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Why Palestinians can count on American students but not Arab allies to protest

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Palestinians may be gratified to see American university campuses erupt in outrage over Israel's offensive in Gaza, but some in the embattled enclave are also wondering why no similar protests have hit the Arab countries they long viewed as allies, Reuters reported.

Demonstrations have rocked U.S. universities this week, with confrontations between students, counter protesters and police, but while there have been some protests in Arab states, they have not been nearly as large or as vociferous.

"We follow the protests on social media every day with admiration but also with sadness. We are sad that those protests are not happening also in Arab and Muslim countries," said Ahmed Rezik, 44, a father of five sheltering in Rafah in Gaza's south.

"Thank you students in solidarity with Gaza. Your message has reached us. Thank you students of Columbia. Thank you students," was scrawled across a tent in Rafah, where more than a million people are sheltering from Israel's offensive.

Reasons for the comparative quiet on Arab campuses and streets may range from a fear of angering autocratic governments to political differences with Hamas and its Iranian backers or doubts that any protests could impact state policy, read the report.

American students at elite universities may face arrest or expulsion from their schools, but harsher consequences could await Arab citizens protesting without state authorisation.

And U.S. students may feel more motivation to protest as their own government backs and arms Israel, while even those Arab countries that have full diplomatic relations with it have been strongly critical of its military campaign.

When asked about the conflict, Arabs from Morocco to Iraq have consistently voiced fury at Israel's actions and solidarity with Gaza's embattled inhabitants, leading to muted Ramadan celebrations across the region last month.

Some rallies to support Palestinians have erupted, notably in Yemen where the Houthis have joined the conflict with strikes on shipping in the Red Sea.

And Arabs around the region have also shown their horror at the war and support for their fellow Arabs in Gaza on social media, even if they have not taken to the streets.

But whatever the reason for the lack of public protests, some people in Gaza are now drawing unfavourable comparisons between the tumult in the United States and the public reaction they can see in other Arab countries.

"I ask Arab students to do what the Americans have done. They should have done more for us than the Americans," said Suha al-Kafarna, displaced by the war from home in northern Gaza.

In Egypt, which made peace with Israel in 1979 and where President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has largely outlawed public protests, the authorities fear that demonstrations against Israel could later turn against the government in Cairo.

At state-sanctioned protests over the war in October, some demonstrators veered off the agreed route and chanted anti-government slogans, prompting arrests.

"One cannot see the lack of large public protests against the war and the muted reaction on the Egyptian street in isolation from a broader context of crackdown on all forms of public protest and assembly," said Hossam Bahgat, head of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights.

At the American University in Cairo security forces are less likely to intervene on campus and there have been some protests. But a student activist there who requested anonymity said they could still face consequences for demonstrating.

"Being arrested here is nothing like being arrested in the U.S. It's completely different," he said, adding that there was "the factor of fear" preventing many from taking to the streets.

In Lebanon, where success in studies has become even more personally important to many young people after years of political and economic crises that have shrunk their shot at future prosperity, that calculation is even tougher.

Several students Reuters approached at campus protests in Beirut declined to be interviewed, saying they feared repercussions from university authorities.

The complex histories of Lebanon and other Arab states such as Jordan that host many Palestinian refugees also play into the question of public protests.

In Lebanon, some people blame Palestinians for triggering the 1975-90 civil war. Others fear any overt displays of support for Palestinians might be hijacked by the Iran-backed Hezbollah, which has been trading fire with Israel since the start of the Gaza conflict, Reuters reported.

"The Arab world is not reacting like Columbia or Brown (U.S. universities) because they don't have the luxury to do so," said Makram Rabah, a history professor at the American University of Beirut.

Besides, he added, with public opinion already largely backing the Palestinian cause it was not clear what protests there would achieve.

"The dynamics of power and the way you change public perception are just different in the Arab world compared to the U.S.," he said.

For Tamara Rasamny, a Lebanese-American arrested and suspended for participating in a sit-in at Columbia a month before getting her degree, that reality has come home hard.

