WASHINGTON: The United States on Thursday imposed sanctions on Palestinian militant group Lions’ Den, the State Department said, in the latest move aimed at those Washington says threaten peace and stability in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
The group is the first Palestinian target of sanctions under an executive order on West Bank violence issued by President Joe Biden in February, which had previously been used to impose financial restrictions on Jewish settlers involved in attacks on Palestinians.
In a statement announcing the action, department spokesperson Matthew Miller cited attacks by Lions’ Den on Israelis as well as Palestinians in the West Bank since 2022.
“The United States condemns any and all acts of violence committed in the West Bank, whoever the perpetrators, and we will use the tools at our disposal to expose and hold accountable those who threaten peace and stability there,” Miller said.
The move freezes any assets the group holds under US jurisdiction and bars Americans from dealing with the group, although it was unclear if Lions’ Den held any such assets or connections.
Other Palestinian armed groups, including Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, have been designated under more stringent US counterterrorism authorities, but Thursday’s move falls short of taking that step for Lion’s Den.
The group emerged in recent years in the Old City of Nablus in the West Bank and has engaged in firefights with Israeli forces and attacks on Jewish settlements.
Since the 1967 Middle East war, Israel has occupied the West Bank of the Jordan River, which Palestinians want as the core of an independent state. It has built settlements there that most countries deem illegal. Israel disputes this and cites historical and Biblical ties to the land.
US imposes sanctions on Palestinian group Lions’ Den over West Bank violence
https://arab.news/9mzgf
US imposes sanctions on Palestinian group Lions’ Den over West Bank violence
- The group is the first Palestinian target of sanctions under an executive order on West Bank violence issued by President Joe Biden in February
- Department spokesperson Matthew Miller cited attacks by Lions’ Den on Israelis as well as Palestinians in the West Bank since 2022
Western Libya forces kill notorious migrant smuggler, security agency says
- The Security Threats Combating Agency raided the group’s hideout in response to the attack and killed its leader, Ahmed Al-Dabbashi
- Dabbashi had been under US sanctions since 2018
BENGHAZI: Western Libyan security forces said on Friday they had killed a notorious migrant smuggler in the coastal city of Sabratha after “criminal gangs” affiliated with him attacked one of their checkpoints overnight.
The Security Threats Combating Agency, a security agency under western Libya’s Prime Minister Abdulhamid Al-Dbeibah, said they raided the group’s hideout in response to the attack and killed its leader, Ahmed Al-Dabbashi, also known as “Al-Amu.”
Dabbashi’s brother was arrested and six members of the force were wounded in the fighting, the agency said in the statement on its Facebook page.
Dabbashi had been under US sanctions since 2018. Washington described him as the “leader of one of two powerful migrant smuggling organizations” based in Sabratha and said he had “used his organization to rob and enslave migrants before allowing them to leave for Italy.”
Human trafficking is rife in Libya, which has been divided between rival armed factions since a NATO-backed uprising toppled longtime leader Muammar Qaddafi in 2011.
The proliferation of smuggling gangs and the absence of a strong central authority have made the country one of the main staging points for migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean to reach Europe.
Dbeibah was installed through a UN-backed process in 2021, but significant parts of western Libya remain outside his control. Dbeibah’s Government of National Unity, or GNU, is not recognized by rival authorities in the east.
An armed alliance affiliated with an earlier UN-backed government in Tripoli – the Government of National Accord – had taken on Dabbashi’s forces in a three-week battle in 2017 that killed and wounded dozens and damaged residential areas and Sabratha’s Roman ruins.
