Threat of expanding hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli army

People wait in line at Lebanese customs at the Beirut–Rafic Hariri International Airport, in Beirut, Lebanon July 30, 2024. (REUTERS)
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Updated 04 August 2024
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Threat of expanding hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli army

  • Hezbollah broadens list of targets while Israeli military attacks infrastructure

BEIRUT: Israeli warplanes conducted five airstrikes on the border town of Kfar Kila on Sunday, demolishing five vacant homes and reducing them to rubble.

An Israeli drone strike also targeted a house in the town center of Beit Lif, causing “severe injuries to two individuals and minor injuries to a third person,” according to the Ministry of Health’s Emergency Operations Center.

The attack came hours after Iran-backed Hezbollah expanded its military operations against the Israeli army on Saturday night, targeting the settlement of Beit Hillel for the first time since hostilities began between the two sides 10 months ago.

The threat of expanding hostilities between Hezbollah and the Israeli army has increased due to Hezbollah’s decision to avenge the assassination of its prominent field commander Fuad Shukr, who was killed in the southern suburbs of Beirut last week.

The situation has raised Lebanese concerns about open war, especially as it has coincided with warnings from Arab and foreign embassies for their citizens in the country to leave immediately.

The Israeli army fired incendiary bombs at the forests near the Blue Line after its heavy machine guns combed the town of Aita al-Shaab.

In addition, an Israeli drone conducted an operation against a motorcycle in the town of Rab El-Thalathine but it failed to hit its target.

In a separate incident, another drone targeted a water distribution power station in the town of Taybeh in southern Lebanon. The strike ignited a fire at the facility, causing a disruption in water supply.

Hezbollah declared that it had “successfully targeted the espionage equipment at the Ramia military site, resulting in its destruction.”

Additionally, the group launched rockets at the Manara military complex, “hitting it directly.”

Hezbollah also said it had used artillery shells to target “the Birkat Risha site, achieving hits,” and “Al-Malikiyah … hitting it directly.”

The group launched around 50 rockets toward the settlement of Beit Hillel on Saturday night.

Hezbollah said in a statement that it had included the location on its target list and attacked it for the first time with dozens of Katyusha rockets in response to Israeli attacks on Kfar Kila and Deir Siriane, which had targeted civilians.

The Israeli military responded to Hezbollah’s action by expanding its own targets to include “a Hezbollah missile-launch pad and an additional infrastructure located in Marjayoun, southern Lebanon.”

It added that it had “eliminated dangers in the Odaisseh area (in) southern Lebanon.”

Israeli media reported on Sunday afternoon that “a factory in Kiryat Shmona in Upper Galilee was directly hit by a missile fired from southern Lebanon.”

Meanwhile, three rockets were fired toward an Israeli site in the occupied Shebaa Farms.

Saudi Arabia’s Embassy has reiterated its request for nationals to depart from Lebanon without delay, while the Jordanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has urged Jordanians “not to travel to Lebanon at present, for their safety,” and requested its citizens “residing and present in Lebanon to leave as soon as possible.”

The French Ministry of Foreign Affairs has requested its citizens to “take immediate measures to leave Lebanon as soon as possible,” describing the situation in the country as “a very volatile security context.”

The statement released by the US Embassy on Saturday requested US citizens to “book any available travel ticket” and contact the embassy if any citizen did not have enough funds to return to the US.

The offices of Middle East Airlines have witnessed some pressure from those wishing to bring forward their departure date from Lebanon.

An employee working in the call center said: “We receive between 6,000 and 8,000 calls a day to change the travel date. Most callers are Lebanese expatriates who have come to Lebanon to spend their summer vacation.”

Arab and foreign airlines have suspended flights to Lebanon, with the exception of a few that have reduced the number of daily flights to one, including Turkish Airlines.

Beirut International Airport saw no new arrivals throughout the night until the early-morning hours although, according to a government source: “Lebanon’s officials have not been warned of the possibility of Israel targeting the airport like it did during the 2006 war.

“However, nothing is guaranteed in this confrontation, and any mistake could lead to dire consequences.”

