Iran’s top Sunni cleric slams regime brutality against protests

Protesters march in Khash of Iran’s southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchistan in this image grab from a UGC video. (UGC/AFP)
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Updated 12 November 2022
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Iran’s top Sunni cleric slams regime brutality against protests

  • Abdolhamid Ismail-Zai is the spiritual leader of the country’s Baluchi minority
  • ‘We do not have freedom in the Islamic Republic. Everything is censored. Everything is restricted’

LONDON: Iran’s top Sunni cleric condemned the regime in his Friday sermon, saying authorities are trying to pay to silence the families of people killed in protests that have rocked the country in recent weeks.

Abdolhamid Ismail-Zai, 75, was speaking out following disproportionate violence meted out against members of the Baluchi ethnic minority, a largely Sunni group in Shiite-majority Iran for whom he is a spiritual and political figurehead.

Last week, 18 people were shot by security forces in the southeastern Sistan and Baluchistan province, and the families want justice, said Ismail-Zai.

“We do not want money,” he said in his sermon at Makki mosque in the provincial capital Zahedan. “Who were the people who made this happen, and for what reason? The people who were responsible for this must be brought to justice. This was the demand of the martyrs’ families.”

Ismail-Zai haș become increasingly vocal in his criticism of the regime throughout the protests, which began after the death of 22-year-old Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini in the custody of the country’s morality police in September.

“We do not have freedom in the Islamic Republic,” Ismail-Zai said. “Where is the freedom? Where is the freedom of press? Where is the freedom of expression? Everything is censored. Everything is restricted.

“A large part of the Iranian people is protesting. A majority of the people of Iran have objections, are unsatisfied. I urge regime leaders to listen to them.”

In recent weeks, Ismail-Zai has also questioned why authorities have used live fire against protesters in Baluchistan and Kurdistan, as opposed to teargas and non-lethal rounds against demonstrations elsewhere.

In his sermon, he also criticized politicians who recently called for the death penalty for protesters, though stopped short of discussing Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

“Representatives represent the people,” he said. “You have to listen to people. You have to defend the people so that the bullets of war are not fired at them.”

One insider close to Ismail-Zai told The Independent: “He doesn’t want the regime to accuse him of provoking violence.”

After Friday prayers, protests erupted against the regime across the region, with demonstrators chanting denunciations of Khamenei and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. People also reportedly threw stones at security forces, and a number of fires were lit.

Amnesty International says Sistan and Baluchistan has suffered disproportionate violence from the regime compared to many other regions.

“Protesters from the oppressed Baluchi minority have borne the brunt of the security forces’ particularly vicious crackdown on demonstrations,” Amnesty said on Friday.

So far, around a quarter of the people killed during the violence across Iran have been in Sistan and Baluchistan, including nearly 100 killed in Zahedan on Sept. 30. Amnesty says it has the names of at least 100 killed in the province since the unrest began.

It is not the first time Ismail-Zai has condemned the regime — he has been a vocal critic over the years, which has seen him subjected to all manner of curbs on his freedom, including travel bans.

An advocate of peace, he has also criticized armed Baluch separatists, instead advocating for a referendum on the country’s political future.


Egypt’s FM heads to Washington for talks with US officials: ministry

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Egypt’s FM heads to Washington for talks with US officials: ministry

CAIRO: Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty traveled to Washington on Sunday for talks with senior officials from the new Trump administration and members of Congress, his ministry said.
The ministry’s statement said the visit aimed “to boost bilateral relations and strategic partnership between Egypt and the US,” and would include “consultations on regional developments.”


Israeli official says force withdrawal from key Gaza corridor has begun, as part of ceasefire deal

Updated 11 min 44 sec ago
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Israeli official says force withdrawal from key Gaza corridor has begun, as part of ceasefire deal

TEL AVIV: An Israeli official said Sunday that Israeli forces have begun withdrawing from a key Gaza corridor, part of a ceasefire deal with Hamas that is moving ahead.

Israel agreed as part of the truce to remove its forces from the Netzarim corridor, a strip of land that bisects northern Gaza from the south. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to discuss troop movement with the media.

At the start of the ceasefire, Israel began allowing Palestinians to cross Netzarim to head to their homes in the war-battered north and the withdrawal of forces from the area will fulfill another commitment to the deal.

It was not clear how many troops Israel had withdrawn on Sunday.

The 42-day ceasefire is just past its halfway point and the sides are supposed to negotiate an extension that would lead to more Israeli hostages being freed from Hamas captivity. But the agreement is fragile and the extension isn’t guaranteed.

The sides are meant to begin talks on the truce’s second stage but there appears to have been little progress.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was sending a delegation to Qatar, a key mediator in talks between the sides, but the mission included low-level officials, sparking speculation that it won’t lead to a breakthrough in extending the truce. Netanyahu is expected to convene a meeting of key Cabinet ministers this week on the second phase of the deal, but it was not clear when.

