An emergency meeting of Arab and Islamic states is taking place in Qatar in response to Israel's air strike on Hamas leaders in Doha last week. A draft resolution seen by the Reuters news agency condemns what it calls Israel's "hostile acts including genocide, ethnic cleansing, [and] starvation", which it says threatens "prospects of peace and coexistence". Israel has strongly denied such allegations. It is not clear what practical decisions could be taken, as analysts say any kind of military response is out of the question. Earlier, Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim al-Thani urged the international community to stop applying "double standards" and to punish Israel. On Sunday, US President Donald Trump said that "Qatar has been a very great ally. Israel and everybody else, we have to be careful. When we attack people we have to be careful." Departing for Israel on Saturday, the US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, said Trump "didn't like the way [the Qatar attack] went down". During his visit, Rubio will meet Israeli leaders to discuss the war in the Gaza Strip and other key issues affecting the Middle East. The Israeli strike on Qatar's capital was last week condemned by the UN Security Council. "Council members underscored the importance of de-escalation and expressed their solidarity with Qatar," the 15-member council said in a statement. Israel defended its action, with President Isaac Herzog saying that the strike was necessary to "remove some of the people if they are not willing to get a deal" to end the war. Hamas said its negotiating team survived the Israeli strike on 9 September – but five of its members were killed, including the son of the group's chief negotiator Khalil al-Hayya. A Qatari security officer was also killed. Qatar has played a key role in brokering diplomatic efforts to end the war, serving as a mediator of indirect negotiations between Hamas and Israel. It has hosted the Hamas political bureau since 2012 and is a close US ally, hosting a large American airbase in the desert near Doha. – BBC
