PM Mikati continues efforts to keep war away from Lebanon

Lebanon’s caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said on Monday he hoped the situation on the country’s southern border with Israel would not deteriorate after five months of hostilities between Hezbollah and the Israeli forces. (Reuters)
Lebanon’s caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said on Monday he hoped the situation on the country’s southern border with Israel would not deteriorate after five months of hostilities between Hezbollah and the Israeli forces. (Reuters)
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Updated 11 March 2024
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PM Mikati continues efforts to keep war away from Lebanon

PM Mikati continues efforts to keep war away from Lebanon
  • Nun punished in Keserwan for calling on her students to pray for the youth of the south

BEIRUT: Lebanon’s caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said on Monday he hoped the situation on the country’s southern border with Israel would not deteriorate after five months of hostilities between Hezbollah and the Israeli forces.

“We are maintaining contact with all relevant parties locally and internationally to prevent war in Lebanon. Despite the suffering our country has endured, particularly in terms of the number of martyrs, we pay homage to their souls,” he said.

Mikati spoke after Israel dropped leaflets over the Wazzani border area using a drone on Monday, in which it attempted to incite residents against Hezbollah, holding it responsible for the fate of residents and their property.

“Hezbollah is endangering your lives, the lives of your families, and your homes, and its members and weapons are entering your residential areas. From your backyard at the expense of your family. Such a shame,” the leaflets said.

Texts circulated on social media warned that the leaflets fell within the framework of psychological warfare, showing fake concern for the interests of people while Israel commits crimes in Gaza and southern Lebanon.

The counter-campaign was followed by calls not to share the leaflets or circulate them on social media.

Meanwhile, a predominantly Christian private school in the Keserwan area in Mount Lebanon punished a nun who urged students to pray for the south and its youth.

Two days earlier, a widely circulated video showed Sister Maya Ziadeh addressing the school’s students in the playground, in which she reportedly said: “In the south, there are students your age who say they have no dreams other than liberating their land.

“Today, we will pray for the south, for the children of the south, for the people of the south, for the mothers of the south, and the men of the resistance because they are men from Lebanon, and they toil to protect this homeland.”

She added: “If we do not pray for them or love them regardless of what we think, then we are traitors to our land, our homeland, and every book we read.

“We pray for the protection of our youth and homeland because it is going through a difficult ordeal, and nothing but love and solidarity strengthens us.”

The video led to widespread criticism by Christians from Keserwan, who wrote on the platform X and called for the nun to be punished.

A parent of one student later announced that the school administration decided to “ban the nun from teaching and transfer her from the school to another place.”

On Monday, a political group opposing Hezbollah — Our Lady of the Mountain — accused the Lebanese authorities of “putting the people of the south in the eye of the storm of the killing, destruction, and displacement by fully and openly supporting the Hezbollah militia in its declared and ongoing war only to support Gaza.”

The group asked in a statement: “By what legitimate authority does Hezbollah give itself the right to decide war and peace, putting all Lebanon and the Lebanese at risk of death and destruction?

“Isn’t this a decision that the parliament and the Lebanese government take? Where do these presidents, ministers, and deputies stand on all that is happening?”

The statement came as Hezbollah carried out several military operations against Israeli military sites on Monday, including an aerial attack with four drones on the Israeli air and missile defense headquarters at Keila barracks. The Jal Al-Alam site and a gathering of Israeli soldiers in Al-Tayhat Hill have also been targeted.

Israeli attacks continued around the Lebanese border areas, and a house was targeted on the outskirts of the town of Jebbayn. Israel claimed that the house was a “Hezbollah military site.”

The National News Agency reported that an Israeli drone fell due to a technical malfunction in the outskirts of the town of Halta in the Hasbaya district.

Hezbollah, meanwhile, said one of its members, Ali Mohammed Zein, from the town of Sohmor in the Western Bekaa, had died.

Al-Fajr Forces also mourned the deaths of three members — Mohammed Riyad Moheyiddine from Beirut, Dr. Hussein Hilal Darwish from Shhim in Iqlim Al-Kharroub, and Mohammed Jamal Ibrahim from Habbariyeh — who were killed on Sunday in Habbariyeh, in the Aarkoub area, when their car was targeted by an Israeli drone.