During the first phase of the ceasefire, Hamas is gradually releasing 33 Israeli hostages captured during its Oct.7, 2023, attack in exchange for a pause in fighting, freedom for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and a floor of humanitarian aid to war-battered Gaza. The deal stipulates that Israeli troops will pull back from populated areas of Gaza and that on day 22, which is Sunday, Palestinians will be allowed to head north from a central road that crosses through Netzarim, without being inspected by Israeli forces.

In the second phase, all remaining hostages would be released in return for a complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and a “sustainable calm.”


2 mass graves with bodies of nearly 50 migrants found in southeastern Libya

Updated 40 min 27 sec ago
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2 mass graves with bodies of nearly 50 migrants found in southeastern Libya

CAIRO: Libya authorities uncovered nearly 50 bodies this week from two mass graves in the country’s southeastern desert, officials said Sunday, in the latest tragedy involving people seeking to reach Europe through the chaos-stricken North African country.
The first mass grave with 19 bodies was found Friday in a farm in the southeastern city of Kufra, the security directorate said in a statement, adding that authorities took them for autopsy.
Authorities posted images on its Facebook page showing police officers and medics digging in the sand and recovering dead bodies that were wrapped in blankets.
The Al-Abreen charity, which helps migrants in eastern and southern Libya, said that some were apparently shot and killed before being buried in the mass grave.
A separate mass grave with at least 30 bodies was also found in Kufra after raiding a human trafficking center, according to Mohamed Al-Fadeil, head of the security chamber in Kufra. Survivors said nearly 70 people were buried in the grave, he added. Authorities were still searching the area.
Migrants’ mass graves are not uncommon in Libya. Last year, authorities unearthed the bodies of at least 65 migrants in the Shuayrif region, 350 kilometers (220 miles) south of the capital, Tripoli.
Libya is the dominant transit point for migrants from Africa and the Middle East trying to make it to Europe. The country plunged into chaos following a NATO-backed uprising that toppled and killed longtime autocrat Muammar Qaddafi in 2011. Oil-rich Libya has been ruled for most of the past decade by rival governments in eastern and western Libya, each backed by an array of militias and foreign governments.
Human traffickers have benefited from more than a decade of instability, smuggling migrants across the country’s borders with six nations, including Chad, Niger, Sudan Egypt, Algeria and Tunisia.
Once at the coast, traffickers pack desperate migrants seeking a better life in Europe into ill-equipped rubber boats and other vessels for risky voyages on the perilous Central Mediterranean Sea route.
Rights groups and UN agencies have for years documented systematic abuse of migrants in Libya including forced labor, beatings, rapes and torture. The abuse often accompanies efforts to extort money from families before migrants are allowed to leave Libya on traffickers’ boats.
Those who have been intercepted and returned to Libya — including women and children — are held in government-run detention centers where they also suffer from abuse, including torture, rape and extortion, according to rights groups and UN experts.


Egypt to host emergency Arab summit on Feb. 27 to discuss ‘serious’ Palestinian developments

Updated 4 min 19 sec ago
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Egypt to host emergency Arab summit on Feb. 27 to discuss ‘serious’ Palestinian developments

  • Egypt has been rallying regional support against US President Donald Trump’s plan to relocate Palestinians

CAIRO: Egypt will host a summit of Arab nations on February 27 to discuss “the latest serious developments” concerning the Palestinian territories, its foreign ministry said in a statement on Sunday.

The “emergency Arab summit” comes as Egypt has been rallying regional support against US President Donald Trump’s plan to relocate Palestinians from the Gaza Strip to Egypt and Jordan while establishing US control over the coastal territory.

Sunday’s statement said the gathering was called “after extensive consultations by Egypt at the highest levels with Arab countries in recent days, including Palestine, which requested the summit, to address the latest serious developments regarding the Palestinian cause.”

That included coordination with Bahrain, which currently chairs the Arab League, the statement said.

On Friday, Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty spoke with regional partners including Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to shore up opposition to any forced displacement of Palestinians from their land.

Last week, Trump floated the idea of US administration over Gaza, envisioning rebuilding the devastated territory into the “Riviera of the Middle East” after resettling Palestinians elsewhere, namely Egypt and Jordan.

The remarks have prompted global backlash, and Arab countries have firmly rejected the proposal, insisting on a two-state solution with an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel.


Israeli military says it is expanding West Bank operation

Updated 43 min 15 sec ago
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Israeli military says it is expanding West Bank operation

JERUSALEM: A Palestinian woman was killed in the West Bank as part of an expanded Israeli army operation in the occupied territory.

The Israeli army said they expanded the military operation to four refugee camps in the West Bank. In Nur Shams, a Palestinian refugee camp east of Tulkarm, Israeli forces had killed several “militants” and detained wanted individuals in the area, a military spokesperson said on Sunday.

The Palestinian Health ministry said Sunday that a woman was killed and her husband injured by Israeli gunfire in Tulkarm. 

Israeli military, police and intelligence services launched a counter-terrorism operation in Jenin in the West Bank on January 21.

It is described by Israeli officials as a “large-scale and significant military operation”. 

(with Reuters)