Middle East: EU pledges €1.6 billion for Palestinians
April 14, 2025
What you need to know
European Union foreign affairs chief Kaja Kallas announced a new aid package for the Palestinians on Monday.
It comes ahead of an anticipated meeting between EU foreign ministers and senior Palestinian officials in Luxembourg on Monday.
Meanwhile, six people were reportedly killed in suspected US strikes on Yemen.
The Houthi-run Health Ministry says that the building targeted was a ceramics factory and that 30 more people were injured. The ministry says that 123 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in US strikes since mid-March.
This round-up of the main headlines on Israel and the crisis in the Middle East on Monday, April 14 is now closed, thank you for following.
EU pledges €1.6 billion in new aid for Palestinians
The European Union has announced a three-year financial support package for the Palestinians worth up to €1.6 billion ($1.8 billion).
"We are stepping up our support to the Palestinian people. €1.6 billion until 2027 will help stabilize the West Bank and Gaza," EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas wrote on X on Monday.
Ahead of the official announcement, Dubravka Suica, the European Commissioner for the Mediterranean, said the support would go hand in hand with reforms of the Palestinian Authority, accused in the past of corruption and bad governance.
"We want them to reform themselves because without reforming, they won't be strong enough and credible in order to be an interlocutor, not for only for us, but an interlocutor also for Israel," Suica told Reuters.
The commissioner's remarks came ahead of the first "high-level political dialogue" between EU foreign ministers and senior Palestinian officials in Luxembourg on Monday.
The EU is the biggest donor to the Palestinians.
EU officials have expressed hope that the Palestinian Authority, which governs in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, may also one day take responsibility for Gaza after the war between Israel and Hamas militants.
Israel condemns German questions about hospital attack
Israel has criticized the German Foreign Ministry on Monday over a social media post that questioned the Israeli military's deadly strike on a hospital in northern Gaza.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry posted on the social media platform X that the attack had been a "precise strike" on a building that was used by the Palestinian militant group Hamas.
It said hospital staff had been instructed to evacuate before the strike, but Palestinian news agency WAFA reported that only 18 minutes' notice was given.
Dozens of patients reportedly could not be moved, and a child died after being unable to receive care during the evacuation.
On Sunday, Germany's Foreign Office and outgoing Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, shared a post on X that said: "The cruel Hamas terror must be fought. But international humanitarian law applies - with a special obligation to protect civilian sites. How is a hospital supposed to be evacuated in under 20 minutes?"
On Monday, Israel's Foreign Ministry pushed back in a post of its own, saying the attack was a "precise strike" on a single building used as a command and control center by the Palestinian militant group Hamas. It insisted the attack was not a general assault on hospital grounds.
The Israeli ministry said it expected "a clear and strong condemnation of Hamas's use of hospitals" and "not rhetoric that encourages Hamas's continued abuse of civilian infrastructure."
WHO says child died because of Gaza hospital air strike
An Israeli air strike that hit one of Gaza's few functioning hospitals resulted in the death of a child according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
"A child died due to disruption of care" at the Al-Ahli Hospital in northern Gaza after a strike, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on social media late on Sunday.
"The emergency room, laboratory, emergency room X-ray machines and the pharmacy were destroyed," he added. "The hospital was forced to move 50 patients to other hospitals. 40 critical patients couldn't be moved."
The Israeli military said it had targeted a Hamas "command and control center" at the hospital, a claim that the Palestinian group denied.
US airstrikes on Yemen kill 6
Suspected US airstrikes around the rebel-held capital of Yemen have killed at least six people and wounded 30 others overnight, according to the Iran-backed Houthi militia.
The Houthi-run Health Ministry claimed that all of those killed were civilians.
"The strike carried out by the American aggression's aircraft on the Al-Sawari Ceramics Factory resulted in 6 martyrs and 30 injured, most of whom are civilians working in the factory, neighbouring homes, and a nearby farm," said Youssef al-Hadhari, a spokesperson for the ministry.
Footage aired by the Houthis' al-Masirah satellite news channel showed firefighters spraying water on a blaze that officials said had been sparked by the airstrikes.
Rebels claimed the site was a ceramics factory in the Bani Matar neighborhood of Sanaa.
Al-Hadhari said 123 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in the latest campaign of US airstrikes on Yemen that began March 16.
The Houthis say they are attacking maritime traffic in sympathy with Palestinians in Gaza, as Israel continues its offensive in the territory.
Israel, the United States and Britain have responded by attacking Houthi targets inside Yemen.
Following a pattern, the US military's Central Command, which oversees American military operations, did not acknowledge the strikes.
Welcome to our coverage
A US airstrike against Houthi rebels around Yemen's capital has killed at least six people, the Iran-backed Shiite militia has said.
Meanwhile, Israel has responded to criticism of an airstrike on a hospital in northern Gaza.
Follow us for more developments in the Middle East on Monday April 14.