KIRYAT SHMONA, Israel: As the sun sets on the hills of northern Israel, four rockets fired from Lebanon trace arcs through the sky before being intercepted with a bang by air defenses.
“Hezbollah is harassing us,” said Yoav Hermoni, the spokesman for Dan, a kibbutz where such exchanges of fire have become common while Israel has been at war in the Gaza Strip for the past month.
The Iran-backed movement in Lebanon has exchanged fire with Israel’s army repeatedly in the weeks since the October 7 attack by Palestinian group Hamas plunged Israel into a war in Gaza to the south.
With Israel facing the threat of a two-front war, it has evacuated areas along its border with Lebanon — including far-northern Dan near the occupied Golan Heights.
Some 600 of Dan’s 850 inhabitants were relocated to a hotel in the coastal city of Haifa, Hermoni told AFP by phone.
“About 30 stayed here, including me,” said Hermoni, who works as a tour guide in normal times but has now been left in charge of the security of the kibbutz.
Across Israel — both near Gaza and Lebanon — around 224,000 people have been made to leave their homes because of the conflict, according to officials.
“We’re refugees in our country,” said Hermoni.
The Hamas attack of October 7 took place about 200 kilometers (125 miles) south of Dan, when gunmen stormed out of blockaded Gaza and attacked communities, leaving more than 1,400 people dead, mostly civilians, and abducting more than 240.
Israel’s withering aerial bombardment and ground attacks in Gaza since have seen over 10,500 people killed, also mostly civilians, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.
But since the day after the attack, Israel has also traded fire across its northern border on a near-daily basis with Hamas’s ally Hezbollah and other Palestinian militants in Lebanon.
The tit-for-tat exchanges have echoed across the verdant hills of the Upper Galilee region.
Below the UN-patrolled border, where a wall snakes along a ridge, camouflaged Israeli soldiers sit among the vegetation or rest in tents set up next to the road.
In his first speech since the start of the Israel-Hamas war, Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah warned last week that “all options” are on the table and that the chance of open conflict was “realistic.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday Hezbollah would be making “the mistake of its life” if it joined the war.
And on Tuesday, Israel said it had responded to another rocket attack from Lebanon with a renewed aerial bombardment.
The exchanges have killed more than 80 people on the Lebanese side of the border and eight inside Israel.
Among the dead in Lebanon are more than 60 combatants from Hezbollah and 11 civilians, according to an AFP count. In Israel, six soldiers and two civilians have been killed, according to officials.
Despite the dull thud of artillery and the sight of warplanes a regular reminder of the danger, Yakov Levi said he was “not scared.”
The hotel where the 26-year-old works in the historic town of Safed was made to close its doors, leaving Levi to “sit all day.”
“This area is very explosive,” said Naor Shimoni, a 38-year-old musician from the village of Safsufa, who had come by motorcycle to a scenic viewpoint in the hills.
If the situation gets worse, said the father-of-five, “maybe I’m going to take my wife and my kids to some place more safe, but I’m going to stay here and protect my village.”
“No place in Israel is going to be safe” if there is a “real war” with Hezbollah, said Yitzchak Lalush, who has also decided to stay.
The stakes are high on Israel’s northern frontier, said the 40-year-old social worker.
“If they get here, they get Tel Aviv,” he said. “We need to stand (our) ground and fight.”
Rockets break the quiet in emptied towns along Israel-Lebanon border
https://arab.news/r65fv
Rockets break the quiet in emptied towns along Israel-Lebanon border
- “Hezbollah is harassing us,” said Yoav Hermoni, the spokesman for Dan, a kibbutz where such exchanges of fire have become common
- With Israel facing the threat of a two-front war, it has evacuated areas along its border with Lebanon
Arab League chief to attend China-Arab Cooperation Forum in Beijing
- The event will be attended by China’s President Xi Jinping and Foreign Minister Wang Yi
- The meeting in Beijing aims to provide a platform for the exchange of views on regional and international issues, particularly the Palestinian cause
CAIRO: Ahmed Aboul Gheit, the secretary-general of the Arab League, will on Thursday attend the 10th session of the ministerial meeting of the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum in Beijing.
The event will be attended by China’s President Xi Jinping and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, as well as monarchs and political leaders from several Arab countries.
Aboul Gheit’s spokesperson, Gamal Roshdy, said the visit would include a number of meetings with senior Chinese officials, including Wang and Vice President Han Zheng.
