Israel says most evacuees back in Gaza border area

A picture shows a destroyed house in Kibbutz Beeri in southern Israel on November 5, 2023. (AFP/File)
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Updated 15 August 2024
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Israel says most evacuees back in Gaza border area

  • Israeli authorities had offered evacuees from the Gaza border area accommodation in hotels paid for by the state
  • Residents of 10 kibbutz communities that were badly damaged in the Hamas attack will be given temporary housing for at least another year in various locations

JERUSALEM: Nearly all Israelis evacuated from their homes near the Gaza Strip in the wake of Hamas’s October 7 attack have returned, Israeli authorities said Thursday.
More than 80 percent of the southern Israeli region’s 50,000-plus population have moved back by July, with 3,700 more people returning since, according to the government agency tasked with reconstruction and rehabilitation of the border communities affected by the deadly attack.
Israeli authorities had offered evacuees from the Gaza border area accommodation in hotels paid for by the state, but that arrangement expire on Thursday.
Residents of 10 kibbutz communities that were badly damaged in the Hamas attack will be given temporary housing for at least another year in various locations, Israel’s Tekuma Authority said in a statement.
A handful of other communities that are very close to the Gaza border have been declared unsafe due to the threat of rocket fire from the Palestinian territory, it added.
Their residents are still entitled to accommodation paid for by the government, while some have rented apartments elsewhere in the country.
On Tuesday, the Israeli defense ministry announced a pilot project to improve security along the Gaza border, with investments in fences, drones, command center and “specialized” communications infrastructure.
The Hamas attack which triggered the ongoing war in Gaza resulted in the deaths of 1,198 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
Militants also seized 251 people, 111 of whom are still held in Gaza, including 39 the military says are dead.
Israel’s retaliatory military offensive has killed at least 40,005 people in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry, which does not provide a breakdown of civilian and militant deaths.
The war has drawn in Iran-backed Hamas allies in the region, including the powerful Lebanese group Hezbollah, whose militants have been trading near-daily fire with Israeli forces since early October.
Tens of thousands of residents on either side of the Israel-Lebanon have been displaced by the violence, and the vast majority have yet to return.


Lebanon Christian leader says ending political deadlock key to war truce

Updated 57 min 17 sec ago
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Lebanon Christian leader says ending political deadlock key to war truce

  • “The urgency first and foremost is a ceasefire to end the catastrophe that our people are enduring,” said Samir Geagea
  • “In the absence of serious international initiatives, our only option to reach a ceasefire is by electing a president”

BEIRUT: The head of a major Christian party in politically deadlocked Lebanon said Saturday that electing a new president was key to obtaining a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.
Lebanon has been without a head of state for almost two years amid a crushing economic crisis and, now, as Israel heavily bombards the country saying it is targeting Hezbollah sites.
Hezbollah allies and their adversaries including the Christian Lebanese Forces (LF) party have been deadlocked over the presidency, unable to reach a consensus.
“The urgency first and foremost is a ceasefire to end the catastrophe that our people are enduring,” said Samir Geagea, who heads the LF and parliament’s largest Christian bloc.
“In the absence of serious international initiatives, our only option to reach a ceasefire is by electing a president,” Geagea, who is close to the United States and Saudi Arabia, said in a press conference.
The Iran-backed Hezbollah unilaterally opened what it says is a “support front” for Gaza from Lebanon, launching cross-border attacks into Israel the day after Palestinian ally Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel sparked war in the Gaza Strip.
Early last month Geagea accused Hezbollah of dragging Lebanon into a war with Israel, “as if there were no state.”
Almost a year of cross-border exchanges of fire between Israel and Hezbollah escalated into all-out war on September 23, with Israel heavily bombarding south and east Lebanon and Beirut’s southern suburbs, saying it is targeting Hezbollah sites.
Geagea called for “a credible president who commits clearly to implementing international resolutions, in particular resolutions 1559, 1680 and 1701, in all their provisions.”
Security Council Resolutions 1559 and 1680 called for the disarmament of all non-state groups.
Adopted in 2006, Resolution 1701 led to a ceasefire in an Israel-Hezbollah war that year and said the Lebanese army and peacekeepers should be the only armed forces deployed in the country’s south.
Hezbollah is the lone group that refused to give up its weapons after Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war, doing so in the name of “resistance” against Israel.
The group was founded after Israel besieged the capital Beirut in 1982, and has since become a powerful domestic political player, though detractors have accused it of being a “state within a state.”
Geagea said a president would have to ensure that “strategic decisions belong solely to the state.”


