Israeli airstrikes near Syria’s Aleppo kills 42: war monitor
Casualties include 36 Syrian troops and six Hezbollah fighters; dozens injured in what is the deadliest such attack in years, says Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approved on Friday new talks on a Gaza ceasefire, a day after the world’s top court ordered Israel to ensure urgent humanitarian aid reaches people in the Palestinian territory. The new talks on Gaza ceasefire and hostage release will take place in Doha and Cairo.
The Syrian Army says Israeli airstrikes early on Friday near the northern city of Aleppo killed or wounded “a number of” people and caused damage. An opposition war monitor said the strikes killed 42, most of them Syrian troops.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, said Israeli strikes hit missile depots for Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group in Aleppo’s southern suburb of Jibreen, near the Aleppo International Airport, and the nearby town of Safira,
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The French government said it is “seriously” studying the option of building a plant to convert and enrich reprocessed uranium to cut its reliance on Russia following the invasion of Ukraine. The only plant in the world that currently converts reprocessed uranium for use in nuclear power plants is located in Russia.
Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes on targets in government-controlled parts of Syria in recent years.
home to a sprawling military facility.
The Observatory said 36 Syrian troops and six Hezbollah fighters died, and dozens of people were wounded, calling it the
deadliest years.
There was no immediate statement from Israeli officials on the strikes.
Israel, which has vowed to stop Iranian entrenchment
such
attack
in in its northern neighbor, has carried out hundreds of strikes on targets in government-controlled parts of Syria in recent years, but it rarely acknowledges them.
On Thursday, Syrian state media reported airstrikes near the capital, Damascus, saying they wounded two civilians.
Hezbollah has had an armed presence in Syria since it joined the country’s conflict fighting alongside government forces.
The strikes have escalated over the past five months against the backdrop of the war in Gaza and ongoing clashes between Hezbollah and Israeli forces on the Lebanon-Israel border.
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Elon Musk said his artificial intelligence startup xAI’s latest Grok-1.5 chatbot will be available on his platform X next week. Earlier this month, Mr. Musk said xAI would open-source Grok, days after the billionaire sued Microsoft-backed OpenAI for allegedly abandoning its original mission in favour of a for-profit model.
Moscow launched a largescale attack on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure on Friday, with a mass barrage of 99 drones and missiles hitting regions across the country, Ukraine’s armed forces said.
Air raid warnings rang out across the country, with 10 Ukrainian regions coming under fire, the country’s Interior Minister, Ihor Klymenko, said.
Ukraine’s state-owned grid operator, Ukrenergo, said that Friday’s attack deliberately targeted thermal and hydroelectric power plants across central and western regions. DTEK, Ukraine’s largest private electricity operator, also said that three of its thermal power plants had been damaged in the attack. It
Ukrainian troops from anti-drone mobile air defence unit at their position in Chernihiv on Thursday.
announced emergency power shutdowns in the city of Odesa.
Escalating strikes
Russia has escalated its attacks on Ukraine in recent days, launching several missile barrages on the capital, Kyiv, and hitting energy infrastructure across the country. Largescale blackouts have already
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Chinese tech giant Huawei said on Friday its profits more than doubled in 2023, as it ramps up efforts to bounce back in a year that saw the company apparently defy U.S. sanctions with the release of a high-end smartphone. Huawei said it generated a profit of 87 billion yuan ($12 billion) last year.
affected Ukraine’s Kharkiv, where 7,00,000 people lost power in an attack on March 22.
Five people, including a 5-year-old girl, were wounded during the attack in Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region. He later said that another man had been killed and one more injured in a separate drone attack on Friday.
Russia will begin calling up tens of thousands of soldiers next week in a conscription drive to replenish its armed forces and build up its military reserves.
Moscow says conscripts are not sent to fight in Ukraine but the draft — which happens twice a year — comes amid persistent rumours of a new wave of mobilisation for the Ukraine offensive.
“The spring draft will be held from April 1,” a senior Russian official said.
Some 1,47,000 conscripts were drafted during last year’s spring call-ups. Russian men aged between 18 and 30 are eligible to be called up after lawmakers increased the upper age limit from 27 last year.