Live updates: Follow the latest news on Israel-Gaza
A plan to deliver aid to Gaza by sea was endorsed by the EU this week, but humanitarian groups warn that the only way to prevent widespread famine is for Israel to allow more lorries to bring food into the enclave by land.
Gaza is in need of vast quantities of aid, as five months of war have left many of its 2.3 million people at risk of starvation.
Israel controls the entry of relief supplies into the enclave through Gaza's Rafah border crossing with Egypt and the Kerem Shalom crossing, while maintaining a maritime blockade and keeping the Erez/Beit Hanoun land entry point into northern Gaza closed for aid.
Israel's staunchest ally, Washington, has grown increasingly vocal over the need for more aid to be allowed into Gaza in recent weeks as it pushes the Israeli government to agree to a ceasefire.
No maritime aid landings or air drops can compensate for destruction and relieve the famine
Hadi Fathallah,
aid expert
“Our goal is clear – to establish a comprehensive aid strategy that includes air, land and sea routes to maximise the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza and ensure that aid is distributed to everyone in Gaza who needs it,” US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said on Monday.
Planes from the US, France, Egypt and Jordan parachuted aid parcels into northern Gaza on Tuesday, dropping 36,800 meals, according to US Centcom, while the UAE and Egypt also delivered relief supplies by air.
Alongside carrying out air drops, US officials have also said they are considering plans to deliver aid by sea from the Mediterranean.
“We have been in touch with officials in Israel, in Cyprus, working with the UN, working with potential commercial entities, to see if we can set up a maritime route as well that would deliver assistance directly into Gaza by sea,” a senior official from the Biden administration said on Saturday.
President Ursula von der Leyen said on Monday that the EU Commission supports the implementation of a Cypriot plan for a maritime corridor to deliver aid by sea to Gaza.
The Cypriot plan, known as the Amalthea Initiative, was first announced in November and envisages aid being collected and inspected in Cyprus before being sent to Gaza via ships checked by a committee that includes Israeli authorities.
However, the plan comes with significant obstacles.
Experts stress the most cost-effective way of getting aid into Gaza is by land.
“There is no alternative for both Egypt and Israel opening up their borders and letting aid and trade go in,” said Hadi Fathallah, an expert on regional food security who’s advised international aid organisations in the Middle East.
“No maritime aid landings or air drops can compensate for destruction and relieve the famine. This needs to be done immediately as the famine risk is snowballing each day,” said Mr Fathallah, now an analyst with the Namea consultancy.
According to the World Food Programme, almost 1,000 tonnes of aid would feed about half a million Palestinians for seven days, meaning Gaza needs more than 4,000 tonnes of food weekly.
So far, the aid provided by air has been far less than the required amount.
By air, volumes so far have been relatively small – with several Hercules or C-17 cargo planes dropping dozens of tonnes per mission at significant cost.
By sea, individual ships have not delivered aid directly into Gaza, and a large navy would be required to deliver the continuous aid required.
In November the British Royal Navy ship the Lyme Bay delivered about 200 tonnes of aid to the Gaza aid centre at Arish in Egypt during one journey.
The scale of ships needed would be difficult to supply. While the US has a fleet of amphibious ships that have previously delivered aid, they may not all be available due to other missions around the globe. One of those vessels is the USS Bataan, currently deployed in the Red Sea to intercept Houthi drones and missiles.
In the aftermath of the 2011 Japan earthquake, which devastated several cities and killed about 20,000 people, a US relief effort was able to deliver 235 tonnes of aid to the disaster zone. But it was unable to provide a sufficient response after the Turkey-Syria earthquake in 2023, when several of the necessary vessels were under maintenance in port.
France also has an amphibious assault ship deployed near Gaza, which has a 70-bed hospital on board, to assist with the crisis.
It can also carry aid and delivered 300 tonnes of food and 70,000 litres of water to the Beirut Port area following the disastrous fertiliser explosion in 2020, but these amounts also fall far short of the estimated 4,000 tonnes of food required weekly for Gaza.
The plan would also need to work out how to deliver aid into Gaza given that the enclave's major port has been damaged during the war.
Odai Al Jamal, a local aid worker who said he visited Gaza port two weeks ago, told The National that the port was “severely damaged” and the road to the port had also been churned up.
A representative from Gaza's municipality confirmed to The National that the port has been "massively destroyed."
The original plan in November envisioned a short-term solution of delivering aid directly onto the shore via landing crafts, with the construction of a floating platform in the medium-term, and building a large enclosed port in the long term.
All of these strategies would be difficult to deliver without a prolonged ceasefire, which is currently opposed by the Israeli government.
Hazem Ayyad, a Jordanian political researcher who is closely following the war, told The National the main impediment "remains Israel," which he accused of attacking aid operations.
Last week, more than 100 Palestinians were killed in disputed circumstances after Israeli forces opened fired on civilians waiting for aid in northern Gaza.
Even if a ceasefire were agreed and ships were able to distribute aid via the sea, the maritime mission would still face the issue of how to ensure aid reached Gazans equally.