UN official appeals for Lebanon’s ports and airport to be spared as Israel presses its offensive

Updated 12 October 2024
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UN official appeals for Lebanon’s ports and airport to be spared as Israel presses its offensive

  • “What I have seen and heard today is devastating, but the sense is that this can get much worse still,” said Carl Skau, deputy executive director of WFP
  • “We have huge concerns and there are many, but one of them is indeed that we need the ports and we need the supply routes to continue to be able to operate”

BEIRUT: A top United Nations official said during a visit to Beirut Saturday that he is concerned that Lebanon’s ports and airport might be taken out of service, with serious implications for getting food supplies into the county, as Israel continues its offensive against the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
“What I have seen and heard today is devastating, but the sense is that this can get much worse still, and that needs to be avoided,” said Carl Skau, deputy executive director of the UN World Food Program, in an interview with The Associated Press.
He appealed for “all diplomatic efforts possible to try to find a political solution” to the war and for supply lines to remain open.
“We have huge concerns and there are many, but one of them is indeed that we need the ports and we need the supply routes to continue to be able to operate,” Skau said.
In Gaza, where Israel has been at war with Hamas since the Palestinian militant group launched a deadly incursion into southern Israel a year ago, hunger has skyrocketed as humanitarian organizations have complained of major obstacles to getting food and other supplies into the blockaded enclave.
Skau said he believes that Israeli authorities had given “commitments” that in Lebanon, the ports and airport would not be taken out of commission.
“But of course, this is a very changing environment. So we don’t take anything for granted,” he said.
In recent weeks, Israel has escalated its aerial bombardment and launched a ground invasion in Lebanon.
About 1.2 million people are displaced in Lebanon, according to government estimates, of whom some 200,000 are staying in collective shelters, where the WFP is supplying them with meals.
Skau noted that food prices have already increased as a result of the conflict, although Lebanon’s sole international airport and its main sea ports are still functioning. The WFP had stocked up enough food to supply 1 million people — about one-fifth of Lebanon’s population — for up to a month, he said, but now is trying to build up supplies that could feed that number through the end of the year.
“We will, of course, be having to restock, and for that, the ports will be critical and other supply lines,” he said.
For instance, the agency has been bringing food in from Jordan through Syria into Lebanon by land, he said. Earlier this month, an Israeli strike on the road to the main border crossing between Lebanon and Syria cut off access to that crossing.
Since the Masnaa crossing was struck, people fleeing Lebanon have continued to cross on foot, while vehicles — including those bringing supplies for the WFP — have had to use another crossing in the far north of the country, making the journey more arduous and expensive.
Skau appealed for the Masnaa crossing to be reopened.
Lebanese General Security, which oversees border crossings, has recorded 320,184 Syrians and 117,727 Lebanese citizens crossing into Syria since Sept. 23, when the major escalation in Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon started.
The influx comes at a time when the WFP has reduced its food assistance in Syria as a result of funding shortages.
“We’ve gone over the past two years from assisting some 6 million people to around 1.5 (million),” Skau said. “And with that, of course, our capacity has been tightened and now we need to scale up again.”


Israel army says Hezbollah fired about 320 projectiles into Israel over Yom Kippur

Updated 12 October 2024
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Israel army says Hezbollah fired about 320 projectiles into Israel over Yom Kippur

  • The military said two projectiles were also identified crossing from northern Gaza

JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said that Lebanese armed group Hezbollah fired about 320 projectiles from Lebanon into Israel over Yom Kippur, Judaism’s holiest day which ended at nightfall Saturday.
“Throughout the weekend of Yom Kippur, approximately 320 projectiles that were fired by the Hezbollah terrorist organization crossed from Lebanon into Israel,” the military said in a statement.
In a separate statement, the military said two projectiles were also identified crossing from northern Gaza, where Israel is fighting Palestinian militants, toward the city of Ashkelon but fell in an unpopulated area.


UN warns against ‘catastrophic’ regional conflict

Updated 12 October 2024
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UN warns against ‘catastrophic’ regional conflict

  • Israel has faced a fierce diplomatic backlash over incidents in south Lebanon that saw five Blue Helmets wounded
  • UNIFIL spokesman Andrea Tenenti fears an Israeli escalation against Hezbollah in south Lebanon could soon spiral out of control “into a regional conflict with catastrophic impact for everyone“

