A Libyan human trafficker sanctioned by the UN has been killed in Tripoli, officials say

A Libyan human trafficker sanctioned by the UN has been killed in Tripoli, officials say
Victims react as authorities dismantle a human trafficking network, according to Libyan authorities, in what they say is Libya, in this still image from a handout video released on August 31, 2024. (Reuters)
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Updated 02 September 2024
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A Libyan human trafficker sanctioned by the UN has been killed in Tripoli, officials say

A Libyan human trafficker sanctioned by the UN has been killed in Tripoli, officials say
  • Amid the chaos, the oil-rich country has emerged as a major conduit for people from Africa

CAIRO: One of Libya’s most wanted human traffickers was killed Sunday in the capital, Tripoli, Libyan officials said, fueling tension in the western part of the North African country.
Abdel-Rahman Milad, who commanded a coast guard unit in the western town of Zawiya and was sanctioned by the United Nations Security Council, was shot dead by unknown assailants, the officials said.
The circumstances of his death were not immediately known, and no group claimed responsibility for his killing.
Libyan media outlets reported that he was shot while he was in his vehicle in the Sayyad area, in the western part of Tripoli. Footage circulated online showed a white Toyota Land Cruiser for Milad with bullet marks on its side.
Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity for their safety. There was no comment from the Tripoli-based government of Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah.
Moammar Dhawi, a militia leader in western Libya, mourned Milad’s death. In a statement, posted on Facebook, he called for an investigation to bring the perpetrators to account.
Libya has been plagued by corruption and turmoil since a NATO-backed uprising toppled and killed longtime dictator Muammar Qaddafi in 2011. The county has since then split between two administrations, each backed by armed groups and foreign governments.
Amid the chaos, the oil-rich country has emerged as a major conduit for people from Africa and the Middle East fleeing wars and poverty and hoping to reach Europe by crossing the Mediterranean Sea.
In June 2018, the Security Council imposed sanctions on Milad and five other leaders of criminal networks allegedly engaged in trafficking migrants and others from Libya. At the time, Milad was described as the head of a coast guard unit in Zawiya “that is consistently linked with violence against migrants and other human smugglers” from rival gangs.
UN experts monitoring sanctions claimed Milad and other coast guard members “are directly involved in the sinking of migrant boats using firearms.”
Milad had denied any links to human smuggling and said traffickers wear uniforms similar to those of his men. He was jailed for about six months between October 2020 and April 2021 on human trafficking and fuel smuggling charges.


Hezbollah readies massive funeral for slain leader Nasrallah

Hezbollah readies massive funeral for slain leader Nasrallah
Updated 39 sec ago
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Hezbollah readies massive funeral for slain leader Nasrallah

Hezbollah readies massive funeral for slain leader Nasrallah
Hezbollah has announced strict security measures and urged security forces to help manage crowds
Hassan Wehbe, 60, an electrician in Beirut’s southern suburbs, said the funeral would be “a historic day“

