Hamas plotted to dig up the remains of British and Commonwealth troops buried in Gaza and blackmail the Government over their return, according to documents uncovered in the war-torn enclave. For more than a century The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC), chaired by the UK Defence Secretary and supported by the Crown, has maintained a cemetery in central Gaza containing the remains of more than 3,000 Commonwealth troops from the First and Second World Wars.

In the aftermath of the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political leader, all eyes are on Khaled Meshaal, who “rose from the dead” after an assassination attempt that made him a hero among Hamas supporters. A senior intelligence chief who was part of the team behind the operation in Jordan’s capital, Amman, in 1997, said: “Meshaal became a self-made prophet. He thought in his Islamic ideology that he was immortal, and it was from there he rose quickly to power.”

Eighteen months after the death of Private Seán Rooney, Irish soldiers in Unifil face renewed danger as the terrorist group and IDF step up hostilities. The streets of south Lebanon look like ghost towns. Usually alive with children playing and people drinking coffee outside cafes, with laundry hanging from balconies and battered cars trundling up and down winding lanes, they have largely emptied since an escalation in hostilities between Hezbollah and neighbouring Israel.

When I went to meet Ismail Haniyeh for his last foreign interview in 2022, I was sent the address of a business park on the outskirts of Istanbul.I expected this would just be the first “pin”, and I might be taken then to a second or third location. But to my surprise, this was indeed the address of the office of the political leader of the terror group holding Gaza in its grip.He was living quite openly, under the eye of the Turkish government.The office – a simple, run-down building – was wher...

A radical Iranian MP who pushed for executions of protesters has stepped forward to become the country’s first female presidential candidate. Zohreh Elahian has registered to run in the country’s snap elections at the end of June following the sudden death of Ebrahim Raisi, its former president, last month in a helicopter crash. A staunch supporter of Ali Khamenei, the country’s supreme leader, she could potentially become the first woman ever allowed to stand if approved by the Guardian Council.

A secret Israeli plan to persuade a powerful Gazan clan to take power from Hamas was derailed when the terror group executed its leader, The Telegraph can reveal. Israel is now trying to recruit more moderate Palestinian leaders from the West Bank to rule Gaza after the war. The plan to install Gaza’s Doghmush clan – the most powerful in the enclave – failed after the group’s leader and several of its allies were assassinated, an Israeli intelligence source with knowledge of the plan said.

Urgent action is needed to help save one of Iraq’s last remaining synagogues from crumbling beyond repair, an Iraqi-British Jewish philanthropist has warned. Mosul’s Sassoon Synagogue, which dates back to 1902 and was once the heart of a 6,000-strong thriving local Jewish community, has become a rubbish dump, with its ritual bath - or “mikveh” - now a barn for horses, according to Edwin Shuker who was born in Baghdad but fled to the UK to seek asylum in 1971.

The intelligence, compiled by the network of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) inside the country from various sources including some inside the IRGC, reveals that the Gangine centre, which has remained secret until now, hosts leaders of the region’s terror groups currently wreaking havoc across the Middle East, most notably, Lebanese Hezbollah.

Israel’s intelligence services have enrolled a swathe of new recruits from within Gaza to aid them in their search for the remaining hostages. It has become much easier to draw Gazans in to work for Israel after the breakout of war on Oct 7, intelligence sources told the Telegraph, with offers of cash, immunity from prosecution, or physical safety. At the same time it is easier for elite units of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to enter the Gaza Strip unnoticed, and one source told The Telegraph.

Iran’s budget to preserve its ancient heritage amounts to a paltry £161 per site and £3,000 per building, a minister has complained. Ali Darabi, the deputy minister for cultural heritage, tourism and handicrafts, said that the country’s historical sites risk falling into total disrepair in the middle of a profound economic crisis. “The fact that all this historical greatness and cultural heritage should be preserved and restored with this minimal budget is beyond me,” Mr Darabi said.