She was meant to deliver a speech at her graduation, and thought about whether it would have been more powerful to send a message there or through her possible arrest.

"And then I thought, my speech is literally about being brave, courageous and speaking up – so I thought if I'm not even listening to my own words, who am I to say anything? That was my logic, and it was worth it," she told Reuters from New York.

Rasamny said she knew it might not have been possible to express herself this way had she been at home in Lebanon.

"I feel in Lebanon it would be more frustrating to watch what's unfolding because there hasn't really been an outlet to do much about it - like take to the streets," she said.

World

US states worried about election unrest take security precautions

Many of the most visible moves can be seen in the battleground states that will decide the presidential election, states like Nevada where protests by Trump supporters broke out after the 2020 election

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As a tense America votes on Tuesday for either Republican Donald Trump or Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris for president, concerns about potential political violence have prompted officials to take a variety of measures to bolster security during and after Election Day.

Many of the most visible moves can be seen in the battleground states that will decide the presidential election, states like Nevada where protests by Trump supporters broke out after the 2020 election.

This year, a security fence rings the scene of some of those protests - the Las Vegas tabulation center.

A defense official said on Monday that Alabama, Arizona, Delaware, Iowa, Illinois, North Carolina, New Mexico, Oregon, Wisconsin and Washington state have current National Guard missions while Washington DC, Colorado, Florida, Hawaii, Nevada, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas and West Virginia have troops on standby.

In Arizona, a similar metal fence has been erected at Maricopa County vote tabulation center in downtown Phoenix, a flashpoint in 2020 for rigged election conspiracy theories and threats against election officials.

County Sheriff Russ Skinner said his department will be on "high alert" for threats and violence and he has instructed staff to be available for duty.

"We will have a lot of resources out there, a lot of staff, a lot of equipment," he added, noting deputies will use drones to monitor activity around polling places and snipers and other reinforcements will be on standby for deployment if violence appears likely.

He said "polarization" becomes more intense in the days after the election so law enforcement will remain on heightened alert and "there will be zero tolerance on anything related to criminal activity".

Concerned about the potential for protests or even violence, several Arizona schools and churches that served as voting centers in the past will not serve as polling stations this year, a local election official told Reuters.

Precautions stretch beyond the battleground states. Oregon and Washington state authorities have said they have activated the National Guard. Some storefront windows in Washington, DC and elsewhere have been covered by plywood.

Back in Las Vegas, Faviola Garibay surveyed the security fence around the linen-colored building where Clark County officials tabulate the votes and where voters such as her can drop election ballots.

"The fencing, the presence of police here, it seems secure," she said. "I feel safe voting."

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Israeli airstrikes kill at least 31 people in Gaza, medics say

Hamas has repeatedly denied using civilian facilities such as hospitals, schools, and mosques, for military purposes.

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Israeli airstrikes killed at least 31 people in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, Palestinian medics said, with nearly half of the deaths in northern areas where the army has waged a month-long campaign it says is aimed at preventing Hamas from regrouping, Reuters reported.

Palestinians said the new aerial and ground offensives and forced evacuations were "ethnic cleansing" aimed at emptying two northern Gaza towns and a refugee camp of their population in order to create buffer zones. Israel denies this, saying it is fighting Hamas militants who launch attacks from there.

Medics said at least 13 Palestinians were killed in separate attacks on houses in Beit Lahiya town and Jabalia, the largest of the enclave's eight historic camps and the focus of the army's new offensive.

The rest were killed in separate Israeli airstrikes in Gaza City and in southern areas, including one in Khan Younis, which health officials said had killed eight people, including four children.

Later on Sunday, health officials at the Kamal Adwan Hospital near Beit Lahiya said the facility came under Israeli tank fire and that one child hospitalized at the hospital was critically wounded.

Hussam Abu Safiya, the hospital's director said the incident took place after a delegation from the World Health Organization visited the facility and evacuated some patients.

He said while evacuating the wounded was important, it was more important to dispatch specialized medical teams to north Gaza hospitals that have become overwhelmed by the number of casualties.

Abu Safiya said the tank fire hit the water supplies, the courtyard, and the neonatal intensive care unit.