Adel Al-Masri, an attorney living in the Ruwais area of Beirut, said many people want to leave the city’s southern suburb.

The attorney said: “The reassurances that minimize the likelihood of a war breaking out are no longer convincing us, as we are seeing what is happening in Gaza, and we do not want our children to live this bitter experience as we did.”

 

 


Morocco to spend $260 mln on flood relief

Updated 6 sec ago
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Morocco to spend $260 mln on flood relief

  • Government will offer 80,000 Dirhams for partially demolished homes and 140,000 dirhams for totally collapsed ones
RABAT: The Moroccan government said on Thursday it plans to spend 2.5 billion dirhams ($ 260 million) on a flood relief plan that includes reconstruction aid, infrastructure upgrades and farming support.
Floods ravaged several villages in the country’s south-east last month, killing at least 28 people and destroying roads.
The government will offer 80,000 Dirhams for partially demolished homes and 140,000 dirhams for totally collapsed ones, the prime minister’s office said.
The plan includes upgrading destroyed infrastructure and support to affected farmers.
Separately, the government said it will continue, for the next five months, to offer cash handouts of 2500 dirhams to some 60,000 households affected by an earthquake that hit the High Atlas mountains in September 2023.
One year on, just 1000 homes have been built, according to official data, as the government continues its gradual construction aid plan for some 57,000 damaged or totally destroyed homes.

Belgian journalists injured in Beirut bombing

Updated 03 October 2024
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Belgian journalists injured in Beirut bombing

  • Israel has been carrying out a bombing campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon and has also sent its troops across the border
  • The bombardments in Lebanon have cost more than 1,000 lives

Brussels: Two Belgian journalists were injured in Lebanon while reporting on overnight air raids in Beirut, their employer said Thursday, as fighting raged between Israel and Hezbollah.
VTM correspondent Robin Ramaekers suffered facial injuries and cameraman Stijn De Smet was being treated for a leg wound, said a statement by the broadcaster’s parent company, DPG Media.
“Last night there was a bombing in central Beirut. When Robin and Stijn wanted to run a report on that, they got injured,” the firm said, adding the pair were being treated in hospital.
“Both are now in safety and are being cared for.”
The circumstances of the incident were not yet clear, the company said. Belgium’s foreign ministry said it was closely monitoring the situation.
Israel has been carrying out a bombing campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon and has also sent its troops across the border.
On Thursday, the Israeli military pounded Beirut with overnight air raids. A total of 17 strikes had hit the capital by dawn, Lebanon’s official National News Agency (NNA) reported.
One of the strikes hit a Hezbollah rescue facility, a source close to the group told AFP, killing at least six people, according to a Lebanese health ministry toll.
Israel says it is trying to secure its border with Lebanon so tens of thousands of Israelis displaced by nearly a year of hostilities with Hezbollah can return home.
The bombardments in Lebanon have cost more than 1,000 lives and seen Hezbollah’s long-time chief Hassan Nasrallah killed.
Authorities in Lebanon say that around a million people have been displaced.
Last year, a journalist was killed and six other reporters, including two from AFP, wounded by Israeli shelling while covering the cross-border fighting in southern Lebanon.


Palestinian activist Issa Amro wins prize for peaceful resistance

Updated 03 October 2024
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Palestinian activist Issa Amro wins prize for peaceful resistance

  • 44-year-old founded Youth Against Settlements group, which campaigns against proliferation of Jewish settlements in West Bank
  • When university where he was studying closed in 2003 during Second Intifada, Amro successfully led six-month civil disobedience campaign

