
Family feared for British couple detained in Iran after Evin prison bombing
The couple were initially held in a 3x3 metre cell in Kerman, southeastern Iran, for at least five months.
Their family endured a "month of torment" in June when the couple went missing, fearing they had been transferred to Tehran 's Evin prison, which was bombed by Israel on 23 June.
Despite the family's fears, the Iranian foreign ministry said on 8 July that the Foremans were still in Kerman, though the British Foreign Office has not yet had direct contact with them.
The family asserts the Foremans are "normal" individuals being held as political prisoners and are urging for their release, while the FCDO continues to provide consular assistance.
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Telegraph
2 hours ago
- Telegraph
Hamas leader's wife ‘smuggled from Gaza tunnels to Turkey'
The wife of the architect of the October 7 massacre was smuggled out of Gaza and remarried in Turkey, it has been reported. Samar Muhammad Abu Zamar, the wife of Yahya Sinwar, slipped out of the enclave using a fake passport and carrying significant amounts of cash, sources in Gaza told Ynet, an Israeli news website. She married again a few months after Sinwar, Hamas's military commander, was killed by Israeli troops in October 2024, the news outlet reported. Sources said her wedding and resettlement in Turkey were organised by Fathi Hammad, a Hamas political bureau member who has been linked to attempts to hide terror operatives and their families. In 2024, footage was released showing Abu Zamar walking through a Hamas tunnel, clutching what appeared to be a designer handbag, hours before the October 7 attacks. Although officially unconfirmed, the story has been widely reported in Israel. Hamas, which styles itself as the primary force of Palestinian resistance to Israel, has repeatedly been accused of drawing strength from the suffering of ordinary Gazans who cannot leave the territory. Ynet reported an Israeli security official as saying that both Abu Zamar and Najwa Sinwar, the wife of Mohammed Sinwar, who took command of Hamas after his brother was killed, left Gaza via Rafah. 'She's no longer here – she crossed through the Rafah border using a fake passport,' a source said of Abu Zamar, saying the escape required 'high-level coordination, logistical support, and large sums of money that regular Gazans don't have'. The women are believed to have escaped via a smuggling network that Hamas has long had in place to evacuate its leaders' families. The report comes amid increasing resentment from Palestinians towards Hamas after 19 months of war. Pictures and videos showing senior members of the group living comfortable lifestyles elsewhere in the Middle East have also fuelled criticism. One Gazan civilian said: 'They send their children to study in Turkey and Qatar—and send ours to the grave. 'What makes them different from any corrupt ruler in the Arab world? 'They only look after themselves.' Hamas is now believed to be under the command of Izz al-Din al-Haddad, the only senior commander from October 7 still alive. Hostage negotiations are believed to have been hampered by difficulty in communicating with what is left of Hamas's military structure in the Strip.


Sky News
4 hours ago
- Sky News
Security personnel shot at Palestinians at Gaza aid distribution centre, claims ex-guard
A former US soldier who was employed to work within the Gaza aid system approved by Israel has said he saw security personnel shoot at Palestinians at a distribution centre. The unnamed American man, who served for 25 years in the US army, has said how he witnessed force being used against unarmed innocent civilians in the Gaza Strip. "There is no fixing this, this needs to be put an end to," he said in a video aired by Israeli free-to-air TV station Channel 12. It comes as the United Nations criticised an aid distribution scheme run by the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) that has been supplying aid in the Strip since late May, claiming it is a "sadistic death trap" where "snipers open fire randomly on crowds". More than 1,000 people have been reported killed while trying to receive food aid since the end of May, according to the UN, with the territory facing a starvation crisis. The unnamed American said as Palestinians were finishing getting their aid, security personnel "began shooting in their direction, shooting at them, shooting at their feet… to get them to leave". In another incident, he said a man was on his hands and knees picking up individual needles when security personnel wanted Palestinians to leave the site. He said a contractor "sprayed an entire can of pepper spray into his face - that's lethal". He also recounted a third incident, describing how he was standing next to two women when a contractor threw a stun grenade and it landed between him and the women. "This thing hit her and she just drops, just lifeless, collapsed to the ground. It looked like she had been killed". 2:55 He said it was at that point that he decided he could no longer be part of the distribution system. Earlier this month, the Associated Press (AP) reported that it spoke anonymously to two US contractors guarding aid distribution sites who said their colleagues regularly threw stun grenades and pepper spray in the direction of the Palestinians. They said the security staff hired were often unqualified, unvetted, heavily armed and seemed to have an open licence to do whatever they wished, the AP reported. Videos provided by one of the contractors and taken at the sites showed hundreds of Palestinians crowded between metal gates, jostling for aid amid the sound of bullets and stun grenades and the sting of pepper spray, the agency added. The unnamed American man speaking to Channel 12 said the centres are in remote areas. "The sites were not set up in locations, nor were they set up in a way that was conducive to distributing or delivering humanitarian aid to a needy population," he said. Residents are not allowed there by car and so people are on foot, he added. "Most of them don't have shoes, no water, going through active warzone areas." 4:10 He also said that if the United Nations method of aid distribution had the support, security and coordination that the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) is getting, then the UN process would be very successful. UNRWA, the UN relief agency for Gaza, has criticised the US-backed aid distribution scheme run by GHF that has been supplying aid since late May, when Israel, which controls supplies into the territory, lifted an 11-week blockade. UNRWA Commissioner General Philippe Lazzarini said: "The so-called 'GHF' distribution scheme is a sadistic death trap. Snipers open fire randomly on crowds as if they are given a licence to kill." 2:00 The GHF uses private US security and logistics companies and largely bypasses a UN-led system that Israel alleges has let Hamas-led militants loot aid shipments intended for civilians. Hamas denies the allegation. GHF said in a statement: "This is a disgruntled former contractor who was terminated for misconduct a month ago. GHF launched an immediate investigation as soon as these allegations were brought to our attention. Based on time-stamped video footage and witness statements, we have concluded that the claims made are categorically false. "At no point were civilians under fire at a GHF distribution site. The gunfire heard in the video was confirmed to have originated from the IDF, which was outside the immediate vicinity of the GHF site. "The gunfire was not directed at individuals, and no one was shot or injured. We take the safety and security of our operational sites extremely seriously. When behaviour falls short of our standards, we take action. The contractor seen shouting in the video is no longer part of our operations. "We remain focused on our core mission - delivering food to the people of Gaza in a safe, direct, and uninterrupted manner, as we have done since launching operations on 27 May. Since then, we have distributed nearly 85 million meals to residents of the Gaza Strip."


