DUBAI: The World Bank has granted Lebanon a $250 million loan aimed at helping alleviate persistent power cuts worsened by last year’s war between Israel and Hezbollah, the country’s finance ministry said on Thursday.
Even before the conflict, Lebanon had for years been struggling with a severe shortage of imported fuel and poor infrastructure.
Following the conflict, however, the World Bank said it would need around $11 billion for reconstruction and recovery.
The fighting between the Iran-backed group and Israel ended for the most part in November through a brittle ceasefire brokered by the United States, though the two sides accuse each other of failing to fully implement the deal.
Lebanon had said it received preliminary approval to increase a World Bank reconstruction loan to $400 million from $250 million. The loan is part of a $1 billion reconstruction program, with the remainder of the financing to come from international aid.
Lebanon receives $250 million World Bank loan to ease power problems
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Lebanon receives $250 million World Bank loan to ease power problems
- The World Bank said Lebanon would need around $11 billion for reconstruction and recovery
Israel army kills West Bank attacker who tried to run over troops
- The Palestinian civil affairs authority named the man as 20-year-old Qais Sami Jaser Allan, adding that he “was shot by the occupation forces between the towns of Einabus and Awarta”
JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said its troops shot dead a man who tried to run over a group of soldiers in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday.
The incident occurred in Einabus in the northern West Bank, the military said.
“A short while ago, a report was received regarding a terrorist who attempted to run over IDF (Israeli army) soldiers operating in the area of Einabus,” the military said.
“In response, the soldiers fired at the terrorist and eliminated him.”
The Palestinian Red Crescent said it rescued three people after the Israeli army opened fire near Einabus on a vehicle with Palestinian license plates.
“Two of the wounded were shot, and one of them is in critical condition. The third was injured as a result of being beaten,” the Red Crescent said.
The Palestinian civil affairs authority named the man as 20-year-old Qais Sami Jaser Allan, adding that he “was shot by the occupation forces between the towns of Einabus and Awarta.”
The incident came just days after a Palestinian from the West Bank ran over an Israeli in his sixties with his vehicle and later stabbed an 18-year-old girl to death in northern Israel.
The perpetrator was killed during the attack.
Following that incident on Friday, the military conducted a two-day operation in the West Bank town of Qabatiya from where the attacker came, detaining several residents including his father and brothers.
Since the start of the war in Gaza following Hamas’s attack on Israel in October 2023, violence has also surged in the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967.
Israeli troops and settlers have killed more than 1,000 Palestinians in the territory, including many militants as well as dozens of civilians, according to an AFP tally based on figures from the Palestinian health ministry.
According to official Israeli figures, at least 44 Israelis, both soldiers and civilians, have also been killed in Palestinian attacks or Israeli military operations in the same period in the West Bank.
