MUZAFFARABAD, Pakistan/NEW DELHI — India attacked Pakistan and Pakistani Kashmir on Wednesday and Pakistan said it had shot down five Indian fighter jets in the worst fighting in more than two decades between the nuclear-armed enemies.

India said it struck nine Pakistani “terrorist infrastructure” sites, some of them linked to an attack by Islamist militants on Hindu tourists that killed 26 people in Indian Kashmir last month.

Islamabad said six Pakistani locations were targeted, and that none of them were militant camps. At least 26 civilians were killed and 46 injured, a Pakistan military spokesperson said.

Indian forces attacked the headquarters of Islamist militant groups Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Taiba, an Indian defence source told Reuters.

“India has demonstrated considerable restraint in selection of targets and method of execution,” the Indian defense ministry said in a statement.

Pakistan said Indian missiles hit three sites and a military spokesperson told Reuters five Indian aircraft had been shot down, a claim not confirmed by India.

However, four local government sources in Indian Kashmir told Reuters that three fighter jets had crashed in separate areas of the Himalayan region during the night.

All three pilots had been hospitalized, the sources added. Indian defence ministry officials were not immediately available to confirm the report.

Images circulating on local media showed a large, damaged cylindrical chunk of silver-coloured metal lying in a field at one of the crash sites. Reuters could not immediately verify the authenticity of the image.

Islamabad called the assault a “blatant act of war” and said it had informed the UN Security Council that Pakistan reserved the right to respond appropriately to Indian aggression.

“All of these engagements have been done as a defensive measure,” Pakistan military spokesperson Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said. “Pakistan remains a very responsible state. However, we will take all the steps necessary for defending the honor, integrity and sovereignty of Pakistan, at all cost.”

The South Asian neighbors also exchanged intense shelling and heavy gunfire across much of their de facto border in the Himalayan region of Kashmir, police and witnesses told Reuters.

Hindu-majority India and Islamic Pakistan have fought two of their three wars since independence in 1947 over Muslim-majority Kashmir, which both sides claim in full and control in part.

‘OPERATION SINDOOR’
Since a 2003 ceasefire, to which both countries recommitted in 2021, targeted strikes between the neighbors are extremely rare, especially Indian strikes on Pakistani areas outside Pakistani Kashmir.

But analysts said the risk of escalation is higher than in the recent past due to the severity of India’s attack, which New Delhi called “Operation Sindoor”. Sindoor is the Hindi language word for vermilion, a red powder that Hindu women put on the forehead or parting of their hair as a sign of marriage.

US President Donald J. Trump called the fighting “a shame” and added, “I hope it ends quickly.” The State Department said Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke to the national security advisers of both nations, urging “both to keep lines of communication open and avoid escalation.”

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for maximum military restraint from both countries, a spokesperson said. China, which neighbors both India and Pakistan, also called for restraint.

The Pakistani army’s shelling across the frontier in Kashmir killed seven civilians and injured 35 in the Indian sector of the region, police there said.

Indian TV channels showed videos of explosions, fire, large plumes of smoke in the night sky and people fleeing in several places in Pakistan and Pakistani Kashmir. Reuters could not independently verify the footage.

In Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistani Kashmir, damage from the Indian strike was visible at sunrise. Security forces surrounded a small mosque in a hill-side residential neighborhood which had been hit, with its minaret collapsed.

All schools in Pakistani Kashmir, the national capital Islamabad, and much of Indian Kashmir and the populous Pakistani province of Punjab were ordered closed on Wednesday in the aftermath of the strikes.

Imran Shaheen, a district official in Pakistani Kashmir, said two mortars landed on a house in the town of Forward Kahuta, killing two men and injuring several women and children. In another village, a resident had been killed in firing, Mr. Shaheen said.

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said Islamabad was responding to the Indian attacks but did not provide details. Pakistan’s populous province of Punjab declared an emergency, its chief minister said, and hospitals and emergency services were on high alert.

A Pakistani military spokesperson told broadcaster Geo that two mosques were among the sites hit by India. The Pakistani defense minister told Geo that all the sites were civilian and not militant camps.