Daily Mail
7 hours ago
- Daily Mail
Triple murderer among 10 inmates released back to the US as part of prisoner swap with Venezuela
A triple murderer was among the 10 prisoners sent back to the US as part of a deal between the State Department and Venezuela. Dahud Hanid Ortiz, 55, was sentenced to 30 years in prison in Caracas last year after he killed three people in Madrid in 2016. He was one of the American citizens flown to Texas on Friday as part of a deal between the White House and the Nicolas Maduro regime in Venezuela. The Trump administration said the Americans had been political prisoners in the country, with Secretary Marco Rubio saying: 'Every wrongfully detained American in Venezuela is now free and back in our homeland.' But the Venezuelan NGO Foro Penal warned that one of them was a murderer, not a dissident, as reported by El Pais. It is not clear if Ortiz was transferred to a prison after landing in Texas last week. Daily Mail has reached out to the State Department for comment on this story. After the prisoner swap, Venezuelan regime leader Diosdado Cabello appeared to troll the US, saying: 'We handed over some murderers for you.' Ortiz was born in Venezuela, but became a naturalized US citizen after serving in Iraq. He was arrested in Caracas in 2018 after he fled Spain following the murders. Spanish police said Ortiz meant to kill his ex-wife's new boyfriend, lawyer Víctor Joel Salas, but instead killed the wrong man and two law clerks at a law firm. Salas told Spanish media he feels betrayed after Ortiz was sent to the US. 'Both my family and I feel deceived, betrayed, and frustrated,' he said. Venezuela on Friday released 10 jailed American citizens and permanent residents in exchange for scores of migrants deported by the United States to El Salvador months ago under the Trump administration's immigration crackdown. Aside from Ortiz, the Americans were among dozens of people, including activists, opposition members and union leaders, that Venezuela's regime took into custody in its brutal campaign to crack down on dissent over the last year. 'Every wrongfully detained American in Venezuela is now free and back in our homeland,' Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement in which he thanked El Salvador president Nayib Bukele. Bukele said El Salvador had handed over all the Venezuelan nationals in its custody. Maritza Osorio Riverón was Ortiz' third victim. Spanish police said Ortiz meant to kill his ex-wife's new boyfriend but targeted the wrong man and two assistants at a law firm Central to the deal were more than 250 Venezuelan migrants freed by El Salvador, which in March agreed to a $6 million payment from the Trump administration to house them in its notorious prison. That arrangement drew immediate blowback when Trump invoked an 18th century wartime law, the Alien Enemies Act, to quickly remove the men that his administration had accused of belonging to the violent Tren de Aragua street gang, teeing up a legal fight that reached the Supreme Court. The administration did not provide evidence to back up those claims. The Venezuelans had been held in a mega-prison known as the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, which was built to hold alleged gang members in Bukele's war on the country's gangs. Human rights groups have documented hundreds of deaths as well as cases of torture inside its walls. Photos and videos released by El Salvador's government on Friday showed shackled Venezuelans sitting in a fleet of buses and boarding planes surrounded by officers in riot gear. One man looked up and pointed toward the sky as he climbed aboard a plane, while another made an obscene gesture toward police. One of the men is reportedly Andry Hernández Romero, a makeup artist who fled Venezuela last year and was taken into Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody at a border crossing in San Diego before eventually being flown to El Salvador. Maduro described Friday as 'a day of blessings and good news for Venezuela.' He called it 'the perfect day for Venezuela.' The release of the Venezuelans, meanwhile, is an invaluable win for Maduro as he presses his efforts to assert himself as president despite credible evidence that he lost reelection last year.