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      Democrats’ Unity Convention Has One Giant Exception: The Gaza War

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      Harris campaign officials and Democratic leaders have stepped up outreach to Arab and Jewish voters before the event, but large protests are still expected.Even as feel-good displays of joy and confidence are set to dominate the Democratic National Convention this week in Chicago, one painful issue is bitterly dividing the Democratic establishment from its left flank: Israel’s war in Gaza.The specter of convention-upending protests that hovered over a gathering hosted for President Biden has receded somewhat with the rise of a new candidate in Kamala Harris, who is seen as more sympathetic to Palestinian rights activists. But tens of thousands of protesters are still expected to convene just outside the event’s security perimeter, and the potential for high-profile disruptions remains real.Emphasizing the unity theme, convention planners have tried to mollify both Muslim and Jewish Americans.Speaking slots have been allotted to the families of American hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. One of the most prominent Muslims in national politics, Keith Ellison, the progressive attorney general of Minnesota, will be given time onstage. Doug Emhoff, the husband of Ms. Harris, is expected to speak proudly of his Judaism. And the Democratic platform highlights America’s commitment to Israeli security.At the same time, Ms. Harris’s campaign manager, Julie Chavez-Rodriguez, held a series of meetings last week to hear the concerns of Arab Americans and some delegates representing Democratic primary voters who cast “uncommitted” ballots in the Democratic primary to protest Mr. Biden’s Israel policy.Despite such efforts, the convention will be shadowed by large protests against the Biden-Harris administration’s approach to a war that Gaza health authorities say has killed more than 40,000 Palestinians since the Hamas attack on Oct. 7 that left 1,200 people dead in Israel.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      U.S., Egypt and Qatar Say Gaza Cease-Fire Talks Will Resume Next Week

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      Top officials from the U.S., Israel, Egypt and Qatar ended two days of talks in Doha aimed at trying to resolve remaining disagreements between Israel and Hamas.High-level talks to halt the war in Gaza ended without an immediate breakthrough on Friday, but the United States, Egypt and Qatar said the negotiations would continue next week as mediators raced to secure a truce that they hope will avert a wider regional conflagration.The announcement came after top American, Israeli, Egyptian and Qatari officials ended two days of talks in Doha, the Qatari capital, aimed at trying to resolve remaining disagreements between Israel and Hamas. U.S. and regional officials hope that movement in the negotiations will blunt or stop a widely anticipated Iranian-led retaliation for the killing of senior leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah, militant groups backed by Iran.U.S., Iranian and Israeli officials said on Friday said that Iran had decided to delay its reprisal against Israel to allow the mediators to continue working toward a cease-fire in Gaza.After the first day of talks ended on Thursday night, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, the Qatari prime minister, called the acting Iranian foreign minister, Ali Bagheri Kani, to encourage Iran to refrain from any escalation given the cease-fire talks in Doha, according to two Iranian officials and three other officials familiar with the call who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.Mr. Al Thani spoke with Mr. Bagheri Kani again on Friday, and both officials “stressed the need for calm and de-escalation in the region,” according to the Qatari Foreign Ministry. Mr. Bagheri Kani said in a statement that the Qatari prime minister had described the cease-fire negotiations on Thursday as being at a “sensitive” phase.On Friday, Egypt, Qatar and the United States said in a joint statement that the mediators had presented Israel and Hamas with “a bridging proposal” consistent with the terms laid out by President Biden on May 31 and later endorsed by the U.N. Security Council.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Israeli Settlers Storm West Bank Village, Drawing Rare Rebukes From Israeli Officials

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      Israeli settler attacks on Palestinians have surged in the West Bank, but a riot on Thursday in the village of Jit stood out for drawing rapid and unusual rebukes from Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose coalition government includes West Bank settlers in top positions. “Dozens of Israeli civilians, some of them masked, entered the town of Jit and set fire to vehicles and structures in the area, hurled rocks and Molotov cocktails,” the Israeli military said in a statement. The military said that its forces, along with Israeli Border Police, were dispatched to the scene and dispersed the riot by firing shots into the air and “removing the Israeli civilians from the town.” The Palestinian Authority said that one Palestinian was shot dead during the attack on the village and that another was critically injured. The Israeli military said it was “looking into” reports of a fatality and that it had opened an investigation with other security agencies into what it called “this serious incident,” adding that one rioter was arrested and transferred to the police for questioning. The prime minister’s office issued a statement saying that Mr. Netanyahu “takes seriously the riots that took place this evening in the village of Jit, which included injury to life and property by Israelis who entered the village.” The statement vowed to find and prosecute those responsible for “any criminal act.” The Israeli military condemned “incidents of this type and the rioters, who harm security, law, and order,” and accused those involved in the violence of diverting troops and security forces “from their main mission of thwarting terrorism and protecting the security of civilians.” The riot came as the war in Gaza between Israel and Hamas has stretched into its 11th month, a period that has also seen increased Israeli military activity against what it terms suspected terrorism in the occupied West Bank, as well as a surge in violent settler attacks there against Palestinians. We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Gaza Cease-Fire Talks: What Has Happened and Where Things Stand