He said India’s claim of targeting “camps of terrorists is false”.

After India’s strikes, the Indian army said in a post on X on Wednesday: “Justice is served.”  

STOCK FUTURES, AIRLINES IMPACTED
A spokesperson for the Indian Embassy in Washington told Reuters that evidence pointed “towards the clear involvement of Pakistan-based terrorists in this terror attack,” referring to the April tourist killings.

India said two of three suspects in that attack were Pakistani nationals but had not detailed its evidence. Pakistan denied that it had anything to do with the April killings.

News of the strikes impacted Indian stock futures mildly, with the GIFT NIFTY at 24,311, 0.3% below the NIFTY 50’s last close of 24,379.6 on Tuesday.

Several airlines including India’s largest airline, IndiGo, Air India and Qatar Airways cancelled flights in areas of India and Pakistan due to closures of airports and airspace.

Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval spoke to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other senior Indian officials briefed counterparts in Britain, Russia, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, an Indian source told Reuters.

The Indian strike goes far beyond New Delhi’s response to previous attacks in Kashmir blamed on Pakistan. Those include India’s 2019 air strike on Pakistan after 40 Indian paramilitary police were killed in Kashmir and India’s retaliation for the deaths of 18 soldiers in 2016.

“Given the scale of the Indian strike, which was far greater than what we saw in 2019, we can expect a sizable Pakistani response,” said Michael Kugelman, a Washington-based South Asia analyst and writer for the Foreign Policy magazine.

“All eyes will be on India’s next move. We’ve had a strike and a counter-strike, and what comes next will be the strongest indication of just how serious a crisis this could become,” he said. — Reuters

VATICAN CITY — Roman Catholic cardinals began the task on Wednesday of electing a new pope, locking themselves away from the world until they choose the man they hope can unite a diverse but divided global Church.

In a ritual dating back to medieval times, the cardinals filed into the Vatican’s frescoed Sistine Chapel after a public Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica and started their secret conclave for a successor to Pope Francis, who died last month.

No pope has been elected on the first day of a conclave for centuries, so voting could continue for several days before one of the red-hatted princes of the Church receives the necessary two-thirds majority to become the 267^th pontiff.

There was only one ballot scheduled on Wednesday. Thereafter, the cardinals can vote as many as four times a day.

They will burn their ballots, with black smoke from a chimney on the roof of the chapel marking an inconclusive vote, while white smoke and the peeling of bells signaling that the 1.4-billion member church has a new leader.

The pope’s influence reaches well beyond the Catholic Church, providing a moral voice and a call to conscience that no other global leader can match.

At a Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica on Wednesday morning before entering the conclave, the cardinals prayed that God would help them find a pope who would exercise “watchful care” over the world.

In a sermon, Italian Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re told his peers they must set aside “every personal consideration” in choosing the new pontiff and keep in mind “only … the good of the Church and of humanity.”

Re, the dean of the College of Cardinals, is 91 and will not enter the conclave, which is reserved for cardinals under the age of 80.

Cardinals in recent days have offered different assessments of what they are looking for in the next pontiff.

While some have called for continuity with Francis’ vision of greater openness and reform, others have said they want to turn the clock back and embrace old traditions. Many have indicated they want a more predictable, measured pontificate.

A record 133 cardinals from 70 countries will enter the Sistine Chapel, up from 115 from 48 nations in the last conclave in 2013 -— growth that reflects Francis’ efforts to extend the reach of the Church to far-flung regions with few Catholics.

No clear favorite has emerged, although Italian Cardinal Pietro Parolin and Filipino Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle are considered the front-runners.

NO EAVESDROPPING
However, if it quickly becomes obvious that neither can win, votes are likely to shift to other contenders, with the electors possibly coalescing around geography, doctrinal affinity or common languages.

Among other potential candidates are France’s Jean-Marc Aveline, Hungary’s Peter Erdo, American Robert Prevost and Italy’s Pierbattista Pizzaballa.

Re suggested the cardinals should look for a pope who respected the diversity within the Church. “Unity does not mean uniformity, but a firm and profound communion in diversity,” he said in his sermon.

