US plans $8 billion arms sale to Israel, US official says/node/2585192/middle-east
US plans $8 billion arms sale to Israel, US official says
Update
US Navy staff members walk next to aerial bombs at the hanger-bay aboard the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) aircraft carrier in Southern Red Sea, Middle East, February 13, 2024. (Reuters))
US plans $8 billion arms sale to Israel, US official says
Israel's slaughter in Gaza has led to calls for arms embargo, but US policy has largely remained unchanged
Package reportedly includes includes munitions for fighter jets and attack helicopters as well as artillery shells
Updated 04 January 2025
Reuters
WASHINGTON: The administration of President Joe Biden has notified Congress of a proposed $8 billion arms sale to Israel, a US official said on Friday, with Washington maintaining support for its ally whose war in Gaza has killed tens of thousands.
The deal would need approval from the House of Representatives and Senate committees and includes munitions for fighter jets and attack helicopters as well as artillery shells, Axios reported earlier. The package also includes small-diameter bombs and warheads, according to Axios.
The State Department did not respond to a request for comment.
Protesters have for months demanded an arms embargo against Israel, but US policy has largely remained unchanged. In August, the United States approved the sale of $20 billion in fighter jets and other military equipment to Israel.
The Biden administration says it is helping its ally defend against Iran-backed militant groups like Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen.
Facing international criticism, Washington has stood by Israel during its assault on Gaza that has displaced nearly all of Gaza’s 2.3 million population, caused a hunger crisis and led to genocide accusations that Israel denies.
The Gaza health ministry puts the death toll at over 45,000 people, with many additional feared buried under rubble.
Diplomatic efforts have so far failed to end the 15-month-old Israeli war in Gaza that was triggered after an Oct. 7, 2023 attack by Palestinian Hamas militants that killed 1,200 and in which about 250 were taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies.
Washington, Israel’s biggest ally and weapons supplier, has also previously vetoed UN Security Council resolutions on a ceasefire in Gaza.
Democrat Biden is due to leave office on Jan. 20, when Republican President-elect Donald Trump will succeed him. Both are strong backers of Israel.
Israeli finance minister Smotrich resigns from post as minister in government
Updated 56 min 22 sec ago
Reuters
JERUSALEM: Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich resigned from his post as minister on Monday in a letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
A spokesperson for Smotrich said the move was a protest against nationalist-religious Jewish Power party head Itamar Ben Gvir’s request for more ministerial positions upon Ben Gvir’s return to the government.
The resignation is not likely to collapse Netanyahu’s coalition. The government passed its 2025 budget in Israel’s parliament last week.
At least 10 people dead in Syria as gunmen target civilians in Tartus and Homs
Attackers, who remain unidentified and at large, opened fire in Haref Nemra, a village in the Baniyas countryside in Tartus
In early March, Islamist-led forces killed over 1,000 Alawites in coordinated assaults on coastal areas including Latakia and Baniyas
Updated 38 min 42 sec ago
AP
BEIRUT: A 12-year-old boy was among four people killed on Monday in Syria’s Tartus province, a coastal region home to a majority Alawite population, provincial officials said in a statement.
The attackers, who remain unidentified and at large, opened fire in Haref Nemra, a village in the Baniyas countryside in Tartus. The Tartus province’s general security forces are pursuing those involved “to bring them to justice,” said Amer Al-Madani, Baniyas’ head of security, who spoke in a video posted on the province’s official Facebook page.
Kamal, a resident of a nearby village and a relative of three victims who asked to be identified only by his first name out of fear of reprisals, said the masked gunmen, whom he believed to be government security forces, arrived at the village seeking the mukhtar, a local leader who represents the community in administrative matters, before opening fire, killing at least four people, including a 12-year-old and an 80-year-old from the same family.
Kamal said he was citing accounts from three other witnesses. The sequence of events has not been independently verified, and there is no official statement on the details of the attack.
Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) is the Islamist group whose leader, Ahmad Al-Sharaa, played a key role in the overthrow of former President Bashar Assad and is now Syria’s de facto president.
The attack forced dozens of families to flee from the Baniyas area, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based war monitor. Kamal also said many in Baniyas escaped to nearby mountains. “No one here feels safe,” he said. “All main roads are empty most times because people are scared to go outside.”
