Libya, China, Israel-Palestine.

Today's three stories you should know.

Jun 11, 2022

Libya

Heavy fighting erupted in Libya’s capital Tripoli overnight between two militias loyal to rival prime ministers. Residents said it was possibly the worst violence they’d seen since the war that toppled Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. The sound of heavy gunfire and explosions rang out across the city and footage shared on social media showed residents fleeing several areas. International media largely stopped covering the violence after Gaddafi was killed but the country had been beset by chaos ever since.

China

Footage of a group of men viciously beating a woman has gone viral in China, outraging tens of millions and prompting calls for the government to do more to tackle violence against women. The CCTV video shows a man approaching a woman at a table in a restaurant in the early hours. After she pushes him away, he unleashes a volley of punches before several of his friends join in, also beating the woman’s friends. Nine men have been arrested and two women treated in hospital for their injuries. “This happened in a society where violence against women is rampant ... To ignore and suppress the perspective of gender is to deny the violence that people -- as women -- suffer," one anonymous post on the social platform WeChat said.

Israel-Palestine

It has now been one month since the iconic Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh was shot dead, leading to an outpouring of grief across the Arab world. There has been little progress on getting an official, independent investigation off the ground. The Palestinian authority has said it won’t cooperate with the Israeli government as it doesn’t believe it would investigate in good faith. The US government has insisted that Israel has the wherewithal to investigate itself impartially. And Al Jazeera, Abu Akleh’s employer, has hired a group of specialist lawyers to take the case to the International Criminal Court. A wealth of evidence, several investigations by media organisations and rights groups, and at least seven eyewitness accounts from journalists point to an Israeli soldier deliberately killing the journalist.