COGAT, the Israeli army's Palestinian civilian affairs agency, said the explosion resulted from an explosive device planted by Palestinian militants and not an Israeli attack.

"The terrorist organizations continue to exploit civilian infrastructure, medical facilities, and international aid organizations for their terror activities," a COGAT statement said late on Sunday.

Hamas has repeatedly denied using civilian facilities such as hospitals, schools, and mosques, for military purposes.

On Saturday, the Israeli military sent a new army division to Jabalia to join two other operating battalions, a statement said. It said hundreds of Palestinian militants have been killed in the "battles" since the raid began on Oct. 5, read the report.

Meanwhile, COGAT said it facilitated the launch of the second round of a polio vaccination campaign in northern Gaza on Saturday and that 58,604 children have received a dose.

The Gaza health ministry said Israel's military offensive in northern Gaza was stopping them from vaccinating thousands of children in Jabalia, Beit Lahiya, and Beit Hanoun.

It said one clinic had come under Israeli fire while parents brought their children for the anti-polio dose on Saturday and that four children had been injured.

The head of the World Health Organization said in a statement the clinic incident took place despite a humanitarian pause agreed upon by the two warring parties, Israel and Hamas, to allow the vaccination campaign.

"A @WHO team was at the site just before. This attack, during a humanitarian pause, jeopardises the sanctity of health protection for children and may deter parents from bringing their children for vaccination," Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a post on X on Saturday.

"These vital humanitarian-area-specific pauses must be absolutely respected. Ceasefire!" he said.

The Israeli military, which had no immediate comment on Tedros' remarks, said it was checking the report about the clinic.

A larger ceasefire that would end the war and see the release of Israeli and foreign hostages held captive in Gaza as well as Palestinians jailed by Israel remains remote due to disagreements between Hamas and Israel.

Hamas wants an agreement to end the war permanently, refusing recent offers for temporary truces, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says war can only end when Hamas is eradicated, Reuters reported.

The war erupted after Hamas-led militants attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages back to Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.

Israel's retaliatory offensives have killed more than 43,300 Palestinians and reduced most of Gaza to rubble.

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Russia targets Kyiv in hours-long drone attack

Ukraine’s military reported on Saturday that air defences had destroyed 39 out of 71 Russian drones that had been launched, and that another 21 had been “locationally lost”.

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Russia unleashed its latest overnight drone strike on Ukraine, targeting the capital Kyiv in an attack that lasted into midday and wounded at least one person, city officials said on Saturday.

Debris from downed drones struck six city districts, wounding a police officer, damaging residential buildings and starting fires, according to city military administrator Serhiy Popko, Reuters reported.

"Another night. Another air-raid alert. Another drone attack. The armed forces of the Russian Federation attacked Kyiv again according to their old and familiar tactics," Popko wrote on social media.

All the drones aimed at Kyiv had been shot down, he said.

Ukrainian energy provider DTEK said a high-voltage line powering the capital and two distribution networks in the Kyiv region had been damaged.

DTEK said in a statement that electricity had mostly been restored and that repairs were underway.

Reuters correspondents reported hearing explosions in and around the city during an air-raid alert that lasted more than five hours. One drone was seen flying low over the city amid the din of automatic-weapons fire.

Ukraine's military reported on Saturday that air defences had destroyed 39 out of 71 Russian drones that had been launched, and that another 21 had been "locationally lost".

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said strikes were also reported in the central Poltava and northeastern Sumy and Kharkiv regions, read the report.

"This year, we have faced the threat of 'Shahed' drones almost every night — sometimes in the morning, and even during the day," he wrote on social media, referring to the Iranian-made attack drones used by Russia.

Russian forces have carried out regular airstrikes on Ukrainian towns and cities behind the front lines of the war which began when Russia invaded its neighbour in February 2022.

Kyiv's military said on Friday that Moscow's forces had launched more than 2,000 drones at civilian and military targets across Ukraine in October alone.

Russia has denied aiming at civilians and said power facilities are legitimate targets when they are part of Ukrainian military infrastructure.

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