Separately on Monday, two unidentified gunmen killed six people in Homs, a city in western Syria known for its religious diversity, with a majority of Sunni Muslims and a significant Alawite minority, a sect of Shia Islam primarily based in Syria.
The attack took place in the Karm Al-Zeitoun neighborhood, claiming the lives of three children and their mother, who all belonged to the Alawite sect, as well as two house guests from the Sunni community. The attack also left the father seriously wounded. There has been no official comment on the incident from the government or relevant authorities.
Syria’s Alawite community in Syria has faced escalating violence, with reports of massacres and targeted attacks.
In early March, Islamist-led forces killed over 1,000 Alawites in coordinated assaults on coastal areas including Latakia and Baniyas, carrying out executions and burning homes, leading to mass displacements.
The attacks, among the deadliest in Syria’s modern history, saw militants rampage through Alawite-populated coastal provinces and nearby Hama and Homs, killing civilians— including entire families— in homes and on the streets. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported nearly 200 deaths in Baniyas alone.
Witnesses identified the attackers as hard-line Sunni Islamists, including Syria-based foreign fighters and former members of Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham, the disbanded insurgent group that led the December Assad ousting. However, many were also local Sunnis, seeking revenge for past atrocities blamed on Alawites loyal to Assad.
While some Sunnis hold the Alawite community responsible for Assad’s brutal crackdowns, Alawites themselves say they also suffered under his rule. The international community has urged Syria’s new government to protect minorities and prevent further violence.
US says new Syria government ‘positive step’ but too early for sanctions relief
Updated 31 March 2025
AFP
WASHINGTON: The United States on Monday called the formation of a new Syrian government a positive step, but said it would not ease sanctions until it has verified progress on priorities including acting against “terrorism.”
Syria’s interim President Ahmed Al-Sharaa on Saturday named a new government that is mostly Sunni Muslim, a sharp change following the overthrow of longtime ruler Bashar Assad, a member of the Alawite minority.
“We recognize the struggles of the Syrian people who have suffered decades under despotic rule and oppression of the Assad regime, and we hope this announcement represents a positive step for an inclusive and representative Syria,” State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce told reporters.
“However, Syria’s interim authorities should fully renounce and suppress terrorism, exclude foreign terrorist fighters from any official roles (and) prevent Iran and its proxies from exploiting Syrian territory,” Bruce said.
She also called on the interim authorities to “take meaningful steps to verifiably destroy Assad’s chemical weapons, assist in the recovery of US and other citizens who have been disappeared in Syria, and ensure the security and freedoms of Syria’s religious and ethnic minorities.”
On sanctions, “any adjustment to US policy toward Syria’s interim authorities will be contingent on all of those steps being taken,” she said.
The European Union has spoken of moving toward easing some Syria sanctions, while Britain and Canada have already lifted some measures.
Can Lebanon’s new central bank governor break the cycle of economic crisis?
Lebanon appointed Karim Souaid as its central bank governor after a two-year vacancy, which in itself was a breakthrough
The new Banque du Liban chief inherits a crumbling economy in a nation beset with political rivalries and blighted by conflict
Updated 31 March 2025
ANAN TELLO
LONDON: As Lebanon faces up to its broken finances, neglected infrastructure and postwar reconstruction, the appointment of Karim Souaid as the new central bank governor marks an important step toward economic recovery.
On March 27, after weeks of government wrangling, 17 of the cabinet’s 24 ministers voted to name asset manager Souaid as governor of Banque du Liban, the country’s National News Agency reported.
Souaid replaces interim governor Wassim Mansouri, who led the central bank after Riad Salameh’s controversial 30-year tenure ended in 2023 — almost a year before his arrest on embezzlement, money laundering and fraud charges tied to financial commissions.
The choice of candidate was critical for both domestic and international stakeholders, as the role is key to enacting the financial reforms required by donors, including the International Monetary Fund, in exchange for a bailout.
Souaid’s appointment comes with high expectations. His priorities include restarting talks with the IMF, negotiating sovereign debt restructuring and rebuilding foreign exchange reserves.
Nafez Zouk, a sovereign analyst at Aviva Investors, told Arab News that the new central bank chief “needs to be able to demonstrate some commitment to the IMF’s approach for restructuring the banking sector.”
Karim Souaid was appointed as the new central bank governor. (Supplied)
Souaid brings extensive experience in privatization, banking regulations and structuring large-scale economic transitions. He is also the founder and managing partner of the Bahrain-based private investment firm Growthgate Equity Partners.