BEIRUT: Lebanon’s Hezbollah is preparing for a massive turnout for the funeral on Sunday of its slain leader Hassan Nasrallah, an opportunity for a show of strength by the Iran-backed group after a bruising war with Israel.
Nasrallah’s death nearly five months ago in a huge Israeli strike on Beirut’s southern suburbs left Hezbollah supporters in disbelief and sent shockwaves across Lebanon and the region.
The country will stop for Sunday’s funeral, to be held at 1:00 p.m. (1100 GMT) at the Camille Chamoun sports stadium on the capital’s outskirts.
Hezbollah has announced strict security measures and urged security forces to help manage crowds that are expected to number in the tens of thousands, with people pouring in from Hezbollah strongholds across the country, as well as from abroad.
Hassan Wehbe, 60, an electrician in Beirut’s southern suburbs, said the funeral would be “a historic day.”
“There will be huge participation. Israel will see that we are not afraid,” he said.
Hezbollah has invited senior Lebanese officials including the president.
Its key foreign backer Iran has said it will participate “at a high level,” without specifying who will attend.
Nicholas Blanford, a Beirut-based Hezbollah expert and senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, said it was important for Hezbollah “to be able to demonstrate that they haven’t been cowed — that they are still a popular force” within the Shiite community.
The funeral “is going to be exactly the event for that,” he told AFP.
The ceremony is expected to last around an hour, including a speech by current leader Naim Qassem, who has called for a huge turnout.
A procession will follow to Nasrallah’s burial site near the airport road, now lined with yellow Hezbollah flags and images of him and other slain Hezbollah figures.
Civil aviation authorities said Beirut airport will close exceptionally and flights will be suspended from midday until 4:00 pm.
The US embassy has urged Americans to avoid the area.
Hezbollah was battered by more than a year of hostilities with Israel that culminated in two months of full-blown war before a ceasefire took effect on November 27.
After Nasrallah was killed on September 27, the group delayed his funeral due to security concerns.
The ceremony will also be for Hashem Safieddine, who was chosen to succeed Nasrallah before being killed in a later Israeli strike.
Safieddine will be buried on Monday in his southern hometown of Deir Qanun Al-Nahr.
The charismatic, bespectacled Nasrallah has long enjoyed cult status among his supporters.
For Ahmed Hallani, 35, taking part is “a religious and moral duty.”
Nasrallah is “our leader and the leader of our victories. We will stay beside him, alive or dead,” he said.
Iraqi Airways and Lebanon’s Middle East Airlines have increased services between Baghdad and Beirut ahead of the funeral.
Representatives of Iraq’s main pro-Iran factions are to participate, while several Iraqi lawmakers are expected to attend privately.
One of Hezbollah’s founders in 1982, Nasrallah was elected secretary-general a decade later after Israel killed his predecessor.
He won renown in the Arab world after Israel withdrew its troops from south Lebanon under relentless Hezbollah attack in May 2000, ending 22 years of occupation of the border strip.
Nasrallah’s years at the helm saw the group expand from guerrilla faction into the most powerful political force in Lebanon, only to be battered in the latest conflict.
Lebanon has said more than 4,000 people have been killed since hostilities began in October 2023, most of them after Israel ramped up its campaign in September, later sending in ground troops.
Among the dead are hundreds of Hezbollah fighters and a slew of senior commanders.
Israel has missed two deadlines to complete its withdrawal under the ceasefire agreement, and still has troops deployed in five places on the Lebanese side of the border after its latest pullback earlier this week.

Israel military says it has received the bodies of dead Gaza hostages

Israel military says it has received the bodies of dead Gaza hostages
Updated 20 February 2025
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Israel military says it has received the bodies of dead Gaza hostages

Israel military says it has received the bodies of dead Gaza hostages
  • The remains to be released from the Gaza Strip are of Shiri Bibas and her two children, Ariel and Kfir
  • Thousands of people, including large numbers of masked and armed fighters from Hamas and other factions, gathered at the handover site on the outskirts of the southern Gaza city

KHAN YOUNIS/JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said it had received the bodies of the deceased hostages handed over by Hamas, through the Red Cross, in Gaza on Thursday.
“The hostages’ bodies were handed over to IDF (military) and ISA (security agency) representatives in Gaza,” a military spokesperson said. A statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said Israel had “received the caskets of four fallen hostages.”

