Middle East & North Africa

BEIRUT, Jan 5 (Reuters) - The head of Hezbollah said on Friday Lebanon would be "exposed" to more Israeli operations if his powerful Lebanese armed group did not respond to the killing of the deputy chief of Hamas on the outskirts of Beirut.

Saleh al-Arouri was killed in a drone strike on a southern suburb of Beirut on Tuesday, in what some analysts said could also be seen as a message to Hezbollah that its strongholds were vulnerable to attack.

DUBAI, Jan 5 (Reuters) - Iranian authorities said on Friday that security forces had arrested 11 people suspected of involvement in two bomb blasts that killed nearly 100 people at a memorial service for a slain military commander.

The Islamic State militant group has claimed responsibilty for the attacks in Kerman, southeastern Iran, on Wednesday.

BAGHDAD, Jan. 5 (Xinhua) -- Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia' al-Sudani reiterated his pledge on Friday to end the presence of the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq after a series of U.S. strikes killed Iraqi security personnel and militia leaders.

Al-Sudani said his government would soon start talks with the coalition through a committee to arrange the withdrawal of foreign troops, a move he said was "a commitment that the government will not back down from."

TEHRAN, Jan. 5 (Xinhua) -- Iran's Deputy Interior Minister for Security Affairs Majid Mir-Ahmadi said on Friday both bomb attacks that rocked the area near the tomb of Qassem Soleimani in Kerman, southeastern Iran, were "suicide attacks."

Mir-Ahmadi told the official IRNA news agency that parts of the bombers' bodies had been found at the site of Wednesday's attack, which has killed at least 89 people and wounded more than 280.

KERMAN, Iran (AP) — Iranian officials tried Friday to link Israel and the U.S. to an Islamic State group-claimed suicide bombing while speaking to a mass funeral for some of the 89 people killed in the attack, seeking to intertwine the assault with wider Middle East tensions from the Israel-Hamas war.

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and the top commander of Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard sought to make the link without offering evidence for their claims. The gathered crowd in front of flag-draped caskets shouted in response: “Death to America!” and “Death to Israel!”

Gaza (AP) —At least six people were killed in an apparent Israeli airstrike on a home in the southern Gaza city of Rafah overnight. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have crammed into Rafah, one of the areas where Israel has told people to seek refuge. But Israeli forces continue to strike all parts of the besieged territory.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The Islamic State group claimed responsibility Thursday for two suicide bombings targeting a commemoration for an Iranian general slain in a 2020 U.S. drone strike, the worst militant attack to strike Iran in decades as the wider Middle East remains on edge.

Experts who follow the group confirmed that the statement, circulated online among jihadists, came from the extremists, who likely hope to take advantage of the chaos gripping the region amid Israel’s war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

BEIRUT/CAIRO/GAZA, Jan 4 (Reuters) - Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Israeli army made statements suggesting the two avowed enemies wanted to avoid risking the further spread of war beyond the Gaza Strip after a drone strike killed a Palestinian Hamas deputy leader in Beirut.

In a speech in Beirut on Wednesday, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah vowed that his powerful Iran-backed Shi'ite militia "cannot be silent" following the killing of Hamas deputy Saleh al-Arouri on Tuesday.

SANAA, Jan. 3 (Xinhua) -- The Houthi group in Yemen launched on Wednesday missiles targeting a cargo ship in the Red Sea, the group's military spokesman Yahya Sarea said in a statement.

The Houthi forces carried out an operation targeting the ship CMA CGM TAGE, he said in a live broadcast aired by the Houthi-run al-Masirah TV.

"The operation came after the ship's crew refused to respond to calls from our forces, including fiery warning messages," he said.

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — In the wake of Hamas’ brutal Oct. 7 attack, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s days in office seemed numbered.

Despite his reputation as the ultimate political survivor, the devastation of the attack and the security failures that allowed it to happen on his watch appeared to be too much for him to overcome.