However, his success as central bank chief will depend on international support, as Western nations and financial institutions have linked aid to sweeping economic reforms, including banking sector restructuring.
Last year, the EU pledged €1 billion ($1.08 billion) to help Lebanon curb refugee flows to Europe. Half was paid in August, while the rest is contingent on “some conditions,” EU Commissioner Dubravka Suica said during a February visit.
“The main precondition is the restructure of the banking sector ... and a good agreement with the International Monetary Fund,” she said after meeting Lebanese President Joseph Aoun.
However, critics have raised concerns about Souaid’s ties to Lebanon’s financial elite and members of the entrenched ruling class, fearing that his policies might favor the banking sector over broader economic reform, local media reported.
Prime Minister Nawaf Salam has also expressed reservations about Souaid’s appointment, saying the central bank chief “must adhere, from today, to the financial policy of our reformist government… on negotiating a new program with the IMF, restructuring the banks and presenting a comprehensive plan” to preserve depositors’ rights.
An excavator removes wreckage at site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted a house in the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Tibnit. (AFP)
Before Souaid’s appointment, Aoun and Salam were unable to reach a consensus on a candidate, according to local media reports. The president therefore insisted on putting the matter to a Cabinet vote.
Echoing the prime minister’s apprehensions is Nasser Saidi, a former Lebanese economy minister and central bank vice governor, who raised concerns about the selection process for the new central bank chief, warning that powerful interest groups may have too much influence.
He told the Financial Times that the decision carried serious consequences for Lebanon’s economic future, saying that one of Souaid’s biggest challenges will be convincing the world to trust the nation’s banking system enough to risk investing in its recovery.
“The stakes are too high: You cannot have the same people responsible for the biggest crisis Lebanon has ever been through also trying to restructure the banking sector,” said Saidi, who served as first vice governor of the Banque du Liban for two consecutive terms.
“How are we going to convince the rest of the world that it can trust Lebanon’s banking system, and provide the country with the funding it needs to rebuild (after the war)?”
The World Bank ranks the economic collapse among the worst globally since the mid-19th century. (AFP/File)
Last month, the IMF welcomed Lebanon’s request for support in tackling its protracted economic crisis. In February, after meeting with the newly appointed finance minister, Yassine Jaber, the international lender showed openness to a new loan agreement.
Lebanon’s economy has been in a state of turmoil since it suffered a financial crash in late 2019, compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic, the Beirut port blast of August 2020 and the 14-month Israel-Hezbollah conflict.
The national currency has lost more than 90 percent of its value and food prices have soared almost tenfold since May 2019. Citizens have struggled to access their savings since banks imposed strict withdrawal limits, effectively trapping deposits.
Lebanon’s prolonged crisis, triggered by widespread corruption and excessive spending by the ruling elite, has driven the country from upper-middle-income to lower-middle-income status, with gross domestic product per capita falling 36.5 percent from 2019 to 2021.
The World Bank ranks the economic collapse among the worst globally since the mid-19th century.
The Israel-Hezbollah war, which began Oct. 8, 2023, and concluded with a fragile ceasefire in November 2024, is estimated to have caused $3.4 billion in damage to Lebanese infrastructure, with economic losses of up to $5.1 billion.
Combined, these figures total 40 percent of Lebanon’s GDP.
The IMF has outlined key conditions for government action. These include addressing weak governance and implementing a fiscal strategy that combines debt restructuring with reforms to restore credibility, predictability and transparency in the fiscal framework.
It has also urged Lebanon to pursue a comprehensive financial sector restructuring, acknowledge losses at private banks and the central bank, and protect smaller depositors. Additionally, it calls for the establishment of a credible monetary and exchange rate system.
Lebanese economist Saidi said that the IMF “quite correctly and wisely” demanded comprehensive economic reforms.
INNUMBERS
• 36.5% Lebanon’s GDP per capita contraction from 2019 to 2021.
• $8.5bn Economic and infrastructure cost of Israel-Hezbollah conflict.
In a March 14 interview with BBC’s “World Business Report,” he said that the government must address fiscal and debt sustainability, restructure public debt, and overhaul the banking and financial sector.
But hurdles remain. Saidi added that while Lebanon “has a government today that I think is willing to undertake reforms, that does not mean that parliament will go along.”
