Israel-Hamas war: China's Xi urges end to war, pledges aid

LGBTQ+ supporters participated in Jerusalem's annual Pride parade, with organizers estimating a turnout of around 10,000.

People carried rainbow flags, Israeli flags and often yellow ribbons, a symbol for the hostages still held in Gaza after Hamas' October 7 terror attack. Others also carried banners or slogans calling for a halt to Israeli military action in Gaza.

Relatives of some of the hostages stood at the head of the march holding a banner written in English reading "Born to be free." 

The turnout was smaller than in previous years, with last year's event estimated to have attracted 30,000 participants.

Yair Lapid, the opposition leader and former prime minister, also attended. 

"The march is more important than ever this year," he said. "Here we are reminded that we are not only fighting for the life of the state of Israel but also for what kind of country it will be. What its values are. What it believes in." 

Organizers said there were no unexpected incidents or violence, and police said some 2,000 officers were on guard.

Sweden's domestic security agency on Thursday accused Iran of using criminal networks in Sweden as a proxy to target Israeli or Jewish interests in the country. 

The accusations came during a news conference by the head of the SAPO agency's counterespionage unit, Daniel Stenling, following incidents earlier this year amid the conflict in Gaza.

In late January, the Israeli Embassy in Stockholm was sealed off after "a dangerous object" was found on the diplomatic mission's grounds. Later Swedish media reports said it was a hand grenade.

On May 17, the area around the embassy was cordoned off after gunfire was heard in the vicinity. Nobody was hurt. 

Stenling, speaking alongside Justice Minister Gunnar Stommer, said that his agency "can establish that criminal networks in Sweden are used as a proxy by Iran," without elaborating on how.

"It is very much about planning and attempts to carry out attacks against Israeli and Jewish interests, goals and activities in Sweden," he said, adding that his agency saw ties between organized crime and "individuals who are connected to the Iranian security services." 

There are "reasonable grounds to believe" Israel was committing war crimes in Gaza using the types of weapons supplied by Germany, human rights lawyer Alexander Schwarz told DW. 

Talking to DW's Nina Haase, he said his organization, the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR), was suing the German government to block the exports to Israel.

The ECCHR has "reasonable grounds to believe that with these kind of weapons, Israel is committing crimes against civilians in Gaza. Crimes consisting of war crimes and crimes against humanity, as recently confirmed by the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court," Schwarz told DW.

The human rights lawyer said that Israel had an "inherent right" to self defense. 

However, "within self-defense, Israel has to respect humanitarian law, which from our point of view it doesn't," he added.

Israel has denied committing war crimes, insisting it was targeting Hamas militants. Hamas is labeled as a terror group by the US, the EU, and others.

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The government of Slovenia on Thursday approved a motion to recognize a Palestinian state, the country's Prime Minister Robert Golob said.

"Today the government has decided to recognize Palestine as an independent and sovereign state," Golob said at a news conference in Ljubljana.

The motion will now head to the national parliament for approval.

Last week, fellow EU members Spain, Norway and Ireland became the most recent countries to recognize Palestinian statehood, which which drew anger from Israel.

The three European countries had planned a simultaneous recognition in the hopes that its symbolism would spur other countries to also commit to recognition. However, on the same day the Danish parliament voted down a proposal for such a move.

Of the European Union's 27 member states, Sweden, Cyprus, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, Romania and Bulgaria had already recognized a Palestinian state. 

The majority, including Germany, do not.

The US-built floating pier in Gaza is undergoing repairs, but Cyprus said it will continue to send out ships carrying aid to Gaza.

The aid will be held in floating storage — onboard storage ships — until the jetty is functional again, which could be by the middle of next week, according to a Cypriot government spokesman. 

"The mechanism surrounding how the floating pier works allows for the possibility of floating storage off Gaza, with offloading to resume when conditions allow," said Cypriot government spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis.

The US military built a floating pier to bring food and other necessities into the war-torn territory. However, the jetty was only functional for two weeks before sustaining damage due to bad weather on Sunday.

Letymbiotis also said that some 14,000 pallets of aid have been collected on the island and over 4,100 have already reached their destination in Gaza.

Israel controls all access points to Gaza and increased its restrictions on the amount of aid entering the enclave after October 7 when Hamas — designated a terror organization by the US, Israel and Germany among others — launched attacks on southern Israel that resulted in the deaths of around 1,200 people and saw more than 200 people taken as hostages into Gaza.

Following protests by students in the US and other Western countries against Israel's actions in Gaza, Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei published a letter in support of the protests.

"Dear university students in the United States of America, this message is an expression of our empathy and solidarity with you," he wrote in the letter published on his website.

"As the page of history is turning, you are standing on the right side of it."

In the letter, the leader of the theocratic regime decries the "state terrorism and ongoing oppression" and quotes from the Muslim holy book Quran, saying "Do not oppress and do not be oppressed."

He advises the US students to "become familiar with the Quran."

The Iranian regime has brutally crushed multiple protest movements in Iran, including the uprising over the death of Jina Mahsa Amini in 2022.

UNRWA, the UN agency in charge of aid to Palestinians, warned that people in Gaza were forced to flee to areas "lacking essential supplies & acceptable living conditions."

In an online post, UNRWA said there was "no safety" in the Gaza Strip and published photos of piled-up garbage from the town of Deir al-Balah in central Gaza.

"This is Deir al-Balah. Everywhere you look there is a pile of trash," they said, sharing pictures of mountains of garbage.

While meeting the leaders of Arab states in Beijing, Chinese leader Xi Jinping said his country intended to help with reconstruction in Gaza after the war ends.

Xi also promised a $3 million (€2.77 billion) donation to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) that saw much of its Western funding suspended following unsubstantiated claims by Israel that its employees had taken part in the October 7 attacks.

He urged a "broad-based, authoritative and effective international peace conference" to address the war.

"The war should not continue indefinitely, justice should not be permanently absent," he said.

China is in favor of a two-state solution to resolve the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians. Beijing recognized Palestine as a state in 1988 and has urged for its acceptance as a full UN member.

Xi is hosting the heads of state of Bahrain, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Tunisia as well as foreign ministers from other Arab League member-states for a five-day China-Arab States Cooperation Forum.

dj/ab (AFP, Reuters, AP, dpa)