BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Barcelona is not interested in repeating as host of the America’s Cup.
“It doesn’t make sense to try to build on the success” of the two-month regatta, city hall official Jordi Valls said.
Barcelona won't bid for the 38th America's Cup after Emirates Team New Zealand won its third straight cup on Saturday. That meant New Zealand will again organize the next cup, including picking a venue.
When asked by The Associated Press if New Zealand already has offers from other cities, the team replied, “There absolutely are other bids but we wish to keep these confidential."
Valencia, south of Barcelona on Spain’s Mediterranean coast, has said it would like to get the cup back after staging it in 2007 and 2010.
Saudi Arabia may also be a possible candidate after Jeddah hosted a preliminary regatta in 2023 on the Red Sea.
Valls called it an “amicable parting” between the city and the world’s oldest international sporting event that started in 1851.
Valls insisted the 2024 cup was a success for the city. But he said it was always considered a “one-off event and that at no moment was it planned for Barcelona to repeat as a venue.” He pointed to other international events it will focus on promoting such as hosting the opening stage of the 2026 Tour de France.
New Zealand also cast doubt on Barcelona’s suitability after meeting with city hall on Tuesday. It argued the port infrastructure could not accommodate more than the six teams it hosted. The cup organizers hope more teams will enter the next regatta.
“We are keeping an open mind on how best to achieve this with a venue, or different venues, that can supercharge the 38th America’s Cup with an increased global footprint, more teams and increased overall expansion opportunities,” New Zealand team chief executive Grant Dalton said in a statement. “It would be difficult to expand the number of teams based on the available infrastructure space in Barcelona.”
Dalton’s decision to not race the cup in Auckland was criticized in New Zealand. He said he could take it back home only if Auckland could match the financial offers of other bidders.
Some 2.5 million spectators turned out for the Barcelona race which started in late August with yachts from Britain, Italy, the United States, Switzerland and France challenging the Kiwis.
The decision by Barcelona’s city hall came amid growing public concern about “overtourism” and rising rents. While some 60,000 people turned out for the opening ceremony of the America’s Cup, there was a public protest of a few thousand who rallied against it.
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Emirates Team New Zealand, right, and Ineos Brittania race during the Louis Vuitton 37th America's Cup Day 6 race 9 in Barcelona, Spain, Saturday, Oct.19, 2024. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)
Ineos Britannia races during the Louis Vuitton 37th America's Cup Day 4 race 5 in Barcelona, Spain, Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was in Doha on Thursday to meet with Qatari officials who have been key mediators for Hamas, as the U.S. struggles to break the logjam of cease-fire negotiations between Israel and the militant group.
Blinken is on his 11th trip to the Middle East since the start of the Israel-Hamas war.
Meanwhile, the Lebanese military said Thursday an Israeli strike killed three of its troops, including an officer, as they were evacuating wounded people in southern Lebanon, and French President Emmanuel Macron said his country will provide a 100 million-euro ($108 million) aid package to support Lebanon.
The Israel-Hamas war began after Hamas-led militants on Oct. 7, 2023, blew holes in Israel’s security fence and stormed in, killing some 1,200 people — mostly civilians — and abducting 250 others. Israel’s offensive in Gaza has killed over 42,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities, who do not differentiate between militants and civilians.
United Nations humanitarian officials are reporting “harrowing levels of death, injury and destruction” in northern Gaza as Israel wages another major operation there.
Israel is also fighting Hezbollah in Lebanon. Lebanon’s Health Ministry says the total toll over the past year is over 2,500 killed and 12,000 wounded. The fighting in Lebanon has driven 1.2 million people from their homes, including more than 400,000 children, according to the United Nations children’s agency.
Hezbollah confirmed Wednesday that Hashem Safieddine, one of its top officials who had been widely expected to be the group’s next leader, was killed in an Israeli airstrike. Over the past several weeks, Israeli strikes have killed much of Hezbollah’s top leadership.
Here's the latest:
BEIRUT — Lebanon’s caretaker prime minister is calling for an immediate cease-fire, the full implementation of the U.N. resolution that ended the last Israel-Hezbollah war and the deployment of 8,000 Lebanese troops to a buffer zone along the border with Israel.
Najib Mikati spoke Thursday at a conference in Paris in support of Lebanon.
