UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire

UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire
This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows Israeli forces digging along the Alpha Line separating the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights from a demilitarized zone in Syria patrolled by United Nations forces on Nov. 5, 2024. (AP)
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UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire

UN force says Israeli work on so-called Alpha Line with Syria saw ‘severe violations’ of ceasefire
  • The Israel military also has begun demolishing villages in Lebanon, where other UN peacekeepers have come under fire
  • “Such severe violations of the (demilitarized zone) have the potential to increase tensions in the area and is being closely monitored by UNDOF,” it added

DUBAI: United Nations peacekeepers warned Tuesday that the Israeli military has committed “severe violations” of a ceasefire deal with Syria as its military continues a major construction project along the so-called Alpha Line that separates the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights from Syria.
The comments from the UN Disengagement Observer Force, which has patrolled the area since 1974, come after an Associated Press report Monday that published satellite imagery showing the extent of the works along the frontier.
The work, which UNDOF said began in July, follows the completion by the Israeli military of new roadways and what appears to be a buffer zone along the Gaza Strip’s frontier with Israel. The Israel military also has begun demolishing villages in Lebanon, where other UN peacekeepers have come under fire.
While such violence hasn’t broken out along the Alpha Line, UNDOF warned Tuesday the work risked further inflaming tensions in the region.
“Such severe violations of the (demilitarized zone) have the potential to increase tensions in the area and is being closely monitored by UNDOF,” it added.
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Syrian officials have declined to comment on the construction, though UNDOF described Syrian officials as having “strongly protested” the work.
As Israel conducted the construction work, which UNDOF described as “extensive engineering groundwork activities,” it has protected earth-moving equipment with armored vehicles and main battle tanks, the peacekeepers said. Troops and earth-moving equipment have crossed the Alpha Line into the demilitarized zone in Syria, known to UNDOF as the “area of separation.”
“Violations of the 1974 Disengagement Agreement have occurred where engineering works have encroached into the AOS,” the peacekeepers said in a statement, using an acronym for the area. “There have been several violations by (Israel) in the form of their presence in the AoS because of these activities.”
UNDOF has repeatedly protested the work, which it described as violating the ceasefire deal over the months of construction so far.
“Based on the engagement, (Israel) has indicated that the current earthworks are being carried out for defensive purpose to prevent unauthorized crossing and violations by civilians,” the peacekeepers added.
Israel sent a 71-page letter in June to the UN outlining what it described as “Syrian violations of the Alpha Line and armed presence in the area of separation (that) occur daily.” The letter cited numerous Israeli-alleged violations by Syrian civilians crossing the line.
Syria has constantly accused Israel of launching attacks against it from territory it occupies in the Golan Heights. Israel has frequently struck Syria over the years, particularly after the start of the Mideast wars following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, assault on Israel.
Israel seized control of the Golan Heights from Syria in the 1967 Mideast war. The UN Secretary Council voted to create UNDOF to patrol a roughly 400-square-kilometer (155-square-mile) demilitarized zone and maintain the peace there after the 1973 Mideast war. A second demarcation, known as the Bravo Line, marks the limit of where the Syrian military can operate.
UNDOF has around 1,100 troops, mostly from Fiji, India, Kazakhstan, Nepal and Uruguay, who patrol the area.
Israel annexed the Golan Heights in 1981 — a move criticized by a UN resolution declaring Israel’s action as “null and void and without international legal effect.” The territory, some 1,200 square kilometers (460 square miles) in size, is a strategic high ground that overlooks both Israel and Syria.
Around 50,000 Jewish settlers and Arabs who are mostly members of the Druze sect of Shiite Islam live there.
In 2019, President Donald Trump unilaterally announced that the United States would “fully recognize” Israel’s control of the territory, a decision that has been unchanged by the Biden administration. However, it’s the only other country to do so, as the rest of the world views it as occupied Syrian territory.


Erdogan still hopes to meet Assad to repair Turkiye-Syria ties, CNN Turk reports

Updated 55 sec ago
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Erdogan still hopes to meet Assad to repair Turkiye-Syria ties, CNN Turk reports

Erdogan still hopes to meet Assad to repair Turkiye-Syria ties, CNN Turk reports
“Restoring ties with Bashar Assad will soothe regional tensions, hopefully,” Erdogan was quoted as saying

ANKARA: Türkiye’s President Tayyip Erdogan said he still hopes to meet with Syrian President Bashar Assad to repair ties with the neighboring country, broadcaster CNN Turk reported on Wednesday.
“Restoring ties with Bashar Assad will soothe regional tensions, hopefully,” Erdogan was quoted as telling reporters on his flight back from Azerbaijan.