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      Israel’s war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip has lasted more than 10 months, with only one weeklong pause in fighting, in late November. That temporary cease-fire led to the return of 50 Israeli hostages captured during the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel in exchange for 150 Palestinian prisoners — and raised hopes among mediators and the international community that another deal would follow.Those hopes were dashed repeatedly over many months of unsuccessful efforts by mediators. In the interim, tensions in the Middle East have risen, particularly in recent weeks after the assassinations of a Hezbollah commander in Lebanon and a Hamas leader in Iran, prompting vows from Iran and Hezbollah to retaliate against Israel.World leaders eager to avert a wider full-scale war believe that an agreement between Israel and Hamas could prevent an escalation. Still, even the most vocal champions of a cease-fire admit that closing a deal will be tough. President Biden on Tuesday told reporters he was “not giving up” on an agreement but that it was “getting harder” to remain optimistic.On Thursday, negotiators are meeting in Doha, Qatar, to try to reach an agreement. Here’s a timeline of recent talks:May: President Biden calls for an end to the war.Declaring Hamas no longer capable of carrying out a major terrorist attack on Israel, Mr. Biden on May 31 pressed for hostilities in Gaza to end and endorsed a new cease-fire plan that he said Israel had offered to win the release of hostages.“It’s time for this war to end, for the day after to begin,” Mr. Biden said that day. Calling it “a decisive moment,” Mr. Biden put the onus on Hamas to reach an agreement, saying, “Israel has made their proposal. Hamas says it wants a cease-fire. This deal is an opportunity to prove whether they really mean it.”June: U.N. Security Council passes a cease-fire resolution.The United Nations Security Council on June 10 adopted a cease-fire plan backed by the United States, with 14 nations in favor and Russia abstaining. Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the American ambassador to the United Nations, said that the United States would work to make sure that Israel agreed to the deal and that Qatar and Egypt would work to bring Hamas to the negotiating table.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Israel Criticized After Strike Kills Scores in Gaza

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      Israeli officials defended the attack on a former school compound, saying Hamas was using it as a base for military operations in Gaza City.An Israeli airstrike early Saturday hit a school compound in northern Gaza where displaced Palestinians were sheltering, killing dozens of people, according to Gazan officials.The Israeli military acknowledged the attack, but said Hamas and another armed Palestinian group were using the facility for military operations and attacks on Israel.The strike in Gaza City, the latest in a string of attacks on schools turned into shelters, drew strong condemnation from the European Union and the United Nations, with Josep Borrell Fontelles, the top E.U. diplomat, saying, “There’s no justification for these massacres.”The strikes have taken place alongside mounting international pressure on Israel to conclude a deal for a cease-fire and an exchange of hostages held in Gaza and Palestinian detainees, with President Biden and the leaders of Egypt and Qatar saying this week that “the time has come.”The Gaza Civil Defense emergency service said more than 90 people were killed. But that number could not be confirmed, and two doctors at a hospital in the area gave slightly lower totals. Gaza health officials do not distinguish between civilians and combatants when reporting casualties.The Israeli military did not provide a death toll. But it questioned the Gaza authorities’ statements, saying that its own assessment of the incident was at odds with the reported death toll, and that more than a dozen militants were killed in the strike.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Harris Must Persuade Gaza Protesters, Not Dismiss Them