The Lebanese army has largely kept to the sidelines in the latest conflict between Israel and Hezbollah. It says Israeli forces have targeted its soldiers on eight occasions, killing and wounding several. Israel apologized for a deadly strike on Sunday.
U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the 2006 war, called for Hezbollah and Israeli forces to withdraw from areas south of Lebanon’s Litani River and for the area to be controlled by the Lebanese army and U.N. peacekeepers.
Israel says the resolution was never implemented and that Hezbollah built up military infrastructure all the way to the border. Lebanon has accused Israel of ignoring other provisions, including by violating its airspace.
The Lebanese army has around 80,000 forces, with around 5,000 deployed in the south.
Representing the Lebanese Army at the Paris conference, Brig. Gen. Youssef Haddad said that Lebanon is working on recruiting 1,500 additional soldiers to help implement the U.N. resolution, the state-run National News Agency reported.
Hezbollah boasts tens of thousands of fighters. Lebanon’s military is not strong enough to impose its will on the militant group or to resist Israel’s ground invasion.
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — The director of a hospital in the northern Gaza Strip says it is facing a “catastrophic” shortage of basic supplies and that ambulances can no longer service the facility.
Israel has been carrying out a major offensive in northern Gaza for more than two weeks. Hundreds of people have been killed and tens of thousands have fled their homes. The military says it is battling Hamas fighters who regrouped in the north, which was one of the first targets of the ground offensive at the start of the war.
Dr. Hossam Abu Safiyeh, the director of the Kamal Adwan Hospital, said in a video message released Thursday that some 150 wounded people are being treated there, including 14 children in intensive care or the neonatal department.
“There is a very large number of wounded people, and we lose at least one person every hour because of the lack of medical supplies and medical staff,” he said.
“Our ambulances can’t transfer wounded people,” he said. “Those who can arrive by themselves to the hospital receive care, but those who don’t just die in the streets.”
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Footage shared with The Associated Press shows medical staff tending to premature babies and several older children in hospital beds, some with severe burns. One child is seen attached to a breathing machine, with bandages on her face and flies hovering over her.
“We are providing the bare minimum to patients. Everyone is paying the price of what is happening now in northern Gaza,” Abu Safiyeh said.
Kamal Adwan is one of three hospitals in the north left largely inaccessible because of the fighting. The war has gutted the health system across Gaza, with only 16 of 39 hospitals even partially functioning, according to the World Health Organization.
PARIS — France pledged to provide a 100-million euro ($108-million) package to support Lebanon at an international conference Thursday, as President Emmanuel Macron said “massive aid” is needed to support the country where war between Hezbollah militants and Israel has displaced a million people, killed over 2,500 and deepened an economic crisis.
“In the immediate term, massive aid is needed for the Lebanese population, both for the hundreds of thousands of people displaced by the war and for the communities hosting them,” Macron said in his opening speech at the conference.
French organizers hope participants’ financial pledges of humanitarian aid will meet the $426 million the United Nations says is urgently needed.
Italy this week announced new aid of 10 million euros ($10.8 million) and Germany on Wednesday pledged an additional 60 million euros ($64.7 million) for people in Lebanon.
BEIRUT — The Lebanese military says an Israeli strike killed three of its troops, including an officer, as they were evacuating wounded people in southern Lebanon.
In a Thursday post on X, it said the strike hit the outskirts of the southern town of Yater. The army says Israeli forces have targeted it on eight occasions since all-out war broke out between Israel and Hezbollah in September.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military, which said it was looking into the reports. It apologized for an earlier strike on Sunday that killed three Lebanese soldiers, saying it had targeted a vehicle in an area where Hezbollah had recently launched attacks without realizing it belonged to the army.
Lebanon’s armed forces have largely kept to the sidelines in the latest conflict. The army is not powerful enough to impose its will on Hezbollah or to resist Israel’s ground invasion.
A displaced family, who fled the ongoing Hezbollah-Israel war in south Lebanon, sit on mattresses inside one of Beirut's oldest and best known movie theatres, Le Colisee, where they have taken shelter, in Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, Oct. 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, left, meets Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Wednesday Oct. 23, 2024. (Nathan Howard/Pool via AP)
Flame and smoke rises from buildings hit by Israeli airstrikes on Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Flames and smoke rise from buildings hit by Israeli airstrikes on Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