Türkiye’s President Tayyip Erdogan said he still hopes to meet with Syrian President Bashar Assad to repair ties with the neighboring country, broadcaster CNN Turk reported on Wednesday. (AFP/File)

Israeli forces kill 22 people in Gaza, force new displacement in the north

Israeli forces kill 22 people in Gaza, force new displacement in the north
Updated 4 min 28 sec ago
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Israeli forces kill 22 people in Gaza, force new displacement in the north

Israeli forces kill 22 people in Gaza, force new displacement in the north
  • Men were held for questioning, while women and children were allowed to continue toward Gaza City, residents and Palestinian medics said
  • “The scenes of the 1948 catastrophe are being repeated. Israel is repeating its massacres, displacement and destruction,” said Saed, 48, a resident of Beit Lahiya

CAIRO: Israeli military strikes killed at least 22 Palestinians across the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, as Israeli forces deepened their incursion into Beit Hanoun town in the north, forcing most remaining residents to leave.
Residents said Israeli forces besieged shelters housing displaced families and the remaining population, which some estimated at a few thousand, ordering them to head south through a checkpoint separating two towns and a refugee camp in the north from Gaza City.
Men were held for questioning, while women and children were allowed to continue toward Gaza City, residents and Palestinian medics said.
Israel’s campaign in the north of Gaza, and the evacuation of tens of thousands of Palestinians from the area, has fueled claims from Palestinians that it is clearing the area for use as a buffer zone and potentially for a return of Jewish settlers.
“The scenes of the 1948 catastrophe are being repeated. Israel is repeating its massacres, displacement and destruction,” said Saed, 48, a resident of Beit Lahiya, who arrived in Gaza City on Wednesday.
“North Gaza is being turned into a large buffer zone, Israel is carrying out ethnic cleansing under the sight and hearing of the impotent world,” he told Reuters via a chat app.
Saed was referring to the 1948 Middle East Arab-Israeli war which gave birth to the state of Israel and saw the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their home towns and villages in what is now Israel.

NO PLANS FOR SETTLERS’ RETURN
The Israeli military has denied any such intention, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he does not want to reverse the 2005 withdrawal of settlers from Gaza. Hard-liners in his government have talked openly about going back.
It said forces have killed hundreds of Hamas militants in Jabalia, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun during its new military offensive, which began more than a month ago. Hamas and the Islamic Jihad armed wing claimed killing several Israeli soldiers during ambushes and anti-tank rocket fire.
Efforts by Arab mediators, Qatar and Egypt, backed by the United States, have so far failed to end the war in Gaza, with Hamas and Israel trading the blame for the lack of progress.
Speaking on Wednesday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Israel “has accomplished the goals that it set for itself” by taking out Hamas’ leadership and ensuring the group is unable to launch another massive attack. “This should be a time to end the war,” he said.
“We also need to make sure we have a plan for what follows,” he said, “so that if Israel decides to end the war and we find a way to get the hostages out, we also have a clear plan so that Israel can get out of Gaza and we make sure that Hamas is not going back in.”
Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said Blinken’s comments showed: “We are facing one enemy and that the US enmity against the Palestinian people is no less than that of the occupation.”
On Tuesday, the United States stressed at the United Nations that “there must be no forcible displacement, nor policy of starvation in Gaza” by Israel, warning such policies would have grave implications under US and international law.
Medics said five people were killed in an Israeli strike that hit a group of people outside Kamal Adwan Hospital near Beit Lahiya, while five others were killed in two separate strikes in Nuseirat in central Gaza Strip where the army began a limited raid two days ago.
In Rafah, near the border with Egypt, one man was killed and several others were wounded in an Israeli airstrike, while three Palestinians were killed in two separate Israeli airstrikes in Shejaia suburb of Gaza City, medics added.
Later on Wednesday, an Israeli strike on a house in western Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip killed eight people, medics said.
Hamas-led gunmen attacked Israel last October, killing 1,200 people and taking more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
More than 43,500 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza over the past year, Palestinian health officials say, and Gaza has been reduced to a wasteland of wrecked buildings and piles of rubble, where more than 2 million Gazans are seeking shelter in makeshift tents and facing shortages of food and medicines.