Lebanon also needs political and judicial reform, including an “independent judiciary,” he added.
Nevertheless, Saidi told the BBC that Lebanon, for the first time, has “a team that inspires confidence” and has formed a cabinet that secured parliament’s backing.
Protesters during a rally outside the Palace of Justice in Beirut. (AFP/File)
Despite this positive step, Lebanon must still address structural failures in its public institutions, rooted in decades of opacity, fragmented authority and weak accountability.
Zouk of Aviva Investors believes another big challenge to reforming the financial sector will be “the large resistance from banks and their shareholders.
“Without some degree of accountability and transparency, I struggle to see how the rest of the reform agenda can be implemented,” he said.
There are “several proposals being circulated that would run counter to the IMF and would far from restore credibility and trust to the Lebanese financial sector.”
Saidi highlighted the broader challenges Lebanon faces, cautioning that without financing for reconstruction, achieving socioeconomic and political stability will remain elusive.
“If you don’t have financing for reconstruction, you’re not going to have socioeconomic stability, let alone political stability,” he said.
“There has to be a willingness by all parties to go along with the reforms,” he added, highlighting that this is where external support is crucial, particularly from Saudi Arabia, the UAE, France, Europe and the US.
Lebanon endured a 14-month Israel-Hezbollah conflict. (AFP/File)
Saidi said that support must go beyond helping bring the new government to power — it must include assistance, especially in terms of security.
In March, Reuters cited five sources saying the US was engaging with Lebanon’s new government on selecting the central bank governor to combat corruption and prevent the Iran-backed Hezbollah from exploiting the banking system for illicit financing.
A US official who met the candidates before Souaid’s appointment told the news agency that the US was making its guidance on candidates’ qualifications clear to the Lebanese government.
“The guidelines are: No Hezbollah and nobody who has been caught up in corruption. This is essential from an economic perspective,” the official said.
The move, according to Reuters, highlights the US administration’s continued focus on weakening Hezbollah. The group has seen its political and military clout diminished by Israel, which decimated its leadership, drained its finances and depleted its once formidable arsenal.
Firas Modad, a Middle East analyst and founder of Modad Geopolitics, told Arab News that he believes US approval was a prerequisite for selecting the next Banque du Liban governor.
“The next governor is irrelevant,” he said a few days before Souaid’s appointment. “He will need to be approved by the Americans, and the Lebanese system will not appoint someone that the Americans do not approve of.”
Washington is pushing Lebanon’s new government to disarm Hezbollah and address longstanding issues with Israel. (AFP/File)
Modad added that Lebanon faces a stark choice: “Normalization with Israel or civil war.” This decision will “determine whether there is a chance to rebuild the financial system and recover some money for the bondholders and smaller depositors.”
On March 22, the Israeli military mounted airstrikes on Lebanon amid renewed violence in Gaza and Yemen. A “second wave” targeted sites in southern and eastern Lebanon, according to the Israeli military.
Israel claimed that the attacks targeted “Hezbollah command centers, infrastructure sites, terrorists, rocket launchers and a weapons storage facility.” It marked the deadliest escalation since the ceasefire in late November.
Washington is pushing Lebanon’s new government to disarm Hezbollah and address longstanding issues with Israel, including border demarcation and the release of Lebanese captives through enhanced diplomatic talks.
Hezbollah, meanwhile, has rejected calls to disarm as long as Israel continues to occupy Lebanese territory.
Israeli troops killed 15 Palestinian medics and buried them in a mass grave, UN says
Dead included 8 Red Crescent workers, 6 members of Civil Defense emergency unit and UNRWA staffer
Updated 31 March 2025
AP
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip: Palestinians held funerals Monday for 15 medics and emergency responders killed by Israeli troops in southern Gaza, after their bodies and mangled ambulances were found buried in an impromptu mass grave, apparently plowed over by Israeli military bulldozers.
The Palestinian Red Crescent says the slain workers and their vehicles were clearly marked as medical and humanitarian personnel and accused Israeli troops of killing them “in cold blood.” The Israeli military says its troops opened fire on vehicles that approached them “suspiciously” without identification.
The dead included eight Red Crescent workers, six members of Gaza’s Civil Defense emergency unit and a staffer from UNRWA, the UN’s agency for Palestinians. The International Red Cross/Red Crescent said it was the deadliest attack on its personnel in eight years.