"It strikes me that with Gaza no matter where it comes in you simply have the problem of distribution," said Keith Mines, a retired US diplomat and director for Latin America at the United States Institute for Peace, who said the plan faced similar issues to a US relief effort to Haiti, when aid fell into the hands of "gangs" on arrival.
Another potential issue is whether Israeli officials would facilitate the quick and efficient inspections of maritime aid needed to provide the quantities required.
Rafah bottleneck
NGOs say the process of delivering aid via the Rafah border crossing has been slowed by exhaustive inspections by Israeli authorities, who say they must ensure no items considered a security risk enter Gaza.
“As hard as it is to quantify how much aid is needed now, it is almost physically impossible to get it all in via Rafah, which isn't designed for commercial use,” said Jessica Moussan, spokeswoman for the Red Cross.
"Sustained and unhindered humanitarian flow is imperative to be able to try to respond to the huge needs in Gaza."
Israel's Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said he wants the maritime plan proposed by Cyprus in November to deliver a "fast track" for aid to Gaza.
"We want to create a fast track for the humanitarian aid shipped to Gaza," Mr Cohen said after visiting Cyprus for talks on the plan in December.
However, under the plan, Israeli authorities would still be involved in checking all aid deliveries before they left the Cypriot port of Larnaca, and therefore the risk of similar delays to those at the Rafah border remains.
Other experts have said that ultimately the only way to ensure sufficient aid reaches Gaza is for Israel to enable the passage of aid via land.
They questioned whether the US is willing or able to pressure the Israeli government to do so.
"Just like airdrops, this is a very complicated and insufficient substitute for getting Israel to open the land crossings - the only effective way to bring in aid," said Martin Konecny, director of Brussels-based think tank, the European Middle East Project.
"It plays into the Israeli desire to seal off Gaza and renounce any civilian responsibility," he told The National.
"It's a symptom of US inability or unwillingness to pressure its ally into opening the crossings while it keeps supplying it with weapons and backing it at the UNSC and the ICJ."
Khaled Yacoub Oweis, Thomas Watkins and Nada AlTaher contributed to this report.
Our legal consultants
Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
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'Unrivaled: Why America Will Remain the World’s Sole Superpower'
Michael Beckley, Cornell Press
Ten tax points to be aware of in 2026
1. Domestic VAT refund amendments: request your refund within five years
If a business does not apply for the refund on time, they lose their credit.
2. E-invoicing in the UAE
Businesses should continue preparing for the implementation of e-invoicing in the UAE, with 2026 a preparation and transition period ahead of phased mandatory adoption.
3. More tax audits
Tax authorities are increasingly using data already available across multiple filings to identify audit risks.
4. More beneficial VAT and excise tax penalty regime
Tax disputes are expected to become more frequent and more structured, with clearer administrative objection and appeal processes. The UAE has adopted a new penalty regime for VAT and excise disputes, which now mirrors the penalty regime for corporate tax.
5. Greater emphasis on statutory audit
There is a greater need for the accuracy of financial statements. The International Financial Reporting Standards standards need to be strictly adhered to and, as a result, the quality of the audits will need to increase.
6. Further transfer pricing enforcement
Transfer pricing enforcement, which refers to the practice of establishing prices for internal transactions between related entities, is expected to broaden in scope. The UAE will shortly open the possibility to negotiate advance pricing agreements, or essentially rulings for transfer pricing purposes.
7. Limited time periods for audits
Recent amendments also introduce a default five-year limitation period for tax audits and assessments, subject to specific statutory exceptions. While the standard audit and assessment period is five years, this may be extended to up to 15 years in cases involving fraud or tax evasion.
8. Pillar 2 implementation
Many multinational groups will begin to feel the practical effect of the Domestic Minimum Top-Up Tax (DMTT), the UAE's implementation of the OECD’s global minimum tax under Pillar 2. While the rules apply for financial years starting on or after January 1, 2025, it is 2026 that marks the transition to an operational phase.
9. Reduced compliance obligations for imported goods and services
Businesses that apply the reverse-charge mechanism for VAT purposes in the UAE may benefit from reduced compliance obligations.
10. Substance and CbC reporting focus
Tax authorities are expected to continue strengthening the enforcement of economic substance and Country-by-Country (CbC) reporting frameworks. In the UAE, these regimes are increasingly being used as risk-assessment tools, providing tax authorities with a comprehensive view of multinational groups’ global footprints and enabling them to assess whether profits are aligned with real economic activity.
Contributed by Thomas Vanhee and Hend Rashwan, Aurifer
Key findings of Jenkins report
- Founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hassan al Banna, "accepted the political utility of violence"
- Views of key Muslim Brotherhood ideologue, Sayyid Qutb, have “consistently been understood” as permitting “the use of extreme violence in the pursuit of the perfect Islamic society” and “never been institutionally disowned” by the movement.
- Muslim Brotherhood at all levels has repeatedly defended Hamas attacks against Israel, including the use of suicide bombers and the killing of civilians.
- Laying out the report in the House of Commons, David Cameron told MPs: "The main findings of the review support the conclusion that membership of, association with, or influence by the Muslim Brotherhood should be considered as a possible indicator of extremism."
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