Sudan extends opening of Adre crossing for aid delivery

Sudan extends opening of Adre crossing for aid delivery
Updated 13 November 2024
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Sudan extends opening of Adre crossing for aid delivery

Sudan extends opening of Adre crossing for aid delivery

DUBAI: Sudan’s sovereign council said on Wednesday it would extend the use of the Adre border crossing with Chad, seen as essential by aid agencies for the delivery of food and other supplies to areas at risk of famine in the Darfur and Kordofan regions.
Experts determined earlier this year that while more than 25 million people across the country face acute hunger, several parts of the country are at increased risk of famine, and that one camp in the Darfur region was already in its throes, the consequence of war between Sudan’s army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.
Adre, which was closed by an order from the army-controlled government in February, was re-opened for
three months
in August until November 15, and it had not been clear whether that period would be extended.
Members of the government have protested against the opening, saying it allows for the RSF to deliver weapons.
However, the Sudanese army is not in physical control of the border crossing which lies within territory seized last year by the RSF, which controls most of Darfur.
Aid agencies decided against ignoring directives from the internationally recognized government, and had been bracing themselves for closure of the corridor, seen as a more efficient route than cross-line deliveries from army-controlled Port Sudan or the more remote Al-Tina border crossing.
The re-opening of Adre in August coincided with the rainy season and the destruction of several roads and bridges, meaning that
aid trickled in
at the start.
More than 300 aid trucks with supplies for more than 1.3 million people have since crossed into Sudan through Adre, according to UN humanitarian coordination official Ramesh Rajasingham in a briefing to the Security Council on Tuesday.
The World Food Programme on Saturday moved a convoy of 15 trucks across Adre with food and nutrition for 12,500 people in famine-stricken Zamzam camp, said spokeswoman Leni Kinzli to reporters on Tuesday.


Blinken: Israel has met its goals in Gaza, time to end the war

Blinken: Israel has met its goals in Gaza, time to end the war
Updated 13 November 2024
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Blinken: Israel has met its goals in Gaza, time to end the war

Blinken: Israel has met its goals in Gaza, time to end the war
  • He called for “real and extended pauses” in fighting to allow essential humanitarian aid to reach those affected by the hostilities

DUBAI: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday that Israel has achieved its objectives in Gaza and that it is now time to pursue an end to the ongoing war.

Blinken said that ending the conflict would be the most effective means of addressing the urgent needs of Gaza’s civilian population.

He called for “real and extended pauses” in fighting to allow essential humanitarian aid to reach those affected by the hostilities and said that Israel holds an ongoing responsibility to facilitate this assistance, urging sustained efforts to address Gaza’s humanitarian crisis.

Blinken also called for increased international pressure on Hamas, seeking “genuine, sustained, and effective pressure” to cease hostilities. He said that achieving peace requires cooperation from all parties involved, with humanitarian access as a central priority.


Russia asks Israel to avoid air strikes near Syrian base

Russia asks Israel to avoid air strikes near Syrian base
Updated 13 November 2024
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Russia asks Israel to avoid air strikes near Syrian base

Russia asks Israel to avoid air strikes near Syrian base
  • Israel has carried out intensive bombing of Syria but rarely targets Latakia
  • Latakia, and in particular its airport, is close to the town of Hmeimim that hosts a Russian air base

MOSCOW: Russia has asked Israel to avoid launching aerial strikes as part of its war against Lebanon’s Hezbollah near one of Moscow’s bases in Syria, a top official said Wednesday.
Syrian state media in mid-October claimed that Israel had struck the port city of Latakia, a stronghold of President Bashar Assad, who is supported by Russia and in turn backs Hezbollah.
Latakia, and in particular its airport, is close to the town of Hmeimim that hosts a Russian air base.
“Israel actually carried out an air strike in the immediate vicinity of Hmeimim,” Alexander Lavrentiev, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s special envoy in the Near East, told the RIA Novosti press agency.
“Our military has of course notified Israeli authorities that such acts that put Russian military lives in danger over there are unacceptable,” he added.
“That is why we hope that this incident in October will not be repeated.”
Israel has carried out intensive bombing of Syria but rarely targets Latakia, to the northwest of Damascus.
Israel accuses Hezbollah of transporting weapons through Syria.
The two warring parties have been in open conflict since September after Israel’s year-long Gaza war with Hamas — a Hezbollah ally — escalated to a new front.
Lavrentiev said that Russia’s air base was not being used to supply Hezbollah with weapons.
Israel stepped up strikes on Syria at the same time as targeting Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Since civil war broke out in Syria in 2011, Israel has carried out hundreds of air strikes on Syrian government forces and groups supported by its arch-foe Iran, notably Hezbollah troops that have been deployed to assist Assad’s regime.
Israel rarely comments on its strikes but has said it will not allow Iran to extend its presence to Syria.