As in medieval times, the cardinals will be banned from communicating with outsiders during the conclave, and the Vatican has taken high-tech measures to ensure secrecy, including jamming devices to prevent any eavesdropping.

The average length of the last 10 conclaves was just over three days and none went on for more than five days. A 2013 conclave lasted just two days.

The cardinals will be looking to wrap things up quickly again this time to avoid giving the impression that they are divided or that the Church is adrift.

Some 80% of the cardinals who enter the Sistine Chapel on Wednesday were appointed by Francis, increasing the possibility that his successor will in some way continue his progressive policies despite strong pushback from traditionalists.

Among their considerations will be whether they should seek a pope from the global south where congregations are growing, as they did in 2013 with the Argentinian Francis, hand back the reins to Europe or even pick a first US pope. — Reuters

CAIRO — Israel’s plan to expand its Gaza offensive, displace people within the enclave and take control of aid distribution has horrified Gazans who already have endured multiple displacements and food shortages during 19 months of conflict.

Israel has been blocking all aid from entering Gaza since March 2 with the collapse of a two-month ceasefire with Hamas that had improved Gazans’ access to food and medicine and allowed many of them to go home.

For Aya, a 30-year-old Gaza City resident who returned home with her family during the ceasefire after months in the southern part of the strip, Israel’s announcement on Monday raised fears of being killed or indefinitely displaced.

“Are we going to die this time?” she said in a message on a chat app.

“Are they going to displace us again? Are we going to end up in Rafah, and will this be the last time, or are they going to force us out of Gaza after Rafah?” she said, referring to the Rafah area in southern Gaza, next to Egypt’s border.

Attending a funeral on Monday for several people killed in an Israeli airstrike on a building in Gaza City, Mohammed al-Seikaly said things were so dire it was hard to imagine how Israel could further intensify its assault.

“There is nothing left in the Gaza Strip that has not been struck by missiles and explosive barrels,” he said. “I’m asking in front of the whole world: ‘What’s left to bomb?’”

On Tuesday, Israeli military strikes killed at least 46 Palestinians across Gaza, local health authorities said. Medics said at least 29 people, including women and children, were killed at a school housing displaced families in the Bureij camp in the central Gaza Strip.

Medics said the school was hit twice within a few hours.

After the first airstrike, the Israeli military said it had struck terrorists operating from a command center used for storing weapons and planning and staging attacks against Israel. There was no immediate army comment after the second attack.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the expanded military operation would be “intensive” and involve holding seized territories and moving Palestinians “for their own safety.”

DEARTH OF FOOD
One Israeli official said the plan would involve moving the civilian population southward and controlling aid distribution to prevent food from falling into the hands of Hamas, the Islamist militant group whose attack on Israel in October 2023 triggered Israel’s military operation in Gaza.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs rejected the plan on Tuesday as “the opposite of what is needed”.

Tamer, a man from Khan Younis in the southern half of the Strip, said he feared Israel could impose its own triage system to decide who would get food.

“Will they arrest people and kill others before they let the rest into the areas they designate?” he said.

Gaza’s 2.3-million people are struggling with a dearth of food, with many eating only once a day. The World Food Programme said on April 25 it had run out of food stocks in the Strip.

Flour often can’t be found, but when a rare sack is available it can cost as much as $500, up from 25 shekels ($7) before the war, Aya said.

“They are starving us so we can agree to anything. We want an end to the war. Let them take their prisoners (Israeli hostages) and end the war. Enough,” she added.

Some residents have been eating weeds or leaves, while fishermen have turned to catching sea turtles and selling their meat.

Israeli officials have said there is still enough food in Gaza, though the head of Israel’s military has warned the political leadership that supplies must be let in soon, public broadcaster Kan reported.

Hamas, which has run Gaza since 2007, accuses Israel of “using food as a weapon in its war against the people of Gaza.”

The war began on October 7, 2023, when Hamas killed 1,200 people and took 251 hostage, according to Israeli tallies.

Israel’s campaign has killed more than 52,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to Hamas-run health authorities, and reduced much of Gaza to ruins. — Reuters