The meeting in Beijing — which comes after Aboul Gheit met EU foreign ministers to discuss the Palestinian cause earlier in the week — aims to provide a platform for the exchange of views on regional and international issues, particularly the Palestinian cause, which remains a priority for the Arab League, especially in light of efforts to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza.
To mark the 20th anniversary of the founding of the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum, Roshdy said the Arab League had produced a commemorative book that highlighted some of the key milestones in its history.
The forum is a framework for dialogue and cooperation between Arab states and China. Its founding document was signed in September 2004 at the headquarters of the Arab League in Cairo, following a visit by then Chinese President Hu Yintao.
Egypt to host Sudan peace conference next month
- The ministry said it was part of Egypt’s “unremitting efforts and endeavors” to put an end to the ongoing war in Sudan
- The conference will be held in the presence of relevant regional and international partners
CAIRO: Egypt will next month host representatives of Sudan’s civil and political groups in a bid to bring peace and stability to the country, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry said.
The offer to hold the event stemmed from the belief that the “current conflict in Sudan is basically a Sudanese issue and that any future political process should include all national stakeholders on the Sudanese scene, and within the framework of respecting the principles of Sudan’s sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity, non-interference in its internal affairs, and preserving the state and its institutions,” the ministry said.
The conference will be held in the presence of relevant regional and international partners and seek to achieve consensus among Sudanese forces on ways to build a comprehensive and lasting peace.
The ministry said it was part of Egypt’s “unremitting efforts and endeavors” to put an end to the ongoing war in Sudan and within a framework of cooperation and integration with the efforts of regional and international partners, especially Sudan’s neighboring countries, the parties to the Jeddah talks, the UN, African Union, Arab League and the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, an eight-country trade bloc in Africa.
Egypt looked forward to the effective participation of all and concerted efforts to ensure the conference succeeded in achieving the aspirations of the Sudanese people, it said.
Brazil recalls ambassador to Israel: diplomatic source
- Relations between Brazil and Israel have soured over the conflict
BRASILIA: Brazil has recalled its ambassador to Israel and will not immediately appoint a replacement, a diplomatic source told AFP Wednesday, ratcheting up tensions between the two countries over Israel’s war in Gaza.
Relations between Brazil and Israel have soured over the conflict, with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in February accusing the Israeli government of “genocide.”
Israel reacted furiously, declaring the Brazilian leader “persona non grata.”
Israel had previously summoned the South American country’s ambassador Frederico Meyer to a meeting at the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial center in Jerusalem, which the Brazilian source said “was a humiliation to which (Meyer) was subjected.”
In response, Brazil recalled Meyer for consultations, and in turn summoned Israel’s representative in Brasilia.
The source said conditions had not been met for Meyer “to return” to Israel.
The Brazilian representation in Israel in the meantime will be led by diplomat Fabio Farias.
Lebanon backtracks on ICC jurisdiction to probe alleged war crimes
- Lebanon has accused Israel of repeatedly violating international law since October
- Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib never filed the requested declaration
BEIRUT: Lebanon has reversed a move to authorize the International Criminal Court to investigate alleged war crimes on its soil, prompting a prominent rights group to deplore what it called the loss of an “historic opportunity” for justice.
Lebanon has accused Israel of repeatedly violating international law since October, when the Israeli military and Lebanese armed group Hezbollah began trading fire in parallel with the Gaza war. Israeli shelling has since killed around 80 civilians in Lebanon, including children, medics and reporters.
Neither Lebanon nor Israel are members of the ICC, so a formal declaration to the court would be required from either to give it jurisdiction to launch probes into a particular period.
In April, Lebanon’s caretaker cabinet voted to instruct the foreign ministry to file a declaration with the ICC authorizing it to investigate and prosecute alleged war crimes on Lebanese territory since Oct. 7.
Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib never filed the requested declaration and on Tuesday the cabinet published an amended decision that omitted mention of the ICC, saying Lebanon would file complaints to the United Nations instead.
Lebanon has regularly lodged complaints with the UN Security Council about Israeli bombardments over the past seven months, but they have yielded no binding UN decisions.
Habib did not respond to a Reuters question on why he did not file the requested declaration.
A Lebanese official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters the initial cabinet decision raised “confusion” over whether a declaration would “open the door for the court to investigate whatever it wanted across different files.”