BEIRUT: UN peacekeepers in Lebanon warned Saturday against a “catastrophic” regional conflict as Israeli forces battled Hezbollah and Hamas militants on two fronts, on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.
Israel has faced a fierce diplomatic backlash over incidents in south Lebanon that saw five Blue Helmets wounded.
On Saturday, the Lebanese health ministry said Israeli air strikes on two villages located near the capital Beirut killed nine people.
Israel had earlier told residents of south Lebanon not to return home, as its troops fought Hezbollah militants in a war that has killed more than 1,200 people since September 23, and forced more than a million others to flee their homes.
“For your own protection, do not return to your homes until further notice... Do not go south; anyone who goes south may put his life at risk,” Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee posted on X.
Hezbollah said Saturday it launched missiles across the border into northern Israel, where air raid sirens sounded and the military said it had intercepted a projectile.
In an interview with AFP, UNIFIL spokesman Andrea Tenenti told AFP he feared an Israeli escalation against Hezbollah in south Lebanon could soon spiral out of control “into a regional conflict with catastrophic impact for everyone.”
The UN force said five peacekeepers have been wounded by fighting in south Lebanon in just two days, and Tenenti said “a lot of damage” had been caused to its posts there.
Around Israel, markets were closed and public transport halted as observant Jews fasted and prayed on Yom Kippur.
After the holiday, attention is likely to turn again to Israel’s expected retaliation against Iran, which launched around 200 missiles at Israel on October 1.
Israel began pounding Gaza shortly after suffering its worst ever attacks from Iran-backed Hamas militants on October 7 last year, and it launched a ground offensive against Hezbollah in Lebanon on September 30.
On Friday, Israel faced criticism from the UN, its Western allies and others over what it said was a “hit” on a UN peacekeeping position in Lebanon.
Two Sri Lankan peacekeepers were hurt in the second such incident in two days, UNIFIL said Friday.
Israel’s military said soldiers had responded to “an immediate threat” around 50 meters (yards) from the UNIFIL base in Naqura, and has pledged to carry out a “thorough review.”
The Irish military’s chief of staff, Sean Clancy, said it was “not an accidental act,” and French President Emmanuel Macron said he believed the peacekeepers had been “deliberately targeted.”
Both countries are major contributors to UNIFIL whose peacekeepers are on the front line of the Israel-Hezbollah war.
Efforts to negotiate an end to the fighting have so far failed, but Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati said his government would ask the UN Security Council to issue a new resolution calling for a “full and immediate ceasefire.”
Lebanon’s military said Friday an Israeli strike on one of its positions in south Lebanon killed two soldiers.


Israeli airstrikes overshadow French-US ceasefire push in Lebanon

Updated 12 October 2024
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Israeli airstrikes overshadow French-US ceasefire push in Lebanon

  • Israeli planes target villages in Iqlim Al-Kharoub, and the districts of Jbeil and Batroun
  • Hezbollah targets Safed, Tiberias, settlements and military bases with rocket, drone strikes

