Middle EastMiddle East news, arts, culture, and politics. Updates on Iraq, Israel, Palestine, Iran, OPEC, and the Persian Gulf states NPR streaming audio. Subscribe to the Middle East RSS feed.
President Biden sits with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, at the start of the Israeli war cabinet meeting, in Tel Aviv on Oct. 18, 2023.
Miriam Alster/Pool/AFP via Getty Images
hide caption
Rahima Banu had the last recorded case of naturally occurring variola major smallpox, a deadly strain of the virus, in 1975. At left: Banu in her mother's arms as a small child. At right: Banu today, close to 50 years old, lives in a small village in Bangladesh with her husband, Rafiqul Islam, and their children.
Michael Schwartz/CDC, Céline Gounder/KFF Health News
hide caption
toggle caption
Michael Schwartz/CDC, Céline Gounder/KFF Health News
Displaced Palestinians gather in the yard of Gaza's Al-Shifa hospital on Dec. 10, 2023. The hospital, Gaza's largest, war raided by the Israeli military early on Monday.
AFP via Getty Images
hide caption
Palestinian journalists stage a protest to draw attention to Palestinian members of the media killed while covering the war in the Gaza Strip on Jan. 15, in Rafah, Gaza.
Ahmad Hasaballah/Getty Images
hide caption
Open Arms members carry humanitarian aid for Gaza in a joint mission between NGOs Open Arms and World Central Kitchen at a port of Larnaca, Cyprus, March 9.
Santi Palacios/Open Arms-World Central Kitchen/Handout via Reuters
hide caption
toggle caption
Santi Palacios/Open Arms-World Central Kitchen/Handout via Reuters
Displaced Palestinians gather to receive food donated by a charity before an iftar meal, the breaking of fast, on the second day of the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan, in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza Strip, Tuesday, amid ongoing battles between Israel and the militant group Hamas.
Majdi Fathi/NurPhoto via Getty Images
hide caption
Chaim Otmazgin, 50, poses for a portrait in his home in Petah Tikvah, Israel on Jan. 21. Otmazgin is a reserve soldier and a Zaka volunteer that was on scene of the attacks on October 7th and the following days.
Maya Levin for NPR
hide caption
Children react during the funeral of the Faojo family, killed in an Israel strike on Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on Nov. 11, 2023. Roughly 600,000 children are sheltering in Rafah, where a spiraling humanitarian crisis is playing out due to the war between Israel and Hamas.
Said Khatib/AFP via Getty Images
hide caption
U.S. President Bill Clinton presides over the 1993 peace accords signed at the White House by Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin (left) and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. The aim was a negotiated deal ending decades of conflict between the two sides. But no agreement was reached. Today there's talk about recognizing a Palestinian state first and then negotiating the details afterward.
Ron Edmonds/AP
hide caption
Demonstrators near Beit Shemesh, Israel, carry stretchers representing each of the 134 Israelis still being held by Hamas on March 1. Amid fraught negotiations over conditions for a cease-fire, the families of the hostages held a four-day march from areas attacked on Oct. 7 in southern Israel to Jerusalem.
Tamir Kalifa for NPR
hide caption
Port staffers prepare aid on a platform near to the docked ship belonging to the Open Arms aid group, as it prepares to ferry some 200 tonnes of rice and flour directly to Gaza, at the port in Larnaca, Cyprus, on Sunday, March 10, 2024.
Petros Karadjias/AP
hide caption
Displaced Palestinians in Rafah decorate their tent in preparation for the holy month of Ramadan. The holiday begins as the humanitarian situation in Gaza remains dire. For many Muslim Americans, the situation in Gaza is infusing the holiday with a different meaning this year.
Ahmad Hasaballah/Getty Images
hide caption
Palestinian children carry banners during a march demanding an end to the war and an end to the famine that citizens suffer from due to the war on Wednesday, March 6, in Rafah, Gaza.
Ahmad Hasaballah/Getty Images
hide caption
Muslims walk next to the Dome of Rock Mosque at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem's Old City, Sunday, March 10, 2024.
Mahmoud Illean/AP
hide caption
Pro-Palestinian supporters wave flags and carry placards during a march in central Stockholm last month in which demonstrators demanded Israel be excluded from the Eurovision Song Contest.
Fredrik Persson/TT News Agency/AFP via Getty Images
hide caption
toggle caption
Fredrik Persson/TT News Agency/AFP via Getty Images
Carmit Palty Katzir prepares to speak at a weekly rally in Tel Aviv, Israel, calling for the immediate release of the hostages being held in Gaza, Feb. 17.
Tamir Kalifa for NPR
hide caption