Since the war in Gaza began 18 months ago, Israel has killed more than 100 Civil Defense workers and more than 1,000 health workers, according to the UN
Here is what we know about what happened. Missing for days
The emergency teams had been missing since March 23, when they went at around noon to retrieve casualties after Israeli forces launched an offensive into the Tel Al-Sultan district of the southern city of Rafah.
The military had called for an evacuation of the area earlier that day, saying Hamas militants were operating there. Alerts by the Civil Defense at the time said displaced Palestinians sheltering in the area had been hit and a team that went to rescue them was “surrounded by Israeli troops.”
“The available information indicates that the first team was killed by Israeli forces on 23 March,” the UN said in a statement Sunday night.
Further emergency teams that went to rescue the first team were “struck one after another over several hours,” it said. All the teams went out during daylight hours, according to the Civil Defense.
The Israeli military said Sunday that on March 23, troops opened fire on vehicles that were “advancing suspiciously” toward them without emergency signals.
It said “an initial assessment” determined that the troops killed a Hamas operative named Mohammed Amin Shobaki and eight other militants. Israel has struck ambulances and other emergency vehicles in the past, accusing Hamas militants of using them for transportation.
However, none of the dead staffers from the Red Crescent and Civil Defense had that name, and no other bodies were reported found at the site, raising questions over the military’s suggestion that alleged militants were among the rescue workers.
The military did not immediately respond to requests for the names of the other alleged militants killed or for comment on how the emergency workers came to be buried.
After a ceasefire that lasted roughly two months, Israel relaunched its military campaign in Gaza on March 18. Since then, bombardment and new ground assaults that have killed more than 1,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. The ministry’s count does not distinguish between militants and civilians, but it says over half those killed are women and children.
Aid workers say ambulance teams and humanitarian staff have come under fire in the renewed assault. A worker with the charity World Central Kitchen was killed Friday by an Israeli strike that hit next to a kitchen distributing free meals. A March 19 Israeli tank strike on a UN compound killed a staffer, the UN said, though Israel denies being behind the blast. Mass grave
For days, Israeli forces would not allow access to the site where the emergency teams disappeared, the UN said.
On Wednesday, a UN convoy tried to reach the site but encountered Israeli troops opening fire on people.
The convoy saw a woman who had been shot lying in the road. The dashboard video shows staff talking about retrieving the woman. Then two people are seen walking across the road. Gunfire rings out and they flee. One stumbles, apparently wounded, before he is shot and falls onto his face to the ground. The UN said the team retrieved the body of the woman and left.
On Sunday, the UN said teams were able to reach the site after the Israeli military informed it where it had buried the bodies, in a barren area on the edges of Tel Al-Sultan. Footage released by the UN shows workers from PRCS and Civil Defense, wearing masks and bright orange vests, digging through hills of dirt that appeared to have been piled up by Israeli bulldozers.
The footage shows them digging out multiple bodies wearing orange emergency vests. Some of the bodies are found piled on top of each other. At one point, they pull out a body in a Civil Defense vest out of the dirt, and it is revealed to be a torso with no legs. Several ambulances and a UN vehicle, all heavily damaged or torn apart, are also buried in the dirt.
“Their bodies were gathered and buried in this mass grave,” said Jonathan Whittall, with the UN humanitarian office OCHA, speaking at the site in the video. “We’re digging them out in their uniforms, with their gloves on. They were here to save lives.”
“It’s absolute horror what has happened here,” he said. Funerals
A giant crowd gathered on Monday outside the morgue of Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis as the bodies of the eight slain PRCS workers were brought out for funerals. Their bodies were laid out on stretchers wrapped in white cloth with the Red Crescent logo on it and their photos, as family and others held funeral prayers over them. Funerals for the seven others followed.
“They were killed in cold blood by the Israeli occupation, despite the clear nature of their humanitarian mission,” Raed Al-Nimis, the Red Crescent spokesperson in Gaza, told the AP.
Israeli troops have killed at least 30 Red Crescent medics over the course of the war. Among them were two killed in February 2024 when they tried to rescue Hind Rajab, a 5-year-old girl who was killed along with six other relatives when they were trapped in their car under Israeli fire in northern Gaza.
From Geneva, the head of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Jagan Chapagain, said the staffer killed last week “wore emblems that should have protected them; their ambulances were clearly marked.”
“All humanitarians must be protected,” he said.