BEIRUT: International diplomatic efforts to reach a ceasefire in Lebanon gathered pace on Saturday against a backdrop of destruction in southern border towns, the Bekaa, and Beirut’s southern suburbs.
Lebanese parliament speaker Nabih Berri received a phone call from French President Emmanuel Macron, while US presidential envoy to Lebanon Amos Hochstein called Prime Minister Najib Mikati to discuss the deadly Israel-Hezbollah confrontation.
Macron said that he is “making the necessary contacts” to prevent Israel from continuing its ground military operations, but said that “the Lebanese must take the necessary steps to cease fire, implement Resolution 1701, and quickly resolve the presidential election to reach a political and diplomatic solution,” according to Berri’s office.
Mikati’s media office said the discussion with Hochstein focused on “ways to achieve a ceasefire and stop the military confrontations between the Israeli army and Hezbollah in order to return to discussing a comprehensive political solution based on the implementation of Resolution 1701.”
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called both Mikati and Berri on Friday. During a 40-minute conversation with Berri, they agreed on three points: “Committing to international resolutions, particularly Resolution 1701, preventing the expansion of the war, and reaching a diplomatic solution,” according to Berri’s office.
Political efforts to mitigate the losses Lebanon is suffering as a result of Israel’s war on Hezbollah are barely heard amid the noise of airstrikes, Israeli artillery, and the immense destruction in southern towns, the Bekaa, Beirut’s southern suburbs, and the cries of people who have lost everything and now find themselves in shelters or on the street.
A closed national meeting was held under the title “In Defense of Lebanon: Proposing a Rescue Roadmap” at the residence of the head of the Lebanese Forces Samir Geagea in Maarab. The meeting brought together Lebanese figures opposing Hezbollah’s ongoing war.
Geagea said the Lebanese people “deserve to live a dignified life free from the specter of wars. It is essential to restore the state amid the collapse of the structure over everyone’s heads and the dominance over the decision of war in Lebanon.”
He noted that “the accumulation of half-measures will not lead to solutions or stability without the establishment of a state.
“The international and Arab communities do not trust the current ruling system that is poised against the state.
“There is an urgent need to first achieve a ceasefire. We must proceed to elect a president who commits in advance to implementing international resolutions 1559, 1680, and 1701, as well as adhering to the provisions of the Taif Agreement.
“The elected president must ensure that the strategic decision-making authority resides solely with the state and grant the Lebanese Army all necessary powers.
“It is essential that the president is detached from all failed policies and is recognized for integrity and patriotism. Following this, binding parliamentary consultations should take place, leading to the election of a prime minister and the formation of a government.”
On Saturday afternoon, for the first time, the Israeli raids targeted the entrance to the town of Barja in the Iqlim Al-Kharoub and the main road of Nahr Ibrahim toward Qartaba in the Jbeil region in northern Lebanon. They also targeted the town of Deir Billa in the Batroun district.
Amid these developments, Hezbollah’s media relations official, Mohammed Afif, urged “against rushing to conclusions” regarding the political outcomes of the war.
“The struggle against the enemy is still in its early stages and the Israeli ground incursion into Lebanese territory will not be a picnic,” he said.
On Saturday, there were no further Israeli attacks on UNIFIL forces in the border area, in contrast to incidents over the previous two days that drew a wave of international condemnation. UNIFIL spokesperson Andrea Tenenti said “Israel is violating Resolution 1701 by targeting our forces.”
Meanwhile, Iran’s parliament speaker Mohammed Baqer Qalibaf arrived in Beirut after personally flying an Iranian aircraft to Rafic Hariri International Airport. Qalibaf said that his visit was made at the invitation of Berri, and that he brought “a message from the leader of the Islamic revolution, the president, and the Iranian people to the Lebanese people and the resistance.”
The Iranian official met Mikati and Berri, and inspected the site of the Israeli raid on the Basta area in the heart of Beirut, accompanied by a number of Hezbollah MPs.
He said: “We have always been on the side of the Lebanese people, their resistance and the Lebanese government. We extend our full assistance to the people and hope that they will be victorious. We will remain by their side in these challenging times. I will head from here to Geneva and I will carry with me the issues of the oppressed Lebanese and Palestinian peoples.”
However, the Iranian official heard from Mikati that “the government’s priorities at this stage are to work on a ceasefire, stop the Israeli aggression, preserve Lebanon’s security and the safety of its people, uphold Lebanon’s commitment to implementing Resolution 1701, strengthening the army’s presence in the southern region, and engage in necessary communications with influential countries and the UN to exert pressure on Israel for full compliance with the resolution.”
Israeli attacks continued on the south and Bekaa, while cautious calm prevailed in Beirut’s southern suburbs. The Israeli army claimed in a statement that “Hezbollah’s activities are forcing us to act against it.”
The Israeli army issued a new warning to the residents of 23 border towns and villages in the south to “evacuate and head north of the Awali River. It is forbidden to return to your homes until further notice.” Most residents of these towns left last year.
The most serious Israeli warning was directed at ambulances and Civil Defense vehicles, with the Israeli army claiming that “Hezbollah fighters are using them for transport.” The army warned that it would target the vehicles.
More than 25 devastating Israeli airstrikes were recorded on border towns, while Hezbollah reported “direct clashes with Israeli soldiers on the outskirts of the town of Dhayra, ambushing an Israeli force and blowing up an Israeli vehicle.”
The party counted “seven military operations carried out since dawn to counter incursion attempts.”
Lebanese Red Cross chief Georges Kettaneh said: “The movement of the Red Cross ambulances is carried out after informing the International Committee of the Red Cross and UNIFIL about our movements and missions, especially when traveling on the border, to ensure the protection of volunteers.”
In the Bekaa, the Israeli Air Force carried out airstrikes on Nabi Sheet, Saraain and Kfar Dan, killing one person and wounding three others. Two were wounded in Al-Kayyal, and four were killed in an airstrike on Boudai.
The Israeli army said that about 30 rockets were launched toward the Galilee panhandle. Israeli media reported “violent explosions” in the city of Safed, and others in Kiryat Shmona.
Hezbollah said it targeted “the occupied city of Tiberias with a salvo of rockets and targeted a military gathering on the outskirts of the town of Blida.”
It also targeted military gatherings in the Metula, Kfar Yuval, Khirbet Nafha, Kfar Giladi and Al-Manara settlements, and a communications base in Keren Naftali.
Hezbollah carried out a drone attack on Ein Margaliot, and another attack with assault drones on the air defense base in Kiryat Eliezer, west of Haifa.