An Israeli reservist fighter pilot said it was like “Top Gun meets Star Wars” as he described how he shot down Iranian missiles and was back at work in his office before the end of the day. The pilot, identified as “Major G”, said that taking to the skies to defend Israel from more than 350 missiles and drones was “the most complex mission of my life”. “It really was a different thing with hundreds of those UAVs and missiles in the air getting intercepted around you, like Top Gun meets Star Wars."

After a sleepless night for many, Tel Aviv’s coffee shops were bustling on Sunday morning as life returned to relative normality after the unprecedented Iranian bombardment. While children were kept home from school, businesses were back to usual in the city which is more than familiar with war. “What else can we do,” said Shira Cohen, speaking from Tel Aviv’s beachfront where she was doing her morning run. “Thank God it wasn’t more than this, but we have to continue living.”

The centuries-old Christian population in the holy city of Nazareth is slowly disappearing because of a mafia crime wave sweeping northern Israel. Mafia gang members reportedly harass Christian store owners in the northern Israeli city and demand the equivalent of thousands of pounds in protection money. Their numbers are reported to have grown since the outbreak of the Gaza war despite the deployment of Shin Bet, the Israeli internal security agency, last year and extra police patrols.

Israel may not be able to destroy Hamas despite five months of intense fighting in Gaza, intelligence officials have admitted. The main objective of the Gaza invasion faces failure as international support turns against Israel, sources warned. Israel believes it has dismantled Hamas’s main command and control structure in central and northern Gaza but pockets of “guerrilla” resistance remain. Senior officials told The Telegraph four out of an original 24 Hamas battalions remain completely untouched.

The beautiful tree-lined roads up the mountainside have been turned into muddy tracks by tanks, with soldiers now patrolling where children once played freely in the 750-strong community. “I miss my children, my wife, the life we lived, the simplicity,” he said, his eldest of two just three years old. “I want to be part of raising my daughter but instead, I’m here, safeguarding what’s left of our community’s homes,” he said, more than 100,000 Israelis have been displaced from the country’s north.

Iran is using European ports to provide cover for shipments of weapons to Hezbollah, The Telegraph can reveal. The Lebanese terror group has received missiles and bombs on ships that go on to dock in ports in Belgium, Spain and Italy, sources said. Hezbollah and Israel are close to all-out war amid daily exchanges of cross-border fire, causing border regions to be evacuated.

Hamas will not release all of its hostages, forcing Israel to “pay a lot of money” through individual deals to free its citizens, a member of Israel’s negotiating team has said. Speaking on condition of anonymity, the negotiator said there was “no way on earth” the terror group would cut a deal to release all of the hostages taken on Oct 7. “The hostages are the only cards left in the pack for the personal security of the leaders of Hamas and their families.”

More than 250 hostages were taken to Gaza when Hamas militia invaded Israel on Oct 7. In November, 105 of them – including 81 Israelis and 24 foreigners – were released from Gaza in exchange for 240 Palestinians, including 71 women and 169 children. Israel is demanding the release of all the remaining hostages as part of the ceasefire negotiations, while Hamas is demanding the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza.

In recent years, Azerbaijan has forged its way into the top short-haul destinations for GCC travellers – it’s only a three-hour direct flight away from countries such as the UAE. Offering skiing or weekend breaks in the capital, Baku, and a wealth of history and culture for visitors to explore, the ‘land of fire’ is also a culinary crossroads. Arabic and Persian flavours with a hint of Mediterranean meets Asia and Eastern Europe, indicate the influence of Azerbaijan being at the heart of the old Silk Road. Here’s where to head to in Baku if you are in search of the perfect weekend culinary adventure.

Kibbutzim in southern Israel have been forced to close their doors to visitors after busloads of souvenir-hunting tourists turned the sites of the Oct 7 attacks into a “safari”. Hundreds of people now arrive daily for “war tours” of the devastated communities to take selfies with the burnt-out homes and blood-stained walls left after the Hamas atrocities, in which 1,200 people died. Some tourists even enter abandoned homes without permission and steal “souvenirs” such as spent bullet casings.