308.3 million to provide life-saving assistance and protection targeting up to 1 million people. Within this appeal, USD 61 million is planned to be allocated to Multi-purpose Cash Assistance (MPCA), $56 million to Food Security & Agriculture, $42.5 million to Shelter, and $40 million and $37 million to WASH and Health, along with other allocations to much needed life-saving sectors. Prior to these latest advancements, an estimated 3 million people were already requiring assistance, with 961,000 people facing acute food insecurity.

Although conditions are worsening, all ports remain operational and accessible, according to the latest report from Logistics Cluster. Airspace is open as well, however humanitarian and commercial access remains limited. Also, according to the same report from Logistics Cluster, many roads and bridges in southern Lebanon remain not passable or closed, limiting crucial movements of goods into the most affected areas of hostilities.

OCHA told Inter Press Service that these constraints have been “complicating planning and limiting sustained operations, even as partners continue to reach people where access permits.”

As of May 2026, fuel prices are higher in Lebanon than any other state in the region, besides Pakistan. Since February 28th 2026, the following increases have been recorded:

The estimated fuel increase by country since February 28th, 2026. Credit: Maximilian Malawista

OCHA added that “Rising costs are adding further pressure on an already fragile humanitarian response. Fuel prices have surged significantly, driving up transport and production costs, while the cost of basic food items has also increased.” OCHA warned that these trends are “undermining people’s ability to afford essentials”, and are “further complicating the delivery of humanitarian assistance.”

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As Gaza’s fragile ceasefire frays and humanitarian conditions deteriorate, a senior UN envoy warned the Security Council last week that delays in implementing the Council-backed transition plan for the enclave will only increase suffering and undermine recovery. Credit: UN News

By James E. Jennings
ATLANTA, USA, May 29 2026 (IPS)

If you have been paying attention to the ongoing wars in Ukraine, Iran, Lebanon, and many other places, perhaps you have noticed that battles today are far different from those of the last century. Now it’s not only tanks and planes but also scores of long-range missiles and massive flights of drones linked to cybernetic warfare.

The tragedy of military and civilian deaths continues, however, with the number of casualties among Russian soldiers in Ukraine reportedly reaching an astonishing 25,000 every month. As always in warfare, civilians are unfairly targeted and suffer the most, with senseless random missile and drone attacks killing innocent people on both sides with regularity.

Professed lovers of peace, like US President Trump and Israel’s Mr. Netanyahu, both of whom have agreed to brokered ceasefire agreements in Gaza and in Lebanon, continue to bomb the other side with impunity. For the most part they are getting away with it, without protests from anybody except a few ineffective agencies and lonely voices.

That is indeed a new, inventive way of war: the combatants agree to a ceasefire, and then one side keeps bombing but insists that the other stop because of the agreed ceasefire. Under such circumstances, all a ceasefire really means is “Your side must stop firing—but we’ll fire at will.”

Such nonsense is a game of meaningless words with no resolution in sight. The increasingly Nazified Likud Party in Israel continues to bomb cities, villages, and individual homes and apartment buildings in Lebanon as if it were licensed to do so, with little effective pushback from the world community.

That is perhaps to be expected since the world has largely stood by silently for almost four years during the certifiable genocide in Gaza. And by now more than 1.2 million people have been driven out of their homes in South Lebanon into a life of desperation and uncertainty.

The efficient US-backed Israeli killing machine in Lebanon has continued to smash residential buildings with impunity and pile up an obscene list of civilians murdered—innocent mothers, fathers, grandparents, and many children.

In Gaza, Palestinian sources have recorded more than 2,000 Israeli violations of the so-called “ceasefire” between October 2025 and March 2026, with a total of over 700 Palestinians killed.

Only a temporary hold from the United States has kept Israel from continuing to bomb Iran. Israel refuses to listen to any restrictions on bombing Lebanon even though there is supposedly a ceasefire in effect.

Deaths there since the short April 17 “ceasefire” continue to escalate day by day. In Iran, both Israel and the US have promised to keep obliterating what was long ago announced as already obliterated.

The number of Iranians killed and wounded in the first three months of the joint US-Israeli aggression has been announced by the Tehran government as in the tens of thousands, and the war is not over yet. Most memorable is the massacre of 120 schoolchildren, mainly girls, on the first day of US bombing at Minab, Iran. Casualties so far on the US side number 13 killed and several dozens wounded. That’s the definition of one-sided warfare.

Modern wars may puzzle observers, but the art of twisting words and phrases and their associated meanings is as old as time. Lying, obfuscation, and obscene claims are the essence of war’s primary weapon, deception. Words can kill and do. “Ceasefire” is the latest lie. For Israel and the US, it means “You cease—we fire.”

James E. Jennings is the Founder and President of the aid agency Conscience International www.conscienceinternational.org and a longtime Middle East Peace Advocate.

IPS UN Bureau

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Credit: Rizwan Tabassum/AFP

By Andrew Firmin
LONDON, May 22 2026 (IPS)

Narges Mohammadi, awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her human rights activism in Iran, has been allowed to go home. After guards found her unconscious in her cell, the apparent victim of a heart attack, she was granted temporary release from prison and transferred to a hospital. However, she still faces the threat of being taken back to jail once her condition has improved.