The group had previously announced it was “launching operations against the Israeli occupation, against the backdrop of the Israeli aggression on Gaza.” Its military activity was limited to the Sunni-dominated Aarkoub area on the outskirts of Shebaa and Kfarshouba, and it previously lost two members when Israel targeted Hamas offices in a building in the southern suburb of Beirut in early January, killing Hamas leader Saleh Al-Arouri.


Turkiye’s foreign minister visits Athens to help mend ties between the regional rivals

Turkiye’s foreign minister visits Athens to help mend ties between the regional rivals
Updated 22 sec ago
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Turkiye’s foreign minister visits Athens to help mend ties between the regional rivals

Turkiye’s foreign minister visits Athens to help mend ties between the regional rivals
ATHENS, Greece: Turkiye’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan arrived Friday in Athens for meetings with his Greek counterpart as part of efforts to ease tension between the two neighbors and regional rivals.
Both NATO members, Greece and Turkiye have been at loggerheads for decades over a long series of issues, including volatile maritime boundary disputes that have twice led them to the brink of war. The two have renewed a diplomatic push for over a year to improve ties.
“Step by step, we have achieved a level of trust so that we can discuss issues with sincerity and prevent crises,” Greek Foreign Minister George Gerapetritis said in an interview with Turkiye’s Hurriyet newspaper published Thursday.
The meeting between the two foreign ministers follows a series of high-profile talks between Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan as part of a relation-mending initiative launched in 2023.
Officials in Athens are expected to raise concerns about rising illegal migration, as Greece has seen an uptick in arrivals. And, despite deep disagreements on Israel and fighting in the Middle East, both foreign ministers are also expected to explore ways to improve regional stability.
The talks will help set the stage for a Greece-Turkiye high-level cooperation council planned for early 2025 in Ankara, Turkiye.

Turkiye’s Erdogan hopes Trump will tell Israel to “stop,” NTV reports

Turkiye’s Erdogan hopes Trump will tell Israel to “stop,” NTV reports
Updated 10 min 12 sec ago
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Turkiye’s Erdogan hopes Trump will tell Israel to “stop,” NTV reports

Turkiye’s Erdogan hopes Trump will tell Israel to “stop,” NTV reports

ANKARA: Turkiye’s President Tayyip Erdogan said that he hoped US President-elect Donald Trump will tell Israel to “stop” the attacks and halting arms support to Israel could be a good start, broadcaster NTV reported on Friday.
Trump’s presidency will seriously affect political and military balances in the Middle East region, Erdogan was quoted as telling reporters on his flight back to Turkiye from Budapest, where he attended a European Political Community summit. 


Nearly 70% of Gaza war dead women and children, UN rights office says

Nearly 70% of Gaza war dead women and children, UN rights office says
Updated 16 min 10 sec ago
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Nearly 70% of Gaza war dead women and children, UN rights office says

Nearly 70% of Gaza war dead women and children, UN rights office says
  • UN Human Rights Office: Systematic violation of the fundamental principles of international humanitarian law
  • The youngest victim whose death was verified by UN monitors was a one-day-old boy, and the oldest was a 97-year-old woman