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      At a campaign rally in the Detroit area on Wednesday, Kamala Harris was speaking about the threat of Project 2025 and the Trump agenda when a small group of protesters interrupted her. I couldn’t make out their words, but it was reported that they were shouting something about Gaza. Harris reacted with her trademark “I am speaking now.” The protesters persisted. Harris’s tone grew stern. “You know what?” she said. “If you want Donald Trump to win, then say that. Otherwise, I’m speaking.” She continued, to cheers from the crowd. The protesters were escorted out.When I watched a video of this scene, my heart sank. It reminded me of another interruption, at a Democratic fund-raiser at a nightclub in New York, 32 years ago. Bill Clinton was speaking when Bob Rafsky, a member of the AIDS activist group ACT UP, stood up to challenge him on his plans to deal with the AIDS epidemic. “We’re dying,” Rafsky said. Clinton engaged at first, saying he was running for president “to do something about it.” Rafsky continued to shout. Clinton became angry. “Would you just calm down?” he said.I knew Rafsky. I was a member of ACT UP, and a journalist covering AIDS in the gay press. When Clinton said, “Calm down,” I heard, Some things are more important than your life. In campaign math, this was probably true: Only a fraction of a percent of Americans were living with AIDS. Clinton had statistically bigger issues to address.Yes, before her Detroit speech, Harris met very briefly with a group of pro-Palestinian activists. But at the rally, I heard the same steely political calculus in Harris’s admonition to the protesters: She has to focus on beating Trump, not on a genocide occurring 6,000 miles away and affecting about two million people, some of whom are related to or have close ties with a small fraction of the American electorate for which the war in Gaza is a decisive issue in this election. And, like people confronting AIDS in 1992, Palestinian Americans and others who want an end to Israel’s war should know that the other candidate would be even worse.Such reasoning is as statistically sound as it is tone-deaf and emotionally blind. It appears that at least one of the protesters at the rally is of Palestinian descent. And given the demographics of the Detroit area, it is quite likely that others in the crowd were Palestinian Americans, very possibly with family and friends in Gaza who are at risk of being killed, whether by bombing, disease or starvation in the coming months, if they are not dead already.Rafsky died in February 1993, one month into the first Clinton administration. In November 1992, on the eve of the presidential election, he gave a speech standing by the coffin of another ACT UP member, Mark Fisher, who had asked that his body be carried through the streets of New York in protest.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Israel Launches Another Offensive in Gaza’s South Amid Push for Truce

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      The United States, Egypt and Qatar are trying to restart peace talks between Hamas and Israel, while Israel carries on its operation in Gaza and braces for attacks by Iran and Hezbollah.An Israeli ground assault in the southern Gaza Strip on Friday forced tens of thousands of Palestinians to flee their homes and shelters, many for a third time or more, even as the United States and some Arab allies pressed both Israel and Hamas to restart peace talks.Between 60,000 and 70,000 people had fled by Thursday evening after the Israeli military ordered people in the city of Khan Younis to leave, according to UNRWA, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees. More continued to flee into the night and into Friday.The Israeli military said its troops were “engaged in combat both above and below-ground” in the Khan Younis area, in an attack involving ground troops, fighter jets, helicopter gunships and paratroopers, and that the air force had struck more than 30 targets. The assault, the military said, was “part of the effort to degrade” Hamas’ capabilities “as they attempt to regroup.”Under a blazing sun, women carrying babies and blankets, men pushing carts and wheelchairs over sandy roads and young children carrying suitcases and backpacks have walked away from homes and shelters and toward unknown destinations. Some were in tears.“People are sleeping in the streets. Children and women are on the ground without mattresses,” Yafa Abu Aker, a resident of Khan Younis and an independent journalist, told The New York Times in a text message.“Death is better,” an older woman said on Thursday, in video from the Reuters news agency. “We’re fed up. We’ve already died. We’re dead.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Can Harris Win Back Arab American Voters? The Door May Be Cracked Open.

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      Vice President Kamala Harris has not strayed from President Biden on Israel policy, but she has taken a stronger tone on the suffering of Palestinians.In Muna Jondy’s family, every topic is fair game on the WhatsApp thread.The 40-person chat, which includes Ms. Jondy’s brothers, sisters, nieces and nephews, discusses everything: the Drake and Kendrick Lamar rivalry, Ohio State-Michigan football superiority and, of course, politics.The discussion of President Biden’s re-election campaign was a common theme this year as the administration’s support for Israel in the war in Gaza alienated many Muslim and Arab American families, including the Jondys.But the mood shifted when Mr. Biden dropped out of the race and Vice President Kamala Harris became the presumptive Democratic nominee. The family took notice last week when Ms. Harris said she would not look away from images of dead children or be silent about the tragedies in Gaza.“Am I crazy or is this way more than Biden ever was willing to say?” Ms. Jondy’s niece messaged the group. Others in the chat were more skeptical: “Would be nice, but unless I see an explicit change in policy I won’t believe it.”The WhatsApp chat is typical of the conversations happening among Arab Americans across the country who turned away from Mr. Biden over the war in Gaza, which has killed more than 36,000 people over the past 10 months. In crucial battleground states like Michigan, where Ms. Jondy’s family lives, many people who voted for Mr. Biden in 2020 said they felt betrayed and joined protest movements that challenged his campaign.Ms. Harris may have an opportunity to change the conversation. While she has not strayed from Mr. Biden on Israel policy since she began her own campaign for the presidency, she has struck a stronger tone on the suffering of Palestinians.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More