Mohammadi has been repeatedly imprisoned for criticising the theocratic regime, demanding women’s rights, advocating for prison reform and campaigning against the death penalty. Over her lifetime she’s been sentenced to a total of 44 years. She’s already spent more than a decade behind bars, including 161 days in solitary confinement, and has also been sentenced to 154 lashes. In February she was handed a further seven-and-a-half-year sentence. From prison – where she experienced cardiac and blood pressure problems and severe weight loss – she has documented systematic rights violations against political prisoners, including sexual and physical abuse of women detainees, torture and extensive use of solitary confinement.

Mohammadi’s case is one among many. While her ordeal has rightly drawn international attention, others more distant from the spotlight are in danger. Three more women human rights activists – Pakhshan Azizi, Sharifeh Mohammadi and Varisheh Moradi – are on death row at imminent risk of execution. The dangers they and countless others face have grown sharply since the current war began.

Repression tightens

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has made clear he wants regime change in Iran. On 1 March, an Israeli strike killed Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. But if the intention was to topple the regime, it didn’t happen. Iran’s ruling theocratic structures run deep, with multiple layers of planned succession. Khamenei’s son Mojtaba Khamenei, injured in the same attack, was quickly named his replacement, despite Iran’s official ideology formally rejecting hereditary succession.

While clerical leaders have been killed, Iran’s coercive apparatus has gained in its day-to-day power, hardening the theocracy into something closer to a military dictatorship, with the Basij, the paramilitary volunteer force long deployed to crush public dissent, now front and centre.

Israeli and US hopes that Iranians would rise up against the regime have been disappointed. Iran has seen successive mass protest waves, each crushed with large-scale lethal violence. They include the Green Movement that demanded democracy in 2009 and 2010 and the Woman, Life, Freedom protests that demanded women’s rights in 2022 and 2023. The latest uprising came in December 2025 and January 2026, triggered by economic collapse, forging a movement that united broad sections of society to demand an end to the theocratic regime. The state suppressed it with shocking brutality, killing thousands and detaining tens of thousands.

By February, the uprising had been crushed. The Israeli-US intervention was unlikely to reignite a meaningful mass protest movement. If anything, for some Iranians the war has stoked patriotism and more intense enmity towards Israel and the USA. The anticipated revolt simply hasn’t happened.

Much of Iran’s vast diaspora has rallied in support of the war as a means of toppling the regime. But while the diaspora is united in demanding change, its array of ethnic minority organisations, Islamist factions, leftists, monarchists and republicans is bitterly divided over what should come next. Reza Pahlavi, son of the last shah, enjoys some support but others are wary about monarchical nostalgia and his close ties to Israel and the USA. The most credible potential unifying figures inside Iran are imprisoned or otherwise silenced.

Instead of losing control, the regime has tightened its repression. Even as Iran’s leaders wage a social media propaganda war abroad, at home they’ve imposed a near-total internet shutdown, including a block on VPN services. The blackout has caused immense economic harm, disrupting businesses and financial transactions and hitting women the hardest. This comes on top of the economic effects of the current US blockade of Iranian ports, sending inflation and unemployment soaring.

Under the cover of war and the internet shutdown, the government has accelerated executions of political prisoners. While precise figures are hard to get, rights groups report close to 200 executions so far this year, most preceded by prolonged torture to extract false confessions. Secret hangings are reportedly being carried out on an almost daily basis. Among those killed are people detained during the January protests. On 4 May, it was reported that three people arrested at protests on 8 and 9 January – Ebrahim Dolatabadinejad, Mohammadreza Miri and Mehdi Rasouli – had been hanged. For families, the suffering doesn’t end there, as authorities reportedly refuse to return bodies and pressure relatives to stay silent.

Local priorities

Democracy and human rights in Iran depend on the regime’s departure. But the latest war isn’t about any of this. For Netanyahu, with an election impending and anger remaining at his corruption charges and Israel’s security failures around the 7 October Hamas attacks, permanent warfare is a political strategy. Donald Trump’s many social media announcements provide little clue of what motivates a president who promised not to mire the USA in foreign wars, but distraction from low popularity ratings and his many appearances in the Epstein files may be a factor.

This war isn’t the way to achieve change. The regime appears entrenched and capable of surviving a longer conflict. Any peace deal would leave it intact, which its rulers would treat as a victory.

Real change will come when protests can grow into a mass movement large enough to withstand the lethal repression the state will inevitably deploy. That can only happen with sustained support that respects the autonomy of local civil society leaders and strengthens their capacity. The immediate priorities must be to protect credible local sources of information amid the information blackout and ensure the safety and security of Iran’s democracy and human rights activists.

Above all, states must press the Iranian government to halt executions and release everyone detained for speaking out, protesting and demanding change, beginning with Narges Mohammadi. Temporary medical release is nowhere near enough. The Iranian regime must let her be free.

Andrew Firmin is CIVICUS Editor-in-Chief, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.

For interviews or more information, please contact research@civicus.org

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