The Red Cross had received four coffins during the handover earlier on Thursday of the bodies of Israeli hostages, including Bibas family members, in the southern Gaza city of Khan Yunis, an AFP journalist reported.
Staff loaded the caskets onto trucks after covering them in white shrouds as a crowd of hundreds watched in the rain.
The remains are of Shiri Bibas and her two children, Ariel and Kfir. Kfir was the youngest captive taken that day. Hamas has said all three were killed in an Israeli airstrike early in the war. The militant group also plans to release the body of Oded Lifshitz, who was 83 when he was abducted.
“The heart of an entire nation breaks,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday in anticipation of the bodies being returned to Israel.
Thousands of people, including large numbers of masked and armed fighters from Hamas and other factions, gathered at the handover site on the outskirts of the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, where large banners had been set up, including one showing an image of coffins draped in Israeli flags.
There were no plans to broadcast the handover live in Hostage Square in Tel Aviv, where Israelis have gathered to watch the release of living hostages. The square was empty as it rained on and off in both locations, which are about 100 kilometers (60 miles) apart.
Israelis have celebrated the return of 24 living hostages in recent weeks under a tenuous ceasefire that paused over 15 months of war. But the handover on Thursday will provide a grim reminder of those who died in captivity as the talks leading up to the truce dragged on for over a year.
It could also provide impetus for negotiations on the second stage of the ceasefire that have hardly begun. The first phase is set to end at the beginning of March.
Infant was the youngest taken hostage
Kfir Bibas was just 9 months old, a red-headed infant with a toothless smile, when militants stormed into the family’s home on Oct. 7, 2023. His brother Ariel was 4. Video shot that day showed a terrified Shiri swaddling the two boys as militants led them into Gaza.
Her husband, Yarden Bibas, was taken separately and released this month after 16 months in captivity.
Relatives in Israel have clung to hope, marking Kfir’s first and second birthdays and his brother’s fifth. The Bibas family said in a statement Wednesday that it would wait for “identification procedures” before acknowledging that their loved ones were dead.
Supporters throughout Israel have worn orange in solidarity with the family — a reference to two boys’ red hair — and a popular children’s song was written in their honor.
Like the Bibas family, Oded Lifshitz was abducted from Kibbutz Nir Oz, along with his wife Yocheved, who was freed during a weeklong ceasefire in November 2023. Oded was a journalist who campaigned for the recognition of Palestinian rights and peace between Arabs and Jews.
Hamas-led militants abducted 251 hostages, including some 30 children, in the Oct. 7 attack, in which they also killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians.
More than half the hostages, and most of the women and children, have been released in ceasefire agreements or other deals. Israeli forces have rescued eight and have recovered dozens of bodies of people killed in the initial attack or who died in captivity.
It’s not clear if the ceasefire will last
Hamas is set to free six living hostages on Saturday in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, and says it will release four more bodies next week, completing the ceasefire’s first phase. That will leave the militants with some 60 hostages, all men, around half of whom are believed to be dead.
Hamas has said it won’t release the remaining captives without a lasting ceasefire and a full Israeli withdrawal. Netanyahu, with the full backing of the Trump administration, says he is committed to destroying Hamas’ military and governing capacities and returning all the hostages, goals widely seen as mutually exclusive.
Trump’s proposal to remove some 2 million Palestinians from Gaza so the US can own and rebuild it, which has been embraced by Israel but universally rejected by Palestinians and Arab countries, has thrown the ceasefire into further doubt.
Hamas could be reluctant to free more hostages if it believes the war will resume with the goal of annihilating the group or forcibly transferring Gaza’s population.
Israel’s military offensive killed over 48,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its records. Israel says it has killed over 17,000 fighters, without providing evidence.
The offensive destroyed vast areas of Gaza, reducing entire neighborhoods to fields of rubble and bombed-out buildings. At its height, the war displaced 90 percent of Gaza’s population. Many have returned to their homes to find nothing left and no way of rebuilding.


Yemeni minister calls for arrest of Houthi officials attending Hezbollah chief Nasrallah’s funeral

Yemeni minister calls for arrest of Houthi officials attending Hezbollah chief Nasrallah’s funeral
Updated 20 February 2025
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Yemeni minister calls for arrest of Houthi officials attending Hezbollah chief Nasrallah’s funeral

Yemeni minister calls for arrest of Houthi officials attending Hezbollah chief Nasrallah’s funeral
  • The Houthis did not officially announce a delegation was attending the funeral, but the Houthi-run Al-Masirah TV reported a delegation from Yemen would participate