The official said the request to revisit the decision came from George Kallas, a cabinet minister close to parliament speaker Nabih Berri, who heads the Shiite Muslim Amal movement that is allied with the politically powerful Hezbollah.
Hezbollah and Amal have both fired rockets into Israel, killing eight civilians and displacing around 60,000 people from towns near the border since October.
Contacted by Reuters, Kallas confirmed he requested a review of cabinet’s initial decision but denied it was out of fear Hezbollah or Amal could become subject to ICC arrest warrants.
Human Rights Watch condemned the cabinet’s reversal.
“The Lebanese government had a historic opportunity to ensure there was justice and accountability for war crimes in Lebanon. It’s shameful that they are forgoing this opportunity,” said HRW’s Lebanon researcher Ramzi Kaiss.
“Rescinding this decision shows that Lebanon’s calls for accountability ring hollow,” he told Reuters.
Information Minister Ziad Makary, the government spokesman, said that he had backed the initial decision and would “continue to explore other international tribunals to render justice” despite the reversal.
Lebanon backtracked a few days after the ICC requested arrest warrants over alleged war crimes for Israel’s prime minister and defense minister and three Hamas leaders.
The initial push to file an ICC declaration came from MP Halima Kaakour, who holds a PhD in public international law. She recommended the measure to parliament’s justice committee, which unanimously endorsed it. Cabinet approved it in late April.
“The political parties that backed this initiative at first seem to have changed their mind. But they never explained the reason to us or the Lebanese people,” Kaakour told Reuters.
“Lebanon’s complaints to the UN Security Council don’t get anywhere. We had an opportunity to give the ICC a period of time to look at it, we have the documentation — if we can use these international mechanisms, why not?”
Ancient Egyptians skulls reveal ‘extraordinary’ cancer surgery, study suggests
- Discovery gives ‘new perspective in our understanding of the history of medicine,’ says researcher
- Ancient civilization may have broken ‘medical knowledge frontier’ with precise treatment
LONDON: Ancient Egyptians may have discovered the existence of cancer and practiced surgery to treat it, a new study has found.
A team of international researchers studied two human skulls, discovering “extraordinary” evidence that places the already distinguished medical practices of Ancient Egypt in a new light.
Historical texts documenting medicine in Ancient Egypt already revealed tremendous knowledge, including the ability to treat disease, traumatic injury and dental issues.
But researchers say that the civilization may have broken through a “medical knowledge frontier” in treating cancer, Sky News reported.
Lead author Prof. Edgard Camaros, a paleopathologist at the University of Santiago de Compostela, said: “This finding is unique evidence of how ancient Egyptian medicine would have tried to deal with or explore cancer more than 4,000 years ago.
“This is an extraordinary new perspective in our understanding of the history of medicine.”
Scientists in the study examined two skulls held at the University of Cambridge’s Duckworth Collection.
The first, of a man estimated to be 30 to 35 years of age, was dated to between 2687 and 2345 B.C.
The second skull is of a woman older than 50, dated to between 663 and 343 B.C.
Microscopic viewing of the male skull showed a “big-sized lesion,” resulting in likely tissue destruction and about 30 metastasized lesions, said Tatiana Tondini, a researcher at the University of Tubingen.
But researchers later discovered cuts around the lesions, suggesting the precise medical use of a metal instrument.
“When we first observed the cutmarks under the microscope, we could not believe what was in front of us,” added Tondini, the first author of the study in the “Frontiers of Medicine” journal.
“We see that although ancient Egyptians were able to deal with complex cranial fractures, cancer was still a medical knowledge frontier.
“We wanted to learn about the role of cancer in the past, how prevalent this disease was in antiquity and how ancient societies interacted with this pathology.”
The female skull that was examined also featured a large lesion “consistent with a cancerous tumour that led to bone destruction,” Sky News reported.
The discovery may also lead to reappraisals of the proliferation of cancer and carcinogens throughout human history.
However, researchers cautioned against making definitive statements based on the study.
Prof. Albert Isidro, the study’s co-author and a surgical oncologist at the University Hospital Sagrat Cor, said: “It seems ancient Egyptians performed some kind of surgical intervention related to the presence of cancerous cells, proving that ancient Egyptian medicine was also conducting experimental treatments or medical explorations in relation to cancer.
“This study contributes to a changing of perspective and sets an encouraging base for future research in the field of paleo-oncology, but more studies will be needed to untangle how ancient societies dealt with cancer.”