GENEVA: The UN Human Rights Office said on Friday nearly 70 percent of the fatalities it has verified in the Gaza war were women and children, and condemned what it called a systematic violation of the fundamental principles of international humanitarian law.
The UN count covers the first seven months of the Israel-Hamas conflict in the Gaza Strip that began more than a year ago.
The 8,119 victims verified by the UN Rights Office in that seven-month period is considerably lower than the toll of over 43,000 provided by Palestinian health authorities for the full 13 months of conflict.
But the UN breakdown of the victims’ age and gender backs the Palestinian assertion that women and children represent a large portion of those killed in the war.
This finding indicates “a systematic violation of the fundamental principles of international humanitarian law, including distinction and proportionality,” the UN rights office said in a statement accompanying the 32-page report.
“It is essential that there is due reckoning with respect to the allegations of serious violations of international law through credible and impartial judicial bodies and that, in the meantime, all relevant information and evidence are collected and preserved,” United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said.
Israel did not immediately comment on the report’s findings.
Israel’s military, which began its offensive in response to the Oct. 7, 2023 attack in which Hamas fighters killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel and seized more than 250 hostages, says it takes care to avoid harming civilians in Gaza.
It has said approximately one civilian has been killed for every fighter, a ratio it blames on Hamas, saying the Palestinian militant group uses civilian facilities. Hamas has denied using civilians and civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, as human shields.
YOUNGEST VICTIM AGED ONE DAY
The youngest victim whose death was verified by UN monitors was a one-day-old boy, and the oldest was a 97-year-old woman, the report said.
Overall, children represented 44 percent of the victims, with children aged five-nine representing the single biggest age category, followed by those aged 10-14, and then those aged up to and including four.
This broadly reflects the enclave’s demographics, which the report said reflected an apparent failure to take precautions to avoid civilian losses.
It showed that in 88 percent of cases, five or more people were killed in the same attack, pointing to the Israeli military’s use of weapons with an effect across a wide area, although it said some fatalities may have been the result of errant projectiles from Palestinian armed groups.


Khamenei aide warns against impulsive Iran response to Israel attack

Khamenei aide warns against impulsive Iran response to Israel attack
Updated 54 min 42 sec ago
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Khamenei aide warns against impulsive Iran response to Israel attack

Khamenei aide warns against impulsive Iran response to Israel attack
  • Israel is engaged in conflicts with the Iran-backed Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon
  • Israeli warplanes struck military sites in Iran on October 26 in retaliation for a large Iranian missile attack

TEHRAN: An adviser to Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has warned against launching an “instinctive” response to Israeli air strikes on the Islamic republic last month.
Israel, Iran’s sworn enemy, is engaged in conflicts with the Iran-backed Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Israeli warplanes struck military sites in Iran on October 26 in retaliation for a large Iranian missile attack on Israel at the start of the month.
“Israel aims to bring the conflict to Iran. We must act wisely to avoid its trap and not react instinctively,” the adviser, Ali Larijani, told state television late Thursday.
Iran said it fired 200 missiles at Israel on October 1 in response to the killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in a strike on Beirut and Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh while he was in Tehran.
After Israel hit back, it warned Iran against any counterattack, but the Islamic republic has vowed to respond.
“Our actions and reactions are strategically defined, so we must avoid instinctive or emotional responses and remain entirely rational,” Larijani added.
The former parliament speaker also praised Nasrallah for accepting a ceasefire during the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war rather than making an “emotional decision.”
On Sunday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said a potential ceasefire between Tehran’s allies and Israel could affect Iran’s response to the Israeli strikes.


Hezbollah claims second attack on Israel naval base in 24 hours

Hezbollah claims second attack on Israel naval base in 24 hours
Updated 08 November 2024
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Hezbollah claims second attack on Israel naval base in 24 hours

Hezbollah claims second attack on Israel naval base in 24 hours
  • The group had on Thursday claimed another attack on the same area
  • Israel has been at war with Lebanon’s Hezbollah since late September

BEIRUT: Hezbollah said it targeted a naval base near the Israeli city of Haifa with missiles Friday, the second such attack in less than 24 hours.
The Iran-backed Lebanese group said it targeted the “Stella Maris” naval base northwest of Haifa with a missile barrage, “in response to the attacks and massacres committed by the Israeli enemy.”
The group had on Thursday claimed another attack on the same area.
In a separate statement, the group claimed that it had also targeted the Ramat David air base, southeast of Haifa, with missiles.
Israel has been at war with Lebanon’s Hezbollah since late September when it broadened its focus from fighting Hamas in the Gaza Strip to securing its northern border.
It escalated its air campaign and later sent in ground forces into the country’s south.
This came after a year of cross-border exchanges with Hezbollah, which has said it was acting in support of Hamas Palestinian militants fighting Israel in Gaza.
The war has killed more than 2,600 people in Lebanon since September 23, according to the Lebanese health ministry.