CAIRO: Yemeni Information Minister Moammar Al-Eryani called on Wednesday for the arrest of a group of leaders from Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis who he said will attend Lebanese Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah’s funeral in Beirut.
Nasrallah, who had served as Hezbollah’s secretary general for more than 30 years, was killed on September 27 as Israel ramped up its attacks on southern Lebanon. His funeral is scheduled for February 23.
Eryani demanded that the Lebanese government arrest the Houthi leaders and hand them over to the rival internationally recognized government in a post on X.
He did not name the Houthi officials.
Neither the Lebanese government nor Houthi leaders was immediately available for comment.
The Houthis did not officially announce a delegation was attending the funeral, but the Houthi-run Al-Masirah TV reported a delegation from Yemen would participate. “We affirm that the movement of these terrorist leaders... in this timing is not a mere participation in the funeral, which is being used as a cover, to gather all the leaders of the Iranian axis and assess the situation after the blows they received,” he added.
The Yemeni minister was referring to the recent Israeli attacks against Iran-backed groups in the region including Hezbollah and the Houthis.
Both groups launched parallel attacks against Israel during its war in Gaza to show support for Palestinians.
The Houthis, who control northern Yemen, also carried out more than 100 attacks on ships off the shores of Yemen since November 2023, disrupting global shipping and causing route changes and losses.
The Palestinian militant group Hamas’s attack on Israel in October 2023 killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel, according to Israeli tallies.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive on Gaza has killed more than 48,000 Palestinians, according to Palestinian health officials, laid waste to much of the enclave, and displaced hundreds of thousands.


Sudan crisis could worsen if paramilitaries declare parallel govt: UN

Sudan crisis could worsen if paramilitaries declare parallel govt: UN
Updated 20 February 2025
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Sudan crisis could worsen if paramilitaries declare parallel govt: UN

Sudan crisis could worsen if paramilitaries declare parallel govt: UN

UNITED NATIONS: The crisis in Sudan could worsen if paramilitary forces fighting the army go ahead with plans to declare a parallel government, the United Nations warned Wednesday.
“For us, preserving the unity of Sudan, the sovereignty and the territorial integrity, remains a key ingredient for a sustainable resolution of the conflict,” the UN secretary-general’s spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.
At a high-profile event in Nairobi this week, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, at war with the Sudanese army for nearly two years, said they would sign a founding charter that would lead to the formation of a “peace and unity government” in Sudan.
Initially scheduled for Tuesday at Nairobi’s state-owned Kenyatta International Convention Center, the signing was postponed to Friday.
“We’re very deeply concerned about any further escalation of the Sudanese conflict, and any steps like this one, which would increase the fragmentation of the country and risk making this crisis even worse,” Dujarric said of the planned proclamation.
Sudan’s foreign ministry, loyal to army chief Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, criticized Kenya for allowing the event.
Since April 2023, the war between the army and RSF has killed tens of thousands of people, uprooted more than 12 million and created the world’s largest hunger and displacement crises.


Israel says 3 Palestinian militants killed in West Bank

Israel says 3 Palestinian militants killed in West Bank
Updated 20 February 2025
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Israel says 3 Palestinian militants killed in West Bank

Israel says 3 Palestinian militants killed in West Bank
  • A Palestinian official confirmed that three people had been killed by Israeli forces

JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said it killed three “wanted terrorists” in the occupied West Bank Wednesday, and a Palestinian official reported that Israeli forces were holding the bodies of three people.
Soldiers “eliminated three wanted terrorists in the area of Al Faraa, who sold weapons for terror purposes,” the military said in a statement.
“Two additional wanted individuals were apprehended.”
A Palestinian official confirmed that three people had been killed by Israeli forces.
“Three people were assassinated, and their bodies are being held” by the Israeli forces, Tubas governor Ahmad Al-Asaad told AFP.
Violence in the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967, has escalated since the October 2023 outbreak of war in the Gaza Strip.
At least 897 Palestinians including militants have been killed by Israeli forces or settlers in the West Bank since the Gaza war began, according to an AFP tally based on figures provided by the Palestinian health ministry in Ramallah.
At least 32 Israelis, including some soldiers, have been killed in Palestinian attacks or confrontations during Israeli operations in the West Bank over the same period, according to official Israeli figures.