Stockholm: Palestinian activist Issa Amro on Thursday accepted the Right Livelihood prize — considered by some an alternative Nobel — for his “nonviolent resistance to Israel’s illegal occupation” in the West Bank, the jury said.
Amro was born in the city of Hebron, a flashpoint West Bank city where roughly 1,000 Jewish settlers live under heavy Israeli military protection amid some 200,000 Palestinians.
He has dedicated his life to fighting against Israel’s occupation of the West Bank.
The 44-year-old founded the Youth Against Settlements group, which campaigns against the proliferation of Jewish settlements in the territory — communities widely regarded as illegal under international law.
The rights campaigner has been repeatedly detained and tortured by both the Palestinian Authority and by Israel, the foundation said.
“It’s a miracle that I still exist,” said Amro.
When Palestine Polytechnic University, where he was studying, closed in 2003 during the Second Intifada, Amro successfully led a six-month civil disobedience campaign.
“I managed to reopen the university with other students,” Amro said in a statement.
“I graduated as an engineer and as an activist — it became part of my character,” he added.
The Sweden-based Right Livelihood Foundation also honored Joan Carling, a Filipino champion of indigenous rights and Anabela Lemos, a climate activist from Mozambique.
It also gave the nod to research agency Forensic Architecture for its work in uncovering human rights violations around the world.
The foundation said the four prize winners had “each made a profound impact on their communities and the global stage.”
“Their unwavering commitment to speaking out against forces of oppression and exploitation, while strictly adhering to non-violent methods, resonates far beyond their communities,” Right Livelihood said in a statement.
Carling from the Philippines was recognized for having defended the rights of indigenous communities for three decades, particularly in their fight against mining projects.
The foundation celebrated Lemos, who heads the NGO Justica Ambiental (JA!), for her role in opposing liquefied natural gas extraction projects in northern Mozambique.
Forensic Architecture, a London-based research laboratory known for 3D modelling conflict zones, won the distinction for “pioneering digital forensic methods” to ensure accountability of human rights violations around the world.
By teaming up with Ukraine’s Center for Spatial Technologies to reconstruct Mariupol’s Drama Theatre before it was destroyed in 2022, the firm highlighted Russia’s “strategies of terror” and “attempts to obscure evidence of their own crimes,” the foundation said.
Swedish-German philatelist Jakob von Uexkull sold part of his stamp collection to found the Right Livelihood award in 1980, after the foundation behind the Nobel Prizes refused to create new distinctions honoring efforts in the fields of environment and international development.


41,788 Palestinians killed in Gaza offensive since Oct. 7, health ministry says

Updated 03 October 2024
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41,788 Palestinians killed in Gaza offensive since Oct. 7, health ministry says

  • Ninety-nine Palestinians have been killed and 169 wounded in the past 24 hours

CAIRO: Israel’s military offensive in the Gaza Strip has killed at least 41,788 Palestinians and wounded 96,794 since Oct. 7, the Palestinian enclave’s health ministry said on Thursday.
Ninety-nine Palestinians have been killed and 169 wounded in the past 24 hours, the ministry said in a statement.
Medics said scores of people were killed a day before in an Israeli strike that hit a school sheltering displaced families in Gaza City, while another struck the Al-Amal Orphan Society, which also houses displaced persons.
As the war in Gaza triggered by the cross-border Hamas attack on Israel nears its first anniversary on Oct. 7, there has been no let-up in Israeli military operations against the Palestinian Islamist group. The enclave has been left in ruins.


Iran Revolutionary Guards consultant dies from injuries in Israeli strike on Damascus

Updated 03 October 2024
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Iran Revolutionary Guards consultant dies from injuries in Israeli strike on Damascus

  • The attack appeared to be the same as one reported by Syrian state media,which said that three civilians were killed and nine others injured

DUBAI: A consultant working for Iran’s Revolutionary Guards has died from injuries sustained in an Israeli air attack on the Syrian capital Damascus on Monday, Iran’s Student News Network reported on Thursday.
It identified the consultant as Majid Divani, without giving further details.
The attack appeared to be the same as one reported by Syrian state media, which said on Tuesday that three civilians were killed and nine others injured in an Israeli airstrike on the Syrian capital Damascus.
Syrian air defenses intercepted “hostile targets” over the vicinity of Damascus three times in a row in one night, following explosions that were heard in the capital, state media said on Tuesday.
When asked about the reported attack, the Israeli military said on Tuesday that it does not comment on foreign media reports.
Israel has been carrying out strikes against Iran-linked targets in Syria for years but has ramped up such raids since last year’s Oct. 7 attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas on southern Israel.